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The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/therealdocturner on 2024-11-25 23:35:57+00:00.
I’m finally in the process of writing a book about my grandfather who passed away twenty years ago. I set up a recorder and visited him several times and I just let him go. I’d get lost in that deep timber behind his Georgia drawl. So much tape. I wanted to share my favorite story that he told because I’m not going to include it in the book. My editor is putting his foot down. He says it’s too far off the beaten trail. I just wanted it out there somewhere. I just transcribed the recording. I figured his words spoke for themselves.
When I was just out of medical school, I got my first job in a small town just north of Portland. I’d been there…six years when four men were mauled to death in the fall of 1954. Their bodies had been dragged off into the woods, and there wasn’t much left of ‘em after they were found. At first, folks had thought it might be a mountain lion or a pack of coyotes, but after the third man was killed, most folks, myself included, had thought it was Kitchner Brown’s junkyard dogs. Kitchner was an unfortunate outcast, and his dogs seemed like they fit the bill.
Kitchner had come home from the War in Europe, a changed man. A German grenade had gone off right next to him, which gave him a bum leg and a broken brain. He was a real nice man, but most folks in town didn’t want much to do with him when he got back. I guess before he left, he was sharp as a tack and quick with a joke. Everybody loved him then. The war ended just after he’d come home and I think everybody was happy to bask in victory and not too keen on staring at what that victory cost.
All Kitchner had was Becky, his young wife. Wonderful girl. They’d been sweethearts since they could walk. Becky didn’t care that he was a little slow, she was just happy to have him home.
They wouldn’t hire him down at the mill, so he went and turned his property into a junkyard. It didn’t bring in much, but it was enough for him and Becky. Becky had tried to argue on behalf of her husband to his old friends, but it was no use. He was dead to them as far’s they were concerned.
One time in church, Becky stood up in the middle of the sermon.
“That grenade didn’t take away nothin’ that made my husband the best man God ever made. Shame on all of you!”
She walked out the door and never came back. Way it goes in small towns, I guess.
A little over a year after Kitchner came back home, Becky got pregnant, but she died giving birth to their little girl, Sarah. Kitchner was left to raise their little girl on his own. He didn’t have much time to mourn. He buried her on the nicest part of his property, with a view of the mill pond in the distance. He even made a bench. When his daughter was sleepin’, he’d always sit on it and watch the stars and talk to his wife.
He made that little girl his life. In spite of their feelings for him, people in town had to admit that there wasn’t a better father than Kitchner Brown. If you ran into Kitchner in town, he would talk your damn ear off about every little thing his daughter did.
He even went down to Portland and came back with three puppies so his daughter would have more company growing up than just him. Those dogs were very protective of that little girl. Anybody that come anywhere near her was given the side eye from those surly mongrels.
Years went by, and then the dyin’ started. Four men, all killed at night.
I gave my two cents as a doctor. Looked like a dog attack to me. Had I known what was going to happen, I’d… heck I don’t know what I woulda done. I didn’t know they were gonna do what they did. I thought something else should’ve been done.
After people had come to an agreement on the responsible party, a bunch of men took it upon themselves and went to the junkyard and shot Kitchner’s dogs right in front of his daughter without even a word. Kitchner was mad as hell, but his daughter always came first. He went and buried those dogs next to his wife and told his little girl that she would see them again someday.
“I know it’s sad for you baby, but they’re havin’ a gay old time right now with your Momma.” He told me he said that to her. Like I said, he’d tell anybody within earshot everything about that little girl.
Everybody thought the problem was solved, until that next night.
Sarah had snuck outta the house after dark. She was crying over the graves of her dogs when she was attacked by somethin’. Kitchner woke up to the screams of his baby girl. He had been able to scare off whatever it was with his gun. He snatched her up and brought her down to my place.
She was all tore up. Runnin’ a fever. I remember when I was cleanin’ her wounds, this awful sound came from outside. I thought it was a wounded coyote at first… but…it just um.. I’ve had nightmares for fifty years about that damn noise. Kept gettin’ closer and closer to my place in the dark. Kitchener still had his gun. I think he was as scared as I was. I kid you not, I never want to hear that sound again.
Scared me so bad, I wouldn’t leave my place after dark. Anyway…
The next day, a pack of coyotes was tracked and gunned down while Kitchner was still by his daughter’s side. For the next three weeks, nothing happened. No more attacks. No more wild cries from hell in the middle of the night. Sarah had gone into a kind of coma, fighting for her life. I thought about taking her down to Portland, but I was scared if we moved her that we might make it worse.
Life returned to normal for everyone except Kitchner. I gotta be honest, I don’t know what was wrong with her, so I won’t even bother to go down the checklist of everything I crossed off. Kitchner told me that he knew what it was, and that he knew what he had to do. But he never bothered to say more. I thought maybe he’d just gone off his nut. Who wouldn’t with his whole world dyin’ right there in front of him?
He spent three weeks talking to everyone in town like he was Sherlock Holmes or something. Asking questions.
Where were they that night?
People caught him goin’ through their properties and homes, like he was looking for somethin’. He was even thrown in the sheriff's cell for one night. He was warned to stop what he was doin’.
One day he went down to Portland. He had his truck loaded up with every nice thing in his home. When he come back three days later, all that stuff was gone. All he had in the truck with him was a couple boxes of bullets.
Come October, there was a town picnic by the mill pond after church. Everybody was there. I stayed with Sarah. I wasn’t gonna leave that little girl’s side for nothing.
Well, Kitchner made a scene down at the picnic.
Stood up on a big stump and started to shout.
“My little girl is gonna die tonight, I’m certain,” he says. “When that moon comes up tonight, her life’s over. There’s only one way that ain’t gonna happen. I narrowed it down to thirteen. I talked to y’all. I can’t narrow it any further. One of you is to blame for all this misery. I know what happened to you ain’t your fault, but you’ve gotta pay for what you’ve done. You gotta be man enough to let me end it. If there’s any part of you that’s sorry for what you did, I’m begging you to come forward now. Save my daughter. Please.”
Everyone was silent. No one knew what to say. Kitchner started to tear up. He started to look a little wild.
“Whoever you are, please don’t make me do this! Nobody else has to die! I’m begging you.”
After another awkward moment, some men from the mill dragged him away from the picnic. Kitchner was screaming the whole time. Swearing there was a monster in their midst.
Half an hour later, Kitchner came back with a couple of guns.
Kitchner Brown murdered thirteen men at the church picnic that day and got a belly full of bullets himself for the trouble. Those bullets didn’t seem to bother him though. He was a bloody mess goin’ about his business. When he was done, he went back to his truck and drove down to my place.
He pointed his gun at me and I about loaded my drawers. He looked like hell and he was certainly not afraid to raise it.
I thought it was over right there.
“I know it ain’t you, Doc. I don’t want to hurt you. Don’t do anything stupid, and I won’t.”
He made me sit with him by his daughter’s side.
A group of men had went and got their guns and camped outside my house, but none would come in because Kitchner was holding me at gunpoint. It went on like that for a few hours until nightfall.
As the full moon of October rose in the sky, Sarah’s fever finally broke and she opened her eyes. Kitchner was thankin’ God and smiling. He was almost bled out at that point; white as a ghost.
I can still hear their voices. I will never forget the words they said to each other, and the words he said to me after.
“Daddy?” she says.
“You’re gonna be alright, baby.” he whispered.
“I saw Momma, and my dogs. Momma said it was time to go home.”
“That’s good, baby.”
“I wish you coulda seen her, Daddy.”
“I hope I will, baby. You get some rest.”
Sarah smiled and nodded back off, and Kitchner turned to me. He smiled. He was holdin’ back tears.
“I don’t know if I’m gonna get to see either one of ‘em again, Doc. I killed thirteen men today, and twelve of ‘em were innocent. I don’t think there’s any forgiveness here or in heaven for what I done. But my baby girl's life was worth it.” Kitchner smiled and died right there as his daughter slept.
The town damned Kitchner to hell with every breath they had to spare,...
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