A Valentine Wish

by Gina Wilkins

  Watson lay in a metal-framed hospital bed, his bald head propped on pillows, his withered body barely a lump beneath the sheets. “Which one of you bought the inn?” he barked wheezily before Dean and Mark could even introduce themselves.

  Dean stepped closer to the bed. “I did. I’m Dean Gates.”

  “You seen the ghosts?”

  “I—er—”

  “I saw ’em. Twenty years ago, on Valentine’s Day. Like to scared me into a heart attack right then. I ain’t been the same since. A year later, they stuck me here.” Watson sounded angry.

  Dean sank into the chrome-legged chair beside the bed, needing its support. “You... saw them? Both of them?” He wondered why Anna had never mentioned it.

  Watson nodded, his bleary gaze distant. “Don’t know why I went out to the inn. Some kind of ignorant impulse. It was nighttime. ’Bout the same time of night the twins was killed. And there they was, standing by the old caretaker’s shack, looking at me and shaking their heads.”

  Mark cleared his throat and gave Dean a look that said he thought the nurse had been exaggerating about Watson’s clarity of mind.

  Dean knew better. “Did they speak to you?” he asked, ignoring Mark’s startled look.

  “No. I didn’t give’em a chance. I got the hell out of there.” Watson gave a sickly smile that showed his toothlessness. The smile faded almost immediately. “Didn’t matter. I know what they would have said if they’d known who I was.”

  Dean leaned closer. “And what was that?”

  The old man’s eyes focused inward. “They would’ve wanted me to tell the truth.”

  Dean’s heart began to pound. “The truth?”

  His gaze sharpening, Watson looked at Mark. “You the reporter fella’?”

  Mark stepped forward. “Yes, sir.”

  “Bring your notebook?”

  Pulling a battered notebook out of his back pocket, Mark nodded. “I never leave home without it,” he quipped.

  “Get out your pen. And write fast. I ain’t telling this more than once, and I don’t want a bunch of questions.”

  Mark looked at Dean, then flipped open the notebook. “I’m ready.”

  Watson turned back to Dean, as though sensing who had the most interest in what he had to say. “I been blackmailing the Peavy family for almost sixty years. They treated me like dirt the whole time. Just like Gay-lon Peavy—the first one—treated my ma. I put up with it ’cause they always paid me regular, but now it don’t matter. I ain’t going to be around much longer, and before I go, I got a few scores to settle.”

  Dean didn’t risk asking questions that might have annoyed the old man. He merely nodded. And waited, tense with anticipation.

  Watson wheezed, coughed and then cleared his throat. “My mama started working for Gaylon and Amelia Peavy when the twins was just little’uns. I was born a few years later. My dad run off, and Mama had to keep working to support me, but Miz Amelia promised her we’d always have a home there at the inn. Miz Amelia was like that,” he added meditatively. “A real nice lady, from what my mama said. I don’t remember her, myself.”

  “And the twins?” Dean dared. “Do you remember them?”

  “Sure do. My mama thought the sun rose and fell on those two. She didn’t much like Gaylon, but she loved them twins like her own, ’specially after their ma died. Ian promised her that when he ran the inn, she’d always have a home there, just like his ma promised before him. Ian always had a temper, but he never lost it with Ma. He was real good to her. Didn’t treat her like hired help, like some of them others did.”

  “And Anna?” Dean couldn’t help asking. “Was she nice to your mother?”

  Watson’s eyebrow rose in surprise. “You called her Anna,” he commented. “That’s what her brother and her close friends called her. Everyone else called her by her full name, Mary Anna. But, yeah, she was nice to everyone. She used to bring me back candy when she went to town. She was one beautiful woman. For a while, all the boys in town chased after her. Most of’em gave up when they saw they couldn’t ever separate her from her brother.

  “lan—he was different from the others. He had that funny name his Brit father give him, and a bunch of big dreams about owning a whole chain of inns. Seemed like all he cared about was the inn and his sister.”

  “Was that why he turned to bootlegging?” Mark asked. “To raise money for his dreams?”

  Watson snorted. “Ian Cameron never ran a bottle of hooch in his life. He was a hotheaded son of a gun, but he was honest.”

  “You were ten years old when he died,” Mark said. “How do you know what he was like?”

  “My mama knew,” Watson insisted. “She’d have knowed if he was messing around with criminals. He wasn’t. Besides, I saw what happened to him. I know he didn’t do what Tagert said.”

  “You witnessed his murder?” Dean asked, startled. “You know who killed him?”

  Watson’s eyes gleamed with a sick satisfaction that made Dean’s stomach clench. “I know. I’ve always known.”

  “Why didn’t you tell anyone?”

  “’Cause he told me he’d kill me if I did. Me and my ma. I was ten years old. I believed him. He fired my ma a short time later, and she got a job at the Arlington Hotel in Hot Springs. I ran off when I was fifteen—didn’t want to be a burden to her anymore. I was going to make enough money to take care of her, so she didn’t have to work so hard. She died before I was old enough to get a decent job that would’ve taken care of both of us.”

  The bitterness was still there, after all these years. Dean bit back the words of sympathy he knew wouldn’t be appreciated. “Who killed the twins, Bill?” he asked, instead. “Was it Gaylon Peavy?”

  Mark’s pen stilled over the notebook.

  “Wasn’t Gaylon,” Watson answered flatly “It was his son, Charles. Charles was the bootlegger. He never cared squat about that inn. Money, that was all he ever cared about. He had quite an operation going, him and Buck Felcher—and Stanley Tagert. Tagert was in on it from the first.”

  “You’re sure about this?” Mark asked, looking a bit worried.

  Watson scowled. “Of course I’m sure. I been collecting money on that memory for sixty years. Think they’d have paid me off if I’d been wrong?”

  “Can you tell us what happened that night?” Dean asked, giving Mark a warning look about angering the old man.

  Watson glared at Mark a moment longer, then turned pointedly back to Dean. “I was outside, catching fireflies and putting’em in a jar. You know, like ten-year-old boys do when they ain’t got anything better to entertain’ em. There was a party going on inside the inn, a birthday party for the twins. My mama was working, serving food and cleaning up after the guests. She was real happy that night, because Ian would take over the next day and he’d promised her a raise.”

  Sighing, Watson continued, “Anyway, I heard some voices out by the old caretaker’s shack, so I snuck up to see what was going on. I knew nobody ought to be there. I heard Charles and Felcher and Tagert talking about their operation. Tagert was saying they were going to have to quit. The cops were getting too close, he said. I heard him say that killing the revenue officer was a big mistake. They were going to get caught. Buck didn’t seem to care one way or the other. He was gripin’ about something else. Probably wanted more money.

  “They heard someone outside and they all froze. From where I was hiding, I could see that it was Ian and Mary Anna coming up the path. I wanted to warn’em, but before I could decide how to do it without tipping Charles off that I’d heard him talking, all hell broke loose. Mary Anna said something to Tagert, I can’t recall what. And then Charles shot Ian. Just shot him, cold.”

  Dean shivered, imagining the moment. Anna’s horror when she saw her beloved brother fall.

  Watson drew a long, shaky breath, as though reliving the moment in his life-weary mind. “Tagert started yelling at Charles, but Charles shot Anna before anyone could stop him. I went numb then. Coul
dn’t have moved if I wanted to. Next thing I knew, Charles shot Buck. Whether it was ’cause he was a witness to the murders, or because he’d been causing a stink about the money, I never really knew.”

  Mark looked up from his notes. “This is... incredible,” he said, his voice a bit unsteady.

  “It’s true,” Watson insisted. “Every damn word of it.”

  “We believe you, Bill,” Dean said gently. “I already suspected something like this.”

  Bill nodded. “I sat there without moving, scared that if I moved, they’d shoot me just like they had the others. There was a lot of noise going on inside the inn, so it took a while for the guests to figure out what had happened. By that time, Charles had told Tagert exactly what to say. Tagert was mad, and scared spitless, I think, but Charles kept telling him they’d had no choice. He said all they had to do was stick together and their troubles would be over. The cops could close the case on the other murder, and he and Tagert could retire with the money they’d already made with their bootlegging. Charles ran back to the inn, then came back with his daddy to ‘witness’ the tragedy.”

  “You mean, Charles killed the twins because he needed someone to blame for the Prohibition officer’s murder? Not because they were to take over the inn the next day?” Mark asked, looking dazed as he tried to follow the story.

  “Charles never cared a lick about that inn,” Watson said, “but he had no intention of going to jail for any of his money-making schemes. He never did like Ian, and he knew there were plenty of others who didn’t, either. He figured if Tagert backed him up, everyone would believe that Ian had been the real criminal in the family. Besides, the twins had caught him meeting with Buck and Tagert. Wouldn’t have taken them long to figure out what was really goin’ on that night.”

  Watson looked back at Dean as he continued, “They called the police chief, a lazy, crooked cop who’d been on the take for years, and hated lan Cameron, anyway. He swallowed the whole story. If he ever suspected anything different, he never breathed a word. Charles probably paid him off. He retired a few months later, then Tagert died in that so-called hunting accident—”

  “Charles killed him,” Dean murmured.

  “More than likely. By that time, my mama had been fired and we was living in Hot Springs, trying to scratch out enough of a living to keep us fed and clothed.”

  “You said Charles threatened you and your mother,” Dean reminded him. “Did you confront him that night?”

  “He saw me,” Watson said grimly. “When he come back with all those people to provide him an alibi, he spotted me sitting in the bushes and I guess he figured I’d been there all along. He slipped into my bedroom that night—I was laying awake, trying to get up the courage to tell someone what I seen. He had a knife in his hand. Told me he’d cut me into pieces if I said a word, and then he’d go after my mama.”

  “That son of a bitch,” Mark muttered. “You were just a boy.”

  “He made his point. I kept my mouth shut, even when his daddy fired my mama. He told her they couldn’t afford us anymore, what with the scandal and all.”

  “When did you start the blackmail?” Mark asked, unable to keep the disapproval out of his voice.

  Watson gave a bark of laughter that held little humor. “I was twenty-five. My mama was dead, worked herself to death thanks to those coldhearted Peavys. I was barely getting by. Charles Peavy was founding his fortune on reasonably honest investments with capital he’d made from his bootlegging days. I’d had to live with the horror of that night all those years. I didn’t see nothing fair about it. So I went to him and told him he owed me. Owed me big. Told him I wanted a guaranteed lifetime job with his family, at a decent rate of pay. Told him if he’d take care of me for life, the way my mama was promised, I’d keep my mouth shut.”

  “How could you do that?” Dean asked, unable to hold his own opinions back any longer. “Because you kept quiet, Charles Peavy got away with murder. Several murders.”

  “If I’d talked then, there’d have been two more dead. Me and my ma,” Watson snarled. “No one would’ve thought twice about us. We was just the servants, after all.”

  “But later-”

  Watson sighed and shrugged one bony shoulder. “By then, I just didn’t care no more. I was old enough and had seen enough of the rough side of life that he couldn’t scare me. I told him I wouldn’t go as easy as the twins did. Told him I had a letter with a friend that was to be sent to all the newspapers if anything happened to me. Told him that same friend would make damned sure I was avenged. Charles didn’t dare cross me. He set me to doing odd jobs for his wife, and I stayed on with them and their kids for the next fifty years.”

  “You mean the entire Peavy family was in on this secret? Even the younger ones?” Mark asked incredulously.

  “‘Course not.” Watson gave Mark a look of dislike. “Charles told’em I was to stay on because of their family honor, or some such nonsense. He wrote in his will that I was to be supported for the rest of my natural life. Wasn’t a damned thing they could do about it, though none of’em liked it much. Only one who ever knew the truth, far as I know, was Charles’s girl. Margaret. The snootiest, omeriest woman I ever had the dishonor of knowing. Took after her father, that one did.”

  Mark dropped his pen. He retrieved it hastily. “Margaret knew?”

  “Told her myself,” Watson said with some satisfaction. “She got to bad-mouthing me one day, telling me she was getting rid of me whatever it took and that there weren’t nothing I could do about it, since her daddy was dead. I told her the truth about her precious daddy. Told her I’d ruin her in town. Since she liked playing the grand lady around Destiny, she didn’t dare call my bluff. She hated me, but she made sure the money kept coming.”

  “And now you are telling the truth,” Dean said.

  Watson laughed shortly. “Sure as hell am. And I want you to print every word of it,” he ordered Mark. “Serve the snotty bitch right to have everyone know where her sacred money came from.”

  “I’m not sure I can print this,” Mark demurred. “This is all just hearsay. Your word against the Peavys.”

  “How stupid you think I am, boy?” Watson glared at Dean. “Get that big Bible off my nightstand. Glued inside the back cover, you’ll find a letter in Charles Peavy’s own hand. You can have his signature verified. It tells everything he done.”

  “How on earth did you get him to do that?” Dean asked, stunned.

  Watson’s smile wasn’t pleasant. “I was holding a knife at the time. Told him that if he didn’t do what I said, I’d cut him into little pieces. And then I’d go after his baby son, his little Gaylon. He believed me. I’d learned from the best, you see.”

  Shaken, Dean clutched the ragged Bible in his left hand. The whole story made him sick. Ian and Anna had been the only true innocents involved, he realized sadly.

  Watson motioned toward Dean’s sling with a frail, shaky hand. “You tangle with the Peavys already?”

  Dean nodded curtly. “I think so.”

  “They won’t be bothering you after this. Wouldn’t dare.”

  Dean hoped the old man was right. He hated every minute of this, but he knew the Cameron name had to be cleared.

  Even if it happened seventy-five years too late.

  Watson looked suddenly tired. Sick. Very, very old. “I ain’t saying I’m proud of anything I’ve done. But maybe this will make up for some of it. If you see them ghosts again, you tell’em—you tell’em—”

  His voice faded.

  Dean sighed. “I’ll tell them you finally told the truth.”

  Watson closed his eyes. “That’ll do. Or maybe I’ll be telling ’em myself before very long.”

  Dean and Mark glanced at each other. Mark looked as dazed as Dean felt.

  “Get out of here,” Watson muttered. “I’m tired. Anything else you want to know, it’s all in that letter. Take the book with you. Never done me much good, anyway.”

  Dean and Mar
k left without saying anything.

  There was really nothing left to say.

  11

  They that love beyond the world cannot be separated by it.

  —William Penn

  DEAN WAS LOST in his own thoughts during the hour-and-a-half ride back to Destiny. The old Bible lay in his lap. Within its covers lay the proof of Ian and Mary Anna’s innocence. His satisfaction at finally clearing their names was almost overwhelmed by his grief that his success would take Anna forever beyond his reach.

  Mark left Dean to his thoughts; Mark, too, seemed to be preoccupied with the story they’d heard from the bitter, dying old man. They had almost reached the Destiny city limits when Mark broke the taut silence.

  “You’ve seen them, haven’t you?” he asked quietly. “The ghosts, I mean.”

  Dean’s fingers tightened around the Bible. “What makes you ask?” he countered.

  Mark gave him a chiding look. “Can’t you just tell me the truth?”

  Dean hesitated a moment, then shrugged. “If I tell you, you have to promise to keep it quiet. I don’t want anyone else to know my lead came from a ghost, all right? I, er, I have my business future to consider.”

  “Mary Anna,” Mark said without commenting on Dean’s request.

  Dean didn’t ask how Mark knew which of the twins he’d talked to. “Yes.”

  “Damn.” Mark shook his head, looking even more dazed than he had by Watson’s revelations. “What the hell is going on here?”

  “I wish I could tell you, Mark.” Dean looked out the window again, thinking of the coming separation from Anna. “I wish I understood it myself,” he added wistfully.

  Why had he been the one chosen to help the twins? Why had he finally discovered true love with a woman he couldn’t have? And why did it have to hurt so damn much?

  Mark parked in front of the inn, but made no move to get out of the car. “I don’t think I’ll come in,” he said. “I want to go home, have a stiff drink and try to process everything I’ve learned today.”