CHAPTER 1

THE OHIO RIVER AT MOSCOW had been at ornearing flood stage for over a week. Though the muddy waterhad started to recede, crossing it still meant running a gauntletof floating trees, half-submerged chicken coops, outhouses,and other river junk that threatened at any moment to stovein the hull of any craft foolhardy enough to try to cross thestream.

Alfonzo Judd was an old hand when it came to the river;he had worked on it all his life. Just the same, he was nottaking any chances with his new steam-powered ferry theClermont. Alfonzo had his younger brother, Homer, standingat the bow to keep a sharp watch out for partially submergedtrees or anything else that could smash the hull or turn thepaddle wheels into kindling. This trip Alfonzo had just onecustomer. The respected federal jurist J. P. Wolfe and histwenty-year-old daughter Annabelle, or Annie as many calledher, were crossing the river to catch the train at Ivor stationfor a trip into Cincinnati, something they did routinely. WhileJudge Wolfe sat in the carriage bending the ear of his hiredman and driver Gabe, Annabelle was standing at the bow,helping Homer to look out for obstacles.

It started out to be an ordinary late-spring morning;father and daughter had made the crossing over a hundredtimes with no problems. However, this day would turn outto be different.

* * *

From a distance, the object looked like the bloated body of acow or some other barnyard animal that had fallen into theriver and drowned. It was now floating downstream with thecurrent. Annie pointed the body out to Homer.

"What do you think it is?" she asked.

"I dunno," Homer answered. "It looks like a dead pig. Itain't no cow. Too pink t' be a cow."

By this time, the floating carcass was less than twenty feetfrom the boat. Annie had a much better view.

"That's not a pig!" Annabelle yelled, "It's the body of awoman. It's got breasts!" She called up to Alonzo to stop theboat.

If Alonzo heard Annabelle's cry, he did not act as if he did;he was intent on being on time to meet the morning train.Annie yelled again, also without success.

When she saw that she was getting nowhere, Annabelleran to the carriage and breathlessly exclaimed to her father,"Homer and I just saw a body floating down the river. You aregoing to have to get Alonzo to go after it before it is lost."

"Are you sure it was a body?" the judge asked incredulously."Are you sure it is not a dead animal dislodged by thecurrent?"

"Father, I would not say that it was a body if I were notsure that it was a body," Annabelle scolded him.

"Very well," grumbled Judge Wolfe as he lumbered downout of his carriage. He made his way over to where he had agood view of the pilothouse and shouted up, "Alonzo," untilhe got the pilot's attention. "I am afraid you are going to haveto turn about, Alonzo. Annie thinks she saw a body in theriver."

Alonzo called back, "If I turn about you will miss yourtrain."

"You let me worry about that," the judge shouted. "I wouldrather have the whole courthouse mad at me for delayinga trial than have to listen to my daughter fussing at me allday."

"Very well," Alonzo called down from the open window ofthe pilothouse. "It's your train you are going to miss, not mine.I'm sure glad that I do not have any other paying customerswho have to go on this wild-goose chase."

The pilot reached over and rang "Full stop" on the enginetelegraph and then "Reverse/one fourth."

"So be it," the judge said. "If it is indeed a body, we can'tjust leave it to float down the river."

The river current was so swift, that by the time the decisionwas made to go after the corpse, it had drifted downstreamand was out of sight. It took half an hour of chasing andlooking before the corpse was spotted again, bobbing amongthe snags and other drift.

Alonzo was able to get the Clermont close enough so thatHomer could snag it with a gaffing pole and hook. Once theydragged the body onboard, Homer and Annie discoveredthat the corpse was not a complete body. It was the torso ofa woman and lacked arms, legs, and a head. The head hadbeen severed just above the shoulders, and the limbs hadbeen amputated by cutting them off at the joints. Part of theflesh in the groin between the hips was also missing. It wasimpossible to tell if it had been sliced off or was the resultof scavengers chewing on the remains. What was there wasbloated and misshapen from its time in the water and theeffects of the warm weather.

Ever curious, Annabelle leaned over the torso andexamined the deceased closely.

"Whatever happened," she announced grimly, "this was amurder. The missing parts have been severed from the body.It was done with a knife or some other sharp instrument; thecuts are much too clean to be otherwise. I seriously doubtthat the arms, legs, and head were gnawed off by some wildanimal."

In examining the corpse, or what was left of it, Annabellefound it hard to equate it with a person who had once been alive, breathing, and talking human being. It just seemed to bea blob of rotten meat. Still, it meant murder, and a murder, nomatter who the victim might be, had to be interesting.

"Annabelle Olivia," the judge exclaimed sternly, "it is notvery ladylike for one to stare at a corpse as you are doing. Thatis a job for the law, not you."

"But, Father," Annabelle protested, "This is the mostexciting thing that has happened around here since ... since,I can't remember when."

"Just the same," the judge admonished her, "you are muchtoo interested in something that should not concern a properyoung woman like you."

While everyone was busy gawking at the torso, Alonzohad taken the Clermont close in to the Kentucky shorelinein order to get the boat out of the swift river current. Aftersome thought, Judge Wolfe had Alonzo take the ferry back toits regular landing spot on the Kentucky shore. The morninglocal had already come and gone when the Wolfes arrivedat Ivor station, but Judge Wolfe had Mr. Spaeth, the stationagent, telegraph the courthouse in Cincinnati to tell themthat the court session would have to be postponed a day.Next, he had Alonzo transport everybody, including the tarp-coveredbody, back across the river to Moscow.

As the only law official on the scene, the judge was forcedto make an arbitrary decision. Though the body was foundin the river, which strictly belonged to Kentucky, it hadprobably washed off the Ohio shore. This meant the murderhappened in Ohio. It made sense that it would be up to Ohiolaw enforcement to investigate. Therefore, when the canvas-coveredbody was deposited on the Ohio shore, the judge hadGabriel go get the wagon and load the body into it.

In 1890 telephone service still had not made it to Moscow.Telephone lines had reached as far as New Richmond andBatavia. The linemen were hard at work planting poles andstringing wire to expand service, but for now, Moscow wasjust another tiny burg that stood alone in splendid isolation.In most situations, the judge did not mind being cut off fromthe world, but sometimes it was a bloody nuisance. This wasone of those times. As there was no other alternative, afteran early lunch, the judge and Gabriel took the body, or whatremained of it, to the sheriff's office in Batavia, the countyseat.

Much to her chagrin, Annabelle was not allowed to ridealong. She was told that "it would not be very ladylike."

* * *

"Aunt Mary, I wish that I had been born a man," Annabellecomplained to the older woman as shewatched Mary, Gabe's wife and theWolfe family housekeeper, roll andshape piecrusts for fried peach pies.

"Why's that, child?" Aunt Maryasked.

"Men get to do everything,"Annabelle complained. "Father didnot want me to even get near the bodythat we found. He said my interest init was `not very ladylike.'"

Aunt Mary shrugged her shouldersand exclaimed, "Child, you knows darn well it ain't. Properladies, like yourself, ain't suppose t' concern themselves withthings like that. You got better things t' do than stick yournose next to some stinky ole body." Aunt Mary shook hershoulders again. "Lord all mighty. It done give me the shiversto think you wanted to go do somethin' like that."

"I want some excitement in my life, Aunt Mary," Annabellesaid. "The only excitement I get is what I write in my mysterystories, and then it is someone else having all the fun."

Mary said, "Don't you worry none, honey child. Soon yoube married like your sisters 'n' have kids of your own. Thenyouse have excitement enough. Believe me—you will wantno more!"

Annabelle sighed. "I'm just not ready to settle down yet,Aunty Mary. I need to make my mark." She rose up from thechair she was sitting in next to the kitchen table and pulledher hat down firmly on her head. "If anyone comes lookingfor me, Aunt Mary, tell them I took Thunderbolt down by theriver. I'll be in time for lunch."

"I will," Mary said. "You be careful. I expect to hear anyday that that horse o' yours done throwed you."

Annabelle laughed. "Don't you worry yourself, Aunt Mary.Thunderbolt and I have an understanding. I keep giving himtreats and he does not buck." Annie grabbed several driedpeach slices from Aunt Mary's mixing bowl. She stuck acouple of slices into her mouth, and the rest she took withher to the barn to feed to Thunderbolt.

* * *

As one might suppose, Annabelle Olivia Wolfe was not atypical young woman. Annabelle did not think of herselfas a rebel; rather she considered herself an "individualist."Being an individualist meant that she had graduated college,"read law" under her father, and much to most other lawyers'chagrin, passed the Ohio Bar Exam with the highest scorein recent memory. Because most other attorneys refused topractice law with a female, Annabelle was forced to work asher father's law clerk. She wrote successful mystery novels,though she had to do so under a male pen name. She usuallywore dresses tailored so that she could ride astride a horse.She was a crack shot with a rifle and could equal Robin Hoodarrow for arrow in a match. In other words, Annabelle didwhat she pleased, regardless if it fell under the prevue of whata "proper female" should do.

* * *

While Annabelle and her horse wandered aimlessly alongthe riverbank, the judge and Gabriel drove what was left ofthe body to the sheriff's office in Batavia. When they walkedinto the sheriff's office, they found the sheriff, Zeno DeMoss,sitting in his chair with his feet firmly planted among thescattered papers on his desk—he was fast asleep.

J. P. stood about five feet from DeMoss and noisily clearedhis throat. The noise startled the sheriff; for an instant, heforgot where he was as he struggled to sit upright.

"I was just restin' my eyes," the sheriff said sheepishly."Can I help you?"

"Homer Judd and my daughter found a dead body, or whatis left of a dead body, floating in the river this morning. It hasall the earmarks of a homicide," the judge said.

Judge Wolfe did not maintain too high an opinion ofSheriff DeMoss. J. P. felt that he was just another politicalhack doing as little as possible to earn his salary. He was gladthat Clermont County, overall, was law abiding, as it couldnot depend on Zeno DeMoss to catch any criminals.

Today was proving to be a case in point. The judge couldtell by Sheriff DeMoss's comments that there was little heplanned on doing, or could do for that matter, to investigatethe death. DeMoss's law enforcement experience was limited.Besides someone going off on a drunk, there was little crimehe had to deal with. Even if the body had been peppered withbullet holes, there was a dearth of hard evidence to lead to aperpetrator. Judge Wolfe had little hope in seeing the crimesolved. After all, this was Zeno DeMoss on the case; the judgewas not dealing with Allan Pinkerton.

There was nothing the sheriff had to go on except apartially decomposed torso of a middle-aged woman, whohad been a little on the plump side. The lack of a head madeidentification difficult. Finger printing was rarely done thesedays, not that it would have been of much help, as the victimwas minus her arms and hands. The only thing that the sheriffmay have been able to go for identification was if someone hadbeen reported missing. However, there were no reports outon a missing middle-aged woman. All that Sheriff DeMosscould, or would, do was turn the body over to the undertakerfor burial in a cheap, wood box to be put in an unmarkedgrave out in Potter's Field.

Yes, someone was getting away with murder, but given thepaucity of evidence and the lack of detective skills, there waslittle else DeMoss was going to do.

* * *

The next day the judge and his daughter completed theirinterrupted trip into Cincinnati. Though nothing else wassaid on the matter, every time she was on the Clermont,Annabelle kept her eyes peeled for another body. A secondbody would eventually be discovered, however it would notbe Annabelle who discovered it.

* * *

Just down the railroad tracks from Ivor Station was the MarbleCliff Limestone Quarry. The quarry had been in operationsince sometime in the 1840s. About ten men worked there,cutting blocks of close-grained dolomite limestone from acliff face, trimming the blocks to roughly the correct size,and then shipping them downriver to Cincinnati. Once inCincinnati they were utilized in all sorts of building projectsranging from the new cathedral, Saint Peter Vinculum, tosumptuous mansions being built for the Cincinnati BeerBarons, the likes of Fleishmann, Morlein, and Hudephol.

In the early days of quarry operation the cut stone hadbeen loaded onto flat boats and rafts for the one-way tripdownriver; now the shipping was done by steam-poweredboats. In the case of this quarry, shipping was done under theauspices of Captain John Fletcher Amiss.

Captain Amiss used an odd-looking craft named theMiss Estelle. Its name really should have been the Phoenix,as the boat kept on rising from the ashes of its demise. TheMiss Estelle first saw life as the Junebug. She was built duringthe Civil War as a "tin clad" gunboat at James B. Eades'sboatyard in Carondelet, Missouri. Before the Junebug couldsee any action, the war ended and the Junebug was orderedscrapped. However, before she was dismantled, a St. Louisriverboat owner bought her, stripped off the armor, andrebuilt the gunboat as a traditional riverboat. Under its newname, Pocahontas, it carried passengers and freight betweenLouisville and Cincinnati for a number of years. It was soldagain, this time to another steamboat captain who washeadquartered in Portsmouth, Ohio. The Pocahontas, nowcalled the Miss Maybelline, served as a packet boat plyingthe river between Cincinnati and Portsmouth. However,in 1875 the Miss Maybelline caught fire at the CincinnatiLanding and burned almost to the waterline, destroyingmost of the superstructure but leaving the boiler and engineslargely intact. Again, the boat was ordered to be scrapped,but Captain Amiss stepped in and bought the hulk for nextto nothing.

One again the former Junebug was transformed. CaptainAmiss had what remained of the superstructure cleared andthe hull planked over and reinforced to carry heavy loads.The engines were moved aft and attached to a paddle wheel.A rudimentary pilothouse was installed on poles between thestacks, and the boiler and engines were protected by simplesheds built on the deck. Miss Estelle was not much to lookat, but she served the purpose of ferrying the stone blocks toCincinnati.