Consumed (5 page)

“Yeah, that rings a bell now that I think about it,” Agent Clifford said. “It’s not in our case file anywhere, though.”

I jotted the name down. “Different how?”

“I guess he just lived the old way—tended land, grew and kept his own food, kids didn’t attend school, only came into town when it was absolutely necessary. Not really a part of the community, I guess.”

“What happened with this guy?” I asked.

“They found out it wasn’t him, which is why it didn’t make the file more than likely,” Whissell said. “I guess a couple more bodies turned up when they had the guy in custody, bodies that couldn’t have been dumped where they were prior to this guy being detained.”

“Do you know what it was that made him a suspect in the first place?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Again, everything I’ve heard is second hand.”

“Well, what did you hear?” I asked.

“I guess the guy had a wife that apparently was a mute and a pair of teenage sons. The one that still lived at home was a little off. The other was out of the house. They had a place out in the country around here—sold and gone now, as far as I know. Anyway, I guess he butchered his own livestock. Add a guy with an odd family, who kept to himself and always had blood on his clothes, and well, he made for an easy target, I guess.”

“So basically, this guy doesn’t fit into the social norm, and they accuse him of dismembering people?” I asked. “Seems kind of like a stretch to me.”

“The word is that when they brought him in for questioning, he just clammed up,” Whissell said. “Never plead innocence or anything like that, so they figured they had him. But then more bodies were found in fields that had just been tended. Can’t dump bodies when you’re sitting in a holding cell.”

But someone else can do it for you.
“Any physical evidence found pointing to this man, or was it all just hunches?” I asked.

“The department went through everything of his: house, barns, vehicles. They never found anything that suggested he did it.”

“Could have done it somewhere else,” I said.

“Nothing was ever found that suggested he did.”

“Where is this guy now?”

“Matheson disappeared right after the original murders in the eighties,” Whissell said.

“Disappeared? Doesn’t that kind of raise a red flag?”

“Probably not the way you are thinking. Again, I only know the stories, so take them for what they are. I guess after he was released, there was still quite a number of people that were pretty damn convinced of his guilt. With that, a makeshift mob kind of formed, and well, one of two things happened. One of the townspeople, um, made him disappear, or he fled to avoid being the victim of the mob. Either way, he was never seen or heard from after. We kind of lean more toward someone around here killed him, though.”

“Was it ever investigated?” I asked.

“That I couldn’t tell you.”

“So you believe a murder happened but never looked into it?”

“Way before my time,” he said.

I rubbed my eye. “No cold-case division here?” I asked. “I would think that this would be the number-one priority.”

“We don’t really have the manpower for working thirty-year-old cases, and these new ones are the FBI’s now, as far as I understand.”

I didn’t respond.

“Wife and sons?” Beth asked. “Do you know what happened with them?”

“Moved along,” Whissell said. “Not sure if anyone knows where they went. I can’t imagine that it was comfortable for them to be around here after.”

“Don’t think there’s a sliver of a chance it was this Owen Matheson and he came back?” I asked.

“He’d have to be pushing eighty if he was alive. Pretty damn doubtful that he’d be out doing this.”

“One of the sons, maybe?” I asked. “You said the one was off. How?”

“Some kind of mental problems, I heard,” he said.

“Developmental in nature?”

“Again, no first-hand knowledge of that. But, as far as I know, he also hasn’t been seen or heard from around here since he and his mother left. Who knows what happened with the other.”

“Do you know what the wife and son’s name were?” I asked. “Has anyone ever tried to track down these two?”

“I don’t know the names, no. I could ask around. We have one or two guys that were around back then still floating around the station. As far as anyone ever trying to track them down, I don’t think so.”

The reason whoever was committing the crimes had never been found was becoming clear to me.

“Yeah, I’d appreciate if you can get me that information and maybe put me in contact with the deputies,” I said.

“Sure thing,” Whissell said.

“Okay. Back to the physical evidence on these new bodies. All we have is the forensic evidence in the files? Nothing more?”

“Yeah, no prints, no murder weapon, no saw that was used to remove the limbs. We have knife wounds consistent with a big hunting knife and the saw marks on the bones of the remains found. The old bodies that were found have the same saw marks as the new bodies,” the chief deputy said. “Same with the bag of cut-up bones. Forensics said it appeared to be consistent with a standard wood saw.”

“The bag of bones—did you handle that?” Beth asked.

“Yeah, I had the pleasure of dealing with it,” Whissell said.

“Where were those found?” I asked.

“Upper part of the county. Northwest of here, near the Kentucky border. A road crew went to pick up the bag, which ripped, and the bones spilled out.”

“I saw the photos. How would anyone know that they were from a human?” I asked.

“The road crew that found them didn’t. But a bag with sawed up pieces of bones found along the side of the road is going to raise some flags around here. The guys that picked it up called us and the coroner went to view the contents of the bag. He ID’d them as human. It probably would have been dismissed if it wasn’t for the lore of The Butcher around these parts.”

“Do you think this guy lives locally around here or is from the Nashville area?” I asked.

Whissell shrugged. “No way to know.”

Richard sat in the living room of his small house—he’d built it himself when he purchased the family land twenty years prior with the lump-sum payment from his mother’s life-insurance policy. Richard had reclaimed the furniture that hadn’t been pilfered from the old house. What he could use, he used—what he couldn’t rehab, he burned. There were only a few bed frames, some miscellaneous tables, random knickknacks, and the ripped-up antique Chesterfield-style couch he sat upon.

Richard stared at an old television playing some fuzzy program from one of the three channels the antenna could pick up—it appeared to be a word-puzzle game show. During the couple seconds of clear picture it showed, Richard had shouted a few wrong answers at the television.

The smell from the kitchen filled his nose—his dessert was about ready. Richard rose from the couch and walked through to the kitchen. He reached down and opened the oven door. The heat and smell rose up and hit him.

“Smells like candied peaches,” he said. Richard chuckled to himself, amused with his selection of a dessert to accompany his meal.

He crouched down and took the pan from the oven. The two halved peaches had been filled with brown sugar and butter where the pit had once resided. He set them on the top of the stove next to the resting meat—two two-inch-thick slices of bone-in thigh, one from Candy and one from Peaches. Richard would sample each to see who he preferred. The more flavorful of the two would find the refrigerator and be eaten as steaks or roasts while the other would end up being used for soup.

We’d spent another half hour at the sheriff’s station chatting with the chief deputy and Agent Clifford prior to leaving. We managed to get the chief deputy to enlist the help of more deputies to patrol the outlying areas of the county for the next few nights. We planned to touch base with him later in the night after he e-mailed Beth the file on the latest found remains.

Beth and I headed toward the medical examiner’s office. Chief Deputy Whissell had called Chip Nehls, the lead medical examiner, to let him know we were on our way—Nehls said he could stay late to meet us personally. Agent Clifford drove ahead of us in his car, leading the way. Our ride had been mostly quiet. I’d been tossing around a few thoughts in my head but needed Beth’s take on them.

“So, did the chief deputy seem awfully dismissive of someone in his county dismembering bodies, to you?” I asked.

“Yup,” Beth said. “No wonder no one has ever been found.”

“I mean but why? Could he actually not give a shit or what?” I asked.

“To me, he seemed like he just kind of wanted to wash his hands of the whole thing. If I had to guess, it’s because he has two FBI agents in his stomping grounds working an investigation.”

“It seemed like more than that to me. They had one suspect ever, and despite glaring things that probably should have been looked into further, he just was kind of set on ‘the guy didn’t do it, may have been killed, and case closed.’ I mean, just because he was in custody didn’t mean that he couldn’t have had an accomplice. The main things are the disappearing shortly after and not pleading innocence when he was in custody. You’d think if someone brought you in and was questioning you about chopping up bodies, you’d probably have a rebuttal or two.”

“Right? But not a piece of evidence, remember.”

“True. I’d like to find that mother and those sons either way and see what they have to say.”

Beth nodded. “I think we need some more information on what happened that came from someone first hand. If he has an officer or two that were there back then, that would help,” she said.

“Hopefully.” I cracked my neck from side to side and shook my head. “The sheriff’s department not searching for the truth to what happened just kind of boggles my mind. I mean, if the guy was innocent and some townspeople killed him anyway, wouldn’t you want to bring the people responsible to justice? Wouldn’t you think this Owen Matheson’s wife or family would be clamoring for an arrest?”

Beth looked over at me. “One would think. Maybe he fled, and his family went to meet with him somewhere else.”

“It’s a possibility,” I said. “Just seems like beyond-shoddy police work.”

“Who knows how the law enforcement was run back then, though or how it is now, for that matter. Hell, some of the deputies in that building might have been part of that angry mob.”

“It’s not out of the question. Well, when we talk to the deputies that were there years ago, maybe that’s something that should be added into our questioning for them.”

“What? Were you part of a mob that ran a guy out of town or killed an innocent man? I’m not sure how well that would go over,” Beth said.

“I probably wouldn’t phrase it exactly to that effect, but I’d like to know a little more about this townspeople mob—I don’t know—maybe just getting a couple versions of a history lesson to see if it all holds water.”

“Sure,” Beth said.

I let out a puff of air. “One way or another, someone should have handled it a hell of a lot better back then. Even now though, I still have to think that someone at the department would want a crack at solving the thing. The major crime of the area that everyone knows about, and no one wants to get to the truth. It just seems too odd to me.”

“Well, we’ll see what we get when we’re through—go from there,” Beth said.

Agent Clifford put on his turn signal to exit the highway. He made a left at the end of the ramp, followed by a quick right onto the next street. Then he slowed and put on his blinker again to enter the parking lot of a standalone building—the long, tan single-story brick building was set halfway up a small hill. The front entrance stood three stories and was all windows, an atrium. The building didn’t look too old yet also didn’t appear if it was much newer than fifteen years. Aside from the light-blue hue of the glass windows, it was fairly nondescript. We pulled alongside Agent Clifford in the parking lot and stepped out. I glanced around. Aside from the building we stood in front of, I didn’t see another building up or down the block. A few trees broke up the browning grass. The parking lot held a handful of cars—none ambulances or coroner transport. Beth and I followed Clifford to the front doors—the sign above them read Nashville Medical Science.

The three of us walked in through the front. To our immediate left was a waiting area with two couches, a couple of chairs, a television playing news mounted to the wall, and a gas fireplace. From what I could see, the floor in the entire place was wood. A large metal sign on the wall had the same logo that hung over the front doors. The right side of the room consisted of a coffee station and a long front desk. We approached the desk and the young woman seated behind it.

She looked up from her computer screen and brushed the long blond hair from her shoulder. “What can I help you with?” she asked. She adjusted her glasses on the bridge of her nose. The woman wore a pair of gray and black medical scrubs.

“We’re looking for Chip Nehls,” I said.

“Sure. One moment, and I’ll page Doctor Nehls for you.” She grabbed the telephone from her desk, said a few words into the receiver, and hung up. She looked back up. “He’ll be with you in a few minutes. If you’d like, you can be seated in our waiting area over there.” She casually pointed to the right of the front doors.

We walked over and had a seat.

“Nice waiting area for a morgue,” I said.

“I think it used to be a day spa that went under. I heard that somewhere though I guess I can’t be certain,” Agent Clifford said.

I scooped up a travel magazine from the table beside my chair and thumbed through it. I was halfway finished with an article about what sites to see in Mexico when a tall, thin man approached and stopped before us.

“I’m Dr. Nehls,” he said. “I assume you would be the FBI agents that the chief deputy phoned about?”

“Correct.” I tossed the magazine back on the table next to the chair and stood.

“And it’s Agent Clifford, if memory serves? Clarksville?” the doctor asked.

“Yup,” Clifford said. “It’s been a bit since I’ve had to come in, which is probably a good thing.”