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sundown in zion

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Gideon returns home after visiting Charlie's wife and boyfriend.

            “I don’t know what to say.” Charlie’s eyes were moist and his face red. He said, “I really don’t know what to say. He looked at the pile of papers before him and picked up the check book.

            “How about, ‘You sailors aren’t as bad as I’ve always heard,’ and let it go at that,” Nelson said.

            Charlie flipped the pages of the check book. “There’s even some money in here. And there will be another deposit this week.”

            “You probably ought to change accounts,” Nelson said. “Sluggo may convince her to pull a stunt.”

            “I’ll take care of it,” Charlie said, “now that I have my own car.”

            They had picked it up late the night before without incident. The title was where it was supposed to be and there had been no sign of life inside the house. Charlie had smiled like a teenager on his sixteenth birthday when he slid under the wheel. He had gone straight home. He was finishing breakfast next morning and sorting his records when Nelson arrived.

            “So,” Charlie said, pushing the papers aside as Nelson sat across the table with a cup of coffee. “Did you steam along false bearings on your way home last night?”

            “Is everything there?” Nelson said, ignoring the question.

            “I think so,” Charlie said. “I think I’ll go shopping for some new clothes and then find a new bank.”

            “Sounds like a good plan,” Nelson said. “I’m off to Connerville.”

            “Oh hell,” Charlie said. “What now?”

            “I have an appointment with the police chief.”

            Charlie cocked his head in surprise. “How the hell did you manage that?”

            “Friends in high places.”

            “No doubt. You never cease to amaze me. What do expect from the police chief?”

            “Not much,” Nelson said, “it might be interesting to note what he doesn’t tell me.”

            “Good luck,” Charlie said. He stood and walked to the front door and opened it. He walked onto the porch and Nelson followed. The day promised to be fair and warmer.

Nelson took a deep breath and said, “I think I’ll head out, don’t want to be late for the chief.”

            A familiar sight walked along sidewalk. It was the woman walking her dog, the same one that Nelson had seen the day before. She looked at them, smiled, and nodded. The dog ignored them. Both men waved.

            Inside, Nelson washed his coffee cup, placed it on a rack to dry, and said, “You need in the shower?”

            “No,” Charlie said. “I think I’ll go for my walk around the park. Did I tell you that yesterday I made a complete lap around it without stopping to rest? That’s exactly a mile.”

            Nelson nodded in appreciation. “That’s great,” he said. “Do they have the distance marked?”

            Charlie scooped his papers into the box. “Uh … no, another walker told me.”

            “Well it’s a good accomplishment at any rate. Enjoy yourself.”

            “I will,” Charlie said. “You too.”

            Nelson shaved and showered and was heading for Connerville by eight o’clock. He found City Hall easily. One of the major state highways connecting the city with the nearest freeway dead-ended into a perpendicular highway that passed in front of the governmental complex. Winding through the traffic jam created by the intersection, he parked in a public lot and entered a building marked “Police.”

            Inside, a sergeant met him and directed him to a small waiting room outside the Chief’s office. Before leaving, the sergeant said, “You want coffee?”

            “No thanks,” Nelson said. “But tell me, has City Hall always been located so that it blocks a major highway?”

            “No,” the sergeant said, “just since we built the new complex thirty years ago. They had to catch up with the population growth.”

            “Did the highway go through before?”

            “No, the highway always stopped where it does, but the street continued through. It was closed so this building could be built.”

            Nelson studied the sergeant’s name tag and said, “Wasn’t that a strange bit of urban planning, Sergeant, … uh …, Patterson?”

            “Ralph, please sir,” the other said, looking around, “and no, not if the Mayor’s brother owned the land.”

            “A unique town you have here,” Nelson said.

            “Oh, not my town,” Sergeant Patterson said. “I don’t even live here. I’ve only been on the force for a year. Went to work here to get a promotion.”

            Nelson nodded. “I see,” he said.

            “I know who you are,” Sergeant Patterson said. “I worked for Sheriff Love before.”

            “Well,” said Nelson. “Mum’s the word.”

            The other smiled but before he could answer, the door opened and the Connorville Police Chief appeared. He was a man of medium height, with a thin face set off by a sharp nose that jutted forward as if being paid to test the air. His hair was full and carefully combed and sporting a deep bluish-black color that no human hair had ever achieved in the natural world. His uniform appeared neat and sharply creased. He nodded at Nelson. “You here to see me?”

            “I am,” Nelson said, “Thank you for taking the time.” He extended his hand. The Chief looked at it, hesitated for a second, and extended his. “Chief Rowland Banks,” he said as they shook.

            “Gideon Nelson.” He followed the chief into his office.

            The office was as sparse and neat as the chief. Awards and photographs covered the side walls. Plastic plants graced the corners of the room. A large print of George Washington kneeling in prayer in the snow adorned the wall behind his desk which was completely bare save for a phone and desk pad. The chief motioned for Nelson to take the visitor’s chair in front of the desk. He eased into his own chair and said, “The FBI guy said you were interested in that girl we found murdered.”

            “Just checking on the progress for the family,” Nelson said. “They still find it too painful to leave home.”

            “You need to talk to the county sheriff,” the chief said, inspecting a fingernail. “It’s his problem, not mine.”

            “I understand your men found the body and processed the crime scene.”

            “I don’t care much what you understand,” the chief said. “We were mistakenly called to the scene and retrieved the body. As for a crime scene, the heavy rains during the night had obliterated any evidence. Nothing left but mud and a little dead gangbanger.”

            Nelson drew his lips tight against his lips. “I thought you said there was no evidence.”

            “What do you mean?”

            “If there was no evidence, why do you think the murder was gang related?”

            “Because she was black and because she had been executed, gang style.”

            “Executed?”

            “Tied to a piece of plywood and executed.”

            “That’s how gangs do it? Tie them to boards, haul them to the next town and dump the body on the side of the road?”

            The slighted hint of a smile crossed the chief’s tight face. He said, “You from around here?”

            “No, from the northwest.”

            “Thought maybe so. Then let me tell you a quick story and I have to go to a department head meeting. There was a mayor in a city near here back in the 1960s that folks still talk about. A legend, so to speak. Once, a group from a black neighborhood came to his office complaining about flooding. Seems a major ditch wasn’t functioning. The mayor listened, respectfully. Then he leaned back and said this. ‘Tell you what I’ll do. Gonna send a crew out to clean that ditch. Ya’ll remember that when election time comes around.’ Then before they could thank him, he added, ‘That said, everybody knows that if you people can’t fuck it or eat it, you throw it in the goddam ditch. Find someplace else.’” The chief laughed. “So I just imagine how your girl got in the ditch.”

            “She’s not my girl,” Nelson said, “her parents are Eli and Martha Stubblefield.”

            The chief’s smile vanished. “Whatever,” he said. “Anyway, Sergeant Patterson can answer any more questions. He’ll even take you to the crime scene if you like, though it’s in the county’s jurisdiction. We want to be sensitive to the concerns of the parents and all that.” With that, he rose. “That’s all I can tell you about the victim. While we were on the case there was no evidence recovered except the body and the plywood, there were no witnesses, no tips, and no clues. Now I have to go.”

            He walked by Nelson but as he reached the door, Nelson said, “Just one more thing, Chief.” The chief turned, annoyance showing on his face. “Do you have any information about a girl from here,” Nelson said, "that went missing from the Ransom Center over in Saline County?”

            The chief’s face reddened. “That runaway?”

            “Bridgette Thompson.”

            “She ran away in Saline County,” he said. “We provided information to the sheriff’s office there but it wasn’t our jurisdiction. Not our problem.”

            “Even though the center belongs to a church here in the city?”

            The chief’s face reddened more. “Who told you that?”

            “Seems to be common knowledge.”

            “Look, Mr, Nelson,” he chief said, turning to face him, “I told the FBI agent I would meet with you and I have. Now if you want to chase down the thugs that killed that black girl, I’d suggest you get on back to Little Rock and start there. And I’d suggest you don’t make a hobby of looking for runaway white girls. We have a crime-free community here and we plan to keep it that way.” He opened the door, “Patterson,” he said to the young man waiting outside, “Please show Mr. Nelson here all the courtesy that our top-rated police department is known for.” With that, he walked away without another word to Nelson.

            Sergeant Patterson stood and smiled. “At your service sir,” he said. “Do want to drive out and see the place where they found the Stubblefield girl’s body?”

            “Some other time,” Nelson said. “Why don’t you just walk with me to my truck?”

            When they were clear of the building, Nelson said, “Did you enjoy working for Sheriff Love?”

            “Very much, sir,” Patterson said. “I would have stayed, but there is only one slot available for a chief deputy and I didn’t have time to wait.”

            “You’re young,” Nelson said. “Wouldn’t you have had time?”

            “Maybe,” Patterson said, but the sheriff doesn’t. He’s old-school around here. That means on the wrong side of politics.” He looked around and then leaned in toward Nelson. “Besides,” he said, “they say he goes to the wrong church.”

            Nelson thought as they neared his truck. “You mean that, if maybe, he became a member of the Connorville Baptist Tabernacle his political future might improve?”

            “That place,” Patterson said. “Oh hell no, the Sheriff wouldn’t be caught dead in there.”

            “Why not?”

            “The Soul Warriors,” Patterson.

            Nelson stopped at his truck and turned to face the sergeant. “The Soul Warriors?”

            “You know them?”

            “I hear things. What is the Sheriff’s beef with them?”

            “Oh,” Patterson said, “they keep squeaky clean here in Connorville. To hear them tell it, they just live to serve Jesus.”

            “But?”

            “But once they cross the county line, look out.” The sergeant looked around again.

            “Up to mischief?”

            “Anything you can imagine.”

            “Oh, I can imagine quite a bit,” Nelson said. “I am a sailor.”

            The sergeant laughed. “Let’s just say they quit serving Jesus and start serving Mammon once they leave our fair city. They have this ‘deer club,’ or maybe more precisely, ‘social club’ south of here where they hang out when they aren’t saving souls. Some of them stay there at all times. As guards, most people think.”

            “They hunt there?”

            “They hang out there. I don’t know how much they actually hunt although they shoot a lot. I know the family that owns land adjacent to them. When the Warriors first started building their clubhouse, the neighbors paid a friendly visit to see how they might cooperate in retrieving game that had been shot.”

            “And?”

            “The head Warrior, a charming guy named Bully …”

            Nelson interrupted. “I’ve met him,” he said.

            “Then you may not be surprised to learn what Bully told my friend.”

            “Which was?”

            “He said, “You stay on your side of the goddam line and we’ll stay on our side of the goddam line and we won’t have no goddam problems.”

            “So the Sheriff suspects they do more than talk hunting when they gather there?”

            “He’s pretty sure but he has no basis to enter. He has documented how much the methamphetamine business picks up when the ‘warrior’ hang out there a lot.”

            “But Connorville is crime free?” Nelson said, changing the subject.

            “Connorville is ‘crime-report’ free,” Patterson said. “There is a difference. Want an example of what I’m talking about?”

            “By all means.”

            “We had a couple of rocket scientists here a few years back. Big time football stars. Headed for the big state “U” and all that. They would get stoned of a night and decide it would be fun to raise a little anonymous hell. First it was just pranks—busted car windows, ‘good pussy’ spray painted on the driveways of houses where nice girls lived, beating up computer nerds, that sort of thing. They wore ski masks but everyone pretty much knew who it was.”

            “They were apprehended?”

            “They were football stars. You don’t apprehend football stars in this town if you want to keep your job.”

            “They went unpunished?”

            “I didn’t say that,” Patterson said. “For reasons known only to them, they decided it would be a rush to rob convenience stores. With a pistol they weren’t familiar with, and a little physical force, which they were, they had hit two and picked out a third. That’s when they met Mrs. Albright.”

            “A store owner?”

            “A retired army noncom who not only had her own pistol but knew how to use it.”

            “She did?”

            “Two shots. Two less football players. Two less petty thieves. Had you been paying attention, you would have felt a positive movement in the gene pool about that moment.”

            “Did it make an impression? Teach anyone a lesson?”

            “I’ll say,” Patterson said. “Taught the business owners in town not to protect themselves from football players gone bad.”

            “It what?”

            “You don’t shoot football stars in this town,” Patterson said. “if you want to keep your business. After a year’s boycott, she sold out and moved back to Texas.”

            “That’s not a happy story,” Nelson said. “Not what some would call the American way.”

            “It’s the Connorville way,” Sergeant Patterson said.