Swamp Monster

by C. A. Newsome

  He’d held out longer than expected. Those looks Joe and Larry gave each other the night before told him Stu was ready to cut his losses.

  Dinner never came. Snores drifted through the vents, the heavy snores of passed out drunks. Underneath the snores, the quiet click of the lock.

  This time the flashlight penetrated the darkness with more certainty, the light kindling twin frissons of hope and alarm. He worked spittle into his mouth and licked cracked lips.

  The sweet face he never expected to see again hovered over him, a finger to the bow mouth, warning him to stay silent.

  She whispered, “I can get you out, but you’re leaving your foot behind.”

  “Are you out of your mind?”

  She set down a carryall and withdrew a quart bottle, some kind of liquor. “I can’t leave you here. Drink this, it will help.”

  Mal propped himself up and took the bottle. She sat on the dirt floor beside him and rummaged in the bag, her face averted.

  “How do you expect to do this without getting both of us killed?”

  Rose’s voice was brisk. “I put Ma’s morphine in the soup. Larry and Joe won’t wake up until the second coming. Uncle Stu is at the club.

  “My grandpa did field amputations in the Civil War. I know how he did it, only he didn’t have an electric saw. I’ll put a tourniquet on your leg to keep you from bleeding to death, and afterwards I’ll cauterize the stump the way grandpa did.”

  “And how was that?”

  “I sprinkle gunpowder on it and light a match.”

  Mal took a swig from the bottle and waited for the booze to burn its way to his stomach.

  “How many of his patients survived?”

  “More than half. What other chance do you have?”

  If he died this way, at least Stu wouldn’t win. “And how do you plan to carry me out of here?”

  “My cousin Nick is waiting outside to help with the operation.”

  “What’s he doing outside?”

  “This is going to hurt more than you can stand. I had to use Ma’s morphine to put Larry and Joe asleep. I’ve got a piece of leather for you to bite on and the gin will help, but it won’t be enough.”

  “What do you plan to do? Hit me over the head with a skillet?”

  “Grandpa was a plain-speaking man. He said making love was one of the best pain killers nature ever invented.”

  Mal choked, spraying gin.

  Rose shifted coming closer, fidgeting with the top button of her blouse. The brisk voice held a slight tremor now. “You’re hurt, so I expect I need to do most of it myself.” She picked up his hand and placed it on a firm, full breast. “I’ve never done this before. Will you tell me what to do?”

  Day 27

  Thursday, May 16, 2019

  Stacy’s guts twisted as she knocked on the door to Ms. Freeman’s office. The summons could only mean one thing. Ms. Freeman knew. And if she knew, other people would know, and they’d all look at her that way people did.

  She didn’t want their pity or disgust. She wanted to be normal and pretend the last twenty-four hours had never happened.

  They’d been eating supper, glued to the TiVo’ed Bachelorette premiere. Onscreen, a hot guy in a suit jumped out of a giant shipping box, showering packing peanuts everywhere.

  “Too goofy,” Ma had said, chewing mechanically.

  As if a guy like that would look at you twice. This is so lame.

  Stacy rolled her eyes at Lynn and Connie. Movement outside the living room window caught her eye. A cop car eased into a space across the street. A second cop car parked in front of the house, followed by a van and an SUV.

  She stopped breathing.

  They’re coming for me. I have to get out of here. She picked up her plate and stood. “I’ll start on the dishes,” she told the room.

  Ma tore herself from stuck up Hannah Brown in her silver spangle dress, her eyes narrowing at the uneaten fish sticks on Stacy’s plate.

  “Sit your ass back down and finish your dinner. You’re not throwing out good food.”

  Connie and Lynn kept their eyes on their TV trays, hoping to be forgotten if Ma’s temper blew.

  Behind Ma, red and blue lights flashed while a line of cops headed down the side yard. More cops, coming up the front walk, followed by two men in suits. Detective Dourson, and a cute guy who looked like he should be handing Hannah Brown a dozen roses.

  I’m doomed. She couldn’t stop the panic on her face, even knowing it would piss Ma off. On the screen, a guy wearing a tux handed a baby seat to Hannah.

  “Sit down now or you won’t—”

  Banging on the door.

  Too late.

  “Joyce Bender, open up, we have a warrant.”

  Surprise, then fury on Ma’s face. Stacy cringed.

  “What the hell have you done?” Ma hissed, pasting a neutral face on as she stood. She cracked the door, leaving the chain in place.

  “What seems to be the problem, officer?”

  “Please step outside.”

  Ma frowning, calculating. Outside the window, the neighbors stood in their yards and lined the street, talking and elbowing each other. She was going to jail, and they were laughing. Prime time entertainment.

  After a pause that lasted too long, Ma stepped out, pulling the door behind her. Voices too low to be understood, the sound of a scuffle.

  Through the window, Ma shouting obscenities as they frog-marched her to the van in handcuffs, surrounded by cops like she was the Hulk or something and they thought she was going to break out an Uzi and shoot everyone.

  The lights, flashing. Red, blue, red, blue.

  Ma?

  Asshole neighbors on the sidewalk, cheering as if this was an episode of Cops. A lady cop with a blank, zombie face, herding her and her sisters into the kitchen.

  More cops tromping through the house. Connie and Lynn scared to death. Trying to calm them down while her heart pounded. She felt like bawling herself.

  Then it got worse.

  Detective Dourson came and said Ma was helping Jamal sell stolen goods, and they were going into foster care as soon as the social worker showed up.

  Stacy couldn’t wrap her head around it. She tried, choking down cold fish sticks with her sisters while the zombie cop lady stared at them, waiting for the social worker to arrive. She kept trying during the hours of limbo before they found a place for her.

  It was after eleven when she’d been dumped at a stranger’s house with mismatched clothes in a garbage bag. She didn’t know where her sisters were. Maybe she’d never see them again.

  Fussy Mrs. Gertz in her fussy house, fussing over her until she could scream. Mrs. Gertz said she didn’t have to go to school. But Stacy didn’t want to be stuck in the fussy house, and school was the only place she knew where she could pretend her world wasn’t falling apart.

  Taneesha in the hall, giving her a hard stare. She must have looked guilty because Taneesha mouthed, “I’ll get you,” before disappearing into class.

  Then Ms. Freeman sent for her.

  This is not happening. It’s not happening. It’s not.

  The door opened.

  Ms. Freeman, dressed in her pretty suit, smiling as if the world was a nice place.

  “Stacy, come in and have a seat. There’s someone I want you to meet.”

  The woman sitting in the visitor’s chair was a drab sort of woman, overweight, with short, iron-gray hair of no particular style. Somehow she looked happy and worried at the same time.

  Stacy sat, backing into the chair while she kept her eyes on the woman watching her so strangely. She looked up at Ms. Freeman, waiting for an explanation.

  The woman said, “Do you remember me?”

  Stacy, mute, could only shake her head.

  “You were only three. Joyce hasn’t spoken to me since then. I’m Dee. I’m your grandmother.”

  Stacy blinked. “You’re dead.”

  The woman bit her lip. “Dead to Joyce, I’m s
ure. There’s a lot of water under the bridge, but I want to look after you, if you’ll let me. Your sisters, too. Will you let me?”

  Day 28

  Friday, May 17, 2019

  Jenny sat at the crowded kitchen table. Detective Dourson’s girlfriend, Lia, set a plate of steaming lasagna in front of her. Terry sat on her left, with Lia’s redheaded friend and Steve across from her. The ends of the table were vacant while the detective and Lia served dinner.

  A damp nose bumped insistently against her leg. Lia’s schnauzer, looking for a handout before she had a chance to taste her food.

  Lia scooped the dog up. “Chewy’s default is ‘pest.’ How did you get past the baby gate, little man? Back to the kiddie room with you.”

  “He’s no bother. I enjoy dogs.”

  Detective Dourson—Peter—handed her a glass of wine. “You’ll change your mind about that if we let him stay. Dig in while it’s hot. Lia will be back in a minute.”

  Terry offered a basket of garlic toast. “Thank you again for Andrew’s leg. I shall treasure it always.”

  Jenny took a slice, handed the basket to Steve. She didn’t know what to think about Terry’s plan to mount the prothesis on his canoe, but her discovery of the false leg led to Andrew’s death. She didn’t think she could bear to have it around. Terry would enjoy it without the baggage.

  “You’re quite welcome.”

  Lia and Peter joined them, a signal for the group to attack their meal. Between bites, the redhead with the graceful hands—Bailey?—said, “It must have been nice seeing Mrs. Redfern after all these years.”

  “It was. She doesn’t remember me, but she’s still very sweet. She patted my hand and asked if I was a Merrill.”

  Bailey’s overlarge Shelley Duvall eyes brimmed with compassion. “Dementia?”

  “Yes, but she’s doing well, considering. She has a very protective group of friends at Twin Towers. You might recognize them.”

  The table gave her a collective confused look.

  Jenny explained. “From those silly videos—Susan’s Snippets?”

  “I don’t understand,” Lia said.

  “With Ms. Snippets coming around the neighborhood, Donna knew someone would eventually tell her where to find Gran. She asked Gran’s friends to watch out for her. They decided the best defense was a good offense and created a plan to distract her.”

  “They made it up?” Lia said. “They weren’t random nuts?”

  “Watch the videos again. You can tell they were determined to outdo each other.”

  Terry shook his head. “Poor Susan. I hope she never finds out.”

  Jenny saw Lia and Bailey trade looks over their wine. A change of subject was in order. “I heard from Jay Overstreet again.”

  “Again?” Lia asked. “How many times has he called?”

  “Five, maybe six. He wants my memories of Andrew for his book.”

  “Will you do it?”

  “I’m about ready to block him. It’s idiotic to think Andrew was a mobster with his hands on a fifty million dollar egg.”

  Terry toyed with his lasagna. “Dick Brewer thought the same thing.”

  “He also said Jay Overstreet killed Andrew. I guess he made that up to string me along. Dick was such a putz in high school. No wonder I didn’t recognize him. I can’t believe he killed Andrew.”

  Bailey turned those sympathetic eyes on Jenny. “Even if Andrew isn’t Malachi, aren’t you wondering what’s inside that compartment you found at the house?”

  “There was no compartment. I was buying time until I could figure out how to get away from Dick.”

  “This is just like The Maltese Falcon,” Bailey said. “Do you suppose Malachi’s treasure ever existed?”

  Steve snorted. “What businessman trusts a peon with that much money in the middle of a mob war?”

  “That seems so obvious,” Lia said. “Why do you suppose the mob bought it?”

  Peter snagged the last piece of garlic toast. “I’ve thought about it a lot. Magicians are masters of misdirection, and between Malachi and Pete, they would have foreseen the need for a contingency plan. I bet the Syndicate had informants inside the club and Pete knew they were there.

  “So Malachi disappears and Pete plants a story with his inner circle that Malachi hid the money even from him, knowing it would get back to the mob and they would think the trail ended with Malachi. If Malachi had a cache, I bet it was a fraction of what everyone said.”

  Words burned into Jenny’s head, words she couldn’t say: Then Andrew died for nothing.

  Peter’s phone buzzed. He looked down at the screen, then held it in front of Jenny so only she could see the text:

  DNA results indicate a match for immediate family with two degrees of separation.

  Jenny looked up at Peter. “What does this mean?”

  Peter nodded at the avid faces surrounding them. “Would you like to talk in private?”

  Jenny took a sip of her wine. “I think I need to stay near the bottle.”

  “We compared your DNA sample to Andrew’s. You’re related.”

  “That’s not possible.”

  “Two degrees of separation. Sibling or grandparent.”

  “My grandfather died in the war. Grandma was a war widow.”

  “Did your mother have any memories of her father?”

  Jenny shook her head. “He joined up the day after Pearl Harbor. She wasn’t even a year old. He never came back.”

  “December 8, 1941. Malachi disappeared in 1940, right before Pete Schmidt sold the Beverly Hills. You ever see any photos of your grandfather? Meet his family?”

  Again, Jenny shook her head.

  “A lot of unwed mothers assumed identities as war widows back then.”

  Jenny blinked. “Why wouldn’t she tell me?”

  “If the stories are true, I imagine she thought the less you knew the safer you were.”

  “If it was so dangerous, why put me in his house?”

  “A calculated risk? She was dying. I imagine she wanted you in a position where Andrew could help you and no one would think anything of it.”

  The tears fell now. “Except I shot my mouth off and got him killed.”

  “You didn’t know. Everyone involved had been dead for decades. It was a one-in-a-million chance that someone who could make sense of it overheard you.”

  The room fell silent as Jenny collected herself. Lia’s chair scraped the floor as she got up, announcing dessert and coffee while she gathered empty plates. Across the table, Steve stared hard at Terry.

  Terry excused himself, returning a few minutes later with a towel-wrapped bundle cradled in his arms like an infant. He placed it in front of Jenny. “You didn’t know he was family when you gave this to me. I think you should have it back.”

  Jenny ran a hand under her nose and sniffed. The side of her mouth quirked up. “I don’t know what I’ll do with it.”

  “Make a lamp out of it, like in A Christmas Story,” Steve cracked.

  “I don’t have the right stockings.” Jenny pulled the towel aside and ran a hand over the wood, frowned.

  “Is something wrong?” Terry asked.

  Everyone leaned in closer.

  She ran a finger along a hairline crack. “This wasn’t here when I saw it at the coroner’s office.”

  “It was damp for thirty years,” Bailey said. “Now it’s drying out. A little wood filler will fix that.”

  “It’s not that. Andrew made puzzle boxes. He gave me one. I still have it.”

  “You think the leg is a puzzle box?” Lia asked.

  Peter nodded at the leg. “Can you open it?”

  “Maybe. He used a system of metal shims. Each shim has a hole drilled in it so they spin around on a nail. The holes are off center, so one side is heavier than the other. You have to rotate the box in a pattern to clear the shims from their latches. Then you can pull it open.”

  “I wonder if he showed you the secret of the box on purpose,”
Lia said.

  Jenny held the prothesis by the ends. “Here goes nothing.” She manipulated the leg in a series of moves as familiar to her as breathing, then set it on the table. “Grab the other end,” she told Bailey.

  They pulled.

  Nothing.

  “I have a rubber mallet in my truck,” Bailey said. “Maybe if you tap it a few times it will shake something loose.”

  Lia and Peter served cheesecake and coffee as the group watched Jenny tap, shake and gyrate the leg. On the fifth try, something shifted. Jenny paused, astonished, as everyone whooped.

  “What do you suppose is inside?” Bailey asked.

  Terry waved a forkful of cheesecake. “It’s the egg.”

  “Get real.” Steve said. “There isn’t enough space for that.”

  Terry grinned. “This is better than Storage Wars.”

  “Why guess?” Jenny said. “Pull!” Bailey tugged. The top of the prothesis came free, revealing a compartment. In it was a gray, plastic tube, two inches in diameter.

  “I expected something classier than plastic,” Bailey said.

  “Plastic is waterproof,” Lia said.

  Jenny tipped the tube out of the slot with one finger. The screw cap stuck. She handed it to Peter. “You give it a shot.”

  Peter placed the tube on the table and tapped the edge of the cap with the mallet. He grunted and gave a twist, handing it back to Jenny. Jenny unscrewed the lid and peered in.

  “What is it?” Bailey asked.

  “Something’s wedged inside.” Jenny used two fingers to ease out a stiffly curled booklet with a red leatherette cover. She pressed it flat. The gold leaf on the front was almost gone, but the embossed image of a harp remained. Above the harp, the words ÉIRE and IRELAND could still be read.

  “It’s a passport!” She opened the little booklet, turning it sideways. A photo of Andrew smiled at her. She turned it around so everyone could see.

  “Hello, Grandpa,” Peter said. “What name is on it?”