Copyright 2024 Kenneth Lane Smith
Some Things Never Change
Small towns have a very different take on the news of the day with a thirst for always wanting to know what their neighbors are up to. Who's doing what to who, who’s in trouble with who and who’s got the latest gossip.
Case in point, the day that both of the town’s only police cars arrived at 127 Queen Street and proceeded to wrap a yellow “POLICE” tape around the entire building. This had the potential of major news of the highest order for the town’s self-appointed gossip merchant and official tongue wagger, Martha Wilberson.
Upon seeing the police activity across the street from her porch, the rumor mill was fired up well before she had any actual information to share within minutes. No information? Why should that stop her?
Telephone lines were burning up with the events of the morning. In this town of fewer than 200 people, Martha was the first to grab onto, what city folks call a scoop!
“Diane, did you hear about the two police cruisers in front of the McMurphy house and the yellow police tape wrapped around the building?”
No, was Diane’s answer. “I don’t know what’s going on, but I’ll find out soon enough!”
Diane added, "I don’t know about that Michael McMurphy fella. He seems a bit strange to me. Betty Mitchell’s boy, Tommy, delivers his milk everyday, but the funny thing is, he never comes to the door when Tommy has to collect from him on Saturdays. He just leaves the money on his veranda.”
Martha had to add that she’d heard the same thing from the man who delivers his bread and eggs. “Why would he never come to the door?” Then she added, “Mr. McMurphy has lived in that house for 10 years and I’ve never laid eyes on him once in all that time. He never goes out, even for groceries. He gets everything delivered and left on the front porch and doesn't bring them into the house until the middle of the night!.”
Diane jumped in with, “Come to think of it, I’ve never seen his wife in all those years either, have you?”
Without answering, Martha abruptly stopped the conversation and said, “I have to go now, there’s something going on across the street. A plumber’s truck is parked outside and the driver just walked out from the house. I’ll call you back.”
Standing, looking out the front window after pulling the curtains back for a better look, she could see the plumber talking to the two police officers with a lot of hand gestures back and forth between them.
The phone rang and it was Betty from the next block over. “What’s going on? Diane said there’s a lot of police activity at the McMurphy house.”
Martha replied, “Yes there’s something going on all right. I have a feeling Mr. McMurphy is in some kind of trouble with the police and it has something to do with the plumbing company. I’m going to go over and find out what’s going on and get back to you.”
Across the street she goes and demands to know what’s going on. The officer tells her, “Ma’am, this is a police matter, please return to your house.”
Martha crossed the street to her own house and immediately picked up the phone and dialed, “Betty, the police said, Mr. McMurphy is being investigated for something that looks very serious! Diane thinks that it might have something to do with McMurphy’s wife who has been missing for years!”
Betty replied, “You’re right, no one has seen her in years. I’ll bet he’s killed her, but why is the plumber there?”
Martha shot back, “Maybe he chopped her up in little pieces and tried to flush her down the drain and it got plugged up! I’ll bet that’s it!”
Betty hung up the phone and immediately called Diane back. “Mr. McMurphy has killed his wife and tried to flush her down the toilet! What do you think about that?”
Diane replied, “Oh I knew he was a bad one. I’m going to call my nephew Tyler who is a radio operator for the police department and see what he’s heard. I’ll call you right back!”
Moments later with Tyler on the line he said, “Aunt Diane, You know I can’t share any confidential police information, right?”
Diane replied, “Okay, okay, I just thought you might know something about a murderer living across the street from Martha.”
Tyler continued, “As far as I know, no one has been killed. Now why don’t you and your friends just relax. I’m sure you’re worried about nothing.”
After hanging up the phone it rang again, and it was Martha calling in a panic! “Diane, the plumber and one of the policemen just walked out of the house holding a burlap sack with something in it, and someone from the county forensics department just pulled up and is looking inside the burlap sack! Oh my God, Betty is right! He’s killed his wife!”
The local gossip group was now burning up the telephone lines with phone calls coming and going to everyone they knew in town spreading the news like wildfire about how Mr. McMurphy killed his wife and chopped her up into tiny bits!
It didn’t take long for a crowd to gather outside of the McMurphy home. Even Bob Bentley from the radio news department rolled up and started asking those in the crowd for details about what they heard and saw, and they were all more than happy to oblige with their thoughts on Mr. McMurphy even though no one had even seen him in years.
Once the live reports started to be broadcast on the town’s local station, panic was taking over the town. News about a killer in their midst was something that big city folks were used to, but not here in this little town! Talk of the event soon turned to what are the good townspeople going to do about it?
Chants of “Killer and Murderer” were becoming louder from the crowd. The mood was getting really nasty.
Then the police officers came out the front and, with one officer on each of his arms, they walked Mr. McMurphy out the door and placed him into one of the police cars.
The chants were getting louder and meaner as the police car drove away, leaving the other officer at the scene to talk to the crowd.
“Ladies and gentlemen, there’s nothing to see here, please return to your homes.”
All that did was invite a barrage of questions from the crowd, “Did you find Mrs. McMurphy’s body in there? Will he be charged with murder? Will he get the death the penalty. Will it be by hanging, or the gas chamber?”
The police officer tried to calm the crowd down and answered their questions, “There was no body found in there. He will not be charged with murder because Mr. McMurphy didn’t kill anyone.”
These answers generated even more questions, “ If he didn’t kill Mrs. McMurphy, where is she?
The officer replied, “Unfortunately Mrs. McMurphy suffered a major stroke years ago and passed away in the hospital late one night.”
Another one in the crowd yelled out, “Well if he didn’t kill her, what did you find in the house that you brought out in the burlap sack? And why was the forensic department here?”
“The plumber called us because he had gone down into the crawl space below the house to fix a leaking water pipe, and he found a number of bones down there, which he thought might be human. The forensic department determined that the bones were not human and were actually cow bones that had been there for many years. I guess you folks are not aware that Mr. McMurphy’s home used to be the town’s butcher shop over 80 years ago and the owner of the shop would simply dispose of beef bones by throwing them down a hole in the floor into the crawl space below, and there they sat for all this time.
Still another question was yelled out to the officer, “Well if Mr. McMurphy didn’t kill his wife or anyone else, why has he not been seen out of his house for years and why did you arrest him and take him away in the police car?
The officer explained, “Mr. McMurphy was completely blinded from a boiling oil flash fire not too long after his wife died and because he had no family or help from visitors to assist him, he just finds his own way inside the home.”
“To be honest, the inside of his house is piled with years of garbage, and we felt it would be safer for him to be checked out by a doctor. We also arranged for a cleaner to come in and tidy the place up before he goes back home. And while I’m on the subject of no visitors, I would consider it a personal favor if some of you could find some time to check on him every now and then.”
“I’m putting this incident down to being a case of misunderstanding, but all this commotion could have easily been avoided if the people of this town would make it a point to look closer at any situation before leaping to conclusions.”
“Any one of you might be in the same helpless and lonely position as Mr. McMurphy someday and I don’t think you would want to be judged the same way as you’ve judged Mr. McMurphy. I’m not naming anyone in particular, but the rumor mill in this town is getting out of hand.”
With that said, all the townspeople began to disperse and walk home in small groups, chatting about the day’s events.
As their focus moved on from the McMurphy news of the day, Martha turned to Betty and could be heard to say, “Did you hear about Mrs. Watson over on Lincoln street? I heard she is getting ready to leave her husband because she found out he was getting rather fond of that new young waitress at the diner!”
Some things never change….
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Copyright 2024 Kenneth Lane Smith
All Rights Reserved
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