The Devil in Pew Number Seven

by Rebecca Nichols Alonzo; Rebecca Nichols Alonzo

  “Harris, come on out and let me talk to you.”

  I’m sure Harris’s mind was scrambling to sort out his options. Should he try to escape before the house was crawling with police? If so, how? And where would he go? When Harris shot my parents, he had crossed a line. At some point in time, he’d eventually face justice. If he didn’t attempt to escape, how long could he remain barricaded in my bedroom? When he finally spoke, he made a not-so-veiled threat of more tragedy.

  “Back off! There’s two more lives at stake in here.”

  Lieutenant Hayes tried to defuse the situation. “Just come on out, Harris, and let’s talk about it.”

  Pressure. Too much pressure. The reality of what Harris had done was sinking in as he talked things out with Sue. There was no way to take back the bullets and undo the nightmare. Looking at his wife and infant son, surrounded by my dolls and toys, Harris stalled for more room to think.

  “No. Don’t rush me,” Harris said. “Give me a little more time.”

  Lieutenant Hayes advanced down the hall, taking up a safe position in the doorway leading to the living room. He remained out of range in the event Harris opened fire down the hallway. He called out again.

  “Harris?”

  “Yes?”

  “Is everybody with you okay?”

  “Yes . . . but . . .”

  “But what?”

  “Check on Mrs. Nichols—the preacher’s wife.”

  “Where is she, Harris?”

  “She is in the bedroom across from this bedroom.” Harris must have seen Momma on the floor in her room after he walked down the hallway to lock himself and the hostages in my bedroom.

  “Listen, Harris. Just come on out, okay?”

  “No, I’m not coming out just yet.” A pause. “Please go and check on her and see if she needs some help.”

  Whether it was out of real concern for my mother or a ploy to get the lawman in his sights, Lieutenant Hayes didn’t know. He wasn’t about to take chances, at least not yet.

  “Harris, come on out. Throw your gun out and come on out. I’m not going back there.”

  “I won’t hurt you if you don’t try to come in this room,” Harris said.

  A long moment passed between them. Lieutenant Hayes turned and saw more backup entering our home. Lieutenant Dudley and Officers Sanford Hardee and Wayne Piver arrived to provide backup within the house. Outside, several dozen law enforcement personnel took up positions around the parsonage to secure all exit points.

  When Lieutenant Hayes didn’t immediately respond to him, Harris said, “Don’t come to this room. Go to the other room.”

  Now that the lieutenant had protective covering by fellow officers, he ventured into the hall and advanced to my parents’ bedroom. When Lieutenant Hayes turned on the light, he found Momma lying facedown, her head and shoulders still wedged under the bed in the same position as when I had last seen her; the telephone handset remained underneath her chest. He observed a splotch of blood on the back of her dress, and since Momma was unresponsive, he checked her vital signs.

  He had arrived too late.

  * * *

  The police turned up the heat.

  With no chance of helping Momma, my brother safely ushered away, and Daddy in transit to the hospital, one of the officers cranked the thermostat governing the furnace as high as it would go. If Harris wouldn’t come out on his own, they hoped to sweat him out. For the better part of three hours, Harris remained fortified in my bedroom with the curtains drawn. Throughout the standoff, Harris told the police he would come out but then failed to comply with their requests to surrender.

  Ten times . . . twenty times . . . almost thirty times Harris repeated his intention of coming out peacefully. Several hours into the ordeal, at eight o’clock, his lawyer arrived and attempted to convince Harris to give himself up. As nine o’clock approached, Lieutenant Hayes tried again.

  “Harris?”

  “What?”

  “Come on out, Harris. It’s over.”

  “Don’t come near this room! I told you I’ll come out when I’m ready.”

  “We have no intention of making a move on you.”

  “I mean it. Don’t make me do any more than I’ve already done!”

  There was that threat of more harm again. Lieutenant Hayes tried to calm him down.

  “We’re not here to hurt you, Harris.”

  “Then why are there so many police?” Evidently, Harris pulled back the drapes long enough to observe the swarm of police activity in the front and side yards from my bedroom windows.

  “All we want to do is to prevent any further trouble, Harris. We have no intention of leaving, and like I said, I promise we have no intention of making a move on you.”

  Silence.

  “Harris, we are prepared to stay as long as it takes. We’ve sealed off all roads within a one-mile radius.”

  Drenched in sweat, parched from the sweltering heat, in need of fresh air, Harris decided he had had enough.

  “Okay . . . I’m coming out.”

  “Listen carefully, Harris. I want you to crack open the door and push out your guns.”

  A minute passed. And then another.

  Four minutes later, the door creaked open. One by one, Harris slid his guns down the hall. It was over. Lieutenant Hayes, flanked by three other officers, placed Harris under arrest, handcuffed him, searched and emptied his pockets, and then took Harris into custody. Although Sue was sobbing, she and her baby were safe.

  For that, I’m eternally grateful.

  * * *

  Momma was gone.

  I first heard the news from the TV. And while Aunt Pat confirmed it, I didn’t believe what I was hearing. The edges of my ears burned as if touched by hot coals. Wanting to know for myself that they weren’t mistaken, frustrated that nobody was giving me any details, I snuck out the back door of Aunt Pat’s home with Missy at my side. Once outside, barefooted, heart hammering within my chest, we broke into a hard run through the cornfield separating our homes to avoid being caught.

  I just had to see Momma.

  It would have been difficult to make our way had it not been for the swirling lights on the rescue vehicles. Beacons of red and blue lit our path. We jumped the ditch by the road, crossed the street, and continued our run behind my house. In the near darkness, we slowed to a fast walk and then rounded the corner to the side yard leading to our carport. My lungs blazed within, matched by the burning in my legs that felt as if they were about to buckle beneath me.

  We walked the last few yards and stopped at the edge of the carport a few feet from the ambulance. The screen door to the kitchen was open. We arrived at the precise moment three rescue-squad members were backing out, slow and steady, carrying a body on a stretcher covered in a white sheet. As they navigated the steps, the reality hit me with the force of a tornado. The report was true. One woman had been shot and killed.

  Yes, Momma was really gone.

  There was nothing I could do to help her now.

  * * *

  The street cleared.

  With the shooter safely behind bars and the crime scene secured, the sea of reporters and police personnel flooding into the community hours before now receded into the night almost as quickly as it had arrived. A disquieting stillness settled on Sellerstown Road. I felt lost, helpless, and disoriented.

  As a seven-year-old child, I wasn’t fully sure what death meant. Momma was no longer in my life, but where had she gone? Aunt Pat hugged me and assured me that Momma was in heaven, but I wasn’t sure why God needed her more than we did. My uncertainty was complicated by the fact that I had no idea when I’d be able to see my daddy again and wondered whether he, too, would be leaving for heaven soon.

  That dreadful, traumatic night, Aunt Pat tucked me into a bed at her house. While I was thankful for her love and care, the fact that my mother wasn’t by my bedside only served to drive home the point that she was gone. As I fell asleep, I hoped the events of th
e day were just a bad dream. I wanted to believe that when I awoke the next morning, we’d be together again as one big, happy family.

  When the sun filled the sky, my hopes for a brighter day faded. Momma was gone. Sitting at Aunt Pat’s breakfast table with Danny, I felt paralyzed. I wanted to be brave, to smile, to act as if everything were normal. The best I could do was to go through the motions of eating. Anxiety stabbed at my heart until there was nothing left to feel.

  Momma was gone.

  * * *

  The phone rang.64

  Hands covered in flour, Aunt Dot placed the rolling pin to the side and then bustled across the kitchen to answer the phone. Another ring. Although not a clean freak like Momma, she wiped her hands on her apron, careful to avoid dirtying the receiver. She had been busy baking Easter pies with Grandma Nichols, Daddy’s mom, when the call came.

  “Happy Easter!” she said, although Easter was still a few days away. Aunt Dot cradled the phone against her shoulder as she worked. Her kitchen was filled with the delightful aroma of baked goodies.

  “Is this Dot?”

  “Yes—” The way the caller had said her name, she sensed something was amiss.

  “It’s James Tyree.”

  While not normally a man of few words, this time James, the head elder of the church, got directly to the point. There was no way to sugarcoat the reality of what had transpired.

  “There’s been a shooting . . . at the parsonage.”

  A jolt of lightning rattled my aunt’s heart. Her mind filled with questions. Shooting? Who was shot? Robert? Ramona? One of the kids? When? Why? Was it a hunting accident, or was Mr. Watts somehow involved? She knew things had quieted down in Sellerstown. While her brother still struggled with emotional distress, by all appearances the threat of physical harm had ended a year ago.

  Now this.

  As if reading her mind, James said, “I’m sorry; Ramona didn’t make it.”

  Words failed her. A cold numbness chilled her to the bone. Ramona? Dead? Impossible. The room seemed to spin. She reached for the kitchen counter to steady herself.

  “Brother Nichols was shot, too.”

  She heard the words, but they almost didn’t register. Robert? Like being punched in the gut, she felt the wind knocked out of her. James added, “He doesn’t know yet that Ramona is dead. You and Martha gotta get up here.”

  Grandma Nichols studied Aunt Dot’s face during the phone call. As she watched Aunt Dot’s cheerful expression suddenly turn dark as if a black cloud had moved through the room, Grandma kept asking, “What is it? What’s happened?” Aunt Dot was too unnerved to speak. She handed the phone to her mother. Grandma Nichols listened, speechless, as James repeated the horrifying news.

  Her son had been shot. Twice.

  He was in intensive care.

  It was too early to know if he’d make it.

  Her daughter-in-law was dead.

  The report was too much to bear. Grandma Nichols was overwhelmed with grief. When she saw her mother was too hysterical and emotionally drained to move, Aunt Dot peeled the phone from her hands and finished the conversation with James.

  * * *

  Aunt Dot and Aunt Martha, Daddy’s sisters, took the first available flight. James Tyree picked them up at the airport and, as they raced to the hospital, filled them in on the details—at least the parts that were known so far. Upon arrival, they found the front entrance to the facility a literal sea of humanity. Well-wishers from the surrounding area converged upon the parking lot, hoping to get inside for an opportunity to see Daddy. The press did too. Dodging cameras and microphones and reporters looking for a scoop inside the lobby, they made their way to the chaplain, who, in turn, briefed them on Daddy’s condition.

  Surgery was needed.

  His condition was critical.

  He had lost a lot of blood.

  His doctors didn’t believe Daddy was strong enough to hear the news that his wife was dead. Aunt Dot and Aunt Martha would be permitted to enter his room on the condition that they didn’t upset him with the horrible news.

  They were ushered into the intensive-care unit, where they found Daddy resting. His large frame filled the bed. Seeing him lying still, his face as pale as the hospital sheets, was almost too much for them to handle. As kids, he had always been there to protect them; now they had to be there for him.

  Aunt Dot approached her brother, fighting back a surge of emotions. Sensing someone was present, Daddy opened his eyelids to half-mast, as if still he lacked the strength to open them fully. Rolling his head to one side, it took a moment for him to recognize his sisters.

  “I’m sorry you have to keep coming here for me.”

  Aunt Dot moved close to his bedside. Slipping her hand into his, she applied a soft, tender squeeze. As brother and sister, they were cut out of the same parental cloth. She’d do anything for her sibling. “It’s no trouble. We want to be here, Buddy. Mom and Daddy are coming up too.”

  A faint smile appeared, then faded as quickly as it had surfaced, pulled down from the surface of his face by an unseen undertow of pain. “How are the kids?”

  “They’re fine, Buddy,” she said, offering another reassuring squeeze of her brother’s hand.

  “Where are they? You sure they’re all right?”

  “They’re with Pat. Everything is okay.”

  That was a bit of a stretch. How could everything be okay ever again? Aunt Dot knew we had just witnessed the murder of our mother. She knew we were shaken to the core of our beings, stung with disbelief. And yet she knew she had to appear strong.

  “What about Ramona?” His forehead wrinkled into a knot, as if bracing for bad news. He searched her face, clinging to the frayed strands of hope. When she didn’t answer immediately, he asked more directly, “How is she?”

  That was a tough one. It was the question Aunt Dot didn’t want to answer. At least not now, not when he was about to undergo surgery. Fighting back a sudden surge of emotion that threatened to betray the truth, Aunt Dot said, “Buddy, we came straight to your room.” While technically accurate, she had sidestepped the grave reality.

  “After we leave here,” she added, “we’re going to check on Ramona, okay?”

  Like a dark cloud, a worried look crossed his face. The muted chorus of equipment monitoring his condition, humming and occasionally beeping in the corner, was the only sound breaking the near silence between them.

  “Buddy, just relax,” she said. “I’ll check on Ramona.”

  “You come right back and let me know—” he said, gripping her hand with a sudden surge of strength. She managed to smile, although she really wanted to cry. Aunt Dot chose her words carefully.

  “We’re putting you . . . and her . . . in God’s hands.”65

  * * *

  On Saturday, two days after the shooting, Daddy was wheeled into surgery. Hours later his surgeon informed us that the operation had been a success. Daddy would need three weeks in the hospital to recover. After that, he would be on crutches for several months. In spite of the positive prognosis, the metal pin used to repair his hip would cause Daddy to limp when he walked—a permanent reminder of this traumatic chapter of his life.

  After Daddy pulled through the surgery, his doctors, the chaplain, and family members gathered around Daddy to inform him that his bride didn’t make it . . . his best friend and soul mate had gone to be with the Lord. Now Daddy would have to continue his journey in this life without the woman he cherished.

  A blank stare settled on his face as the reality sank in. His hollow eyes betrayed the fact that his mind was racing back to happier times—like the evening they met in Bogalusa . . . their first date in the coffee shop . . . the day they stood proudly at the altar to exchange vows just weeks after meeting . . . the children they begged God for when they couldn’t conceive . . . the souls they ministered to across the country. He had lost the companion who had stood by him through the blackest nights. She had been his faithful partner in ministr
y—he in the pulpit and she at the organ supplying the sound track of praise for the service.

  They were such a great team.

  While a twenty-inch scar marked the location of the incision, there was no outward sign of the scar left on his broken heart upon hearing the news that the love of his life was gone. Stricken with a grief so profound, so overwhelming, Daddy wept bitter tears. While the wounds to his body would heal in time, he knew nothing would erase the memory of that fateful day. Daddy later said that during his season of intense mourning, the Scripture came to him, “Sorrow not, even as others which have no hope” (1 Thessalonians 4:13).

  My mother’s brother-in-law, Walt, was there when Daddy was told about his wife’s death. While there’s never a comfortable time to raise the subject, Walt carefully asked Daddy what he wanted to do with Momma’s body. Daddy said, “After the funeral in Sellerstown, take her home to Bogalusa.” His precious Mona would be laid to rest where they first met.

  I can only imagine what Daddy felt in that moment. As much as he had wanted to protect his wife and children, he had been powerless to do so. As I would later witness, guilt over his inability to keep Momma out of harm’s way tormented Daddy for years to come.

  When I was finally permitted to see him later that day, Daddy’s face brightened as I entered the room. I pulled myself onto the hospital bed beside him, careful to avoid jarring his injury. While I was still dealing with my own loss, I wanted to be strong for him. I put on my best smile and said, “Mommy’s in heaven now.”

  With his big hands, Daddy pulled me to himself, tight. He buried his head against my neck and cried softly. He lingered in that embrace for what felt like an eternity, almost as if he were afraid to let go for fear of losing me, too. Through his tears Daddy whispered, “I know, Becky. I know.”

  I was at a loss for words. While Momma had been the sun in our universe, she wasn’t coming back. Nothing I could do or say would fix things for Daddy—and for Danny and me. Life would never be the same without Momma illuminating our home with her sparkling spirit. And yet we knew that, if life were to go on, it had to be without her. One day we’d see her again in heaven. But the waiting is always the hardest part. In a way, Daddy’s embrace expressed these things without words. He’d miss her every day. So would I.