Scrapped (3 page)
Chapter 4
Beatrice was thinking about Jenkins Hollow, too. She thought she heard Elizabeth fuss and checked on her, saw she was still asleep, and stood for a moment looking over her granddaughter, whose face shone in the glow of the night-light. What an amazing, beautiful little creature she was—and that shock of red hair, well, if she kept it, the girl was going to be even more unusual. That was one thing Beatrice could claim she had given Elizabeth. Beatrice, of course, was mostly white-haired now.
Beatrice had read how redheads were dying out. The gene pool was getting slimmer and slimmer for them. She knew of a group of families in the Nest, which was a neighborhood in Jenkins Hollow that had always had several generations of redheads. For years she’d ignored the rumors concerning the intermarrying and inbreeding, but her husband had confirmed it one morning, after he delivered a Down syndrome baby that didn’t make it.
“It was a mercy to them,” he’d told her. “It doesn’t feel like that now, of course. But that baby was the product of, well, a brother and sister.”
“What?”
“Yes.” He’d lowered his eyes. “It’s quite a problem up there.”
“I’ve never heard of such a thing,” Beatrice said.
“Of course not, Bea. It’s all hush-hush,” he said and held her hand. “There’s plenty in this world you don’t know about, and I’d like to keep it that way.”
Beatrice smiled at the memory. Here she was, eighty-one years old, and back then she couldn’t have imagined some of the things she was exposed to now every day, as a matter of course. Girls running around half naked in public was just part of it; the other was the lack of respect the girls had for themselves. It was almost as if sex was the only thing they cared about. And as if they thought they had invented sex. She looked at her grandbaby and felt that same sense of protection that Ed must’ve felt for her. And yet she knew it was futile. Elizabeth would start out seeing much more in her life than what Beatrice never could have imagined all those years ago.
She supposed the redhead must have come from the hollow, and believed the police would find out what happened—eventually. She hoped it was an accidental drowning. She ran her hand through her mostly white hair. Thinking about it all—the possibility of a murder here, in Cumberland Creek—sent spasms of fear through her.
Back to Jenkins Mountain. Beatrice used to hike on the ridge that looked over Jenkins Hollow and out over the river. On one side of the river was a group of Old Order Mennonites—those that still dressed in plain clothes and eschewed “modern” conveniences, like electricity and cars. There were plenty of other kinds of Mennonites around, though, like some of her neighbors, who dressed normally and embraced technology but still held true to some of the basic tenets of the religion. Beatrice didn’t know exactly what the schisms between the Old Order Mennonites and the other sects were based on. All she knew was that most of the Old Orders kept to themselves. They always had. Although they were neighborly, they were never overly so.
On the other side of the river and around a small hill was the Nest—the neighborhood that was a melting pot for castoffs, inbreeds, and other troubled sorts. Most of them were impoverished and still didn’t have running water. Ironic since the river life force that fed the valley started deep in the caves on Jenkins Mountain.
Beatrice sighed. She hated that so many of them were exactly what the rest of the world envisioned when they thought about Appalachia—that they were all inbreeds, that they lacked education and were impoverished. Damn.
She had traveled all over the world and still thought the Cumberland Creek Mountains and the Blue Ridge Mountains were the most beautiful places on the planet. That included Jenkins Hollow. From the ridge, you could look down on the settlement, with its beautiful white clapboard church at the center and the steep mountains folding into one another in the background.
As you looked farther and farther into the distance, the mountains grew smaller and smaller, but they sort of looked as if they were fanning out from one another. In the fall of the year, you couldn’t ask for a prettier place to visit. It was unique because it was so hard to get to that the tourists left it alone. Hell, many of them probably didn’t even know it existed. There were no tourist shops, fences, or paved paths.
So many legends existed about the place. It was a remote place when she was a child that everybody had a scary story about. Ghosts. Aliens. Wild, marauding Native Americans or mountain men. Several of the ghost tales were about jilted lovers taking their own lives. Then there was the story that claimed a curse was placed on Mary Jenkins, one of the settlers of the region, because she took up with a Native American chief and bore his children, provoking the suicide of a young Native American maiden, Star, who had been promised to him. She cursed them before she leapt to her death. None of the story was probably true, mused Beatrice. Still, it was interesting to ruminate on it in terms of some of the landmarks on Jenkins Mountain. Lover’s Ridge. Suicide Plunge. Star’s Tears, which were boulders shaped like tears.
Beatrice leaned her head back in the rocker. A streetlight shone on the wall just where a puffy little lamb was jumping across it. She pondered life and the randomness of it. Ghosts. Lambs. Churches. Precious sleeping babies. Mountains. Rivers. And dead redheads washing ashore.
She felt the drifting sensation of sleep and then jerked back awake. Was she falling? She grabbed the chair to steady herself and blinked. Oh, it was just a dream. Just a dream.
Chapter 5
Annie pulled her lasagna out of the oven while she listened to the football game in the living room. She took in the scent of oregano, garlic, and tomatoes. All her boys, including her husband, were planted in front of the television, watching football, even Sam, who was just four. She slid the pan back in. She’d give it another twenty minutes.
She sat back down at the kitchen table, where she thumbed through a huge book of ancient symbols. None of them seemed to match her carelessly drawn symbols from the drowned body. Was DeeAnn onto something? Was it a satanic ritual of sorts? Annie wanted to dismiss that, but she’d learned a long time ago not to rule anything out at the beginning of a story.
“You getting anywhere?” Mike asked as he walked into the room, tossed his beer bottle into the recycling bin, and opened the fridge for another.
“Not really,” she said and sighed. “These symbols look so strange. They must have a connection to the death.”
“Humph, maybe not. You know some of these young people are into carving themselves up. Cutting themselves. I don’t get it,” Mike said, then opened his bottle. The burp hissed into the air.
“I don’t think she could cut herself on the upper arm like that. She seemed to be very young,” Annie said. “Though it’s getting harder and harder for me to tell how old someone is, let alone someone dead in a river for God knows how long.”
“I hear ya,” he said and kissed her head, then left the room.
Just then the doorbell rang. It was Cookie, who was dropping off some new die cuts for Annie. Sheila’s new Cricut machine made die cuts, which the women were enjoying placing in their latest scrapbooks. Sheila just chose the design, plugged the cartridge in, and slid the paper or cardboard in, and out came a sheet of easily punched-out designs—hearts, spirals, and even
Namaste
symbols.
Namaste
symbols.
Annie was always working on at least one of her boys’ books, so she had plenty of cutout soccer balls and birthday cakes. But the croppers had spotted a
Namaste
symbol in one of the cartridges, and they all had asked for one, since Cookie had gotten them so into yoga and they were all working on a yoga scrapbook-journal project.
Namaste
symbol in one of the cartridges, and they all had asked for one, since Cookie had gotten them so into yoga and they were all working on a yoga scrapbook-journal project.
Annie heard the front door open, and her sons greeting Cookie with squeals, hugs, and kisses before she waltzed into the kitchen.
“Mmm. What are you making? It smells so good,” she said, arms full of paper bags.
“Lasagna. Why don’t you stay for dinner?”
“That sounds like an offer I can’t refuse,” Cookie said, placing her bags on the table. She fished around in one. “Here’s your
Namaste.
Isn’t it beautiful? I love the crimson you chose. It will look great on that beige page of yours.” She ran her thin, pale fingers over the rounded edges. “Look at that,” she said. “What a clean line.”
Namaste.
Isn’t it beautiful? I love the crimson you chose. It will look great on that beige page of yours.” She ran her thin, pale fingers over the rounded edges. “Look at that,” she said. “What a clean line.”
“It’s nice,” Annie said, not quite as enthusiastically. She was still distracted by the symbols. She loved the ancient Egyptian symbols. “Look at this,” she said, pointing to the page. “These symbols are so beautiful.”
“Oh yes, the scarab,” Cookie said, leaning over the table, her long black hair falling over her shoulders. “I have a necklace that has that symbol on it.”
“You do?”
“It means ‘spontaneous creation,’ or some such thing. Good luck and all that,” Cookie said and laughed. Annie loved the way she laughed, with no holds barred. “But what are you doing?”
Just then dark, curly-haired Ben came running into the kitchen. “Can I get some water?”
“Help yourself, baby,” Annie said. “You know where the cups are.”
He stood on the stool and rattled around in the cupboard until he found the perfect cup.
“I’m sorry. Where were we?” Annie said.
“What are you doing with this book?” Cookie said, leaning over it, her black hair falling on its white pages.
“I am trying to find a match for the symbols that were”—Annie lowered her voice—“carved into the drowned body.”
“Oh, can I see?” Cookie asked, her eyebrows lifting as she straightened herself.
“Sure,” Annie said, and slid the paper with her sketchings over to Cookie, whose green eyes lifted further.
“Runes,” she said.
“What?”
“It looks to me like what you have here are rune symbols. You won’t find anything about them in this book of Eastern religious symbols. Runes are Germanic. I should say, originally Germanic. Then they traveled up through Britain and into Scandinavia, and each of those cultures gave them their own little twist.”
“How do you know this stuff?” Annie said and smiled.
“Some pagans are still using them for divination. I don’t know that much about them. Just what they are. I’ve seen them in shops and so on, but they never called out to me.”
“Oh,” Annie said, with one eye watching Ben get water from the refrigerator spout. “Where can I find out more?”
“Now, see, that’s going to be tricky,” Cookie said, sitting down at the table. “There’s a lot of stuff out there—even on the Internet. But what’s good information . . . I don’t know what to tell you. It pains me to say this, but a lot of pagans are just making stuff up—even the stuff that’s not supposed to be made up. Like claiming they know the true meaning of the runes . . . I mean, I think there are people who do. I can check around for you.”
“That would be great. I’ll look around, too,” Annie said.
Annie found Cookie intriguing. She never talked much about her past. When she was asked about it, she would say it wasn’t important. “I live in the present moment.” But she always knew the most obscure facts—like what a blue moon really was, or what herb to plant during what phase of the moon. And then there was the time she talked about quantum physics, which captured Beatrice’s heart—a woman who had studied physics, then quantum physics, her whole life.
But there was this other, commonsense, earth mama, good cook, and great friend part of Cookie, which was most endearing. In the year she’d lived in Cumberland Creek, she had immersed herself in several networks of people and had plenty of friends—especially the scrapbook club, the group of women who cropped every Saturday night come hell or high water. It had taken Annie a whole year of living in Cumberland Creek to find any kind of friendship. Cookie was just different, attracting people wherever she went. She oozed warmth.
“When will supper be ready?” Mike yelled over the football game.
“In a few minutes,” Annie yelled back. She looked at Cookie and frowned.
“What can I do to help?” Cookie said.
Chapter 6
Bill would be here any minute, Lizzie was fussing, and Vera was still in her nightgown, though it was nearly supper time.
“Land sakes, let me take her. She probably needs a change. Now, go get dressed,” Beatrice said as she walked in the door.
The three of them had vowed to get together for Sunday dinner when they were all in town. They thought it would be a good thing for Lizzie, a consistent tradition for her, this child who was often schlepped between households and people. Coming together every Sunday was a touchstone for all of them—the primary caregivers and this miracle of a growing, healthy child.
Vera could hear her mother changing Lizzie as she rifled through what clean clothes she had. Good God. What had become of her? She was such a mess, couldn’t keep track of anything. She finally found a shirt that wasn’t too wrinkled and a pair of jeans that had been washed—what?—a few weeks ago?
She’d been lured into playing with her daughter all day, and the time had just slipped right by. Elizabeth often pulled Vera into her play world, and there she would stay forever, if she could. She knew what Beatrice said was true—she doted too much on Elizabeth. But she was going to have only one go-around at this parenting thing and didn’t want to miss a thing. And today she felt the passage of time sharply, the appreciation of life. Today’s paper reported that the drowning was not an accident. The murder of the unknown young woman reminded her of Maggie Rae’s death and the loss of her young life—a loss Vera still mourned—even as she held her own baby girl. New life.
She heard Bill enter the house and greetings being exchanged. Elizabeth was thrilled with seeing her father, which made Vera’s heart sink. Lord, she wished she could have forgiven that man and they could be the happy family all children wanted and deserved.
“Heard about the murder?” Bill said later, while seated at the table. “Pass me the potatoes, please.”
“Yes, I did. I was a bit shaken up. You can imagine,” Vera told him.
“She was a redhead,” Beatrice said, spreading butter on a roll.
“You are the only redhead I know in Cumberland Creek. You and Lizzie, that is. Must be from out of town,” Bill said.
“Thanks. I’m glad you remember my red hair, Bill, but there’s some redheads in Jenkins Hollow,” Beatrice said.
“Da-da-da,” Lizzie said and giggled.
“Yes, that’s your dad,” Vera said, exchanging a look of pride with Bill, who was spooning mashed potatoes into Lizzie’s mouth.
“Mmm, good,” he said, exchanging silly grins with his daughter.
I could love him again,
Vera thought. She felt her heart open from time to time, and then he’d anger her and she would go back to thinking,
Never again.
The last time she was almost ready to forgive him, she had heard about him dating a young lawyer from Charlottesville.
Of course young,
she thought and grimaced.
Vera thought. She felt her heart open from time to time, and then he’d anger her and she would go back to thinking,
Never again.
The last time she was almost ready to forgive him, she had heard about him dating a young lawyer from Charlottesville.
Of course young,
she thought and grimaced.
“Are you okay?” Beatrice said.
“Huh? Oh yeah, I’m fine,” Vera replied.
“You’re awfully quiet, and you had that faraway look in your eyes.”
“Mama, I’m thinking about there being a murder in Cumberland Creek. For some reason, I keep thinking of the body and the poor young woman who nobody has even claimed.”
“And then people keep bringing it up,” Beatrice shot at Bill.
“For God’s sake, I just asked,” he said, turning back to Vera. “I wonder if she was from up there. The river flows from there. If she drowned on the mountain, it would make sense if she ended up at the park.”
Vera shrugged.
“This is tasty ham. Did you use my recipe?” Beatrice asked.
Vera nodded. “Except I baked it just a wee bit longer.” She watched Bill lift Lizzie from the chair and sit her on his lap. But she was ready to go and wouldn’t sit still. She took off across the kitchen like a lightning bug.
“Such energy,” he said, grinning. “Hey, what do you know about this Cookie person?”
Beatrice groaned.
“Why? She seems like a nice person. She’s great with Lizzie,” Vera answered.
“We don’t really know much about her, do we? She’s new to town, and suddenly a dead body shows up.”
Beatrice sat up a little straighter.
“She’s been here almost a year, Bill. She waited all that time to kill someone? Really?”
“I don’t know her. She just seems kind of weird.”
“I agree,” said Beatrice. “She is weird. But she’s likable, I tell you. A good heart. Always helping where she can. But the rest of that stuff . . . I dunno.”
“What stuff?” he asked, moving across the floor to catch Lizzie.
“She calls herself a witch,” Vera said, then bit into a thick slice of ham.
He snorted. “Really? What does she do? Twitch her nose? Wave a magic wand? Does she know Harry Potter?”
“It’s not like that,” Vera said, moving dishes around, piling them on top of one another as she sat at the table.
“They say it’s an actual religion,” Beatrice said. “I’ve looked into it, and it is. Quite interesting, really.”
“I bet,” he said. “New Age mumbo jumbo.”
“Well, yes . . . and no,” Beatrice said. “I’m still thinking it over.”
“Well,” he said, grabbing Lizzie from the floor, swooping her over his shoulder to giggles and squirms, “while you’re thinking about that, think about what a witch would be doing someplace like Cumberland Creek. I mean, we’re about thirty years behind the rest of the country. Why would she want to be here?”
“I can tell you one thing,” Vera said. “I don’t know what I would have done without her this past year. And she can call herself a witch or an ogre. I really don’t care. I like her, and believe me, Bill, she didn’t kill anybody. Hell, she doesn’t even eat meat, because she loves animals. She’s so tenderhearted. So give it a rest.”
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