Before I could reply, the front door slammed open below and I heard somebody taking the stairs at least two at a time. "Minda! Are you in here? Is everything all right?" Gatlin called. "Why is it so dark up there?"
My legs weren't so shaky, I found, that I couldn't run to meet her.
Again we sat in the dismal front parlor of Minerva Academy and waited for the police. And this time, out of consideration (or fear of a lawsuit?) for what I'd been through, Hugh Talbot had turned up the heat. Still, I shivered as I sat in the burgundy velvet chair pulled close to a gas fire that hissed and curled, then hissed again.
"I thought something was wrong when I got home and found Napoleon still in his pen," Gatlin said. "Then Mabel Tidwell said she'd just come home from her sister's in Greenville and hadn't called me about the dog or anything else.
"I tried to phone you here, Minda, but all I got was voice mail." My cousin stood beside me, her hand on my shoulder. "You're going straight to the emergency room as soon as we leave here. Are you sure you feel like waiting for Chief McBride?"
"What's another knot?" I tried to shrug, but it hurt too much. "It'll match the one on the other side of my head." I was so glad to be alive and out of those awful wrappings, I didn't mind waiting for medical attention if it would bring us closer to finding out who was in such a hurry to send me out of this world.
"At first I thought it was somebody playing a joke," Gatlin said. "One of Dave's students, maybe. I could just imagine some of those clowns watching from a parked car somewhere and laughing while I made a fool of myself yelling for Napoleon."
"What made you change your mind?" I asked.
Her hand tightened on my arm. "I don't know. Something. Sounds kinda crazy, I know, but it was almost like a voice whispering in my ear, telling me to get over here in a hurry."
Hugh Talbot had been standing quietly by the window, watching, I assume, for the police. Now he turned to me. "Arminda, I wouldn't have had this happen to you for anything in the world. We're going to get to the bottom of this. I promise."
"I'm sorry I kicked you," I said. "I thought it was—whoever hit me over the head coming to finish me off."
"Do you have any idea who it might've been?" Gatlin asked. "Did they say anything? Could you tell if it was a man or a woman?"
"All I heard was a lot of grunting and panting," I said. "Whoever it was is probably soaking in a hot bath right now."
I said that without looking at Hugh Talbot because I wasn't completely sure it hadn't been him. He had happened on the scene just before Gatlin came bursting through the door and charged up the stairs. How could I be sure he hadn't been there all along, and had seen her coming from the window in the upstairs hall, then saved his skin (and mine) by playing the hero?
Gertrude Whitmire and Chief McBride reached the academy at the same time, but Gertrude, being the pushier of the two, had the first say.
"Arminda, please tell me you're all right!" she demanded, descending on me with cane in hand and Hershey on her breath. "I was carrying my groceries inside when Hugh phoned to tell me what happened! And I was the one who asked you to stay. I feel terrible, just terrible!" And she stationed herself across from me as if she meant to make herself my permanent guardian.
"Let's take a little walk," the chief suggested after noting the stories from Hugh and Gatlin. "I imagine you're about ready for some fresh air."
And I was, although I realized he wanted to question me away from the others.
"Now, tell me," the chief said as we paused where the pathway curved away from the building. "Who knew you were coming here today?"
"It was sort of a spur-of-the-moment thing," I told him. "Gatlin and I decided to browse around the old library as we were leaving the Grill this afternoon. Nobody knew we were coming."
"Was anyone else with you? Or could somebody have overheard?"
We sat on a cast-iron bench that felt cold all the way through my pants, and yellow light from a lamp behind it made shadows loom on the walk. "Sylvia Smith was there with her mother, but I don't think they were listening to what we said," I told him.
"Maybe Gatlin or Mrs. Whitmire mentioned it to somebody after they left here earlier," I suggested. Or Hugh Talbot might have been waiting for his chance
The chief took my elbow to escort me inside just as his nephew and another policeman pulled up alongside Gertrude's car, parked near the front steps. Her groceries—or some of them, I noticed, were still on the front seat.
The boy, Duncan Oliver, they had suspected of causing my bicycle accident, had already been living in Columbia at the time, the younger policeman told me.
"We'll question everybody in this blasted town if we have to!" Chief McBride said, glaring at the ground as we walked.
"You get on over to the doctor now and have 'm take a look at you, and if you think of anything else that might help us, give me a call, all right?"
I nodded. He was a kind man, and I was close to tears— if I tried to speak, there would be no stopping them.
Harrison Ivey wasn't on duty at the emergency room—thank goodness! The poor, helpless victim is not the image I like to project, and I'd just as soon he not learn about my recent misadventure. The staff nurse checked me over and gave me something for my headache, and at Gatlin's insistence, I went home with her for the night, stopping by the Nut House only long enough to grab a toothbrush and pajamas.
While inside, I sensed an atmosphere of—dare I say it— annoyance of a most unangelic nature and found Augusta stewing over a basket of needlework in the upstairs room that had been my grandmother's. Her long fingers moved almost faster than the eye could see as the needle wove in and out of what seemed to be a pile of old socks.
"I thought you hated darning socks," I said.
Augusta didn't look up. "I said I dislike mending things," she said. Two red spots the size of fifty cent pieces burned on her cheeks. "I also dislike it when someone goes back on her word."
"Look, Augusta, I'm sorry. I know I promised to be careful, but I only meant to stop at the bookshop. If I had known—"
"But you didn't know, and I didn't know where you'd gone. Fortunately I was able to get a message to your cousin. I assume she reached you in time to prevent—"
"Minda! Need any help up there?" Gatlin, who had followed me inside, called from the landing.
"No thanks! Be down as soon as I can scrounge up some clean underwear!" I hollered back.
"I don't guess you found anything in the attic?" I said to Augusta in an attempt to get her off my case.
"As a matter of fact, I did: your grandmother's christening dress, your mother's birth announcement, and a composition book that might have belonged to Lucy."
I heard Gatlin's footsteps on the stairs. "Minda? Who are you talking to up here? I do believe you've had too many licks on the head!"
"I told you I had a guardian angel," I said. "Then if I were you, I'd get rid of her. Her performance of the last few days leaves a lot to be desired."
"I'm thinking about it," I said, making a face at Augusta.
Still, I noticed that she followed me down the stairs and would probably be waiting at Gatlin's. At least I hoped she would.
Chapter Twenty
Gatlin and David made the ultimate sacrifice of spending the night on the pullout sofa so I could have their bed, but I might as well have been trying to sleep on a truckful of gravel rumbling down a mountain pass for the way I flopped about. Every time I closed my eyes I could almost feel that dusty velvet closing in on me, relive the helplessness of not being able to use my arms.
I rubbed my left forearm where an indentation had remained hours after I was freed. Gertrude Whitmire said the draperies had been taken from one of the third-floor rooms and left on a chair while the windows were cleaned for the holiday season. "I meant to get rid of those old things," she told us, "but after what happened to Otto, it didn't seem important. I forgot they were there."
Whoever attacked me had tossed the fabric over my h
ead and then hit me from behind with something heavy—probably the metal doorstop—that was meant to knock me out.
"The thickness of those old curtains probably saved your life," the chief told me. "If you hadn't fought back, then gone limp the way you did, they would've pitched you straight down that stairwell."
The rope used to bind me after I was mummy-wrapped in the draperies was the kind found in every hardware store, but the police planned to do a fiber analysis to see if it matched the strands found in the tree on Water Tower Road.
After kicking off my covers for the third time, I looked up to see Augusta standing there with a mug of something hot. I've never liked milk, hot or cold, but I hated to hurt her feelings, so I sat up and pretended to be pleased.
"Don't worry, it's not milk, it's tea," she said. "Lemon ginger. It'll relax you, help you sleep."
I thanked her and chugged it right down.
The telephone woke me, and I could tell from the light outside, I'd slept most of the morning away.
Gatlin stuck her head around the door. "Good, you're awake! How's the head?"
"Full of marbles, but I'll be okay after I've had coffee." I threw an arm over my eyes to shut out the sun. "What time is it?"
"Almost ten… and guess what? The prodigal has returned."
I rubbed my eyes. "Huh?"
"That was Vesta calling. Mildred's back!"
"Did she say where she's been so long? Why she didn't let us know where she was going?"
"She's not saying much of anything, according to Vesta, but she'd damn well better talk to me!"
My cousin plopped on the bed beside me. "Do you feel like going with me? I'm going to find out what all this is about if it kills me."
"Don't say that!" I shivered under the covers, thinking of what had happened the day before. But I didn't want to miss out on this. "Where is she?" I asked.
"In her little rooms behind the shop. Where else?" Gatlin stood to examine her reflection in the mirror and made a face. "Yah! Bad-hair month! Dave's taking the girls to Sunday school and church, and he'll pick up sandwiches or something and meet us at the bookshop for lunch. That should give us at least a couple of hours to worm something out of Mildred. Coming?"
"Wouldn't miss it," I said.
On the way to Mildred's, Gatlin told me she'd spoken with Maureen Foster's husband, R. T. "He called last night and promised to come by and look at my disaster, see if he thinks it's worthwhile."
Although she tried to make light of it, I knew Gatlin's hopes were riding on this project. Under Otto's management, Papa's Armchair barely turned a profit. Vesta had said as much. Incorporating a tearoom would fill a need in the community as well as bring in more customers, but I wasn't sure it was worth the expense.
My cousin must have been reading my mind. "Sometimes you have to spend money to make money," she said, pulling into a space in front of the shop. "Anyway, it's too late to turn back now. Dr. Hank's promised to have all those old records removed tomorrow."
"What's he doing with them?" I thought of Irene Bradshaw's paranoia about her daughter's secret.
"Don't worry, they'll be destroyed. Told me he should've had it done long ago, but nobody wanted the storage space, so he just left 'em there."
"I hope he reassures Irene," I said. "And speaking of Irene, did Vesta find out about those pills she gave Mildred?"
"She didn't say anything about it. We can add that to our list."
Gatlin had a "don't mess with me" look on her face as she unlocked the door of the bookshop, and just then I wouldn't have wanted to be in Mildred Parsons's shoes.
But Mildred, though frail, was up and ready for us. We hadn't called ahead on purpose, but I guessed she must have expected us.
We found her at her desk in the tiny back office, and she looked up, adjusting her bifocals, when she heard us come in. "Good morning," she said, as if she'd been there all along.
"Mildred, where on earth have you been?" Gatlin stood, arms folded, in front of her. "We were worried to death, and you can imagine how we felt when we learned you lied about visiting Lydia Bowen!"
Mildred flinched. She tried to cover the expression, but I saw it. Lie is a strong word.
However, she didn't deny it. "I had my reasons," Mildred said. "I'm sorry if I caused concern, but this is something I had to do, and I had to do it alone."
And I had thought only John Wayne talked like that. "Are you going to tell us what that was?" I said.
"You know, of course, I have family down in Brookbend. There were certain things there I needed to look into."
Obviously seeing my puzzled expression, Mildred went on to explain. "I doubt if either of you've ever been to Brookbend. There's not much there, and it's out of the way—a little farming community about fifty miles below Columbia, but I still have relatives there. It's where I was born and raised, and my parents are buried there."
I waited for her to continue. She didn't.
"I don't understand why you couldn't have let us know where you were going," I said. "We were more than concerned, Mildred. Vesta was about ready to call the bloodhounds out on you."
"Was it really so important that you couldn't tell us?" Gatlin asked. "Why all the mystery?"
Mildred thumbed through papers on her desk and picked up a pencil. "I'd rather not discuss that just now, and I'd be grateful if you didn't pursue it." Her announcement had a period as big as a grapefruit at the end, and I knew there would be no use in questioning her further.
I glanced at Gatlin, who looked as if she might spew cinders, but she only shrugged and turned away. I followed her to the front of the shop.
"It won't do a bit of good to keep after her when she's like this," my cousin muttered. "Might as well leave her alone for now."
I remembered that we'd forgotten to ask Mildred about the stomach medicine Irene had given her, and mentioned it to Gatlin.
"I'm about ready to slip her some arsenic myself!" she sputtered, "but go on and ask her if you think you'll get a civilized answer."
Mildred Parsons doesn't scare me, I told myself. After all I'd been through, I was prepared to stand up to the devil himself! After all, I had an angel on my side. I marched back to stand beside her.
Mildred raised an eyebrow at me and went on scribbling.
"Do you remember Irene Bradshaw giving you some kind of pills for your stomach the night you got so sick?" I asked in a voice too loud to ignore.
"Of course." She didn't look up.
"Do you still have them?"
She sighed and folded her hands in front of her. "A few I think. I took most of them in Brookbend… a most unsettling experience."
"And they didn't make you sick?"
"Certainly not! Why would Irene give me something that would make me sick? Frankly, they were most helpful. I wish I'd known about them earlier."
"Do you think you might spare a couple? I think I ate something that disagreed with me last night. My stomach's giving me fits."
"My goodness, Arminda, why didn't you say so? They're over there in my purse.… Let me see…. I'm sure I didn't take them all." Mildred dug in her pocketbook and brought out a flat cardboard box. "Here they are! Good, I thought so. You may have the rest."
I thanked her and tucked the box into my pocket, then turned to find Gatlin holding up two fingers in a victory sign behind Mildred's back. Surely the medication was harmless if Mildred had continued taking it with no bad results. Also, the pills were the kind you punch out from a foil packet, and I didn't see how they could have contained anything like a strong narcotic, but it wouldn't hurt to have the remaining ones checked out.
"I don't guess Mildred knows about Otto's leaving his share of the shop to you?" I whispered as I helped Gatlin sort through boxes.
She shook her head. "I'm letting Vesta take care of that. And we had talked about adding a tearoom, so that's no surprise. Also she'll be getting an annuity, so financially, she'll be okay."
"From Vesta?"
"Wel
l, yes, but as far as Mildred's concerned, Otto arranged it in his will."
"I never knew Otto was so thoughtful," I said.
My cousin laughed. "Neither did Otto." She stood and stretched. "So what now?"
"About the bookshop or Mildred?"
"Neither, silly! What do we do about you? About somebody who obviously doesn't have your welfare at heart. It's all because of that pin you found when Otto died—I know it is! Somebody thinks you're getting a little too close, and they want you out of the way before you find out any more."
"It's the quilt," I said. "I keep coming back to that old quilt."
"Then let's find the damn thing! What about that woman in Georgia? The one whose grandmother had it last?"
"Peggy O'Connor. She pretended she didn't know what I was talking about, but she was lying through her pearly whites."
Gatlin thought about that. "Then let me have a go at her. I'll set her straight."
"But what if she's the one trying to stop me?" I said. "Come to think of it, all the bad things started to happen after I paid her a visit." But somehow I couldn't imagine the ladylike grandmother lurking in the underbrush until I biked past, or trussing me up like a turkey and dragging me across the floor… unless she had an accomplice.
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