Grave Intent

by Deborah LeBlanc

  “You should see a doctor about that rash,” Janet said.

  “Huh? Oh, nah. It’s nearly all gone.” He lifted his chin so she could see the full length of his neck. “Soap and water took care of most of it.”

  Janet offered a nod. In truth, his face looked bloodless now, his eyes puffy and red.

  Wilson sidestepped his way to the door, opened it a few inches, and peered out. “Michael didn’t happen to come by while I was washing up, did he?”

  “No. Was he supposed to?”

  “No, no, just wondering was all.” Wilson glanced toward the window again. “So you guys are heading up to Carlton I hear?”

  “Well . . . yes.”

  He nodded, but to the clock on the stove not her. “I guess you won’t be seeing Michael again before you leave then, huh?”

  Janet’s internal defenses went to full alert. Why was Wilson suddenly so interested in when she’d see Michael? “I suppose I won’t,” she admitted.

  He grinned, and his blood-webbed eyes fastened on the window again. “Good, good.”

  “What?”

  “I mean . . . uh . . . I’m sure you’ll have a good trip.”

  Growing more bewildered by the minute, Janet turned away from Wilson and called out, “Girls, you about ready?”

  “Almost!” Heather shouted from the hall.

  “Janet?”

  Shocked by the nearness of Wilson’s voice, Janet spun about. He stood an arm’s length away from her.

  “No need to be so jumpy,” he said. “I just wanted to ask you something.”

  She took a step back. “What?”

  Wilson frowned and seemed to study the top of her head. Finally he asked, “Why do you dislike me so much?”

  Stunned by the question, Janet gawked.

  “Really,” he said. “I want to know.”

  Janet couldn’t remember the last time she had so much trouble swallowing saliva. “You sure you want to discuss this?” she asked.

  They stared at each other for a long, unblinking moment. In the distance, a drawer banged shut and small feet shuffled across wood floors.

  “Nah,” Wilson said. “Suppose not.” He put his jacket back on, then shrugged. “Guess I’d better be going.”

  Janet didn’t reply.

  Wilson lowered his head and walked slowly away. Old age appeared ponderous on his shoulders, like a load of bricks, causing his body to slump, his back to bow. Janet couldn’t get used to seeing Wilson this way, so frail looking, so brittle. Empathy welled up inside her, which took Janet by surprise.

  She opened her mouth, ready to tell him to stay, to talk, when he suddenly stopped and snapped his fingers. He turned around, and Janet saw a glint of mischief in his eyes. It was quickly replaced with a mournful, pitiful gaze. The right corner of his mouth jittered.

  “I meant to ask,” Wilson said. “Would you have a few bucks to spare until Monday?”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  A panoramic view of hell, disguised as beige, floral wallpaper, stretched out before Anna, and she studied it, transfixed. Every floret had become Thalia’s frightened face, every petal her daughter’s open mouth, crying for help, each twining vine Thalia’s arms desperately reaching for her mother. No matter how long Anna stared, no matter how many times she shifted in her seat, she sensed the same message deep in her soul—in her womb. Thalia was in trouble. Dead, yes—but somehow, somewhere in trouble just the same.

  Anna fidgeted in her seat again, wanting to look back at the casket. She knew if she did, though, Ephraim would have her hauled out of the room, stripping her of the last chance she’d have to be near Thalia’s body. So she focused harder on the wall, trying to decipher the turmoil percolating inside her. She knew timing was everything, but had the time come? Was it this moment? Should she wait a bit longer?

  Even more confusing to Anna was the occasional mental image she received of a fair-haired child with dead, blue eyes—and the dark-haired woman Anna had met earlier by the water fountain. What did they have to do with Thalia?

  Oh, my beautiful daughter, my Thalia, I hear you. I feel you. But how do I find you? Where do I even begin to look?

  A memory suddenly tagged Anna’s heart. It reminded her of the time Thalia was five and had gotten lost in a crowded market. Anna had been so alarmed and distraught by her disappearance, she’d barely had the wherewithal to think. She’d pushed and shoved her way through people, shouting for Thalia until she was hoarse, searching for any piece of clothing, any hair color that might match her daughter’s. Soon, Anna discovered herself silent and tracking Thalia strictly by sense. She allowed everything around her with no significance to fade away, concentrating only on the vibrations of Thalia’s emotions. Anna felt them so strongly it was as though they belonged to her. Fear—loneliness—the despair of one being too small in a world much too big. Those sensations had led Anna to Thalia like mud tracks on a white floor.

  Anna sat back in her chair expectantly. Maybe that’s what she needed to do now. Simply follow the tracks.

  Urgency suddenly grew up Anna’s spine, like a tree with a thousand crooked branches. Each bough reached, poked, prodded against a nerve ending until she could barely remain seated. She felt it so strongly.

  Thalia’s fear—

  Anna reached for the tool she’d managed to keep hidden from Ephraim.

  Thalia’s loneliness—

  She slipped it out from beneath the cuff of her blouse. The tip pricked the pad of flesh beneath her fingers, drawing a drop of blood.

  Thalia—too small in another world much too big—

  The fear Anna intuited from Thalia quickly escalated to dread, the loneliness to a profound sense of abandonment.

  Toosmall—too big.

  Too much.

  It was time.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Michael wasn’t accustomed to hyperventilating. He’d heard breathing into a paper sack helped, but even if he had one, it wouldn’t solve his real problem. It wouldn’t bring back the coin.

  He lowered the top lid of the casket a few inches, hesitating. He hated to close it, but what other choice did he have? If he brought the missing coin to the Stevensons’ attention, there was little doubt all hell would break loose. He didn’t think Ephraim, or Antony, or any other member of their congregation had removed it because they’d been too adamant about not touching the corpse. Almost to the point of disgust. That left only two other possibilities. Sally and Wilson.

  Michael wrote Sally off immediately. He’d known her most of his life. She would have sawed off her own arms before stealing anything. Even during business hours when she had free access to his office, Sally had never so much as taken a postage stamp from his desk without asking. Wilson on the other hand . . .

  Although Michael knew his father was capable of making hard-hearted, stupid choices, he’d never known him to steal from a casket. Not in all the years they’d worked together, no matter how tight money got. Misappropriate funds from the business? Yes. Swipe grocery money from his wife? Yes. But steal from a casket? This would be a first.

  Reluctantly, Michael closed and latched the lid, then polished a smudge on the coffin with his coat sleeve.All the while he took deep, slow breaths in an attempt to control his anger.

  In through the nostrils, out through the mouth. In through the nostrils, out through the mou—

  A loud, long scream froze Michael’s deflating lungs.

  Oh, shit, someone noticed the coin was missing.

  He turned around slowly, his mind whirling through nonsensical explanations.

  The few people left in the room didn’t point at him accusingly nor did they storm the casket. They were too busy gawking at the blood dripping from Anna Stevenson’s wrists.

  Within seconds two-dozen women raced into the viewing room and fluttered around Anna like myopic moths.

  Michael hurried toward them. “Give her room,” he said, and the moths pressed closer to the bleeding woman. “She needs air!” The cir
cle grew tighter still, hiding the calm, white face from his view.

  Turning on his heels, Michael rushed for the phone in the reception area. He collided with Sally in the doorway.

  “Where’s Stevenson?” he asked, catching her by the shoulders.

  “Which one?”

  “The girl’s father, Ephraim.”

  “Outside, I think. Why?” Sally peered over his shoulder. “What’s going—is that blood?”

  Michael looked back at the crimson pool widening on the floor. “Yeah, it’s Stevenson’s wife.”

  “Oh, Lord.” Sally’s face turned ashen. “You find him. I’ll call 911.”

  “You will call no one,” Ephraim’s voice boomed behind them. He shoved his way past Michael and Sally and stormed into the room. His voice thundered as he commanded the women surrounding his wife to step aside.

  “Mr. Stevenson, we need to call an ambulance,” Michael insisted. “Your wife’s losing a lot of blood.”

  “You will call no one!” Ephraim repeated, shouting over his shoulder. “We will tend to our own.” Then he turned back to Anna and grabbed her chin, forcing her to face him. Her eyes were dull brown stones that Michael suspected saw nothing at all. The hollows of her cheeks were splotchy and paling fast, her lips an almost nonexistent waxen line. Her forearms dangled over the arms of the chair, and her sliced wrists dripped relentlessly.

  Ephraim exhaled her name, “Anna.” His thumb pressed against her lips, then he removed his hand and brushed at it as though repulsed. “Cela!” he yelled.

  A young, pregnant woman waddled to Ephraim’s side. Her dark, eager eyes searched his face.

  With a barrage of rolling r’s and staccato syllables, Ephraim spat his demands, and Cela hurried to comply. From a nearby satchel, she removed a diaper, ripped it in two, then barked a command to two other women. The women rushed to Anna’s side and laid their hands on her shoulders. Cela stepped carefully to the side of the chair, then quickly wrapped Anna’s left wrist with a section of diaper. Anna’s expression remained blank, her breathing heavy and audible as though she’d fallen into a deep sleep.

  As soon as the other diaper remnant was tied around her right wrist, Anna was lifted to her feet. A single-edged razor fell from her lap to the floor. The women gasped collectively, and Anna was quickly escorted from the room.

  “So, so sad,” Sally murmured.

  Michael stood numb. He’d witnessed many spectacles over the years as a funeral director. Wives trying to climb into their dead husband’s casket, a father who’d obsessively clipped the toenails of his deceased son throughout a viewing. Once he’d even seen a woman spit on her dead brother’s face, then rub the spittle across his cheeks and into his ears. As bizarre as all those things were, not once had he been faced with an attempted suicide.

  Relieved that Anna was at least being tended to, Michael whispered to Sally, “Did Chad get back yet?”

  “A couple of minutes ago.”

  “Have him get the hearse ready. It’s time for this to end.”

  “Way past time,” Sally agreed.

  When she slipped out of the room, Michael walked over to Ephraim. He teetered between professionalism and chivalry, debating on whether he should keep his nose out of Stevenson’s business and just finish with the service or flatten Ephraim’s face for being a Neanderthal to his wife. He figured the latter would solve little. The Stevensons would be leaving soon, and his interference might only serve to make Anna’s situation worse once Ephraim had her alone.

  Michael glared at Ephraim. “Have you assigned pallbearers?”

  Ephraim looked at him as one would a pestering dog.

  “Men who will carry the casket,” Michael said sternly, assuming Ephraim didn’t understand the term, ‘pallbearer’. “It’s time to go to the church.”

  Ephraim turned away and with an unsteady hand, signaled for a one-eared woman, who stood nearby. Quickly and silently she left the room only to return a moment later with six men in tow. Lenora appeared behind them.

  The entourage walked in procession to the casket. When they reached it, Lenora laid her hands on top of the casket and began to chant while her fingers slid across the polished surface. A hot band of apprehension wrapped around Michael’s stomach when she pulled against the lids. What if she opened one and noticed the coin missing? How would he explain?

  But Lenora’s hands kept moving. They traveled along the handles and over each bronzed corner. After a while, she made her way to the water glass and bowl still resting on the stool at the head of the coffin. She lifted the bowl and placed it on top of the casket, then removed the glass and holding it reverently in both hands, walked slowly out of the room.

  The six men separated into two groups of threes, a group on either side of the casket.

  Suspecting they were preparing to lift it, Michael said to Ephraim,“There’s no need to carry the casket. I’ll get a church truck so you can roll it out.”

  Ignoring him, Ephraim signaled to the pallbearers. Together they reached for the rail handles and lifted the casket off the bier, the bowl balancing atop it.

  With a perturbed sigh, Michael stepped aside as they carried Thalia out.

  Ephraim followed them with his head bowed low. Michael trailed behind Ephraim, glancing once over his shoulder at the vacant bier and the lone chair, which sat bracketed in blood.

  When they reached the front entrance, the doors were already open with Sally and Chad standing on either side. The hearse, backed up to the building, awaited its passenger.

  Chad led the pallbearers to the back of the vehicle and gestured for them to set the casket on the rollers inside. The incense bowl was removed, and the bronze box gently pushed in and secured. One of the pallbearers closed the hearse door behind it.

  Resolved to civility, Michael turned to offer Ephraim last condolences, but the man was already sliding into a station wagon four vehicles away. Anna sat behind him, her face pressed against the window. She looked like a lost, desolate child.

  A shout of “Mia subtolamain!” jerked Michael’s attention back to the hearse. Lenora, hunchbacked and in a pitcher’s stance, had the water glass balanced in her right hand. The reality of what she prepared to do sent Michael’s arms waving in the air.

  “Stop!” he shouted.

  Lenora threw the glass against the door of the hearse, missing the back window by inches. She turned sideways as water and shards of glass flew everywhere. Once the debris settled, she trotted off to a nearby van.

  Appalled, Michael could only gawk at the three-inch scratch now etched across the back of his vehicle.

  “Damn,” Chad said, appearing beside him with Sally. He went to the hearse and examined the damage.

  Sally shook her head in disbelief. “The nerve of those people. After all we did for them. After all we put up with.”

  Throughout the parking lot, engines roared to life, and cars and trucks began to line up on the street.

  Michael kneaded his brow. “Yeah, well, there’s nothing we can do about this now. We still have to get them to the church and cemetery.”

  “If you want, I can make that run,” Chad offered.

  Sally scowled. “Are you crazy?”

  “Pretty big crowd for you to handle alone,” Michael said.

  Chad opened the driver’s door to the hearse. “What’s to handle? The pallbearers will take the casket through the church and cemetery. All I have to do is direct them on where to go. Besides, the two bodies from Magnolia are in the prep room, and since you’re faster at embalming than I am, it makes sense that you stay. If we both go to the cemetery, those bodies won’t get embalmed until late. We’ll be here past midnight.”

  The man has a point, Michael thought. If they didn’t divide the tasks, not only would they be working late, he’d probably be forced to put some chores off until tomorrow, which meant a later departure for Carlton.

  “You that sure you can handle it?” Michael asked.

  “Absolutely.”
/>   “All right then, but take the cell phone.”

  “Got it right here.” Chad patted his jacket pocket.

  “If you run into any problems, give me a call.” Michael turned to Sally. “Better yet, why don’t you—”

  She ticked a finger at him. “Huh-uh. Don’t even ask.”

  “What?”

  “For me to ride along with Chad. I’ve had my fill of those people.”

  “Sal, Chad hasn’t been around long enough to know how Father Melancon and Jasper work. You have. Just sit in the hearse. If he runs into a snag with either one of them, you’ll be right there.”

  “Like that’ll do any good,” she said. “You know Melancon. This late in the day he’ll be so anxious to get back to his rum and Coke those people will be lucky to get holy water sprinkled on the casket.”

  “You don’t have to come,” Chad said. “I’ll figure it—”

  “And as for Jasper,” Sally continued. “That caretaker’s deafer than a rock. It wouldn’t matter who told him what anyway. He couldn’t hear it.”

  “In case, Sal,” Michael said. “Just in case. You shouldn’t have to deal with the Stevensons at all.”

  Sally pursed her lips while car engines whined impatiently nearby. Finally, she threw her hands up and marched to the passenger’s side of the hearse. “Okay, okay, but if those people start acting up in church, I’m leaving. With or without Chad.”

  Chad slipped behind the steering wheel, closed the door, and gave Michael a thumbs up through the open window. “It’ll be all right, boss. Don’t worry.”

  “Quit sucking up already and go,” Sally said, and slammed her door shut.

  Michael peered into the hearse. “When you’re done at the cemetery, both of you can head straight home. We’ll meet back here at nine in the morning.”

  “You got it.” Chad started the hearse and began to power up the window.

  Michael backed away, then remembered Wilson. “Hey, wait.”