Long Holler Road - A Dark Southern Thriller (10 page)

  Frank saw them first and waved, smiling like he always did. He cut his saw off and waved both hands over his head to get Hugh’s attention. Hugh saw the sheriff but kept on working, not wanting to stop until he had cut completely through the felled tree. When the log was cut through, he stopped his saw and wiped the sweat from his face with an old checkered handkerchief. Snake had been running the winch that was loading the truck. He stopped what he was doing as well and jumped from the back of the truck to the ground.                                                                                                                

  These men were doing the hardest work the sheriff could imagine, in heat that would kill some men, and could barely make ends meet. Of course if Hugh didn’t spend a lot of his money on alcohol, things would be easier. But given the fact that he had a wife that was almost crippled and getting worse every day, who really needed full time care he couldn’t provide, and then two sons, who were hard workers, but were most likely not mentally capable of making a living on their own, the sheriff could kind of understand why a man would want an escape from cruel reality.

  Snake asked the sheriff if he wanted a cool drink of water. The sheriff thanked him and told him no. Then he looked at Hugh, who looked beaten down from the hard work and little sleep he had gotten the night before. The sheriff had to do his job, no matter how hard it was. He decided not to tell Hugh he was under arrest until they were in the car and on their way to the sheriff’s office. He didn’t want to upset Snake and Frank.

  “Hugh, I need you to come with me. I’ve got a few more things I have to clear up. I know you need to work, but this has to be done.”

  “Alright then,” Hugh said, looking down at his old ragged work boots. “I’m plum tuckered out today anyhow from not sleepin’ last night. Let’s go git this over with. Now by god, you can’t keep me up all night tonight, though.”

  Hugh got in the car with the sheriff as Snake and Frank watched.

  “Daddy, what do you want us to do?” Snake asked.

  “Just load everthang up and go on home, boys. Frank, you drive the truck, but be keerful. We’ll git a fresh start in the mornin’.”

  As the sheriff started backing his car up, Snake yelled, “You’ll be home for supper won’t you? I’m cookin’ pinto beans and corn bread tonight.”

  The sheriff had to look away from Snake and Frank and try to control the big lump that was in his throat.
What in the world is gonna happen to Annie and those boys?

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  We were walking down the dirt road from the old grist mill dam when we saw an old pick-up truck approaching. Me, Glenn and Tom had just helped Randall Robins get in his hay and had walked down to the creek to jump in the cool water and rinse away the stinging, itchy straw that clung to our sweaty bodies.

  Jack Bynum pulled up beside us, his left arm hanging out the window of his truck. “Reckon you boys could help me if I paid you a little? My old bull busted down the fence and got over in Hugh Williams pasture and I can’t get him up by myself.”

  I couldn’t think of anywhere I had rather
not
be than Hugh Williams pasture in light of what had just been found there two days before. But we were all raised to believe that you always helped a neighbor in need, and a couple of extra dollars on top of what I’d just earned wouldn’t be bad either. So we all agreed to help Mr. Bynum and jumped in the back of his pick-up.

  There were still a couple of unmarked cop cars on Hugh’s property when Mr. Bynum pulled the truck over on the shoulder of the road. We jumped out and asked him where he’d last seen the bull, thinking more about the cop cars and the bodies that had been found in a liquid state, than the actual task at hand. He told us that he had seen him chasing one of Hugh’s milk cows down on the creek bank, and he figured the reason his bull got out was because the old cow was in heat.

  When we crossed the fence over into Hugh’s pasture, one of the cops who was sitting in his car got out and asked what we were doing. He told us that this was a crime scene and we weren’t allowed on the property. When Mr. Bynum told him about his bull, he looked us over and must have decided we didn’t look much like crazed killers. Of course Hugh Williams didn’t look like one either.

  “Well, go ahead,” the cop told us reluctantly. “But be as quick as you can and let me know when you leave. Don’t touch anything or take anything off the property.”

  We nodded, stating that we understood and accepted his terms and began walking in a fast pace toward the creek. The shade of the trees along the creek was a welcoming sight. It was a hot day and I was completely dry from our little swim we’d had earlier.

  Mr. Bynum stopped and put his hands on his hips, looking up and down the creek. “Boys, let’s split up and see if we can find him that way. If one of you sees him, just yell real loud. If we can git him hemmed up down there in the corner where the gate is, I believe he’ll cross the creek and go through it. He’s probably mounted that old cow a hundred times by now. Maybe he’s got it out of his dern system. But be careful. An old horny bull can git kinda fractious sometimes.”

  Well, this was wonderful. If we hadn’t been in the wrong place at the wrong time, I could be resting right now in my cool bedroom, smelling what Momma was cooking for supper, listening to my new Eagles tape. Mr. Bynum would have found someone else to help him. Instead, I was trying to find a bull that weighed almost a ton, that was horny, and I was going to try to separate him from the one thing that could relieve his horniness. I was pretty sure he was not going to go without a fight. On top of that, all of this was taking place on the property where two people who had been murdered were found in barrels, their bodies reduced to a gruesome, stew-like substance. What a glorious day this had turned out to be.

  I started walking down the creek bank with the ambiguous feeling that I wanted to find the bull and get this over with, and at the same time hoping one of the others found him first. The water level of the creek had gone down considerably in the last couple of weeks like it always did in the hot, dry summers. I had my head down looking for hoof prints, which was crazy, because the whole creek bank was covered in them. Hugh’s cows came here to get water and would stay in the cool shade most of the day in the summertime.
             

  Not watching where I was going, I tripped over a sizable mound of dirt that looked out of place on the otherwise smooth creek bank. It looked like wild ferns were growing on top of it, but when I took a closer look, I noticed that the ferns had been uprooted. It looked more like they had been laid over the top of the mound, maybe to conceal it. If that was what they were trying to do, they had only done a half-assed job. I squatted down on my haunches to pull out what appeared to be a white root that was sticking out the side of the mound, near the bottom. It didn’t give at all, and felt cold and wet. Not giving up, I straightened my legs and placed my foot on the side of the mound for leverage and pulled harder. The root started to give and the small tree it was attached to began to emerge from the damp pile of dirt. I saw what I believed to be a piece of cloth that had been wrapped around part of the tree and brushed away the packed soil from it with my other hand. It was then that I realized that what I was pulling up was not a small tree at all. It was a man’s arm. What I had thought was a small piece of root was a finger, the blue nails caked with mud.

  To my surprise, I didn’t scream like a girl. I calmly stepped back a few feet and yelled, “Y’all come here, quick!”

  “Did you find him?” It was Tom’s voice.

  “Just come here. Everybody.” I answered loudly.

  Tom came trotting up before the others and looked at me as if I had lost my mind. He could see the mud on my hands that I hadn’t bothered to wipe off. I didn’t say anything, just pointed to the partially exposed arm that looked like it belonged to a mannequin.

  When Tom finally realized what it was, he jumped back and shouted, “Oh, my lord. Is that a…oh,… that….that ain’t real.”

  “Yeah, it’s real, Tom.” I said, watching the color rapidly drain from his face.

  Neither of us said a word as Glenn and Mr. Bynum walked up at the same time. We just kept looking from the arm back to each other.

  “Well? What is it?” Glenn finally asked, thinking it must be some kind of joke.

  Me and Tom pointed at the same time. “It’s that,” Tom said, waving his pointed finger.

  “Oh my God. Not another one.” Mr. Bynum muttered under his breath.

  Glenn looked like he was going to faint, so I grabbed his arm, “Are you alright? You’d better sit down,” I said, pulling him away from the body. At least I assumed there was a body that the arm belonged to. After hearing what was found in those barrels, I didn’t know if it was attached or not.

  Mr. Bynum looked at us, a grave expression on his face. “Boys, I wish I hadn’t of brought you here. Y’all ain’t got no business havin’ to see somethin’ like this at your age.”

  “It’s okay, Mr. Bynum,” I said. “Somebody had to find it sooner or later. I can’t believe those cops missed it. I guess it’s a good thing you did bring us here.”

  Mr. Bynum shook his head and said, “I guess we better go up there and tell that lawman what you found, George.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  “Somebody’s got it in fer me and I don’t know why. Lord knows I ain’t never hurt a livin’ soul in my life. You’ve knowed me all yore life, sheriff. I’ve lived right there in Long Holler in the same house I growed up in. Reckon why somebody would want me to go to the ‘lectric chair?”

  Hugh Williams was in tears. He couldn’t remember crying since his momma died when he was twelve. He wasn’t feeling sorry for himself. He was worried about his wife that couldn’t take care of herself and his two boys. Frank was nineteen, Oscar, who everybody called Snake, was just a little over a year younger. They could both cook and do some things for their momma, but they couldn’t make a living. They were hard workers, but didn’t know anything but cutting pulpwood and Hugh had to tell them almost every move to make when they were doing that. Only the repetitive tasks that required little thought or reasoning was all he could depend on them for without keeping a close eye on them.             

  Most people would call them
slow.
Neither could read above a third grade level and both had quit school at sixteen to help Hugh, who desperately needed it. The teachers were glad to see them go. They felt like they were a waste of time anyway, because they couldn’t learn and were holding the other kids back.

  Both boys had hearts as big as all outdoors and would do whatever you told them. Hugh just couldn’t imagine them being able to find enough work that they were capable of doing to keep the light bill paid and pay for Annie’s medication which was getting more expensive all the time. Hugh also had a small mortgage on his house and property that he had taken out to buy logging equipment. They didn’t know how to go about paying that every month, even if they had the money. And who was going to take their momma to the doctor? Neither boy had a drivers license and couldn’t pass the written exam to get one. They probably couldn’t pass the drivers test, either. The thoughts of them out on the road in a car, or especially the old log truck, scared Hugh to death.

  Hugh’s oldest daughter, Georgia, lived in Atlanta and had a good job. But her husband was a big shot that hated her family and wouldn’t allow her to even visit much, so the prospect of her caring for her mother was out of the question. Virginia, his other daughter, had gotten married at eighteen and moved to Chicago and never looked back. Hugh wouldn’t even know how to contact her.  

  When the other body had been found, that pretty much removed any lingering doubt anyone had in their mind that Hugh Williams was a cold blooded killer. The sheriff still had a hard time believing it, but would have a hell of a time convincing anyone else that didn’t know Hugh as well as he did. And not many people did know Hugh very well. He had been in Long Hollow all his life, but never socialized at all. If he wasn’t working, he was taking care of Annie, or drunk, or a lot of times both. He didn’t have drinking buddies, preferring his own company when getting inebriated. If most people in Long Hollow hadn’t seen him in passing at the store or out working somewhere, they might not even know he existed.

  The sheriff was also very concerned for Hugh’s family. He thought about having some kind of fundraiser to try and raise a little money to help them. He couldn’t stand to see a hard man like Hugh sit in front of him and cry like a baby. Detective Baker had wanted to interrogate him again when the sheriff had finished and Andrew White wanted Hugh to calm down a little bit first.