The Laconic Lumberjack (A Nick Williams Mystery Book 4)

by Frank W. Butterfield

  We sat in the back in a booth. The waitress came by and took our orders for pork chops, fried potatoes, and coffee. As she was pouring my cup of coffee, a tall, thin Negro man came up behind her and asked Red, "This him?"

  Red nodded and slid over in the booth. The man reached out his hand to me and said, "I'm Ronnie Thompson."

  I'm sure my eyes nearly popped out of my head. I shook the man's hand and said, "Pleased to meet you, Mr. Thompson."

  "I spoke to Mister Henry and that man from Washington the other day. Did they tell you what I said?"

  I nodded and said, "But would you mind telling me the same thing again?"

  He told me the story which confirmed what Henry, Dawson, and Andy had said. Carter's father had come in, he'd sent them out on break, they'd heard the scream, and everyone had run back in. It was all the same.

  Once he was finished, I asked, "Is there anything else?"

  "Well, sir, I think I heard Mister Wilson talkin' to someone while we were out gettin' some water."

  "Was he white or Negro?"

  "Definitely white. I didn't mention it to Mister Henry 'cause I just plumb forgot. But, today I started runnin' the whole thing over again in my mind and I remembered hearin' someone yellin' at Mister Wilson. In fact, I'm pretty sure it was that man they call Hoss."

  Red looked over at me and nodded his head slowly.

  . . .

  Mr. Thompson showed me a copy of the Albany Herald. The headline was all about how I was missing. The story, it turned out, didn't have much to it. It was from the U.P.I. and didn't reference any specific person as a source. Some local color was added at the bottom about how Tom Kincaid was my attorney and that he had no comment.

  I excused myself to make a few phone calls from the payphone in the back.

  The first person I called was Tom Kincaid. He quietly listened while I gave him a brief overview of what we were doing. Then he spent the next three minutes, and two of my dimes, swearing at me and telling me I was going to jail and asking me if I was loco or something. I finally hung up on him when the operator asked for a third dime.

  The next person I called was Mike. He said he knew all about what was going on since Nick Smith had called him just like I'd asked. He said Marnie had stopped reading the San Francisco newspapers altogether but was otherwise busy helping him and the other guys out with the jobs that were coming in. Mike mentioned that Robert needed to talk to me about some real estate transactions. I told him to let Robert know I would call him in a day or two if I could. The last thing Mike asked was that we get someone to take a snapshot of us in beards before we shaved them off. I replied that I wasn't sure either of us was going to shave off our beards and that we might just move up to redwood country and live out our lives as lumberjacks. Mike's response was to snort over the line in disbelief and hang up on me.

  . . .

  We stayed at the diner until it closed at 10. It turned out that most of the Negroes in town knew I was there and working at the mill. Mr. Thompson assured me, however, that, as far as he knew, Red was the only white man who knew about it. And, as far as he was concerned, it was going to stay that way.

  . . .

  Red followed me back to the motel. He parked his old Chevy truck a couple of blocks away and then walked over and knocked on the door.

  I let him in and quickly closed the door behind him. He sat down in one of the chairs at the table and looked me up and down.

  "You sure do look mighty handsome in that beard."

  I smiled and offered him a Camel.

  "No, thanks."

  I took one and lit it.

  "So, what gave me away?"

  "Well, it wasn't any one thing. But the clincher was last night. I was drivin' by here and saw your boyfriend leanin' on the door in front of Nick Smith's farm truck and all the little pieces fell into place. And, today, when we was workin', I kept lookin' at you from different angles until I realized it really was you under all that hair."

  I laughed. "Carter doesn't want me to shave it."

  "I'd have to agree with him." He looked at me meaningfully. The air in the room got a little warm, so I walked over and turned on the window air conditioner to cool things down a bit. As I did, I heard a knock at the door.

  I opened it slightly and saw Carter. Pulling the door back, I saw he was drunk again. I pulled him in quickly and slammed the door shut.

  "Hi there, Boss." He leaned into me and began running his hands up and down my back.

  "Carter, we have company."

  He stood up and saw Red sitting at the table.

  "What's he doing here?"

  Red stood up. "Maybe I should leave."

  I shook my head. "No, stay a little longer." I looked up at Carter. "He knows who we are."

  "What?" Carter was fuzzy and swaying a little.

  "He introduced me to Ronnie Thompson. Remember? The man from the mill that Henry talked to. He was the one who heard someone else with your father."

  "Oh, yeah." He reached an arm out to Red and patted his shoulder. "Nice to meet you." He looked around the room and then turned back to Red. "Wass your name?"

  Red said, "I'll go. See y'all at the mill tomorrow."

  Carter laughed. "Not me, buddy boy. I been fired. Shit-canned. Let go."

  Red sat back down. "What happened?"

  Carter, who had been leaning against me this whole time, finally walked over to the bed and fell on it.

  "I dunno. I went out out to this place called The Well. You know it?"

  Red nodded and said, "Yeah."

  "Well..." Carter stopped and laughed to himself. "That's funny, isn't it?"

  I said, "It's a laugh riot, Chief. So, what happened?"

  "Well..." Carter laughed again.

  I shook my head and said to Red, "Maybe you outta go. He needs a long shower to sober up a bit."

  Carter was on the bed saying, "Well... That's a deep subject, ain't it?"

  Red laughed and slipped quickly and quietly out the door.

  . . .

  The next morning I woke up to find Carter gone. It was a little after 6, and there was a note in pencil on his side of the bed. It said, "Gone for coffee back soon."

  I got up and walked into the bathroom to relieve myself. As I was doing so, I heard the door open and could smell coffee and bacon as Carter walked in through the door.

  We sat down at the table and ate. Carter asked, "How bad was it?"

  I asked, "How bad do you feel?"

  "Not very."

  "Well, I gave you three aspirin and made you drink three glasses of water. That trick always works, doesn't it?"

  "Sure, does." He was chewing through a mound of bacon. Grease was also good.

  "So, you got fired?"

  "Yep. Musta said the wrong thing to the wrong person. Only thing I remember is being at The Well and drinking boilermakers."

  "Damn."

  "Yeah."

  "So, how do you know you've been fired?"

  Carter stopped chewing and looked at me. "Good question."

  "What can you remember?"

  "I just remember one of the guys sayin' how I shouldn't go back to work. Not if I knew what..." He whacked his head with the palm of his hand. "Oh. That was a threat."

  "Why the threat?"

  "Let's see." He chewed thoughtfully. "Seems like I asked about that number five saw again." He picked up another strip of bacon and waved it in my direction. "Yeah. That was it."

  "Who was it?"

  "It was that tall fella, the one who told us that he used to work for Uncle Leroy."

  "Hoss."

  "How'd you know his name?"

  "I need to tell you what happened last night." While he continued to eat, I gave him the run-down on how our cover had been blown and what I'd heard from Red and Ronnie Thompson.

  After I finished, Carter pulled a newspaper out of his coat pocket and placed it on the table. "Did you know you were missing?"

  I read the new headlines. These were
all about how the sheriff wanted to bring me in for questioning. I just shook my head.

  He finished his cup of coffee, leaned back in his chair, and sighed. "That was good. What time is it?"

  I looked at my watch. "It's we don't have time o'clock. That's what time it is."

  Carter nodded. "OK. But, tonight--"

  "Tonight we leave work at the end of work and no more bar hopping and no more boilermakers."

  Carter saluted and burped. "Sure thing, Boss."

  . . .

  The morning was uneventful. Red and I worked together until lunch. As we were pulling down a medium-sized pine tree, I had a sudden inspiration. When the lunch truck came, I used a little trick that I learned in the Navy about how to make myself sick. The details are unimportant but, nevertheless, I was laid out on the back of that truck after lunch and dropped off in front of the infirmary.

  According to the sign on the door of the little wood building, the doctor on staff was still on his lunch break when I walked up. So, I took this as an opportunity to hike over to the number five saw.

  The best way to sneak around anywhere is to brazenly go about your business as if you belong there. For the most part, no one will question someone who appears to know what they're doing. I walked the half mile or so to the big shed where the number five saw could be found.

  As I got close, I saw the little shack where they sold soda pop and sundries. And I saw the spigot with a ladle hanging over it. It's always good to confirm things you hear about second or third hand.

  Knowing that there might be someone in the little shack, I walked around the shed in a big semi-circle, using the woods that bordered it as cover and approached the shed from the other side of the building.

  Sure enough, there was a monster saw, and it was loud. But to see it, and to know what it could do to a full-grown man... Well, that was something entirely different.

  I saw Ronnie Thompson standing at the end of the saw table removing the boards as they were finished and, along with another Negro man, stacking them in preparation for binding them together, which a third Negro man was doing. A white man was loading the bundles onto a truck using a forklift. He appeared to be the supervisor.

  Now that I could see the setup, I could imagine how someone could be shoved into the saw. The thought of that happening was gruesome and made me more sick at my stomach than the little trick I'd used earlier. I had to beat a hasty retreat back into the woods so no one could hear me when I emptied my already empty stomach.

  I stood there for a moment, bent over, and tried to decide what to do next. What I really wanted was to talk to the other men who'd been there on the day it happened. But then I realized I probably had the best account of things already from Mr. Thompson.

  Finally, I decided I should probably go see the doctor.

  . . .

  Dr. Young was a dying man. There was just no other way to describe him. He was alarmingly thin and had sallow skin. I wondered if he was an alcoholic in his last throes. I'd seen that color on a man before when his liver was failing from too much booze.

  As he listened to my heart and took my pulse, he was obviously going through the motions.

  "What did you have for breakfast?"

  "Usual." I was still playing Robert Parnell, Washington lumberjack.

  "Eggs?"

  "Yep."

  "Bacon?"

  "Yep."

  He took off his stethoscope and made some notes on a chart. "Your heart is fine. Do you still feel nauseous?"

  "Yep."

  "Aren't much of a talker, are you?"

  "Nope."

  All of his questions had an edge of being annoying for the simple act of asking. I played it cool and pretended like I wasn't noticing.

  "Well, Mr. Parnell, I would say you just got a touch of food poisoning. Anyone else eating from the lunch truck seemed to get sick?"

  "Nope."

  "Maybe it was from the eggs."

  I shrugged.

  "Company policy is that if you can walk, you can work, so I'm gonna send you back to the work site. I'll call a truck to come pick you up."

  I just nodded while he picked up the phone receiver on his desk and put in the request.

  This was my opening to see what I could find out.

  I mumbled, "Must be hard."

  The doctor was making notes on his report. "What's that?"

  "That saw. What happened."

  He was quiet. This was a trick that almost always worked. You just give someone a little bait and they will take it. Usually.

  "Yes. It was awful."

  I nodded and waited.

  "The body was in three pieces."

  I sat there and tried to keep my stomach quiet.

  He sighed deeply and opened a desk drawer. He brought out a bottle of bourbon and drank straight from it. He offered me the bottle. "Might help settle your stomach."

  I took a sip to be courteous. And, truth be told, it did help.

  "Know him?"

  The doctor took another swig before closing the bottle and putting it back in the desk. He laughed wryly and said, "That son of a bitch? No. The best way to deal with Wilson Jones was to stay out of his way."

  I nodded.

  The doctor looked out the window and asked, "Wonder where that truck is?"

  He turned back around and looked at me. "Why are you interested in that saw?"

  I shrugged. "The man who did it died." I shrugged again.

  The doctor put his hands over his eyes and said, "No. Earl Waskom didn't kill Wilson Jones." He stood there for a moment, swaying slightly.

  "Who, then?" This was playing with fire.

  The doctor sighed deeply. "I have my suspicions, but I don't know for sure." Just then the truck horn sounded. "You better go."

  I hopped off the examining table and extended my hand to the doctor, who shook it. His hand was clammy and cold.

  Chapter 20

  Whispering Pines Inn

  Thursday, August 6, 1953

  Just past 8 in the evening

  That night, I suggested we go to Miz Jen's diner. We each left the motel about ten minutes apart. I got there first and took the booth in the back where Red and I had sat the night before. Carter came in not long after.

  The same waitress as the night before came to ask about our orders. Carter put in for fried chicken, and I decided to try the fried catfish.

  After she had brought us each a Coke, I recounted what had I'd seen at the number five saw. I also went over my conversation with the doctor.

  Carter took a sip of his Coke and said, "So, you've confirmed what Henry and Dawson found out. Where does that leave us?"

  "First, no one believes Earl Waskom did it."

  "But we knew that."

  "Yes. But now we also know that it's an obvious frame-up."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean that there's some sort of conspiracy going on. If everyone knows it wasn't Mr. Waskom, then why is no one coming forward about who it actually was?"

  "Maybe no one saw it happen?"

  "That's the most likely answer." I took a sip of my Coke and thought for a moment. "I think the Klan is somehow involved in all this."

  Carter laughed and rolled his eyes. "Son, that's like saying that people are involved in this."

  I looked at him for a long moment and had a sudden thought. "You know, Chief, not everyone in this town is like your daddy."

  He narrowed his eyes and asked, "What?"

  "Look at Tom Kincaid. Look at Mr. Sterling at the jail. Look at Uncle Leroy. Not to mention the judge at the hearing. These men may have some pretty ugly thoughts about us and who we are, but I don't think any of 'em are bigots."

  "What are you saying?"

  "I'm saying that part of the trick that the Klan plays on people is to make itself hidden. Keep things under the sheet, so to speak. No one knows who is or who isn't so you go along to get along. Makes the Klan look much larger than it really is."

  Carter
nodded thoughtfully.

  "Maybe this was about a power struggle. We know your daddy must have been high up. Obviously, the sheriff and his deputies are involved. But not the Chief of Police."

  Right then our waitress came by to check on us. "Fried chicken always takes a little longer. Y'all want another Coke?"

  We both nodded and she smiled as she picked up our empty bottles and walked off to get two more.

  Carter said, "So, what you're thinking is that this wasn't about this Hoss fella getting a better job?"

  "Maybe. I'm just laying things out to see what might stick."

  Carter blinked a couple of times and sat up. "Wait."

  "What?"

  "Smith Brothers."

  "Yeah?"

  "Smith. Nick Smith. Belle Terre. He owns pine."

  Just then our waitress returned with two bottles of Coke and two new straws. "Food should be here in about ten minutes."

  Carter smiled at her and said, "Thanks."

  She smiled sweetly and stood there for a moment.

  Carter asked, "Something you wanna tell us?"

  She looked at us, from the one to the other, and asked, "Can I touch it?"

  I laughed as Carter stuck out his chin. She ran her fingers through the bottom of his beard. "It's so soft!"

  I stuck out my chin as she did the same to my beard. "And yours is so wiry. Like a dog!"

  We all laughed as she walked into the kitchen.

  Carter winked at me as I said, "But Smith is a common name. Anyone who owns land around here must own some pine. And wouldn't he be too young to be one of the brothers?"

  Carter shook his head. "No. I remember there was a much younger brother. The mother died in childbirth. I seem to remember my mama talkin' about it. Mrs. Smith was, maybe, 45 when it happened."

  I thought about it. "And, that would've been in, what, 1910 or so?"

  "Somethin' like that."

  "So what are you thinking, Chief?"

  "Maybe Nick is involved in this."

  I shook my head. "Now that would be a conspiracy of the highest order. That would mean Red and Henrietta and Jerry would all have to know about it or be in on it."