“That freaked me out a little,” I said.
“Me too,” Dewey said.
Uncle Henry sneezed.
“You still up to doin’ yours?” Uncle Henry asked Carry.
“Yeah,” Carry said as though he just asked the stupidest question ever. “Mine better not be in code like Mom’s was, though. I want to actually understand it.”
“I will try do better for you,” Madame Crystalle said. “Please, take seat.”
My mother got out of the chair and let Carry take her place. I noticed my mother was shaking, especially her hands. I think she was more freaked out than anyone. It was pretty spooky.
Madame Crystalle took a deck of cards from somewhere beside her and handed them across the table to Carry. She had them with the backs up and the backs were pretty neat. They were black with a silver ring painted on the center. Inside the ring was a red dragon curled up with its wings hanging down over the bottom of the ring. The deck looked thicker than a normal deck of cards.
“Shuffle these,” Madame Crystalle said. “Use overhand shuffle, though. I don’t want my cards bent.”
Carry did as she was told. “When do I stop?” she asked.
“Go for as long as feels good to you. You are imprinting your future onto the cards.”
Carry shuffled some more, then came to a stop. She looked like she was about to set down the deck, then she started shuffling again for another minute or so. “I just felt compelled to,” she said.
Madame Crystalle smiled. “This is good. It means you go with your instincts.”
Finally, Carry actually did stop. “Okay, what do I do now?”
“Hold the deck in your left hand and make three piles of cards on the table from left to right.”
Carry did and then Madame Crystalle leaned over and picked up the piles from left to right with her left hand. I couldn’t figure out what was so important about everything being done using lefts.
She laid out seven cards in all and in the end they formed a T shape. First she laid out five cards in a straight row and then two cards beneath the center card in the row. Some were upside down from me and others weren’t. I wondered if that mattered. And boy, if I thought the backs of the cards were neat, the fronts were even better.
Each one was different. The first looked like an old scraggly tree with a green gem tangled in its root. It read “Ace of Pentacles” on the bottom.
The second was the Five of Cups and showed a dwarf drinking something out of a bottle with his back against a tree and five cups in the grass around him. The dwarf looked drunk to me.
The third one was The Lovers and showed two dragons looking like they were about to kiss. That one sort of disturbed me. Dragons don’t kiss. They go and burn down castles and collect treasure.
The fourth one was the Four of Cups and showed a lady with very long ponytails standing at a table where four little lizards were playing with four golden cups. Two of the cups were on their side, the other two were standing.
The fifth one (which was the last one along the top row) was the Queen of Wands and showed an older lady with a beautiful dress made from purple and gold silk. She was seated on a tall wooden throne with a blue dragon sleeping at her feet.
The remaining two came down from The Lovers card. The first one was the Knight of Wands, which showed a younger-looking man riding a dragon in the moonlight. This one was pretty awesome. I would love to ride a dragon. Especially at night.
The final card, at the very bottom of the T, was the Two of Cups, and it showed a young man and woman holding hands in a garden with a huge moon over their heads and the face of a dragon inside the moon. It almost looked like they were getting married or something.
“What do they mean?” Carry asked, anxiously, just as Uncle Henry sneezed for what seemed like the hundredth time.
“Well, let’s see,” Madame Crystalle said. “I see you are smart in school. This is good. I also see you know it. This, not so good. You would have more friendships if you didn’t always act so sarcastic.”
Carry’s face reddened. She hated getting lectured the best of times. Now she was being lectured by a psychic whom she got as a birthday present.
Madame Crystalle noticed Carry’s reaction and quickly covered. “It’s okay, though, you have good heart. See these cup cards? Cups represent love and compassion. You have many. So your heart is in right place. But . . .”
“But what?” Carry asked.
“You get very lonely at times,” Madame Crystalle said.
“No, I don’t,” Carry said back snarkily.
“You cover it with your sarcasm or your quick wit. But you wish you had more friends. You also long for a boyfriend.”
We all sort of giggled at that and Carry’s face went completely purple. This was turning out to be the best birthday present ever. I started thinking for my birthday I’d get Carry a psychic reading.
“Well, I have good news for you,” Madame Crystalle said. “I see a boy in the immediate future. Someone more than just a friend.”
“He won’t be nineteen and drivin’ a red Pontiac Sunbird, will he?” my mother asked, referring to a boy we once caught with Carry in the backseat of a car. “Actually, he’d be twenty now.”
“No, but he will be older than you, Caroline. And he’ll probably have dark hair. Brown, black, maybe a dark red. And don’t worry about your mother. See this card here?” She tapped the Queen of Wands. “This is your mother and she’s sitting right beside one of your cup cards. Which means she will be approving of your love choices from now on. So this new boy for sure your mother will be accepting of him. But, I see at first you won’t trust her to be, and you will try to hide your relationship. Rest assured this is unneeded. Your mother will not try and sabotage anything.”
There was a little more after that, but that was the main part. That was the part that made Carry happiest (and most embarrassed). I thought it must be weird, living her life now, just waiting for this boy to drop into it who is going to become her new boyfriend.
By the time we left Madame Crystalle, I noticed a change in every one of us. Carry was in deep thought, probably about this new boy. My mother was in deep thought, probably about the stuff she was told that made absolutely no sense to anyone. Uncle Henry had changed because he found out he was allergic to incense. I was quietly cursing myself because I forgot to ask Madame Crystalle about the frog standing outside her shop, and Dewey had changed because he found out that, along with rugs and cats, there were also Persian people.
CHAPTER 4
That night, Leah lay in bed unable to sleep. Her encounter with the psychic kept rolling around in her mind. What happened earlier had affected her more than she had thought. She didn’t really believe in psychics or the ability to “see the future” at all; in fact, she normally referred to it as “hocus-pocus gobbledygook.” But her ad hoc session with Madame Crystalle had been so intense, Leah couldn’t help but be touched by it.
The problem was, the woman didn’t make any sense. Leah was a logical person, and there was no logic in what she’d been told. It was just a bunch of sketchy details without any definition. And to top it off, Leah kept going back to the fact that she had told Madame Crystalle on the phone she was a detective. That part made it a little too convenient for Leah’s liking.
Leah remembered every word the psychic told her. She’d gone over the words at least fifty times in her head, and there was nothing there she could do anything with. None of it made any sense. Some of it was downright ridiculous and funny. A maniac tailor who deprives people of their sight. Now there’s an image that’s really hard to conjure up in your imagination. Something about finding a body in darkness with writing on it. The psychic had been unable to say anything about the writing at all.
Yet, writing on a body found in darkness is pretty specific. They aren’t just things you pull out of your sleeves. So this was where Leah was torn into possibly believing the woman and attempting to follow up on the clues. But reall
y, what clues did she have? She didn’t even have a name or place for a victim. Or any kind of context to put this into.
It was the last piece of evidence Madame Crystalle had given Leah that made Leah consider trying to follow the sparse path of clues; it was the one thing that was tangible and possible to get something out of. The words on the sign: WELCOME TO GRAY . . .
It was a partial on a road sign. That should be traceable.
This road sign was something Leah might be able to find. But so what if she did? She still had no idea what it meant.
Did she even want to know what it meant? And sweet Jesus, if Police Chief Ethan Montgomery ever found out she was hunting around on a case with the sparse evidence she had been given from a psychic, he’d have a heyday with it.
It would probably be the day before Leah had to start looking for a new job.
“I guess you ain’t goin’ to get much sleep tonight,” she said to herself, deciding her best course of action at this point was to get up and go fix herself a mug of warm milk.
Sliding her feet into her slippers, she stood from her bed and slowly padded her way down the hardwood floors into the kitchen. Opening the fridge, she pulled out a carton of milk. She closed the fridge door and immediately her pulse went up twenty notches and she nearly jumped right out of her slippers. Hank had moved beside the opened door while she was peering in the fridge.
“God, Hank, you tryin’ to give me a coronary?”
“Sorry. I guess I’m a little sneaky in my old age. I just heard you walkin’ round and thought I’d come check on you, make certain you were all right.”
“Oh,” she said, almost in a sigh. “I’m okay. It’s just that psychic has me in a bit of a tizzy.”
“I can imagine. The woman was pretty intense. I was almost left in a tizzy, and it wasn’t even me she was talkin’ to!”
Leah pulled a pot from one of the cupboards and put it on the stove. She turned on the burner and poured in some milk. “Would you like some warm milk, too?” she asked Hank.
“Hmm. Actually, that sounds like it might just hit the spot. Thank you.”
Leah poured more milk into the pot and returned the milk carton to the fridge. Then she came back and started stirring the milk with a spoon as it simmered on the burner. “So,” she asked, “seriously. Why are you up?”
“Oh, you know me,” he said. “I don’t sleep at the best of times. And your sofa is comfortable and all, but it ain’t no bed in no five-star hotel room.” He laughed.
“I’m sorry,” Leah said. “I wish we had somewhere else to put you.”
Hank raised his hand. “No, no, I’m not really complainin’, I’m just bein’ funny. I don’t mind the sofa at all. So, about that psychic lady—you gonna act on anythin’ she said?”
“Well, that’s just it. Even if I wanted to do somethin’ based on what she told me, she didn’t actually say anythin’ I could possibly use to do anythin’.”
“Well, she told you folk are in danger. She told you someone is blindin’ them and that he’s actin’ like some maniac tailor, which could mean lots of disgustin’ things when I think it over.”
Leah set two mugs on the counter, took the pot of milk off the burner, and carefully tipped it to fill them with the now-warm milk. “Is that what you heard?” she asked Hank. “Because that’s not what I heard. I just heard a bunch of half-baked facts all rolled together.” She handed one of the mugs to Hank.
“Thank you,” he said. “That’s because you chose not to try and form the bits and pieces of information she gave you into somethin’ real. You’re too analytical. Sometimes you need to fill in the blanks yourself so that you can create—or at least finish—the story. Your story might not always be the right one—fact is, most of the time it probably isn’t—but it gives you a place to start. And as you go you can change your story as circumstances change and you gather more facts.”
Leah took a sip of her warm milk. It felt good going down her throat. “Ethan would kill me if he knew I was even considerin’ doin’ this.”
“Yeah, well, Ethan owes you a lot. He knows that. Hell, half this town knows that. Take chances, Leah. It’s the only way in life to push yourself to your full potential, and if we don’t all reach our full potential, what’s the point in being here?” He took a sip of his milk. “This is really good milk, by the way.”
“It’s just milk warmed up in a pot, Hank.”
“Still really good.”
“Thanks.”
A silence followed while Leah thought about what the psychic had told her. “So, say I do try and follow this up, Hank. Where the hell do I start? The only thing she gave that’s even slightly possible to research is a partial on a road sign.”
“Then that’s where you start. The road sign. Then at least you’ll know what town she’s talkin’ ’bout.”
Every bone in Leah’s body was telling her not to do this, telling her that following the scattered advice given to her from a Main Street psychic was a dumb idea. And yet, she knew, deep down in the pit of her gut, that was exactly what she was going to do. So she may as well stop fighting it and just give in and get it over with.
“What made you so smart, anyway?” she asked Hank.
“Watchin’ you grow up,” he replied.
“We both know what I’m gonna do,” she said.
“Yep, you’ve decided already,” Hank said.
Leah sighed. “I guess I have. Sometimes I hate my gut instincts.”
“Your gut instincts are what make you good at your job.”
Turned out, this time, she didn’t have to listen to any instincts.
CHAPTER 5
The body was discovered washed up on the shore of Willet Lake in the northwestern part of Alvin at approximately 6:55 A.M. Tuesday, just as the sun was rising. Leah had calls from the station being forwarded to her house, and she took the initial report from a witness named Luanne Cooper. Luanne was a photographer who just happened to be up early in Willet Park. She was taking pictures of winter birds and anything else she could find worthy of picture taking. Willet was a pretty little park, and its lake probably the prettiest in all of Alvin. With everything near on frozen and crystalized, it looked even prettier than usual.
When Leah asked why Luanne was in the park so early, she replied, “I don’t want pictures of people, I want pictures of nature. And by eight, even in the winter, people are out doin’ stuff. Walkin’ their dogs, walkin’ their spouses, just goin’ for walks. Gettin’ in the way of all my good shots.”
Leah asked her to remain at the site but not to touch anything. “If any other member of the public shows up before I do, please make sure they stay well away from the crime scene. The last thing we need is someone corruptin’ any evidence we might have.”
Luanne agreed to keep an eye on things.
Leah called Chris, waking him up from what must’ve been a helluva good dream to make him so cranky. “Why the hell you callin’ me at not even yet seven?” he asked.
“We got ourselves a body. Washed up in Willet Lake. Get yourself in uniform and meet me there. Sooner is better.”
“All right. I’m up. I’m comin’. I don’t suppose there’s any chance of there bein’ any coffee when I arrive?”
“Just get there,” Leah said, and hung up the phone.
It took her under twenty minutes to get dressed and make the drive to the park. It took Chris an extra ten or so before he arrived. By the time Leah got there, she could see what Luanne meant about the public starting to come into the park. They’d already begun encircling the crime scene, although Luanne had done a good job keeping them away from anything important.
The body was a woman who had washed up beneath one of the two wharfs that stretched out into the lake. She was lying facedown on her stomach with her arms outstretched, one in the sand on the beach, the other waving in the water. She wore a white collared shirt that floated ghostly. Her blond hair was long and full and matted with algae. From where Leah stood
, it looked like the dead woman was wearing a long skirt. Leah couldn’t see her feet in the murky water’s depths, but she imagined that an outfit like this would probably go with heels, and that heels or any other kind of slip-on shoe would’ve likely fallen off into the lake.
Leah immediately cordoned off the surrounding landscape with police tape, giving the crime scene a very wide berth. She wanted to keep the public as far away as possible. It was now going on eight and already over a dozen or so had collected to see what all the fuss was about.
Luanne Cooper, a short, slender woman with cropped, spiky, deep red hair and bright green eyes, stood to one side with a Canon camera slung over one shoulder and a camera bag over the other. She had red lipstick that reminded Leah of Christmas. Her ears were full of hoops (four in each); the last two on both ears had crosses hanging from them. The camera had a pricey telephoto lens attached to it. At least from what Leah knew about cameras, she guessed it to be pricey.
Leah tried to pin an age on Luanne, but it was tough. Likely, she was in her late twenties or possibly early thirties.
Chris brought the CSI kit and Polaroid camera from the trunk of his squad car and took pictures of the body from every angle. Then he scraped the fingernails and toenails, and bagged each in separate evidence bags.
Then, while Chris interviewed Luanne, Leah tried to discern different shoe prints in the muddy clay and sand around the wharf. It was hard to make out anything clearly because the location was well trodden. There were, however, four different shoe prints that looked like they’d pressed into the ground fairly recently. Leah made a cast of those, even though there was really no reason to believe that this was the place the body was thrown into the lake. It could’ve easily floated to this location on its own.
Leah took a look at Luanne Cooper’s feet. She was wearing brown boots with a slight heel. “Can you carefully walk down here, along the side of the wharf where there are no footprints?” Leah asked her when Chris had finished taking her statement.
A Thorn Among the Lilies Page 3