Carnies and Wildcats: Ulciscor

by Robert Spearman

  Jimmy cried.

  He returned to the lobby of The Ashley. It was warmer than outside, but his breath still a cold fog. Once inside his warm apartment, he poured himself a glass of wine and sat back on the sofa, and thought of Marie’s story.

  Jimmy remembered many of the events, but there were other details—a mystery, an incomplete story. Marie did not know it all and neither did he. He itched to learn the rest.

  A name tumbled into his mind, Bud Hammontree—his father’s partner.

  Bud knows the answers but where is he? Is he still alive?

  Five years earlier his father had died, and Bud came to the funeral. He greeted Jimmy at the funeral and expressed his sympathy. He shared his warm remembrances about “the good old days”. Bud told Jimmy to stay in touch, and Jimmy assured him he would. Bud scribbled his address and phone number on a scrap of paper and gave it to Jimmy. Jimmy tossed it in the garbage the next day.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Jimmy got out of bed the next morning with one goal in mind, find Bud Hammontree. He made a big pot of coffee and called the Sheriff’s Department.

  “Lowndes County Sheriff’s Office,” answered the lady on the other end.

  “Betty Coleman please,” he said.

  Betty started at the sheriff’s office a year before his dad. Past retirement age, she had been in charge of human resources for over 40 years and that made her indispensable. Betty was the grease that kept the wheel turning—managing overtime, managing shifts, vetting new recruits and keeping the payroll within budget.

  Betty Coleman had served and tolerated four different sheriffs during her tenure. In Georgia, county sheriffs are elected. Once elected, they can change employees the minute they take office. Newly-elected sheriffs sometimes gutted whole departments, but none dared to bother or replace Miss Betty.

  Jimmy listened as he waited for the phone to connect. A public service announcement played while he was on hold, it touted the successes of the sheriff’s new drug task force.

  “Betty,” croaked the old woman as she came on the line—all business, no play.

  “Miss Betty? This is Jimmy Miller, Oatmeal’s boy.”

  “Oh Lord, Jimmy, how are you?” Betty said. Her voice softened—more pleasant and less formal.

  “Doing well Miss Betty and how are you? Did you have a nice Christmas?”

  “Okay, I guess. The kids are grown, grandbabies too. No one likes to visit the old woman anymore. Ella, my oldest, sent me tickets, and I am flying up to see her in DC right after the first. How are they gonna make it around here without me? They will make a mess of my office.” Betty laughed, she sounded like a chicken cackling.

  “Now, Jimmy Miller, why are you calling me? You didn’t call me to exchange a holiday howdy after all this time.”

  Jimmy laughed, time to turn on the charm. “Why Miss Betty, I am calling to give you a holiday howdy. Feeling nostalgic and lonesome I guess. Making the rounds saying hello and ho-ho-ho to my friends and my dad’s old friends.”

  “Well ain’t that sweet,” she said. “Who else have you called?”

  “Oh, a few friends of my own, and my mother’s people up in Pennsylvania,” Jimmy lied. “I want to call Bud Hammontree too, but I don’t have his number.”

  “Bud? Ha! That old coot is living up between here and Hahira in a retirement village on a golf course. He plays golf three times a week and has a few old women he dates. Bud visited me here a few times trying to put the moves on me, but I don’t have time for that goat. And by goat, I mean goat, old men smell like goats.”

  Jimmy laughed under his breath. “Do you have his number?”

  “Sure sweetie. Hold on a sec and I’ll get his number for you.”

  Betty gave him the phone number. “Well, Jimmy darlin’, it’s been good hearin’ from you. You have warmed this old woman’s heart on a cold December day. Your dad was a great guy, we miss him around here.”

  “I miss him too,” said Jimmy.

  “Well you should, he pulled your ass out of the fire enough times. Oatmeal Miller didn’t keep you from finding trouble, but he sure kept trouble from finding you. Happy New Year, Jimmy, and don’t be a stranger.”

  “Happy New Year to you Miss Betty, I’ll ride out there after the first and see you.” Jimmy lied again and hung up the phone. Jimmy had no intentions of going to see her, he had what he needed.

  * * *

  Jimmy dialed Bud Hammontree’s number. Bud answered on the second ring. “Hammontree here,” he said. Bud’s voice was sweet and lilting like he was turning on his manly charms to a geriatric vixen caller.

  “Bud?” Jimmy asked.

  He lowered his voice to a lower, manlier tone. “Yes, who’s this?”

  “Oatmeal’s boy, Jimmy.”

  “Jimmy! It’s great to hear from you!”

  “Likewise. You been doin’ alright?”

  “Retired and living large, living large Jimmy! Man, you told me you were gonna call me after your pop died but you never did.”

  “I know, life kinda got in the way plus I got reassigned to China. I’m sorry it’s been so long.”

  “I can understand that, but hey, no problem. So what do I owe this call?” asked Bud.

  “I’d like to come see you,” Jimmy said, “drop off a Christmas present and sit around and chat. You’re kinda all I have left of my old man.”

  “Sure, why don’t you swing by this evening? Bring a couple of steaks and we’ll fire up the grill. I’ll ask a special friend of mine to whip us up a potato salad or something. What time you wanna be here?”

  “How does six-thirty sound? I’ll need directions.”

  “Okay, six-thirty and bring bourbon with them steaks.” Bud gave Jimmy the directions.

  Jimmy left his apartment. The weather had warmed, but the wind was an icy razor cutting through Jimmy’s winter coat. He stopped and bought two steaks and a bottle of bourbon. Jimmy drove north from Valdosta towards Hahira. Bud told him on the phone it was on a back road between Mineola and Hahira. After making a few wrong turns and backtracking, Jimmy spotted the golf course and the entrance to the retirement complex.

  The retirement community was not bad. The property featured a full eighteen-hole golf course, with club house and swimming pool. Each housing area was comprised of duplex units with small, wooden, fenced-in backyards, and parking for two cars in front of each unit. Jimmy pulled up to Bud’s apartment and parked next to a golf cart. The golf cart had a back license plate which read: “Bud’s Baby”.

  As Jimmy parked his car, Bud walked out the door of his condo. An older lady came out with Bud. “Awww Jimmy,” he said. His face beamed and he gave Jimmy a big hug. “I’m so damn happy to see you.” Bud loosened his bear hug on Jimmy and introduced the lady. “This is Delores. She’s leavin’, but she brought us the best tater salad you ever put in your mouth.” Bud leaned over and kissed Dolores on the forehead and gently slapped her butt with the palm of his hand.

  “Nice to meet you, ma’am,” Jimmy said.

  “You too, young man.” Delores wrinkled her nose at Bud, waved to them both and walked away.

  Bud grabbed Jimmy by the arm and took him on a tour of the house. The inside was nice, not cheap but not expensive. The walls were off-white. Someone had decorated the condo with flowers and knickknacks. Jimmy imagined that Delores or another one of Bud’s lady friends had helped with the interior design.

  Pictures and plaques covered one wall of the den—photos of Bud as a deputy, pictures with Bud and Jimmy’s dad, service commendations, and softball trophies. Bud’s history hung on this wall. Jimmy looked at the photos but paused longer at the ones with Bud and his dad.

  “Your dad was a stand-up guy,” said Bud.

  Jimmy turned to Bud.

  “James always did right by me. Me and your pop had a few close calls, but we covered each other’s hind-side.” Bud was on the verge of tears. “Man, how I wish I could talk to the cantankerous old fool one more time.”

 
; Jimmy smiled and put his arm around Bud. “I miss him too,” he said.

  He remembered his dad withering away in the nursing home, his mind slipping away because of Alzheimer’s.

  Jimmy came to visit him the last time just a few days before he died. For several seconds, his mind opened and he spoke with great clarity. It was as if his dad shook away the disease that had ravaged his mind and body for two years. He said to Jimmy, “Son, life turns on the point of a needle. Run away from the past and don’t let it ever catch you.”

  The words echoed in his mind. His father had warned him to run from the past. But yet, here he stood, in Bud Hammontree’s duplex, not running from the past but running straight back to it—looking for answers.

  Bud’s stomach growled and interrupted their reminiscing. They both chuckled. Bud suggested to Jimmy that they start the steaks and open the bourbon. Jimmy poured two glasses of bourbon over ice and added Coke to fill the glass.

  Bud and Jimmy sat on the patio and sipped their drinks. Both pulled their chairs closer to the grill to catch its warmth. Bud talked about his younger years as a deputy. He teared up when he told Jimmy about meeting his dad for the first time. This led into a retelling of the oatmeal story.

  Bud placed a few ears of corn on the grill along with the steaks. He turned the steaks again, waited a few minutes and said, “Rare.”

  Jimmy told Bud to leave his on until medium. Bud nodded. Satisfied that their steaks had cooked to a perfect medium, Bud served them.

  They wasted no time in eating everything. The potato salad was the best Jimmy had ever eaten, and the corn—roasted to perfection.

  Bud cleared the table and Jimmy freshened their drinks. Bud and Jimmy retired to the den—Bud in his recliner and Jimmy on the sofa.

  “Well, we’ve been talking about me and the past, but what’s up with you Jimmy? How’s the job?” asked Bud.

  “No job, sorry to say. Allen Ridley fired me last month.”

  “Fired? Hell, I thought you would be at Ridley’s forever,” he said. Then he leaned over and said something that surprised Jimmy. “You know, your pop helped you land that job at Ridley’s.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Jimmy.

  “Well let’s just say your old man had Harvey Ridley’s nuts in a vise. He blackmailed Ridley into giving you a job once you graduated from high school.”

  “Care to elaborate?” he asked. “You know I would love to hear the story,” Jimmy said.

  Maybe it’s the murder.

  "Well, it goes back a ways. An election four years after your pop started gave us a new sheriff. The new sheriff did a total fruit basket turnover and lots of folks lost their job. 'Too much corruption,' he claimed.

  “Me and your pops were uniformed deputies and two good eggs. We had always kept our noses clean—always protected each other and never let the other one stray too far from the straight and narrow. Our clean noses caught the eye of the new sheriff and he promoted us to detectives—gave us shoulder holsters for our guns and an unmarked car. We took turns driving the car home every night. We thought we had won the lottery.

  “Me and your pop were newly-promoted, greenhorn detectives. We got a call one morning to go out to a lake house on Ocean Pond, accidental drowning. We arrived with the coroner and the ambulance. The lake house belonged to Harvey Ridley. Ridley's little daughter had drowned. The coroner looked around, asked a few questions and ruled the death an accidental drowning. The ambulance boys picked up the body and we left.

  "But your pop, God bless him, said something was strange. He said he felt too much tension in the house. Plus he noted a wet spot on the porch and we both saw Ridley's boy sitting in the car. Oats and his intuition, and he had a good one. Kinda like he knew who stole that shit from the football locker room."

  Bud winked at Jimmy and smiled.

  Jimmy's eyes widened. He took a long drink from his glass.

  "Oh Jimmy," he said, "don't act surprised. Your pop told me everything. There were no secrets between me and him."

  Jimmy sat on the sofa in silence.

  No secrets?

  "I convinced your old man to shake off his suspicions and let the coroner's ruling stand. Back in those days, if the coroner had signed off, it didn't pay for newbies like us to start asking questions. We put it out of our heads.

  “A few years passed. Nothing major ever happens in our one-horse county—small stuff, petty larceny, drugs, bank hold-ups and a few homicides.

  “Most murders we worked involved jealous husbands or drug deals gone sideways. We had a few that stumped us too, but we always solved them. Oats was the brain and I was the muscle of our little partnership.

  “One night, in November, I don’t remember the exact year, the carnival was in town. It always came to town in November. We received a call to go out there, dispatch said homicide. I swung by your dad’s house—it was my night to have the car. By the time we arrived the uniformed guys had come, and judging by the size of the crowd, everyone in the county was there too.

  “A damn gruesome sight, a young girl, a real cutie and the carnival owner’s daughter. Her throat sliced open from ear to ear. The murderous bastard had put her body on display right outside the back gate ticket booth. She had a sign hanging around her neck, ‘I hate Carnies and Wildcats.’ Trust me. I never will forget that sight.

  “The crowd had trampled the crime scene. We tried pushing them back to give us space to work, but it was too late. The little girl’s old man showed up too and was holding his little girl. Every little bit of evidence we hoped to get from the scene was disappearing in a hurry.

  “Your dad convinced the father to give us the body so we could try and investigate. The City Police detectives showed up too. We gave them the scene to work for evidence and clues. And we took the little girl’s dad with us to the sheriff’s office to try and piece it all together.

  “As you can imagine, the girl’s dad was shaken up by it and we were too. No amount of experience prepares you for something so gruesome.

  “He had little to offer. We asked him about his daughter’s habits and friends. Also asked if he suspected any of his workers. He was insistent that none of his folks could do something so hideous, but I had my doubts.

  “He told us about something that had happened earlier that week. A boy had come to his office, demanding to run away with the carnival. He told him no and the boy became angry and they booted him off the property. Told us he spotted the same kid in the crowd while he was holding his daughter’s body.”

  “He was certain it was the same kid?” Jimmy asked.

  “Me and your dad asked the same thing. He said he was ‘fairly sure’ that he recognized the face but was ‘very definite’ it was the same football jersey and number. Said he never saw the name on the jersey but could never forget the colors or the number—black with a yellow seventeen, Valdosta High School. All kinda strange since the sign around the little girl said that the killer ‘hated Wildcats’ and this boy wore a Wildcat jersey.”

  Jimmy’s body stiffened. “Freshen up your drink there Bud?” he asked, reaching for Bud’s glass.

  Bud offered him the glass without hesitation. Jimmy poured them both more bourbon in the glasses and topped it off with more Coke. Jimmy made Bud’s stronger than his. He wanted Bud to keep talking. And Jimmy had to drive back to Valdosta, he didn’t want to drive back drunk.

  He handed Bud his drink. “So, you questioned the man, what happened next?” Jimmy asked.

  Bud took a mouthful of the drink and let in sit in his mouth for a moment before he swallowed. “Well, let’s see. There was no evidence and no suspects except for this angry boy wanting a job—not a good motive for murder. We took the girl’s dad back out to the fairgrounds and told him we would keep working on it. The Valdosta City detectives came up with nothing in their investigation.

  “Your dad took me home and we called it a night. Not much you could do at the fairgrounds in the dark plus we needed more info on the jersey number.
We got back together the next morning, had breakfast at Beulah’s and then drove out to Valdosta High. We asked the principal’s office to give us one of the most recent football programs. The kind that lists the players and their numbers, stats and such.

  “They brought us one and we left. Your dad made me drive while he looked through the program.

  “A few minutes later he said, ‘Ridley, Allen Ridley.’

  “We drove out to the Ridley’s house, but Harvey was at work. Mrs. Ridley was there and she invited us in.

  “Mrs. Ridley was a lovely lady but loopy. Not sure if she was on medication. Maybe self-medicating with something from the liquor cabinet.

  “We asked her a few questions. Standard routine—where is Allen now, where was he last night, stuff like that. Mrs. Ridley told us that Allen was spending a few nights at a buddy’s house and she remembered him saying he wanted to go to the carnival.

  “Strange though, in spite of the questions we asked, she never once asked us if Allen was in trouble. Weird, huh?”

  Jimmy nodded.

  “We thanked her and stood to leave. She stared at us, said we looked familiar. Your dad told her we came to the lake house when her little girl died.

  “Then she said something which floored us.

  “She said, ‘You know it wasn’t an accident, right? Allen killed my little girl. I don’t know the trouble he’s in now but this time I hope somebody stops him.’

  “Then she kinda sobered up, as if she realized she had said too much. After that, she got rid of us quick, pushed us out of the house in a hurry. Your dad tried to get her to give up more info, but she stopped like someone had flipped a switch.

  “He told me to drive back to the office because he needed to talk to Sheriff Reaves. His secretary said he was unavailable. Sheriff Reaves was a great politician and administrator, but he fell far short on the law enforcement side of the job.

  “Your dad slipped the Sheriff’s secretary a note—something about the Ridleys I’m sure—told her to take it to the Sheriff. Within seconds, we were sitting face-to-face with the Sheriff.