Tomb With a View

by Casey Daniels

  “The building was begun in 1885, and dedicated on Memorial Day in 1890. The architect was a fellow named George Keller.”

  At the sound of the deep, booming voice, I turned just in time to see the president materialize at Jack’s side. He stood with his shoulders back and his chin up and his right arm cocked, just like the statue inside the rotunda. I repeated what he’d just said, except I left out the fellow part. There was no use sounding as fuddy-duddy as he did.

  “And he wasn’t even quite fifty years old when he died.” Jack shook his head sadly. “Fifty. It’s sounding younger all the time, isn’t it?”

  I couldn’t say I agreed so I was glad he didn’t wait for an answer. “President Garfield was in the House of Representatives, I know that,” he said. “But for how many terms?”

  “Nine,” the president rumbled. “I was elected in 1862 while still on active duty with the Army. I attended my first congressional session in 1863.”

  “Nine.” I parroted the information to Jack. “I . . . that is, he was elected in 1862 but he was in the Army then, so he didn’t go to Washington until the following year.”

  I wasn’t imagining it; Jack was impressed with my knowledge. His eyes lit up. “And he was elected president in 1880.” He was on a roll now, but then, I couldn’t blame him. Thanks to the quick answers the president had provided, Jack mistakenly thought I was a kindred spirit in the Garfield geek squad. “He was shot in July of that year and died in September. Such a loss to our country. Such a waste.”

  “Humph.” The president agreed without actually coming right out and agreeing. “I advocated civil service reform, you know.”

  “Civil service reform,” I told Jack.

  “I directed a special subcommittee to modernize the census-taking process.”

  “Census.”

  “When I was a congressman, I even went around and visited various government agencies so I could see firsthand how they were spending the people’s money. Once I assumed the presidency, I ordered an investigation into widespread corruption in the Post Office.”

  “Post Office,” I said.

  The president frowned. “It is truly a shame there wasn’t time to accomplish more. And a calamity that I didn’t have time to teach my successors to pay more attention to the past in their search for solutions to the problems of the present. Alas, the lesson of history is rarely learned by the actors themselves.”

  I couldn’t follow most of that, so I just glommed on to the last part. “The lesson of history—” I began.

  “Is rarely learned by the actors themselves!” Jack grinned. “You can even quote the president. Pepper . . .” He took my arm, and together, we headed into the crypt. “Something tells me this is a match made in heaven.”

  Was it?

  I couldn’t say. I only knew that for the first time since Quinn walked out on me, I felt pretty, and smart, and more than competent in my job. Of course, the president helped me out every step of the way. But Jack didn’t know that. And Jack didn’t care. Jack was funny and he was friendly, and yes, OK, he was also incredibly hot. But there was more to my attraction to him than that. Take, for instance, the way he talked about history and actually made it seem not nearly as boring as I always thought it was. We explored the memorial top to bottom, and an hour-and-a-half flew by.

  I’d already gone into the rotunda and told the gawkers there that the memorial was closing for Marjorie’s funeral. Now, standing outside the office together, Jack and I watched those visitors file out the front door. He leaned close. “You’ll be here again tomorrow?” he asked.

  I hoped it meant he was planning to come back, but I knew the rules of the game. If I wanted to keep him interested, I had to play it cool. “I’m on permanent assignment here in the memorial,” I told him. “At least until Ella can find a docent to take my place.”

  “Take your place? Impossible,” he said, and humming, he walked out of the memorial.

  When the door closed behind him, I realized I was humming, too. The president was hovering outside the office and I smiled at him. “You want to come along?”

  “To that woman’s funeral?” I didn’t know ghosts could look green, but he did. “I have business of state to take care of,” he blustered. “Important matters. Things essential to the workings of the government. I—”

  I cut him off with a laugh. “I was talking about a walk around the memorial.” I swirled a finger in the air. “I’ve got to make sure there’s no stragglers left behind.”

  “Oh.” He blew out a breath of relief. “Well, really, I’d best get back to my cabinet. We are discussing those Post Office reforms, you know, and . . .” Even as I watched, he stepped into the rotunda and poofed away into nothing.

  I took one last look around, and everything was ship-shape.

  Well, just about everything.

  Upstairs, just outside the roped-off doorway that led into the old ballroom, that CLOSED TO THE PUBLIC sign was upside down again.

  9

  Believe me, when it comes to the men-and-romance department, I have more than enough experience, some of it good, some of it is disastrous. I knew better than to have my head turned by Jack’s smile, or Jack’s charm, or Jack’s gorgeous body.

  That didn’t mean I wasn’t grinning—just a little—when I locked up the memorial and headed to the other side of the cemetery for Marjorie’s funeral.

  Or that I didn’t have to remind myself that standing at the edge of an open grave and grinning probably wasn’t the most politically correct thing to do.

  I wiped the little glowy aftermath of my encounter with Jack from my expression and did my best to concentrate on what the minister was saying about Marjorie. No easy thing considering it was all about how dedicated she was, how wonderful she was, how knowledgeable she was about all things James A. Garfield, and blah, blah, blah.

  To my way of thinking, it would have been way more interesting if the plump, bald minister could have given me some insight into who tossed her over that balcony.

  With that in mind, I took a careful look around the crowd of mourners. It was no surprise that most of them were familiar, Garden View employees and volunteers. I mean, really, did I expect Marjorie to have friends?

  I gave the people I knew a quick once-over. Ella and Jim Hardy (our big boss) both looked appropriately solemn. So did Ray Gwitkowski. He was just behind Ella, next to Doris Oswald, and both Ray and Doris had their eyes cast down, looking at the simple, but tasteful, program we’d all been given that listed the bare essentials of Marjorie’s life: birth date, death date, and the plot number where her copper-colored casket would soon be lowered into the ground. It also included a note of gratitude from her nephew, Nick Klinker, who said, as Marjorie’s only relative, he was grateful for all the kindnesses shown to him in his hour of need.

  Or maybe the program wasn’t what Ray and Doris were looking at.

  I’m tall, remember, so I sometimes get an interesting perspective on things. I craned my neck for a better look, and from where I stood, I could see what a lot of the other mourners couldn’t: Ray and Doris didn’t have their eyes averted out of grief, or even respect. They weren’t reading the program. Both of them had their gazes focused on where their fingers were entwined.

  Old people, holding hands like lovestruck teenagers? I would have been grossed out if I wasn’t so busy wondering what it meant and if it could have anything to do with my case.

  Ray had mentioned that he was dating someone new, but I never expected it to be Doris, and talk about a new perspective! Suddenly, ideas weren’t just niggling at the back of my mind, they were jumping up and down, shouting out the possibilities. Here’s pretty much the way my thought processes went:

  Marjorie made Doris cry. Marjorie made Doris think about leaving the cemetery. And Doris loved her volunteer work at the cemetery.

  This told me there was no way Doris could have been all that fond of Marjorie.

  Marjorie blackmailed Ray into taking her to conc
erts and movies and parties. Marjorie demanded his time and his attention. She dangled the promise of a get-rich scheme in front of him like a fat worm on a hook, and because of it, she expected him to jump at the drop of a hat. She had not only stolen Ray’s time—time he could have been spending with his new honey, Doris—she’d also humiliated him and played him for a chump.

  This meant that Ray wasn’t a big fan of Marjorie’s, either. In fact, I knew this to be true, because Ray had gone to her place that night I visited to throw that wedding invitation back at her.

  Could old-folk love run deep enough to spark jealousy? The kind that resulted in murder?

  I didn’t know, but I did remember that both Ray and Doris were in the cemetery the morning Marjorie was killed. If I recalled correctly (and yes, I usually do), when I ran into them, they both looked a little flustered. And I hadn’t forgotten that back at Big Daddy Burger after all the flipping and the squirting was done, Ray lied to me about something. Nobody was that jittery when they were telling the truth.

  I tucked all this away for further consideration, and since the minister was now saying something about Marjorie’s dedication to always looking her best (yikes!), I continued to study the crowd. I’d gotten there a couple minutes before the service started and talked to Ella, so I knew the man standing closest to the minister was Marjorie’s nephew, Nick. He was in his thirties, and not bad looking, considering he was related to Marjorie. He had eyes that were a soft shade of blue, mousy brown hair, and a high forehead. He was wearing a dark suit that was just outdated enough for me to think he only pulled it out of his closet for weddings and funerals. Ella said he was a software engineer, and I wasn’t surprised. I pegged him as a geek.

  Nick’s wedding was the one Marjorie had tried to browbeat Ray into attending, so I assumed the petite blonde who stood at Nick’s side was his fiancée. She, too, was wearing a dark suit. Every strand of her shoulder-length hair was in place and her nails were perfectly manicured. One look, and I knew that Marjorie and her soon-to-be niece-in-law did not share the same good taste, especially when it came to shoes. No alligator green platforms for this woman! She wore a pair of Dolce & Gabbana pointed-toe slingbacks made from a combination of earth-toned patent, suede, and snakeskin, and I experienced an instant pang of shoe envy.

  “Amen!”

  I was jolted out of my thoughts when the minister finished his prayer and the folks all around me mumbled, “Amen,” in response.

  Before the mourners scattered back to the cars parked along the winding road, I knew I had to talk to Nick. For one thing, I had a trunkful of Marjorie’s Garfield memorabilia I was anxious to get rid of. For another . . .

  Well, experience has taught me more than just what’s what where men are concerned. I knew that when it came to murder, it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility to suspect the victim’s nearest and dearest. I also knew it would be stupid not to take this opportunity to question Nick. After all, if anybody knew Marjorie, it was probably her only living relative.

  I was all set to close in on Nick when I saw him approach Ella. I didn’t want to butt in. He might have been doing something sappy like thanking the staff on behalf of the family for all their concern and support. Or he could have actually been as nutsy as his aunt and eager to talk about President Garfield and his supposed connection to the family. Either way, I wasn’t taking any chances. I waited until Ella walked away before I made my move.

  “I’m Pepper,” I said by way of introduction. “I’m the one who—”

  “Found her. Yes, of course.” Nick’s expression softened. “I can’t tell you how grateful I am—” He stopped short and glanced at the woman at his side. “I can’t tell you how grateful Bernadine and I are for all you did for my poor, dear Aunt Marjorie.”

  I carefully avoided pointing out that by the time I found her, there was nothing I could have done for Marjorie even if I’d wanted to. She was that dead. I sloughed off his gratitude. “All I did was call the cops. It was nothing.”

  “It was the final act of kindness for a woman who was nothing but kind herself.”

  See? I was right. He was getting all mushy. Funerals do that to people. I knew this for a fact when this total stranger reached over and gave my arm a squeeze. I guess it was a good thing I was so distracted by the gesture, since it kept me from saying what I was thinking, and what I was thinking in relation to this horse hockey about Marjorie being kind was, “Huh?”

  Instead, I tried to keep myself—and my investigation—on track. “Speaking of cops . . .” We weren’t, not exactly, anyway, but I wanted to, and this was my perfect opportunity. “I’ve been wondering if you have any theory about what might have happened to your aunt?”

  “Theory?” Nick and Bernadine exchanged glances. “It seems pretty obvious what happened. She went over the railing of the balcony. The police say she was pushed.”

  The what was all pretty straightforward. It was the who I was worried about. There wasn’t exactly a good way to inch closer to the subject so I jumped in with both feet. “Do you know anyone who disliked your aunt enough to do that?”

  Nick’s nose scrunched. His eyes scrinched. If I didn’t know that Quinn had already asked him the same question—and believe me, I knew he had; there was no way a guy as thorough as Quinn would let something so obvious get away from him—I would have said that Nick was surprised by the very thought.

  “You work here,” Nick said. “And Aunt Marjorie spent so much of her time here. I have to imagine you knew her well. So it shouldn’t come as a surprise when I tell you exactly what I told the police when they asked me that question. No one disliked Aunt Marjorie. How could they? She was sweet and compassionate. She truly cared about other people, about their interests and their ideas and their feelings.”

  “Right.” I hoped I looked more enthusiastic than I sounded, and when I was afraid I didn’t, I settled for hoping Nick wouldn’t notice. “But someone did throw her off that balcony,” I reminded him. “If we could figure out who—”

  This time, he patted my arm. “Aunt Marjorie was a big believer in law and order, and so am I. I have faith that the police will find the real murderer. Until then, all we can do is wait, and hold Marjorie in all our hearts.”

  Actually, there was something else we could do. “Speaking of that . . .” I hoped I wasn’t stepping into something I couldn’t easily get out of, and braced myself in case Nick started babbling on about the long-gone president and I had to make a quick exit. “I was at Marjorie’s the other night, and she has all that memorabilia and—”

  “Of course! Aunt Marjorie told us all about that commemoration she was in charge of for the cemetery, didn’t she, Bernadine?” His fiancée’s nod was a reflection of his. “I just told Mrs. Silverman . . .” He looked back to where Ella was chatting with the minister. “None of her collection means anything to me. I don’t want any of it, and we certainly don’t have room for it, do we, Bernadine? I’ll be liquidating every bit of it as soon as I’m able. Now, if you’ll excuse me.” The minister had turned toward his car and I knew Nick had to catch up with him so I backed off. Good thing I did, too, or I would have missed out on the most interesting thing that happened that day.

  Well . . .

  I remembered Jack, and now that the funeral service was over, I allowed myself a smile at the same time I corrected myself. This was the second most interesting thing that had happened that day.

  Because just as I turned around, I saw Ray head toward his car.

  And as soon as his back was turned, I watched as sweet, fluffy Doris kicked dirt on Marjorie’s grave.

  Just for the record, one o’clock is a lousy time for a funeral. By the time it was over, it was too early to head for home, and too late to get much accomplished back at the office even if I was inclined to go over there. My wisest course of action seemed to be to head back to the memorial. After all, it was officially closed for the rest of the day, and that meant I could officially take my time, free of the
gawkers, and try to get a line on my investigation.

  I parked and walked around to the front of the building, and it wasn’t until then that I second-guessed my plan. But then, that’s when I noticed a movement in the huge rhododendron bushes over on my right. And that’s when I remembered the creepy guy with the baseball cap and the chilling gaze.

  As if he was looking at me right then and there, I froze, watching the branches of the bush twitch. My heart in my throat and my knees already starting their morph into Silly Putty, I thought about how alone I was, and gauged the distance back to my car. I’d already taken a step in that direction when the rhododendron branches parted and Jack walked out.

  He looked just as surprised to see me as I was to see him.

  “I’ll bet this looks weird, doesn’t it?” He strolled up to me and poked a thumb over his shoulder and back toward the bush. “I wasn’t doing whatever you think I was doing.”

  “Since I can’t imagine what you were doing . . .” Baffled, I shrugged. “What were you doing?”

  His answer was simple enough. “Communing with President Garfield.”

  I wasn’t sure if I should be relieved or worried. If Jack and I shared a Gift and he really was talking to the president, it would save me the trouble of maybe someday having to explain the whole I-see-dead-people thing to him. That being said . . .

  I glanced around.

  I didn’t see any sign of President Garfield.

  Which meant maybe I should be worried that Jack was as weird as the weird guy who’d weirded me out earlier in the day.

  Something told me Jack could read the cascade of worries and doubts that filled my head. He laughed. “Communing with the president. Up there,” he said, and because from where we stood I couldn’t see what he was talking about, he grabbed hold of my hand and gently pulled me to the side of the building. “I was trying to get a better look at the bas-relief sculptures.”

  Bas-relief. It’s one of those terms I should have learned when I got my degree in art history. Since I didn’t, I had to learn it when I started taking visitors around the cemetery. Bas-relief describes a sculpture that’s made from chipping away stone so that the picture stands out from the background. In the case of the memorial, there are five of them, high up on the walls. Each one shows a different aspect of the president’s life: Garfield as a teacher, a soldier, a congressman, the president, and at his death. The figures on each of the reliefs are life-size.