No More Will You Weep My Willow

By Wm, Jesse Correll Jr.

This is a story about a feud between two men, a stand of Black Oak trees, a unique Weeping Willow tree and the Devil. It is three stories that take place over a 100-year period. It is a story about believing...or... maybe not believing.

• Language: English
• Publisher: william correll
• Release date: Sep 25, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201206710

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

It’s been raining unabated every day for two straight weeks without a break to let things dry out. The rainy onslaught starts on the evening of my dad’s memorial service and interment. When I walk out the front door of my apartment building on day fifteen, I expect another rainy day, so I have my raincoat on. To my surprise, though, it’s a gorgeous day. It’s still early morning. The sun is just beginning to crest over the top of the trees and there’s not a raincloud in the sky. Today’s an important day for me. So, I’m happy to see the sunny day that’s about to unfold, and I smile at the world outside. My name is William Cornell, Jr., but everyone knows me as Junior. Starting today, though, they’ll soon be calling me Sheriff. Today’s the day that I become the County’s Acting Sheriff. As I drive into town to assume my new role, my thoughts are on my dad.

The Onondaga County Sheriff’s Department and County Jail building is found on Main Street in the center of the town of Split Rock between the town hall and the courthouse. Both of those buildings are new. The Sheriff’s Department building is over a century old, and it’s scheduled for replacement within the next ten years. As I drive into town, my thoughts are on all that has taken place over the past two weeks. I pull my patrol car into the Sheriff’s designated parking spot in front of the main entrance to the Sheriff’s Department building, shut off the engine and I sit there to reflect on how my life suddenly changes the day my dad died.

My dad has been with the Sheriff’s Department for just over forty-two years. He was a patrol officer for ten years, the undersheriff for two years, and for the last thirty-plus years he was the County’s elected Sheriff. He ran a good department, and he was well-liked by his troops. He is also popular in the county and well respected by the law enforcement community at large. I can only hope to be like him.

My dad’s big dream from the day I was born was for me to become the Sheriff when he retired. He called it his forty-year plan. When I’m growing up, he’d encourage me to go into law enforcement so I can fulfill his dream. He began grooming me to replace him from the day I was born. Regrettably, he didn’t make it to retirement, so he won’t get to see me become the County’s new Sheriff.

My dad was planning to retire in eight months. He was ready to sit back, fish, and enjoy a peaceful quiet life. He talked about traveling with mom, as he affectionately called her. Then one day my dad had a heart attack and he died. A weak artery, the doctor told us. He also said that my dad died quickly and with no pain. That’s about the only good thing I can find to say about him dying. That and knowing he died while fishing. Fishing was something he loved as much as he loved my mom, me, and his work, but not quite. If he could have picked a way to leave this world, he would have chosen to die with his favorite fishing rod in his hands and a big mouth bass hooked to his line. That thought made me smile. When he died, though, he’s cheated out of seeing me become the Sheriff and his dream come true. When I walk into the Sheriff’s Department today, I’ll be the Sheriff just as he planned, but he’ll not be there to usher me in.

At the County Commission meeting last night, the Commissioners voted to make me the Acting Sheriff until the upcoming election. There are no objections from any of the commissioners or meeting attendees. It takes only fifteen minutes for the discussion period to conclude and the vote to finish. It’s highly unusual for any issue that’s brought before the County Commissioners to pass so quickly. It did help that the attendees in the crowded meeting room were either Sheriff’s Department employees or my friends who were there to support me. The vote goes smoothly, yet when I enter the building today as the Acting Sheriff, I’ll enter with two issues that I must confront.

My first issue is the need to set up a political support group to help me get elected Sheriff when the elections come up in about three months. During his years as Sheriff, my dad set up a significant and powerful political support base. My training to replace him included showing me how to nurture that support group. If I have any hope of winning the elected to be sheriff, he’d tell me when we discussed the issue, I’ll need that political base. My second issue is my dad’s troops: Will they accept me as their boss? That’s what I’m most concerned about today. When I enter the building, I’ll quickly find that my concern about my dad’s troops will be unwarranted.

I exit my car and look up at the building that houses the Sheriff’s Department. It looks the same today as it did yesterday and all the years before my dad died. Today though, my dad will not be sitting in his office as usual. My dad was at his desk every morning at seven o’clock sharp, except on Sundays. No early day for my dad on Sundays because that’s our family morning and the one morning that my mom can make a big breakfast for the three of us so we can eat together. So, on Sundays my dad will be at the office at nine o’clock. I plan to be in my office at seven o’clock today to honor his memory. It’s ten minutes to seven as I walk up the cement steps of the building.

As I walk up the steps towards the building’s entrance with its big double doors that open into a large vestibule entranceway, I’m very apprehensive. I open one of the big doors and when I step into the vestibule, I see a large banner above the two lobby entrance doors. We’ll Miss You, Sheriff in big dark blue letters is hand printed on the banner in. Good people made that sign and placed it there for all to see. It expresses the sentiment of the people in the county. I’m overwhelmed with a sense of pride and eager to make these same people proud of me. As I open one of the two entrance doors to the building’s lobby, I take a final quick look up at the banner and smile.

As I walk across the lobby to the stairwell that leads to my office on the second floor, I feel strangely conspicuous. I can hear my rubber-soled shoes squeaking louder than usual on the granite floor. As I make my way up the stairs, I feel like I’m moving in slow motion. When I open the door to my office, I’m greeted by a chorus of voices that echo off my office’s granite floor and the cinder block walls. They begin to sing For he’s a jolly good fellow, for he’s a jolly good fellow, for he’s... and I smile out at the crowd in front of me. Then they begin to chant, Speech, speech. My apprehension about whether they’d accepted as their boss by my dad’s troops fades away in an instant, and I feel guilty for my unfounded concern. Given that I stand just over six-foot-four and weigh in at around 235 pounds, I tend to stand out in a crowd. I raise my hands and the crowd goes quiet. I address them with a big smile on my face.

You all know I’m not good at making speeches, I tell them as I look out at the faces in the crowd. They’re familiar faces. They’re the faces of people eager to serve their county. That was my dad’s forte. As you all know, he did like to talk. There’s a moment of laughter before I go on. It’s one of the lessons he planned to teach me before he left us. He just didn’t have time enough to teach me that skill. And besides, I’m a slow learner. Laughter rolls through the crowd again. I stop for a moment to gather my thoughts.

I know how proud my dad was of every one of you for the dedicated work you’ve always done to keep our county safe over the years that he was the Sheriff. You are his pride and joy. So, I ask this of you: Please don’t stop doing your jobs. It’s our job to pick up where my dad left off. Let’s make him proud for hiring us, training us, and believing in us. He’s no longer with us, so now it’s up to every one of us to show the people in this county that he left them the best-darned Sheriff’s Department in this state. Now, let’s get out there and do the job he taught us to do. Let’s go catch the bad guys. I turn, walk behind my dad’s desk, and I sit down in his big black leather chair. As the crowd slowly moves out of my office and back to their jobs, I see my mom standing by her office door and watching me with a smile on her face.

Hi, mom, I say to her. My mom has been the Sheriff Department’s Administrative Assistant to the Sheriff for the years my dad is the Sheriff. His law enforcement life became her life as well. And it’ll not change now that I’m the Sheriff. She’ll continue to be my Administrative assistant, at least until she retires in about three months. She has an office connected to my office and she’s been standing at the back of the crowd by her office door and listening to me address my employees.

Do you feel up to being here today, mom? I asked her. She doesn’t answer me. She just turns, walks back into her office and she sits down at her desk that’s covered with files in neat stacks. She opens one of the files and she sits there pretending to read it. I know that she’s not reading but seeing her there has a calming effect on me. Still looking at the file in her hands, she finally responds.

I opened this office every day after your dad was shot! she says tersely, and without looking up. I need to be here today and not at home! Especially today! She continues to look at the file as we both relive that fateful day ten years ago.

My dad is on his way home from a late-night meeting when he decides to stop at a gas station on the edge of town and he walks in on an armed robbery. He’s in the right place at the right time, but it almost gets him killed when he throws himself between the robber and the station’s clerk. The bulletproof vest he always wears stops the bullet and it saves his life. When you deal with the criminal elements in society, you always need to be caution, thus the vest. The bullet incapacitates my dad, though. So, it’s the station’s clerk who, using my dad’s pistol, shoots and kills the robber. There are two heroes that night and my dad and the station clerk get recognition for their actions. The local paper called them selfless. My dad almost dying that day almost kills my mom from the worry, though. Then she speaks again.

I have work piling up that I need to deal with, Sheriff, she tells me. I know that today of all days my mom wants to be here. She doesn’t want to be at home sitting alone. This office has been her second home for all the years she’s worked for the Sheriff’s Department. Plus, I need to get Maggie familiarized with how this office operates before I retire.

Maggie will be taking over as my Administrative assistant when my mom retires. Maggie’s currently the Sheriff’s Department’s Senior Clerk of Records, so transferring her should be seamless. Maggie’s also my longtime friend and possible Mrs. Junior. My mom likes Maggie. She believes Maggie will be good as the Administrative assistant, and good for me as well. A perfect match for me, she always tells me, just like she and dad have always been. I haven’t been in a big hurry to get married, though. In my mom’s eyes, I’ve been dragging my feet for far too long. Mom realizes that I’m not going to say anything, so she changes the subject. Sometimes, silence is truly golden.

As you know, the troops did ask to have a wake party for the Sheriff, but I put a stop to that idea, she tells me. Even at home, my mom refers to my dad as Sheriff. It’s little things like that always endeared him to her. They’re always a team at home and at the office.

I can’t keep them from having a bash for your coronation, though she continues. She’s still looking at the file in her hands. It’ll be this Saturday at the farm. As usual, they’ll bringing sleeping bags and tents. My parents have a ten-acre mini-farm just outside of town with room for picnics and parties. Over the years, there have been functions held at the farm at least once a year, and my mom is always in charge.

Car keys will be left with me, and no one on duty or scheduled to go on duty will be allowed to drink, she informs me. Those are my rules. She stands up, walks into my office and she stops just inside the doorway with her arms crossed. It’s her house so it’s her rule.

Sheriff, I know that if your father could see you today that he’d be very proud of you, she tells me as she looks at me intensely. She wonders at just how much he looks like his father, especially in that uniform. Yes, she thinks, he has his dad’s eyes.

She walks to the side of my chair, and she kisses me on the forehead just like she would do to her husband for so years. Then she turns around, walks back to her office and she gently shuts the door. She’s a protective mom, maybe a little overprotective sometimes, but she’s also protective of every man and woman who works for the Sheriff’s Department. She’s like a mother hen with her baby chicks. They’re her family, all twenty-three of them, and they do call her mom. And at my party on Saturday night, she’ll be in charge just like a mother hen.

My party on Saturday is peaceful, just as my mom knows that it’ll be when she’s in charge. It’s an all-day party with multiple games, including croquet, lawn darts, touch football, and even bocce ball. There is a dozen or more kids in attendance who are running amuck and having kid’s fun, even the grownup kids. While the kids are still out and about during the day, the drinking is minimal among my troops and their spouses. I promised my mom that I wouldn’t drink. She said that it’d look bad and that my dad never did. I kept my promise to her by drinking root beer all day. After all, it’s her house so it’s her rule. The following morning, I’m very glad that I made the decision not to drink.

At about one o’clock in the morning, the drinkers begin to find places to sleep off their drinks. Tents soon begin to fill with the bodies of the sleeping. The kids, sent to their tents earlier, are tired out from their busy day of activities and are already in dreamland. Mom and I are both happy that there are no fights or arguments. We both know all too well that alcohol is a mean drug for most people, especially when they drink to excess. The entire event was just good clean fun for all in attendance. Being the Sheriff and their boss now helped to keep the drinking to a minimum. Having family and kids in attendance helped, too. The truth is, though, they probably feared my mom more than they feared me. Not drinking makes it easier for me when I wake up early the next morning because that’s when my future as the County Sheriff unfolds.

It's Sunday morning at about five o’clock when I get up. The sun is just beginning to make its presence known. I’m up early the next morning to make sure the bonfire is out completely. Just as I exit my mom’s house, I see the strobing lights of a patrol car move up the long dirt driveway that links my mom’s farm to the blacktop road that leads into and out of town. My mom has the driveway gates closed and locked to keep the partiers from leaving, so I walk out to unlock and open them. The driver pulls through the gate and stops next to me. The deputy driving the car is TJ McCoy, one of the newer members of the department. TJ is twenty-three years old and a good young man who has potential. He exits his patrol car and hands me a single sheet of paper. It’s an incident report.

Sorry we must bother you, Sheriff. The Duty Sergeant needs you to approve this report before it goes out. I came out here as soon as they completed the report, TJ explains. I try to read the report in the dim light but all that I can read are the words Amber Alert printed at the top in bold letters. It means there’s a child missing. At that moment I’m glad I did listen to my mom, and I stayed sober. TJ turns on a flashlight to illuminate the report so I can read it. It says that two young boys are missing and gives a brief description of each boy. This, I know, is not good.

We found the boy’s backpacks and phones at the old Jansen farm. The Duty Sergeant sent me here with the report for you to sign and to see if you want a ride out to the farm, TJ tells me. I handed the report back to him, and I turned my head back to my mom’s house.

Let me get my things. Then you can drive me out to the farm, I tell TJ. These party guys will be of no use until later, so we’ll let them sleep it off.

When I get back to the house, I head to my room and get into my uniform. When I get down to the kitchen, I tell my mom about the missing boys. As I’m strapping on my service revolver belt, I ask her to please brief everyone when they’re up later in the morning. My mom will make sure the partiers are clearheaded. She’ll have hot black coffee, bacon, eggs, and toast available. She has the bulk of everything already prepared for when everyone wakes up. My mom knows from experience that they’ll need it. I kiss her on the forehead, walk out of the house and I’m transported to a situation that’ll change my life forever.

CHAPTER 2

Carl Levitz and Tom Holt are two young boys who live near each other about fifteen miles north of town on farms their families own. Whether at school or at play, whenever you see one of the boys, you can be sure that you’ll see the other. The two boys are twelve years old, and they’ve been friends for their entire lives. They’re polite, well-mannered boys and everyone in town knows them by sight. On Saturday or Sunday mornings, the deputies will see the two of them heading out to either the Crystal Creek or to Chrystal Lake with their fishing poles, bait buckets and tackle boxes in hand to spend the day fishing. Later in the day, they’re often seen making their way home with a string of freshly caught lake perch.

At about eight o’clock on the morning of my party, the two boys left their houses on foot to visit a friend who recently moved to another farm about seven miles away. They took lunch, a plastic jug with Kool-Aid, and they set out on foot to visit their friend. They also take their cell phones with them. The two boys have done this hike before, and it goes very well, so their parents are not overly concerned. They are, though, told to call their parents periodically just to be on the safe side.

This type of hiking trip is a right-of-passage for boys. It’s the kind of trip that a young boy will take just before he enters his teenage years, and usually before he can drive a car. It’s a trip that says to his parents, I’m grown up now, and I can take care of myself. In this case, though, that’ll not be true.

The parents of the two boys became concerned when the boys did not check in or show up at their friend’s house by noon. It’s not a four-hour walk. At most, it should take them no more than two hours. When the parents’ efforts to find the boys are unsuccessful, they call the Sheriff’s Department to report that their boys are missing. That’s when the patrol units begin to search for them.

Sheriff Department policy mandates that four patrol cars are always on the road with two deputies in each car. All four patrol cars at once began to search for the boys. The county is big with back country roads and old cow paths. At first there’s little concern about the boys. For the most part, everyone thinks that they’ve just wandered down some old road or cow path and simply lost their way. Maybe they even found something different to do on the way. Boys will do that sometimes. As the patrol cars and the parents search for them, the thought in everyone’s mind is that they’ll soon show up at home safe and sound. But that doesn’t happen.

As the day begins to turn to night, everyone begins to grow more concerned. The duty sergeant asked all deputies report to work to help with the search effort.

One of the patrol units finally calls in to report that they’ve found two backpacks, a jug of Kool-Aid and two cell phones out at the old, abandoned Jansen apple farm on Levy Trail Road. The deputies and the boys’ parents search the farm late into the night and early morning hours with the hope that they’re there and safe. The searchers concentrate their efforts in the areas around the Jansen farmhouse including the five or six out-buildings because that’s where the boy’s backpacks are found. They want to make sure the boys haven’t maybe entered one of the abandoned buildings and have maybe fallen through a rotted-out floor and are maybe injured or trapped inside. Searching in the out-buildings at night proves to be difficult and their search turns up nothing. Where the farm is found also made the search difficult.

The Jansen Farm is about fifteen miles from my mom’s farm. To get there, you take the main county road north and turn right onto seldom used Levy Trail Road. The old Jansen farm is about halfway between where the two boys live and where the friend lives now. According to older residents in the county, Jansen, the owner, abandoned the farm sometime in the 1920s or 30s. The story goes that the owner, Hans Jansen, walked away from the farm one day and he’s never seen nor heard from ever again.

Back then, no one in the community gave any thought to him abandoning his farm and disappearing. Back in those days, farmers were deep in debt to the banks, and they knew that they’d never be able to pay off their debts. Debt-ridden farmers began to simply walked away and abandoned their farm to the bank.

A couple of the county’s older residents recall that a young couple bought the farm sometime in the early 1950s. They say that the couple renovated the farmhouse and that they did occupy the farmhouse for maybe five years. They also recall that the man is the owner of a construction business and that his wife is the towns doctor at the time. There are stories about strange deaths and disappearances occurring at the old farm that have been passed down from generation to generation with some of the stories even going back to the early 1900s.

No one believes those stories, and most people view them as something parents tell their kids to keep them away from a place that they consider dangerous. These stories never work to keep the kids away, of course. of Newer residents to the county don’t even know about these stories and if they do hear them, they blow them off as stories with no truths attached to them. Over the years, the old farmhouse has become a popular spot for teenage parties. It’s still a magnet for parties because it’s secluded, and old Levy Trail Road isn’t well-traveled.

Nowadays, only the Sheriff’s patrol cars and tractors or farm trucks use old Levy Trail Road. After you pass the Jansen farm, there’s just acre upon acre of open farm fields with an occasional old farmhouse here or there. The locals call old Levy Trail Road ‘Lover’s Lane’ because it’s so isolated, and there’s reality to that name if the locals are honest about it. The area around the Jansen farm is isolated and perfect for a little backseat gymnastics.

The drive to the Jansen farm from my mom’s house takes TJ about twenty minutes. I have time to think about those stories that I’m also told when I’m growing up. I stuck those stories someplace in the back of my mind to think about later. Unfortunately, sometimes there’s a fine line between fact and fiction, as I’ll learn when we finally reach the farm.

The Jansen farmhouse sits at the end of a half mile long gravel driveway that winds its way through a forest of derelict apple trees. The fields have not been down for years, and they’re overgrown with weeds. As TJ draws closer to the farm’s entrance, I can see the blue emergency lights of the patrol cars strobing in the dusk of the early morning sky. I look far out past the lights and into the receding night sky as TJ drives and I see dark clouds and lightning streaking across the horizon. Then they’re gone. The distant storm seems to me to be there one second and then not there the next second. Is my mind playing tricks on me, I think at that moment? Strange, I think, just as a cold chill walked up my spine.

When TJ turns the patrol car onto the farm’s dirt drive, the reality of where I’m heading comes to me. The old stories about the Jansen farm and that distant storm are forgotten by me at least for the moment. Later, in hindsight, I realized I should have paid more attention to my inner thoughts that day.

When TJ stops the car in front of the farmhouse, Sergeant Paul White, the duty sergeant, spots me and walks to the car’s passenger side door to greet me. I exit the car and White begins to update me on the search. As I listen to White, the parents of the two boys walk over to where we’re standing. I can see that they’re distressed. Then, as parents, how could they not be feeling distressed when their kids go missing? I nod at them, but I remain listening intently to White’s report. The report so far is not bad, but it’s also not good. The boys have yet to be found.

White tells me they searched the farm’s outbuildings using the powerful flashlights that we issue to every deputy. It was, he said, completed just after he arrived at the scene. He also informs me that he’s requested an auxiliary power supply unit for lighting just in case it’s needed. The sun is rising, but it’s still at least an hour before it’ll light up everything. Everyone’s waiting for the sunlight so they can do a more thorough search. White tells me that the evidence team is on their way to take over the search. They’ll ensure that the chain of evidence will not break in any way when they search the buildings. White’s radio suddenly squawks to life. He listens without saying a word. He turns to me, and he’s white as a sheet. I’m about to talk with the boy’s parents, but I never get the chance.

Junior, they need us out back, the sergeant tells me in a very low voice. I can hear the emotional stress in his voice. As White tells me this, a young deputy standing on the porch steps motioning for White and me to come over to him. So, we walk over to where he's standing. The deputy addresses me as Junior when we get to him. It’ll take time for the troops to adjust to calling me sheriff. It’ll take longer for the older deputies to adjust to my new status I suspect, though. They’ve been with the department for a long time and all of them know me from my growing up years. It’ll take time for the younger deputies, as well because they’ve called me Junior forever. It’s not something I care to worry about right now, though. I’ve two very distressed deputies and I don’t know why, but I’ll soon find out.

It’s the worst thing I’ve ever seen, Junior, the young deputy tells me in a voice so low that I can hardly hear him. He’s standing on the bottom step in his stocking feet and he’s as white as a sheet. I’m worried that he’s about to pass out, so I tell him to take a seat on the steps. I call for another deputy to come over and stay with him just in case. Then White motions for me to follow him. He walks up the farmhouse steps with me following close behind and he opens the front door to the house for the two of us to enter. As the White leads me through the house, I look closely at the interior of the house.

Farmhouses built a hundred years ago were built to last, and this house is no exception. The house still looks sturdy and sound for its age. As we make our way through the farmhouse, I see that its interior is in total disrepair and that there’s trash scattered everywhere. The interior doors, no longer attached to their door jambs, are now leaning against damaged walls. The glass panes from the windows have also been broken and tiny shards of glass lay strewn about and embedded in the wood floors. Beer cans, beer bottles and liquor bottles, broken, litter the floor. Empty cigarette packs and hundreds of cigarette butts, unfiltered and filtered, cover the floor. I follow White through the house to the kitchen and then out the back door. Then White leads me around to the side of the house to where a group of deputies are waiting for me to arrive.

Over here, Junior, Lenny Brooks, the County’s coroner, calls out to me. I know that if Lenny is here, the news is not going to be good. Lenny’s standing next to a very large weeping willow tree that stands next to the farmhouse and not far from the creek that traverses the Jansen farm property. I walk over to Lenny.

It’s not pretty under there, he tells me. No one’s gone near the bodies other than the deputy who found them. When Lenny uttered the word ‘bodies,’ that chill ran up my spine again.

I had your deputies seal off a perimeter around the crime scene. The portable lighting unit is being setup too. In a professional tone and demeaner, Lenny updates me on what they find. From what he tells me, I know we’re in for a very long day. My first thought was to call my dad to take charge, but this is now my crime scene.

You sure got here quick, Lenny, I tell him. My remark is more out of nervousness than to make a point. I’m glad Lenny’s already here. Lenny’s more than just the County coroner; he’s my dad’s longtime trusted friend. The two of them attended the same high school and graduated together. Lenny was the school’s top student back then and my dad is the school’s top jock. The two of them traveled in different social circles during their high school years, though. Back then, the jocks and the nerds didn’t mix socially. Lenny went off to college after high school and he returned home with a medical degree. My dad graduated from college, returned home, and joined the Sheriff’s Department. My dad helped the county recruit Lenny to be the coroner. The two of them become fast friends while working together during their long-interconnected lives and careers.

I always have my police scanner on at home. So, last night when the call went out about the missing boys, Lenny tells me, I started listening to the conversations between the patrol units searching for the boys. I eventually decided to go to the station to see if I could help with the search. Another warm body is always helpful. I was at the station when the sergeant called into dispatch to report that they’d found the boys’ backpacks at the old Jansen farm, so I drove out here to help. Unfortunately, they end up needing my help. There’s a sadness in Lenny’s voice as he talks. Lenny, like everyone else searching for the boys, was hoping for a good outcome.

I’m working with one of the search groups when the deputy finds the boys’ bodies. They come and get me immediately, he says. When I get here, I have the deputies secure the crime scene and I take over until you’re able to get here. Only one deputy entered the crime scene. When he sees the boys, he at once backs out. I relieved him of his shoes for your crime scene guys and sent him home. Wasn’t feeling too well. I also have the deputies keep the parents away until you get here. It’s not my place to tell them, and I didn’t want those poor parents to see what you’ll be seeing.

Lenny steps forward and he parts the long green branches of the weeping willow tree so we can step through the opening and into the tree’s underbelly. Once we’re inside, he releases the branches, and they fall back into place. We’re alone under the weeping willow tree and isolated from the outside world, except for the bodies of the two boys hanging in front of me, that is.

With the portable lights illuminating the tree’s underbelly, it looks like the inside of a dome. The generator that powers lights has been set up away from the tree, so the noise is minimal and unobtrusive. All I hear is a slight humming sound. I can’t miss the naked bodies of the two boys hanging from a branch in front of me, and my heart sinks. I look carefully around the tree’s underbelly. My task now is to solve two very gruesome murders. I’m thinking about what I need to do next when Lenny speaks up and breaks into my train of thought.

The men thought you might’ve overdone it at your party last night, he says with a smile on his face. Lenny knows that I like to have a drink or two now and again. Lenny also knows that if my mom’s in charge of a party at her farm, and she always is, she has a way of discouraging certain behaviors. Drinking too much is one of those behaviors she discourages. Lenny also knows if you’re a Sheriff’s Department employee, getting on her wrong side is not a smart thing to do, and that includes me. Lenny drops that line of conversation when he sees I’m not paying attention to him. I’m reviewing in my head the tasks in front of me. I need to find out who murdered these two young boys. That’s what I need to concentrate on at this moment.

I take my time to carefully look around the tree’s dome-like interior. The dome’s wall consists of hundreds of thin leafy, green branches that hang down to barely touch the ground. I feel like I’m in a dome with green walls. The branches, densely packed together, so I doubt if sunlight has ever penetrated the wall. I live in a county with weeping willow trees growing by the rivers, streams, and lakes, but I’ve never seen one that’s grown quite like this tree.

The one thing that I notice is that the grass under the tree is lush and a deep green color even without any sunlight penetrating the dome’s wall. I also notice that inside this dome of death