Mr. Cooter's Bowling Ball

by Harper Harris

  “Oh, yeah, no problem.”

  We broke a part and I was about to leave, but I didn’t want to make Greg think I was leaving because I didn’t want to be near him.

  “Um, but we can keep a ‘date to be decided’ rain check?”

  I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to come back to the party, so it was a totally open invitation.

  “Of course. I’ll see you later.”

  I left him in the bowling alley and headed towards the door that John just left through. I walked through the Designated Smokers door and found a nice little outdoor area. John was furiously smoking a cigarette. He seemed pretty angry and I had a feeling it might not take too much probing to get him to reveal why.

  I walked over to him and when he noticed me, he holds out his pack.

  “Smoke?” he offered.

  I looked at the cigarettes and thought about it. I used to smoke here and there – back in my clubbing days, so I hadn’t lit one in a while – but I was never really a smoker, per se. I took one, though, because I felt it would be easier to keep up a conversation with John if I smoked with him. I held the cigarette up to my mouth and John lit it for me. I inhaled and started to cough immediately.

  “Green lungs?” John asked.

  I shook my head.

  “No, it’s just been a while.” I took a second soft puff and told John, “I hadn’t pegged you for a smoker.”

  John shrugged.

  “It’s a terrible habit I picked up in the Army.” He took a long drag and blew it out. I still couldn’t imagine him killing anyone. I had this image of calm and cool John, painting his happy little landscapes. “I’m used to smoking by myself. This is a change of pace.”

  “Do you prefer smoking alone?”

  “It’s not that. There’s just very few people to smoke with and so I’ve started using this time to think about whatever I need to.”

  I wondered what was on John’s mind at that moment.

  “What are you thinking about now?” John smiled and looked at the ground.

  “Nothing that would interest you. Just the idle thoughts of an old man.” He took a pause and a deep breath. “I do have to apologize to you, though. I’m sorry you had to see that display at the park. I just love Gladys so much and sometimes I get so jealous. I wish you had never seen that at all.”

  It looked like I had just found my window.

  “Were you jealous enough to murder Lonny Krump?”

  John flinched at my question – it was small, but I saw it. He kept looking at the ground, focusing on something under his foot. All I could hear was my breathing as I waited. When he finally looked up at me, the look on his face told me all it needed to. He kept smoking, taking even longer drags of his cigarette.

  I could tell he wasn’t going to answer, so I ask, “Why’d you do it, John?”

  Chapter Twenty

  Friday

  I still half expected John to deny it. I still almost couldn’t believe that the mild-mannered painter did it. But something about his demeanor, he was so calm. I was starting to see a crack in his façade.

  “It was all a mistake, you know.”

  That was enough to confirm he did it, but maybe he wasn’t the criminal mastermind I was painting in my head. Maybe this could all be mitigated somehow.

  “Are you saying you didn’t mean to kill Lonny?” I asked him.

  There was obvious hope in my voice and it seemed like John picked up on it. He wrinkled up his nose and shook his head.

  “Oh, no, I meant it. I definitely meant it,” he whispered that last part. I knew just seconds ago I had thought that I could barely believe John had done it, but then it was all I could see. “It just turns out Lonny was the wrong guy. Which is unfortunate because I kind of liked him.”

  The wrong guy?

  “What do you mean, he was the wrong guy?”

  John dropped his cigarette to the ground and crushed it under his shoe. He wiped his chin.

  “It should have been Gustavo. That’s clear now.”

  I knew John thought Gus and Gladys were having an affair – which wasn’t an excuse – but I couldn’t figure out why Gladys would be having one with Lonny. Nothing throughout my investigation brought that up.

  “Why did you suspect Lonny? I thought you guys used to be friends.”

  “That had nothing to do with it,” he waved his hand dismissively. “I found my wife’s invitation to this stupid dance in her purse. Lonny, the idiot, wrote something to my wife asking if she would accompany him to the dance.”

  This must have been what Gladys was talking about when she said John was impossible to live with. I knew he travelled a lot, but, apparently, he had become obsessed with Gladys cheating on him. It just sounded like Lonny was trying to be a good friend since he probably assumed that Gladys was going to going alone.

  “So, that’s why you –”

  “Cleary,” he said, interrupting me. He took out another cigarette and lit it, inhaling and visibly relaxing his shoulders a bit. “I mean, did Lonny think I wouldn’t see the note? Gladys is my wife and I do my best to keep track of everything. I mean, he probably thought I’d never find out. I really wasn’t going to come to this thing. I was forced to because people don’t seem to understand.”

  He seemed to be getting agitated again and took a deep breath.

  “That’s not important right now. I was telling you about Lonny. I decided I needed to confront him.”

  It looked like finding that note had given him all the motivation to start hatching a plan. His ‘proof’ was flimsy at best, but, for a man like him, it didn’t seem to matter.

  “While Cooter and Lonny were at that dumb dance class, I went to Cooter’s trailer. It was actually right after I helped you move.”

  I wasn’t sure whether or not John realized how crazy he sounded. He was talking about a murder like it was just another day.

  “I was hoping to break in and steal something I could use to murder Lonny with, but you know that the idiot doesn’t lock up his place. I just walked in and took his bowling ball. I didn’t plan that part, though.”

  “What do you mean you didn’t plan that part?”

  It sounded like John had gone to great lengths to plan the entire thing.

  “Using the bowling ball. It was just extra fitting that Lonny and Cooter were often rivals for county bowling champion.”

  That was in the police report as a possible motive. It hadn’t made much sense to me then, but now it was all coming into focus.

  “I parked in the woods behind the church, so no one would see me and just waited for Lonny to have his usual after class smoke. He was always alone since no one else was a smoker and, since I quit the class, he had no one else to smoke with, so I knew he would be alone.”

  It was almost like he wasn’t really talking to me anymore, just reliving what happened.

  “I snuck up behind him – I’d learned how to be real quiet back in my Army days. I hit him, and he just crumpled to the ground. I thought he’d put up more of a fight, but, I don’t know, maybe he was surprised. Before he died,” John sniffled, “Lonny tried to explain away or plead his case or whatever. He said that he thought I wouldn’t even be coming to the dance since I quit and that he just didn’t want to show up alone. He tried to reassure me he wasn’t trying to do anything with my wife, but, obviously, I didn’t believe him. Well, until it was much too late, when I started to suspect Gustavo. But it had already been days after I killed Lonny. Waste of time.”

  There was no remorse. It was like he didn’t care that he killed his former friend. It was like this entire thing was just one big inconvenience.

  I started to back away, not sure how John saw me fit into this whole thing after confessing everything to me. I slid my phone out of my pocket because I was going to call the Sheriff. John noticed me trying to get away.

  “What are you doing?” he asked with an edge to his voice.

  He threw down his second cigarette and stomped it under
his foot. I felt a rush of adrenaline go through me and, in what probably was a bit of foolishness, I just told John the truth.

  “I’m calling the Sheriff.”

  I kept backing up as he slowly approached. He looked anything but safe. In that moment, I wondered if he had killed anyone else besides Lonny. I wouldn’t have been surprised.

  “Why are you doing that, Kari? Are you afraid I’m going to hurt you?”

  I was a little, but that wasn’t it.

  “You have to know you can’t get away with this. You killed someone and you’re going to pay for what you’ve done.”

  I wasn’t going to back down. John might be a scary guy, but he wasn’t about to scare me into submission.

  “Oh, you shouldn’t have said that.”

  Suddenly, he lunged at me and my instincts took over. I hadn’t lived in San Fran for twenty-nine years without learning self-defense. When he got close enough, I struck his knee with a defensive kick.

  “Shoot!” John yelled before falling to the ground.

  It was enough to get him away from me for a bit, but I dropped my phone in the process. It cracked when it hit the asphalt. I was about to make a grab for it to see if it still worked when the back door opened.

  “Kari?”

  I turned towards the voice and found Greg Olsen looking for me.

  “Greg?”

  What was he doing here? My lapse in attention gave John the chance he needed to scramble to his feet and limp away into the forest.

  “John!”

  I hadn’t expected him to actually stop, but this did complicate things. I didn’t want him getting away. John was going to end up in jail if I had anything to say about it.

  I turned back to Greg and saw him looking over to where John had just run away and then he looked back at me. It was clear he sensed something had just happened and he was just about to run after him, I could see it in his eyes. I was surprised he would take that upon himself, but I stopped him.

  “Greg, don’t!”

  He kept himself from sprinting away and there was a question in his face.

  “What’s going on, Kari?”

  I didn’t have time to explain the whole thing to him right then and there.

  “I promise to tell you everything later, but, right now, I need your phone.”

  If I waited too long, John would get further and further away. Greg dug into his pocket and took out his cell.

  “Here, do whatever you need to do.”

  He handed me the phone and I dialed Sheriff Cranston and he picked up on the first ring.

  “Kari, is everything alright?”

  “Beau, I’m in Jasperville and the real murderer is hobbling down County Road 216 towards Appleton. It’s John Goodstone! Don’t let him get away!”

  “I’m right on it.”

  He didn’t ask any questions, just trusted in my judgement. Cranston hung up the phone and I took a deep breath. It was all out of my hands now. I had to trust other parts of the law to take care of the mess for a little bit.

  I gave Greg back his phone and went to lean against the church. All the adrenaline I had earlier was leaving and I needed to rest a little. He followed me and stood a few feet away, giving me my distance.

  “What do you mean by real murderer? You don’t mean –”

  Greg looked in the direction that John had just run off in. I nodded.

  “Yeah, he’s the one.”

  “John Goodstone? I never would have guessed.”

  He looked completely stumped. I was really grateful to him for coming out when he did. Things may have not gone down in my favor and Greg’s sudden appearance helped out quite a bit.

  “I think that was his intent. He never wanted anyone looking at him like he was a killer.”

  He would have let Coot go all the way to death row for him. He could have probably left the murder unsolved, but he chose to frame a former friend of his and I wasn’t sure if I’d ever learn why. Maybe it was convenience, but a small part of me felt like it could have been a little bit of payback for when John didn’t get his way those few years back.

  I picked myself off the wall and put a hand on Greg’s upper arm.

  “Thanks for coming out when you did. Looks like you may have saved the day.”

  He got all sheepish and shy and looked down at my hand.

  “I didn’t do much. I was really just looking for you. Wanted to see if you were okay.”

  I softly patted him a couple times and then motioned with my head.

  “We should get ourselves inside. There’s gonna be a whole lot of explaining to do.”

  “Looks like it,” he said softly before he opened the door for me to head back into the bowling alley.

  Greg was right behind me as we integrated ourselves back into the dance.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Friday

  Greg and I made our way back inside. No one was immediately suspicious, but I knew it was only a matter of time before word spread – that small-town effect. I looked up at Greg.

  “I'm going to go find Ashley. I'll talk to you later?”

  He nodded, and I left him be. A lot of interesting things went down with Greg and me tonight, something I'd need to reevaluate later. Right then, I wanted to get to my friend and get her up to speed before the gossiping started.

  I found her dancing with a different partner. This time, the dancing wasn’t as awe-inspiring as her jig with Gustavo, but it was still pretty good. I got close enough to tap her shoulder.

  “Oh, Kari! Would you like a dance?”

  She was clearly having the time of her life. Unfortunately, it was time to put a bit of a damper on it.

  “I need to talk to you. Can we go over there?”

  I pointed to a nearby corner that had very few people hanging around it. Ash saw the look of concern on my face and bid her partner a quick goodbye. I led her away from everyone, so I could tell her what happened.

  “What’s the big news. You look a little frazzled,” she asked.

  I was. I hadn’t expected to need to defend against myself against John. Honestly, I hadn’t busted out any fighting moves in a while. I’d learned self-defense just in case anything happened while I was in San Francisco, but, years later, it came in handy in a very unexpected situation – which, I would have guessed, was typically what ended up happening. Those types of things come in handy when you least expect it.

  I looked around to see if anyone was nearby, but, obviously, no one was spying on our conversation. I was just getting a little paranoid. I turned back to Ashley.

  “So, I was outside, and, long story short, it turns out John Goodstone is the murderer. He’s the one who killed Lonny!”

  Her eyes went wide at my piece of news.

  “No way! Are you serious?” I nodded with great enthusiasm. “Are you okay? Did something happen with you guys?”

  I shook my head.

  “No, I confronted him, but I’m fine. He did try to lunge at me, but I’ve got a few tricks up my sleeve. Plus, Greg showed up and spooked John enough that he just ran away. I really hope the Sheriff caught him.”

  I knew with the evidence I brought, Cooter would get out of jail, but this wouldn’t feel complete unless the real culprit was put away.

  “Ooh, you’ll have to tell me about these tricks later. Did he tell you why he did it?”

  “Jealousy,” I sighed. It was a time old motive. “He thought Lonny was making advances on Gladys and so he killed him.”

  I hated how remorseless he sounded. I was sure his next plan was to kill Gustavo if he got the chance. He may have even tried to tonight for all I knew.

  “That’s horrible.”

  I had no idea how long it would take Sheriff Cranston to find John, so I suggested that Ash and I wait outside. I couldn’t stand inside with all the loud music and dancing people.

  “Yeah, we can take a breather,” she said.

  The two of us walked outside and took a sit down on the sidewalk
. After a couple of minutes a few other people came outside and started milling about. I wasn’t sure what was going on at first, but when more and more people came outside, and I could hear them talking about John Goodstone. It seemed like word had gotten around. I had seen a few cops from the station at the dance earlier, so my guess was that Beau had sent out some kind of alert and the gossip started from there.

  “Looks like everyone’s here…” Ash commented.

  It looked like most of the dancers had come outside and soon I could see Sheriff Cranston’s cruiser pulling up.

  “He’s here.”

  I stood up and walked over to where he was pulling up. As the car came up, I could see John in the back of the prowler. I did an internal fist pump. Once Beau fully stopped, I went up to the window he let go down.

  I leaned in and said, “Looks like you caught him.”

  “With your amazing help. I never knew lawyers do so much.”

  Admittedly, I probably worked myself into a tizzy for my cases, but a nicely wrapped up case gave me a lot of solace.

  “I guess I’m just a little extra. Did he confess?”

  I looked in the back and saw John with his head down. Beau shook his head.

  “He hasn’t said a word since I collared him. Just sulking in the back, muttered something I couldn’t quite catch, but that’s it.”

  I’d probably have to fill Beau in on what I knew and what I figured out. It would take a lot more time if I didn’t get it all out now.

  “Well, like I said on the phone, he’s the one who killed Lonny. It was first-degree – totally planned out. He thought Lonny was trying to get Gladys to step out on him after he saw a note from him to his wife. So, he stole Coot’s bowling ball because he thought that he’d make the perfect fall guy. He’d used Cooter and Lonny as patsies before. Anyway, he waited outside of a late-night dance class and, when Lonny was taking his usual smoke, John hit him until he died.”

  It must have been horrible, and that pool of blood was massive – it was a pool! John took one of the most violent routes to kill his former friend. There had been so much blood.

  Beau turned in his seat and looked at the perp in the back of his car.