faces. One he showed to the neighbors. The other he showed only to the dead.”
D uring deer season, Muschinski’s filling station served as an official checking facility, where the huntsmen brought their kill to be weighed and tallied. By five in the evening on that gray, bitter Saturday, when Frank Worden returned—empty-handed—from the woods, a string of stiffening carcasses already hung in the gas-station yard. Though Worden hadn’t come home with a kill, the season still had eight days to go, and he wasn’t discouraged. In fact, he drove directly to Muschinski’s to ask a question about the town’s yearly big buck contest.
Immediately, Muschinski mentioned that he had seen the Worden truck leave town early that morning and that the store had been closed ever since. Had Frank’s mother, Muschinski wondered, decided to go hunting, too?
Worden was puzzled. As far as he knew, his mother had intended to keep the store open all day. Concerned, he went across the street to try the door and discovered that it was, in fact, locked. Since he wasn’t carrying a key, he hurried home to fetch one, then quickly returned to the store.
As soon as he stepped inside, he saw that something was terribly wrong.
The cash register was missing from its counter. And the floor was spattered with reddish-brown stains, which led in a trail to the back door and which Worden instantly recognized as blood. A great deal of blood.
Running to the rear, he looked into the driveway. Muschinski was right. The store’s panel truck was gone.
Worden was alarmed but didn’t panic. He’d been a deputy sheriff for nearly a year and knew how to proceed. He picked up the phone and dialed Sheriff Art Schley at his office in Wautoma, the county seat, about fifteen miles away. Schley could hear the agitation in his deputy’s voice as Worden reported what he’d discovered inside the store.
Schley, who had been sheriff for just over a month, immediately phoned the home of his chief deputy, Arnie Fritz, and—in some distress himself—relayed the news. Within minutes, the pair were speeding down to Plainfield.
By the time they arrived, Worden had had a chance to examine the store for clues. “He’s done something to her,” Worden blurted out as soon as he saw the two officers. When Fritz asked whom he meant, the missing woman’s son—by now deeply distraught—answered bitterly and without hesitation.
“Eddie Gein,” he said.
Keeping tight control of his emotions, Worden explained why he suspected Gein. “He’s been hanging around here a lot lately, bothering my mother to go roller skating and dancing and to movie shows.” Just the day before, Worden went on, Gein had come by the store around closing time to check on the price of antifreeze. While there, he had inquired very casually if Frank intended to go hunting on Saturday. Frank—not attaching any particular significance to the question—had confirmed that he meant to be out in the woods first thing in the morning.
Frank then showed Schley and Fritz something he had discovered while awaiting the sheriff’s arrival—a slip of paper with his mother’s handwriting on it. She had made it out that morning. As far as Frank was concerned, it was a piece of evidence that pointed directly to Gein. It was a sales receipt for antifreeze.
The three men decided that Gein should be located immediately. In the meantime, Fritz had put out a call for help. Before long, lawmen from throughout the region and as far away as Madison—sheriffs, former sheriffs, deputy sheriffs, town marshals, traffic officers, State Crime Lab investigators, and more—were converging on Plainfield. Among the first to arrive on the scene were Marshal Leon “Specks” Murty of the village of Wild Rose; sheriffs Wanerski, Searles, and Artie of Portage, Adams, and Marquette counties; traffic officer Dan Chase; deputies Arden “Poke” Spees and Virgil “Buck” Batterman; and Captain Lloyd Schoephoerster of the
D uring deer season, Muschinski’s filling station served as an official checking facility, where the huntsmen brought their kill to be weighed and tallied. By five in the evening on that gray, bitter Saturday, when Frank Worden returned—empty-handed—from the woods, a string of stiffening carcasses already hung in the gas-station yard. Though Worden hadn’t come home with a kill, the season still had eight days to go, and he wasn’t discouraged. In fact, he drove directly to Muschinski’s to ask a question about the town’s yearly big buck contest.
Immediately, Muschinski mentioned that he had seen the Worden truck leave town early that morning and that the store had been closed ever since. Had Frank’s mother, Muschinski wondered, decided to go hunting, too?
Worden was puzzled. As far as he knew, his mother had intended to keep the store open all day. Concerned, he went across the street to try the door and discovered that it was, in fact, locked. Since he wasn’t carrying a key, he hurried home to fetch one, then quickly returned to the store.
As soon as he stepped inside, he saw that something was terribly wrong.
The cash register was missing from its counter. And the floor was spattered with reddish-brown stains, which led in a trail to the back door and which Worden instantly recognized as blood. A great deal of blood.
Running to the rear, he looked into the driveway. Muschinski was right. The store’s panel truck was gone.
Worden was alarmed but didn’t panic. He’d been a deputy sheriff for nearly a year and knew how to proceed. He picked up the phone and dialed Sheriff Art Schley at his office in Wautoma, the county seat, about fifteen miles away. Schley could hear the agitation in his deputy’s voice as Worden reported what he’d discovered inside the store.
Schley, who had been sheriff for just over a month, immediately phoned the home of his chief deputy, Arnie Fritz, and—in some distress himself—relayed the news. Within minutes, the pair were speeding down to Plainfield.
By the time they arrived, Worden had had a chance to examine the store for clues. “He’s done something to her,” Worden blurted out as soon as he saw the two officers. When Fritz asked whom he meant, the missing woman’s son—by now deeply distraught—answered bitterly and without hesitation.
“Eddie Gein,” he said.
Keeping tight control of his emotions, Worden explained why he suspected Gein. “He’s been hanging around here a lot lately, bothering my mother to go roller skating and dancing and to movie shows.” Just the day before, Worden went on, Gein had come by the store around closing time to check on the price of antifreeze. While there, he had inquired very casually if Frank intended to go hunting on Saturday. Frank—not attaching any particular significance to the question—had confirmed that he meant to be out in the woods first thing in the morning.
Frank then showed Schley and Fritz something he had discovered while awaiting the sheriff’s arrival—a slip of paper with his mother’s handwriting on it. She had made it out that morning. As far as Frank was concerned, it was a piece of evidence that pointed directly to Gein. It was a sales receipt for antifreeze.
The three men decided that Gein should be located immediately. In the meantime, Fritz had put out a call for help. Before long, lawmen from throughout the region and as far away as Madison—sheriffs, former sheriffs, deputy sheriffs, town marshals, traffic officers, State Crime Lab investigators, and more—were converging on Plainfield. Among the first to arrive on the scene were Marshal Leon “Specks” Murty of the village of Wild Rose; sheriffs Wanerski, Searles, and Artie of Portage, Adams, and Marquette counties; traffic officer Dan Chase; deputies Arden “Poke” Spees and Virgil “Buck” Batterman; and Captain Lloyd Schoephoerster of the
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