Gator Boy Read online

  David ran up and grabbed Katie, then ran back to the car.

  “That big ugly alligator almost ate Puppo,” said Katie.

  “Oh my God. That horrible thing got Jaime and Brad. Oh my God,” cried Melissa hysterically.

  “Y’all stay in the car. I’m going to run over there and use that police radio.”

  “No, that thing’s out there, it’ll get you too,” said Melissa.

  “Don’t worry,” said David, “I’ll get in the car.”

  He jumped out of the car and ran over to the cop car. Pulling the dead cop out of the doorway, he climbed into the police car and shut the door.

  “Hello! Hello! Is any one there?”

  “This is the Lafayette Police,” answered a voice on the radio. “Please identify yourself.”

  “This is David Ford. Send help. There’s a killer gator monster on the loose out here.”

  “Where is Officer Lacomb?” the dispatcher asked.

  “He’s dead. I think that thing got him. It looks like it got my two boys, too,” he said, breaking down.

  “Stay right there, Mr. Ford. Officer Lacomb called this in a short time ago and help has been dispatched. They should be arriving any minute now,” said the dispatcher.

  Ford had no sooner put the radio down when all at once help arrived in force. The place was crawling with every cop in Lafayette. They brought in a big crime scene panel truck where the Fords were taken for questioning. A lady psychologist took Katie and Puppo away from the gruesome scene and was listening to Katie’s story of how the monster almost got them.

  Back in the truck one of the cops let it slip that there had been two killings on the bayou the day before. Hearing that David Ford jumped up and said, “You sons a bitches knew there was a killer like that on the loose out there and yet my two boys are dead? My boys would still be alive if y’all had only put the word out.”

  Overcome with grief, he started to go for the cop’s throat. Two other officers stepped up, grabbing David’s arms. David just fell back down in the chair with his head in his hand.

  “Calm down, Mr. Ford. We know how you feel. The last thing you want to do at this point is assault an officer.”

  “My boys would still be alive,” David cried to himself with his head in his hands. “They’d still be alive.”

  CHAPTER 5

  Momma and Lena, arriving back at the Gadon house, found that all of the ladies from up and down the bayou had come with flowers and food dishes to help take care of Lena and pay their respects for Louis. All of the men were out hunting that killer gator, and all of the women were doing what they could. That’s just how people on the bayou helped their own kind through these tragic times. They had all done the same thing for each other at one time or another. But in the midst of the tragedy with so many other things going on this show of support always came unexpectedly, and was very heart wrenching.

  It was the whole purpose of this gathering to take the minds of the survivors off of the tragedy and focus on the good things. They’d share funny stories and laugh together as well as cry together. It was all part of the grieving process for not only Lena but for everyone. Louis was a well-loved member of the bayou community.

  “Well Miss Nonette, if you was dis gator where would you be?” asked Jed.

  “Gators are pretty easy to figure out. They usually stay where they got food. Maybe we need to go to the area where dose killings happened,” said Nonette.

  So the two hunters headed out to where Louis’s arm was found. When they started approaching the area they could hear a great deal of activity going on. As they came up on the scene they saw boats dragging grappling hooks, and other boats pulling metal nets. They saw people dropping blood in the water and using deep sea fishing rigs. And still others watching radar screens and zipping all up and down the bayou with many different arrays of apparatus for snagging and killing a gator. Nonette looked at Jed and said, “Jed, let’s get the hell outa here. No self-respecting alligator would be within a mile a dis circus, or dat bunch a fools. Dat bunch a Coon Asses don’t know a damn ting about hunting gators.”

  “Well, where do we start, Miss Nonette?” Jed asked.

  “Soon as we get away from dis area we’ll try trolling slowly an’ quietly pulling dese chickens behind us. Wit all a dat goin’ on over dare we may just get lucky an’ come up wit something.”

  So they did as Nonette had suggested. After all, she was the pro and Jed knew it. They baited the large hooks with the two chickens and slowly trolled up the bayou. After they had gone at least two miles they saw a sight on the bank that threw them both for a loop. For there dragged up on the bank laying dead on it’s back with its whole belly ripped open and the neck broken, was a sixteen-foot bull alligator.

  “Damn! What the hell did dat?” asked Jed.

  “Well, Sher, we ain’t after no regular gator here. Dat son of a bitch right there on the bank is about big as they come in dese parts. An’ I believe dat whatever the hell done dat, left it here as a sign for us to back off. We need to call it a day today an let Nonette tink about how’s the best way to go about killing a monster like we up against. You drop me back at my place an’ I’ll see you in the morning wit a new plan. We can’t be dumb about dis like dat bunch up dare. Whatever done dis could kill every one a dose Coon Asses in nothin’ flat.”

  Jed took Nonette back up the bayou to her place. She climbed out of the boat and said, “I’ll see you in the morning over at your place. Let me tink and pray on dis a little bit before we go an do something stupid.”

  That night Nonette built a huge fire on an altar made of stones out behind her place. With feathers in her hair and an array of polished animal bones teeth and claws around her neck she danced around the fire and chanted a chant these parts had never known. The Cajun and Creole people call it Voo Doo. Some say that perhaps the slaves brought these beliefs over from Africa. Others say that the Canadian French learned these ways from the Indians on their way through the country during their migration from Canada to where we now call Louisiana. There are Cajun swamp people who still practice these bizarre rituals to this day.

  Shana , Aga, Yano, Shanda, Aba, Yalo, Monta, Shandra. Over and over she repeated the chanting as drums sounded in her head while entranced she danced around the fire in primitive fashion. She went down to her knees and then rolled over on her back in a trance. She saw herself confronting the beast. Along with Jed, there was another man and woman with them on the boat she did not know. The vision was very dark and foggy as she did battle with the beast. But this was no ordinary gator. As she fought with the beast in her vision she noticed that it stood on its back legs like a man. It also used its arms in a human fashion. The arms and legs were much larger with huge hands and feet and giant claws. This is how it was able to rip open the belly of a bull gator like the one it had killed up the bayou. As she fought with the monster there was an explosion and fire burning all around them. Then she started getting flashes of all the little towns all along the bayou leading to the swamps in the Bason. There was a school bus on the bank in the distance. The name on the side read, Au-Dessous De Le Arbre. In the Cajun dialect, it means beneath the trees. She did not understand all she had seen but later she would. Then her eyes opened and the trance was over. Her ritual had been successful. She had seen how she was to defeat this great beast. Exhausted, she went in her cabin and without even getting undressed she fell into the bed and into a deep sleep.

  There was a lot going on back at the gas pier. After hours on the water the boys had not seen so much as hide nor hair of that killer gator. They had all decided met back at the pier to refuel and regroup for tomorrow’s hunt. Danny Tibideaux was on the edge of the pier gassing up his boat. Tebeau was always on Tibideaux’s back for smoking while fueling up his boat. And just like always there was Tibideaux with his usual cigar hanging out of his mouth puffing on it while gassing up his boat.

  “Damn it, Tibideaux, one a dese days you gonna blow us all up,” hollered out
Ronny Tebeau who was tying up his own boat.

  Tibideaux just waved him off as if to say yeah yeah. But what Tibideaux was totally unaware of was that at that very moment he was being watched from beneath the water where the glow of that very cigar had attracted the attention of the horror that waited below. All within seconds the creature shot up out of the water. Grabbing hold of Tibideaux from the side the giant jaws clamped around his chest and back as the creature snatched him off the back of his boat. As Tibideaux was pulled screaming into the water, his cigar fell on to the dock. The gas pump handle also fell to the dock. The fumes ignited. There came an explosion that shook the entire pier as the whole place went up like a torch. The concussion from the explosion threw Tebeau off the back of his boat right into the front end of Jean Lecroy’s boat that was just pulling in. Tebeau’s head smashed into the front end of Lecroy’s boat and he was knocked unconscious. Jean Lecroy, seeing what had just happened, looped a rope around Tebeau and pulled him up onto his boat. But it did not look very good for Tebeau. The back of his head was laid open to the bone and he didn’t even appear to be breathing. Hitting the controls Lecroy crammed it into reverse and pulled away from the pier. By this time the whole pier was totally engulfed in flames. Two of the boys came running out of the store on fire screaming as they threw themselves into the water. Screams of people being burned alive came from inside the store and then suddenly were drowned out by the sound of the huge fire that blazed. All that could be done by the few remaining boats that were just pulling up was to watch in horror as the whole scene took place.

  Back at Jed’s place they heard the explosion and saw the sky light up.

  “What the hell is dat?” asked Jed, looking on in wonder.

  “Dat sounds pretty serious, Momma. Maybe I should go check it out.”

  “Well Sher, if you tink you gotta, go ahead. But watch yo’ ass out there,” Momma said.

  “Don’t you worry yo’ pretty self about ole Jed, Momma,” he said.

  Leaning over he gave Lena a kiss in the cheek. “See you later, baby,” he said as he hurried out.

  “I’ll be back in nothin’ flat,” said Jed, already untying Gator Boy.

  He gave it full throttle as he pulled away from the dock. Jed’s place was about fifteen minutes away from the gas pier. As he got closer and closer the sky grew brighter. He could smell the smoke and fumes from the burning gasoline. As he came around the bend he saw the whole place in flames. There were people in boats, helpless to do anything but watch the place burn to the water. Those two men who had run out of the store on fire and jumped into the water had somehow made it out to the boats and were pulled in. They had critical burns over their entire bodies. One of them was totally unrecognizable. His lips, eyelids, ears, and nose were totally burned off. He would later turn out to be Perry, the storeowner, who would die on the way to the hospital.

  Ronny, the only one there who had actually seen the monster attack Tibideaux, had been brought back to consciousness by Lecroy performing CPR on him. But he was suffering from a serious head injury and was not coherent. A total of five people lost their lives that evening because of that monster.

  As Jed looked out over the devastation he wondered in the back of his mind if somehow this disaster was connected in any way with the gator monster. Turning and looking into the faces of the rest of the guys he could see that discouragement and uncertainty had seized them all. The police and the fire department came screeching up to what was left of the gas pier. There was a small bit of dock left intact by the boat ramp.

  “Hey, y’all, listen up. Let’s get dese survivors over to the paramedics at dat dock over dare where they can get medical help.”

  After they had turned the victims over to the fire department one of the young paramedics folded back the tarp that they had the burn victims wrapped in and gasped. He had never seen such a gruesome sight.

  “My God! They look like melted candles. It’s incredible that these two are still breathing,” he said.

  “Let’s get them to the hospital stat!”

  They also put Ronny Tebeau on a gurney and he was rushed away as well.

  Jed gathered the other fishermen together and said, “Look, y’all, I know dis is a bad time an’ all, but we still got a killa gator out there to hunt down an’ kill. What y’all say we meet over at Luke Gio’s spot in the morning to come up wit a new game plan? We’re gonna have to line up a gas truck so we can get fueled up in the morning.”

  “How can you just act like none a dis happened, Jed?” hollered out one on the guys.

  “Look, Willie, I know how you boys feel. I feel the same way, too. An’ I can’t say for sure but sometin’ tells me dat damn gator had sometin’ to do wit dis, too. What happened here this evening is the worse thing a lot a us ever saw. But what happened to Louis is pretty damn bad, too. An’ we owe it to him, if nothin’ else, to get dat damn gator dat got him.”

  “Jed’s right, Willie. We gotta keep going or we die, too,” said Lecroy.

  “Well, you boys wit us or do we have to kill dis sombitch ourselves?”

  The rest of the boys started looking at one another and one by one said, “I’m in. You can count on me. We’ll be dare at Luke’s place in the morning.”

  “OK. Everybody meet here about nine o-clock in the morning. Dat’ll give me time to do some calling around. I’ll see y’all in the morning,” said Jed.

  Everybody left after the last reports were made and the victims were rushed away to the hospital.

  Jed started up Gator Boy and headed for home still in a daze, thinking about all the events that had occurred in just the past couple of days. Pulling up to his place he felt a sort of sense of security and he was happy to be home. He tied his boat off at the dock and went up to the house to find Momma and Lena sitting at the table in the kitchen talking over a cup of coffee.

  “Well, what happened?” asked Momma as she stood up and poured Jed a cup of coffee.

  Jed took the cup from her hand and took a big gulp, then joined them at the table.

  “Momma, I don’t know where to start. The gas pier blew up.”

  “Blew up? My God, what happened?” asked Momma, shocked.

  “Well, nobody’s really sure. Every’ting was fine one minute and the whole place went up like a torch the next. Lots of the guys are missing and thought to be blown up in the explosion. Two of the boys dat managed to get out got burned real bad. Ronny Tebeau got a bashed in head an’ he’s in real bad shape. They rushed him and two others to the hospital.”

  “Who were the two others?” asked Momma.

  “Well they was burned up so bad dat they couldn’t be identified. I tell you, Momma, they looked like monsters they were so messed up.”

  “Stop it! I can’t listen to anymore,” screamed Lena, standing up with her hands over her ears.

  Obviously the recent loss of her father was taking its toll. Jed put his cup down and stood up and, taking Lena in his arms gave her a hug and said, “I’m sorry, baby. I didn’t mean to upset you. I shouldn’t be talking about all a dis in front a you.”

  Looking at his watch Jed said, “Well, it’s late. I got to make some calls in the morning. I’m gonna hit the sack. Come on, baby,” he said to Lena.

  “In the morning dis’ll all look better.”

  “You go on, Jed. You need the rest. Me an Momma was talking about a wedding shower,” said Lena.

  Jed was dead tired so he kissed Lena and Momma and went off to bed.

  In the morning he started calling around to find the cheapest fuel source. With the gas pier gone that was going to be a problem.

  Nonette arrived at Jed’s place early and Momma filled her in on all the latest tragedy over a cup of coffee as Jed called around for gas prices. When Jed had the information he needed he walked out on the porch and said, “Let’s go, Miss Nonette. The rest of the men are gonna be waiting fo’ dis news.”

  Nonette threw back her last swallow of coffee and said, “If you waiting on me,
Sher, you backing up.”

  They climbed on to Gator Boy and headed out to meet the boys.

  CHAPTER 6

  It was an eerie sight to pass by the gas pier and see only a smoldering ruin. Looking at the devastation, Nonette realized what the explosion and flames were all about that she had seen in her vision. She also knew that the monster had caused all of this.

  “It’s hard to believe. You’d almost expect to see Ronny Tebeau running out to service the boats,” said Jed.

  Nonette, not speaking a word, just looked stone cold at the scene, astounded that she had seen it all in the vision the night before.

  No one knew it yet but Ronny Tebeau had fallen into a deep coma and the doctors had all but lost hope in his complete recovery. Perry, the owner of the pier, and Ronny’s father, went into cardiac arrest and never made it to the hospital. And it appeared as though the gas pier would be no more.

  Jed was the last to arrive, but with good news.

  “Y’all, listen up. Well, boys, I called around an’ the cheapest way we can do dis is to call out a gas truck. If the purchase is for at least one hundred and fifty gallons or more, we can buy direct,” Jed informed the boys.

  “Well, dare’s six of us at twenty-five gallons each, dat’s right at one fifty,” said Lecroy.

  “Seven,” said Nonette, standing up as she cut a bite off of a piece of beef jerky, taking it in her mouth right off of the knife blade.

  “I reckon I’ll be gassing my boat up here too from now on,” she continued.

  “So dare it is. Dat’s more den enough to call out a truck. The guy at Texaco said they could have the truck here at one o-clock. I’ll call an’ confirm dat,” said Jed.