Page 96 of Death on Gallows Path

Urban had been active in business, with his connections reaching across Northern Kentucky and well into Cincinnati, Louisville, and Lexington.

“No. He was not part of the business community at that time.”

That struck me as careful wording, meant to answer the letter of the question while avoiding the spirit.

Doing quick mental math on possible ages, I asked, “Did you have dealings with his father?”

“Absolutely not.”

I blinked at his vehemence.

He didn’t seem to notice as he added, “Some people you cross paths with, through a combination of geography and their ability to insert themselves into the higher levels of professional business intercourse. You are not, however, forced to deal with them. Weak-willed individuals might say they are thus forced when, in fact, they are merely putting the venal and short-term considerations of expediency ahead of all else, including principle, honor, or integrity.”

Whew.

Not a careful answer this time. It was safe to say Urban didn’t think much of the senior Swindell.

He capped it off with, “You do your best to limit acknowledging their existence while maintaining your expectations for your own behavior.”

“You extended that to not having dealings with the son?”

“Damon was a late child and so the occasion did not arise in my business dealings.”

“But if the occasion had arisen?”

“I would have avoided him as assiduously as I had the father, based on what I knew from trusted sources.”

“What was Damon’s relationship with his father?” Another flicker of distaste showed before I could add, “Or his mother, for that matter.”

“His mother, I have been told, was a lovely young woman, an immigrant, who was employed in the household of a neighbor as a nanny. His father had two older children whose mother had died. The father married the neighbor’s nanny. Some said to acquire childcare for his children without paying a salary. A year after she gave birth to Damon, she was gone, without Damon. The story the family put about was that she returned to her native country to care for an invalid mother.”

Urban didn’t believe that.

Whatever the truth, Damon had no mother and a less than warm and cozy father.

“How was his relationship with his siblings?”

Deadpan, Urban said, “The last I encountered either of them, they would immediately correct you by emphasizing half-siblings. Each achieved an education, then moved far away, building lives elsewhere. Only Damon remained in his father’s orbit. From the little I chose to hear, he strove mightily to earn his father’s approval and never succeeded, despite following in those paternal footsteps.”

I might have felt sorry for the young Damon, but having encountered the adult Damon, I didn’t. Lots of people were dealt a rough hand and became good adults. There is a level of personal responsibility in how we work the clay we’re handed.

Urban wasn’t done.

“It is something, perhaps, to be grateful for that the cycle ends with Damon, since he had no offspring.”

That felt like an end to what he would say about Damon. I tried an approach more likely to appeal to him.

“Was there more about that history of the public hanging you didn’t tell me the other day?”

“There is a great deal I didn’t share. I provided you the merest sketch of the events in Owensboro. Do you have a particular area of interest?”

“Actually, I meant the case here, in North Bend County. The one involving Judge Swindell and the Alsup family.”

His eyes sharpened slightly, but he said merely, “The same answer applies.”

We were at a juncture.

If I let him loose and told him I wanted to know everything, the telling might never end.