“So you went to look for them. Then what?”
“We followed a trail to the caves. Heard a scream.”
“Before or after you got to the caves?”
“Before,” Dean said.
“What happened at the caves?”
“There was a guy. He was dragging Mary’s sister Sarah into the cave. She looked dead. Mary chased after.”
“Did she go in the cave?”
“The guy noticed Mary and ran after us. He caught Mary and hacked her with his knife. I tried to help her, but God, the blood.”
He began to sob, and Frank let him go for a minute. When he was done, he wiped his nose with the back of his hand.
“How’d the blood get on your shirt?”
“Mary was on the ground. He was stabbing her. I tried pulling her away but he dragged her away from me.”
“Was she still alive?”
“Barely. He threw her over his shoulder and headed for the caves.”
O’Bannon said, “So you ran?”
“I did. That’s when I met up with Mr. Harwell on the trail.”
“Describe him for me. This man.”
“Big. Like Dick Butkus big. He wore an army jacket. His face was burned real bad. His eyes, they were kind of just white.”
Frank raised his eyebrows. “That was quite a tale.”
“I didn’t kill them.”
“You can tell me son. The judge might go a little easier if you admit it. Might save your life.”
“Honest, sir.”
Frank looked him up and down. Dean shifted in the chair.
“Our officers searched those caves and the woods inside and out. We found no sign of a boogeyman in an army jacket. What we did find was four girls laid out in the cave. Butchered. Sliced open. Why’d you do that?”
Dean shook his head. “I would never hurt anyone.”
“Make it easy. Tell me why you did it.”
“I think I need a lawyer, sir.”
Smart enough to ask for a lawyer. “Last chance.”
“I’d like a lawyer.”
A lawyer didn’t do Dean much good. His trial lasted two weeks. It took the jury two hours of deliberation to produce a guilty verdict. At the trial, two people had passed out when the crime scene photos were revealed. Tom Harwell had buried his face in his hands and cried.
In the spring of 1970, when his appeals had been exhausted, four guards, the warden, and a prison chaplain escorted Dean to Old Sparky at Mansville State Penitentiary. His last words were: “I’m sorry those girls died, but it wasn’t me that killed them.”
And with that, the State ran 2,000 volts of electricity through an innocent, twenty-two-year-old man.
Eight
“Remind me how this was a good idea again?” Chris’ father said. Mike Peters was sitting at the kitchen table. He still had on his blue mechanic’s pants and steel-toed boots. There was grime caked under his nails. It was always there, no matter how much he scrubbed with Gojo soap.
“We were just checking the place out,” Chris said.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Peters,” Hope said. “It was my idea.”
“Don’t take the blame for this chowderhead. He’s a big boy. You knew someone got killed the other night. What if you had run into the killer?”
He’d neglected to tell his father about hearing someone on the other side of the door. “But we didn’t.”
“And if you had?”
“I would’ve messed him up,” Chris said.
His father rolled his eyes. “You’re soft.”
Dad put in twelve hour days as a diesel mechanic for a big trucking outfit out of Hamburg. To Dad, anyone who didn’t perform at least ten hours of manual labor a day was soft.
Chris was about to point out that he was, in fact, tough. Then the doorbell rang. That would be the police. Dad got up, wiped his hands on his pants. Chris heard him open the door and start up a conversation with female officers. To his surprise, Dad came back with two, good-looking plainclothes cops. One was blonde, the other brunette.
“These are Detectives Martz and Greco,” Dad said, and he pulled out two chairs.
“I’m Martz,” the blonde said.
“Can we sit down?” Greco said.
“Please,” Dad said.
They sat down. Dad took a seat across the table from the detectives. Chris and Hope sat on either side of Dad. He had called them after finding out Chris had gone to the slaughterhouse.
“We checked out the slaughterhouse,” Martz said. “You claimed there were bloody clothes in the basement.”
Chris said, “They were soaked.”
Martz said, “We didn’t find any clothes.”
“They were there, I swear,” Hope said.
Greco put up her hand. “There was residual blood on the floor. Our crime scene people are taking samples.”
“See Dad, we’re not crazy,” Chris said.
“No, just stupid for poking around when a killer’s on the loose,” his father said. He took out his pocket knife, clicked it open, and started digging grime from under his nails.
“Your dad’s right. It wasn’t smart. Not safe out there,” Martz said.
“Did you see anyone?” Greco said.
Chris glanced at hope. They were screwed.
“That look tells me you did,” Martz said.
His dad folded the pocket knife and stuck it in his pocket. He leaned forward, forearms resting on the table. “What did you two see?”
“Didn’t see anything, but I heard something behind the basement door in the slaughterhouse. Something scratching on the door,” Hope said.
“Did you see a person?” Greco said.
“No,” Chris and Hope said in unison.
“Where’s the door go?” Martz wondered.
Hope jumped in and said, “It runs to the mansion. There used to be a hotel that took up the mansion and the slaughterhouse property. A big resort. A tunnel ran from the hotel laundry to the hotel. I like to research things.”
“Apparently
