Devil at Dusk - Installment thirty two. "The last and final installment!"

Welcome all to Devil at Dusk Installment thirty two!

Sunday night the Sheriff’s Office got some more reports of UFO’s, this time the people that called said they saw lights of an unidentified flying object around the highway 15 area not far from the farmhouse. Monday morning Jerry and I went and got our search warrant and we made it back over to DD’s aka Mr. Baker’s (“the killer”) house while he was at work. Shortly after arriving we made it into the house, the first place we went was down to the basement. While searching the basement I noticed what looked to be blood stains on the floor and Jerry found a bag with many pairs of beige nylon seamed stockings in it, Eureka! This is the evidence that we really needed to link Baker to the murders. After that we checked the rest of the house but that was really all that we were able to come up with as far as evidence goes. So we left DD’s and went back to the Sheriff’s Office and we showed Sheriff Holifield what we found, we also mentioned the blood stains. The Sheriff told us that it was enough evidence to make an arrest.

By then it was already late in the afternoon so we had a few hours to make the preparations to go in and make our arrest. We contacted all the neighboring police departments and sheriff’s offices and we pulled as many officers, sheriffs, deputies and their dogs. This would also be Sugar the blood hound puppy’s first work debut. We all knew DD got off work in the early evening, at least a once or twice a week he would run some errands or go shopping after work in Bay Springs. We wanted to time it so we were all arriving at his house just around sunset, that way we knew he would be there. Soon it was time to pull our motorcade together, the Sheriff gave me a flashing light to attach to the top of my car and a siren, he told me since I was the lead investigator for this investigation that they wanted me to be at the head of the pack! I was speechless; I had assumed that I would just ride along with Jerry in his car!

So I lead the way for the rest of the motorcade of police vehicles and sheriff cars. We all had our lights and sirens on until we got a few miles from the farmhouse then we turned them off. We all finally arrived at the farmhouse and parked so we were surrounding the front of the house. Then we all started getting out of our vehicles. Just as we were starting to surround the house, DD was taking the trash out. He looked around and realized we were all there to come and get him! He started to run towards the partially wooded area out behind his house. All the men and I plus all of the dogs came after him. He ran through the small wooded area which ends up in a clearing, we all follow. After that we saw the most amazing sight ever!

We saw a large saucer shaped UFO!!! It was just on the edge of the woods in the clearing (a good spot for a UFO to land and to stay somewhat hidden for the most part). DD also sees the UFO (he had the dear in the head light look on his face) and he also sees the men surrounding him. The next thing we know an alien pops out of the UFO!!! It looks like a female (it has a body similar to a female that is) it was thin and short with a big oblong shaped head with big huge black eyes and a nose but it did not appear to have a mouth.  The skin on this thing had a greenish tint and was kind of leathery looking. She ran after DD (The Devil at Dusk) who was our killer. We all stared dumbfounded at the sight that unfolded in front of us! DD started to run toward the men but the men surged forward with guns drawn toward DD. Then the alien finally reaches DD! She takes one hand (her hand had three fingers on each hand, so a total of 2 hands with 6 fingers) then she takes 2 of the 3 fingers, reaches out and pinched the nerve where the base of the head and neck meet. DD drops to the ground, he was out cold! Then the alien rips his clothes off and drags him to her UFO and pulls him in! Then she fires up her UFO, turns on enough lights to light up a football stadium then proceeds to take off!!!

We all just stood there watching like we were in a daze! I really think we were in a daze, I think the alien put something in the air to basically make us stand there and do nothing. Afterwards we all said we felt numb and the whole thing seamed to happen so fast. We felt like we had been in a fog bank.We all got into our cars and drove back to our houses. Jerry came back to my place, we go in, Jerry sits on the couch and I get us some tea. I come back with the tea and sit next to him. We were both still in shock by what we had seen. I say to Jerry… well that was bar none the strangest damn thing I have ever seen in my entire life. Jerry nods his head and says yes ma’am, strangest damn thing ever!!!

The End

Devil at Dusk - Installment Thirty One.

Welcome Folks to Devil at Dusk installment number thirty one.

The next day I put on a pair of overalls with a button down shirt, I braided my hair in two pig tails with a big straw hat and then I put on my old cowboy boots. I went out to the stable and grabbed a piece of straw and placed it between my two back teeth. Then I got into the old pickup truck and drove over to the pharmacy in Bay Springs. I parked the truck and walked in. I told the gal behind the counter that I needed something for a tooth ache, she smiled at me and said all right; let me go get our pharmacist Alan. Next thing I know I am standing face to face with the killer! The hair stood up on the back of my neck because he looked just like the drawing that Charlotte did. With a smile on his face he asked me, how can I help you today? I told him that I had a tooth ache and asked him what he recommended, he told me to rub a little bit of clove oil on the gums surrounding the area and that it would help tide me over until I was able to see the dentist. I thanked him and took my bottle of clove oil to the cashier, paid and then left.

I got into my truck and drove to the Sherriff’s Office, I spoke to Jerry, and I told him I saw Mr. Baker at the Pharmacy. I asked him to do a vehicle registration search on him to see what we could come up with. He found Mr. Alan Marcus Baker at 4292 Willow Springs Road Laurel MS 39440 and a 1950 Pontiac Chieftain was registered to him. Now we know his middle name which we did know before (also matches the cuff link AMB), the address matches the address that was on the mail box so now we do know we have the right place and we now know that the 1950 Pontiac is a Chieftain. I asked Jerry to please research Mr. Baker’s info for me to see what else he could come up with, he told me will do. Then I asked him if he wanted to come with me tomorrow to do a stakeout in front of Mr. Baker’s house (it was Sunday and the pharmacy was closed every Sunday), Jerry said yes he would like that. I told him I would bring the picnic basket. He told me he would let me know tomorrow if he was able to dig up any more dirt on Baker.

Sunday morning rolls around, Jerry meets me at my house at 7 a.m. and we get into one of my cars and drive over to Mr. Baker’s place. I drove the sage green car so it would blend into the scenery better than some the other cars, once I got there; I drove the car so it was tucked away into the wooded area and parked it. This way we could be concealed for the most part where we could watch and wait. I asked Jerry what he found out about Baker, he said he inherited the farmhouse from his mother 9 years ago, one year ago he got a parking ticket, then 6 months ago (in December) a guy driving by the farmhouse had a flat tire, he stopped alongside the road in front of the house to change out his tire. It was about 45 minutes after sunset and he reported to the Sheriff’s Office that he had heard a lady screaming, he said it sounded like it was coming from the basement of the house. 

One of the deputies went out to the house and spoke to Baker, he said there had been a report called in that somebody had heard a woman screaming and it sounded like it was coming from his house. He told the Sheriff that there was not a woman at his house, the screaming sound was the mystery radio show he had been listening to, he said he liked to record the episodes and listen to them at a later date. He told the Sheriff his name and that he was the pharmacist over in Bay Springs. December was when the first murder had happened so Baker must not have taken into consideration that a car could break down, right in front of his house (especially since it was not a very well traveled road though there, but there was a few other houses peppered along the road) however either he thinks fast on his feet (to come up with the murder mystery radio show) or he figured he better make sure to have all bases covered and came up with it in advanced. I am sure he had been very careful in the future that nobody would be hearing a female screaming at his house. Also since the female screaming had been reported back in December prior to when the first body had been found, so there was no reason for the Deputy to not believe what Baker had told him, the deputy never looked any further into the case and closed it.

We talked about the case together a little more in depth, we talked about how it looked like he had been kidnapping the girls at dusk and killing them in the night shortly after that and then dumping the bodies off later in the night. I nick named our killer the Devil at Dusk and started referring to him as that most of the time after that. A couple hours after we got to the farmhouse we saw him pull his car out into the driveway and so he could wash his car. He washed it, dried it and polished it, then drove it back into the garage. I pulled out my camera and took pictures of him washing his car. After that we stuck around for a few more hours but nothing else happened so we drove back home. We had decided that we had enough information collected to finally get a search warrant, so on Monday Jerry and I went to court to get a search warrant.

To be continued…..

Devil at Dusk - Installment Thirty

Welcome back everybody to Devil at Dusk Installment Thirty!

I was up at 6 am the next day, I pulled out my typewriter and I typed up a synopsis of the information I had gotten from Marguerite. Soon, I would go to my office and I would use the parts of the synopsis that were important and after that it would all go into the file. When I was done I started making some breakfast for Marguerite and I. Marguerite woke up she said she smelled bacon cooking and got up to join me for breakfast. When done we cleared the table and did the dishes. Then we made ourselves presentable for the day. After that Marguerite put all of her things in her overnight bag, she came out to join me in the living room just before we headed out for the bayou. I thanked her again so much for all of her help and I paid her for her services. She took the money and said wow, thank you! From the looks of it I imagined that was probably the most money she had seen at one time in her entire life.

 I said to her alright kid lets hit the road, we drove on and before too long we finally made it to the bayou. We saw the swamps, bridges, dilapidated house boats, mosses, the weeping willows, magnolias and mangrove trees. I pulled up to her little pink shack and she asked me in, I told her I would come in for a moment to say hi to her papa and her grandmere. Marguerite’s grandmere asked me if I wanted a glass of sweet tea and I said that would be wonderful. In the mean time Marguerite’s papa asked me how the investigation was going and he also inquired whether or not his daughter was able to help. I told him yes that she has been a very big help. I thanked him and Marguerite’s grandmere again so much for letting me take Marguerite away from them for a few days. Soon I was done with my tea and had to be on my way, I thanked them all again and said goodbye.

I drove home, a few hours later I arrived. I called up Jerry to see if he wanted to go grab a burger, fries and chocolate malt at the diner down the street. He said sure thing doll, I will be over in an hour to pick you up. Exactly an hour later he picked me up and we drove down to the diner. After eating we went to see what was playing over at the theater, there was a comedy that was about to start in 20 minutes. So we bought our tickets and picked out our seats for the show. When the show ended we came back over to my cottage and I invited him in for glass of Port. We talked about the information we got from Marguerite, the investigation and what our next strategy was going to be with the new info we had gotten. Our next step was to try to locate the farmhouse that Mr. Baker lived in just off of HWY 15, then to have a stakeout so we could see who lived there and to take note of the comings and goings of our person of interest. My plan was to start trying to find the farmhouse tomorrow.

The next day I drove from Laurel to Bay Springs on HWY 15, along the way I saw lots of small houses and tiny shacks. At about the 7 mile mark I found a network of small roads of off a small main road in a semi wooded area. On the small main road was a big old light grey farm house, I drove in front of it and noticed a mail box out front. I made a u turn at the end of the road and drove in front of the house slowly to see if there was a name on the mail box, there was a name and address. The name was A. Baker, so I drove back over to one of the other small side streets where my vehicle would be camouflaged by the wooded area, this way I was able to park alongside the road and see the house with my binoculars. I stayed for a couple of hours and since I did not notice anything I took off. My surveillance was mostly for fact finding rather than anything else. I would came back over the course of the next few days or week, to wait and watch to see what else I could find. After that I went in to Bay Springs and found where the pharmacy was located. I was going to come back tomorrow to visit the pharmacy with a costume on because I did not want our person of interest recognizing me at a later date.

To be continued…..

Devil at Dusk - Installment Twenty Nine

Welcome all to Installment Twenty Nine of Devil at Dusk!

After Marguerite was done looking at all of the evidence, Jerry and I took her around to all of the places where the murder victims had been found. Marguerite told us she would collect all the information she could from these things and places, then while we were at dinner she said she would discuss her findings with us. She said it would be better that way instead of bit by bit because by the end of the day she would have more of a complete picture rather than just fragments to share with us.

Half way through the day we needed a break, so we all came back to my cottage and I made us sandwiches, sweet tea and some fruit for lunch. When we were done with lunch we all got back into Jerry’s car and hit the road again. By the end of the day we had managed to go to all of the sites where our victims had been found. Jerry drove Marguerite and I over to Ling’s for some Chinese food for dinner. During dinner Marguerite shared with us the information that she had picked up; she told us she believed that the killer’s last name is Baker, she said she believed that the cuff links I had found by the railroad tracks did indeed belong to him (the cuff links I found had the letters AMB on them, so I was correct they were initials).

Marguerite said that he is only about 5 ft 4 in tall, with a stocky build; he has medium brown hair with a crew cut, blue eyes, light skin and a round face. She told us he drives a white or cream colored 1950 Pontiac, he works as a pharmacist over at the pharmacy in Bay Springs  MS, which is right on HWY 15 and is about 15 miles away from the town of Laurel. She also said he lives in a big old farmhouse in a semi secluded area about 7 miles from Laurel and that his house is also just off of HWY 15.

Marguerite said that our killer kills because he had been molested by the lady that was his care taker when he was a child; she was from the town of Laurel. His mother had a nervous breakdown when Baker was 8 years old and she was put in a mental institution. His dad hired a lady who was 29 years old and had a 10 month old baby to come to take care of him while his dad was at work, his dad worked 10 hours a day, five days a week. This lady took care of him for almost a year. Marguerite says that Baker never got help or counseling so now he is getting his revenge on the young women in the town of Laurel.

The description that Marguerite gave matched what Rose the gal that almost was kidnapped, gave us right on down to his physical description and his car. Also after Charlotte came up with her sketch and we showed it around to people, some people thought he looked vaguely familiar because he just lived down the road but he did look so familiar that people knew directly who he was. I was guessing that was because he worked in Bay Springs so he probably did mostly all of his shopping, errands etc… in Bay Springs and probably only came into Laurel to stalk and kidnap then kill his victims. The whole time Marguerite was talking I was taking notes. After dinner Jerry dropped off Marguerite and I at my cottage. I told Marguerite to go in and make herself comfortable and that I would be in shortly. Jerry stood on my front porch and whispered in my ear to have a good night. He gave me a hug and a kiss and then he went off into the night.

I went into my cottage and sat on the couch to listen to the music on the radio, while I processed all of the information from the day. Marguerite came out of the bathroom where she had been getting ready to go to bed. She came over to tell me good night, she was such a tiny waif of a girl, I had to keep reminding myself she was in her 20’s and not a teenager. I stood up and gave her a big huge hug and thanked her so much because she was the key really for me to be able to finally track down and get the “monster”.  Marguerite said she was so glad she was able to come and help out. I told her to be ready to leave the cottage to go home by 9 am. She said very good and goodnight.

To be continued….

Devil at Dusk - Installment Twenty Eight!

Welcome back to Devil at Dusk installment twenty eight.

Marguerite and I traveled all the through the bayou, crossing the bridges that went over the swamps, we drove through the groups of small trees and we saw moss covered cottages. Everything looked like it was dripping with green. Halfway home we stopped off at a small diner for a cup of coffee so we would not be tempted to drift off to sleep on the way back. Just before we finally made it to my cottage in Laurel Mississippi it was almost 11 pm, we were getting off the main highway and driving onto the main street we both noticed something very strange looking in the night sky, it was a large circular object all lit up with a ton of lights! Oh my goodness I exclaimed! This is the UFO several of the people around town have seen! Marguerite’s violet eyes were as big as saucers, she said wow! I have never seen one of those before! We could not believe our eyes!

We finally pulled into my gravel driveway and went into the cottage. I showed Marguerite around the cottage and where the guest room was so she could put her things down, I told her to make herself at home that my cottage was hers for the next few days. Since we were both very tired after a long and exciting day we had decided it would be a good idea to turn in for the night.

The next morning I made us breakfast with bacon, eggs, toast, fresh fruit and a pot of coffee. Just as we were finishing up and getting started on the dishes we heard a knock at the door. I told her that must be Jerry; I had told Marguerite that Jerry (the man I was dating) worked for the Sheriff’s Office and that he is a Deputy Sheriff. I also mentioned to her that he would be joining us for the day and that he had been assisting me on the serial killer case. Today we would be riding around in his sheriff’s car on official business. I introduce Jerry and Marguerite to one another and we all get into the car. Jerry starts to head over to the Sheriff’s Office and on the way over we tell him about the UFO sighting we had, we were both very excited about it and both of us were talking a mile a minute. We finally got to the Sheriff’s Office and we all go in. Jerry and I take her on the tour of the office and introduce her to everybody. Then we take her to where we store the evidence and we sign for each piece so she can have a look at it and to touch all of the pieces.

To be continued….

Devil at Dusk - Installment Twenty Seven

Welcome everybody to installment twenty seven of Devil at Dusk!

After speaking with Ilya I was convinced that I had to try to track down Marguerite and to have her use her psychic abilities to help me out with trying to find out who our serial killer was. Since I pretty much did not have anyone else to call on about this matter I decided to just get in the car and drive on down to the bayou and ask around to try to find her.

So the next day I did just that, I got into my car and drove to Larose Louisiana. Larose was a very old and small town. I finally made it there and I stopped off at the first coffee shop I found. I walked in and took a seat at the lunch counter. The waitress came over to me; she wore a starched pink and white uniform with a name tag that said Marge on it. She was chewing on a piece of gum and had a pencil behind her ear. She pulled out her note pad and pencil and took my order. I was only there for a piece of pie, coffee and to get some information. I started to make some small talk with her and I noticed she was quite friendly. I had told her I was passing through on business but I had heard of a young gal by the name of Margarite that was a healer out in these parts. I told the waitress that I had been suffering from some horrible migraines for most of my life (I thought I had better use a pretext here instead of saying I needed a psychic to help me catch a serial killer). Marge says to me…ah yes, you are talking about the white witch’s granddaughter! She lives here in Larose out in the bayou just on the outskirts of town! I said oh I did not realize that was her moniker but I do believe we are referring to the same person. I asked Marge where does she live, how can I find her? I told her I was desperate to find something to help me with these horrible migraines! She said for me to follow this here main road west until I end up in the swap lands. She said that I will find a few shacks out there and a very small general store of sorts, Marge said Marguerite lived in a tiny shack that had been painted pink (her grandmere’s favorite color) many moons ago however now the paint had been pretty washed out looking after all these years. Marguerite and her grandmere’s house was located behind the general store.

I finished eating my pie and drinking my coffee, soon after that I settled my tab and thanked Marge very kindly for all of her help and information. I got back into my car and drove out to Marguerite’s house, sure enough there was the strange looking washed out pink shack. There was a young girl sitting on the front stoop, in a little patch of shade reading a book. She looked to be only just a mere teenager and she was very thin. She was wearing a clean but very thin cotton house dress that looked like it was from the 1930’s and she was barefoot with her feet in the dirt. Her skin was very pale white, her scalp was pink and her hair was also very light. Her hair was down to her waist and she had locks of matted coils of hair all over her head. She looked up at me as I was pulling into her driveway, she had pale violet colored eyes and that was when I realized she was an albino. Now I knew why people said she looked different than most people.

I got out of the car and said hello. I introduced myself and asked the girl if she was Marguerite, she said yes. I explained why I was there, that I was in dire need of her help. I needed her to use her psychic abilities to try to help me catch the serial killer that had been terrorizing the small town of Laurel Mississippi. I asked her if I could come inside to speak to both her and her grandmere. She said yes, I followed her inside the tiny house. Her grandmere was sitting in a rocking chair doing some knitting. Marguerite offered me a nice cool glass of sweet tea, I told her that would be lovely. She came back with three glasses, one for each of us. We sat and talked for hours, I learned that Marguerite was actually 23 years old even though she looked like a school girl. She was very tiny and thin, she got her stature from her grandmere. Her and her grandmere looked just alike, except her grandmere was much older and not an albino.

Marguerite told me she had been home schooled and had been in training to become a healer ever since she was a small child. She realized she had psychic abilities when she was about 14 years old. When I first approached Marguerite and her grandmere they were both very quiet and reserved because I was a stranger from another town. They were not really open to strangers for the most part. However I think they could see the fear and desperation in my eyes and how much I needed to capture the killer before he struck again! The clincher was when I explained how Bet my dearest friend in the whole wide world ended up at the mercy of this cruel savage beast! I felt so much guilt over not being able to protect her or to save her. I also had so much guilt because the serial killer was on the loose still and I had not been able to capture him yet. I did not express a single word of my guilt to Marguerite but she sat down close to me, took my both of my hands into her two tiny hands, then she looked me straight in the eyes and she said to me, you can let go all of your guilt now. She told me to let it wash away and to be healed. She told me to let go of my burdens that I had been carrying on my back all of these months and that it was not my fault, not a single bit of it.

I started to cry because she saw into my heart and knew my feelings. Those were the feelings that I had to hide every day from all other people. I had to hide them because I was supposed to be invincible, I was the investigator and I always had to be strong. However there I was sitting here crumbling in front of this tiny young gal who was so wise beyond her years. Marguerite tells me she will do whatever it takes to help me find the killer, even if that meant that she had to leave the bayou and her grandmere for a few days (she told me she needed to come to Laurel to see the evidence we had collected and to also see the places where the victim’s bodies had been found). Marguerite leaving the bayou for even just a few days was an incredible thing in itself because Marguerite had never left the bayou in her entire life except to go into town a couple times a year. She said she would get hold of her papa to come out and to take care of grandmere for a few days. So off we went to get her papa, he was not too far away.

Her papa followed us in a big old farm truck all the way back to the pink shack. When we came back grandmere Katherine Marie had made a giant pot of Etoufee’ with fresh vegetables, big juicy prawns and flavorful crawdad tails over rice for dinner. We sat down to eat the wonderful feast that Katherine Marie had prepared for us, during dinner I had explained to Marguerite’s papa how I needed Marguerite's help. He and Katherine Marie were both fine with me borrowing Marguerite for a few days because they could see it in my eyes how urgent and important it was. So that night Marguerite packed a small overnight bag and we traveled back to my cottage in Mississippi.

To be continued…..

Devil at Dusk - Installment Twenty Six

Welcome to installment twenty six of Devil at Dusk

I had to do whatever it would take to try to track down our killer! I had to be smarter than he was. I had been hearing rumors around town for a few weeks now that there was a psychic over in Larose Louisiana. I asked around to the towns people here in Laurel what they happened to know about this person. I heard many interesting stories regarding this person…they all said she was a young lady probably in her early 20’s (well at least that was a start, right?). One person told me she was 4 foot 8 inches tall and lived in the smallest house in the world, another person told me she was a witch and to be careful, another person told me she was a white girl from South Africa and her pet monkey rode around on her shoulder and went everywhere with her!

I finally went to the Russian’s the ones we had hired to teach at the horse riding school, because they had cousins that had moved to Louisiana. They had been keeping in touch via phone and letters, while the cousins made their journey through the south and eventually would be heading up to the eastern seaboard as a part of the traveling circus. I knew it was a long shot but I had to find out something about this person to see if it was worth my while to contact her. The Russian’s said their cousins had contacted them just the day before, they had said they were in a small town in Alabama for a few days and the cousins left them a contact number to reach them at in case of emergencies. They gave me the number to reach them directly. I contacted them as soon as possible.

 I spoke to Mr. Ilya Markov and I introduced myself. I asked him if they made it through Larose Louisiana on their journey and surprisingly they had (Larose was not originally on the route but the circus took a detour because one of the performers had gotten very sick). I asked them if they were familiar with a young gal in her 20’s that was a psychic there in that town. He said yes, he had heard that, he had heard that she was in her mid 20’s and was raised by her grandmere and her papa (her mama passed away when she was little). One of Ilya’s circus friends was the performer that had gotten very sick and needed her help. They said she was Cajun traiteure (a healer along with being a psychic), her skills for being a healer had been passed down from her grandmere, to her papa and then down to her. Her papa had gotten remarried a few years ago and had moved however he was still living in Larose. They said her name is Marguerite and her grandmere is Katherine Marie. 

Her grandmere was getting quite old and with her papa gone, Marguerite was taking over on doing most of the healing now but she does get quite a few requests for her psychic abilities. Marguerite was also taking over the role of caretaker now that Katherine Marie was getting on in years. Ilya told me they said she was born and raised on the bayou. She was a little bit of a wild child and a very pale looking girl. He said they had heard that her psychic abilities were spot on though. I asked him if there was anything else that he could tell me, he said she looked different than most people but that was just what he had heard since he had not seen her he did not know about any of that….

To be continued