The Case of the Sinister Spirit (Jane Gallows Witch Private Investigator Book 1)

by Leighann Dobbs

  “Yes. Seems she got into the bubbly down there. You know how she can’t hold her liquor,” Wanda said.

  Tess held up a large cobalt vial. “And she drank the entire bottle of potion I gave her.”

  Wanda sighed. “You know, I’m a little worried about Glad. She’s been out there almost all day, every day, trying to control those brooms. She’s tried all different styles, but the truth is it’s not the broom that’s the problem.” Wanda tapped the side of her head. “It’s up here.”

  “Has she made any progress?” I asked.

  “Very little, I’m afraid. I honestly don’t know what to do. If she doesn’t pass the test, her license is going to get pulled. She’ll go into a big funk.”

  Nobody wanted Gladys in a big funk. Normally she was happy and chipper, but when she was in a bad mood, the whole town needed to watch out. She’d cast spells right and left, turn people into toads, unleash the bats in the belfry. We had to make sure it didn’t come to that. But what if Gladys’s broom-flying days were over for good?

  A strange swishing sound came from the hallway. I leaned back in my chair to look out in the direction of the noise. Zelda was shuffling down the hall, wearing what looked like giant yellow mops on her feet and muttering curses in a foreign language under her breath.

  “Zelda, what are you doing?” Wanda asked.

  Zelda scowled at us. “What does eet look like I’m doing? I’m cleaning ze floor.”

  “Is that some new method?” Tess asked. “It doesn’t seem very efficient.”

  Zelda turned to us and smacked her hands onto her hips. “Choo got a better idea? The vacuum cleaner is still broken. What do choo expect me to do? With all the animals around here, this place gets filled up with bat fuzz, cat hair, and owl feathers. One has to do something to keep it clean.”

  “That vacuum belt hasn’t come in yet?” Wanda asked.

  “No. And every time I try it, the thing wails like a banshee.”

  Wails like a banshee... That reminded me of a little inconsistency in Charlie’s story. Minnie and Sophie had heard a loud banshee wailing the night Bud had died, but Charlie had said he didn’t have any wailing in his repertoire of ghost sounds, and he hadn’t even been home that night to enact his fake ghost routine.

  Dave Brown had said someone else had been digging on the property besides him and the other treasure hunter that had left town. Charlie had also said more than one person was after that treasure. Could there be another suspect we had yet to identify that was responsible for both the wailing and Bud’s death?

  Chapter Thirteen

  The next morning, I got to the office bright and early. The mill building where my second-floor office was located wasn’t exactly in the most prestigious part of town, and as such, it didn’t have a lot of occupants. Clients were few and far between. Apparently, having your office in a seedy, abandoned mill building didn’t exactly instill a feeling of confidence in clients.

  As I opened the doorway to the stairs, I noticed a shiny new lockset on the door beside it that led to a big office suite just below me. Good, more tenants. Maybe business would pick up.

  Moe was lying on the couch, his feet up on the armrest, his hands folded behind his head. He sat up when I came in.

  Jinx trotted over to the couch, hopping up onto the portion that Moe’s feet had just vacated.

  “Hey, man, this couch is cold.” He cast an angry look at Moe, who scowled right back at him.

  “Live with it, buddy,” Moe said.

  Jinx made his Grumpy Cat face, turned his back end to face Moe, and then curled up in a ball and started snoring almost immediately.

  “What gives, Red? You catch the killer yet?” Moe asked.

  “Not quite yet. But I do have some more clues.” I told him everything I’d learned since the last time we’d spoken, including Charlie’s confession of how he had rigged up the speakers and lights to scare away treasure hunters. I told him about the alibis that Sheriff O’Hara had verified. And about the tiny inconsistency of the wailing ghost.

  “So it was a fake ghost the whole time?” Moe asked.

  “I think so. At least it seems that way. Dave Brown, Minnie, and Sophie never heard the ghost sounds after nine p.m., which agrees with what Charlie had said. Then there was the electrical cord to prove it. I don’t know of any real ghost that stops wailing at nine,” I said. “That explains why I never felt a ghostly spirit there.”

  Moe nodded. “So Bud was killed by a human.”

  “Looks that way, but which one? Only one person doesn’t have an alibi, and that’s his son Steve.”

  Moe started pacing the office. “Yeah, it’s usually a family member, isn’t it? But why would Steve kill him? Do you think he knew about the treasure? Do you think Bud caught him digging up the treasure and they fought and Steve killed him?”

  “It’s possible. It looked like Bud had been pushed and fell backward onto the pitchfork. I’m not sure the killer meant to kill him. They could have started pushing each other around and he fell back by accident. From all accounts, Bud and his sons didn’t get along well. But I think it was mostly bluster on Bud’s part. I think he was angry because they didn’t pay enough attention to him.”

  “And there’s always the other son. His alibi was corroborated by the wife, and who can ever trust spouses that corroborate each other’s alibis?”

  “Good point. Normally you can’t. But in this case, I don’t see why the wife would lie to cover up for him. He was cheating on her, and she knew about it. If she suspected he was the killer, wouldn’t she want to rat him out so he would go to jail? Seems like she’d want revenge and to get rid of him.”

  “Why wouldn’t she just leave him if she wanted to get rid of him?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she doesn’t have the money to do it. I don’t think she works, and they’ve got nothing. They share one old beater car. They have to take turns to go to appointments.” Though she did manage to pay for spa treatments and manicures.

  “Maybe he has something on her, and he’s forcing her to lie for him.”

  I hadn’t thought about that.

  “Wait. Did you say they had an old beater car? Maybe that’s where your banshee wail came from. You know, I had a ’41 Buick Super Sport Coupe with a belt that used to slip, and it wailed all the time.”

  “I think cars are made a little differently now, Moe.” Did cars still have belts? My ancient El Camino had belts. Belts seemed like something even new cars would have, but Brent and Chastity’s car was almost as old as mine.

  What if Chastity had lied to cover for Brent, and the wailing sound really was from their car? I flipped open my laptop and did a quick search for their address. It wouldn’t be too hard to figure out if the car made noises like that. I’d just go to their house and wait until one of them went out in the car then follow it to see if it made an awful wailing sound.

  Moe was still pacing. “Looks like you’ve got to go back to the barn, Red. Now that you’ve eliminated some of the suspects, you might have a fresh eye for clues. Look in particular for anything that points to those sons.”

  I left Jinx on the couch and headed to the chocolate shop. I needed a chocolate fix, and the prospect of seeing Joe didn’t hurt either. I didn’t like the way my morning was going, so it would be a nice pick-me-up. But Joe wasn’t in the shop. Instead, a perky young blonde eagerly helped me with my purchase of dark-chocolate peppermint bark.

  As I got back into my car, I thought I heard a cackle split the air. My heart stilled. Was that Aunt Gladys? I held my breath, straining to hear, but no more cackling came.

  Maybe it had been my imagination. I was overworked and underchocolated. I felt like the case was stalling out, and I was having to retrace my steps back to Bud’s barn again, with slim prospects of finding anything new.

  I sat in my car and ate half a pound of peppermint bark. I deserved it, because the morning really wasn’t going my way. Funny thing though. I had a sneaking suspicion that the res
t of the day wasn’t going to be any better.

  Chapter Fourteen

  As I’d suspected, my day didn’t improve once I got to Bud’s. I parked a little way down the road so my car wouldn’t be seen in his driveway and started near the house, skirting the granite foundation, looking for dig marks. I wasn’t surprised when I didn’t find anything though. If someone had been digging near Bud’s house, he surely would have noticed.

  Charlie had mentioned seeing Bernie Alcorn out on Bud’s land with his surveying equipment. I figured Bernie must have been down back near the stone wall boundary in order for Charlie to notice from his place. I had thought the stone wall seemed like a good spot to bury the treasure, so I followed it. After about five minutes, I found fresh dig marks.

  Someone had dug a hole about two feet wide and then filled it back in. Had they found the treasure? Dave Brown had bought new shovels from the hardware store on his way out of town. Was he really leaving, or had he just been switching to another hotel and pretending that he’d left?

  His alibi had been verified by O’Hara, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t the one coming here looking for treasure, just that he wasn’t the one who had killed Bud. He could still be coming back here to treasure hunt. Then again, so could the killer.

  I tossed my bag down and started scanning the area, walking slowly in a grid pattern, searching for anything that might yield a clue as to the identity of the killer. I was on my hands and knees, scraping around in the crunchy dried leaves and pine needles, when I heard, “Put your hands up and turn around slow.”

  I was getting a little tired of hearing that line out here, but this time the voice wasn’t Charlie’s. It was Sheriff Bobby O’Hara’s.

  I put my hands up and scuttled around on my knees to face her. Brent and Chastity were with her. Over in the distance, I could see Steve jogging up the field. Great, the whole family was here.

  “She keeps coming over here and digging. She mentioned something about a treasure to me. I think she thinks there’s a treasure here, and she killed my dad to get it.” Brent turned to O’Hara. “Wouldn’t that be just like the killer to try to blame the death on me?”

  O’Hara narrowed her beady eyes on me. Since I was still on my knees, I felt at a bit of a disadvantage with her towering over me.

  “He has a point, Gallows. Why do you keep coming here?”

  “I told you. Bud hired me, and I want to see the job through.”

  “Really? Doesn’t seem like he’d be able to pay you for it.”

  “Some things are more important than money.”

  “Didn’t you find her with my dad’s body?” Brent asked.

  “Yep.”

  “And she said she was trying to get rid of rats in the barn. If that’s the truth, why is she digging way out here? I think she’s lying.”

  My arms were starting to get tired. I glanced longingly toward my bag, which held a fresh supply of chocolates. I couldn’t dig inside with my hands up in the air, but if I could, I could cast a forget-about-it spell or a momentary confusion spell and make my escape. Would that be cheating though?

  Steve jogged up to the group. “What are you guys doing here? What’s going on?” He eyed me suspiciously.

  “We were driving by and saw her digging,” Chastity said.

  “Technically I wasn’t digging. Someone else dug this hole. I was just searching for clues.”

  “Clues for what?” Steve asked.

  “For who killed your father.”

  “Why would you be looking into that?” O’Hara asked, her gun still trained on me. “I thought you were looking for rats.”

  My arms were really starting to burn. “You can put the gun away. And can I put my hands down now?”

  She looked uncertain but holstered the gun. “Don’t try any funny stuff.”

  My arms fell to my sides, leading to instant relief in my shoulders. I didn’t dare ask if I could stand. “I was just trying to see the case through. Now that the rats are gone from the barn, I figured I’d try to shed some light on what happened to Bud. I feel loyal to my clients.”

  O’Hara huffed. “Yeah, you’re all about loyalty. Especially like when you stole my boyfriend in high school.”

  Brent, Steve, and Chastity all looked at her with confused faces.

  After a second, Chastity said, “Are you going to arrest her?” I couldn’t tell if she wanted O’Hara to arrest me or not.

  “Arrest her?” Steve asked. “Do we need to go that far? I mean, she is annoying, but she hasn’t really done anything.” Steve earned some points with me on that one.

  “Yes, she has. She’s the one that killed Dad. She keeps coming back to the scene of the crime,” Brent said. I wondered if he’d been talking to O’Hara too much. She’d said almost those same exact words earlier.

  “Well, wait a minute, why would she kill Dad?” Steve asked. Then he turned to Brent. “You’re the one who keeps coming back to the scene of the crime here.”

  “I did not come back here. I drove by and saw her here,” Brent said.

  I glanced at the driveway. My car was parked quite a way down the road. But I suppose he could have seen it out on the street and recognized it as mine. Or maybe he saw me in the field. Or maybe he really was coming back to the scene of the crime. But if he was, why would he bring Chastity? Were they in on it together? Was that why they were corroborating each other’s alibis?

  “Are you accusing me?” Brent asked Steve. “You’re the one that doesn’t have an alibi. Where were you that night?”

  “I was home. Neighbors can verify they saw my car.”

  O’Hara glanced at Steve. “Well, actually, no one saw your car until after nine thirty.”

  Steve ignored her and turned to Brent. “Who can verify that you were home? I mean, besides Chastity. I heard maybe you were with a certain someone.”

  I glanced at Chastity. Her cheeks were bright red, and she was looking at the ground. O’Hara’s eyes darted between Chastity and Brent, a slight crease on her brow. Perhaps Steve’s words had made her doubt their corroborating alibis.

  Which made me wonder. Could the killer have been Brent or Steve or maybe even Chastity? They were the only suspects I had left. Glancing out over the landscape, I could see their cars in the driveway. They both had old cars, which could have squeaky belts that might wail like a banshee.

  I squinted up at O’Hara from where I was, still on my knees. “Can I go now?”

  She didn’t look like she wanted me to go. She glanced at Brent. “You gonna press charges?”

  Brent appeared to think that over for a while then must have decided better of it. “No. Just make her get out of here, and make sure she never comes back.”

  Why was he so insistent I never come back? He seemed to be keeping a close eye on the property. Was he afraid I might find something that would incriminate him?

  I didn’t want to linger in case someone changed their mind. I jumped up, brushed the dirt off my knees, and grabbed my bag. The trip hadn’t been a total bust. Now I was second-guessing Brent’s and Chastity’s alibis. Not to mention Steve’s. He hadn’t come home until nine thirty. What time exactly had Bud been killed? Was it before nine thirty?

  I couldn’t look into any of the alibis right now, but one thing I could do was figure out who had the car that made a noise like a wailing banshee.

  I trotted to my car and pulled away, giving them a little wave as I passed the driveway. But I didn’t go far. I pulled over in a dirt road about a quarter mile down the street and turned with my car facing out. I had a fifty-fifty chance that one of them would drive by in this direction. If they did, I could follow them and find out if their car squealed.

  After a few minutes, a dirty white Oldsmobile drove by. Looked like I’d be following Steve.

  Chapter Fifteen

  I followed Steve all the way into town, but not one squeak came out of his car. He found a parking spot and got out. I drove as slowly as possible to see where he was going.


  Surprise! It was Bernie Alcorn’s surveying office.

  Had Steve been surveying the land to sell it to a pharmacy? Charlie and Minnie had both mentioned they’d feared that might happen. Or did he have some sort of a lead on where the treasure might be buried? Someone had said that information was often handed down from generation to generation. His family had been on that property for quite a few generations. He might’ve heard rumors about where the old Dunbuddy house once stood.

  But the nonsqueaking of the car was a fly in the ointment. I had hoped to use that to verify the killer. Maybe this was better, since I was sure O’Hara wouldn’t give any weight to Minnie and Sophie’s report of wailing. Maybe I could convince O’Hara to look into Steve further by letting her know I’d seen him go into Bernie’s. Then again, knowing how antagonistic she was toward me, she’d probably see that as me trying to frame him for a murder I’d committed.

  Maybe Steve had gotten his car fixed? There was only one auto mechanic in town, Julian Crosby. We’d been friends since high school.

  Julian answered on the fifth ring.

  “Hey, Julian, how’s it going?”

  “Jane? Long time no hear. What’s going on?” I could picture Julian, a big bear of a man, wiping his greasy fingers off on the red cloth that always hung out of the back pocket of his jeans, his face cracked in a friendly smile as he talked on the phone.

  “Nothing much. I have a little favor to ask.”

  “Shoot.”

  “I was wondering if you’ve done any work on Steve Saunders’s car lately?”

  “Saunders ... Sanders ... Hold on.” A series of muffled noises came through the phone as I heard him flipping through the notebook in which he penciled appointments. He came back to the phone. “Nope, no Saunders in here.”

  “Okay. Thanks. You keeping out of trouble?”

  “You know it. How’s your cousin Liz?” Julian had a little bit of a crush on Liz. Liz didn’t return his feelings.

  “Still single if you’re asking.” Liz was going to kill me, but I couldn’t help myself. Besides, Julian was a nice guy, and I thought they’d be good together, even if she said he smelled like grease and looked like Bigfoot.