The primary aim of the "Novel Excerpts" blog category is to showcase my creative writing, specifically from the novels I've written. Hopefully, these posts will provide a glimpse into my storytelling style, themes, and narrative skills. It's an opportunity to share my artistic expressions and the worlds I've created through my novels.
The Boaz Safecracker, written in 2019, is my seventh novel. I'll post a chapter a day over the next few weeks.
Book Blurb
Fred Martin, a 1972 graduate of Boaz High School, returns to his hometown after practicing law and living in Huntsville for over thirty-five years with two goals in mind. First, to distance himself from the loss of Susan, his wife of thirty-seven years who died in 2013 of cancer. And second, to partner with his lifelong friend, Noah Waters, to crack the safes of Elton Rawlins and Doug Barber, two men who got under their skin as high school football players.
Little did Fred and Noah realize the secrets the two old Mosler safes protected. Who murdered three Boaz High School seniors in the fall of 1973? Is a near-half-century-old plan to destroy Fred’s sister and steal the inheritance from a set of 44-year-old illegitimate twins still alive and well? How far would Fred’s mother go to protect her family?
What starts out as an almost innocent prank turns life-threateningly serious the more Fred learns and the more safes he cracks. All the while, he falls in love with Connie Stewart, his one-date high school classmate who may conceal a secret or two herself.
Chapter 58
As I rolled the baby Mosler out of its little alcove, I pondered how Dad ever got it down those stairs. Although it wasn’t the behemoth the T20s were, no man could come close to carrying it across a level and unobstructed surface, much less down a steep staircase. I concluded it had most likely been deposited down here during the time of the second renovation of Martin Mansion. The one-room cabin, which Dad used as a library, was part of the original structure. Great-granddad Stonewall had added on not long after Granddad Fredrick moved to Cincinnati in 1919. Then, in the early fifties, when Dad and Mom moved to Boaz to take care of Stonewall, another, more elaborate, addition and renovation took place. The last is a U-shaped structure built around the existing rectangular dwelling. It was odd, no doubt, Stonewall’s way, the cabin’s back wall remained exposed to the outside, leaving the original back door. I reminded myself my conclusions were often wrong, and that I often possessed less than all the relevant facts.
It wasn’t a key Dad had hung on a tiny nail driven into the back side of a stair riser. It looked like a piece of old cardboard. The safe’s combination was scrawled in heavy pencil in large numbers on the card hung nearly a foot above my head. I almost didn’t see it. I guess Dad thought there was little chance anyone would find out about the hidden door to the cellar, much less see the card that was virtually the same color as the pine board it was attached to.
I reviewed and memorized the Mosler’s combination and bent down to turn the dial. Just as I completed the third spin, my cell phone vibrated. I stood and removed my iPhone from my left-hand pants pocket. It was Bobby Sorrells. My first choice was to ignore the call and lean over and pull open the old Mosler’s heavy door. With the news of Angela’s death, one I was framing as mysterious, I chose to answer.
“Hey Bobby.”
“Can you talk? In private?” He asked.
“Yes, I’m alone.”
“I just returned from Dayton, Ohio. I had to fly back up to meet with the defense attorneys I’m working for. Once again, I had a lull in my schedule and decided to drive down to Cincinnati.” Bobby paused.
“What prompted you to do that?”
“You know me. When I’ve started a new painting, I can’t quit until the canvas is complete. Every picture tells a story.” I could hear something in the background. Music.
“Did you learn anything interesting?” I ignored the music.
“I’ll let you be the judge of that. I just report what I discover.” The music faded. Bobby must have turned down his radio if that’s what it was. I suspected he was driving.
“Okay.”
“You remember hundred-year-old Lessie Bouldin?”
“Wasn’t she Miss Mossie’s neighbor? Lived across the street?”
“Yep. I spent the best part of yesterday morning with her. The old woman has a mind like a steel trap.”
“What did she catch? That’s relevant to me? I was feeling the need to finish my exploration of the old Mosler and skedaddle back upstairs and out the back door of Martin Mansion.
“It’s a small world. Your friends, Carson Eubanks, Rebecca Rawlins, and Caleb Patterson, all came for a visit Thursday afternoon. Miss Lessie didn’t know them but seems she used an iPhone 10 to make some pretty good pictures. I’ve confirmed it to be those three.”
“That’s really strange. I could see why Carson would visit his mother, but what brought the other two along?” I asked.
“Great question. It gets stranger still. Miss Lessie said around 4:00 that afternoon, Carson left in a taxi and the other two, she had to be referring to Rebecca and Caleb, stayed. Keep in mind Miss Mossie was very sick.”
“Not any longer. You didn’t know she died?” The look on Tyler’s face at the pond when he shared the text he received from his father was still clearly impressed on my mind.
“No, I finished up about five yesterday afternoon. I’ve been driving back ever since, except for the half-day I spent sleeping at the Day’s Inn south of Nashville.”
“I’m not sure when Miss Mossie died. Tyler, Carson’s son, learned about it yesterday. I don’t know when his father found out. Now that you know this, does it strike you as just a little strange she died shortly after the three of them visited?” I asked.
“I agree, but what makes it more suspicious to me is that Carson left Rebecca and Caleb at his mother’s alone.” I heard a dinging sound. “Hey, let’s talk later, I’ve got to unload some coffee.”
“Okay, I need to go too. But quick. You know Carson is very sick. He could have gotten to feeling really bad and had to leave.”
“That sounds reasonable, but why wouldn’t all three of them leave at the same time?” I heard Bobby’s car door slam.
“I didn’t think to ask Miss Lessie how the three of them got to Miss Mossie’s. I just assumed they drove. All together.
“Take care of your business and let me know if you think of anything else. Thanks for calling.”
After ending the call, I bent back down and pulled on the Mosler’s heavy door. I heard a fifty-year creak. It was a term granddad Fredrick had taught me during my summer visit to Cincinnati in 1972 after I graduated high school. He had said, “if a safe door hasn’t been opened in half a century, it will croak like a frog.” I concluded this baby had been left to sleep quite a while.
Another shock. This time bigger than when I had stumbled upon the old Mosler a few minutes ago. Laying on top of a box with dimensions about the size of a sheet of letter paper, lay a pistol. I removed it, using my handkerchief. I already knew it was virtually identical to the other two Smith & Wesson’s I had recently discovered, both, also safely secured inside a beautiful Mosler. My gut stood up and spoke, announcing this was my third time to step into a pile of you know what. By now, I was down on one knee. I laid the pistol on the floor to the side of the Mosler, careful to protect it with my handkerchief.
As I removed the rectangular box, I knew it contained, or originally contained, stationary. Until now, I had failed to notice the box was a lightly-shaded mauve color. The lid was tight, and I almost had to tear back the four corners to lift it off the underlying box. Inside, given the weight, I had expected to see nearly a full box of unused paper, mauve-colored just like the letter Luke had shared with me at Martin pond yesterday morning.
Instead, I saw a typed letter addressed to Julia Stewart. At the bottom, it was signed, “Harriet Martin.” It seemed Mother had written at least two letters to Connie’s aunt, Johnny Stewart’s mother, and had refused to mail them both.
For some reason, before reading, I removed the letter, laid it beside the pistol, and saw a photograph laying quietly in the mauve-colored box. I couldn’t have been more surprised if Dad’s voice had suddenly shouted down to me from the top of the stairs. I had no doubt the camera that had made the picture was once mine, a gift from Dad on my seventeenth birthday, August 13, 1971. The camera was a Polaroid, it’s first generation of instant cameras.
The real shock came from what the camera had captured. It was an X-rated photo. I could make out Deidre, Rebecca, Angela, a Hispanic-looking girl, and Randy Miller. They were all skimpily dressed, laid back on two couches that formed an L. There was also an extra leg sticking out on the floor from behind the left side of the couches, and an extra arm and hand on the right side. So strange. Who were those two?
How on earth did Mother, if it were Mother, snap this photograph? I could understand how the sound of the camera wouldn’t have alarmed any of the half-crazed bodies. I tried to put myself in Mother’s shoes. Not only would she have solid reason to dislike, even hate, the philandering Johnny Stewart (Deidre was laying in his lap. I suspected she was naked under that old Army jacket spread across her midsection). But, Mother would also have a strong reason to despise Randy Miller. Seeing him in this scene must have shocked Mother. She loved him and had full faith in his quest as youth pastor to guide her daughter and all the Church’s young people down the narrow pathway towards Heaven.
My memory pushed forward the word “Ludes.” And, the closer I examined the photo, the clearer my memory became. It was taken inside the Lighthouse. If taken by Mother, how had she pulled this off? An even closer look at the photo suggested that it wasn’t Randy Miller. It was Ricky Miller. The two brothers were virtual twins.
Things became crystal clear when I read the note scrawled across the back of the photo. “Deidre’s world is a disaster. She’s ruining her life. I won’t have it.” Mother had initialed the photo and dated it. October 12, 1973.
I exchanged the photo for Mother’s letter. I started to read and was quickly confused. It was addressed to Julia Stewart, but the salutation was to Bill, Julia’s husband. The letter was confusing at best, but one thing seemed obvious. Mother and Bill Stewart had a plan to teach their children a lesson. I remembered Mother had served on the Church’s finance committee during my senior year. Bill had served as chairman for as many years as I could recall. The two must have connected someway.
The letter was dated Wednesday, October 10, 1973. The letter was written as though Mother was the leader. She told Bill to meet Friday night behind the ice house alongside the railroad track. Mother even emphasized that Bill wear dark clothing. She said “the kids won’t see us, but we can see them as they come from the football stadium in Johnny’s old Bonneville. After they pass, we’ll walk to the Safe House.” It was then I started to sense I understood the context of what I was reading. The letter was written two days before a football game. My gut told me it was the Albertville/Boaz game, the very night Johnny and his two friends were murdered. I became semi-nauseous when I read Mother’s final sentence: “I’ll bring a pistol, you bring the rope.”
My growing anticipation I was about to need a bathroom persuaded me to skip my usual pondering. Yet, out of habit, I did turn the letter over. On the back, printed in pencil along the bottom was, “Original, copy to Bill. Things didn’t go as planned.”
I quickly made the decision not to return the items to the safe. I laid all items in the mauve-colored box, including the pistol, careful not to touch the old Smith. I closed the Mosler, spun the dial, and raced upstairs to the closest bathroom.
Instead of throwing up, my bowels opened. Strange how emotional shock can trigger such violent physical reactions. As I sat on the toilet in Mother’s tiny bathroom right off the kitchen, I couldn’t help but ponder what I had just discovered. I knew I was jumping to conclusions, but it certainly appeared Mother and Bill Stewart had something to do with the death of his son Johnny. I knew it was a leap but, “I’ll bring a pistol, you bring the rope,” was more than mildly incriminating, especially since the word was, Johnny was both shot and hung. Finally, Mother’s note that “Things didn’t go as planned” to me at least, was even more damning.
Twenty minutes later walking towards my cabin uneasily toting the loot I had lifted from Martin Mansion, it began to rain at the same time my iPhone once again vibrated in my pocket. I shifted the box from my left hand to my right and pulled out the little beast. It was Noah.
“Yep.” My greeting was short as I questioned why I had even answered.
“I’m fighting fires and don’t have any time for questions. Just wanted you to know that Carson Eubanks is dead.”
Right as I was halfway through asking Noah when Carson had passed away, the call ended. I tried calling him back but received his voicemail.
I walked up the two steps to my porch and felt like I was stepping off a cliff. My world, things happening to me and around me, were more out of control than at any time in my life.
The Pencil-Driven Life 