I puzzled over my new challenge throughout the morning as I focused on dyeing several samples of lace in a variety of teas. I planned to present the batch to Mrs. Withers and tell her to pick a lace, any lace, so I could get on with the dress. I had to go on the assumption that the wedding was still on for next week.
Where should I start in my task of helping to clear Chris’s name? Of all the people in the camp, I knew Chris the best, but he was out. I didn’t know if I would be allowed to talk to him in jail. I knew Jim and had toyed with the idea of getting to know him better. I hadn’t expected a murder to give me that opportunity. Then I had met Torey Brand, and Chris’s friends Skip and . . . what was his name? Finn? Last on my list was Emmett McDowell—a more unsavory character I couldn’t imagine.
I ran over the events of the previous day, even though I had no desire to remember the horrific scene inside the colonel’s tent. Chris had taken to his bed with heatstroke. I’d spent an interminable hour and fifteen minutes fitting Colonel Windstrom. I sighed, shutting my mind to the image of the coat I had labored over covered in blood. All that hard work had gone to waste. Then I’d come out of the tent and searched for Chris. No, wait—first I’d talked to Sean McCarthy, that obnoxious photographer. Then I’d gone to look for Chris, only to remember my measuring tape. When I’d returned to Colonel Windstrom’s tent, the sentry was gone. I’d later seen him sitting on the ground nursing a bump on the head. Maybe he could shed some light on what happened inside Colonel Windstrom’s tent. I’d start with the sentry.
The house phone wrenched me out of my musings. Welcoming the break, I went into the kitchen and picked up. “Hello?”
A long moment of heavy silence filled the receiver. I was about to hang up when a strange man’s voice growled, “Dembrowski? You can run but you can’t hide. We’re on to you, dude. Better watch your back.” The line went dead.
My hand was shaking as I hung up the phone. Somebody was after Pete! Visions of massive inmates in orange jumpsuits converging on our house set my heart racing. What was Pete getting me into?
The doorbell buzzed, and I jumped about a mile. I stole down the stairs and peeked through the leaded glass. I couldn’t tell who was standing there, but whoever it was wasn’t wearing an orange jumpsuit. I opened the door to find a slim young woman with sandy curls and an impish smile. She wore a bright yellow sundress and flip-flops with plastic daisies on the straps. A striped canvas bag hung heavily on one shoulder.
“You don’t recognize me,” she said in a satisfied tone.
I did recognize her voice. “Hi, Torey.” I tried not to stare. “Is this the real you?”
“Reality is nothing but an illusion.” She followed me into the hall. “Which is the real me: the art student, the barista, or the woman pretending to be a nineteenth-century woman pretending to be a boy soldier?” She pirouetted around, arms outstretched. “All the parts fall short of the whole.”
“So who are you today?”
“Today I’m the penniless student, hoping it really won’t cost me more than twenty bucks to make this old coat fit.” She pulled the uniform coat out of her bulky bag and held it out to me.
“I don’t believe in bait-and-switch.” I examined the bunched-up seam. “It’ll take maybe forty-five minutes to an hour. Do you want to hang out or come back?”
“I can’t stay—I have to start my shift in twenty minutes. Sentry duty to guard the tent of a murdered man. Seems like too little, too late.” She shook her head; her sandy curls danced. “Do you think you could drop it off at the camp for me?”
I opened my mouth to protest that I didn’t do house calls, but then reconsidered. It would be a good chance to poke around the camp and see what I could find out. “Sure. I’ll stop by when I’m done.”
After she left, I took Torey’s coat upstairs and settled down to ripping out the lining. I decided not to trim the seams, so it could go back to the bigger size if necessary. I noted the hand stitching on the sleeves—yup, this was the coat of an authentic. All my alterations would have to be done by hand.
It took me closer to an hour and a half to complete alterations that would satisfy the most Farb-hating purist. Of course, that man was dead—maybe no one else in the encampment really cared about authenticity. But if anyone did, this coat would pass muster. As I bundled it into my shoulder bag, I shivered, remembering the last Civil War coat I’d completed and the tragic fate of its wearer. Thank goodness I wasn’t superstitious like Marsha’s mom, or I wouldn’t touch another reenactor’s sewing to save my life.
I grabbed a quick bite of lunch and steeled myself for one more visit to the Civil War camp. I changed into a calf-length swirly skirt and short-sleeve cotton blouse and caught the bus for Turner Run Park to deliver Torey’s coat.
An eerie hush greeted me there. Men sat around cold campfires, resting in the midday sun. But I didn’t hear any joking, storytelling, or even arguing. They just sat in gloomy silence, staring at the ashen coals of yesterday’s fires.
Their glum faces intimidated me—I didn’t want to disturb them to ask for help finding Torey. She said she’d be guarding Colonel Windstrom’s tent, but it appeared to be cordoned off by police tape. I glanced about at a loss.
I caught a glimpse of the isolation tent, secluded on the outskirts of the camp. I was suddenly overcome by curiosity. Just what did they keep in that lone, forbidding tent? I glanced over my shoulder—no idle eyes followed my movements. Feeling like a trespasser, I crept up to the isolation tent.
I reached forward to draw back the tent flap, when it shook in the still air. A man’s hand pulled the fabric aside.
I gasped and jumped back, astonished to see Emmett McDowell emerge from the isolation tent.
Looking as surprised as I felt, he stammered, “You! What do you want?”
Affecting my best dumb brunette look, I gave him a helpless little smile. “I’m supposed to deliver Torey Brand’s coat, but I don’t know where to go.” For some reason, my words came out in a southern accent, as if I’d suddenly decided to audition for God and Glory. I tried not to giggle. “Can you help me?”
Emmett frowned. “Torey Brand?” He led me quickly away from the isolation tent without a backward glance.
Belatedly, I remembered Torey’s deception. Did Emmett know she was really a woman? I racked my brain, but I couldn’t remember her camp name. “You know, the young sentry who guarded Colonel Windstrom’s tent.” I indicated my bulging shoulder bag. “I’ve got the coat right here.” It was hard to talk without using identifying pronouns. “Well, maybe I’ll just have a look around and try to find Torey myself.”
Emmett grabbed my arm. “Didn’t I see your brother hanging around the camp yesterday, before all hell broke loose?”
I stiffened, removing his hand. “It’s possible. Pete is a camera operator on God and Glory, the movie that’s filming in town.” I softened my tone, “Surely you’ve heard of it?” I tried to channel Scarlett O’Hara, but he wasn’t buying. Maybe if I had a fan to tap him with.
Emmett scowled. “Of course I’ve heard of it. I brought the movie to Laurel Springs, for your information.” He puffed out his chest like a cocky little rooster. “They wanted to stage the battle scenes in Gettysburg, of all places, but I happened to know that Laurel Springs was offering major tax incentives to bring business here. It was the least I could do to benefit my hometown.” He beamed at me, inviting me to admire his benevolence. Sure, I could do that, if it meant he was dropping the subject of Pete’s presence at a murder site, especially after his eagerness to finger Pete as the thief who stole Angeline.
“That was very thoughtful of you, Emmett.” I looked down at my shoulder bag. “Well, I should go. Nice to see you.” I dropped him a curtsy, which actually worked in my swirly skirt, and zipped off while he was still in the middle of his corresponding bow.
I knew Torey wasn’t guarding Colonel Windstrom’s tent, but I didn’t know where she was. I scanned the rows of
tents, but they all seemed to be deserted at the moment. I spied a group of soldiers lounging under a clump of trees. Some of them were smoking—I wondered if they smoked Marlboros or if they rolled their own “authentic” tobacco.
I picked out Torey among the group of young men and boys. She twirled a long stick in both hands as if it were a majorette’s baton. Without her uniform coat, it was easier to identify her as a woman, but then, I knew what to look for. The guys seemed to be treating her as one of them. Since I couldn’t remember her camp name, and I didn’t want to blow her cover, I walked up to the group without speaking. They barely noticed me. A spirited discussion was in progress.
“The battle’s going to be a real drag,” one young soldier said. “I’ll bet the cops won’t even give us back our rifles in time.”
Sure enough, none of the soldiers held any weapons. Sounded to me like the cops had a smart idea there.
“They were here all morning, poking through everybody’s stuff,” a heavyset teen soldier said. “Mercer almost got busted for weed—he had to stuff it down his shorts. I guess it was worth it for the cops, though. I heard they solved the case.” He lounged back against a tree and crossed his arms, obviously proud of his inside information.
“Who did it?” the group chorused.
I watched Torey closely—she listened with the rest, intent on the speaker.
The teen leaned forward and whispered in an impossibly deep voice, “It was a ghost. The ghost of a Civil War widow. She’s offended by the way we’re entertaining ourselves with the war that killed her husband.”
The tense group erupted in laughter, and someone swatted the jokester on the head with his kepi. Torey laughed with the rest. So much for respecting the dead.
I caught Torey’s eye. “I finished your coat.” I dragged it out of my shoulder bag and held it out. She grasped it eagerly. “I hope I still look like a boy now that this fits me better.” She reached into her pants pocket and pulled out a worn twenty-dollar bill. “Thanks.” She slung the coat over her shoulder.
“Hey, Torey, you know the other sentry who guards Colonel Windstrom’s tent? The guy with the ginger beard?”
She stopped cold. “The one who got whacked yesterday? That guy?”
I tried to feign nothing more than a mild interest. “Yeah, that guy. How is he?”
“He’s recovering from a concussion. He spent the night in the hospital, but he’s back at camp today. The doctors told him to rest, but he really wants to fight in the battle on Saturday.”
“Are they going to go ahead with the battle, after what happened to Colonel Windstrom?”
She shrugged. “Everyone’s kind of on edge, but the organizers think it’s best not to give in to fear. They’re dedicating the battle in Colonel Windstrom’s honor. They say he would want the reenactment to continue.” She chuckled. “I don’t think they give a damn about what Colonel Windstrom would want—they just want to fight the battle.”
“And what about the sentry? Is he going to be able to fight?”
“He’s got a head injury. He can’t remember what happened or who hit him. If he’s fighting on Saturday, I plan to stay out of his way.” She gave me a quizzical look. “Why do you ask?”
Should I tell her Marsha asked me to look into the murder? Suddenly I realized that every person in the camp was a suspect at this point, including Torey herself. Could she be a murderer? Could I risk assuming that she wasn’t? I had to suspect everyone. I wasn’t sure I was cut out for this sleuthing business. “I was just wondering if he knew anything. I’m a friend of Chris’s—I hate to think about him being in jail for something he didn’t do.”
Torey nodded. “Chris is such a fun guy. He’s the one who put up the five hundred dollars for our bet. He thought it was the funniest thing to fool Colonel Windstrom into thinking I was really a boy.” She smoothed the front of her newly altered coat. “I’ve spent a lot of time with Chris at the camp. So many of the guys are super-serious about being authentic and everything, but he was just here to have a blast.” She twisted the brass buttons on her coat. “He and I . . . well. I just can’t see him as a murderer, that’s all.” She looked over her shoulder. “The sentry with the ginger beard? His name is Brandon Draimer. Or at least that’s his camp name. He’s hanging out in his tent over there. I’ll show you.”
Torey led me to a tent undistinguishable from all the other tents surrounding it. I wondered how anyone could find the right tent in this maze, but Torey never hesitated.
“Hey, Brandon,” she called out as she approached the entrance. “You’ve got another well-wisher.” She flipped back the tent flap and ushered me inside. “This is Daria, the seamstress. She’s worried about your health and well-being.” She grinned at me and pushed me forward. “Have at it,” she told me, and ducked out of the tent.
I took a few tentative steps inside, wondering who the other well-wishers might have been. As my eyes adjusted to the dimness, I made out the figure seated on the cot. Brandon of the ginger beard sat with his feet planted squarely on the ground, elbows on his knees as he pored over a glossy magazine. He squinted up at me. “Howdy. Are you from the newspaper? I’m not supposed to give any statements.”
“I’m not from the newspaper. I’m a friend of Chris Porter. I was there yesterday when . . . when everything happened. I saw you sitting on the ground and I just wanted to see how you were now.” I didn’t sound much like a detective to me, but Brandon took my words at face value.
“Yeah, I got a concussion. Bastard got me on the back of the head. I never saw him coming.”
“Who was it, do you know?”
He glared at me. “I. Never. Saw. Him. Coming,” he repeated very slowly, as if I couldn’t understand English.
“Right. Sorry. That must have been really scary.”
“Yeah.” He turned back to his magazine, clearly bored with me and my inane questions.
“It’s just so weird that Chris was there, don’t you think? He said someone gave him a message to go see Colonel Windstrom in his tent.” I leaned in. “Did you send Chris a message?”
Brandon stuck his thumb in the magazine to hold his place. When he stood up, he was a head taller than me. “He says someone sent him a message? You can’t believe a thing that guy says. All he’s after is a laugh—it don’t matter if he’s laughing at you or with you. Big funny guy—but who’s laughing now?” He took a step toward me. I instinctively backed up. “For all I know, Chris is the one who hit me on the back of the head, right before he speared the colonel. I got a message for him now. You can tell him that the truth will out. I didn’t see anything and I can’t remember anything about yesterday, and I don’t even know if there was a message or not. But the truth will out. You tell him that.”
“Uh, okay.” Obviously we were done here. “I hope your head feels better.” I ducked out of his tent. I got a brief glimpse of him turning back to his magazine, and breathed a little easier. He wasn’t going to come after me, it seemed. So much for my first attempt at sleuthing—all I’d managed to do was antagonize my first witness. I thought of my ex-fiancé, Randall, boasting of his success in deposing witnesses in court. I could just imagine his derision at my efforts. He probably would have the whole thing figured out by now. Or he’d want me to think so, anyway.
I paused in front of Brandon’s tent, trying to plot out my next move. If I were smart, it would be to dodge Sean McCarthy, who was approaching with an infuriating grin.
“Daria Dembrowski! Can’t stay away?” He lofted his camera and captured a shot of me with the tent in the background.
“That sounds more like a description of you.” I held my hand up in front of his camera lens. “What is there to take pictures of today?”
He let the camera dangle on its strap around his neck. He held out both hands, palms upwards, with a lift of the shoulders. “I can always find something fascinating, something that warrants another look from a different point of view.”
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br /> “Okay, so what have you found today?”
“You mean, besides an enchanting seamstress snooping around the edges of a crime scene?”
My face got hot. “Yeah, besides that.”
He picked up his camera, turning it over when he saw my frown. “I got a number of photos of Allen Fischer, aka Brandon Draimer, the sentry with the bad luck to get knocked out by a murderer.” He held out the camera to me and scrolled through a series of pictures of Brandon in his tent. Even though I’d just come from there, the scene looked different through McCarthy’s lens—more like news, somehow.
I looked up from the last one. “Maybe it was good luck. He didn’t get killed.”
“Good point.” He clicked off the camera.
“So what did you discover from a different point of view?”
He narrowed his eyes. “I’m in the midst of discovering it right now.” He cocked his head to consider me from another angle. “See, I’m a journalist. I hang around crime scenes as part of my calling. But you, you’re a seamstress. You sew for a living. That’s fascinating in itself, but even more interesting is your presence here with no sewing machine in sight.” He threw up his hands in feigned despair. “I can’t make it out.”
I couldn’t help laughing. “No mystery there. I came to deliver Torey Brand’s coat that I altered for her. Anything wrong with me stopping in to see how Brandon was doing?”
He nodded. “Just as I thought. Snooping.”
I bowed my head in mock surrender. “Guilty as charged.”
“And? What did your snooping reveal?” He pulled a little spiral notebook out of his pocket and looked up, pencil poised over the page.
I tossed my head. “Nothing that you can’t find out for yourself.”
He laughed and pocketed the notebook. “I’ll do that.” He waved a cheery goodbye. “Happy snooping!”
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