The Angel Whispered Danger (24 page)

“I didn’t say I
knew
who did it! I said I
thought
I knew who did it,” Violet said. “And I have evidence, too.”

“Oh, this is ridiculous!” Ma Maggie stood stiff as a starch-dried shirt. “Violet, you’ve gone too far. This is no time to be silly.”

“Murder isn’t silly, Maggie Brown!” Violet glanced quickly at me and I knew I had to jump in soon.

“I think we’ll let the police take care of that, Vi,” Uncle Ernest said. “Now, why don’t we all help ourselves to some of this wonderful food? I’m tempted to start with dessert myself.”

“Where’s your evidence, Cousin Violet?” I asked, grinning. “Bet I know where you’ve hidden it.”

“That’s for me to know and you
not
to find out,” my cousin said, drawing her pudgy self up as straight as possible.

“I saw you out there in the toolshed. What have you got in there? You’ve locked it away in that shed somewhere, haven’t you?”

“Certainly not!” Violet marched off in a well-rehearsed huff and the rest of my relatives lit into me at once.

“Kate! What in the world were you thinking of teasing Violet like that?” My grandmother gave me a look that would freeze a sunbeam.

“Kathryn, I’m surprised at you,” Uncle Lum said.

Uncle Ernest just looked sad and shook his head. I was glad when Aunt Leona grabbed my hand and led me away to help in the kitchen.

As soon as I could get away, I crept to the telephone in the hall and called my friend at the Bishop’s Bridge
Bulletin
to ask if he’d heard anything more about the skeleton they’d dug up next door.

“Why, Kate, sure is good to hear your voice after that scare you gave us the other night!” Charles Hollingsworth’s voice sounded kind of rusty but nice. “As a matter of fact, I did hear something about that—sort of secondhand, you might say.” He lowered his voice. “If you repeat this, please don’t give the source, as I’m not supposed to know. The policemen who were talking weren’t aware I was around—if you know what I mean.”

“In other words, you were eavesdropping?”

“Guilty.” He paused. “Kate, the skeleton wasn’t that of a woman as we suspected. It was a man. Been there close to forty years, they think.”

“A man? Are you sure?”

He laughed. “Well, I didn’t examine it or anything, and wouldn’t have known the difference if I had, but that’s the latest word. I think the sheriff was kind of surprised, too.”

I thanked him and went back to see if I could find Violet after her shocking announcement and abrupt departure, and discovered her on the back porch with a plate of peach cobbler in one hand and a slab of pound cake in the other.

“What are you doing out here all by yourself?” I asked. “People will be wondering where you are.”

She dabbed her plum-colored lips with a paper napkin. “Then let ’em. I’m keeping an eye on the toolshed . . . and for heaven’s sakes, keep your voice down, Kate! I don’t want anybody to know I’m out here.”

If a person could bellow in a whisper, my cousin Violet did, and if anybody had been within twenty yards of the toolshed, they would’ve heard every word she said.

“After what we said in there, I don’t think anybody will come close to that place in broad open daylight,” I told her.

Violet laughed and nudged me with a hefty elbow. “But just wait until tonight! Fooled ’em good, didn’t we?”

“We’ll see,” I said.

I went inside to give Ma Maggie and Aunt Leona a break with hostess duties and was grateful that some of the neighbors had taken over in the kitchen. Uncle Ernest, his friend Goat and Uncle Lum, along with several other men, had made themselves comfortable on the front porch with glasses of something that looked like iced tea, but I knew darn well it wasn’t. I was glad when Marge came by with Jon and Hartley a little later to see if she could help. A friend had taken Darby and Josie, along with her own children, to an afternoon movie, she told me.

“You can keep me company and tell me who some of these people are,” I said. “They seem to expect me to remember that their sister went to school with my mother in the third grade, or that Aunt Somebody-or-Other was a bridesmaid in my grandmother’s wedding.” I wanted to tell my cousin about Violet’s far-fetched plan, but if it didn’t work out, I knew I’d never hear the last of it. I did tell her what I’d found out about the skeleton belonging to a male.

Marge directed a new arrival to the kitchen with a plate of sliced ham before replying. “Really?” she said. “Well, that’s kind of a relief, isn’t it? I mean—we thought it might’ve been—you know.”

“I know,” I told her. “So where do we go from here?”

“
We
don’t go anywhere, Kate McBride, so don’t even think about it.” My cousin stepped back and frowned at me, turning her head to the side so that a strand of bright hair fell across one eye. “You aren’t cooking up some crazy scheme, are you?”

“Don’t worry, I’ve had enough excitement,” I said, feeling that surely nothing would come of Violet’s wild plan. Still, I was relieved to see Burdette bouncing up the steps so I could change the subject. “Here comes your hubby,” I said. “Uncle Ernest says he’s to take part in the service tomorrow.”

Marge nodded. “Ella earmarked several Bible verses for him. Thought a lot of Burdette, she said—even though he is a ‘heathen’ Baptist!” My cousin shook her head and smiled. “Poor Ella,” we said together.

By late afternoon visitors had thinned and we were running out of places to put all the food. Deedee had left earlier to collect Cynthia from pageant rehearsal and Marge and Burdette followed soon after. I managed to entice Cousin Violet from her back-porch sentry duty long enough to join us for an early supper as Ma Maggie and Uncle Ernest planned to stop by the funeral home before going to my grandmother’s for the night. Formal visitation was scheduled at Bramblewood after the service the next afternoon.

“Maggie and I have some things to discuss and I’ll be late getting home, so please don’t wait up for me,” Uncle Ernest told us at supper. My grandmother looked at him kind of funny but didn’t say anything, and I think I was the only one who noticed that he carried a small overnight bag with him when he left.

Thank heavens Violet stayed out of sight until Lum and Leona, tired after a long day, went upstairs early, and Grady had taken off to visit a friend he’d known in high school. I didn’t blame him for not wanting to hang around Bramble-wood. I wouldn’t be here myself if I hadn’t been fool enough to go along with Violet’s crazy scheme.

“Lord, I never realized it took so blasted long to get dark this time of year!” Violet said as she paced back and forth in the dusky kitchen. I had finally convinced her we could keep an eye on the toolshed just as well from inside.

It was after nine and, so far, nobody had approached the shed. I hadn’t seen Augusta or Penelope all day, but I had a feeling they weren’t very far away—or I hoped they weren’t.

“What makes you think Uncle Ernest is in some kind of danger?” I asked. “If you think you know who’s behind all this, I wish you’d share it with me.”

Violet rattled the ice in her glass of lemonade. “When I’m sure, Kate, when I’m sure. I just have a nasty feeling, is all.”

“You better have more than a feeling to make me miss another night of sleep,” I told her. I didn’t add that I had an uneasy sense that something was going to happen tonight, too.

My cousin finished her lemonade and poured herself another glass. “Are there any more of those cheese straws Cecilia Butterfield brought over? All this waiting’s making me hungry.”

I sat by the window and listened to Violet munch. Tonight she had worn dark purple so she wouldn’t be easily seen in the dark. Earlier I had telephoned Josie to tell her good night and she had asked if her dad had called. It broke my heart to admit I hadn’t heard. “I imagine we’ll hear something tomorrow,” I said, trying to sound optimistic. But I was beginning to grow as worried as I was angry. If Ned had left the hotel the day before, he should have been in touch by now. And in spite of my resentment, I found myself praying that nothing had happened to my husband.

I wasn’t surprised when after less than an hour, Violet dozed off sitting at the table with her head on her chest, and I took advantage of the situation to dig a penlight from my purse so that I could read a paperback mystery, one of Tamar Myers’s funny Magdelina Yoder series, under the cover of the kitchen table. I needed something light to help me pass the time. Magdelina was having an hilarious confrontation with her sister’s rotten little mutt when I thought I noticed movement out of the corner of my eye and, for a fraction of a second, a beam of light cut across the lawn.

Turning off my penlight, I moved closer to the window. It was difficult to see in the darkness and for a moment everything was still. Maybe I had imagined it. Then a dark figure stepped from behind the arbor and dashed across the lawn to the shed behind the house.

“Violet, wake up! Somebody’s out there!” My cousin’s head had dropped lower, and what had been light snoring sounds were now close to the dish-rattling stage. I gripped her shoulder. “Shh! You’ve got to stay with me. It looks like somebody was curious enough to take the bait.”

“You don’t have to shake me, Kate. I was only resting my eyes a minute.” Violet adjusted her glasses and looked where I was pointing. “Are you sure it wasn’t a shadow or something? I can’t see a thing.”

“That’s because whoever’s out there has gone into the toolshed. I thought you said it was locked.”

“
You
said it was locked. There’s no way you can lock that old door.” And my cousin Violet began to chuckle.

“What’s so funny? Don’t you dare go bananas on me now!” I really wanted to shake her this time. “Didn’t you say some kind of evidence is hidden in there?”

“Just because I
said
it doesn’t mean you can take it to the bank, Kate.”

“Then where is it? What did you do in there?”

Violet crept close behind me as I slowly opened the door to the back porch. Of course, it squeaked. “Nothing,” she said. “I just did a little painting, is all.”

I was almost afraid to ask. “What kind of painting?”

“I guess you could call it fuschia or maybe hot pink,” she said. “It’s that kind that glows.”

“You mean fluorescent? What did you paint?”

“Oh, just a couple of feet of the floor inside the door, but I didn’t do it until this afternoon and it’s supposed to take about twenty-four hours to dry.” Violet’s shoulders were shaking with laughter, and I was scared to death that whoever was out there could hear her.

“Keep your voice down . . . think of something sad,” I whispered. “Think of poor Ella.”
And think of what might happen to us if whoever that is comes this way!

With our backs to the wall, we inched our way to the other end of the porch where wisteria vines concealed us from view. Parting the tendrils, I found my eyes had adjusted to the darkness enough to see the outline of the toolshed to the right of the muscadine arbor. A few seconds later, someone came out.

I motioned to Violet, then stepped aside so she could see, and she grabbed my wrist in a tourniquet grip. “Can you tell who it is?” she asked.

“Looks like a man.” I almost laughed. “Seems to be having trouble with sticky feet.” The person crossing the lawn stopped every few steps to wipe his shoes on the grass. Even from where we stood, I could see the cotton candy glow of his footprints until finally, having had enough, I suppose, the figure bent and pulled off his shoes.

Violet drew her purple shawl about her as if she meant to follow but I put up an arm to bar her way. “Oh, no you don’t!” I said. “I’ll trail him at a distance and see where he goes. Wait here until I get back!”

She snatched at my shirt. “But what if you don’t?”

“Then holler like hell! Now,
please
, Violet! He’s getting away!”

I had to hope she stayed where I told her as I didn’t have time to look back. Thank heaven the person running ahead of me didn’t look back, either. I don’t believe he knew he was being followed, but he had to have known he had wandered into Violet’s trap and was probably being watched. As I passed the garden, the smell of roses drifted out to meet me and I wondered again what my uncle had been searching for in there. Farther on, mounds of honeysuckle on what used to be a pasture fence filled the air with its sweet, heady scent. A chorus of frogs had started rehearsals nearby, and somewhere in the distance a lone dog bayed. The night was warm, and now and then a breeze ruffled leaves in the ash tree at the edge of the field with a soothing, oceanlike sound. But I wasn’t soothed.