Bait and Witch

by Angela M. Sanders

  She seemed to think it over while she swallowed a mouthful of sandwich. “Okay, come in. Don’t mind the dog. He won’t bite.”

  I followed her to a linoleum-topped kitchen table, her buff-colored terrier trotting after us. The rest of Lalena’s sandwich and a jelly jar of yellow liquid sat next to a romance novel. The kitchen was as pink as the trailer’s exterior—pink stove, pink refrigerator, and pink countertops. A lamp with a base shaped like a sad clown lit the table.

  “Sit down, please. What do you want to know?” she asked, taking the seat across from me.

  “It’s adorable in here,” I said.

  “Is it?” She looked lazily around the kitchen. “I hate pink.”

  “Oh. But—”

  “This was Aunt Ginny’s place. She left it to me when she died. I haven’t had the chance to do much more than hang my sign out front.”

  “It’s so cozy, though.”

  “It’s such a hick trailer. In a hick town. I need to go somewhere else, at least for a vacation. Somewhere like—”

  “Paris,” I said, remembering the history of the Eiffel Tower she’d checked out at my recommendation. “Have you been there?”

  “No. Probably never will.” She drained her tumbler and rose. “Want some?” She refilled her glass from a box of wine in the refrigerator.

  “No, thanks. This is my lunch hour at the library.”

  “I don’t usually drink in the middle of the day.” She examined the glass’s straw-hued liquid. “Not bad for box wine. I’m just so . . .” She set down the tumbler. “You didn’t come to hear my troubles, though. You said you want to know about Craig? Maybe you’d rather have my psychic impressions of the library’s future.”

  “You really think the retreat center is a done deal?”

  “People sure seem to think so. Folks in the diner talk about how things will change. The Rudds might move to Forest Grove and rent their farmhouse to tourists. And Sam Wilfred came back to get in on the action.”

  That got my attention. “What does he have to do with it?”

  “Big House still belongs to his family. It’s a nice place. Great view. Sam will make a lot of money renting it out once the center is up and running.”

  Oh. So that’s why he was here. That’s why he voted for the complex. All his talk of happy memories of the library couldn’t compete with lining his pockets. The thought grated on me.

  Lalena eyed me, one brow lifted. “I’m getting a psychic flash. That’s what you really wanted to talk about. Sam and the library.”

  “No. That’s not it.” I hastily redirected the conversation. “Your brother suspects Craig is the murderer, but you told me it couldn’t be true. Why not? I got the impression it was about more than his love of animals.”

  Lalena got up and dumped her tumbler’s contents down the sink. She filled her glass with water and took a few swallows before returning to the table.

  “Craig and I dated for a few months. You haven’t been here long, but Craig doesn’t have the reputation as the best boyfriend on the planet.”

  No surprise there.

  “Underneath all his hustle is a sweet guy, though. I know it. I see it. He acts like the big gangster because he’s insecure. He’s not a murderer.”

  “Do you have evidence he couldn’t have killed anyone, or is it just your instinct?”

  “ ‘Just’ my instinct? That’s how I make my living, you know.” Her dog put his front legs on hers. She lifted him onto her lap.

  I wavered between questioning her further about Craig or following this thread. I decided to plunge in. “What’s it like?”

  “What’s what like?”

  “Being psychic.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, you have unusual abilities. It must have been scary to realize you could do things other people couldn’t. That you knew the future.”

  She shrugged. “When you have the gift, you have it.”

  “It didn’t freak you out?”

  “What the—?” Something behind me had snagged Lalena’s attention. I turned to find Rodney clinging to the window screen, his belly splayed to show his star-shaped birthmark, and his golden eyes boring in at us. Somehow he’d managed to scale the side of the trailer. Sailor yapped from Lalena’s lap.

  “Rodney!” I said. “Get down.”

  He turned his head to me, then leapt from the window and disappeared from view, leaving claw marks in the screen.

  Lalena dumped the dog off her lap and shouted, “Okay, so I’m not psychic. I don’t need to be. I tell people things, and they see what they need to see.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It’s like this.” She slid a deck of tarot cards from the counter. “Give me an issue. Tell me something you’re concerned about.”

  “Well, the library, for one.”

  She handed me the deck. “Shuffle. Go ahead.”

  I had a friend in college who read tarot cards, and I’d seen her deck, heard her talk about arcana and the Celtic cross and things like that, but I’d never handled tarot cards. This deck was big in my hands but worn enough to shuffle easily. I’d expected to feel some sort of tingle like I did with books, but they might have been playing cards for all the energy they communicated.

  “Is that enough?”

  “Frankly, it doesn’t matter. Okay, now cut the deck and turn over the bottom half. Don’t worry about it. Whatever card is up will be fine.”

  I cut the deck and flipped up the bottom half as instructed. The card showed a man in a broad hat standing in front of a table holding a pentacle, a sword, and a goblet. He hoisted some kind of stick in one hand. “What’s that?”

  “The Magician.”

  I felt as if I’d grabbed an electric fence. I dropped my hands to my lap. “Oh.”

  Lalena didn’t seem to notice my shock. “It means you have the tools at your disposal to solve the problem. Really, though, you could have chosen any card, and it would give you the answer you want. Like this.” She pulled a card with a man seemingly penned in by pentacles. “Four of Pentacles. Stay the course, it says, and protect yourself. Or this.” She pulled a card with a crowned woman holding a sword. “Queen of Swords. Use your brain.”

  “But I chose the Magician.”

  “Right.” She gathered up the cards and tied them into a square of velvet. “Magic is really nothing but you seeing what you need to see—or want to see. It’s confirmation bias.”

  “So . . .” I looked at the boomerangs in the pattern of the linoleum tabletop. “So, you don’t think people can have magical abilities, like, say”—I forced a laugh—“being able to recommend the perfect book to someone?”

  “You think you’re magic? I really did love that book on the Eiffel Tower,” she said. “But, no. You’re simply a good librarian. You’ve probably absorbed a lot that you’re not aware of. There are people who are freakishly good at remembering numbers and dates. Maybe you’re one of those, except with titles.”

  “What about knowing who’s going to call, guessing the next song on the radio—things like that?” I asked.

  “Coincidence. Take the phone calls. How many people call you regularly, anyway? Chances are high you’re going to know when you’re due to hear from a friend.” Lalena glanced up at the sound of a car crunching gravel, creeping down the road forming the trailer park’s spine. “That’ll be Mrs. Garlington for her weekly appointment.”

  “So, you’re not psychic?” I said.

  “Keep your voice down.” She tightened the knot on the deck of tarot cards. “Not more than anyone else. People give off all sorts of clues with how they act, what they respond to. Mrs. Garlington, for instance”—she nodded toward the driveway, where a car door thunked shut—“she wants to complain about her son and hear how much he loves her. I can do that, and she’ll walk out of here happy.”

  I stood. “I’ll let you get to business, then. You really don’t know more about Craig Burdock—where he was the night of the murde
r, for instance?”

  “No. I haven’t seen Craig in weeks. Not after what he did to me with the dental assistant.” She hesitated a moment, as if unsure whether to speak. “You need to talk to Duke.”

  “The library trustee?”

  She nodded. “He lives across the drive. The night of the murder I saw him leave on foot carrying a canvas bag.”

  “Did you see where he went?”

  “No, but it wasn’t to Darla’s. He turned right at the highway, not left, like he was headed to the library.”

  The dog barked at the doorbell. Lalena crossed the trailer’s tiny living room in a few steps to open the door to Mrs. Garlington.

  I had no choice but to leave. I turned to say good-bye and stopped short. Sailor was lying by the pink sofa happily chewing on something. I stepped closer. In the dog’s mouth was Craig Burdock’s fringed moccasin. The moccasin I’d seen him wearing two days earlier.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Craig Burdock been wearing those moccasins when I saw him at the library. Clearly, Lalena had spent time with him lately—after he was at the library, but before he was arrested the next day. Why had she lied? It could something as innocent as she was embarrassed that she had been seeing him again. Or she could be protecting him. She was certainly eager to toss blame Duke’s way.

  And the talk about magic. Even if Lalena were right and I had some sort of superpower remembering book titles, that wouldn’t explain the books that appeared by my bedside each night. Or the copy of Pride and Prejudice with scrambled text. I remembered back to my flight from D.C. to Portland. Could I have bumped my head when I was so suddenly ill?

  Right now, my grumbling stomach reminded me that I had more pressing matters: lunch. The entrance to the Magnolia Rolling Estates let out down the block from Darla’s tavern. I’d get a sandwich to go and take it to the library, where Roz would be ready for her own lunch.

  The diner was quiet. Darla wiped down a counter, and through the cutaway to the kitchen, the cook was chopping onions, likely prepping a gumbo or jambalaya for dinner. Someone sat at the counter sipping a Coke. His bulk spread over the stool, his elbows were planted wide, and if I wasn’t mistaken, his sweater was hand-knit. Duke McConway. Kismet. Two thoughts leapt to my mind: Lalena’s claim that Duke was on a mysterious errand by foot the night of the murder and Amphibious Vehicles of the D-Day Landing.

  “Josie, hon.” Darla tossed her cloth into a bucket and wiped her hands. “What’ll you have?”

  “Something I can eat at my desk, please,” I said. “How about a grilled cheese?”

  “I’ll duck into the kitchen and get it started. Marty’s busy with dinner prep.”

  That left me alone with Duke. He swiveled on the stool and took a long draw through his soda straw. “You finish your report for the judge yet?”

  “Word sure gets around quickly.” His tone irritated me. In the old days, I would have smiled politely and said no. The Wilfred me wasn’t as docile.

  “I don’t see why you’re wasting your time. Point one, it’s the trustees who decide what’s good for this town. Point two, anyone with half a brain knows Wilfred needs commerce, not an ancient house sitting on a plot of land breeding trouble.”

  “Where were you that night, anyway?”

  “Ha. That’s a good one.”

  Not the response I’d expected. “I’m serious. You were seen out on foot that night.”

  “Are you accusing me? Because, if so, come out with it.” He punctuated his comment by hoovering his straw through the dregs of his soda. “You aren’t the sheriff.”

  “The sheriff isn’t the only person who cares what happens up there,” I said. “I found the body. I live there.”

  “Not for long.”

  Darla returned to the counter. “Josiekins, you need protein. You’re getting hangry. Duke here has his objectionable qualities, but—”

  “Hey, Darla.”

  “Let me finish. He may not be a perfect gentleman, but he doesn’t go around shooting strangers and tossing them in the bushes, do you?” She winked at me.

  I got it. Good cop, bad cop. “You protest a little too much, Mr. McConway. Did you tell Sheriff Dolby you were up there that night?”

  “Who said I was?” He was standing now, shifting from cowboy boot to polished cowboy boot. The few silver rivets still left on his belt glittered. “What gives you the right to come into town, not even having roots here, and make accusations?”

  “You should know you can’t do anything here without someone seeing you.”

  I’d gone too far. Beads of sweat popped on Duke’s forehead. He was holding his temper, but just barely.

  Darla saw it coming, too. “Josie, now, you don’t know Duke like I do. He’s not that kind of man.”

  “I’m tired of all this insinuation,” Duke said. “The sooner that library is history, the better. It’s tearing up the town. Even you, Darla. I never thought I’d see the day. What I do, and when, is my own business.”

  What had I gotten myself into? “I never meant to—”

  “You want to know what everyone was doing the night you arrived? Ask Darla here where she was. You just might find the answers illuminating, especially for a library trustee.” With that, he slammed money on the counter and whisked past me, a buffalo on Fred Astaire’s feet.

  Darla’s face blanched. She busied herself at the cash register, neatly smoothing Duke’s bills and avoiding my eyes. She had something to hide, too, it was clear. What was it?

  Could she and Duke—? No. Couldn’t be.

  “I’m sorry. I blew it,” I said.

  Darla’s phone rang, and she fished it from her apron with relief. “Hello? Judge Valade?”

  “Grilled cheese to go.” The cook handed me a foil-wrapped sandwich.

  I took the sandwich without letting my gaze leave Darla.

  “Hmm,” she said. “Okay.” Pause. “Okay.” Pause. “Right, well, good-bye.”

  “What did he say?” I couldn’t ask fast enough.

  “They moved up the deadline. The judge is leaving early today, and you’ll have to have the report to him by three.” She looked at the clock above the counter, a black cat whose eyes shifted from side to side with each swing of his pendulum tail. “It’s already past one.”

  * * *

  Roz was waiting at the library’s front door when I returned. “What took you so long?”

  “I went to the tavern for a sandwich and was, um, waylaid.” I unwrapped the scarf from my neck and slipped off my coat. “Do you think you could stay this afternoon? The judge is going out of town and upped the deadline. I have to get it in by three this afternoon.”

  “Oh, I would, but I can’t. I’m on deadline. I’m going to work on my project at home this afternoon. I have to finish it.” She heaved a sigh. “I’m sorry. I knew it.”

  “Knew what?”

  “Why even hold out hope?” Her voice rose in a flash of anger. “It never pays. The library is kaput. The judge won’t even give us until the end of the day to get in our report. That doesn’t bode well for his reading it.”

  “What is this project, anyway?” I said. I guess I was getting used to her negative ways, because her rant didn’t faze me.

  “Nothing,” she said automatically. “Dylan is in the kitchen. Get him to watch the circulation desk. He’ll love it.” A moment later, she was out the door.

  Roz was right—Dylan was thrilled to lord over the circulation desk. I told him I’d be in my office, but my door would be open, and to let me know if anything challenging came up. He said he’d make me proud, and as I headed toward my office, I heard him say, “Welcome, fellow Wilfredian, to our humble library.”

  “I’ve known you since you were in diapers, Dylan.” Mrs. Garlington had sheet music tucked under an arm and sounded upbeat. Lalena must have delivered on her psychic reading. “Don’t give me any of that hogwash.”

  Rodney was napping in my office armchair, but that was all right. I needed to focus at the
desk. The report’s shape was already laid out. All I had to do was to fill in some of the facts—and find a way to get around the argument that the library’s grounds attracted troublemakers. I glanced at my watch. It was too late to interview the sheriff, but I could go through the local newspapers and look at crime reports. Say, five years’ worth. This would be the last bit of bolstering the report would need.

  I took my notebook to the old dining room and found bound copies of the Forest Grove News-Times, which looked to be the nearest newspaper to Wilfred. The paper was a weekly, which would, fortunately, make my work faster. I lugged volumes for the past five years to the worktable. Bound newspapers. I shook my head. This library needed updating in a serious way.

  Pen in hand, I got to work. Wilfred had suffered very little crime, and none of it would have made the fine print in Washington, D.C. Someone had been periodically taking eggs from a sidewalk stand and not leaving money; a propane tank was stolen off a truck parked in the church parking lot; a drunk driver was detained.

  The library’s grounds didn’t get off scot-free. The police had caught kids from Gaston trying to break into Big House. Vagrants camped along the river path over the summer. One article in particular caught my eye. The Save Wilfred’s Youth group was founded just a few months ago. At the top of their agenda was to keep teenagers away from the library grounds after hours.

  Then I heard it. There was no other way to describe the sound: The books were grumbling. They grumbled in bass, in soprano, in short chuffs, and in long moans. This couldn’t be explained by a good memory for titles. This was something else entirely.

  “Ms. Way?” Dylan stood in the doorway.

  “Yes?” It was hard to focus on him with the chorus of books demanding my attention.

  “I was thinking of adding a ‘Dylan’s Favorite Graphic Novels’ section to the card catalogue. What do you think?”

  “I—uh—that sounds fine.” Whatever the noise was, it clearly didn’t bother Dylan.

  He squinted. “Are you listening to me?”

  “Can you hear that?” I said.

  “Hear what?”

  I was going to sound like a crazy person. I took a breath and tried again. “Tell me what you hear.”