The Stubborn Schoolhouse Spirit (The Penelope Pembroke Cozy Mystery Series)

by Nickles, Judy

  “He figured out Marlo and Lewis Collier were stealing art? Did they take the Bancrofts?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “So he thought if he could get them back, he’d redeem himself.”

  Sam laughed. “You’ll read it all in the Bugle next week. Now it’s your turn. You went to the archives, didn’t you?”

  “Do you know what I found there?”

  “No, but I’d like to. Are you going to tell me?” He slid down the wall to the floor and pulled her down beside him. “I’m guessing, from the look on your face, you didn’t like whatever it was you turned up.”

  “I sure didn’t.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “The year before he died, Edgar Ragsdale donated his journals and photographic plates to the historical commission. I guess he wanted to set the record straight or clear his conscience or something, I don’t really know.”

  “So did he?”

  “He kept his journals from the time he came to Amaryllis until about 1930. He was from Minnesota, too young to have fought in the Civil War, but Jeremiah Bowden still considered him a you-know-what Yankee.”

  Sam chuckled. “I know what.”

  “Anyway, it was love at first sight with Daisy Bowden. He was thirty, and she was close to it. Jeremiah threatened to kill both of them if they even looked at each other.”

  “But they did.”

  “Apparently they carried on a secret courtship until she married Vincent Ives.”

  “So she broke it off with Ragsdale?”

  “No—she married Vincent Ives because she was pregnant with Jessie Ruth. Jeremiah engineered the whole thing to save the Bowden name. As town founder and its chief mover and shaker, he couldn’t afford a scandal.”

  “The plot thickens.”

  “To the consistency of glue. Apparently Ives always suspected Jessie Ruth wasn’t his, and Daisy kept slipping around with Ragsdale. Finally, the two of them decided to run off.”

  “They should’ve done that to begin with.”

  “Uh-huh, well, they didn’t. So anyway, Jeremiah got wind of the plan, and he told Vincent Ives and said he should threaten to leave and take Jessie Ruth with him—which would make Daisy straighten up and fly right. The problem was, though Vincent didn’t mind leaving. Apparently Daisy made life miserable for him, and he didn’t want a child who didn’t belong to him. So he bought his train ticket, checked his bag, and came out to the house to tell Daisy he was going.”

  “The gentlemanly thing to do, I’m sure.”

  “Anyway, Jeremiah showed up, and things got a little heated.”

  “And Jeremiah killed Ives for double-crossing him,” Sam said.

  “No, he didn’t. Ives told him off. Said he shouldn’t have interfered with Daisy and Edgar to begin with and he should leave well enough alone now.”

  “So who killed Ives?”

  “Edgar Ragsdale.”

  “Ragsdale killed him? After Ives defended him?”

  “Well, Jeremiah stormed off, swearing he’d see all of them dead, and Ives seemed

  to believe he meant to make good on his threat. He told Daisy to pack up Jessie Ruth and come with him that night, and he’d see to it she could connect with Ragsdale later if not sooner. Then Ragsdale showed up at the house to see why Daisy hadn’t met him at their usual trysting place, which was in his studio of all things. He overheard the conversation and thought Ives was trying to make off with Daisy. So he grabbed a coal shovel standing outside the door of the house—that’s the Sit-n-Swill to you—and bashed Ives’ head in.”

  “Ouch.”

  “So then he and Daisy managed to drag the man’s body to the school, so he could bury it in the basement. After Daisy left, he stripped Ives of most of his clothes, carried them back to the house, and put them under those stones in the hearth.”

  “Did Jessie Ruth see what happened?”

  “That was the awful part. She saw and heard too much, although they didn’t realize it until she cried and cried about somebody hurting the man she called daddy. Edgar and Daisy were so overcome with guilt at what had happened that they stopped seeing each other. Jeremiah’s threats might’ve had something to do with it, too. Daisy kept on teaching, but according to what Edgar wrote, she was never the same.”

  “So how did Jessie Ruth find out that her father was Edgar Ragsdale and not Vincent Ives?”

  “A year later, Vincent Ives’ sister showed up in Amaryllis. His baggage had come home without him, and she’d finally decided to find out why. She stayed long enough to hear the gossip about Ragsdale and Daisy, and she got Jessie Ruth off by herself and started asking questions. Jessie Ruth remembered what she’d seen, even though she didn’t understand, but she told Ives’ sister, and the sister confronted Daisy, who of course denied everything.”

  “Well, of course, she did.”

  “That’s when she tried to burn Ives’ personal effects stuffed into the hearth and caught the house on fire in the process. Years later, Jessie Ruth was talking to her mother about the fire, and Daisy let something slip. It all clicked in Jessie Ruth’s mind, but Daisy said she’d be considered just as guilty as Ragsdale if Jessie Ruth ever told anyone.”

  “So she didn’t.”

  “No, but she went up to Ragsdale’s studio and told him she just wanted to get eye to eye with the man who murdered the only father she’d ever known and ruined her mother’s life. They never spoke again.”

  “But he left everything to her.”

  “Out of guilt, I guess. She never even used any of the money to put up a marker for him at the cemetery.”

  “That’s some story.”

  “What do I do with it, Sam? Why ruin reputations after all these years? The Bowdens made this town, and Edgar Ragsdale recorded its history in pictures. Harry wants to start a museum on the second floor of this place. Build it around Ragsdale’s pictures, and now we have his cameras, too.”

  “I like that idea.”

  “I did, but I’m not so sure now.”

  Sam leaned his head back against the wall. “The fireplace kept its secret all these years. So did the basement.” He stifled a smile. “With a little help from Jeremiah and Jessie Ruth.”

  “Hush!”

  He held her against him. “I’m joking.”

  “Maybe not. Daddy said everyone always swore Jeremiah Bowden haunted that basement, and I watched Tabby talking to Jessie Ruth.”

  “Did you see Jessie Ruth?”

  “You know I didn’t, but Tabby did.” Penelope shivered. “I don’t believe in ghosts. I just blessed don’t, but I know what I saw.”

  “I don’t believe in a lot of things, but I’m not foolish enough to say they don’t exist.”

  “So you don’t know everything.”

  “Not by a long shot.”

  “Tabby described Jessie Ruth right down to her high-button shoes.”

  Sam nodded. “Maybe Jessie Ruth has been guarding Vincent’s grave all these years.”

  “I hope she’s gone for good.”

  “Some spirits are stubborn.”

  “So you do believe in ghosts?”

  “Look, Nell, I think what Harry Hargrove wants to do, preserve the history of the town and all, is great. I hope you and Mrs. Hargrove will support him. Nobody has to know what you found out at the archives. I doubt anyone else will go looking for information about Edgar Ragsdale anyway.”

  “Maybe not. I wouldn’t mind finishing this place if I could be sure nobody was going to bother us again. Nobody dead or alive.”

  “I can’t tell you it won’t happen, but I have a feeling you’re home free.” He got up, pulling her after him. “I have a good feeling about this place, Nell. I found the second basement and the trip wire weeks ago, so I knew the paintings were there.”

  “Did Bradley know?”

  Sam smiled. “I’m not speaking for him.”

  “Did Lewis Collier kill Marlo?”

  Sam shrugged. “Let’s just say she made the mista
ke of trying to double-cross him.”

  “And the books?”

  He sighed. “It’s all going to come out, so I’ll go ahead and tell you that Lewis learned his thieving ways from his uncle J. Compton. There were codes in the books telling which paintings went where and for how much, and Lewis had added the ones he was moving. I’m not sure yet how Marlo got hold of them, but they were her insurance policy that Lewis Collier wouldn’t stiff her.”

  “So when Marlo gave the books to the library…” Penelope interrupted.

  “Bingo. Of course, I imagine she planned to retrieve them later—for a price.”

  “She paid the price, didn’t she? She paid with her life.”

  Sam nodded.

  “What about Jessie Ruth? Was she involved in art theft, too? Lewis Collier said she wasn’t.”

  “Who knows? I’m sure she told Lewis about the second basement and how she’d fixed the door.”

  “Just to hide Ragsdale’s cameras?”

  “I guess we could conjure her up and ask her,” Sam said.

  Penelope slapped a hand over his mouth. “Don’t say it! Don’t even suggest it!” She turned toward the key-hole. “If you come back, Jessie Ruth, I’ll tell everybody about you—how you were too cheap to even put up a marker on your own father’s grave after he left you every penny he had. Some big philanthropist, huh?”

  Sam applauded. “You tell her, Nell.”

  Penelope took a step toward the basement door and raised her voice. “Just leave us alone. Go away, and don’t come back.”

  Without warning, the floor rolled beneath her feet, and the door of the key-hole flew open. A wail—something between that of a child and a wild animal—filled the room, which went instantly ice cold. Penelope fled to the safety of Sam’s arms until the floor leveled out again, and the air lost its chill in the sudden silence.

  Sam looked down at her. “I guess you told her.”

  Penelope buried her face in his chest. “That didn’t happen…did it?”

  “Nah, didn’t happen, Nell.” He hugged her. “Let’s go home.”

  Look for more Penelope Pembroke Cozy Mysteries coming soon to Amazon.

  Book 3: The Feed Store Floozy

  A former Amaryllis resident returns to open an antique store in a building which has had many lives, including a saloon/parlor house, but Penelope and the other residents of the town aren’t counting on the murder and mayhem he brings with him.

  Book 4: The Possum Hollow Hullabaloo

  Penelope keeps the B&B slick as a whistle, but when the secrets of a forgotten community set back in the woods begin to leak out, she finds herself in the middle of a mess she can’t clean up.

  Book 5: The Larcenous Legacy

  The new priest of St. Hyacinth’s brings a breath of fresh air to the parish, but something about an ordination gift from his immigrant grandfather is rattling the bones of evil past and present.

  Book 6: Sam’s Last Stand

  Tiny the biker, aka Sam, is back again, and Penelope is head over heels in love—but if Sam can’t let go of his dark past, they have no future.

  Visit Penelope online at http://www.thepenelopepembrokecozymysteryseries.yolasite.com