Killer in Town

By David Conrad

An unknown sniper is systematically killing the prominent men of
Franklin, Illinois. No one knows who will be next. Sheriff Marcus Dixon
and Detective Mary Ellen Selvedge must catch the killer, and they must do
it with little help from the local police or from anyone outside. Its 1936 in
the heart of the Great Depression. Th ere are plenty of potential suspects-
-men who have lost their jobs, had their homes foreclosed, are broke, or
who are just plain angry and desperate. Th en, there are the communists,
anarchists, and fascists, all of whom are becoming more active in the
Depression.

Marcus and Mary Ellen are in love, but they must put their marriage plans
on hold until they can catch the killer. Th eir investigations take them
from the homes of the rich and powerful in Franklin to a miserable shack
in shantytown, even to a training camp for the German American Bund.
Every new shooting by the sniper raises the levels of fear and panic in the
people of Franklin, and Marcus and Mary Ellen must bring the killer to
justice before the town comes apart.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Apr 25, 2011
• ISBN: 9781462004003

Book preview

1

Sheriff Marcus Dixon and Mary Ellen Selvedge sat swinging gently—just enough to stir the air—in the front porch swing at her house on Maple Street. They were not sitting close together. It was too warm for that. Across the porch, Mary Ellen’s mother, Ruth, rocked in her chair. Other families up and down Maple Street were on their porches, some listening to Amos N’Andy on radios playing from inside their houses. It was nice to be out on the porch this time of evening—a time to talk about the events of the day, to walk across the next lawn and visit with a neighbor, or to just sit quietly. Later, after things cooled down, everyone would go inside.

Marcus and Mary Ellen talked idly about the movie they had seen earlier that evening: Myrna Loy and William Powell in After the Thin Man. Mary Ellen had seen the first Thin Man movie several times. She was always talking about it. She thought Nick and Nora Charles were the perfect couple—witty, urbane, and always able to solve crimes. It was Marcus’ first exposure to the Thin Man. He found the movie entertaining, but It’s not real life, you know. I don’t see how they could drink so many martinis and party all the time and be such great detectives.

Marcus and Mary Ellen were planning to get married in the fall. It would be a good sized church wedding with everybody there. For their honeymoon, they would probably go to some nice place like the resort at French Lick over in Indiana, as many couples did.

But Marcus and Mary Ellen were not an ordinary couple. Marcus was the sheriff of Hill County, Illinois and Mary Ellen was his one and only detective. Well, she was that in her off hours. She still ran the City Café, the favorite eatery and gathering place in Franklin, located right across from the Court House.

The phone rang inside the house. Ruth rose grudgingly and went to answer it.

It’s for you, Marcus, she called out.

Marcus walked into the house and took the phone. Sergeant Orville Bailey was calling from the sheriff’s office.

Marcus, Tom Dees has been shot. He’s dead. His hired man found him sitting in his sulky in the stable. The horse had come back from the track and just stood there.

Marcus processed the information as he heard it. Tom Dees was President of the First National Bank in Franklin. He lived on a fine estate outside of town. He was probably the wealthiest man in Hill County, but he certainly wasn’t the best liked—too many foreclosures on houses and businesses, too many refused loans. Dees was best known for his love of trotting horses. He had a dozen of them, and he had his own track for running them. Since he lived outside of town, this was a matter for the county sheriff.

Marcus walked back to the porch. Let’s go Mary Ellen. We’ve got work to do. Tom Dees has been shot.

In addition to being the proprietor of the City Café and the unpaid volunteer detective of the sheriff’s department, Mary Ellen, with her blond, up-swept hair, creamy complexion, china blue eyes, and perfect figure, was the prettiest woman in town. She had talked Marcus into making her an auxiliary detective so she could work on the case of a missing coal heiress, and although most of what she knew about detective work came from the movies she loved to watch, especially the Thin Man series, she had played a vital role in finding the missing heiress and was now the Sheriff’s Department’s only detective. In the process, she and Marcus had fallen in love.

Marcus was not your usual balding, red neck sheriff either. In fact, he was young and, with his abundant brown hair, athletic build, and clean features, he had been the most eligible bachelor in Franklin until he and Mary Ellen got engaged.

Sheriff and detective climbed into a 1936 Chevy coupe with the Sheriff’s emblems on the doors and headed for Tom Dees’s place two miles west of town.

Who would want to shoot Tom Dees? Mary Ellen wondered.

Aw come on. You know the answer. (She did). Lots of people have thought about shooting Tom Dees. There’s a guy who had few friends and plenty of enemies, at least people who hated him because he had refused to help them when he could have.

I guess you are right. He turned us down when mother and I applied for a loan to re-open the café after Dad died. We had to scrape together every penny we had just to open the door.

That happened a lot. Dees wouldn’t take a risk with anyone, no matter how bad they needed it to stay in business or keep their home. He put the bank’s money in government bonds where it was safe. It made the Depression a lot worse for everyone in Franklin, or so just about everybody thinks. It wasn’t all his fault, but people need a real person to blame for something like that, and around here it was Tom Dees.

The Chevy came to the entry to the Dees’s estate. A bright moon in the eastern sky lit the two brick pedestals that guarded the entry, each with a bronze horse head on it. Arching overhead a sign read GREENBRIAR FARM – TROTTING HORSES. A winding road led to a large white house with Greek columns and a circular driveway. Behind the house were stables and a half-mile track.

Marcus and Mary Ellen got out of the car and walked up brick steps to the front door. There, they met the second son of Tom and Harriet Dees. His name was Harry, and his narrow face, framed by longish black hair, seemed strangely calm considering the circumstances.

Hello, Harry, said Mary Ellen. They were about the same age. She knew him from high school. Sorry about this.

Hello, Mary Ellen. He nodded to Marcus and stepped aside so they could enter. In a hushed tone, he told them his mother was waiting and led them down a hall and through double doors into a large, expensively furnished room.

Harriet Dees sat on a couch being comforted by her daughter, Marsha. Also there were Alfred Dees, the oldest son, and Will Wilson, the man Sgt. Bailey had identified as the hired hand. He was introduced as the horse trainer.

Marcus expressed his regrets about what had happened and turned to Wilson. I understand you found the body.

That’s right Sheriff. I was up at the house havin’ my supper. Mr. Dees was out on the track workin’ Dandy Dancer. I could see him from the kitchen window. After supper, I looked out and saw he wasn’t on the track anymore. I went down to take care of Dancer, and I found him standing in the stable, a little lathered. Mr. Dees was still sitting in the stirrups, all slumped over. I could tell by lookin’ he was dead. I tied up the horse and ran up to the house. I didn’t touch nothin’, Sheriff.

OK. Let’s go down to the stable, Marcus motioned to Mary Ellen to come along.

This was only Mary Ellen’s second case. She had never seen a dead body before. Marcus wondered how she would handle it. For that matter, Marcus had been sheriff for only three years. He had not seen a great many gruesome crime scenes himself.

They entered the main stable. There in the passage way between the rows of stalls, lit only by the yellow light of one bulb, stood a beautiful bay standard bred horse, sweat caked on his chest and forelegs. Tom Dees was sitting in the sulky, his head lolled over to one side, his eyes staring into infinity. The reins were still in his hands, but slack. The only sign of foul play was a red stain over the left breast pocket of his khaki shirt.

Marcus looked at Mary Ellen as she stared at the bizarre scene. She was handling it well. Indeed, it was hard to believe that a man had died this way.

Marcus put his hand on Dees’s shoulder and pulled him forward. Rigor was setting in, so his whole body moved together. Marcus leaned over to examine Dees’s back. Even in the dim light, he could see an ugly exit wound and a splattering of blood and tissue down below on the back of the sulky seat and on the frame.

Mary Ellen, he spoke softly as he continued to examine Dees’s body, Go in the house and call for the funeral home ambulance and get the coroner out here. We’ve got some forensic evidence to look at, and I don’t want to move the body until the coroner has a chance to examine it.

OK if I rub down Dandy Dancer and feed him, asked Will Wilson.

You can feed him, but don’t touch anything else until the coroner gets here.

In a few minutes, Mary Ellen was back. The coroner is on his way.

The coroner in Illinois was an elected official. They were not required to have medical training, but their job was to determine the cause of death in other than natural death cases and to convene a coroner’s inquest to determine if criminal investigation was needed.

Luckily, the coroner in Hill County was a medical doctor. His name was Hubert Batson. Well past 60 years old, his vision was not what it once was, neither was his hearing. But he had a sound medical practice and he was well known and respected.

Doctor Batson arrived at the stable after about thirty minutes. He surveyed the situation and quickly commented, "The damned light in here is awful. He pulled an 18-inch flashlight from his bag and began to examine the body.

Chest wound, small or medium caliber rifle, high powered. The bullet passed through his chest and probably tore up his heart. He didn’t die instantly, but it didn’t take long. Doesn’t look like we are going to find the bullet. Seems to have exited from this wound in his back. Like I said—a high powered rifle. But from the size of the wounds, it was probably a medium caliber rifle, maybe a 30.06—lots of muzzle velocity and accuracy, but not a whole lot of impact force. I’d say that Tom Dees had a few moments to think about his life before he left us.

The guys are here with the ambulance from the funeral home, Doc. Can they take him now? Marcus asked.

OK. Not much more I can do here. I’ll do an autopsy at the funeral home. And you, Sheriff—see if you can find the bullet, or what’s left of it. That is going to be a crucial piece of evidence.

How about the horse and sulky?

Batson examined Dandy Dancer’s flanks and tail carefully with his flashlight. Then he went over the sulky.

Mary Ellen had been taking notes as she listened to Doc Batson talk and watched him work. Doctor, she said, any idea how we can find the bullet?

He looked at her, seeing her for the first time. Mary Ellen. So you’re a detective now. I heard about it. It’s a helluva surprise to me, but I say good on you, he chuckled.

Thanks Doc, but about the bullet …

"Well, Detective, judging by the size of that exit wound, there has to be some pretty serious blood and tissue, maybe some bone fragments out on the track. That’s where he was shot, isn’t it?"

Yes, we think so.

Well, go out there in the morning and find it. Should tell you quite a bit.

Marcus had listened. He told Will Wilson to close the track and make sure that no one and no horses went on it next morning."

On the way back into town, Marcus turned to Mary Ellen: That was a pretty bad scene out there. All that blood and the way he looked. Did it bother you?

Some.

Well, that sort of thing comes with the territory. Remember you wanted to be a detective. You talked me into it. Do you still want to do it?

Mary Ellen sat up straight in her seat. Marcus, I know what people are saying about me: I’m the sheriff’s new girl friend who is pretending to be a detective. And I suppose some are saying I’m just a dumb blond who has no business even trying to be one.

She paused and turned to look at Marcus. But you know what? I want to show them … and I guess I want to show myself … that I am a real detective. And most of all, I want to find out who shot Tom Dees. I’ll work hard to do it, and I’ll get used to all the blood and other stuff.

Marcus smiled and laid his hand on hers. That’s my girl. Tomorrow, get your mother to come in and run the café, and we’ll go out first thing in the morning and examine every inch of that track.

Mary Ellen agreed, but it would not be easy telling her mother that she was working on another case. She had been seriously injured on the last case, and Ruth had always been opposed to her daughter being a police officer. But Mary Ellen was a grown woman; her mother would just have to accept it.

I’m sure Mother will do it, but we will have to make some special arrangements. I’ll open the café and start breakfast, and she’ll come in about eight and take over. She wouldn’t know where everything was to open the café herself.

OK. I’ll come in and have breakfast, and when your mother gets there, we’ll leave.

Next morning they arrived at Greenbriar Farm at about 8:15. They were greeted by Will Wilson and Harry Dees, both of whom gave appreciative glances to Mary Ellen in her trim beige suit and medium heels, her shiny