Murder in Gettysburg
Since most of my family has begun writing mystery short stories, I've written one myself. You can check out my bro's mystery story on his blog, Midnight Eyes. Anyway, this is my mystery story, hope y'all like it.
Murder in Gettysburg
It was a wet night on 21st street, as Mr. Lockheart laid down for a good night’s sleep. It was almost 12 o’clock, and all of the people in Gettysburg were tucked in, getting what they deserved after a long, tiring day. It had been raining for a couple of hours, a hard rain, but not enough to flood a small town like Gettysburg. William lived alone, and lived somewhat of a hermit life, having a neighborhood, yet no friends, and no primary career. He lived mostly off welfare checks, and off small payments of giving blood and plasma. He worked at McDonald’s, but got paid below minimum wage. He never really knew his purpose in life, except to succeed in something, which after 42 years of life he still hasn’t done. Before he went to sleep, he would always think to himself “tomorrow is a new day. Tomorrow will be a fresh start. Tomorrow I will wake up, and succeed in something.” But his hopes were down that night, after the long rain, the cold night, and the 3 hours of watching re-runs of American Idol on his 10-inch T.V. He felt like nothing special would ever come to him, nothing to give him a boost so that he would feel confident in “succeeding”. If his luck couldn’t get any worse, a knock sounded at his front door. “Probably some Mormon group trying to get me to convert”, he thought. He got up out of his bed, rustling through candy wrappers and pizza boxes to get to the door. He slowly opened it, only to find a large man in black with a gun. Those were the last few seconds of his life.
“The murderer, of about 20-30 years old, made his way from the center of town, to this small neighborhood, careful not to step on any blades of grass, or to disturb anything that would end up looking strange. He walked on the sidewalk, and made his way to the front doorstep of Mr. Lockheart’s small house. He knocked on the door. Mr. Lockheart opened the door. A bullet was fired directly in the center of chest, killing poor William. The motive, I have no clue. The murderers identity, I haven’t any idea.”
“Sir, the story works out perfectly! The murderer’s motive was because he knew William from some other place. William must have annoyed him in some way, annoyed him into committing homicide. The murderer chooses a rainy day, to avoid any evidence of footprints or anything. And! William being a lonely man, this must have been someone he knew. But whom does William know?? The only people in contact with William are the people from McDonald’s.”
Looking at the scene, it was a total mess. The door was split in half, the windows broken; the body laid out on the roof. Everything breakable in that house was broken.
Everything was perfect in Detective McCormik’s mind, except one thing. How did no one see or hear the murder? The house is totally destroyed, which must have made a large amount of noise! Yet, even with houses only 5 or 6 yards away, no one noticed anything at all!
The Detective was an old man, one you could call a wise man. Quiet, elderly, yet respectable. He was one of those people you liked because you thought he always knew what was going on. He kept most information to himself. He was a good detective, which is especially strange, finding him in a small “useless” (you can say) town like Gettysburg. A cigar was always sticking out of his mouth, unless he took it out to yell at his assistant Peppy. You could say he was a hairy man, having a large brown beard, and an abundance of hair sticking out of his detective’s hat. You could say he was the stereotypical detective, yet he had one defining feature: He was missing a finger, on his left hand.
Slurping noises came out of the mouth of his assistant Peppy, who was loudly chewing gum and taking notes at the same time. Peppy claimed it helped him at the crime scene.
“Shut it Peppy”, yelled McCormik. “I’m trying to concentrate”.
Peppy gave him a bad look, and went back to the police car for some breakfast. Looking at some notes about William, the Detective noticed a couple of things. Peppy could have been right. The man William was a lonely man, meaning, who would have the motive to kill him, because no one really actually knew him. Also, looking at the history of Gettysburg, there hasn’t been crime in 2 years. In a small Kansas town like this, there isn’t much going on. No organized crime, no enemies or clubs. So who would kill a man like this? As far as McCormik was concerned, Mr. Lockheart was no bad man, and didn’t really do anything to deserve what had happened to him.
“Let’s see”, said the Detective, looking at more notes about the town. The Dectective wasn’t from Gettysburg, he was part of the Lawrence Police Department, and was called for this case, considering he was the best detective in Kansas, and because he was very nearby. He looked at the notes, and found that the population was merely 578 people, or, now 577. He also found that last night was the first rain since July, a couple of months before. So, his assistant seemed to be right. Someone he knew from McDonalds, and someone who chose to kill him on a rainy day to avoid complications with evidence.
Another question arose to Detective McCormik’s mind. Why isn’t the press here yet? Yes, it is a small town, but it was almost noon, and this being the first murder in two years, why would no press show up at all?
Peppy walked up, small donut crumbs spilling out of his mouth.
“So, sir. Have, uh, have you found out who killed the guy?”
“No, I have a couple of questions, things that don’t make sense, but I shouldn’t bother because I know you’re too stupid to answer any of em’.
“Yeah very funny boss. Try me.”
“Well, first of all, it was a loud murder. And obviously no one heard anything because there haven’t been any calls to the Gettysburg police yet. Also, who would kill this man, and what would be their motive. Why wouldn’t they use their own police department instead of ours, and why haven’t the press showed up at all.
“Ok, I got answers to all of those questions boss. It’s a Friday night, people are tired, and they want to get their good night’s sleep. So no one wakes up to loud noises, they’re fast asleep. The second question, I’ve already answered, some dude from McDonalds that’s pissed at William because of a raw burger or something”-
“Yeah but that doesn’t make any sense Peppy! If it’s a raw burger that the guy is willing to kill some about, than the guy obviously isn’t a trained murderer! He’s some guy who has a bad temper and gets pissed real easy at a raw burger! He’s no trained murderer, or he wouldn’t be in Gettysburg. And another thing, this murder was so perfect, so it must have been a trained murderer of some kind which it wasn’t!”
A crowd of people started forming on the un-mowed grass. Peppy put in another piece of gum, and started getting people to move away from the crime scene. Then, finally, the Channel 3 News showed up. They started taking pictures and had a report on it, but Detective McCormik was expecting them to have an interview. There was none. The press was there for an hour, yet no interview took place with the Detective. The press left, and more and more people started crowding around.
The detective took out his notepad, and started taking some notes. He knew one thing; the murderer is often in the crowd of people that are examining the crime scene, to avoid suspicion that they were the murderer. He walked in front of each one of them, and looked them straight in the eyes. One thing was very strange that he noticed. Every one of them avoided eye contact. Using more psychology, if two people are suspects, often the culprit avoids eye contact of the person examining them. Who knows? Maybe this was a strange town that did things much different than the usual cases of what he dealt with.
McCormik scribbled down some more notes as he made his way towards Peppy, who was in the back seat of the cop car reading The Da Vinci Code, still chewing the same piece of gum.
“OK Peppy, I got some news for ya. Some person claimed they saw a person in all black walking down the street at about 11:45. This must’ve been the murderer, because everything works out perfectly that it was he.
“Yeah boss, ok, but how does that help us…?”
“Ummm, it doesn’t really help us actually, just the fact now that we know it was 1 person, and not more than 1.”
“I don’t know what to tell ya boss, except that I’m at the part of Da Vinci Code where they kill that one guy, so I really want to get back to my story.”
And then, a thought came into Detective McCormik’s mind. It seemed strange the first time he thought of it, but now that he thinks about it, it works out perfectly.
“Peppy! I got it! I know who the murderer was!
“Who??”
“It must have been the whole entire-“
Then a person in the crowd screamed in their loudest voice “STOP!” The detective turned around to see what was going on. A Black car with tinted windows pulled out of the driveway next to the house they were investigating, and went full speed to the highway. All thoughts changed in McCormik’s mind, from one thing to the other, as he jumped into his vehicle, quickly turning the keys, and sped off to chase the car. He was shaking, for he had never really been in a high-speed chase before, he was just a detective.
“Peppy, I want you to call for back-up, this is a fast one, and I don’t think we will be able to catch after him.”
Peppy threw the novel to the ground and quickly called the Gettysburg police.
“We have a high speed chase on highway 51! We need backup. The car is making its way north to Lawrence, and I don’t think we will be able to catch him going north! We need more cars! It’s a small black car with tinted windows, I think it’s a Honda Accord but we’re too far away to see. I can barely catch the license plate number, but I think it is I76-4976.”
There was no response. For about 10 minutes the chase continued, and no backup came. And then, McCormik turned around. He knew what was happening. He was being led off to somewhere else, to buy time for the murderers. Yet it wasn’t just 2, or 3 murderers, it was 577. 577 people that all hated 1 person. All coming up with what they thought was a flawless plan to kill 1 innocent man. The reason? Who knows? Maybe to get some action in a boring town like they were in. But, as the Detective and his assistant arrived back into the horrible town of Gettysburg, they found no one. They found that every one of those 577 murderers had evacuated the small, dry, and flat town. And had done it all to take away someone’s life. Everything made sense at that moment. Why no one woke up, they knew it was happening. Why the press had taken time to show up, it’s because they knew it had happened. Yes he had solved the murder case, yet how was he to arrest 577 murderers, when he didn’t know their whereabouts?
Murder in Gettysburg
It was a wet night on 21st street, as Mr. Lockheart laid down for a good night’s sleep. It was almost 12 o’clock, and all of the people in Gettysburg were tucked in, getting what they deserved after a long, tiring day. It had been raining for a couple of hours, a hard rain, but not enough to flood a small town like Gettysburg. William lived alone, and lived somewhat of a hermit life, having a neighborhood, yet no friends, and no primary career. He lived mostly off welfare checks, and off small payments of giving blood and plasma. He worked at McDonald’s, but got paid below minimum wage. He never really knew his purpose in life, except to succeed in something, which after 42 years of life he still hasn’t done. Before he went to sleep, he would always think to himself “tomorrow is a new day. Tomorrow will be a fresh start. Tomorrow I will wake up, and succeed in something.” But his hopes were down that night, after the long rain, the cold night, and the 3 hours of watching re-runs of American Idol on his 10-inch T.V. He felt like nothing special would ever come to him, nothing to give him a boost so that he would feel confident in “succeeding”. If his luck couldn’t get any worse, a knock sounded at his front door. “Probably some Mormon group trying to get me to convert”, he thought. He got up out of his bed, rustling through candy wrappers and pizza boxes to get to the door. He slowly opened it, only to find a large man in black with a gun. Those were the last few seconds of his life.
“The murderer, of about 20-30 years old, made his way from the center of town, to this small neighborhood, careful not to step on any blades of grass, or to disturb anything that would end up looking strange. He walked on the sidewalk, and made his way to the front doorstep of Mr. Lockheart’s small house. He knocked on the door. Mr. Lockheart opened the door. A bullet was fired directly in the center of chest, killing poor William. The motive, I have no clue. The murderers identity, I haven’t any idea.”
“Sir, the story works out perfectly! The murderer’s motive was because he knew William from some other place. William must have annoyed him in some way, annoyed him into committing homicide. The murderer chooses a rainy day, to avoid any evidence of footprints or anything. And! William being a lonely man, this must have been someone he knew. But whom does William know?? The only people in contact with William are the people from McDonald’s.”
Looking at the scene, it was a total mess. The door was split in half, the windows broken; the body laid out on the roof. Everything breakable in that house was broken.
Everything was perfect in Detective McCormik’s mind, except one thing. How did no one see or hear the murder? The house is totally destroyed, which must have made a large amount of noise! Yet, even with houses only 5 or 6 yards away, no one noticed anything at all!
The Detective was an old man, one you could call a wise man. Quiet, elderly, yet respectable. He was one of those people you liked because you thought he always knew what was going on. He kept most information to himself. He was a good detective, which is especially strange, finding him in a small “useless” (you can say) town like Gettysburg. A cigar was always sticking out of his mouth, unless he took it out to yell at his assistant Peppy. You could say he was a hairy man, having a large brown beard, and an abundance of hair sticking out of his detective’s hat. You could say he was the stereotypical detective, yet he had one defining feature: He was missing a finger, on his left hand.
Slurping noises came out of the mouth of his assistant Peppy, who was loudly chewing gum and taking notes at the same time. Peppy claimed it helped him at the crime scene.
“Shut it Peppy”, yelled McCormik. “I’m trying to concentrate”.
Peppy gave him a bad look, and went back to the police car for some breakfast. Looking at some notes about William, the Detective noticed a couple of things. Peppy could have been right. The man William was a lonely man, meaning, who would have the motive to kill him, because no one really actually knew him. Also, looking at the history of Gettysburg, there hasn’t been crime in 2 years. In a small Kansas town like this, there isn’t much going on. No organized crime, no enemies or clubs. So who would kill a man like this? As far as McCormik was concerned, Mr. Lockheart was no bad man, and didn’t really do anything to deserve what had happened to him.
“Let’s see”, said the Detective, looking at more notes about the town. The Dectective wasn’t from Gettysburg, he was part of the Lawrence Police Department, and was called for this case, considering he was the best detective in Kansas, and because he was very nearby. He looked at the notes, and found that the population was merely 578 people, or, now 577. He also found that last night was the first rain since July, a couple of months before. So, his assistant seemed to be right. Someone he knew from McDonalds, and someone who chose to kill him on a rainy day to avoid complications with evidence.
Another question arose to Detective McCormik’s mind. Why isn’t the press here yet? Yes, it is a small town, but it was almost noon, and this being the first murder in two years, why would no press show up at all?
Peppy walked up, small donut crumbs spilling out of his mouth.
“So, sir. Have, uh, have you found out who killed the guy?”
“No, I have a couple of questions, things that don’t make sense, but I shouldn’t bother because I know you’re too stupid to answer any of em’.
“Yeah very funny boss. Try me.”
“Well, first of all, it was a loud murder. And obviously no one heard anything because there haven’t been any calls to the Gettysburg police yet. Also, who would kill this man, and what would be their motive. Why wouldn’t they use their own police department instead of ours, and why haven’t the press showed up at all.
“Ok, I got answers to all of those questions boss. It’s a Friday night, people are tired, and they want to get their good night’s sleep. So no one wakes up to loud noises, they’re fast asleep. The second question, I’ve already answered, some dude from McDonalds that’s pissed at William because of a raw burger or something”-
“Yeah but that doesn’t make any sense Peppy! If it’s a raw burger that the guy is willing to kill some about, than the guy obviously isn’t a trained murderer! He’s some guy who has a bad temper and gets pissed real easy at a raw burger! He’s no trained murderer, or he wouldn’t be in Gettysburg. And another thing, this murder was so perfect, so it must have been a trained murderer of some kind which it wasn’t!”
A crowd of people started forming on the un-mowed grass. Peppy put in another piece of gum, and started getting people to move away from the crime scene. Then, finally, the Channel 3 News showed up. They started taking pictures and had a report on it, but Detective McCormik was expecting them to have an interview. There was none. The press was there for an hour, yet no interview took place with the Detective. The press left, and more and more people started crowding around.
The detective took out his notepad, and started taking some notes. He knew one thing; the murderer is often in the crowd of people that are examining the crime scene, to avoid suspicion that they were the murderer. He walked in front of each one of them, and looked them straight in the eyes. One thing was very strange that he noticed. Every one of them avoided eye contact. Using more psychology, if two people are suspects, often the culprit avoids eye contact of the person examining them. Who knows? Maybe this was a strange town that did things much different than the usual cases of what he dealt with.
McCormik scribbled down some more notes as he made his way towards Peppy, who was in the back seat of the cop car reading The Da Vinci Code, still chewing the same piece of gum.
“OK Peppy, I got some news for ya. Some person claimed they saw a person in all black walking down the street at about 11:45. This must’ve been the murderer, because everything works out perfectly that it was he.
“Yeah boss, ok, but how does that help us…?”
“Ummm, it doesn’t really help us actually, just the fact now that we know it was 1 person, and not more than 1.”
“I don’t know what to tell ya boss, except that I’m at the part of Da Vinci Code where they kill that one guy, so I really want to get back to my story.”
And then, a thought came into Detective McCormik’s mind. It seemed strange the first time he thought of it, but now that he thinks about it, it works out perfectly.
“Peppy! I got it! I know who the murderer was!
“Who??”
“It must have been the whole entire-“
Then a person in the crowd screamed in their loudest voice “STOP!” The detective turned around to see what was going on. A Black car with tinted windows pulled out of the driveway next to the house they were investigating, and went full speed to the highway. All thoughts changed in McCormik’s mind, from one thing to the other, as he jumped into his vehicle, quickly turning the keys, and sped off to chase the car. He was shaking, for he had never really been in a high-speed chase before, he was just a detective.
“Peppy, I want you to call for back-up, this is a fast one, and I don’t think we will be able to catch after him.”
Peppy threw the novel to the ground and quickly called the Gettysburg police.
“We have a high speed chase on highway 51! We need backup. The car is making its way north to Lawrence, and I don’t think we will be able to catch him going north! We need more cars! It’s a small black car with tinted windows, I think it’s a Honda Accord but we’re too far away to see. I can barely catch the license plate number, but I think it is I76-4976.”
There was no response. For about 10 minutes the chase continued, and no backup came. And then, McCormik turned around. He knew what was happening. He was being led off to somewhere else, to buy time for the murderers. Yet it wasn’t just 2, or 3 murderers, it was 577. 577 people that all hated 1 person. All coming up with what they thought was a flawless plan to kill 1 innocent man. The reason? Who knows? Maybe to get some action in a boring town like they were in. But, as the Detective and his assistant arrived back into the horrible town of Gettysburg, they found no one. They found that every one of those 577 murderers had evacuated the small, dry, and flat town. And had done it all to take away someone’s life. Everything made sense at that moment. Why no one woke up, they knew it was happening. Why the press had taken time to show up, it’s because they knew it had happened. Yes he had solved the murder case, yet how was he to arrest 577 murderers, when he didn’t know their whereabouts?
Comments
You certainly take your time, don't you. Haha! Well, well. Very good. I should like to have been in on it. Perhaps murderer #1. The guy who got away. Yah, shee!
Ever,
CF