Treachery on Okaloosa Island

13 – Bickel in Control Curtis Porter asked for Ester Haynes to return to the witness chair. I guess I had not really looked at her closely before. She was probably in her middle thirties but looked quite a bit younger. Her figure would make most women jealous and even an old retired teacher like me could see that her legs were her best asset. They were muscular and firm from dancing so much, I guessed. For an instant, another pair of legs like hers flashed through my mind but I couldn’t place where I had seen them. The other striking thing that made her face appealing were her eyes; they were wide apart and always looked straight at whoever was talking to her, except when she lowered her head to compose herself. As Max our former beach attendant would have said, “Ester Haynes is fine!” “Miss Haynes, yesterday you were telling us about how you just arrived at Fort Walton Beach and that Launie Sanderson had bought the property out at the east end of Santa Rosa Blvd and opened Launie’s Gentlemen’s Library…” Laughter erupted in the room and Bickel pounded his gavel. “I have warned you and I will empty this room on the next disruption.” He involuntarily looked to where Bob usually sat I noticed. “Miss Haynes, I apologize for the people in the room and ask you to go on with telling us about the job you had with Miss Sanderson.” Schaberg was on his feet, “That’s already been answered, Your Honor…” “Overruled, I’ll take care of what we hear in this court, Mr. Schaberg.” Schaberg looked startled and turn to look at Porter who also was looking at Judge Bickel with a questioning look. The whole courtroom was silent and everyone was looking around wondering what has just happened. “Continue Mr. Porter.” “Okay, now Miss Haynes… What did the girls do at Miss Sanderson’s place?” She hesitated, “About the same as we had done in New Orleans except toward the end….” “What do you mean ‘toward the end?” “Well, Launie seemed to lose interest in what we were doing.” She looked toward Launie and was met with a stare so steely that she quickly turned back to Porter. “There were lots of days we didn’t see or hear from her. She was out on that big boat, the Lollipop, a lot of the time.” There were snickers of derision. Bickel who had been looking down at some paper jerked up his head and the courtroom became quiet. “Kitty, the oldest of us and probably the most outgoing, almost ran the place until she just disappeared one night. And then Chuck disappeared too.” “Chuck disappeared?” “Yes, they had a big fight… Him and Launie… And then he was just not there anymore.” “How do you know about the fight?” “Some of us heard Launie cussing and screaming that night. One of the girls knocked on her door and when she didn’t open it, one of us did. The table was overturned and looked like it had been slammed against the wall. Her face was all swelled up and turning purple. She was going to have a black eye and did for many days. After that she wore so much eye make-up that you couldn’t see her eyes, just the sockets.” “And Chuck was not there?” “I never saw him again after that.” “And then the same happened with the girl you call Kitty?” “No, I mean yes, she was gone all of a sudden, but she and Launie didn’t have a fight because Launie was very upset and called her a bunch of names because she—Kitty just disappeared. But Kitty was gone a long time before Launie and Chuck had the fight and he left.” Launie Sanderson looked like she would come out of her seat and spat out, “You ungrateful bitch. You will pay for what you say.” Schaberg grabbed Launie’s arm, but Porter was fit to be tied, “Your Honor, I call for a mistrial!” “Oh, come on Mr. Porter, you know very well that is not going to happen, not in my lifetime.” Bickel turned to Schaberg, “Mr. Schaberg, if you cannot control your client, I will put her in that soundproof glass cage back there so we cannot hear anything else she might say to disrupt these proceedings. Continue, Mr. Porter.” Porter looked in Schaberg’s direction and I thought I saw a slight smile as he rubbed his hand across his chin. “Miss Haynes, I had just asked you when the woman known as ‘Kitty’ had disappeared before we were interrupted.” “Early in the summer, I think…June or early July. Some weird guy was coming in regularly and asking only for her. After she did her routine right in front of him, they would sit and he would drink and she would keep the drinks coming. I saw her leave with him one night.” “Now, Miss Haynes, you said Miss Sanderson was not paying much attention to you girls?” “Just before the end…” “The end?” “Before Ollie’s death,” Ester was crying again “before his murder.” She sat and sobbed uncontrollably for a few minutes until Porter started again. “Miss Haynes, I am almost finished asking you questions. Will you try to answer just a few more? Okay, now we know you and Ollie were spending quite a bit of time together, and that people could see that you were going to have a baby. Had you and Ollie talked about any plans?” “That was all ruined, of course when he…” It seemed like minutes as she struggled to get the words out, “Yes. We were going to just disappear like Chuck and Kitty had. We were going to go two nights after…” The next came out of her like a scream, “…two nights after Launie Sanderson took him out and shot him the back of his head!”