by Karine Green
Kathy smiled. She needed to 'talk' to some slaves, or at least read their testimonies. "Do you have any with interviews of the slaves?"
The Librarian helped her dig out some old books that documented the stories of the slaves who had lived in the area. The Tales of Sugar Cane Negroes, It was published in 1932 by Leon Lacompte. She looked at the 'borrow' card. Lee Wilson was also on this card. She photographed it, and made a note to check if the Lacompte reporters were ancestors. Perhaps chasing the Caine's' was a family obsession? And since it seemed to be passed down she was sure if there were any living descendants they had to have inherited the private journals.
"Did you help the person who looked at this last?"
"Someone looked at this?" The librarian frowned. "People usually don't seek to remember what the actual slaves have to say, they usually prefer Hollywood's stories." She looked at the card, "I'll go ask Megan, she is our part time librarian." She paused, "The one on Hattie Rainier, has a great-great-grandson who is the Sheriff of this Parrish. He may have some firsthand stuff in his family history collection." She headed toward the check-out desk.
"Thank you. I definitely need to know what the slaves thought. The Hollywood stuff is fogging up everything," Kathy said smiling, and taking the book over to the table she had been working at. This was the third time she read something that mentioned Sheriff Rainier.
She opened the book to the first testimony. It was for Marie Edwards. She was 74 at the time of the book's printing. That would have made her a little girl, almost a toddler just prior to and during the Civil War. Too young to remember first hand.
She flipped to the next one. "Here's Hattie." Hattie Rainier, was 92 years old at the printing. That would have made her a young adult just prior to the Civil War. This was someone with a fully formed memory, and opinions to match.
Hattie was the cook for the Blanc Plantation. She married Bo Rainier, a freed slave from Rainier Riverboat Company. Hattie's mother used to take her with her to visit Dark Lady at the Caine Plantation.
Kathy made a note: Could Hattie's mother have been a co-conspirator in the fledgling Underground Railroad?
Hattie relayed the tale of poor Ridely, adding that he had been bought off the whipping post, by Mrs. Caine. Ha! I knew it! He was to be whipped for getting one of Hattie's House Girls pregnant without the express permission of Master Blanc.
Kathy smirked, "Apparently no unauthorized mouths to feed were allowed on the Blanc Plantation."
She smiled, so, the Whipper becomes the whipped, or would that be Whippee since he didn't actually get it? Someone enjoyed getting those orders, no doubt. The girl involved had been starved and then beaten. She later miscarried, and after that was not able to have children. Blanc was definitely a bastard, Kathy thought frowning at the text.
The reporter asked about Dark Lady. Hattie would have been 7 when Mary, that was Dark Lady's real name, died. Beyond adding Dark Lady's real name, she didn't really have anything new to add to what Kathy already knew. However, Hattie was first person, so she confirmed several legends as more credible historical facts then they were fifteen minutes ago. Dark Lady had been her code name, but eventually everyone called her Dark Lady.
Hattie thought Mistress Caine went mad, and was killed, presumably by Dark Lady. Dark Lady was shackled, and then whipped to death with a terrible razor whip. And, Stable Boy died the same day, in the stable on the Caine Plantation, but Hattie didn't know how he died. She had heard several different tales about his death.
Kathy made copies of Hattie's testimony for her growing collection. She would have to get a binder for all the research, or at least start scanning them into her tablet's file, so they could all be together.
The librarian returned. "Ms. Marconi, Megan, said she helped a woman who said she was writing a college paper. She had a class schedule."
"Thank you," Kathy said smiling, "Why would she show the librarian a class schedule? What difference would that make?"
The librarian shrugged, "Sometimes they do it to coax more help out of us; translation, they want us to do their research for them because they don't know how. So they play dumb freshman, and then ask for a lot of help. Megan says this lady seemed a bit older, about your age. She had very short blond hair. Beyond that, Megan says she doesn't remember."
"Thank you," Kathy said, helping the librarian gather the books up. She tried hard to ignore the 'a bit older, about your age' comment.
She waited out front for Jason, thinking that she had not really been in the stable/garage since she had bought the place. She had just looked in, and moved on, during the move in process. Perhaps there was a small chance some part of it was still intact from Dark Lady's time period?
Jason pulled up in the patrol car almost immediately. "It was getting slow, thought I would just sit here, and watch that stop sign," he said, holding up his ticket book.
"Making friends, are we?" she said, smiling.
He nodded smiling. "The town's people actually get upset if I don't write them. I can't have them gathering outside my office with pitchforks and torches. Besides, obnoxious traffic enforcement keeps burglaries and robberies in check. And, to answer your next question, no, there were no tickets the night of the museum break-in. I already checked that. And, the mover's ticket was the only one from the night of the Lawrence murder. I had it dismissed for him. Poor dude has been through enough."
She smiled, and remembered how many times she had found a suspect based on the traffic tickets they got trying to speed away. It would have been faster for the suspects to just leave their license at the scene, along with their place of employment, in case the detectives couldn't find them at home. She also found several witnesses that way. If it hadn't been for the fact that she knew where the movers were, they would be prime suspects right now because of that ticket.
"Home, my lady?" Jason asked.
"Yes," she said, continuing to smile. She updated him on her new information, and the fact that some information was now considered confirmed as facts, regarding Dark Lady and Ethan-Stable Boy.
Kathy looked at his car computer. "Are you logged in?"
"Yes, writing tickets, remember?" he said, turning the computer's stand to face her.
She ran Lee Wilson's name in the system, and received a bunch of hits. Too many. She narrowed the search to this state only, again there were too many. Apparently Lee and Wilson are as popular in the South as John Smith was elsewhere! There were hundreds, men, women, all races, no way to sort them out. It was a GAM as her grandmother used to call things like this. God Awful Mess!
"Got something?"
"No, it is probably an alias anyway. Someone had checked out several of the books I was looking at today two weeks ago under the name of Lee Wilson."
"Really, our psycho history buff?" Jason said, raising his eyebrows. "I had never even fathomed checking library cards."
"It was a lucky find." She shrugged, as they pulled into Kathy's driveway. "The stable," she said quickly, sounding more desperate than she wanted to. She recollected herself. "I thought it might be a good idea to check out the stable. Since the history is so strong there. Maybe Milton's killer left something there to feed the ghost story? Especially since several pages of William's journal was missing." She didn't want Jason to leave, but was too shy to ask him to stay.
He nodded and parked closer to the stable than the kitchen door.
There was nothing of the old stable left. It had basically been converted into a modern ten car garage, with enough space above it to have plans drawn for an apartment, but right now they were just open rafters. Even the hay lofts were gone. Someone, at one point, had plans for this garage. Too bad Kathy didn't have the extra money to finish it. It would make an excellent temporary domestic violence shelter.
"Dinner? I might not do sweet tea as well as the diner? But there is no sense in letting the new appliances sit there unused."
"Sure." Jason said, smiling.
He asked her at least a hundr
ed questions about growing up in New York City, in particular Manhattan. She kept to the surface details, and was able to throw in some cool police war stories to avoid talking about her parents. Luckily he never asked.
It was dark when he got up to leave. "Chief or not, I still have roll-call in the morning."
"Thank you for staying. Next time, I want to hear about how Mike got beat up for not staying overnight in the attic." She pointed upstairs.
He smiled and looked at the floor. "I only threw water balloons on him, in the morning when I found him sleeping in his own bed."
She laughed, "When you're sleeping, that counts as being beaten up."
He laughed, "You should have heard him scream."
She leaned up and gave him a kiss on his cheek. "I look forward to next time."
He looked very shy, but smiled. "Me too."
She was a bit hurt by the fact that he simply left without further...well, without further anything.
****
In the morning Kathy entered the small street front office of the Historical Society. The bell jingled on its spring. Jason had waited in his office, stating that Kathy would do better without him.
"Hello, Lauren, Do you have a minute?" Kathy said smiling, and trying not to look like she was being fake, as she greeted Lauren.
Lauren smiled, "Sure."
Kathy noticed a photo on her desk. She had seen it before, but it didn't have meaning until now. "Is that Jason Rose?"
The frame sported a photo of Jason in shorts and a tank top holding a football, Lauren was hanging off his shoulder looking up at him love sick. He was wearing sunglasses so his expression was harder to read. Boy Howdy, she was bony in that bikini. If Kathy was that skinny, she would wear a one piece to avoid looking emaciated. Kathy loved her body. She had actual curves to fill out a bikini very nicely.
Lauren smiled, and her eyes beamed. "Yes." Then her look turned darker, "How do you know my Jason?"
"I was consulting on a case. I didn't know Jason had a girlfriend." She was feeling a bit disappointed. She had thought her and Jason had hit it off well. Perhaps that was why he didn't come with her to talk to Lauren; he's stepping out on her. She stopped herself. No he isn't, nothing happened, she gave him a peck on the cheek that he barely reacted to before leaving. Additionally, Jason did not speak very fondly of Lauren...the Queen of Idiots engaging in idiocy was a phrase she had heard him use more than once over the last two days.
"Jason and I go way back." She smiled again, picking up the frame, hugging it, and then setting it back down. "I heard about poor Milton Lawrence. I remembered something when I saw the case." She pulled a note card in an envelope out of her desk. "Mil gave me this, said to give it to you with the closing papers, but I forgot. I was just so happy to have the house saved."
Kathy smiled, "The murder was two days ago, why not hand it over when you remembered." She hadn't mentioned the murder, but supposed it was a safe assumption on Lauren's part that she was indeed consulting on the Lawrence murder, and not the Museum burglary. It also did not escape Kathy's attention that Lauren didn't deny being Jason's girlfriend.
"I was busy, and didn't think it was important."
Kathy wanted to call B.S. on her, but smiled instead. "Yes, Jason said you were in New Orleans."
Her eyes darkened and her tone of voice became accusatory. "Why would Jason discus anything about me with you?"
Kathy smiled at Lauren's over reaction. There was nothing going on between the two. It was time to find out how deep into her fantasy she was living. "He said you wrote a book about my house. I bought and read it to learn more about the place." she continued smiling as pleasantly as she could.
Lauren beamed. "He is such a sweetheart. I just love him so." She patted the frame.
Kathy smiled and opened the note card. It read, 'Someone is after me. I am told the homicide detective can help.' It had his business card with 'please call me because the next quilt is red, but I don't' know what that means' scribbled on it. Kathy sighed. If Lauren had given this to her the first day, Milton would most likely still be alive, because the killer would have been alerted that the authorities, or perceived authorities knew what was planned. Her face fell.
"What is it?" Lauren asked.
Kathy tucked the note into her tablet's case. "Nothing, just something I wish I knew before he died."
"I am sorry, but I am not a delivery person, and Mil knows where the plantation is. He could have delivered it himself." Lauren folded her arms, and leaned back hard on her heel.
"Wow," Kathy said stunned. "Of all the cold blooded things to say. The man was whipped to death. He and his daughter were being stalked, and he tried to get a message to me for help. A message you conveniently forgot about. So, what do you know about the stalker?"
"What?" Lauren stiffened. "Nothing."
"Then why did you withhold evidence? Most people would have turned it in right away." It was extremely suspicious that she did not, and then follow it up with that attitude. What a bitch.
"Get out. I have nothing to add to this conversation. I am not the Post Office of La Famille Lawrence." She pointed to the door.
Kathy smiled a ridiculous fake smile. "I know you are not the Post Office of La Famille Lawrence. Please let me apologize for thinking you were human. By the way, you and Jason should have an updated photo. He looks like he is still in high school there." She paused for a moment, giving an overtly thoughtful look to Lauren. "Seems like you would have at least called your lover, to let him know you had the letter from Milton. I wonder what sort of appreciation he would have shown at the help with the case." She walked out leaving the door open.
"Born in a barn!"
"Yes, proud of it." As annoyed as Kathy was, Lauren did have a point. Milton was a back-door neighbor, why didn't he just walk over and talk to her? Did the incident in Junior High scare him that bad? More to the point, what was Lauren's role in this? Kathy wasn't buying the forgot it story.
Louise Caine-Mathews
A week later, Kathy put on some flip flops with her brown and turquoise maxi-dress. It was going to be seventy-four degrees here today, and 28 degrees back home. She posted it on her Facebook page, and immediately got several invitations for company. She smiled. She did not miss the cold! She typed back, when the house is done, everyone can visit. I can't wait to see y'all. She laughed at the use of the word y'all. That was not a word her friends would know her to say. Three 'likes' popped up immediately.
She turned her attention back to getting ready for the afternoon.
Jason had asked her to something called a Town Fish Fry. She had read about it in the copy of the historical newspaper that had Percy's arrest recorded in it. She was pleased to find out that the town still meets on the banks of a small nearby river. There was live music. They played games, quilted, danced, ate, and of course fished. The fresh catch was deep fried right there. Usually it was catfish, but whatever was on the line was on the menu. Jason had teased her about eating a baby gator once. This was the first one of the long season that ended with whatever weekend fell after Thanksgiving.
The thought of spending time with Jason, that didn't relate to the Lawrence murder, was nice, more than nice. Still, she was afraid to be excited. Kathy, men, and relationships didn't seem to be a good mix. But, there was something different about Jason. She wanted him to like her back. She had never wanted, or cared about that with anyone else.
The twisty bell rang downstairs. She loved the sound. She had found it at a salvage store downtown, and installed it yesterday evening. It wasn't period for when the house was built, but it was super old and super cool to have the key-twist door bell.
"Coming!" she called, trotting down the stairs.
She opened the door, "My dear Mister Rose, you do look adorable in civilian clothing," she said, with a really bad southern accent.
He smiled, and straightened his polo shirt. "That is supposed to be my greeting. Your dress looks incredible," he said, leading her
to his jeep.
"Jeep, I would have figured you for a big red pick-up guy."
"That's Mike, although with all the kids he and his wife seem to keep having, a pick-up won't be his vehicle of choice for long."
At the fish fry everyone was curious to meet the Yankee' who bought the ole spook house. Everyone was friendly, but when Kathy suggested they come to visit, they somehow had to go find someone they hadn't seen yet at the fish fry. She hadn't really expected all of them to come and visit. What she really wanted to know was, how superstitious were these people, and what did they believe about the ghost stories? So far, it was just a rambling sample of everything she already knew with varying degrees of exaggeration.
They all brought over samplings of their signature dishes for her to eat, which included no less than six varieties of something called gumbo. It looked horrendous, but Kathy had politely tried each one, and was thankful it tasted better than it looked. She was on the fast track to being a connoisseur of gumbo.
Jason helped his nephew in a three legged race against Mike and Mike's elder son. Jason won; probably because he hugged his nephew close enough to his hip to pick him up as he darted to the finish line. His nephew had laughed wildly, happy to finally beat his older brother at something.
Mike's wife, Sarah was nice, and very glad that Jason seemed to find someone he was interested in. She had a stroller with their two year old daughter, and was visibly expecting another.
Kathy thought, Man, for twenty-nine, Mike sure did hit the ground running when it came to getting his family settled. She watched Jason and his nephew get ready for another heat in the three-legged race.
"You know, for a minute, I thought Jason and Lauren had a thing," Kathy said, glad they didn't. Jason was far too good of a catch for that bat of a woman.
Sarah smiled, "That Lauren Grayson is way too interested in Jason. He wants nothing to do with her. It is so embarrassing. There was some sort of stalking incident that Lauren describes as a bad break-up, but Jason denied having any sort of relationship with her at all. Apparently the incident involved her sitting nude, and spread-eagle on his desk; that is what I heard, not what Jason said. Jason threatened to lock her up for trespassing, after pointing out that she was a bony bitch; not a bitch to be boned."