A Salvation Army Band played
And the children drunk lemonade
And the morning lasted all day, all day
~ Life in a Northern Town, The Dream Academy
Life in a Northern Town
There was only one murder in Williamsport as far as anyone could remember. Old Mrs. Brown up on the hill took in boarders – laborers who drifted along the seaside villages – and one of them tied her up and stabbed her to death. Olivia Truman was the one who found her and she screamed loud enough to wake the dead. Doug Harper heard her from out in his field behind Mrs. Brown's, that's how loud it was, and he ran up at once to help, so he was the second person to see it. In a town the size of Williamsport, news travels like wild fire, especially with the younger ones unemployed and at home all day. Valerie Mercer was driving past and saw the commotion and went to sound the alarm at the fire hall before heading back up.
By noon the population of Williamsport had doubled as neighboring towns came in caravans to witness the spectacle. Olivia was telling everyone over and over again how she found her, how she thought it strange that Mrs. Brown wasn't in church and a chill took her – that's how she said it, "I felt a cold chill run down my spine" – and she just knew. So she hotfooted it up the road to check and there Mrs. Brown was – half her face cut away by that psycho and blood everywhere. She'd never seen so much blood.
The townsfolk crowded the windows and doorways so that they could see, too, but the Mounties had arrived by then and were pushing everyone away, telling them all to go home unless, like Olivia Truman, they'd seen something in which case they needed to make a statement. Everyone wanted to make a statement. Everyone had a poor opinion of Stan Cleaver and the low lives that came into town from up the way ("those people from Bear Creek", Alice said meanly and they all concurred). Everyone had been the last person to see Stan the night before. He hadn't been right in his mind, drinking at the fire hall dance, like he was up to something. Someone said they heard him talking violence. Someone said they had been concerned for Mrs. Brown, all alone in that lonely house with that man. No mentioned the possibility that she might have been violated. People didn't talk about those things. At least not in public. And she was nearly sixty! (The older women were secretly thrilled.)
Danny and his friends came running from the creek where they had been fishing and Danny had the sense to climb the tree so that he could see down on the whole setting, even saw the body when they brought it out. He told Jeremy later that he could see her dead eyes, how blank they were. But what he really saw was the crowd and their eyes. They were –
excited. More so than at a dance or a wedding or even the First of July. They had come to life - the sheen of perspiration and runny make-up glowing on their faces, blood lust coursing through their tensed muscles so that he could see their hearts beating in their fat necks.
The very fact that they were part of something important for the first time in their dull little lives made them –
happy. As if suddenly they mattered, as if they had worth. It seemed an odd thing to be proud of. It puzzled his 11-year-old mind.
Danny learned something about his fellow man that day. He just didn't understand it until much later.