Tom Cash
Chattanooga and the mountains of southeast Tennessee is where it all happens. Gus, half German, half Cherokee but mostly Indian, tells what happens. The girl he meets and falls in love with has a trace of Irish but mostly Sioux and Ojibwa blood. Their career objectives seem to be on a collision course. Not quite trusting the other does not prevent bonding, however, and together they find blood much thicker than water. Gus has a fondness for high-end foreign sports cars but is disinclined to buy them. He just drives them away without owners' permissions. Peg suspects he does this but cannot be sure.
Two friends who live high in the Smoky Mountains overlook all character flaws and non-Indian blood and share with Gus and Peg their ancestors' ghosts and primeval customs. They also establish customs of their own. One Feather is all Cherokee. We are not sure about Little Bird. Is she Indian? Gus and Peg have brushes with murderers and drug traffickers. Gus stumbles onto oodles of money. True friends, One Feather and Little Bird help with the money. Despite scrutiny by federal agencies and other dangerous characters, Gus does not alter his life style. Although buffalo have not returned nor white man disappeared, Gus and Peg persist in doing their version of the Ghost Dance.
Tom was born and grew up in Kentucky. His home town was old Eddyville, now flooded by Lake Barkley. He studied journalism at University of Missouri and holds English degrees from University of Kentucky. In England, during World War II, Tom worked with Scotland Yards as U. S. Army CID. He fought under Patton in Europe. He taught school, worked as a controls technician in steam and nuclear plants, and as chief personnel officer in the power production division of Tennessee Valley Authority.. He retired as labor relations manager.
Other books are: Weep No More, My Lady, 2000, Wandering Steps and Slow, 2001, and Sunday's Children, 2002. Tom lives in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
The Hamilton County line runs along the backside of Signal Mountain where the mountain's appendages reach like fingers over into Sequatchie valley and Sequatchie County. The transition at spots is gradual and at others precipitous. From the relatively flat top of the mountain, directly across Highway 127 from a sandstone church, is Pickerel Road. It winds its way west past yards displaying hubcaps, rusting machinery, and past nondescript houses and barking dogs until it reaches a decidedly steep downhill and at that point it snakes its way down, crosses into Sequatchie County and then up just a little before plunging off the edge of the earth as deep ruts in dirt. No one knows the origin of the tracks or can remember what ever happened to the cart or the owner. There is nothing down there below.
At the place along Pickerel where it tips back up slightly, back to the left if you are going toward Sequatchie, was a dwelling. It probably had never seen a coat of paint or at least, if it had there was no evidence of it. The front porch, which ran the full width of the house, had its roof supported by five poles, trees at one time obviously because you could see where the limbs had been lopped off, short two or three inch stubs still there. The floor of the porch was about a foot and a half up from the ground and was supported at intervals by rocks, boulders actually, not uniform or shaped, just rocks. The boards of the porch were rough sawn and there were gapping cracks between them. Underneath the porch was bare dirt, and this was the coolest, most comfortable place for the blue tic hounds whose thumping tails and scratching could not only be heard but also almost felt from above on the porch.
I was looking for Joe Dale Summers. I had been told it was along here on Pickerel Road. When the dust had swirled on past me and it was safe to open the door, I got out and started up what appeared to be a path from the road to the house. Perhaps this was Joe Dale’s house. No sooner had I entered the yard than the hounds were at me barking and yapping. They really didn't look vicious, but you never know. I kept my hands in my pockets, talked as soothingly as I could and stopped, looking to see if human help was available.
She whistled. It was a shrill whistle that darn near made me want to heel. The dogs stopped barking as if shot, tucked their thin tails under their bellies and slunk back under the porch. They had had obedience training I thought.
"Wha’cha want?" she yelled.
"Is this where Joe Dale Summers lives?"
She didn’t answer. She looked me over.
"You a cop?" she asked. She didn’t rise from a rocker on the porch. I saw she was rather large, perhaps forty. She was wearing a plain cotton dress and I suspect that was all. She had on tennis shoes that once were probably white but now the color of everything else in the area, a dirt hued brown. No socks.
"No," I said and volunteered nothing more.
"Who are you?"
"My name is Ray Hartzler," I said, still standing about a porch length away.
"Not very talkative, are you?" she said.
I said nothing.
What do you want with Joe Dale?"
"I came up here all the way from Ooltewah to see Joe Dale. He knows me."
She scratched an unbelievable area and yelled inside, "Joe Dale!"
I was relieved when he looked out, saw me and said, "Come on in."
I looked back at the Mercedes.
"It’ll be there," he said.
The inside smelled like rancid grease and just like my grandfather’s old smoke house. He led me through two rooms to the kitchen. He reached into a dilapidated cupboard and pulled out an old Red Food paper sack and put it on the table.
"Count it."
I did and it was right.
I nodded.
He nodded too and motioned out the back way. Hidden from view from the front of the house was a Hummer.
"Get in. I’ll get the Mercedes."
Clutching my sack, I waited. He put the Mercedes in behind the Hummer so that it too would not show from the road.
"Gert will move it out when we are gone," he explained.
