The Tragic Tale of Jedfrey Mulligan

Jedfrey Mulligan stood 6’8’’ in his stocking feet and weighed a good 280 pounds on a good day. Once he won a race at the county fair, running a quarter mile - it was a horse race. The county fair discontinued the eating contests, as did each of the towns all around, because he could outeat anyone within 250 miles. He could lay a man out flat with one swing from his mighty left fist and perform a hundred-fifty pull-ups with his right arm. He could lift a wagon and change the wheel and axle without aid, and once lifted his neighbor's ox and carried it home, over two miles away.

The folks of Mountain Bend lived in fear of him, trembling at his shadow and running when he appeared, only breathing a sigh when he would finally leave town again. Children ran to their mothers, crying when they saw him, and shopkeepers prayed that he wouldn’t come to their stores on his monthly visits. Bartenders tried to hide the good stuff, while the harlots outright hid themselves from the giant of a man.

It never failed that once a month, he would come to town to do his business. He’d come down off his hill, wearing his tattered best clothes. His ruddy face scrubbed till it shone, and his coal-black hair slicked back with bear grease. His too-big feet would be covered in battered boots patched multiple times. His well-hoarded money was always stashed away in his raggedy leather wallet.

He’d come to buy staples like corn, coffee, sugar, beans, and flour. He’d stay to drink and play poker in the bars. What he really came for was the women, whom he’d leave used and abused, little caring for their needs and only going home once he’d busted a few chairs, windows, or bones.

Now it came to pass that the town noticed that Jedfrey Mulligan had not come to town. Just how long he hadn’t been no one could agree. Some said it’d been only two months since the giant had been seen. Others claimed that it had been about five months since the troublemaker had come down from his hill. They all agreed that it sure had been peaceful without him coming to town.

Now, none were too worried about the missing brute. They figured he could fend for himself, big as he was. They never even thought that he might be hurt over on his hill, living there by himself. They just didn’t care about him, except that he wasn’t there with them to bully them.

Until the evening that the drifter arrived in the town. The man stood 5’7” only because of the 2” heels on his boots. His straggly ash-colored hair framed a pinched, ferret-like face. He came into Asa Inman’s bar exuding all the charm of a smarmy snakeoil salesman. Everyone thought he was a common traveller until he reached into his pocket. What he pulled from his pocket turned even old man Asa as white as a ghost; the whole place became quiet, and Mimi Henson ran outside wearing only her petticoat, screaming into the night.

It’s said that Mimi ran to Sheriff Baldwin, reporting what she saw, because he appeared in the bar’s door within 15 minutes of the stranger's appearance on the stool. Nonchalantly, the lawman said hello to the town’s folk, while never taking his eyes off the drifter’s back. Walking towards the newcomer, he sat down beside him and waited for the man to order another shot of the barkeep’s own Ozark whiskey.

Now, all the stories differ on exactly what happened next, but they all agree that the sheriff took the drifter to jail once he saw Jedfrey Mulligan’s wallet, but the stranger kept claiming he’d found the wallet on the trail. Everyone argues whether the sheriff went to Jedfrey’s place and checked it out afterwards, or if he called the Pinkerton agency first and asked for an agent to come, and that agent was the one to do so. What was found, no one could agree; although some responded that all the animals were dead, while others stated that no animals were there. What can be agreed upon is that no one, not the town, the sheriff, nor the Pinkerton agent, found Jedfrey at his home.

It’d been repeated throughout the years that the agent and sheriff both followed clues they found at the cabin, and over the course of a month, they performed their investigation. Making sure to check every crevice they came to, the two lawmen left no stone unturned. They questioned every person they crossed, hoping for some news.

While searching some woods one day in the district, they were separated, and the agent came upon two oddly dressed women. Every storyteller, every retelling tells this part differently, adding something new, forgetting a part here or there. All of them conclude that the agent ended up at the women’s house, where a third woman snuck up behind him and smashed him on his head. The three women then dragged him to the top of the table and restrained him with a rope.

Meanwhile, Sheriff Baldwin had grown suspicious of the agent’s silence in the woods and gone back to look for him. Tracking from the last location he had seen the Pinkerton, he quickly and quietly followed the trail the three had left. When he came across the clearing and saw the Griegs ’ old cabin, it was said that he moaned, made the sign of the cross, even though he wasn’t Catholic, and began praying.

The Reverend Griegs had built the house when he had first moved to the area. The crazy-eyed preacher had shown up with his new bride and began building his homestead. They’d mostly kept to themselves, and so the locals ignored them. His wife died five years after their arrival, giving birth to their only daughter, and years later, he would take in two bastard girls of unknown parentage. No one had seen the reverend in years, but stories of him or one of his daughters meeting trespassers at gunpoint abounded in plenty, and with good cause, most of the tales had a lot of truth to them. Now, there was the sheriff, staring at the very cabin that even schoolchildren were warned to avoid.

Even though the day was warm, a trail of smoke was coiling from a pipe on the roof of a small outbuilding, which the sheriff knew was used to cure meat for the winter. He heard several animals in the barn and saw several chickens clucking in the yard. The sound of children splashing in the creek below the hill and babies crying in the cabin confused him since the sisters lived on their land alone.

His hackles raised, the sheriff continued forward, unsure what he would find. Quietly, it is said, he walked across the farmyard and up the porch steps. With stealth, he slid across the porch to the door, where it stood partially open. Cautiously, pushing the door open wider, he stepped through the entry to find a couple of toddlers playing with some tacky-looking stuff on the table. Upon closer inspection, he realized the two tots were playing in a puddle of blood. He could hear another baby crying beyond the right-hand doorway, and through the left-hand doorway, the susurration of female voices.

Sheriff Baldwin walked towards that door and found it led to the basement stairs. Checking the surroundings one last time, he began to walk down the stairs. Keeping to the inside of the steps, to prevent them from squeaking, he walked with all the stealth that his Cherokee friend Sakonige Nya had taught him. The last few steps were loose, so he skipped to the bottom in one long-legged leap, descending into a long, narrow hall with several doors that separated the huge floor in half.

He walked down the darkened hall towards the only doorway with a light fanning through its opening. Each darkened entry he stepped past, setting his nerves on edge until he was wound tighter than a clockspring. The deeper he walked into the rapidly cooling basement, the more rank the smell became, tickling his nose with a memory of helping Sakonige butcher some deer after their hunt, but way more pungent.

The sounds of the voices were coming from behind the door, so the lawman cautiously peeked around to make a quick inspection of the room before he charged in. Jumping back, he stood with his back to the wall, unwilling to believe what he had seen. His mind was also having trouble connecting what his eyes saw with what his ears heard.

“I wan’ the liver this’n time, Memaw.”

“No, cooks it for me-me, Ma!”

“Don’ cut too deep, Sissy Dodder. Don’ wanna pierce the guts this’n time.”

“I got it! Quit crowdin’ me.”

“Sis Mudder, canna we keep this’n a wee bit longer? He shore is a looker.”

“I dunna know. He has a weakened chin like Grandpa Da.”

“Oh, mind your’n mouth, Sister.”

“Dodders, Dodders, hush yo’ mouths. We have time ‘fore stringin’ this’n one up. Stop yo’ fighting.”

With these words, the good sheriff cringed, crossed himself once again, and drew his guns. Diving quickly through the door, he began to fire his revolvers into the room. He fired his weapons shoulder-high until he heard clicks.

When the smoke cleared, the sheriff was the only one standing in the room. The young children were bawling under a long wooden table, and the three women were on the floor. The lawman went to the women and made sure they were dead. Then he checked the men’s bodies he saw in the basement room.

Several torsos hung from the rafters, missing various parts of flesh. Toes and fingers were put in pickling barrels, while buttocks were covered in salt to cure on the tabletops along the walls. In the center of the room, tied down on top of the table the children were still hiding under, was the Pinkerton agent.

After untying the agent and helping him to his feet, the two lawmen proceeded to check the whole of the grounds out, from basement to attic and cabin to barns. Between them, they tore the place apart.

In another part of the basement, in a room all to himself, was where they found poor Jedfrey Mulligan. With a shackle around his neck, he was chained to the wall, as if the women didn’t want him to escape, but still, he didn’t need the shackle to keep him where he was. These vile women had also hobbled him, effectively preventing his escape at all. There was no way the two could carry the giant out of the cabin, so the sheriff told Jedfrey they’d come back to fetch him.

Twelve children under ten years of age were rounded up just inside the cabin’s domain. A few teenagers were caught hiding out in the barn, but it’s told some got away. No one knew for sure who those children belonged to.

The townspeople were horrified to learn what was happening in the hills above their town. In their pity, they forgave Jedfrey Mulligan for all his past transgressions. Many went out of their way to help him through the rest of his years.

Sheriff Baldwin had many nightmares about what he had found inside the Griegs ’ old cabin, turning to drink, trying to drown out the memories of that fateful day. The poor man soon lost his sheriff’s badge, and his wife walked out on him shortly after.

As for Jedfrey Mulligan, he was never the same again. A good foot shorter, he weighed less than two hundred pounds. When he slept, it was with both eyes open, and his Bowie knife clutched in his fist. He never did get over his mistrust of women after his ordeal, cringing from any female who walked near him. Now, he scared little children only with the sudden onset of tears he would have.

Most of the children were rehabilitated and adopted into neighboring families. Most of the kids soon forgot all about their early childhood. Some did remember, as if in a dream.

It’s said that the older kids who escaped continued the ways they had learned, and some were shot by the local landowners. To this day, it’s said that few have survived. Not many. But a few. They, too, have the same appetite as their matriarchs.