All Things Return
by
W.H. Harrod
Smashwords Edition
Copyright © 2011 by W.H. Harrod
Smashwords Edition License Notice:
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Although this is a free book all rights are reserved. This book remains the copyrighted property of the author, and may not be reproduced, copied or distributed for commercial or non-commercial purposes. If you enjoy this book, please encourage your friends to download their own copy at Smashwords.com.
This book is dedicated to my wife, Debra, whose assistance and encouragement were invaluable in my effort to write this book.
CHAPTER ONE
Twenty-seven years of existence did nothing to prepare Howard Douglas for the mental anguish he felt this day, not even the loss of his parents in a car wreck during his childhood. That tragic experience had come close to destroying his young life, yet it paled when compared to the grief confronting him today. This pain was evil.
Recent events, now forever etched into his consciousness, unfolded before him. Henceforth, all his thoughts would filter through this horrific, never-to-be forgotten period of his life.
Howard recalled the surprise phone call from his estranged fiancée’s parents coldly informing him Whitney had committed suicide, and they were bringing her home for burial. That’s all he was told.
Two and a half years earlier she had disappeared without so much as a ‘goodbye’ or a ‘go to hell.’ He’d pleaded with her family to tell him what they knew about her sudden disappearance, but they refused to tell him anything. Now, with no apparent regard for his feelings, they informed him that the lifeless body of the single human being he came to realize too late meant more to him than anything else in the world traveled back to him as mysteriously as she left, in a metal box.
What would he do now? He’d always expected her to return some day. No matter the circumstances surrounding her absence, he had intended to do everything possible to make her want to stay, never again giving her reason to leave. He loved her. She must have known he did. Never, in his wildest dreams, did he expect her to return home this way. Instinctively, he realized that somehow he must bear part of the responsibility for this unspeakable tragedy. No suitable explanation had been provided to him so far. Her parents merely informed him that Whitney had suffered from depression and had swallowed a bottle of sleeping pills. No one found her until it was too late. His personal grief mattered little to her family. All his familial rights had ceased the day Whitney left town. He became history to them. The fact that they notified him at all surprised him.
He sat alone on the patio as the darkness of the encroaching evening enveloped him. The descending blackness seemed appropriate. It symbolized the moment better than anything. Whitney’s death had smothered the light from his life—from his soul. Darkness covered everything.
“How can I go on living feeling this way?” he cried out as he raised his forearm to wipe the tears from his swollen eyes. His watch scraped his face as he pulled a tear soaked shirtsleeve across his moist cheeks, causing him to partially regain his senses. He vaguely recalled some chore awaiting his attention, but what it was escaped him.
He remembered the strange man who had approached him while he stood alone following the graveside service. At first, he hadn’t understood the stranger, and only after asking him to repeat his statement did he comprehend what was said. The stranger addressed him as if he knew him, and requested a meeting at Howard’s home at 9 p.m. that evening for the purpose of relaying important information concerning Whitney. Stunned, and unable to reply to such an unexpected confrontation, Howard merely nodded his assent. The stranger confirmed the 9 p.m. appointed meeting time before turning and walking away.
Relieved at the interruption of this intense grieving process, Howard thought about the stranger’s request. What can this stranger tell me about Whitney? Who is he? Will he show up here as he said he would? Before he had time to think about it further, the front doorbell rang. Startled by the sound, he nervously glanced down at the glowing numerals on his watch. He easily made out the time, 9 p.m. exactly. This unforgiving day wasn’t finished with him yet.
CHAPTER TWO
Howard’s journey to the front door halted momentarily as he stopped to turn on the interior lights, revealing a pathway through the messy living room to the front hallway. A shudder ran up his spine as his hand reached forward to open the door to the same strange man who had approached him at the grave site hours earlier. Words escaped him as he confronted the casually attired, middle-aged, Caucasian male standing before him under the glaring front porch light, so he simply stood silently waiting, his despair apparent to the world.
The stranger spoke first, “Thank you for taking the time to see me during what must be for you a terribly painful experience. I promise not to keep you any longer than is necessary. May I come in?”
Howard moved aside to allow the stranger passage into his home. Not knowing the man’s intentions, he wondered if he erred in allowing him inside. Maybe the stranger intended to perform some mischief. But, it matter little. Howard didn’t care anyway—nothing could make him feel worse than he did right then.
The stranger walked into the center of the living room and took a seat on one of the two soft leather couches facing each other across a glass-topped coffee table. He didn’t bother to look back to see if Howard followed along behind. The stranger’s nervousness apparent, he sat with arms on his knees, clasping and rubbing his hands together. Howard’s barely functioning senses detected the man’s agitation as he came over to the couch across from the stranger and sat down.
Neither party seemed inclined to talk as they glanced furtively towards each other. The stranger broke the silence. “You don’t know me, and I’m not going to tell you my name. You will know why soon enough. I’m not from around here, and when I leave, you will never see me again. However, there are things I feel you need to know. I’ve told myself a hundred times on my way here to mind my own business and keep quiet about what I know. But in the end, I couldn’t. Whitney deserves better.”
Howard sat quietly unwilling to commit any of his dwindling emotional reserves to some strange man’s story. Yet, he nurtured hope that somehow this person might bring some sense to this craziness.
“Whitney was my dear friend. I came to know her soon after she left here and came to Dallas. She moved into the same condo complex I lived in,” said the stranger. “I—”
Howard came to life. “Dallas! Dallas? She was in Dallas all this time?” Even coming so late, it gave him relief to know where she’d been during all those painful months.
“Yes, Dallas,” answered the stranger. “I got to know her very well during that time.” He hesitated for a moment to regain his composure. “In fact, I may well have been her only friend during that entire period.”
Howard tried to make a comment, but the stranger cut him off.
“Please, let me finish my story first before you ask me anything. I know what needs to be told, and I don’t want to leave anything out. So please, be patient and bear with me.” The stranger collected his thoughts and started again. “The Whitney who arrived, hurt and outraged, in Dallas two and a half years ago wasn’t the same Whitney who took her own life last Monday night. Many things changed while she lived there, as many things happened. One thing, though, never changed. She loved you just as much the day she died as when she arrived there. I know this for a fact; she told me this only the week before she killed herself.”
Howard, upon hearing this, exhaled as if the last vestiges of life within him escaped his pounding chest.
The stranger again paused. “I never really knew what was going on until much later, and for that matter, neither did she. This is, I sincerely hope, the last time I’ll ever have to relate to another human being the details of such a sick and disturbing affair.” Having said this, the stranger sat back.
“This is going to take awhile, but there’s no short version of it. You and Whitney were the victims of an evil, self-serving bastard’s sordid scheme to destroy your relationship to serve his own purpose. As this story progresses, I believe you will begin to see the light. Many things that most likely confused you will become painfully clear.”
“Unless you’re a complete fraud, which I seriously doubt based on what Whitney told me about you, I’m sure you remember the brief affair you had with the beautiful young girl in Cancun in 1978. Right?”
Howard looked stunned. Color returned to his pallid skin tone. He had felt certain no one else knew about that.
The stranger nodded. “Good, I can see that you do. Well, you were set up from the start. You went to Cancun by yourself supposedly to gather information on property your company might be interested in purchasing in the future. While there, a beautiful young lady approached you, made your acquaintance, and then plied you with booze and proved that you weren’t a paragon of morality after all. She played you like a rube. Without your permission, she arranged for photographs to be taken of you two together sunning on the beach. I saw the pictures, by the way. You looked like the proverbial deer in the headlights. Later, you purchased the photographs and destroyed them, thinking that ended it, but it didn’t. Copies were saved for later use.”
All the color, plus more, returned to Howard’s face. His eyes glared as things started to come together.
“And later turned out to be November 1, 1978. You, no doubt, remember it as the day Whitney disappeared. She received copies of those photographs in the mail that day. That’s right. A large envelope from the resort where they were originally taken, addressed to Mr. and Mrs. Howard Douglas, contained an invitation for the happy couple in the photographs to return to this scene of connubial bliss for another exciting and romantic vacation during the coming winter months,” he said before pausing again. “Whitney later told me she actually fainted from the shock of seeing the photographs.”
“The worst was yet to come,” continued the stranger. “By an amazing coincidence, someone you’re very familiar with showed up at the door under the pretext of needing a company file you maintained at home. Finding Whitney experiencing a complete emotional breakdown, he offered to help in anyway he could. At first he insisted there must be some mistake, but after awhile conceded that even if the photographs couldn’t lie, she needed to give you another chance. He insisted that you were really a good person inside, and surely this, hopefully, single incident wouldn’t ruin your happy relationship.”
“By the way,” said the stranger as he halted his exposé, “if you doubt any part of this story, maybe this will convince you that I know what I’m talking about.” He reached into his coat pocket and brought forth two items. First, he produced a photograph showing Howard and the scantily clad young woman on the beach in Cancun. Then he handed Howard another photograph of the stranger and Whitney sitting together on a park bench. Although Whitney displayed a warm smile, Howard saw immediately that the spark typifying her zest for life was missing. Written on the photograph in Whitney’s unmistakable neat style was a message, “Thanks for being such a wonderful friend. Whitney.”
The stranger rested a moment as Howard stared at the photographs. “But,” he continued, “Whitney was inconsolable by this time. She felt violated. Nothing in her life made sense any longer. You, the one true source of love, trust, and loyalty in her life, turned out to be a fraud. She started ranting about running far away and never coming back. She never wanted to see you again, ever. She couldn’t possibly stay here any longer after what you did. She needed to go somewhere, anywhere.”
At this point, the stranger shook his head from side to side and displayed a look of incredulity. “And wouldn’t you know it. Guess who just happened to have a comfortable condo located in a large southern city totally furnished and available for her exclusive use at no charge for as long as she needed it? Why, he couldn’t bear the thought of such a good friend being driven out into this cold, lonely, and very dangerous world, if he could help it.”
The stranger sat back into the folds of the soft leather sofa and stared at Howard for the first time. “Pretty slick, huh? Send you away on business. Concoct some scheme to expose you as being a lying scumbag. Show up just in the nick of time to help the innocent victim. Stash her, most willingly, in a comfortable nest in a big city hundreds of miles away, and then take his time getting down to the business of developing a very, and I mean very, close personal relationship with this totally disoriented, disillusioned, and most importantly, indebted young woman whose entire world had just collapsed around her.”
Howard’s face displayed an even deeper sense of anguish. The words crawling upward from the depth of his throat sounded more like a growl. “Richard? Richard? Of course, Richard! That greedy, weaseling little bastard would do something like that. Of course, he would; he has the ethics and morals of a pig. That son-of-a—”
“You may want to restrain yourself for a while longer because I’m not done by any means,” interrupted the stranger before Howard had time to get a good rant started. “Let me finish my story first. That was only the beginning. It gets even sicker. I’ll start with the fact that I know the company you work for is up to its ears in criminal activity. Your boss, Richard, and the companies he supposedly owns are nothing more than fronts for a powerful Mexican cartel that uses him and those companies to launder millions of dollars of drug, prostitution, and gambling profits. You spend most of your time finding business opportunities that will allow your employer to stash and later launder even more dirty money.”
“To your credit, you didn’t always know what you were involved with. In the beginning, they enticed you with a large salary, one much too large for a young man right out of graduate school with no experience in much of anything. And the perks: cars, expense account, country club, vacations, mixing with political high-rollers, you name it and it’s yours if you want it. They deceived you, but, eventually, you figured it out. Though by then, you knew too much. They couldn’t let you simply walk away. If you leave, you die. These people have no regard for human life. That’s what they deal in. So there you are, working for a scumbag crook who fronts for international criminals, and there you’re going to stay forever.”
“But how could you know this?” asked Howard before the stranger could begin again. “I mean, Richard wouldn’t have told you this, and how else could you have known it?”
“That brings us to the last part of my story,” said the stranger, “and very possibly, the saddest part. You’re right, Richard didn’t tell me this. As a matter of fact, I don’t think Richard is aware of who I am, at least I hope he isn’t. Whitney insisted that it be that way. But he did, over time, reveal some of his activities to Whitney, and she felt obligated to do as he requested and help him at times to at least partly repay him for maintaining her so comfortably in Dallas. She found out you were stuck here forever; she eventually found out everything. And knowing everything put her in the exact same fix that you were in. She couldn’t leave either. Not ever.”
After another lull, the stranger started again, but this time in a more subdued manner. “Although troubled, given her mentally depressed state, Richard’s activities really didn’t bother Whitney that much until she found out the worst. She learned he set you both up. She discovered how he contrived for her to find out about your brief affair by having the same woman he hired to get you drunk and entice you into her bed send photographs to your home using letterheads and envelopes stolen from the resort. She eventually learned everything. Richard, she discovered, was a liar and a crook and involved with the Mexican cartel.”
“You weren’t the only one who got set up like that. There were others. After Whitney accidentally discovered the relationship between Richard and a mysterious young lady in Cancun, she hired a private detective to go there and find out the truth. Then, when she learned that both of you were victims of Richard’s treachery and your lives forever ruined, she lost it. She became more and more despondent. She hated herself; she hated her life, and especially, her relationship with Richard. Even worse, she hated not being able to do anything about it, except, what she finally did. She waited until an entire continent separated her from the person she detested most in this world and until her only friend would be out of town for a couple of days, then she swallowed a bottle of sleeping pills, laid down on her bed, and waited for the pain to go away.”
The stranger sat back, signaling the end to his story and looking as if he expected Howard to go off on a screaming diatribe. But nothing happened. Neither man moved; rather, they sat quietly staring at one another without saying a word. Howard appeared to be entering into a state of shock. He couldn’t believe it; he now felt more pain than before. A stronger emotion fought its way to the surface—anger. So intense, he could taste the bile rising up from his churning stomach.
“Well, I’ve done what I needed to come here and do, and although I do regret that what I’ve told you makes your pain worse, somebody besides me needed to know the real reason for what happened to this sweet lady whom I’m certain never did anything to harm another person in her entire life. She deserved better than this, and even though I’m not normally a vindictive person, I figure that if there is anyone alive who has the responsibility to do something about this, it’s you. So, there it is. I’ve said what I needed to say, so I best get out of here and leave you to your business. As I said earlier, you’re never going to see or hear from me again, and for the record, I won’t be going back to Dallas.”
With that, the stranger rose from the couch and without waiting for a reply from Howard, headed for the door. Still in shock, Howard was unaware of the stranger’s sudden absence. When he recovered, he turned in time to see the back of the stranger come to a halt, only steps from the front door. The stranger mumbled something unintelligible, reached into his vest pocket, pulled out an envelope, and then turned and walked back to where Howard sat. Once there, he raised his hand holding an envelope and extended it towards Howard, saying, “If you should somehow manage to live through all this, which I seriously doubt, you should know about this. I salvaged it from the files I saw Richard attempting to destroy. I know in her heart this troubled Whitney for you not to know.” Then the stranger left, leaving Howard alone with his growing rage.
CHAPTER THREE
The sight of the professor studying a racing form still seemed strange to Terrance. He witnessed this same scene many times during the past year, yet he still found it difficult to believe. It simply didn’t fit. A former renown and respected professor in the Department of Religious Studies at the same university from which he, Terrance C. Butler, graduated a year ago this past May, 2002, reading a racing form while riding in his Jeep Cherokee as it sped down the interstate between Kansas City, Kansas, and Lawrence, Kansas, fit none of the scenarios he might have imagine.
He enjoyed these trips to the track with the professor because when the professor rode along it meant they held a winning ticket. The professor took great pleasure in coming along to cash in their Pick Six tickets. Today they headed home with a sizable amount of winnings in their pockets. If Terrance’s memory served him correctly, they had made five trips together during the past year since he entered upon this arrangement with the professor.
Each trip resulted in another much-needed infusion into Terrance’s nearly empty cash coffer. Today, his share of the winning ticket amounted to thirty-one hundred dollars. Ten percent of the winnings belonged to him for carrying the professor’s bets back and forth to the track.
It didn’t happen every day or even weekly for that matter. The professor wouldn’t bet on any Pick Six offered daily through the simulcast betting facility in Kansas City. He watched and waited until he believed his chances of picking the winners of six consecutive races looked best. He followed the daily results of all the horses running at a particular track, and when the right combinations came together, he made his move. That’s where Terrance came into the picture. He carried the bet to the track and made himself available to take the professor back to the track on those occasions when they won. Today they enjoyed their biggest payday so far—thirty-one thousand dollars.
Terrance interrupted the silence. “Are you sure you’ve only been doing this for the last couple of years?” he asked, with more than a hint of playful distrust evident in his voice. “You’re awfully good at this to be so new at it. What do you do with all the money you win? You haven’t taken a vacation since I moved into your garage.”
“It’s a garlow, not a garage,” responded the professor as he perused the form, “and I make good use of the money we win. I take great enjoyment in the many civic opportunities afforded me during this period of my approaching dotage. And no, I have not been at this very long, much to my profound disappointment. I shudder to think about all the good I could have done with the money I may have won.”
“I guess I can understand giving money to your favorite charities, you being a religious person and all,” responded Terrance, “but don’t you keep any of it?”
“First of all, I’m not necessarily a religious person. I taught religious studies, and there is a difference. And I have no need for the money. My wife and I are amply provided for. We have a wonderful home, good health, good friends, and sufficient funds to live on, so why hoard it? Many others in the community can use our help, and I, and my wonderful wife are only too happy to do what we can to assist them. We have had this conversation before if you will but recall.”
“I recall,” said Terrance. “But, I don’t see how you can say you’re not religious. You do more to help people than most of the other so-called religious people I’ve met. If you’re not religious, then what are you?”
“Like the Buddha,” replied the professor, “‘I am awake.’ Or, I suppose in the parlance of this ‘New Age,’ I am simply a spiritual entity aware of his oneness with the universe and my fellow man. Whatever others want to call me is all right with me if they will stay out of my way and let me do what forty-five years of teaching has taught me. Simply stated, my basic and most important purpose as a human being is to help others.”
Back in Lawrence twenty minutes later, they approached the rear of the professor’s residence, a stately one hundred year old, three-story wooden home situated on a large shaded lot a few blocks from the university. Terrance rented the apartment above the garage right off the alley behind the house. Religious discussions with the professor always invigorated Terrance, and he often prattled on and on about some aspect of one of the many areas that make up the field of religious studies.
“So, you don’t believe in all that stuff about praying and kneeling and asking for forgiveness and so forth?” asked Terrance in a tone of voice that reflected a person seeking confirmation more so than knowledge.
The 1997 Jeep Cherokee slowly came to a stop in the parking space along side the garage. Neither occupant appeared inclined to move, pending the conclusion of another of their seemingly never-ending conversations regarding this subject.
“Did you listen to any of my lectures when you attended my class? Surely you didn’t pass the course, did you? I’m sure we’ve been over this many times before. My official response to questions regarding prayer is that continually resorting to making pleas to a supposed vindictive and potentially malevolent entity created by our ancestors, apparently frightened by events they couldn’t comprehend, who subsequently proceeded with all manner of attempts to pacify this entity through sacrifices and rituals, is totally inconsistent with contemporary science and advanced intelligence.”
“Then tell me, what were you doing there at the counter while the guy counted out the thirty-one thousand dollars? You sure had a big smile as you looked up at the ceiling mumbling something. What was that all about?”
“What do you think I was doing?” answered the professor, an impish gleam in his eyes. “I was giving thanks. What do I really know for sure about anything?”
As the professor exited the Cherokee laughing, Terrance glanced at his watch and realized he needed to hurry to avoid being late for work. Without bothering to go inside his apartment and pick up his mail, he backed out and headed off to his place of employment.
By 3 p.m. he should already be at his cubicle located in the farthest corner of the editorial section of the local newspaper. He, along with several young staffers, wrote articles on any number of subjects of community interest. Or another way to put it, he wrote on anything that never had an opportunity to come anywhere close to the front page. Social events, charitable events, supermarket openings, graduations, street closings, anybody riding anything through town going coast to coast for any cause, he was your man. But if the subjects held any possibility of approaching an excitement level of maybe one point five on a scale of twenty, they went to the gray-beards or rather, the more seasoned scribes. Anyway, they never got to him.
Only twenty-four years old and already his life and his work bored him. He worked at the paper strictly for a paycheck. By saving his money, he hoped to enroll in law school next year. He refused to accept the inevitability of working at some meaningless job for the rest of his life like so many people he knew were either doing or preparing to do. Life offered more than that, and he intended to grab as much of it as possible. Right now though, making a living took priority, and this job served a purpose.
His parents had told him all along, as soon as he graduated from college and had his Political Science degree in his hand, they expected him to start making a living. He, more than once, expressed his desire to attend law school, which is why he graduated with the Political Science degree, but that didn’t seem to resonate with them. So for the time being, he scribbled lines for the local newspaper’s gossip section while figuring out a way to attain the law degree he considered essential. This job served a short-term purpose until he found another way. If the professor ever hit one of those million dollar Pick Six cards instead of the small ones, all his problems disappeared. His ten percent share would more than cover the cost of law school. That’s what’s needed, he figured, one big deal to come through so I can get going with my life. A big break awaited him somewhere; he knew it.
Terrance’s watch read 3:10 p.m. by the time he finished parking the Cherokee and raced though the employee entrance hoping not to be seen coming in late again by any of his supervisors. His file already contained two official warnings relating to this very subject. One more and he might expect some type of formal discipline. He didn’t give a crap, except he did need this job for now. His luck held, as he saw not a single person interested in a skulking young man scurrying around the partitions while making his way to the farthest corner of the still busy pressroom.
“Well, okay then,” said Terrance as he sat down in his ergonomically designed, keyboard pounder’s chair and pulled up to his cubicle’s desk. Six-foot high partitions faced him on three sides, all brimming with shelves, slots, hanging files, drawers, and of course, one of the most sophisticated computerized work stations ever made available to the working world. It did about anything imaginable—as long as it pertained to things that made the company money—like work. No personal e-mails, no chat rooms, no anything that didn’t have something to do with the job title. To attempt to use these amazing machines for one’s own enjoyment constituted grounds for immediate dismissal. With this thought nowhere close to his present consciousness, he hurriedly set about checking his personal e-mail inbox. Hey, it’s just a job after all. It’s not as if I expect to be around long enough to get a gold watch.
Terrance completed his e-mail correspondence and determined he should begin to display some semblance of job interest. Upon review of his personal project’s schedule, he verified that all his current writing assignments were complete and awaited the right opportunity to be used to fill a hole in the back part of the paper on a slow news day. Ah, it’s good to feel needed, he reflected as he began to review the new assignment file on the computer monitor.
At times, Terrance had no reason to talk in person with any of his supervisors or his fellow workers for days at a time. He only needed to look at the assignment file, find his assigned snoozer subject, review the background information available along with any comments from the individual assigning him the project, and get to work. “What torture awaits me this day?” he asked as he scrolled down the screen.
Automatically scrolling to the bottom of the weekly assignment sheet, he failed to find anything directed to his attention. Maybe they already fired him? Were they aware of his lack of punctuality all along? “What a bummer,” he mumbled while scrolling back to the top of the screen to make sure. With a mixture of surprise accompanied by relief, he found his initials TCB prominently displayed on the first line at the top of the page. He never made the top of the page before. What caused his editor to bestow this honor upon him now? Possibly, he’d been a bit hasty. Maybe they did recognize the untapped talent lying right beneath the surface concealed by the undisguised dullness inherent in all the writing assignments dumped upon him so far. Excited, he placed the cursor on his initials, left clicked the mouse, and waited for the machine to reveal his future.
Recognizing his editor’s laconic style, he hurriedly scanned the text.
TCB (Terrance Carl Butler) DROP EVERYTHING. NEED THIS ASAP. PLANNING TO RUN PIECE IN THIS SUNDAY EDITION—LOCAL SECTION LEAD STORY. FILES FULL OF INFORMATION ON THIS GUY. HE’S BEEN INVOLVED IN EVERY FORM OF COMMUNITY SERVICE LAST TWENTY PLUS YEARS. DIED YESTERDAY/HEART ATTACK. ESPECIALLY NEED EARLY BACKGROUND. GET COMMENTS FROM FRIENDS, NEIGHBORS, CO-WORKERS, ETC. FUNERAL IS SATURDAY. BE THERE! COUNTING ON YOU! GET BUSY! TOM.
Scrolling down the page, Terrance saw the attached obituary from yesterday’s paper. “Mr. Joseph D. Right died unexpectedly at his home last night from an apparent heart attack. Mr. Right, fifty-one years old, was director of the local North Side Homeless Shelter for a number of years as well as a longtime volunteer and coordinator of a number of other community and civic projects. Funeral arrangements are pending.”
His heart sank into his chest—another glorified obituary piece. He’d never heard of this guy. “So, he ran the local shelter; how hard could it have been to make soup?” Plus, they expected him to attend the funeral. He really needed to get some money and get into law school. Surely, he could do better than this. He sat there staring at the computer monitor for sometime while mentally reviewing his prospects regarding life, love, and the all important, pursuit of happiness. He reluctantly admitted that things didn’t look too good at this moment, especially, if he must continue to sit around manufacturing enough boring information to allow him to write dull pieces about soup kitchen managers.
Soon sanity prevailed, and he began to organize his thoughts around the job at hand. He saw it all very simply. In the end, it’s all the same crap, just a different day’s ration. It’s all about sucking air. You either did, or you didn’t. You either lived, or you became fertilizer, and if living appealed to you, you better be in the game. Unless of course, you became one of those pathetic millions of living, yet comatose, people who choose to sit around forever holding their breath scared out of their wits over the prospect of having to be engaged in life while, ironically, praying to stay alive forever. Not Terrance, he envisioned himself as a player.
CHAPTER FOUR
“Could I possibly be involved in a more boring activity?” mumbled Terrance as he reviewed the paucity of information collected. He’d found little of note to write about apart from the several generic articles published over the years relating to the North Side Homeless Shelter and its publicity shy director, Mr. Joseph D. Right.
Mr. Right arrived in the community in late 1981 from no one knew where. He lived alone and none of the articles ever mentioned anything about a wife or family. He never owned a home, choosing to rent the upper floor of an older home owned and occupied by an elderly widow woman, for the entire time he lived in the community. He received a modest salary as director of the homeless shelter, and the ten-year-old Dodge van he owned and used without reimbursement in his many civic activities attested to his frugal lifestyle.
He’d never received a traffic ticket, had never been in jail or prison, and hadn’t been sued. He never registered to vote, never secured a gun permit, and always paid his personal property taxes on time. He didn’t smoke, drink alcohol, or associate with those who did and maintained a lifestyle consistent with the numerous youth programs he supported that promoted abstinence. No records existed that provided a previous work history, a military record, or any educational achievements. A published photograph of the guy did not exist. “How could anyone be involved in so many civic and public activities and not have had at least one photograph taken?” asked Terrance.
The information obtained from the death certificate provided by the State Health Department included his name, address, occupation, and date and cause of death. Terrance summarized the basic information at hand: Joseph D. Right, fifty-one years old at the time of death, born in Joplin, Missouri, on September 10, 1952, to John F. Right, and Nora M. Right. To write an article, based upon the scant information available at the present, he could only repeat the information previously alluded to in the earlier articles and include the date and cause of death. That’s all he had.
Terrance reconciled himself to the fact that a more determined effort must be made before he dare present a first draft to his editor. Not interesting or vital to the interest of the community mind you, merely acceptable. Well, okay then, what’s the plan? Asked the small voice from the skeptical part of his brain.
Terrance decided he needed to request deeper background information from Joplin, Missouri, relating to any known relatives or old friends. Meanwhile, he would talk to the landlady and the neighbors, as well as to the subject’s fellow workers at the shelter. What did they know about him? Somewhere a photograph of the guy must exist. “That should help me put some meat on these bones,” he mumbled as he finished the e-mail instructions to the paper’s contractor for securing background information through outside private detective agencies. He expected a response within twenty-four hours if things went as usual. By late tomorrow afternoon, Saturday, the day of the funeral, he planned to finish the article. This would be well before the Sunday deadline.
Terrance grabbed his tape recorder and notebook, stuffed them into his canvas backpack, and headed for the door to go talk to the landlady and the neighbors. Maybe this wouldn’t turn out to be such a loser assignment after all. It allowed him to spend time out and away from the newsroom with no one watching over him or observing him coming in late or leaving early. Gathering information for the remainder of today and most of tomorrow appealed to him much more than sitting in the office. They couldn’t say anything about his absence because he had to have the information.
The sudden sensation of cool early evening, mid-September air on his face revived him as he exited the building into the parking lot. Terrance took a deep breath, exalting at the prospect of being out and about on this beautiful fall evening. “At least, I’ll never end up like this poor loser,” he said to himself as he settled into the Cherokee for the short trip to Joseph Right’s former residence.
CHAPTER FIVE
After the stranger left, Howard sat alone absorbed in his thoughts on the sordid scheme his boss had foisted upon him and Whitney. This could never have happened if I hadn’t turned out to be a petty liar and a cheat. My blind ambition created this nightmare.
Howard believed the stranger’s story. It all made sense to him now. His boss reveled in pathetic schemes such as this. He often contrived bogus deals to have his way or secure the inside track on something that piqued his interest at the moment. He had an insatiable appetite regarding money, sex, power, and position. He wanted everything, and he wanted it now. He offered a favorite piece of advice to associates. “Always get to the money side of the deal, and always get there first.” He preached that most people only talked about deals, and ninety-nine percent of all deals never got completed or made any money. He said, “Do everything possible to make sure that your deals get done and that you get the biggest or best part even if that means losing friendships or changing the deal to better suit your interest. You can always come back later with the money in your pocket to patch things up. If you can’t, don’t worry about it. New friends are always out there—if you have the money.”
The longer Howard sat there, the more subdued he became. His initial rage subsided. The bile receded back into the pit of his stomach. Clarity of purpose replaced the rage. His mission was before him. The people who participated in the destruction of his and Whitney’s lives must be held accountable. They, too, must suffer.
Howard planned to turn over to the FBI all the information he secretly collected for his own safety, proving beyond any doubt he worked for a bunch of crooks. He had everything: addresses, phone numbers, bank accounts, off shore locations of shell corporations, banks used to funnel the illicit profits through to prevent their being traced, and most importantly, names, starting with his boss, Richard Whiting.
Howard then needed to vanish from the face of the earth forever, leaving everything behind—all of his possessions, his few friends, and most importantly, his name. The criminals he intended to expose would never stop looking for him. They would track him down and kill him, no matter how long it took or how far they had to go.
Howard needed to do one additional thing before leaving town after he posted the criminal evidence to the local F.B.I. office. He would take the nine shot hand gun he carried with him for protection when traveling and fire every one of the bullets into the sick brain of Mr. Richard Whiting.
Howard experienced complete calm. He felt at peace with his mission. Only the hurt from Whitney’s death and an intense desire to seek vengeance remained. Once he got up from the couch, he intended to proceed without interruption to execute his plan. With no other reason to live, nothing stood in his way. But, before Howard Douglas ceased to exist, he felt a compulsion to reflect on his short life, if only for a moment.
Pertaining to his personal life little mattered prior to him meeting Whitney. He had little memory of his parents who died during his childhood. He remembered them mostly through the events and descriptions he heard from the aunt and uncle he lived with afterwards. They lived in a small Illinois town right down the road from where he lived now. They raised him as best they could, with money always being tight and hard to come by. They seldom had any extra, so he learned to get along on the bare necessities. He never owned a good bike or a ball glove, nice shoes, clothing, or any of the neat things that come along from time to time that kids go nuts for, like stereos, cassette recorders, electronic calculators. He knew he placed a burden on his aunt and uncle, so he never complained.
As a result of this, Howard determined never to be a burden on anyone again. He would work hard to become somebody, be respected, and be able to afford all the things denied to him as a kid. When he had a family, he would make sure they, too, had all the things that made people happy. Those goals caused him to focus his efforts while he attended school. He worked, hustled, and borrowed his way through college and graduate school, earning an MBA, which he was sure, would earn him respect and provide him the opportunity to make his fortune.
Howard’s plan went as designed until he met Whitney after his second year of graduate school. Only three years younger than his twenty-four years of age, she had just finished her third year of college. She operated her own lawn cutting business during the summer, and she worked her rear end off. She did a great job, charged a fair price, and received more offers for work than she could handle. Her good looks and disarming personality helped, also. Many red-blooded males who lived to get out of mowing their yards for whatever reason jumped at the chance to have a very pretty, well-endowed, five foot five inch tall, tanned, naturally blond, twenty-one-year-old coed, clad in cut off jeans and halter top work in their yard every week—all summer long.
Howard sure noticed her, and he didn’t even have a yard. He worked as an intern in the office of a real estate development and syndication company during the summer and rarely found time to do anything. His job as an intern loaded him down with all the unglamorous work that can go on in a busy organization: research, copying, court filings, personal errands, and anything else employees of the company came up with to keep his days filled. When he did get out during the day, he often saw her either in her truck or cutting the lawns. He was smitten right from the first moment he saw her cutting one of the largest, most beautifully landscaped lawns in the community. After awhile, he knew what days to expect her at any of several lawns located on his normal route.
Fate played a hand in bringing them together. Howard gazed longingly at her every single time he saw her going about the business of mowing yards and ignoring the hordes of gawking males who happened by her work sites with regularity. Because of his shyness, it took nothing less than a wreck to bring about their initial meeting, and it came about quite innocently.
Out and about one sunny afternoon, Howard anticipated seeing her at one of her regular jobs. Forgetting to watch the traffic, he stared too long at a yard hoping to catch a glimpse of her working and failed to see her pull out in front of his barely drivable 1963 Ford Falcon. He crashed into the rear of the small pickup truck she used to haul her lawn equipment from job to job. Both vehicles sustained minimal damage, but Howard got his ears burnt. She told him to pay attention to his driving or get that scrap heap off the street. Howard took no offense as he relished having a reason to be talking to her. A suspiciously large number of additional meetings followed to work out the myriad details of getting her vehicle repaired. Over time, she eventually warmed to the unassuming and pleasant personality of this shy, nice looking young man.
Soon after that they started seeing each other regularly and within six months they moved in together. It didn’t make any sense on the surface; she was energetic, vivacious, outgoing, and a practical joker. Howard, on the other hand, all six foot, one hundred seventy-five pounds of him including the shoulder length dark brown hair he wore until he got his first and only job after graduate school and the ever-present brown corduroy jacket with the padded elbows, possessed all the charm and personality of his favorite slide rule.
She was quick smart, not like Howard who needed time to think things through. She looked at something and made her decision about what to do with it or about it and moved on. Howard needed to complete a research project on the subject. For some weird reason, though, they both brought something to the table that the other needed, and it worked.
“How did I ever let something so wonderful get away?” Howard remarked as he sat on the couch reminiscing. “How is it I didn’t see this coming? What happened to my brain at the time?” Again, he drifted back to the year of his graduation when the future looked so wonderful.
Back then Howard reveled in his good fortune as his plan neared completion. He had a wonderful girlfriend plus the essential MBA degree. Now, the money must surely follow along soon; he felt confident of it. His primary ambitions neared completion. He would be somebody, be respected, and have everything he wanted, including the money.
Howard realized now it wasn’t fate that brought him together with a successful local businessman who took him under his wing and began to provide him with many valuable insights regarding getting ahead in the world. He concluded two things as he recalled the experience. First, the setup began way back, well before the Cancun incident with the beautiful young woman. He’d been picked out as an easy mark before he ever got going. That’s why Richard had seemingly chosen him from out of nowhere. Secondly, his personal obsession to obtain material wealth blinded him to many things.
That explained why Richard early on related to him the story of his personal transformation from a guy not going anywhere fast by trying to go by the rules. Somehow, according to Richard, it had always worked out that he and all the other losers who tried to be good Boy Scouts ended up with nothing or, at most, the dregs. He finally tired of this exercise in futility and decided not to be the flag bearer for that weary army of poverty stricken idealists any longer. Richard started looking around for people going places and getting things accomplished and being financially rewarded for their efforts. As soon as he cleared those idealistic notions of fair play from his thinking processes, he found those people. He watched them to ascertain which direction they traveled, and then he did the smartest thing he’d ever done in his life. He stepped in line with the winners, went along with them, and never looked back.
Howard saw his mistake too late. He sold out before he started. Honesty and integrity are not concepts you leave on a shelf until they suit your purpose. They must be applied rigorously, daily, in all phases of one’s life. Once you make an exception, from then on, you’re for sale. A special situation will always arise to justify another exception. Eventually, those exceptions add up, and the accumulative result will be that your life is a fraud. Your life, built upon sand, will lack a stable foundation to help you weather the inevitable storms of misfortune and undeserved opportunity, alike. Admiring honesty and understanding honesty doesn’t automatically make you honest. Your personal conduct determines that.
Howard returned to the present prepared to go forward and do, in his mind, the right thing. Certain people needed to be held accountable for what happened to Whitney, including him. His mind now clear, he realized a number of important things that needed to get done, and it was time to get started.
As he began to extricate himself from the deep folds of the soft leather couch he remembered the envelope given to him by the stranger. He recalled the gist of the stranger’s parting remarks relating to this envelope containing information he may have some interest in doing something about. He opened the envelope and extracted a tattered and torn single page filled with an abundance of typed legalese. He scanned the document. Then he read and reread each line.
PARENTS DENIAL TO RELEASE INFORMATION TO ADULT ADOPTEE. TEXAS CENTRAL ADOPTION REGISTRY. I state that I am the birth mother of the child listed below. On this Second day of May, Nineteen Hundred and Seventy-Nine, I hereby deny consent to the release of my name and address to this child when he is eighteen years of age or older.
Travis Howard McClain
Born: May 1, 1979
Birthplace: Dallas, TX
Birth Mother: Whitney Ann McClain
Birth Mother DOB: May 21, 1954
Current City of Residence: Dallas, TX
Parent Signature: Whitney Ann McClain
The stranger wrote in long hand on the bottom of the wrinkled and soiled page, “Do the math. If you decide to look into this you will want to begin your search in Lawrence, Kansas. This wasn’t Whitney’s idea. She deeply regretted allowing Richard to pressure her into going through with this. In the end, I’m sure this contributed to her decision to end her life.”
First, the excruciating pain of Whitney’s death devastated Howard. Then after he learned of Richard’s deceit, he experienced the blackest, vilest form of anger imaginable. Now, the microscopically small amount of sanity he yet retained came under assault from another unexpected direction. He had a son—a living manifestation of the love he and Whitney once shared, and even this was denied him.
Howard intended to exact retribution, but this new information required patience. He needed time to affect a scheme. Could he do it? Could he see Richard and not let on that he knew what he’d done to their lives? Could he prevent himself from blowing Richard’s brains out at first sight? “Yes, I can and I must. I have a son to think about now, and I intend to do everything within my power to ensure he is cared for, and safe from harm.”
CHAPTER SIX
The piercing sound of the alarm clock aroused an indignant sleeper. Terrance couldn’t imagine it being morning already. Why did he set this digitalized byproduct of Satan’s misanthropy for a Saturday morning anyway? He hated getting up in the morning and, especially, on Saturdays. Then it dawned on him, “the soup kitchen guy.” He needed to finish that snoozer article before the Sunday deadline. “Damn! I have to go to the funeral to boot. What a wasted day this is going to be.” He threw the covers off as reality seeped into his consciousness.
A hot shower and a large cup of black coffee energized him, allowing him to get pretty much on track. He recalled the previous day’s efforts to get the ‘soup kitchen’ story together and how he, so far, failed to come up with anything new. Not a single neighbor knew anything new about the guy. They came into contact with him only on infrequent occasions when someone happened to pass him on the streets of the neighborhood or when he came outside in the spring or fall of the year to tend to yard work or make some minor repairs on the house. Most of them did know of his numerous civic activities from the newspapers. Other than that, they knew practically nothing.
The people the subject worked with offered but slightly more help. They liked him and respected his dedication to his work, but not a single person could comment on his private life. He never talked about anything at work, except work. No one socialized with him outside of work. Some told of hearing about his umpiring baseball games and hauling kids to little league games. On infrequent occasions, they too met him out shopping or at the supermarket. He never told any of them about his private life, and he never talked about his past or the future. For all people knew, he went home and sat in a corner until time to come back to work the next day, and the next day was everyday. He never took a day off, and as far as anyone could remember, Joseph Right never took a vacation in all the years he worked at the shelter.
Rumors told of him using his own funds to subsidize numerous civic and youth activities and of him hauling kids around to science fairs, debating contests, and swim meets in his own van. Not a single person ever recalled a time when he didn’t pull out his wallet when asked to donate money to a worthy cause. By all reports, he was a very decent person, a quiet person, and most of all, a private person.
So why does this bother me? Terrance pondered. Am I actually that cynical at the age of twenty-four? Why am I so surprised to learn of the existence of a good and decent human being in the community? Upon what basis have I created this unflattering opinion of humanity so early in life?
Terrance decided to quicken his pace. The landlady, the single person he wanted to talk to most last night, told him to go away when he knocked on her door at 7:30 p.m. He explained the purpose of his mission to her, but she still wouldn’t allow him into her house at such, according to her, an inappropriate time of the day. He persisted and at least got her permission to come back this morning. She likely represented his last hope for information on the local scene. With this in mind, he headed out the door to his car.
Terrance went over some of the fundamentals employed by reporters during interviews as he traveled the short distance to her house: Get to know more about the subject. Listen, because a good reporter is a good listener. Don’t BS them. Explain to them what you are doing. Be sympathetic. Don’t chit—chat. Let the facts speak for themselves. Don’t judge. Thank them when you’re finished.
He barely finished reciting the last reporting guide line as he arrived back at Joseph Right’s former address. This sunny Saturday morning brought quite a few people who lived in the neighborhood out and about. Some worked in their yards while others headed off with their children to soccer games. “Crazy!” Terrance exclaimed. “They all could be asleep in their comfortable beds if they wanted. They don’t have some silly filler piece to get ready for some insignificant small town newspaper.”
The landlady, one Mrs. Judith Bidwell, stood on the front porch looking towards his vehicle as he pulled to a stop in front of her home. Her gaze never wavered as he shut off the motor, retrieved his pack, exited the vehicle, and headed towards the front porch where she stood waiting. Terrance discerned a look of distress on her otherwise featureless face. Her sullen appearance gave him cause to expect a difficult interview.
“Good morning, Mrs. Bid—” began Terrance as he approached the porch steps.
“You’re late. You said you would be back early,” interrupted Mrs. Bidwell, reminding Terrance that elderly people have a different and often perverted concept of time as well as the terminology relevant to it.
“I’m sorry,” responded Terrance, deciding not to waste time debating the subjective nature of the word early. “I appreciate your taking the time to speak with me this morning. I’ll not detain you any longer than necessary. I’m hoping you will be able to provide me with information relating to Mr. Right’s life and his activities in our community. So far, no one seems to know much about Mr. Right. As I told you last evening, we plan to run a lengthy piece on him in tomorrow’s paper. Anything you could tell me about him would be very helpful, I’m sure.”
The landlady said nothing. She stood in place and stared him up and down. All five foot, ninety pounds, of her in a flowered housedress, partially covered by the full white cotton apron tied around her waist, made him think of individuals he’d seen in photographs taken in the 1930s. The wire framed spectacles and the silver-white hair tied back in a bun legitimized the dust bowl image. He estimated she had to be at least eighty years old.
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