I was crazy for keeping that swab here. I needed to get it out of the house. Let Deena or Cherrie Mae keep it. But how could I do that? Mike wouldn't let me go anywhere, and he probably had Jeff and his wife, Becky, across the street spying on me. I could just imagine him telling them how I was trying to do too much. How I needed to keep off my feet—
The doorbell rang.
My head cocked, listening.
The TV muted. Mike's footsteps thudded against the carpet. The front door clicked open.
"Mornin, Mike." A man's voice. "Tully here?"
"Why?" Mike sounded suspicious.
"I need to talk to her."
"What for?"
I pushed to my feet, heart hammering.
"We just need to talk to her."
"Maybe I don't want you talkin to my wife."
I waddled out of the nursery and around the corner. Down the hall. In my doorway stood Officer Ted Arnoldson in uniform. Mike turned and glared at me.
My stomach hit the floor. Was this about my pact with Deena and Cherrie Mae? The swab? Couldn't be that. How could they know?
"Mornin, Mrs. Phillips." Officer Arnoldson gave me a tight smile. He stood over six feet—taller than Mike. His blond hair looked mussed, like he'd been in a hurry. "I'd like you to come with me down to the station." His ice blue eyes drilled into me.
"What?" Mike's faced flushed.
I bunched the neck of my T-shirt. Could he see my bruises through the makeup? "Why?"
"We need to talk to you. I'll bring you home soon as we're done."
"My wife's not goin anywhere with you." Mike flexed back his shoulders.
I couldn't answer. My knees were about to give way.
"Mrs. Phillips, you need to come down to the station."
"What for?" Mike stepped toward the officer.
"It's business between her and the police."
Mike's hand raised. "I'm her husband."
Officer Arnoldson stiffened. "Mr. Phillips, move back."
"You tell me why—"
"Move. Back."
"You are not takin my wife!" Mike swung the door to shut it.
Officer Arnoldson shoved his foot in the threshold. "Stand back now! Or I'll put you in cuffs."
"For what? Protectin my wife?"
"Wait, Mike." My voice shook. "Don't get in trouble. I'll go."
"You're not goin anywhere."
"It's okay."
"No, it ain't!" Mike swiveled toward me, his back to Arnoldson. "What have you done?" he hissed.
I shook my head, my throat stuffed with cotton. Whatever this was, I couldn't let the cop go now—and leave me alone with my husband.
"Mr. Phillips, move aside." The policeman reached for the mike at his lapel, ready to call for backup.
"It's okay, I'll go." I tried to move around Mike.
"No you're not." He pushed me back.
"Hey!" Officer Arnoldson stomped through the doorway.
Mike swung toward him. "You stay outta this."
Arnoldson clamped a hand on his arm. "You assaultin your wife in front of an officer?"
My husband jerked away. "Get off me!"
"Mike, stop!" He couldn't get arrested. Not now. What if they did know about the swab and told him? "I'll come right back."
"Step away." Arnoldson pointed a finger in Mike's face. "Or I'm takin you in."
The vein in Mike's temple throbbed. He glared at the policeman, chest heaving.
Michael, don't.
Mike's tongue ran across his bottom lip. His eyes shifted to me, full of rage. He'd kill me for this.
With a slow blink, Mike leaned back. He sneered at Arnoldson. "You gonna tell me what this is about?"
"I don't need to." The policeman motioned me toward his car. For the first time I noticed it sitting at the curb. What would the neighbors say? The news would be across town in a heartbeat.
I didn't dare look at Mike. Head down, I shuffled out the door. He and Arnoldson argued some more, but I barely heard above the blood pounding in my head.
Somehow I made it down the sidewalk. Arnoldson opened the front passenger door of his car. I fumbled into the seat. He closed the door—and I swear all oxygen sucked away.
Not until we started off did I glance back at Mike. He stood on the porch, arms folded, body rigid. A look to kill in his eyes.
Chapter 26
Cherrie Mae
Mayor B's footsteps sent my body into a freeze. I gawked at the pictures lyin out in rows, the open drawer.
The footsteps headed my way.
I flung myself to the desk.
The steps slowed. Mayor B must be starin at my cleanin supplies in the hall, wonderin what I was doin without em.
"Eva? Cherrie Mae?"
He sped up again.
With a heave a both arms I whisked the photos and the empty folder across the wood and into the open drawer. They landed askew on top a the hangin files, no time to set em all straight. I slid the drawer closed.
"In here, Mayor B." I snatched up his ashtray and spun around. He appeared at the office doh. He carried two blue folders in his hand.
We stared at each other.
Suspicion creased his forehead. "What're you doin?"
I raised the ash tray. "Just emptyin this." My heart skittered round like a cornered muskrat.
He eyed me. "Where's Eva?"
"She still feelin poorly. I made her go to bed. I cleaned your room first so she could rest. Look like it's flu, leastways a bad cold." I picked up the waste can by the desk and started toward the kitchen, where I'd empty it and the ashtray. My ankles liked to shake my feet clean off.
Go upstairs, Mayor B! I had to get back in the office and straighten that drawer. The way the man was lookin at me, I half expected him to check it soon as I left the room. But I couldn't just stand there and wait for him to leave.
His gaze followed me as I passed him into the hall.
"You might want to look in on her, see if she need anything." I walked on toward the kitchen, head up, like my whole world hadn't gone spinnin. My fingers nearly dropped the ashtray.
"What anxious moments pass between the birth of plots, and their last fatal periods." Joseph Addison wrote that almost three hundred years ago. I knew exactly what he meant.
I rounded the corner, still feelin Mayor B stare after me. He was gon check that drawer. I knew it. And I'd be a dead woman.
How fast could I run to my car?
In the kitchen I emptied the waste can and ashtray. Washed out the glass dish and dried it with a paper towel.
Where was Mayor B?
By the time I got back to the hall my heart had nearly broke my ribs. Mayor B was nowhere in sight.
I leaned toward the staircase and gazed up. The master bedroom was open. Voices murmured.
Relief sagged me like a rag doll. I hurried into the office and set down the two items. Reached for The Desk Drawer.
Upstairs a doh closed. Did I hear footsteps on the carpet?
I swiveled and headed back out the office toward my cleanin supplies. Mayor B's heavy tread sounded at the top a the stairs. I reached for my vacuum cleaner. Started rollin it toward the livin room. Mayor B hit the wooden floor a the hallway, still carryin the blue folders.
"She all right?" I turned back to him.
"Pretty sick. Bed's where she needs to be." He gave me a piercin look.
"Mm-hmm." I headed on toward the livin room, feelin his eyes at my back.
Nothin I could do but keep on cleanin. I plugged in the vacuum and set to work. Any minute I was sure Mayor B would stalk into the room. Grab my arm. Where was he? In the office? The kitchen, gettin lunch?
Lord, You got to help me.
>
Seemed like it took a lifetime to sweep that carpet.
Finally, as I unplugged the vacuum, Mayor B appeared, a sandwich on a plate in his hands. "You clean the office yet?"
Have mercy. My voice was gon shake. "I usually vacuum and dust in there toward the last. You want me to go ahead and do it now?"
"No, that's all right. You can just kick me out when you get to it."
Was the man playin with me? "Okay."
I headed to the TV room. For another good hour I kept cleanin—and prayin. My hands never stopped their shakes, and my mind ran a hundred directions. Meanwhile Mayor B didn't leave his office, far as I could tell. Never had he stayed home so long on a work day.
He had to be playin with me.
By the time I was ready to clean the office I knew I was done for. The man was sittin in there, jus waitin for me to come in and try to work. He'd roll out that drawer, say in a voice to kill, "What you been doin, Cherrie Mae?"
I reached the doh to the office, my knees tremblin. The mayor sat at his desk, studyin papers from the folders he'd brought home.
"I'm ready to clean in here now."
He leaned back and took his time lookin round the room. Ran his finger across the top a his desk, then inspected it for dust. "Know what? It doesn't even look dirty in here. Just leave it till Thursday."
My pulse stopped. I had to get in there and fix that drawer. Maybe by some wild miracle he hadn't already seen it. "You sure? Won't take me long."
"I'm sure." He smiled at me—most chillin smile I ever seen in my life. "Go on home, now, Cherrie Mae. We'll see you Thursday."
I eyed him another second. My tongue ran around my dry lips. "All right. Thank you."
Quick as I could, I moved my cleanin supplies out a that house and into my car. I drove away in a hurry, thankin God I'd got out with my life. For now.
But night would come all too soon.
http://www.pulitzer.org/works/2010-Feature-Writing
2010 Pulitzer Prize
Feature Writing
The Jackson Bugle
Gone to Ground
What happens to a small, quiet Southern town when evil invades in the form of a serial killer?
By: Trent Williams
October 29, 2010
(Excerpt)
The ancient legend of the amaryllis flower drips with blood.
In Greek mythology Amaryllis was a shy virgin nymph who fell in love with Alteo, a conceited shepherd with the strength of Hercules and the beauty of Apollo. Alas for Amaryllis, her love was unrequited. Alteo desired only one thing—a beautiful flower that had never before existed. In despair, Amaryllis consulted the Oracle at Delphi as to how to find such a bloom. The Oracle instructed her to stand at Alteo's door every night dressed in white and pierce her heart with a golden arrow. For thirty nights she stabbed her own heart, spilling her blood. When Alteo finally opened his door he found a crimson-petaled flower that had sprung from Amaryllis's blood. Only then did he recognize her beauty and fall in love with her.
The modern-day flower we know by the nymph's name grows in abundance around the Amaryllis Methodist Church on South Street, thanks to volunteer gardener Harvey Bayless. In his suspenders and faded blue baseball cap, Harvey, age 71, carefully tends the church garden throughout the year. The amaryllis bulbs, which can grow to four inches wide, lie dormant through the winter and push through the soil to bloom in March and April. Their colors are spectacular, some red, others orange. Harvey's favorite color is that of the "apple blossom," tinged pink and white, with green in the center.
Every three to four years Harvey digs up the bulbs.
The reason, he explains as he weeds the garden around the church, lies with the bulbs' tendency to sink deeper into the soil a little each year. "The bulbs like to have a bit of their tops exposed," he says in his heavy Southern drawl. "Leave 'em alone too many years, and you'll find 'em sunk too low, hidin'. You could say they've gone to ground." He makes a sound deep in his throat as he ponders his choice of words. "Sort of like that killer we cain't find."
And so, once the amaryllis are done blooming in that third or fourth year, Harvey will carefully remove the bulbs from their homes. But not too soon. He first allows time for the leaves to continue growing. "You got to allow the foliage to replace the bloom in the bulb," he adds. He tends the uprooted bulbs over the cold months, replanting them in February.
Harvey was unaware of the legend behind the amaryllis flower. Upon hearing the story he stops weeding and rocks back on his heels, one dirt-streaked hand finding his jaw. For a moment he is silent. His gaze lifts from the garden to roam down the street toward the house where Alma Withers, victim number four, lived. "Kinda makes you wonder, don't it."
After another spell of solemn rumination, Harvey takes off his cap to wipe his forehead, then doggedly returns to work.
Chapter 27
Tully
I'd never set foot in the Amaryllis police station. And I sure didn't know about the scary little room where Chief Cotter took me. Didn't look much bigger than a prison cell. Dull gray walls. No windows.
John Cotter stood behind me. Two against one. He carried a beige folder.
My mind churned.
"Have a seat." The chief's gray eyes took in my white face, then dropped to my neck. My shoulders pulled up. He studied me for a minute.
A rectangular wood table backed against the wall with three chairs around it. On the table sat a tape recorder. Would they tape everything I said?
I lowered myself into a seat at one end. No way would I sit in the middle of these two cops. The chief sat down next to me.
My pulse fluttered.
John Cotter remained standing, watching me. "You need some water?"
I nodded.
He laid the folder on the table, then strode out. My eyes fastened on the smooth beige. What was in there? The folder had a tab. Nothing written on it.
Officer Cotter returned with a full glass. "Here you go."
My mouth tried to say "thanks," but nothing came out.
He closed the door and sat down at the other end.
The air closed in. I took a long drink, then sat straight-backed, hands clutched in my lap. A voice in my head whispered I didn't have to answer their questions. Didn't have to talk to them, period. At any time I could ask them to take me home.
To Mike.
My fingers curled into my palms.
Chief Cotter clicked a button on the tape recorder. A red light came on. "Don't worry about this." He waved a hand. "Just normal procedure." He leaned his big arms on the table and spoke toward the recorder. "Monday, April 25th, 11:15 a.m., Amaryllis police station. Present are Chief Cotter, Officer John Cotter and Tully Phillips."
He looked to me. "Reason we brought you down here, Mrs. Phillips, is we heard some information that leads us to believe you may know somethin about Erika's Hollinger's murder."
I stared at him. The swab? How could they know?
"I know this is frightenin to you. But you got nothin to be scared about. Just tell us the truth, that's all we ask. Looks like you've been wantin to do that anyway."
Air had to fight its way down my windpipe.
The chief pulled the beige folder toward himself and opened it. Inside sat the envelope I'd sent him last Friday.
My heart stopped.
He pointed to the envelope. "You ever seen this before?"
I licked my lips. "What is it?"
The chief gave me a look. "I received this in the mail on Saturday. Postmark was Friday, from Bay Springs. When I saw the content and the note, we immediately began investigatin who'd sent it. Soon as the Bay Springs post office opened this mornin I gave them a call. Asked if anyone happened to remember processin the envelope. Turns out someone did since it was se
nt to me, no return address, soon after a murder in our town. The employee said the envelope had been pulled from the mailbox outside the post office. The letter sat on top of the other mail, as if it had been dropped in there toward the end of the day."
Chief Cotter watched me for any sign of recognition. I waited him out.
"Mrs. Phillips, I know you tried to be anonymous. I can understand that. But of course we needed to know who sent the envelope. When I questioned the worker at the post office, the person mentioned steppin outside of the building around five o'clock and seein a young pregnant woman walkin away from the mailbox. We went on a hunch the young woman was from Amaryllis, since the employee didn't recognize her. Well, there aren't a lot of young women near deliverin a baby in this town. When we showed the employee your senior picture in the high school yearbook, that person said it was you."
The plastic gloves. My boxy printing. The envelope and stamp sealed with water from the faucet. I'd been so careful.
"Mrs. Phillips." The chief tried to sound gentle. "We know you sent the swab. It's really important you tell us about it."
I focused on the envelope, feeling the two men watch me. The room felt so hot.
"Tully," John Cotter said. "You're not goin to get in trouble."
I already was in trouble. More than they could know.
The chief tapped the folder. "Take us back to last Tuesday night. What time did your husband get home from work?"
"I came home at the regular time. You got that?"
I bit my lip. "I don't know."
"You don't know?"
My head shook. "I was already in bed."
"But you weren't asleep, were you?"
I kept quiet.
"Because your husband was late. And you were worried."
They were just guessing. They couldn't really know. Unless they'd heard Mike threatened to kill Erika.
How would they know that? "Why should I be worried?"
"Does your husband usually come home on time?"
"Yes."
"But he didn't that night."
Say nothing, Tully.
"I take it that's a yes." The chief leaned back. "So Mike comes home late. What happened then?"
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