Peter Lance Graves told EQMM that it was his discovery of the Ellery Queen novel The Greek Coffin Mystery, as an adolescent, that sparked his love of crime fiction. He went on to read Agatha Christie and “took way too long to discover John D. MacDonald.” But he soon became fascinated with true crime as well. In this post he brings to life a true crime that, for him, comes very close to home. But then he brings us back to fiction through discussion of a recent crime novel with a similar theme. The Illinois author’s first published work of fiction, the story “Neighborly,” appears in the Department of First Stories of our current issue (March/April 2024).  —Janet Hutchings

This happened on January 23, 1930—at a rail terminus for the Chicago & Alton line near Granite City, Illinois—just across the Mississippi from St. Louis.  Trains lumbered in and out of the bustling rail hub, sending passengers and freight to Chicago and parts east.  On this day, like any other day, the hard men of the “running trades”– brakemen, flagmen, conductors, firemen—washed up in the locker room of the C&A hotel . . . sat elbow to elbow in the adjacent restaurant… trod wearily upstairs to the bunkhouse for a few hours of sleep.  Multiple sets of tracks snaked along both sides of the spartan hotel, which sat within the freight yard itself. The hotel rumbled day and night as rail cars were switched and mammoth steam locomotives were turned at the roundhouse nearby.

But on this gray January day, the familiar rhythm of the hotel was shattered by the clap of a gunshot in the locker room—followed by two more.  Chairs skittered across the wooden floor of the restaurant as diners leapt to their feet.  Then, raised voices and footfalls on the stairs as men hustled down from the bunkhouse.  In the locker room, a man lay on the dingy tile floor, blood streaming from his wounds.  All three shots had found their mark.  Standing above him, a fellow brakeman dropped a gun to the floor and said, “Call the police.”                                   

These two men—Leroy “Bud” Rudder and Ray French—shared more than just a vocation.  They had shared an enduring friendship, then a home, and ultimately . . . a woman.   Now, three pistol shots served as a ringing coda to a three-year saga of two young families shattered by tragedy and betrayal.

Bud and Ray were both brakemen for the Chicago & Alton, and had worked together for 5 years or so.  They lived near the C&A shops in Bloomington, Illinois—midway between St Louis and Chicago—and in fact they were next door neighbors in 1925 and 1926.  “The Shops” in Bloomington were renowned for their workmanship; Pullman sleeping cars were built there.  At one time, more than 2,000 men labored there to repair and maintain locomotives and rolling stock.  

Bud Rudder was a veteran of the Great War.  Bud and his wife Gladys had two young kids, as did Ray French and his wife, Nellie.  By all accounts, Bud and Ray were best friends.  Gladys and Nellie—each with two kids under the age of 7—were also good friends, keeping company while their husbands were on runs with layovers in Chicago, or at the other end of the line near St Louis.

To understand how tightly woven was this community fabric, you must consider the times.  Immigrants worked The Shops: the Germans, the Irish, the Scotch.  The work was dangerous—men were burned in the foundry or crushed coupling the rail cars.  Limbs, eyes were lost.  There was no air conditioning, so people sat out in front of their houses on summer evenings and talked.  Some men couldn’t leave the bottle alone, so “callers” went from house to house in the middle of the night to rap on windows “Hey, Joe.  You awake?  Number 65 North to Chicago at 3:30.”  Few households had telephones.  At O’Neill’s grocery store, you paid what you could, paid the rest next week.  In this tight community of rail workers, growing families routinely moved from rental to rental, always within shouting distance of The Shops.  By 1927, Ray and Nellie had moved a few blocks away.  Work was steady and both young families were eking out a living in the bustling orbit of the C&A shops. 

In April of 1927, Gladys Rudder’s parents visited from Indiana and spent the week, en route to their new home in California. The day after they left, Gladys—who was newly pregnant with their third child—began feeling poorly.  The doctor visited and initially believed her symptoms were associated with her pregnancy.  But Gladys’ condition worsened, and a few days later she went to the hospital.  She was diagnosed with scarlet fever, as were Bud and the kids. 

Scarlet fever was highly infectious, and prior to the advent of antibiotics, not effectively treatable. Two days after being admitted to the hospital, Gladys was dead.  Bud and the kids were quarantined at home—a sign on the door flapped in the breeze, warning “Scarlet Fever—KEEP OUT.”  While her family was quarantined, Gladys was quickly buried—to prevent further infections.  Bud’s daughter, Betty, was not quite 5 years old.  Little Leroy, called Junior, was barely 3.

Shortly after Gladys passed, Bud accepted the gracious offer from Ray and Nellie French to move in with them.  Such was the bond of fellow railroaders and their families who had each other’s backs.  Nellie rode herd on the four kids, as Bud and Ray continued those runs back and forth between Chicago and St Louis.  Sometimes they went on runs together.  Other times Ray would go north to Chicago, and a day later Bud might go south.  These runs typically involved a layover.

You can guess the rest.  By October, the living arrangement had gone astray.  Bud and Nellie had begun an affair, which they made little effort to conceal.  Bud, Betty and Junior were ejected from the French house.

In 1927, it would have been unconscionable for a working man to raise two kids under 5 by himself—let alone one in the brakeman pool.  Bud placed his daughter Betty with another neighborhood couple—Peter & Alice Nenne.  The couple was 10 years older and childless, but Pete Nenne was an engineer with seniority for the Chicago & Alton, and they were well situated in a newly built home.  Bud and Junior went to live with yet another railroader Albert Carlson, and his wife.

The ensuing years brought more turbulence.  Bud placed legal custody of Betty with the Nennes; he and Junior remained with the Carlsons until Albert was killed in a freak rail accident in 1929.  Appropriately, Bud moved from the widow Carlson’s home to a rooming house, leaving Junior in her care.  Ray and Nellie French attempted to reconcile but the relationship was understandably fraught, and Ray filed for divorce in September of 1929, listing Bud as a co-respondent in the divorce.  Meanwhile, Bud and Ray continued to work together in the same C&A pool of brakemen.  In December of 1929, Ray was granted the divorce.  Just weeks later, Bud and Ray had their fateful encounter in the locker room at the C&H hotel.

Local newspaper accounts provide insight into the incident and ensuing events.

“Blood transfusions have been resorted to in an attempt by physicians to save the life of Leroy F. Rudder, 32, who is in a Granite City hospital with bullet wounds in his head, chest and abdomen inflicted by Ray T. French, 33, according to the United Press.”—The Daily Pantagraph, Friday, January 24

“Several days after the divorce was granted, Rudder and French’s former wife Nellie were quietly married.  The two men did not meet until last Thursday.  Threats passed between them and shortly French was seen to draw a revolver and fire three shots at Rudder, each taking effect.  French insists he shot as Rudder drew a knife but an exhaustive search by police fails to reveal the blade.”—Edwardsville Intelligencer, January 27, 1930.  

“Witnesses are said to have told police that French fired three times as Rudder drew a knife.  No such weapon has been found by police nor have witnesses offered to corroborate the testimony.  Mrs. Rudder was at the bedside of her husband . . . she did not visit French in his cell.”—The Daily Pantagraph, January 26, 1930.

“Hovering between life and death for two days, Leroy F. Rudder succumbed at midnight Saturday at St. Elizabeth’s hospital from bullet wounds received during an altercation with the former husband of his wife.  In an effort to save the victim’s life, several blood transfusions were made, but not from fellow employees.  They replied they were not in sympathy with the man and that others should be called upon.

“Testimony at the inquest showed that French fired the fatal shots as Rudder advanced on him with a knife.  Hilton Taylor, another brakeman, who was in the washroom at the time of the shooting, corroborated French’s testimony.  J.R. Craig, brakeman, who was in a sleeping room at the hotel, testified that he was awakened by the sound of loud voices and heard French say, ‘Don’t pull that knife on me you—’ Then heard three shots.” — Granite City Press Record, January 28, 1930.

“Mr. French made a plea of self-defense, asserting that Rudder drew a knife.  When the knife alleged to have been carried by Rudder was presented to the jury, a verdict of exoneration was quickly reached.”—The Daily Pantagraph, January 28, 1930.

One of Bud Rudder’s pallbearers was Peter Nenne, the C&A engineer who adopted Bud’s daughter, Betty.  My mother, Betty Graves.  The loving, adoptive grandfather I grew up with helped lay to rest the biological grandfather I never knew.

And buried with him was a tragic story of loss, love, betrayal . . . retribution.  Grampa Nenne told us Betty’s dad had died in an accident on the railroad.  My mother never spoke of it. 

Ray and Nellie French would each marry others—Nellie, twice more.  Ray continued to work at the Chicago & Alton, advancing to the position of conductor.  The widow Carlson remarried and adopted Junior, who grew up, married and moved to California.  Betty married and had four sons.  What would have become of this brother and sister who twice suffered tragic loss, were it not for the benevolence of neighbors, these railroaders who took them in and held them close in the depths of the Depression.

The story may have remained buried forever, had it not been for the dogged efforts of my brother, Steve, who painstakingly searched birth and death records, pored over newspaper articles and contacted members of both the Rudders and French descendent families.  Steve is the true detective in this story.  I, merely the reporter.

As a lifelong devotee of crime fiction, I have always been intrigued by stories such as my family’s real-life mystery.  Stories that probe the reverberating effects of a crime that smolders through the ensuing years—haunting families, investigators and reporters.  And more the better if the narrative transports me to a different world and sparks my imagination. 

I highly recommend just such a novel—Blaze Me a Sun, by Swedish author Christopher Carlsson.  Translated by Rachel Willson-Broyles, Blaze Me a Sun is a fine example of literary fiction in the crime genre.  On one level, it a police procedural.  It is certainly a deftly plotted, page-turning whodunit.  But the beating heart throughout the novel is the poignant reflections of the main characters as they search for the truth (and not just a solution to the mystery.)

The story begins with a writer looking into an unsolved murder committed 30 years prior in a small Swedish town.  The characters are richly drawn:

• The writer at a personal crossroads who moves back to his childhood home, where by chance he encounters a friend from his youth and a mysterious old woman.  Both may hold clues to the old, unsolved crime.
• A tortured cop who couldn’t solve the crime but can’t let it go.
• His son, who reluctantly becomes a cop and picks up the trail.

The dynamic relationship between characters is rewarding, as is the depiction of small-town Swedish culture. Carlsson expertly weaves the tale as another young girl goes missing, a mutilated body is found in an abandoned car, and a young woman narrowly escapes the killer, only to endure another tragedy.  Along the way, a body is unearthed . . . evidence long concealed is discovered . . . a killer is identified . . . the mystery solved.   Or is it?

To reveal more would spoil this very entertaining novel that spans generations as it peels away family secrets—and keeps you guessing until the very end.  You’ll find Blaze Me a Sun to be a satisfying turn on a long-ago death.

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Carlsson, Christopher.  Blaze Me A Sun, 2021.  Translated by Rachel Willson Broyles, Hogarth/Random House, 2023