Death in Reel Time

by Brynn Bonner

  “Because I’m looking right at him.”

  I was ridiculously gratified that, for once, I’d been the one to set Esme’s world off-kilter. I promised a sputtering Esme details to follow and clicked off as Tony came back in with his camera already set up on a tripod. He had it ready to go in seconds.

  Johnny sat back down, reluctantly. “How’d you figure it out?”

  I told him about Celestine’s diaries and what she’d written about his supposed death. He shook his head slowly from side to side, his shoulders shaking as he began to sob.

  “It must have eaten Riley alive,” he said, once he’d gotten hold of himself. “I’d planned to go back. I knew he probably thought the fall had killed me. And it nearly did. But then as time passed I thought this way was better.”

  Tony and I both sat silent, letting him find his way. Johnny confirmed Celestine’s assessment of him as a young husband. “I wasn’t a man to go through tough times with back then. Fact, for Renny especially, I was the one that made times tough, real tough. I knew full well I didn’t deserve her when I married her. There’s not a day that’s gone by in the last sixty years I didn’t wish I could go back and fix things and make it all right. That night Riley told me I had to leave before I hurt her bad. I didn’t want to hear that, him telling me how to be with my wife.”

  “So you and Riley did fight about it?”

  “Yeah, just like Celestine wrote,” he said. “Riley hauled me off with my arms twisted behind my back down to the trestle. We used to go there when we were kids and talk our big talk about how our lives were gonna go. So he took me out there so he had me trapped and I had to listen, but that just made it worse on my end. I felt like a caged animal or something.”

  “And you two fought?” Tony asked. “Like physically? Was that part like she wrote?”

  Johnny nodded. “Best I remember, Riley was telling me I had to leave and never come back, never see Renny again, nor the baby. That I was never to see him or Celestine again. The blood rushed to my head and I felt like I was going to catch on fire I was so mad. I hit him in the gut hard. I was stronger and younger than him, but I was also drunk as Cooter Brown. He came at me like a freight train, and next thing I knew there wasn’t nothing between me and that river but night air.”

  “Man,” Tony said breathlessly. “How in hell did you survive that fall?”

  “The river was deeper back then,” Johnny said. “In spots anyway. A lot of the rocks were brought from the quarry at a later time to stop the river from eating away the farmland on the north side. I hit a deep pool when I went in. I got the breath knocked out of me good and broke some ribs and I got beat to hell on the rocks. But somewheres way on downstream a fella from one of the camps jumped in and tried to save me, least that’s what I thought he was doing. He pulled me out but then he took my clothes and my boots and just left me there.”

  He recounted how he’d lain there for maybe a full day, then somehow got himself overland to his buddy Hershel Tillett’s family farm. Hershel hid him in the barn for three weeks, sneaking food out to him and tending to his wounds.

  “I had a long time to study on it when I was hiding out at the Tilletts’. I came to it that Riley was right. I needed to just get gone. He told me if he had to stop me from hurting Renny again it would be for good and I knew he meant it. He would have killed me and he would have been right to do it. He said he wouldn’t stand by and see his brother turn into what I’d become. I didn’t understand myself why I acted like I did with Renny; it was like a devil got inside me. So after I thought on it for a while, I figured he must already think I was dead and this way he’d at least be able to chalk it up as sort of accidental whereas if I stayed and he killed me cold he’d never be able to live with that. And ’course, neither would I,” he said, a pained smile twisting his lips.

  “Where did you go?” I asked.

  “When I was mended enough, me and Hershel set out together. We had in mind to go to California for some reason or other, and the only way we had to get there was to ride the rails.”

  “So you didn’t buy a ticket and board a train carrying a knapsack?”

  “Well, I had a rucksack all right, but I didn’t have jack to buy a ticket with. Me and Hershel hopped the train out of the Crawford stop.”

  “Did you make it to California?” Tony asked.

  Johnny nodded. “Yep. It wasn’t what everybody made it out to be. And whatever I was mad about didn’t get left behind, neither. It didn’t take nothing at all for me to get in a fight when we was tramping. I was all the time getting my ass whupped or whupping somebody else’s. Or getting beat upside the head by the railroad bulls before we caught on good about how to hop the train.”

  “When and why did you become Charlie Martin?” I asked.

  “Hershel got the fire in his belly about enlisting in the army and by then I didn’t care much what happened to me, so I said I’d go with him. But that fella that took my clothes got my billfold, too, and anyways, I didn’t want anybody to come looking for me, ever. I was leaving the old life behind and I didn’t want to be Johnny Hargett anymore. Hershel got the bright idea to go back home and take his brother’s papers. There was nothing to ’em back then,” Johnny said. “None of this picture ID business. I was pretty close to his brother’s age. Nobody thought to check against death certificates. So I became Charlie Martin, and he’s a better man than Johnny Hargett ever was.”

  “And that’s the name you signed up under?” I asked.

  Johnny nodded. “We went to the war and I had some of the devil knocked out of me. I did Charlie Martin proud during the war. There was times I was even brave. I looked after the other boys and held up my end of things. But when I came back home I turned right back into a coward. I couldn’t face folks back home, not Renny and not Riley or Celestine. And I knew I was never going to be fit to live around people ’cause I didn’t trust myself. I didn’t trust that Johnny Hargett wouldn’t come back. So I joined back up and spent my life in the army until I retired.”

  “And came back here?” I prompted.

  Johnny nodded. “I just wanted to see what had become of Renny. I figured she’d remarry and have a good life with some good man who’d take care of her and the baby, but I found out she never did marry again. But she seemed happy from what I could tell in the few days I skulked around Crawford. There for a while I came back every couple of years to check on them. After Renny passed and Olivia was living over here, I decided I’d just stay around. There wasn’t anybody here who’d recognize anything about me.”

  “And you ended up becoming friends with Beth,” I said.

  “That was pure accidental and I tried to hold her off, but after a while I couldn’t help myself. I liked talking to her so much. She puts me in mind of Renny when she was young.”

  “She was like Renny in a lot of ways, wasn’t she?” I asked. “Are you going to tell the rest?” I was operating on a hunch now and I was a long way from having the pieces put together, but I figured I’d risk the bluff.

  Johnny held my gaze, his faded blue eyes filled with anger and hurt. “Turn that thing off,” he said to Tony.

  Tony still looked dazed, but he turned off the camera and gave me a sidelong glance, widening his eyes and lifting his eyebrows.

  “How did it happen?” I asked.

  Johnny looked out the small window with a view of the parking lot. A breeze bothered the leaves on a Japanese maple and it reminded me of one of Olivia’s sculptures. Time passed and I wasn’t sure Johnny was going to answer, but finally he gave a heavy sigh and began.

  “I knew what he was, Beth’s husband. He had the devil in him, too. I could see it. And I knew sooner or later he’d do something really bad to her. And he did.”

  “How did you happen to be there that day?” I asked.

  “It was near dark,” Johnny said. “I’d finished putting in some hostas at a house near Beth’s and I went by to return something Beth had lent me.”

  “That
shovel?” I said, nodding toward the tools propped in the corner.

  Johnny raised an eyebrow. “You don’t let no moss grow on you, do you? I came up the driveway on my rig and I could hear him cussing at her. I got the shovel out of my cart and started for the backyard. Then when I come around the corner I saw him haul off and belt her on the side of her head. It was like I was reliving a nightmare. I hated him and myself both at the same time and all of a sudden I had the notion I could redeem myself if I could stop him. I could finally atone for every bad thing I did to Renny. I pulled out the gun I carry for protection and fired it. I wasn’t aiming at him, just wanting to stop him. But that boiled him over and he come at me like he was gonna tear my head off. The gun jammed and I couldn’t get off another shot. I’d dropped the shovel with all that was going on and I grabbed for it. He kept on coming so I swung it with everything I had left in me and it connected. He was dead before he hit the ground.”

  “And you left Beth lying there while you got rid of his body?” I asked, more accusation than question.

  Johnny nodded, just once. “I checked her and she seemed to be breathing okay so I figured she’s just got knocked out. I thought it would be easier for her if he just disappeared, like I did, or at the very least if she could believe he died somewhere else. I wrapped him up in the tarp and put him in my cart. I got him down to the lake and rolled him in. It was full dark by then and nobody saw me. I left my rig at the lake and went back to see after Beth, but she was gone. Then you,” he said, flipping a hand in Tony’s direction, “came roaring up on that bike of yours and I figured she must’ve called you and she was okay.”

  “What did you do then?” I prompted.

  “Well, I had to figure out how to get rid of that tarpaulin. It had blood all over it and I didn’t want it pointing the way back to Beth’s house. I remembered a young fella I know with a landscaping business. I think you know him. I’d seen his crews at work and knew how they did things so I folded the tarp and later that night I slipped it in with the others at his greenhouse.”

  “I’m no lawyer,” Tony said, “but that sounds like self-defense to me.”

  “You don’t understand, boy,” Johnny said harshly. “I don’t give a rip what they call it. I don’t care about going to jail, or burning in hell, for that matter. And anyhow the way these things draw out I’ll be dead and gone before I see the inside of a courthouse. I just don’t want my last days to be about all that. And I don’t want Beth thinking I’m a murderer. Last I heard she couldn’t remember anything about that night and I’m hoping it’ll stay that way.”

  “She’s remembered enough,” I said. “She knows someone was there and it’s only a matter of time before she remembers the rest.”

  Johnny nodded. “All right, then. There it is. It’s all over for me. You can call the cops on me.”

  “I’ll call Detective Carlson and you can tell him your story, but we need to make a stop along the way. I don’t want Olivia, Beth, or Daniel hearing this from the news.”

  I dropped Tony at my house so he could fill Esme in and also because he still didn’t want Beth to realize he knew about the abuse. I drove on to Olivia’s and, by some convivial trick of fate, found Olivia, Beth, and Daniel all there. I had Johnny wait in the car while I told them everything. I asked if they wanted to see him, but they were all too much in shock to even formulate a question—much to Johnny’s relief.

  * * *

  The morning newspaper carried the story, or a story—the one he and I had settled on as we drove to meet Denny. The essentials were:

  Charlie Martin, an elderly World War II veteran, suffering from dementia and a previously undiagnosed case of post-traumatic stress syndrome, had misinterpreted something Blaine Branch said that fateful evening when they’d encountered one another as night was falling. Martin had believed himself under threat. He had no memory of the altercation or what had transpired until recent days when the details started to come back to him. Martin turned himself in to the police and is now at the regional Veterans’ Hospital undergoing testing and evaluation. A sad end to a tragic story. Branch’s widow could not be reached for comment.

  twenty-four

  A FEW WEEKS LATER ESME and I attended the weirdest, most awkward, most poignant, most painful, most mind-bending family reunion imaginable. Olivia, Johnny, Beth, and Daniel hashed through many things that had happened over the past sixty-plus years.

  Both Beth and Johnny had asked Esme and me to be there, probably to buffer the friction of raw emotions. But we were woefully inadequate to the task. Sitting on a plastic chair in the small, antiseptic hospital room, with all of us gathered around Johnny’s bed, was like being inside a pinball machine gone berserk. Thoughts and feelings came pinging from all directions and the impulse was to duck and cover.

  If this had been a made-for-TV movie there would have been a gush of sentimentality and forgiveness all around and everyone would have dissolved into a sappy puddle of tears and smiles. This gathering was sapless. No old family recipe exchanges or reminiscences about Easter egg hunts at Grandma’s house or trips to the beach. They don’t make a greeting card for thanks for leaving before you killed my mother. And as apologists go, Johnny Hargett was a sorry specimen, no pun intended.

  “I said I’d tell you anything you want to know; I owe you that,” Johnny said to Olivia, rubbing at a two-day growth of gray stubble on his cheek. “And I want you to know I’ll tell the whole truth, nothing but. You won’t likely thank me for it ’cause none of it’s pretty. The first thing I want you to understand is I know your mama was special. And I loved her, I did,” he said, giving one slow nod. “She saw something in me that made me want to be a good man.” He waved a blue-veined hand. “But it was too late. I was broke and I didn’t know how to fix myself and she trusted me too much. And the better she was to me the more of a danger I was to her. I saw plain I had to get away from her to save her.”

  Olivia let out a deep sigh. “You know you caused a lot of hurt and a lot of pain and guilt by the way you left. I’ve read Aunt Celestine’s diaries. Uncle Riley lived out his days thinking he’d killed you.”

  Johnny’s lips set into a thin line. The air seemed to grow thicker as we all waited. “Well,” he said finally, “I hate that Riley and Celestine suffered and I’m not pleased about all of you being shamed by what people had to say about why I left, neither. But the truth of it was worse. And I’ll say it right out, I’d do it the same way again if that’s how it had to be. Renny stayed safe and that was what mattered. And Riley would tell you the same if he could.”

  “That’s true,” Esme whispered, her head tilted over close to mine. “That’s what Riley says.”

  I looked her a question, rolling my eyes toward the ceiling. She gave a nod.

  “Where were you all those years?” Olivia asked.

  “All over,” Johnny said, shrugging a bony shoulder. “Me and Hershel rode the rails for a while and that was all right, but it didn’t suit me. I was always getting into scrapes with the other hobos and without anything to live for I got reckless. Then Hershel talked me into joining the army and that got me straightened out. After a few trips to the brig I finally learned some discipline. Then the war taught me some more lessons. I re-upped when I got back stateside. The army was a good place for me; it kept me away from regular people. But I’d take leave every few years to come back and check on you and Renny and see how you were getting on. I was hoping Renny would find a good man and remarry, but I guess I ruined that idea for her for good and all.”

  “So you were spying on us during all that time?” Olivia asked.

  Johnny frowned. “I wouldn’t call it spying. I just wanted to know you were okay.”

  Silence fell and everyone began examining their shoes, the tree outside the small window, or the medical equipment. I searched my mind for something to say that would help move things along, but nothing came to me. The silence went on for what seemed an interminable time, then finally Beth blurted, �
��You killed my husband.”

  It wasn’t an accusation, just a statement. Johnny responded in kind. “I did,” he said, “and given the circumstances facing us that day I’d do the same thing again. He would have killed you. If not that day, then some other day when something in his brain misfired. Now, I don’t doubt he loved you, but it was a crooked love, all twisted and tangled and mean. I know about that. ’Course, there’s them that would say that’s no kind of love at all, and maybe it’s not. I’m not the one to say. Anyhow, I said I’d tell the truth so I can’t say I’m sorry I killed him, ’cause I’m not. You’re here, alive and healthy and young. Not unscarred, I know that, but you can start again and have a good life; you’ve still got plenty of days ahead of you.”

  “I loved him, you know,” Beth said, her eyes focused on something far away. “In the beginning I really loved him.”

  “Of course you did, Beth,” Olivia said, putting an arm around her. “You did everything you could for him.”

  “Maybe someday some smart people will figure it all out,” Johnny said. “This probably won’t make any sense to you and it’s a mystery to me, too, but you loving him probably made him ashamed. I expect he knew he wasn’t worthy of it. I did. None of this is on you. That’s what I wish I could tell Renny. That the sickness was mine and that leaving was the only loving thing I had to give her.”

  “She knows,” Esme whispered again.

  Johnny adjusted his position, trying to bring himself into a more upright position. Daniel located the remote and adjusted the bed.

  “How about you, boy?” Johnny asked, looking up at him. “You got anything you want to ask?”

  Daniel raised his eyebrows. “Nothing to ask,” he said after a moment. “But something to say. I don’t know how to feel about you or about any of this. On the one hand, I’m grateful to you for saving my sister’s life. On the other hand your life isn’t exactly a shining example of manhood. In fact I’d say you’ve caused a lot of people a lot of pain.”