Manhunt. Volume 14, Number 1, February/March, 1966
The Anonymous Body
by Nancy A. Black
The suddenness of the blow sent me sprawling. I struggled in a swirling fog to keep my feet... then the world came down on me and I slipped into a bottomless pit.
It stood there, rising stark against the sky. The barn next to it was weathered and discolored by years of rain, snow, and wind beating against it. The silo itself was old and nearly as weathered as the barn, although there was some evidence of the red paint that must have once shone brightly upon its wooden staves.
I drove my new station wagon into the rutted driveway, feeling each bump and jolt with the anguish only an owner of a new car can feel. When I saw Clyde Jenkins, the county sheriff, waiting for me some of my annoyance at being called out here to this part of the county vanished. Clyde had greater problems than my resentment. Ever since he’d taken office a little over two months ago, after Tom Rinehart died suddenly of a heart attack, he’d had more trouble than Tom had encountered in twelve months. Clyde, a short, undersized man, was nearly dwarfed by the big western-cut hat the sheriffs in this state have taken to wearing. Following in the footsteps of a long line of big, bluff, stockily built sheriffs whose size alone had often been enough to quell a disturbance, Clyde had become the butt of some of the county’s worst ruffians, who wouldn’t hesitate to take a swing at a lawman they thought they could whip in a fight. Clyde’s brow was knitted now in a frown which he seemed to wear continuously these days.
As I left the wagon and walked toward him, Clyde beckoned me to follow him and trudged off toward the barn. I followed him, a little surprised at Clyde’s lack of a greeting. We walked through the barn, its musty odor and the layers of dust over everything proclaiming its long disuse. We stoped in front of the door to the silo and my eyes followed Clyde’s pointing finger. I looked, blinked, and then staggered backward as a wave of nausea gripped me. I’d seen death before but not quite like this. I backed hastily away from the door and looked at Clyde. The frown on his forehead had deepened and his eyes were very tired and very dull.
“She’s dead, isn’t she?” I asked foolishly, for one glance at the body lying at the bottom of the silo was enough to tell me that she was dead.
“She’s dead, all right,” Clyde answered.
“I’ll get my equipment,” I said. “I suppose you want it from all angles. The works.”
“From every angle you can think of. Close-ups, especially. Lot’s of them. This is murder.”
Clyde’s words, “This is murder,” hit me as I walked back to my station wagon for my equipment. Murder was something I hadn’t expected to encounter when I returned to my hometown after the Korean War bent on making my living as a photographer. Working as a small town photographer, I soon discovered, was not the way to acquire riches, especially if you were competing against two well-established old-timers. Hence my preoccupation with the photographic needs of the county offices, particularly the Sheriff’s office.
I found another man and Cal Lewis, Clyde’s favorite deputy, with Clyde when I returned to the silo. I had a nodding acquaintance with Clem Pitkin. While I set up my equipment I listened to Clem explain again to Clyde how he had found the body.
Clem, who owned the farm next to this one, had arranged with old Mrs. Banning to run part of his herd of cows into the barnyard for the coming winter. He’d also gotten permission to fill the silo. Mrs. Banning had been happy to let him do it since the farm had been vacant since her last tenant left over three years before. Clem and his son Jack had come over this morning to clean out the silo in preparation for filling it sometime the next week. Right away they’d found the body of a woman, covered over with some old straw that apparently had been carried from the barn floor and dumped on top of her.
I went to work, taking shots from every angle. I tried not to look at the woman too closely as I worked. She’d apparently been strangled and wasn’t a pretty sight to look at. But I couldn’t help noticing a few things about her. Her dress looked as though it was a new one and fairly expensive. But it didn’t go with the woman at all. It was gaudy, and much too young for her. Twenty years before she could have probably worn the dress and looked attractive in it, although in a cheap sort of way. Now she just looked hard and rundown. I put her somewhere in her forties, although it was hard to guess. Her hair was long and loose, and obviously dyed a reddish brown.
Once I looked up and found Cal Lewis looking intently at the dead woman. He had a funny look on his face. “Know her, Cal?” I asked.
“No,” he answered shortly. “I never really knew her.” He turned on one heel and strode off.
Cal was kind of strange at times, but most of the time he was easy to get along with and very easy to talk with. He was a bachelor and seemed quite contented with his singleness. Almost everyone in the county knew Cal and liked him. Maybe it was that slow Virginia drawl of his that set you to liking him as soon as he opened his mouth. Cal had drifted into town soon after the end of the war. Six months later he’d become one of Tom Rinehart’s deputies and had been on the force ever since. Cal came from Petersburg, Virginia, and could tell the story of the Civil War battles of that city better than any eye-witness could have done.
The coroner and his men came just as I was making my last exposure. I didn’t want to watch them take her out of there so I took off for town. Anyway I had a ten o’clock appointment to get back to and it was half-past nine then.
Much to my surprise I found my sometime fiancee waiting outside my studio when I returned. Anita Taggert is a tall, cool blonde with a lot of big ideas which I don’t quite measure up to. We were in high school together and like all kids that age I suppose we had more than our share of big ideas. Anita was bent on a career as a topflight fashion model and I was sure I was headed for a career as a magazine photographer along with such as Robert Capa, Werner Bischoff, and others.
Then Korea came along before we left high school. When we graduated Anita and I became engaged and then like a lot of other young kids we parted. I headed for Korea via the U.S. Army and the Signal School at Fort Monmouth where I learned to handle a camera the Army way. Anita headed for New York and her modeling career. I guess it must have been Korea that changed things for me; or maybe I never was cut out for the big dreams I’d wanted. But anyway somewhere along the way I lost my taste for my big ideas. When I came home and announced my intention to settle in the old hometown and concentrate on family portraits, Anita pleaded with me to change my mind. When I stood firm she promptly broke our engagement and took the next plane back to New York. She still dropped in to see me on the infrequent occasions when she made a visit home, hoping to change my mind, I’m sure, although she didn’t press the issue.
I couldn’t help feeling a little smug as I got out of my new station wagon. Anita was staring at the wagon as though she’d never seen one before.
“What did you do, Matt,” she asked. “Inherit some money from one of your grateful clients?”
I grinned at her. “Business has grown a bit since your last visit.”
“It must have.”
She turned away from the wagon and looked me over. I saw her disapproval when she looked at my clothing. Tramping around in a barn and a silo isn’t compatible with the wear of highly polished shoes and gray flannel suits. So, instead, I wore a pair of heavy work shoes and a suit of suntans with a leather jacket to cut the chill of early fall. I was certain it had been a long time since Anita had been this close to a man dressed as I was.