Characters in 1922

I expected infection from the rat-bite in spite of the salve, but there was none. Achelois died later that year, but not of that. She never gave milk again, however; not a single drop.

Sheriff Jones might not give a hoot in a high wind for the likes of Andrew Lester, attorney-at-law, but he was good friends with Harl. They were both members of the newly formed Elks Lodge, and Harl had it in for my son.

In June of 1922 I murdered my wife, Arlette Christina Winters James, and hid her body by tupping it down an old well.

… I was a boy in Fordyce, we had a neighbor—a nasty old rip name of Bradlee. Everyone called him Pop Bradlee.” “Mr. James—” “My father had to do business with him from time to time, and sometimes he took me with him. Back in the buckboard days, …

The thief had to shoot him in the thigh in order to effect his escape, and although Charles Griner lived, an infection set in (I could sympathize), and he lost the leg.

… when he got back to Lincoln, Omaha, Deland, or wherever he hung his hat when he wasn’t doing Cole Farrington’s business. “I could use a drink myself, Mr. James.” “Me, too. Nailing fence is hot work.” I looked him up and down. “Not as hot as riding …

“If no next of kin appears,” said Dr. Tattersall, the Morgue’s Chief Medical Officer, “I suppose he will be buried in public ground.”

The only thing that remained when she regained enough wits to put the lid back on was Elphis, the goddess of hope. But in that summer of 1922, there was no hope left for our Elphis.

And is it any wonder that I thought of Sheriff Frank Jones when I did? My mother’s habit of turning statements into questions saved me from the electric chair.

He got an arm around me and half-carried me down the porch steps and toward his car. George the rooster was lying frozen to the ground beside the woodpile, and the cows were lowing. When had I last fed them? I couldn’t remember.

The day they make me move the Sheriff’s Office to the county seat is the day I resign and let Hap Birdwell take over, like he wants to. No, no, it’s just a court hearing up to the City. Amounts to no more than paperwork, but there it is.

… 1922 had been the worst year of my life, one where I’d turned into a man I no longer knew, and Harlan Cotterie was just another washout on a rocky and miserable stretch of road. “She’s bright,” Harlan said. “Mrs. McReady at school says Shan’s the …

… Home and been snared by the Omaha cops (as Sheriff Jones had no doubt expected he would be), but Henry Freeman James was smarter than that. He sussed out the Home’s location, but didn’t approach it. Instead, he looked for the nearest candy store and soda …

“Fix him up,” I told Herbert Castings when I could talk rationally again. “Mr. James... sir... the damage is...” “I see what the damage is. Fix him up.

Hermie Gordon says you’ve got a cow living in there with you.” Hermie Gordon was the rural route mailman, and a notorious gossip. I named a price so low that Harl’s mouth fell open and his eyebrows shot up.

Even after Henry’s and Shannon’s deaths, even after losing the farm, I was trying to beat the corpse in the well. She and her minions. John Hanrahan was the storage foreman at the Bilt-Rite factory.

It was willed to my wife by John Henry Winters, her father. I wished to add this land to our freehold farm, which in 1922 totaled 80 acres.

Amounts to no more than paperwork, but there it is. And you know how Judge Cripps is... or no, I guess you don’t, being a law-abiding sort. He’s bad-tempered, and if a fellow isn’t on time, his temper gets worse.

Kevin Rohrbacher accompanied me across the lobby. I suppose that is the correct verb; it wasn’t quite dragging.

He tried to thank me again, and couldn’t. It was all too much. “Stop by Lars Olsen’s smithy on your way back and fuel up. Mind me, now, or you’ll be on foot instead of behind the wheel when you get home.” “I won’t forget.

… look of him; I’d gone to school with his father, and Henry would have gone with his younger sister, Mandy. “Is there a problem, Mr. Stoppenhauser?” he asked. “Not if Mr. James leaves now,” he said. “Won’t you see him out, Kevin?” Kevin came in, …

He’d said nothing about her all week, although I knew Shan was gone. Mert Donovan had told me when he came by for a load of seed corn. “Went off to some fancy school back in Omaha,” he said.

“But. ” He raised his finger, which reminded me of Mr. Stoppenhauser at the bank.

… of Indians from the Shoshone reservation in Lyme Biska walking along behind... and behind them, Old Pie driving the gather-truck. Shannon asked for a dipper of cold water, which I was glad to provide. She stood there on the shady side of the …

There was a Testament in her night table, given to her by Pastor Hawkins, but I had never seen her read it, and so left it where it was. But I took the bottle of iron pills, which she kept for her monthlies.

… for something to hit it with, but before I could grab the broom Henry had left leaning against Phemonoe’s stall, Achelois reared again and the rat thumped to the floor. At first I thought she had simply dislodged it, but then I saw the pink …

Your voice will carry! Your—. There, fool boy, you’ve raised that god damned dog again.” Rex barked once, twice, three times. Then silence. We stood, me grasping Henry’s shoulders, listening with my head cocked.

… into the Omaha branch of the First Agricultural Bank, pointed a gun at a pretty young teller named Rhoda Penmark, and demanded all the money in her drawer. She passed over about 200 dollars, mostly in ones and fives—the grimy kind farmers carry rolled …

He certainly must have been deranged.” Little is known of Mr. James at this writing. Ronald Quarles, the head librarian at the Omaha Public Library, took Mr. James on in late 1926.

I was a fool, and everyone I ever loved paid the price. I sometimes wonder if Sallie Cotterie ever came back to Harlan, or if he went to her in McCook after he lost the farm.

… had closed the bathroom door all the way—most ladies are private about their bathroom duties, and Shannon Cotterie had a special reason to feel that way as the summer of 1922 gave way to fall—but perhaps it came off the latch and swung open partway. Her …

… possibility of the outraged swain making an appearance at the site of his lady-love’s durance vile, Sister Camilla would have. In her business, she had surely dealt with outraged swains before. My only hope was that, once accosted by the authorities, …

… I stood in the back, unnoticed, then slunk out halfway through Reverend Thursby’s eulogy. Rev. Thursby also presided at Henry’s funeral, but I hardly need tell you that the attendance was much smaller. Thursby saw only one, but there was …

Victoria Hallett is a respectable married woman with three children now, but in the fall of 1922, she was Victoria Stevenson: young, curious, rebellious, …

… April 11, 1930 Magnolia Hotel Omaha, Nebraska TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN: My name is Wilfred Leland James, and this is my confession. In June of 1922 I murdered my wife, Arlette Christina Winters James, and hid her body by tupping it down an old …