by Bobby Cole
The officers slowly walked to the front porch. Millie threatened a swat at Rolex with her broom, “Hush, Rolex!”
In a whispered voice, the commander inquired of Obermeyer, “Rolex?”
“She’s a watchdog,” he replied with a smile, while studying Millie Brown.
“Oh. Okay. What’s with the dead snake?” the commander quietly asked Obermeyer.
“I’s killed it yesterday. If’n you hang one up likes that, it’ll rain in three days. We needs the rain, ma’am,” Millie explained. Both officers were surprised that she had heard their whispered words.
“Okaaaay,” the commander responded as she passed the snake carcass.
“You officers come on in.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” they said in unison, holstering their weapons.
“I do needs to see your badges first, I reckon,” she said with a serious look.
Obermeyer had his out first, and she studied it until satisfied. The commander then handed over her shield for inspection. Again Millie studied it for authenticity.
“Ummhunh. Y’all come on in. Excuse my ironing board. Gettin’ ready for church on Sunday,” Millie explained, discreetly sliding a small object into her apron pocket.
The detective and the commander both noticed.
“Ma’am, I need to see whatever it was that you just put in your pocket,” the commander stated, suspiciously.
Embarrassed, Millie reached in and pulled out a small silver can. She held it in her hand for the police to see. “Dat’s just my snuff. I’s embarrassed for y’all to see it,” she answered bashfully.
Millie’s simple demeanor and willingness to cooperate relaxed both the detective and the commander. They both noticed an older man rise from his chair as they entered the room.
“This here’s my husband, Haywood. He’s watching teevee. Don’t move much on Friday evenin’s.”
Both officers took steps forward and shook Haywood’s hand. He was quiet and seemed more interested in the television than the police officers.
“Evening, it’s nice to meet you,” the commander offered.
Haywood nodded and remained standing though clearly wanting to sit back down.
Obermeyer noticed Haywood Brown’s Coca-Cola bottle next to where he had been sitting.
“You like those small Cokes?”
“I do,” Mr. Brown answered curtly.
“It looks different. Is that Spanish on the bottle?”
Mr. Brown looked at the bottle, and then at Millie, and finally to the detective. “Um, well, yeah, I guess it is. I don’t know where she gets these.”
Obermeyer thought about the Coke bottle while the commander turned her attention to Millie Brown. “Mrs. Brown, we’re looking for Cooper Dixon, and we have reason to believe that he might be here.”
“Lord no, he ain’t here.”
“Has he been here or do you know where he is? We want to help him,” the commander explained.
“I don’t have no idea where he’s at,” she responded carefully so as not to lie but not offer too much truth either.
“Mrs. Brown, where were you late this afternoon?”
“I went to my friend’s house and got my hair did.”
“Where does she live?”
“She stays about a mile up the road.”
“Has Cooper been here or there today?” Obermeyer asked.
“Damn it!” Haywood yelled before Millie could answer.
“Haywood, we’s got company,” Millie scolded.
“Even I’s knew da answer to that puzzle,” he replied, without looking up.
“Ma’am, we need to look around. We believe Cooper is not here, but we can’t leave any stone unturned. I’m sure you understand,” the commander offered.
“Yes, ma’am, go ahead, but you ain’t gone find nothin’. Somebody’s settin’ that poor man up to look bad. I knows he ain’t done all that the TV folks says he has.”
“You’ve known Mr. Dixon a long time?” Obermeyer asked.
“All his life. Practically done raised that boy myself. I shelled many a pea with that child settin’ in my lap.”
“Ma’am, may I use your bathroom?” Obermeyer asked politely. The events of the day were having their usual effects on him.
“It’s right there,” Millie replied, pointing at a narrow door.
The commander instructed the patrol officers who had just entered the house to spread out and look through the house and barn. She sternly told them not to make a mess of anything. As soon as she finished completing her orders, her cell phone rang, and she answered quickly. Her eyes widened and her gaze met Obermeyer’s before he shut the bathroom door. With several nods of her head, she confirmed her understanding and slapped the phone shut. She said, “That’s it. Emergency Response monitors have a personal locater beacon with Cooper’s name coded into it going off in Coosa County!”
“Coosa County! That’s where Cooper’s hunting property’s located! Stand by!” the detective said excitedly.
“We also just got a call from the Coosa County sheriff’s department saying they just received a 911 from a woman claiming she just escaped from a cellar with Kelly Dixon! She also said that a Mark Wright is in the house holding a boy hostage and that Cooper’s trying to rescue him!”
“Mark Wright!” Obermeyer exclaimed, quickly walking away from the bathroom. Obermeyer wanted to think and not react.
“That’s what they said, and that’s all I know.”
“Holy shit!” Obermeyer exclaimed and then remembering Millie, said, “Sorry, ma’am.”
“Das all right, young man. We’ve heard worse,” Millie replied.
“Commander, we need to roll.”
“We are, but hang on, slow down. Stand by!” she said with a twinkle in her eye.
The commander looked at Millie Brown and then around her house. She said, “Miz Brown, I’m gonna have two officers stay here in case this is a trick.”
Turning to Obermeyer, she said, “You and I take separate cars. I’ll relay details by radio as I learn ’em. Let’s go!”
As they quickly left the house, Rolex broke into another tirade and chased the commander all the way to her vehicle. She hurriedly shut the door and sprayed gravel as she pulled to the edge of the road, waiting on Obermeyer.
Obermeyer jogged to his cruiser. He yelled and waved for the uniforms to follow him. As he was buckling his seat belt, the passenger door flew open, and Millie Brown sat down and began pulling on her seat belt.
“Whoa! What do you think you’re doing?”
“Comin’ wit you.”
“No, ma’am, you can’t.”
“Now you listen here, young man, if this has got anythin’ to do with Cooper bein’ in Coosa County, I’m goin’, and I’m riding wit you,” she stated emphatically, clicking the seat-belt buckle.
“What’s that?” he replied, pointing to her lap.
“My iron. I’s takin’ it for protection.”
CHAPTER 101
The loud explosion confused Cooper, and initially he feared that Mark had doubled back somehow and left him in the cave alone, blowing the exit tunnel shut, entombing him. But after a moment he could faintly hear Grayson crying. He didn’t think Mark would have abandoned the boy—he was his bait, his leverage. Cooper believed that Mark was still in the cave, near what he surmised to be the destroyed tunnel, and he intended to hunt Mark down before he seriously harmed Grayson.
With the cave in total darkness, Cooper knew that using a flashlight would betray his location, but he didn’t have a choice. Whenever he clicked the light off, he couldn’t see anything. He had never experienced such black. Above ground, even in the deepest, darkest woods at night, there was always some source of illumination. Here, he couldn’t see anything—not even his hand in front of his face. At least Mark can’t either.
The silence after the near-deafening explosion, the darkness, and the enormity of the cave were suffocating Cooper’s attempt to think clearly. He dropped to his
knees, suddenly realizing he had his backpack with him. He took a deep breath, let it out slowly and started formulating a plan to rescue Grayson. By touch alone, he opened his pack and removed the steel traps. He wondered how to best use them. If I could arm them, set ’em in that narrow part of the cave I came through, and then lure Mark to the area, he just might set one off. At that point, I click on my flashlight and shoot the bastard.
After a few moments’ consideration and not having a better idea come to mind, he quietly gathered up his gear and began feeling his way back toward the narrow passageway.
After moving only a few yards, Cooper heard the iconic warning buzz of a rattlesnake’s tail. A cold chill shot down his spine, and in that split second, a wave of perspiration covered his body. The sound bouncing off the cave walls made pinpointing its location impossible. Cooper was shaking as he tried to locate the increasingly intense sound, finally deciding that the snake must be ahead of him or it would have already struck. He squatted to make himself as small of a target as possible, in case Mark was nearby, and then he clicked on his flashlight to search for the snake.
When the light came on, Cooper immediately spotted the snake. It was less than an arm’s length away. The timber rattler, one of the largest species of rattlesnakes in the world, appeared to be as big around as his upper arm. Cooper wanted no part of it or its potent hemotoxin venom that would likely kill him before he could get out of the cave. Cooper headshot the snake. He briefly watched it twist in erratic spasms on the cave floor and then fall off a ledge. He clicked off his light. One down.
This cavern was Mark Wright’s ancestral dark secret. Each generation worked diligently to keep it off the official known list of over four thousand Alabama caves. Doing so guaranteed privacy. Anyone exploring the cave would be horrified at what they would discover.
Mark’s great-great-grandfather had been part of the Underground Railroad that helped funnel escaped slaves north. The truth, however, was that his great-great-grandfather was an opportunistic, malignant sadist. He helped many make the journey but solely as a front to ensure a fresh flow of victims coming through, from which he could carefully select the right specimens for his torturous pleasure. If a large group came to him, he would help most move to the next stop. A weak male or a single female would be culled. Allowing the vast majority of travelers to pass eliminated most suspicion, and since it was a dangerous trip that many didn’t survive without the predilections of a demented old man, he enjoyed impunity.
Sickened by what her husband was doing, Mark’s great-great-grandmother slipped away one night with most of the family cash, never to return. A month after she was safely several states away, she sent a man to stop her husband, but he never returned. Two months later, she was found at the bottom of a well. The old man continued his evil ways until his natural death many years later.
Mark’s thermal goggles had been a present to himself last year. He dreamed of stalking one of his brunette victims through the cave. He had been working himself up to human prey. Experimenting with a few stray dogs and one cat, the clarity of the heat signatures were unbelievable. He could tell specifics about each animal before killing it.
Mark affixed his goggles and then checked his pockets for his old .38 caliber blued steel revolver and the two remaining sticks of dynamite. He looked at Grayson’s white form and touched the shock collar remote. Grayson screamed in pain and pleaded for his dad to stop.
“Do you hear that, Cooper? He wants you to come help him! And by the way, you can turn around. We’re back in the main cavern now.”
Mark listened but couldn’t hear anything other than Grayson’s whimpering and sniffling. He knew that Cooper could hear his voice, but he was not close enough for Mark to see his heat signature. Mark would sit and wait. Over the years of stalking his rape victims, he had developed patience. Mark dangled his legs off the table’s edge.
“So, Cooper, how do you like complete darkness? Can’t see shit, can ya? I find it… invigorating. You gotta imagine everything. How do you imagine things? What do you want it to be like?”
Over! I want this to be over… and you dead at my feet, you son of a bitch, Cooper thought but held back from screaming it.
Cooper was slowly inching his way through the cave toward Mark’s voice, making steady progress. He knew that he would eventually have to turn on his flashlight but was trying to cover as much ground as possible by touch, fearing snakebites with each step and movement of his hands along the rock wall.
After several minutes of silence, only periodically broken by the echoing drip of water, Mark stated loudly, “Oh, Coooooooper, I’m guessin’ you killed one of my snakes. Seen any of the others?” Then he laughed sadistically. “You might as well talk to me. So how are you and Brooke doing these days? Better than you and Kelly? You don’t know Brooke like I do. Has she put the moves on you yet? Answer me! You know, I can’t believe you trusted your wife with that nut job Brooke. Now, that was a mistake you’re gonna regret, my friend.”
The constricted passage was obvious. Cooper had to turn sideways to fit through. When he reached the opposite end, he focused on blindly setting the traps in the center of the narrow trail. His hands were shaking as he realized he could easily be wearing one of these traps if he wasn’t careful. Setting traps in broad daylight was difficult enough; doing it from memory, blind, with the fear of being bitten by a rattler at any moment or attacked by a psychopath was almost too much.
“Another thing… if you happen to find some funky sticks while you’re fumbling around in the dark, they aren’t sticks. They’re bones!” Mark let out another disturbing laugh. “Nobody other than family’s made it outta here alive in decades. I just thought you might benefit from that little piece of knowledge. And… in the spirit of being a good host, I’ve decided to share a few tidbits of family history with you and Grayson… and since you’ll never have the opportunity to divulge any of it, I thought why the hell not?”
Mark continued as if in a casual conversation, “So anyway, this is family property—been in my family for generations. Before the War of Northern Aggression it was a big-ass plantation called Live Oaks. Do you see? Live spelled backward is evil. Live Oaks… Evil Oaks. Ironic, isn’t it?”
Cooper didn’t respond but continued setting the traps. As long as Mark kept talking, Cooper had a good idea where Mark was and how much time he had.
“Unfortunately, for me, they had to sell a chunk of the property to keep the family afloat. That still pisses me off. During prohibition, they were gonna make this cave into a gambling hall like Bangor Cave in Blount County. Those owners made millions back in the early 1900s… but the family worried somebody would find out what all had gone on down here—just another missed chance at gettin’ rich. Well, I decided to keep up the family tradition. Not much left of the family but me, Uncle Don—who, by the way most likely died yesterday—and a crazy uncle who lives up the road a little ways. Now that dude’s pretty interestin’. The old bastard had a stroke and can’t talk… and he thinks he’s livin’ at the turn of the century. He just roams the hills around here, scaring the shit outta everybody. Locals won’t even come near this place or him because he’s bat-shit crazy. You never know where he’s at. Hell, he could be in here with us, right now. He could grab you by the throat and gut ya at any second. Everybody needs a crazy uncle, and mine sure has come in handy.”
Mark continued with an eerie ease, “Maybe I’ll get him to help with my little project. He’ll do whatever I ask. All he’s ever wanted was to see the Mississippi River—since he saw it in a National Geographic when he was a kid. Just wants to look at a muddy river. Not very ambitious, is it? You know, I could tell him where your family lives, and for the price of a bus ticket they’d disappear down here one night. So here’s my proposal. How ’bout you come to me, and I won’t tell him where you live? That’s fair. Come on, Cooper, be a hero for your family.”
Cooper listened to every word as he carefully finished locating and settin
g the traps where Mark would surely step on one. Taking a deep breath and saying a quick, silent prayer of thanks that he still had all his fingers, he momentarily clicked on his flashlight to find a place to hide. He quickly spotted a giant limestone formation that offered decent concealment, and it would help him steady his aim. He grabbed his pack and began feeling his way into position when he realized that he didn’t have his rifle with him. Damn it! It’s leanin’ against a tree.
Mark taunted, dragging out each word, “Oh, Cooper? Where. Are. You? If you don’t say somethin’, I’m gonna shock the shit outta little Grayson here, and it’ll be all your fault.”
Cooper turned away from Mark’s voice, cupped his hands, and yelled, “I can’t walk. I think my leg’s broke. For God’s sake, don’t shock the boy. You can have me.”
Mark laughed out loud. He knew well how easy it would be to fall. The cave was full of holes, ledges, and loose rock, plus no small amount of slippery bat guano.
“Fine!” Mark yelled, jumping down. He turned around to look at the table to see his butt print. He could even see the heat signature from where his hands had gripped the table’s edge.
He squatted down to whisper to Grayson, “I expect you to be right here, in this spot, when I get back. Don’t move! If you do, the rattlesnakes will bite you and you’ll die… a very slow and painful death. Ya hear me? You little pansy.”
Grayson’s only response was to curl into a tight ball under the table, whimpering. Mark knew he had broken him. Not that it mattered anymore. Without Brooke, Grayson was a burden. Unless I could sell the little wuss.
Mark stood up and yelled in Cooper’s direction, “Hey, Coop, I got an idea. Let’s play Marco Polo! I’ll be Marco, obviously. You’re Polo… since you wear those preppy shirts all the time… you faggot!”
“Whatever you want. Just leave Grayson alone!”
“Quit trying to be such a damn hero for Brooke. You won’t even come out of hidin’ to save your own family, and you’re worried about her. What’s up with that?”