Mary Francis Colt loved her job working as a secretary for John Fulton, public defender. For a girl growing up in Lakeview, a small Florida town in the turbulent 1960s, it was a solid opportunity for a better life. Mary Francis dreamed of bigger and better things. But that all comes crashing down when she is kidnapped by Bonelle Jackson, the irrational and dangerous mother of two men her boss helped sent to jail. When their mother's plot to break them out of jail is foiled and one of the sons is killed by police, Bonelle brutally murders the innocent Mary Francis and abandons her mutilated body in the swamps. Soon, law enforcement officials are hot on the manhunt for the escaped convicts and their murderous mother. Benji Goldman and Charlie Pepper become involved when they discover the body of Junebug Black floating in the water off of Monkey Island in Lake Harris. Now they must determine if these two murders related-before another person winds up dead.

Monkey Island

By Thom Weekley

iUniverse, Inc.

Copyright © 2011 Thom Weekley
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4620-5179-3

Chapter One

1968

A warm blast of air greeted her when she opened the door of her Impala. 'It's summer time now.' she thought as she exited her vehicle. Mary Francis Colt was a local born girl and the secretary for the Public Defenders' Office in the 9th Judicial District of Florida in the sleepy southern town of Lakeview. His name was John Fulton. She had worked for him for the last six years and was a faithful and trust worthy employee, even though he wasn't always equally faithful to her as an employer. Their office was in downtown Lakeview and he was set to oversee all the people accused of crimes in criminal trials when they were deemed indigent by a judge and could not afford to hire a private lawyer. Her duties included typing legal briefs and letters, preparing John Fulton for trial, answering the phone, and the most important of them all—make sure there was a hot cup of coffee on his desk when he got to work in the morning.

As she fumbled through her purse to retrieve the office keys, she opened the door, picked up the copy of the Lakeview Chronicle and went to her desk. She hung up her jacket on the wall peg next to her typewriter as she usually does in the morning, put the keys back into her purse and went to the coffee machine to make the strong morning java. When the coffee started brewing, she returned to her desk and went through her purse looking for her compact in order to put on her professional face for the day. The compact slipped out of her hand and fell to the floor. As she went down on her knees to pick it up, she saw a pair of shoes of a woman standing over her. They were the shoes of Bonelle Jackson, a person who had been pestering her and John lately about her two sons.

"Git up off'n the floor, bitch!"

Mary Francis looked up into the steely eyes of Bonelle and immediately noticed the snub noised revolver in the black woman's hand. "Please don't shoot, Bonelle. I have two children at home. Who will take care of them?"

"I got's two boys too and they in the Lake County jailhouse cause your boss man didn't defend them well enough to get them off."

As Mary Francis struggled to get up through tears and an awkward position, grasping at the corner of her desk she once again looked into Bonelle's eyes and the gun she was brandishing in front of her.

Bonelle was born in the outskirts of New Orleans in a black Cajun settlement called Pointe du Alb. She had grown up hard. She started washing clothes when she was ten to buy food for herself and her alcoholic mother and had turned prostitute by the time she was twelve. By then she had a steady clientele of rich white men who liked nothing better that to snuggle up to a pretty young black girl and pretend to have intercourse. Bonelle had been beaten several times when the flesh didn't exactly keep up with the urges. She married Somali Jackson when she was fourteen and by the time she was sixteen, she had two babies, Goshawn and Marjoe Jackson. Somali went back to his homeland in Africa at the birth of the second child believing that he was not the fatherly type, leaving Bonelle to raise the boys by herself.

It was at this point in her life that she began to practice the dark at of Santeria, a Caribbean version of a West African religion that involves animal sacrifices and magic spells. She became so involved that she studied to be and got the position of a woman's version of orisha called iyalorishas (mothers of orishas). In the Santeria religion, this would be like a priestess position and she vowed to make her two sons, Marjoe and Goshawn members and santeros, or priests, themselves.

She moved to Lakeview soon afterwards and became involved in organized crime by becoming a numbers runner for an illegal Traffficante bolita syndicate in Tampa. Her job was to sell bolita numbers to the poor people of Lakeview and deliver the prize money, if there ever was any.

She had recently been involved with a local bolita hustler named Junebug Black. He sold numbers on his own and hardly ever paid off any winnings. The Trafficante family found out about Junebug and ordered Bonelle and her boys to take care of business, in other words, permanently nullify the problem which was costing them money and giving the family a bad name. When Bonelle confronted Junebug, a fight ensued and her boys were locked up for racketeering and attempted murder.

John Fulton was appointed to be council for Bonelle's two boys. At the time Fulton had an overwhelming case load and the States Attorney had a box load of evidence which included two pistols and two switchblade knives. They also had eyewitness testimonies from several patrons of the 2 Spot bar that told the court about them. They were GC, Connell and Prince. They ended up getting ten years in prison which would be reduced to three years on good behavior. Junebug was let off with probation. Bonelle steadfastly blamed John for their conviction and tried every way she could to get them out of jail. She even called one time to threaten John and his wife with death if he didn't convince the judge to release them from prison.

When Mary looked up she saw Bonelle pointing a pistol at her head. "I want's to see Mr. John. I want's to see him right damn now!" Bonelle ordered. There was a threatening tone in Bonelle's voice that the secretary had not heard before.

"He's not in yet. Can I help you, Bonelle?" Mary responded nervously through tears. When Mary looked up at the stern faced black woman, she saw the snub nosed revolver pointes right at her head. This sent the shivers right up her spine for she knew that this time there was going to be real trouble.

"Git on up! Git on up now! I don't have time to wait for Mr. John, so you will have to do."

As tears flowed from the Mary's eyes, she exclaimed, "What are you going to do with me?"

"Never you mind, now git on up of'n the floor."

Mary rose from her crouched position and reached for her purse. Immediately Bonelle snatched the purse out of her hand saying, "You might'n have a gun in there. I'll take this right now."

Mary reached for a Kleenex from her desk top and wiped the tears from her eyes and Bonelle continued, "You'll have plenty of time to cry later, now takes me to your car. And remember, I has a gun at your back so don't try any crazy business or I'll put a bullet in you so fast it will make your head swim."

A pigeon walked at their feet cooing as only pigeons can. He was looking for a tiny morsel of food and found one in an earthworm that struggled across the already hot sidewalk outside the office.

The two walked out of the building without locking the door. On the way out Mary saw her jacket hanging on the wall peg and thought that this would be a sign to John that thing had gone very badly this morning. They headed to the parking lot where Mary was forced to open the passenger side door so that she and Bonelle could enter the automobile without Bonelle letting down her guard and avoid suspicion. Then Bonelle reached into Mary's purse and retrieved the car keys, handed them to Mary and said, "Now let's be on with it." As the car came out on Main Street, it turned toward East Town and the part of town that Bonelle knew well. It was a traditionally black neighborhood where there were some black entrepreneurs that owned shops, but most of the commercial enterprise was done by white people. There was a grocery store on the corner of Main and Rambo Street owned by the Jacobson family, and Army/Navy surplus store owned by a mean old cuss named Alfred Whattle, and a paint store owned by Jimmy Newsome. The houses were mostly rickety old dwellings owned by white slum lords who rarely, if ever, did anything to fix up their properties. Yet they extorted exorbitant rents from their poor tenants, sometime by the week, and tossed them out without pity if they failed to pay. These were the people that Bonelle sold bolita numbers to. They were the ones who could least afford to gamble, yet they played anyway for some very slight chance they could earn a few thousand dollars, which was truly a fortune to someone who had nothing.

As they passed through East Town, Bonelle waived at some of her clients to avoid suspicion. When they got to the end of Main Street, she ordered Mary to turn onto Sunnyside Drive and go all the way around to the Frog Log landing. Then Mary turned up onto a dirt road toward an abandon grove caretaker's house. Bonelle told her to drive through the sand to the back of the house where they saw a 1954 Buick .

Bonelle had preplanned to leave the getaway car there out of sight and throw off investigators and to change over to her car to continue the journey. "Now stop the car and git on out!' Bonelle said as she brandished the gun toward Mary's body. She handed Mary the keys to her car and told her, "Gits into that car over there and be quick about it." Mary started the car and drove around to the front of the house and onto Sunnyside Drive. A lazy alligator rose up out of the water and began to swim toward shore. He climbed up on an old cypress log and began to sun himself in the morning light oblivious to the unnatural goings on at the road.

Mary and Bonelle exited Sunnyside drive onto Sleepy Hollow Road and then across to the Lisbon Road. They traveled toward Lisbon until they came upon an abandoned old church where Bonelle told her to pull off and around to the back where the automobile was not quite so visible. They entered through the back door of the church where inside they found the remains of several benches which at one time had been pews. Mary was told to sit down on one while Bonelle made a phone call. She had previously stretched a telephone line from a neighbor's house all the way to the old church and this is where she did her business and contacted the Tampa bolita syndicate with messages without the benefit of prying eyes. She dialed the number of John's office....

Chapter Two

The Abduction of Mary Colt

John Fulton got to his office as usual about 8:30 and expected to see Mary at her desk and a cup of coffee on his. He had feelings for Mary for some time now. In fact his recent divorce from his present wife was partly due to those feelings. But she was hopelessly in love with her current husband, Rex, who was one of John's best friends. Two cooing pigeons ruffled and flew away when he approached the door. When he entered, he saw her jacket hanging on the wall peg and when he didn't see her, he thought she might be in the back at the coffee machine or in the bathroom. When she was in neither place, his suspicions arose because he knew that she would never leave the office unlocked and her jacket still hanging on the peg. He went into his office half expecting her to jump out a surprise him. The files he had worked on until midnight the night before were still on his desk and the empty coffee cup he drank out of was still there.

"Mary. Mary, bring me a cup of coffee." Not hearing any response he decided to get up out of his chair and see what was going on. He went back to the coffee machine and then rapped on the bathroom door. No response. He became alarmed. He went out to the parking lot to see if her car was still there. It was not. He barely heard the phone in his office ring, so he hurried inside and picked up the receiver.

"Hey, muthafucka! I got yo bitch secretary here. If you don't git my boys out'n dat jailhouse, I goin' to kill her dead. You got's twenty-four hours to git dem out or she dead!" He immediately knew who the voice on the other end was Bonelle Jackson. He had done all he could for the boys. They had refused to plea bargain to get a lighter sentence, so now they were going to have to do their time, which was about three years with good behavior.

"You better not harm a hair on her head. Let me talk to her!"

"She alive. You don't need to talk to her. You just need to call the judge and git my boys out'n dat jailhouse. I be waiting at de East Town grocery store for them. Then you can have your bitch back."

"You don't understand. They are not coming out. And you have committed a federal crime by abducting Mrs. Colt. You'll go to the jailhouse when you get caught for a long time." John pleaded.

"If'n you don't git my boys out'n the jailhouse, I be goin' up for murder, so I got's nothing to lose. You hear?" The phone went dead.

* * *

Immediately after the trial Goshawn and Marjoe were sent to a new prison in Bushnell for youthful offenders that had just opened. The prison staff was new and had many raw recruits from the nearby community as prison guards. Because of the extreme overcrowding in the Florida prison system, they had also transferred some hard core prisoners from Raiford State Prison to mix in with the youths sent there to straighten out their lives. Because of the new people, the overall security procedures of the prison had gaps in it, something that Goshawn and Marjoe recognized from the beginning. On the first day in the yard, Goshawn found a piece of steel left over from the construction crew that could with a little work be transformed into a prison shank or other useful weapon. The two men were staffed together in a temporary cell with a window made of hardware cloth wire, so they started planning their escape. They figured out they could use the piece of steel to eventually cut a hole in the window and escape to the outside perimeter where there was only a guard tower and a ten foot fence topped with barbed wire between them and the woods that surrounded the plant. Now all they had to do was start sawing the wire and get a feel for the routine of the changing guards in the tower. It didn't take but two days to saw the window wire, so they were ready.

Outside a hawk flew over the compound looking for a tasty rodent morsel to make his aviary breakfast. The tower guard, who had been on the night shift and was waiting for his replacement, scoped the hawk with his rifle and pretended to shoot the gallant creature. Pkscirrrrsh! he mimicked the sound of the gun going off. He then turned his attention to the other side of the tower and the construction crew that was coming on duty and was still working at the prison.

Both men watched outside as a majestic bald eagle circled above the compound looking for a squirrel he had seen from afar. He reached outr with his talons and grabbed the hapless squirrel and flew away to his nest and the waiting female who was tending her three chicks.

That break came sooner than expected. While the changing tower guards were exchanging pleasantries with their backs to the prison, Goshawn and Marjoe slipped through the opened wire window and bolted toward the fence about a hundred yards away. Goshawn held the bottom of the fence up for Marjoe to get through and Marjoe held the fence on the other side for Goshawn. By this time the guard had seen them escape and leveled his standard issue 30 ought six rifle and scoped Goshawn as he was half way under the fence. Marjoe saw the bullet enter Goshawn in the back and went straight to the heart. Goshawn was killed instantly. Knowing that the next bullet would be his, Marjoe ran as fast as he could into the woods behind the fence. He didn't even feel the bullet that nicked his right shoulder.

The piney woods that surrounded the prison stretched out for miles. There was a swampy area to the west of the prison and a beautifully manicured face on the front. Marjoe ran until he found an old travel trailer out in those woods a couple of miles away. He stumbled onto the property and beat on the door. There was no answer, and to his surprise the door was unlocked. He went inside the small dwelling and saw a telephone on the floor next to a tattered couch. While he was binding up his wound that was bleeding profusely, he dialed a number that he knew all too well, "Hello, Mama?"

The phone rang in the old church. "Is dat you, Marjoe?.... How you got lose?.... Goshawn dead?.... Oh sweet Jesus. Where you at?.... I git de car and come git you. You goes out to the hard road and I'll be along directly. As she hung up the phone, she grabbed her gun and ordered Mary up off the pew. When they left the church, Bonelle forced Mary into the trunk of the car. "Git inside dat cooter hull and shut up. We goin' on a trip...." She then slammed it shut, got into the car and headed toward Sumter County.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Monkey Islandby Thom Weekley Copyright © 2011 by Thom Weekley. Excerpted by permission of iUniverse, Inc.. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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