Zion (22 page)

 A police officer arrived in less than ten minutes. The officer on duty had been working a wreck over at Dead Man’s Curve in the middle of town. James Luke had passed the fender bender and the officer on his way to Old 51, where he made the turn north toward Mississippi. The officer left the accident and headed back downtown, now going in the direction where James Luke had just left, the patrol car lights flashing.

Less than a half an hour later, all of the old bridge ladies were out on their front lawns, and plenty of the town and gown learned of the gruesome murder at the Claiborne House. A reporter from the
Star-Register
who lived in a garage apartment up the street was onsite writing notes for a story in his little steno pad, gathering the facts for the Monday, July 29, 1974, afternoon paper. He was almost jolly because he knew it would make front page news above the fold. “If it bleeds, it leads,” and this story was drenched in blood.

Later in the night, Marshal Brownlow drove over with his bloodhounds. He had been called because he was the brother-law to the Pickleyville chief of police, Bruce Nesom, and because he had tracking dogs. It took less than ten seconds standing in the bedroom for him to recognize both Wesley and Charity, and to see that they were as dead as stones.

Coroner L.B. Wallace, a veterinarian in Ruthberry, said they’d died within minutes of the phone call to the police station. There was enormous blood loss, and the two beautiful people were pretty no longer. He said this was the worst murder scene he’d witnessed since the stabbing of a Negro boy in 1957 for whistling at a white woman in Liberty City.

The marshal had never seen anything quite like it either. And it was not just the gore in the bedroom and the bathroom. It was the unmitigated waste of it all, the loss of human life, the potential for good lives lost. Or at least one good life, Wesley’s, whereas Charity’s ship had long sailed, gone to sea ever since she was a girl and into a dark water forever.

Chief Nesom and the marshal spoke to the Presbyterian minister in the front yard of the big house. He was the Claiborne family’s long-time pastor. An erudite man who had graduated from Princeton, he said he would call Dr. Claiborne in Washington, D.C., just as soon as he got the number from the man’s sister who lived in town and was also a member of the church.

“You know,” the Reverend Hannibal Knox said, “there was a gentleman sitting in a panel truck parked on the street. It was a blue Chevrolet, I believe. I saw him when I was preparing to leave for the manse after the service. He got out of his truck, and he was dressed for worship, well dressed. I think he carried a book, a copy of the Holy Scriptures, but I did not recognize him at all. He was headed west toward the little lane behind the houses. This was peculiar, because as I said, he was not present at our evening worship service, and the automobile is now gone. We had perhaps thirty people in attendance tonight, and I would have noticed any visitors. I almost went over to speak to him before I walked to the manse.”

“Can you tell me what he looked like?” asked the marshal.

“Average-looking, a Caucasian gentleman with black hair. The darkness was hardly overcome by the street light,” said the minister. “This probably will not help you. I wish I could offer more details.”

“It helps a little,” Nesom said.

The marshal and the chief were standing outside on the front steps of the Claiborne place. The chief smoked a Tampa Nugget cigar, and the marshal chewed a piece of gum.

“This Bible was on the bed,” a detective said. “It had a little blood on it and looked out of place. It seemed odd, the woman being naked under her robe and all, and the kid not far away from her, all of that with the Bible laying on the bed. Plus she was drawn on a big poster board on the first floor like the kid was drawing her naked or something.”

The detective held the book carefully with a handkerchief. Brownlow and Nesom inspected it. The detective avoided the blood stains on the cover with his bare fingers. They could read a note written in black ink on the front flap. “From Tom to James Luke. Seek and ye shall find. God bless. December 24, 1961, Thomas E. Hardin.”

“Our man is James Luke Cate,” the marshal said. “And this is a disaster right out of hell,” Brownlow told the chief.

“Somebody might ought to go see that old boy,” the chief said.

“If he ain’t blood loss dead already. He left here with a blood trail, drips and drops,” Brownlow said.

“We couldn’t be lucky enough to find him dead,” the chief replied.

The marshal took his dogs from the kennel on the back of his truck. He aided the Pickleyville police with tracking a blood trail that left the house heading out of the back door. He’d brought both of his hounds, Dixie and Duke, and they picked up the trail and were soon making a beeline through backyard and the alleyway toward the Federated Presbyterian Church. Once at North Spruce, they stopped. The marshal and the city detective watched the dogs go cold on the trail. The hounds had lost the scent and sniffed the air above the street.

“Drove off, huh?” Chief Nesom said, stating the obvious.

“I’d say so,” the marshal answered. “Did y’all find any weapons?” he asked.

“No, but there was an open box of .25 autos on the nightstand and there were three spent .25 casings and three .45s on the floor,” the chief said.

Two hours passed. Tom and Sara Hardin were met at the front door of their house in Zion by Marshal Brownlow and Reverend Poole. The marshal said, “We are sorry, but we’ve come here to tell you that Wesley has been killed at the home of Howell Claiborne. Both Wesley and Mrs. Charity Claiborne were shot to death in the house, and the best I can tell it was murder. The shooter has not been positively identified yet. I am deeply sorry to carry the news to you.” He was withholding information until he could locate James Luke or get a little closer to doing so.

Tom said, “When I find out who did this, I’m going to kill him.”

Marshal Brownlow nodded. He didn’t want to say anything to the contrary. He was angry enough to kill someone himself. Still, he didn’t want to chase two men instead of one.

 In the living room of the house on Lower Louth Road, the old Hardin home place, Tom held Sara for the first time in many weeks as they both wept the uncontrolled tears that accompany the death of an only child, a grief so inconsolable that not holding one another up, each would have fallen down to the wood floor.

Marshal Brownlow stayed at the house for a while with Poole. They stood on the front porch in the night air and talked. Corrine Travis, Tom’s faithful cousin, arrived. Brownlow said he wanted to escort Tom to the city morgue to claim the body as soon as he was able to go. Wesley’s driver’s license was in his wallet, and the marshal knew exactly who the boy was despite the disfigured head.

Corrine and Reverend Poole said they would stay as long as necessary. The marshal left this house of mourning and went to put the dogs in the pen. He asked Reverend Poole not to let Tom or Sara leave. He would return shortly or try to figure out the best way to persuade Tom to go to the morgue.

The marshal called the police station in Natchez and alerted the officer on duty about the murders in Pickleyville, Louisiana. He said he had a warrant issued by the police in Pickleyville. Then he asked for permission to interview James Luke and his wife, depending on who could be located. The officer said he’d call the chief at home and get back to him.

Brownlow needed to meet again with Tom and take him to claim the body. So he called the house and spoke to Reverend Poole, who said Sara was in bed and two female co-workers from Doolittle Library were there holding a vigil, as was Corrine. One of the women had given her enough valium to sleep a standing horse.

The marshal asked the minister to drive Tom over to City Hall to claim the body. He said he’d do it.

Soon, the marshal met Reverend Poole and Tom at the Pickleyville City Hall, where the police station, jail, and makeshift coroner’s office were housed. The minister had driven Tom in his Oldsmobile. Inside City Hall, they sat on a recycled church pew in the hallway when the marshal arrived. The place smelled like Pine-Sol, ammonia, and death.

“I’m sorry,” the marshal said as he walked in.

“I thank you,” Tom said.

Reverend Poole stood and shook the marshal’s hand absently.

“Are you up to seeing the body?” the marshal asked.

“Not really, but I don’t guess it’s right not to,” Tom said.

“No,” Brownlow said. “I don’t guess it’s much of an option.”

Tom claimed the body. The head trauma had swelled, and the face only half resembled his son. He could recognize the left side of the face, which was unharmed. The big bullet had hit the right side of the forehead with explosive force and disfigured it beyond natural recognition.

He did not linger long while Coroner Wallace pulled the cover back over the body. The veterinarian casually noted that Charity was in the cooler, too.

“The loss of a son is the greatest of all losses,” Tom remembered reading in his world literature class at the junior college. It could have been the words of Professor John Coumes or the writings of Heraclitus, though he could not recall which one. But now the words belonged to Tom Hardin, and they were purchased like an oath.

Reverend Poole went home. Just the marshal and Tom sat in a City Hall interview room drinking coffee. The building was empty except for a night dispatcher. The marshal had said he’d take Tom back to his house. He updated Tom on how the dogs closed in on the trail, losing the track and the scent two blocks over on North Spruce. He told Tom about finding the bloody Bible with James Luke’s name written on it. He mentioned the Presbyterian preacher said he saw a vehicle.

“Are there any fingerprints?” Tom asked. It was as if he’d been crushed by a giant weight, his body drawn into itself like a turtle in a shell as he sat in the chair.

“I don’t know,” the marshal said. “You’ll have to ask the chief. But your name was written in front of the book.”

“That’s the Bible I gave James Luke, that no-good bastard. You know he did it. I guess what Charity said about my wife must have been true,” Tom said.

“Is there any chance that Wesley’d have the Bible you gave James Luke in ’62?” Brownlow asked.

“None, no chance,” Tom said.

“Well, I’ll have to get a warrant, and Bruce Nesom is working in it. Cate’s surely wounded, shot by either Charity or Wesley. I don’t know which at this point.”

“Did my boy suffer?”

“No, Tom, not from the looks of things.” The marshal took off his cowboy hat and wiped sweat from his forehead. He sipped the coffee trying to stay awake.

“We need to find him,” Tom said. “Or I need to find him. I’ll damn well find him.”

“Best to let the law handle this.”

Tom made a fist. “I’ve got a dead son here. Where was the law for him when he needed it?”

The marshal was worried the time was short before there would be vengeance. He decided to take Tom home immediately and get Freddy Wentworth to watch the house to be sure Tom didn’t leave. When he got back to the office after dropping Tom off at home, Mrs. Lott was waiting for him, where she’d kept her post since he called earlier in the night. She had phoned every hospital between Pickleyville and Vicksburg, and no patient fitting James Luke’s description or name had staggered in needing treatment. This fact did not make finding the man any easier.

He called James Luke’s house in Natchez and woke his wife, who said he was on a fishing trip to Arkansas. The marshal asked about the make and model of the truck. She said he owned a blue Chevrolet Suburban and that he’d been gone for a couple of days now. No, she didn’t have the license plate number on the truck off hand, nor did she expect him to be home until Monday. She said there was no way to reach him. The marshal asked her to call him the minute he arrived.

“Is he in some kind of trouble?” she asked.

“I just need to talk to him as soon as possible,” he answered.

Brownlow was caught up in the case because of the hounds, or so he had told himself, even though the primary reason was that he was deeply involved in the Zion community and everyone who lived there. He was able to assist in the investigation with Chief Nesom’s permission, and the bloodhounds had raised his status. He’d gotten to be a major player in the region’s law enforcement activities because of his dogs and his decades-long connections to area lawmen. Some local folks wanted him to run for the state legislature in Baton Rouge, but the heart attack was slowing his ambitions, not that he’d ever had much ambition to begin with. His dogs were the only trained tracking bloodhounds east of Angola Penitentiary in Louisiana, and recently he’d been called out to a county on the Mississippi Gulf Coast to help find a lost child.

Brownlow felt responsible for this disaster in many ways. By talking to James Luke Cate in the first place, he had allowed the man to connect the dots back to Charity, and this led directly to the deaths of two people. But even if it was inevitable, Charity was the one digging up trouble like a dog after a long-buried bone, causing anguish for others and even herself. The first level of culpability was attached to her.

He was worn down by the long day that had spread into the night. The only time he had any real energy was when he was with his hounds, and having them in the truck box buoyed his strength. After the long night, his wits were not slowed, even if his body was anything but spry. He had succeeded in getting Tom sequestered for a couple of more hours, at least until he could figure out a plan to do something with him.

Deputy Marshal Freddy Wentworth waited at the Hardin family’s driveway with instructions not to let Tom leave until the marshal arrived. Brownlow was worried about Tom going off the reservation, taking justice the old way, and he did not want another murder to deal with inside his district or anywhere else if it could be prevented.

At eight-thirty on Monday morning, Marshal Brownlow awoke from a few hours of sleep. He had a solid plan worked out in his mind. He placed an all-points bulletin on the Suburban after getting the license number from the Adams County Sheriff’s Office. He spoke to the Natchez chief by phone.

He then called Chief Bruce Nesom at his house at nine o’clock. “How are you?” he asked.

“Donald, must you harass me? I just fell asleep a couple of hours ago, and I’m not going to work till noon. Lest you forget, I was up all night.”

“Brother-in-law, I needed to wake you,” Brownlow said. “I have a plan to deal with Tom Hardin. I’ve got a reasonable feeling he might try to go after Jim Cate, and that would mean more trouble by far.”

“He’d be mostly justified. No jury’d ever convict him in Louisiana. Mississippi maybe, because Cate lives up yonder and not here. How’s Tom doing now?”

“I don’t know. He was pretty shook up. Freddy is at Tom’s house parked in his driveway making sure he doesn’t leave—assuming Freddy ain’t asleep on the job.”

“At least somebody’d be getting a little sleep. I’m for that. You can’t keep him boxed in forever,” Nesom said.

“I have a plan to handle it. I want to take Tom with me to find Jim Cate, keep him close to the breast. Otherwise, like I said, I’ll be chasing two people, and one is plenty hard enough to deal with.”

“So, why’d you call me? To ask my permission? I ain’t your boss. Besides, you’re overstretched plenty with the heart trouble, Donald. It’s not even your jurisdiction. It’s nine in the morning, and I’m trying to sleep. You see how important it is to me, don’t you?”

“Well, I’m looking for sound advice from a friend and fellow peace officer. And yes, it’s your jurisdiction, not mine.”

“They say Cate’s old lady’s daddy’s got big money. I asked one of my officers who just come here from working up at the Natchez P.D., and he said James Luke Cate married into the Tartt family, and his wife’s daddy’s the president of the biggest bank in Natchez. You’ll be up against some old money in Mississippi. Liable to get your ass in a hard pinch, and you well know the man has left the parish.”

“But I can’t rest till I lock him in jail. Then they’ll lawyer the hell out of us. That’s okay, I guess. We always have to deal with that. I need to help old Tom out.”

“Can Hardin be trusted? Because it’s a pure-d risk having him along. The fellow’s a common citizen with no law enforcement background at all as far as I know.”

“Yes, he can be trusted. He’s a good man.”

“Can anybody really be trusted?”

“You’ve been in politics too long, Bruce.”

“Damn, you’re the one that got me into politics, and you’ve been elected even longer than me.”

“I know, I know. To hell with it. Glad you answered the phone. Go on back to bed.”

“I will, Donald.”