Episode 18: Where the Cold Wind Blows

Blurb
Frank Tilley was not a nice man, nor one beloved by his community. He may even have been a pain in Sheriff Andy Hodge's buttocks. But no man deserved to die like that.

Tonight, the dark earth comes for one of its own.

Content Warnings

 * Discussion of domestic violence

Plot Synopsis
Frank Tilley is a railyard worker who helps smuggle moonshine. Acting as a middleman in the black market for liquor that has exploded since Prohibition, he uses his connections to his advantage. The people of Baker’s Gap dislike him, but tolerate him either because of his usefulness or because they fear him.

Nearly nightly, he drinks at Bill and Arnie Ward’s place, a hardware store with a secret saloon in the basement that masquerades as a chess club. They avoid the scrutiny of the law in part because Bill’s wife is related to the sheriff, Andy Hodge. The main trouble they encounter is Frank, whose behavior causes frequent problems.

One evening in fall 1927, the sheriff arrives at the hardware store to a scene of chaos. Carl Minor is on the ground with a broken nose, Bill attempting to rouse him. Frank is in the middle of strangling Eugene Dougherty, while Bill’s wife Bonnie and Arnie attempt to take control of the situation.

Andy works to diffuse the situation successfully, sending Frank on his way. It was the last time any of them would see Frank alive.

At two in the morning, Andy receives a phone call from Deputy James Mutter about a train found stopped on the tracks, nearly causing an accident with another train. Upon investigation of the first train, the conductor finds shattered bottles of moonshine and the bodies of two breakmen. He hurries to the nearest farmhouse to make the call.

When Andy and James arrive on the scene, they begin their investigation. It’s clear the train made an unscheduled stop in order to unload moonshine. It appears at first to be a moonshine deal gone wrong, but Andy soon finds Frank’s severed head displayed in the engine. The sight makes even the coroner sick.

The train’s crew is nowhere to be seen, but Jeremiah Silcox, a local man who rides the rails, is found hiding in the caboose. He had boarded the train in order to go to a town called Paradise on the Tennessee-Virginia border, and accidentally bore witness to the carnage. He tells the story of a pale woman who he claims must’ve killed Frank, and mentions the Dark Earth and the Good Mother, causing Andy to roll his eyes and assume he’s babbling because of his drunkenness. After handing him off to a deputy, Andy decides to take on the task of informing Frank’s wife, Cora Lee, of his passing.

Cora Lee and Frank live in a run-down farmhouse on the edge of a thick pine forest. As dawn creeps in, Andy arrives to break the news with Deputy Mutter. The house is silent as he knocks on the door, and Cora Lee seems not to be at home. Inside the house are signs of a struggle, the kitchen ransacked in the manner of a domestic dispute. As Andy prepares to enter the house, Mutter calls for him.

Around the porch, barefoot and coatless, Cora Lee stumbles out of the woods, covered in dirt. Her face is bruised, and her hands and arms are streaked with blood. She collapses into Andy’s arms.

She tells the sheriff her husband is dead, and that he was a bad man, and that the Dark Earth finally came for him.