“Stay here,” I told my friends.
Charlie looked fearful, while Hansen took a deep breath. I got of the car and went to meet my fellow witches.
“You two okay?” was the first thing I asked them.
They too had gotten out of their car and were walking toward me, looking wary. Neither of them was dressed in witch clothing today. Scarlett was wearing a simple flowered dress with black stockings underneath, while Josephine had put on a mishmash of ripped jeans, boots, and a button down under a jacket with a T-shirt peeking below the bottom edge.
“We’re fine,” said Scarlett. But her eyes were puffy and her face was pale. “Once all of us got angry,” she went on, “the ghosts turned tail and ran. I believed the fat one when he said they hadn’t come for a confrontation. I think they simply came to make a point. Which they did.”
“It doesn’t make sense. You were leaving them alone until they attacked,” I said.
“There’s a good chance they’re not the smartest bunch,” said Josephine dryly.
Scarlett looked past me to the car, where Charlie was sitting, afraid, and Hansen was feeling who knew what.
“I’m afraid you can’t have him,” I said quietly.
Two pairs of eyes turned to me. “Geraldine made it clear that I was to apologize. Josephine too. That apparently is not how things are done,” said Scarlett. She hung her head. “It was just so frightening. We had never thought much about the risk of exposure before. Then all of a sudden someone was writing about us in the paper as if he knew all about it.”
Inside, my relief was enormous. All I said out loud was, “So what now?”
“The only issue is what Rosalie wants. As of this morning she still wanted to take a vote. Geraldine was making it clear that it was your problem,” said Josephine.
I almost rolled my eyes. I was getting kind of tired of hearing that the coven didn’t have any interest in helping with the ghosts, or Ellie, but I was glad enough that they might have decided to leave Hansen to me. If they left him alone and never thought of him again, that was really all we could ask for.
“We’d like to apologize to Hansen in person,” said Josephine. “I understand that now might not be the best time. I’m sure we frightened him. We’re sorry for that, too. Just make sure he knows he’s not in any danger from us going forward. If you could let us know when we could come back and actually speak with him, we’d appreciate it.”
Josephine paused for a moment and gave me a troubled look. “We trust you. We trust you will impress upon him how important it is that he not reveal our secrets. I don’t think any of us will be so forgiving if any more newspaper articles appear, random as they may seem.”
“He won’t be printing any more articles. I hope you all understand and believe that even I would not tolerate such a thing,” I said.
“You have a good group of friends. You’re lucky in that,” said Scarlett. She looked like she was about to say something more, then thought better of it. I knew what she said to be true, though. Many witches had a harder time making friends outside of the coven than I did. I was incredibly lucky in that regard.
Chapter Thirteen
I went back to the car after promising Scarlett and Josephine that I would let them know when Hansen was ready to talk. Charlie gave me a questioning look when I got in. “I thought they were going to walk up to the car and take him right out,” she said.
“You know I wouldn’t let that happen,” I said. The relief in the Beetle was palpable.
I watched Josephine and Scarlett drive away, then pulled out of the driveway myself. As we drove, I told Charlie and Hansen what the two witches had said.
“I’m perfectly happy to accept their apology. Like I said, I didn’t mean to do so much harm,” said Hansen when I had finished.
“You’re being remarkably calm about all this,” said Charlie. “Or at least, you’re being much calmer than I would be in your situation.”
“I don’t know about that. You also have some pretty great friends,” said Hansen.
He was sitting in the back seat, and I smiled at him in the mirror.
Hansen whistled as we drove up to Mrs. Smith’s house. Bathed in sunlight, it didn’t look as imposing as it had the night before, but it still looked pretty imposing.
“Some house,” he said.
“It is the biggest house I’ve ever seen,” said Charlie with conviction.
This time there was no sign of Gracie when we arrived. Instead, the three of us walked up to the front door and were greeted by the butler, who opened it just as we arrived.
By his glare and what Gracie had said, I knew he was Hamilton.
“Good morning,” he said. He was squinting at us and he did not look pleased.
“Good morning. We’re here to see Mrs. Smith. Gracie was supposed to meet us,” I said.
This caretaker was too well trained to have any tells, but even I could see that he wanted to roll his eyes. “She isn’t here yet. You can see her grandmother with her when she arrives. Until then you can wait in the hall,” he said.
He ushered us inside. Before Charlie could even open her mouth to ask a question, he was striding away.
The hall was spacious and comfortable, with two cushioned benches along each wall. The three of us all sat along one wall, gazing around and trying to orient ourselves. It turned out to be exactly the sort of house I would expect to walk into if the person who owned it was very rich and very old. There was expensive-looking furniture everywhere. I assumed a lot of the pieces were antiques, though I was no expert.
We sat, and we sat: no Gracie, and no sign of life from within the house. The place was so quiet it was as if no one was home. Given that Gracie had said that her grandmother wasn’t very well, it was hard for me to believe she was out.
We sat for five or ten minutes before we heard a car drive up and a car door slam. Hamilton was just coming through the archway he had disappeared through when the front door opened, and in stepped Gracie. She was wearing sunglasses that covered half her face and a shirt dress that brushed her knees. Her blonde hair hung in perfect curls and she had a bag slung over her arm. I was sure that just like the furniture in this house, everything she was wearing was very expensive. She oozed confidence and sophistication. It wasn’t until she took off her sunglasses and you had a chance to look at her eyes that you could see how shallow she actually was.
My eyes slid to the caretaker, who had appeared as if by magic when Gracie came in. His facial expression hadn’t changed, and he didn’t say a word. But he did have an even stiffer back than before, plus his footsteps were clipped and his hands pressed tightly to his sides. I had the distinct impression that he was not pleased that Gracie had let herself in.
I thought irrelevantly that he should visit the hardware store on Main Street, where he could buy a lock for the front door if he wanted to keep Gracie under better control.
“Here everyone is. I was wondering. Hamilton, it is so desperately good to see you. How is my lovely grandmother?” Gracie asked.
As she spoke, she gave each of us a megawatt smile, the performance so overdone that I would have thought she was going to inherit her grandmother’s entire fortune any minute now. Given that I knew she had several cousins, and I was pretty certain a sibling or two, that was hard to believe. When you could choose Gracie or someone else, there was really no reason to give the nod to the former.
Hamilton inclined his head and said, “It is good to see you well, Miss. Your grandmother is in her usual spot looking out at the garden. Do you have any news?”
“As a matter of fact, that is why we have come. I hope you’ve told my grandmother to expect us?” she said.
“Mrs. Smith is always prepared for guests, but I did remind her that you’d be arriving with friends this morning. She is terribly excited. I hope you will remember that raising hopes that you cannot fulfill will not be good for her at her age,” he said primly.
The bright light that appeared t
o be shining on Gracie’s face from wherever dimmed a bit, but she nodded and said to the three of us, “I’m so glad you three are here. Although you”—she gazed directly at Hansen with a flirty smile—”are definitely unexpected.”
I had also caught her staring at Jasper with a calculating look from time to time. Maybe she just wasn’t picky about how many handsome men she flirted with.
Hansen, that consummate professional, rose to his feet and smiled. “Good to see you again, Gracie. Thank you for inviting me to your grandmother’s lovely home,” he said.
“Thank her. Once we get to the bottom of this case, she’ll be the one with the story,” said Gracie. A remarkable offer of charity from someone who did not usually offer such things.
Hamilton led the way. Despite the fact that the house looked huge, it was only a short walk to where Gracie’s grandmother was seated in a room with two entire walls of glass. All around her were plants. She was sitting in her own comfortable chair in a spot protected from the sun, but with a gorgeous view of the grounds.
Mrs. Smith smiled when she saw Gracie. “My darling granddaughter. So good to see you. Come say hello,” she said. Despite the warmth of the room, she had a blanket draped over her knees.
“Grandmother. There you are! How are you?” said Gracie.
Charlie glanced at me, and I raised my eyebrows. Gracie sounded remarkably human all of a sudden, downright normal. he flung her arms wide and hurried over to her grandmother.
Hamilton appeared from behind us with an extra chair, so that there were now enough seats for all of us. Gracie waved at Hansen and Charlie. “These are Lemmi’s friends. They’re both reporters, so don’t say anything scandalous in front of them or they might put you in print,” said Gracie. She actually sounded serious, and Charlie gaped a bit.
Mrs. Smith let out a twitter of laughter. “That might be a reason for me to say something scandalous, darling. You young things are always so careful. What a bore,” she said. She winked at Charlie, who beamed right back.
Hanson smiled. “You have a beautiful home,” he said. “Thank you for having us. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
Mrs. Smith waved him away, but I noticed that Hamilton was looking pleased, the first time I had seen him look anything other than annoyed. Maybe he liked the fact that Hansen knew enough to say something polite. What did he think we were, barbarians?
Mrs. Smith leaned forward and said earnestly, “My husband was very concerned with having the perfect home. It was his obsession for years, but I would always roll my eyes. After he passed away a few years ago, I realized how nice it was. How nice this place was. I have tried to keep it up as such.”
“You’ve done a wonderful job,” I said.
“Thank you,” she said. “May I offer you some tea?”
We all agreed to tea, which was ready and waiting for us on a side table. Hamilton disappeared to get some cookies to go with it.
“Now Granny, you know why we’re here. You were going to tell us about the gardener,” said Gracie.
“Yes, Burbank,” said Mrs. Smith. “He’s been working for me for years. I can’t imagine what has happened to him. It’s truly awful, and I’m very worried. I told you as much. I don’t think the police want to tell me anything. They think he’ll turn up, but he has never missed a day of work before.”
She turned to me, looking distressed, her hands twisting in her lap and her eyes wide. Hamilton had reappeared and was monitoring her so closely that I wondered if he’d kick us out if she got too upset. We had to avoid that, and sooner or later we had to figure out a way to tell her that her gardener with dead.
“We’ll do our best to find him,” said Charlie, trying to sound reassuring. “There might be a simple explanation for the fact that he’s gone missing.”
“There might be,” said Mrs. Smith, “but I doubt it. Either way, I want proof of what has happened to him. That’s the most important thing. You can’t tell me he just ran off to Vegas. He would never do something like that. He has a family.”
Just then another man came bustling in, tall and thin and dressed in white scrubs.
“There you are,” said Hamilton. “We were beginning to wonder what happened to you.”
The other man gave him a large smile. “I was held up. My apologies. I’m Franklin, and I’m one of Mrs. Smith’s caretakers,” he said, looking around at us visitors.
Once introductions had been made, Franklin took Mrs. Smith’s blood pressure and asked her a couple of questions, then excused himself. He seemed pleasant enough, but Hamilton glared at his back all the way out. I tried very carefully to make it look like I was watching my tea, when I was really nosing in on the human interactions we were witnessing. I always loved a good dramatic moment, not to mention that careful observation was a good way to get clues about who was playing what role in the cases we investigated.
“Can you tell us about the last time you saw Burbank?” Charlie asked.
Gracie’s head snapped to her grandmother as if to make sure she wasn’t too tired for further conversation. But her grandmother looked more like she had come alive with the chance to talk to some new people. She waved her cookie around as she spoke. “I told Burbank that he could do whatever he wanted on the grounds, and he proved himself a long time ago. I trust his judgment. He has never once spent more money than he was supposed to. He has never once planted a flower I didn’t like. He is a hard and competent worker and I trust him. I told him that we only had to speak about once a week, and I made sure I had some time free in case he had questions. Despite my telling him he could do whatever he wanted, he always ran creative ideas past me. I thought everything he did was lovely, but deep down I appreciated that wanted to keep me in the loop.
“Even when we weren’t meeting formally, he usually came to find me at the end of the work day, because he knew I was mostly at home and that I liked to hear about the gardens. He also might have figured out that I often went out in the evenings to see what he had been working on. Not to check up on him, of course, but because I enjoyed his work so much.
“We had our weekly meeting this past Saturday morning as usual, and I didn’t see him again after that. I thought that was strange. Then I realized that I had been out seeing a friend at a time when Louise told me he had come looking for me. I think she might have said something else about it, but I don’t remember now. You have to ask her.
“I did my usual and wandered out to the newest garden, but since Burbank hasn’t come back I haven’t been out there again. That patch is further from the house than the others. It’s also larger, and it requires a lot more of his time. To be honest, I’ve never seen him so happy as when he’s working on that particular garden. He gave me the plans for it. He says it’s going to be the best garden in town by the time he’s finished. I just laughed, because everyone always says that I already have the best gardens in town.”
“Of course you have the best gardens,” Gracie murmured.
Mrs. Smith inclined her head. “Thank you, dear. Feel free to print that,” she said to Charlie and Hansen with a wink.
“A garden exposé would actually be very interesting. Especially with spring upon us,” said Charlie.
Mrs. Smith nodded as if she was pleased with the idea. “Of course, there have been photographs and magazine articles over the years, but nothing recently. I don’t know how I’d do it without Burbank here anyway. I do hope he’s all right, but I have a terrible feeling now that so much time has gone by.”
We all exchanged looks. It made perfect sense that she had a terrible feeling. There was no good explanation for the man going missing. “Could you tell us which garden he was working in before he disappeared?” I said.
With such extensive and rolling grounds, it didn’t help us much to know that it was not near the house. There were still any number of places it might be.
Mrs. Smith pointed Hansen to a side table where there was a map. Hansen grabbed it and spread it out in front of us, and Mrs. Sm
ith pulled on her glasses and stared at it. “This one,” she said with certainty. “That’s the one he was working on. He really wanted it to be something special, and we all knew that it would be. He was even talking about hiring a couple of extra assistants in the summer to look after everything. Of course I told him that was fine. We’ve had gardening assistants before. Besides being a wonderful gardener, Burbank was a very good teacher.”
Turned out Mrs. Smith had several gardens throughout her extensive property. The one I’d been in before was only a small sampling. The garden she was pointing to now was around another part of the lake. I could see how it would be a beautiful spot, with a wide view of the water. We’d have to walk out there after we were finished with our tea. I really hated to think what we might find.
“I have another question,” I said to Mrs. Smith, “but if you find it upsetting you don’t have to answer.”
Mrs. Smith raised her chin. “I already know what you’re wondering. No, I don’t know why anyone would want to harm Burbank. He was a lovely man. I paid him well, and as far as I could tell he spent his money responsibly. He didn’t drink, and I don’t think he gambled. I say all that to indicate that I don’t think he had bad habits, or enemies. I would also like to think that he knew perfectly well that if he needed money he could come to me. Of all my employees, he had been here the longest,” she said.
Hamilton was still standing quietly in the corner, his expression unchanged no matter what Mrs. Smith said.
There was one more question I wanted to ask, but it felt wrong to ask it in front of everyone. What I wanted to know was whether Mrs. Smith had left the gardener any money in her will.
It had occurred to me that Gracie herself might be a suspect. If she had known what I was thinking, she would probably have started wearing orange just to fit the part. The only trouble with that was that she wouldn’t murder someone herself, she’d hire someone to do it.
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