“He may be watching us right now,” said the ranger.
“If he is, he’ll be real still,” said the sheriff, his eyes like those of an excited hunter. “His whole idea is to keep out of sight. Once he’s seen, he knows he can never get away.”
“Hard to track a man wants to stay hidden,” said the ranger.
“He can’t escape me,” said the big man. The engines were started again and the boats moved slowly forward, their exhaust noise bubbling in the swamp water.
In a few minutes, the sheriff pointed to a mud island, larger than the others nearby, that was coming up on the right. “Hey, here’s something. He might have gone ashore here.”
The ranger idled the engine and came back to stand with the sheriff at the side of the boat. They studied the island.
“I see marks on the edge of the bank,” said Sheriff Good. “Might be where his fingers and toes tried to grab at the mud,” he said. Harry nodded to Charleston as they too saw the thin lines into the edge of the mud between the reeds.
“Nose her in here. I’ll go take a look,” said the sheriff.
The boats moved in to the edge of the island. The big man grunted as he clambered on to the mud and pushed his way into the high reeds. Harry followed the sheriff. The ranger held a clump of reeds as a way to anchor his boat. Charleston remained with the ranger’s wife, as she allowed her craft to drift a few feet from the bank. The current was growing as the tide changed and the ranger’s boat swung against the mud bank, rocking slightly and forcing the ranger to pull harder on the slippery roots.
“Sheriff, don’t be too long. I can’t hold her here,” he called, as some of the reeds he was grasping came loose from the mud on the hammock outcropping.
“I’ll be back soon,” the gruff reply came from about fifty feet away.
The sheriff was in among the high grass and the mud runs of muskrats. Every few feet Harry would go, his legs sunk up to his knees in new soft sections of the thick ooze and he had to spend a few minutes and his strength to pull himself out. He was getting tired and breathing hard in the intense heat. The insects found him now that he was no longer out on the open water, and he spent much of his time and energy swatting at the flies which blinded him swarming at his eyes.
Then, for an instant they both saw a movement in the grasses. Good pulled hard to release his foot from the ooze and then slapped his body flat on the ground, crawling now to get speed towards the grass. Then he waved his hand at Harry who was close behind him, now also on his stomach, as the sheriff stopped.
Harry listened but heard nothing. The swamp was deadly silent. The birds and animals were not moving and the swarm of flies as if warned were also gone. Harry was waiting for what would come, waiting to see or hear.
Harry heard the lawman breathing hard. He smelled his sweat and saw the water coming up over the sheriff’s arms ahead of him on the ground. He listened harder trying to make out new noises. Behind him he heard the rattle of the ranger’s oar as the man pushed against the tide. The skin of Harry’s stomach was wet. He could feel the water at his groin. He had a wild thought of the sheriff having to spend several hours this evening cleaning all this muck out of the firing chamber of his revolver, deep into mud under the big man’s leg.
Harry watched back and forth as the grasses now swayed lightly from a breeze rippling through the wetland. Then he fixed on one spot. Fronds of reeds appeared slightly out of place, not regular. He knew that here in the swamp everything had its position.
The big man had seen them too. In the next instant he watched as the sheriff had summoned his strength and leaped forward at those reeds. No prey could have escaped. Harry heard the thud of his heavy body crashing down into the grasses and the muck and then saw the sheriff’s right hand grabbing at something. As he got closer he saw a man’s bare foot, the attached leg slithering away. Then he saw the lawman grabbing the foot, then a hand, and the wriggling of the captive slowed, ceasing to struggle.
“Let me go, let me go,” a voice shouted. It was an attempted yell but from a voice that was weak and hoarse.
Harry moved forward and in another moment was face to face with an old man, a half naked man whose black skin was barely visible under its thick coating of mud. From the eyes of this person came an unmistakable energy, a glare of life. This man was old but far from dead.
“OK, you got me. You got me,” the person said.
“Snagged him, Ranger,” shouted the sheriff. “Don’t you try to escape now, you Walker.”
The man wriggled free from Sheriff Good’s grip and stood up.
The sheriff reached into his holster and drew his gun. He wiped the large revolver against his trousers, then raised the gun, aimed over the man and quickly fired two shots. his rounds hitting the brush overhead. Animals screamed and ran while birds jumped up from the leaves and bits of branches tumbled down. From the distance came the call from the ranger, “He try to escape, Sheriff?”
The man slunk back. Good aimed directly at the man’s heart.
Harry yelled, “Hold your fire. He’ll surrender. Don’t shoot that gun.”
The sheriff raised the revolver slightly and fired again, hitting a small tree to the side of Walker as if he was torturing the fugitive.
“Go ahead. Give me a shot,” he yelled as he pointed the gun directly at Walker.
Harry grabbed at the barrel of the sheriff’s gun. The sheriff, astonished at Harry’s action, pushed him back with his left hand, fighting to pull the revolver away from Harry. The sheriff fell backwards as his feet slipped in the mud and Harry pushed forward to land on top of the big man, Harry’s hand still holding the gun.
“You son of a bitch, Jacobsen,” the sheriff said, rolling on top of Harry and pinning him into the mud.
“You’re not going to kill him,” Harry tried to shout, gasping as he felt the sheriff’s great weight on top of him. Then other hands were there, pulling at the sheriff’s back.
“It’s all right, Sheriff. Walker isn’t going anywhere,” the ranger said, “I put your cuffs on him.”
Harry stared at the big man who had moved back and was glaring at the prisoner, his revolver still pointed at the man. The prisoner looked back, his eyes showing fear and exhaustion.
“Why did you shoot at him?” Harry heard himself screaming.
“Didn’t you see?” Good yelled back. “He was trying to get away. He got back in that brush we’d have never got him.”
“The old man is done,” Charleston said. “He can’t run any farther.”
“Let’s go home,” said the Ranger.
“Are you Walker?” asked Harry, looking at the mud covered fugitive standing next to him, his hands locked.
A voice answered him, in a rasping whisper, “My name is Walker John Douglas.”
Harry wasn’t prepared for what he saw, what a life in a swamp does to a man after thirty years. This derelict bore no resemblance to the photograph of this man Harry had seen in the old newspaper. The eyes were the same, showing that the intelligent glimmer of the brilliant mechanic was still there. The rest of him looked close to death. The old man was missing front teeth and his hair, while white, was vibrant with swamp flies and their filth. His skin, bitten over and over by insects, was scratched on his back, stomach and legs with deep red and infected fissures from sleeping on rough branches in the mud and the rest of his body showed bones instead of muscle and fat. He was dressed only in a ragged pair of shorts.
“You’re going to my jail,” said the sheriff, his hand slapping the old man’s shoulders and almost knocking him to his knees with the force.
“Take it easy, Cheeks. You’ll kill him before you get him to jail,” said Charleston. He leaned over the old man, who stood with his handcuffs held up in front of his mud covered face. “Walker,” he said, “I’m your family’s lawyer. Listen to me.”
The prisoner turned his head, his eyes on Charleston. “You keep your mouth shut until I talk to you,” the lawyer said.
Walke
r nodded, his eyes moved slowly over each of the men around him.
“Killing wouldn’t be no loss to the taxpayers,” said the sheriff, pushing the man again.
Charleston reached forward and held the big man’s arm. “You hit Walker again and I’ll make sure you go to jail in his place.”
The sheriff shook Charleston loose and said to the ranger, “Let’s get him to jail.”
Charleston walked close to the prisoner until the old man was put into the ranger’s boat. The boats got underway, engine smoke rising in the swamp humidity. The ranger’s wife followed her husband’s boat through the swamp, not letting the sheriff get out of sight.
Charleston, his face filled with concern, leaned toward Harry as they speeded through the dark marsh and said, over the roar of the engine, “He was alive all these years, living in that swamp. I never suspected.”
The lawyer’s eyes filled with tears, “This is inhuman, the fault of everyone in this Goddamn town.”
Harry looked at him and nodded, “After seeing his condition, I’m just thinking that if he didn’t have a motive before for burning down River Sunday, he sure has one now.”
Chapter 17
Friday August 6, 10 am
Harry walked into the office. The first thing he saw was Annie’s desk piled high with charts, color photographs and descriptions of individual raceboat specifications. She looked up with a smile when she heard the door open and the street traffic noise surged in.
Harry went over to her desk. He stood behind her chair, looking over her work and rubbing the back of her neck.
“Don’t want to offend anyone by misspelling a name of a driver or a boat,” she murmured, breathing deeply as she felt him touch her.
“I wrote up the arrest of Walker,” he said. “I think we should put it on the front page with that old photograph of him.”
She looked up at him and said firmly,” Good.”
He said, “I’m glad we’re in this together.”
She nodded. “I’ll work out something with Chauncy when he gets in,” she said. “We still have time to get changes to the printer.”
Harry moved to the door.
“Are you going to see Walker at the hospital?” she asked.
Harry nodded and said, “Charleston wants me there as a witness as he tries to get a confession from the old man.”
She stood up and said, “I almost forgot.”
“What?”
“Walker’s boat?” she said.
Harry stopped with the door open. “What about it?” he asked.
“The boat’s been stolen.”
“The Black Duck?” Harry raised his voice in astonishment.
She nodded, saying, “All that was left was the engine and a few parts that had been removed from the hull.”
“I bet Catch towed it out in the Bay and sank it, the bastard,” said Harry.
She shook her head and added, “I couldn’t get anyone to give me a straight answer.”
Harry grinned and said, “I imagine Blue and his people must be singing praise right now. Their devil is gone.”
She began gathering and sorting the regatta pictures into piles. “Each of these racers has to be listed in the proper class,” she said.
“I’ve got another headline, or at least a possible one. Missus Kirby may have some explaining to do,” he said.
“The town money?” she said, looking up at him.
Harry answered, “Billy Elliot said that some of Walker’s money was withheld from his mother and kept by the town.”
“They can’t get away with that,” she said.
Harry nodded, “First, I want to see what comes out of Walker’s testimony to the sheriff.”
The River Sunday hospital had been recently renovated with modern glass fronted buildings and had a helicopter landing space on its roof to transport cases to Baltimore. In front, memorializing the building’s early history as a Civil War veterans home, was a small hill where children, both black and white, were playing, taking turns keeping other boys and girls off the summit. The hill was actually a mound, not more than ten feet in height and stretched out for only about a hundred square feet in total area. On its front was a brass dedication plate and a small red white and blue flower bed spread in front of the area.
“August 1, 1898. To the River Sunday brothers in both the Union and Confederate Eastern Shore Companies who lost their lives facing each other at the crest of Culp’s Hill during the battle of Gettysburg, July 1863, this Soldiers Hospital and perpetual garden is dedicated.”
The hospital fronted on a large street with both sides lined with parked cars and wide sidewalks. Back from the street were white homes with dark green shutters and sun browned lawns. On the hospital’s side of the thoroughfare and at either edge of the memorial mound were open areas of heavily watered very green lawn leading to parking lots, one on the east or town side and one on the west, for the visitors to the facility.
Besides the young children who were playing on the hill, adults were beginning to gather. Why these people were present was not immediately evident to Harry as he approached the hospital from parking his van. The only indication that this gathering might be irregular was the presence of one of the town police cars, its red and white colors stark against the simple pastels of the tree lined street. Sitting in the drivers seat by himself was Captain Stiles, sipping on a can of Coke, his eyes moving slowly around the area.
From what Harry could see the people on the right side of the entrance to the hospital were blacks, men and women he knew personally or had seen attending the black Baptist Church. They milled about, tending their children, or talked in groups. Some waved to Harry. Opposite them, Harry found another group coming in by ones and twos from the other parking lot further to the west of the hospital. This group as it formed up on the other side of the small mound, seemed to be white. He knew some of these people too. Many of them were members of Reverend Blue’s church.
He went quickly to the room where Walker was being kept under guard. The old man, recovered from his shakes and exhaustion, was sitting up, savoring the last forkfuls of a hospital breakfast. His sister had brought him pajamas and robe and he looked regal there in the small and spare room, the air filled with the smell of eggs and sausage, him appearing happy even though he was a prisoner.
In the corner the sheriff had arranged a video camera so that all Walker’s comments were on tape. Charleston was in a chair at the side of the bed. The Sheriff was talking to Charleston when Harry walked in. Harry went over to the window and leaned against the wall there, taking out his recorder. The sheriff stopped talking, looked at Harry, his face tightening. He started to say something to him, and Harry could see the words forming on his lips that appeared like “get out of here.” Then the sheriff stopped himself and turned back to Charleston.
“You can keep on telling him to keep shut, but sooner or later he’s got to talk,” the big man said.
“I want to answer your questions, Cheeks,” said the old man.
“Don’t you go calling me that again, Walker. It’s Sheriff,” said Sheriff Good.
Charleston put his hand on Walker’s arm and said, “The sheriff has told you your rights. What that means is that you don’t have to talk. If you insist on answering him, I suggest that you call him what he wants, Walker.”
“He used to like that name. Homer started it, calling him Cheeks ‘cause he was so fat,” said Walker. The old man’s voice was hoarse but strong.
The Pastor had come in right behind Harry. He stood by the window and occasionally looked outside at the groups forming on the lawn. The sheriff sat down in a chair opposite Charleston and began going over various typewritten papers on his wide lap. A nurse came and went around the bed, adjusting the electronic monitoring equipment that was still hooked to Walker.
The Pastor said softly, “I want to tell you about your mother, Walker.”
Walker said, tears forming in his eyes, “I know she’s dead, Pastor.”
The Pastor leaned over Walker, putting his hand on the old man’s thin shoulder. “Her last words were about you,” he said.
The Pastor went on, “She said to me, ‘I’ll tell the Lord I’m proud of Walker, that’s what I’ll say.’ Then she died.”
Walker put his hands over his face, rubbing his skin and eyes. “So much sorrow in that woman’s life,” he whispered.
“You brought it to her,” said Sheriff Good abruptly. “Let’s get started.”
Walker put his hands down and looked at the Pastor. “Thank you for helping her,” he said. Then he turned to the sheriff. “I’ve thought about you too. I’ve thought about you and the rest of the people here in River Sunday.”
Good stood up and turned on the video camera. As he went back to his seat, he said his name, the date and asked Walker to state his name. Then he sat down and held his notes up to his face. He read, “Tell me what you did after you lit the town fire thirty years ago.”
Walker began to talk. His forced silence over all the years in the swamp seemed to make him spout words, to open up like a spigot that is turned on and flows out a great flood, as if the very concept of talking to other humans was a tremendous pleasure.
“I didn’t light any town fire, I’ll say first off. I will tell you how I escaped from the firemen and police who were after me,” he said.
“First of all, I didn’t have time to do much thinking. All I could think was that if I didn’t get away I’d be in the River Sunday jail and no telling when I would get out. In front of me was a group of angry men coming on, claiming that I had started what was looking to be a real bad fire, and I didn’t have the words or any other ideas how to dissuade them. Maybe in hindsight I should’ve let them capture me and then with Mister Charleston’s lawyer help I could sort out what was a big mistake. Then again, these people were angry mad and I might have been killed to settle it right then and there. I decided the best thing to do was get the hell out. I ran.
“However the fire got started, it was out of control and vicious. Boards were flying through the air, on fire and setting other buildings on fire. The group that was chasing after me held back as flames whipped out between me and them. I had a chance to get away and I took it.
Powerboat Racer (River Sunday Romance Mysteries Book 3) Page 22
