Sheriff Hicks raised a flap in the counter to let me through. He guided me to his office and closed the door. “What’s on your mind?”
“It’s about Thomas Jefferson.”
He shook his head.
“You’ve got tongues wagging all over town, young lady.” He sank down on the chair behind his desk and fixed me with a steady gaze. “I think it’s time to level with me, Miss Cady Andrews. What really brings you to town?”
“I already told you. I’m just—”
“Writing some kind of a story before you head home to New York. Is that it?”
I nodded.
“And here you are in my office, asking about something that happened when you were a tiny baby. People are talking. And what with all the trouble that’s happening down south…” His voice trailed off, and he shook his head again, his eyes on me the whole time.
“I already said I’m not here to make trouble.” Except I wasn’t so sure anymore, not after talking to Mrs. Jefferson and Daniel.
“Uh-huh.” He eyed me speculatively. “Those kids that went down to Mississippi, they’re a lot like you. College kids. There are hundreds of them down there trying to get colored folks to register to vote. It’s stirring up a lot of bad feelings, let me tell you, all those outsiders mixing in where they’re not wanted. Some of those kids have come smack up against Mississippi tradition. Some of them have been hospitalized. I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if someone was killed down there this summer. People are wondering if you’re one of them, if you’re part of the plan, showing up here and asking a bunch of questions about a colored fella.”
“I have nothing to do with anything that’s happening in Mississippi. And anyway, people have a right to vote, don’t they?”
“If that’s what they want to do. They also have a right to be left alone if they don’t care to vote. They have a right not to be harassed by a bunch of college kids who don’t know what they’re talking about and who listen to people who don’t know what they’re talking about either. Not to mention people who make their living by stirring things up. Professional agitators.” He leaned back in his chair. “What is it that you want to ask me?”
“Can I see the police file on Thomas Jefferson? I’d also like to see anything you have on Patrice LaSalle.”
He studied me for a few seconds.
“First you ask about the Jefferson boy and what he did. Now you want to know about the fella he murdered. Care to tell me what your real interest is in that case?”
I repeated what I’d told him when I first met him. “I heard about it. I got curious. I think it would make a good story.”
“For your school paper?”
“Maybe.”
“You know what they say about curiosity.”
“I know what they say it does to cats,” I told him. “But I’m not a cat. So, can I please see the files?”
“No, you cannot.” Before I could ask why not, he continued. “In the first place, police files are not open to the public. Second, those files no longer exist. This isn’t the original sheriff’s office. The original one was flooded out.”
“And the records?”
“Ruined.”
Dead end. Again.
“You didn’t happen to be working here at the time of the murder, did you, Sheriff Hicks?”
“I was here,” he said. My heart sped up. “But I wasn’t involved in the investigation. The sheriff took care of that himself.”
“But you’re familiar with the case—with what happened?”
“I know the broad strokes.”
“Can you tell me about it—about what you know?”
He sighed. “You’re persistent, I’ll give you that. But there’s no advantage to digging into the past, especially that particular slice of it, particularly not now, when people are already worked up about what’s happening down in Mississippi. You don’t want to go stirring up all kinds of bad memories, do you? Besides, aren’t your folks missing you? Don’t you think you should head home?” He stood up.
The message was clear: he wasn’t going to answer my question.
The woman who was washing windows looked over her shoulder at me when I left Sheriff Hicks’s office. So did the woman at the desk. Her eyes stayed on me as I walked across the room. I glanced at her as I closed the door behind me. She was on her way to the sheriff’s office. The gossip train was rolling on.
Chapter Twelve
ANOTHER FIRE
I WENT FROM the sheriff’s office to the drugstore, where I bought a New York Times. I took it back to Maggie’s and sat on the porch to read it. So far, no one had found the three civil rights workers who had gone missing in Mississippi.
The screen door opened.
“Well, I was wondering where you’d disappeared to.” It was Maggie. She glanced at the paper. “Checking out the news from back home?”
I couldn’t remember telling her where I was from. So how did she know? Who had she been talking to?
“I got a call from the courthouse.” She sat down in a wicker chair. “One of the clerks wanted to know why I was interested in the Thomas Jefferson murder trial.” I felt my cheeks redden. I couldn’t even look at her. “The funny thing is, I have no interest in it. So I asked him what he was talking about, and do you know what he said?” I had a pretty good idea. “He said someone was in there looking for the transcript. He said it was a girl and that she gave my name.”
“I’m sorry.” I was too. Genuinely sorry. “But he wasn’t going to help me until I mentioned you and the newspaper.”
Maggie appraised me for longer than felt comfortable. “I told him I was kicking around a few story ideas about war veterans and how they fare when they get home,” she said at last. “We have quite a few who were over in Korea too. Some haven’t done well. But it would have been nice if you’d told me what you were up to. I had to think pretty fast, let me tell you.” She ducked her head so that she could look me in the eye. “Why are you so interested in Thomas Jefferson? And why are you telling everyone you’re from New York when clearly you’re not?”
My head snapped up at that. “How did—”
She raised a hand to silence me.
“I spent a few years in New York, Cady. I know what people there look like and sound like. You’re not from there. In fact, unless I miss my guess, you’re from Canada. I can hear it in the way you speak.”
I stared at her. For once I didn’t know what to say.
“Time to come clean, young lady.”
She didn’t have to ask twice. I told her everything. Maybe that old sheriff had been right when he told Mrs. Jefferson that people who’d done something wrong really needed to confess to feel better. I told her about Mrs. Hazelton and the envelope. I also told her about Mr. Travers and the Weekly Crier and about the story I hoped to write and why it was so important to me. She didn’t laugh. She didn’t make fun of me. Instead she smiled and said, “Reporter, huh? It’s a tough row to hoe for a woman. But it can be done, Cady. It really can. I started on a newspaper in San Francisco. I had to fight long and hard to get decent assignments, and by that I mean real news, not the women’s pages, although I paid my dues there. I covered social events just like you did. I did a recipe column for a while. I wrote about hairstyles and fashion and how to feed a family of six on just pennies a day.” She sighed. “I thought I was doomed to a lifetime of non-news—at a newspaper, no less!”
“Is that why you came back here?”
She shook her head.
“There was a murder—a woman killed her husband. I had met the woman once before, and when the reporters came clamoring for a story about the Black Widow—that’s what one of the rival newspapers called her—she refused to talk to them. She refused to talk to anyone except me. My editor had no choice. I got the story. I told her side.”
“But she killed her husband.”
“In self-defense. He was a gambler and a drinker—most of the other papers didn’t report that. I dug in
to his life. I painted a portrait of the man. My publisher got a lot of flak—how dare I say it was the husband’s fault he was murdered? But my editor stuck with me. And because my stories were selling papers, the publisher came around. I covered the trial from start to finish. By the time the jury acquitted her, I had proved myself. My editor moved me from the women’s pages to hard news. I caught some big stories there. Crime. Corruption. Crooked politicians. You name it. I had the time of my life. But it was hard work. All I ever did was chase stories. I felt like I had no other life.”
Her smile had more sad than happy in it. “I thought I wanted a change, so when my father died, I came back here. Did I tell you my grandfather started the paper? It’s been in the family for three generations—four, now that I’m here. But I’m afraid I’ll be the end of the line. And I’ve been wondering if I did the right thing by coming here. It’s quiet—maybe a little too quiet.” She sighed. “So, what’s going on, Cady?”
“I don’t think Mr. Jefferson killed Mr. LaSalle.” There. I’d said it. The thought had been spinning around in my brain ever since I’d spoken to Daniel and Mrs. Jefferson. Maybe since before that. Maybe since I’d found out that almost every scrap of information about the trial was missing. “I want to find out. I want to write about it as badly as you wanted to tell that woman’s side of the story.” But there was a problem. I would have to tell her sooner or later. I decided on right now. “I’m not sure I can afford to stay on with you, Maggie.”
“If you don’t stay here, I don’t know where you’ll go. This is the only place in town besides the hotel. And that hotel is no place for a young girl. It attracts mostly traveling salesmen. Besides, it’s expensive. I’ll tell you what. You can do chores in return for your room and board for as long as you’re here.”
“Are you sure? I don’t know how long it will—”
“I’m sure.” She stood up. “That’s settled.”
“I’m great at cleaning,” I told her. “I’ve scrubbed more floors, washed more walls and polished more windows than you can imagine.”
Maggie smiled. “I was going to hire a girl to do some cleaning. The place really needs it, and I don’t have the time. I’m sure we can work something out.” She paused as she opened the screen door. “Have you talked to Lorne Beale?”
“Who’s he?”
“He was the sheriff back in the ’40s. He’d be pretty old by now, but I know he’s still around.” She disappeared inside and was back in a flash with a slim telephone book. She thumbed through it. “Humph. He’s not in here.” I was pretty sure I heard disappointment in her voice. “Leave it with me. I’m sure I can track him down. Come on. Let’s have some lunch.”
Arthur was in the kitchen, slicing tomatoes. I washed the lettuce, and we all sat down to iced tea, tomato sandwiches and a crisp salad. After that, I got to work washing the floors of all the upstairs bedrooms. By the time I caught the first whiff of supper—it smelled like chicken (it was, with a big bowl of fresh peas)—I had worked up a real appetite.
It was just Maggie and me for supper. Arthur was working late.
“I found Lorne Beale,” Maggie said casually. My heart slammed to a stop. Finally, a real honest-to-goodness lead! “He’s in a nursing home over in Fairview.”
“Where’s that?”
“About fifteen miles north of here.”
Fifteen miles?
“Is there a bus?”
“It just so happens that I have to drive to Fairview tomorrow. There’s a man up there who can apparently whistle the whole of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. Everyone says he’s pretty good.” She makes a wry face. “I know—it isn’t exactly earth-shattering news. But I learned pretty quickly that local people are interested in local people—your Mr. Travers understands that, I’m sure. I’ll drop you there on my way.”
I heard thumping. Then hammering. Someone yelled, “Get up, get up!” I smelled smoke.
I was dreaming, and, of all things, I was dreaming of the Home. I never thought I would.
More thumping, only this time I was awake.
“Cady, come on! You have to get out of the house!”
I threw off my sheet and ran to the door.
“Come on,” Maggie said.
We raced downstairs and out into the yard. A fire truck stood at the curb. Firemen were hosing down the front of the house where the parlor was.
“What happened?” I asked.
A fireman came down the front walk and stopped in front of Maggie.
“Looks like someone threw a homemade firebomb through your window.” He held up the remains of a bottle. “It’s a good thing you were home and awake when it happened. It was filled with gasoline. Fire’s out. I don’t think there’s any structural damage, but we’ll have to get the fire marshal down to take a look first thing in the morning.”
Another car pulled up, and Sheriff Hicks got out. The fireman went to report to him. When he was finished, Sheriff Hicks walked over to Maggie and me.
“Bert says someone threw a Molotov cocktail through your window,” he said. “You have any idea why someone would do that?”
I looked apprehensively at Maggie. How would she answer?
“No idea at all.” Maggie’s voice was shaky. She was rattled, and I didn’t blame her. What if she hadn’t woken up? What if the fire had spread more quickly? What if someone had been hurt? Maggie looked around. “Where’s Arthur?” Her voice rose with panic. “Arthur?” she called. “Arthur?”
“Over here!” Arthur was at the side of the house with a group of firemen.
“Are you sure no one has a grudge against you?” Sheriff Hicks asked, looking directly at me.
“I’m pretty sure,” Maggie said. “You read the paper, Brad. Have you seen anything in there that would offend anyone or make anyone angry at me?”
Sheriff Hicks had to admit that he hadn’t.
“But someone sure sent you a message,” he said. “Either that or we’ve got an arsonist on the loose. I’ll be back with the fire marshal first thing in the morning.” He glanced at me. “Can I have a word with you in private, Maggie?”
Maggie obliged. She and the sheriff crossed the street to his parked car and stood there talking. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but I saw Maggie shake her head again and again. When she finally returned, she said, “He wanted to know if I thought you had anything to do with it.”
What? “He thinks I started the fire?”
“He thinks all your questions about Thomas Jefferson are getting people riled up. He says everyone is talking about what’s going on in Mississippi, and they think it’s peculiar that you showed up here at the same time and started looking into Jefferson’s murder trial. He says you’ve been seen in Freemount.”
“Is that a crime?”
“Not that I know of. But it’s not the usual thing for people to do around here.”
Chapter Thirteen
I HIT A DEAD END…AND FINA NEW LINE OF INQUIRY
THE NEXT MORNING, after we’d spent the night in a neighbor’s front room, the fire marshal confirmed that the damage was superficial. Maggie heaved a sigh of relief. She and I drove up to Fairview while Arthur nailed plywood over the broken parlor windows, which would have to do until Maggie could get them replaced.
The nursing home that housed Lorne Beale, the former sheriff, was a low-slung building surrounded by a lush green lawn dotted with flower beds and rows of shrubbery. The windows twinkled in the late-morning sun. A bright-white sign with black letters set at the entrance to the driveway identified the place as John H. Chisholm Home for the Aged.
“Who was John H. Chisholm?” I asked.
“Is,” Maggie said. “He’s a very rich man. He owns a couple of canneries, two dairies, a trucking company and a tomato-processing plant. Inherited it all from his daddy. But he didn’t turn out to be one of those second-generation born-with-a-silver-spoon-in-his-mouth types who only know how to spend money but not how to make it. He’s wealthier than his father
could ever have imagined. There’s a rumor going around that he’s planning to run for state governor.” She nodded at the building as she pulled into the parking lot. “He also owns this nursing home.”
“He owns it and he put his own name on it?”
“Thinks highly of himself, doesn’t he? I hear it’s a nice place. I’ve never been in it. I also hear that you need a lot more than what social security pays to stay here. Frankly, I’m surprised Sheriff Beale can afford it. Being sheriff might sound important, but the pay is strictly civil service.” She leaned across me to open the passenger-side door. “I’ll pick you up as soon as I snap a few pictures and hear a few bars of Beethoven’s Fifth.”
I jumped down and smoothed my skirt over my knees.
“Wish me luck,” I said.
Maggie gave me a thumbs-up and put the truck into gear.
As soon as I stepped into the cool, bright foyer, a woman at the reception desk looked up.
“Can I help you?”
“I’m here to see Mr. Lorne Beale.”
The woman smiled. “You must be his granddaughter. He used to talk about you all the time.”
“Used to?” Past tense. I didn’t like the sound of that. Had he died?
“He’ll be thrilled to see you,” the woman said.
I breathed a sigh of relief. He was still alive.
“Go down that hall.” She pointed. “Make a left turn when you can’t go straight anymore, and follow the corridor to the end. And don’t worry.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I’ve seen a lot of grandchildren visit for the first time, and they all have that same look on their faces. They all expect it to be horribly depressing in here. But it’s not. You’ll see. And your grandfather has the best room in the house.”
I thanked her and followed her directions. She was right. The place was far from depressing. It was flooded with light. Paintings, mostly still lifes, hung on the walls. When I turned at the end of the hall, I found a corner alcove with two large windows, a couple of comfortable chairs and a small table. People could sit here and talk while enjoying the view. If only there had been a nook like this at the orphanage, somewhere quiet to read or think. There was only one door at the end of the hall. I knocked and heard footsteps. Mr. Beale had a spritely step. I hoped he had as lively a mind.
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