A Welcome Murder

by Robin Yocum

  Uh-oh. Lester the Molester was attempting to do a good turn for the former star of the Steubenville Big Red. Edward shook his head and said, “Your honor, in light of Mr. Earl’s history—”

  “What Mr. Earl? It’s Johnny,” the judge said. “You’ve known him all your life. You were his catcher, for God’s sake. He’s not going anywhere.” He turned to me. “You won’t leave Jefferson County, will you, Johnny?”

  I put both hands on the table and slowly lifted myself from the chair. “You bet your sweet ass I’m going to leave Jefferson County. As soon as I get out of here, I’m renouncing my US citizenship and immediately moving to the Aryan Republic of New Germania.”

  My response took Lester completely off guard, and he asked, “Where?”

  “I am a legal citizen of the Aryan Republic of New Germania, and you have no jurisdictional right to hold me. In fact, I am a colonel in the army of that country, and I have diplomatic immunity. Your laws don’t apply to me, and I demand to be set free immediately.”

  “What?” If I had been speaking Arabic, he couldn’t have been any more confused. “New Germany?”

  “New Germania, you horse’s ass. Now, I demand to be set free this instant.” I slammed my fist down on the table. “You have no right to hold me.” I turned to the general, stomped twice on the hardwood floor, and gave him the Nazi salute. “Tell him, my gen-er-all!” I yelled. “Tell him I’m a colonel in your army and their rules don’t pertain to me!” I turned back to the judge. “We have no extradition treaty with your fascist, oppressive government. Once I am across the border, I won’t come back until the day that we invade your country and overthrow your bourgeois government. I am a prisoner of war. I have rights under the Geneva Convention. I demand to see a representative from the Red Cross. I will report you all to the United Nations.”

  “The United Nations? What the—”

  “This is an act of war! Tell them, General, tell them they have no right to hold me!”

  The general was stoic, glancing at me out of the corner of his eye.

  “Get him out of here!” Lester yelled.

  “Your ass will be sorry. When we attack your country, you’ll be the first one we come after, you homo!”

  Lester was beating his gavel so hard he knocked a glass of water to the floor. “Get him the hell out of my courtroom. Set bond at one million dollars.” He again slammed his gavel, and it splintered into three pieces.

  The flashes from the news photographers’ cameras went off in rapid succession. Two deputies had my arms and were trying to drag me out. I grabbed the defense table and held on. “This is bullshit. You have no right. I demand to speak to my spiritual adviser, the right Reverend Wilfred Lewis, chaplain of the state for the Aryan Republic of New Germania. Pray, reverend, pray very hard. Ask God to smite down these heathen bastards. Tell him to kill ’em all. While you’re at it, tell him to send the Jews and niggers and faggots to hell, too, just like you said.”

  Two more deputies came from down the hall to help out, but by this time the fight was nearly over. “General, help me! Oh, dear God, don’t let them take me back to the torture chambers, I beg of you!” They dragged me out to the hall. As they did, the general and the preacher, their heads down, headed out of the courtroom; Lester was whipping his desk with what was left of his gavel handle; Fran was slouched in his chair, his thumbs hooked in his gun belt, looking dumbfounded behind his swollen nose and Technicolor face. The deputies dragged me down the steps to the jail. I kept kicking and yelling, all for show, but one of the deputies didn’t see the humor and gave me a good dousing of pepper spray. Then I went peaceably.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  SHERIFF FRANCIS ROBERSON

  “That was quite a performance up there,” I said calmly, waiting for Johnny to get off the cot. Then I yelled, “What in God’s name is wrong with you? Have you completely wigged out?” I turned and pointed an index finger toward Fritz, who was getting off his cot. “Broadcast one word, Fritz, one fuckin’ word, and I swear to Jesus I’ll wash your face in that toilet and you won’t get another cupcake the entire time you’re in my jail.” Fritz skulked back to his cot, and I turned to Johnny. “What was that all about?”

  “I’ve been trying to tell you, Fran, I can’t leave the jail. Did you see that beast sitting in the back of the courtroom?”

  “He was a little hard to miss.”

  “He was my cellmate in prison. His name is Alaric Himmler, and he’s a lunatic of the first degree. He wants to drag my ass to Idaho or Utah or Montana, somewhere out there, to join his new country.”

  “He has a country but he doesn’t know where it is?”

  “It’s sort of a floating target. Reality is not this guy’s first language. He’s not real strong on the details. He’s apparently got a few wives lined up for me and a commission in his pretend country’s army. I didn’t think he was getting out of prison for another couple of weeks, and by that time I’d planned to be long gone. Now, I’m hosed. Not only will everyone think I’m crazy, but a Nazi to boot.”

  “Don’t forget suspected murderer,” I said.

  “You’re hilarious, Fran.”

  “Why don’t you just tell Mr. Himmler that you don’t want to go?”

  “That won’t work. He doesn’t respond well to words like ‘no.’ Besides, he really wants my money.”

  “You have money?”

  “Oh, yeah. A boatload. Left over from my drug-dealing days. I hid it and the feds never found it—four hundred and seventy-two thousand dollars.”

  I put my hands over my ears. “Christ, Johnny, I’m the sheriff. Don’t be telling me that.”

  “You’ve got to help me out, Fran. Keep me in here until I figure out how to get out of town.”

  “You pretty much took care of that with your antics upstairs. Johnny, I’ve got to ask you, did you really mean what you said yesterday?”

  He shook his head. “Hell no, you’re a good sheriff.”

  “I don’t mean that. I mean about being the worst quarterback you’ve ever seen.”

  “What? Of course not. I was just trying to get under your skin.”

  “I played four years of football at Bethany and was the starter for two, you know?”

  “It was just something to get you riled. That’s all.”

  I nodded. “Okay. I’ll get the prosecutor to ask Judge Pappas to give you a mental evaluation. Given your antics in court today, I’m sure he won’t question that request. That should keep you locked up for a while. But I know the judge, and he’s not going to let you stay here forever. He’ll cool off eventually, and you’ll have to go.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  MATTHEW VINCENT “SMOOCHIE” XENAKIS

  For the next three days, Mr. Oswald didn’t come in to his office. Shirley continued to call me “Mr. Xenakis” and said his absence was due to a heavy schedule of off-site meetings. “I really need to talk to him,” I said.

  “I’ll be sure to pass your message along, Mr. Xenakis.”

  She was treating me like I was a salesman trying to schedule an appointment. “Shirley, is there something wrong?”

  She struggled to swallow and shook her head. “No, sir. Everything is fine.”

  On my way home that night, I was passing through town when I saw my brother, Luke, getting out of his car in front of the Starlighter Bar. He spotted my car and waved for me to stop. He pushed his head into the open passenger-side window and said, “Hey, killer.”

  “That’s not funny, Luke.”

  He winked. “Sure it is. Come on in, and I’ll buy you a beer.”

  “I don’t know, Luke, I need to get home.”

  He rolled his eyes. “One beer. Come on.”

  I pulled my car to the curb and followed him inside. The day-shift workers from the steel mill were lined up at the bar. When we entered, people’s heads turned, and I felt the gaze of a dozen steelworkers. When we sat down, Luke said, “You’re a celebrity.”

  “What do you mean?” />
  “Did you see the way everyone was looking at you?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t come in the Star that often.”

  He grinned. “That has nothing to do with it, big brother. You’re the talk of Steubenville. Everyone thinks you killed Rayce Daubner.” He caught the attention of the waitress and held up two fingers. “Rolling Rocks.”

  “No one believes that I killed Rayce. They know I’m not capable of something like that.”

  “Don’t fool yourself. Everyone’s wondering if they misjudged you. No one thinks it was Johnny; it would be too obvious. They think you killed him. Look around the bar. Everyone in here is looking at you and whispering. It’s all about you, bro.” He was right. When I looked up and made eye contact, their eyes dipped back to their drinks. Luke took a hit of his Rolling Rock and grinned. “Turns out, everyone thinks you’re a very dangerous man.”

  Even I had to smile at the very thought. “You know, the secretary keeps calling me ‘Mr. Xenakis,’ and my boss hasn’t been in the office for three days. I’d swear he’s ducking me.”

  “He probably is. All this time he’s been beating up on you, and now you’re a suspected murderer. That would make my ass pucker.” He leaned across the table and lowered his voice. “Matthew, this is a great opportunity for you. You’ve been presented a chance to change your life. The best thing that can happen here is that no one is ever charged with Rayce Daubner’s murder. You’ll always be the suspect. You’ll be the guy who killed him and got away with it. Everyone will always wonder if you’ll snap again. It’s perfect. Take advantage of this. Play the cards you’ve been dealt. Let everyone think you’re a very dangerous man.”

  I love model trains, and I have a big setup in our basement. As a kid who was prone to abuse from nearly every other kid in town, I spent a lot of time in my room with my trains and train magazines. I have continued the hobby and have made by hand a detailed, scale model of the steel mills and the railroads that service them. The Herald-Star did a feature story on it a few years ago, and they took a photo of me standing in front of the display and wearing an engineer’s cap, which Dena Marie said made me look mentally retarded. I’m now working on a model of the railroad trestle that spans the Dillonvale Gorge east of Adena, Ohio. Dena Marie doesn’t mind my hobby, and I sometimes think it’s because it keeps me in the basement and away from her.

  After dinner, I went downstairs to work on the trestle, but I couldn’t focus on it. I couldn’t stop thinking about the looks I had received in the Starlighter Bar and my brother’s words: “Everyone thinks you’re a very dangerous man.” I’ve read stories about men and women who after years of abuse become violent. They just snap. That certainly isn’t me, but I guess no one else knows that. In turn, my brother’s other words kept popping into my head: “Take advantage of this.”

  I put down my paintbrush and walked to the half-bath we had in the basement. There’s a small mirror above the sink, and I stared hard into my reflection, then started to laugh. As I mentioned, it’s difficult to look intimidating with bulbous lips. I pressed my lips together and tried to roll them under, squeezing the excess flesh between my teeth. I noticed for the first time in my life that when I frown, my right eyebrow dips lower than the left. Holding the pose, I leaned toward the mirror and in a barely audible tone said, “Call me ‘Matthew.’” It didn’t sound right. I tried again: “Call me ‘Matt.’” Not intimidating enough. Again, I rolled my lips and held my frown, and in a low, slow voice tried my middle name. “Call me ‘Vincent.’”

  That was it. For twenty minutes, I practiced the pose, working to keep my lips tight and my eyes steady. “Call me ‘Vincent.’” I wet down my hair and rubbed in some of Dena’s hair gel that was sitting on the back of the toilet. It gave me a harder edge and made my eyebrows more pronounced. Suddenly, there was nothing funny about what I was doing. “Call me ‘Vincent.’” Perhaps Luke was right. This was an opportunity. I postured in the mirror for another hour, practicing sneers and holding stare-downs with my reflection. The corners of my mouth, I learned, would turn down slightly when I frowned. “Call me ‘Vincent.’”

  I gripped the edge of the sink and was staring hard into the mirror when Dena Marie yelled down the stairs. “Smoochie, are you going to help the kids with their homework or play with your trains all night?”

  I walked to the bottom of the steps and looked up, my face frozen in the stony expression I had practiced. She swallowed, the look of disgust on her face melting away. I waited a moment. Then I said, “I’m not ‘Smoochie’ anymore. Call me ‘Vincent.’”

  Carmel’s Clothiers, on Market Street, is the only men’s clothing store in Jefferson County. At one time, when the steel mills and coal mines were booming, Carmel’s did a handsome business. But the demand for fine suits tumbled with the mills. Carmel’s was sold several times and now carries a scaled-down line of clothing.

  The Beckett kid—the one they called “Hootie,” who was always talking through a mouth full of saliva—had worked at Carmel’s since graduating from high school a few years earlier. He’s lazy and a wise guy. He stands out in front of the store, rocking from heel to toe, hands stuffed in his pockets, always wearing a garish polyester shirt with the top three buttons undone, pants that look like they belong on a disco floor, and shoes that need polishing. He laughs after every comment with a nervous, snorting laugh as he sucks air into his spit-filled mouth.

  When I walked into Carmel’s the morning after meeting Luke at Starlighter, Hootie was dressed in a bright-purple shirt and pale-yellow pants.

  “I need a suit and I need it today,” I said.

  “We got a lot of suits. What kind?”

  I fingered a few of the dark suits on a rack against the wall. “I want a suit that will help me make a statement.”

  He laughed, and little flecks of saliva spewed onto his chin. “You? What kind of statement would that be?”

  “A statement that doesn’t say I’m a reject from the disco era.” I cupped my hands and slapped his ears the way Rayce Daubner had done to me every morning in high school.

  “Mother fuck, Smoochie, what’s wrong with you?!”

  I grabbed his ears, twisted them, and pulled him close. I had seen that in a movie. “My name isn’t Smoochie. My name is Vincent Xenakis. You, you little punk, can call me ‘Mr. Xenakis.’ Got it?”

  The boy’s eyes widened, and a stunned look consumed his face. “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Now listen carefully. I want a suit that conveys the message that I’m not someone to be toyed with.” I fished the newspaper from my hip pocket and dropped it on the counter, making sure the story of my suspicion of murder was faceup. His eyes went to the paper, then back to me. “I’m a 40 long. What do you have in my size?”

  He practically sprinted to the rack of suits ahead of me. He parted the suits, exposing a dozen or so in my size. The first one was summer-weight wool—charcoal with light gray and white pinstripes. I plucked it from the rack and took it to the dressing room without comment. When I returned, Hootie was waiting with his tape measure and tailor’s soap. He marked the cuffs on the sleeves and pants. It was good around the waist.

  “You can pick it up next Tuesday, Mr. Xenakis.”

  “We seem to be having a problem communicating, Hootie. I hear the sewing machine in the back, so I’m guessing that Mrs. Sadowski is back there. I’m going down the street to get a haircut, maybe a shave. When I come back, I better be able to wear that suit out of the store. I don’t care if you’ve got to hem it yourself, it better be done. Now I need to use your phone.”

  “No one’s allowed to use it except employees.”

  I picked up the handset and started dialing. As the phone on the other end of my call began to ring, I looked at Hootie and asked, “Did you say something?”

  “No.”

  “Good. Is my suit done yet?”

  Hootie swiped at some stray saliva with the back of his hand. Then he turned and walked to the back room. Shirley answered
the phone, “Social Services.”

  I waited until she had repeated herself before responding. “Shirley, this is Vincent. I won’t be in today.”

  It took a moment for her to realize who it was. “Oh, Mr. Xenakis. Okay, ah, is there a reason why you won’t be in?”

  “Of course,” I said.

  She waited for an additional explanation, which didn’t come. “F-fine,” she stammered. “I’ll tell Mr. Oswald. Will you be in tomorrow?”

  “I don’t know. It’s still today.” I hung up.

  I went down to the Ideal Barber Shop. Frankie Faust, who had cut my hair since I was a kid, was in the barber chair, reading the sports page. Okie Piergowski was loafing in a chair, working the crossword puzzle. “Morning, Smoochie,” Frankie said.

  “My name’s Vincent,” I said, sliding into the chair that he had vacated.

  “Okay . . . Vincent,” he said. “What’s new?”

  “I saw you reading the paper, Frank. I’m sure you know what’s new. The cops think I might have murdered Rayce Daubner.” I looked at him and winked. “But we all know that I’m not capable of something like that, don’t we?”

  “Sure. You wouldn’t do something like that,” he said, struggling to swallow. “Ah, you want the usual?”

  “No. Just trim it up on the sides. I want to wear it slicked back.”

  “Smoochie—I mean, Vincent—it’ll be hard to keep your hair in place like that. I’ll have to use a gallon of gel.” He forced a laugh.

  “Then use a gallon of gel,” I said without the slightest hint of humor. “And give me a shave, too.”

  I walked out of the barber shop thirty minutes later, smelling of talc and hair gel and bay rum. I wanted to make sure that I gave Hootie enough time to get the suit altered, so I stopped by the diner for breakfast. “Coffee, wheat toast, and two eggs, scrambled,” I told the waitress. “And I don’t want the eggs runny.”

  She was cracking her gum as she nodded. “You got it, sweetie,” she said.