“How do you know him?” I asked.
“Well, he was a neighbor to my grandparents. What has this got to do with poor Clifton?”
“I’m not sure,” I said. “What do you remember about John Robert?”
“I remember my dad telling me that Johnny Keith was the best fiddle player west of the Mississippi. That’s what. I’ve heard Johnny Keith play. I was just a kid. He was playing at the church for some dance fund-raiser. I just remember my dad leaning over and saying that he was the premier fiddle player of the valley, not Scott Morgan. He was adamant about that.”
I’m not sure why I reacted to this news the way I did, but tears rose to my eyes. I swallowed and fought them back. This all had to mean something. This could not be a coincidence, I thought again.
“Ma’am?” she said. “Are you all right?”
“John Robert Keith—Johnny Keith—was my grandpa,” I said.
Her hand covered her mouth, and after a long moment of watching me for some reaction or some hint of an unnamed emotion, she said, “You’re that historian who lives up in New Kassel.”
“Yes,” I said and glanced at Colin. “This is—it’s a small world.”
“It sure is,” she replied, but that was all she said. She crossed her arms in front of her chest. I couldn’t help but feel that she was either hiding something or was keeping something to herself.
“Well, we won’t bother you anymore,” I said. With that, Colin and I walked out to the car, just as a cold gust of wind stirred up the leaves in her front yard and flung them all about.
Once in the car, I sat there, numb.
“You want to explain to me what just happened?” Colin said.
I filled him in on what I could. Glen Morgan coming to me with the recording—which Colin already knew about—and my cousin Phoebe’s discovery. And how I’d just met with Glen Morgan a few days ago and he never once mentioned that a cousin of his had just been brutally murdered. Why wouldn’t he have at least mentioned it to me? Is that why he’d been acting so nervous when I first met him?
“What does it mean?” he asked.
“Maybe nothing,” I said. “But it certainly makes me question Glen’s motives.”
“Why?”
“Well, isn’t it strange that the very day he contacts me with this earthshaking discovery, his first cousin is horribly beaten and shot to death? I mean, so far as coincidences go, this has to be astronomical. Do the math. What are the odds? Like a bazillion to one.”
“Nothing is ever easy with you,” he said.
My mouth dropped open. “I didn’t do anything!”
“Let’s get back to New Kassel and discuss this with Mort,” he said.
“Right.” I just sat there looking at the small white cottage in front of us.
“What’s wrong?”
“I don’t think I can drive,” I said. “I’m pretty wigged.”
“Okay, I’ll drive.” When Colin got where I’d been sitting, he got wedged between the steering wheel and the seat. “God, I hate midgets,” he said, reaching beneath his leg to release the seat and readjust it.
“No, you don’t. My mother’s shorter than I am,” I said.
“Okay, she’s the only exception.”
THE NEW KASSEL GAZETTE
The News You Might Miss
by Eleanore Murdoch
Have no fear, fellow New Kasselonians, our brave and wonderful new sheriff is hard at work, trying to discover who shot at me last weekend! I’m doing fine and have gotten over the shock of the traumatic events. Although somebody still owes me a new pair of binoculars.
That surge of electricity last Tuesday when the lights dimmed all over town was just Elmer Kolbe getting electrocuted when he was putting up the Christmas lights on the river overlook. Other than some singed hair and an insatiable thirst, he says he’s doing fine.
This year, the cookie bake-off will be headed by Charity Burgermeister. We are looking for at least five-hundred dozen cookies to be donated to the Give a Kid a Cookie Foundation. Father Bingham and the nuns will distribute them to children in the foster homes and hospitals throughout three counties for the holidays. Please have your cookies to Charity by next Sunday.
May everybody have a fun holiday procession this weekend and may those cash registers sing!
Until next time,
Eleanore
Eleven
It was Saturday, just before sunset, and Mary was about to become New Kassel’s forty-seventh Santa Lucia. I have to admit that I was a bit nervous, and Rudy had brought the fire extinguisher along with us. I made him keep it in the van, though.
The drum and fife corps sounded first, coming from the direction of Ye Olde Train Depot at one end of town. Slowly, they marched down River Pointe Road. Behind them, the children’s choir of the Catholic church began to sing, “Come they told him, pa rum pum pum pum.”
Following closely behind was Patty Greene, riding on my neighbor’s mule. She carried her newborn daughter, wrapped up in a blanket, who was supposed to be baby Jesus. Joseph, played by her husband, walked alongside. There were no electric lights involved in the procession, only candles or propane lights. After they passed by, my daughter Mary came along, dressed in her long white robe, with a plate of sweet cakes in her hand, the wreath of candles atop her head.
“Oh my God,” Rudy said. “You didn’t tell me she’d have to balance a tray at the same time she’d be walking.”
“Just shut up, Rudy. You’re ruining the moment.”
She walked with her head held high, her face illuminated by the candles and the flashes of cameras. Speaking of which, I stepped out from the crowd and snapped three photographs of her. She smiled and kept walking. After Santa Lucia came a long line of people dressed as Father Christmas, Saint Nicholas, and Santa Claus. Then Elmer Kolbe carried a huge lighted menorah. Eleanore followed with a cage full of doves and let them loose. The birds took off quickly and disappeared into the sky. Children wearing wooden shoes from Holland clopped down the cobblestone street, and the only family of African-Americans in New Kassel, dressed in brilliant African robes to represent Kwanza, threw candy out at the onlookers. The procession ended with four archangels, their wings flapping behind them in rhythm to their steps. The archangel Gabriel was played by Chuck Velasco, and I want to state for the record not only that angels should not wear construction boots but that Chuck is about the furthest thing from an angel that you’ll find in New Kassel. But that’s okay; he took the part seriously, boots and all. After the parade, the New Kassel sixth-grade choir stopped at every intersection and sang “Joy to the World.”
The whole event took about twenty or thirty minutes, but people drove from miles around to see it.
“I don’t believe it,” Rudy said. “She didn’t burst into flames.”
“What?” Matthew said. “I want to see her burst into flames! Who’s going to burst into flames?”
“Nobody,” I told him.
Rachel was with Riley somewhere in the crowd. All the tourists who had gathered now went about shopping. The only time our gift shops stayed open past five o’clock on a Saturday was during the holidays. There were big sales and nearly every shop was offering baked goods and refreshments. “I think we should celebrate,” Rudy said. “Our insurance rates won’t go up.”
I jabbed him in the ribs. “You’re terrible.”
“You know as well as I that it could have gone either way.”
I smiled, but the smile faded when I saw Sheriff Mort headed toward me through the crowd. “What’s up?” I asked.
“The blood matched our victim. He was definitely killed south of here in that little roadside rest area.”
“Could they really get a clear view of Eleanore and me from there? It was nearly dark.”
“My bet is somebody had binoculars and was watching out for witnesses. When they saw you guys, they couldn’t take any chances,” he said.
“That’s silly. There’s no reason Eleanore and I would hav
e thought they were anything other than hunters.”
“I know,” he said. “But there you have it. Murderers are quite often just as stupid as they are paranoid.”
I shook my head.
“Is there a reason we have to talk about blood and bullets after a holiday procession?” Rudy asked.
“Sorry,” Mort and I said in unison.
“So, how’s it going with the music?” Mort asked.
“What do you mean?”
“You’re having it analyzed,” he said.
“I’m going to e-mail Leo tonight when I get home. Haven’t heard anything so far,” I said.
“Oh, okay,” he said.
Just then, Mary came running up to me, her wreath in her hand and the white gown already gone. “How’d I do?” she asked, eyes sparkling.
“You were wonderful!” I said and hugged her.
“Thanks.”
“Your head get hot?” Mort asked her.
“Actually, yeah, it did.”
* * *
These kind of days are wonderful and exhausting all at the same time. I’d been gone all day at the museums, then I’d attended the holiday procession. I wouldn’t have traded one moment of the day, since I’d been completely in my element and had a great time, but as we pulled into the driveway, I could feel my muscles sort of tighten up and scream.
Mary instantly headed to the corral before the car engine was even off. Anytime Mary went to the corral, the horses came to the edge to greet her. I’m not sure what magical power she’s got, or maybe they just like the way she smells, but they will follow her wherever she goes. “She’s still here!” she called out.
The mystery horse was, indeed, still in the corral. “All right,” I said to Rudy. “We need to get the vet out here next week and take a look at this new horse.”
“Are we keeping her?” Rudy asked.
“I don’t know. Somebody had to put her in the corral. Last I knew, draft horses couldn’t exactly jump a five-foot-tall fence. She’s got shoes, so you know she belongs to somebody. I don’t get it,” I said.
He shrugged. “Why us?”
“Don’t ask that question. Bad things happen when you ask that question.”
I grabbed the mail out of the mailbox and headed inside. “Matthew, you need a shower before you get on your jammies!”
Matthew made some disgruntled noise. I’m fairly certain he was worried that the grime was the only thing keeping the skin on his bones and that by taking a bath he was endangering his life, but so be it. As I walked in the house, Matthew was already stripping his clothes off—not happily, I might add—to get his shower over with. Before he ran to the bathroom, he stopped and said, “Mom, what are we going to do about that guy in the woods?”
A large envelope that was nestled among the bills, advertisements, and newspaper got my attention. It was addressed to me. The return address was none other than that of Clifton Weaver, so I was a bit distracted. “What, honey?”
“There’s a guy living in the woods,” he said. “Should I keep feeding him, or what?”
I thought about this a minute. “No, don’t feed him anymore. Talk to your father about it.”
He ran off to the bathroom and I stood there staring at the envelope in my hand. How could it possibly take a week to deliver a package to me, when Clifton Weaver and I lived in the same small town? It had to have taken a week, because he’d been dead that long at least. Obviously, he couldn’t have mailed it to me after he was dead.
I opened the envelope, hands trembling the whole time. What could Clifton Weaver have sent me? I wondered. I didn’t even know him. I didn’t think I’d ever met him. A lot of people in town knew who I was because my job was a high-profile one for a small town and my name was in the New Kassel paper once a week over something. But I didn’t always know everybody, and I hadn’t known this man.
I dumped the contents of the envelope on the kitchen counter. Inside was a CD and a letter. The letter read:
Dear Mrs. O’Shea,
I am not certain that you know who I am, but I have been a resident of New Kassel for a very long time. My grandfather was Scott Morgan. I believe your grandfather knew him. I am aware of your special skills at solving old crimes. When you listen to this CD, I believe you will understand why I have chosen you to give this to. Once you’ve listened to it, call me at the number below. I’m not sure what to make of this recording. It does not sound like a hoax to me. The original is in a very safe place. My only regret in sending you this is that I’m not certain if there is any danger involved. I feel as though I am being watched. But maybe that’s just the old military man in me. Please listen to this carefully.
Yours respectfully,
Clifton A. Weaver
Gooseflesh tickled my arms, and the hair rose on the back of my neck. A letter from a dead man. God, I hated those. I didn’t even notice that Rudy had walked in the house until he asked, “Where are you going?”
“Up to my office,” I said. I never even glanced his way. I took the letter, envelope, and CD upstairs and put the CD in the player. Then I sat down and listened. At first, it sounded like a recording done in somebody’s house, the living room probably, which wasn’t unusual. Back then, that was quite often the makeshift studio. The music was the same type I’d been listening to for the past week. I didn’t recognize my grandpa’s voice anywhere, but he could have been playing the fiddle. I heard some names thrown around—Scott and Toot. So it was definitely the Morgan Family Players. Scott called the session quits. “We’ll go back at it tomorra,” he said. I heard the recorder click off.
I sat in the dark for a second, wondering if this was some sort of joke. Then the recorder came back on and there was a tapping sound on the microphone. Then I heard a woman’s voice say, “I’m going to sing you a murder.”
A guitar kicked in, wonderful harmonies in the chords, and then the mystery woman began to sing.
It was a bright and shining autumn morning,
When I found her with my only love.
I thought my eyes they were deceiving,
Until I heard the voice from high above.
The voice said, “You must go and show her
That she cannot take him away …
He was meant for your heart only
Regardless of what she’ll try and say.…
Then the chorus kicked in.
The beautiful Belle, well, she’s going straight to hell,
For doin’ to me what she did that day.
And let it be said, that the face of the dead,
They don’t e-ver truly go away.
Now I waited softly in the barn loft
For her to return and speak her lies.
But she could not know that I’d seen her
And she should prepare for her good-byes.
The ax it was sharpened and so pretty
It gleamed just right in the light.
She couldn’t see this coming, could she?
I pulled it back and swung with all my might.
The beautiful Belle, well, she’s going straight to hell,
For doin’ to me what she did that day.
And let it be said, that the face of the dead,
They don’t e-ver truly go away.
Now Belle was so beautiful, I have stated,
And all the people there they did weep.
But it was she who I most deeply hated
For takin’ the love that I did need.
So now she’s a rotting under the bridge of stone
Nobody will ever know her lips.
Her body is cold, and Eddie, he moans.
I don’t regret a one of those licks.
The beautiful Belle, well, she’s going straight to hell
For doin’ to me what she did that day.
And let it be said, that the face of the dead,
They don’t e-ver truly go away.…
No, they never truly go away.…
When she was finished sin
ging, the sound of her breathing into the microphone was all that could be heard. Then a muffled sound, like she’d set the guitar down. Then one last haunting sentence before she turned off the recorder: “I wrote that one myself.”
“Oh crap,” I said. I grabbed the envelope and examined it. The return address may have been for Clifton Weaver in New Kassel, but the postmark was another story. The package had been mailed from Wyoming. So Clifton had either been in Wyoming on the day he was killed and he’d posted the letter before flying home to meet his demise or he’d mailed this to somebody in Wyoming and requested that they mail it to me on a certain day. Or in the event of his death. Or had it been sent by somebody in Wyoming who was pretending to be Clifton Weaver?
I didn’t think it really mattered. What mattered was that Clifton Weaver had thought to send me this … this … blood ballad.
I picked up the phone and dialed the sheriff. “Mort, we have a huge problem.”
Twelve
I opened the door and let Mort in at almost midnight. I handed him the envelope by the very edge. “As soon as I realized what it was, I stopped handling it. I know you’re going to find the postman’s prints on it, but maybe, just maybe, you’ll find a print from the person who sent it to me.”
“Hang on. Slow down,” he said.
“I also touched the CD and the letter inside, so I suppose you’ll check those for prints, as well. Here’s a transcript of the lyrics to the song,” I said.
Mort read the lyrics. In the amount of time it had taken him to drive out to our house, I had played the CD several more times and had written down the simple yet perplexing words.
He glanced up at me with a sharp expression. “You think this is for real? It could just be the lyrics to a dumb old song,” he said. “Those mountain people are always singing about dying and lost love and dying … dying, mostly.”
“Well, this wasn’t written by mountain people; this was written right down here in southeast Missouri,” I said.
“You know what I mean,” he countered.
“The voice says, ‘I’m going to sing you a murder.’ Then after the song is over, she takes credit for writing it. The names in the song, Eddie and Belle…”
The Blood Ballad Page 10