Bath Massacre: America's First School Bombing (12 page)

But just once more McMullen tried the door, knocking as hard as he could. After a moment, he heard something inside. Kehoe was coming down the stairs, alive and apparently well. Wearing just pants and his
bedroom slippers, Kehoe opened the door and greeted his unexpected visitor.

“What is the matter?” McMullen asked. “Are you going to kill yourself sleeping?”

Bemused, Kehoe gave a sly grin. “It wouldn’t be a bad way to die, would it?” he said.

“Probably no,” said McMullen. Kehoe invited McMullen in. The two men talked a while, McMullen hemming and hawing with excuses about why he didn’t want the horse. Kehoe was surprised but conciliatory, offering a glass of cider to his guest. He went down to the basement to fetch the cider, then sat back down with McMullen. “Now you sit tight,” Kehoe said. Kehoe said he had to feed his other horse and then would drive McMullen home.

McMullen declined the offer, saying he didn’t mind walking back. Kehoe insisted. McMullen downed his cider, then followed Kehoe out to the barn. The horse was fed. Kehoe walked over to his machine and again offered to take McMullen home.

“No, go on and get your breakfast,” McMullen said. “You are going to town. Go on, I can walk home.”

“No, I ain’t going to get any breakfast until I get to town,” Kehoe said. “I won’t be going down for an hour or so. I have got to shave.” Finally, McMullen acquiesced. After dropping McMullen at home, Kehoe quickly turned around and headed back to his farm.

A few days later, Kehoe called McMullen, saying he was going to town, and asked if McMullen’s sister would like a lift. That she did, and McMullen thought this would be a ripe time to bring the horse back. When he was about a quarter mile from his destination, McMullen saw Kehoe coming down the road. Kehoe appeared surprised. The two men talked a bit, then Kehoe told McMullen, “I will go back and help you put the horse in the barn.” Again he offered to take McMullen home once they were done.

As they put the horse in its stable, Kehoe looked at McMullen. “Al,” he said, “You made a mistake by not keeping that horse over there.”

McMullen chose not to reply.

Kehoe drove McMullen back to the road. McMullen’s sister was there, waiting for Kehoe, so McMullen decided to walk back to his farm.

From start to finish, the whole episode was strange and a little unsettling. Allen McMullen had no more dealings with Andrew Kehoe.
²⁰

Throughout the fall and into winter and spring Nellie Kehoe’s health grew worse. Blinding headaches, the constant rasping cough, a body wracked by ill health. There seemed to be no end to it. She was constantly in and out Saint Lawrence Hospital. Alone during those times, Kehoe usually ate his meals in town. He often drove to Lansing to visit his wife in the hospital.

David Harte sometimes saw Kehoe’s truck at night coming home from what Harte assumed was a trip to Saint Lawrence Hospital. He always knew when Kehoe was out; the man never shut his garage door when he left and always closed it up tight when he returned. Generally speaking, Kehoe’s trips weren’t late; he usually came back between eight and nine o’clock.

In mid-April, Harte noticed that Kehoe’s trips were on the increase and he often had boxes covered with some kind of tarp in the bed of his truck. Kehoe never said a word about any of this.
²¹

In late April or early May Kehoe bought a hotshot battery from an automotive and radio supply shop in Lansing. A hotshot battery, commonly used as an alternative to the hand crank when starting a Model T Ford, was made up of four one-and-a-half-volt dry cell batteries, each cell being about two and a half inches around and between six to seven inches long. The combined voltage of the cells was about six volts, enough to fire up a car engine or any other sort of device that needed a handy electrical spark. Kehoe also purchased a new set of tires for his truck.
²²

In early May, as Frank Smith made his rounds in the school basement he noticed something funny. There were a couple of trapdoors down there, each about eighteen inches square. One of them was open. Come to think of it, this wasn’t the first time he’d seen that. Seems maybe he’d found both trapdoors open two or three times before.

Strange. He hadn’t left them open as far as he could remember.
²³

Payday. Ward Kyes said good morning to Kehoe and took his check, just like always. He was about to put it in his pocket when his foot slipped off the clutch. Ward jumped back so the bus wouldn’t roll, accidentally dropping his paycheck in the process.

Kehoe watched the piece of paper float to the ground. “You better keep that,” he told Ward. “That may be the last you will ever get.”

He’s good-natured this morning, Ward thought, as he laughed at the little joke. “Are you going broke?” Ward asked.

“I guess not,” Kehoe said.
²⁴

A year or so earlier Kehoe had proudly showed Monty Ellsworth his Winchester bolt-action rifle, a real beauty of a gun. Ellsworth mentioned at the time that he had a rifle he never used; maybe he and Kehoe could target shoot sometime. “That’s a fine idea,” his neighbor replied, giving Ellsworth an open invitation to come anytime he wanted.

Ellsworth, a man with many ideas, planned to open a gas station on the road in front of his house. It made potentially good business sense; with the increase in automobiles in the area, people would need gasoline. Who better to buy it from than their neighbor?

Come Thursday, May 12, Ellsworth was working in his yard, getting things ready for construction. When Kehoe came over to chat, Ellsworth took a break.

They didn’t talk about much, just general conversation between neighbors. Kehoe reminded Ellsworth that they had never got together for the promised target practice session. Ellsworth explained the obvious; he’d been up to his armpits in work. But would Kehoe like to come over the next day? “Sure,” Kehoe replied.

He promptly arrived on Friday, May 13, at 8:30 a.m., gun and pasteboard targets in hand. The two men nailed the targets to a board and set them up one hundred yards away.

Ellsworth fired off three rounds, one a bull’s-eye, one close to center, and one wildly off target. Kehoe had better aim, hitting one bull’s-eye and two shots close to center. The men moved the targets fifty feet closer, exchanged guns, and again fired three rounds apiece. Once more Kehoe displayed a steady hand and excellent aim, beating Ellsworth nicely. Ellsworth gave Kehoe his Winchester back and tried firing with his own gun once more.

Three, four, five, six times they shot. Kehoe’s aim was tight, besting
his opponent in each contest. Ellsworth stood in awe of his neighbor’s talents.

When it was over Ellsworth walked with Kehoe back to the truck. There was something in the back, a crate of some kind about two feet long and a foot wide. The box was partially filled with rifle shells, maybe a thousand or so by Ellsworth’s guess.

A week later Ellsworth wondered how Kehoe had maintained such cool during their target shooting considering all the man had weighing on his mind.
²⁵

On Saturday, May 14 a construction crew working on a bridge near Bath reported a large quantity of dynamite was missing.
²⁶

Looking across the road, Lulu Harte noticed Kehoe loading up his truck. There was something odd about Kehoe’s cargo. It looked like old wheels and assorted scrap, not the everyday items farmers normally packed into their machines.