Dry Bones

by Carole Morden

  Even as I reviewed the list, I knew the police would not take me seriously. I would have to find some hard evidence that proved Craig was an active participant in at least one of those deaths and not just a recipient of the worst case of Murphy’s Law ever.

  Thankfully, I reached the motel and pulled into the parking lot. I was having trouble with the vision in my left eye. Examining myself again in the rearview mirror before getting out of the SUV, I could see why. My eye had swollen shut. I definitely lost round one.

  The Holiday Inn’s lobby bathroom held one large paper towel dispenser. Ignoring the intellectual graffiti carved into the walls, I grabbed four paper towels. The vending machines supplied the ice I needed. At this point, the poor man’s ice pack felt heavenly on my eye. I hoped the swelling would go down before the reunion dinner. At least the black eye would match my dress. Woo-hoo. I’d be “styling,” as Jake would say.

  Knocking on the door to the room I called out, “Rachel, open the door. I’ve got my hands full.” I waited a minute and knocked again. No answer. Setting the ice pack down and sliding the key through the lock, I opened the door.

  One glance around the room made my heart stand still. The laptop computer was open and on. Papers were strewn all over the floor. The bathroom door was open, the light on, and no one was in the room. Rachel’s purse lay open on the bed with the contents scattered out.

  “Oh, Rachel. Oh no, what happened?” I cried out.

  I picked up the papers off the floor and noticed it was part of her research. There was no note. For once, I hoped Rachel was out drinking. It was better than the alternative. Maybe she was in a hurry and didn’t want me catching her.

  That’s when I noticed a phone number written in Rachel’s handwriting on a hotel pad. Digging my cell phone out of my purse, I punched in the number.

  “Anderson Taxi service. How may I help you?”

  “This is Jamie Storm. I’m at the Holiday Inn on Scatterfield. A friend, Rachel King, just left here in one of your cabs in a big hurry. Could you send a car for me? I need to go to the same place, but I’ve lost the address. I’m not from around here.”

  I hoped that sounded convincing. I figured if the cab company got another fare, they’d be willing to cheat a little. I was counting on the power of greed.

  “Yes, ma’am, we’ll be right there. The hospital isn’t far.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  Hospital? What do you mean, hospital?

  I wanted to scream, but opted to hang up instead. Firm fingers of dread clamped onto my stomach and twisted. Fear and bile rose in my throat. My head throbbed above my eye, but I didn’t have time to give into it. I glanced in the mirrored dresser. The swelling on my eye had gone down, but it was still shut, black, and puffy. I ran to the bathroom and swallowed two ibuprofen before the taxi arrived. I pulled my hair back in a ponytail, which revealed the extent of the bruise, but right now I didn’t want even a strand of hair in my face.

  Throwing the purse strap over my shoulder, I marched toward the door determined to do something—anything—to help Rachel. I wasn’t sure how fast a taxi could make it, but I would be out front waiting. My mind whirred with thoughts of what could have happened. Every fiber of my being screamed for Rachel to be okay.

  The cab pulled up after what seemed like an eternity of pacing, and I hopped in the backseat. The driver didn’t say a word, just pulled onto Scatterfield He crept along at about twenty miles per hour. Could he go any slower? Looking at my watch, I realized it had only been a minute since I climbed in the back of the old yellow car. Several minutes later, the driver pulled up in front of St. John’s Medical Center.

  “Ya want me to wait?” the cabbie asked, not really looking at me. Not really wanting to wait, because it was 98 degrees out with the humidity at about 70 percent.

  Pulling a twenty-dollar bill from my wallet, I said, “No, don’t wait. I’ll call again if I need a ride.” Without waiting for change, I ran into the hospital entrance to the front desk. “I’m looking for Rachel King. Do you know where she might be?”

  “Honey, you look like you need to see a doctor for that eye. The emergency room is just down that hallway and to your left.” Pale blue eyes surrounded by wrinkles and bifocals looked at me sympathetically.

  “Please, I’m looking for Rachel King. She’s the emergency, not me.” Tightness gripped my chest.

  “What’s she in for?” the seventy-something volunteer asked. Her voice was calm, kind, patient, and gentle.

  “I don’t know that she was admitted. I just know she took a cab here and was dropped off.”

  For the first time since leaving Montana, I broke down. Maybe it was the soothing, tender voice of the volunteer, but suddenly everything seemed hopeless. Unwelcome tears slipped out of my eyes, and I bit down on my lower lip. The harder I tried to keep them in, the faster they fell. I turned, looking for a bathroom in which I could take refuge, but found none. Through blurred eyes, I found a seat and sobbed into my hands.

  I felt an arm slip around my shoulders and squeeze. “Now, honey, everything is going to be fine.”

  “I can’t do this. Really, I can’t.” With a hiccupping sob, I looked at the volunteer. I’m sure my splotchy, red face—one eye red-rimmed and the other black and swollen—cried out for sympathy.

  “No, I expect you can’t. But I know who can, and it’s going to be fine.”

  “Please, is there any way you can find Rachel King for me? Can you page her or something?” Between blowing my nose and sucking in air, the words came out jerky. I was beyond caring about the curious glances from others.

  “I’ll go page her, honey, and in the meantime, why don’t you say a little prayer? You know God is the only one big enough to handle the things that are out of our hands, and I know He cares about your friend and about you.”

  With a tender squeeze to my shoulders, JOANNE/ST. JOHN VOLUNTEER, according to the nametag pinned above her left breast, walked resolutely back to her desk and picked up the phone, pushed the intercom button, and said, “Rachel King, please come to the front desk. Rachel King, please come to the front desk.”

  I was so startled that someone was comforting me instead of the other way around that I stopped crying. I could get used to being incognito as a pastor’s wife if this was the way things worked. I looked over at Joanne and mouthed, “Thank you.”

  Looking around with my good eye, I flinched when I saw Rachel—pale, bone-pale—walking toward me. She looked smaller, like a shadow trying to creep behind a bush and not be seen. With shoulders slumped and dry-eyed, she moved steadily toward the information desk either not seeing me or not recognizing my battered, ballooned face.

  “Rache, I’m over here. What happened? What’s wrong?” I stood and put my arms around her.

  Joanne bowed her head slightly and whispered a prayer that was camouflaged from the ever-constant flow of people coming and going.

  “Dad’s dead,” Rachel said in a monotone voice. “Mom called me from the ambulance. She left a message at the motel. I didn’t notice the phone light flashing until I started the computer search. I came as soon as I got the message. He either had another stroke or a heart attack. They won’t know until the autopsy. Maybe it was the shock of seeing me this morning. I don’t know.”

  “Rache, Rache.” I folded my arms around my friend in a helpless gesture. I had no words, no reassurance, nothing.

  “I don’t know how to feel. I’ve wanted him dead for so long. I’ve spent nights lying awake, wishing he would be hit by a car . . . drowned. I even wished he’d be so sorry for what he’d done he would kill himself.” Rachel took a big gulp of air. “And now—now he’s dead. And I feel nothing. No sorrow, no joy, no relief, nothing.”

  I held on to her, my hand moving in small, slow, caring circles on her back—the soothing back rub, a standard in the pastor’s wife’s bag of tricks.

  “I need to go to Mom’s. I can’t let her go home alone. She’s in the emergency waiting room. She
hasn’t moved or spoken since they told her the news. I told her I’d be right back. Can you send my suitcase and computer over to the house?”

  “Of course, Rache. Let’s go see your mother, and then I’ll take care of everything.” Slipping my arm into the crook of her arm, we walked back to the busy waiting room.

  The pungent odor of hospital-strength disinfectant disavowed the cheerful outlook the brightly-colored hallways tried to convey. No problems here. This is a happy, happy place. Rachel’s body stiffened as she prepared to enter the waiting room. It was then that she must have noticed my face.

  “What in the world happened to you?”

  “Now’s not the time. I’ll tell you later.”

  I approached Rachel’s mother. “Mrs. King, I’m so sorry.” The older woman was stoic, her purse on her lap, her lips sealed in a thin, white line. I knelt down on the floor and took hold of her tightly-clenched fists. “I’m so sorry.” It still seemed lame the second time around, but it was all I had.

  “We were about to eat lunch, you know,” she said. “Not much . . . just a ham sandwich with chips and lemon-meringue pie. Jack always liked something sweet with his meals. I don’t care if it was breakfast, lunch, or dinner. He had to have something sweet to eat. I think I’d better throw the sandwiches away, don’t you think? I put mayo on Jack’s. I just eat mine plain. Maybe mine would be okay? I’m not sure. I can’t think. Should I eat my sandwich?”

  “Mom, forget about the sandwich. I’ll fix you something to eat when we go home,” Rachel snapped.

  I patted Rachel’s leg, and she stopped talking. “Jack won’t mind if you throw out his sandwich. It would probably be better than saving it. But you might keep the pie. I imagine you’ll have lots of company in the next few days. I’ll have my mom bring over some fried chicken and potato salad. You go home with Rachel. She’ll help you make some phone calls. It’s okay to cry, you know.”

  “Cry? Oh no, I really couldn’t. Jack didn’t like it if I cried. Said I wasn’t a little girl anymore and crying wouldn’t do me any good. Jack always just kind of told me what to do, and I’m not sure . . .”

  Pain radiated from Rachel’s eyes. “Let’s go home, Mom. We’d better start on those phone calls. I need just a minute to talk to Jamie, and then I’ll be right back.”

  Rachel took my arm and led me across the room. “Before Mom called I managed to find the orphanage where Craig lived. I didn’t find out who his sister was, but I got the name of a gal who worked there when Craig was adopted. She’s in an assisted-living facility in Indy. Her name and address are on some of the papers I printed out. I was planning to go there with you, but now . . .”

  “I’ll drop by later,” I said. “I’m sure the last thing on your mind is the reunion dinner tonight, but if you want to come, I know my mom would love to sit with your mom.”

  “We’ll see. Give us the rest of the afternoon, okay? I feel guilty about not feeling sad, but I can’t pretend something I don’t feel.”

  I gave Rachel a hug. “It’s okay. Don’t worry about it now. You’ll have plenty of time to sort it all out later. I’m going to see if I can find the lady from the orphanage. I’ll bring your stuff by later.”

  I walked over to Rachel’s mom and planted a kiss on top of her head, gave her a quick hug, and left the hospital. I’d see somebody later about my face.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  After stopping at the motel to find the address, I called Mom to fill her in on the death of Rachel’s dad. True to form, she told me she would bake a cake, fry some chicken, and make both a potato salad and a veggie tray. She assured me that she would be happy to spend the entire evening with Rachel’s mother and help her with the company that would be stopping by to give condolences. I don’t know if good moms are hard to come by, but I wouldn’t sell mine for a million bucks.

  At three forty-five, I pulled into the parking lot of the assisted-living facility. After explaining my purpose, the front-desk clerk called Celia Leeds and spoke to her for several minutes. I heard her describe what I was wearing, explain that Celia was under no obligation to talk to me, and cautioned her that I looked a mess. Perhaps my ensemble—a black eye mixed with wrinkled, grass-stained clothing—wasn’t her style. When she hung up the phone, she muttered, “Apartment 137. Down the hallway, take a left, then another left. Celia’s place is at the end of the hall.”

  The apartments all had names above the numbers on the doors. The hallways were painted a light caramel color and decorated with a sentimental wallpaper border of china dolls, drums, wagons, and toy soldiers. Bulletin boards hung about every twenty-five feet, sporting announcements of every kind. It didn’t take long before I knew when the next Bingo night was and what the residents would be eating for their dinner meals for the following month. Lessons for ballroom dancing, crocheting, and Chinese cooking were offered. Bridge games were on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. in the activity lounge. Activity lounge. Now there’s an oxymoron.

  Rapping on door 137, I prayed Celia Leeds would be receptive to questioning. The door opened to reveal a thin woman with silver-gray hair pulled back in a loose chignon. Her ill-fitting housedress, the color of mountain bluebells, sagged off her shoulders. Perhaps she had once filled it out, but in the way of so many frugal seniors, she refused to part with it although it no longer fit. She wore gray slippers with white anklets. She was about five foot eight and had a pleasant smile.

  “Jamie Storm?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Thanks for seeing me.”

  “What can I help you with?” Ms. Leeds asked.

  “I was wondering if you could answer a couple of questions for me.”

  “Depends on the questions. What about?”

  “Lost Lamb Orphanage. You worked there in the ’60s?”

  “Whew, that was a long time ago,” she said.

  “I need some information on a brother and sister who lived there.”

  “I’m not sure I can remember much from back then.” Then as an afterthought, Ms. Leeds continued. “You look harmless enough except for your black eye. Come on in. Some bruiser take a swing at you?”

  “It’s a long story.”

  “Humph. I bet.”

  Celia lived in a small, two-bedroom apartment with a tiny kitchen, but a spacious dining-living room combination. The furnishings were simple, comfortable. I settled on a glider-rocker that matched the blue couch. A quick glance around the room confirmed that Celia didn’t believe in clutter. The end tables, bookshelves, and coffee table were all free from accumulations of paper, magazines, or mail. The infamous Sister Thornbush would have approved.

  Without another word, Ms. Leeds filled two glasses with ice and poured tea into them. I accepted and took a long drink. “Now what can I do for you,” she said.

  Not wanting to appear rude, I started with small talk. “When did you first go to work for the orphanage?”

  “That was a long time ago. Let’s see, I graduated from high school in the spring of ’53. I wasn’t ready to go to college, so I thought I would work for a year, save some money, and then go. Lost Lambs was my third interview, and they hired me, first to clean rooms, help the cook, and do whatever odd jobs needed done. Then I fell in love with those poor lost kids, and they fell in love with me. I soon found myself in charge of a group of girls, fifteen in all, as a housemother of sorts. Later on, I was given another group. By the time I had been there ten years, I was housemother to the twelve housemothers and fathers working there. I loved every bit of it.

  “Never did get married. I guess I felt like I couldn’t leave those kids. So many had been hurt or abandoned by people who should have loved them. Some could hardly trust me, let alone strangers. My heart wouldn’t let me leave them, so I never let it get entangled with a man.”

  “When did you retire?” I asked.

  “Two years ago I slipped and broke a hip. Not so good at seventy. This business of getting old is not all it’s cracked up to be. No diapers yet, tha
nk goodness.” She smiled when she said this.

  I smiled back and took another long sip of tea.

  “Since the hip, all sorts of health problems have crept up though. I resigned one month after the fall and rented this apartment. Help is available if I need it, but it isn’t nursing home status yet.”

  Miss Leeds creaked over to the west wall. Pictures covered it, both in frames and pinned up with brightly colored tacks. Old black-and-white photos with scalloped edges, Polaroid shots, 35mm full-colored pictures—all of them children.

  “These are some of my kids.”

  I followed her to the photo-splattered wall. It looked completely out of character in the pristine room.

  “Nice,” I said.

  Pointing to one of the Polaroid snaps, Miss Leeds reminisced. “Here’s little Amanda James. She came to us when she was just two. Her mama died giving birth to a baby brother. He didn’t make it either. We never did find a dad.”

  Good memory. This might be my lucky day.

  “I’m looking for information on a Craig Haskell and his sister. I believe the state put them into the orphanage in 1964 sometime after their parents were killed. I don’t know their birth names or even the sister’s name. His name, as I said, is Craig, and his adopted name is Haskell. He may have been adopted in 1965 or 1966. I’m trying to find out if his sister was adopted and what her name is.”

  “That was a long time ago,” Celia said. “Many adoption records were sealed, but in the case of children whose parents were killed, the regulations were not as strict. Let me think back. We had a lot of brother-and-sister combinations. One in particular that I remember might be who you’re looking for. The young boy’s name was Craig if I recall correctly. Craig Blanchard. His sister’s name was Rella. Actually Cinderella, but we all called her Rella. Can you believe what some folks will name their children? Rella was the oldest. Wonderful girl. One of the sweetest we ever had.”