Dumping Grounds (Joshua Stokes Mysteries Book 1) (11 page)

17

The Darkness before Dawn

Still sitting in his rocking chair on the back porch, Joshua awoke. Something had startled him from his sleep. He tried to pull himself together so he could look around for whatever scared him awake.

While he was down in the bayou, a fight had taken place in front of Miller’s Grocery in Moffettville.

When Joshua got home about one o’clock that morning, after dropping Kathy back by the Ala-Miss around midnight, he had four messages on his answering machine from Deputy Cook, telling him what had happened and asking what they should do about the boys fighting.

His beeper, which was still attached to the bloodied pants he was wearing earlier, lay forgotten in a pile on the bathroom floor. It too, had callback messages from the Sheriff’s office.

He had no sooner gotten home than Deputy Cook came driving up into his yard looking for him.

“Damnit, Sheriff, where the hell have you been? We was getting worried that something bad had done happened to you.”

“Not that it is anybody’s business where I went, I went up to the 4 Mile, to get some supper. I forgot to take my pager with me.”

Deputy Cook looked at his watch and gave Joshua a doubtful look, which did not get past the Sheriff.

“Now, tell me about the fight,” Joshua continued, “The message said it was in Moffettville, in front of Miller’s Grocery. Why would anybody be fighting there? It wouldn’t a racial thing was it?” Joshua asked. He worried it was racial because of the location. Just north of Miller’s place, across the railroad tracks at Wilson Road, near the old Cemetery was a Negro community.

“Naw, Sheriff, it didn’t have anything to do with Niggers,” Cook replied.

Joshua cringed at his deputy’s use of the word nigger. They had done talked about that before, several times to be exact. Nigger was still used prominently in the south. Joshua himself had grown up using it, but it was no longer an acceptable word, especially by a servant of the people. Times were changing. People were changing. Hell, they even had colored deputies working for the county now and one deputy had advanced so far that he made State Trooper.

“It was them damn boys of Autry Reston’s,” Cook exclaimed, “They was bound and determined to kill Willie Jr. same as their daddy kilt big Willie I reckon, but they bit off more than they could chew when they went to messing with that boy. Him and his cousins, Hannah, Pearl, Patty, and Tom’s boys, nearly ended up killing those boys.

Seems those boys been feuding for a while now. Those boys belonging to Autry Reston and his kin have been sending messages back and forth at school and such, threatening to whup Willie Jr. because his daddy caused their daddy to go crazy and kill himself.

I’d heard that since Mister Stringer passed away, Missus Stringer was selling her place and moving over into Mississippi. She’s trying to get them younguns of Willie and Lacey’s away from here.”

“Well, that might be best, Cookie. Willie and Lacey murdered like they was, and Autry’s suicide has got to be hard on both families, especially the children.”

“Yes, Sir, I’d imagine so, but them boys are not above the law, neither are Autry’s. They can’t go around beating each other up every time they see one another, can they.”

“No, they can’t, and we have to see that order is observed. All of them boys are growing up fast. Their testosterone is kicking in and kicking high.

I will go have me a talk with Dotty Reston tomorrow. It surprised me that Autry’s folks let her back into the fold, especially since her actions indirectly caused all the mess. She hasn’t been out of the clink but a couple of months; I’ve been expecting some kind of shit to get started.”

“Well, Sir, if you don’t mind me a saying so, the shit done hit the fan. The pile ain’t gone do nothing but get bigger, and stink a whole lot more.”

“Yep, I reckon it will, Cookie. What did y’all end up doing with them boys?”

“Well, one of em had to be taken to the hospital. He had a few broken ribs and a punctured lung. The rest of em scattered, left him laying there when we drove up.”

When Joshua asked who called it in, Cook had replied, “Hell, I dunno Sheriff, but I’d s’pect it was old man Miller. It was in front of his house, being he lives there in the back of his store.

Of course, it could have been Little Bill, he was probably up at that hour, I don’t s’pect the old man and woman was up that time of night. Most old folks like them, go to bed with the chickens,” Cook said dryly.

Joshua thought to himself, that for once, he would like to go to bed with the chickens.

Deputy Cook had left his place about 1:30 to finish his rounds, Joshua had then gotten his bottle off the table and come back out onto the porch to sip him a nightcap and have a smoke before retiring to bed. He reckoned he had fallen asleep in his rocker. That was nothing new; of late, it had become a regular occurrence.

Now, here he was, wide-awake again.

However, he still had no idea what had woke him so suddenly. The moon, which had shone brightly earlier in the night, was now gone.

It was the darkest hour before the dawn… in another 30 minutes or so, the sun would begin its rise and the chickens would be up.

Soon, he would probably hear Mister Kelly’s rooster, a quarter mile across the swamp, start crowing. He always crowed at the butt crack of dawn.

Sometimes, the rooster was loud enough to wake Joshua, other times he was not. It depended on how much Joshua drank before going to sleep.

It seemed the only sleep he got here lately, was on his porch in the rocker. He reckoned this night was not going to be any different as his eyes became heavy and his lids began to droop.

A crackling noise, which he had heard on previous nights as he sat on his porch, roused him from his dosing.

Joshua sat upright in his chair, listening.

He heard the noise again. This time, he pulled his gun from its holster. Not that he was afraid; he did not have any outright enemies that he was aware of, but there were wildcats and panthers that roamed the woods around his home. He did not want a bobcat to slip up on him.

Their teeth and claws were sharp as razors and could do a lot of damage to a human body.

Joshua looked over to where Jack was laying on the swing, but it was too dark for him to see his dog.

Moments later, he heard a low quiet growl. It sounded as if it was coming from Jack’s direction and he thought he heard Jack move. His eyes swung back toward the river, where the crackling noise originated.

A white mist rose from the ground near where the waters edge should have been. Slowly, it began moving toward his cabin.

Joshua was use to mists and fog forming along the waters edge and moving low across the land, but this mist was different; it had a glow about it.

As it moved, it began to take shape and appeared to be taking the form of a person.

Joshua was not afraid of ghosts. He grew up with a ghost in his house and ghosts had appeared in and around his cabin since he first moved in, nearly twenty-five years earlier. He often felt their presence around him.

On several occasions, he had seen them. Most of the time, he heard them, their voices echoing from the past.

You could not tell it now, because a hundred years of untamed growth blanketed the riverbanks with vines and trees, but many years ago, the Caledonia Plantation, also known as the Moffett Plantation, had cotton fields all along the banks of the river; slaves worked those fields daily.

It stood to reason that the blood, sweat, and tears of those owners and well as the slaves, was soaked deeply into the earth, and so were their souls, buried beneath its soil.

As the sun was setting on quiet, late-summer days, Joshua had heard field hollers, shouts, and the moans and groans of long-dead slaves.

He heard them sing songs in the early morning hours as they headed into the fields and at the end of the day as they came in from the fields.

He had heard them sing happy tunes, sad tunes, and mournful tunes; all carried to his ears on winds of the past.

On separate occasions, he had heard at least three different songs sung.

The song that sounded happy, was the “
Hey he hi ho, just a picking all day
” song. They usually sang it in the evening. Joshua reckoned it was happy because the day was about done. The song that sounded mournful was the “Riverbank makes a very good road” song. “
The dead trees show you the way, Left foot, peg foot, traveling on, Follow the drinking gourd,
” was what he thought they said. He had heard them sing that in the mornings as they headed into the fields, dreading the long days work.

The sad song was the “Wade in the water” song. That one always made Joshua feel a heavy sadness overcome him, maybe because they sounded very sad as they sung it. He’d heard that one on a Sunday morning…

Jack was use to ghosts being there too. He did not usually acknowledge them, but this time, he was and this in itself concerned Joshua.

The mist did not feel threatening, but it was still a ways from the cabin.

It looked almost smoky, iridescent in its appearance, as smoke does when it rises effortlessly into the air from a slow burning flame.

Joshua watched, waiting expectantly, mesmerized by its movement.

The figure came closer and closer. The closer it came to him, the more it took shape. By the time it reached the foot of the steps leading up to the cabin, it was the full-bodied apparition of a woman.

Her long flowing hair became the color of the night; her dress was thin, almost transparent. Pressed against the thin material, her nipples were firm and upright.

She moved across the floorboards, apparently without moving her feet and legs. Joshua looked up at her as she stopped and stood over him.

He could hear a low growl form in Jack’s throat and then become louder. Joshua was unable to make out the features of her face, but could tell where her eyes and mouth should be.

He heard her voice without seeing her lips move. She said “Please find me, take me home.” Then she placed her hand on her hip and at the end of her fingers, he could see the rosebud tattoo through the thin material.

When Joshua looked back to her face, it was clearly visible. Her hair was jet black. Her eyes painted with black pointy outlines, and her red luscious lips were sown shut with black thread.

Joshua awoke with a start, jumped upright and almost tripped over his dog Jack, who lay at his feet.

He fumbled around in the darkness hunting his cigarette lighter. He finally got his hands on the small table, which sat beside his rocker. He found his cigarettes, lighter, and then lit the small kerosene lantern he kept there on the table. The smell of the kerosene smoke was comforting as it illuminated his surroundings.

Joshua gazed around and looked out as far as the lamplight would permit. It was pitch-black outside. Not even a moonbeam found its way into the darkness surrounding him.

He breathed a sigh of relief as he stepped over Jack and sat back down in the rocker. Jack did not move, not even an ear twitch that Joshua could see.

“Are you alive, Old Boy?” Joshua asked, taking the toe of his boot and touching Jacks nose. Jack raised his head, looked at Joshua and then rested his head across Joshua’s booted foot.

Joshua poured himself a shot of whiskey, swallowed it in one gulp and then lit a cigarette.

He sat there trembling, remembering his dream, but in his mind, he could not decipher if it had really been a dream. It seemed so real and he had felt wide-awake.

“Maybe it was all that greasy food I had for supper,” he mumbled, and then took another swallow of whiskey, this time straight from the bottle. It was easier than trying to pour it into a glass with his hands shaking so.

Once his nerves settled, Joshua snuffed the lamp and sat there staring out into the darkness, waiting . . .

Emma felt she had been on the edge of death when held captive, for at any given moment, they could have snuffed out her life, as they would have a candle.

Then, when she escaped, she felt she was on the edge of victory. Victorious in maneuvering her way through the old house and out to freedom, even though doubt formed shortly afterward, as to whether she had actually escaped, or had they played her like a fiddle and let her escape so they could chase her again.

Emma again felt as if she was on the edge of death. The river had swallowed her whole. Her body was being digested through its muddy bowels… all of her oxygen was gone, her lungs, about to explode. There was nothing she could do other than wait. Wait, hope, and pray that God would see fit to raise her from the river bottom and breathe air into her near lifeless body.

Once she relaxed and let her body lie on the bottom of the river, an amazing thing happened; Emma felt her body slowly began to float upward and onward.She did not know if she could stay conscious long enough to reach the surface, but she was sure as hell going to try!

Emma knew she needed to avoid bends in the river where limbs and debris collected, in order to avoid becoming entangled in them, but she was no longer atop the water, she was submerged deep within it and when she opened her eyes, the water was too dark and murky to see.

The river currents felt swift, Emma was no longer comfortable going with the flow. She gathered what strength she had left and began rolling in the deep water, her deft movements through the water seemingly bringing her closer to the surface.

By her estimations, she should have surfaced way before now; she began to panic. Although it felt like a very long time to Emma, she had been below the surface for less than four minutes.

Flowing headfirst into a pile of debris, fear overwhelmed her. Emma sucked in her breath in surprise, taking in a mouthful of water.

Luckily, the water did not make it into her lungs, but she did feel as though something had cut her left arm as it went into the limbs. She grabbed a hold of the limbs and went to pulling herself upward, climbing up the largest limb she could feel. When she breached the surface, Emma spat out the water and sucked in the largest breath of air she could; it was painful to her airless lungs.

She climbed out of the water and lay exhausted on the muddy bank. She had to hold onto roots that grew out of the bank, in order to maintain her place and keep from sliding back into the watery hellhole.

Emma lay there until she could breathe easier and then raised her head and looked around.

It was very dark, but she could make out an outline above her; she was still under the bridge.

Undoubtedly, she had done a belly flop right into one of the dreaded undertows!

“Lord, I could’ve sworn I’d floated further than that!” Emma mumbled, huffing for more air into her lungs.

Disheartened by the situation, Emma wondered what to do next. Fear of jumping right back into the same Eddy, kept Emma hanging onto the roots for safety.

Her common sense told her she needed to stay put until daylight. As she looked around, straining her eyes to see into the night, all she could see was darkness.

It was pitch-black, but Emma could sense a thick fog form around her. She could feel the moisture of the fog settle on her face and the air she breathed was damp.

Emma lay there, too exhausted to pull her self further up the bank. She was also afraid if she pulled harder, the rooted lifeline she held tightly, might snap. If it did, she would be hurled back into the river.

She did not know where the tree limb she used to climb out was and it was too dark to look for it. Squirming around feeling for it, might dislodge unseen dangers, so she lay there, praying for daylight.

Emma wrapped her fingers tighter onto the roots and grasses. She could feel the different thickness and textures of each within her hand. She closed her eyes.

Emma figured that maybe she could use her other senses better if she shut down some of her more useful ones. Her sense of smell was useful; she could smell the rich soil, the pungent odor of creosote, also, the aroma of sweet olive and pine tar from the trees.

As she lay there, she felt something else she was not used to feeling. She felt it constricting as it moved across her legs. Emma knew immediately what it was; she had no doubt that it was a snake.

It probably would not have been so terrible if it had just gone on and left her alone, but instead, it crawled under her clothes and up her back!

Emma knew the snake was probably seeking the warmth of her body, but as its head came out the neck of her blouse near to her mouth and nose, she became frightened. She felt its tongue flick the air near the tip of her nose and resisted the urge to scream.

Her grandfather had told her if she ever encountered a snake around the nursery just to stop in her tracks and let it go on its way.

He said that most snakes were harmless and if left alone they would not harm you, but she had never been this close to a snake in her life.

It took every ounce of Emma’s reserve not to become a screaming lunatic, especially when she felt more slithering creatures around her legs and thighs.

I reckon he done brought all his damn kinfolk up in here to check me out, she thought quickly as the snakes crawled up her legs toward her waist.

Emma almost lost it, when she felt one come up between her legs and across her buttocks. She had forgotten that she did not have on underwear beneath the vintage clothing.

Emma’s breaths began to quicken. She feared she would begin to hyperventilate if she did not get control of herself. She took a deep shaky breath and held it, pretending to be dead, but then common sense told her the snakes could probably feel and hear her heartbeat. Her pretensions of being dead were useless.The only thing she could do was lie still and let them crawl all over her.

“Well, just looky what we got ourselves here, Vern.” Emma heard his familiar, nasally sounding voice just as the light from their flashlights landed on her; she began to cry hysterically. It was hopeless; she would never escape them!