Wolves of Manchester (part 2) Rosebud
Chapter 4
The First taste of Blood
The next morning, Bud had the twins get their rifles out of the truck as he poured the morning coffee into plastic cups. While they drank, he told them how to hunt Squirrels.
“Squirrels are much smarter than most folks think. They gather the nuts for the winter and hide them in the stone walls. They can hear you before you see them, and as soon as they do they head for the nearest tree to hide in. Then when you show up, they move to the opposite side of the tree where you can’t see them.
But you can fool them if one of you stands still, and the other slowly walks circles around the base of the tree. When you do this, the squirrel will move to the side where it is exposed and is an easy target to kill.
Now one of you gets to kill the first squirrel as your brother walks around the tree. So who gets the first shot? I think the best way to decide is a shooting match...He took the empty plastic cup, walked 50 paces, and stuck it in the crotch of an oak tree. That´s your target men, He said as he pointed to the small white circle that was the cups bottom. The one who put a bullet closest to the center gets to shoot the first squirrel.”
Both Karl and Kevin loved to compete with each other, and were already taking their rifle out of gun cases. Then they began to argue who was going to shoot first.
Bud immediate put an end to the squabble between the twins when he said. Karl you were the first out of your mother’s womb that makes you the oldest. Do you want to shoot first or second? “
Karl said.” My younger brother can decide” and he hugged him.
Kevin laughed, then smiled and pointed at his brother. “You are the oldest, brother, you should go first.” That was the moment that the twins bonded into one person and the moment the Brothers of the Wolf truly became a pack. Each one took their shot and both hit the center of the target. Bud was amazed and started to tell them to shoot again. Then the twins spoke in unison.
“We have decided that the one who sees the first squirrel will have the first kill.” They asked for the hunting knife, took the box of cartridges, and left their father standing there open mouth, as they turned and walked arm in arm into the woods. It was not long before they found several squirrels and the twins had each killed one .Karl took the hunting knife and cut them open. Then Kevin put his fingers into the intestines and ripped out the bleeding hearts. Gave one to his brother as he said”Eat this brother wolf” then he put his into his mouth, crushed it with his teeth and swallowed it. He licked the blood from his fingers and laughed as Karl followed his example. ” Now we are Brothers of the Wolf he said.” They embraced then kissed each other on their bloody lips, and then they cut off the heads and tails and took their trophies back to the camp for their father to admire
Bud finished the coffee and started to fold the tarp when he heard the rifle shots, followed by eerie howls and wild maniacal laughter. He froze, trying to find a logical reason for these sounds coming from the woods.
When the twins came running into the camp, each one held a gutted bloody squirrel’s body, and they had smeared its blood over their faces and arms. Then they showed their father the severed tails.
“Dad!! We got our first trophies,” as they held the bloody mutilated and decapitated bodies in front of their father. That was the frightening moment when Bud realized that he had taught his sons not about hunting squirrels, but to kill for the pleasure of it.
Not knowing what else to do. He yelled at the both of them.
“What in the hell have you two done? I took you here to hunt, not to butcher. You take those squirrels with you. Go to the lake, and wash off that blood then throw their bodies away. I will put the guns away. Then we are going home.”
On the way home Bud reminded them. “We will never mention this to your mother. You are her joy and she loves you with all of her heart. If she found out what you two did today it would destroy her completely. Do you understand me? We are family and we stick together no matter what!” They both spoke at the same time. “OK dad, we were only having fun. We are sorry, but we are keeping the tails.”
Once they were back on the paved road Bud said,” I am glad you two understand how much hurt you will cause to your mother. You can keep the tails and I will forget this ever happened. But, I want you to promise me to keep this a secret from her and help her in the shop. “
When they arrived at Rosebuds, Rosalie Gustavo was in the kitchen. There were dozens of cookies baking. Fresh apple pies and muffins sat on racks cooling and a pile of pots and pans in the sink. The twins took their bloody trophies and guns down to their basement room, put them in the closet and then returned to the kitchen. They kissed their mother then began to clean up the sink.
Rosalie beaming with pride looked at Bud and said. “We have raised two wonderful boys .I am so proud of them.” Then she went over to where they stood smiling in all their innocence, and smothered them in her motherly love.
All summer and into the Christmas season Karl and Kevin helped her in the restaurant. They took orders, cooked burgers, washed floors, and dishes, took out the garbage and stole her money from the cash register.
Marsha Callahan was one the school girls who frequented Rosebuds and the twins found her sexually arousing...They tried flirting with her every time she came there with her friends.
She was six feet tall and the top student in her class. She was also leader of the girl’s basket ball team, and the best runner on the girls track team. At school she found the twins to be repulsive and was not afraid to tell them so in front of her friends. She humiliated them to the point that the twins decided to terrorize her.
They began to follow her, and soon knew where she lived and her daily routine of jogging along the river each evening before sunset. They would wait for her to pass. Then run behind her barking, howling and whistling. Their plan failed miserably. Marsha was not intimidated in the least.
She would stop, turn around and laugh at them, stick her index finger high into the air and shout; “You two morons need to grow up.” Then she would turn and run so fast that the twins were left behind in angry muted silence. She was however, concerned that if she told her very protective father about the twins he might stop her from jogging each evening. So she said nothing to him about it. Besides she was very sure that she could easily control them.
The next evening Marsha jogged, but there were no howls behind her. Satisfied that she had put an end to their nonsense she ran every evening. What she did not know was.
The Brothers of the Wolf had gone to hunt elsewhere.
After New Year’s Rosebuds closed for a much needed vacation. Bud and Rosalie told them that they were going to Florida for ten days of sunshine, rest, and a visit to Disney World.
Bud gave Karl the keys to the Buick and asked him to drive them to the Manchester airport. With Kevin sitting in front next to his brother, Rosalie and Bud held hands and admired how well their sons had grown into such nice and polite men. When the Buick stopped in front of the departure gate, Bud gave them four hundred dollars to tide them over until they returned. The twins thanked him, then opened their doors and took their luggage out of the trunk.
Rosalie hugged each of them, and told them how much she loved them, and made them promise not to stay out too late, as Bud carried their luggage to be checked in, Rosalie blew her boys a last kiss.
When the twins drove away she did not hear them howl like the wolves they had become.
Chapter 5
Eliza Gomez Sanchez
Having no parental restraints the twins decided that evening to take, a fifth of vodka from the restaurant, their parents Buick Riviera and the hunting knife, and then go to Boston to watch the porno movies and see the burlesque shows in Scully Square.
Eliza Gomez Sanchez was an illegal immigrant new to Boston.
She had come all the way from Honduras´, through Mexico and up to the border city of Piedras Negras. She was going to join her brother Ernesto and her sister Modesty. They had promised her work with them at the Holliday Inn and sent her enough money to make the trip.
Then in Piedras Negras she was robbed of all her money and identification. In desperation she started trading sex for food and rides from the truckers to come to this Sanctuary City of Boston.
The day she arrived she found that her two siblings had been arrested by Immigration and Custom Enforcement authorities, and she had no idea how to find them .She went to the Honduran consulate for help, only to find that the office was closed over the weekend.
Now she was out in the bitter cold, begging on the streets, trying to earn enough money to keep alive until the consulate opened Monday in the morning. And she was afraid of dying from the cold and hunger that Boston provides its Illegal’s.
That is when she saw Karl and Kevin walked out of the Burlesque and head for a sedan parked nearby. She hurried across the litter filled street and intercepted them. She held out her shivering hand and begged them for money.
As she stood in front of them, Kevin reached into his jacket and withdrew a very fat wallet; he waved it in front of her.
“What will you do for one hundred dollars? Will you take a ride with my brother and me in the back seat of that car over there? “
The very thought of that money ,money enough to eat and sleep somewhere warm, was enough for Eliza say to yes .
Once they were seated in the Buick with Kevin and the girl in the back seat. Karl pushed a switch, locked all the doors and started the engine. Then he put the car into gear and drove onto the highway that took them back to New Hampshire.
Eliza was not at all concerned .She had done this more times than she could remember. But when Kevin put his hand under her dress she pushed it away and demanded her money. Kevin put his hand back, as Karl said.
“Don’t worry, I promise we will pay you even more. We want to go somewhere where we will not be disturbed. And I know the perfect place. Now you two drink some Vodka and get nice and friendly. We are going to a beautiful spot where we have been before.”
She drank the vodka and felt better, then she drank even more and she felt warm.
By the time they crossed the state line the vodka had made Eliza very drunk. Kevin had thrown her clothes out onto the highway, and now he was on top of her grunting like a beast in heat.
Karl drove through the spitting snowflakes onto the back road along the stone wall and pulled into the same spot where their father had taken them hunting. It was the exact place that they had killed to become Brother of the Wolf. He shut down the engine and took his brothers place in the back seat.
When he was done with the unconscious girl, they dragged her out of the car, gutted her from pelvic bone to sternum, and then again took turns raping her lifeless body. They cut off her long black hair for a souvenir, carried her body to the stone wall and threw her over it into the fallen leaves-
As they drove back onto the graveled road the snow storm began to cover the road, the blood on the ground, and the mutilated body of Eliza Gomez Sanchez, they threw the empty vodka bottle out the window into the snow
The storm began with powerful winds and a blizzard of snow falling.
It was as if nature had become a conspirator to The Brothers of the Wolf. They howled and talked of how little of her corpus would remain in the spring once the predators were done with it.
At Dunkin Doughnuts they stopped and washed the blood from their hands in the bathroom, and then ordered coffee and doughnuts to go. They laughed and howled all the way back to Rosebuds. They look their new souvenir down to the basement, tied a red ribbon around it and put it in the cabinet with the Squirrels tails, the rifles and hunting knife. Then without a bit of remorse they had a good night’s sleep.
All that night and throughout the next two days the winter storm raged.
It seemed as if God wanted to entomb Eliza´s mutilated body in a casket of pure white snow
The next day they awoke late. Showered together, changed clothes and put the night be fore’s bloody ones in the washer, and then went up to the kitchen, where Karl fixed steak and eggs for their breakfast. When they looked out the window and saw the amount of snow that had fallen, that they danced, and sang, with joy.
They stayed inside for a week, and washed the restaurants floors, scrubbed the counter tops, organized the dishes and glassware. Even the refrigerators shelves, stove and grill were spotless when the snow abated and the sun came out again.
As they worked; they schemed daily on what they were going to do to take revenge on Marsha Callahan. Both the twins hated her and wanted to kill her. They wanted to rape her and cut her throat, take her hair and put it with their trophies. But, they also knew she was never going to be in any situation they could think of where they could.
They gave up on this impossible dream, and developed a new strategy to inflict terror and pain, pull out her hair and get away with it. They decided that they could do this the first chance that came their way.
Then the weather cleared, and they set to work shoveling the walk and driveways. Then they took the Buick to a carwash and had it cleaned inside and out, and then waxed, while they feasted on fried clams, scallops, french-fries and onion rings. Then they filled the gas tank and drove to the airport.
Bud and Rosalie had been waiting for fifteen minutes in front of the arrivals doors, when Rosalie started to panic. She was positive something terrible had happened to her precious boys. She paced back and forth, looking at her watch and then back to the street. She was about to insist the Bud call the police when she saw them. They stopped in front of her, Karl opened the trunk lid. And then both of them got out.
While Bud put the luggage into the trunk of the car .Rosalie immediately gathered her sons to her side, put her arms around both of them , with tears of relief on her cheeks, she pressed them to her breasts and said. “Thanks to God you are all right.”
As Bud was driving home, the twins sat in the back with their mother. She told them about the wonderful time they had had in Florida. How glad she was to have missed the terrible snow storm, and the bone chilling cold. As soon as they drove up to Rosebuds, Bud was surprised when he noticed how well his boys had cleared the snow away from the drive and walkways. And he said to Rosalie.” Look how fortunate we are to have such wonderful sons.”
The twins suppressed their laughter as Kevin said. “Mom, just wait until you see a surprise we have for you and dad inside. You must be very tired from the flight home, leave the luggage and we will bring it in.”
While Kevin helped his mother out of the car, and Bud put the car into the garage, Karl ran to the restaurants door and waited for his parents to make their way up the walk way. When they reached the door they said. “Now mom, shut your eyes and don’t open them until we tell you.”
They took her hand and led her into the restaurant. When everyone was inside then they shouted “surprise” and told her to open them. What Rosalie saw took her breath away. There, above the counter was a large sign with the words.
“Welcome Home Mom and Dad!!We Missed You Very Much. “
The entire restaurant sparkled and looked brand new. Never in her life was Rosalie happier than that moment-
Chapter 6
Marsha Callahan
The day Marsha Callahan and her best friend walked into Rosebuds. They found Rosalie at the counter making coke floats for a half dozen seventh grade kids... As soon as she saw the twins clearing tables she pointed them out, then said in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear.
“Look who is over there? Why. It’s little Boo and tiny Peep. Two little sheep who want to be wolves, and chase me in the dark, but they don’t even have the courage to face me in the daylight.”
Horrified that her sons were being ridiculed, Rosalie left the counter, went over to where Marsha was standing. Stood in front of her, put her muscular arms on her hips, and proceeded to tell Marsha in no uncertain terms that she was a rude, arrogant spoiled brat. Then told her and her friend to leave Rosebuds and never return.
Karl and Kevin’s faces had turned red with murderous rage, but their mother assumed they were embarrassed. She went over to them took each one by the hand and said.” Forget her she is nothing but a tramp.”
They did not forget, not for one second.
That night they came to decision on how they were going to punish Marsha.
There was a girl’s basketball game between Manchester and Nashua scheduled for next Saturday evening, and when Marsha returned home they would be waiting in the dark.
It did not take them long to find exactly what they wanted on the restaurants computer...For $14.99 including free next day shipping they placed an order with Trendy Halloween Novelties for two latex masks, and paid for them with Rosebuds bank card. Next they went shopping at Wal-Mart, where they purchased two black overcoats, gloves and a roll of heavy black monofilament cord. That night they went back to the park looking for a dark narrow passage to set their trap.
They found the perfect place twenty yards from Marsha’s front door.
In school the next day they cornered Marsha as she was going to class, and said to her.
“We do not forget, and one day when you least expect it we will have our revenge. “
As they turned to walk away, Marsha said to them.” You two ugly gnomes will never catch me. You are too short, too fat and just plain ugly. I am smarter, and faster, and you two can to go to hell.”
They turned around as she raised her index finger, and smiled at her.
Then she saw something in the way they stared at her, that for the first time made her afraid of them.
The next afternoon UPS delivered their package from Trendy Halloween Novelties. They took it down to their basement bedroom opened it, and were soon dancing around the room with the grotesque masks covering their faces.
It was pitch black on the side street adjacent to the Callahan’s home. They talked as they stood in the cold waiting,
“I still think we should have brought the knife, Kevin said. I wish we could rape and kill the *****.”
Karl nodded in agreement as he thought about the pleasure of it.
Then he shook his head as he said.” It is too risky, and we have no chance to get away with it here. But tonight we are going to scare the crap out of her and get away with it. She will not be able to identify us with these masks on and it will be her word against ours, but one day, we will find a way to kill her. “
Even though it was spitting snow when Marsha stepped off the school bus, she did not seem to care. Her mind was still replaying the basket ball game, and the two shots she had missed in the final minutes that had cost her team the game. She never saw the black plastic cord stretched across the sidewalk. Suddenly she was sprawled on the cement and in pain. She started to get up when she saw the snarling faces of two wolves looking down at her.
When one of them grabbed her by the hair she screamed.
“Daddy, help me, help me” as she ripped of the mask, and raked her finger nails across the leering face leaving a red welt along his cheek-.
Clarence Callahan was sitting at his desk in his bathrobe. He had just finished his shower, and his wife Cathleen had poured him a scotch and water, he started filling out his daily log.
The snow, stormy weather, and the idiots that did not know how to drive on slippery roads caused him to return home late. It had been a long day. He took a long drink of Scotch, and then he heard his daughter’s terrified voice.
Without hesitating, he took his service pistol out of its holster and raced to the front door. As soon as he saw her on the ground and the two figures over her, he pulled back the pistols slide and loaded a round into its chamber. The twins froze at the sound, and then they heard a cold angry voice say.
“If you bastards move I will kill both of you. Now put your hands in the air and turn around and face me so I can see who I am dealing with.” By now his daughter was up off the cement and he told her to come and stand by his side. He asked.” Marsha are you hurt, do you know who these two are?”
“I am ok Daddy, but I hurt my wrist and knees. I do know them. Their names are Karl and Kevin, but I can never tell them apart. They are the twin sons of Rosalie and Bud Gustavo, the people who own Rosebuds restaurant. What are you going to do to them Dad?”
“First, I am going to find out who is who, now that your fingernails have made that possible. He pointed his pistol directly at them and said.”
“Ok let´s start with you Scarface. Now l want you to tell me what is your name, and then you can tell me wolf heads, after he takes off that stupid mask. “
After Kevin and Karl had identified themselves, Clarence Callahan said”Now let me tell you who I am.
I am Detective Sergeant Clarence Callahan, of the New Hampshire State Police. And you two idiots are up to your eyeballs in serious trouble.” Callahan took his daughters hand, then put his over her shoulder and said “Marsha, Now that you and I can tell one from the other. Please go inside and calm your mother. Then call the police department and tell them to send a squad car here, and tell them it is a silent run. I don´t want sirens and flashing lights disturbing our neighbors.”
It took the squad car six minutes to arrive, and one minute for two very large cops to put the twins in handcuffs. While Sergeant Callahan filled out the complaint, he said, “Before you lock them up for the night. I want fingerprints, mug shots, photos of the scars on that one’s face, and photos of the two of them with the masks on, and off their faces.”
I was precisely one A.M when Rosalie and Bud received the call from the Manchester Police Department. In panic, anxiously Rosalie wanted to know if their sons were hurt or involved in an accident.
When she asked the desk officer, he put the frantic woman on hold. Then he forwarded his call to the booking desk, where she was informed that Karl and Kevin has been arrested for assault and would be spending the night in jail until they were interviewed by a juvenile officer in the morning.
After a sleepless night Bud and Rosalie were at the police station trying to find out what was going on, and why their two wonderful boys were locked up like common criminals, and they demanded their immediate release.
New Hampshire Law Enforcement does not accommodate demands from distraught parents quickly.
It took four days before the twins went before the juvenile court judge who issued a restraining order in favor of Marsha and Clarence Callahan against them, and then he fined them five hundred dollars each on the misdemeanor charge of harassment, as he released them from jail into their parent’s custody. The judge said. “You two will find out that your actions will have serious consequences if you ever appear in this courtroom again.”
To be continued
Chapter 7
Serious Consequences
The serious consequences were quick and final in coming. They came that evening with the appearance of Miss Lewis and the school’s director Bob Daily knocking at the Gustavo´s front door. They handed Bud the notice that the school board had voted that Kevin and Karl were permanently suspended from attending school.
Rosalie was shocked, but Bud said as he read the notice. “ Thank you, my sons have wasted enough time there. Now they can get a good paying job working with the Highway Department.” He tore the notice in half, gave part to Bob Daily and the other half to Miss Lewis, and slammed the door in their faces.
It took Bud one day to convince his supervisor that his boys were good responsible workers. February tenth they went on the State of New Hampshire’s pay roll, repairing pot holes, clearing fallen limbs and trees, cleaning drainage ditches, plowing snow, and spreading rock salt on ice covered roads.
The winter winds were still drifting the fallen snow when I sat down at my desk. The weather forecast was predicting another twenty inches to fall over the weekend. Ralph Shoemaker walked in with doughnuts and two mugs of hot coffee. Then he said, “Bill, my friend you know what all this snow means? It means that the ski lodges will have a great year and the tourists will be spending money. There are ten ski lodges and God knows how many hotels. Restaurants, bed and breakfast accommodations are going to spend money with this paper on advertisements, which means that you will be writing glamorous reviews about them for the next two months.” Then he handed the mornings paper. “Here is a story that I am sure you will find very interesting.”
I could not believe my eyes when I read the byline.
STATE POLICE CAPTURE A PÁIR OF WOLVES IN MANCHESTER.
There below the story was a color photograph of two boys handcuffed together. They were dressed in black and wearing lifelike and frightening masks of snarling wolves with bloody fangs bared.
Then Ralph said.” Well Bill, I was wrong there seems to be still wolves in New Hampshire, even if they are a couple of teenagers who wanted to frighten a classmate that they feel humiliated them in front of their mother.
Naturally their names are not mentioned, as they are juveniles here in Manchester. Now go to work and happy writing.”
The most famous ski lodge in the state is Cannon Mountain; where on a clear day one can see four states and Canada. It was the one I picked to begin my glowing and boring review. I had written this same article every winter for the last six years and my mind and heart was not in it. Nor was I enthusiastic when I finished articles on Mountain Club of the Loon, Breton Woods or Tuckerman’s Ravine. It took me twelve hours to write basically the same uninspired drivel about all ten lodges that I had written last year, but they paid the paper and it paid my salary.
My moral improved as I put the first draft into a folder, then I put the newspaper in my briefcase, and thought of all the fine Hotels, and restaurants that I would enjoy on the Manchester Union Leader´s expense account, while I was photographing the lodges, lifts, ski and gift shops, and interviewing the tourists with broken legs and arms during the next week.
When I got home and opened the door the bouquet of cinnamon, brown sugar, toasted hazel nuts coming from the kitchen made my mouth water. I knew instantly that Sylvia and her mother were baking Smile Cookies. I stopped in the hall, took off my mackinaw, boots and scarf and. put my briefcase down. Then I clapped my hand in anticipation and announced.”I am home ladies.
I hope you girls are baking those for me to take to the mountains tonight.”
Sylvia ran up to me and gave me a warm welcome home hug.
“No daddy. These are the samples that I am taking to Rosebuds tomorrow. Mom has fixed a nice stew for tonight and I will let you have one cookie for dessert.”
After supper and a cookie, I said, “Bev I have a story to tell you while our daughter package´s her cookies. Will you come into the den; I have something I want you to read. And then I want your opinion.”
When we were settled on the sofa I said. “You remember when you ask me what Scott meant when he asked me about wolves. Well I think now it the time to tell you. I told her about my conversation with Scott on the lake and how he was going to commit suicide. And that he believes his daughter’s spirit intervened, and that she was murdered by human wolves that prey on humans and deer. Then I gave her the newspaper and waited for her comment.” And I was not surprised when she said.
“Well Bill, this is all very interesting. But I don’t think it proves anything, two teenage boys frightening a girl is not unusual. I do think that they were wearing wolf like masks is a strange coincidence .but is not enough to call for their indictment in the case of a school girl that has vanished and not been seen since she left her school to go to a tennis match. Besides there are no deer involved. I do think that you should send a copy of this to Scott as you promised him you would keep him informed.
Now you need to pack for your trip to ski country. And I need to help Sylvia make Smile coolies. Tomorrow is her big day and she is so excited, we are taking the first two dozen over to Rosebuds. Wish her luck before you leave, Drive carefully, stay away from all those snow bunnies and don’t eat too much gourmet food or drink too much wine.”
It was 10mpm when I checked into The Mountain Club on the Loon Resort Hotel.
To be continued
Chapter 8
Killers on the Loose
With their father’s advice, his twin boys were soon driving a two ton dump truck, salting and plowing New Hampshire’s narrow back roads. It did not take them long to notice how many deer came out of the woods to lick salt and eat the uncovered grass and willow twigs.
They took Karl’s rifle, hid it behind the trucks seat and put the hunting knife in the glove box. By the end of their first month’s employment they had shot eight deer, cut off the tails, left the carcass to rot and hung the tails in their trophy cabinet.
Chris Callahan decided that he wanted to join law enforcement a year after his cousin joined the State Police.
He was a devoted husband, father to two beautiful girls that he adored, and he loved the outdoor life. He decided to study for a position with the New Hampshire Fish and Game. He excelled in biological science and game management and after his training he became a game warden who did not tolerate law breakers and he despised poachers. In the ten years he has dedicated to enforcing the game laws he has caught hundreds of violators, most of them minor infractions, Fishing or hunting without a license the most common. Many deer poachers were out of work men who were in need of meat to feed their families, and there had been a few cases he had failed to report them. Now he was determined to find the one who had been killing for no other reason, but to cut off the tails. All the deer had been killed by an expert marksman, and a 22 caliber bullet fired into their brain.
He had been on look out near Lake Massabesic from three A.M till sunrise for two weeks. From his vantage point he had a good view of both Loon Island and the roads that encircled the entire lake. When he saw headlights across the lake, he examined the slow moving vehicle with his binoculars, and recognized it was a State Highway truck. What he found unusual was that it had its spotlight on and seemed to be examining the nearby woods. He decided to investigate,
In the truck the twins had made plans to kill the first deer they saw that morning .Karl sat next to the open window with the rifle, as Kevin drove and searched with the spotlight. When they reached the intersection of route four and the highway back to Manchester, they had not found a victim and gave up the hunt.
They turned around, shut off the spot light and were heading home when Chris Callahan fell in behind them and turned on his blue lights. Karl told his brother to slow down as he put the rifle behind the seat. Once it was out of sight they pulled over, and stopped, rolled down the window and turned on the dome light and waited.
Callahan got out of a new Jeep Cherokee and walked up to the truck where he was greeted by a smiling teenager.
The reason I stopped you is your spotlighting. May I see your driving license, and can you explain why you were using a spotlight?”
Kevin coolly answered.” Not a problem sir and he handed him his license. It is part of our job. We were looking for pot holes and fallen trees to take care of...”
Still suspicious, Callahan asked if he could look in the back of the truck. Kevin laughed as he said, “Help yourself officer; there is nothing to see but tools and a pile of roadside trash.”
Finding nothing out of the ordinary, he returned to the truck’s cab to return the drivers license. When he handed it to Kevin, he realized the passenger was his exact double. He could not keep the surprise out of his voice when he said. “Are you two twins?”
Both Karl and Kevin spoke in unison. “Yes sir. We are the only identical twins working for the State of New Hampshire Highway Department.”
When they drove away they howled with insane laughter and glee, and talked about how lucky they were to be brothers, and decided that it was too risky to kill another deer for a while.
