Highway 19 between Alvine and Sparks was a quiet, scenic stretch of road during the daylight hours. After dark, this road in southwestern Minnesota was merely a lonely passage that separated miles of cornfields. In the dead of winter at two O’clock in the morning, the highway was as desolate as if it’d been carved upon the face of the moon.
Al Merit had been the Sheriff in Alvine for nearly a year. He was well-liked in town and enjoyed his work. He was heading home after spending an interesting evening with a female acquaintance and he was driving the cruiser. This, in itself, was not a problem. He had been told that he was free to use the car, that it was a perk of the job. He just didn’t feel right about it tonight. He had been nervous about his first date with Cathy Lane and had consumed more than his customary two beers. He wasn’t drunk, but he was buzzed and he knew it. He now deeply regretted his lapse in judgment.
Al could see the flashing red light up ahead, miles away, signaling the intersection at Highway 42. The blood-red light looked out of place in the passing countryside, where everything was black and white at this time of night. The snow-covered farms had been put to bed hours ago and he hadn’t passed a car since he’d left Sparks. The last Al had heard, the temperature was -18 degrees and a nasty wind had kicked up, which made it feel much colder than that. The flashing light marked the halfway point. He switched on the radio and found a station playing Glen Campbell’s new song: Rhinestone Cowboy. Al found himself singing along.
He noticed the figure nearly a mile from the intersection. Al strained his eyes, but knew in an instant that he was seeing a man walking on the shoulder of the road. Al shut off the radio and cursed his luck. The last thing he needed was for someone to smell beer on his breath. He fumbled for a stick of chewing gum, wondering what the man was doing out in this weather at this time of night.
“Son of a bitch,” he muttered to himself as he drew closer. The figure was definitely a man and a giant of one, at that. Al slowed the cruiser to forty, then to thirty, leveling off at a slow twenty-five MPH. The man had just passed through the intersection and was bathed in intermittent flashes of red light. He was heading towards Al, hands thrust deep in the pockets of a fatigue jacket. Oh shit, thought Al. The country had been flooded with the return of soldiers from Vietnam and many of them had come back damaged from their years of fighting. He’d seen it firsthand and it always put him on high alert. This time was no exception.
A chill ran down Al’s spine as the car crept nearer. The man wore no hat and his hair was long and wild, trailing behind him in the stiff January breeze. He wore a long beard and it looked matted and tangled. Al shuddered when the man stopped walking and turned to face the road. He was expecting him to stop; to offer assistance, which is exactly what he should have done.
Al was suddenly afraid. The man looked to be close to seven feet tall and he appeared to be quite solid under his olive-green jacket. Al was dressed in his Saturday night go-to-town clothes and he wasn’t carrying his gun. The shotgun was locked securely in the trunk. Al fought the fear; it wasn’t the first time he’d felt it. The fear came with the job and any cop who told you different was a liar. At twenty feet away he was looking directly into the man’s vacant, dark eyes and Al felt as if he were looking straight into the face of death. This type of fear was new to him. He couldn’t come to terms with it, couldn’t coax his right foot into stepping on the brake pedal of the Ford LTD. Al felt his body rocked by a spasm of shivers.
Al couldn’t make himself stop the car. He managed a weak wave as he passed the figure and he eased down on the accelerator, breaking the law as he drove through the intersection. He drove nearly one hundred feet before he checked his rearview mirror. The man was waving his arms, which only made him appear to be taller and seem much more menacing.
Al continued to drive, stepping down on the gas pedal until the cruiser hit eighty. He didn’t slow down until he saw the glowing lights of sleepy little Alvine. He had never felt such shame. He’d contemplated turning back many times over the last ten miles, but simply couldn’t bring himself to do it. He couldn’t call for assistance. They would smell the beer on him, a mile away. He was a by the book guy, and he didn’t want to set a bad example.
The tall man had frightened him, but why? Al didn’t know, but what he did know, buzzed or not, was that his days of drinking and driving were over; and perhaps more importantly, that his days as Sheriff were numbered. He’d lost his nerve. Even if the man had been high on PCP or LSD, he should’ve been able to handle the situation. He’d trained for that sort of thing, many times. The guilt was smothering him.
Al parked the cruiser in the driveway and walked into his warm little home and crawled into bed. Sleep evaded him for a long, long time.
The next morning was Sunday and the shrill ring of the telephone woke him at just after eight. Al answered on the fifth ring, still groggy with sleep.
“Hello?”
“Al? I didn’t wake you up, did I?” asked Marge Frapp, the Moon Lake County Dispatcher, who worked out of an office in Meacham.
“No, I’ve been up for hours,” Al lied. “What can I do for you this morning?”
“You’re a terrible liar,” replied Marge. “Listen, I hate to spoil your day off, but we’ve got a dead body to deal with; frozen solid, by the sound of it.”
“What about the County boys, or the State Troopers, can’t they handle this?”
“Afraid not, there’s been an accident over in Glendive. A bad one; you’re on your own with this one. Sorry Al, that’s life as a big city sheriff.”
Al was still wiping the sleep out of his eyes when it hit him. The force of the thought caused him to nearly double over on his single bed. “The body?” he asked in a weak voice. “Where is it?”
“Between you and Sparks on Highway 19, just past the intersection of Highway 42; white male, dead as a doornail on the shoulder of the road.”
“I’ve got it,” stammered Al. “Thanks, Marge.”
“Sorry, just doing my job. I’ve got Jim Hagen on the way to assist you with the body. He’s bringing the hearse.”
Al hung up the phone and held a pillow to his face as the tears began to flow. He knew that he’d killed that man, as surely as if he’d taken his service revolver and shot him in the forehead with it. His body was wracked with sobs and he gave into them. He had never had a suicidal thought in his life, never even understood them until that very moment. He wanted to die. Five minutes would pass before he was able to stand up and head to the bathroom.
Ten minutes later he was heading out of town in the cruiser.
There were four cars at the side of the road, including Hagen’s hearse, which Al was thankful to see. He’d composed himself, not justifying his inaction of the early morning, but coming to terms with it. He’d made a huge mistake, one that he alone would have to live with for the rest of his life.
He stepped out of the car and began to take statements from the farmers who had discovered the body. He avoided looking at the dead man, who appeared to have stretched out on the side of the road and simply went to sleep, forever. He quickly thanked the people and ushered them away, wanting to get this over with. Jim Hagen was inside the warm hearse waiting for Al to finish his investigation.
Al fished out the camera from the glove box and mechanically went about taking pictures of the death scene. He fought the emotions that were screaming from deep within. A tear dripped down the bridge of his nose as he waved Hagen from the car. Al quickly wiped the tear away with his gloved hand.
“Holy smokes, he’s a big one. He looks peaceful, doesn’t he?” asked Hagen. He was a thin man in his early fifties. He wasn’t as sharp as his old man who ran the family mortuary, but he was a whole lot stronger. “I’ll bet he’s frozen to the blacktop,” he added. “This isn’t going to be easy.”
“Just get the gurney,” said Al. “Let’s get this over with.
Hagen did as he was told, opening up the back of the black hearse and pulling out a six-
wheeled gurney. Al began to lift one of the dead man’s legs, discovering that Hagen had been correct. The body was as stiff as a board and frozen to the pavement. Al groaned.
The name on the dead man’s jacket read: Kline. They worked the body back and forth, gradually they ripped it free from the ice with a loud thwack. Al avoided looking at the pasty blue face and the frosted beard. He was on auto-pilot and wanted nothing more than to finish this grizzly task. The ice took a shock of Kline’s matted hair, where it would stay until the thaw in March. Al did a quick search of the body and found Kline’s wallet. There was nothing else of any significance. He opened it up and counted twenty two bucks. He quickly tucked the wallet into his coat pocket. Then, with considerable effort, the men rolled the body onto the gurney and strapped him in for the ride. They then wheeled him up to the back of the waiting hearse and heaved him inside. Hagen expertly locked the gurney into place.
“How do you want to play this?” Hagen asked, lighting up a smoke, offering one to Al. Al took it, gratefully.
“I’d say he froze to death. There are no signs of foul play and my guess is that he was on
something. We’ll have to send him to Worthington for an autopsy. Do you have time to do another transport for us?”
The hearse was cheaper than an ambulance and the Coroner’s office wouldn’t reimburse the Sheriff’s Department; typical red tape and politics. Hagen’s Mortuary turned a quick eighty bucks for the transport. This, in their business, was about all they could do to pick up some extra cash.
“Not today,” said Hagen, exhaling a long plume of smoke into the calm morning air. “I’ve got a wake for Ben Miller this afternoon, funeral’s tomorrow morning. I suppose I could run him down there after we close up tomorrow afternoon.”
“That’ll work, there’s no rush. I’ll get on the horn and see who this guy was. I’ll let Doc Linder’s office know to expect you.”
They spoke for another five minutes, commenting on the weather and speculating on why Kline had been out there. Al casually mentioned that he’d driven this stretch of road the night before and lied that he hadn’t seen anything, just in case it came out somewhere down the line. He didn’t think it would, but he wanted to cover himself, just in case.
He called in the information from Kline’s wallet to Marge, instructing her to check up on the guy. He then drove home and crawled back into bed. He would not attend Mass today, perhaps, never again. He wept long and hard and didn’t get up again until well after noon.
The day passed by in a blur. Al watched television and ate canned ravioli. Try as he might, he couldn’t get Kline out of his head. He wondered if he’d be inside there forever, and supposed that he would. Al was no stranger to death, but this was different. He knew the man’s name and was directly responsible for what had happened.
Al watched the evening news. The good news was that the temperature was going to rise steadily throughout the night, reaching the teens by tomorrow afternoon. The bad news was that a huge snowstorm was approaching from the Rockies and by tomorrow afternoon they might well experience an all-out blizzard.
Al shut off the lights at nine O’clock and went back to bed. He was mentally exhausted and he surprised himself by sleeping straight through until six the following morning. He got up and showered; made himself some eggs and bacon, dressed, and was out the door at a quarter past seven.
He drove down to City Hall where he occupied a few rooms in the basement. Besides his office and Betty’s lobby, there were two cells in the back and a small bathroom. It wasn’t much, but Al had called it home for nearly a year and he hoped to retire from that very office. Al opened the door, noticing the lights were on. Betty Borgstrom was already seated at her desk and Al could smell the coffee brewing.
“Good morning, Al,” greeted Betty, a kind, but frumpish woman in her late fifties. She wore a lime-green pants-suit with a ruffled white blouse. Her platinum blonde hair was screwed into a fresh beehive.
“Morning, Betty,” replied Al, who made his way to the steel coffee pot. “How are you today?”
“Busy, the phone has been ringing off the hook. You’ve got a stack of messages on your desk.”
“You’ve got to be kidding. What the heck is going on?”
“Well, they approved your request for that truck you asked for.”
“The Bronco?” asked Al, suddenly cheering up. He’d asked for the four-wheel drive vehicle six months ago after losing a suspect in a chase, the man had driven his pickup cross-country into a cornfield. Al had been embarrassed over the incident and had nearly demanded the city council approve his request.
“Yep, Mark Swenson says they’ve ordered it from the Ford dealership in Worthington and that you can pick it up on Friday. You’ve got to trade in the LTD.”
“They can have it,” replied Al, sipping his coffee.
“Oh, and a Miss Cathy Lane, telephoned. She said she was expecting a call from you yesterday? And, that you didn’t call? She asked if you were all right.”
“Shit,” muttered Al.
“Anything you’d care to share with me?”
Al looked at Betty and smiled for the first time that day. “Not really,” he said.
“The other thing is that body you picked up yesterday. Captain Lyle Kline?”
Captain? Thought Al, the smile gone as quickly as it’d appeared. “What about him?”
“Turns out he’s a war hero; Congressional Medal of Honor, two Purple Hearts, Bronze Star, the works. He was a pretty big deal. Hollywood was even considering a movie about the guy. We’ve got to get him to Worthington. I was on the phone with the Secretary General this morning.”
“What did you say, the Secretary General? What are you talking about?”
“Sorry, I meant the General’s secretary. Oops. Still, they’re sending some of their own men up here to do an investigation. Apparently, this guy wasn’t into drugs or booze.”
Al felt his face drop. He couldn’t help it, and the coffee cup shook in his hand. “What was he doing there?” he managed. “Has anyone figured that out?”
“Uh-huh, his grandmother lives over in Sparks, looks like he wanted to surprise her. Hank Green found his car last night, looks like the motor hatched. They say he’d walked nearly twenty miles in that cold. The poor guy, what a way to go… Al?”
Al had already closed the door to his inner office.
The storm arrived ahead of schedule. Snow began to fall at just after ten, an hour later the wind swept in. Al spent the morning on the telephone. Hagen promised to be on the road by three, four at the latest, explaining that you couldn’t rush the bereaved. Doc Linder was waiting for the body and promised to do the autopsy as soon as Hagen arrived. Linder also reminded Al that he was a family man and that family men were supposed to be home with their families after dark. Al assured Linder that he understood that, which he certainly did not. He’d never liked Linder, who had a sick sense of humor for a man in his position.
He returned his attention to the window and the driving snow.
Al dismissed Betty at just after one. She lived outside of town with her mother and hated driving in the snow. Al followed her home, happy to be out of the office. The roads were indeed getting bad, and more than once he thought Betty was going to drive her Maverick straight into the ditch. She risked a quick too-da-loo wave as she turned into her long driveway. Al turned around, watching to be sure Betty could make it up her driveway, and then he began to patrol.
There was nothing more he could do and he needed to keep his mind off of Kline. The deepest pangs of hurt had subsided and he was just starting to think that he could cope with it.
He stopped and used the payphone to call Hagen. Old Mrs. Hagen answered with the kindest telephone voice that Al had ever heard. She informed Al that Jimmy hadn’t left yet. She thought he’d be on the road within the hour. And no, Jimmy wasn’t worried about the weather. That old hearse could go through just about anything the good Lord co
uld throw their way. She then invited him out to dinner, which she always did. She had a fifty year-old wallflower and never missed a chance to marry her off. Al declined; he’d met Alice Hagen, who worked alongside her father and brother in the family business. He definitely wasn’t interested.
He continued with his patrol, helping his first stranded motorist at just before three. The storm was picking up strength. A woman had driven her Volkswagen Beetle off the shoulder and the little car had ended up nearly on its side in the steep irrigation ditch. Al didn’t recognize her, but he recognized her last name and he brought her back into town. Her brother would pick her up at the Clark Station.
Between four and five he picked up three more stranded motorists. He drove them all home. Night arrived at a quarter after five and Al cursed the blackness. The snow was falling in waves and at times, Al could barely see the road. He thought six inches might have fallen, but there was no way to be sure with the swirling wind. The heavy LTD barreled down the road, crashing through drifts that stretched out across the road like thick tentacles.
He was out on Cemetery Road, six miles from town, when he noticed his fuel gauge read just over an eighth of a tank. The Ford drank gasoline like it was going out of style. He turned around and headed to town to fill up. The drive took fifteen minutes.
When he arrived in town, Al discovered that both the Clark Station and the Co-op had shut down for the night. He pounded the dash with his fist, wondering what to do. The storm was howling outside the car, lashing against it with a renewed fury. No one would think twice if he called it a day; no one, except himself that is. He didn’t want another Lyle Kline, not on his watch. He picked up his radio and called County Dispatch. Howard Spikes answered.
“Go ahead, Sheriff,” said Howard, a burly man in his late thirties.
“Hey, could you do me a favor? I’m here in Alvine and I’m running low on fuel. Could you call over to Sparks for me and see if the Conoco is still open?”
“Are you sure you can make it there, Al? We’ve called our guys off the road.”
“Yeah, I’ll be okay. Just tell them I could be there in a half hour, in case they were planning on shutting down early.”
“Copy that, Al. I’ll get right back to you.”
Al spied a coke machine and fished a quarter out of his pants pocket. He parked the cruiser in the middle of the road and ran up to the machine. He squinted his eyes against the driving snow, the wind shrieking across the steel outbuildings of the deserted Co-op. By the time he got back inside the warm cruiser, he was freezing cold and Howard was calling on the radio.
“Go ahead, Howard.”
“They’re still there, said they’ll wait for you.”
“Ten-four, thanks a lot, Howard.”
“No problem. Al, I’m supposed to ask. Has Hagen left with that body, yet? We got a call from some General’s office, wondering about that.”
“Yes, he did,” spat Al into the microphone.
“Don’t bite my head off,” replied Howard. “Just doing my job; be careful out there, Sheriff. This is Dispatch, over and out.”
“Copy that, Howard. I’m sorry; it’s been a long day. Unit One, over and out.”
Al dropped the shift lever into drive and slowly crept out of town. Al drove slowly, holding the handle of the spotlight with his left hand as he steered with his right. He found himself alone on the road, which was good. He’d already decided to call it a night after filling up the tank. The car would be ready in case he got a call, which he undoubtedly would. That’s the life of a small-town sheriff. The Force of One, as Al liked to call himself.
The road was straight and flat as a pancake. Al drove the cruiser at thirty MPH and continued to work the spotlight. Thankfully, the ditches were as empty as the road. The red light of the intersection snuck up on him, hiding behind the sheets of snow that fell from the sky. With the flashing red light came the memories. He tried not to think about it and concentrated on the spotlight beam, almost hoping to discover a stranded car in the ditch. Try as he might, he couldn’t get his mind off of Captain Lyle Kline. A tear fell.
The intersection loomed ahead and Al noticed something odd about the snow there. He studied it for a moment, slowing the car to a crawl. It looked as if a plow had run across Highway 42 and had left the intersection plugged with snow. He cursed his luck and wondered what he should do. He stopped the car just outside the intersection, set his can of Coke on the dash and opened his door. He trudged up to the intersection, examining the twin piles of snow that the inconsiderate plow driver had left behind. They were knee-high and compacted. Al cursed again and returned to his car. The needle on his fuel gauge stood at just above empty.
The red light flailed in the wind, the intermittent flashing beckoning him to try and pass through. He knew he should turn around, yet, Al couldn’t bring himself to do it. He carefully backed up the LTD and said a quick prayer.
Al gathered speed and hit the first pile of snow at nearly thirty miles per hour. The Ford bucked violently and exploded into the intersection. Al cheered. The crash had caused the car to lose valuable speed and Al pressed hard on the gas pedal. The rear tires broke loose and the cruiser began to fishtail. Al fought the wheel, knowing he was past the point of no return. The cruiser was nearly straightened out when it hit the second pile of snow.
There was a fleeting second where Al thought he’d actually make it. The heavy car lurched up and over the snow-bank, back tires spitting rooster tails of white powder, before it settled down halfway across the obstruction. Al screamed as he shifted into reverse. The car moved a few feet and sank.
Al sat there for a long moment. His body shook with a futile anger and he wanted to lash out at someone. He swore a long string of curses and then reached for the microphone. It was wet and sticky. Al looked at the radio, noticing that the indicator lights were not working. He quickly found the dome light and switched it on. The nearly full can of soda had dumped its contents on his radio. He’d forgotten it on the dash before he’d plowed into the snow. He tried the microphone, there was no response. He clicked thru the channels, nothing. Al screamed in anger. He then began slamming the transmission into gear; trying to rock the heavy car; knowing it was useless, but trying, just the same.
Five long minutes passed. Al had never felt so helpless. There was a shovel in the trunk and he pulled on his heavy jacket and leather gloves, knowing it was his only hope. He attacked the snow with a vengeance. He shoveled for nearly ten minutes before getting back behind the wheel and giving it another try. The car moved.
Al rocked the car back and forth, being patient. He had about two feet of play and he backed up and put the cruiser into park. He could do this. He got out again and continued to shovel. Satisfied, he stowed the shovel in the trunk and returned to the car. This time there was no question. The cruiser hesitated for only a second before lurching out of the intersection. Al let out a whoop.
And that’s when the engine began to sputter.
“Shit!”
Al feathered the pedal, coaxing the Ford another fifty feet before the engine died. The car was out of gas. He calmly shifted the transmission into park and switched off the lights, then the ignition. He then began to scream. Blood-red light filtered inside the car from the intersection. The light seemed to be mocking him. Kline had caused this to happen, Al was certain of that. He was parked just a few feet away from where the man had died and Al could feel his presence. Al tried to compose himself, wondering what he should do. He knew the best plan was to stay with the car. Someone would come along, more than likely it’d be the plow driver who’d caused this mess. Al thought about how good it’d feel to give him a piece of his mind. To write the man a few tickets, expensive tickets.
But Al couldn’t stay with the car. Kline was there, he knew it like he knew his own name. The blue face was there every time he closed his eyes. The fear was back. Al got out of the car and began to walk. Sparks was ten miles ahead. He could m
ake it.
He’d walked about two hundred yards when he began to hear something. The sound began to build like a growling dog that was rapidly approaching in the darkness. Al froze in his tracks; shivers ran up and down his spine. The sound continued to build and Al finally understood what it was. The plow was heading back down Highway 42. Al began to run back towards the intersection.
The flashing light was merely a red speck in the distance, the snow obscuring the cursed glow. Al fought to retrace his footsteps in the snow. Wind lashed at his exposed face, howling in his ears. He ran, heart racing inside his chest. He could see the dark silhouette of the cruiser, snow already frozen to the warm windshield. He trudged on, careful not to slip and fall. He could hear the plow clearly now, its yellow lights becoming visible in the dark storm. Al screamed for it to stop. The blade of the plow roared across the icy blacktop, blotting out his screams.
The plow driver was supposed to stop at the four-way intersection, but he didn’t. Al stared in disbelief as it shot across the intersection without even slowing down. The sound of the plow quickly diminished, the roaring of the blade carried away with the wind.
Al continued to run, hoping somehow that the plow driver would realize that he’d just left
someone stranded at the intersection. He stood under the flashing light for a long time.
Jim Hagen drove the hearse under the Emergency Room canopy and slammed the transmission into park. He quickly exited the car and ran inside the double-doors.
“You can’t park that there, Mr. Hagen,” said the Charge Nurse. “Besides, Linder is waiting for you in the basement. He’s mad as hell.”
“Get a doctor,” ordered an ashen-faced Hagen. “Do it now! I’ve got Sheriff Merit in the car.”
“Dear God.”
Twenty minutes later, Hagen was backing the hearse into the garage, under the back of the hospital. Linder was waiting there along with two strong-looking men. They opened the door and stood back, looking inside with a confused stare.
“Where the hell is your gurney?” snapped Linder.
“I had to leave it alongside the road. We had an emergency.”
Linder shook his head. “Couldn’t you have at least bagged him? My God, man.”
Hagen shook his head. “He’s too big. We don’t have bags that size.”
Linder looked at the body with a furrowed brow. “Well,” he said to his help. “Don’t just stand there, go find a gurney!” He then returned his attention to Hagen. “What the hell happened out there? I damn near came looking for you, myself. Your mom is worried sick.”
Hagen rubbed his pasty face with both hands before speaking. His hands were still shaking. “I got a late start, it couldn’t be helped. The roads were terrible, I almost turned back. When I got to the intersection of 19 and 42, I found Sheriff Merit’s cruiser abandoned at the side of the road. It was covered in snow, must’ve been there a few hours.”
“Merit, eh?” asked Linder.
“I found him lying down on the side of the road, in the exact same spot we’d found this guy on Sunday morning. He wouldn’t respond, shock, I think. I don’t know; I’m not a doctor. I did everything I could to get him to snap out of it. I tried getting him into the passenger seat, but I couldn’t do it by myself. He was as limp as a sack of potatoes. Finally, I just rolled your stiff there, off the gurney and pulled the Sheriff in alongside him.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“I wish I was. I didn’t know what else to do. I couldn’t just leave him there. Anyhow, about halfway here, Merit woke up…”
“And found himself in the back of a hearse, with this giant?”
“Exactly!”
Linder’s face grew pale. “Oh shit,” he muttered. “What happened then?”
“Well,” said Hagen. “He started to scream. I think he’s still screaming upstairs in the Emergency Room. I don’t know Doc; I think he’s lost it.”
Hagan’s diagnosis proved to be right on the money. Al’s days of patrolling the countryside were over. His mind had retreated to a faraway place, never to return. Captain Lyle Kline would be buried with full military honors at Arlington Cemetery. The service was attended by President Carter and several high ranking military officials. They all agreed it had been a terrible, senseless tragedy.
And, had he been able to speak, no one would’ve agreed more than Sheriff Al Merit.
Terror from above
Bits And Pieces Page 6