Fiction: A Killing on a Bridge (68) A historical fiction

Saint Sebastian River Bridge
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By Roger Owens

Sunday,
September 3,
1922

Ma Middleton had been cooking since before dawn. Red had helped cart wood for the stove and been rewarded with extra coffee and biscuits, with ham and redeye gravy.
    Ramon had come back from Wauchula with his family on Monday, the third of September, two days after the attack. He brought his family to retrieve the body of their brother, son and cousin, Luis Xian Alejandro Alvarez y Gomez.
    His entire family, it appeared to an amazed Red, as the steady stream of cars, trucks, and even motorbikes spun the dust up from Blue Cypress Lake Road until it hung over the humid air of the fish camp like a wet, filthy dishrag. Whoever the Mormons were, there sure seemed to be a hell of a lot of them. They’d pulled a tractor with a grading blade off a trailer and filled the dry swale on the far side of the road to make a crossing for their vehicles, and by the time the sun was bouncing off all the metal and glass from the west, there had to be a hundred cars and trucks on the flattened grass.
    Red had sought out Harlan Middleton to ask if he should go hunting to feed all these folks, and the old man just haw-hawed and growled, “You wait, son, you’ll see. These folks believe in bein’ ‘self-sufficient’ I think the words is, an’ they take their religion real serious.”

Tents and rain tarps went up

    It wasn’t long before Harlan was proved right. Red saw that the vehicles had been loosely circled around an open area on the west side of the road, and as the light went their headlights lit that spot brightly. Tents and rain tarps went up, large fires cast new shadows across the savannah, and the smell of something delicious cooking came to him on the evening airs.
    Once the fires were up the car lights went off. Ramon came to the house and escorted Red, Guy, Jenny and Skeeter across the road. Harlan and Ma Middleton came after with Rosalijo and his cousins, and Jasper and Rufus, all carrying pots and big serving bowls filled with Ma’s excellent victuals.
    The Mormons’ vehicles were lined up facing each other, creating a pathway that reminded Red of a circus midway. Tents and flying tarps sprouted beside most, and stake-side trucks were covered with canvas to create rooms for entire families. Piles of firewood, unloaded from the trucks, sat at intervals by the fires.
    Ramon led them through from the open end on the south side where the ditch had been filled in for a driveway. The fires lined the center of the pathway every thirty feet or so, and Red saw people stand to watch them pass. Black-haired children clung to their parents’ legs or looked from their arms, and some of the adults pointed, clearly talking about the party led by Ramon.
    Red was beginning to get nervous. Did these people blame him for Luis’ death? He could hardly doubt it; he blamed himself.
    At the far end of the path was an Earl Travel Trailer, something Red had only seen in the newspaper. It was a rolling tent or, what did the paper call it? A camper? It was well-used but well-kept, too, a solid trailer with a fancy wooden interior that converted from a table and benches to a double bed. It had cabinets, a sink, and a tiny gas stove, all of which he had read in the ads over breakfast at the Flamingo Café, back in the Village. And all of which now seemed like a hundred years ago.
    The trailer was hauled by a 1915 Cadillac Model 51, in perfect condition at five years old. Red figured the trailer was nine or ten years in; the model had started in 1913 and this looked like one of the originals. The Earl had never caught on, and only a few hundred were ever made. It was already a collector’s item. A rich collector, Red thought suspiciously.
    The Cadillac limousine had three doors on either side, and as Ramon brought them to the last fire, right by the trailer, it seemed all six flew open and Mexicans of all sizes exploded out and charged at them. The Caddy held fourteen if you were good friends, and it looked like they were close.

Red had the .45 in the back of his belt

    Red had the .45 in the back of his belt, and he grabbed for it, but he knew it would do him no good. Then a hard hand clamped on his wrist, and he couldn’t have pulled that gun if his life depended on it.
    Skeeter Willis’ voice hissed and gritted in his ear. “Don’t go shootin’ yo’self in the ass son, it hurts, I c’n tell yeh. They’s just grievin’, don’t worry none…”
    The first of several women and children hit them like a wave, and Red was clobbered by a boy and two girls, none over nine years old. They clung to his legs, the smaller girl climbed to his hip, and they were crying, clutching him, moaning.
    He turned and the girl on his hip saw Skeeter and she leapt on him like a turkey on a June bug. Red saw a stunning older woman embracing Ramon, obviously his mother. Men came after, and when they had all hugged Ramon as well, they turned to Red and his group.
    Skeeter and Harlan and Ma Middleton all stepped forward and they all hugged too. The crying and wailing went on the whole time, and Rosalijo and his cousins, and even Rufus and Jasper, all got their hugs in.
    Finally, the racket quieted down as the family confronted Red. He stood tall to face them. Guy, Jenny and the Indians held back; the fact was, he was the ramrod on this operation, and if there was blame to be carried, it was his burden, not theirs. He’d made the deal, he’d shook hands. He’d promised to take care of these boys, and he’d failed. Whatever price they wanted to extract from him, he was ready to pay it.
    Ramon led the older woman who’d hugged him over to Red, who stood up straight to take his medicine. “This is mi Madre, Sofia Sabela Alejandra Gomez y Alvarez. Mama, this is Senor Roja, el Padron.”
    She was short, dark, and voluptuous, and even though Red was only a few years older than Ramon himself, he felt an almost gravitational attraction to his beautiful, grieving mother.
    She turned to look on him for a moment, and her eyes were terrible. Dark smears under them told of sleepless nights, and tears had left them red as blood. Red thought she would yell at him, slap him, he didn’t know. He swallowed, once, hard. He could think of nothing to say, only looked down and wrung his hat in shame like the boy Jasper.

“You killed these men who did this?”

    He felt short, strong arms grasp him, and she hugged him hard to her ample bosom. The wailing all around continued, but it was as if she spoke for his ears alone. “You killed them? You killed these men who did this?”
    Red’s eyebrows rose, but he nodded. “Ah, yes ma’am, I kilt six of ’em. We kilt fourteen all together, here and at Skeeter’s place out Jackass Junction.”
    She stood back, holding his hands and looking him up and down. “Six men? So young…it is a hard world, Senor Roja, is it not?” Before he could answer, she spoke again. “Fourteen men. Is that all of them, Senor Roja? All the men responsible for my Luis?”
    Red drew a breath, thinned his lips, and she knew that it was not.
    “You are his Padron. It is your duty. You must finish them. We will help you.”
    Red was breathless, both with her blazing attraction and her bloodthirsty words. But he knew one thing; he’d already been bound to kill every last God-damn Ashley and all their gang, before he’d ever come back to the cypress woods. The answer was easy. He grasped her hands back, hard. “Yes ma’am, by God, I will kill every last God-damn one of them, or die tryin’.”
    It was then that a strong, clear voice, a preacher’s voice if Red ever heard one, called out from the interior of the Earl.
    “Brave words for a young man! But then, I heard you’ve killed not six, but eight men in this fight!” The Camper rocked heavily as a man as tall as Red and half again as heavy stepped from the open doors, into the firelight.

This had to be the Patriarch

    The people quieted, waiting for him to speak again, and Red thought that this had to be the Patriarch, what these folks called a preacher, but maybe more, like a boss preacher man. He sure as hell looked the part. His long, wavy gray hair and beard flew out behind him, completely joined top to bottom. He wore a brown suit with faint squares that had gone out of style before the Great War, a matching vest, white button-up shirt and a tan bow tie. His great teeth, incredibly, stuck out past his beard, jutting with his chin, and he wore a vast smile, the kind of man you always saw with his head back, usually grinning or laughing.
    Yet his eyes showed his grief, and something else; a grim determination. Red had heard that out West, the Mormons had been some pretty tough customers. This man looked like the type they would have welcomed. As it turned out, the Mormons believed strongly in what they called “retribution.”
    Red Dedge just called it revenge.

Copyright © 2022 by Roger Owens