Big Hungry: A Novel

by John Clausen

  The saloon was no thing of beauty. The worn wooden floors, innocent of any serious janitorial attention for decades, creaked under the slightest weight. The air smelled of old beer, sweat, and stale flatulence. The bar itself was nothing more than a wooden counter covered in a brownish, cigarette-scorched linoleum and liberally decorated with the penciled and carved observations of generations of hard-drinking patrons. The back bar held a generous selection of hard liquor, pickled eggs, Slim Jims, beef jerky, and various other culinary delights ready to assault the beer drinker’s alimentary canal. The walls were hung with old and poorly preserved deer heads and antlers. Among those and other trophies from hunting and fishing seasons long past was a white, 14-inch fish, which Jimmy swore was an albino Northern Pike his brother had caught in the Garrison Reservoir. This was generally held to be untrue, although few patrons challenged Jimmy on it. Also nailed on the wall – above the men’s room door – was a well-worn John Deere tractor cap that used to belong to the late Constantine Popinga, a farmer of Greek descent who had died of a heart attack while sitting on the toilet. No one thought it odd that Jimmy Nolen had tacked the cap over the door as a memorial to the deceased. In fact, no one really questioned anything Jimmy Nolen did in his establishment. He was the very unofficial mayor of the town and he poured an honest drink. Jimmy had owned and operated the bar for decades, growing from a pleasantly stout Irish lad to a thick, middle-aged alcoholic to a mountainous, 70-year-old beer-drinking machine his patrons had come to know and love.

  On this particular night, Jimmy was serving an unusually large and thirsty crowd. Darrell Johnson and Wesley Otto, the Ackerman Dray Lines stalwarts, were relaxing after a hard day hauling dry-cleaning fluid and kerosene stoves. Droop Hornsby was skulking at the end of the bar, burdened with a load of unspoken prevarication. Several farmers were playing liar’s poker and discussing dismal crop prices while a handful of oil patch roughnecks drank boilermakers and talked about politics. In a corner booth, Jonas Johnston, having snagged a ride into town with Charlie Taylor, was crouched over a draft beer watching the crowd.

  Across from him sat Furman Potter, invisible to everyone in the place…or so he thought.

  Furman was thinking that it might be fun to zip off for a tour of the Schlitz brewery when he noticed that Jonas was looking right at him.

  “Fifty pounds of chicken feed,” Jonas growled, looking straight into Furman’s eyes. Furman ignored him.

  “Fifty pounds of chicken feed,” Jonas insisted.

  “You ain’t talking to me, are you?” Furman asked.

  “Bill, Bill…to Bunker Hill,” Jonas said firmly, directing a military salute toward his invisible booth mate.

  “Can you see me?”

  “Plain as day. Plain as a Model A,” Jonas shouted. “Model A. Model A. Model A.”

  By now, Jonas was beginning to attract attention. Several of the roughnecks glanced up from their drinking. The farmers, who knew Jonas well, continued their game but kept their ears cocked in case Jonas did anything entertaining. Jimmy Nolen rumbled out from behind the bar and made his way to the booth.

  “Am I going to have some trouble over here, Jonas?”

  “No sir,” Jonas mumbled. “No sir.”

  As Jimmy Nolen made his way back to the bar, Furman looked at Jonas, thinking it might be a good time to see The Cow Palace in San Francisco. Jonas was staring at Furman with a gleam of recognition in his eyes. This surprised Furman considerably; he really looked nothing like his old mortal self…much younger and there was that blue light.

  “You supposed to be dead,” Jonas said clearly.

  “You know who I am?”

  “Yep,” Jonas said before snapping another salute and exclaiming, “Kaiser Bill went up the hill.”

  Jimmy Nolen headed for Jonas’ booth again.

  Chapter 17

  The next morning, Eugene Hornsby was about halfway through his ham and eggs when Darrell Johnson and Otto Wesley burst through the door of the Sportsmen’s Café out on Highway 5 near the Farmer’s Union Oil Company. Eugene looked up at them as they came in the door and knew that his day was about to be ruined. The two men were excited and trying to hide it. They hustled over to the lawman’s table and flopped down as if they’d just run ten miles. Darrell let out a gust of air. Otto seemed like he was waiting to breathe.

  “Bad trouble, Gene,” Darrell said. “We found Harlen Ackerman out at Number Three.” Number Three was one of Ackerman’s producing oil wells…the third and most profitable of his many wildcat oil ventures.

  “What you mean? You found him?”

  “Yeah, laying in a pile all covered up with blood.”

  “Alive?”

  “Well, yeah…but just barely. We put him in the truck and took him to the clinic. Doc Brown has him.”

  The men were obviously eager to tell him more, but Hornsby grabbed his hat and made for the door.

  “Stick around close today, boys. I’ll need to talk to you later.”

  Hornsby was halfway to the clinic when he met the town ambulance heading south with blaring siren and flashing lights. A short radio conversation told him that the ambulance was headed to Porterville with the rapidly failing Ackerman aboard. The Tulleyville clinic was not equipped for serious trauma. The town couldn’t afford it. So instead of a state-of-the-art hospital, the town had purchased a very fast and very deluxe ambulance that they reasoned would be cheaper and just as good. It could get an injured or ill person to the elaborate Porterville General Hospital in time to treat almost anything that might happen in Tulleyville. The ambulance was fitted out with serious life-sustaining emergency equipment and the volunteer fire department folks who drove the ambulance were actually quite proficient. Half a dozen times per year they hauled patients – mostly heart attack victims – down the road to Porterville General. This, however, was the first time they’d ever been called upon to treat what looked like a very bad gunshot wound to the abdomen of the area’s leading citizen.

  Hornsby flew down the highway ahead of them, clearing traffic and hoping his old friend and employer was as tough as everyone said.

  An hour and ten minutes later, Julius “Doc” Brown, M.D. was explaining to Hornsby what he knew about Ackerman’s wound, which wasn’t much. The rancher had been hit in the lower bowels by a large caliber bullet.

  “Didn’t get a good look…just enough to know the clinic couldn’t handle it. Lost a lot of blood, though. Out there much longer he’d been gone.”

  “Takes much longer, I’m gonna have to take off,” Hornsby said, looking at the waiting room clock. “Check out Number Three and see if I can find anything. Hope Darrell and Otto kept their mouths shut. Probably couple dozen citizens out there stamping around the crime scene by now.”

  “Hard to imagine those two keeping a lid on something like this.”

  “Prob’ly not. About three beers into the story over at Nolen’s by now. I’m going to have to get out of here pretty quick.”

  Hornsby was on his feet and just about to leave when a tired, blood-spattered emergency room doctor came through the swinging doors and approached the two men.

  “I’m Doctor Durnell,” he said, extending a hand toward Hornsby. “I understand you came in with Mr. Ackerman.”

  “Yeah, me and Doc here. Is he gonna make it?”

  “Still too early to tell. Lot of lost blood and some damage to his liver and spleen. From the damage, I’d say it was a large caliber bullet, maybe a 30.06 or a 30.30. Something big and packing a wallop. Can’t tell for sure…entered, did some pretty major damage, and then exited. Missed the spine, clipped a couple important organs. I’ll know more later.”

  “I guess he’s out for a while.”

  “I’ll call you as soon as I know more. Don’t get your hopes up. He’s a long ways from being out of the woods. Leave a number with the nurse at the front.”

  Hornsby drove directly to Ackerman’s Number Three after leaving the Porterville Hospital. He was surprised to find no one mi
lling around the scene. The wind was blowing some trash across the small dirt parking area, but other than that there was no movement at all. Ackerman’s pickup truck was parked in front of a small metal shed on the property. Hornsby could see a large, dark pool of blood that had partially soaked into the dirt.

  He stood next to the pool for a moment and looked around. The shot had to have come from the north, he reasoned. The truck and the shed would have obscured the shooter’s field of vision from the south and the east…and to the west there was nothing but driveway…nothing to hide behind.

  A careful search around the northern perimeter of the lot revealed nothing useful. No footprints or spent cartridges revealed themselves. No tire tracks stood out. Hornsby took out a roll of crime-scene tape and strung it across the entrance to Number Three. He would have preferred to come back with some help and do an inch-by-inch search for evidence. Of course, he really didn’t have anybody he could rely on to help him. With the tape securing the area, he turned back to the scene and began his search, figuring it would take several hours and probably turn up nothing.

  Hornsby was a half hour into his search and finding nothing significant when he noticed a large red Ford pickup approaching. “Oh, hell,” he muttered, “here comes the crowd.”

  The pickup came to a dusty halt behind Hornsby’s vehicle. It was Odell Scrum, looking concerned and stricken and, Hornsby thought, more than a little pissed off. The lawyer stepped down from the cab and made his way to where Hornsby was standing.

  “I just came from the hospital,” the lawyer said with no preamble. “Still can’t tell if he’s gonna make it or not.” Hornsby thought the lawyer sound a little peeved…as if the hospital wasn’t trying hard enough to get him the information he wanted. Scrum had a talent for making people do what he wanted and on the rare occasions when it didn’t work he could be abrupt. Without another word, Scrum started searching along with Hornsby.

  “Odell, this is an official police crime scene. You think you ought to be poking around here? Could be you’ll be defendin’ whoever did it. I don’t want to get in a jam over who saw what and who did what here at the scene. Maybe it would be best if you just went back to town. Appreciate your wanting to help, but we gotta be careful with a shooting case.”

  “Eugene,” the lawyer said, drawing himself up to his full height, “I am an officer of the court. I don’t see how my helping you out is going to have any bad ramifications down the road. Maybe you should take good help when it’s offered. Harlen Ackerman was a good friend to me…almost like a brother. When you catch the son of a bitch who shot him, I guarantee I won’t be defending him. So let’s just get back to work here. I’ll take the responsibility.”

  “That’s just it, Odell, you can’t take responsibility. I’m the law right here and now. You’re just another private citizen. I’m gonna have to ask you to get in your vehicle and leave the scene. That’s all there is to it.”

  If it had been anyone but Scrum, Hornsby would probably have grabbed him, put him in his car, and sent him on his way with a minor cussing out for compromising the crime scene. Given the circumstances, the size of the scene, and Hornsby’s lack of competent help, he was tempted to let the lawyer help. Scrum was, as he had pointed out, an officer of the court and an intelligent man, which could not be said for everyone who might volunteer to help. Nevertheless, Hornsby decided to stick to his guns and make the lawyer leave. He wasn’t sure if it was good procedure or if he just disliked being pushed around by a big shot.

  Scrum left the scene wordlessly and got into his truck. Hornsby watched him drive onto the dirt driveway and was about to resume searching when he saw the lawyer slam on his brakes and jump out of the cab to pick something up near a rusted metal tank that lay abandoned on the side of the driveway.

  “Got something,” he shouted.

  Hornsby trotted over to the truck and looked at the object Scrum held in his gloved hand.

  “That’s a 30.30 casing, isn’t it?”

  “Saw it under the tank here…almost covered up with trash.’

  Hornsby picked the casing out of Scrum’s hand using his pen to avoid fouling any possible fingerprint evidence. He avoided looking into Scrum’s face, not wishing to see the man’s I-told-you-so sneer.

  “Well, I guess I’ll be going,” Scrum said as Hornsby put the cartridge into a small plastic evidence bag. “Wouldn’t want to interfere in a professional evidence search.”

  Hornsby felt his face heat up at Scrum’s snotty tone, but didn’t say anything. Instead, he just muttered, “Yep, I think that would be best. Thanks for your help.”

  The lawyer gave him one more dirty look before driving away. Hornsby went back to his search, which lasted almost two more hours and turned up nothing significant. He bagged up samples of the bloodstained dirt, took pictures of some tire and shoe tracks, and closed down his investigation of Number Three.

  By the time he arrived back in Tulleyville, everybody in town seemed to have heard of the shooting and the spent 30.30 cartridge. And almost everybody had his or her own theory. Nolen’s Bar was doing a record business with a steady din of loud conversation coming out the door. Hornsby crossed over and walked to his office carefully avoiding the people he saw on the street. He was sure that the drinkers in Nolen’s would have some weird solution to the crime all worked out.

  He found his brother Droop sitting in his office chair.

  He jerked a thumb toward a small couch where visitors usually sat. “Git,” he said as his lanky brother unfolded himself from the swivel chair and slumped toward the couch.

  “You’re gonna need some help gettin’ him,” Droops said. “You know that, don’tcha?”

  “Getting who?”

  “Ben Mooney, that’s who. The crazy bastard that shot Ackerman. It’s all over town. You gotta arrest him…and I’m here to help you. Some of the other guys are ready, too. But we gotta be careful…he’s a tough son of a bitch.”

  “What the fuck are you talking about, Droop? I’m not arresting anybody…at least not right now. How come you think Mooney did it?”

  “That 30.30 shell…hell, everybody knows Mooney’s got that old Winchester.”

  “How the hell do you know about any 30.30 shell? I’m back in town for five minutes and everybody knows what’s in the evidence bag. I’m gonna have to have a little talk with Odell Scrum. What’d he do? Go straight to Nolen’s and make an announcement?”

  “I don’t know what he done,” said Droop. “But everybody knows about it and everybody knows Mooney did it.”

  “Any of you geniuses come up with a motive?”

  “Crazy bastard like that don’t need a motive. He didn’t have a motive when he busted my nose.”

  Hornsby felt a bad headache coming on. His brother sometimes affected him that way. It bothered him a lot that his brother was a redneck moron and the town laughingstock. No doubt Droop had powered down a few beers at Nolen’s while listening to bar talk about the Ackerman shooting. Plus, Droop had a grudge against Mooney for the broken nose incident. Hornsby had no doubt that his brother would be right there at the head of a lynch mob if this had been the Wild West. As it was, he would probably be satisfied with badmouthing Mooney from a safe distance. The rest of the barflies could also be relied upon to steer clear of Mooney. Hornsby’s next move would be a visit to the hospital in Porterville to see about Ackerman’s condition.

  He drove straight from his office to the hospital and was a little surprised to see two Tulleyville residents in the waiting room. One was Odell Scrum, looking official and talking to one of the doctors. The other was Jonas Johnston. Jonas was clearly agitated and talking softly to the empty chair next to him. Hornsby ignored the old man and went directly to Scrum.

  “Can I get a word with you, Odell?” he asked. Then he looked at the doctor. “How’s Mr. Ackerman?”

  “Not much change, officer. He’s still unconscious. Vitals are stabilizing somewhat. No prognosis right now. Just have to wait and watch h
im carefully. I’ll see that somebody calls you if there’s any significant change.”

  “Include me in that call, Doctor,” Odell ordered as the physician turned to leave.

  “Odell, I’m wondering how come my brother and every other bar bum in town knows about that 30.30 shell. You hold a press conference or something like that?”

  “Didn’t tell a soul, Eugene. Well…I take that back. I did mention it to my wife, but I don’t think she told anybody.”

  Telling Nora Scrum anything, Hornsby knew, was the same as putting a full-page ad in the Porterville paper. Within five minutes of receiving such hot gossip, Mrs. Scrum would have been on the phone to her gang of busybodies. Surely Scrum knew his wife’s proclivity for blabbing, Eugene thought to himself.