currently loaded with coliforms, bacteria that thrive on human waste—but the silt and water traces found on Mitchell were not. That left a three- mile stretch of river where the murder could have occurred and I’d be able to cover it pretty quickly thanks to Slim’s canoe.
I was in a hurry because I knew the SBI wouldn’t take long to figure it out and I wanted to get there first. They’d never let me near the spot once it had been staked off. On foot, it would have taken days. I was hoping that the rustlings I heard in the woods as I passed were SBI men hoofing it and not some mad river stalker who had done Mitchell in and was waiting for the next victim.
There was no one along the river at that time of day. It was too hot for both the fish and the fishermen. I checked first one bank of the river, then double-backed against the slow current to check the other. I was looking for a spot easily accessible to the public by car, but probably on private land or in an obscure area. Whoever had killed Thornton along the Neuse must have gotten him there willingly. He was a big man. No one would bother to kill him somewhere else, then drag him to the Neuse before carting him across the county to Mary Lee’s. He must have had a meeting with someone he knew, someone who didn’t want to take the remotest chance of being seen with him for personal—or political—reasons. Or both.
Some of the more popular parking spots along the Neuse were out as the murder spot, since night time was prime time for teenagers suffering from hormonal overload and no one in their right mind who wanted to be alone would expect privacy in those areas. No, it had to have been a less public spot, probably south of the U.S. 1 bridge.
I found what I was looking for two miles and almost three hours further downstream. I was sunburned and my arms were starting to ache from fighting the current on my doubling-back segments. I’m no lightweight when it comes to upper-body strength, but I’m no Arnold Schwarzenegger either. By the time I spotted a series of old campfires, deserted in the afternoon sun, I knew I was getting close. It was a remote fishing area, the charred campfire remains left behind by catfish seekers who sometimes squatted along the banks all night long, determined to haul in both breakfast and the next day’s dinner by morning.
The people who fished this stretch of the Neuse weren’t using fancy fly rods and they weren’t doing it for the fun—they were sustenance fishermen who kept every fish, no matter how small, because they had nothing else to eat. They were often old farmers whose land had given out or been polluted beyond use by nearby industrial areas. Or, more and more these days, Mexican immigrants who had dropped off the migrant worker circuit and made Raleigh their permanent home. They’d sneak down onto private land around dusk where the pickings were good and had forged quite a few illicit paths along the river. I pulled the canoe over and beached it, so I could explore the stretch better on foot. Footprints and the usual mess humans left behind dotted the shore: flattened fast food cups, clear plastic doughnut wrappers, Styrofoam that would last until the end of time, and a million or more cigarette butts. God, but people were worse than pigs. At least pigs ate garbage instead of simply making it.
There were several trails leading from the shore’s edge up into the surrounding woods, most winding over gnarled tree roots exposed by erosion, before turning into narrow lanes that criss-crossed the forest floor and fed into a wider dirt road about a quarter mile back from the shore. I was looking for a fairly big side lane, however, one wide enough to accommodate a car that had pulled off the main dirt road. Mitchell must have driven his own car and I knew he’d be the type to have a land yacht. I found one likely road, but there was no evidence of hanky panky along it.
About a hundred yards further downstream, I had
I was in a hurry because I knew the SBI wouldn’t take long to figure it out and I wanted to get there first. They’d never let me near the spot once it had been staked off. On foot, it would have taken days. I was hoping that the rustlings I heard in the woods as I passed were SBI men hoofing it and not some mad river stalker who had done Mitchell in and was waiting for the next victim.
There was no one along the river at that time of day. It was too hot for both the fish and the fishermen. I checked first one bank of the river, then double-backed against the slow current to check the other. I was looking for a spot easily accessible to the public by car, but probably on private land or in an obscure area. Whoever had killed Thornton along the Neuse must have gotten him there willingly. He was a big man. No one would bother to kill him somewhere else, then drag him to the Neuse before carting him across the county to Mary Lee’s. He must have had a meeting with someone he knew, someone who didn’t want to take the remotest chance of being seen with him for personal—or political—reasons. Or both.
Some of the more popular parking spots along the Neuse were out as the murder spot, since night time was prime time for teenagers suffering from hormonal overload and no one in their right mind who wanted to be alone would expect privacy in those areas. No, it had to have been a less public spot, probably south of the U.S. 1 bridge.
I found what I was looking for two miles and almost three hours further downstream. I was sunburned and my arms were starting to ache from fighting the current on my doubling-back segments. I’m no lightweight when it comes to upper-body strength, but I’m no Arnold Schwarzenegger either. By the time I spotted a series of old campfires, deserted in the afternoon sun, I knew I was getting close. It was a remote fishing area, the charred campfire remains left behind by catfish seekers who sometimes squatted along the banks all night long, determined to haul in both breakfast and the next day’s dinner by morning.
The people who fished this stretch of the Neuse weren’t using fancy fly rods and they weren’t doing it for the fun—they were sustenance fishermen who kept every fish, no matter how small, because they had nothing else to eat. They were often old farmers whose land had given out or been polluted beyond use by nearby industrial areas. Or, more and more these days, Mexican immigrants who had dropped off the migrant worker circuit and made Raleigh their permanent home. They’d sneak down onto private land around dusk where the pickings were good and had forged quite a few illicit paths along the river. I pulled the canoe over and beached it, so I could explore the stretch better on foot. Footprints and the usual mess humans left behind dotted the shore: flattened fast food cups, clear plastic doughnut wrappers, Styrofoam that would last until the end of time, and a million or more cigarette butts. God, but people were worse than pigs. At least pigs ate garbage instead of simply making it.
There were several trails leading from the shore’s edge up into the surrounding woods, most winding over gnarled tree roots exposed by erosion, before turning into narrow lanes that criss-crossed the forest floor and fed into a wider dirt road about a quarter mile back from the shore. I was looking for a fairly big side lane, however, one wide enough to accommodate a car that had pulled off the main dirt road. Mitchell must have driven his own car and I knew he’d be the type to have a land yacht. I found one likely road, but there was no evidence of hanky panky along it.
About a hundred yards further downstream, I had
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