Beetlebottom #16

Repent all ye sinners, said the blind man to the Bullfrog.

Mama and the Old Man packed ratty suitcases and a few cardboard boxes into Mama's new car.

The Old Man did what he did best, cursing up a blue streak and smelling extra pungent with all the unusual physical activity.

Mama was holding back on outright crying, and just mumbled words of disbelief as she packed the car up.

 Mama hid her secret horde of cash deep in her best suitcase. 

The Old Man had his lesser stash of dollars and coins stuffed into three unwashed socks. 

He placed the socks cash carefully at the bottom of a cardboard box that held other unwashed clothes and a collection of girlie magazines.

Mama had completely forbidden the Old Man from driving her nice shiny new car. 

It was a small point of resistance anyways, as he had lost his license last year, due to a misunderstanding about intoxication and belligerence.

But today, she didn't have it in her to drive.

She gave the keys to the miserable old bastard and moved towards the passenger side.

Mama had gone into full crying and sobbing, when she got in her seat and slammed the door shut.

It got worse when the Old Man closed his door and sealed in the rancid stench of unwashed body odor and rot gut booze.

There were a lot of good reasons to leave out the back way.

Not letting the townspeople see them driving by would cover their tracks for at least a few days.

And, more importantly for the Old Man, it would make it easier to skip out on the money he owed to nearly everyone.

The dog watched all the proceedings from a distance, staying well away from the Old Man's boots.

He lay in a shady part of the grass, with a soup bone between his front paws.

 The dog could not ponder the future, but knew well enough about past days.

And so it was.

The Old Man fired up Mama's pride and joy new car. He steered towards the old tractor path that went across the field and joined up with the backroad outa town.

Mama sat there with her eyes full of broken dream tears.

The Old Man lit a cigarette and rolled down his window to hang a flabby arm over the door.

The grass hadn't seen any traffic, and certainly not a mower in years.

The grass was a couple feet tall, so the Old Man just followed the ruts where the tractor used to go.

At just a couple minutes into crossing the field, the front wheel hit something and the car heaved over a bit. Then the rear wheel hit whatever it was, and pitched the back of the car up.

That was pretty much it. A thump and a bump, followed by another thump and a bump.

“ Christ, you old fool, watch where you're driving”

“ you'll get us high centered on a log or something out here.” the Mama snarled, angry at getting jostled around.

Of course, neither one realized that the orchard field speed bump was her son, Porch Man.

 He had been laying out in the field since David Lee Royce shot him in the face.

Porch Man had actually been “ resting in peace” with flies gathering around the hole in his head.

The Old Man blindly running over the body of Mama's son, was just the icing on the Karmic cake.

The Old Man got to the edge of the orchard field, just before the dirt road and stopped the car.

He tossed his cigarette butt out the window.

He pulled a small bottle of home brew whiskey out from under the seat.

He took a strong pull from the bottle and put it back.

He lit a new cigarette and turned into the dirt road to make the escape from Beetlebottom.

At the dump, the driver of the pick-up truck, showed Sheriff Fussfutter the two bodies that the boys had discovered.

Lanky Pete and Slim Jim were sitting in a booth at the HazBean Cafe.

Sheriff Fussfutter had left the two young delinquents in the care of Lilli until he went for a look-see at what all the fuss was about.

 Lanky and Slim barely made any sense when they spoke morphine induced gibberish. 

Lilli did manage to figure out that there was two dead guys at the dump.

In a small town, two dead guys is a really big deal.

Mainly because, well ..who are they? 

It's gonna obviously be someone known to everyone else…so who…and how?...

And when…and?

Lilli told the two truckers that were back for lunch, and of course, more of Lilli's good natured company.

Telling truck drivers any bit of gossipy news is like broadcasting from a powerful radio antenna.

 

It didn't take long for the entire downtown of Beetlebottom to be in a flash fire of rumours and misguided theories. 

All this on top of the breakfast encounter with the wild and untamed woman, was just too much to fathom.

Sheriff Fussfutter couldn't make heads or tails of the situation at the dump.

Two dead guys that he had never seen before.

Somehow, it appeared to him that they had driven this fancy car off the edge of the quarry.

It was obvious that the two men had been thrown from the wreck and killed.

When Hoodsdigger scrambled up to the top edge of the quarry pit, the morning rain had cleared away any tire tracks.

The whole thing didn't look quite right, and definitely didn't feel right at the gut level.

That big son of a bitch, biker looking guy was a mystery.

Don't get many of that type around Beetlebottom. And none, without causing a stir.

That other one, the younger, scrawny guy kinda looked like an older version of Lanky Pete and Slim Jim.

But still, what was left intact of this poor slob, didn't look like anybody Hoodsdigger recognized.

How could that be? 

How do two total strangers end up crashing a car way out here.

The old farmer with the pickup truck, the guy that originally found Lanky and Slim…stood back at a respectful distance.

After a while, the farmer piped up, “Sheriff”

Hoodsdigger looked over, temporarily breaking the spell.

“Yeah, what?”

“Sheriff, I've been thinking. The only thing that makes sense, to me anyways…is that these two gentlemen were kidnapped by a flying saucer.”

“Pulled up in a beam of some sort.

 Sucked right off the road” 

 “They were flying to God knows where, to get interrogated and probed, likely.”

“They musta fought back, or something happened. They got dropped outa the sky, and crashed to earth at the dump here.”

“ Whaddya think, Sheriff ?..makes sense to me”

Mostly out of curiosity, Hoodsdigger looked skyward.

There wasn't any signs of a flying saucer.

 Although, true enough, Hoodsdigger didn't really know what signs of a space saucer would really look like. 

Of course unless there was a shiny disc up in the sky right now.

And there wasn't.

Hoodsdigger looked back at the farmer. The farmer looked sincere, he wanted to help in whichever way he could.

“ Well you know my friend …. I don't really know for sure, I guess anything is possible at this point.”

“ I mean really, if you told me yesterday that I'd be looking at two dead strangers at the dump today…well…I woulda had to laugh.”

“ But…here we are …and I ain't laughing.”

“So, I guess that little green men and flying godamned saucers are as good for the list of suspects as what I got so far”

“ Cuz, I got nothing. Two dead out of towners and a wrecked fancy car upside down at the dump”

“That's it, that's all” 

Hoodsdigger turned from the farmer to look down at the mangled body of the idiot, Billy Brown.

Though, at this very moment, the sheriff had no idea that this was Billy Brown laying dead and cold a few yards away from his gangster Uncle David Lee Royce.

Right at that point in time, Sheriff Hoodsdigger Fussfutter was deep in the middle of pondering “ what in the Sam Fuck is going on here, and why today.”

“That moron Lanky Pete tried to burn the school down yesterday.”

“Abe got knocked out by something launched at him by unknown persons.”

“Lanky is burnt and cut up. Abe is recovering from his head wound over in the town of Rumple.”

Just then ..at peak bewilderment, the farmer called over to Hoodsdigger. yet again.

“ Sheriff, hey Sheriff …someone is calling you on the radio”

“ They sound kinda panicky “

The Sheriff thought to himself…” why would anyone be panicked…when I'm out here with two dead strangers?”

Hoodsdigger sauntered over to the patrol car and grabbed the microphone.

“ Hoodsdigger here, whaddya want?, I'm kinda busy up here with dead people and crashed cars and stuff”

“Sheriff …oh man, you gotta come quick…you gotta!”

“There's a fire over at the old orchard road.

 Bush and grass, but it's all the way up to the Jeffries old house now!” 

The radio dispatcher’s name was Eunice . She was right at her emotional ragged edge.

“Sheriff …somebody saw the smoke and drove over that way…

The Sheriff turned around away from the patrol car.

He scanned the sky over to the northwest and saw the plume of black smoke a couple miles away….just over the tree line.

Sheriff…”Well godammit…call the fire department.” 

We do law work, and they do fires, remember?”

“ Yessir…already did that, yes sir…it's just that…well…uh.. 

One of the firefighters found a body…a dead body,  Laying in the orchard field…and uh.. ..well”

“ Well what, well fucking what, Jesus Christ, get on with it” Hoodsdigger was on his own edge right about now.

Ah…the dead person got burnt in the fire, ah..but .um..it ah .. appears they got run over…sir”

“What are you saying…the fire department ran them over?” Jesus H Christ…is that what you're saying?”

“ Ah no sir…I mean I don't think so…really..I'm pretty sure he was already runned over when they got there. Yup, pretty sure…sir”

“But…sir…um. You oughta know too…that uh ..well. The Chief says the body has a bullet hole ..sir. there's a hole in the dead guy.”

“ Stop right there Eunice…stop right godamned there .. take a breath, gather yourself…Eunice…just to be real clear…there's a dead guy in the old orchard field, he's burned from a fire, he got run over ..and…and ..he's been shot!”

“Eunice…is that correct ?”

“ Yessir, that's what the Chief says…they are still trying to get the fire out out at the house…he said to call you”

Hoodsdigger replaced the radio microphone to the hook on the patrol car dashboard.

Hoodsdigger walked slowly and in a bit of a daze.

He got up to the farmer.

“ Hey, tell me something…to the best of your recollection…do space aliens ever start fires, runover people and shoot them?”