There
were the two sisters, Mo and Maude, from up Bridgeport way. Maude was arrested,
cuffed and carted off for her part in poisoning twelve vagrants – wanderers of
no interest nor need to no one, while Mo made her escape out the back door and
across the frozen creek, but the ice couldn’t begin to bear the weight, so she
went under for good.
They
reportedly made their own brew, those two, and a lethal one it was, too,
according to those that knew. The coroner, he had a hard time with chemistry
but he knew poison when he saw it and he’d just seen it a dozen times. The
police, they suspected more, but ran into ‘no bodies, no clues’.
They
had been a careful duo, out of necessity, not accommodating any man that might
pose a threat to overpower them, even though the act itself would take some
considerable courage on his part
because these two knew how to throw their weight around and were quite the tag
team when they needed to be. Like Big Bill Swain, who didn’t go down easy, as
the poison failed in early trials, he flailed and broke their vials, so they
finished the job hand-in-hand in hand-to-hand combat, a cleaver and an elk
rack. It was not something they relished doing, but necessary, albeit messy and
distasteful. From that, the lesson was learned and they took critical measure
before they took a man in, and they tweaked the potion and dosage to be more
potent for each gent and their own safe measure.
Puttering
about the kitchen:
“Let’s
not get hung up on technique. The recipe is not important it’s the outcome that
counts,” Mo bemoaned. But Maude bided
her time while fine tuning the stew, taking pleasure in ‘the incremental’.
They
had a habit of finishing the other’s thoughts, they did. ‘Speaking Parallel’ is
how they described it. In fact, their thoughts could not be more co-joined even
if they were not, and for awhile the Doc couldn’t be exactly sure while they
were within their mother because their hearts beat as one. (Their father they
never knew, didn’t care, and never bothered.)
The
men they come and go.
It
was their nature, you know.
Harvest
Beck was the longest man we had…
…in
terms of residency. A good worker,
worked the farm hard. He lost his place when the bottom fell out and was
an itinerant laborer working for other folk ever since.
He
was good help.
Enjoyed
the task. Stayed all three months of spring…
…and
well into June.
He
thanked us kindly and we parted ways.
…which
is all we can say…
…with
certainty. Bless ‘im.
While
investigating the police thought that it might be best to interview them in
separate rooms dare they make one daft from their parallel prattle. But it was
a tactic they soon found counterproductive because by putting them in different
‘shells’, they clammed up altogether. So, the investigation dragged on, and it
was a damn big farm in which to find a clue. All the while, no one seemed to be
looking with earnest conviction for the departed, most reported missing by
probation, passive parents, or past partners, but all with little persistence
or passion. What no one knew, but suspected, while only one dozen in the
smokehouse drew any attention, somewhere lay another two, at least, of Life’s
losers lost a sunder.
Meat pies, they made and sold
locally….and they pondered…but came to realize that once tainted by tinctures
‘the Meat’ could kill innocents as well, and if the victim be a child?…lord
forbid…blew that idea straight to hell. Couldn’t feed them to the hogs (who
could grind a man to ‘nothing left’) for the very same reason; self
preservation, since they cured, and subsided on their own ham and bacon. No,
they decided, if a man gave up his ghost he ended up a post. They opted for a
digger on the tractor, took turns driving the rig, dug a double wide shaft,
dropped the cured corpus erectus vertically therein. Then with a few words of
solace, marked them all with a cedar split. When the investigators brought in
the dogs, they sniffed and sniffed the posts, and a few lifted their legs, but
the handlers misunderstood and mishandled them by pulling the stubborn hounds
away. So once Maude was convicted and sent to spend her days as ward of the state, it was out of their hands. But make no mistake, there still stands a mighty long fence on that farm to this day.
