The Louisa County Karma Man

Louisa: Ned Healy was a brutal man. Weighing in at over 400 pounds and shaped like a refrigerator, he was as easy going as a wrecking ball and as forgiving as a guillotine. Once crossed, he kept enemies for life. And perhaps---in the end---he was his own worst enemy. Or so, Ned Healy's only friend, Jack Lipton said at Ned's funeral on May 14. But, says Jack, that's what the Karma Man told him.

     The story goes something like this:

     Ned Healy's parent's kicked him off the farm when he turned 18. He'd always been in trouble with Florence's lone police officer, Andy Crowely. When he was in highschool, he got worse with drinking and drugs and picking fights. His parents threw him out when he beat up Crowely's son, Arthur with a 2 x 4. And seeing as Arthur never filed a complaint against him, Ned lived quite happily in Florence for about five years working at the grain elevator by the Mississippi. All that time, he never saw his parents and subsisted on burgers, fries, beer, and bullying people at The White Elephant Saloon. Then both his parents died in a car accident this past December and he inherited the farm.

     Ned soon set about making the farm his own. He loaded up his truck and dumped hundreds of thing down the side of a ravine near a creek on the farm. He threw out all his parent's things, like his father's old books and his mother's collection of Hummel figurines, his great grandma's blue plate she had brought all the way from Ireland, and of course, the cats.

     Ned hated all six of the fat, lazy felines. He felt absolutely no compunction as he gathered them up from around the house on a bitterly cold February night, stuffed them into a burlap sack, and tied it shut. He got in his pick up and headed over to Morning Sun to buy beer, the sack wriggling and meowing in the seat next to him. About a mile or more out of town, he threw the sack out the window. He glimpsed it tumbling into the ditch in his rear view mirror.

     On his way back, he saw a tall, thin man standing there watching him as he drove by. It unsettled him but another slurp of beer rinsed it out of his mind. Later that night, he was in his underwear drinking beer, eating chips and watching tv when he heard footsteps crunching in the ice-crusted snow outside. Someone rapped on the front door. Ned yelled , "Go away." The rap came again. And then again. Angered, Ned rushed to the door, shouting as he flung the door open, for his visitor to go away.

     But there was nobody there. And no foot prints in the snow other than his own. He closed the door and turned around when there on the couch sat the man he had seen on the road. He was tall and thin, with a scraggly amber goatee and bulging blue eyes. He wore a weathered gray overcoat, boots, and had a purple stocking cap.

     "Great grandma's blue plate---you sure you want it that way?" the unwelcome guest asked.

     "What?" said Ned in surprise.

     "Your mother's Hummel figurines and your father's books---you sure you want it that way, too? And what about those six cats? They're still alive, you know. You sure you want to let them die?"

     "Who are you?" roared Ned.

     "Listen, chubbikins: your karma teeters on the brink," the man snapped back, "You've made a series of decisions and I'm here merely to find out if you're comfortable with it so certain contingencies can be made. Clear?"

     "What are you talking about?" Ned roared.

     The tall, thin man rolled his bulging eyes. "Oh great; you're barely sentient and have the sophistication of a stool sample."

     Ned roared and threw a crushing left at the man's face. Somehow, he missed.

     "I'll take that as a 'yes'," the man said suddenly at Ned's ear. Ned whirled around, but the man had vanished without trace.

     Three and a half months went by. On the road to Morning Sun, animals scavenging for carrion had torn open the burlap bag and feasted on the 6 dead cats. Most of the bones still lay in the ditch but some had been dragged along the edge of the road. A ways up the road, a coyote had abandoned a skull still attached to its vertebral column. Bleached white by the sun and its lower jaw gone, the upside down skull with its long jutting canines twitched eerily at the wind's slightest breath as if still alive.

     Friday night, May 8 at 8 PM, Ned's pal, Jack Lipton, tended the bar that night at The White Elephant Saloon. Ned walked in looking to be in a foul and evil mood. Jack poured him shot and a chaser and asked what was wrong. Ned told him to go away. It wasn't until the fifth shot and chaser that Ned finally called Jack over.

     "Remember 'bout that tall, thin guy with the scraggly beard and bugged-out eyes I told ya? Well, I ran into him again 'fore I came in here." Ned said. "Just outside this fine 'stablishment. Know what he told me?"

     Jack shook his head.

     "He said if'n' I came in here it'd be like pointin' a gun at my head. Said I'd set my karma up to kill me but if I just went on home, it'd be alright. What kinda bullshit's that?"

     Jack shook his head again, and asked what happened to the man.

     "I dunno. I heard a car honk and when I looked back he was gone."

     Suddenly the door opened and in walked a trio men Ned recognized---one he hadn't seen in a long time. Inspite of the chisled physique and Army-disciplined posture, he knew it was Arthur Crowely.

     "What the hell's that faggot doing here?" Ned roared loud enough so Arthur could hear.

     Jack sneered that Major Arthur Crowely taught martial arts in the 82nd Airborne. He was on leave to visit his mom for Mother's Day.

     "Well, why the hell's he not in uniform?" Ned shouted, slamming his beer glass on the bar. When Arthur ignored him, Ned approached him and shouted again. "You hear me, soldier-boy? Why you not in uniform?"

     Arthur rose to face Ned. Ned stood more than a head taller plus some over Arthur and was twice as broad. But Arthur stood his ground grinning at Ned.

     "Didn't I tell you if'n I seen you 'round here again I'd whip your ass?"

     "Ned," Arthur said almost apologetically, "Don't do this. You don't know what you're up against. Folks here abouts already know you're a big, stupid loud-mouth. Ain't no sense in belaboring it."

     People 'round the bar busted up laughing until Ned drove his fist into the side of Arthur's head. Arthur swayed at the blow but came back with a sharp side-kick straight to Ned's bloated belly. Ned doubled over, backing to the bar. Reaching behind him, he grabbed a beer bottle and threw it at Arthur. Arthur ducked it and the bottle flew across the barroom and smashed-in the tv screen. The place rang with hoots and catcalls. Ned charged, but Arthur grabbed onto his shirt and rolled backwards to the floor, flipping Ned over him with his legs. Ned crashed hard on top of the big lighted juke box which buckled into a heap of smashed plastic beneath him. He rolled off the pile and managed a bear-like swing at Arthur. Arthur leaned back away then snapped a sharp kick into Ned's right knee, the bone crunching resoundingly at the blow. Arthur lunged and drove the heel of his hand upwards into Ned's nose.

     Ned hit the floor like a toppled monolith.

     Monday afternoon, Jack drove out to Ned's farm. He'd only just got out of the car when Ned came limping out from around back, his right leg imprisioned in a steel-ribbed vinyl brace. He used a cane to keep his balance as he walked across the uneven yard. When he got up to Jack, he was red-faced with anger and puffing hard.

     "You see where he went?" he hollered nasally.

     Jack asked him who he was talking about. Ned's eyes were blackened, a huge 'X' of adhesive tape covered the bandages and gauzed stuffed into his nose to give the pulpy-mass some sort of shape.

     "That tall, thin guy with the scraggly beard and bugged-out eyes! He was here again! You seen him!"

     Jack shook his head.

     "You sure! I know I saw him headin' this way!"

     Jack assured him he hadn't seen anybody and asked what the guy had wanted.

     "It was all that karma shit again, you know. Said it was too late and that my karma was screwed. Kept asking me if I remembered the cats. Jesus! What I want to know is how the puny son'abitch got in my house!"

     Jack suggested maybe he was one of Santa's elves and came down the chimney.

     "Ha, ha, ha," Ned thundered, brandishing his cane. "Jes shut your mouth or I'll shove this here cane up your chimney. Where's my lunch?"

     Jack handed him the big bag of burgers and fries. Just then, they heard Florence's lone police officer, Andy Crowely pull up behind Jack's car.

     "What do you want?" Ned shouted.

     Andy told him the owner of the White Elelphant would wait until the end of the week for Ned to pay $15,000 for the damages. If Ned didn't pay, he'd press charges. Ned looked angrily at Jack; Jacked said his boss was mad about the juke box. Andy said they could work out something on the overdue property taxes, especially since he could tell Ned was going to have some hospital bills due.

     "I don't need your goddamn help!" Ned stormed back, smacking his cane across the car's hood. "You tell that faggot boy of yours I'll whip his ass next time I see him!"

     Andy pointed a finger Ned's brace and replied, "My boy doesn't beat-up cripples." As Ned ranted and swore, Andy drove away.

     Ned gimped back inside, Jack followed. They turned on the tv and settled down as some PBS antique show came on. Jack asked Ned how much he owed.

     "Enough." was all Ned said as slurped his beer and ate his five burgers.

     The show was an endless parade of people showing junk to some guy in a grey suit who then told them how much it was worth. Suddenly, Ned pointed at the screen, coughing as beer frothed out his mouth. On the screen was the tall thin man with bulging blue eyes. He held a blue plate and he was showing it to the man in the gray suit. Sensing what Ned was sputtering, Jack turned up the volume.

     "...excellent example of l8th century English saltglaze earthenware with a delicate Littler's cobalt-blue lead glaze," said the man in the suit. "No doubt a piece of the finest Staffordshire wares produced around 1760. Collectors would pay $150,000 for this."

     Ned gasped as he suddenly realized the blue pate was the same as the one his great grandma had brought from Ireland.

     The tall, thin man next showed a set of ten Hummel figurines which were valued at $10,000 a piece, all the same as the ones Ned's mother collected.

     Then the tall, thin man brought out a dozen old books. All were valuable and each one Ned recognized as the same as those belonging to his father. But one was particularly valuable:

     "A first edition of Atlas of Spiritual Forcelines In Iowa by Morganna Oley, published in 1891," announced the man in the gray suit. "Complete with the hand tinted maps and...yes, this one is inscribed. Well, I have seen a museum in Hopkins Grove, Iowa bid over three million dollars for another first edition of this book..."

     Ned instantly tottered out of his house and slid into the cab of his truck. With great difficulty, he rumbled out to the ravine where he had dumped all his parents' stuff. Standing at the ledge, he saw a flash of bright blue in the sun and slid down the ravine on his massive butt, his wounded leg causing him a great deal of pain on the way. As he got near, he saw it was his great grandmother blue plate. With a triumphant roar, he pulled it from the debris.

     Only half of it was intact.

     Cursing, he twisted around, feverishly rooting through the fragments of broken glass and mildewing old clothes. Then he found one figurine. And then another. And then another and another until he had retrieved six in all. Craning excitedly, he saw three books poking out of the silt down below. He picked up each book and brushed off the mud, each being a first edition just like the ones on the program. Then he found the Morganna Oley book. Quaking, he opened the cover and found it too was a first edition with the hand tinted maps and inscription.

     Laughing, he climbed back up the ravine. It was hard going and he slipped several times but his triumph bouyed him over the pain in his knee. He got home just as the sun was setting. Jack met him and looked at the treasures piled in the back.

     "Shouldn't have chucked 'em, huh?" Jack observed.

     Ned ignored him and went straight in the house to call an antique dealer in Morning Sun willing to meet him. When he came gimping back out, Jack offered to drive him but Ned brushed him impatiently aside. He took off the brace from his leg so he could drive easier and gulped down a pair of beers to take the edge off the pain.

     "Don't go drinkin' up all my beer!" Ned bellowed, looking pale and sweating profusely as he left.

     The next morning, Andy Crowely found Ned dead at the wheel of his pick up truck in a ditch strewn with cat bones on the road to Morning sun. The front right wheel had been punctured by what looked like a cat skull that had flipped up and embedded its fangs in the thinest part of the tire sidewall. When the tire blew, Ned skidded out of control into the ditch. The cab was pretty squashed and it took a few hours to cut Ned's body out.

     The coroner reported that while Ned was quite drunk at the time of the accident, he had died of conjestive heart failure. He noted that Ned might have survived if he hadn't been trapped inside the truck's crumpled cab.