Time to Die

by Hilda Lawrence

  Perley turned thankfully to the door. “Come over here and take an arm,” he said. “Now Miss Rayner, I want you to let Nick take my place. He and Mr. Walters will put you in the car and drive you home with Miss Beacham.”

  “And what are you going to do?” she asked with suspicion.

  “Mr. East and I are going to have a look for your weapon.”

  “You’d better get used to calling it an arrow,” she said, “because that’s what it was.” She left them without further comment.

  Perley sighed with relief, made an audible note about remembering to clean up the blood before Sunday or they’d have parent trouble, and put out the lights. He locked the door behind him.

  “Where’s that wall she was talking about?” Mark asked.

  It was the cemetery wall. They walked over to it in the dark, with Perley’s flashlight pointing the way. It stretched along the north side of the grounds, a strip of fieldstone about four feet high. It was high enough to hide behind and low enough to shoot over and, as Perley pointed out, it was a lonesome kind of place.

  Perley shivered. The moonlight was soft and friendly where they stood, but it struck harshly at the posturing angels on the other side of the wall.

  “He’d have to stand on a grave,” Perley said.

  They went over every inch of the ground and found nothing. A little blood in one spot, that was all, and the tall grass bent.

  “‘It fell to earth I know not where,’” Perley quoted mildly. “I learned that poem when I was a boy. . . . What do you make of this?”

  “Nothing. Local yokel having fun.” Mark kicked at an empty gin bottle half hidden in the grass. “This is what Mrs. Briggs smelled so opportunely. I noticed some of the lads making little journeys to a truck parked down the road. Just clean country fun, as Nick says.”

  “You’re always taking cracks at the country.”

  “The country’s always taking cracks at me. I think one of your barber shop boys was trying to give the city dick a thrill. If I ever find out which one I’ll beat the pants off him.”

  They returned over the deserted grounds and walked slowly down the hill.

  “I notice you’re still hanging on to those arrows,” Perley observed.

  “I’ll give them to you tomorrow. What time is it?”

  “Half past ten. Want to go home or do you want to walk down Main Street? It’s kind of gay in summer.”

  “Home. . . . What’s that white stuff that grows on your side porch?” “Clematis.”

  “We’ll sit out there and you can tell me where we’ll go fishing tomorrow.”

  Young Josephine Beacham, who ordinarily answered only to Joey, woke at midnight because she was having a bad dream and was also thirsty. The moonlight poured in at the window and showed her that Cassie’s bed was still empty. Cassie was Miss Cassidy, a perfect peach who let you say your prayers in bed in the winter but wouldn’t let you sleep without your tops in the summer. She didn’t nag about anything but the tops, and she let you wear boys’ pants and didn’t follow you around like an old sheep.

  Joey shook off the bad dream which had to do with being caught without a shirt in the hotel lobby, and padded across to the bathroom. She drank three glasses of cold water; she had to, because of the pickles. Cassie had been at another table, so she’d had her own way about all the pickles within reach. Eleven kinds.

  Cassie was probably over at the Peck cottage, playing poker with the Pecks and Miss Sheffield and Mr. Kirby. Their light was still on. She must have come home with them in their car. She herself had come home in the hotel station wagon with the other kids. She wondered if Cassie was winning any money from Mr. Kirby. He was a dope. She stood at the bathroom window and considered removing her top just the same. Just for a few minutes. She twisted a button thoughtfully. The light in the Peck cottage went out.

  Cassie would be home in a minute. Joey padded back to bed, top on. Tomorrow when her father came back from New York she’d ask him about the top. She stretched out on her bed and pretended to be asleep. Roberta would be coming home soon too. She was out with Nick. Nick was a dope. Joey fell asleep in spite of herself and didn’t know that no one came home for another hour.

  Mark emptied the last bottle of beer and eased it quietly to the porch floor. “Is that your phone?” he asked.

  Perley struggled upright in the swing. “Golly, I been snoozing. Yep, that’s it. Now who in time is that? It’s past one o’clock.” He tiptoed across the moon-spattered boards and opened the screen door. “Shut up!” he hissed at the nagging bell. “You’ll wake Pansy.”

  Mark heard his rumbling greeting and listened idly. Somebody’s car was gone. Or was it somebody’s gas? Or maybe it was somebody parking in somebody’s field. And why not? It was a night for it. Anyway, it was a fool thing to be calling about at this hour. Then he sat up, suddenly alert. Perley’s voice had changed abruptly. Gas, he was saying; gas gone. No, it wasn’t gas. It was Cas. . . . Cassidy. Gone. Cassidy. He got up and went inside. Perley was replacing the receiver.

  “Well?”

  “Get the car out while I leave a note for Pansy. I’ll tell you as we go along.”

  A few minutes later they were driving through the sleeping streets, out into the country. They could read each other’s faces in the white moonlight.

  “It’s only a disappearance,” Perley said. “If it was a kid I’d say get out the hairbrush and wait till morning, but this is sort of different. It’s not one of our own people either.”

  “Who?”

  “Miss Cassidy. She’s a kind of governess for the little Beacham girl. She didn’t come home from the church supper, and they just found it out. It may not be anything, but I will say it looks odd.”

  “So will I. I wonder what she found to do.”

  “Don’t talk like that. Miss Cassidy’s a fine, good woman, in her late thirties. She’s well-known and well-liked around here. Been coming up summers for about five years. Wore a small blue hat with little white birds on it. Blue and white dress. White shoes. Star sapphire ring that the Beachams gave her last Christmas. Would you know a star sapphire if you saw one?”

  Mark said he would. “Who called you? Beacham?”

  No, Beacham wasn’t there. He’d made a quick trip to New York and was due back in the morning. Roberta had called. Joey was the little one, around eight or so. Beacham, a widower, was a business partner of Pee Wee Peck’s father. He and Peck rented the two best cottages the hotel had. “Now you know as much as I do,” he said.

  They turned off the road and began to climb the mountain. They could see the hotel lights, far up.

  Mark laughed softly. “You know what I’m making out of this, don’t you? Widower Beacham and a governess who wears star sapphires. If I were you I’d say sweet nothings to Roberta, who looks pretty young for her age, and wait for that morning train. Maybe the girls are going to have a new mama.”

  Perley gave him a look of affectionate disgust. “Always dragging in love. Don’t you ever look for anything else?”

  “Nope. That’s all there is, with variations. . . . Anyway, what else can I think under the circumstances? Look at that moon. Smell that hayfield. And then if that doesn’t soften you up, take a deep drag of the stuff that’s growing along the fence. What is it, by the way?”

  “Honeysuckle. Want to stop and make yourself a wreath?”

  Mark grinned. “On the level, Perley, doesn’t the small blue hat with the little white birds sound bridal? Or semi-bridal? Or if you don’t like that, let’s say she took a nice, long walk, all by herself.”

  “She didn’t. She’s not the type, at one o’clock. And I don’t like the elopement angle either. I don’t like anything about this. I don’t like anything that’s happened tonight. I feel like I’m being taken advantage of.”

  Mark went on easily. “You get it that way sometimes. . . . You know it needn’t be an elopement. It can be one of those unrequited affairs calling for drastic action on the lady’s part. If it is, ev
erybody’s going to have fun and you’re going to feel worse than ever.”

  Perley spoke slowly and with caution. “Does an unrequited affair calling for drastic action boil down to one of your variations?”

  “It does. A lopsided one. I’ve handled two in my day and I don’t want another. You clean them up, hand in the facts, and the family tries to kick you downstairs.”

  “Why?”

  “Well now, let’s see. You say Miss Cassidy’s in her late thirties? And a very good creature? That’s the time they do funny things if they haven’t had a chance before. They write themselves scandalous letters full of words you’d choke over, fake illness, stage disappearances. Anything to grab off a little attention. But they usually snap out of it. Don’t worry.”

  “I’ve got to worry! Beacham’s prominent. And all that stuff you just said is out. A better women than Miss Cassidy never lived. Beacham told me so himself one time when we went fishing together. He’s a very democratic fellow. He told me that when his wife died he didn’t know which way to turn. She died when the youngest girl was two weeks old. Miss Cassidy was the nurse and she stayed on. It got to be so he couldn’t get along without her. She managed everything. He’d sort of hoped for a boy that time, you know how men are about wanting boys, but he never said a word to anybody. Still, she caught on. She was the one who started calling the baby Joey instead of Josephine. And later on she egged the kid to climb trees and all that, and she bought her some little fishing pants like Beacham’s. But she didn’t go too far that way. She dressed Joey like a little lady on Sundays. Joey’s a picture on Sundays. Why that woman gave that family something to live for! If him and her have run away to get married, why I guess it’s all right. But they didn’t have to do it that way. They could stand up in anybody’s sight!” He cleared his throat furiously. “Why did this have to happen? What did happen?”

  Mark was non-committal. “I’d be a fool to guess. . . . This it?”

  “Yep.” Gravel crunched as they swung between gateposts and passed under a brightly lighted portico before a long, dark veranda. They went on for several yards until they came to an aggressively simple cottage nestled in trees.

  “Waiting for us,” Perley said. He sounded impressed.

  A small group of people moved out of the shadows. Mark knew Roberta and Nick Sutton, but the others were strangers. There were no introductions. They all seemed to know who he was, and he fitted names to people as the talk went on. He stood behind Perley and watched and listened.

  Archie Peck took charge. As Beacham’s partner he felt a natural responsibility for the Beacham household, and said so, over and over again. He looked as if he had fallen out of bed and dressed in the dark. He was short and fat. His sparse red hair stood on end, and his round, red face glistened with heat. He was a little drunk, but not enough to give Perley ideas. He took Perley’s hand and clung to it.

  “Wilcox,” he said, “this is terrible. You’ve got to do something before Mike gets here.” Mike was Beacham.

  “Now, now,” said Perley. “Maybe there won’t be anything to do. Maybe the lady is taking a walk by herself in the woods.” He waited hopefully.

  Peck’s fat, babyish mouth opened to reply, but his wife closed it promptly with a look.

  “Not in those shoes,” she said.

  Franny Peck was a blonde little creature in something pink that might or might not have been a dress. She shook her curly head and widened her eyes. Mark told himself that she would have dimples when she smiled, and guessed that she would smile as soon as it was humanly possible. But she wouldn’t go overboard, he decided. She’d give them something wan and suitable to the occasion.

  “Let me tell you what I know,” she begged softly. “It isn’t very much because I’m not clever at things, but maybe I can make you see why we’re a little worried.”

  “You go right ahead, Mrs. Peck,” Perley said heartily. “I expect you can help me a lot.”

  “Well, I’m going to try.” She smiled. It was a grateful one, with two dimples, appropriate and promising. “Cassie,” she went on, “that’s Miss Cassidy, sat with Arch and me at the supper. Miss Sheffield and Mr. Kirby were at the same table but farther down.” She nodded to the other man and woman. “Then after supper we all strolled around. We crawled over that wall like children, absolutely like children, and read the names on the headstones in that quaint old cemetery. Then Cassie said she ought to see what Joey was doing and she went back to the picnic grounds alone. We didn’t see her again. Arch had to drive downtown for something, and I drove home with Hank and Cora.” She nodded to the other pair again. “We were going to play poker, and we did. Cassie had promised to play too, but when she didn’t come we decided she’d gone home to bed. Arch came back, and we played until midnight. That’s absolutely all.”

  The other woman took it up. Mark had seen and heard her at the supper, and marveled. She had reached for food beyond man’s grasp and got it every time. She was dressed now as she had been then, in flowered chiffon and flowered hat. From top to bottom she was all awry. He remembered her voice; she’d told the immediate world that she was from Kentucky and had extolled its two prime products at the top of her leather lungs. She bore a striking resemblance to one of these and had recently consoled herself with the other. She was Miss Cora Sheffield, and he envied her breath.

  “Never trust a motherly woman,” she neighed at Perley. “Cassie said she was going to look up Joey. Joey says she didn’t. Make what you can of that. Now when I say I’m going somewhere, I go, like a homing pigeon.”

  “That’s fine,” Perley said helplessly. “Now what time would you say it was when you people left the grounds? And why didn’t you try to find Miss Cassidy, considering you had a date, so to speak?”

  Miss Sheffield brought Mr. Kirby forward with a hearty shove. “Talk,” she commanded.

  Henry Kirby, Hank, dapper, dyed, and pushing seventy, looked as if he had been riveted together by an expert. He didn’t have much to say. Miss Cassidy had driven down to the supper in the hotel station wagon. He thought she’d come home the same way. What was wrong with that? As for the time, he didn’t know. It looked like eight-thirty when they left. The sky looked like eight-thirty. He hadn’t examined a watch. He didn’t like watches. He shrugged his beautiful shoulders as if he were shaking off years.

  Perley turned to Roberta. “Can you add anything?” he asked weakly.

  Roberta said Joey had returned in the wagon because she thought Cassie had gone with the Pecks. Cassie often let Joey shift for herself because she thought it was good for her. And Joey didn’t think there was anything funny or queer about it. Maybe it did sound kind of careless, nobody taking the trouble to find out where poor Cass was, but she was always so capable. It just seemed natural not to bother. As for herself, she and Nick had been too upset about that arrow business to think of anything else.

  “Arrow!” Miss Sheffield showed her fine teeth. “I heard about the brat, but I didn’t see it happen. Nickie, I love you! Did you pink the old girl too?”

  Nick turned, limped over to the steps, and sat down.

  “Mr. Wilcox.” Roberta’s voice was urgent. “Cassie may be hurt too, like Miss Rayner, I mean. She may be lying somewhere, hurt.”

  “She was a trained nurse, wasn’t she?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “She’ll know what to do then. Where’s the little girl, Joey?”

  “Joey’s with Pee Wee, over in their cottage. Mr. Wilcox, will you let Nick and me go with you? You’re going to look for her, aren’t you?”

  “Now, now,” Perley said. “Mr. East is going to help me and you all know who he is. Miss Cassidy’s as good as in her bed right now.”

  She returned his look soberly. “But if she isn’t, who’s going to tell my father? My father’s coming tomorrow morning—this morning. He’ll be here for breakfast. Who’s going to tell him she’s gone?”

  No one answered. Mark began to smile in the dark. He wondered whether he d
ared say what he thought, that Beacham already knew. He was framing the sentence when something stopped him. A shrill whimper broke the silence, a sad little crying that might have come from a very small and not quite human heart. He looked down at a puppy groveling at his feet.

  “Cassie’s,” Roberta said.

  Before he could speak there was another sound, this time from a cottage farther on. It was a whimper too, but there was no doubt about its origin.

  He took the cringing animal in his arms. “I’ll tell your father,” he said. “I’ll meet the train.” He walked over to the other cottage alone.

  * * *

  * Blood upon the Snow

  CHAPTER TWO

  MARK and Perley were on the station platform early the next morning. There was the usual crowd of women and children out to meet week-ending husbands and fathers; there was also the usual crowd of hangers-on, augmented by the town sluggards who were willingly breaking the habits of a lifetime because, except for resurrection morn, there’d never be another day like this one. But the normal horseplay was absent. The women stood close together and talked in whispers; even the children were silent. Off to one side, a crate of live chickens grew suddenly clairvoyant and rent the air with piteous appeals.

  Miss Cassidy was still missing, and the sun beat down without mercy.

  A shout went up. “Here she comes!”

  A puff of smoke appeared above the pines down the track, and the little branch line train chugged around the bend. Perley nodded to Mark, and they stepped forward. The crowd made respectful way.

  When Michael Beacham moved across the platform and sent eager looks in all directions, the first familiar face he saw was Perley’s. His own face showed no surprise. He strode forward, white teeth gleaming in a broad smile.

  Perley took Beacham’s bag and clapped him on the shoulder. “Come on over to the freight shed,” Perley said. “I want to talk to you.”

  “What’s this?” Beacham’s laugh boomed like a fiesta cannon. “A pinch? Don’t shoot, I’ll come quietly!”