The Big Find

                                                                 The Big Find

                                                                           by

                                            Austin Mitchell

 Ephraim and Norris were in the woods cutting yams-sticks when they saw the two men digging away. Ephraim gestured to Norris to keep silent as the latter was about to fall a tree. Ephraim crept forward to get a closer look at what they were doing. It was around two o clock in the afternoon. They were in the district of Clementson a large district five miles north of Linstead. The two men watched as the diggers finished digging the hole. They could see that it was a large hole enough to hold a body. The two men left and went and opened their car trunk and took out a large canvas covered object. Both men had trouble carrying it to the hole. They dumped the canvas into the hole then heaped dirt on it. An hour after the two men left, Ephraim and Norris were still arguing as to what to do. Ephraim believed that they should report what they saw, to the police. Norris was of the opinion that they should find out what it was that the men had just buried.

            “I’m sure that a body was in that tarpaulin,” Ephraim said.

            “I haven’t heard of anybody being killed around here lately. Although if it was a body they could have killed him somewhere else and just dumped the body in Clementson,” Norris opined.

            “So what should we do?” Ephraim asked.

            “I vote that we find out what they were hiding before we do anything,” Norris advised.

            Both men realized that they only had machetes. They would need a shovel for getting out all that earth. Hambo was an old man living about half a mile from the woods. He did manual labor and therefore had these kinds of tools all over his yard. When the men reached Hambo’s yard he was not there. They were however lucky to find two shovels in some amount of disrepair. They then made their way back towards the woods. Norris was the first to start digging.

            Ephraim was about to say that if they found a body, Hambo found out that they had taken away his shovels and then the police found the dead body if they were not digging themselves into a grave when they heard loud voices. Ephraim and Norris darted behind some bushes.

            “Where’s the money Brown-man?” a man asked.

            Both men recognized Juggler’s voice. He had been sent to prison five years ago after being convicted for the murder of two men. The latest they had heard was that he had escaped and was now on the run. They both knew that they were dead meat if Juggler found them. Then they heard another voice that chilled their bones to the very marrow.

            “Brown-man what did you do with Bernie and where is Dudley?”  Joseph Sprawl asked.

            Norris looked at Ephraim and could see the wild fear in the man’s eyes and knew that the man could burst out of the bushes in an instant in a desperate effort to get away from Sprawl and Juggler. Sprawl had killed his first man in a knife fight and had gotten off those charges by proving self defense. From then on he had been held for several murders none of which came to trial as the witnesses never came forward. Both men knew that Sprawl, Juggler and another man, Blam roamed together.

            “Since he doesn’t want to talk we have to kill him. Maybe when we find Dudley and when he hears what we’ve done to Brown-man he’ll tell us where the money is,” Blam said.

            Both men knew that while Blam had stayed out of prison and had never gone on any wild killing sprees like his two friends he was a pretty rough customer. It appeared that he was their spy. Both Juggler and Sprawl lived underworld surfacing to do their crimes and then disappearing again.

            The two men listened as the three men inflicted more punishment on Brown-man but the man refused to talk. Then they heard three shots almost simultaneously. They knew that Brown-man had been killed.

            “I have to find that money and that guy had better tell us where it is or else we are going to wipe out him and his whole family,” Sprawl threatened.

            Neither Norris nor Ephraim knew the dead man, Brown-man, nor Dudley but they knew Bernie. He was an associate of the Sprawl gang and was thought to be one of their spies. The three killers did not leave at once but stopped to have a smoke and to discuss their future plans. A courier service vehicle had run into road-block mounted by  some of the Sprawl gang members. Two of the security men had fled. The other two were tied up, blind-folded and left in some bushes. Brown-man and Dudley along with Bernie were to bring the money to a secret location. But the three men had disappeared and by the time the gang managed to hold Brown-man there was no sign of the other two men or the money.

            “Who lives at Dudley’s home?” Sprawl asked.

            “He has a woman there and two children,” Blam replied.

            “We are going to take them away and hold them until he gives us back our money,” Sprawl said.

            “Maybe we should kill one of them just to show him how serious we are,” Juggler said

            “Come let us go up there, we might just do as you said Juggler,” Sprawl said.

            “What are we going to do with Brown-man’s body?” Blam asked.

            “We’ll come back for it later tonight. We can throw it in the bog hole,” Sprawl replied as they moved out.

            The bog hole was a deep hole in the woods. They said caves were underneath but nobody had ever investigated. Both Norris and Ephraim knew that many persons had suspicions that the bodies of a lot of persons who had disappeared without a trace could be found down there.

            The two men waited until they heard the car drive off before they came out of hiding. They went to look at Brown-man’s body. It was spattered with blood. He was lying on his back and from their observations they could see one bullet hole in his head and two others had bored him on both sides of his chest.

            Norris saw the look of fear in Ephraim’s eyes and knew that the man was about to give up.

            “We have to find out what those men buried in that hole,” Norris said.

            “Far as I am concerned it’s a body they put down there. We heard those men say so, didn’t we?” Ephraim asked.

            “Far as we know it could be the money they hid down there. I vote we dig for it,” Norris said.

            Ephraim looked at Norris. The man was brave and had once put a gunman to flight but he would stand no chance against Sprawl and his friends. Norris was tall and and was thirty years of age. Ephraim was of medium height and built.

            “How are we sure that Dudley is not on his way here right now or that Sprawl and the others won’t catch us?” Ephraim asked.

            Norris grabbed up his shovel and moved off. Ephraim followed him to where they had seen the men digging the hole. Norris started to shovel out the dirt.

            “You going to stand there and stare or are you going to help me? If you don’t help me and I find that money it will be all mine,” Norris remarked.

            “Suppose you find Bernie’s body, what are you going to do?” Ephraim asked.

            “Just re-bury it, what do you think I should do? Call a morgue or the police and tell them that I’ve found a dead body?” Norris asked as he threw out dirt.

            The sarcasm in Norris’s voice spurred Ephraim into action and he grabbed his shovel and started to dig out dirt too.

            The two men got down to the digging. Ephraim was matching Norris shovel full for shovel full. Finally they reached the parcel.

            Ephraim jumped out of the hole and stood looking down at the object.

            “Come and help me lift it out and don’t stand up there acting as if you are scared, Ephraim,” Norris reprimanded him. “If it was a body none of us could stand where we are right now.”

            Ephraim had to agree but maybe the fright he was in did not make him see that. But as far as he was concerned Norris was wrong as the man had just been buried so how come the body would have started decomposing so soon. Nevertheless despite his doubts Ephraim jumped down into the hole and helped Norris to haul the parcel out. The weight of the parcel and the shape assured Ephraim that it wasn’t a corpse. Norris took out his machete and cut the strings tying up the parcel and there were the packets of money. There were two distinct bundles.

            “See I told you Ephraim it’s about six million based on what Sprawl and Juggler said. We will share it equally. Good thing that we have crocus bags with us,” Norris said as they got down to parcel out the money.

            Ephraim was still staring in awe at the amount of money before him. Finally at Norris’ insistence he got down and helped him to parcel out the money. They both examined the heaps to make sure that they were equal before putting it into their bags. They threw back the earth into the hole and set off for their respective homes. They sneaked in to leave Hambo’s shovels in his yard. Before parting they agreed not to tell anybody, not even their family about the money. Ephraim told Norris that he would lock up his money in his store-room to which only he had a key. They agreed to meet the next day to discuss what they should do with so much money.

            The next morning Ephraim woke up to hear his ten year old son, Marvin, telling his mother, Merlene, that somebody had broken into the store-room. Ephraim quickly put on some clothes and went outside.

            “Why would anybody be wanting to break into that little store-room?” Merlene was asking as Ephraim joined them.

            Ephraim was dumbfounded as he made his way into the store-room. He kept mostly farming tools and seeds for planting in the store-room.

            “Marvin and I have to get ready as the taxi will soon be here but this is all a mystery to me, Ephraim,” Merlene said as he came out of the store-room.

            “They didn’t take anything. I think I’m going to report it to the police. There’s nothing there for them to take,” Ephraim said resignedly as both Merlene and Marvin went inside to get ready for school.

            As soon as they left, Ephraim locked up the house and headed for where Norris lived about a mile away. It had to be him as nobody else would have known that the money was there. He took his longest and sharpest machete with him.

            When he reached where Norris and his girlfriend, Paula, lived the house was locked up. He was there calling the man’s name when Ben, Norris’ neighbor, said he had seen him leaving early this morning with some bags. He had told him that he was going to the country as his mother was ill. Ephraim was about to head back home when Paula arrived in a taxi. She expressed surprise at what Ben was telling her. Ephraim said that they were supposed to have gone to cut some more yam-sticks. Paula returned to say that Norris had gone with all his clothes. Ephraim knew then that Norris had played him for the fool. He felt sorry for Paula when she began crying. Ephraim stayed there and tried to console her. After about ten minutes she dried her tears and told him that she was going back inside to try and contact some of Norris’ relatives in an effort to find his whereabouts.

            That night as they lay in bed Ephraim confessed to Merlene what had happened. She started to cry when she remembered that it was the Sprawl gang, who had killed her brother , Bang. Bang used to run with them but when they fell out they had filled him with lead.

            The next morning Ephraim made a report to the police station. He told them about Brown-man’s murder whereupon he and the policemen went to the murder scene.

            From his hideout Blam observed Ephraim leaving out of the station with three policemen. Word had spread from early morning that his store-room had been broken into. It seemed curious to Blam as to why anybody would want to break into dirt-poor Ephraim’s store-room. Word was also out that Norris had left the district in haste.

            Because of Ephraim’s cooperation he was not charged. However he was still warned that he could still be charged with grand larceny, especially if all the money was not recovered. To be continued. Please visit the Austin G Mitchell pages at Amazon for a look at my books.