Closed (A Short Story by Shannon O’Day)

((Shannon O’Day, 1956-57) (Part Three of Four Parts))

When Gus O’Day and his wife returned from Fayetteville, North Carolina, he learned of Shannon’s run-in with the law, not to mention that his reckless attempt to farm was over, but “Thank God for that,” he told his dude. Ronald Short, the county attorney.

Why, in fact, was Mr. Short initially confused about the Kent Peterson murder that he didn’t let out, but the sheriff, Dakota Country, Sheriff Terry Fauna, never pursued the murder, or his inquisitive nature, just let him pass, again both? Gus and Short were puzzled. It seemed that he never needed the law to close the case; he just did it by himself, as if someone had lowered the blinds. Now instead of Shannon hanging out with Gus, because of her bullying for wanting to know the details of the murder, what she didn’t take to court, wanting to know, what she didn’t know, or pretended not to know, but he should have Known, if he really did kill Kent, and of course he did kill Kent, but hanging out with Gus might bring things to light, and Shannon was okay with the court’s results, so it started happening. hung out at Dickey’s Diner, ate there before, just didn’t hang out there, and now he was hanging out there, got to know old Josh the cook pretty well, and some waitresses, and a young blind man who played Ricky Nelson songs. , and a little black boy who came in and did a tap dance, called Zam Zam.

It was a Friday night, Shannon, she had left the Diner, had spent half the night leaning against the utility pole looking at the empty lots around her, one would think she could have held her gaze indefinitely. Then he stumbled back to his apartment on Wabasha Street, next to the World Theater, where he couldn’t hurt himself or anyone else, including innocent bystanders or maybe all three.

It was then that he changed the course of his life, which was simply inevitable, to be a danger if he hadn’t. He was now drinking in the cornfield of Gus’s neighbor, Mr. Orville Stanley (who had retired from the railroad and had this hobby farm with his wife) Alice Stanley, his daughter Nadine, and their daughter five years old, Dinah.

He knew them as well as anyone else knew them. So 1956, he asks them without disturbing the interruption, if they don’t mind if he drinks among their corn supplies. And as time went on that summer, he would drop a pint of moonshine into the old man’s mailbox and when they met and talked, he would drop a pint into his back pockets.

So now no one needs to bother questioning Shannon about the murder and he didn’t get that intimidation from his brother, and the way he thought about it: out of sight out of mind, or maybe, what you don’t know, you can ‘ It wouldn’t hurt, or possibly, the concept that blood relatives are thinker than water, wouldn’t be tested under fire, as Mark Twain would have said. And that was it, and that was fine with Shannon O’Day.

But that wasn’t how Gus and the country’s attorney saw things, Mr. Ronald Short, but Gus mustn’t be as persistent as Mr. Short.

The following Saturday Mr. Short and Sheriff Fauna, both friends, good friends, not close friends but light friends, had dined at Dickey’s Diner, the Sheriff believed and said to Mr. Short in so many words: Simple fate was taking the expected course, and he shouldn’t be too reckless in taking advantage of fate and poking his nose into the case any further than he already had, that Judge Finley had made his decision, and he wouldn’t stand to be compared. takes this to another level, apart from curiosity.

Mr. Short knew Finley had a bad temper and didn’t want to be questioned about his trials, and in particular about this Shannon O’Day business; and Finley had told his dear friend, Sheriff Fauna, not to let Short catch a whiff or a glimpse of the real picture.

Ronald Short began to meddle in what Judge Finley thought was his business. Short feeling that he wasn’t doing Finely any harm in the process, but was telling the Sheriff about his new investigation into the murder, and forgot that the Sheriff was a dear friend of Finley’s, more than he was.

“No,” he told Fauna, “what puzzles me is Henry Sears, the witness, the same one who saw a stranger kill Kent Peterson and then went into the woods. And then after the court hearing , got up and left the state. I think Shannon had some money stashed away and paid Sears to lie.”

Judge Finley told Sheriff Fauna the following Monday morning in the hallway of the Dakota County Courthouse: “What kind of county prosecutor do we have here, a detective? Ask him if he has a license to snoop around!” of the court!”

So, in that moment, his trust and confidence in Ronald Short shone unsteadily, you might say. In that trying moment, he told the sheriff, “Mr. Short could be a victim of pure, compounded circumstances…joke like anyone else; if that damned boy doesn’t believe the old picture he’s showing, he could get into it.” somewhere”. alley, or being subjected to some outrageous misfortune and coincidence that befell Mr. Peterson, and then we can all rest in peace. If it doesn’t work, well, the alley will do.

Short still didn’t have a second in doubt that it was Shannon who had paid someone to lie for him, in the plain, simple color of money. But Shannon never had a penny to his name at this point.

So all Ronald Short had to do was find out where the money was coming from, or where the witness was, or work with Gus on Shannon’s guilt and conscience, on carrying out the murder. Either, either would work. And this is exactly what he was determined to do, to pursue and, if necessary, to persuade, and he was not discreet, having the sheriff supply him with spies, thinking that the sheriff was one of his respectable spies, taking pride in his profession to catch the real killer, instead of chasing shadows, as any little boy who could read the court files would have told them ‘nonsense’ and known something was fixed.

In full view of half the city of St. Paul, evidently on his way home from the latest image display, no one could locate Judge Finley to tell him about it. Anyway, Ronald Short had found someone, someone he thought he could get information from, who called him and said he had the information he was looking for, and Short met this man, in an alley by the Diner, but there was someone behind. hidden doors.

He never had more common sense than to believe that the sheriff was on his side, and that he could tangle with the old judge and walk away as if nothing had happened. Not to mention trying to question the witness and assure him that he has no bad feelings, and he would keep his identity a secret, but secrets aren’t secrets when two people know them, they’re agreements.

Inside the Baptist church that Sunday morning, Short’s wife had the funeral, and of course Judge Finley and Sheriff Fauna were present, but not Shannon O’Day or her brother. They both even brought roses for their wife to lay in the coffin.

That was a lot of money, $10,000 in 1956. He could have paid for two small houses in the North End of St. Paul, in fact, he bought one, for the judge. And as far as the judge and the sheriff are concerned, the investigation is closed. For ever and ever; off the record.

Written on 5-27-2009 xx No: 407