Bury the Hatchet in Dead Mule Swamp (13 page)

Tracy shifted in her chair.
“I think we’ll be done soon, although it’s the state lab doing the
work, so I can’t really speak for them. A Harvest Ball would be
fun. It would do a lot to boost local morale.”

I had a little trouble
shifting from the official policewoman to a community-minded
Tracy.

She continued, “Kyle and I
would be happy to provide some security. You know, control parking
and watch for anything unusual. Now that the building is a crime
scene, the killer might be watching for something we don’t
understand yet. Hopefully, we’ll catch the guilty party
soon.”

“Do you think it’s this
woman who called me?”

“A hatchet is an odd choice
of weapon for a female, but this whole case is pretty strange. I’ll
call Detective Milford about your note. Maybe it’s from the same
person who sent the package to Cora.”

“Maybe.” I had no
opinion.

Bob spoke up from across
the room. “Just got word back on that phone number,
Chief.”

“Good. It’s all right to
share that information with Ana.”

“OK, then,” Bob said. “It’s
a disposable cell phone. There was one recent call made on it, this
afternoon.”

“That had to be the call to
me,” I put in.

“Yup. It pinged off a tower
in Emily City, so that’s not going to narrow the choices down a
lot.”

Tracy looked sad. “Thanks,
Bob. Follow up on tracking the purchase.”

“Already started, but it’s
after five. OK if I go home for the day?” Bob asked.

“Sure,” Tracy said. “Let’s
all go home. This case is like an octopus—too many wiggly
arms.”

Chapter 18

Before I left the police
station, I asked Tracy for a photocopy of the threatening note,
which she made without taking it out of its plastic sleeve. I
thanked her and headed for Jerry’s place.

“Are you out of food at
your house?” he teased as he opened the door. He held a pasta fork
in his hand. “I just fed you lunch.”

“What? No. I’m not even
hungry. Look at this.” I thrust the copied threat into his hand as
I entered the living room. Admittedly, this house was beginning to
feel comfortable to me. But Jerry’s reaction was anything but
comfortable. He seemed to expand to fill the room with
indignation.

“Who would do this? When
did you get it?”

“It was put in my car
through the window. I left it down about an inch. Probably when I
was parked right where I am now, but this morning.” I pointed
across the street.

Jerry walked to a desk, put
down the fork and plucked his cell phone off the charger. He began
stabbing at it. In a moment he asked, “Is Louisa there?”

Louisa who?
I thought, but I just listened.

In a moment, he continued,
“Lou, this is Jerry. Were you home this morning? Did you happen to
see a car parked in front of your house?... Yes, the Jeep that’s
there again now. It’s Ana’s. Ana Raven.”

“Jerry, what are you
doing?” I protested.

He turned to me and put a
finger to his lips. I felt chastened and a bit put out. “All right.
I thought you might have been home. Someone tampered with her
vehicle, and we would like to find out who that was.”

As he hung up, my
exasperation got the better of me. “You can’t just start calling
people,” I said. “I’ve been to the police already. They won’t like
having someone investigating on their own.”

“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear
that,” Jerry said, staring at me intently as he poked at the phone
again. His voice softened. “Karen? Hello, it’s nice to hear your
voice too.”

Interesting
tone.

“Say, I was wondering if
you were home this morning... You were?... Well, yes, she is here
again, in fact.” His smile twisted into a conspiratorial grin and
he winked at me.

This is too much! Oh,
wait; it’s part of the plan.

“What? We’re planning a
community shindig, some sort of Harvest Ball, to be held later this
fall. We’ll have the details worked out soon. I’d never leave you
out, Karen. By the way, did you happen to notice anyone stopping
near Ana’s car this morning?... Really? That’s interesting, but her
office is in the block, so it’s probably not
significant.”

Jerry looked at me and
raised his eyebrows. I glared at him, although I wasn’t sure if I
was annoyed at his aggressive pursuit of the culprit, or feeling
slightly jealous.

“Thank you. Love you too,
Karen. I’ll be sure to let you know when we get a date
finalized.”

“Who was that?” I asked
fixing Jerry with what I hoped was a withering glare.

“My neighbor, Karen Ames. I
thought that would be obvious from the conversation.”

“No, not who you were
talking to. I heard you call her Karen. Who did she
see?”

“Whom, Ana, whom did she
see.”

“Whatever. You’re the
newspaper man.”

Jerry’s eyes twinkled. “Are
you feeling testy because I told her I love her? I thought our
relationship was just a ploy, and you weren’t looking for anything
more.”

My emotions collapsed in a
puddle of nerves and remorse. “Oh, Jerry, I’m not. I guess it’s
just that all of this drama is getting to me. I’ve had about enough
of getting mixed up in local crimes. Why is someone targeting me? I
just seem to be in all the wrong places at the right times.” I
sniffed.

Jerry pulled a tissue from
a holder on the desk and handed it to me. “Karen is a cousin of
mine, second cousin, if it matters.”

I dabbed at my eyes, which
had gotten misty for some reason, and suddenly laughed. I tossed my
head and tried to smile. “Whom. Whom did your second cousin
see?”

“My very second cousin saw
Virginia Holiday cut through between our houses on the way to her
office, my dear. Does that sound suspicious?”

I laughed harder. “No, it
does not! But it reminds me that I’ve wanted to ask why you don’t
own that corner. The rest of the block is yours, right?”

“That’s true. I own it all
except that little square. Karen’s is the only other house on the
block, and it’s in the family estate. Used to be the carriage
house. She rents from me.”

“How did that squat little
block building get separated from your kingdom?”

“That’s a story in itself,
but perhaps not interesting to anyone except me. My
great-grandfather sold the corner lot to his best friend, whose son
opened a shoe repair shop. That was in 1914. The friend was
grateful, but a bit of a tightwad who didn’t trust old Charles. He
had legal wording put in the deed that the property couldn’t be
sold back to a Caulfield or any close relative for 99
years.”

“What about Karen? Is she
too close?”

“She is for the purpose of
buying the lot. Believe it or not, there have to be five degrees of
removal for a sale.”

“Unbelievable.” I shook my
head. “But, that provision runs out soon.”

“It does. It’s no secret
that I’ll be reacquiring the corner and pulling that eyesore down.
Even with the new wood shake awning Ms. Holiday put on the front,
it’s just an ugly building. I’m hoping no one else cares and tries
to drive up the price.”

“Does she know she bought a
building with a limited future?”

“I’m not sure. As I said,
it’s in the deed, but does she realize I really do want to buy it
back? I haven’t talked with her about it. I’ve barely seen her,
actually, since she first moved in.”

“I suppose it’s not
relevant to this note, anyway. The letter was put in my car, and is
focused on the school building,” I said.

“That would be my
conclusion, also.”

“Jerry, you really
shouldn’t be calling people about the note. Tracy’s going to get
uptight.”

“I suppose you’re right,”
Jerry said, draping an arm around my shoulder and steering me
toward the back of the house. He picked up the pasta fork. I was
glad he seemed willing to give up control of the situation, but I
should have known better.

“Come on in the kitchen and
I’ll feed you again. I was draining spaghetti when you
knocked.”

Chapter 19

I spent the weekend trying
to focus on tasks that would need to be accomplished if there was
to be any chance of having a Harvest Ball, with a dramatic
reenactment, in just a few weeks. Getting the old school building
in good enough physical condition was Jerry’s problem, but I
promised to take care of a number of the other
arrangements.

Chad hadn’t been very
excited at first about changing his plans, which had been for a
spooky game of what was essentially hide-and-seek for college kids,
but promised to talk to his friends and call me back. As it turned
out, some of the girls were a lot more interested in an activity
where they could dress up and pretend to be part of something
scary, without actually being chased down dark hallways, even by
boys they knew. He said they were now eager to receive the details
of the story, and hoped that Cora would let them write a script.
One of the girls, Brittney, was in the thespian club, and she
wanted to give it a try. She was even hoping to get credit for the
project in her Directing class.

I felt a lot more hesitant
about calling Cora. I debated between chatting by phone and waiting
until Tuesday for our regular work day. In the end, I decided that
fretting over it was too stressful, and I punched in Cora’s number
on my cell. Despite her hermit-like ways, she had heard of the
plans for the Harvest Ball, thanks to news delivered with her
groceries by her son, Tom. She wasn’t impressed.

“That two-faced Jerry
Caulfield has some ulterior motive. You mark my words,” she
sputtered. But when I shared the idea for the drama featuring Chad
and his friends playing the roles of Judge Reuben Oldfield, the
murderer Zeke Bradley, and other contemporaries, she thawed like an
ice cube on a hot sidewalk. It was so cliché, but it was all I
could picture. She reacted as predictably as Jerry had
claimed.

She offered to look up the
old records, and open the boxes with any artifacts she had, even
more things than the furniture from the room where the murder took
place. “I’ll show you everything on Tuesday. Wait until you see
what I have!” she said.

Jerry and I had talked over
bowls of spaghetti with clam sauce the night before—it turned out I
was hungrier than I thought—about the music. He wanted live music.
I wasn’t sure what resources the small town of Cherry Hill and
rural Forest County had to offer.

“You’ll be surprised,” he
said, and began jotting down names of groups with their genres: The
Blue Grass—bluegrass, Hot Sauce—jazz, Jim Frank and Friends—swing.
He couldn’t recall the names of the groups for light classical and
soft rock but had run ads for all of them in the paper at one time
or another, so he knew he could locate them.

“What mood are you looking
for?” I asked.

“Let’s ask around. Just
poll the people you talk to and see what kind of reactions we get.
I think bluegrass would appeal to most people.”

I’d asked Chad. He’d
responded with a snort, “Those are my choices? How about none of
the above?”

Cora had immediately said,
“Light classical.” My own opinion ran to jazz to keep the party
up-tempo. As much as I liked classical, I didn’t want the guests
going to sleep.

At least getting the food
organized was straightforward. Adele was right that Jerry would
rely on her. He’d simply said, “Call Adele. She’ll handle it, and
it will be perfect. Let’s start the Ball at seven in the evening,
and just offer small desserts and free drinks like coffee and
cider, but with a cash bar.”

I decided to talk to Adele
after church on Sunday, and maybe spend some time with her if she
was free. In preparation for this plan, I gathered some pears from
a tree at the edge of the woods and made loaves of fruit bread.
Then I put together a tossed salad.

My idea worked out
perfectly. The Sunday service had been upbeat, and the drafty
church building was pleasantly cooler now that we’d reached
September. I approached Adele as she was walking through the foyer
toward the exit door, and asked if she had plans for the
afternoon.

“What do you have in mind?”
she asked.

“I have some almond-pear
bread I just made. I thought it might be nice for you to have
something that probably didn’t come from your own store. And I’ve
got salad. Maybe we could pool our resources?”

She laughed. “I suspect you
have something in mind besides food, but you know I can’t resist
news, so come on over. I put a roast in the crock pot this morning.
I think we’ve got ourselves a lunch.”

Adele lives on the
northeast side of town, on Birch Street, north of the river and
northeast of the old school. Her home is a squarish two-story, with
an enclosed front porch. It’s newer than Jerry’s Victorian mansion,
probably built during the second spurt of town growth, when farmers
and entrepreneurs moved into the area after the timber was cut. Her
grandfather-in-law had founded the grocery store that bears the
family name.