Finding Ray 1

I saved the packet until after supper, until after my bath, until after the TVs went off and Penny went to bed. Then with bated breath, I pulled out the papers out of the manila envelope and began to go through them again only more carefully. I reread the letter, although its contents were sparse. I noticed the spelling and the errors. Why didn't he write in hand? and why did he refuse to identify himself? 

Turning to the police report from Greenwood, I noticed that his record went all the way back to 1948. He was arrested several times over a three year period for vagrancy, public drunkenness, assault and battery, and trespassing. It seems that he grew tired of or gave up on Greenwood because his arrests there ceased near the time I was born in 1956. 

Most of his arrest took place in Carroll County. It was the same old stuff. Apparently he like to drink and fight and did both of them pretty consistently. Surprisingly to me, he had almost as many arrest in Montgomery County as in Carroll. And in the papers were copies of some handwritten notes made by more than one Montgomery County Sheriff. 

I thought all this was interesting but essentially useless until I actually read the Montgomery County Sheriff's notes. He made mention over and over of one Jimmy Dugger who repeatedly bailed Ray out of jail. Not only that, but Jimmy had been under surveillance by the sheriff's office off and on for years. It seems that Jimmy and Ray were good friends and possibly partners in crime. Literally. They were suspected of moonshining, growing pot, and receiving stolen property. 

This got me pretty excited because maybe, just maybe, Jimmy, who started bailing Ray out of jail in the mid 1970s, might still be alive. He would be an old man now, but if he was still around, maybe I could find him. Through the notes, I found out that Jimmy lived, at that time at least, in Popular Creek, but the notes contained no phone number and no exact address. Popular Creek is not an actual town, but an area around Highway 407 between Winona and French Camp. These "areas" can be pretty big. Was he still alive? was he still there? and would he talk to me if I could find him? I had to find out. The idea off tracking down Jimmy, then finding Ray had the butterflies soaring in my belly. I had a journey to make to start the process.