by Daniel Adams
“She ain’t takin’ me anywhere, ain’t that right, Boys,” Jubal smirked.
“That’s right,” one of them answered.
They moved closer, crowding her back.
“Back off!” she snarled.
Full of shine and false courage, the six men had no intention of backing off. This was going to be fun. At the least they would beat the shit out of her, at the worst, rape her and bury her in the swamp. One of them, Otto, was out to make a name for himself. He wanted a rep and now was a good time to get it. When he thought she wasn’t looking, he tried to snatch the shotgun. But she was watching. With a lightning fast move, she butt-stroked him with the shotgun. The blow caught him under the chin and lifted him off his feet and flat on the floor, out cold. Seeing Otto go down, the bartender figured Mattie was focused on him. Reaching under the bar, Don pulled out a pistol.
BOOM!
A full charge of buckshot from Mattie’s shotgun tore out a huge chunk of the bar next to Don’s stomach. With one hand, Mattie reloaded the shotgun. She fired again, blowing the mirror behind the bar into smithereens. Again she reloaded. What scared several of the men in front of her was that she had done everything with her left hand. Her right hand still hung at her side. They had never seen anything like it. If she could shoot that well with one hand, what was the other hand capable of? It gave them pause. Plus she wasn’t nervous in the slightest. Here she was facing a room full of big men, and she was acting like she was buying corn at the market. It gave them double pause.
“I said back off,” she yelled. The shotgun swung around to point at the lead man’s gut. It was one thing to confront her as a gang, but quite another to have the shotgun pointed at you. His false bravado fled like a dry fart in a high wind. He stepped back, shoving his pals out of his way. If they wanted to jump her, fine, but he was going to stay alive. She grabbed the pistol out of the bartender’s hand. It was the first time she had used her right hand. The men expected her to point it at them but she tucked it in her belt—another thing to give them pause. If she didn’t need two guns to face the crowd, just how good was she? They were about to find out.
“Jubal, I’m not going to tell you again,” she yelled. “Get your ass over here NOW!”
What happened next would be analyzed and talked about and thought about for many years to come and the people who were there to see it would become experts who would tell their story dozens of times to people who would shake their heads in amazement. The incident would become controversial with half of the town taking one side and the other half taking the other side. Had the bar’s security camera been working, it might have settled the controversy in short order but it wasn’t. The rednecks standing closest to Mattie had the best view which made their version of what happened a little more believable than those standing twenty feet away.
It went down like this. A man named Job (like the Bible) Smith who was standing about fifteen feet behind Mattie decided to make a move. He wasn’t a brave man, indeed he was something of a coward, but with Mattie’s back turned to him, he saw the chance to be a hero. Looking around, he spotted a stick that was used to prop open the door, leaning against the wall beside the door. The stick was four foot long and about two inches around. It was made of oak. With furtive movements, he picked up the stick. It felt good in his hands. No one around him noticed what he was doing because their eyes were focused on Mattie. With a quick step forward, he lifted the club for a crippling blow to the back of Mattie’s head only there was a BANG and the stick was jerked out of his hand, landing with a thud on the floor.
Everyone heard the bang—knew it was a gunshot—only Mattie was still facing the crowd with her hand still at her side. Everyone looked around, trying to see who had fired the shot then they looked at each other for inspiration which none of them had. It was a mystery. They had all seen Job raise the club and had been ready to rush over and stomp Mattie into a bloody pulp but the shot had put a stop to it. Job was so puzzled he didn’t know what to do. One second, he had been ready to brain Mattie with the stick the next the club was gone. He looked down at the club. Maybe he has just dropped it, he thought. Reaching down, he picked up the club. As he brought it up he noticed something. There were two very large holes in the club just above where he had been gripping it. He couldn’t make any sense of it. If Mattie had shot, he would have seen her draw her gun. No way around it. But she hadn’t drawn her gun. The rednecks around him saw the holes and were as puzzled as him. Maybe he should try again, he thought.
“She’s tryin’ to bust up the Klan. That’s why she’s here!” Jubal shouted.
Rednecks from the dance floor and bar pushed toward Mattie. Several of them broke beer bottles on the bar, the ends of the bottles jagged and deadly. Leading them was Jeeter, a skinny redneck with a sunken chin and straggly red beard.
“Let’s rush her, she can’t get all of us,” he shouted.
BOOM!
He screamed and looked down at what was left of the bottle in his hand. Blood dripped from his fingers where broken bits of bottle had ripped through his flesh. Luckily for him, Mattie had fired at the bottle and not at his hand. A shotgun blast at such short range would have taken off his hand. As it was, he wasn’t that badly injured although no one could tell that with all of the blood, pouring onto the floor. The attack on Mattie instantly lost steam. With her left hand she reloaded the shotgun. It was very disconcerting for the men in front of her. They all thought of themselves as gunman which was interesting in light of the fact they never practiced. For most of them, the only practice they got was shooting at game during hunting season. Unfortunately, shooting maybe a dozen shots during hunting season was no match for a woman who had shot tens of thousands of rounds since she began shooting. It wasn’t even close.
“Try me!” she yelled. “Go ahead!”
“Where’s your arrest warrant?” the bartender shouted. “You can’t arrest Jubal without one.”
The rednecks around him grumbled and called to their friends.
“He’s right,” one of Jubal’s friends bellowed.
“I don’t need one,” she responded.
It was at this point everything could have changed because Job had decided to try it again only this time he was going to make sure his grip on the club was sure. With his hands locked on the club, he swung it back then swung it in an arc toward Mattie’s head.
BANG!
Job looked down at the end of the stick clutched in his hands. Two more bullets had torn through the wood, cutting it cleanly in half. The rest of the stick clattered to the floor. Mattie’s arm was still at her side. There was no way she had fired the shot. Most everyone had been watching her and they would have seen her draw and shoot. It had to be someone else, someone hanging back where they couldn’t be seen. It was very upsetting to Job and his pals.
What they didn’t know was that when a shooter could draw as fast as Mattie, it couldn’t be seen by human eye. They only was to see it was to videotape it and then slow down the draw so it could be seen. It was that fast. Less than the blink of an eye. She had seen Job coming at her with the stick in the reflection off a lamp near her head. She had practiced shooting backwards enough to do it in her sleep. She hadn’t raised the pistol any higher than the rim of the holster. That was another reason they hadn’t seen her fire.
“What are you arrestin’ him for?” the bartender snapped.
“Murder.”
“She’s lyin’. I didn’t kill nobody. All of you know me.”
“Who’d he kill?” the bartender asked.
“Paxton Flatt—his son.”
It caught all of them by surprise. There was no doubt in most of their minds that Jubal was capable of murder. There were rumors that he had killed several people. What was hard to believe was that he would kill his own son. That was unfathomable. The room became deathly still.
“That’s a fuckin’ lie,” Jubal yelled. “Noonan killed my boy.”
“You all know that Jubal owed R
afe a lot of money. Well, your pal Jubal couldn't borrow the money to pay Rafe back so he had to come up with it some other way cause Rafe was leaning on him real hard. Jubal found out that Paxton was covered by a million dollar life insurance policy, so Jubal seduced Grace and got her to loan him part of the insurance money she collected. If you don't believe me, you can ask Mia at the bank. She gave Grace three hundred thousand dollars in cash.”
Something about what she said hit home with some of the rednecks. They knew Jubal was a conniving con man who hadn’t hesitated to cheat others in the community. That he would kill his own son for a million dollars was certainly believable.
“You lyin’ nigger. It ain’t true. I loved my boy.”
Some of the rednecks turned to look at Jubal. He felt their eyes on him. The tide was turning. Mattie was believable. He was not.
“The night Paxton was killed, whoever killed him had to walk to the barn, and you know what, Paxton's dogs didn't bark--that's what Grace told me. The dogs didn't bark cause it was somebody they knew,” Mattie explained to an increasingly supportive crowd.
“Don’t listen to her,” Jubal shouted. “You all know how much I loved my boy.”
“After Paxton shot Noonan, Jubal saw the perfect chance to frame him for the murder. Before Jubal went to Paxton's place to kill him, he snuck into Doc Flint's place and stole Noonan's slippers from under his bed. When he was at Paxton's place, he wore the slippers so that they had Paxton's blood on them. After he killed Paxton, Jubal took the slippers back to Doc Flint's and put them back under Noonan's bed. His car was seen on the street behind Doc Flint’s house the night Paxton was killed. What were you doing there, Jubal?”
“That’s hogshit,” Jubal shouted. “She’s makin’ this up.” People began to move away from Jubal. Even his pals at the table scooted their chairs away from him.
With her right hand, Mattie pulled Noonan’s slipper out of her jacket pocket. She held them up still wrapped in the evidence bag.
“When Jubal didn't pay Rafe back on time, Rafe had Junior Barnes and Leroy pay him a visit. To show Jubal he meant business, Rafe had Junior Barnes shoot off Jubal's right big toe.”
Mattie noticed that the crowd was no longer pressing toward her. Instead, they were focused on Jubal.
“Who you gonna listen to, that nigger or me?”
Had Jubal been a pillar of the community and a stand up guy, it might have gone his way. However, with his track record of schemes, thievery and cons public not many among the patrons were willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.
“Jubal bandaged his toe, but he was bleeding like a stuck pig.” She tossed the slipper to the bartender. “Turn it inside out,” she ordered. After taking the slipper out of the bag, he turned the slipper inside out. Blood was clearly visible on the fabric where a person’s big toe would go.
“The blood on the inside is Jubal's--from his big toe.” The FBI lab matched it with Jubal's blood.” The last part, about it matching Jubal’s blood was a lie. She hadn’t had time to get it to the lab.
For a big man Jubal was remarkably fast. Mattie had hardly finished her sentence before he bolted for the door. Mattie didn’t waste a second. She ran after him. By the time she got to the back door, he had jumped in his truck. Spewing gravel, the truck swerved out onto the driveway narrowly missing another truck. Mattie ran to her car. A few seconds later she roared out of the parking lot in pursuit of Jubal’s truck. It was going to be a pursuit to remember.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
By the time Mattie pulled onto the highway, Jubal’s truck was going over 80 miles per hour away from town. She had no idea where he was going. Maybe he was just reacting and not thinking, she guessed. People do strange things when they’re caught in bad situations. Even as she watched, at least a mile ahead of her, his taillights vanished in the darkness. He had either gone around a curve or wrecked. Either way, she would know soon enough. She peeled out of the parking lot with her foot flat on the accelerator. Engine at full throttle, her car rocketed along the road, her headlights boring twin tunnels of light in the inky blackness.
Glancing down, she saw the speedometer needle swing past the one hundred mile per hour mark and continue climbing. She knew she was risking everything to catch Jubal. At this speed, if she hit a car or animal she would be dead. All it would take was for her to turn the steering wheel a little too quickly and the car would flip and roll—six times at a minimum, she estimated. More than likely the car would end up in the woods, mangled and crushed into a coffee table-sized hunk of battered steel—with a soft, creamy center—her. She kept her eyes glued to the road in front of her ready to slam on the brakes or take evasive action.
Ahead of her, the road angled down to a narrow two-lane bridge then curved toward the river. It was here that Jubal’s taillights had disappeared. After about a half-mile the road straightened and paralleled the river again. As she came around the second curve she saw Jubal’s truck only a half of a mile ahead of her. She had closed the gap between them to half a mile in less than four minutes. She saw Jubal’s truck suddenly accelerate. Evidently, he had thought Mattie wasn’t following him and had slowed down. Bad mistake. By the time he got his truck up to speed she was only one hundred yards behind him. She never slowed until she was right on his bumper. A quick glance at the speedometer gave her a start. They were going over 125 miles per hour.
They raced along the two-lane road for a mile with her car only a few feet behind the truck. Jubal swerved back and forth across the road, trying to keep her from passing him. He knew that if she got ahead of him, she would slow him to a stop. Both vehicles rocked and swayed as a crosswind buffeted them back and forth across the road. Bumps that at 60 miles per hour wouldn’t have been anything but a mild annoyance launched the cars a foot in the air at 125 miles per hour. One thing in her favor was that the truck couldn’t take a curve as fast as her sedan which meant if she positioned her car right she might be able to cut low on a curve and pass him. It would be risky on a calm day but with the crosswind it would be downright dangerous. Looking ahead, she saw a curve coming up. As they headed into it, she feinted to the left then swerved low, accelerating around the curve with her tires squealing in protest from the G-Forces trying to tear the tires off the rims.
She would have passed him but for two things; a deer standing directly in the path of her car and Jubal cutting in front of her so she had no choice but to slow down and tuck in behind the truck. For a brief instant she considered hitting the deer but it was a big one and she quickly changed her mind. If she hit him at 125 miles per hour he would probably join her in the car along with the windshield and hood. Happy with forcing her to abort her charge to the front, Jubal suddenly slammed on the brakes. His move caught her off guard and her sedan nearly slammed into the back of his truck. What saved her were her blink of an eye reflexes. She never consciously told her feet to hit the brakes. It just happened. Tires smoking, the sedan slowed instantly to 60 miles per hour with a tight four inches between the two vehicles. Seeing she had slowed in time, Jubal accelerated away with smoke pouring out of his tail pipes. If she were lucky, he would throw a piston or burn a bearing. The chase was putting a big strain on his engine.
Jubal was so busy watching her he forgot to look in front of him which was nearly his undoing. He swerved back and forth across the road, blocking her from passing him. After a hard lurch to the left, he looked ahead in time to see a lumber truck bearing down on him—air horn blaring like a broken fire horn. With a microsecond to react, he swung the truck to the left, missing the semi but zooming off the road at well over 100 miles per hour. Lucky for him the road was relatively flat. The truck tore through small trees and brush, kicking up dust and debris like a rampaging lawn mower. It hit a bunch of small moguls that bounced it up and down in spine-jarring acrobatics that nearly tore the undercarriage off of the truck. Streaming dirt and tree limbs behind it, the truck slued sharply to the right, slid across the road and repeated the same process on
the right side of the road.
One thing about Jubal, he learned from his mistakes. When he jerked the truck back on the road the second time, he only turned the steering wheel a little bit. It paid off. The truck swung back onto the road, wavered a few moments then roared away. Mattie had hopped he would crash because it would end the chase. Even if it was just the two of them on the road, the chance of a fatal crash was probably better than fifty-fifty. Next time Jubal might not be so lucky and end up a hood ornament on a 40-ton semi truck.
Unfortunately for Jubal his excursion through the ditch had taken a heavy toll on his truck. Although the engine and transmission had survived relatively intact, the same could not be said for his shocks and springs. She noticed that the back right corner of his truck sagged a good six inches lower than the left. Also, the right front fender was crunched back far enough for it to rub on the tire. Whenever Jubal hit a bump, the fender hit the tire sending a small cloud of smoke into the air. No way could the tire take that kind of punishment. It was only a matter of time until the tire blew.
The truck sped up, careening along the road like a runaway train. Sporadically, pieces of the truck would fall off and skim along the road in a shower of sparks. Mattie dodged the debris, knowing full well that if she hit one of them, it might be enough to wreck her. She backed off a little—a decision that probably saved her life. As Jubal topped a low hill, he found himself facing oncoming cars in both lanes. One car was passing another and there was no time to move over. Jubal had no choice. He angled off the road for another run along the shoulder of the road. A short ways behind him, Mattie had to make the same decision. A head on crash at a combined 160 miles per hour or a romp through the brush and debris along the shoulder. She chose the shoulder.