Still, the house had to be searched again, and I did so while Tinkie sat outside Eleanor’s room as a guard. If she came out, Tinkie would divert her until I finished.
With the dogs helping, it didn’t take long to investigate the place. I didn’t find a single locked door or anyplace that looked suspicious. There was no trace of Monica; she wasn’t being held in the house.
During my search the rain clouds passed and the sun burned hot. Humidity at a thousand percent. The air outside was liquid with moisture, creating the highest possible ick factor.
Tinkie and I were in the kitchen. She’d put a kettle on to boil to make herbal tea for Eleanor. “We should talk to Barclay. I need a full accounting of his whereabouts since he arrived in Natchez. I still can’t believe Kissie let him stay in Briarcliff without permission from the sisters.”
Barclay definitely had some ’splaining to do.
“Barclay could charm his way into a convent. I don’t believe Kissie intentionally endangered the Leverts.”
“Do you think he stole the necklace?” Tinkie asked.
The theft of the necklace had fallen so far down my priority list I’d pushed it to the back of my mind. “Why would he stay in Natchez if he had the necklace and money was his objective? He could sell it for a lot of money.”
“Revenge? To make his mother acknowledge him? I’m glad Eleanor gave him the DNA. Maybe the lab will put that issue to rest.”
“I’ll stay with Eleanor if you want to interview Barclay.” I made the offer because Tinkie had a thing for Barclay and also because I did, too. He could work me. Tinkie, who’d grown up manipulating men, wasn’t as susceptible to his charms as I might be. Not that I would betray Graf, but only that I might not be at the top of my game. Barclay was crafty, and I didn’t want to fall victim to his scams.
“I’d love a chance to grill him. At least we know why Marty Diamond was so aggressive toward him. Barclay put Kissie in a bad spot.” Her eyebrows lifted. “A case where we have two handsome, talented men. It could be worse.”
Tinkie was incorrigible. “And it probably will be.”
“I’ll be back here by eight, in case the kidnapper calls.”
In the past, the ransom calls had come late in the evening. Tinkie would have plenty of time to find Barclay—Natchez wasn’t that big a town and Barclay was hard to miss. In the meantime, though, she showed me how to turn on the telephone tape recorder. She left her laptop so I could do some research.
After it was brewed, I took the herbal tea to Eleanor. I tapped and there was no answer. Eleanor was sound asleep, as still as a corpse on top of the bedspread. She was so wan and lifeless I feared for a moment she actually might have died. On closer inspection, I deduced she was in a deep, deep sleep. She was utterly exhausted.
I returned the tea tray to the kitchen and gathered Tinkie’s laptop. In the investigation, we’d learned a good bit about Monica’s sordid love life, but not much regarding Eleanor’s past. Other than Jerome, I had no idea who Eleanor had dated or desired. Somehow, I felt it might be useful information.
Eleanor told us to take our pick of the second-floor bedrooms, but I set up in the front parlor, where I had a good view of the main staircase and also the door to the back staircase, a small, narrow, dark passage the servants used to tend to the needs of their owners or employers, as the case might be. If Eleanor awakened, she wouldn’t get by me. Perhaps I’d jumped to the wrong conclusion about her involvement in this mess, but I couldn’t afford to put aside my concerns based on Tinkie’s say-so. If I’d learned anything from past cases, it was not to give my trust too willingly to anyone.
The afternoon slipped away while I read online articles in the local Natchez newspaper documenting charity drives, pilgrimages, fetes, soirées, dances, balls, political organizations, garden clubs, and civic organizations. Monica had been quite active. She was often elected to boards and positions of authority, though judging from the photographs accompanying the articles, not liked. The other women stood apart from her in most of the shots.
Eleanor was mentioned in some of the reports, but often in the background. Monica was always front and center, which might be another reason Eleanor would like to do away with her. As Aunt Loulane would say, no woman enjoys the role of “always the bridesmaid, never the bride.” Eleanor, at some time or other, would have wanted to shine.
Gossip gave a picture of the Leverts’ role in Natchez society. What I needed, though, was a historical perspective. I dug back in the files. Luck was with me. Natchez is a town that relishes its history. Preservation societies, Daughters of the American Revolution, Daughters of the Confederacy—plenty of organizations had a Web presence, and all of them had detailed information on members and events.
I went back to the 1970s, when the Levert girls came of age. I found a write-up and photographs of Helena Banks Gorenflo’s wedding. Eleanor and Monica were double maids of honor. The photos portrayed a happy grouping of young, beautiful people. So the troubled water between Helena and Monica had come later and, based on what I knew, likely involved a man.
To my utter surprise, I hit on an engagement announcement for Eleanor Levert and Gaston Gaudel, a French artist. Eleanor was only twenty. The nuptials was scheduled for May 1. She was to be given in marriage by her sister. Which made me curious where her parents were.
My Web gallivanting took me to the Mississippi archives, where I found death certificates for Middler Levert, who died of a massive heart attack in 1978, and Marcella Ardoin Levert, who—I had to read it twice—fell from the bluff of Briarcliff in 1973. The death was ruled an accident.
I called Jassine, Cece’s newspaper reporter friend, and got her to dig up the obituary for Marcella Levert. The story was another example of the tragedy dogging the Levert family.
As Jassine paraphrased from the numerous newspaper clippings kept in the morgue, or newspaper library, she grew excited. “Marcella took a fall from a horse early in the day. Suffering a terrible headache, she took to her bed. The doctor made a house call at Briarcliff and pronounced Marcella shaken up but uninjured. He gave her a sedative to relax and ordered the household to keep her as still as possible.
“During the night, Marcella got out of bed. She accidentally wandered into the yard and fell from the bluff. The family didn’t discover her death until morning, when the gardener saw her floating in the river. In a freakish twist, the current didn’t catch her body.”
“Good lord.” I regretted my earlier harshness to Eleanor. She’d had enough loss in her life—I felt bad about implying that her sister was dead.
“Okay, here’s some more information,” Jassine said. “The twin girls had just entered their teen years. Grief-stricken, their father took them to Europe for the next five years. They returned only for the girls’ debut into Natchez society and the announcement of Eleanor’s engagement to the artist Gaston Gaudel, a man she met in Paris. There’s a photo of Eleanor and a very handsome man. They look ecstatic.”
“I wonder what happened. Eleanor never married.”
“What’s your interest in Eleanor’s and Monica’s past?” Jassine asked. Like any good journalist, she’d caught a whiff of a story. “This can’t figure into an insurance claim case, but I have to say their lives would make a fabulous movie.”
I couldn’t tell the truth, so I did the only other thing available—I lied. “I’m writing a movie script. About the Levert family. I thought a little background on the sisters, their lives in Natchez, participation in the community, all of that, would help me render them more vividly. I can also use parts of this in my insurance report.” I was proud of my breezy ability to fabricate on the spot.
“Why didn’t you ask Eleanor? Or Monica?”
I gave a tolerant laugh. “One reason Delaney Detective Agency is so highly regarded is because we do a thorough job of investigating. Asking our employer isn’t exactly … impressive.”
Jassine chuckled with me. “There’re tricks in every trade, right?”
“That’s right. Did you find anything on the wedding?”
“Hold on a minute.” There was the sound of something heavy dropping onto a desk and pages turning. Jassine was flipping through the bound issues of the paper. She was a very good friend of Cece’s to go to all this trouble for me.
Finally, she came back on the phone. “You aren’t going to believe this.”
I knew from her tone it was bad. “What? Was she dumped?”
“The night before her wedding, Gaston was murdered Under-the-Hill.”
I felt as if a fist were pressed against my sternum. Breathing was difficult. “What were the circumstances?”
“It’s a huge story. ‘French Artist Stabbed in Brutal Robbery’ is the headline. The bachelor party was going on, and the group of young Natchez men left the rehearsal dinner at the Eola and went Under-the-Hill. At the time, there was a club offering adult male entertainment.”
It wasn’t hard to imagine. Bachelor parties where the groom had one last fling at freedom were standard practice. Groomsmen did their best to insure a hangover so intense the actual wedding was a foggy memory.
“Was there a fight?”
“No, it seems Gaston went outside to get cigarettes from his vehicle. The other groomsmen finally missed him and went out to check. They found him in the parking lot. He’d bled to death. Can you believe the luck of it? Eleanor has lost everyone she ever cared about, except Monica. No wonder those two have such attitude. They act like the rest of us aren’t fit to wipe their feet.”
“No wonder,” I repeated. Jassine didn’t know Eleanor now stood to lose her sister. “Thanks, Jassine. I’ll tell Cece she owes you big-time.”
“Tickets to the Black and Orange Ball in New Orleans this year would be a nice compensation.”
“I’ll put a bug in her ear.”
I’d just hung up when I heard my hound’s low, serious growl. Sweetie stood at the front door, her hackles raised and her lip curled as she snarled. Easing back a curtain, I studied the front lawn. Night had fallen, a soft, misty summer night that gave the stars a magical glow. I didn’t need Sweetie Pie taking off after a deer, and it was highly possible wild game hovered at the edge of the woods, so I slipped outside and gently closed the door. Behind me, I heard Chablis’s frantic little paws at the door trying to dig her way out to me. The sound brought to mind old movie clips of fingernails digging at a coffin, a cheerful thought that made me want to rush back inside and slam the door locked.
Briarcliff was a house that invited visions of the macabre. Edgar Allan Poe would have been right at home.
Planting my feet on the front porch, I listened to the sounds of the night. Laughter, dim and muffled by the fog, drifted up from Under-the-Hill. Inside the house, Sweetie bayed a complaint accompanied by Chablis’s ear-piercing bark. I had to get back inside before they woke Eleanor.
As I put my hand on the knob I heard the sound of horse hooves. They came toward the front of the house hard and fast. Without thinking I rushed down the steps and into the driveway. The ground trembled beneath the weight and power of the horse, but I couldn’t see anything. Fog carpeted the front lawn, disguising even the familiar shapes of the trees.
“Barclay!” I called, my heart thudding. I knew it was Barclay, but at the base of my reptilian brain, a red alert sounded. Childhood fears of bogeymen and headless horsemen made me want to turn tail and run for safety. Instead, I held my position. “Barclay!”
The horse burst from the fog, a black mountain of muscle and flying mane. The massive creature slid to a halt in the gravel of the drive three feet in front of me. It reared, a wild whinny breaking free of its throat.
The horse seemed to be twelve feet tall. Front hooves pawed the air directly over my head. I couldn’t move. I was paralyzed by fear.
“No!” The scream came from the front door.
Everything happened in slow motion. Eleanor was framed in the doorway. She was yelling, but I couldn’t hear a sound. Sweetie and Chablis charged out of the house toward the horse.
I stood there unable to do a thing to save myself.
The rider’s black cape swirled around him as he swung the horse hard to the right. The front hooves slashed down two feet from my shoulder with a thud that shook my bones.
With a snort of exertion, the huge horse leaped forward and away as Sweetie and Chablis barked at its heels. Then horse and rider were gone, consumed by the fog and the night.
“Sarah Booth, are you okay?” Eleanor came down the steps and put an arm around me and led me to the porch. “I thought you were going to be trampled. Why didn’t you run?”
I didn’t have an answer for her. But before we could get inside, headlights swept the driveway. Thank God. Tinkie had returned.
14
Tinkie took command of the situation. She ordered me, Eleanor, and the dogs back into the house while she took Eleanor’s handgun and a flashlight and followed the hoofprints across the front lawn.
“Sit down before you fall.” Eleanor eased me into a chair. “I’ll get us a drink.”
She returned with three glasses, ice, and a bottle of Bushmills 1608. She filled the glasses and handed me one. “Did you recognize the rider?”
Before I could answer, the front door shut with a solid thud and Tinkie stormed into the room, her cheeks burning with angry color. “Whoever it was can certainly ride.”
“Did you recognize him, Eleanor?” I asked.
“I didn’t get a clear look. A large man, broad shoulders. I’m sorry. You were under the rearing horse and I was so focused on you.” She poured Tinkie a drink and gave it to her.
My hand had stopped shaking, so I could sip the whiskey without chipping my teeth. “It has to be Barclay. Broad shoulders, long legs. He knows the property.”
“I don’t think so.” Tinkie sat beside me and rubbed my back. “Barclay was with me until half an hour ago. He couldn’t have driven here, gone to the stables, saddled up, and ridden.”
I hated to admit it, but she was correct. It would be an act of superhuman speed. “If not Barclay, then who?”
“I don’t know, but I can assure you I’m going to find out. No one nearly tramples Sarah Booth and gets away with it.”
Eleanor started to speak but was interrupted by the phone ringing. Tinkie switched on the recording device and signaled Eleanor to pick up. She did so, but before she could say hello, Monica’s voice crackled from the speakerphone. “I’m alive, Eleanor.”
The line snapped with static, and there was a strange echo, as if she was in a huge empty room. “I’m being held in a terrible place. I’m cold and scared. But I’m not harmed. He hasn’t hurt me … yet. The kidnapper wants me to tell you that today you went to the insurance company and then the bank. I’m saying this so you know I’m alive and it’s today. If you don’t get the money for him, he will kill me. Don’t doubt it. Do what he says. He’ll call tomorrow with specific instructions. I—” The line went dead.
We sat in stunned silence. I’d never expected Monica to call. I’d honestly begun to believe she was dead.
Eleanor’s relief was palpable. She vibrated with emotion. “She’s alive. She’s alive!”
“Thank god.” Tinkie stood and gently held Eleanor’s shoulders, either supporting or restraining, I couldn’t tell which. “She had information that proves she is alive. A very good sign. If the kidnapper wanted to kill her, she’d be dead by now.”
I’d recovered my wits enough to realize one of my best suspects, Eleanor, seemed to be in the clear. She’d been in the house all afternoon and evening, and she was with me when Monica called. As to Barclay, I’d been positive he was the marauding horseman. Now I had to rethink the knotty problem of the horseman and why he was rampaging around Briarcliff.
At most, we had twenty-four hours to come up with the money and devise a plan for the drop. I’d make another appeal for Eleanor to call in the law, but I knew it would be futile. The best Tinkie and I could do was protect her when she to
ok the money and ransomed her sister.
“Can Oscar get the cash?” Eleanor asked Tinkie. Her mind had obviously forged ahead. “The insurance check is good. Once Monica is rescued, she’ll endorse it. There won’t be any liability for your husband.”
“He’ll do his best.” Something was troubling Tinkie. I started to ask what was wrong, but she gave me a glance that told me to hold off. She went to the recorder and played back the message. Monica’s voice was strong, even broken up by the static. “You’re sure this is your sister?”
Fear passed across Eleanor’s face. “Do you think it’s an imposter?”
Tinkie tried to hide her worry. “No, I believe it’s Monica and I think she’s unharmed.”
“Then we have to be ready.” Eleanor drained her glass and put it down. “Whatever they want from me, I’ll do it. I’ve lost everyone in my life I ever loved. I will not lose my sister.”
Tinkie re-cued the machine, but she didn’t play it. “If Oscar helps with the money, Eleanor, we have to be ready for the kidnapper when he calls with the details of the drop. Could you listen to the call again?”
“Why?” Eleanor was distraught. “It makes me feel so helpless.”
“Does it sound like she’s calling from the same place the kidnapper called from the first two times?”
Eleanor considered for a moment. “Play it again, please.”
Tinkie hit the button and Monica’s voice once more filled the room.
“I can’t say for certain.” Eleanor went to the mantel and steadied herself. “I don’t remember the static or echoey sound, but maybe I wasn’t paying attention. Maybe it was there all along.” She tugged a handful of her hair. “Why can’t I remember? What’s wrong with me? This is my sister’s life!”
Tinkie caught her hand and stopped the tugging. “It’s hard to remember details at a time like this. Relax. Let the conversations come back to you. Anything you remember could be helpful. Background noises, things we can use to pinpoint the location. Is there any place in Natchez with acoustics like that? An old, empty building?”
Bones of a Feather: A Sarah Booth Delaney Mystery Page 15