Dead and Buried

by Karin Kaufman

  “Can you tell me one more thing, Detective Rancourt?” I said. “Was Patti killed in front of the Dawson headstone?”

  He answered without hesitation. “Yes. Facing it, struck from behind while she was bent slightly forward.”

  “Looking at the headstone.”

  “In my opinion, yes. Ladies, it’s time for me to go.”

  “Can you back down the driveway all right with my car in the turnaround?” I asked, walking him to the door.

  “Yup.” Just outside the door, he paused, his expression serious. “You ladies be cautious, all right? You never know when a first-time killer might decide to become a second-time killer.”

  Great. Thank you so much. “Thanks for stopping by, Detective Rancourt. We’ll be careful.”

  Duly cautioned, I closed the front door and Emily and I went back to the kitchen. Minette came out of hiding to sit in her teacup, I took the lasagna out of the freezer, and as I lifted dishes down from the cabinet, my mind raced. Whoever had killed Patti hadn’t snuck up on her while she was examining the Dawson headstone. There was nowhere in the vicinity to completely hide, and how would the killer have known Patti would show up?

  Nope, he or she had led Patti to the headstone, knowing perhaps that it would intrigue her because of the surname and Patti’s love of genealogy and history. Or because someone had stuck a bat to it, breaking the society’s pact with the cemetery, and Patti was the only one in the society who didn’t want bats used as tour decorations. And the killer had the hammer in hand because? Because he or she was nailing up bats.

  “Would you look for the name Dawson in the index of that history book?” I asked Emily.

  “Sure.”

  “You don’t know who in the society nailed bats to the trees—or strung them on branches?”

  Emily looked up from the book. “No, but we all knew they were going up. Anyone could have done it. Or several people.”

  My eyes wandered over the kitchen, settling on Minette in her teacup. “How did you ever manage to not get caught when you lived with Ray?” I asked. “Please don’t ever fly around like you did at Olivia’s house.”

  She smiled and rested her forearms on the teacup’s rim. “People don’t believe in fairies. I hear them talk when they see me. They say, ‘That was a wicked big bug’ or ‘Believe you me, Martha, I did not see what I thought I saw.’ People talk themselves out of good surprises.”

  I let go with a laugh. “You’re a little more than a surprise, Minette. You’re more along the lines of a shock.”

  “Is that good?”

  “Yes, in your case it is.”

  She laughed with glee, and her wings pulsated briefly, as if they were an inextricable part of her laughter. “I’m glad, I’m glad.”

  “But still, when I said don’t dive into my pocket without asking, I also meant be careful in everything.”

  “Minette’s right about one thing,” Emily said. “People talk themselves out of what’s directly in front of their faces. If I’d only seen her for a second, by now I would have talked myself out of seeing her. And by the way”—she held the book aloft—“there’s no one named Dawson in volume 1 of this history.”

  “Well, it was a thought.” I slid the pan of lasagna in the oven for later heating and joined Emily at the table. “Do you remember telling Rancourt that the killer might be trying to set Laurence up? Do you think it’s possible?”

  “I talked to Laurence this morning,” she said, shutting the book and pushing it across the table, “and I gave him the names of everyone in the society. I already knew he didn’t know Patti, but he’s never even heard of the others, and for Laurence, that’s saying something.”

  “Did you mention the murder?”

  “No, I told him I wanted to know more about the people I’m working with. Of course, he saw right through that. He knows something’s up. But I kept calm and the police haven’t phoned him, so for now, all is well.”

  “Kate.”

  I looked toward the hutch.

  “I will be back.” Minette stood, flapped her wings forward, and hurtled toward the living room.

  In answer to Emily’s questioning look, I said, “She uses the fireplace flue as an exit.”

  “Wonderful.” She flopped back in her chair. “Do you know how lucky you are? A fairy lives in your house. It’s incredible. It’s magical.”

  Truthfully, I was still pinching myself. It would take months, maybe more, before I became used to Minette’s presence and didn’t do a double-take whenever I saw her. If she chose to hang around that long, that is.

  “I hear her wings,” Emily said, her gaze rising.

  An instant later Minette flew over my head and came to rest on the library book. “Brodie was right, Kate.”

  “We talked about this already,” I said. “Maybe he knew so much because he’s the killer.”

  “I never liked Brodie,” Emily said.

  “No, no.” Minette shook her wings once, causing her to rise straight up. “He was right the killer had to get rid of Patti’s body fast,” she said, floating back down. “I know why he chose Emily’s house.”

  CHAPTER 19

  Standing in my back yard and looking toward Emily’s house, I saw Minette’s point. Every yard but Emily’s was well lit. Patio and porch lights, solar lights, even floodlights several houses down. Something illuminated those yards. Any killer with an ounce of sense, who felt remorse and wanted the body of his victim to be discovered before it rotted away, would choose the dark yard.

  Minette’s theory also explained why the drag marks veered toward Emily’s yard partway through the woods. After being forced to get rid of Patti’s body because of the upcoming DUI checkpoint, the killer dragged her to the woods. Then he decided to leave her where she would be found, and he chose the darkest route to the darkest house. Indecisive was Rancourt’s word for the murderer. He had no plan, and he let his shifting emotions guide him.

  “Laurence hates the patio lights,” Emily said. “They shine in our bedroom, and he likes things black as night. It’s habit to leave them off, even when he’s out of town.”

  “I’m not totally convinced,” I said, “but this light thing makes sense. And if Minette’s right, you weren’t targeted, and neither was Laurence.”

  “Now I need to leave the back lights on, for crying out loud. I don’t care what Laurence says. To think all this happened because of a patio light.”

  “Patti would have been killed regardless, and we still need to be careful,” I said, walking back inside my house.

  Minette greeted us by calling our names and cutting circles in the air above our heads as we headed back to the kitchen. Delighted by her discovery, she was a tiny ball of pink fire—so much so that I worried she’d rocket right into a wall.

  “That was brilliant, Minette,” I said. “Now let’s settle down and find the killer.”

  She soared to the ceiling, sped toward the kitchen table, then pivoted on a dime and came straight for my face. “Stop!” I cried, shielding myself with my hands.

  “Sorry, sorry.” She thrust out her arms, used her rose-petal wings to reverse course, and fluttered like a nectar-drunk butterfly to the hutch. “See me? Slowly and slowly.”

  “Astonishing,” Emily said, still beguiled by Minette’s talents.

  Before sitting with Emily at the table, I turned on the oven to heat our lasagna and took a box of frozen garlic bread out of the freezer. When Michael had been alive, I’d prepared almost every meal. We’d gone out on occasion, and four times a month we’d ordered pizza from Angelo’s, but other than that, I’d made our meals. And maybe I was rare in loving it, but I had. Now, cooking, chopping, mixing, frying—all the chores of making meals from scratch—reminded me too much of Michael. It was too painstaking and too . . . caring. Foraging through my freezer, popping something in the oven or microwave, then downing it without giving it too much thought was easier on my heart.

  “While dinner heats, let’s whittle down o
ur suspects,” I said. “Can we dismiss Charlotte? I’m with Zane on her. She’s a thief, not a murderer.”

  “I agree.”

  “Me too,” Minette called out from the hutch.

  “That leaves us with Olivia. I can see her as the murdering kind, though she’d plan a murder.”

  “Agreed,” Emily said. “She doesn’t stumble into things. She plots a course.”

  “What about Zane?”

  “He’s strong enough to have dragged and carried Patti. So are Jonathan and Brodie.”

  “Maybe it was Olivia and she put Patti’s body on a cart or dolly,” I said. “No, forget I said that. The important question is why kill Patti? Could she have caught Olivia stealing headstones?”

  “Patti treasured Mount Hope, and Smithwell history in general. The thefts would have angered her.”

  “Let’s eliminate Zane for now,” I said. “He was genuinely disappointed in Charlotte for stealing, and he has a fear of that library—and supernatural retribution. He wants to be executive director, but he must have known he wasn’t next in line after Patti. Killing her wouldn’t accomplish anything. Unless . . .”

  I heard Minette behind me, softly saying, “Slowly and slowly,” and turned my head to see her flitting toward me. Once over the table, she drifted downward and sat cross-legged on the book. “To be director is not enough to kill someone.”

  “Humans kill for all kinds of stupid reasons,” I said.

  “But Zane is afraid and kind. He won’t kill because he doesn’t want to make more ghosts.”

  “I thought you said ghosts weren’t real.”

  Emily looked startled. “Ghosts are real?”

  “They’re like dreams,” Minette said. “There are bad ones, but they aren’t ghosts, and there are good ones, the ones we loved who died, and those are like dreams.”

  “Mumbo jumbo,” I snapped. “That’s of no use to anyone. Let’s get back to the subject at hand.”

  But Emily had heard enough. “This is freaking me out. Ghosts on top of killers?” She shrunk back in her seat. “Now I’ll never sleep. I have to stay here tonight, Kate. Can I?”

  “Of course you can.”

  My friend breathed an audible sigh of relief. “There’s just too much going on, and my house is so quiet.”

  “I’ll make up the spare bedroom.”

  “I’m going to get my things now. I don’t want to walk back to the house at ten or eleven o’clock.”

  “Take my flashlight for the path.” I dug my high-powered flashlight from my cabinet under the sink and gave it to her, along with a few words of encouragement for the short journey home. “Ignore all this talk about ghosts. How many nights have you spent alone in your house and been just fine? Or walked home from my house in the dark? More than I can count.”

  Emily nodded resolutely and marched out the door.

  Shutting it behind her, I turned on Minette. “Don’t talk about ghosts in front of Emily. She’s not like me.”

  “Yes, Kate.” She hung in the air, suspended by the tiny vibrations of her wings two feet from me.

  “I’m going upstairs to make Emily’s bed.”

  As I mounted the steps, my irritation with Minette and her cryptic answers to my questions grew. Maybe she couldn’t tell me what I wanted to know. Was that it? She wasn’t allowed? But who wouldn’t allow her, and why?

  I gathered sheets and blankets from the linen closet in the hall, then strode for the spare bedroom. I’d have to check it for dust, I thought. It had been ages since I’d had an overnight guest.

  Minette followed me at first, but then she shot ahead, halted, and hovered in a doorway. “This room. This room is better for Emily.”

  I ignored her and walked by, toward the third bedroom on the top floor. “That’s Michael’s office,” I called back. “This one at the end of the hall is the spare bedroom.”

  She flew at my head, her wings vibrating close to my face. “Michael’s office is sunny.”

  “Stop.” I shooed her and continued to the third bedroom. “You’ve been back there?”

  “Yes, it’s sunny. When the sun comes in, it’s the color of Emily’s hair. This one is dismal.”

  “It is not dismal.” I glanced around at the seldom-used room. It was less sunny, yes, because its window was smaller and even in November bare tree branches blocked some of the sunlight. But it was my spare bedroom. That was its designated use.

  Minette streaked to the top of the bed’s headboard and stood erect, staring defiantly up at me. “You don’t want to use the sunny place because you’re angry.”

  “Oh, Minette.” I let the sheets and blankets fall to the bed. “Don’t start. Emily and I are way too busy for this. I’m not angry. I just don’t want to use that room. It’s private—can’t you understand that?”

  In perfect innocence and sweetness, she said, “No, Kate.”

  Well, of course not. You’re a fairy. “I’m not surprised. I don’t suppose you have private trees.”

  She folded her arms and plumped up her chest. “Fairies die too.”

  I froze in place, my eyes riveted to hers. I’d never considered it before. But of course. All creatures die eventually. Had she lost someone? Did she know the grief of it?

  But I didn’t want to ask her. I didn’t want to talk about it.

  “Are you sad or angry?” she asked.

  I shook out the bed’s bottom sheet. “Both.”

  “Mostly angry. You don’t see good surprises.”

  I shook out the bed’s top sheet. “The world is a terrible place.”

  “And also good. God sent me to you, and I think Ray did too. Don’t be angry about Michael. Use his sunny room.”

  “You want to know about good?” I said. I flung the sheet on the bed and stepped closer to Minette. “I prayed and prayed, and when I got home that night, after Michael died, I shouted at God. I said, ‘Did you watch him suffer? Did you care?’” My fingers curled into fists, and as I raised them to the ceiling, Minette quivered. “‘And if you saw him suffer, didn’t it break your heart?’”

  Minette flew across the room and I wheeled back at her, accusing, unforgiving. “You know what I heard back, Minette? Nothing. Not a word. So don’t you ever, ever tell me not to be angry.”

  When I’d finished, finally finished, my inexcusable rant, I clamped my hands over my mouth. The look of anguish on Minette’s face almost took my breath away. She stood on the dresser, tears sliding from her emerald eyes down her cheeks, down her pink clothing to her feet.

  “I’m so sorry,” I said. I didn’t want her to believe in anything beyond what we could both touch and see. Or, if she did believe, I didn’t want to her declare her beliefs aloud and so confront me with her good cheer. I wanted to crush her sweet naiveté because in some twisted way, that would make me feel better. What had Michael’s suffering and death done to me? “I’m so, so sorry. I’m an idiot. I’m not angry at you. Please don’t be afraid of me.”

  Minette brushed the tears from her cheeks. “You’re kind to ladybugs. I’m not afraid of you.”

  She held up her arms, like a child asking to be picked up, then flew to my shoulder, sat, and buried her face in my hair.

  “You are a good surprise,” I said. “One of these days I’ll get my head screwed on straight.”

  “It’s crooked?”

  “It’s just an expression.”

  I heard the front door close and Emily call for me. “I’m upstairs,” I yelled. “Be down in a minute.”

  “I love you, Kate.”

  Minette’s tender words almost did me in. Good heavens, I was a fortunate woman. I took a deep breath and blinked away my tears. “Humans argue. I used to argue with Michael, but I loved him very much. But I promise you I’ll never yell like that again.”

  “We argue good,” she said.

  I chuckled. “Oh, do we?”

  “Like love arguing. Like when you care about someone. Not like people at the mansion. Not like Olivia and Jonathan
.”

  Raising a hand to my shoulder, I invited Minette to step onto my open palm. “You’re right. I should have thought of it. Those two are oil and water, but they both want to run the society. What did Emily say? Jonathan moves a table one way, and Olivia wants him to move it two inches another way.”

  “She said it’s a wonder they get anything done.”

  “Oh, Minette, that might just be it!”

  CHAPTER 20

  “Is there a tour at the mansion tonight?” I called as I trotted down the stairs. Emily was in the living room, unzipping her overnight bag. I had a feeling she wouldn’t be needing it.

  “Sure there is,” she said, looking at her watch. “One starts in half an hour.”

  “Will Brodie be there?”

  “Everyone will. Unless Olivia and Charlotte decide not to show their faces. Why?”

  I strode to the kitchen, turned off the oven, and put the garlic bread back in the freezer. “Do you have Brodie’s phone number?”

  “Yes, in my phone. Kate, what’s going on?”

  “Kate knows something,” Minette said merrily. “She does!”

  “I think I know something,” I said. “And it’s no more than a gut feeling. We need evidence.”

  Emily sat down at the table, her eyes shifting from Minette to me.

  “What was Brodie looking for at the Dawson headstone?” I asked, sitting across from her.

  “We never did figure that out.”

  “You said he was Jonathan’s puppy, eager to please him.”

  “Right . . .”

  “We need to ask Brodie point-blank what he was doing there.”

  “Okay, we’ll confront him at the mansion, fine. But I don’t understand where you’re going with this.”

  “Rancourt said the killer was indecisive, and we’ve been thinking the killer has to be a man because only a man could carry Patti’s body around. But what if there are two killers? Or one killer and one accomplice? And what if they argue and second-guess each other all the time?”