The Valley of Good and Evil

By L. E. Barrett

In the last book of the Kennebec River Trilogy the small city of Hallowell fights to save their community from an outside evil.  The story of a small Maine river city in the early 1960s concludes with another murder, more sex, more mayhem, more troubled personal relationships, and a master plan that no one would anticipate. L. E. Barrett ha

• Language: English
• Publisher: Snitch LLC
• Release date: Apr 27, 2018
• ISBN: 9780998834665

L. E. Barrett

L.E. Barrett originates from Hallowell, Maine and lives in Monroe, Maine. He served as a Marine Infantry Soldier in Vietnam, as a Colonel in the Army, and a Senior Analyst for the Department of Veteran Affairs before committing himself to writing.

Book preview

Chapter 1

THE THURSDAY MORNING after Old Hallowell Day, Harry Pratt and Hoppy Christie rested on a mound of freshly dug dirt. The two old friends shared a bottle of Teacher’s Highland Cream Scotch Whisky. After every gulp of the whiskey, each in turn nodded his approval and licked his lips. Neither man drank anything other than the cheapest brands of alcohol. The bottle of Teacher’s had been a gift from Ray Buck, Hallowell’s acting chief of police.

Harry called Ray after the Kennebec County Coroner’s Office returned Bobby Hennessy’s casket to the Hallowell Cemetery. Ray had asked him to do so. Ray told Harry not to bury the body until he got a chance to inspect it. Within minutes of Harry’s call, Ray pulled up in the police cruiser with his lights flashing and siren wailing.

Chief Buck used a crowbar to open Bobby’s casket. Ray examined the body. He went back to the police cruiser and brought back a camera. Ray took photos of the body from every possible angle. He made Hoppy and Harry stand next to the casket holding their shovels. At first, the two men refused to have their pictures taken.

Both men complained about the putrefied odor coming from the corpse, and how the dead sometimes do not like being disturbed.

Hoppy grumbled, It ain’t right to be making pubic what God has already took. How do we know he won’t come back for us? Everyone knows the dead got strange ways. I, for one, am against it.

Ray replied, The dead never harm an innocent man. You didn’t have anything to do with Bobby Hennessey’s death. You both are innocent men. Right?

Hoppy reasoned, I suppose you’re right.

Ray assured, I promise you, Bobby Hennessey won’t hold a grudge against either one of you. He knows you’re both involved in a lawful police investigation. I agree, the dead have secrets and sometimes they hold grudges, but they know the difference between police work and grave robbing.

Both men begrudgingly allowed Chief Buck to photograph them with the decomposing Hennessey body. Each man’s face expressed his displeasure at being photographed with the body. Their stone faces and set jaws gave the photos a seriousness that contrasted with the summer day and the half full bottle of whiskey on the ground.

As Ray prepared to leave, the two men began to slowly shovel dirt into the hole containing Hennessy’s casket. Once the men saw Chief Buck’s police cruiser drive out of the cemetery, they dropped their shovels. They took a seat on the pile of dirt that would eventually fill Bobby’s grave. It was a warm, cloudless late July day. The men had known each other since they were young boys playing hide and seek behind the tenements in Joppa. They spent most of their adult lives drinking in cramped, squalid apartments, on bar stools, pissing in alleys, and sitting along the riverbank talking about why life was never fair. Neither man had a desire to be anything more than what he was, and they both often verbalized their doubt in the wisdom of advancing one’s self in a world that was always changing.

You know that was Buster’s boy, Harry said.

He’s not looking his best.

The boy’s been dead a year. Hard to figure, but the same ones who ordered him buried also ordered him dug up. No one respects the dead anymore. A man’s lucky to get out of this world without someone pissing on his grave. People don’t respect the dead like they used to. You used to be able to tell how important a fella was by the size of his funeral and the stone they put on top of him. No one goes to funerals anymore. They put down a stone slab that dogs shit on and people walk all over. It just doesn’t seem right, Harry disparaged.

He done himself in, Hoppy whispered.

A surprised Harry said, You don’t say?

Hung himself from a beam in a cow barn.

You wouldn’t think a young fella would do such a thing, Harry offered.

How so? Hoppy asked.

A man half grown, who hasn’t experienced much of life should have everything to live for – it’s life that turns you toward the grave. Life will eat you up and spit you out. When I was young, I thought I’d get on a ship and go around the world. Yet, I ain’t been out of the state of Maine but once, and that was to an aunt’s funeral in New Hampshire. Maybe that’s why I’ve done the things I’ve done, Harry surmised.

The way I heard it, it was the bottle done you in. You took to it like it was one of your mother’s titties, Hoppy asserted.

I won’t lie to you, I like my drink. You can’t fault a man for being who he is. But, I never once thought of killing myself. Not as long as there is the possibility of another day of drinking.

I hear there’s more to the story, Hoppy hinted.

There always is, Harry said.

Ain’t any of my beeswax, but some say he may have been the one that kilt the boy in the river, Hoppy stated.

Hoppy gave Harry a dubious look. The type of look that expresses a distrust in everything except what he was telling Harry.

Are you talking about the judge’s son who fell out of the sky? Harry asked.

You know there are some who do swear he fell out of the sky. He landed in the middle of the Old Hallowell Day Parade. I don’t believe anyone expected it. The way I heard it, he was wrapped up in a silk cloth, like a cocoon from some large spider, maybe one of them spiders made big by the atomic bomb they dropped. If that’s the case someone has a lot of explaining to do.

Maybe he was shoved out of a plane, or shot out of a canon, from the other side of the river. You know people do all kinds of crazy shit these days. You don’t die and show up a year later without someone knowing where you’ve been, Harry reasoned.

Could be just as you said it. If you ask me, nothing’s been right since Clyde Emery drowned in the river, Hoppy asserted.

How do you figure?

Hoppy continued, Well didn’t he have the kid’s bloody shirt, and a share of the stolen train booze? Which you know he didn’t share with me or you. Which ain’t normal, as we were always giving him free stuff when he didn’t have none. Nobody in town cared for Clyde as much as you and me. That’s a fact. I’d fight the son-of-a-bitch that doubts it. Clyde knew the fellas that done him in. Even as a kid, he wouldn’t swim in the Kennebec. He had no business being in the river. If you ask me, he got in over his head.

Clyde died a selfish man if you ask me, Harry replied.

Some say he got on the bad side of Phil Demere. You know you’re going down river once Phil has it out for you.

"Dip put out a can in the store and they collected enough to get Masciadri to cut him a handsome granite gravestone. In large letters they engraved on the headstone, Rest in Eternal Peace. I’m not so sure if that was an afterthought or the plan all along," Harry said.

What do you mean?

Harry answered, You know the cops don’t take camera pictures of the dead or hand out free whiskey. Dip also ain’t the sort to get people to donate money unless it’s on a horse. People don’t kill each other in this town unless someone on the hill wants them dead. Hear me out. You got a peculiar hanging in a barn, two dead men in the river, and Earl Eames gets himself killed by his own wife. A train full of booze plum disappears like Harry Houdini rose from the grave and made it vanish. You would have to be a fool not to cross the dots.

So, you think there is more to it? Hoppy asked.

I’m as sure as a man can be about anything these days, Harry claimed.

Hoppy remarked, When you tell it like that, I can plainly see you have a point. Mrs. Snow always called me a slow learner in grammar school. But, I ain’t any such thing. I learn in my own way. She was constantly hitting me in the head with the chalkboard erasers to get my attention. Though it didn’t have nothing to do with how thick my skull was then or now. When it comes to facts, I know them when I hear them.

We ain’t ever had a crime wave like this one. No matter what they tell you, it’s only going to be half the truth and that half is mostly made up, Harry said.

You sure got that right.

Hoppy do you believe in God? Harry asked.

What man don’t who’s had the hard times I’ve had, Hoppy grumbled.

A serious Harry said, I used to think when you’re dead, you’re dead.

Sounds about right.

Hoppy, are you afraid of dying? Harry asked.

Only when I got drinking money in my pocket. But, when times are tough, I’d dig the hole myself and get in.

I got to agree with you on that one. You haven’t lived until you’ve thought about killin’ yourself, Harry lamented.

Death don’t scare a man with nothing to lose, Hoppy boasted.

Guys like you and me need to keep our noses clean. Ain’t anybody going to take care of us.

Hoppy leaned over the open grave, The boy had an awful smell to him.

It’s natural for a body to smell a bit when it’s been dead for over a year, Harry declared.

I still wish Chief Buck warned us before he opened the coffin. I wouldn’t have stood so close.

Harry took a long swig out of the whiskey bottle.

The other day, I went into Dip’s store. The place plum full of horse bettors. I said as loud as I dared to, ‘Dip, I ran into Ethel Morgan. You remember, Teddy Morgan’s wife?’ Dip tells me she passed away last spring and that Teddy has gone on and got himself remarried to a woman from Skowhegan. He’s already moved somewhere up that way. I say, ‘I’m sure it was her, as she sat next to me the first time I was in the second grade. A pretty, young thing at the time. I’d recognize her anywhere.’ Dip tells me that Teddy’s new wife is twenty years younger than him. He tells me he doesn’t think Teddy would be happy to hear that his old dead wife has returned from the grave.

I thought you told me you buried Ethel Morgan last spring? Hoppy probed.

Don’t stop me. I’m coming to the good part. When I’m sure everyone has taken the bait, I say I was mowing the side of the riverbank when I see a big chunk of gravel behind the Morgan family gravesite roll down the hill into the river. I hurried down in time to catch the end of a coffin that was about to go into the water. I pulled the coffin up the steep bank. When I got it on flat ground, it broke into three pieces. The body inside rolls out of the coffin. It lands up against my leg. I looked down and I sees Ethel Morgan looking up at me. The same Ethel Morgan I was sweet on in the second grade. Her clothes had rotted away. She was as naked as one of those women with bones in their noses you see in Africa. Though she didn’t have any eyes, and her lips were shriveled up, which made it seem like she was laughing at me. Like she was having a good old time in the grave. She still had all her hair if you know what I mean. Ethel also had the nicest big blue titties and plump, doughy, white thighs I recollect ever seeing, and I’ve seen my share of dead ones. The site of her spread out like that and laughing at me got me thinking. I tell myself, no one will know. I’d just got my britches down around my knees and my pecker out when I hear people talking. Thank God I spotted the ladies from the Hallowell Legion before they seen me. The women were putting flowers in front of the veteran graves. I quickly found an old tarp and wrapped Ethel in it. Nearby, I’d already dug a grave for Hanna Collins. You know, she recently passed. She always had women staying at her house. It wasn’t like the whole town didn’t know what those women were up to. I carried Ethel over to the Collins grave and dumped her on top of Hanna’s coffin. Then I shoveled a foot of gravel on her. I say a quick prayer in a hope that these two women will get along. It’s not like her husband had any further use for her. After that, I dumped Ethel’s old coffin in the river. The river took it away and then swallowed it up. If you ask me, it won’t be long before all the Morgan’s are washed down river.

What did Dip say?

First, it was as quiet as the Sacred Heart Catholic Church at midnight. The bettors couldn’t get out of the store fast enough. You would’ve thought I had a disease they all thought they could catch. Dip sits behind the counter as cool as a cucumber. He waits for the other fellas to leave. Dip says a man would be crazy to be buried in the Hallowell Cemetery. He tells me ashes is the only way to go. No one ever messes with a jar of ashes, and if they do, it ain’t a big deal.

Dip must want to put you and me out of business, Hoppy responded.

I never thought of that.

If you ask me it’ll be the end of grave digging as a way of making an honest living. Tell me, did you really put Ethel Morgan in Hanna Collin’s grave? Hoppy asked.

Cross my heart and hope to die, though, I can’t swear to the whole truth of the story, Harry said. He then made the sign of the cross over his heart with his right index finger.

That Ethel Morgan sure turned out to be a fine lookin’ dead woman.

Hoppy took a long gulp of whiskey.

I sure hope Ethel and Hanna appreciate what you done for them.

Me too. I sure hope Ethel ain’t gonna hold a grudge. Ain’t none of us saints. Everybody knows the flesh is weak.

Hoppy conceded, Don’t worry, you can count on me. If anyone asks, I’ll be the first to say that Harry ain’t no saint.

Harry took a mouth full of whiskey and pitched the empty bottle into Bobby Hennessey’s open grave.

An inebriated Harry mumbled, Hoppy, you’re one of the best. They just don’t make fellas like you and me anymore.

Chapter 2

WHEN GUS ARRIVED IN AUGUSTA, he had ridden the Greyhound Bus for three days. He decided to make the trip after he received a disturbing letter from Martha. She asked him to come back for a few days. She promised to take care of his expenses and to find him a safe place to stay. He knew returning to Hallowell was not in his best interest; but he felt he could not let Martha down. In her letter she wrote about police harassment, a police raid on her house, and the police having an interest in finding a young man named Dwayne Harris. Martha asked him to come as soon as possible. The letter also contained two hundred dollars and a promise of more money in the future.

Gus bought a bus ticket under his real name. The ticket was for a Gus Harris. In the past, when he traveled to Maine, he used the name Dwayne Harris. He thought if the Maine police were looking for a Dwayne Harris, they would be less likely to connect Gus with Dwayne. He also carried with him a driver’s license and a social security card for a Joe Ricker. When he got to Maine, he was prepared to change his identity. He figured no one would be looking for a Joe Ricker from Louisville, Kentucky. He could help Martha and then easily slip out of town. He told himself that there was nothing to be worried about.

Gus planned on spending only a few days in Hallowell. He would arrive on July twenty first and return to Chicago on July twenty fourth. In the meantime, he would tell everything he knew. The drunken encounter with the stranger, the stranger’s shoebox full of photos, the gun in the closet, the man’s story about his young conquests, and why he had felt the need to leave town.

Lately, he had been using a lot of heroin. He brought enough with him to stay high for a week. Besides heroin, he had a change of clothes, shaving bag, leather jacket, the book On the Road, and a twenty-two pistol in his small duffel bag.

Before Gus left Chicago, he was staying with a girl named Monica. She claimed to be a Beat, into jazz, poetry, Buddha, tantric sex, and getting high. She urged Gus to read Jack Kerouac’s On the Road. Monica referred to the book as the bomb, the thing, or the Holy Grail. She said he reminded her of one of the characters. Gus had already read half the book. He liked how the characters were not stuck in meaningless jobs or inhibited by society’s rules. Everything the characters did in the book was done for pleasure or self-awareness. He saw himself as a younger Dean Moriarty. Monica must have known it. A character who embodied what it meant to have a truly free spirit. Moriarty lived his life in high gear and was not afraid to lose himself in life. After his trip to Maine, Gus planned to go west in search of kicks and other seekers who were tired of stale, obsolete, and meaningless lives. Those freaks Monica called cool cats. People who did not label each other or fear a future they knew they could not change.

His bus pulled up to the curb in front of the Augusta Greyhound terminal. Gus half expected to see troops of cops waiting for him. The street was dark and empty. He could see the light of the bus terminal sign and a street light on the corner. There did not appear to be anyone on the street. The driver unloaded the passengers’ suitcases. Gus stayed on the bus until all the others departed. When he got off the bus, his duffel bag sat alone on the sidewalk. He picked up his bag and headed away from the bus station. He walked up a hill and crossed behind the Hartford Fire Station. He walked down Gage Street and crossed into Capitol Park and in front of the Maine State Capital building. Gus climbed over the little league park fence. He stumbled through a thicket of bushes. He came out onto a train track. He planned to follow the track to Hallowell. He then would walk a couple of blocks to Martha’s place. It was a cool and cloudy night. Gus stayed close to the thick vegetation on the river side of the railroad tracks. The clouds and the bushes obscured his lone, dark figure.

For the first time since leaving Chicago, Gus had a sense of relief. The boogeyman out to get him was only in his head. Maybe no one was looking for him; they did not know he knew what they were up to. The solitude and darkness of the railroad track buoyed his spirits. He heard the snapping of branches and the sound of hard leather shoes running on the track. Gus began to sprint, his duffel bag banging against his left leg. After a while, the noise behind him stopped. He again settled back into a fast walk. He stopped and listened. The night held a deadly silence. He heard the Kennebec River flowing in the distance, and his own labored breath.

Gus was struck from all sides by bright beams of light. The light blinded him. He immediately knew he was boxed in. The lights closed in on him.

A man in the dark spoke, Mr. Harris, you are surrounded. We have eight guns trained on you, should you decide to run. If you don’t do anything stupid, I promise you’re perfectly safe.

I ain’t done nothing. You fellas must have the wrong guy, Gus replied.

"Dwayne, Gus, or whoever you’re calling yourself these days, you can be confident in the knowledge that we know who you are. We also know why you’ve come back to Hallowell. You can help us, or we’ll be forced to use other measures. Either way,