I was wrong.
“That certainly explains a lot of the mystery surrounding my visions. You know, those pesky dreams, daydreams mostly, that have been affecting me since early spring. I can see something clearer now. I think I recall the person wearing those tennis shoes,...uh, that would be Rosemary...she came into the room and stood by the crib next to my mother’s high-top laced shoes. That’s when I climbed out from under the bed. No, wait. That’s not right. I climbed out from under the bed before the tennis shoes came into the room. I was arguing with my mother. And she hit me. She pushed me away from the crib and...I can see what she is doing. She has a pillow over Colby’s head. His little legs are kicking.”
Tears formed in her eyes as she related the images coming back to her from the shadows of the past. It was an intense pain for me, and I could only imagine for Mary as well.
“Then Rosemary came into the room and tried to stop my mother as well. But she couldn’t. My mother was very strong during those moments. She was able to hold off Rosemary. And I remember her eyes, the way she stared at me and at my nanny. Her eyes were intense and...I don’t know a word to describe what they looked like. I remember that now. Oh, my Lord. I can see her...and little Colby.”
Tears were running down her makeup by this point. She began sobbing softly. I felt sorry for her having to relive such agony. Watching someone kill someone you love and not being able to stop it has to be the worst imaginable experience of life. It just has to be. And in this instance, it just may be worse than a young girl finding her father gunned down in their driveway. Maybe.
“Do you have any idea why your mother would do something so horrible?” I said.
“Mercy,” she said.
“I don’t understand,” I answered.
“I think I told you that my mother hated my father. He abused her. What I kept from you was the horrible truth that my father abused me too. My father slept with me many times. My mother was powerless to stop it. I think she tried in the beginning, but after a while, I think she gave up...until she realized that she could stop it by hurting him at his deepest level.”
“Hurting his son,” I said.
“That’s what she thought, I believe. My father was constantly telling us every day that he wanted his son to be just like him. I think my mother cringed at such a notion and decided that was not to be. So, since she was almost powerless against my father, she chose the only act she believed would end the nightmare for me as well as for her.”
“Did it?”
“Yes. He never came into my room after Colby died. In fact, I think that my father and mother moved to separate rooms in the house after Colby was buried. They in effect lived separate lives once my brother was gone.”
“So back to your point. You’re mother removing your brother from the family was merciful for …,” I paused hoping she would fill in the blank for me.
“For me. She did it for me. Perhaps some mercy for herself, but I know that my mother loved me and wanted to protect me from my father. I also believe that in some twisted sense she thought that killing my brother would protect him from his father as well. Mercy all around, don’t you see,” she said while our little group listened and tried to understand.
I looked at Rosey and then at Josh. Rosey was stoic, but I could tell that this revelation affected him at some hidden level. Josh had tears in his eyes.
“I take it you are not surprised by what we have discovered?”
“Not really. You’ve helped me to see things a lot clearer. I had it buried, inside all of those memories of events, trips, fights,...and there were of course some good things. I suppose that my subconscious buried the specifics of that day as a way to cope with the intense pain of losing my little brother. I do remember my mother coming to me. I spent a lot of time in my room, alone, crying. I’ve had that memory for years, maybe since it happened. But I didn’t remember why I was crying. Funny how you can bury stuff like that. Anyway, after several days of crying alone in my room, my mother came to me and told me that I could not go on like that. She said I needed to remember the positive things about my brother, and stop grieving over his death. I think that’s when I must have begun to bury the truth. Still, I did have one problem.”
“What was that?” I said.
“He was so young when he died, I couldn’t remember many positive things about him.”
“It was too much for a five year old to take in and process,” Josh said.
“Yes, I understand that. But what was I to do?” Mary pleaded.
“I think you did well,” I said, half-believing what I had just said.
“I perceive you think something else, too,” Mary said. “You have something else to talk about with me.”
“Perhaps, but I am not certain of it.”
“I think I know what it is. You think that I killed my son Robby just like my mother killed Colby. Isn’t that true?”
I could feel the room grow still, like a heavy pall placed over a casket. As far as I could ascertain, no one was breathing, at least not so as to be heard. I cut a glance at Rosey and he shrugged his shoulders as if to say, go for it. Josh appeared to be a little shocked at Mary’s declaration.
“Yes, that is correct. That is what I think, although I cannot prove it.”
“Well, let me help you with that,” Mary said.
48
After stopping off at the Riley Corners Police Station to provide Sheriff Roscoe Tanner with vital information, we were on our way out of town, heading home to Virginia. Sam was sitting with his head and front paws between the two front seats but resting his hindquarters on the back seat. He was studying the road signs as they hurried past as we headed north by northeast. He might have been anxious to return home, or he was dreaming about Maybelline’s cheeseburgers. Who knows?
I felt good to be going home for a longer rest than a few days.
“Did you think that she was going to confess?” Rosey said as we neared the state line.
“At that point, with the way that she had reacted to the information about her mother and with the way she then remembered that stuff she had lost for the better part of her life, I figured she was at the point of telling all. It wouldn’t have surprised me.”
“Yeah. Just wondering if I was the only one who was feeling that.”
“No, I was right there. I guess we were both waiting, expecting something more.”
“You think she told us the truth?”
“About herself?” I said.
“Yeah, about her innocence.”
“It certainly makes more sense than my rather wild theory. I have enough people lie to me most every day of my life, so I’m getting to the place where I can tell when someone is genuine. At least I suspect that is the case. You have reason to doubt her?”
“No, not really. I think she leveled with us. I think she knew enough about her mother subconsciously to stop herself from repeating history,” Rosey said.
“I could call Rosemary to see if she remembers anything about Robby’s death.”
“But Mary said that Rosemary was not working that day. Her day off. I also seem to recall Rosemary telling you or both of us that she was not working that day.”
“That’s what I’m getting at. I would like to call her to verify that little fact,” I said.
“Will you?”
“No. I’m gonna let this one pass. If she lied to us and did kill her son, then she has remembered enough at this point that she’ll simply have to live with whatever guilt might be there.”
“Possible that she feels no guilt,” Rosey said.
“Possible, but she doesn’t strike me as a person devoid of a conscience.”
“Could be a good actor.”
“Send her some kind of award, statuette or gift certificate. I’m finished with this one. I don’t like investigating old crimes.”
“Harder work?”
“I don’t know if it’s harder. I just know you have to get inside people’s heads and
hearts and get them to bare their souls. I’m no shrink. I prefer fresh crime scenes of recent vintage. Old stuff is not my thing. We all have skeletons in our closets. I’ll bet you have some, don’t you?” I said.
“Me? Not on your life. I am as pure as the driven snow. My life is an open book.”
“May I comment about that pure as the driven snow line?”
“You may not. Figure of speech. I am innocent of all charges.”
“Then why is it I know nothing about your clandestine missions to Europe and Asia and South America?”
“Because my boss, the Federal Government of the United States of America, prefers that I not keep you, of all people, in the loop.”
“What an unkind thing to say. Me, of all people, me, the one who has saved your butt more than once. Me, the one who is most likely to be your friend for life, perhaps even the only friend you will ever have who would be willing to die for you….”
“I’m impressed. Wow. But, here’s the thing, despite your fervor and friendship, the Feds still won’t allow me to tell you what I do and where I go.”
“So I should be mad with them?”
“That would be one choice.”
“You’re just dodging my bullet, that’s all. Deflecting onto a larger entity. Harder to pinpoint.”
“Live again to fight another die,” Rosey said and smiled.
Rogers seemed genuinely glad that we were back in the pocket, if you can ascertain from the stoic emotions of a machine with artificial intelligence any hint of gladness. Her voice inflection denoted some positive energy in our direction. With Rogers, you take what you can get.
“So, using the nearly time-honored word of Inspector Clouseau, is the case sól-ved?” Rogers said.
“As far as I am concerned, it is. We did at least what we were asked to do …,” I said.
“And more,” Rosey added. “We helped the Feds put a stop to some gun runners working out of North Carolina all along the coast.”
“I’m supposed to be impressed by all this?” Rogers said.
“If you want to be. Doesn’t bother me one way or the other,” Rosey said.
“Well, that’s a fairly cavalier attitude if you ask me,” Rogers said.
“That be me, Mr. Cavalier,” he said.
“What’s wrong with Mr. Wonderful?” Rogers asked me.
“He’s tired and just glad to be out of Carolina. We all three are glad to be back here. I just want a little R&R,” I said.
After I finished with my verbal report so that Rogers could store the facts, suppositions, and conjecture from the events of our time in Riley Corners, I sat quietly in front of her monitor making sure I had unloaded everything I wanted to keep on file with her. Something was gnawing at me. I couldn’t decide what it was.
“You finished with me?” Rogers said.
“For the time being.”
“You want an alternative concept for a motive?”
“You have something?”
“Putting some facts together with all of the conjecture you have delivered to me, I do, in fact, have another possible motive lurking out there in some ethereal domain.”
“Okay, let me hear it.”
“You supplied me with Mary Carpenter’s idea that her mother killed Colby for Mary’s sake, a mercy killing on behalf of the daughter who was being abused by the father. Then she also offered some twisted kind of logic concerning mercy for the boy-child, Colby, so that he would not grow up to be like his father. I suggest to you that the latter mercy is more in keeping with revenge against the father to inflict pain on him. What if it was in fact a mercy killing, but had to do with Colby’s asthmatic condition, a condition that was worsening because it was not being treated. Perhaps it was such that there was no effective treatment for it at that time. So, Beth Anne Johnson could not bear to watch her son struggle to breathe.”
“She killed him out of mercy because he was suffering so much? Is that your theory?”
“Some of the evidence leans that way I’ll say.”
“Nothing concrete.”
“Dearie, I don’t think there is anything concrete in this case except that someone probably killed Colby Johnson. The evidence points to the mother as the murderess. I am merely offering to you yet another theory of the crime. This assumes, of course, that all the facts you have entered into my database are correct. That is, of course, a dubious assertion at best.”
“Dubious. And, I might add, that this alternate theory of the crime you have put forth would suggest that the mother be sane rather than some lunar lunatic.”
“You would not allow for the moon to so affect her that she was able to do what she wanted to do for her son but could not without the interference, if you please, of the lunar cycle?”
“Let me get this straight. Your theory is that she watched her son suffer extraordinary breathing difficulties, so much so that she wanted to take his life to keep him from suffering. However, she could not bring herself to do this. The moon somehow or other interceded for her and caused her to be able to take his life under the moon’s effect. Is that what you are saying to me?”
“While it does sound implausible, I admit, you have restated my alternative theory of the crime.”
“I might as well believe in demon possession as an alternative theory of the crime,” I said to Rogers.
“I am not aware of any historical notation on the moon being linked to demonic possession.”
“I wasn’t involving the moon in my sarcasm.”
“The moon is involved though. The data supports something of the moon’s affect, or, you will have to revise your belief that there is no such thing as coincidence in crime.”
“How about we keep this discussion on your new theory between us for the time being. Let me sleep on it. I might then want to take several months to ponder all this. Frankly, I think it is too much for me to unravel.”
“Goodnight, Clancy. We shall discuss this again, I am sure,” Rogers said and put herself into a sleep mode.
Sam made himself comfortable on his corner of the couch, Rosey was asleep on the opposite end, and I was by the window resting my eyes. We stayed in those positions without talking until after midnight. Finally, Rosey got up and went to bed in the guest room. Minutes later, I managed to force myself off of the couch and into my nightgown. I think I remember climbing into bed, but nothing more than that until morning. Rogers’ alternative theory was way in the background by the time I fell asleep.
49
After several days of lying around doing nothing except thinking about Colby Johnson and how he died and why, brooding over the various motives of his mother, rethinking what role Mary, his older sister played in the drama, and each tidbit of speculation, story, and synopsis offered by the people Rosey and I had questioned over the many days of our investigation, Rosey headed back to D.C. to deprogram with some of his bosses and I was left to wander around the vast wilderness of my vague and inconclusive mental state. After he left, I sidetracked a little and contemplated Rosey’s situation with our government. When he said that his boss was the Federal Government, he was only telling the truth in a broad sense. He actually worked for whichever alphabet group needed his expertise at the time. That much I knew. Just how he managed to spread himself around for those agencies is still a mystery to me. That he is willing to spread himself around for those birds is even more of a mystery. It’s downright inscrutable. Whatever the reason, he seems to enjoy doing their work and doing it as he is called upon. It would be quite difficult for me to answer to their beck and call. Then again, I am quite confident that my government would be extremely reticent to call upon me for such work. The grief I would impose upon them would be among the top five reasons their reticence would be in evidence.
Two weeks had gone by since we had left Riley Corners. Rosey was still off somewhere with someone answering some questions. Late one Friday night I received a call from B.C. Jenkins. She told me that her mother was taken to the hospital earlier
that day and she didn’t think Rosemary would make it. She said it was her heart.
I called Rosey and asked if he would be willing to come back to Norfolk and then on to Riley Corners. I told him about Rosemary. He said he would drive down tomorrow.
“Are you finished answering questions?”
“No.”
“How is it you can just leave then?”
“I am a free man, my friend.”
“Free, yet bound.”
“I am bound for no other reason than I choose to be bound. That does not mean that my bosses control me. I am free to go and do.”
“Sounds conflicted.”
“It’s their problem. They can deal with it. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
As soon as we finished our cell phone conversation, my land line phone rang. Technology rampant.
“It’s a sad time, Clancy. I’ve enjoyed my mother for many, many years. I hated to see her go, but, she left this world happy. She went to sleep about twenty minutes ago. She enjoyed a long good life.”
“You were with her?”
“I was. I stayed overnight in the hospital and we had some good parting words. She knew that death was imminent and she wanted to tell me some things. It’s hard. Azalea is taking it harder than I, but we’ll survive.”
“Have you made some plans?”
“Sunday afternoon at two o’clock. We’re having the service in the chapel of the Wilkens-Billings Funeral Home in Riley Corners. Mother and I planned this while she was still lucid. You think you can come?”
“Rosey and I will be there,” I said.
“Good. We’ve missed you guys around here. You practically became a part of the family. It’ll be good to see you, even under such circumstances. Feel free to bring Sam.”
“Thanks for calling, Bergamot. We’ll see you Sunday afternoon.”
“If you can, stay on after the service. We plan to have a family gathering; relatives from all over will be there for the event. There will be enough food to feed the entire county since several churches will be involved.”
Mercy Killing Page 24
