Digging Deeper
There were a dozen blocks of new houses under construction. Those blocks encompassed the numbered and named streets from 6th Street all the way up to 12th. As David and I approached from 6th Street along Bigler, I noticed that the progress of the houses looked like a model created to show how a rowhome is built from the foundation to the roof. The foundations of the homes closest to us were still being excavated while the homes furthest away appeared to be almost complete. In the distance, I saw men with black mops spread hot tar onto the flat roofs of the finished structures.
On the construction sites closest to David and me, diesel-driven cable excavators scooped light brown earth from future basements. The excavators piled the earth where it could be removed by bulldozers. The dozers pushed the earth toward great draglines with latticed booms. The draglines scooped the spoil from the piles and heaved it into waiting dump trucks to be hauled away.
David spoke close to my ear so I could hear him over the roar of the straining engines of the excavating equipment and the clatter of the idling dump trucks. “Where do you suppose they take it all?” He asked.
“Probably to the waterfront.” I answered. “They’re always trying to reclaim land from the river. Further south, on the other side of League Island, they’re filling in the marshes.”
I looked around to see if there were any temporary construction offices near us. I knew that a company large enough to excavate for the building of block upon block of new homes would also be large enough to have a regular business office somewhere in Center City. I didn’t bother to go there because the secretaries and corporate officers would have no knowledge of the men in the field. If I wanted to know anything about Larry, I needed to talk to the foreman and the men on the site.
At the opposite end of 6th Street, I spotted several temporary buildings parked in a row. I assumed the buildings housed offices for the various contractors who had crews on the nearby sites. David and I walked the length of the block and stopped in front of the row of unpainted wooden structures.
Each building had a lettered shingle nailed to the outside wall over the single front window that was next to the door. The sign which read ‘Newlin Excavation’ was bright red with white letters. I was about to climb the two-step staircase to rap on the wooden door when it burst open to disgorge a running man.
The man jumped over the steps and raised dust as he charged away from the office. I barely had a chance to see what the thin, wiry man looked like because he ran so fast. A tin safety hat flew through the door behind the running man and narrowly missed his retreating back. A torrent of shouting and foul language followed the hat.
The source of the shouting turned out to be a short, fat, red-faced man. The man had short arms and squatty legs and almost no neck. He was dressed in bib overalls that removed any hint of shape from his bloated, overweight body. His appearance reminded me of an engorged tick.
The tick man waddled down the steps and shouted after the running man. He pointed as he roared with a voice that sounded like it was full of gravel and sand. The words he shouted were difficult to identify. To me they sounded like shouted gibberish. My mind heard the words and translated them for me. The man said something like; “GET THAT FUCKING ROCK OUT OF THERE, OR ELSE I’LL FIRE THE WHOLE GODDAMNED BUNCH OF NO-ACCOUNT FUCKS!”
The man turned an awkward about-face on his squat legs and waddled back up the steps. He stopped himself on the landing to mop his face with a red bandana. He laughed into the bandana with an ugly grunting sound, like a hog nosing in the mud. He finished with his face and stuffed the red cloth into one of the front pockets on his overalls. The man cast an amused glance toward David and me. “Yeah?” He asked with his gravel voice.
I wasn’t quite sure how I wanted to handle the man. His quick change of manner from enraged to amused put me on my guard. Anybody who could scream in your face, then laugh at your back was someone to be wary of. I made up my mind to tell the man a very little bit of truth and a whole pile of lies, that way he’d never be able to sort out what I’d said. I stepped forward with a line of official sounding bullshit.
“We’re detectives with the firm of Walters, Stack, and Owens. My name is Kellerman.” I tilted my head toward David to introduce him. “My associate is Mister Farmer. We’re here to investigate the murder of Theodore Danton. Maybe you’ve heard of it.”
The tick man shook his head on his non-existent neck. “Naw.” He replied.
I stepped toward the man again to try to insinuate myself into his office. The tick man refused to play along. He stood firm on the landing.
“You are?” I asked.
“Brud Foote.” He grunted without offering a pudgy hand to shake.
I was shocked at the tick man’s name. His was probably the worst name I’d ever heard. The fact that he gave it to me as willingly as he did, meant he was used to the sound it made and the taste of it as it left his mouth. I couldn’t help but think if my folks had branded me with a name that bad, I would have disowned them over it before they had a chance to disown me for being queer. My first name of Lawrence was bad, but to have to go through life as Brud Foote was downright cruel.
“Good to meet you Mister Foote.” I lied politely. “Lawrence Ploughman is a suspect in the Danton murder case. We understand he was employed by Newlin Excavation, and he worked on this site. We’d like to talk to anyone who might have known him. We’re trying to get a line on his character.”
Brud tapped his chin with a blunt finger which featured a chewed off fingernail. He repeated Larry’s last name like he needed to hear it to jog his memory. His slovenly conversational speech smeared the syllables together until the name was barely intelligible. “Plow-ma-a-an, Plow-ma-a-an…” Brud slurred as he thought. His face brightened as a memory struck him. “The fag?” He asked.
I was tempted to punch Brud’s fat, ugly face for his use of the word I hated. I held my temper and tried to remain professional. “We understand he was a homosexual, but we don’t believe the fact is germane to the case.”
Brud cocked his head at me. I guessed he didn’t understand one of the words I’d used. “Homo, wha?” He asked stupidly. He shook his head like the word didn’t matter. “Don’t care. Fuk ‘em. Hope he sizzles when ‘ey fry ‘em. Fukin’ fag.” Brud waddled into his office and slammed the door shut.
David and I were left to stare at the closed door. I took a step back and started to leave. I knew from experience that arguing with a man like Brud was as pointless as shouting at a locked door. I planned to circumvent Brud’s refusal of help if I could.
I decided to see if I could find a tin cap like the one Brud had thrown from his office and ask around the construction site anyway. I figured if I shed my suit jacket and rolled my sleeves up, I would look like one of the workers just enough to be left alone for a good long while. I started to say something inane like ‘that’s the way things go sometimes,’ but I never got the words out.
David marched past me. He climbed the steps and kicked the wooden office door off its hinges. David’s kick was like that of an army mule. The door left its frame with the tearing sound of screws as they ripped from the dry wood. The plain door thudded flat on the floor of the office within. David strode through the opening he’d created. I hurried after him.
I entered the office just in time to see David march to the desk Brud sat behind. He seized Brud over top of it and hauled him up by the bib of his overalls. David dragged the man over the desk and seethed hatred into his face. He screamed at Brud without words, a raw animal sound of rage.
Brud seemed unmoved by David’s anger. His face remained placid. The man’s steady demeanor worried me. I thought it likely a man like Brud had pissed off enough people in his life that he was used to being manhandled. I also reasoned if David harmed Brud, Brud would react like the blustering coward I suspected he was. Guys like Brud like to call the police and press charges, they like to sue people. David didn’t need any of that nonsense in his life. Neither did I. I rushed to intervene between the two men.
I threw myself against David’s solid back and wrapped my arms around his to pin his upper arms against his body. “LET HIM DOWN!” I shouted in David’s ear.
David ignored me. He held Brud tightly like my weight on his back was nothing more than a housefly that landed on his shoulder. He shook Brud like the man was a rag doll and growled at him again. I tried once more to reach David with my words. “David!” I cried. “This won’t help Larry!”
My words seemed to reach my friend. David’s tense, angry muscles relaxed. He set Brud on his feet and let go of his clothes. “I’m sorry.” David muttered, his rage spent.
I released David and rubbed my arms up to my shoulders where they ached from the exertion. David slunk out of the office and down the steps outside. He left me to deal with Brud.
I began with an apology. “I’m sorry, Mister Foote. Mister Farmer hasn’t been himself lately. I’d like to pay for the damage and give you a little something for your inconvenience.” I reached into my jacket pocket for my wallet. I hoped that a few dollars would smooth the incident over.
Brud laughed his hog grunt laugh at me. “Naw.” He said. “You and him is f’red. Gonna phone yur boss. C’m-on back t’morrow. Give ya a job cleanin the shitter.” He laughed again at the triumph he planned to have over David and me.
I put my wallet away and shrugged. My shoulders ached and made me regret the shrug. “You do what you have to do.” I said and left the office to find David.
David was at the edge of the property. He had a clod of dirt in his hand. He broke pieces from it and examined the inside of each break before he threw the fragment away and broke another. He spoke before I had a chance to. “The soil around here is no good. Too much clay and not enough loam.”
I looked at the clod of dirt which David held. I didn’t know much about soil for farming. I only knew which types of dirt made good trenches for war and which had to be propped up with timber and sandbags. I didn’t think David wanted to talk about the soil. I waited for him to come to the point.
“I can’t believe I did that.” David said. He dropped the clod of dirt and dusted his hands off. Without the dirt to hold onto, his hands tremored with intense emotion. “I’ve never lost control like that before. Never. I’m ashamed of myself for how badly I wanted to hurt that man. I’m ashamed for putting my hands on someone. What happened after I left?”
“I tried to buy him off, but the guy doesn’t want money, he wants a pound of flesh. He said he was going to phone our office and get us both fired.” I grinned over the lies I’d told Brud. “I almost wish I could see his face when he tries to look up the name I gave him. Good fucking luck finding Walters, Stack, and Owens in the telephone book.”
David grinned his own amusement over the joke we’d had on Brud. His grin didn’t last. It drew down into a desperately sad frown. “Law, we can’t let them send my son to the electric chair. We have to do something. That horrible man can’t be right. We have to save my son.”
David kicked at the dirt like he wasn’t done analyzing it for crops. “Do you think…do you think they’d take me instead?” He asked. “If we can’t find who killed Ted and if Larry gets found guilty, do you think they’d trade me for him? I’d sit in that chair. They wouldn’t even need to strap me down if it would save Larry. Do you think they’d do that?”
David’s question made my heart ache. For the first time, the lump of emotion in my throat was more painful than the upset in my stomach or the hangover in my head. “We’re not there yet, my friend.” I said to try to soothe David’s worry. “We’ve still got time and lots to do. Come on. I have another idea.”
