The technicians had been at St. Helena last week, but Sam and I had agreed to let the team work without our hanging around. We were rank amateurs and the office in Topeka had all the information we could give them. Which was precious little.
“Sam, I know Deal told the KBI a bunch of lies.”
“No doubt in my mind. But Deal was dead right about one thing. This is not our investigation.”
“It’s not his, either,” I snapped. “There’s no way he can claim Copeland County has jurisdiction there.”
“Now don’t get het up. All I meant was that it’s in the KBI’s hands now. In fact, Dimon called yesterday and apologized after he saw a video of Deal’s TV interview. After that, he viewed Deal and Talesbury’s jaunt to Topeka in a whole new light. But even so, he said Talesbury had the right papers to claim the key.”
“At least I have the satisfaction of knowing after that news interview he’s the laughing stock of the entire state of Kansas. I’ll bet he’s had his ears pinned back.”
“Dumb bastard.”
“Better him than us making fools of ourselves.”
“You mean we’re not?”
Brittle from lack of sleep, I assumed he meant me. Sam and Keith were still allies in their shared disgust over the YouTube tape. But I managed to keep my mouth shut.
“How’s the new deputy working out?” Sam asked.
So that was how it was going to go. Sam would mask his confusion and frustration by seeing how many of my buttons he could push.
I didn’t take the bait. “Best one we’ve ever had.”
***
I began preparing our report for the Gateway Gazette. Sam had issued a couple of speeding tickets. We often omit mention of domestic violence calls. I warned the citizens about burning off fields without notifying the fire department.
About ten o’clock I checked with Margaret and she was surprisingly pleasant. She was busy answering letters to persons who had written requesting information about their ancestors.
“Did any new stories come in?”
“Not a one. Which suits me just fine. Some of the letters are over ten days old.”
***
Stuart Mavery called on my cell an hour later.
“Morning, Lottie, Stuart here.”
“Hi, is Edna doing all right?”
“They are sending her home in a couple of hours.”
“Great. When I checked her in, the doctor said he thought it was a TIA, a little mini-stroke. Sort of a warning against a future larger one, and with this one all her symptoms would be temporary.”
“They were.” He paused. Something was off. The silence sounded strained. I wished I could see his eyes.
“Is everything all right, Stuart? Did you sleep OK at your mom’s house?” I didn’t want to say, “You sound funny,” but he did.
“Actually no.” He cleared his throat. “Lottie, did you know mom had once been in a mental institution?”
Chapter Thirty-One
“Oh Stuart, no. I’m so terribly sorry. And you didn’t know this?”
“No. I didn’t. Did she ever mention it to you?”
“No.” She hadn’t, but guiltily, I thought about Edna’s account of her life in Iowa. Obviously she hadn’t told her son a thing about that time either. Although I was not under any oath of confidentiality, it was a matter of common sense not to relay secrets that weren’t mine to share. She had never told me a thing about mental health problems. Just that her husband was a bastard.
“Stuart, it’s not unusual that you didn’t know. Years ago, people simply didn’t discuss family problems. It wasn’t considered in good taste.”
“That may be, but you would think a mother would at least tell her only child that there are medical problems in her personal history.”
I closed my eyes. He certainly was not an only child either.
“Stuart, now may not be the best time with Edna just getting out of the hospital, but why don’t you plan on coming back in a week or so. If she’s stronger and getting along OK, you might like to ask her if there are issues that she might want you to know about.”
“All right. It’s going to take a couple more days for me to iron out some nursing details for home health care. She certainly can’t be alone at night.”
“No, and I have a feeling she’s going to hate that. But there are several ladies who make their living as care-takers for the elderly. Call social services and see if they can give you some names.” My suggestion had been automatic before I remembered that the director of our multi-county social services department had been murdered.
“Wait a minute. I’ll give you some names.” I scanned down the service ads in the Gateway Gazette and recognized one that Edna might be comfortable with.
“I don’t mind telling you, I don’t know anyone less crazy than my mother. I mean no one. She’s about as down to earth as they come.”
“I agree.”
After I hung up the phone, I realized I had meant every word. Edna was evasive and had her petty little subterfuges to conceal expenditures from her first husband, but her life was centered around the farm and every day things. Her tapes might have jumped around, but nearly all oral histories do. They are full of digressions and back-tracking.
She was understandably upset over a murder that had taken place practically right under her nose, but who wouldn’t be? And I suspected most younger persons wouldn’t be able recall the details of a person kneeling next to them.
I agreed with Stuart. Mental illness just didn’t seem to fit.
After he hung up, I walked to the front door and stepped outside for a moment. I needed a jacket. The cold front the weatherman had predicted was on the way. There was a vacant lot between the hardware store and the run-down wreck of what had once been a lumber yard. Weeds grew out of old tires thrown there among the decaying brown stalks of last year’s vegetation.
The grass between the sidewalk that fronted the jail and the curb was still brown. The whole main street seemed to be painted in melancholy shades. Deeply unhappy over my encounter with Deal, I knew I had to call Bishop Rice and see if Talesbury’s claim was complete. Done Deal? Deal done? I wished.
I was put on hold. When Rice came on his anger was evident in his crisp, sharp voice. He began talking before I could state the purpose of my call.
“I am taking into account, Miss Albright, that no one out there seemed to know a thing about church processes, but this has been unbelievably muddled from the get-go. Just today, I learned I’ll need to consult an attorney about this glebe. And this Diocese can barely afford to furnish coffee filters for my office. We cannot afford legal fees.”
“I know that, sir.”
“Our only hope is that’s there’s some flaw in passing down this piece of land or that the original Glebe was sold.”
I sighed, knowing how tangled things had become when he first checked out the four corner land. “I would like to know if Talesbury has the legal right to claim our church building.”
“Oh brother,” he said. “I hadn’t thought of that.”
“I hadn’t either, until today.” Then I told him about Talesbury and Deal being there.
He said nothing.
“Talesbury told me it was going to be a home for children.”
The Bishop made the leap immediately. “Refugee children. Of course. I could not imagine why he would want a piece of property out in the middle of nowhere.”
“I couldn’t either, but I’m checking out the possibility of oil or archeological finds or some money angle anyway. Just to be sure the refugee angle isn’t a front for something else.”
“From what you’ve said, Sheriff Deal doesn’t seem like the humanitarian type.”
“That’s an understatement.” I closed my eyes to shut out the quick image of Deal’s florid face. “The KBI has taken over the murder investigation, that’s no longer the task of either Carlton or Copeland County. Than
k heavens the other two counties St. Helena includes have chosen to stay out of this mess.”
“All right. Please continue checking out the money angle, I’ll call a lawyer and check on the ownership of the building itself if the glebe is valid.”
“As you know, sir, I work out of the courthouse. I have easy access to county records. I’ll start with mineral rights on surrounding land. It won’t take long. But I’m quite sure we won’t find anything.”
“We need to be sure.” He cleared his throat. “Please accept what I’m going to say as speculation. Just first thoughts, OK? Nothing official.”
“I understand.”
“If Talesbury’s claim to the glebe holds, there’s not a single thing this Diocese can do about it. Not one thing. Glebes are granted to individuals. They are not owned by the church.”
He had already explained that, and if I didn’t understand before, I certainly did after extensive research.
“Then as far as the law is concerned, you simply built a structure on land you didn’t own. The church is his also.”
***
Luckily no one crossed my path the remainder of the day. I caught up chores, thought, cleaned with a vengeance, thought, typed file labels, thought, and finally settled on sorting thumbtacks.
There was no way in hell that I could explain to a throng of earnest women who had busted their butts raising money that St. Helena had been confiscated by a rank stranger. I didn’t care how deep Talesbury’s roots were in this county, he was not a native Kansan, and he didn’t have a clue about life out here.
Where would he find staff? The church was too tiny to hold many children, and the land around was utterly treeless. The whole venture was ludicrous. African children out here? With no wildlife, no vegetation? The man was out of his mind. Images of the lonely schoolhouses I’d seen in the 1800s crossed my mind. Those kids had survived. But they’d had homes to return to in the evening.
Then against my will, I kept thinking of all the children I’d see on TV lately. Haitian waifs with extended stomachs and flies over their sickly bodies. Other regions where little babies lay listless in their ruined mother’s arms.
I tried to put myself in Talesbury’s place and think like a man who had been through the horrors of the Tutsi/Hutu wars. Mass slaughter, children raped, animals burned alive. Of course they would be better off here, with good food and decent medical care. I thought about Talesbury’s expression this morning.
The burning eyes of a fanatic bent on doing good.
***
The next morning Keith helped Josie carry her suitcases to the driveway.
“All set. Finally.” She’d found three registered voters to carry the recall petition. “I’m outta here. And so’s my dog. Aren’t you, girl? Ready to go home?”
Tosca leaped into Keith’s arms and licked his face. He laughed and handed her to me. “Can’t stand loose little dogs,” he said. “She’ll take up with anyone.” Tosca then obligingly licked me from forehead to chin. Social duties completed, she ran back and forth from the house to the passenger side of the car and barked. She knew the drill.
Josie laughed, then gave me a hug. She pushed me to arm’s length and looked into my eyes. “Don’t be too hard on yourself, hear?”
I nodded. She hugged Keith. “Take good care of her,” she said. She strapped in Tosca, then went and around and settled into the driver’s seat. She powered down the window for a final farewell. “I’ll be back. As soon as Harold schedules the hearing to fry Deal. Shouldn’t take too long.”
She left. The house seemed empty when we went inside.
I coveted her dog.
Chapter Thirty-Two
I checked development permits the next day. There was no point in going over all the deeds again. I had pored over abstract histories and ownership claims for those forty acres when we began sorting out land issues for St. Helena. I wanted to know if anyone had ever applied for drilling permits for oil wells.
They hadn’t. Nor had there ever been nearby archeological discoveries.
While driving home, I swung by St. Helena again, hoping to find Talesbury there alone. I had a faint hope that if I approached him in a nonthreatening way, treated him as I would a person reluctant to give an oral history, he might talk to me.
His car wasn’t there. But the KBI was now in charge of the investigation and Talesbury was already undoubtedly a “person of interest.” During that trip to Topeka no doubt he had gone through an extensive interrogation.
I had my own set of questions, but after Deal had finished denigrating my abilities, I doubted the agency would be eager to share any of Talesbury’s answers with me, despite Dimon’s apology to Sam. Nor, apparently, were they interested in contacting me to see if I had discovered new information.
***
We ate in silence, missing Josie, missing Tosca. Keith rose and carried his dishes to the sink.
He stood braced against the counter, his brow wrinkled, whistling a tune I didn’t recognize. “I have an idea, Lottie. While it’s still daylight, let’s grab that old metal detector I have in the barn and do some snooping.”
“Good idea.” I sprang to my feet. “Terrific in fact. I understand why Talesbury wants the land, but not why Deal would go to so much trouble to back him.” However, I wasn’t so naïve as to assume one could just walk up to some old farmer and try to buy a little piece of land. I’d thought that when I first came out here, but land is treated like family jewels.
Irwin Deal wasn’t rich and neither was Talesbury, but they seemed to be ready to pay whatever lawyers’ bills came their way to lay claim to a worthless piece of dirt.
Keith’s metal detector had excellent depth sensitivity. But it was hand-held and heavy and I wasn’t able to manage it well for long periods of time. What’s more, I had no interest in treasure hunting. Normally, Keith didn’t either, but some of his buddies had managed to lure him into an occasional outing.
Although I’d ignored most of his explanations about his detector I knew it could be set to reject iron objects such as nails and other loose trash, and that his model actually could burrow into the ground.
At the church yard we worked for four hours. He moved the instrument and I dug when the frequency indicated some sort of a find. After the sun set all we had to show for time spent was a handful of very ordinary American coins, a couple of spoons, and sore backs.
“There’s better equipment than mine,” Keith said on the way home. “Riding ones. Really good. Do you want me to check it out?”
“No. I’ll tell the KBI we went over the property in case they’re interested, but realistically, Talesbury’s claim on the glebe doesn’t have that much to do with a murder investigation.”
“We’ve covered all the bases,” Keith said firmly. “Just like we should. If I get any more ideas, I’ll follow up on them too.”
I smiled and looked out the window at the full moon. Keith really was the best deputy we could have hoped for. I was thinking about giving him a raise.
***
Sam Abbott came to the historical society the next day. I glanced at the clock when he stepped through the door. “Am I supposed to be there? Instead of here?”
He laughed. “Nope. Just wanted to tell you that Agent Dimon called again. Betty’s dispatching and all ears, as usual. I was about to leave for lunch so I thought I would just come over and tell you in person.”
“Well, what?”
“You already know there wasn’t a trace of any poison on any of the ceremonial trappings.”
“I knew that. But did they look at the items in the plastic sack that Reverend Mary planned to deliver after the service?”
“They did, but there was nothing there either.”
“I didn’t think there was. I made a list and replaced all of the things and called every family. All of them were expecting Reverend Mary to bring supplies later that afternoon. I couldn’t deliver the items then, but I t
ook care of it the next day.”
“Dimon says he can’t see how anyone could have done this. He’ll be out in person to interview Edna Mavery.”
“She’s not up to it.”
“Has to be, Lottie.” He dug the toe of his boot on the floor and seriously studied the stitching. “This is a murder investigation. She has to pull herself together. They’ll use a hypnotist if they have to.”
***
He left. I had one more idea. I called the KBI and asked for Agent Dimon.
He seemed pleasant enough, so maybe Deal hadn’t done me as much harm as I’d thought.
“Were there injection marks on Mary Farnsworth’s body?” I asked.
“No,” he said. “There weren’t.”
“Did you check her fingers?”
“I’m sure we did. Why? What are you thinking?”
“There was a diabetic kit in that plastic sack. It was labeled ‘Bertha Summers.’ She is a new diabetic and Mary was bringing her a monitor, but I’m wondering if there was something on the retractable pen that pricks for blood samples.”
He laughed. “We’re way ahead of you, Miss Albright. That was one of the first things we looked at. We also tested her lipstick formula, the antibiotic salve, and even the baby aspirin. Everything. I mean everything.”
***
I called Margaret and asked if she would be free to come in a couple of hours. She said she didn’t see why not since she practically lived there anyway and people just naturally expected her to be at their beck and call.
It took several minutes to soothe her, praise her, and pamper her enough to coax her to come in. We don’t run the historical society like it’s a hobby. It’s open during the posted hours. But I needed to call on Edna. Perhaps there was some way to prepare that poor woman for a visit from the KBI. I had to try.
***
Inez Wilson, our county health nurse met me at the door. “Well look who the cat’s drug in. Come in, Lottie.” Inez twisted her thin angular body to yell across the room. “Edna, you have a visitor.”
Edna sat in her overstuffed chair, with a pile of magazines, a jar of Vicks, and her reading glasses on a TV tray beside her. Her feet rested on a footstool in front of her. Inez frowned. She bent over and grabbed a little fold of Edna’s cheek and gave it a little shake.
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