Long Holler Road - A Dark Southern Thriller (22 page)

  When we had walked down the limestone gravel road that led to our hay barn maybe a hundred yards or so, I could see the moonlight reflecting off a vehicle of some kind. As we got a little closer, I could see it was a van. Not a customized van like the ones that were beginning to become popular, but a plain, white utility van. They told us to stop and keep our hands held high.

  The smallest one opened the back doors and took out a spool of nylon rope. He cut off three pieces and started with me first. He never spoke, but the bigger man who was still pointing the gun at us told me to put my hands behind my back. They were tied tightly and I was then told to step into the van. Then Glenn and Snake were bound and both told to get in beside me. To my dismay, they still hadn’t checked to see if we were armed. I guess youth does have it’s advantages, and assumed innocence is one of them. We were told to keep quiet as they shut the back doors of the van. The big man got in the back with us and placed hoods over our heads. The other one walked around to the drivers side door and got in, cranked the engine, and we started moving.

  Snake was beginning to sob quietly and I told him to stop. Surprisingly, it worked. We rode for a good while with nobody speaking a word. I was trying to tell by counting the seconds how far we traveled before we made a turn and then tried to count the turns and whether they were right or left. I have no idea why I thought of it. As scared as I was it was a wonder I could think of anything other than what fate was in store for us. But I was determined to survive and for Glenn and Snake to survive with me. If only I could figure out a way to conceal my pistol where it wouldn’t be found. But as long as my hands were tied, there was no chance of that. It couldn’t be seen now, because my shirttail was out and covering it. But at some point I was sure they would search us.

  I knew our captors weren’t the Bullards. Maybe some of their friends they had hired, but I doubted that too. Bruce and Freddy would have much preferred to come in person and wouldn’t have the patience to take us to another location when we were already in a remote place with nobody around. They would have just pulverized us right then and there.

  After we had traveled about twenty minutes, if the math I had been doing in my head was accurate, we came to a stop. I could tell the last quarter of a mile or so had been uphill. Putnam County was full of ridges, but if I’d kept up with all the turns correctly, we should be roughly fifteen miles southeast of our farm.

  The back door of the van opened and we were told to get out. I felt a hand on my shoulder and the big man said, “You get in front, you get behind him, and then you.”

  I couldn’t tell which one of the men was leading me, but we walked several steps and I heard a door open. We walked through it and immediately started walking down stairs. We came to a landing, made a right turn and continued our descent. When we reached the bottom some lights were turned on and even through the hood I could tell they were very bright. Like neon lights. I heard the door shut behind us and the rattle of keys that sounded like they were locking it. We stood there for a minute in silence. I could hear our two captors moving things around the room. Then the hoods were jerked off our heads and I was almost blinded by the bright lights. When my eyes finally adjusted I could see the room we were in had solid concrete block walls. One wall had a mirror than ran the entire length that looked to be about four feet high. I had seen cop shows on TV where they would be questioning somebody in a room that had a mirror on the side the suspected evil doer was on, and the cops would be on the other side of the mirror watching those being questioned. I couldn’t remember if they were called one -way mirrors or two-way mirrors. One-way made more sense.

  There were three small beds against one wall and in the corner was a bathroom, complete with a shower. There were books of all kinds stacked neatly around the foot of one of the beds. Other than the beds there was not another stick of furniture to be seen. The small man walked around behind each of us and untied the ropes from our wrists. He was wearing a big, bulky jacket that was zipped up, which I thought was odd, considering it was still August. He then walked through another heavy steel door, a different one from the one we’d come through. The bigger man looked us over for a minute, walking around us several times. I knew he would frisk us any minute now and find my pistol. But if he was going to do that it seemed to me like the smaller man would have stayed and held his gun on us. Maybe he is coming back, I thought. In a minute I heard the door opening. I was right. He
was
coming back. He had a basket of some sort in his hand and walked over to me.

  “Empty your pockets and put the contents in the basket,” the big man said.
              I was beginning to wonder why the smaller man never spoke. Was he a mute or something? I knew this was it and they would find my pistol. After we emptied our pockets they would surely frisk us to make sure we hadn’t left anything. Either that or they were very trusting kidnappers. Then I got an idea. I knew it probably didn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of working, but I was going to try it just the same. I started emptying my pockets slowly, as if I were having trouble getting the things out. I had a pocket knife, some loose change, a pocket watch that had belonged to my granddaddy and my lucky marble I had carried since I was six. I pulled each item out one at a time, careful not to let my shirttail raise up high enough for my pistol to be seen. I carefully eased the pistol out, turning sideways and making it look like I was digging something out of my pocket. I slid the pistol into the waistband of my blue jeans and pulled another item from my pocket and placed it in the basket.

  “Hurry it up,” the big man said. His voice wasn’t really angry. Just extremely impatient.

  I quickly reached back under my shirttail and surreptitiously slid the pistol around to the front of my pants in one quick motion. The man  looked away for a fraction of a second and I quickly pushed the pistol on down in the front of my pants. I was hoping it didn’t discharge and blow my wiener off before I ever got a chance to do anything with it besides pee. The pistol was now trapped safely by my underwear. Thank goodness they were briefs and not the old baggy boxer shorts like Daddy wore. Now I had to count on these men being the type that avoided feeling another man’s crotch like they would someone with the plague.

  When we all had our pockets empty, the little man started patting us down, beginning with Snake. I was last. He started at my ankles and came up my leg, rubbing in circular motions. Then he felt around my pockets in the front and back. My stomach was churning with fear and I knew I was visibly shaking and starting to hyperventilate. I had that surreal, out of body experience that can’t be explained to anybody that’s never had it themselves. Then he took his hands off me and nodded to the big man. I couldn’t believe he had missed the gun that was now resting on my family jewels. But what was even more unbelievable was him not saying anything about the small holster on my belt.
He had to have felt it,
I thought.
Momma was always getting on to me for not tucking my shirt in, saying I looked like a tramp. Thank God I had decided to disobey her once again. As long as my luck held out, that slouchy shirttail that was concealing the bulge in front of my pants might be what saves us.

  The two men walked to the door. The small one went out of the room and the big man stood in the doorway for a second, lowering the gun he had been pointing at us.

  “You are now our guests,” he said, as if we’d just checked into a fancy hotel, “We hope you enjoy your stay. Could I get any of you something to eat or drink?”

  The last thing on my mind right now was eating. My stomach felt like it had been invaded by bats instead of butterflies. But Snake’s ability to eat was not impeded by a mere brush with death or the fear that death might still await him soon.

  “I…I wouldn’t mind a bite to eat,” he said timidly.

  “I’ll see if I can round up a bologna sandwich or something. The cook made a wonderful cake today, too. I’ll bring you all a piece and some cokes. I’ll have the cook prepare you a good breakfast in the morning.”

  He turned and walked out, locking the door behind him. I suddenly had a feeling that the big man’s voice sounded vaguely familiar. I tried my best to search through the junked up closet in my brain and find the face that the voice belonged to. I wasn’t having any luck. We all just stood there, afraid to move or speak. I finally got the nerve to walk over and sit on the end of one of the beds. Glenn and Snake hesitated for a minute and then followed suit.

  The man returned with a silver tray that looked expensive. Snake’s bologna sandwich looked as out of place as a string of pearls around a hog’s neck sitting on top of it. The little man was holding a gun on us as the big man placed the food and drinks on the bed that Snake was sitting on.

  “Please enjoy,” the man said, “we’ll check on you later.” 

  Snake flew into the sandwich like he hadn’t eaten for three days. Then he took a bite of one of the pieces of cake.

  “Mmm,  that’s some good cake, boys. It’s coconut with some kinda real good frostin’.”

  I was glad Snake was enjoying himself. Otherwise, I’d have my hands full trying keep him from crying. Did he really believe these men were being hospitable because they were lonely and just wanted us to hang around? It might be better for all of us and help me to try and figure out how to get us out of this mess if he did think that.

  After Snake finished his cake he asked if he could have one of the pieces that was supposed to belong to me or Glenn. We told him to eat it all if he wanted it. He finished his coke and let out a loud belch. After what seemed like a long time, we still hadn’t heard anything else from our captors and decided we may as well lay down on the beds and try and get some rest. I had been thinking that this would be the perfect opportunity to hide my revolver. I threw back the covers to my bed and climbed in, fully dressed. I didn’t know for sure if we were being watched, but suspected we were. I had no idea if the two men had any accomplices. For all I knew we could be under twenty-four hour surveillance. Once in bed, I pulled the covers up high around my neck then reached down and fished the pistol out of my underwear. I then turned over, making it look like I was trying to get comfortable, and slid the gun between the mattress and box springs. I wanted it pushed up far enough to not be noticed, but at the same time keep it where I could get to it quickly.

  The lights were eventually dimmed. Not cut off, but dimmed, like they were in a theatre when the movie was about to start. I was laying there wishing I had x-ray vision like Superman so I could see what was happening on the other side of those walls. I was still a young teenager, after all. Then I started thinking seriously about our situation. I was almost positive these people had been hired or had some sort of connection with the Bullards, but not Freddy and Bruce. Probably some shady characters Jake knew from his years in the moonshine business. Who else would want to kidnap us? We sure didn’t have any money or come from wealthy families that could pay a big ransom. I wondered about Glenn’s truck. Daddy would see it in a few hours when he arrived at the farm for the morning milking. They may have found it already. Mine and Glenn’s parents knew where we were going and though they were usually already in bed when we got home from these nighttime fishing trips, somehow Momma always seemed to know when I got home. It was some kind of inexplicable intuition that mothers had. If I wasn’t home by midnight, or a little after, she would wake Daddy up and they would go find us and see if we were alright. Even if she didn’t notice I wasn’t home, Daddy and Paul started rounding the cows up for milking at three AM and they would be sure to see the truck.

  But what I didn’t know was that the truck was not there anymore for Daddy or anybody else to find. And even if it had been they would have no idea of where to start looking. If we were gonna get out of this thing alive, it was going to be up to me.

CHAPTER THIRTY

  “He wouldn’t just run off like that, Andrew,” George was telling Sheriff White, beginning to get frustrated.

  “Alright, George, just try to stay calm. I’ll send some deputies out right now. And you’re sure he went fishin’ with Snake and that Burt boy?”

  “Yeah, I’m sure. I saw him loadin’ his stuff in Glenn’s old truck and they had a big bunch of chicken livers. I don’t think they’d be haulin’ chicken livers around for the fun of it. I’m telling you, them Bullard boys have something to do with this. They threatened him when he kicked Bruce in Lena’s store that day and she pulled a shotgun on ‘em. Now he’s the key witness in their daddy and brother’s murder case.”

  George propped his elbows on his knees and put his face in his hands. “I shouldn’t have let him go out like that at night. I can’t believe his momma did either, ‘cause she’s a worrier anyway. We just wanted him to do something besides sittin’ around and worryin’, so we let him go.”

  “It ain’t your fault, George. You can’t watch him every minute of the day and night. I’ll tell you what. I’ll go and round up them Bullard brothers right now if I can find ’em, and asked ‘em what they was doin’ last night. See if they’ve got an alibi they can prove. If they say they do, I’ll check it out and see if they’re telling the truth. I can’t hold ‘em with no evidence, of course. But maybe I can put some fear in ‘em and git ‘em to start talkin’. Them two like to talk big, anyway.”

  “I’m comin’ with you, Andrew, and I don’t want to hear any argument. I’ve got to find my boy.”