The only two people who had not seemed totally surprised Hamm and the others were missing were Earl Finley and Jimmy Head. Minutes after
Earl had made the obligatory phone call to Betty Raye on behalf of the Democratic Party of Missouri to say how sorry he was to hear about the bad news, he was locked in a back room of a cheap hotel with several friends, trying his best to keep from smiling as he plotted his next move. Jimmy Head had been in Kansas City for a friend's funeral when the news hit but when he came back to Elmwood Springs all he said was, "I'm just surprised it didn't happen sooner. I feel bad for Betty Raye but she's a hell of a lot better off without him."
In time, it became painfully clear that they were not coming back. Betty Raye thanked her mother for coming but told her that she was fine and Alberta would look after her and Minnie should go back on the road.
She was not fine but when she was not with her boys she just wanted to be alone and think, to try to come to terms with what was happening. No one ever dreams that the last moment, that last glance of someone, might really be the last. She could not sleep, or eat. Not knowing if he was dead or alive was torture, but in addition to grieving for her husband she had two children and an entire state to worry about.
A month later, after attending a rather strange and ambiguous memorial service for Hamm and the four men, it hit her that most likely Hamm was not coming back. And she wanted to die. Had it not been for her two boys, she might have. Hamm Jr. who had adored his father, was taking his loss particularly hard and he needed her.
As the widow of such a powerful man, Betty Raye had at least received the nation's sympathy and support but Vita Green had suffered through the entire thing alone and silent, waiting, like Betty Raye, for some word. But unlike Betty Raye, having a sense of how dangerous politics could be and how reckless Hamm had become, she had been halfway expecting something like this to happen. Expected or not, it was devastating for her. Out of respect for his family, she did not attend the memorial service but stayed home and held her own very private wake. The people who knew about her relationship with Hamm tried to be helpful, but as Betty Raye had learned, nothing could help except, maybe, time.
Time and patience were two things that Jake Spurling had plenty of. An unattractive man with red pockmarked skin, Jake was as dedicated to solving missing-persons cases as most men were to their families. Even though there had been a memorial service, none of the bodies had been found; as far as he was concerned, this case was far from over.
Jake Spurling was one of the best criminal investigators in the country and he vowed he would never give up on the Hamm Sparks disappearance until he got to the bottom of it. And who had been behind it. Jake was known far and wide as a man who, once he had a case, was like a dog with a bone. He would root and dig for information no matter how long it took, or where he had to go to find it. To Jake this was the case of a lifetime.
Luther Griggs, the bully who used to beat up Bobby Smith, lived in a trailer park behind the post office and had a son as mean as his daddy had been at that age. Over the years Aunt Elner had had a series of orange cats that she always named Sonny. That morning Luther Griggs, Jr. had thrown a rock at Aunt Elner's present cat named Sonny and had hit him in the head. At a quarter to twelve that night Aunt Elner called her niece with the news.
"Norma, I've killed the Griggs boy."
"What?"
"I've killed the Griggs boy, murdered him in cold blood. I didn't mean to but there you have it. Tell Macky to go on and call the police."
"Aunt Elner, what are you talking about?"
"I've killed him, poisoned him, he's probably lying over there dead and they're gonna trace the fudge back to me sooner or later, so I might as well give up and get it over with. I've tried to live a good life all these years and here I've wound up a cold-blooded killer."
"Aunt Elner, listen to me. You stay right where you are and don't do a thing, do you hear me?"
Norma went into the bedroom and shook him. "Macky, wake up!" He stirred a little… "Macky, wake up. We have to go over to Aunt Elner's."
"What's the matter? Is she sick?"
"Get your clothes on… she says she killed the Griggs boy."
"What?"
"I don't know, Macky. She's hysterical. She said she poisoned him. Just get dressed before she calls the police."
Macky put his pants on over his pajamas, Norma grabbed her coat, and by the time they got there, Elner was out on the porch waiting for them, wringing her hands.
"I know I've disgraced the family," she said. "I don't know what caused me to do such a thing."
Macky led her back into the house. "Aunt Elner, just sit down and tell us what's going on."
Elner was distraught. "It's gonna be in all the papers; do you think they will handcuff me? Poor old Sonny has a hole in his head and now his owner is going to jail or maybe to the electric chair."
Macky said, "Aunt Elner, now, just calm down. What happened?"
"I must have gone insane. Maybe I can plead insanity do you think so?"
"What did you do?"
"Well, I wanted to get back at him for hitting Sonny. I knew I couldn't catch him, so I tried to figure out a way to get him up on the porch and take a good whack at him. I made up some fudge to get him over here." She looked stricken. "Oh, I just should have stopped there. But I had a whole bunch of old chocolate Ex-Lax, so I just melted it up and threw it in."
"Is that all?"
"A little dab of Mennen's underarm deodorant."
"Just that?"
"No."
"What else?"
"A half cup of oven cleaner. Polident tooth powder… I sprinkled a little on the top… it looked kinda like sugar."
Norma couldn't contain herself "Oh my God."
"Hold on, Norma," Macky said. He asked in a calm voice, "Is that all, Aunt Elner?"
Norma looked at him like he was crazy. "Is that all?.. That's enough to kill an entire family right there!"
Aunt Elner said, "I never thought of that. Do you reckon he may have taken that candy home? I may have killed them all. They may all be laying up in the trailer park dead." She threw her hands up in the air. "Now I'm a mass murderer."
Macky said, "Aunt Elner, now slow down. Start from the beginning. Tell me everything that happened."
"I made the candy… and waited till I saw him skulking around in the backyard. Then I called him over and said, "Come here, little boy, I've got some nice candy for you." I just meant for him to have one bite and then I was gonna try and grab for him but before I had a chance to do anything he snatched most all of the candy off the plate and took off before I could get at him."
"When did this happen?"
"This morning."
Norma said, "Why did you wait so long to tell us?"
Aunt Elner shook her head. "I guess when you do a thing like that the criminal mind just takes over. I thought I might get away with it. I should have come clean from the start. And now I've killed the whole Griggs family."
"Oh my God," Norma said. "Shouldn't we call a good lawyer, Macky? Isn't that what you're supposed to do at a time like this?"
"We are not going to call anybody. I am sure he is fine."
"Macky, we can't guess about something like this. We're looking at a murder charge. You go over there right now and look at that boy. We may all have to go on the lam."
"For God's sake, all right, but this is stupid."
"Macky promise me you won't come back until you have seen that boy walking and talking."