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  I finished another cup of coffee while the sweet smell of maple smoked bacon lingered. Joyce was a gem. She’d brought out a tray table, and a folding chair, setting them near the rocker. She dashed back into the cabin and returned carrying two luncheon plates filled with bacon, eggs, and grits, dimpled with a pat of butter.

  Duke required me to orchestrate behind the scenes while I kept my focus on the murder victim. I had to put Joyce in the driver’s seat. “Do you still want to talk with Minnie?”

  Joyce’s face reddened, and the tone of her voice dropped to a whisper as she responded, “Yes—I want to know if he’s hurting her.” Any semblance of a long lost love for Duke on Joyce’s part had vanished.

  “Do you want to talk to her today?”

  “How can we do that? Duke never leaves her alone.”

  “Sure he does. He said he was trucking today. We could take a sightseeing trip, mosey by, and see her on our travels. We could get in and out before he got home.”

  Joyce leaned forward; her eyes aglow. “Where did you learn to think like that?”

  “I’m not the warrior type, baby, I’m a reporter. Sneaky is the name of the game.”

  Joyce checked on her two young boys and made arrangements with her parents to cover for her while she was at Minnie’s. It was a calculated risk, but early enough in the day that we’d miss Duke entirely. If he showed, we’d play the hand that was dealt.

  A few minutes past ten we launched our mission. Joyce sat deep in the Avenger’s seat, noticeably in a sour mood. “Hey, what’s up with you?”

  “It’s not you, Walter. It’s me.”

  “It’s not you—it’s him.” Her jaws tightened as she nodded then looked out the window. Soon she slipped into a trance-like state. I focused on a more pressing issue. I didn’t want to get out of the loop with Landers. He likely had new information, and I wanted to work it into the puzzle. We pulled off the highway onto Dixon Holler road and made our way up the incline to their house.

  The circular shaped driveway provided parking with the nose of the Avenger pointed back toward the highway. Joyce collected her composure after a few moments of nostrils flaring and lips curling. She could hide the stress but not placate it. Engaging Minnie face to face on the issue was the only way she would have peace of mind. I was confident that Joyce’s passion and sincerity would succeed to win over Minnie’s trust to confide in her. I counted on it.

  “Let’s do this thing,” I said.

  Joyce nodded. By the time I had both feet firmly on the ground, Joyce had made a beeline for the front door. It wasn’t unusual for Minnie to greet people at her house. She collected money from the gun range patrons, helped Duke with the survival camp, and had access to an old AMC Eagle to run errands. She had her means of escape, but she never made an attempt. If she had, I was sure he’d take it away from her. She wasn’t entirely isolated from the world, but a social captive in Duke’s control.

  Minnie answered the door. Her eyes widened as she stood speechless. “We were out for a drive and thought we’d stop by to say hi,” Joyce said.

  Minnie cordially invited us in and served sun tea. We talked superficially about the drive and weather. I was bored to tears. If Joyce was serious about finding the truth I had to find someplace else to be while she dug up the dirt.

  “Minnie,” I asked, “When we shot on the range I noticed some other buildings in back. Is that the survival training camp?”

  “Yes,” Minnie answered with an eye-twinkling smile. The mere mention of Duke’s accomplishment brought happiness to her countenance. “Y’all know he’s the president of the Vigilance Committee. He uses the camp classroom for their meetings too.” Again, she flashed the smile.

  Minnie was a different person when Duke wasn’t around to browbeat her into submission. She possessed a hidden personality that lived inside the shell of another human being. It wasn’t healthy. According to Joyce, the Minnie we saw was not the old Minnie she’d known from her childhood. When behaviors are hidden, they spook me in an unexplainable way. I counted on a predictable set of actions, and neither Duke nor Minnie presented their true self. Which one was the real Minnie? I surmised—neither. Both personalities were smokescreens for surviving in Duke’s world. There were likely more, and I attributed the blame to Duke.

  “Think Duke would mind if I took a peek out there?”

  “No, Duke has people out there all the time. He promotes the training camp whenever he can.”

  “Cool, I’ll check it out.” I pointed to the back door, and Minnie responded with a nod. Joyce stood and gave me a quick kiss on the cheek. “Don’t get lost Walter. I don’t want to have to come find you.”

  I headed through the kitchen counting the steps from the living room to the back door. Survivalists and doomsday preppers were a different breed of people. Some were sincere; others were money-grubbing fear-mongers. However, I’d found them an excellent resource for my vigilante needs.

  I walked toward the gun range continuing my subconscious and occasionally conscious recon of the facility. I stood between the gun range that sat to the southwest side of the hollow and the training camp on the northeast side. Unlike the four shoddy lean-to sheds on the firing line, the survival camp had a single structure encircled by an eight-foot high cyclone fence topped with razor wire. The compound’s primary two-story building had been respectable once but now was in need of paint and repair. An American flag fluttered in the light breeze atop the gabled overhang of the porch.

  At the northern corner, a double wide vehicle gate stood open. I strolled inside the wire and around the camp structure, peeking through windows to grasp a visual layout of the interior. A row of windows across the south side of the building allowed for a look at an area much like a large meeting hall.

  Climbing two steps onto the porch I made my way to a set of double-doors. A quick 360° scan turned up no threats of watchers. I had no idea why I felt the need for precautions I’d been given permission. I chocked it up to old habits. The prompting in my spirit warned of danger. Moments like these intensified without a weapon strapped to my belt.

  I considered retrieving my bug-out bag from the Avenger. With a few of my simple tools, I would be inside the building in a matter of seconds. I reached for the doorknob and gave it a slight turn. The door had been left unlocked. I concluded with gates open, and doors unlocked, the fence and wire were more aesthetic than practical for security.

  Inside the entryway was a small vestibule. From there, I saw a kitchenette on the right side, and a large room to the left. I stepped into what I believed was a makeshift classroom. Five rows of plywood topped tables mounted on sawhorses spanned the width of the room, leaving aisle space on either side of the rows. Each of the tables had three to four metal folding chairs lined up and facing in the same direction. A desk stood on the north side of the classroom with a padded chair, and a large dry-erase board next to it.

  I walked the aisles around the tables and appraised a sweeping view of the layout. Between the rows of windows on the south side of the building, the wall space had been papered with topographical maps and prepper type news articles. Centered on the back wall hung a large white flag with a black circular symbol. Smaller Missouri State and Confederate Battle flags dotted the walls as well.

  A police scanner perched precariously close to the edge of a wood shelf above the desk. It continuously emitted a high-frequency buzz through a pair of speakers mounted on either side. Hung on the north wall under the scanner was a large corkboard with Vigilance Committee emblazoned on the wood border. This facility doubled as the meeting hall for the committee. The VC, as the committee is known to locals, is reportedly do-gooders with an air of secrecy about them that I found unsettling.

  I questioned the need for a police scanner? I doubted it had any survivalist purpose. To my way of thinking, a two-way radio communications, like citizen’s band or ham were more viable for survivalists. Monitoring police broadcasts was far too limiting to be of any real val
ue for disaster preparedness. It was most likely a tool for the VC to track law enforcement.

  On the north side of the classroom, a short hallway led to a bathroom. Adjacent was a staircase that presumably led to additional rooms above the classroom. At the back of the classroom on the west wall was what appeared to be an exit door to the fenced area, but I distinctly remembered no such door visible outside. Along the hallway walls, an assortment of photos were taped and pinned to the wall panels. My buddy Duke was prominent in a majority of the pictures. Judging by the background terrain, they’d been taken at locations nearby. Weaponry was the common element; a slew of tricked-out AR 15s, AK 47s, and various sniper rifles were shown with notable pride.

  At the head of the classroom sat a desk with a display of brochures. Dixon Holler camp was referred to in one flyer as the Missouri Alliance Tactical Training Center. Inside the advertisement was listed a range of features offered by Duke: Weapons training, armed response drills, escape and evasion, threat matrix, and membership to the Dixon Holler gun range. Minnie had mentioned Duke’s followers were skilled in disaster preparedness. I questioned what sort of disaster they were preparing for where someone needed response drills and escape training?

  I compared other brochures that lined the desk with the Missouri Alliance flyer. Some were “Urban” training centers that taught stockpiling long shelf life foods and how to pack a bug-out bag for a quick escape from a major city. Another camp focused on “Wilderness Survival” focusing their training on hunting, trapping, tracking, fishing, and foraging training. Those camps were more my speed. They sounded like vacation skills rather than training for a disaster.

  The one notable commonality the camps shared were courses in weapons training. From the Louisiana Delta Alliance located on the Mississippi River bayous to the Alaska Arctic Alliance (AAA) headquartered in the metropolis of some Podunk called Glennallen, they each offered unique specialties for their regions. There was an apparent connection between these survivalists although they didn’t claim an affiliation.

  As I looked through the various brochures, I had the deep impression there was something sinister at work—something hidden between the lines that wasn’t written, but decipherable. I eased myself into the leather office chair at the desk and poured over the pamphlets. There was something here—I sensed it.

  An hour quickly passed as I studied the various brochures. What I discovered most revealing had nothing to do with the survivalists, but with me. My dislike for Duke and his behavior had driven me to avoid him at every opportunity. Consequently, I didn’t know who he was. I allowed my disdain to get in the way and cloud my vision. That was before I became cognizant of what he was—a violent wife abuser. Perhaps, he was more skilled than I’d supposed he might be. I would never again approach him passively. If I were required to intercede in his behavior, I wouldn’t waste words.

  I hadn’t met anyone in Shell Knob, other than Joyce, who’d mentioned the Missouri Alliance. I would have assumed a local training camp of this kind would’ve had some influence on the makeup of the community. I had dismissed it as irrelevant.

  I snagged a brochure from each of the camps, about a dozen in all, and stuffed them in my back pants pocket. I wanted to know everything I could about what Duke was into. I tidied up the desk and stepped out onto the porch. As I pulled the double doors closed, I heard Joyce call my name.

  “Yeah.” I didn’t hear a response, so I made my way toward the house. Maybe Duke had shown up unexpectedly, and that spelled trouble. I quietly entered through the back door and into the front room. I didn’t have a good feeling about what I’d walked into; in the quietness you could hear a pin drop.

  Minnie sat on one of the sofas with her back toward me. Her head bowed low. Joyce knelt at her right side with their hands cupped together. Duke wasn’t there. After a few quiet and uncomfortable seconds had passed, Joyce spoke. “Have a seat, Walter.”

  “Okay.” I figured Minnie must have unloaded the goods. That would be good news. Talking was the first step. Nothing else could happen in a right sense if she wasn’t willing to open up about the problems. I took a seat on the opposite couch.

  Minnie hesitated to start. Tears welled up, and she sobbed bitterly. Finally, Joyce consoled her with a long hug. Shortly after that, she began, “Our love started out rocky, but grew. I got myself pregnant in high school right after Duke and I started going steady. In high school, it was a big deal to have a steady boyfriend, and I did what I needed to do.”

  I interrupted her, “You had to get pregnant to keep Duke?”

  “No—that happened by accident. I didn’t want Duke to get mad at me for not satisfying his needs.” Minnie looked through the large front-room window toward the driveway leading to the highway as if watching for Duke to arrive. “I had to… It was only right. After he had found out I was going to have a baby, there was a lot of stress on him. He said he had to do the right thing.” Minnie smiled. Her face reflected the bliss from her reminiscences, but they were lies. All conjured up memories from wishful thinking that had never existed, not with someone of Duke’s low character. “During the first year, everything was wonderful. We had a new baby, and Duke had landed a good paying nationwide truck driving job. It was real hard on him because he didn’t like to be away. He sacrificed for us.”

  “What went wrong?” Joyce asked.

  Minnie buried her head in her hands. She took the time to regain her composure. Then she softly spoke, “Nothing.” Minnie looked into my eyes, “Nothing went wrong. Duke loves me more now than ever before.” Happiness radiated through the tears as she slipped deeper into her fantasy world of love.

  Again Joyce asked, “You told me what went wrong, remember? You and I talked about it.”

  Minnie cast her gaze on a 5 × 7 framed picture of an infant. “It was all my fault. It had to be. When Jules died, there was no one else to blame.”

  “How’d the baby die,” I asked.

  “Duke couldn’t understand how God would let something like this happen to him. I wasn’t the mother I should have been. It’s the only explanation.”

  I asked again, “How’d the baby die?” I’d suspected the child had died from abuse or neglect on Duke’s part, but Minnie made it sound as if Duke wasn’t there.

  “The doctor told me that sometimes seven-month-old babies die. I’d laid him in his crib for a nap, and he never woke up again.”

  “How is it your fault?” Joyce asked.

  “I can’t explain, but it had to be me. Duke wasn’t here when it happened.”

  Minnie paused for a minute and collected her thoughts. It was the kind of pause that might’ve lasted a minute but felt like an hour. “When Duke got home, I tried to explain what the doctor had said, but I couldn’t; it didn’t make sense, not even to me. I asked Duke to talk to the doctor, but he refused. He said if I’d been a better mother Jules would never have died. Duke was right.”

  It was the right time for me to interrupt and set her straight, but I didn’t have the words. I didn’t know if she’d been a good mother or not, she might have a screw loose or be a taco short of a fiesta plate. But, from what she’d said, it hardly sounded as if she was to blame.

  “I didn’t do well after that. Duke said I let myself go. I didn’t want to see any of my friends. Some days I didn’t get out of bed, and if I did, I didn’t get dressed or brush my hair. Worst of all, I didn’t attend to Duke’s needs. He was spending more time on the road. When he was home, he was always unhappy. All I wanted was Duke to be happy after I’d let him down.”

  Joyce had been through her share of marital stress. She comforted Minnie with an affectionate embrace. Something I was incapable of. What I’d caught from Minnie was Duke, Duke, Duke, and that was a bad sign. Joyce might have broken through the ice, one-on-one, but there was now a chill in the air. In my book, it was a history lesson and added to a small degree my understanding. But I didn’t hear the evidence I expected.

  Minnie looked over at me and c
ontinued, “During the following year after Jules died, Duke and I argued—a lot. I’d failed in doing my part to keep the house clean the way he wanted. I was out of control; Duke had to keep me safe. Sometimes, he tied me up so I wouldn’t hurt myself; other times he had to slap some sense into me. He didn’t want to do it, but I made him. That’s not his fault; I’m to blame.”

  “Is he mistreating you?” I asked.

  “He never has; he loves me. Even when he threatened to leave me, I knew he still loved me. I could always tell. One time he accused me of sleeping around. He called me ugly, terrible names, but he was only trying to show me how much he loved me. Never in all my born days had I ever seen him so angry or jealous. He swore he would kill me before he’d let me go to another man.” She quietly gazed out the window for a few moments then glanced back and forth between Joyce and me. “I think that shows how much he loves me, don’t you?”

  I wondered who she was asking. It was a waste of her time if she was asking me. Duke had mentally tortured her and physically abused her. She couldn’t see it or didn’t want to. She was a basket case of mental instability. Minnie stared into my eyes expecting a response, but I had nothing for her. The solution to her problem she’d never accept.

  Joyce had choked up with emotion. I didn’t share her feelings. As I listened to Minnie defend Duke and make a hero of him, I was sickened by her dialog. Minnie must have suspected I wasn’t buying her bill of goods. Like any good salesperson, she quickly launched a second pitch.

  “I thought he was wrong when I was restricted from seeing my old friends. I realize now he was right. They were a bad influence on me. When Duke insisted I cut ties with my family, it was hard, but he was right. All they wanted to do was lead me away from him. Duke was always right.”