Ahead of the Press Publishing

Haunted

By : S.L. Kotar and J.E. Gessler

Chapter 3

Standing at the front door to Mr

Final disposal of body transferred to legal relative or guardian.

If he filled in the blank at the end of the second sentence with the name, “Donna Taft,” that would make it an even fourteen words. A baker’s dozen plus one.

In case John Kimble, M.D., father of the deceased, chose to receive the remains, the blank would be filled in by two different words. But the count would remain the same.

Fourteen.

Half of fourteen is 7.

Fourteen times fourteen is 196.

    Add a zero to 196 and get 1960. The year the running started.

    “Hello?”

Startled out of his reverie, the out-of-state cop removed his hat. Out of politeness for the dead. Not Mrs. Coulter. She was still alive. A living, breathing miracle.

“Mrs. Coulter, my name is Phillip Gerard. I’m a police lieutenant from Stafford, Indiana. May I speak with you a moment?”

She was young and on the plain side as far s. Louise Coulter’s modest one-story white clapboard house, Gerard couldn’t explain what he was doing there. If pressed for an answer, he would have replied, “To tidy up the details.” And then, less emphatically, “For my report.” In either instance, both were true, yet neither held the whole story. “The “details” were no longer germane to the “report.” The report, for all practical purposes, was complete. All the “t’s” were crossed and the “i’s” dotted. Captain Carpenter required no more than a dozen simple words:

Identity confirmed.

as appearances went. Brown-on-brown. That was police-speak for brown hair, brown eyes. She was thin and of medium height. Her expression was non-judgmental for which he was grateful.

“Of course. Won’t you come in?”

“Thank you.”

Like its owner, the interior was plain and neat. Several child’s toys were placed on the couch. They had the appearance of just having been picked up.

“You’re here about the man who saved Robert and me?”

“Yes.”

She led him into the living room.

“Won’t you please sit down?” She indicated a chair and he took it, turning his hat over in his hands. “Can I get you some coffee?”

He very much wanted coffee but the remembrance of Donna Taft’s offer in slightly different circumstances made him refuse.

“No. Thank you. I wonder… if you’d tell me about the accident. In your own words.”

She sat opposite him and watched as his hands fingered the hat.

“There isn’t much to tell. It was late afternoon. The weather was bad. Robert and I really shouldn’t have been out. I picked him up after school. We were going shopping. To buy a costume.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “It was close to Halloween. What… type of costume was Robert looking for?”

If she thought that an odd question she didn’t say so.

“He wanted to be Superman. We had already been to two stores. They were out of Superman costumes. We were going to try a third at a 5-and-10-cent store across the street. There was a traffic signal at the crossroad ahead of us. When it changed, Robert went ahead and I hurried to catch up. I… wasn’t paying attention.” Her eyes misted over. “It was my fault that man died. He saw the truck and I didn’t. They tell me he dropped his lunch pail and ran into the street. I never heard him shout or anything like that. The first I knew anything was wrong was when I felt a shove from behind. I flew forward, pushing Robert ahead of me. It was then I heard the crash. When we got to the other side I turned around. At first I didn’t realize what happened and then a lady came up to me and said, ‘That man just saved your life.'”

She picked up one of the toys and stared at it before continuing.

“I thought I ought to go over and see if I could help, but there were already two or three men standing in the street. But I could see… him. He was lying there. Not moving. His eyes were open. I thought that was a good sign, but they tell me… it’s not like in the movies. When someone dies – they don’t close their eyes. They stay open.” She startled him by asking, “Is that true?”

“Yes.”

“I didn’t know. I thought they’d help him up and he’d be all right. But when one of the men shouted, ‘Call an ambulance,’ I had a bad feeling. He never moved. I think he was already dead. I asked the policeman later. He said it was a brain hemorrhage.”

To prevent himself from mutilating his hat, Gerard set it on the arm rest of the chair.

“Very likely.”

“I found out later he was a doctor.”

“Yes.”

“They told me he killed his wife.” He steeled himself for the inevitable, He didn’t look like a murderer, but she didn’t say it. In death, perceptions altered. “I don’t know what to think about that.” She met Gerard’s stare. “What would he want me to think?”

“That he was a good man who made one… tragic mistake.”

“That’s kind. Were you very close to him?”

The question caught him off guard.

“Why do you ask that?”

“You came here to make sure I didn’t think badly of him. Didn’t you?”

“I never said that,” he tried in weak defense.

“Aren’t I right?”

“Yes.”

“Then, I won’t. I wondered how to feel. About my son and I being saved by a man who killed his wife. You’ve made it all right. Like it was God’s plan. An eye for an eye. Perhaps now God will have mercy. What do you think?”

I don’t speak for God.

    “I think you’re right. It was God’s plan.” He stood, forgetting to retrieve his hat. “Thank you for taking the time to speak with me. I’m sorry if I upset you.”

“Not at all. It felt right to talk about it.” She followed him to the door.

“Before I leave I have one more question.” He felt foolish asking. “Did you ever buy Robert a Superman costume? For Halloween?”

“No. I never found one. It was too late.”

He shivered inwardly.

“What did he decide to go as?”

“A knight.”

In shining armor.

    “I see. Thank you again.”

He was almost out the door when Mrs. Coulter remembered something.

“Just a moment. I have his lunch pail. I went and got it… after they took him away. The police didn’t want it. It didn’t seem right leaving it in the street. Would you like to have it?”

“Very much.”

She went and got it. It was a metal lunch box, the type working men carried back and forth to the job. Some of the green finish had tarnished. There was a dent on one side. Gerard held it by the handle. He, too, was a working man. It felt strangely natural in his grasp.

“Perhaps his family would like to have it.”

Despite the statement, she meant for him to keep it.

Phillip Gerard turned and left, having unwittingly exchanged a hat for a lunch box.

The way Superman had transformed into a white knight.

 

The train was loading when he returned to the station. Retrieving his valise from the locker where he had stored it, Gerard made his way toward the back: the second-to-last car in the line, one hand clutching his belongings, the other the lunch box. Stopped at the door to the baggage compartment, he put down both and showed his badge to the train official standing guard. The man looked at it with the erroneous expression of one who could not read, then unlocked the door and let him in. He locked it behind the out-of-state detective.

Locked me from getting out or locked others from getting in?

    Errant thought.

The man was just following protocol.

Running lights across the floor illuminated the compartment, making it dim but not dark. Shades covered the windows. All were drawn. Burlap sacks stamped “U.S. MAIL” filled one side; the other was lined with haphazardly stowed boxes bearing lading labels or personal ID tags. The coffin was set in the middle, making passage by either side difficult. A folding chair for his use, he presumed, had been placed at the head. Or the foot. No designation was made. It was just another box, merely larger and heavier than the rest. A rough, worn and soiled freight blanket had been tossed over the top. Undoubtedly to disguise the contents. People didn’t like to know they were riding with a coffin. It poorly concealed the obvious shape.

Setting down his bag and the lunch pail, Gerard shimmied down the left side. Not finding what he sought, he went back on the right. It was there his eye caught it. The red ribbon “Pete,” the Bennington policeman had gone to remove. Gerard’s lip curled in disgust. The man hadn’t even the good grace to take it with him. He had left it for him to find. If he tried to make an issue of it, “Pete” and his partner would deny any knowledge of it.

For a brief moment, Gerard envisioned hanging them from the long red ribbon. The image brought comfort.

The car was cold and he shivered. The train company obviously didn’t bother heating the baggage compartment. Or, perhaps they had turned off the heat knowing what else they were transporting besides U.S. Mail and salesmen’s samples.

It would be a long trip involving several transfers. The train that was, not the car. At predetermined stations the second-to-last car would be unhitched and rolled to a different train. Two days, possibly three. He could have purchased a plane ticket and flown home. Met the car at the depot in Stafford. Or not. A “meat wagon” arranged by Donna Taft would be waiting there to take the coffin on the final stage of its journey. There it would be unloaded at a local mortician’s. He absently wondered whether she would have a funeral service. And if so, with an open or shut lid? If open, Dr. Richard Kimble’s battered face would require the services of a make-up artist.

What would she choose? To look at the countenance of her beloved brother one last time, or to leave the lid closed?

Open, he decided. In defiance. We have nothing to hide. He was innocent.

    As opposed to receiving the body from Michigan City after the execution. In that case, she would have held a private service for family, only. With a closed casket service. No one wanted to take a last look at an executed man. In that scenario, there was no honor in death. Just sunken eyes and a pale, greenish-waxy complexion.

He had seen too much death.

 

    Clickety-clack. Clickety-clack. Clickety-clack.

    They forgot about him. Somewhere along the line, after one transfer or another, the word failed to be passed on.

There’s a man in the baggage car with the stiff. A cop, or something. There wasn’t any room for him in the passenger compartment. Someone ought to relieve him. Bring him a food tray.

    He was left totally undisturbed.

For the first several hours Gerard sat on the chair, imagining it placed by the occupant’s head for no better reason than he wished it to be so. The ride was bumpy and the speed erratic. Sometimes the train slowed to take a curve, then sped up again. At others it chugged around track that might have been wound too tightly around a mountain. Knowing there were no precipitous routes between Vermont and Indiana he soon lost all semblance of location. Having forgotten to wind his watch, he soon lost all track of time.

I’m on the train to nowhere. Going up and down, around and around and never getting anywhere. A giant child is watching me. Dr. Kimble and I are just another plaything in an alien adolescent’s playroom. We’ve been snatched away from Earth. Tomorrow or the next day we’ll be forgotten and left to…

    Left to what? Fall back in the toy box and be abandoned?

    He was getting the episodes confused.

If we’re merely dolls, then I’m not alive and Dr. Kimble isn’t dead.

    The idea held some appeal.

As hunger pains rather than pudgy fingers, or ghosts of fugitives past assailed him, he glanced down at the metal working man’s lunch pain. Telling himself his stomach was empty rather than curious, he picked it up and snapped back the two clips. There was just enough light to see inside. He identified one sandwich wrapped in wax paper, an apple, an unfrosted slice of pound cake and a thermos. Taking it out and sniffing the contents, he smelled coffee.

He was going to work, not coming from work.

    For some reason the realization disturbed him. As though the pieces had been placed incorrectly in the jigsaw puzzle. If the police had gotten that incorrect, there might have been other mistakes. What if Kimble hadn’t been dead when they brought him to the morgue? What if the attendant had merely taken the word of the medical staff and shoved the body onto a slab? What if that same attendant, oblivious to his mistake, later released the body to the funeral parlor? Without heeding the fact the skin was not corpse-cold, another thoughtless aide might have shoved the body into the coffin and ordered it sealed.

Were he to pry open the lid, would he see a man’s face, twisted in a death throe? See fingernail scratches on the inside of the lid where he had desperately attempted to push it open?

The idea was too gruesome to contemplate and yet Gerard couldn’t stop his mind from dwelling on the possibility.

Stop it! For God’s sake, he’s dead.

    Richard Kimble is dead. Get over it.

    As though to prove his nonchalance, he unwrapped the wax paper and inspected the sandwich. Bologna and cheese with mayonnaise and mustard. Home-made, not from a deli. Slightly rancid. No reason it shouldn’t be. It had been sitting in the lunch box for days. The pound cake, not wrapped, was as stale as a piece of toast. The apple was a Macintosh. Still edible. No power on Earth would have compelled him to eat it. No power but –

The idea came to him like a bolt of lightning. A story his father told. One he had heard from his own father. Back in the Old Country. About the sin-eaters. It was a Welsh story, actually, not an English one, but it had the power to chill the blood. It was believed among the deep, dark coal-miner-dwellers of Wales that when a man died, there was only one way to prevent his soul from going to hell. Place a repast, a feast of food around the body. Legs of mutton; breasts and drumsticks and thighs of chickens; briskets of beef; fruit and vegetables and pies and cakes and then summon the sin-eater.

That miserable man, whose sole occupation was eating his meals off the chests of dead men, would come and feed his face with the mutton and the chicken and the beef and the rest of the offerings and by so doing, consume the sins of the dead, taking them on as his own. In that way, the deceased’s spirit was permitted to soar into the afterlife as pure as the day he was born.

“It’s a pagan ritual, to be sure,” his father had repeated the words of his father to his attentive and horrified son. “Not Christian, at all. Not recognized by the Church. But they believe it, those Welsh miners, and who’s to say they’re not right? No one knows. Maybe the Last Supper was Christ’s way of having His sins eaten by His disciples. There’s lots that isn’t written in the Good Book.”

    Young Phillip Gerard had asked his minister if there was such a thing as sin-eaters eating the sins of the dead and he had reassured him there was not. But his father’s words had resonated in his mind.

No one knows.

    Phillip Gerard had been baptized and confirmed in the Church of England. He attended the Episcopal Church in Stafford. He had been married under its auspices. Sin eating was a pagan ritual.

He ate the apple, he told himself, because he was hungry.

 

    Clickety-clack. Clickety-clack. Clickety-clack.

    Railroad wheels going over railroad ties.

 

“Are you going to stay for the execution?”

The warden looked up from his desk. He should have stood the greet the officer; should have shook his hand. But he had not.

“Yes.”

“You don’t have to. We have professional witnesses.”

“I understand that. I feel it’s my duty.”

“See it through to the end, is that it?” Gerard nodded, although that would not have been the expression he choose. “You were the investigating officer?”

“Yes.”

“All right. I’ll issue you a pass. Present it two hours ahead of time. You’re familiar with the ritual?”

Ritual.

    Gerard couldn’t remember why the word bothered him.

“I’ve been briefed.”

“Ever been to an execution before?”

“No.”

“It takes steady nerves.” No answer. The warden assumed he had inadvertently offended him and tried to make amends. “You’re a police officer. You’ll hold up. There are some who don’t. Family members, obviously. Even some reporters. I had to ask.”

“I understand.”

“After the body is pronounced there will be an autopsy. That’s standard procedure. Then, it’s released to the family. In this case…” He checked his notes. “There’s a sister?”

“Yes. Mrs. Taft.”

“I see arrangements have been made to take it back to Stafford. By train. Will you be accompanying it?”

“No. I intend to leave immediately after it’s over.”

“The State appreciates your diligence.”

“Thank you.”

“I’ll see you there. There won’t be any further need for us to speak. You’ll be with the witnesses. Afterward, you’ll be asked to sign a statement that everything went according to law.”

“Very well.”

The warden hesitated and then asked, “There isn’t any need for you to have any last words with the prisoner? Because if there is, speak now so I may arrange it.”

Gerard heard another man answer for him.

“Yes. I’d like to speak with him.”

The warden sighed. He had hoped otherwise.

“In that case, arrive back here four hours before the scheduled time. You’ll have five minutes before his last meal and the visit from the minister.” Gerard started to turn away before he added, “You realize, of course, the condemned has the right to refuse. If he doesn’t wish to see you, I will deny your request.”

“Of course.” Out of perversity the warden waited until Gerard was at the door before adding, “He won’t confess to you. They never do.”

“I don’t expect him to.”

Which was a lie they both understood as such.

Phillip Gerard paced outside the prison walls for hours, first walking up and down and then around and around. He hoped to tire his mind and did not succeed. At the appointed hour, he presented himself and was admitted. Turning in his service revolver, he was escorted through the prison to the cells where the condemned were housed. Richard Kimble was isolated from the rest. On this, his final day on Earth, he was not to be bothered by nearby minds. His was a solitary journey and he would meet it alone.

The prisoner was sitting on the edge of the bunk as the guard and the visitor approached. Although he heard them come with the second sight those about to die are often gifted with, he did not look up until the guard cleared his throat.

“I have someone here to see you.”

Kimble slowly lifted his head and his eyes locked with those of Gerard’s. Sensing the immediate tension, the guard stepped back and then, as the policeman waved him away, he left them alone. Both men stepped closer, separated only by steel bars and impending eternity.

“Hello, Dr. Kimble.”

A half smile.

“Seems a little funny, you addressing me as ‘doctor.’ Considering the circumstances. Doctors are supposed to save lives.”

“It’s a form of respect.”

“For what I was convicted of?”

Gerard noted the thinly veiled sarcasm and ignored it.

“Your reputation as a healer was well established.” He paused and then added, “Captain Carpenter told me you saved his grandson.” He nervously swallowed. “He wanted me to tell you –”

“No need. But I appreciate it. A case of rabies, wasn’t it? The boy was bitten by a rabid dog?”

“That no one realized was infected but you.”

“Seems like a long time ago. I try not to think about those days.”

“You should.”

Kimble flinched and inched away.

“As a means of balancing out the scales, you mean? That won’t help.”

“I thought, perhaps, it would.”

“It can’t. The scales are all out of whack, but not the way you think. I didn’t kill my wife.” Although spoken dispassionately, the sentence reeked of bitterness. The doctor pulled back, regretfully shaking his head. “What I just said – ‘I didn’t kill my wife.’ I wanted to say, ‘I didn’t kill Helen,’ but I can hardly force myself to say her name.” He tried with conscious effort. ‘Helen.’ As though she’s not a human being, but a….” His breath came in labored gasps. “But something reduced to a ‘victim.’ Or, ‘the decedent.’ How many times in court did I hear that expression used? It made me want to stand up and shout, ‘She’s not a ‘decedent! She was a woman; she had a name. Use it, for God’s sake!'”

He spun around suddenly and put his hands on the bars. Gerard did not flinch.

“Why do they do that?”

Having no answer, Gerard softly replied, “I don’t know. I’m not a lawyer.”

“And I’m not a doctor; not any longer. My medical license was rescinded. I’m just ‘Mr. Kimble.’ Or, ‘Kimble.’ Or, ‘KB7608163. But you called me ‘doctor’ out of respect. Yet, Helen is reduced to a dead body. Where’s the respect in that? She was a loving, caring human being. She dedicated her life to helping the sick the same as I did. She volunteered her free time to helping paroled men integrate back into society. She… planted geraniums,” he added in a sob. “That’s what I’ve been thinking about.”

“I’m sorry.”

Gerard felt a rivulet of perspiration roll down his forehead. He stemmed the inclination to wipe it away for fear the unanticipated movement would startle or frighten the man before him.

Kimble’s eyes widened in intensity.

“Tell me you’re sorry you didn’t find the one-armed man and I’ll be satisfied.”

A cold chill ran down the detective’s back. It all became clear. He had wondered if Richard Kimble would agree to see him and now he had his answer. They both wanted something from the other. They each, in their own way, sought a confession.

Life was never that easy.

“Dr. Kimble,” he began, choking half way through the name. “I can’t say that. I did everything in my power. I didn’t find him because he doesn’t exist.”

Kimble rocked back on his heels.

“What have you been doing since you brought me here?”

If the question surprised him, he didn’t let on.

“I’ve been walking around the prison.”

“Let me tell you what you were thinking. And if I’m wrong, let me tell you what your recurring nightmare will be after I’m executed: What to do when you find the one-armed man? Because you will. One day – it doesn’t matter when or how – you’ll discover the truth.” Stepping back, his fingers gripped the bars until they were white-knuckled. “He gets hit by a car. He knows he’s dying and he wants the last laugh. They ask him if he wants a priest and he waves them off. ‘A priest can’t help me. I killed that woman in Indiana. The one they fried the doc for. That cop – that Gerard – never found me. I skipped outta town and got clean away.’ They’ll call you: the police in St. Louis or Detroit or Bennington and tell you about the confession. Then, Lieutenant, you’ll know what it’s like to be convicted. Only, in your case, you’ll be guilty as charged.”

Gerard swallowed the bile that had risen to his mouth. It burned all the way down.

“I’m sorry you feel that way, if it makes you feel any better.”

Richard Kimble’s face turned ashen.

“I’m innocent.”

“Good-bye, Dr. Kimble.”

Phillip Gerard stepped back from the cell, averting his gaze as he did so. He did not wish his last impression of the condemned man to be one of an avowal before God.

He made him up. To save his sanity. He can’t face the truth.

    I did everything I could. There is no one-armed man.

    He believes a lie and I must believe the jury. I did my job. The law is executing him, not me. Justice is being served. I obey the law.

    Richard Kimble watched him walk away, realizing, where Phillip Gerard did not, there would be one final opportunity for them to meet: between the glass wall separating the witnesses from the condemned in the electric chair. One last chance to make his point.

He no longer cared.

 

Phillip Gerard passed through inspection and walked into the witness area, also known as the viewing room. Warden Paul Reinstadt was already there, accompanied by an anonymous guard. Four chairs had been placed before the curtained window. Two men he did not recognize were already seated to his left. Thomas Burnett, the lawyer who had represented the prisoner, sat beside them. That left the chair on the right for him. He sat and nodded toward Burnett when the attorney turned to him. No words were spoken.

As though his arrival signaled the start of the last act, the curtain was drawn by the nameless guard. Richard Kimble, wearing a prison-issued long-sleeve light blue shirt and dark blue trousers with paper slippers was escorted in. Flanking him were two other guards and a minister. The man of God held a Bible and kept his eyes averted on the text. He did not repeat the prayer aloud. Those present presumed that was at the request of the prisoner.

Warden Reinstadt spoke.

“I have received a call from the Governor’s office. There will be no reprieve. The execution is to take place as scheduled.” He turned to Richard Kimble. “May God have mercy on your soul.”

Richard Kimble did not react.

He passively allowed himself to be strapped into the electric chair. A band was placed around his head. Electrodes had already been positioned on his chest. They were attached to the telemetry monitor where a physician would make the final determination of death when the heart stopped fibrillating.

No last words were spoken by the condemned. Nor did he peer through the glass wall to the witnesses. He was already looking ahead.

A jolt of electricity shot through the living human being. His eyes opened as if in surprise and his head was thrown against the backrest. His knuckles tightened, the veins in his neck distended. One. Two. Three seconds. Richard Kimble didn’t count. He couldn’t, had he wanted to. His brain was already turned off. It required only for his heart to follow. In death, the auricle of life was the last to cease.

Four. Five. Six.

No one in the room counted, either. If asked, they would have said it required an eternity.

The muscles of the man strapped into the chair relaxed. The head listed forward, eyes half closed. No final gasp.

It was over.

Richard David Kimble, M.D. was dead.

Justice, according to the laws of man, had been served.

The curtain drew to a close. The two witnesses got up, signed the register and left. Tom Burnett wiped his sweaty hands on a handkerchief he had been clutching and turned to Gerard.

“I wish I hadn’t been here,” he whispered. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

“Take a sip of water. That will settle your stomach. It’s your responsibility to notify the family. The warden will take you to his office. You can use his telephone.”

“I don’t think I can.”

Gerard had no pity.

“The warden won’t do it. That’s why you’re here.”

“Please, Phil. You call her.”

“Not-on-your-life.”

A grim joke in the face of death.

Gerard left him there. He signed the book, the final action that completed his role in the drama, and walked out. He felt nothing.

Leaving the penitentiary, he crossed into the parking lot. He had arranged for a rental car. He had not cared to take the train home.

A shadow, cast from one of the isolated light standards, crossed his path. It might have been a cloud passing over the moon but was not. His heart quickened as a man stepped out from the night. Gerard stopped in his tracks.

The man was a stranger. He was broad-shouldered with black, wavy hair and dark, almost black eyes, or so they looked in the dark. The shadows played tricks because it appeared the sleeve of his right arm was pinned up, past the elbow. Gerard gasped. His mind was playing tricks. It couldn’t be the one-armed man. He didn’t look startled. Instead, he looked smug.

“He’s dead, ain’t he? The doc? That Kimble fellow.”

“What’s it to you?”

“Now, I’m free.”

“What do you mean?”

“I killed her. The doc’s wife. Didn’t mean to, but I did. Hit her over the head with the base of a lamp when she caught me breakin’ in.”

“That’s impossible. I looked for you.”

“You’re the cop, aren’t you? Gerard?”

“Yes.”

“I skipped. Got lucky. Caught a train. You never knew.”

“No. I never knew.”

“Gotta go, Gerard. So long.”

“Wait a minute!” The man stopped, turned around. “Why are you telling me this, now?”

“Wanted you to know. You fried an innocent man. Hate cops.”

Gerard took in a deep breath. It was not enough. He felt like choking.

“I’ll follow you to the ends of the earth.”

“Won’t bring the doc back.”

“But it will serve justice.”

The man looked startled.

    “What’s justice mean to you?”

Not what it used to mean.

    The one-armed man started running. Gerard tried to follow but his legs would not respond. The harder he tried, the more mired he became in a morass of swirling paralysis.

Stop that man! He killed Helen Kimble!

    But he was alone and even if he had been in a crowd of spectators, not a soul would have responded. Helen Kimble’s murderer was dead. No one chased a ghost.

Link to HAUNTED Chapter 4