they had spring-loaded covers on them, and every time a hog wanted to eat, all it had to do was press its snout into the mechanism and open it. When it was done, out came the snout, and that spring-loaded lid slammed down with a loud clank. Usually two or three clanks, in fact. One, a beat, and then two very close together. All the time we were at the crime scene, those hog feeders made a constant racket in the background.
Now, bodies look smaller dead than they do when they’re alive. I’m not sure why; they just do. This one was no exception, and it wasn’t just the fact that he was a half a head shorter, so to speak. Even with the legs straightened out, he’d probably only be about five-three or five-four. It was sobering to see this wreck of a corpse, and think that he’d been alive and well only half an hour before. I just stood there looking for almost a minute, sort of taking it all in. Sometimes it helps, sometimes it doesn’t. But if you don’t do it, you always seem to regret it later in the case. I looked around for his other shoe, but didn’t see it.
“Sure looks dead,” I said.
“You must be a detective,” said Hester.
“Kneeling, you think? When he was shot?”
She paused a moment. “If the debris is under Gary’s car… I’d think it would have gone further if he’d been standing, maybe. But there’s always the angles… but sure. I’ll go with kneeling until we find out differently.”
“Restrained and shot. Whether he was kneeling or not doesn’t matter. Talk about malice aforethought.” Binding the wrists surely eliminated sudden impulse. I took a deep breath. “Well, let’s see what our witnesses have to say.”
Hester and I crossed to the two old men standing by their mailbox. “I’m Deputy Houseman,” I said, not sure if they’d remember me, “and you’ve already met Agent Gorse?”
“Sure have. You was at the bus business, right?” asked the one I thought was Jacob.
He was referring to a car crash about fifteen years ago, when the two brothers in their old Dodge had been rear-ended by a school bus. They’d stopped in the middle of this very road to have a discussion, regrettably just into the hill and curve where I was now parked. The bus didn’t see them until it was too late to completely stop. The brothers were just shaken up, but the bus driver was furious. I’d given them a ticket.
“Yeah, that was me.”
“You put on a little weight,” said Jacob.
“Yeah.” I glanced at Hester, who was doing an admirable deadpan. “So, what happened here, Jacob?” I asked. “What did you see?”
“Well,” he said, “I was comin’ up to put a letter in the box, and Norris was in the barn feedin’ the cows, and there was this commotion down the road there.” He pointed downhill to where the road curved around to the right. “I said to myself, ‘well, what’s all that commotion?’ and just then this young man here come a hell a kitin’ round that curve, about as fast as he could go, and I thought there was something funny about him, and then I saw he had his hands behind his back, like he was ice skatin’.” He shook his head. “Had to be hard to run that way.”
“I’ll bet,” I said. I already had questions, but I let him go on with his story. Witnesses have a way of clamming up on you if you keep interrupting their train of thought.
“And he kinda came up short on one leg. I think that’s ‘cause he only had one shoe on. Anyways,” he said, “these other two come runnin’ behind him, and they was gaining pretty fast, and one of ‘em had a shotgun.” He paused. “I ducked down right quick. I was at Anzio, you know. Ever since, I see somebody runnin’ my way with a gun, I duck.” He smiled, almost shyly. “Instinct, they call it.”
“Okay… me too, and I’ve never been to war.” It still surprises me to see how much the WWII vets are aging.
“So I’m kinda behind the tractor, but I’m still lookin’. Then this one fella hollers something I didn’t catch, and the one laying over there sorta turned his head to look, and he musta tripped, ‘cause he just fell flat. Kerwhump.” He shook his head. “Couldn’t get up fast, ‘cause of his hands, so they was on him just like that.”
“Sure.”
“They was saying something, but I didn’t get it. Mostly another language, you know?”
“Like what?” I thought I could ask that without inhibiting him.
“Oh, golly. There was some different language… maybe Spanish? Sounds a lot like Italian to me, but I couldn’t make out words I knew. Then English, too. That I could make out. That one word was ‘motherfucker.’“He looked startled. “Oh, I’m so sorry, ma’am!”
“Think nothing of it,” said Hester. “Did they say any proper names or anything?”
He shook his head. “Nope. They just seemed real upset, you know? Anyway, the one on the road over there, he was crying, I think, and they got him up on his knees, and the one with the shotgun, he just come up behind him, and put the gun to his head, and shot him. Bang. One time. A terrible thing. And that one there, he just flopped into the road so hard and fast the dust flew.” He reflected a moment. “Musta been like getting hit with a truck, almost. That close and all.”
“Musta been,” I said.
“Then the others, they just looked around real fast, and I think they really saw the barn and the house for the first time, down there, you know? Like they saw it before, but it didn’t register…” Jacob’s hands had been in the pockets of his overalls throughout, and now he brought one of them into the conversation by pointing toward a cat in the barnyard. “It’s like, you ever notice how a cat fixes on its prey? He’s aware of everything, but just doesn’t care about it bein’ there. All he sees is the mouse, until the job’s done. It was like that.” Mission completed, his hand returned to his pocket. “Anyway, these two just turned around and ran back down the road and disappeared.”
“Do you think they saw you?” asked Hester.
“Pretty sure they didn’t. Their eyes just passed right over me.”
I felt it would be best to lead him to the end before I backed up through the events. “Then what’d you do, Jacob?”
“Well, I didn’t stand up right away, that’s for sure.” That shy smile again. “But when I did, I did it real careful, just in case they was comin’ back for somethin’, you know?” He paused. “But then I heard a car leaving down the way, and I supposed it was them. I don’t take no chances, so I just took off for the barn lickety split, and got Norris, and we called from the telephone in the barn.”
“That’s what we did,” interjected Norris. “Just that way.”
“We thought it’d be best if we brought the shotgun, too,” said Jacob, pointing toward a fencepost just behind the mailbox with a twelve-gauge leaning up against it. I’d missed it in the weeds and scrub.
“Figured we’d better,” said Norris. “You never know.” Given the afternoon’s events, it was really hard to argue with that.
Jacob smiled again. “Norris, here, he was on Guadalcanal. Jarhead.”
“Ah. Always good to have a Marine around. You two didn’t happen to recognize any of the three, did you?” It hadn’t sounded like it, but you can always hope.
“No, I didn’t… I think the dead one was a Mexican boy, but I’m not sure,” said Jacob. “One of the other two might have been, too, but he looked… different than that, but like that? I don’t know how to put it…”
I tried to help without planting anything in his head. “He was the one with the gun? The one who shot him?”
“Yes.”
“What kind of complexion?”
“Well,” said Jacob, “kind of dark, sort of dark… like a good tan would be.”
“Okay. You happen to notice his hair color?”
“If I recollect, I’d have to say very dark, too. Black, maybe? Really dark for certain.”
“What’d he have on? “I was taking notes now.
“Black pants, I think. Maybe navy blue. A dark sweater or something like it. Maybe a sweatshirt, with no sayings on it. Probably a sweater. I think maybe a real dark jacket, too. Maybe.”
“Got it.”
“And, oh… black tennis shoes.” He considered that for a second. “Maybe just black shoes. Might not have been tennis shoes, now that I think about it.”
“About how old? Best guess.”
“I can’t tell with them, the Mexicans. Not until they get really old, like me. Then it’s the wrinkles, you know? But… old enough to know better. No kid.”
