A Good Man Gone (Mercy Watts Mysteries)

by A W Hartoin

  The rapping started up again, louder than before. I put my eye to the peephole. Nobody. Something hit the peephole and I jumped back a foot and hit my cast on the edge of the breakfast bar.

  “Shit.”

  “Mercy Watts, I heard that.”

  Groan.

  I opened the door. Great Aunt Miriam stood with her left hand on her hip and a large four-pronged cane in her right. It was raised to the height of the peephole and she looked ready to clock me with it.

  “Hello, Aunt Miriam,” I said.

  She stalked past me with her cane still raised and made a growling sound deep in her throat.

  “So what can I do for you?”

  Aunt Miriam looked me up and down with emphasis on my chest. “A nice young lady dresses properly to receive visitors.”

  Who ever said I was nice or a lady for that matter?

  “I wasn’t planning on receiving visitors.”

  “You opened the door.”

  “I’ll be right back.” I went in my bedroom and put on the accursed bra. Then I went back into the living room and stood in front of Aunt Miriam like a recruit ready for inspection. “Better?”

  “Hm,” she growled.

  “What? I put on the bra.”

  “You’ve no shoes and your hair, you look like you just woke up.”

  “I did.”

  “Hmm.”

  “Fine.” I went to the bathroom and ran a comb through my hair. I washed my face and applied lip gloss and a new coat of mascara to be on the safe side. My feet begged to be shoeless, so we compromised and I put on sandals. Better, practically stunning, if I did say so myself.

  I marched back to the sofa. “Better?”

  Aunt Miriam narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips. God forbid I be fishing for a compliment. Vanity is a sin, you know.

  “We will be late now, thanks to your nap.” She pronounced nap like it was a dirty word. The kind I would say.

  “Late for what?”

  “Our appointment at four.”

  “The coffin thing? That’s tomorrow.”

  “It’s today. Hurry and we’ll be on time.” By on time she meant a half hour early. It was three o’clock.

  “Mom said tomorrow.”

  Aunt Miriam stood up and marched to the door after giving me a scorching look, and I knew to drop it. She wasn’t wrong and neither was my sainted mother. It wouldn’t be healthy for me to suggest otherwise.

  I followed her out the door and down the hall past Mr. Cervantes’s open door. I caught a glimpse of him smiling under the chain. Mr. Cervantes both admired and feared Aunt Miriam much like the rest of the world. Unlike the rest of the world, Mr. Cervantes would’ve asked Aunt Miriam out for coffee if she weren’t already married to God.

  Aunt Miriam went straight to my truck and stood at the passenger door. She was eye to eye with the lock and she stared at it like she could open it by force of will.

  I came up panting behind her and said, “I can’t drive. Painkillers.” I waved my cast beside her head.

  She turned around, looked at my cast, and her lips relaxed into their usual thin line. “Bad break?”

  “No. It’s alright. Hurts though.”

  Aunt Miriam grumbled.

  Come on, you’re a nun. Give me a little sympathy, a pat on the head, something.

  “Your mother didn’t say how it happened,” she said.

  “I fell off the stoop of a wrecked trailer.”

  Her lips pursed.

  “I was following up on Gavin’s last case in Lincoln.”

  Aunt Miriam’s lips relaxed and she patted my shoulder. “We need a ride.”

  “Where’s your car?” I asked.

  “At the hospital.”

  “Alright then. Aaron said he’d take us tomorrow. Let’s walk to Kronos,” I said.

  “Will he be there?”

  “Where else?”

  A ten-minute walk to Kronos was enough to make Aunt Miriam antsy. It was twenty minutes down Highway 40 and we already bordered on being late by her watch. When we walked in, Rodney stood behind the bar, wiping glasses and jawing with a couple business types. When they turned and saw me, their jaws dropped. It was the guys from earlier. I guess they doubled back in hopes of another Mom sighting. They simultaneously dropped fives on the bar and shuffled past us, murmuring something about appointments. Aunt Miriam glared at them and climbed onto a bar stool.

  Rodney looked over his smudged glasses and said, “What is it with you?”

  I could tell by his expression that he really didn’t know.

  “Maybe it isn’t me. It could be Aunt Miriam,” I said.

  Rodney thought about that, and Aunt Miriam growled.

  “We need a ride. The appointment for casket picking is today,” I said.

  Rodney yelled for Aaron who appeared from the storeroom with a smudge of ketchup on his chin and his glasses dangling from one ear.

  “What,” he said.

  “We need a ride,” I said.

  “Okay.”

  No questions asked. I liked that in a man. Aaron fixed his glasses, wiped his chin, tucked in his shirt, which untucked itself in three steps and said, “I’m ready.

  I helped Aunt Miriam off the stool. It was a good two-foot jump for her. She straightened her veil and marched out the door.

  “What’s with the cane?” asked Rodney. “She got the arthritis?”

  “No. She thinks it gives her an edge in negotiations,” I said.

  “She wants a cheap casket?”

  “You bet.” I saluted Rodney and ran to catch up with Aunt Miriam and Aaron.

  When I caught them at the curb, Aaron opened the 300’s passenger door for Aunt Miriam. She settled herself in, adjusting every bell and whistle the seat had. She wiggled, made sure she could see over the dash, looked through the glove compartment, who knows why, maybe she thought I stowed some condoms in there. She’s been looking for evidence of immoral behavior since I was fifteen. There’s plenty of it to be found, but being a nun she didn’t know where to look. I’d never put anything in a glove compartment. What am I, stupid? I don’t think so. Besides, it was my dad’s car. Ick.

  Aaron put me in the backseat with the care he used with Aunt Miriam. He’d have belted me in, if I hadn’t beat him to it. Aunt Miriam continued to adjust her seat, grumbling about her lumbar region. Since she drove an ancient Ford Escort, I didn’t think it was the seat that was bothering her. She gave Aaron directions every fifteen feet and pointed out other cars and traffic signs that didn’t pertain to us. I admired Aaron for his calm forbearance, but the truth is he probably didn’t hear a word she said.

  I lay down in the backseat and tucked Dad’s emergency blanket under my head. I sucked in a lungful of Dad’s scent and listened to Aunt Miriam critiquing the shape of a new Volvo driving by.

  Twenty minutes later Aunt Miriam was still gabbing on, but this time about the size of a parking lot. It was too small, badly shaped and to top it all, full. Aaron parked on a side street and she didn’t like that either.

  Aaron helped me out of the backseat. “How long?” Maybe he had been listening to Aunt Miriam and couldn’t take it anymore.

  “Beats me.”

  “I’ll stay here,” he said.

  Coward.

  We left Aaron leaning on the 300 studying an elm and walked towards the funeral home. There must be one architect that designs funeral homes and he’s obsessed with the South. This particular design was Tara, the one from the movie, not the book. The illusion was perfect down to the sweeping verandas and flowers. It was made to look old while at the same time being shiny and well-scrubbed. It gave me the creeps. Not because I knew what went on inside, but because it was all so fake and cheerful. I didn’t think funerals should be cheery, well-scrubbed, and shiny. Death was miserable crap, at least they could own up to it, but I guess I was in the minority because the place was kicking. The lot was packed to the point of double parking. Some guy in an Excursion parked on the lawn. We wal
ked up the front steps and rang the bell. I swear it sounded like the theme from Gone with the Wind.

  A girl with sad eyes and frosted blue eye shadow answered the bell. We told her we had an appointment and she promptly told us we didn’t. Wrong answer. After Aunt Miriam scared the glitter off her, she went to get management.

  A tall young guy, also with sad eyes, hurried out from the back. He stopped short when he saw us. That time I didn’t know if it was me or Aunt Miriam. She’d called in some favors to get Gavin a spot and my guess was he’d already spent too much time with her.

  He took a deep breath, straightened his tie, and smoothed back the remains of his hair. Okay, it was me, but at least I didn’t have to do the talking.

  “We’re here, Mr. Altemueller,” said Aunt Miriam.

  “Yes, yes you are,” he said, looking at me.

  Don’t look at me, bub. It’s her deal.

  “We’re ready,” she said loudly.

  Mr. Altemueller jumped and flushed. “Well, Sister Miriam, you see I think there may have been a miscommunication with our dates. We were expecting you tomorrow and we have a large event today.”

  Event. Now death is an event. Super creepy. Of course he was talking to my boobs at the time.

  “We’re here now,” said Aunt Miriam.

  I couldn’t see Aunt Miriam’s face, but the back of her head scared me.

  “Yes, I see that. Right this way,” he said to my boobs.

  We followed him past rooms named Remembrance One, Two and Three. They were packed with sobbing mourners and people drinking cappuccinos with extra foam. Mr. Altemueller led us down a ramp through double doors into the showroom. The showroom was empty save a dozen caskets on velvet-covered pedestals. The room was pure white with low lighting and little spotlights trained on each casket, but it was the least creepy room in the place. It was real and down to business. The business was death, but what of it. It had to be done and we had to do it.

  “Normally I’d walk you through the process, but it’s a special day and I have to get back.”

  “Price list,” said Aunt Miriam.

  “Yes, right. Well, I’ll send my assistant down in a few minutes to see if you’ve made a choice and we’ll see what we can do.”

  “We’ll see a price list. Send your assistant with that.”

  “We don’t really have a price list per se. You see, we’re offering custom burials.”

  Aunt Miriam pointed to a gold casket trimmed in oak. “So we can’t buy that exact casket?”

  “Yes, of course you can. That one is our Eternity Gold and it’s very popular.”

  “Why is it custom?” I couldn’t resist.

  “It’s a special design,” he said.

  “What’s special about it? Doesn’t it come from the factory that way?”

  “I…I have to get back. Please look around and…” Mr. Altemueller left mid-sentence. We weren’t typical mourner material. Who but us goes in looking to bury a loved one on the cheap? Most people are probably so shell-shocked they’ll pay anything just to get it over with and to not look cheap. Of course, those people wouldn’t be from the Watts clan. Aunt Miriam had been taught by the Catholic Church and they took those vows of poverty and economy seriously.

  “Special.” Aunt Miriam grumbled and started walking from casket to casket. She took pictures for Dixie, scratched paint with her fingernail, tapped on lids, and tugged on handles. She put it into perspective. I mean, we were burying this thing after all. It should hold up.

  Wait a minute. Why? What for? Presumably we weren’t going to dig it up. Why not go for the old pine box? It ends up in the same place.

  Aunt Miriam walked back to the double doors and turned around. She stared at each casket with the intensity of a chess champion. If she favored one, I couldn’t tell. She stopped looking at the caskets and began pacing back and forth in front of them. She swung her cane beside her, occasionally snagging on the beige carpeting and irritating herself.

  “Do you want me to get the assistant?” I asked.

  “No.”

  Great.

  The more I looked at those coffins, the more I imagined being in one. My hands were clammy and I felt like I had a hole through my middle. Aunt Miriam kept pacing. The more she paced the thinner her lip line got. Yipes. I didn’t know what I did, but it was bad.

  “I think I need a coffee.” I gave her a wide berth and went for the door.

  “We’re almost done.”

  “Err. Okay. You want the assistant?”

  “No.” She went to the small padded bench next to the door and sat down. She put her cane between her knees and leaned her chin on it. I sat down on the end of the bench and waited. Time goes slowly in a room full of coffins. I could hear the sounds of sorrow through the doors along with the piped-in music mutilating some of my favorite old songs. “Like a Virgin” should never be played in a funeral home. It’s just not a good idea whether it’s lyricless or not.

  Then a sound rocketed out of my purse so loud it echoed off the walls and was magnified ten times. Being a cool customer, I screeched and fell off the bench.

  Aunt Miriam looked at me, her chin still on the cane. “Answer your phone.”

  I did a mental bout of cussing, grabbed my purse, and pulled out my new, very loud phone. “Hello.”

  “It’s me. Where are you?” It sounded like Uncle Morty chewing something big and wet.

  “Who is this?”

  “Who do you think?”

  Aunt Miriam gave me the evil eye and motioned to the door. I got off my knees and walked out. The hall was filled with more mourners and I threaded my way to the door, trying not to get felt up or scorched by coffee.

  “Uncle Morty?”

  “Duh. Where are you?”

  “Funeral home picking out the casket,” I said. “What do you want?”

  “You should’ve checked out Wilson Novelties,” he said.

  “We covered that. Where are you?”

  “Lincoln. Where do you think?”

  “That was fast,” I said.

  “Only for old ladies,” said Uncle Morty.

  “You didn’t have Aaron with you. Never mind. What’ve you got?”

  “Gavin signed the guest book. The clerk remembers he wrote down something out of it. It made the guy uncomfortable.”

  “What’d he write down?”

  “Shit. I don’t know. Probably a name and address. I spent the last hour going through the book. My eyes are killing me. These people have terrible handwriting.”

  “Any bells go off?”

  “None, except Lee, but we already knew he bought a present for Sample here.”

  “Anybody else?”

  “Listen to a few names for me and see if you recognize any of them. Leslie Baum, Corey Hampton, Jason Moore, Beth Simpson, Ali Musat, Jefferson Bell, Shelley Peterson, Emily Robere, Elian Katz and Rob Clemens.”

  “They don’t sound familiar to me,” I said.

  “Those are all the names from Gavin’s page and the one before. Those are the ones he would’ve naturally seen. Christ. I’m going to have to look up every one of these bastards.”

  “Better you than me.” I hung up, walked back towards the coffin room and there he was, Emil Roberts, peeking at me from around a corner.

  Christ. What a dickhead.

  Without thinking, I pivoted and went for him. I’d had enough. You can follow me to Kronos. You can follow me home, to the grocery store, to my parents’ house, but you cannot follow me to a funeral home.

  “Look, you little creep. Get the freak off me. If I lay eyes on you again, I’m going to kick your balls into your throat. You got that?”

  Roberts nodded with his mouth open and cappuccino slopping down his shirt. I turned from him and walked as fast as I could towards the coffin showroom. I spotted blue eye shadow girl on the way. Unfortunately, she spotted me too and did an about-face. I followed her into Remembrance Three and zigzagged through mourners and past the casket, the Eter
nity Gold. Nice choice. Pictures were grouped on the casket along with a ton of flowers. Mr. Altemueller was making a bundle off this event.

  A large wooden easel sat at the foot of the casket. I was in arm’s length of blue eye shadow girl and I reached out to grab her arm, when I saw the picture propped up on the easel. Rebecca Sample. It was the shot I’d seen in the Reverend Coleman’s office. Rebecca Sample smiling with her long, blond hair draped over her shoulder and looking like nothing could possibly be wrong. The children that had surrounded her had been carefully edited out. Rebecca was alone in that picture, life size, but taken out of her life. The hole in my stomach returned. I hadn’t missed it.

  Blue eye shadow girl disappeared from Remembrance Three and mourners crowded me taking their turns at the casket. I got turned around and headed to where the lid was up. An old woman steadied herself with my arm and said what a shame it was. I tried to pull away from her, but found myself boxed in. I hadn’t known Rebecca in life and I didn’t want to know her in death. When you haven’t got life to remember, death is all you’ve got. I was able to forget Rebecca while I investigated Gavin’s murder, but if I saw her, she’d be there right alongside him forever. Gavin was enough.

  Too late. There she was, lying in a box. Expensive and pretty as it was, it couldn’t compare to Rebecca herself. She didn’t photograph well. Rebecca was a beauty in person. The mortician hadn’t caked makeup on her. She looked fresh and rested. A high-necked pink blouse covered her bruised neck and brought out the subtle blush of her cheeks. The crack on her head must’ve been in the back because there were no marks on her face.

  “Charlotte wanted Rebecca in her wedding dress, but they couldn’t get the blood out,” said a woman behind me.

  “Ellie, do we have to talk about that now?” asked a man.

  “I’m just saying.”

  “Just saying what? God, I have to get out of here.”

  “Earl, Earl? Where are you going?”

  I turned away from Rebecca and followed Ellie and Earl through the crowd. The sea of mourners parted for them. I guess it was Earl’s distress that did it. His hand was over his face and Ellie was soon crying. They stopped at some rosewood sofas in Remembrance One. I passed them and went out the door into the hall. A line blocked my way. People were cued up to sign the guest book. A man bent over the book crying, his hands gripping either side of the desk and tears dripped down his nose. It was Lee Holtmeyer. I watched as Reverend Coleman rubbed his back and whispered in his ear. He straightened up, wiped his nose on a tissue and signed the book. He walked towards me with the reverend’s arm around his waist.