Revenge in Monkey Bottom

By Dick Carlsen

In the prequel, "Monkey Bottom", a former Navy Flag Officer, Chet Dillon, is forced out of the Navy after NCIS discovers and investigates an adulterous affair with a female government employee on his base. The admiral's mistress is murdered by his wife, who later dies in a horrific auto accident, caused indirectly by the admiral.

In this sequel, Dillon relocates to Puerto Rico to hide from his shame and disgrace. He is hired as a liquor wholesale company sales rep to service Navy accounts in the Caribbean.

Dillon's company pulls him back to Norfolk temporarily to assist in securing the liquor contract for the prospective Pamunkey Indian/City of Norfolk resort casino. In so doing, he becomes fair game for people seeking vengeance on him.

Enter a Native American who does dirty work for his tribe and who seeks revenge for very different reasons. Does Dillon live or die? Is he subjected to 18th century Iroquois atrocities?

The story takes the reader to former Navy bases in PR and Eleuthera, the Great Dismal Swamp, Navy Fleet HQ, and examines the casino project and wholesale liquor business that tie into Dillon's fate and an NCIS investigation.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Jan 20, 2022
• ISBN: 9781665548717

Dick Carlsen

Dick Carlsen was born in and grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. He attended Chico State College, graduating in 1968, and completed graduate studies at Indiana University. He is retired after a 44-year Navy civilian career, during which he traveled extensively to Navy activities worldwide. He lives in Virginia Beach, Virginia, with his wife Cathy and their rescue dog, Woody. They enjoy occasional trips to other beach areas and Lake Gaston in North Carolina. His published novels include, Happy Valley College, The Head of the Snake, Monkey Bottom (a Navy-centric story), The Lost Boys of Happy Valley College, and Revenge in Monkey Bottom. His retirement hobby and passion is writing, and he volunteers most mornings of the week walking dogs in the care of a local animal rescue shelter.

Book preview

PROLOGUE

1999

Good morning. I need to talk to Special Agent Frank Maxwell, please, said Bill Duncan, the police chief of Falls Church, Virginia. Bill would not have known that his friend Frank had been transferred to the Naples, Italy, Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) office, but had fortuitously recently returned to Norfolk, Virginia.

The person on the NCIS end chuckled to himself, then said, Sir, that would be Special Agent in Charge Maxwell.

Oh, my. My apologies, please. When I last worked with him, he was Special Agent Maxwell. Sorry.

That’s alright, sir. Who may I say is calling?

He’s in on this Saturday morning?

Yes, sir. Routine.

Police Chief Bill Duncan, Falls Church, thank you.

Hold one, please.

A moment later, Bill heard the friendly, familiar voice of Frank Maxwell. Bill, how the heck are you? Where are you? And congratulations!

Thanks, Frank, and congratulations on your promotion. I’m glad I was able to reach you straightaway on a Saturday morning. Well, first, I’m doing great. Second, I’m in Norfolk, and you’re not going to believe what I am about to tell you.

Uh, oh. That doesn’t sound good.

Tell me about it. I’m in Monkey Bottom, having decided to try again to walk my Pamunkey Indian ancestral land since that time about three years ago when I had that awful discovery that cut my visit short.

I remember it well, my friend. What a mess that whole affair turned out to be. A lot of moving parts. Two women dead. A former Navy Flag Officer, Admiral Chet Dillon, disgraced and forced to retire after our investigation revealed he was having an affair with a fellow government employee on the naval base named Dottie Gorman. But it got worse when his wife, Linda, caught him in the act, killed his mistress in Monkey Bottom, headed out of town to her mother’s house in Falls Church, then died in a horrific auto accident on I-64. Ya know, I’ve often wondered if anyone sought revenge against the admiral.

Never mind that she had murdered someone, but Linda Dillon had been watching the TV news when she saw the story that her husband had been relieved of his Norfolk naval base commander duties, was livid, grabbed a couple small bottles of bourbon, and drove from Falls Church to have it out with her husband in Norfolk, only to lose control of her vehicle due to intoxication.

Right, and I remember you and me interviewing her at her mother’s house. Frank, I’ve again come across a dead body. I swear to you, this is getting crazy.

No, Bill. Say it ain’t so, said Frank.

It is. Appears to be a white male, shot to the head, but that’s all I can tell from a proper distance.

Damn. We need to keep you away from Monkey Bottom. Just kidding. Don’t go anywhere, Bill. Steve Hooper is still working in this office and has duty this morning. He’ll probably have the lead as a special agent. I’ll snag him and head your way after we contact Norfolk police and the air station security folks. I’m sure you’ll recognize some of the faces. Be there as soon as we can.

Okay. I’ll be in the parking lot, said Bill, and he put away his phone.

Waiting for NCIS arrival, Bill reflected on May 1996, when he had been walking in a place on Naval Base Norfolk, more specifically, Naval Air Station, Norfolk, called Monkey Bottom when he came across the body of a dead woman. He was there to visit and explore his tribal ancestral land. That effort failed with his grim discovery. Upon finding the body, he had called the Norfolk Police Department, who in turn contacted the NAS Norfolk Security Department. They contacted Naval Criminal Investigative Service, and representatives of all three agencies had descended on Monkey Bottom to converse with Bill, ask for his analytical thoughts, and commence an investigation. After meeting with a gaggle of law enforcement types, he decided to return to his home in northern Virginia. At the time, Bill, in his mid-40’s, was a detective with the Falls Church, Virginia, Police Department in the Washington, D.C., suburbs west of downtown. Since his visit, he had been promoted to Chief of Police, which had been an all-consuming career bump, thus the inability to return to Monkey Bottom in a timelier manner.

On this instant replay, Bill’s call to the Naval Criminal Investigative Service and their arrival shortly thereafter started another chain of events much like the Dottie Gorman matter, with a new investigation complicated by the whodunnit list of possible suspects.

CHAPTER ONE

1996

Before former Navy Admiral Chet Dillon, now disgraced, embarrassed, wifeless Captain Chet Dillon, USN, (Ret), hereafter referred to simply as Chet, could sneak out of Norfolk he had one solemn, unfortunate task to perform. He felt compelled to deliver the urn with his deceased wife, Linda’s, cremated remains to her mother. He was not looking forward to that encounter for many reasons, most glaring and predominant that by his actions he had indirectly caused the death of his wife. But do it he would. Get it behind him so he could move on with his plans and life.

So, on a splendid day for driving, Chet departed his flag quarters on Dillingham on Naval Station Norfolk, drove across the naval base, exiting Gate 4, working his way around the adjacent neighborhoods, even passing near the dreadful place called Monkey Bottom that had been a nexus of bad events, and jumped on the I-64 freeway. I-64 would take him through the commute, rush hour bottleneck of bottlenecks, the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel, forcing backed-up drivers to breathe the lovely, noxious exhaust fumes from all the other vehicles crawling through the tunnel, into the Peninsula of Hampton and Newport News, past Williamsburg, and up the I-64 gauntlet of thick forest bordering both sides of the freeway, as well as the median, as his wife regrettably found. He then got on I-295, call it the Richmond beltway, before exiting onto white-knuckle I-95 that would shoot him due north to the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. Chet reflected on the last time he was on that highway. Only a few long weeks prior, he had attended a Flag Officer Budget Seminar and had taken his lady friend, Dottie, to a few of his favorite restaurants in the evening before some serious sex.

He got off I-95 at the I-495 Beltway, taking it north to the Route 50/Arlington Boulevard exit that would put him close to his destination of Falls Church. He took one of the many exits off Arlington Boulevard, made a few more turns, found the street on which his late wife’s mother, Mrs. Dorothy Tatum, lived, and parked his car. He was looking at a lovely, two-story colonial in a middle-income residential area thick with mature trees that had recently filled out after a Winter hiatus. It was eerily like his flag quarters on Dillingham on the naval base.

He sat in his car for a short while thinking about what lay ahead, as if he didn’t have time to think about all that on his numbing four-and-a-half-hour trek from Norfolk to D.C.. What lay ahead could have been construed as his visit to Dorothy, or his life post the Navy.

Time to get it done, he mumbled to himself, not looking forward to what could be a brutal verbal exchange. He knocked on the door, urn in hand, and he heard the telltale footsteps on a hardwood floor from inside approaching the door.

It was opened by Dorothy, and through the storm door he saw a distraught, grieving woman. Add angry, for it, too, was written on her face. Come in, was all she said, turning away to walk into the living room. Gone, absent, was the charming, genteel, southern countenance with which she greeted Special Agent Maxwell of NCIS and Detective Duncan only a few weeks prior when they visited to interview her daughter, Linda.

Chet followed her in, closing the door gently behind him. She pointed to a chair. No, How are you, or Can I offer you something to drink? None of that. Chet immediately felt this was going to be worse than he imagined and was already anxious to depart. The time was just before noon. He said, Good morning, Dorothy. I’m sorry …, to which she quickly raised a hand, the flat facing him like a stop sign, signaling No, I don’t want to hear it or anything from you. He shut up, but he was still holding the urn. Dorothy pointed to a nearby table, indicating he should place the urn on it. He did so, eager to get it out of his hands. It had created a heavy load in more ways than one, and the cruel symbolism was beginning to weigh heavily on him. Not that he didn’t deserve it.

Thank you for delivering the urn and saving me a drive to Norfolk.

Yes. Of course.

I won’t keep you. The sooner you’re gone from my sight the better. I’m sure you understand.

Yes.

Where are you going to live?

I’d rather not say at this point.

Oh? Hiding?

I have my reasons.

Ah. Somewhere where no one knows you, where people won’t point a finger at you and smirk.

Enough, Dorothy.

It’s been a bad year. First, losing Tom to cancer, now this. And with a son still in prison.

You’re a …, yet another hand quickly raised to stop Chet in mid-sentence. She obviously didn’t want to hear crap from him. He got the hint.

I did like you at one time. I viewed and accepted you as an officer and a gentleman. This was designed to be a loud shot over the bow, and it struck home with Chet. He winced. You seemed to be a good husband to my Linda, but I was fooled. Didn’t give me any grandchildren, but I’ll grant you a pass on that. She was a sweet, fun-loving woman before she married you. What did you do to her, you and your military culture and rank privilege? My sweet girl turned sullen and angry like her brother. I blame you for it, Chet.

Chet sat still, taking this in, a scowl beginning to take form.

But I no longer like you. In fact, I despise you, and I’ll take it one step farther. I hope you rot in hell, Chet. Maybe something evil will happen to you.

Chet had sat there quietly, taking the expected hits, but it was now time to get up and leave, which he did, having given Dorothy the opportunity to sink her verbal claws into him, as expected. He didn’t have to take any more from her, regardless. Goodbye, Dorothy. I’ll find my way out.

Good. Dorothy wanted one more parting shot. And don’t let the door hit you on the ass on the way out, she yelled, since he was already at the front door and she wanted to ensure he heard her, loud and clear. She also wanted to put a bullet in his head.

Chet in turn burned a little rubber as he accelerated away from her house. Boy, that was ugly, he said to himself as he let off on the gas and relaxed. I’m glad that’s behind me. Not really, Chet.

Dorothy, shaking, tears falling in agony, decided it was time she called her son, Larry, who was serving a prison sentence, to tell him about his sister, Linda.

CHAPTER TWO

Greensville Correctional Center, Jarratt, Virginia

Tatum, you have a phone call. Take it in the booth in the rec room, a beefy, no-nonsense prison guard told prisoner Larry Tatum. Larry walked to the rec room.

Hello. He wasn’t given to cheerful telephonic greetings and wasn’t really given to cheerful greetings at all.

Hello, son. I hope you don’t mind me calling, but I have important news to tell you.

Larry could sense, hear, the quiet sobs emanating from the other end of the line, so his hopes that it was news that his sentence had been overturned or reduced were quickly dispelled, but then, that sort of news would come from his attorney that his parents had paid for. Yeah? What is it, mom?

Dorothy got right to the point, for she didn’t much care to talk to her son in prison and wanted to make this quick. Your sister’s dead.

What?! When? How? What happened?

She was killed in an auto accident on I-64 near Williamsburg.

When?

Oh, son, I don’t remember. I’ve lost track of the days. Maybe three weeks ago.

Why didn’t you call me earlier? You know I loved Linda.

I know. I know. But I’ve been so distraught and didn’t feel like talking to anyone. I’m sorry. She almost said, I really didn’t feel like talking to my son in prison.

Okay, mom. Is there more to it?

Oh, son. Yes, there is. In fact, I just had to deal with her widower husband, the naval officer.

I know who he is, mom. I met him before all this stuff happened to me, remember?

Yes, hon. Anyway, Chet brought me the urn with Linda’s cremated ashes. Oh, this is so hard. I’m looking at the urn as I talk to you. It hurts so badly.

Yes. I feel bad for you.

Thanks. You asked if there was more to it.

Yes.

There is, and here’s what has happened, as she told her son about the Saturday morning newscast that sent Linda overboard, and how she, Linda’s mother, almost called the police to get Linda under control. She also told Larry about the affair the admiral was having that caused his removal from command.

Damn. Damn that sonofabitch!

Please, Larry. No swearing. This is tough enough.

I can’t help it. And I’m stuck here and helpless to do anything about it.

Which might be a good thing.

No, it’s not! But when I get out of here …. He was livid, incensed, and would have done harm to Chet had he been within reach.

Did he say where he’s going?

He wouldn’t tell me.

The coward. I’ll find him.

No, son. Let it go.

No, mom. There needs to be justice, a reckoning. Something I’m regrettably quite familiar with. No, he needs to pay a price for what he did to Linda.

I’ll send you the newspaper article about Chet. Interestingly, Dorothy did not know about the murder investigation and charges against Linda.

Okay. Do that. And they hung up.

Greensville Correctional Center was the temporary home for Larry Tatum and Robert Watkins, a light-skinned Native American with some African American blood. Located a few miles north of Emporia, Virginia, in the small town of Jarratt, it was a mile off the I-95 interstate, about 60 miles south of the state capital in Richmond, and about 80 miles west of the Hampton Roads area. The center had the distinction of housing the Commonwealth’s execution chamber. Opened in 1990, the center was initially classified as a maximum-security facility, but with the opening of other facilities housing the most hardened criminals, it was re-designated medium security. The center and an adjacent minimum-security work camp housed about 3,000 inmates.

Tatum and Watkins were housed in one of the three pod-style buildings that each housed 517 inmates. A fourth pod contained the 192 higher-risk inmates. The pods were the primary structures in the hexagon-shaped prison that occupied 125 acres. The total complex was 1100 acres.

Larry Tatum was 26 years old, just under six feet in height, with a slim build, and a scar on his left cheek from a rough encounter. He was serving a term for drug possession and attempt to distribute and was on his best behavior as the clock ticked slowly toward the end of his sentence. Never mind he was not caught for the murder of one of his customers that threatened to squeal on him. Larry was a loner. Not overly friendly unless there was something in it for him. He had been that way most of his arguably young life. He was an outcast in high school and much to the angst and chagrin of his successful parents and sister, he dropped out of school.

His parents tried and failed to get him the help he needed, and allowed him to stay at home, but there were rules. No drugs in the house, and none of his worthless friends were allowed in the house. It meant Larry would disappear for days at a time, crashing here and there. He had a part-time job, so he had some spending money. He wasn’t a bad kid, just mis-directed, and screwing the pooch with his life. Eventually, things turned worse. He got in with the mob, proved himself and his loyalty by various means, including a couple kills in which he was involved, and was in heavy with the drug distribution business in northern Virginia. It was lucrative. The area was affluent, and high school kids, his primary market, found the money for drug habits.

Things didn’t go well for Larry. He was apprehended during a typical, simple sting operation, found guilty by the judge, and was off the streets while he cooled his heels at the Greensville Correctional Center.

Larry was sitting in the exercise yard. As someone whose prison term was nearing completion, he enjoyed the privilege of longer exercise, read breathe fresh air, periods. On this day, he was chatting with an equally disagreeable human being, Robert Running Deer Watkins. Robert was a descendent of and member of the Pamunkey Indian tribe.

Six months more in this hellhole, Robert.

I hear ya, Larry. I won’t be far behind you. Seven months and I’m outta here.

Then what?

Probably the same shit that got me in here in the first place. But I gotta be more careful in the future and have a better idea of the jobs I take. Some of these people I’ve worked for have half-baked ideas of how to pull off dirty work. I gotta find smarter employers.

That would help. Where you gonna live?

In Suffolk. On the fringe of the Great Dismal Swamp, close to that ancestral land.

Oh? Really?

Yeah. While I consider myself descended from the Pamunkey tribe, who shared the swamp with other indigenous tribes, I’m also descended from what are called Maroons, people of color that lived in the swamp for various reasons, mostly that they were in hiding. Most were escaped slaves that found safety in the swamp, and many used it as a pass-through as part of the Underground Railroad that runaway slaves from the South used for temporary transit and hiding as they made their way north.

Fascinating, and that from an uneducated fool like myself that didn’t pay attention to my history teachers in school.

There’s a lot of history and tradition within the tribe and Maroons. Maybe if I clean up my act, good luck on that, I can find a decent job in Norfolk. I’m hearing rumblings about a Pamunkey tribe effort to get approval to build a large casino there, on a piece of Nansemond tribal land near the baseball stadium and as an alternate, a place called Monkey Bottom on the naval base.

Ha! That’s a weird name for a place. Monkey Bottom. Huh!

Yep, it is. From tribal history passed down, a lot of people think the name came from a bunch of monkeys that lived on that land, but I’m of the belief that it was named for our Pamunkey tribe that used a dark, gray clay called Monks Clay for their pottery many years ago.

Wow. You’re a fountain of knowledge, Robert. Interesting stuff. Casino, huh?

That’s what I hear from my tribal members in the know. Jobs. We’ll see. What about you? What’s next?

Larry slowly pulled out his wallet, extracting a folded piece of paper that was a copy of a newspaper article his mother had sent him. He unfolded the paper, handing it to Robert. I need to find work back home, but this, he said, an angry tone evident.

Robert looked at the piece of paper, taking in the newspaper story headline that read, Naval Base Admiral Relieved for Misconduct. He took the time to read the story, then asked Larry, Okay. What’s the connection?

The person relieved was the husband of my sister, Linda. He didn’t have the balls to tell her about any of his Navy issues. She was staying with our mother when she saw the news on a local TV station about her husband being relieved of command. Can you imagine the hurt she felt?

Yes. I can see that.

Well, from what my mother told me, my sister went berserk. Wild. Walking around the house breaking things. Hell, my mom almost called the police on her! How about that? Anyway, my mom tried to talk her into staying in the house that night, but Linda was determined to see and have it out with ’ol Chet. She drove off. Unfortunately, she took a couple bottles of booze with her and must have consumed much of them, for she lost control of her car on I-64 between Richmond and Norfolk, went off into the median, and hit some trees. She died on impact. No seat belt. Thrown from the car.

Oh, man. No good, Larry.

Yeah. So, her damn husband, by his actions, having an affair, and it being announced to the world on TV, indirectly caused her accident and death. There’s no debate in my mind. He’s guilty and should pay a price for what he did. My sister was a good woman. Tough to get along with sometimes, but she wouldn’t have ever pulled a stunt like her worthless husband, ‘the admiral’, did. She didn’t deserve that. As much as I can be a worthless piece of shit, and I’ve proven it repeatedly, I miss her and love her. Larry had every right to feel as he did, but one thing he never knew or would find out was that his dear sister shot and killed her husband’s mistress.

So, what are you going to do, Larry? Obviously, nothing now. You’re stuck here behind bars, doing time, helpless to do anything about it.

Yep. You’re right. I’m stuck here, and all I can do is think about it, how I would like to get some revenge for my sister. I’m going to do it. It’s just a matter of when and how. I don’t care. I need to make things right, ya know? So, yeah, until then, all I can do is think about it and let it fester.

You gotta be careful, Larry, or you’ll end up right back here, and maybe even staring down the gun barrel of the execution chamber in another part of this rathole.

Oh, yeah. Something to think about. Seriously. But I plan to find a way to exact revenge. Stay out of the crosshairs of the law. It’ll take a lot of planning. My first problem when I get out of here will be, where is the sonofabitch? How do I find him? He could be anywhere.

I might be able to help you, said Robert.

Robert Running Dear Watkins didn’t tell his prison mate, Larry Tatum, everything. Some things were best kept secret. What he didn’t tell Larry as they sat in the prison exercise yard and chatted, Larry telling Robert he planned to seek revenge against the widower husband of his sister, Linda, was that he was secretly known as The Enforcer within the Pamunkey Indian tribe. Every generation of the tribe had such a person, someone kept in the background, living in obscurity, prepared to do the occasional tribal dirty work. It could be eliminating a tribal member bringing discredit and dishonor to the tribe. Or, doing the same to someone that had desecrated sacred tribal lands.

In fact, he had recently heard from a fellow tribe member that a woman had been shot and killed on sacred Monkey Bottom tribe ancestral land in Norfolk, certainly a desecration of sacred land, but that the alleged killer had died in an auto accident. The question among the tribal elders, however, was one of further accountability, and what should be done about it if anything. Apparently, the killer’s husband, now a retired naval officer, had broken his wedding vows and had an affair with another woman, the woman shot and killed in Monkey Bottom.

Robert being behind bars made the Enforcer aspect moot until he was released from prison, but the tribe was in no hurry. They needed time to decide on a course of action, and the Enforcer could take care of business later and when able to do so.

Robert fooled people. He had his moments of likeable. At just over six feet tall, thick around the chest and shoulders, and a football no neck appearance, he was not someone to tangle with. Throw in his Army Ranger training and killing skills learned and honed during two tours in the Army, and one did not want to be on the bad side of him.

Robert took pride in his ancestry and tribal roots and was a student of Native American history. His heritage and hiding places were linked to the Great Dismal Swamp, an area that once covered a million acres and had varying cultures of humans as inhabitants for 13,000 years. It is in the Coastal Plain Region of southeastern Virginia and northeastern North Carolina, between Norfolk, Virginia, and