by Ron Fisher
“How well is this gonna’ work if you and me are sleeping under the same roof? If they know about you, they’ll eventually know about me.”
“I’ve been thinking about that,” I said. “We need to find you your own place. Maybe Eloise can help with that. Let’s go see her. She’s looking forward to seeing you, and she’s making dinner for us.”
“Lead on,” Alvin said.
We retrieved our cars and headed to Pickens County, Alvin right behind me in a bright yellow Mustang convertible rental he got at the airport. Alvin's creed in life could be right out of an old Mel Brooks movie, The Producers. “If you’ve got it, baby, flaunt it.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Eloise made us dinner, with Mackenzie helping, while I showed Alvin Still Hollow. Alvin made them feel like he’d known them forever. Mackenzie was enthralled by him, and Eloise whispered to me that she’d forgotten how dangerously handsome she thought he was. Neither of them knew anyone else like Alvin “Big Hurt’ Brown.
He and I were out in the yard, looking back at the house.
“This must have been a hell of a place to grow up in,” Alvin remarked. “Sort of like the Cleavers gone Green Acres.”
He made light of it, but a wistful expression in his eyes suggested there was more to his thinking. I realized how much different growing up here would have been to the South-side Chicago streets of Alvin’s youth. Alvin had at least sampled a better life, having spent his youngest few years living with his mother’s sister and her family in rural Greenville County, with his cousin Taylor Johnson, long before he’d gone away to college and I’d thrown him that pass that crippled him for life.
Taylor’s mother, Alvin’s aunt, was a wonderful, kind, woman. It would have been a terrific home to live in. For Alvin, it was like moving from heaven to hell when his worthless father had torn him and his mother away from there, moving them to Chicago where he soon deserted them. Leaving Alvin and his mother to fend for themselves on the streets.
It struck me just how much the events of our early lives determined who we would become. Standing there looking at Still Hollow took Alvin back to a time that might have been the best of his entire life. The time he lived with the Johnsons. The one time he could remember as a child feeling safe and secure enough to calm the never-ending fear inside that, if he didn’t keep a constant guard up to defend himself and his world, no one else would.
Alvin had grown up a tough, hard guy, but as Eloise had said, he had a big heart. And I felt that briefly living with the Johnsons kept that heart from withering over the following years.
“There were good times here, I can’t deny that,” I said. “But there are some regretful memories here too. My grandfather and I didn’t always get along, and I spent a lot of years here feeling sorry for myself. But that’s another story.”
“Dinner’s ready,” Eloise called from a doorway, and we went in.
Eloise had the table set with a country-cooking feast. She must have thought that Alvin and I hadn’t eaten in a week. She’d made sweet tea, fried chicken, biscuits and gravy, turnip greens, black-eyed peas, and sweet corn. A banana pudding sat in the fridge for dessert. Knowing the health-conscious diet Alvin religiously stuck to, there wasn’t one dish on the table that he would probably eat. Even the turnip greens were cooked with fatback.
He shocked me by eating everything and even went back for seconds.
I was staring at him as he took another drumstick from the basket of chicken. He looked at me and grinned like a kid at Christmas, then he turned to Eloise.
“Miss Eloise, I haven’t eaten food like this since I was a little boy, and me and my mama lived with my aunt Millie over in Greenville County. You sure have brought back some fine memories to me.”
I had to smile.
Eloise placed a hand on his arm. “Well, Alvin, since you’re going to be staying here, we’ll have to do this every night.”
I cleared my throat. “Change of plans, Alvin will be doing a little undercover work for a while, and it’s best if nobody knows we all know each other. He’ll be bumping up against some pretty rough characters, and he won’t exactly be making friends with them. If some of them want to follow him home, we don’t want them coming here.”
Like the one who had already followed me, I thought.
Eloise looked from one of us to the other, a hundred questions behind her eyes. Mackenzie was wearing the same look in the chair next to her.
Both were concerned, and I got the feeling that Mackenzie was also excited to be included in such intrigue. I had some reservations about letting her in on things. However, she needed to know. There was always the possibility that she might run into Alvin at some inappropriate time and give something away. More importantly, my actions had placed her in danger as well as the rest of us, and she deserved to know about it.
“What are you two going to do?” Eloise asked.
I said, “It’s better that you don’t know all the details. Let’s just say we’re going to pick up where Kelly left off but this time, it won’t be us getting kicked in the head.”
“You’re going to find the man who assaulted her,” Eloise said.
“That be the idea,” Alvin said.
“So where will Alvin stay?” she asked, looking at him.
“Somewhere nearer the Clemson area, if possible,” I said.
Eloise was thinking hard. “I may have a place for you. I’ve got a friend with a son in the army in Afghanistan. He lives in a small modular home near the town of Liberty, and it’s relatively close to that area. It’s fully furnished and vacant, sitting on some farm acreage, and very private. My friend owns it and she’s been talking about renting it while he’s gone. She could use the money. It would be cheaper than any motel.”
“I told you she could help,” I said to Alvin. “And cheap is good. Because the Clarion will be picking up the tab, if you approve, Eloise.”
“Of course, I approve, little brother. We can even put him on the payroll if you want to—secretly, that is. Welcome to the Clarion, Alvin.”
Alvin said, “I don’t need to be on any payroll. I got enough problems with the IRS already. Besides, I don’t know nothin’ bout no newspapering. What would my job title be, anyway, HNIC?”
Mackenzie giggled, and Alvin reached across the table and bumped fists with her.
They seemed to have bonded, and she was looking at Alvin like he was a rock star. The power of Alvin’s magnetism.
“What is HNIC?” Eloise asked.
“Forget it, Mom,” Mackenzie said. “It’s a black thang.”
She and Alvin bumped fists again.
Eloise and Mackenzie gathered the dishes up and took them into the kitchen. I grabbed Alvin and we followed them. I opened the dishwasher door, looked at Mackenzie and my sister, and said, “We got this.”
“We do?” Alvin said.
“I’ll rinse, you load.” I handed Alvin a dirty plate.
He took it and gave me one of his looks. “You tell anybody about this and I’ll kill you.”
I wasn’t entirely sure he was kidding.
Later, when we were settled into our chairs in the den, I texted him the names and descriptions of Doughboy, Terrell the bartender, April Cheney, and the Dollar brothers, along with the bar’s name and address. Alvin sat and studied the descriptions.
I said, “Become a regular at this place. We’ll both be going in there, but separate. As I said, we don’t know each other. Make them believe you’re one of them. Maybe a dealer yourself, down from Chicago where things were getting a little hot. You’re not looking to compete, but to hook up with whoever’s running things. You heard that maybe the Tiger’s Tail is the place to find that connection.”
“But why would I go there?” he asked. “Why not Greenville, or Atlanta?”
“Home folks in the Upstate. Tell them you grew up near there, which is sort of the truth. Just make them think it was in Pickens County, not Greenville County. I would think it’s a hell of
a market if you’re selling party favors. You’ve got both Clemson University and Southern Wesleyan University right there. That’s a pool of about 30,000 potential customers, all young, away from home, and looking for a good time in an otherwise wasteland of rednecks and country folk, and where they roll up the sidewalks at dusk. Right next door on the lake are thousands of retired baby-boomers with aches and pains who, like May Burgess, are looking for a little help with an addiction that began with a doctor’s prescription for Oxy, which they can no longer get.”
“While I’m doing this, what’ll you be doing?” he asked.
“Working with April Cheney—if she sticks around—and keeping up with the law enforcement’s progress. April was helping Kelly, so she’s going to have to help me some. I’ll work it outside in, you work it inside out. April won’t know about you, but maybe if somebody in the Tiger’s Tail tips to your game, she’ll find out and tell me before they can come at you. Get to know this Doughboy, who was dealing to May Burgess. Try to find out what you can about the Dixie Demon’s involvement in the opioid scene, along with the Dollar brothers. Just keep your ears open. If we can find out who hurt Kelly, maybe we hurt them back a little. Or a lot.”
Alvin stared at me like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
“Are you not the J.D. Bragg who about a year ago, when we were into that thing over in Greenville County, was preaching non-violence shit to me?”
“Kelly changed that.”
He stared a moment longer. “Then I be your man.”
Eloise came in and broke up the conversation with the news that she’d secured Alvin her friend’s small house in Liberty. The friend was happy to oblige and liked the idea of getting a little extra money for a few days rent. Eloise had drawn a rough map to the place and said Alvin would find the key in a blue flowerpot on the porch.
With that, Alvin and I took our leave, driving both cars with me in the lead.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The drive from Still Hollow south to Liberty took us a little less than a half-hour. With Eloise’s map, we quickly found the house, a couple of miles west of town.
The place sat on open farmland and was everything Eloise had said it was. Small and private, and well off the main road. A fenced pasture ran along either side of the long drive, and a half-dozen head of cattle stood by the fence dumbstruck in our headlights as we approached. We parked in front of the house and got out. It was one of those modular homes that had a brick foundation built around the crawl space underneath to disguise it from looking like a doublewide. It almost worked.
“I’ll bet you don’t have those at your place in Chicago,” I said, looking back at the cows.
“I do, but mine come medium rare with steak sauce.”
Alvin found the house key where Eloise said it would be, dropped off his bag inside, and was back out in less than a minute.
He said, “All the place needs is a few beers in the fridge and the little woman to come home to, and I’m all set. Now where is this Tiger’s Butt place you were telling me about?”
“The Tiger’s Tail. It’s about twenty minutes down the road.” I gave him the directions. “I don’t care what time you get out of there tonight, you call me and let me know how it went.”
I got in my Jeep and Alvin in his bright yellow rental. When we reached the highway, I went left, and he went right.
#
My cell phone rang and woke me from a sound sleep. As I picked it up, I glanced at the clock on the nightstand. It was 2:22 a.m.
“You awake?” Alvin asked.
“Yeah,” I said, not really sure that I was.
“I’m out of there and on the way back to the ranch. Even stayed for last call.”
“You make any new friends?”
“Of course. Nobody can resist my winning personality, you know that. Me and this Doughboy mother-fucker best friends now.”
“Did you stick to the script?”
“Yes, I did. I told him I was looking for a job and somebody had mentioned his name. He asked who, and I gave him my ‘you-know-fucking-better-than-to-ask-me-that’ look, and he let it slide. I think I got him a little scared of me. Must have been my Gangster Disciples tatt.”
“So, what did he say?”
“He said he’d think about it, but I got the feeling that hiring and firing be above his paygrade. The guy’s a schlepper.”
“We speak Yiddish now, do we? I asked.
“I am a man of many languages and cultures, my friend.”
“So, is anything going to come of it? Or was that a dead end?”
“After a visit to the head, where Doughboy stayed long enough to have pissed five times, he introduced me to Sonny Dollar, who just happened to walk by our booth at the precise moment Mr. Doughboy returned. Not very subtle. Sonny Dollar, however, was a more interesting character—and with a more suspicious nature. He joined us, and they both seemed to go out of their way to avoid the subject of drugs, or the fact that I was looking for an employment hook-up. But it still felt like a job interview. I’m thinking Doughboy works for this Sonny Dollar. And he’s scared of him, Doughboy showing the man a lot of respect. But my gut tells me this Sonny ain’t the top dog either. He don’t strike me as top dog material. He just a thug.”
“The older brother Laverne probably runs things,” I said. “Or the Dixie Demons.”
Alvin said, “By the way, they’re gone. The Dixie Demons. Doughboy told me about them being there and said they took off earlier in the day. I think the D-boy was a little star-struck by them.”
There went my chance to find out anything else about them. That was completely up to Bagwell and the Clemson Police Department now.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Wednesday was publishing day at the Clarion, and I needed to be there, so I did my Kelly visit earlier than usual. Doctor Mathis was an early bird too, I found him in Kelly’s room making his morning rounds. He looked around when I walked in.
“Oh, I’m glad you’re here. I wanted to tell you that Ms. Mayfield is showing considerable improvement, and if this keeps up, we should be able to bring her out of the medically induced coma soon.”
“What is soon?”
“She still has a way to go, but I’d guess the first of next week.”
“What will that entail?”
“It’s simple, actually. We slowly reduce the anesthetics and the other drugs we’re giving her until she wakes up.”
“So, she just suddenly pops her eyes open and says, 'What’d I miss?'”
“Maybe not quite that,” he said with an uncomfortable smile. He didn’t seem to appreciate my sense of humor. “But barring any unforeseen complications, I’m very optimistic that she’ll be back to normal very soon.”
I sincerely hoped he was right, but I still couldn’t get onboard his optimism train. Dissimilar personalities, I guessed.
#
From there, I went straight to the Clarion to help put the paper to bed. The staff was busy adding the finishing touches to things, re-proofing others, filling in blanks, and readying the press for printing. Although it was a much, much, smaller operation than the big-city papers, knowing this press run was mine, and my first, I couldn’t help being a bit excited.
I read the story of Kelly’s attack that Vickie wrote—or re-wrote—and she’d done an excellent job. I told her so.
She beamed. “So, what’s next? Are you ready to include me on the opioid thing? I’m ready when you are.”
“Not yet, I said. Just sit tight.”
“I was talking to a friend last night who goes to Clemson, and he said he knows a guy that was getting oxy from a dealer out of a bar there. I could follow that up, if you’d like.”
Jesus, I thought. Was she talking about the Tiger’s Tail?
“I would not like. I thought we’d settled this. In time, girl, in time.”
“Jawohl, mien Führer. Your vish ist my command,” she said, in a terrible German accent.
Underneat
h her attempt at humor was a barb I didn’t miss. She wasn’t the type to take rejection well.
I spent a little more time with Jason Pilgrim as he uploaded the week’s digital issue for our web circulation. I’d never seen that process done—Kelly had introduced the digital version of the paper. Jason didn’t talk much, but at least he answered my questions when I asked them.
I kept getting the feeling something was bothering him, but if there was, he didn’t bring it up. I hoped he wasn’t about to quit. We’d certainly be lost without him. The number of people who read the digital version was rapidly approaching the hard copy circulation. Kelly had even talked about recording some of the news on camera, and sending it out as a digital video version like a local cable headline news program. The times, they were a-changing.
#
While I was busy at the Clarion, Alvin was visiting his paraplegic cousin, and my old college football teammate, Taylor Johnson, in the medical institution in Greenville. I’d told Alvin that I would be tied up all day, and asked him to say hello to Taylor for me and tell him I’d visit soon. I never went too long between visits, and I’d been doing that for years.
I told Alvin to go back into the Tiger’s Tail that night and call me if anything big developed. If not, to go home and get some sleep. That’s what I intended to do. We agreed to hook up sometime tomorrow, and figure out where we were and what we needed to do now.
As the day progressed, even with my nips and tucks here and there, and a suggestion or two, the staff had this week’s publication of the Clarion well in hand. I was relegated to an observer, more than a manager. With Kelly’s story taking the whole front page, we didn’t need another news lead. So, the first-ever John David Bragg supervised issue of the Clarion was ready.
Eloise seemed to be in high spirits too. I think that even with my help, she never thought we’d be able to get the paper out without Kelly. So much for my sister’s faith in my abilities. I didn’t blame her. I’d never shown any interest in the Clarion before, and the truth was, I would never be as good at the job as Kelly anyway.
