Dark Places

by Linda Ladd

  I waited a second or two for them to bust out in “I wish I was in the land of cotton” and sway together under crossed Confederate flags. It didn’t happen. No flags available, I guess.

  “How long have you worked here, Ms. Asholt?”

  “Since last summer. August first, to be exact.”

  She pronounced it summuh. She pronounced all her r-ending words that way. I didn’t like her much already. But hey, I didn’t like anybody lately. I was becoming antisocial. I was in a real bad mood, too. I didn’t like professors getting eaten up by spiders, I guess. Or psychics telling me my days were numbered. Or assholes who ran pseudo prep schools. After admitting my problems, however, I tried to lighten up. I smiled, a grim caricature that resembled an annoyed skeleton. Time to get to know Ms. Southern Belle a little better.

  “How do you like it here at the academy?”

  “I just luv it. I luv playin’ at office politics. And I’m damn good at it, too.” She laughed and winked as if Bud and I should find that admirable.

  I said, “And office politics reign supreme around here, I bet.”

  “Oh, yeah, is that ever true. I learned right off what I had to do to survive around here. Kiss Simon Classon’s butt and you’ll get whatever ya want.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes’m.”

  Yes’m? Bo Peep was truly grating on my nerves now. I liked southern accents but Bud’s southern charm was just about the only deep-south drawl I was going to put up with. Maybe because Bud’s was for real. This lady was as phony as a three-dolluh bill.

  “So you’re sayin’ you’re a brownnoser.” Bud was frowning, seemed slightly put off himself now, as if Asholt was no longer such a welcome member of his southern charm school.

  “Sure, that’s the only way ya get ahead in places like this. Not just me, pretty much everybody around here. Classon told people what to do, and trust me, they did it, or else he’d get ’em. I fired ten people right aftuh I got here just ’cause he called down and told me to. I’m no fool. I know which way the wind’s blowin’ and so I use it to my personal advantage.”

  I said, “Gee, you sound like a real jerk.” Sometimes I’m downright forthright.

  Asholt seemed stunned for a moment, as if I’d slapped her across the face with a glove and challenged her to a duel in the back lot of Tara Plantation. Too bad I couldn’t. It would be serious fun. Maybe I should. I thought about it. She was gathering her wits now, no doubt thinking, uh-oh, gotta brownnose, gotta brownnose, do it, do it, quick, quick, think up something good to say to soothe the ruffled-up detective missus.

  “Now, Miss Claire . . .”

  She pronounced that Miz Clayruh, and that did it for me. “Look, ma’am, don’t call me Miz anything. You got that? I’m not Scarlett O’Hara and neither are you. This is a homicide investigation, and I’m the detective in charge. I prefer you to call me Detective Morgan and just park that whining southern accent because it doesn’t cut it with me. Do you understand me or do I have to put it in Alabaman?”

  Shocked, yes, she was. Her practiced phony charm wasn’t working on that mean ole Yankee gal, gee whillikers, yee haw, and let’s go make some praline candies. But she got her nose back in joint real quick. “I am truly sorry, Detective Morgan, if I offended you. It was unintentional, I promise you.”

  Yeah, I’m sure. Her southern accent had balanced itself to a normal rendition of Birmingham environs, if I was any judge of southern climes. Just as long as she never, ever called me Miz Clayruh again. I felt hostile, bristling even, and I blamed it primarily on how much I loathed and detested brownnosers, especially proud, self-admitted ones. One type you didn’t meet a whole helluva lot. Only a very self-confident, well-practiced suck-up would openly admit it, I’d say. I controlled my bone-deep aversion to the woman. “No problem, ma’am. Now, I need access to your student records starting today and going back to the first day the academy opened its doors. Will that be a problem?”

  “Of course not. In fact, you can get that information in my office. I’ll need to check with Director Johnstone first, you understand.”

  “Okay. Why don’t you scurry up there and see what you can do?”

  Bud looked askance at me as I watched Ms. South of the Mason-Dixon leave in a real hurry. “Wow, Claire. That went well. What’d you have for lunch? Three-inch nails?”

  “C’mon, Bud, you can’t like her.”

  “What’s like got to do with it? Hell, I don’t like anybody around here. But I’m tryin’ to be civil. And she was a big fan of Bear Bryant. Said she actually met him once at a U. of A. publicity day. Now that’s something.”

  “Oh, well, now I’ve changed my opinion. She must be Mother Teresa.”

  “You’re in one helluva foul mood.”

  Right. And I knew I was, tried half-heartedly to analyze my funk for a second but Bud beat me to the punch.

  “You miss Black, don’t you? Sleepin’ alone at night is makin’ you all grouchy, huh?”

  “Shut up. And that’s not it.” I glanced around the cafeteria. “I don’t like being on this campus. I don’t like the people who work here. It gives me bad vibes that I can’t shake. You know, like I should do the world a favor, throw all these people in jail, and swallow the key.”

  “God, Claire, what’s wrong with you? Shake it off already. We’ve got a job to do.”

  I glared at him, but he was right. I was being unprofessional. Time to get it together and put some serious brakes on my personal opinions. “Sorry. You’re right. The way Classon died has made me edgy. I’ll get myself up to snuff.”

  Bud brightened. “Up to snuff. Know where that comes from?”

  “Oh God, please make him stop.”

  “Yes’m, Ms. Clayruh, way back in the 1600s everybody used snuff. That’s finely powdered tobacco, if you don’t know, and lots of professional baseball players use it nowadays, but they’re changing to Dubble Bubble now because Skoal causes cancer. Anyway, back then people could sniff it to see if it was good quality. So, if something’s good, it’s up to snuff.”

  I leaned back in my chair. “I am so glad to know all that, Bud. It’s going to help in this investigation, I can feel it.”

  Bud shook his head, then he said, “You hungry? Maybe if you ate something, you’d feel better. Act better, even. How about a cappuccino? Here, let me go get you one. And by the way, Merry Christmas and all that good cheer and peace on earth stuff.”

  I watched him stroll over to the cappuccino machine. He turned, waved, and blew me a kiss. I couldn’t stifle my smile. I shifted my attention to the kids eating at the surrounding tables. They all were having a great time, laughing and talking, acting like regular goofy teenagers. I probably acted like that once a long time ago before people I loved started dying off one by one. I ended that train of thought in its tracks, and refocused on the chattering students. I wondered if they knew about all the ugly stuff going on at the highest levels up in Director Jesus’s office. I thought not, but they probably wouldn’t care. Probably didn’t even know who the director was, probably thought he was some Bahamian sandal salesman floating around campus.

  Bud was back. “Here you go. Drink this and turn back into the real Claire Morgan. Then you can tell me what put ya in such an insult-slinging mood. Hell, I bet our friend Beulah has puncture wounds in her forehead.”

  “Sorry. I just want the guy who did this, and we’re not exactly getting anywhere fast.” I picked up the hot coffee that Bud set down in front of me. I took a careful sip, and it tasted good, sweet. “He’s going to do it again, Bud. I know it. Even the psychic knows it.”

  “What psychic?”

  “That’s right, I haven’t told you the good news.” I filled him in on Joe McKay, and Charlie’s decree on letting him horn in on our investigation. Bud stared at me, eyes all round and disbelieving, as if I was one of George Lucas’s Cantina creatures.

  “You are kidding me, right? Not funny.”

  “That’s what I told Charlie. He disagreed.
”

  “Man, this doesn’t sound like Charlie. He always pooh-poohed all those medium shows and talkin’-to-ghosts stuff.”

  I’d never in my life heard Bud say pooh-poohed, not in any context, but I let it pass. I was back to my usual agreeable self.

  “Unfortunately, not this time. He ordered me to take the so-called psychic to Classon’s house and give him a look-see. That’s where I’ve been so long.”

  “No shit? Did he come up with anything?”

  “Oh, yeah. Get this. He saw spiders, head injuries, you’re in danger, detective, you know, the usual ESP crap.”

  “He said you’re in danger?”

  “Yeah, but don’t fall for that vision-quest stuff. He’s not for real.”

  “Hey, I’m not going to laugh in his face. Sometimes they get it right. You ever see Psychic Detectives on Court TV?”

  “The only thing I’m in danger of is losing control and punching Beulah in the nose. But I’m almost over that.”

  “And to think meeting Bear Bryant was wasted on her.”

  “Gotta raise your standards for lunch companions. Come on, let’s go find Scarlett and snoop around in her files.”

  We trekked over to Asholt’s office. Darkness cloaked the buildings in shadows, and inside the quadrangle, the church clock bonged six times. Mrs. Harper, Asholt’s secretary, a heavyset lady with gray hair pulled back in a tight bun and held in place with an unlikely pair of black-lacquered Chinese chopsticks, was efficiency personified. She was finishing up her work for the day, but she showed us with precise, no-nonsense instructions where the student files were and how to access them correctly. She said Birmingham Belle was in conference with Jesus, and my ears instantly started burning. I waited for an irate call to come in from Charlie any second now, because truth be told, I was out of line with the woman. Getting angry and personal with her was unprofessional. I wouldn’t do it again, uh-uh. I glanced around Asholt’s office, looking for Confederate flags hanging on the walls or old movie posters from Gone with the Wind. She’d probably superimposed her face over Vivien Leigh’s. Instead, there were lots of framed graduation certificates hanging around, most of them from Podunk junior colleges in rural nowhereland. Figured.

  Half an hour later, it was Bud that got the call from Charlie. A command performance, no less. His turn to meet Psychic Joe and show him the murder scene. I told him not to let the guy touch him, and he said I didn’t have to worry. He took off, and I sat down behind Mrs. Harper’s computer and typed in Joe McKay. He’d told me he’d been a student here at some point in time, and I needed to check that our. I minimized the screen when Ms. Beulah waltzed in, said a pleasant, drawl-less “Hello, Detective, anything I can do to help?” I politely declined, and she looked relieved, snatched her red coat with a sequined Christmas wreath on the lapel, flipped her green muffler around her neck in a fashionable drape, then slunk like a kicked dog the hell out of there. I often have that effect on people, southern phonies, or otherwise.

  Then the closing-time exodus began in earnest, and the staff disappeared with all the urgency of Cinderella at the stroke of midnight, only earlier. Just the way I liked it. Jesus stuck his head in Beulah’s office door and told me I should make myself at home but he was quitting for the day because of the dinner he was hosting at his house at 7:30. He didn’t invite me. Bud, either. Luckily he didn’t chastise me for jumping onto Asholt with both my hobnailed boots, either. A pleasant surprise.

  The building grew silent and dark to match the waning day’s journey into night. I could snoop to my heart’s content. Joseph McKay’s name bounced up on the screen. I read his statistics, found that he’d been enrolled at the academy almost fifteen years ago. Everything was pretty much fill-in-the-blank personal statistics, six foot one, 185 pounds, blond hair, blue eyes, et cetera, et cetera. There was no box to check for ESP or psychic whiz. Then I hit pay dirt. The “other comments” line. Hey, hey, hey.

  I clicked it in a hurry, and there it was in all its ugly details. McKay had been expelled from school, kicked out, sent up the river, and why? For putting a live garter snake in Simon Classon’s roll book. Anybody heard the term personal vendetta? I read on, almost drooling on the keyboard, and found that he was quite the troublemaker, had been sanctioned four times by his instructors, three of them by Classon, who wrote a lengthy, overly nasty account of McKay’s tasteless prank and how much mental suffering it had cost him, angst, even. I guess his angels were off duty that day, too. I read on. Psychic Phenomenon Boy was a real mess. Caused all kinds of consternation, problems, nearly drove Classon and Jesus nuts. I liked him better all the time.

  Then I delved some more into his past but hit a brick wall when I tried to find out who recommended McKay for admission and funded his scholarship. Beside the green blinking cursor it said confidential. Aha. Highly suspicious and something to look into. I printed all the screens containing Joe McKay’s data. Maybe Charlie’d like to take a peek at his guy’s penchant for juvenile delinquency. Maybe then he’d take him off the case and thereby improve my hideous mood.

  I checked out the rest of the files for incorrigible students, printed the screens, then shut down the computer, bundled into my parka and gloves, and headed out to my car, suddenly eager to talk to my boss. Across the quadrangle, the library building was aglow with yellow, beckoning lights in every window. I headed there, craving more incriminating ammunition against McKay and wondering if they had any microfiche of the local newspaper articles about campus deaths from spiders or snakes in roll books. Inside, it was warm and cozy with expensive tan leather couches and chairs grouped around for students to study on. Must be Building Tan. Only one kid in sight. Sound asleep and snoring with odd, puffing sounds. Probably allergic to ecru. I walked up to the checkout desk.

  A man immediately got up from behind the counter. He’d been working on a laptop. He left the lid up. Typical man.

  “May I help you?” He smiled, a tall black guy with black-rimmed square glasses, thick hair parted on the left, quiet voice, nice manners, good teeth, polite. The run-of-the-mill librarian, to be sure.

  “I’m Detective Morgan from Canton County Sheriff’s Department. I’d like to use your microfiche machine, if that’s okay?”

  “Sure thing. No problem. Have you used microfiche before?”

  “Oh, yeah. I’m a detective, remember?”

  He laughed. “Then I’m sure you have. I’m Morton DeClive, the head librarian here. Nice to meet you.”

  “Same here. And may I say, Mr. DeClive, you’re the only normal person I believe I’ve met since I stepped foot on this campus.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  Good vibes at last. A man I could talk to without wanting to double my fist and deck him.

  He said, “That was terrible. You know, what happened to Simon.”

  I nodded. “Yes, it was. He a friend of yours?”

  “No.”

  “Did you like him?”

  “Hell, no.”

  Like I said, he had a nice smile. He displayed it now. “Did you have any specific run-ins with Mr. Classon?”

  “He called to bawl me out regularly, usually on Wednesdays.”

  “Wednesdays?”

  “Yeah, go figure.”

  “He died on a Wednesday.”

  “That’s right, he did. You think that’s significant?”

  I shrugged. This case was already so weird, nothing would surprise me. “Who knows? Maybe.”

  “Nobody liked him, at least nobody I know of, but not enough to kill him. Most people just ignored him and reamed him out behind his back. I’ve seen grown men stick out their tongues or give him the finger after he walked by.”

  “Really? That seems a bit childish.”

  “Yeah, but it sure felt good.”

  We laughed together. I liked him. I can’t believe it. I actually liked someone on the staff of the Dome of the Cave Academy for the Gifted. He took me to the rear corner of the main room and showed me the microfiche setu
p. Then he told me he had a list of all articles about the academy printed in the local newspapers. I asked Morton if he’d print them out for me to read through at my leisure, leisure which I really didn’t have, but I sure didn’t have the time or inclination to sit in the library until the ten o’clock closing time, even with Morton DeClive for company.

  I perused briefly and gathered up a handful of brochures advertising the academy and its dubious perks while he printed out an inch-high stack of news articles. He offered to loan me a file of the academy’s own news releases, which he kept in his desk for personal reference. I jumped at that and invited him to please include anything else he thought might be of interest to the investigation. Told you we were both polite. On the other hand, I was building up a volume of homework that didn’t look inviting, but what else did I have to do? Black was gone, and I’d already done my Christmas shopping.

  It turned out I didn’t have to worry about what to do with my time. My cell phone burst into song just as I reached my Explorer. I dug in my handbag for it as I slid into the driver’s seat.

  “Yeah. Morgan.”

  Bud said, “Joe’s had a vision. Says he saw the second murder victim. Charlie said for us to check it out.”

  “No way.”

  “Uh-huh. You’re to meet us there ASAP.”

  “Who’d he say it was?”

  “Stuart Rowland of Satan fame.”

  “Yeah, right. We just saw him this morning. Where’s he live?”

  “Lake Road 565. Know it?”

  “Yes. Gotta box number?”

  “390. His turnoff’s close to the SP Quick Stop. We’ll meet you there.”

  My adrenaline pumped up to car-lifting levels, and I pulled out and called for backup as I gunned my way out of the parking lot and fishtailed onto the gravel road. Lake Road 565 was about fifteen minutes away, on a road lined with outlying subdivisions. I made the quickstop in ten, eager beaver. Ahead of me, I saw Bud’s Bronco turn off the highway and head toward Rowland’s place. I sped up, caught them, and then jumped out in front of Rowland’s driveway almost before my engine died.