V

The Darlings of Strangetown all loved “Royal Bill” Marmaduke, Sheriff of Limestone County. The man was a living legend, and a deep thorn in the side of the Greeks. He was a Republican. Among their councils on the Hill they sneered him as a scallawag, traitor to his class, traitor to his race. But he was a war hero. He swore his oath to the Confederacy in Huntsville, Alabama and mustered into the 19th Alabama Infantry Regiment. He fought under Fighting Joe Wheeler at Shiloh with the 19th Alabama, and rode as a guerilla fighter with his friend Frank Gurley, who became Sheriff of Madison County. When John Bell Hood invaded Tennessee in the winter of ’64, he came down out of Hurricane Valley to fight with the 19th Alabama one last time. When he mustered back in, there wasn’t anybody left he knew. And when he fought at Franklin, he lost all the new friends he’d made too. He was a changed man after all that. But that’s a whole another story.

 
He ran on the Republican ticket, which was roundly viewed with cynicism by his fellow Greeks and suspicion by Strangetown. Maw Possum brought in the colored vote and helped elect Limestone County’s first Republican. Royal Bill ran down the Klan’s operations out of Dogwood Flats while getting his take out of Strangetown’s tables. The Klan was bad enough. There were a lot of people coming home from the war with everything gone, and then being told it’s the negro’s fault, it’s the Yankees’ fault. They’re told that they might have lost everything, but at least they are still white and they should be grateful. And people actually believed that stuff and joined the Klan because they just ate it up. The Klan’s problem was that most of them were stupid, but they provided a pool of useful idiots for the real enemy of Strangetown.

Adelphon Kuklos was a secret society of absolute white terrorists. They were a committed few willing to do violence on their fellow man for a white world. No one knew who its members were. Rumors and gossip abound about the AK. They controlled the Klan from the shadows, and possibly the Greeks themselves. All anyone really knew is that Royal Bill Marmaduke shot one of them dead saving the life of Drake Shoney down in Belle Mina. The Adelphon Kuklos had strung Shoney up by the noose when Royal Bill pulled out his Navy Colt and shot down a figure in a scarlet robe as the others fled. No one recognized the man who Royal Bill shot, and the investigation into this curious episode is a story for another time.
After that, Royal Bill grew beloved in Strangetown. He had taken on the terrorists himself. His popularity snowballed from there. He ran parades and rodeos and raced wagons around the track. The crowds in Strangetown cheered Royal Bill who rode along like a king on his wagon. He became a powerful political force that was resented by the Greeks, admired by The Major, and profitable to Maw Possum.