“No, I didn’t figure that at all. See, she left the milk in the car. I figured she started a new life sans milk.”
I deserved that remark, so I swallowed my pride and nodded. “Where does the investigation stand now?”
“We have a missing person bulletin out. Her photograph has been sent to major Mississippi towns, New Orleans, and Memphis. We never got a single hit. If she went to those areas, she stayed under the radar.” He calculated. “She’ll be harder to find now since she’s likely had the baby.”
“The baby is safe. Someone left her on my front porch. She’s received medical care and Sheriff Peters is involved.” Where Libby was concerned, my trust factor was sorely lacking with Hoss Kincaid. He’d done nothing to earn my confidence.
“You have the baby but not the mother?” He had the decency to look concerned.
“Yes. I believe Pleasant was abducted and is being held somewhere.” I gave him the rest of the details about Libby but skipped over the fact that the baby was in the Richmonds’ care. He could get those details from Coleman. I felt my jean’s pocket for my car keys. It was time to move on. I wasn’t gaining any ground here. “Thanks for your help, Sheriff. If you get any leads would you let me know?”
“I might,” he said, deliberately provoking me.
“Thanks again.” I headed out the door before I lost my temper and said something I would truly regret.
* * *
By the time I got back to Dahlia house, I was longing to see little Libby and get a dose of baby love. I would never admit it to Jitty, but in the short few moments she’d been completely mine, I’d felt a strange stirring in my chest.
I called Tinkie for an update and filled her in on what I knew.
“If something has happened to the mother, do you think Oscar and I can keep little Libby?”
“Tinkie, the optimum outcome is to find Pleasant Smith, the mother. Imagine how she’s feeling.”
Tinkie’s sigh was audible. “I know. It’s just that Oscar loves her as much as I do. I never thought he’d come around to adoption, but he’s talking about it. Seriously. And not just to placate me. Libby has him wrapped around her little finger. She is a Daddy’s Girl in the cradle.”
If anyone could school a one-day-old infant in the art of man manipulation it was my partner. Tinkie could hand out Ph.D.s in DG training if she chose to. I’d never seen a more successful model of “make a man do what you want and love doing it.”
I entered the foyer and closed the front door behind me, still listening to Tinkie rave about the baby. “Tinkie, don’t set yourself up for heartbreak. Love little Libby, but know it’s temporary.”
“I know, Sarah Booth. I’m indulging in a bit of fantasy, but she isn’t my baby.”
That sounded rational, but baby fever wasn’t something one could will away. “Why don’t you drop the baby with Madame Tomeeka and come help me with the case.”
“Tammy’s out of town. She’s in Memphis visiting her daughter.”
I tried to think of other friends who might take care of little Libby—to give Tinkie a break from the bonding that was going on. Cece was at the newspaper and wouldn’t change a diaper for a lottery win, and Millie had her hands full at the café. Harold was great with dogs and kids, but he was at the bank working.
“Okay, I’ll give you a call if I find anything.”
“You do that.” I heard the baby coo and my own heart melted. Those baby sounds spoke right to a woman’s inner core.
I hung up and turned to the kitchen when I yelped from fright. A woman in a floor-length shirtwaist dress with her hair pulled into a bun stood in the parlor door. She had a baby in one arm and two clinging to her skirt.
“Motherhood is the most blessed of all conditions,” she said in a light, pleasant voice. “I have been blessed with a passel of children, all smart, all eager to journey into the world.”
I knew it was Jitty, but I had no clue who Jitty thought she was. Her habit of jumping around in time and space made me crazy. At least this was better than Rosemary with the spawn of Satan. “Give me a clue, please.”
She loved to make me guess.
“My brood calls me Marmee, and my girls grew up to be literary heroines.”
“Margaret March.” I had her pegged. “The perfect mother who raised a family of perfect girls.”
“The mantle of motherhood rested lightly on my shoulders. I had the talent for it.”
“And modest, too. I somehow don’t think Louisa May Alcott is writing your lines.”
“I have no need of a speechwriter. I’m my own woman and I raised my darlings to be the same. They are perfect models of womanhood, but they are not vapid. They think, they do, they live, and, by god, they love.”
“Lucky they reside in a book. Otherwise, they might have been burned for witches with their progressive views.” I had a mind to devil Jitty a bit now that she was assuming the mother of all mother disguises. I knew what was coming next.
“Even Jo did her duty and produced an heir. Several, in fact, and they were the joy of her life.” Jitty dropped her beatific expression, and her plump white cheeks thinned, the skin shifting to the light mocha shade that was my haint. “When you gonna jump in the sack with one of those men sniffin’ after you and get yourself with child?”
“It might be nice if I loved the father of my child.”
Jitty waved the phantom children from her skirts and they evaporated, as did her skirt. She had on skinny jeans and my favorite pair of boots. “Love comes and goes, Sarah Booth. Every relationship has its ups and downs. True love isn’t guaranteed, but the love of a child is something you need to experience.”
I didn’t doubt her evaluation, but I did question her timing. I’d just ended my engagement. I wasn’t ready to jump in the sack and get pregnant just because Jitty thought I was behind schedule on producing an heir.
“You’re going to pressure my ovaries into an early death.” The look on her face was priceless. I plied my advantage. “You know stress can kill healthy ovaries. Think of all those eggs shriveling away, defeated by cortisol and other stress hormones.” I had no clue what I was talking about, but lack of facts had never stopped Jitty. What was good for the goose was good for the gander, as my Aunt Loulane, fount of Proper Lady Wisdom, would say.
“You are lyin’, Sarah Booth Delaney.”
I suppressed my grin and gave her my most serious expression. “I’m not.”
“You are too.”
“Not.”
“Are too.”
“Not!” I grabbed my abdomen. “I can almost feel them dying right now.” I went into a high-pitched, pathetic voice, “‘Make it stop. Make it stop. Stress is killing me.’ Now that’s the sound of some cracked eggs shriveling into dust because of pressure.”
Jitty waved her hand at me in disgust. “You think you’re smart, but you are just a smart aleck.”
“Jitty, I’m doing my best.”
She sniffed. “Keep that little Libby for a day or two and I’ll bet your eggs get a whole lot better.”
“Or it could be I discover I don’t like minding babies.”
“Your mama is rollin’ in her grave.”
I had to laugh then, because the one thing I knew about my mother, Libby Delaney, was that whatever path I chose to follow, she’d support me one hundred percent. “Give me some time, Jitty. There are a lot of fish in the sea.” For once, I was going to get the last word with my know-it-all haint.
“‘You don’t need scores of suitors. You need only one … if he’s the right one,’” Jitty replied, stealing a line from the Alcott book. And she was gone before I could think of a retort.
I put my pistol in the trunk of the car, called up Sweetie Pie and Pluto, and waved them into the front seat. I loved to ride with the top down, but it was securely in place due to the cold weather. I was headed to Bolivar County once again. I wanted to talk to the clerk at the convenience store where Pleasant Smith was last seen. Sheriff Hoss Kincaid h
adn’t mentioned questioning the clerk, and if his attitude was any indication, I doubted he’d made the effort. He’d written Pleasant off as a runaway. End of story.
Gertrude Strom was on my mind as I drove. She’d abducted my fiancé and shot him in the leg, all to punish me for some breach of trust by my mother. The whole thing was a fabrication, a story made up in the coils of her fevered brain. She’d demonstrated crazy again and again, and returning to the area around Sunflower County was just one more example of how nuts she was. Coming back here after jumping bail was stupid, and one thing about Gertrude, she wasn’t dumb.
Was she so crazed and vengeful that she’d risk prison just to hurt me again?
I wished I could think the answer was no, but I knew it was possible. Probable. She would risk her freedom to hurt me. That was not a comforting thought.
On the way to the store, I called Madame Tomeeka, a woman with such talents that she drew customers from Memphis and New Orleans. I had tremendous respect for Tammy, but I was also wary. Tammy’s dreams had foretold danger for me and Tinkie more than once. While some believed that forewarned was forearmed, I accepted that her dreams made me anxious.
Still, anxious was better than poleaxed.
“Tammy, I need your help. When you get back from Memphis, I want to have a séance.”
“I’m not in Memphis.”
I was stunned that Tinkie had out and out lied to me. Maybe she’d been mistaken about where Tammy was. I chatted with my psychic friend, and ten minutes later, I’d arranged for a gathering at Dahlia House to allow Tammy to attempt to figure out where baby Libby’s natural mother might be. Tinkie, Millie, and Cece were all on the guest list. And when I called Millie, she offered to bring a homemade chicken potpie and bread pudding. Plans set, my focus returned to the job at hand.
In the distance I saw the lonely convenience store with two gas pumps and an awning that looked like a tornado had had its way with it. It wasn’t a place that inspired a desire to stop, but it was the only place to buy a few groceries, gasoline, and maybe a soft drink within a twenty-mile radius. Nothing but the two-lane highway and barren cotton fields could be seen in any direction. Desolate would be an accurate description.
I pulled around to the north and left Sweetie and Pluto in the car while I entered. I prowled the interior, assessing the clerk behind the counter. He was a young man, probably just out of high school. Tall and thin, he looked to be more the artistic type than a jock. High school had probably been an unhappy experience for him.
He stood at the cash register, reading a copy of Madame Bovary. Definitely a bookworm. When I put a soda on the counter, he looked up with a lazy smile. “Will that be all?”
I paid for the drink and opened it, taking a sip. “I’ve been hired to find Pleasant Smith.”
He went deathly pale, not exactly what I’d expected. “I haven’t seen her in a month,” he almost whispered.
“Were you working here when she came in for some milk?”
He nodded, his hands shaking a little as he put the novel down on the counter.
“Can you tell me what happened while she was in the store? Maybe she said something that would indicate where she was headed.”
“She was going home. She’d come to buy milk for her cousin, the baby her mama keeps.”
“So she purchased the milk. Anything else?”
He thought for a minute. “No, she didn’t buy anything else. She picked up some guitar strings I’d ordered for her.”
“You’d ordered?”
He blushed a deep red. “She broke her D string, so I ordered a new set for her. As a present. She could really play that guitar. You should hear some of the songs she wrote. She’s gonna be a star.”
He lost all self-consciousness when he spoke of Pleasant’s talent. The boy clearly cared for her, whether she knew it or not. “Did she get the strings?”
“Yeah.” Glumness settled over his features. “She didn’t get to use them, though. She disappeared. Her guitar is still at her mama’s trailer.”
“Where was her car found?”
“Abandoned on Highway 12. I told her not to trust that old beater. She was a pretty good mechanic, when it came right down to it. She kept the piece of crap running, but it broke down all the time. She should’ve had a better car.”
“How far from here?”
He pointed toward the farm road that disappeared into the distant vista of brown fields. “That’s Highway 12, the quickest way back to Fodder Gin Road, so that’s the way she went. Her cousin was hungry, and there wasn’t any milk in the house. She barely had enough change to pay for the milk.”
A young pregnant girl who’d spent her last change on a gallon of milk didn’t register with me as a likely candidate to run away. “Tell me about Pleasant. You knew her.”
“I did. She’s a good girl. Somebody took her and they’re still hanging on to her.” His face pinched up in frustration. “She’d never have taken off like that. Not expecting a baby and all. She’d talked all her plans out with her mama and they’d figured out how Pleasant could catch up on her studies next semester. She had a great chance at getting a scholarship from Delta State. She wanted to study the music business. She would never have run out on her dream of being a songwriter and performer.”
“Did you go to high school with her?”
He nodded slowly. “I did. She kept to herself. The other girls were jealous because she was so pretty and she had talent. She got the lead in the school plays when she tried out. The band director used some of her songs. She’d met this Nashville agent who was gonna make it happen for her.” When he looked up at me, he was angry. “She wouldn’t run out on all of that. She wouldn’t run out on—” He broke it off and didn’t continue.
“What’s your name?” I asked.
“Frankie Graham.”
I made a note and then asked. “The store here. It’s called the Three Bs. Why?”
“Booze, bacon, and barbecue. The owners think those are the three necessities of life.”
“Frankie, were you more than friends with Pleasant?” I’d be willing to bet he was in love with her.
His head dipped low. “I tried to take care of her. I helped her with the car and gave her my cell phone when she needed to make calls about her songs.” He looked up. “I wanted to be more than that, but Pleasant had a ticket out of the poverty and the desperation all around her. She didn’t need me hanging on and dragging her down.”
The doors of the store burst open and two large men, red-faced with alcohol and bluster, pushed in.
“Well if it isn’t Candyass Frankie.” A tall blond boy with rippling muscles reached across me and picked up Frankie’s book. “So you’re reading about a madam. The whorehouse kind? That’s the only piece of ass you’ll ever get around here, Stringbean.”
The other boy reached into the cooler and pulled out a six-pack of beer. He came to the counter. “Come have a beer with us, Frankie. We’ll show you how to grow a pair.” They looked at each other and laughed.
“Don’t make the little wussy cry,” the blond said.
Frankie rang up the beer without comment.
The bell on the door signaled another customer—this was a flurry of activity for a store stuck in the middle of nowhere. A pretty young girl sashayed past the two young men and put a twenty on the counter.
“Pump one,” she said.
“Oh, baby, I’d like to give you my number one pump,” the blond boy said. The other slapped his back, almost choking on laughter.
“Word around the high school is that your nozzle is so small I wouldn’t feel it,” the girl said with complete aplomb.
Bada-bing! If I’d had her self-assurance in high school, it would have been a less miserable experience. She prissed out the door, her perfect sun-streaked blond curls bouncing behind her.
The two boys went to the door to look out. In the moment of privacy, I asked Frankie, “Cheerleader?”
He nodded. “Her boyfriend
will beat the snot out of these guys, and it wouldn’t be a bad idea. They were tormenting Pleasant the last time she was in the store. She gave it right back to them.”
I snapped a photo of each guy while they were busy guffawing and man-patting each other’s backs for the bawdy comments. Frankie might not have been the last person to see Pleasant before she vanished.
“Hey, pencil dick,” the beefy brunette said as he flicked a finger under Frankie’s nose, “I don’t have the money to pay for the beer. I’ll bring it back. Later.”
Frankie picked up the six-pack and put it under the counter. “That’s against store rules.”
“And you’re gonna take my beer?” the young man asked.
“Yes.” Frankie was scared but determined.
“You sure you want to try that?” The beefy boy reached into his pocket and brought out a switchblade. “I might gut you or I might slice your car tires.”
“You can’t have the beer. I’d have to pay for it and I don’t have any money.” Frankie wasn’t brave, but he was fiscally responsible. He wasn’t going into debt for beer.
“Weasel face, you’d better—”
I dialed 911 and when DeWayne answered, I spoke loudly. “Deputy Dattilo, there’s a robbery in progress at Three Bs Grocery on Highway 12. Could you send several patrol cars, please? One suspect is brandishing a knife.”
That was all it took. The two young men hit the door, leaving the beer. Tires smoked as they churned out of the lot.
“Sarah Booth! Sarah Booth!” DeWayne squawked at me. “I don’t have jurisdiction in Bolivar County.”
“I know,” I said. “It was a scare tactic, and it worked. But those boys are headed east on Highway 12. They may dip into Sunflower County and they need to be picked up. They were in the store the day Pleasant went missing, and they’re real macho assholes. I’d like for you or Coleman to question them. You know, as in really question them.”
Neither Coleman nor DeWayne would slap a prisoner around, but if given the chance, I’d do it to those two.
“I’ll be on the lookout, and I’ll call Hoss.”
“Good luck with that,” I said. Hoss had not impressed me as a man of action.
Rock-a-Bye Bones Page 5