Gone

Jerry Mitchell: Felix Vail has a habit of disappearing — and so do some women he's known.

Growing up on a dairy farm in the community of Montpelier in northeast Mississippi, he sometimes skipped chores and wandered off for days in the woods.

He seemed wired differently than others in his family. When his mother announced they couldn't keep their cat's new offspring, he scooped up the kittens and shot them.

He seemed wired differently than classmates, too. "He didn't have to study like the rest of us," recalled high school classmate Leon Watson.

As a young man, Felix dabbled first in preaching and then in psychology, working full time at a chemical plant in Lake Charles, La.

Slender and 6 feet tall, he strolled across the McNeese State College campus with a confident, cool air, despite the fact he never came close to graduating. Women noticed his light blond hair and piercing blue eyes. He gave many of them rides in his Karmann Ghia convertible.

Bob Hodges joined Felix on some of those rides. The two of them went barhopping and picking up women.

"He was a very good-looking man," Hodges recalled. "He had a charisma that women liked."