April 2021 – Ink-Stained Wretches

Naming Characters: Steve Dauchy MacCaskill

I’m working on a mystery novel—I’ve been working on it for years, but now I’m working on it—and am faced with dilemmas too numerous to whine about in only one post, so I’ll move along.

I will instead write about the one pleasure of the writing life: creating and naming characters.

My novel is set in a little town very like my own hometown. I don’t base my plot on real events, and I don’t use real people as characters—with one exception: Steve Dauchy.

Note: One of my readers, Cullen Dauchy, knows more about Steve than I do, especially about his early life, and I hope he’ll feel free to correct any errors.

Steve Dauchy was a career blood donor at Katy Veterinary Clinic in Katy, Texas. On retirement he moved to Fentress, where he lived with his veterinarian-owner’s parents, Joe and Norma Dauchy. Joe and Norma lived next door to me; in local terms, next door meant that my house was on one corner, then there was a half-acre “patch” of pecan and peach trees and grass and weeds, then a street, and then on the next corner, the Dauchy yard and their house. The point being that when Steve visited me, he didn’t just walk across a driveway.

Joe was my dad’s first cousin, so I guess that makes Steve and me second cousins. I have a lot of cousins on that side of the family, although most are human.

Steve is a family name, with a story behind it. As I understand it, back in the ’20s or ’30s, my great-uncle Cull (Joseph Cullen) Dauchy, Sr., enjoyed listening to a radio program about a Greek character who frequently spoke of “my cat Steve and her little cattens.” Uncle Cull was so amused by the phrase that he named a cat—probably one of the barn cats—Steve. And ever after, he always had a cat named Steve.

*Uncle Cull and Aunt Myrtle Dauchy’s house, home of the first Steves*

So when the clinic cat became part of the Uncle Cull’s son and daughter-in-law’s family, he became the latest in a long line of Steves.

How to describe Steve. He was a fine figure of a cat: a big tabby, deep orange, with an expression of perpetual boredom. His reaction to nearly everything translated as, “Meh.” I’ve heard that’s common among clinic cats.

Once when Steve was standing on my front porch, the neighbor’s Great Dane got loose and charged over. I was frantic, shouting at the dog, shouting at Steve. But when the dog hit the porch, Steve just looked up at him. Dog turned around and trotted home.

Some would say Steve was brave, and I’m sure he was. But I believe his grace under pressure had their roots elsewhere.

First, he had experience. He knew dogs. In his former employment, he’d observed the breed: big, little, yappy, whining, growling, howling, cringing, confined to carriers, restrained by leashes, sporting harnesses and rhinestone collars, hair wild and matted, sculpted ‘dos and toenails glistening pink from the OPI Neon Collection. He’d seen them all, and he was not impressed.

Facing down a Great Dane, however, took more than experience. There was something in Steve’s character, an inborn trait that marked him for greatness: his overarching sense of entitlement. He was never in the wrong place at the wrong time. My porch was his porch. The world was his sardine.

Except for the kitchen counter. Steve thought kitchen counters were for sleeping, and Joe and Norma’s maid didn’t. Consequently, he stayed outside a lot. He took ostracism in stride and used his freedom to range far and wide. Far and wide meant my yard.

At that time I had three indoor cats—Christabel, Chloe, and Alice B. Toeclaws—and a raft of outdoor cats. The outdoor cats started as strays, but I made the mistake of naming them, which meant I had to feed them, which meant they were mine. Chief among them was Bunny, a black cat who had arrived as a teenager with his mother, Edith.

One day Bunny, Edith, and I were out picking up pecans when Steve wandered over to pay his respects, or, more likely, to allow us to pay our respects to him. Bunny perked up, put on his dangerous expression, and walked out to meet the interloper. It was like watching the opening face-off in Gunsmoke.

But instead of scrapping, they stopped and sat down, face to face, only inches apart. Each raised his right paw above his head and held it there a moment. Next, simultaneously, they bopped each other on the top of the head about ten times. Then they toppled over onto their sides, got up, and walked away.

That happened every time they met. Maybe it was just a cat thing, a neighborly greeting, something like a Masonic handshake. But I’ve wondered if it might have had religious significance. Bunny was a Presbyterian, and Steve was a Methodist, and both had strong Baptist roots, and although none of those denominations is big on ritual, who knows what a feline sect might entail?

Steve had a Macavity-like talent for making himself invisible. Occasionally when I opened my front door, he slipped past and hid in a chair at the dining room table, veiled by the tablecloth. When he was ready to leave, he would hunt me down—Surprise!—and lead me to the door. Once, during an extended stay, he used the litter box. Christabel, Chloe, and Alice B. were not amused.

*Distance Steve traveled between his house and mine. His house is way over there behind the trees.*

Invisibility could work against him, though. Backing out of the driveway one morning, I saw in the rearview mirror a flash streak across the yard. I got out and looked around but found nothing and so decided I’d imagined it. When I got home from work, I made a more thorough search and located Steve under the house, just out of reach. I called, coaxed, cajoled. He stared. It was clear: he’d been behind the car when I backed out, I’d hit him, and he was either too hurt to move or too disgusted to give me the time of day.

It took a long time and a can of sardines to get him out. I delivered him to the veterinarian in Lockhart; she advised leaving him for observation. A couple of days later, I picked him up. Everything was in working order, she said, cracked pelvis, nothing to do but let him get over it.

“Ordinarily,” said the vet, “I would have examined him and sent him home with you the first day. I could tell he was okay. But you told me his owner’s son is a vet, and I was afraid I’d get it wrong.”

Although an indoor-outdoor cat, Steve did plenty of indoor time at his own house, too, especially in winter, and when the maid wasn’t there. One cold day, the family smelled something burning. They found Steve snoozing atop the propane space heater in the kitchen. His tail hung down the side, in front of the vent. The burning smell was the hair on his tail singeing. They moved him to a safer location. I presume he woke up during the process.

At night, he had his own bedroom, a little garden shed in the back yard. He slept on the seat of the lawnmower, snuggled down on a cushion. Except when he didn’t.

Once extremely cold night, I was piled up in bed under an extra blanket and three cats. About two a.m., I woke up to turn over—sleeping under three cats requires you to wake up to turn over—and in the process, reached down and touched one of the cats. It was not my cat.

I cannot describe the wave of fear that swept over me. It sounds ridiculous now, but finding myself in the dark with an unidentified beast, and unable to jump and run without first extricating myself from bedding and forty pounds of cat—I lay there paralyzed.

Unnecessarily, of course. The extra cat was Steve. He’s sneaked in and, considering the weather forecast, decided sleeping with a human and three other cats in a bed would be superior to hunkering down on a lawnmower.

Steve’s full name was, of course, Steve Dauchy. In my book, he will be Steve MacCaskill. MacCaskill was the name of a family who lived next door to my Aunt Bettie and Uncle Maurice. Their children were friends of my father and his brothers and their many cousins. They were a happy family.

“My family had to plan everything,” my dad’s cousin Lucyle Dauchy Meadows told me, “but the MacCaskills were spontaneous. If they decided they wanted to go to a movie, they just got into the car and went to a movie.” When Lucyle and the other girls helped their friend Mary Burns MacCaskill tidy her room before the Home Demonstration Agent came to examine it (I am so glad the Home Demonstration Agent didn’t examine rooms when I was a girl), one of the first things they did was to remove the alligator from the bathtub.

I heard so many delightful stories about the MacCaskill family that I decided they were too good to be true until my Aunt Bettie’s 100th birthday party, when my mother introduced me to Mary Burns MacCaskill, who had traveled from Ohio for the party.

So as an homage to that family, I’ve named my main character Molly MacCaskill. And when choosing a pet for Molly, I couldn’t choose a finer beast than Steve.

***

Kathy Waller blogs at Telling the Truth, Mainly. She has published short stories, as well as a novella co-written with Manning Wolfe. She is perpetually working on a novel.

Left Brain/Right Brain- How Novelists Use Both

Francine Paino AKA F. Della Notte

Do we have one brain or two? Technically, we know we only have one, but then it’s divided right down the middle into two, right and left, with each hemisphere more potent for certain behaviors. The hemispheres communicate through a thick band of 200-250 million nerve fibers called the corpus callosum. A smaller group of nerve fibers, the anterior commissure, also connects parts of the cerebral hemispheres. Many learned opinions and schools of thought exist explaining whether or not either hemisphere of this highly complex organ is dominant and determines our strengths. Current neuroscience says the left- brain is responsible for specific functions such as logic, linear thinking, and facts.

Who could be a better example of left-brain strength than Albert Einstein, the German-born theoretical physicist, recognized as one of the great physicists, known for his theory of relativity, the E=mc2. He also made important contributions to the development of the theory of quantum mechanics. Still, he was also an excellent violinist. He was known to perform impromptu concerts and step outside of his home with his beloved violin, Lina, to accompany Christmas Carolers. Not only could he appreciate the music for its mathematical properties, but his right brain heard and appreciated its beauty.

Right-brained artistic genius, Marc Chagall, was considered the master of color. His artworks extended to stained glass and ceramic, but perhaps he’s best known for his canvases reflecting his Russian-French Jewish heritage and life in Vitebsk. In Chagall’s own words, we see the dominance of his right brain.

If I create from the heart, nearly everything works; if from the head, almost nothing. – Marc Chagall

But can an artist such as Chagall, known for his cubist renditions of his profoundly folk-impressionist style, bring to life his flights of fancy such as La Mariee? (The Bride), without relying on left-brain analysis and calculations for size, space, and symmetry?

Like scientists and artists, novelists, too, use both hemispheres. Each writer has a different method. For some, the story unfolds with facts, figures, characters, and situations growing with almost mathematical precision, but not I.

For me, the story germinates like a movie reel in my head. Different scenery, locations, events, perhaps a piece of music can trigger these images.

In the first book in the Housekeeper Mystery series, I’m Going to Kill that Cat, the story came to me one day while visiting my mother at her apartment in a retirement community. One of her frail, elderly neighbors -let’s call her Jill, screamed at the top of her lungs, “I’m going to kill that cat,” referring to another neighbor’s cat that goaded Jill’s dog, causing the poor doggie to yank the leash making Jill take a tumble. Her screams brought out all the residents, including my mother and me. Once we got the irate Jill up and determined that she wasn’t injured, the scene played in my head. What if two older women who had a long history were involved in a similar incident?

The dog owner became Martha, a sad and bitter woman who lived alone with her two dogs on a limited income.

What if Martha’s nemesis, Velma, lived in the same community and attended the same church. Velma has it all. Wealth, position, and a feisty cat who loved to provoke Martha’s dogs, as Velma loved to needle Martha.

What if Velma is found dead the following day, and an autopsy reveals it was murder by poison? And what if Martha had a garden filled with plants of all kinds – some beautiful but deadly?

And what happens to Velma’s cat, LaLa?

To solve the case, along came my conscientious and stand-offish Father Melvyn Kronkey, the pastor of the Catholic Church to which both ladies belonged. And, of course, such a devoted priest needs a highly competent assistant. She appears in the character of Mrs. B., a caring people person, or one might say nosy.

The conflicts blossomed in my head like a silent movie to which I set the words. The what-ifs, the characters, the settings, and the personalities became more precise and multi-dimensional as the left hemisphere began to analyze who, what, where, when, and why? How will events unfold logically, with real underlying factors? What was the problem between these women and who killed Velma?

In book two of the Housekeeper Mystery Series, Catwalk Dead, circumstances draw Mrs. B. and Fr. Melvyn Kronkey into a theater murder and the Macbeth curse through her son’s ballet company. They work to unravel whether this was a crime, a curse or both.

While the story created itself in my head, I had to take the time to learn about the backstage craft, including set construction, catwalks, logistics, methods, and equipment, so vital to the story’s action.

Every author can speak to their creative side, and the need for the problem-solving skills necessary to create conflicts, then bring them to logical conclusions.

Neuroscience continues to learn more about how each section of the brain operates when confronting different needs and situations. Still, the entire brain must be engaged to create fascinating stories that are scintillating, coherent, valid and clear, and, most of all, satisfying to the reader.

Pick Your Poison–An Almost Perfect Crime

“All things are poison and nothing is without poison; only the dose makes a thing not a poison.” Paracelsus, Swiss physician (1493 –1541) (emphasis added)

“Poison has a certain appeal . . . It has not the crudeness of the revolver bullet or the blunt weapon. I have no special knowledge of the subject, if that is what you mean.” (Agatha Christie, They Do It With Mirrors, p.178)

The history of poison is an ancient one, and before the birth of forensic medicine in the 1920s, poison was virtually untraceable; it was almost the perfect weapon.

Socrates drank poisoned hemlock and died in 399 BCE (Eyewitness). Cleopatra orchestrated poisonous experiments on her slaves and prisoners of war. Concoctions made from “Henbane, Belladonna Strychnos nux-vomica” were used to isolate the most painful and disfiguring combinations (Quave). Cleopatra ruthlessly searched for the quickest and least painful poison for her future self, should she need it. In the end, in 30 BC, she chose the bite of an asp to end her life (Quave).

Alexandre Cabanel. *Cleopatra testing poisons on condemned prisoners*

The Borgias of the Italian Renaissance, resorted to a wide variety of deadly formulas to eradicate obstinate Church officials and political rivals. The Borgia’s parting gifts included combinations of “arsenic, strychnine, cantharidin, and aconite incorporated in drinks, clothes, gloves, book pages, flowers, and drugs” (Sage). The deadliest poison in the Borgia arsenal, Cantarella, made with arsenic as a base was “so dangerous that the actual formula was destroyed after their deaths.” (Blum).

John Collier. *A glass of wine with Caesar Borgia*

“. . . Served in a goblet of wine at dinner, it had the reputation to function with time-clock precision. According to the desire of the murder, cantarella could kill in a day, a month, or a year. It was also believed that cantarella was so powerful that no antidote existed. . .” (Sage).

During Victorian times, married women frequently resorted to poisoning as the solution to a bad marriage, or to cash in on a spouse’s or relative’s life insurance policies. Arsenic was so popular it was given a “nickname: the inheritance powder.” (Blum).

In England, between 1857 and 1872, Mary Ann Cotton, a notorious female British serial killer and arsenic devotee, killed “eight of her own children, seven stepchildren, her mother, three husbands, a lover – and an inconvenient friend” before she was caught and hanged (Blum; Johnson; Murderpedia).

Sometime between the 1880’s and 1908, in the United States Belle Gunness, known as “Lady Bluebeard,” is believed to have killed between “13 to 42” people,” including her own children. (Murderpedia). Using strychnine and/or bludgeoning to kill her victims, sometimes using both methods, Belle then butchered her victims and fed the body parts to her hogs. (Schecter; Murderpedia).

Harold Schecter, who arduously documented Gunness’ murders in Hell’s Princess: The Mystery of Belle Gunness, Butcher of Men, wrote that despite years of diligent attempts to find or identify Belle, dead or alive, she was never found. The Gunness case remains unsolved.

Murderers are not the only ones who are on the lookout for the perfect murder weapon. Mystery writers, including the most famous of mystery writers, Agatha Christie, frequently used poison as a weapon in her novels. An extensive study of Christie’s use of poison was analyzed by Anne Harrison, detailed in her article, “Poisons Used in Agatha Christie’s Books, Foul Toxins From the Queen of Crime” (2017). Harrison’s research found Christie had used poison more than any other mystery writer of her era.

“. . .More than thirty victims fall foul to a variety of toxins (while others survive attempted poisonings). Christie’s knowledge was extensive, a result of her work as both a nurse and a pharmacy dispenser during both World Wars.” (Harrison).

Agatha Christie plaque -: Torre Abbey.jpg : Violetrigaderivative work: F l a n k e r, CC BY-SA 3.0 /, via Wikimedia Commons

Harrison’s research proved Christie had more than a simple working knowledge of poison and drug interactions. Harrison’s findings further revealed how proficient Christie was ensuring not only the correct toxin’s application but how she skillfully determined appropriate outcomes for each. Harrison noted that not all of Christie’s literary victims died; some recovered.

Research confirmed the drugs/poisons Christie actually chose for her stories were actual drugs available and accessible at the time she wrote her stories. Christie did not fabricate the names or kinds of drugs, or their effects, or the application, but used her real-life knowledge to enhance her storyline, which as we all know, it did.

Christie’s novels incorporate a plethora of toxins: “strychnine, cyanide, arsenic, thallium, taxine, coniine, bacillus anthracis, plant arsenic, Belladonna (also known as Deadly Nightshade, Devil’s Berries or Death Cherries), physostigmine, Morphine, Vernol (sleeping tablets), and physostigmine” (Harrison).

In the real world, poison had always been hugely problematic for law enforcement –if used for murder, its detection was virtually impossible. The cause of death was widely determined by a medical examiner who was politically appointed. Frequently appointees had no medical training, scientific knowledge, or access to detection tests. People died of unknown causes, unsolved murders rose, and murderers walked free.

The rate of unsolved murders rose as industrialization encroached on cities and towns. According to Deborah Blum, in The Poisoner’s Handbook – Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York, “As industrialization encroached throughout the U.S., new chemicals and poisons appeared unregulated. Frequently, these poisons were undetectable.” (Blum)

Blum wrote that it was not until the first pioneers of forensic medicine appeared and true scientific detection tools were created and tested, that medical examiners and their staff were finally able to detect certain poisons as a definitive cause of death.

Some toxins widely used at that time: “Morphine went into teething medicines for infants; opium into routinely prescribed sedatives; arsenic was an ingredient in everything from pesticides to cosmetics. Mercury, cyanide, strychnine, chloral hydrate, chloroform, sulfates of iron, sugar of lead, carbolic acid, and more, the products of the new chemistry stocked the shelves of doctors’ offices, businesses, homes, pharmacies, and grocery stores. . . “(Blum).

In New York, public outcry demanded a qualified non-political appointee medical coroner, a knowledgeable physician. After years of political stonewalling, a decision was finally reached, and in January of 1918, “Dr. Charles Norris …became the new Chief Medical Examiner of New York” (Blum).

No long after his appointment, Norris hired the chemist, Alexander Gettler. It was Gettler who would later perfect tests to detect wood alcohol poisonings, cyanide gas poisoning, and he work tirelessly to find tests able to detect various poisons. Norris and Gettler established the first forensic standards, tests, and mandatory forensic protocols, and through their efforts saved thousands of future lives.

It is not possible to encapsulate the entirety of Blum’s “The Poisoner’s Handbook – Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York.” Blum’s history of poison, its insidious effects on the public, the rise of the first forensic department in New York and the United States, along with the discoveries of both Norris and Gettler, and the incredible people who worked with them, is well worth reading.

The public owes a debt to the unfailing dedication of both Norris and Gettler, who demanded scientific rigor in the detection of toxins, but who also paved the way for regulatory reform and laid the foundation of forensic medicine.

Norris died in 1935, and although few knew, Norris had been financially supporting the Medical Examiner’s office with his personal resources since his original appointment. Two years after Norris’ death, three members of his staff published a “comprehensive textbook on forensic science, Legal Medicine and Toxicology. . .it was dedicated to Norris.” (Blum)

Dr. Alexander Gettler and Dr. Charles Norris

Gettler continued to work, finally retiring at seventy-five. “On the day he left office, he estimated that he’s analyzed more than 100,000 bodies.” (Blum). A prodigious writer, Gettler produced numerous scholarly papers on various toxins, detection methodology, and forensics. Gettler had also trained a legion of young scientists known as the “Gettler Boys,” who went on to become medical examiners working “from Long Island to Puerto Rico.” (Blum). Gettler died in 1968.

The story of poison is far from complete; it continues to morph and change; new toxins are created every day. Their detection, however, is far more likely thanks to Harris and Gettler.

The Poisoner’s Handbook – Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York, became a best seller in 2010, and a PBS NPR American Experience series feature in 2016.

If you are looking for the perfect murder weapon, before considering poison, a bit of research is recommended.

Other References

Lakeisha Goedluck. A Brief History of Women Putting Poison in Their Lovers’ Food.

Chemical Safety Facts. Org. “The Dose Makes the Poison.”

Photo Credits:

Book photo courtesy of Amazon.

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A former paralegal, Renee Kimball has a master’s degree in criminal justice. Among her interests are reading, writing, and animal advocacy. She fosters and rescues both dogs and cats and works with various organizations to find them forever homes.