I am working on a new novel, a murder mystery set in
The novel’s main character, Buck McDivit, returns for the first time since appearing in my book Ghost of a Chance. Bones of Skeleton Creek is the mystery’s tentative title. Here is an excerpt from the book:
Excerpt from Bones of Skeleton Creek (first draft, unedited)
Muted sunlight peeked through a thick cover of clouds as Buck stood in a semicircle with a group of men, waiting for the arrival of the investigator. No one spoke as they watched a gray van back up to their location. It must have already started out as a banner day for homicides in
Even though a chill wind whipped the tree limbs at the nearby ranch house, Satchel’s only jacket was a light, waist-length jacket with the words medical investigator printed on the back. Satchel wore glasses that did little to impart an air of studiousness to the large man with dark, shoulder-length hair.
“What’s up, Cowboy?” he asked Buck, ignoring the other half-dozen law officers and ranch hands observing the situation.
“Bad news,” Buck answered, nodding toward the body occupying the eye of the circle.
No one had approached the body, wary of destroying evidence at what was obviously a crime scene – a gruesome crime scene. The body in question was that of a man lying on his back, his legs bent at the knees and folded beneath him in what would have been a most uncomfortable position – if he were alive to notice. He wasn’t.
The first job of a medical investigator is to check for trauma, something that may have caused the death. Sometimes trauma isn’t apparent, or the actual cause of death obvious. No such problem existed with this death. The man was quite naked and lying in a puddle of blood that pooled mostly beneath his buttocks. Satchel Pratt put on a pair of rubber gloves and knelt beside the victim. From the black bag that he carried, he removed a syringe which he used to extract a sample of blood from the victim’s femoral artery.
Pratt had a sheath on his belt from which he took what looked like a meat thermometer and quickly inserted it beneath the right side of the man’s rib cage, an area of the body known as the intercostal space. Deftly, he directed the thermometer into the dead man’s liver. The lead cop, a Logan County Sherrif’s deputy, stepped closer.
Satchel wiped off the thermometer with a wipe and placed it back in the sheath. “Can I borrow your pen?” he asked the deputy.
The dead man’s head rested on a mess of blood, bone and brains. Gently lifting it, Satchel inserted the pen in the gaping hole.
“This is the exit wound,” he said.
The man’s mouth splayed open in a grotesque smile. Satchel used the opening to probe inside with the Deputy’s pen. When he removed it, he turned around and offered it back to the person that had loaded it to him.
“You keep it,” the deputy said, shaking his head and taking a step backward.
Satchel grinned, one Buck had seen many times before. It was Pratt’s shtick and he always performed it for the benefit of those police officers that had not yet observed the scene of a homicide, and for the entertainment of the others that had. Zipping down his light jacket, he slid the pen into his shirt pocket. His performance wasn’t yet finished as he anticipated the Deputy’s next question.
“How long has he been dead?”
Buck tried hard to keep from smiling as Satchel removed a second meat thermometer that he kept sheathed on the right side of his belt. Holding it close to his myopic eyes, he touched the instrument to his tongue. Both deputies and the three cowboys gasped.
“Maybe as long as twelve hours,” Satchel said, “But it could be less because of the cold weather.”
Seeing the men’s stunned reaction, Buck could contain himself no longer, breaking into an uncontrolled bout of rollicking laughter. It stopped abruptly when a familiar voice spoke behind him.
“What’s so funny, McDivit?”
From the distinctive, raspy voice, Buck knew without turning that it came from Logan County Sheriff, Big Jim Hagen.
Buck didn’t bother answering because the sheriff, he knew, had already witnessed Satchel’s little act more than once. Someone even taller than Sheriff Hagen, accompanied him. It was a man that Buck recognized instantly and knew very well - Clayton O’Meara, Buck’s former boss and the owner of the ranch on which the dead man was murdered. Although he rarely saw the man, this was the second time Buck had run into him that day.
“What’s the story here, Satchel?”
“You got yourself a homicide, Sheriff.”
Buck starting taking notes as Satchel Pratt began to recite.
“Caucasian male, about thirty. Someone brought him into this clearing about ten to twelve hours ago and forced him to strip off all his clothes. They tied his hands behind his back with chicken wire and had him kneel. They castrated him – while he was still alive from the amount of blood on the ground. Then they stuck a weapon in the victim’s mouth and pulled the trigger.”
“Sounds more like a suicide to me,” the sheriff said. “No one would let a shooter stick a pistol in their mouth.”
The deputy snickered, but quickly turned his head away when Pratt said, “You mean right after he cut his own balls off?”
Sheriff Hagen said, “I’m just saying that when somebody dies from a gunshot wound in the mouth, it’s usually suicide. What’s your take on it, Buck?”
“This seems more like a case of revenge to me than a professional hit. I wouldn’t be surprised if the victim knew who killed him. He also has a nasty contussion on the side of his head. I imagine his killer nailed him with the pistol he used to kill him with. Maybe he was unconscious when the killer jammed the pistol in his mouth and pulled the trigger.”
“Satchel, does that sound about right?”
“His upper lip is split. I’d say it makes for a pretty convincing story. Now all you need is the killer.”
Big Jim Hagen digested Buck’s theory and Satchel Pratt’s take on it. Glancing at the big man standing beside him, he asked, “You recognize the victim?”
Clayton O’Meara nodded at the Sheriff’s question. “Name is Frank Boggs. One of my hands. Only been working for me about a month or so. He’s a local and my foreman can get you all the information we have on him.”
Sheriff Hagen glanced at his lead deputy, still ashen-faced from observing Satchel’s little joke. “Get your head out of it, Lamont. Cardon off the victim and start combing the area for evidence. Don’t look like we’ll find much, but you never know.”
Clayton left the crime scene, shaking his head and taking his gawking hands with him. He didn’t speak Buck before leaving, but he smiled and nodded in his direction. It didn’t matter. There was still much to do before he and Satchel bagged the body and carted it to the van.
The day had started out cold and had only grown colder. As Buck and Satchel finished their work, the murder scene looked like a washed-out oil painting. It was the end of a long day and wet flakes of snow began falling from the ashen sky as the two men rolled the gurney to the back of the van.