Tater Jones on the Case

Tater Jones was everything a person thinks of when he thinks of a Southern Sheriff: big, fat, reflector sunglasses, black and white patrol car with lots of lights on top. You were sure you didn’t want to be on his wrong side, because he ruled Covington County, Mississippi, with an iron baton. I’m sure he had a given first name, but I never heard him referred to by anything but “Tater” or “Sheriff”. He lived in a huge mansion of a place on 20 acres, surrounded by a ten-foot high massive red brick wall, paid for, no doubt, by the graft money he extracted from the enterprising people who sold illegal liquor in the county “laundromats”: Covington County was dry. Miss your payment this week, and Tater shut you down until you coughed up the demanded tithe. >>

However, this story isn’t about Tater Jones. It’s about Hurston Wade. >>

Hurston was married to Janice Wade, a gentle, attractive Southern Belle, who also happened to be my bookkeeper. Hurston was a 100% southern male: a snuff dippin’, pickup drivin’, hard drinkin’ twenty-five year old. A large silver-buckled belt held his pants up; he wore his baseball cap with the brim turned up; and a sunny outlook kept his spirits up. He would say “hello” to Janice while cruising past the office in his pickup by momentarily shutting off the ignition, allowing gas to accumulate in the cylinders, and turning the key back on, resulting in a loud BANG that sounded like a gunshot. >>

Practical jokes were Hurston’s specialty. At the county fair, Hurston might come up holding a couple of Orange Sodas, and ask if you would like one. He would tip it upside down into your front pocket before you could say “Sure!” I never could duplicate that trick, despite lots of practice. Hurston had it down, cold. >>

One day, he jacked up the rear end of a friend’s car and put a block under the differential. When the friend got into his car and tried to leave, the tires spun and threw gravel, but the car didn’t move. Yes, Hurston loved a good laugh. >>

One late afternoon, Hurston came bounding into the store. “Hey, y’all! The train derailed coming into town! There’s two cars of corn spilled all over. Everybody’s going down to haul some home. Let’s go!” >>

“Can you do that, legally”, I asked. Call me a chicken, but I certainly didn’t want to do anything that would get me crossways with the Sheriff. >>

“The foreman in charge of the cleanup crew said he didn’t care.” >>

“Well, let’s go!” I jumped into my pickup and followed Hurston’s pickup to the sight of the derailment. There was corn, lots of corn, as well as probably ten guys with shovels, loading their trucks. We selected an empty spot and backed in. I helped Hurston load his pickup, and he helped me load mine. Waving, Hurston headed toward Old Salem and I turned toward Hot Coffee. >>

“Nance, look what I got”, I hollered when I got home. “Should be just about right to feed out those two pigs we just got!” Working together, we unloaded the corn into 27 large black garbage sacks. The front of the carport was stacked two high with sacks of corn. There must have been half a ton of it. Pleased with our enterprise, we went in to supper and talked about the tasty pork that we would be producing. >>

The next morning, I measured out a quart of corn for each pig before heading in to work. Along with our table scraps and excess produce from the garden, the cost to feed these pigs out would be almost nothing. I was a happy farmer as I drove into work. When I got there, Janice told how Hurston made two more trips for corn after supper, even using an old trailer they had. He unloaded his corn into an old house on their property. Hurston had so much corn, she said it collapsed the floor! We had a good laugh about that, but I thought to myself “Greed tempts fate.” Then the first customer called in, and Janice and I had no more time to talk of corn.
Just before closing, Hurston walked into my office and flopped down in a chair. “Well, I got busted,” he said. >>

“Busted! What do you mean, Hurston?” I asked. >>

Hurston related the following tale. “A railroad investigator showed up at my place this afternoon and said he was looking for stolen corn from the train wreck. I asked him how he came to call at my place, and he pointed to the trail of corn leading down my driveway. The tailgate on my old trailer didn’t fit tight, and I guess I leaked a nice little trail of corn right to my door. He said he was either going to collect for the corn, or call Tater Jones.” >>

“What did you do?” I asked, half-afraid of the answer. >>

“I asked him to wait just a minute, while I went into the house for my checkbook, because I was fixin’ to buy some corn”, Hurston laughed. “He was a pretty nice guy, though, and only charged me $100, which is a bargain compared to what I would have paid at the feed store.”
“Well, that isn’t too bad, considering that he had you over the barrel,” I said. “But didn’t you tell him you had permission from the foreman?” >>

Hurston explained. “I got that bit of information from a guy at the gas station that got some of the first of the corn. Maybe he didn’t ask the right guy.” >>

I was now a nervous wreck. Would I get a visit from the investigator? How would it look for me to get caught with stolen corn? I always avoided trouble like the plague, and here I was, up to my neck in it! I wish I had never seen that stupid corn. As soon as I locked up the store, I headed for home. Calling for Nancy from the carport, I explained the situation. I decided the best thing for us to do would be to hide the corn, and maybe the whole thing would blow over. But where could I hide 27 big bags of corn? The only place I could think of was in the attic. First, I had to make the bags lighter. By suppertime, I had 54 bags of corn. Then I had to laboriously haul them up to the hot, stuffy attic. Fifty-four trips up the ladder! I was bushed. >>

As we started supper, the thought occurred to us that the ceiling wouldn’t be able to hold all that weight. Dang! Another trip up the ladder, and another half hour in 110-degree attic heat moving the bags around. My legs could barely support me coming down the ladder, but I felt that I had done as much as I could. I washed up, sat down, and picked up my fork to try supper again when the phone rang. >>

“Hello.” >>

A deep southern voice started talking. “This is Sheriff Jones. I am investigating the railroad corn spill. I believe you may have something to tell me about that.” >>

My heart stopped. What do I say? As I struggled to take a breath, I decided to make a clean breast of it, to explain that I thought it was okay, and to volunteer to pay for the corn. As I drew in a breath, the deep voice morphed into Hurston’s laugh. >>

“Ha, Ha! I had you on that one, didn’t I?” >>

“Hurston, you ass! Are you trying to give me a heart attack? I was picturing myself in a chain gang, cutting the sheriff’s grass for the next ten years! Boy, you gave me a scare!”
“You have a good night sleep, old buddy!” Hurston laughed again and hung up the phone. My fate was sealed by my own greed. I didn’t get a good night sleep that night or any night until all the corn had been fed out, and the pigs sent to the slaughterhouse. >>

Which is another story.>>