Elinor and Dot joined her on the porch. The view of the valley below was stunning. Above them, the summit of Big Bear Mountain reared its knobby head.
“Have they taken him away already?” Dot asked.
“No, ma’am. He’s laid out there in the front bedroom.”
“So you’re waiting for the funeral home,” Elinor said.
“How would they know about it?”
“You haven’t called yet? Would you like me to make the call?”
“Them cell phones don’t work up here on the mountain. My granddaughter pitches a fit about it every time she comes. Directly I’ll get the truck out and go let Mr. Cranston know to come pick him up.”
“Mrs. Deaver, are you telling me that you don’t have a telephone?”
“I reckon I could get one now. Martin never would let ‘em run the wire up here for fear it’d set fire to the place.”
Astonished, Elinor and Dot turned to look at the rutted track they had just traveled, as innocent of cell phone towers as it was of electric poles and telephone lines.
*****
“I feel like such an idiot,” Elinor said.
“We forget there are still folks living back in these hollers who distrust the modern world,” Dot said. “I smelled coal-oil, too, that first time we were here and didn’t even think about what it meant.”
“Well, that’s that, Dot. We may never find out how Eula Wyckham spent her last hours on this earth.”
“As a mathematician, I would point out that all we’ve done is eliminate the possibility she telephoned from the Deaver place.”
“Somewhere between here and the library she called Guy Pettibone. Unless he lied about it. My heavenly day, what’s that all about?”
Speeding toward them, lights flashing, screamed a Johns Valley Police cruiser, closely followed by another squad car, then another. Bringing up the rear, with more lights flashing—these mounted to the side mirror—was Shelby Jacks’ pickup. Elinor turned in her seat to watch the procession slow and turn into the gravel road they had just passed.
“That’s where you saw Kate’s car the first time we went to the Deaver place,” Elinor said. “Oh, my! Dot, I know where Eula Wyckham made that call. Turn around.”
“Whose road is it?”
“The Calenders. I saw it on the mailbox as we passed.”
“Mathew bought property out this way. We all signed a card for him in the teacher’s lounge.”
“And Kate paid a courtesy call on Janie Calender the day Betty Blanton listed Eula Wyckham’s house with her.”
A steep gravel road opened out on acreage that was the site of several rustic-looking tin-roofed structures, one of which was a two-story home. Automobiles belonging to the residents were corralled against the house by the posse of police vehicles, silent now, though their emergency lights still whirled. A car door had been left open, suggesting haste. There was not a soul to be seen.
Dot backed the Datsun up a low knoll overlooking the yard and they rolled down the windows. The scene seemed frozen in time, not even a dog to bark at them. Then uniformed officers rounded the corner of the house with Mathew Calender between them, his arms cuffed behind his back. Close on their heels, Shelby Jacks and DeWayne Ratliff, carrying a bundle of burlap, brought up the rear. Seeing Dot’s car, Shelby Jacks peeled off from the others and came over to issue a terse order.
“Clear out, ladies. We can’t be responsible for the safety of civilians.”
“Oh, nonsense!” Elinor said, getting out of the car.
“Ah, come on, Elinor! Get back in the car.”
Elinor ignored her nephew-in-law, and Dot, taking her cue from Elinor, did likewise.
Approaching the cruiser, whose backseat now contained the prisoner, Dot leaned down and confronted him. “For heaven’s sake, Mathew! Why would you do such a thing? Do you care nothing at all about your family?”
Mathew Calender hung his head and said nothing.
“He confessed,” DeWayne told Elinor. “That laptop you insisted was so all-fired important? Well, here it is.” He indicated the sacking in his hands. “Now do me a favor and take Miss Dot and both of you head back to town. What are you doing here anyway?” he couldn’t help adding.
Elinor pulled Dot away from the door so they could close it. They watched as police vehicles backed, turned, rearranged themselves, and departed in the order they had arrived. Out on the highway the sirens started up again. Only now did they notice that a small cluster had assembled on the front porch, Janie Calender, still wearing nightclothes, and her children, both of whom were taller than she. The mother and son were expressionless, but the daughter, she who had lately had her own brush with the law, was weeping.
“What do we do?” Dot whispered.
“See if we can be of any practical help.” Elinor walked toward the group. “Janie, I’m so sorry. Do you want me to call Claire?”
“She’ll be getting ready for Sunday morning worship. Please don’t bother her.”
“I’ll put on some coffee and start some breakfast.” Elinor walked around the group and entered the house. Dot, less certain of a welcome, waited for the family to go inside before joining Elinor in the kitchen.
“Elinor, do you really think we should be here at a time like this?”
“This is exactly the time we should be here. Go see if you can help with the kids. Talk to the girl.”
“Right.” Dot bustled to the door, but turned back. “What for?”
“Find out if her father left the house again after they got back from the Little Rays banquet.”
A few minutes later, Janie Calender came into the kitchen. She had put on jeans and a tee shirt, tidied her hair. Without makeup, she seemed almost as young and vulnerable as her daughter. She opened the refrigerator and set out a few things, the remains of a berry cobbler, a pitcher of tea.
“I don’t know what I’m doing,” she said.
“Sit down, my dear. You’ve had a terrible shock. Have you and the children eaten anything?”
Janie shook her head. “We were still in bed. Mathew likes to work in his shop while it’s cool. Mrs. Woodward, what are you doing here?”
Elinor evaded the question with a half-truth. “I saw the parade of police vehicles and came to see what the ruckus was about.” She stopped what she was doing and sat down at the table across from Janie. “My dear, it’s time to come clean about your relationship with Eula Wyckham. What was she to you? Your aunt?”
Janie looked startled. “What makes you think that?”
“By all accounts Eula Wyckham was not a very warm person, yet she invited an orphaned teenager to come live with her. I don’t think she would’ve done that unless you were kin to her.”
“Well, you’ve got it wrong. She was my mother.”
“Your mother? Oh, my. She gave you up?”
“One sister wanted children but couldn’t get pregnant. The other didn’t want children and got pregnant. How did you know?”
“People generally leave their property to a blood relative if they have one.”
“She wanted to get her affairs in order. She had terminal cancer.”
Finally, Elinor thought. A motive. If only the motivation to propel a non-religious woman through the doors of New Community Church.
“She was dying?”
“She said it had spread to her lungs and brain.”
“She must have picked New Community because she knew you would be there.”
“I was surprised, but I welcomed her as I would anybody. We were promoting the Little Rays banquet and I told her about it. She said she didn’t have any money with her but would I stop by her house sometime so she could buy a ticket. It was just a ruse, you see. But I didn’t want to go to her house, so I just said, oh, pay me next Sunday, or something like that. So, out of the blue, she dropped in, said she had a patient out this way.”
“So, she knew where you lived.”
“Probably saw our name on the mailbox.”
> “And that was Saturday, the day she died?”
“I was working in the kitchen when I heard her car pull up. I invited her in and offered her a cold drink. She began telling me about her health, very matter-of-fact and dry, like she was. It seemed rude to ask her why she was telling me about it. Then she started talking about when my mother was sick. She said that when she got the news, she took a job with a rural health association in our area so she could help tend to her. I said, how did you know my mother? That’s when she told me they were sisters. She thought I knew, but I didn’t. My mother never told me.”
“Gracious me! And you never suspected?”
“Why would I? She was nothing like my mother.”
“Why would your mother not tell you?”
“Maybe she was waiting till I got older.”
“Tuberculosis, wasn’t it?”
Janie nodded and reached for a napkin to wipe her nose. She may not have a tear to shed for Eula Wyckham, but it was clear that her mother’s death still affected her deeply. “She had been a nurse, too, when she was younger. She caught the disease from one of her patients and it didn’t respond to antibiotics. She was confined to one room of the house, and I had to stay out because children are more susceptible. My father used one set of dishes for her and boiled them after every use. Sometimes I would go stand outside her window and she would blow me kisses.”
“I can see how an invalid might lose track of her family.”
“We moved a lot because of my father’s work. At least, that’s what he told me. I think now that people found out about her illness and asked us to move.”
“The sisters must have been close at one time in order to come to such an intimate agreement.”
“I don’t know anything about that.”
“Did she tell you the identity of your biological father?”
“I didn’t ask. It makes no difference to me.”
“Did Ms. Wyckham use the phone while she was here?”
“She called the garage about her car.”
“Was anyone else here at the time?”
“I remember hearing Jeffrey practice his trombone.” Even now the muffled tenor drifted down the stairwell. “He’s not indifferent,” his mother explained. “He’s stressed.”
“Was your husband here?”
“Mathew was probably in his shop. He didn’t leave for the mountains until after church Sunday. I’m not sure about Sara. She was… she got involved with an older fellow, perhaps you heard.”
“There are three cars out front. Does Jeffrey drive?”
“He can drive. He doesn’t have a driver’s license yet.”
“The VW is Sara’s car?”
“That’s how she got involved with the mechanic,” Janie said drily. “The starter went out.”
“Did you tell your husband that Eula Wyckham was your birth mother?”
“I didn’t tell anyone. I didn’t mean for anyone to know, but then she left me her house and it got people wondering. I just said it was because I stayed with her that time. I didn’t want a connection to her. I resent her coming here and saying she was my mother. I had a mother. And I loved her very much!”
“Did she tell you that she had made a will leaving her estate to you?”
“No! I was flabbergasted when Betty Blanton called me into her office that day. Your niece Kate thought I should grieve for her, but I felt nothing for that woman.”
“Did she bring a laptop computer into the house with her that day?”
“She didn’t even bring a purse. She took a ten-dollar bill out of her pocket and laid it on the table. I went to get a ticket for her and she left.”
“It must’ve been in her car. ” Dot had been lurking outside the doorway, waiting to catch her attention. Elinor pushed herself away from the table and said briskly, “Dot, I think we need to fix this family a good breakfast.”
“I’m for that,” Dot said.
*****
Dot was eager to share the fruits of her own inquiry. “The girl sleeps at the back of the house. If Mathew went out again after the banquet, I doubt she would’ve known about it. But the son’s windows overlook the gravel parking area. Did you notice the mud on the VW tires?”
“How could I miss it? Red as blood. Where do the parents sleep?”
“Downstairs at the back.”
“Sara’s had plenty of practice sneaking out of the house. I’ll bet she knows how to do it without waking her parents.”
“Easy enough to do. I had a stick shift once. She could let off the brake and roll down to the highway before starting the engine.”
“The boy probably knows how to do that, too.”
“My money’s on the girl. She’s already been in trouble.”
“Mathew hunts and fishes, Dot. He would own a boning knife.”
“And any of them could have taken it. I wonder why Eula Wyckham gave up her baby?”
“An unmarried girl finds herself in the family way, the father refuses to help, her sister in Oklahoma desperately wants a baby—Ada probably wasn’t sick yet—so that’s how the sisters handled it.”
“Doesn’t explain why Mathew Calender would kill his mother-in-law. He didn’t even know about her till that day.”
“Maybe we’ll know more when we get a look at Eula Wyckham’s computer. I think I know what she was looking for, Janie’s father.”
“Elinor! I bet you’re right.”
“The reason Eula Wyckham made a career change and relocated to Johns Valley was to be near her sister and daughter. It must have broken her heart to see the kind of home she had consigned that baby to. Kate says Pritchett, the surveyor, drank. He committed suicide after the death of his wife, without making any provision for his daughter. Eula Wyckham tried to make amends by taking Janie in, but it was too late to forge a relationship, and, in any case, Wyckham was emotionally ill-equipped for the job. She didn’t know how to console a young woman after the death of her mother—or who she thought was her mother. She should’ve told her then.”
“Janie makes no bones about not liking the woman.”
“Young Janie Pritchett may not have known why Eula Wyckham was being so helpful to her, but she was sensitive to the undercurrents, and they propelled her into marriage with a man so introverted that Mathew Calender might have been solitary to this day but for the girl’s determination to get out of Eula Wyckham’s house.”
“But why kill Eula Wyckham? She was going to be dead soon.”
“And why take her laptop, which she apparently left in the car? But there you have it, Dot. He confessed. It’s over. Mathew Calender is the murderer we’ve been looking for. I feel terribly let down and sad for that family.”
Approaching the edge of town, Dot turned east on the state highway to take Elinor home. “My brain feels hot,” she said. “I never did get back to sleep this morning.”
“Then I take it you’re not going to church.”
“You’ve got to be kidding.”
Chapter 11
Elinor was so late for church that, literally, it was all over but the singing. Slipping into a back pew, she met the pastor’s eye as Claire swept along the center aisle in a long ivory-colored robe and scarlet vestments to take up a position just past the vestibule to greet her departing congregation. Elinor allowed the sanctuary to empty out some before going against the flow to reach the office wing. At this hour the hallway was jammed with mothers collecting toddlers, choir members stripping off robes, teenagers noisily catching up with social lives interrupted by an hour of solemnity.
Based on her long association with the inner-workings of churches, Elinor correctly guessed which closed door concealed a cadre of elders counting out the morning offering. Two men and a woman looked up inquiringly. Before them, spread across a table, lay a jumble of currency, checks, and small sealed offertory envelopes.
“Need any help?” Elinor asked.
“Don’t think so, Mrs. Woodward. Thanks anyway.” Mary Tingley looke
d back at her stack of ones. “Oooh, now I have to start all over. Have you seen Janie? It’s not like her to miss church.”
“I’m sure she’ll turn up.” Elinor closed the door. Further along the hallway, she tried the door to Janie’s office and found it locked. Opposite, the pastor’s door stood open. Elinor went in and sat down to wait, not bothering to turn on the lights. Some fifteen minutes passed before Claire Holmes entered behind her and removed her long colorful stole and ivory robe.
“Oh, Elinor! You startled me. I’m perishing in all these layers. I threatened not to wear anything under my robe this summer, but I chickened out. What’s up?”
“Close the door, Claire. It’s about Janie. Her husband has been arrested for the murder of Eula Wyckham and Patrick Allen Childers.”
“Oh, no.” Claire sank into the chair next to Elinor. “Poor Janie. First Sara falling head over heels for a child predator, and now this. Why on earth would he do such a thing?”
“The police will have to sort all that out. I’m here about another matter. You said you had an appointment with Patrick Allen Childers. What was it for?”
“Nothing important. I was hoping Patrick’s company could offer a more competitive price for an insurance policy that’s part of my compensation package. Actually, there’s a committee that handles all that. I’m not supposed to worry my little head about the business of running the church.”
“What made you think of it?”
“I saw the invoice and was shocked at how high it was. But, it is based on age and there’s no denying I’m getting older.”
“You don’t normally see church expenses?”
“Oh, yes, I do. I sit down with Janie once a month and we go over everything. She, in turn, reports to the finance committee. It was all set up years ago. They don’t expect me to have an accounting degree. My job is to visit the sick and pray over the dead. But what’s this about Mathew? Why did he kill those people?”
“I wish I knew, Claire. Perhaps it will come out when they take his statement. He has confessed.”
“Dear God. I don’t know how people recover from something like this. Janie’s so conscientious that she didn’t want to disturb me with the news. She called an elder to say the family wouldn’t be attending worship service this morning. I had no idea why.”
Death In The Stacks: An Elinor & Dot library mystery Page 19