Morgan James - Promise McNeal 01 - Quiet the Dead (14 page)

Susan rolled her eyes and frowned. “Miz P. why are we sitting here looking at an art book, when someone is out there trying to scare you half to death?”

“Oh, Susan,” I answered with a sheepish smile. “I’m sorry; I need to fill you in on what I found out yesterday, don’t I?”

“Well, Duuh.… That would be nice! I’m kinda in the dark here.” I poured coffee for us and spent the next twenty or so minutes giving Susan a run down on what I knew that she didn’t, leaving out, of course, my dream of Stella Tournay hanging over the creek. When I got to Paul Tournay recounting his experience with the ghost figure, Susan asked me if I thought he really had seen the ghost of his grandmother. I had to consider that for a moment. I firmly believed Paul had seen something more than shadows. Was that something Stella Tournay? I wasn’t convinced of that, though I didn’t have a better answer at the moment. Except, Paul later reported seeing Mitchell with another woman. Could that woman have been sneaking away from the house after a rendezvous with Mitchell Sanders? No, that couldn’t be right. The ghost incidents were well before Mitchell moved into the house. Yet, Paul had said it was Mitchell who kept watch with him after he moved in to try and spot the ghost again. And according to Paul: Mitchell moves in, ghost goes away. How convenient. I wondered when Mitchell met his new love, and under what circumstances.

When my story was spent, I reminded Susan of the confidentiality of anything we would share and explained I could only share such information with her because she was technically working for me on the case. She pointed out that keeping everything a secret could get really sticky, now that Sheriff Mac would be expecting information about anyone who might want to prowl around my house, assuming I thought the Tournay case and the snake were related. She was right, of course, and in truth I wasn’t sure the two were related, though I would have made a small bet they were.

Susan was excited at the prospect of sorting out the Tournay puzzle with me, and full of questions. Being already suspicious of Garland Wang, one of her interesting questions was why Garland called me about Becca’s accident, since he had told me in our last conversation that my job was finished. If he really believed Becca was the victim of a random shooting, why call me? Susan’s question made me think. What was Garland’s hidden agenda? I was reminded of the Tarot card spread, The Knight of Swords, a possibly not entirely trustworthy person. And then there was the Wheel of Fortune card. Perhaps that card didn’t refer to me, personally, but to the whole Tournay case. I shook my head to clear some of the confusion. On the other hand, perhaps the cards said nothing useful. Perhaps I needed to stop trying to force pieces of information to fit and just go where my intuition took me. I could not shake the feeling that the whole business was about money, though not just who got the trust money. No, there was something else. Garland had been blasé about where the trust money originated, too blasé. He definitely didn’t want to share any information about where Tournay got the five million. I needed to follow the money, that’s what my intuition told me.

“I can see your mind churning, Miz P.” Susan said. “What are you thinking?”

I chewed the cuticle around my left thumb and tried to focus on what had happened so far, what my prowler didn’t want me to see, and what was worth the risk of shooting at Becca’s car. “I’m thinking I need to go to Garland’s office and look through the Tournay trust records.”

“Good idea.” Susan opened the manila folder containing her Internet information and a yellow pad. “Let’s make a list of things we need to find out.”

I looked across the table at her information. A diagram of little boxes listing salient points about Boo and Angel Turner filled an entire page. I was pleased and showed my satisfaction with a broad smile. “Good going, Susan. I’m a list and diagram maker too. It helps me focus on the facts and possibilities. I am impressed. Let’s see what you have?” I reached over and turned her pad towards me.

“Thanks Miz P. You know I could be your Billy Beale. We are a lot alike, I think. Except I don’t have an old war injury, of course.”

“Who is Billy Beale?”

“Oh, wow, Miz P. You got to get to know Billy. I read this great mystery writer, her last name is Winspear, and she has this character, Maisie Dobbs, who is a private investigator. She’s also a psychologist, by the way, just like you. She lives in London, after World War I. Maisie is very cool, very independent. Her able assistant is Billy Beale. He always researches and organizes the facts for Maisie in folders like these, or on little index cards, and between the two of them they solve the mysteries.”

I groaned. “Oh, Susan, this isn’t a mystery novel. It’s real life. And I am most certainly not a private investigator. I wear Pooh Bear pajamas, remember?”

Susan interrupted me, “You really are, sort of. Garland Wang’s cases always have you solving mysteries. What about the case he had you on where you connected all that stuff together and found out who was really behind the cigarette trucks being highjacked. I mean it’s true the Georgia state agents got all the credit, but you are the one who figured it out for them. And Mr. Wang sure was happy to get his client off the hook for the murder charge.”

“A fluke, Susan. Pure luck. I am a psychologist. I’m supposed to help clients struggle with the mysteries of the human mind, not solve crimes. I do some research for Garland because I need the money; that doesn’t make me a private investigator. It’s only research.”

“Well, I know that. But didn’t you tell me you wanted a rest from counseling, to be sort of retired? Maybe we could just take a few cases now and then. We could quietly put out the word that we are available for confidential inquiries, just like Maisie Dobbs. Nothing too way out. It could be a steady source of income to augment Granny’s Store. Just think about it.”

Regardless of the fact that any income would be a steady income compared to Granny’s monthly red ink, there was no way I wanted to become a private investigator. Still, Susan was so excited about the possibility; it was heartless to rain on her parade. “Well, we can think about it; but no commitments, not yet. Agreed? Right now we need to find out who is leaving dead snakes on my door, and why…” My sentence was broken off by the sound of Sheriff Mac’s car on the gravel drive.

He hugged Susan hello and introduced himself, being careful to look me sincerely in the eyes and shine a well-rehearsed smile on me. As we shook hands, I studied his face. There was a strong family resemblance between him and Susan’s dad; though to me the sculptured Allen face and dark eyes looked much more comfortable, more relaxed, on his cousin Daniel. I could imagine Mac preening before the mirror, practicing his politician’s smile and turning left, then right, to decide which would be the best camera angle. Re-election would be very important to this man. I doubt Daniel even looked in the mirror to comb his hair. In fact, I thought Daniel probably smoothed back his dark waves with his hands and not a comb. After the sheriff asked what time I’d heard the noises, and what I’d seen; he inspected the cut phone wires, and looked around the yard. Shortly, he was back on the porch, and Susan and I turned to face the front door, waiting patiently while he gave the snake a serious investigative look.

“Well,” he began, stretching the
well
out to sound like a paragraph of professional conclusions, “looks to me like we could have us some local devil worshipers, what with that star symbol painted in red before they knifed the snake up there. Or more likely, no offense meant Miz McNeal, just a bunch of kids rushing up Halloween, and trying to scare a flatlander.”

A voice bellowed from behind us. “They ain’t local, Mac. And they wasn’t kids. I can tell you that.”

The three of us turned to see Fletcher Enloe standing in the yard, and Sheriff Mac stepped down to shake hands with my neighbor. “Well, hello there Fletcher. Real good to see you. Haven’t seen you in too many Sundays. You know something about this nonsense?”

“Course I do,” he shot back. “You think I’d be a standing in somebody’s yard shooting my mouth off, if’n I didn’t?”

In an effort to mollify Enloe’s irritable nature, or just to insure his vote at the next election, Sheriff Mac answered with excessive respect. “Of course you wouldn’t Fletcher. I know you to be a man of few, but valuable, words. Tell me, if you don’t mind to, what do you know about this trespassing incident.”

“Mr. Enloe, “I interjected, “would you care to come up on the porch and have a cup of coffee?”

“I’ll take coffee, if it’s fresh. Down here in the yard, thank you.”

I didn’t blame him. I wanted to be as far away from the dead snake as I could get, too. “Certainly, “I replied. “Cream and sugar? How about you, Sheriff?”

Both men nodded yes to cream and sugar and Susan volunteered to get mugs for all. Even though I’d had so much coffee already that I felt like Superman—able to leap tall buildings with a single bound—I didn’t reject Susan’s offer. I think I felt the need to hold something warm and comforting while studying an impaled snake on my door. “By the way Sheriff, what kind of snake is that?”

Mac motioned back to the door with his thumb and replied. “That there is not a mountain snake. If I ain’t mistaken, it’s one of them Bald Python creatures folks with more money than sense buy in the pet stores. I’d say the snake was dead before they pinned it to the door. And all that red stuff, including the mess on the floor made to look like blood, is plain ole red barn paint. If you get close enough you can smell it. You can buy that paint anywhere, including the Ace hardware store in town. That knife though, now that I’ll want to do some checking on. It looks like a standard army knife, could be from a million second hand stores. We’ll see. Could be it was used for some other crime here abouts.”

Susan brought coffee and Enloe and Mac sipped silently. I drank mine thinking that Perry County, North Carolina, does not have a pet store that sells reptiles; though there must be at least twenty that deal in exotic snakes in Atlanta. Enloe continued to stand alongside Sheriff Mac in the yard and drink his coffee with concentration. The sheriff was the first to speak. “Now then, Fletcher, what do you want to tell us?”

Enloe cleared his throat and gave his account of the night before. “I was working late last night. Must have been nigh on three o’clock. As you know, most folks coming from town take the airport road out here and that brings them right past my front windows. That’s where I was, don’t you see, that’s how come I saw the vehicle coming down the road real slow like. I wondered who the hell’d be out that time of night, so I turned off the desk lamp and watched. They cut the headlights and pulled in my drive, and then I reckon they realized they had the wrong house, so they eased back out into the road. They didn’t cut the headlights back on until they was well down from my house. I could make out the lights go back on, and then they cut them again. I figured they pulled into Miz Promise’s drive. Knew that wasn’t right. They was up to no good. That’s when I got my rifle and cut through the pine thicket twixt our houses. By the time I got over here, I couldn’t see a lot cause it was still raining some.

“They left the car up yonder at the head of her drive, pointed out towards the main road. Guess they thought that was pretty smart. I seen there was two of them. The driver, a kinda short feller, went around to the back door; and the other, a pretty tall drink of water, wearing a long rain slicker with a hood, went to the front. They didn’t seem to be trying to break into the house, so I didn’t see no need then to shoot’em. But I watched them real good. Directly, they got back into the vehicle and eased real slow up the drive with the lights off. About that time, all the floodlights on the outside of the house went on. I heard the vehicle head back east towards my house and town; didn’t see nothing else about them from where I stood.” Enloe pointed to the cluster of white pines separating his house from mine. “I hunkered down over there for a spell to see if they was coming back. They didn’t. The outside lights stayed on, so I figured Miz Promise was awake and no harm was done. I never saw the fools hang that ugly snake on the door. I’d probably taken a shot at them, if I’d seen that thing hanging up there. The tall one in the slicker must’ a had it hid in a sack on my blind side whilst he went up to the door.”

Sheriff Mac listened to the story; then walked over to the wooded area where Enloe had said he watched the house. “Well, hell, Fletcher, from where you was hiding, it’s a wonder you saw as much as you did. I see you did have a clear rifle shot at the one messing around at the back door, though.”

Enloe looked disgusted. “Of course I did, Sheriff Mac,” he called out in the sheriff’s direction. “You think I didn’t learn nothing in Korea about choosing my target? The shorter one headed for the back door was carrying a big set of bolt cutters. Did I mention that? If he’d touched that back door, he’d be singing at the pearly gates by now.”

“I believe that, Fletcher,” Sheriff Mac said. “I know you’re a cracker-jack shot.” He scratched his neck lightly and thought for a minute. Finally he asked, “So, Fletcher, how come you know they wasn’t local?”

Fletcher Enloe looked at Sheriff Mac as though he had less brains than a piece of saltwater taffy. “Well, I can tell a North Carolina truck tag, even if it is dark. And that one wasn’t. It was Georgia. I couldn’t cite you the county, but I saw that big old orangey Georgia peach stamped on it.”

“Could you tell the color and make of the vehicle, Fletcher?”

“Only that it was a light colored SUV, white maybe, maybe Chevy, Ford, Jeep, They all look alike to me. Couldn’t make out the tag number, excepting the first two letters, YU, I think. Blame fool cataracts make it hard to see as good as I used to.” With the last remark, Fletcher Enloe handed his coffee mug to Susan and nodded a thank you. “Well, that’s it Sheriff. I don’t know nothing else. I’ll be getting back on home now. You know where I am, if you need me.” He looked in my direction, avoiding eye contact. “Mostly relieved you wasn’t hurt, girl,” he said to me as he turned to walk away.