New Novel

{Below is the first chapter of my newest novel. The novel is available at fictionwise.com Search under my name, Bob Liter)

FORK IN THE ROAD
By Bob Liter

CHAPTER ONE

Mayor Ollie Oelwein hoisted his rear onto the last empty stool at the counter in Rosemary’s Delmonico Diner. He turned and mumbled, “Twelve citizens, not countin’ you and me.”
“You going?” Rosemary Allen asked.
“Of course,” the mayor said. “Got to. Look at all these people. No doubt they’s goin’. Best gathering I've seen in Fork for some time.”
“I may run out of doughnuts,” Rosemary said.
“What?” the mayor said. “Can’t hear much above the chatter.”
Rosemary leaned closer and repeated the statement. She pushed slender fingers through long, gleaming auburn hair, moved a strand from her forehead, sighed and glided from behind the counter. She joined in conversations as she refilled coffee cups at the six ancient tables, their scars hidden by checkered red clothes.
The material of her white polyester waitress uniform moved with the flow of her legs and buttocks. Some male eyes focused higher where curves bounced and breathed.
She returned to behind the counter and said, “Everybody’s talking about the snow storm again. Haven’t heard a single rumor this morning about the murder. Kinda strange, people talking in July about a snow storm.”
“Well,” the mayor said, “there’s principles involved here. No sir, Daniel Owens just can’t get away with what he did. You goin' aint ya?”
"No," Rosemary said. "Won't be any business, but I'm not going down there and watch Daniel make a fool of himself."
The mayor chewed the last bite of his third chocolate-covered doughnut, gulped the last drop of coffee, and slid off the stool.
“Serve him right if he makes a fool of himself. Got no business attacking a public official. If he gets away with that, why who knows what’s next?"
He cleared his throat a couple of times and said, "Hey folks, we better git. It’s thirty-five miles to Cleardale, ya know.”
Gregory Lancaster, the garbage collector, who was sitting alone at a corner table, stood and said, “Hell, Ollie, we got two hours yet. Gonna pick up a couple blocks of garbage before I head down.”
“Smells like ya already made some pickups,” Fred Gilmore, the grocery store owner, shouted.
“Don’t often see ya up this early,” Gregory replied.
“Now, now boys, don’t need discord on an important day like this. I’m headed for Cleardale.”
The mayor hitched up his pants, waved like a departing candidate, and went outside. He stood in the morning sunlight on the cracked sidewalk in front of the diner beneath the Coca Cola sign, looked south on Main Street. Dave Martin’s Hick’s Gasoline Station wasn’t open yet. Three store fronts in that direction were boarded up. Weeds grew against the edge of the buildings.
Damned fool, the mayor thought. He could get some business if he’d get off his lazy ass. Probably still in bed with that wife of his. The mayor snickered at the idea.
To the north, Gilmore’s Quick Stop Grocery was open. Fred’s wife swept the front walk like every morning. Glenn’s Hardware Store was closed. Probably wouldn’t open until after he got back from Cleardale, if then. And beyond that, John Turner’s apartment building stood out. Only four apartments, but the building front was brick. It looked out of place, being new and all. Made the rest of the buildings look even older than they were.
Except for Absalom’s Tavern across the street, of course. Nothing could make it look any older than it already did with its faded Griesedieck Beer sign and its eroding stone walls.
Some wanted to publicize the fact that it was the first tavern built in Cleardale County, but Hester DeWitt, president of the historical society, forbid it. Said it made Fork look bad enough by just being there.
“Should be demolished,” she insisted.
She hinted she wouldn’t mind if the sagging building next to the tavern that housed Millie Pruitt’s Knickknack Shop also was torn down.
“Imagine a young woman like that opening a shop right next to that horrid tavern,” she often told her husband.
People thought Turner was nuts, building an apartment building in Fork. But all four of the apartments were rented. Brought three new people into town from Cleardale because of the low rent. Rosemary Allen lived in the fourth.
The mayor could remember when all the stores were open, the town was bustling, sort of. It never had been much, but at least it was more then.
“Is Buford scared because he has to testify?” Lard Herman asked as he came out of the diner picking his teeth.
“Claims he ain’t," the mayor said.
A small crowd formed in front of the diner beside the mayor’s ten-year-old Chrysler. Faded white letters spelled out “loading zone” on the sidewalk.
Lard leaned against the Chrysler as he continued to explore his teeth. The mayor wiped an imaginary smudge from the front fender and announced he was going to pick up Margaret and head for Cleardale.
“Damn fools,” the mayor snorted an hour later as he drove on County Road 24R a few miles short of Cleardale. He leaned back and watched orderly fields of corn and soybeans drift by. The road had once been marked by farm houses and barnyards but now only a few remained. A corporation, Pork Products Incorporated, had bought up much of the land. He wrinkled his nose and was thankful the huge hog farm was nearer Cleardale than Fork. The folks in Cleardale had fought the project for years, but in the end the corporation won. Now it raised thousands of pigs and harvested corn and beans from the rest of the land.
Cars whizzed by. Many of them honked like berserk geese as they passed.
“Now, now, Ollie,” Margaret said. “Don’t let them upset you. You’re the mayor, you must maintain your dignity. Sit up and watch the road.”
She turned the rearview mirror and adjusted her hat.
The parking lot behind Cleardale County Court House, half taken up by spaces reserved for county officials, was full. Ollie swore under his breath so Margaret wouldn’t hear. He backed out of the lot and parked a block away in the first empty street space he found.
He admired the clean sidewalk and the prosperous looking stores as he and Margaret walked back. Gregory Lancaster stood in front of the building smoking a bit of twisted cigar. Margaret walked around him as if he were a separate building.
“Seats all taken, I suppose,” the mayor said.
“Nope. Not all. They saved a couple in the front row for you and Margaret,” Gregory said.
They entered the one-hundred-year-old limestone building and trudged up wide, worn steps to the second floor. They leaned against the wall at the top to catch their breath before entering a large room where tall windows provided a view of the parking lot. Many of the folding chairs from the stack against the far wall were scattered about the room with bodies parked on them.
The mayor and Margaret made their way to the front and thanked Buford DeWitt who had put a coat on one chair and a camera on another. Buford, a small man with tiny hands and a bit of a mustache, said, “Saved ‘em for ya.”
“Thanks, Buford.”
Buford’s wife, Hester, sitting straight as a rake handle, nodded to the mayor and his wife.
“Damn fools,” Buford whispered, when those behind repeated complaints about Hester’s hat. She removing hat pins and whispered, “What’s there to see, I’d like to know.” She removed the hat and placed it on her lap. The imitation grapes, attached to the left side, tried to escape.
A large desk dominated the front of the room. A wooden chair sat beside it. The conversational buzz quieted as a bald man wearing rimless glasses and a gray pin-stripped suit entered the room. A manila folder was tucked under his arm. He settled onto the chair behind the desk. He squinted at the faces before him. He removed a white cloth from a drawer and dusted the top of the desk. From the same drawer he produced a large gavel and placed it near his right hand. He looked out at the crowd.
“Quiet, quiet.”
A hush settled over the room.
“I’m Judge Homer Hopping. Now if you people don’t be quiet I’ll have you removed. By gum, we’re going to have order. Hear me? Where is Mister Buford?”
Buford DeWitt stood and said, “Here, your honor.”
“Well, you git up here and sit. We’ll hear from you first.”
Buford wiggled in the chair beside the judge.
“You comfortable yet?” the judge asked as he glared at Buford.
“Now I understand, Mister Buford, that you are alleging that this other fellow assaulted you and your wife.”
“My last name is DeWitt. Buford DeWitt. That is correct, your honor.”
Buford looked at his wife. Hester nodded her approval.
“Tell me what this thing is all about,” the judge said.
Buford hemmed a little, hawed a little, and, after getting a stern look from Hester, said, “Well, your honor, he knocked me down. In a snow drift. When I tried to get up he knocked me down again. Then he knocked my wife down. Into the snow drift.”
The judge studied papers from the folder, looked up and said, “Mister, what is it, Owens, Daniel Owens, what about that? Owens, you here?”
Daniel Owens rose from the middle of the crowd and said, “Here.”
Daniel, in his usual denim jeans, jacket and scuffed boots, strode to in front of the judge and said, “I didn’t knock him or Hester down. I shoved ‘em. They just fell into the snow bank. I shoved Buford back down when he tried to get up. Was tired of him swinging at me. Hester socked me with her purse.”
“How tall are you, Mister Owens?”
“About six two I guess,” Daniel said.
“How tall is Mister Buford?”
“Don’t know.”
“Well,” the judge said, “He’s not much more than five feet, I’d guess. As I understand it, this happened in Mister Buford’s driveway. Is that correct?”
“Mister DeWitt’s driveway, yes,” Daniel said.
“What were you doing there?”
“Plowin’ snow into DeWitt’s drive.”
“Why were you doing that?”
Daniel pushed long, dark strands of unruly dark hair from his forehead.
“It’s a long story,” he said.
The judge picked up the gavel by the heavy end, pointed it at Daniel and said, “I don’t care how long it is, I want to know the reason why you were blocking Mister Buford’s drive. That is what you were doing, isn’t it?”
“His last name is DeWitt. He’s one of our councilmen.”
“Fork has councilmen?”
“Yes, three.”
“So?”
Daniel put his thumbs in the back pockets of his jeans. He pushed his right boot around on the floor as if he were moving dirt.
“We elected ‘em several years ago. Ollie’s the mayor, Buford is the street commissioner, and Gregory collects the garbage.”
“Yes, yes, go on.”
Dan scuffed the floor with his right boot again.
“Well, ya see, we had this snow storm last February. Buford rents John Turner’s truck, the one with the plow attachment, and plows our streets. That’s his job. Gets paid fifty dollars when he has to plow. Plows every chance he gets. First time he ever had to work for the money.”
The judge stood, shook his left leg, sat down again, and said, “Get to the point.”
“Buford plows his own street, College Street, first,” Daniel said.
“College Street? Does Fork have a college?”
“Gosh no. That’s just the street’s name.”
“So?”
“Buford plowed his own street first, comes back and clears the plowed snow from his driveway entrance and then goes about the rest of the town plowin’ streets and blockin’ everyone else’s driveway.”
Buford stood from his seat beside the judge and said, “I can explain that, your honor.”
“Explain it,” the judge said.
“No way could I plow all the streets if I’da stopped to clear every driveway. I cleared mine because Hester, well she said I had to because of the historical society meeting.”
“The complaint says you pushed four feet of snow into Mister Buford’s drive. Is that correct, Mister Owens?”
“Correct, your honor,” Buford DeWitt said.
“I was asking Mister Owens”
“Correct, your honor,” Daniel said, mimicking Buford.
“This is dumb. I’ve got several other hearings scheduled this morning. How did you do it?”
“Do what?”
“Push four feet of snow onto this fellow, Buford’s driveway, what else?”
“I used the same plow he used,” Daniel Owens said.
“Mister, what is it?” The judge shuffled the papers in front of him and added, “Mister Turner’s truck and plow, is that it?”
“Yes, your honor.”
The judge shook his head, glared at Buford DeWitt, then Daniel Owens and said, “You're fined five dollars, Mister Owens. It’s because of nonsense like this that I haven’t played golf in a week."