Fiction: A Killing on a Bridge (42) A historical fiction

Saint Sebastian River Bridge
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By Roger Owens

Sunday,
July 16, 1922,
5:30 AM

Red was in Jimmie’s Flamingo nervously drinking coffee and eating his grits with sunny-side-up egg yolks sloppily mixed in when the newspaper truck slowed momentarily, and a half-grown boy heaved a bundle of papers onto the front porch. He’d slept, badly, at Senegal’s, and been up even before that most early of risers was out of bed to force breakfast on him.
    Not that Senegal’s breakfasts were any hardship, but once he’d checked on Guy he had cranked the old hoss and headed to town. The sun wasn’t quite up, and the crickets were still going at it fifteen to the dozen.
    Red jumped up and carted the bundle in, pulled out his Buck knife and cut the heavy twine holding it together, then set the rest on the bar for Jimmie, along with a nickel for the paper.
    Jimmie, casually running a rag over the bar, shook his head and pushed the coin back. “’Spect you’re gonna make me a lot of jingle today, son, so don’t you worry about it none. Don’t worry about your breakfast neither.”

“I won’t take charity”

    Red bridled a little and refused. “I’ll take the paper, but I won’t take charity.”
    Jimmie just smiled. He liked this energetic young man and knew well his sometimes-fractious nature.
    Jimmie wasn’t wrong either. Greyson Stikelether had filed the lawsuits and criminal charges late on Friday, so the news would be sure to make the Sunday papers. By quarter to six the place was filling with the usual farmers but also the storekeepers and lawyers and tradesmen. They all wanted to hear the news before church services, and Jimmie’s was the place to get it. They bought newspapers and called for the Aeriola.
    Jimmie switched it on and fiddled with the dial for a second, then WDAE from Tampa came on with the tail end of the Farm Report. At six on the dot, the announcer came on the air, in a quick, sharp voice intended to sound knowledgeable and trustworthy.

This is WDAE from Tampa Florida, with the morning’s news, from Tampa, from Florida, and from arouuuund the world!
    In the election in southern Ireland on Friday, Michael Collins of the Pro-Treaty Sinn Fein party carried a majority of the seats, raising hopes for a peace between the warring factions before the potato harvest in the Fall.
    In Japan, Marshal-Admiral, Viscount Kato Tomosaburo, became the twelfth Prime Minister of the Empire of Japan, with a majority vote of the National Diet naming him the designate, and Emperor Hirohito having signed his commission on Monday, June 12.
    It has been announced by the family of George L. Drew, the notable timber merchant from Jacksonville Florida, that Mr. Drew passed away as of the 19^th of April, 1922, after a brief illness. He served as the postmaster for Jacksonville for some years, despite not needing the pay, according to grieving family members. “He wanted to give back to the community,” his wife tearfully told reporters.
    Closer to home, from Fort Pierce Florida, multiple lawsuits and criminal charges have been lodged by two young farmers, brothers, whose home was burned by a local criminal family long known to be in cahoots with the notorious Ashley Gang. The older brother, one Guy Dedge, lost a leg from the attack.
    The lawsuits also claim many prominent citizens of the Village of Vero in Saint Lucie County have harbored or aided the Ashleys, shared in their ill-gotten gains and knew of the nefarious attack ahead of time.

“Those named in the suit include…”

    Those named in the suit include local land magnate Herman Zeuchs, Former Governor Francis P. Fleming, and Saint Lucie County Sheriff J.R. Merritt…

    Jimmie’s exploded. Men jumped up, shouting and waving fists. The radio was drowned out by the arguments that sprang up like new cane.
    Jimmie was shouting but no one could hear him. Lilly peered nervously out over the batwing doors in the kitchen, behind the bar.
    Red knew Jimmie kept an old broken-arm double-barrel shotgun, sawed down short to be a “crowd pleaser,” right behind the bar. Jimmie had also once confided that the only time he’d had to use it, he’d blown a hole in his roof that cost almost fifty dollars to get fixed. Red figured he’d be reluctant to do it again. He thought about firing his own pistol, into the floor maybe, but that was when Greyson Stikelether chose to make his grand entrance.
    There was no other way to say it; a grand entrance it was. He stepped in the door, swung his right arm wide, grinning that grin through that grey beard that seemed neither to grow nor ever to be shorn.
    “Well, friends and neighbors, what’s the news?” His voice carried to the far corners, and everyone stopped for a second. Then the questions flew, folks hollering to be heard.
    “Did ya hear about the lawsuits…”
    A matronly woman: “Who are the poor young boys who lost…”
    A lawyer called out, “The Sheriff? Can the Sheriff truly be involved?”
    To Red’s astonishment, the majority of folks seemed to be on his side.
    The Judge held up both hands, calling for quiet. “I can tell you what is happening my friends, but you must be still so that I can do so!”
    Lilly started banging what sounded like an iron skillet from the kitchen, and the people settled down. Lilly was an institution, her cooking was unparalleled, and the general consensus was that you didn’t ever want to upset the cook.
    An old man in a threadbare corduroy jacket at the back table said, “So turn off the gol-dang radio, Jimmie, and let’s let the man talk!”

“Yeah!!” “Hell yeah.” “’Bout time…”

    A ripple of approval moved across the room. “Yeah!!” “Hell yeah.” “’Bout time…”
    The Judge took his sweet time about it. Red realized in a heartbeat the conniving old codger took to the attention like a duck to water.
    “You all know that I am still a practicing lawyer in the Great State of Florida…”
    Grumbles into coffee cups, which Lilly was once again refilling at breakneck pace, although she never seemed to hurry. “Come on!” “Yeah, Judge, get on with it!”
    Stikelether nodded his kindly grin around, and said, “Well, all right then. I personally filed those lawsuits, and the criminal charges that go with them, on behalf of this upstanding young man and his invalid brother, cruelly burned out by the Frankenfields!” He held out his upturned palm to Red Dedge. “Their despicable depredations caused his brother to lose his leg!”
    Red’s eyes goggled at that; it was true in a way, but the Judge had made it seem like it had happened when they burned the farm.
    A growl of unrest simmered through the Flamingo like a pot on the back of the stove. They all knew Red Dedge, and they all knew the Frankenfields too, and there was no choosing between them. The Frankenfields were rumrunners, sure, but they were also enforcers for John Ashley, killing competitors and burning them out, and everybody damn well knew it.
    This didn’t look much different to the average resident of Vero; what made it explosive were the rich and powerful men named in those suits. It was common knowledge that more than other criminals helped with and profited from the Ashleys’ robberies. There was no way they could have stayed out of jail without help from people far higher on the social ladder than the wretched Frankenfields. But to have those men named, to see it in print, hear it on the radio, was a severe shock to the good citizens of the Village of Vero and of Saint Lucie County.
    Why, it was top of the front page in the Vero Press, the Fort Pierce News, the Palm Beach Post, even the Fellsmere Tribune. The Tampa Bay Times put the story on page one below the fold.
    The Okeechobee News did a special retrospective edition on the Bank of Okeechobee being robbed and shot to bits by John Ashley and Laura Upthegrove back in 1915, and the heroic stand made by Bank President D.E.Austin against the reputed King and Queen of the Everglades. No one thought twice about how John Ashley had been in jail in Miami at the time.

At seven thirteen, Jimmie’s door flew open so hard the little bell flew off and clattered under the table occupied by the matron who had asked about the “poor boys” who had lost their home. As Sheriff J.R. Merritt, Z Zeuchs, the Francis P. Flemings, father and son, Teddy Canova, William Kimball and Todd Campbell stormed through the door, they were met by the substantial woman at whom the bell had flown, she in high dudgeon.

“Well I never!”

    “Well I never!” The room went deathly silent. “The very idea! I suppose I should expect such uncivilized behavior from men who would take money from bank robbers!”
    Seven well-dressed men of substance stood frozen, with their mouths open, reminding Red of Lilly’s advice. “Close jour mouth, chico, jou gonna catch flies…”
    The café erupted in shouts and fists were shaken. These self-important men had expected to barge in and lay hands on Red Dedge with no opposition, and Red expected the same. These men were not used to being told no. Especially the Sheriff. His face boiled with rage, his mustaches waving about as he chewed curses under his breath. He was going to make a move.
    Greyson Stikelether roared over the crowd. “Any attempt to arrest the plaintiff in a lawsuit against you will result in your removal, Sheriff! It is a state crime, which I shall report to governor Hardee! You and your vigilantes will retire from the premises immediately, or I will personally press charges!”
    It was a bold move. Accusing the Sheriff of vigilantism! Red was as stunned as the Sheriff himself, but the crowd shouted approval, still shaking fists and making threats. Another lawyer shouted “I’m a witness! I’ll testify to it!”
    Merritt, his face a furnace of fury, turned helplessly to the men with him, and they just nodded, turned dejectedly and trooped out the door. A chorus of cheers and jeers followed them out into the dawn.
    Lilly swayed her considerable rear end over to the matron’s table, picked up the little bell, and, having given the men present a perfect view of said rear end, drew their breath as she stretched up to hang the little bell back on the hook on the door, while her magnificent breasts stretched her calico blouse most pleasingly.
    Red Dedge could not fathom how he had gotten the support of so many of the citizens of the Village of Vero. He and Guy had been there a little over two years, having come when Red was sixteen and Guy was nineteen. The people probably knew the brothers grew the best vegetables in town, that Red generally sold them exclusively to Senegal Johnson, and not much else. Not that he could think of, anyway.
    The Judge stepped over to his usual table by the window, and three turpentiners in stained overalls and grimy Union suits grabbed their plates and cups of coffee and retreated to another table, where two river rat clamdiggers scooted over to make room for them.
    He turned and motioned Red to him, and they sat, the focus of every eye in the room. Lilly brought a pot of coffee, poured for Stikelether and Red, and left the pot on an iron trivet. She lifted an eyebrow; the Judge nodded, and in due time a half-dozen fried eggs, a pile of grits the size of a horse turd, and a slab of salt ham big enough to saddle that horse, arrived at the table.

The eyebrow rose at Red

    The eyebrow rose at Red; he shook his head, only warming his coffee cup from the standing pot. He’d had eggs, toast and grits, little enough for a hard-working man but now he was too nervous to eat anything more. He looked up at the Judge shoveling eggs and grits into his mouth as efficiently as he did fried catfish come lunchtime; he looked down at the table, fiddled with his coffee, bounced his knees. He looked back up. The Judge kept shoveling, paying him no mind, until he thought he would scream.
    Finally, with most of the ham and eggs gone, Stikelether wiped up the rest of the grits with slices of toast shiny with butter. His eyes flicked up to Red’s, and he grinned that grin.
    “Bet you’re wondering what in the hell you’ve gotten yourself into. It’s not like I didn’t warn you, young man,” and he raised an eyebrow of his own.
    Red was shaking his head, his face down. He could see his own troubled face in the coffee cup. “No sir, no sir, I never thought this would be easy.”
    He thought of killing Kenny Frankenfield with buckshot, no different from a hog, of burning his house and turning out his woman and children, of Senegal shooting Bobby, who was nothin’ but a retard, really, to save Red’s life. He stared at the face in the cup. “No sir, I did not.”
    Stikelether nodded, finished his eggs and slurped coffee. Red looked him in the eye. “What do we do now?”
    That damned grin again. “Now,” and he paused to wipe his face, “we start making deals.”

Copyright © 2022 by Roger Owens