Southern Gothic (9 page)

“I’ve got to take on what might be the most dangerous job of all. I’m going to visit Luther Boer’s wife.”

Chapter 9

The next day,
Max drove out east on Route 40 and exited onto Thomasville Road. The Winston-Salem city line ran clear out to the town of Walburg where there were several groups of apartment buildings. Some looked well-maintained and pricey. Others looked as if they had been designed in the 1970s — all brick and utilitarian. Then there were those that made Max thankful for his crappy trailer.

Pulling up to one of these disheveled buildings, Max noted the dented cars and scattered trash in the yards. In warmer weather, he imagined most of the people hung around outside — indoors would be too hot. But winter had arrived early, and the biting chill hit Max every time he got out of his car.

Knocking on the door to Apartment B, Max skipped from foot to foot and blew warm air on his hands. He had waited until Luther left for work, and he knew Luther’s wife, Maria, was still inside. So, he knocked again. “Mrs. Boer? Please answer the door.”

When the door finally opened, Max faced a short but harsh-looking white woman. With a cigarette in hand, scraggly hair tied back with a dirty kerchief, and eyes that didn’t want to be bothered, she glared at him like a petulant teenager. “What do you want?”

“You’re Mrs. Luther Boer?”

“Yeah?”

“I was hoping you could answer a few questions about your husband’s involvement with the police department’s crime scene division.”

Her face lost all of its swagger. Jabbing her cigarette in his direction, she said, “I am not going through all that crap again. You IAD people can talk to him direct. And he ain’t dirty, so there ain’t nothing to talk about anyways.”

Max smiled and decided to play along. “No, no, ma’am, you misunderstand. We’re not investigating your husband for any wrongdoing.”

“You’re not?”

“I promise you, he’s not in any trouble coming from us. But he is involved in a case that has crossed our table regarding another officer, and I hoped by speaking with you, I might be able to get the information I need without causing your husband any embarrassment at headquarters. Those things can stall a career, and frankly, when it comes to IAD asking the questions, other police officers might make poor assumptions.”

Her brow furrowed tight. “You sayin’ that by talking with me, you’re trying to protect him from getting an ass-whooping from the other cops?”

“Yeah, that’s pretty much what I’m saying.”

“Shit, why didn’t you say so? Come on in.” She walked away from him and headed into the kitchen. “Want a beer?”

Max glanced at his watch — 10:14 am. “I can’t. I’m on duty.”

The apartment stank of mold and grease. Max suspected the windows had never been opened, and the grime coating the bottoms of the panes backed up this idea. A torn couch sat against one wall and off to the side was a plastic table with two chairs. Junk mail piled up on the chairs, and the table looked like a dumping ground for pizza boxes and take out. In front of the couch was a stained coffee table with three full ashtrays. A few feet away, a small television perched on a pile of old phone directories. Behind the television, hung on the wall bold and proud, Max saw a large poster of a black fist.

Sauntering over to the couch, Maria took a swig from a beer bottle. “So, Mister IAD who don’t want a beer, what is it you want to ask me?”

“I was interested in Luther’s family history.”

“Huh?”

“You see, the person I’m looking into has a long history in this area going back all the way to the days when the land your home is on was probably a plantation. How far does Luther’s family go back around here?”

With her mouth drawn tight, Maria set her beer on the coffee table. She stared at that beer, nodding to herself, and then stood. “Mister, we’re good people and we don’t deserve you trying to drag us down because of things that got nothing to do with us. We’re down far enough as it is.”

“I’m not trying to cause you trouble.”

“Bullshit. I can hear it in your voice. You ain’t good people. I seen the way you looked at that poster. You think you know everything and you’ve got your nose in the air about my home. Ever since y’all found out about Chicken, you been harassing us. Why you always giving Luther the shit jobs? Huh? Why you always passing over him for promotions? You ever think that maybe we need that money to survive? Pay him so little, work him all hours, and then you dare come here trying to paint us with a brush because ol’ Chicken is in my past. Look around here. You think a top man in the police should be living like this?”

“I apologize, ma’am. I’m not insinuating anything about you or your husband. I really only wanted to ask a few questions.”

“Well, you ain’t asked anything yet, but you sure implying a lot.”

Max closed his mouth. Part of him wanted to ask her what Luther had told her he did for a living or about Luther’s gambling. Part of him thought that was too vindictive and might cause trouble for him down the road. Still another part argued that she had a right to know the truth about her husband. Except, other parts of him pointed out, it wasn’t his place to provide that truth.

Turning to leave, Maria said, “Figures. Y’all are such pansies. Can’t solve a crime without Luther but you want to hang him every time he speaks the truth about racial problems.”

Max halted and turned back. “Your husband spends his days collecting evidence at crime scenes for others to process. It’s not a high level position. And the reason you’re poor isn’t his job. Even the lowest crime tech makes good money. Luther’s just a fool who gambles it all away instead of sharing it with you.” The words were out of his mouth before he could stop himself.

“Get out,” she growled. Then she lunged at Max, pounding his back with her fists. “Get out of here! Don’t you ever come back!”

Driving home, Max thought over all Leon had said about people being more honest and straight-forward down here, and in regards to the subject of prejudice, he had to agree. It was easier in the South to know where people stood.

More importantly for the case, Maria Boer’s lack of filter on her thoughts led to her letting the word
Chicken
slip. Whatever that referred to, Max knew he wouldn’t end up researching poultry.

The work went fast. Searching the name Chicken with North Carolina and the late-1800s gave him all he needed. By the time he sat across from Sandra and sipped on his instant noodle soup, he had plenty to share.

“Back during the Reconstruction,” Max said, “there was a man named John Walter ‘Chicken’ Stephens. He got the name when he was young because he stole chickens. Anyway, after the war, he was a Republican as well as a lapdog to the Governor — a scalawag who aided the KKK by turning a blind eye to their actions.”

Sandra nibbled on a piece of toast — the other extravagant part of their meal. “I thought the Republicans of that time became the Democrats of today.”

“Sort of. And the Democrats back then were also the Conservative party. It gets confusing. It also doesn’t matter as much because the bigotry ran deep on all sides. Chicken Stephens didn’t care what party he was with as long as it benefited him. Though nobody could outright prove it, he was suspected of burning barns that belonged to black families, and there were even accusations of murder. Oh and most people of the time, including members of the press, took it as a given that Stephens had stolen his seat in the North Carolina Senate.”

“What a lovely man.”

“After meeting the woman Luther Boer married, I have little doubt she’s related. Must’ve been quite a shock when he found out.”

“Probably caused his gambling problem.”

“Anyway, in May of 1870, the Democrats were holding a convention in the Caswell County Courthouse to figure out their plans for the August state elections. Chicken walks right into the Courthouse despite death threats to him and his family. Even his niece stopped him on his way to warn him that trouble was brewing. But he carried three guns whenever he left the house, so he didn’t think he had to worry.”

“Sounds like he should have worried.”

“You know it. He goes into the courthouse which is filled with former Confederate soldiers and politicians. Nearly three hundred. He runs into Frank Wiley, the county sheriff, and asks him to run again but for the Republican Party. Wiley says he’ll decide later, and in a few hours, Chicken gets a note from Wiley saying they should talk. So, Chicken’s probably thinking that things are going great for him. He meets Wiley and they go to a small storeroom out behind the courthouse.”

Sandra snorted. “Because there’s nothing suspicious with that.”

“Don’t forget. Chicken had ignored a bunch of death threats and because of his connection to the governor, he held a lot of power. I think he was so cocky, he never imagined anyone could touch him.”

“But they did, right?”

“Of course. When Wiley and Chicken got in the storeroom, there were three other men waiting. Wiley ducks out and the three men, with the help of a few others, murdered Chicken. Hung and stabbed him.”

“And this guy’s related to Maria Boer?”

Max finished his soup but his stomach still felt empty. “Yeah, but I think there’s a deeper connection to this case. See, in addition to being a prick, Chicken pissed people off because he also worked with the Union League. They were a very private society that organized former slaves to vote together as a political group — specifically for the Republican party. Since that was Lincoln’s party, most black voters sided with the Republicans, anyway, but through the Union League, these former slaves created the backbone for the party in North Carolina. The League also fought back against the KKK, playing out their own violent missions most nights. The war was officially over, but each night the streets were a madhouse of vengeance.”

“I think I see where this is going. Lilla, right?”

“Exactly. Since Chicken Stephen was active with the Union League, there’s a possibility that he came into contact with either Lilla or her husband.”

Sandra leaned forward, her eyes blazing with excitement. “That’s real interesting because it ties in with what I learned today about Baxter House.”

Drummond poked his head through the ceiling. “Sounds like I got here at the right time.”

“Not exactly,” Max said. “You missed me telling all that I found out about Chicken Stephens.”

“Now it really sounds like I got here at the right time.”

Sandra winked at Drummond, and he gave a bashful grin back. “Can I tell about Baxter House now, or do you two still have some bickering to do?”

“The floor is yours,” Drummond said with a bow and he settled near the sink.

“Thank you. Most of what I found on Sebastian was pretty mundane. He was a local, which we knew, and he went to Reynolds high school. Got a liberal arts degree from UNC and seems to have stayed around Winston-Salem ever since. I’m not completely sure, though, because he jumped from address to address — sometimes more than twice in a year — and then not at all. See, once he’s out of college, records of him become rather sparse. No employment records, no W-2s, nothing like that. He didn’t pay his taxes at all. In fact, I can’t even find where he lived in the last few years.”

“Was he one of those ‘off-the-grid’ types?” Max asked.

“Seems that way. Except then about a year ago, he applies for a position cleaning and taking care of Baxter House. I can’t find anything that suggests he looked for any other job. He sought out that specific job and only that job.”

“That’s definitely strange. I don’t know what it means though.”

Drummond said, “It means he had a specific reason for wanting access to that house. He didn’t need the job for money or anything. Just access.”

“But what if he never got the job? What if it went to somebody else?”

“Lots of options — depends on how far he was willing to go. Before the job went elsewhere, he could threaten the other applicants, make them back out. Or, if that didn’t work, he could create a new job opening by killing off the guy with the position he wants. There’s also bribery. Or he could look into his employer’s history, find something damaging, and blackmail his way into the position. That’s just off the top of my head.”

Max wagged a finger at Drummond. “You think in a very twisted way.”

“See how your mind works once you’ve been at this as long as I have.”

Sandra raised her voice. “Boys, stop it and listen.” She let them stare at each other for a few seconds before continuing. “It doesn’t matter how he did it because the fact is that he did it. Sebastian Freeman got that job. So, I looked into Baxter House and found some important things. After Cal Baxter came into his money, he had the place built quickly, paying double what it was worth to make sure it was done fast. He also designed the house himself and kept the number of workers to a minimum. Even weirder — he had large wood fences built around the property until construction was done.”

“So nobody knows what exactly was built except what we see now.”

“Right.”

Drummond clicked his tongue. “That doesn’t bode well for the builders.”

Max nodded. “Sadly, I agree with you.”