Windows To The World

A MINISTER’S GHOST

Philip DePoy

Fever Develin is an unusual man who left the Blue Mountain region of Georgian Appalachia years ago with only one person to see him off, Skidmore Needle who was his best friend.  Devilin now has a doctorate in cultural studies and has returned to his hometown to study and capture the music and folklore of the area.

One of the reasons he came back to Blue Mountain was that he realized that no matter where he lived he would still be in Blue Mountain. “Home wasn’t a place as much as a cellular memory, a collection of experiences that trail out behind you. “ When he came home Skidmore Needle was still his best friend, but was now the Sheriff. He had helped Skidmore solve a few cases but now they were having a problem. Skidmore was warning Fever to stay away from his latest investigation.

Two   lovely teen aged girls are coming home one night from a movie date and are killed by a train at a railroad crossing. They are Rory and Tess, the nieces of a close friend of Develin’s, Lucinda.  . Their car, a Volkswagen was apparently stalled on the tracks and the girls died instantly.

Lucinda asks Fever to investigate because it made no sense to her. They were alert active girls and even if their car was stuck on the tracks, she can see no reason why they didn’t just get out of the car and run out of the way. Fever begins to check things out despite opposition from the sheriff and he finds that the keys to the ignition were not in the car nor found at the scene. And the seat belts were still fastened. How could the girls not have heard the train, which screams several loud whistles before it approaches the railroad crossing?

This proceeds to be a very interesting story. We all know of people hit by the train at railroad crossings and we have had these same questions. Why would a car stall on the tracks, why didn’t the warning whistle suffice to alert the drivers and why didn’t the driver just get out or at least try?

Because there is always more to the story of course, but we will usually never know these answers. In this mystery a complication set of overlapping causes have one great effect as these two girls die, but here at least there were some answers.

The back story of live in a southern mountain area is well done. Develin discusses some funeral rites. In Blue Mountain funerals were social occasions as well as memorial services. Folks dressed up, everybody brought food to the fellowship hall. Genuine sympathy and goodwill were evident. Of course the dressing up was a declaration of economic status, the food a serious competition, but to Develin the sympathy wasn't particularly deep. That was not the case when children such as these were being buried.