Eat A Peach
Tony Canzoneri
Copyright 2007 All rights reserved
"Sheriff, do you know this guy?"
"Sure, everybody knows BeaBeau," Buck said.
"This guy is fried."
"Absolutely."
"No, I mean it; this guy is like Ozzy Osborne on dope."
"I thought Ozzy Osborne was on dope."
"Not compared to this guy," Jeff said. Jeff hadn't been in the department or lived in the area long enough to have encountered BeaBeau yet.
"Yeah I know. I guess he came back from Viet Nam a little twisted and spent some time in Whitfield."
"Does he have a record?"
"Served sixty days for growing marijuana and we get countless complaints when he singing to his corn."
"What?"
"He sits out here naked, plays guitar and sings to his corn. Actually he sings to all the vegetables in the garden but he says the corn likes it best. We just tell him to put some clothes on or don't sit so close to the road."
"He's toast."
"He's a little burnt around the edges but he's harmless," Buck said.
"Oh yeah, wait till you see this and I tried to get him to stop but he doesn't listen. Besides he's doing such a good job." Jeff led the Sheriff to the side of the house and around the garden which was at least a half acre. At the other end of the garden, BeaBeau was standing in a big hole about waist deep under a dead tree. He was a fairly big man in his mid fifties with a long grey beard and thick gray hair to his waist. The hair was tied back in a ponytail with a rubber-band every eight inches all the way to the end looking like a massive gray rope. He was shirtless with a pair of faded surfer baggies and flip-flops, his body was so covered with dirt and sweat you could barely see the tattoo on his left shoulder of a marijuana leaf inside a peace sign. On his right shoulder was a tattoo of an ace of hearts being pierced by a commando knife with a single drop of blood. In between were massive scars across his chest and around his back. BeaBeau wore a patch over his left eye, his face looked old and tired and his head wobbled as if it were too heavy to control.
As Buck and Jeff approached, BeaBeau whispered as if there were someone next to him, "Look out, it's the p-i-gs." Then his head rolled back and he said out loud, "Greetings, Law man, how's it hang'n."
"Hey, BeaBeau," as Buck got closer is jaw dropped. "What have you got here?" Laid out on the ground next to the hole was a nearly complete skeleton.
"Pretty far out, huh man."
"Do you know who this is?" Buck said.
BeaBeau dropped his head, "It's Melissa, man."
"Who is Melissa?"
"It's my sister, man."
"How do you know it's her?"
BeaBeau's head rolled to the side and looked at the bones, "It looks just like her, man."
"BeaBeau, did you bury her here?"
"No way, it wasn't me man. I was in a hospital in Guam wait'n on my discharge papers, it was nineteen seventy one, when she just disappeared. Just after mom died she was never seen again. I always figured she just ran off, you know. But I guess she never left, man this is freak'n me out."
"You need to get out of that hole and let us handle it from here," Buck said.
"Hey, little Sheriff dude, check this out," BeaBeau motioned to Jeff. Jeff moved over to the edge of the hole as BeaBeau pulled out two white patent leather go-go boots and placed them below the leg bones on the now complete skeleton.
"Wait, I need to take a picture," Jeff swung the camera up and started snapping pictures as BeaBeau pulled a red patent leather jacket from the dirt and shook it off.
"Wow, disco corpse," Jeff said.
"BeaBeau, get out of there, we have to try and determine cause of death," Buck said.
BeaBeau staggered slightly stepping to the other side of the hole. He bent over as if he were balancing himself on a rail and carefully picked up the skull. He turned it slowly showing Buck a dime sized hole in the back. Jeff and Buck looked at each other.
"Bummer," Jeff said.
"Okay BeaBeau, come with me while Jeff secures the crime seen." BeaBeau stood looking at the bottom of the hole moving his head from side to side like he was trying to line his good eye up with something then get it focused. "BeaBeau, come on," Buck extended a hand to help him up.
"BeaBeau, you got a shaker box?" Jeff said.
"Sure do man."
"Run get it for me would you."
"I'm almost running now man," BeaBeau said, ignoring Buck's hand, crawling out on his hands and knees. He walked slowly, carefully staggering one direction then the other like he was on a ship in high seas.
Buck was looking puzzled. "A shaker box," Jeff said, "to sift through the dirt, maybe find some small pieces of jewelry or the bullet that made that hole."
"I got that but how did you know he would have one."
"He's a bottle hunter." Jeff's body language added a "Duh" but not out loud. "It is kind of an art really. These guys walk the woods until they find an old house site that could have been abandoned any where from fifty to a hundred and fifty years ago. Usually the houses are long gone, reclaimed by trees and vines so the only way to identify the site is by finding things like flowers that people used to plant around the house, or foundation stones, an old cistern. Then they circle the area until they find the trash dump. It's never far from the house and usually in a gully or a depression. Then they find the outer edge and methodically go from one end to the other digging up and turning over every piece of trash."
"Oh, that sounds like fun."
"It is actually. It's sort of a mix of treasure hunting and archeology. You mostly find bottles because they last forever, silverware, knifes, anything that went out with the trash, by accident or on purpose." Buck faked a yawn. "You can also find out about the people that lived there. If there are liniment bottles someone was in pain from some hard physical labor, Magnesia bottles means someone had stomach problems, soda-pop bottles means they were rich."
"Now how do you figure that?"
"Back in the thirties, during the depression a soda bottle was returnable for two cents. You would have to be rich to just throw it in the trash."
"Sometimes I wonder about you, Little Sheriff Dude."
"The brave ones will even go down in the old cistern just to see what's in there and if you can find where the outhouse was you never know what you might find." BeaBeau was zigzagging back across the yard holding a two foot square frame with a screen in the bottom and handles on one side like a wheel barrow. Two of the legs fold out and slip into a slot making them rigid, the other two were on a pivot. This was so you could put a shovel full of dirt into the frame, lift the rigid legs off the ground and shake the frame back and forth on the pivoting legs. The dirt falls through the screen and anything else is left behind. "This is nice BeaBeau, you make it your self?"
"Sure did man, I bet I've shook an acre of dirt through this box." BeaBeau was looking lovingly at the box as he took a half a joint from one pocket and a Zippo lighter from the other pocket. He put the joint to his lips and flipped the lid off the lighter with a tiny clink.
"What the hell are you doing?" Buck said.
"Oh, sorry man, here you need to catch up." BeaBeau said holding the joint and lighter out to Buck.
"BeaBeau focus on me, who am I?"
BeaBeau twisted his head around to bring the patch-less eye into line with Buck. "Oh shit I'm stung, I almost toked up with Smokey, man. Jees I gotta tighten up."
"Just go around behind the house, or some where I can't see you."
"Groovy." BeaBeau staggered back toward the house.
Jeff was standing with his hands on his hips, "You could have arrested him for possession right there."
"Look Jeff, I hired you to replace three pot belled good ole boys that came with this job. I can't afford to waste your valuable time making cases against pot smokers. It is a waste of resources and besides, he's a combat vet."
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