Defying Death in Hagerstown

by John Paul Carinci

  “How’s the story going?” he asked excitedly.

  I told him very little, mostly just about Lolita and the nursing home.

  “I’ve never been inside that nursing home,” he said.

  “That’s probably a good thing,” I remarked.

  I was happy for Brian because a nursing home can be a very depressing place to visit. On the other hand, some people feel that young people should be exposed to the sick and elderly in order to be awakened to the brevity of life and encouraged to make the most of their time.

  Wally inspected my car as if the president were going to be riding in it, while Pawler looked on and Brian bent my ear.

  “So, how long you staying? Oh, and I heard there was a shooting at the police station by that Billy Blaine creep.”

  “Yeah, Brian, can you believe that hard-on Blaine shot an officer in the station house? That’s some real big balls!”

  “It’s all been in the papers, you know. Shame you didn’t write the stories. They even wrote about someone trying to run you down. Think it was Blaine, Lou?”

  We spoke for a few minutes more. I found out that Brian was going to night school. He wanted to be an architect. I commended him on his choice, telling him to stick it out and that it is far better to choose a career that uses your brain rather than your body, as a body will break down and become less reliable as one ages; eventually it’ll get hard to continue with merely muscle instead of brains.

  He listened intently, again putting me on a pedestal, as many in his town had done, except, of course, for Billy Blaine and the town’s law enforcement.

  Wally had motioned for Pawler and me to come stand underneath the car on the lift. I looked first at the lift, then at my car, and then I slowly made my way underneath it. I was always paranoid about extremely heavy objects raised right above my head. I hoped Wally would talk fast. I couldn’t take another hit in the head.

  “Lou,” Wally began, “someone clearly wants you dead. I’ve seen many instances of someone putting the fear of God in a person by modifying and rigging something on his vehicle, but in this case, someone wanted to do you in for sure!”

  “So, Sergeant Pawler was correct,” I said, as I glanced apologetically at Pawler, then at Wally, and waited.

  “Oh, he was right on!” Wally smiled.

  Pawler looked at me and said, “When we were at the hotel parking lot, I thought I saw a drop of brake fluid on a rear brake line, so as a precaution I had the vehicle pulled in without anyone starting it up.”

  With that, Pawler called the station house for the fingerprint officer to come to Wally’s to print the car.

  “Someone knew what they were doing here,” Wally said, with a little admiration for the culprit. “They sliced the brake line just enough for your brakes to fail, perhaps on a highway or steep incline some minutes after your next car trip began. And that’s not all. Look here.” He pointed to the insides of the two front tires.

  “That’s a bubble!” I snapped, as I shook my head in disbelief. “Holy crap, that’s ready to blow!”

  “That, too, was brilliant,” Wally declared, a devilish smile on his face.

  Nice that he’s being entertained at my expense.

  “You see,” he continued, “as the tires heat up like they do after a few miles, the air pressure rises in the tires and the bubble has a great chance of causing a major blowout. This is someone who clearly has done this sort of thing before.”

  “I was going to head to the farm off the highway . . . .”

  “I bet you would have come back in a body bag.” Wally shook his head with a very serious expression on his face.

  “The only way you’re going to any farm is in the back of a police cruiser, Bub,” Sergeant Pawler snapped.

  “I’ll have this baby fixed up as good as new, as soon as I receive the go-ahead from the authorities,” Wally said. “And after they lift all prints, I’ll dive under the hood and inspect everything, including the full electric system and fuel lines. But, gentlemen, I fully expect to find nothing additional. After all, with both tires bubbling from being sliced, and the brake line already oozing precious brake fluid, the job would have been successful in causing a horrific accident. But more likely, an overturned vehicle and then a flipping car. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but I’m glad you men had me do a quick look-see.”

  “I’ll be dipped!” Brian exclaimed as he, too, came under the lifted car. “A real-life execution hit!” he marveled.

  Brian ran for coffees and donuts while we waited for the fingerprint officer to arrive. I listened to voicemail messages while I waited. Graham Griffiths had left another message, and Felicia had left me a couple as well. She wanted to lift my spirits and make me laugh, which her messages did. I returned Graham’s call before he could get too worried and raise suspicion at the newspaper’s main office.

  “Where have you been, buddy? I was—”

  “Listen, Graham, I can’t talk. I am fine now, but it’s been rough. Someone tried to take me out, run me down, then poison me, and now cut the brake lines and tires on my car.”

  “Son of a bitch! They’re out for you, my man!”

  “I’m fine. Don’t tell anyone at the newspaper, especially Harold the hard-on!”

  “But what are you going to do? You need protection.”

  “Listen,” I said, “I’m fine. The police captain assigned an officer to me full-time. I’m as safe as anyone could be. Trust me, Graham. I’m cutting out of this town in a day or two, so please don’t call anymore. I’ll call you when I have some more time. Take care. I’ll see you later,” I rushed the call.

  “Watch your ass, okay?”

  “Okay, bye,” I said and disconnected the call.

  While we waited, we enjoyed the coffee and donuts Brian had picked up, and Wally explained what needed to be done to rectify the damage to my car.

  “Lou, you realize that once a tire is compromised the way your two tires were, we have to replace them. Unlike with a regular hole from a nail or even a screw, we cannot just seal up a hole of this kind with a plug. The tires were cut purposely so they would blow at any high-speed heat-up, the perfect scenario for a nasty accident. The brake line can be replaced real easy. After I get an okay from the police, I can have your car ready in about an hour and a half.”

  “He won’t be needing it for a while,” the sergeant chimed in. “I’ll be taking him for a ride.” He laughed and looked directly at me. “I made him an offer he can’t refuse!”

  I hated to have to rely on anyone. For my entire life, I have been independent to a fault. I feel somewhat helpless when another person has to drive me around. But I realized I had no choice. I needed to get to Elizabeth’s Market Farm and Creamery. We needed to pick up the pistachio ice cream for Lolita, or I’d look like a fool.

  So, I was stuck with Sergeant Pawler, who had absolutely no way about him. I didn’t know if it was just me he hated, or maybe the world. I knew little about him or his personal life except that he had served in the military with the Marines. He also was divorced a few years back, and had been with the police force for over ten years. I could tell that he was tough as nails and went real hard on criminals, taking his job perhaps too seriously. I knew one thing: I wasn’t going to ruffle his feathers knowing that he wanted nothing to do with babysitting me and being my shadow. He, no doubt, would celebrate with Captain Krolm upon my departure from Hagerstown.

  It was around ten thirty that morning when Sergeant Pawler drove me to the farm to purchase the pistachio ice cream.

  I remembered the few times I had eaten pistachio ice cream. It was a little funky compared to other flavors, but still very good. I was curious why the farm creamery’s ice cream was so much better than other brands. No doubt, Lolita was an expert after 110 years of life. She had known food back when it didn’t have preservatives, additives, and fat-free low everything in it. I hoped the farm would enlighten me as to how they made the fresh, homemade ice cream and how it differed fro
m store brands.

  The farm was fifteen minutes away by highway. All I could picture was the major blowout I would’ve had if I had been driving my own car. I thought about the motive to knock me off. It finally sank in: Someone wanted me dead. It’s a very unnerving feeling to know there is someone who wants you dead so badly that nothing will stop their attempts.

  First, your stomach tightens into a knot once your mind accepts that the threat is real. Your eyes may start twitching uncontrollably, as mine did, and worse, you start looking around at your surroundings nonstop and uncontrollably, because anyone could be the killer. No one was exempt. Even old people were suspected potential killers, as disguises can make anyone look entirely different. And lastly, whenever you eat or drink anything, it immediately turns into acid in the stomach, and the stomach emulates a simmering volcano.

  Sleep is impossible for the potential mark of a killer. The mind revolves faster than a spinning top, calculating all the ways you could ultimately be killed in full, gory detail. And the detail plays back in the mind as if it were a movie on an endless loop.

  So, here I was, riding along with Sergeant Pawler, once again in the back of his cruiser. I was supposed to feel safe, but my mind convinced me differently. After all, for someone to poison me with thallium and, on top of that, to slice my tires and brake lines, they meant business. Anyone can take out another person if they want to badly enough. No one can ever be fully protected. No one can be put into a protective bubble. Car bombs can be planted. High-powered rifles can be shot from great distances. Poisons can be added to foods or drinks. Walk-by stabbings can’t be defended against if you’re caught unaware.

  No, I would have to get out of town, and quick. Fear is a very strange emotion. It eats away at you, driving you insane to the point where your mind stops working properly and your thinking becomes clouded. This was where I was at that precise moment. I could concentrate on nothing but death, and even envisioned my own wake, coffin, color of the casket, and the pillow inside it, and all the mourners around it. Unfortunately, there weren’t many mourners. It crossed my mind that maybe I should try to do something about that from this point on. I had never thought of my own funeral before, but as I envisioned it, there were so few cars lined up behind the hearse that it really bothered me, not that a hundred cars in procession would make me much happier at that moment.

  I was suddenly shocked back to reality as Sergeant Pawler blurted out, “Don’t look now, but I think someone is following us.”

  Of course, I spun around and looked. What I saw was a large black car with no license plate on the front, still a good distance behind us. They’re following a police officer? Now that is strange. Then again, almost everything I had experienced in Hagerstown had been strange, dangerous, or unusual.

  As soon as we passed the next exit, the sergeant put on his siren and flashing lights. I watched closely as the large black car made a sharp turn off at the exit and left rubber in a quick getaway. I strained as I tried to see the driver.

  “They were uncovered!” Pawler said, as he called into the precinct and ordered a cruiser to the exit in pursuit of the black car. I thought that chasing the car ourselves would have been a better idea, but the sergeant clearly thought it could be a trap of some kind, and his number one priority and his orders were to protect me. So he asked for a cruiser to trace the black car’s tracks just in case they were careless. I thought it was fruitless.

  But now I was convinced that I had to wrap up my investigation of the 1923 murders real soon, or I could be the next obituary in the local paper. I could just drop the investigation; after all, I had only come to interview Lolita and write a nice story about her. Still, why should I cave in to someone who was spooked because I was nosing around about some murders that took place ninety-one years ago?

  After all, what did I really have? I had spoken with a few people and uncovered mostly old news about the murders, their victims, and some suspects who were never found guilty. I had seen clippings about the murders, and I’d read about the victims. There was nothing concrete to indicate that I was closing in on any real leads, thus I wasn’t a threat. Why kill me? What good would that do? No one had been able to solve the murders for almost a century. What made anyone think that I could do any better?

  I turned quickly around to look behind us, studying the road. Nothing. No one was behind us or even close to us. Then it hit me. The only variable, I figured, that someone had deciphered was that this nosy reporter, who was investigating a 1923 murder case, also was interviewing Lolita Croome, the oldest person in America and, more importantly, the oldest living Hagerstown resident, a woman who lived through all the murders and knew all the victims. Still, I wondered, where was the connection to the killer? And who today could possibly care so much that they, too, were willing to kill to keep the truth from coming out?

  Sergeant Pawler didn’t talk. It was like driving with a mummy. Well, he wasn’t very pleasant to speak with anyway, so I probably was better off in my own world. After all, my mind is always so active that sometimes I have to scream internally to stop thinking so much. It doesn’t usually work, and today was no different. I kept wondering if someone was waiting with a machine gun or a grenade around the next bend. Anything was possible.

  Ice cream, think ice cream, please! In return, my mind sent out the thought, You could wind up on ice—as a corpse!

  Nice thought, Lou.

  “Sergeant,” I said, against better judgment, “you think we’re safe now?”

  “I am. Don’t know about your sorry ass. At least I have a gun to protect myself.” He laughed, and I couldn’t help noticing that it sounded almost sinister.

  “Oh, that’s real encouraging!” I snapped, as I looked all around the highway, searching for anything slightly suspicious, just in case.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  We arrived at the creamery in about twenty minutes. It reminded me of a very big ranch, the kind in the old western movies. Cows and horses were grazing on a huge tract of land. We drove up a very long driveway past trees and farmland, under and past a huge old wooden sign that read Elizabeth’s Market Farm and Creamery.

  “Don’t get out until I give the order!” Pawler yelled as if I were deaf.

  I always wanted to be a Marine, I thought.

  “Let me look around. Stay down and stay put.”

  “I’m as put as can be, sir!” I replied.

  “You know, I should shoot you right here myself and save everyone the trouble. I would, too, if I knew there was a bounty on your head, you know.”

  “Aw, you love me!” I smiled a real big smile.

  “You little turd!” he snapped as he exited the car and walked all around the parking area to view the large property. Then I saw him wave for me to come out.

  We were met at the entranceway by the owner of the farm who was waiting for us. She was very concerned to see a police officer, and mistook me for a detective. The sergeant reassured her that there was no police matter concerning the farm. He told her about my assignment and the need to bring the Hagerstown celebrity, Lolita, some fresh-made ice cream.

  I explained to Sherri that Lolita was 110 and loved fresh-made pistachio ice cream, and that I wanted to make her happy. But I also wanted to know more about how the ice cream was made and why it was so much better than store-bought ice cream.

  Sherri took us on a tour and let us taste a few flavors.

  “We’ve never had a big-city reporter here,” she said. “Let me tell you the history of the farm. It was founded in 1893 by the Burnett family, and it stayed in that family until my husband’s father purchased it in 1978. He added in the fresh ice-creamery addition. It was an instant success. Of course, we raise and sell fresh fruits and vegetables, but we also produce fresh dairy products right at the farm. We use the fresh cream in our products.”

  “What is involved in the process of ice-cream making?” I asked, as Sergeant Pawler gave me an impatient look.

  “Well, our ice cr
eam has a different fat content than most store brands and has twenty-five percent air in it as opposed to fifty percent in store-bought. Ours is also made in an Italian-style batch freezer, and we use a blast freezer set at minus thirty-five degrees so that the tiny ice crystals don’t have a chance to form chunks. To make the pistachio flavor, we mix in a pistachio paste, similar in consistency to peanut butter. Then we fold in the fresh pistachios after the ice cream comes out of the batch freezer. You can easily taste the difference from the store-bought kind.”

  Pawler’s eyes were glazing over. He probably wanted his donut fix. Too bad for him. I was doing research.

  We tasted the pistachio and quickly knew why Lolita loved homemade.

  I found out that pistachio ice cream was created 1940s. They were cultivated over 7,000 years ago, and were loved by the queen of Sheba.

  I purchased three two-gallon buckets of pistachio ice cream, and we were on our way. I could tell that Pawler was ready to kick my ass, so I cut it rather short.

  Once outside, the sergeant inspected the general area again, while I looked out over the horses that were grazing in the fields. Pawler inspected the police cruiser very carefully, even lifting the hood and getting underneath the car and looking closely at all four tires.

  He finally gave me the okay to climb into the back seat, and we took off at a rather fast speed. He was annoyed, but I didn’t really care. Pawler always seemed pissed off at something or somebody. What a way to live your life.

  On the drive back, I pulled out Lolita’s diary and thought, God forbid I should lose it. I would never be able to face Lolita or her daughter ever again. I think I would just disappear and not even go back to my job. And what if someone injured or killed me and stole the diary? It was just too much to think about.

  I flipped through the 365 perfectly handwritten pages that looked like they had been written yesterday, even though Lolita had written it all in pencil. The year 1923 was a long time ago, but certain world events mentioned in the diary stuck out. They had crazy weather back then, too, just like today. For instance, on July 10 of that year, Russia had a hailstorm with two-pound hailstones that killed twenty-three people and many cattle.