The Traveling Corpse (17 page)

Annie commented, “In for a penny; in for a
pound.” Art shook his head, but Verna agreed to go.

Von said to Brad, “Lead the way.” Without
thinking, Von automatically reached his right hand below the seat
to put the lever into reverse.

Verna quickly dropped her hand down to stop
him and whispered, “It'll beep. It probably doesn't mattah since
we're not too close to Numbah Five, but it's bettah if you don't.
Sounds carry at night. I think you can get out if you squeeze
through there. Careful, now.”

After the B and V's left to find the entrance
to the farmer's field on the opposite side, the Andersens and
Davises cut off their headlights and drove slowly across the Blue
course. They didn't want to alert Karl if he were around. Silently,
they pulled up near the new bathroom building and parked so they
could stay in their cart and still see the farmer's field and the
future path which Art had helped prepare earlier. It was dug four
inches deep, and the wooden forms were in place in the ground. All
was ready for the cement to be poured the next morning. The
bathroom building shielded them from view of anyone coming from the
south.

Doc Davis pulled his cart up beside Annie. He
unzipped part of the top section and leaned over and whispered to
her, “We've got great seats for the space shuttle lift-off.”

“When?” she pointed to her watch.

He held up ten fingers.

They settled down to wait. Soon a white light
rose from beyond the far line of trees almost due east. Up, up the
powerful Discovery space ship climbed into the night sky. They
watched, transfixed by the spectacular sight, until the initial
thruster peeled away and fell back to Earth. The craft curved
slightly to the north as it kept climbing. They leaned forward to
be able to see it through the windshield. Finally, all they could
see was a tiny speck of light, and then the heavens swallowed up
this scientific wonder.

Annie bowed her head and prayed, “Lord, it's
Annie and Art down here, and the rest of our gang are with us.
Thank you for letting us witness the miracle of space travel.
Please be with our astronauts and keep them safe. And Lord, please
keep us safe. We're kindda old to be on a stake-out. We really need
you to watch over us. In Jesus name, Amen, and thanks for
listening.”

The seniors wrapped blankets around
themselves and settled down in their carts to wait. The moon came
up and stars filled the cloudless sky. They sat and waited, not
daring to talk. Art reached over and squeezed Annie's hand. She
remembered once when Art came home on furlough. He borrowed his
dad's car, and they parked on Blueberry Hill. That was over fifty
years ago. World War II was raging, yet somehow it was a gentler
time—no drugs. Their only worry that night was having the local cop
knock on the car window and wave them off. Art looked fondly at
Annie; she wondered if he too was remembering ‘necking' in a 1942
Studebaker.

Annie's body tensed; she leaned over to Art
and whispered in his ear, “Did you hear anything?” She thought she
heard a twig break, her heart leaped, but she felt safe with Art
beside her, and the Davises nearby.

Art shook his head. Annie wasn't surprised
that he didn't hear the little sound. His hearing wasn't nearly as
good as it used to be. She wanted him to have his hearing tested,
but he just told her to speak up, to stop mumbling, that he could
hear just fine, thank you. That made Annie remember the joke Mr. B
told about a man who was telling his neighbor, “I just bought a new
hearing aid. It cost me four thousand dollars, but it's state of
the art.”

“Really,” answered the neighbor. “What kind
is it?”

“Twelve-thirty.”

Annie chuckled to herself. All was quiet
again. To pass the time she let herself think about another of Mr.
B's stories: Two elderly women, Marguerite and Eliza went to a
local restaurant for lunch. Marguerite noticed something funny
about Eliza'a ear, and she said, “Eliza, did you know that you have
a suppository in your left ear?”

Eliza answered, “I have? A suppository?” She
pulled it out and stared at it. Then she said, “Marguerite, I'm
glad you saw this thing. Now I think I know where my hearing aid
is!”

Suddenly, Annie sat up straight; her body
rigid. Art looked where she pointed. There was movement in the
field. The ostriches and emus were awake and moving. Something had
disturbed them. From the sliver of moon now in the sky, they could
see the birds running faster back and forth, but they couldn't hear
them. Doc told them once that ostriches and emus rarely make any
kind of vocal noise.

A moment later, Art pointed toward the fence.
A big man wearing jeans, a turtleneck sweater and a stocking cap—a
toboggan, was trying to get through the fence. Annie realized that
this was the same place where she and Barb had noticed that
afternoon that the fence was partially cut. He pushed at it, then
pulled a tool from his back pocket and cut the fence in two. Annie
gestured. Art moved his head to let her know that he saw, but he
signaled her to remain silent. The big man pushed through the fence
and stepped onto the golf course. They watched him move directly
toward the forms for the new cart path. It was obvious that he knew
exactly where he was going and what he was going to do with the
shovel he was carrying.

The D's signaled from their cart. Doc raised
his hand and drew a question mark in the air. Annie put a finger to
her lips then made fists with her hands and moved them to her eyes,
looking through them like they were binoculars. The D's understood
and sat back. They, too, kept their eyes glued on the big man as he
began digging in between the wooden forms. The sandy soil moved
easily. The ground was much easier to dig in here in Florida than
some of the clay soil up North. There you sometimes needed a pick
axe to loosen that hard dirt.

The man dug for ten minutes or more. Then he
put the shovel down and pushed his way back through the torn fence.
Annie supposed that he was going to take a rest; even digging in
sandy soil is tiring work. Perhaps, she thought, he went to sit in
his golf cart for a few minutes. But as soon as he was out of
sight, he returned and started digging again. After another ten
minutes he dropped the shovel and climbed back through the fence
only to come right back. This happened several more times. Puzzled,
the two senior couples kept watch. After nearly forty-five minutes,
the man straightened up and surveyed his work. He seemed satisfied
that he had dug deep enough. He pushed the shovel into the pile of
dirt he'd dug out; then he put his hands on his hips and rotated
his upper body to loosen the kinks. Then he walked back to the
fence, crawled back through it, and was out of sight again.

Shrubbery blocked part of their view, but
they could see the long necks and scrawny heads of the ostriches
and their smaller cousins from Australia, the emus. The birds were
running back and forth, obviously greatly distressed. Agitated
wings were beating. Then they heard a long, low intimidating
warning sound:
wullf, wullf, woohoo.

Suddenly, the man was scrambling back through
the fence, hurrying to get away from the 300 pound male ostrich who
was charging with its black and white wings extended. The ostrich
kicked at the fence, a powerful kick. The fence collapsed where it
had been cut. The bird was free from his pen.

The man ran for his shovel. Using it as a
weapon, it looked like he was trying to chase the bird back into
the pen, but the bird was not distracted. The nine foot ostrich
charged. The man tried to defend himself with the shovel, and he
was yelling and screaming at the top of his lungs. The huge bird,
without moving a muscle in his upper body or moving his leg
backward for more momentum, whipped his powerful leg forward. Its
kick was deadly accurate. With just that one kick, the big man was
knocked backward. The shovel flew out of his hand and the man fell
into the newly dug grave. They heard a scream and a groan; then all
was silent.

Seemingly satisfied, the giant bird turned
away. With his short attention span and tiny brain, the African
bird apparently forgot the man and returned to the field with his
females.

Art and Annie winced and shuddered as they
watched helplessly. The Davises did too. It was hard to just sit
and see a man kicked, possibly to his death, by a bird. They had
nothing to use as a weapon, not even a golf club, as they'd taken
their bags off the back of their carts so the clubs wouldn't make
any noise.

Once, Art started to unzip the side curtain
to go the man's aid, but Annie came to her senses and grabbed his
jacket sleeve, “Please don't go out there, Art. Before we left home
I promised you that I wouldn't do anything foolish. Don't you! You
don't have anything to defend yourself with, not even a golf club.
That fellow had a shovel, for heaven's sake, and it didn't do him
any good!”

Similarly, DeeDee had to convince Doc that it
was a helpless situation.

Suddenly, a powerful flashlight played on
their carts. Annie cowered on her seat, scared, then surprised and
greatly relieved to see Deputy Joe Juarez come running up, “Stay
put,” he ordered them. “You can't help him; you'd only be killed
yourself.”

They hadn't heard Juarez coming. They had no
idea that he was there, that he had followed them. How glad they
were to see him! How glad they were to let him be in charge, to
take over. With admiration, they watched the deputy move forward
with confidence. Then the bright lights of an automobile
illuminated the area. Sgt. Menendez was behind the wheel of the
green and white sheriff department's car. She pulled up beside the
two golf carts.

The A's and the D's threw off their blankets
and unzipped the side curtains. Before they could get out of their
carts, Sgt. Menendez ordered them, “Stay where you are until my
deputy can patch that fence some. We brought baling wire along
after you told us it had been cut. Don't need those birds out here.
When it's safe, I'll let you know.”

The two couples sat in their carts stunned by
the horror that had played out in front of them. Annie bowed her
head and kept saying her sentence prayers, talking to her Lord.
When the sergeant waved them over, the seniors hurried to the
fallen man.

“Sure you want to see this?” Juarez asked.
“It's bad.”

Art looked at Annie; she nodded ‘Yes'. The
young deputy shone his flashlight down into the hole. Although
Annie had seen many dead persons and many accident victims during
her years as a nurse, she was not prepared for the sight of the
results of the bird's vicious attack. The deeply torn flesh was
slashed down the length of the man's trunk, exposing his chest
cavity. His heart was ripped in two. His jacket had not begun to
protect him from the ostrich's one long razor-sharp toenail. Stiff
with a little arthritis, Annie slowly got down on one knee and
reached down into the hole to find the man's wrist. It was still
warm. She looked up at Doc and said, “I can't find a pulse. You
try.”

Art helped her up. Then Doc took her place on
the ground. After a moment, he looked up to the others and mouthed,
“Dead.”

DeeDee cried. The other seniors' eyes were
moist.

Sgt. Menendez asked quietly, “Can you
identify this man? Is this Karl Kreeger? Is this the man you've
been telling me about?”

Dumbfounded, the four friends shook their
heads. The man who lay crumpled on the ground near the Fifth tee
was not Karl Kreeger. His stocking cap had been knocked off; there
was no bushy hair. The big, bald and now dead man was Jolly Jiggs
Jolley. He wasn't Jolly anymore!

Almost as one, Art, Annie, Doc, and DeeDee
exclaimed, “Jiggs!” They never suspected that Jiggs was the big man
they'd been watching, for they assumed he was Karl. Annie rubbed
her left temple. Something wasn't right.

Menendez said, “I need to radio for an
ambulance, but it certainly doesn't look like there's any rush.
That poor man is already dead. Before I make the call, can any of
you tell me the name of the person who owns that farm field?”

Art said, “Brad told us it is a Gerald
Gilbert.”

The seniors heard the sergeant on the radio
in her car telling the dispatcher, “No need for sirens. This is not
an emergency. I have a nurse here and a veterinarian; they both say
the victim is dead.” Next, the officer asked the dispatcher to call
Gerald Gilbert and request him to come immediately to meet with
them, that they needed to inspect his field with the big birds. She
also asked for back-up personnel. After she finished the radio
call, she turned to the seniors and ordered, “Now tell me who this
Jiggs is; tell me all you know about him.”

Doc began, “We know, of course, that Jiggs
lived in BradLee. After his wife died a few years ago, he became
very depressed. The story I heard was that one day he forced
himself to get out of his house and go play golf which he used to
do every day. As luck would have it, he teamed up with another
single man who turned out to be Karl Kreeger. Karl liked Jiggs and
invited him to come to Bingo on Tuesday nights to work as a
volunteer. Jiggs agreed to try it, and it appears that he enjoyed
himself. After that he seemed to have begun to shake the blues;
life started to have more color. He began joking and smiling again
and was one of the most loyal Bingo volunteers Karl had. He was
indebted to Karl, and they became fast friends. If he had bouts of
the blues after that, none of us knew about it. Everyone started
calling him ‘Jolly Jiggs Jolley.'”

DeeDee added. “Also, because Karl and Jiggs
were about tha same size, all of us here in tha park used ta call
them tha ‘Bingo Twins.'”