Dead Sleeping Shaman (25 page)

It was good to
get home, kick off my shoes, grab a cup of tea, and congratulate Sorrow, with a sad sigh, for being a good boy. He hadn’t pooped or peed in the house. Maybe he wasn’t man enough to lift his leg yet, but he was getting the idea of not defacing the place where you ate and slept.

I sipped the hot tea and let my body sink into itself. I didn’t want to think or speculate. There was something about Marjory’s friends, and especially about Arnold Otis, that had drained me. I didn’t eat at the restaurant. I hadn’t been hungry. Still wasn’t. There were times when being with too many people filled me in ways that I didn’t want to feel. Maybe another reason for coming to the woods, so I could pick my times and places to be social. But that was not a choice at the moment, not with so much going on in my life.

I lay down on the brown couch, Sorrow on the carpet beside me, and put one arm up over my eyes. What I needed right then was the forest on a warm, rainy, summer day, when the trees talked to me and clouds lay overhead like the all-encompassing ceiling of a cave. I wanted to be cradled, to breathe and live without complication, but that wasn’t possible. Maybe ahead—when the snow came and I had enough money to live without scrounging work, without being involved with death.

How quickly people tired me. Except a few.

The phone rang. It was Bill, back from Lansing.

“Got your October story,” he said, all business as usual. “Good job. Come in next week and we’ll talk about holiday pieces. I’ve got some ideas. Maybe you’ll come up with something … ?”

There was a pause. The kind of pause that happens when the subject is about to change—maybe go to a place you don’t want to go, or are afraid to go. I held my breath, then broke whatever was coming in two.

“The brother, Arnold Otis, came to town,” I said.

He cleared his throat. Maybe swallowing words. I couldn’t think about that right then. Whatever had been about to happen made me nervous. My heart was beating faster and I had a lot of spit in my mouth. “I heard,” he said. “We covered the meeting here in TC.”

His voice dropped. I sensed sadness there—as if he knew a moment had passed between us that might never come again.

“He came to Leetsville after that,” I finally said. “It turned out I’d already met him.”

“Where?”

“I was at Deward. Checking something I found in my photographs.”

“What?” He was back to being a newsman, not a friend.

“There was an oblong, or more a rectangle—dug over—on the ground. It looked … I don’t know … odd. And very close to the jack pine where I found Marjory.”

“So?”

“Well, I was kind of crawling around the space … you know, like a gravesite … when I found six very dead roses someone had laid there.”

“Oh, my God!”

“Yeah. That’s what I thought.”

“So? Where does this Otis guy come in?”

“He came up behind me when I was on my knees. Never gave me his name. He said he was fishing the Manistee. But no fishing pole.”

“You think he was there to see where his sister died?”

“Yup. But later … and I don’t know if this is connected or not … I was at Bellaire, seeing Marjory’s aunt, and when I came out the roses were gone, the photographs I’d printed were gone, and so was my camera.”

“Hmm. Think he did it?”

“I don’t think it was him. But he could have called someone. He was the only one who knew what I had.” I hesitated a minute. “Anyway, we’re going out tomorrow and Lucky and Officer Winston are having that rectangle dug up. See what might be there.”

“What do you think it is?”

“No idea. I’ve got a suspicion. Otis said he thought it could be his brother, Paul, who had murdered Marjory. The guy hasn’t been seen in years. In and out of mental hospitals, like their mother. There was a letter to Marjory. Crystalline, her friend, found it. The letter was from someone who claimed to be writing for Marjory’s brother, but they didn’t say which brother. Arnold said he’d had a friend write it for him. Something about being blackmailed by somebody he thought might be their mother or his brother.”

Bill listened and said nothing.

“Or …” I went on. “It could be somebody from the End of the World group. He thinks the rope they wear at the waist is suspiciously like the rope they found around Marjory’s neck.”

He still said nothing.

“Lucky’s coming to rely on me,” I added after a while. “I’m not a cop. I don’t have the first idea what I’m looking for …”

“I don’t believe that. So Dolly’s still with that cult thing?” He gave a low laugh. “She’s such an odd cuss. That’s worrying you, I’ll bet.”

“Well … yeah, I guess …”

“So, you’ll get me the story tomorrow? Whatever they find. Do a recap of the investigation so far. Don’t forget to bring in Arnold Otis. It was his sister who was murdered.”

“He’s going to be furious. You know the story will go out on the wire, once we print it.”

“Can’t be helped, Emily. You know that. We don’t do favors. Not even for people close to us. That’s not what news is.”

I sighed heavily.

“That bad?”

“Oh, just … I don’t know.”

“Yes, you do.”

We hung up. I first rested my hands on the phone and then disconnected it from the wall. Enough of people. Too much anger boiling around me. What I needed most was Dolly and her easy certainty, her way of stumbling along in a straight line without looking side to side. I needed her firm belief in what was there before her eyes, while I questioned everything. Too much thinking can be bad for you, I’d found, just as my mother used to say too much reading was bad for the eyes. Too much thinking kept you from jumping on moments that could change your life, and left you wallowing in self-pity. Better not to think at all.

I lay down on the couch, had my face licked a few times—which made me happy—then went to sleep.

Friday, October 23

4 days left to make amends

I parked on the
track leading into Deward, beside a couple of state police cars, Lucky’s patrol car, Crystalline’s car, and a few others—one long and black, with darkened windows. For just a minute I sat still before getting out and going on to the ghost town to get caught in the middle of another problem, or another disappointment. Whatever was going to happen would happen whether I took a couple of minutes to figure out who I was right then or not.

I set my hands on the steering wheel and stared off into the woods. Thick, changing trees, and then the pines and firs. Deep places between them, each with only enough space to exist. The October day was temperamental, clouds then sun then clouds again; dark, moving shadows then a clear, bright blue sky. I closed my eyes but could still see the moving clouds. There was no power that could stop the moody, changeable day. No power that would allow me to understand what was happening to people around me.

I was a little sick of me at that moment—my neediness, my baseless depressions. Learning things about myself wasn’t always a pleasant event, but being honest meant looking at the darkest part of who I was, as well as giving myself a pat on the back for the good stuff.

I took a deep breath and got out of the car. Voices came from farther up the trail, toward Deward. The people were already out there: Lucky, Officer Winston, someone from the DNR, diggers, Crystalline and her group, Arnold Otis and his retinue. Maybe they’d finished digging, found nothing, and were on their way out. Was I going to be relieved that nothing was found? As I walked toward the voices, I had no idea what I counted on.

Crystalline came over to greet me, throw her arms wide, and hug me close.

“This isn’t going to be a happy day, Emily,” she whispered as she pulled me aside. “The thing that frightened Marjory is out here. We all feel it …” She indicated Felicia, standing down the road, flat eyes wide, her expression serious. Beside her, Sonia stood with her head thrown back, eyes closed, arms and hands spread. She looked as if she might be in a trance.

Crystalline stayed close, near the two men digging beside the jack pine. Officer Winston, Lucky Barnard, and another man with a DNR patch on his jacket sleeve, watched. Off to one side, standing as if they had no part in what was going on, Arnold Otis stood with an aide and his attorney. They seemed to be sharing secrets—their heads close together, hands at their mouths.

Lucky nodded in my direction but said nothing. Officer Winston, solid and in charge, said, “Morning, Emily.” He introduced me to Dave, the man with the DNR, who shook my hand.

I glanced at Arnold Otis, but he pretended not to see me. I turned my back on him and stood looking down into the hole where the men dug, shovelful by slow shovelful, swinging the dirt to the side, dumping it in a careful stream, then taking another shovelful, first one man and then the other.

“Nothing yet?” I finally asked Lucky, knowing full well if there’d been anything, he’d have said.

He shook his head. “Maybe should’ve brought a backhoe. Only thing is I worried about what was down there. Doing damage.”

“You started earlier than you said you would,” I complained.

“Had to,” Lucky said. “You know Leetsville. Words been going around that we’re hunting for something. I expect they’ll start showing up with their shovels any minute now.”

“What do they think we’re looking for?”

He sighed. “One thing going around is that there’s a stone buried that can stop the world from ending. Another one is that there’s buried treasure. Something to do with David Ward, the guy who owned all this property.”

“Oh geez,” I groaned. “Isn’t there enough going on for them? We don’t need any more high drama …”

Lucky shook his head. “Got a murder. Got the world going to end in a couple of days. Got Dolly shaving her head. Got you trying to do her job …”

“Hit something!” one of the diggers interrupted, beckoning to Officer Winston. The other man stopped digging at the far end of the rectangle and leaned on his shovel, looking down.

Beside me, Crystalline began to moan. Her head was thrown back; her eyes closed. “It’s her,” she whispered. I think I was the only one who heard. “It’s her. The woman. Marjory knew …”

Sonia and Felicia hurried over. They stood beside Crystalline, each holding one of her arms in support.

We moved closer. Winston bent to see where the man pointed, at something in the hole.

“Looks like cloth. Maybe a blanket,” the man said. “I’m trying to uncover it. Seems to go from one end of the hole to the other.”

The hole was down more than four feet. The thing they’d uncovered formed a mound, the blackened cloth wrapped around whatever was there, stretched from one end to the other. In places, the cloth was torn, or maybe rotted. It wasn’t possible, from where I stood, behind the men, to make out what it was.

Beside me, Crystalline bent her head and waited. Felicia and Sonia held still, their eyes fixed on the open rectangle in the dirt.

“You see this, Lucky?” Officer Winston looked down, then over to Lucky. He pointed.

Lucky nodded. “What do you think it is?”

“No idea. Something buried, that’s for sure.”

“Let’s let them dig the earth away. Maybe we’ll know better.”

I turned to Arnold Otis and his friends. They’d moved closer with the first call from the digging man and stood bent over, staring into the deep hole. Arnold’s face was dark red. His eyes were riveted on the blackened cloth.

“What is it?” he demanded of Lucky, who only shrugged.

Arnold quickly turned to his retinue and whispered again.

The tall attorney came forward, talking to Lucky’s back. “This is obviously something to do with Mr. Otis’ family, or at least with Marjory, and he wants it stopped. We can get a court order, if you insist. You’re interfering with his right to privacy …”

“Tell Mr. Otis to can it,” Lucky called over his shoulder and stepped closer to the hole, peering down hard. The attorney went into a huddle with Arnold and the aide.

“Can you peel back any of that material?” Lucky called to one of the men standing up to his chest in the opening.

The man bent, leaning over the long package. He pulled at a place where the cloth seemed to be rotted almost through to whatever was beneath it.

“Don’t fool with it too much,” Officer Winston said. “If we have to, we’ll dig it up and lift the whole thing out of there—just the way it is.”

The man pulled a little more. The cloth gave easily at the far end. First one layer, then another. As he pulled away what seemed to be the last layer of cloth, I sensed movement in the woods, on the other side of the opening. When I looked up, three cult members, in their cinched robes, cowls pulled far up over their heads, faces shadowed, stood there, among the trees.

I heard a small gasp behind me and turned just at the moment when Arnold Otis and his men noticed the three figures in the woods. Arnold’s face went from deep red to near black. His eyes were wide.

“Get those people out of here,” he screeched and lunged forward, constrained by his aide’s hand on his arm.

Lucky took a step back then stopped. He walked in the direction of the cult members, stopped again, both arms out at his sides like a traffic cop, and waited to see what would happen next.

I didn’t need to see their faces to know who the cultists standing there were: Brother Righteous, Sister Sally, and Dolly Wakowski.

Arnold Otis recovered enough to yell at me and Lucky, “See, I told you they’re involved. I told you!”

Lucky looked from Arnold to Dolly and her friends. I hurried to where Dolly stood, up a small, tree-covered hill.

“What are you doing here?” I demanded.

Dolly said nothing. Her hand was on Brother Righteous’ arm. The arm was shaking. Sister Sally held his other arm. They weren’t holding him up as much as holding him together as he moaned.

“You’d better leave,” I hissed at all three. “This is police business.”

“Will you let us know what they find?” Dolly whispered toward me, her thin voice wavering.

“Why? You’ve given up the right to know anything about this investigation,” I said, enjoying that her lips withered and trembled.

“Because we need to know,” was all she said.

Sister Sally put a hand out to me. “Please, Emily. Dolly is only
… she is one of us and we care about those who have suffered.”

“You mean the saved who will be going to the great Rapture in a few days? Or you mean the rest of us?” I hissed, too angry to be anything but cruel.

Sally hesitated, turning her round eyes on me. “Everyone. We see to everyone.”

“Then go home. I’ll find you. If I think it is any of your business, I’ll let you know …”

They turned and moved back into the woods the way they’d come, all three walking close together, holding on to each other.

“Emily!”

Officer Winston motioned me over. Arnold Otis ran up behind us. Crystalline and her friends huddled together near the edge of the hole. I knelt, looking where Winston pointed. The digger in the hole pulled back the last of the rotted cloth. A fairly large piece came away at once, slowly uncovering something yellow beneath. Not really yellow, but yellowed, and still bright enough to shine, down in that dark place.

“It’s teeth,” the man said. “A skull.”

“A body,” Lucky said.

“That’s what Marjory knew,” Crystalline whispered. The two beside her were still.

“No, no …” Arnold moaned behind me and backed away from the grave. “I told you. It was them …” He kept backing away as he spoke, one hand covering his face, the other flailing beside him. His aide followed, speaking in low tones, soothing, I imagined. “I know who did this. I know …”