Dead Man Talking

  ~

  An hour and a half later, I reached for my cell phone as I passed the turnoff to Six Gun. Granny didn’t answer, and she didn’t own an answering machine. Said she’d lived this long without missing any important phone calls, so why ask for that type of intrusion. I glanced at the dashboard clock, wondering if I could push the speed limit any further. Then my cell phone rang.

  “Hello?”

  “Alice, it’s Twila. There were a couple seats on an earlier flight, and I rented a car. I’m just outside of Dallas, at a pay phone on I-20. Where can we meet for a late lunch?”

  “Wonderful,” I said. “I wasn’t looking forward to getting back to Esprit d’Chene after dark. There’s a Cracker Barrel just off the Tyler exit on I-20. Probably take you about an hour.”

  “Sounds good. See you there.”

  Twila hung up, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Despite the protection of white light, security guards, Sir Gary, and Trucker, the farther I’d driven from Esprit d’Chene, the more worry consumed me. I’d niggled the worry to death, but I couldn’t decide if it came from Katy’s deceit and my suspicions, or whether my cousin might be in danger.

  I arrived at the Cracker Barrel and made a round through the restaurant, just in case Twila had gotten there ahead of me, but I didn’t see her. Normally I’d have browsed the old-time memorabilia — after all, it was nearly time to start Christmas shopping, a chore I loathed — but I forwent that pleasure today. Instead, I returned to the front porch and sat in one of the dozen rocking chairs. Cell phone in hand, I called the plantation house.

  Katy answered before the first ring faded. “How is everything?” I asked.

  “The guards arrived, and I introduced them to Trucker. Jack came by, too, with the statements. I told him about Sir Gary, but he just said he was glad I hadn’t put that on tape.”

  Katy fell silent for a second, then said, “I called Uncle Clarence and asked him to have this attorney friend of his contact me. Mr. Jeeves is retired, but he was a criminal attorney down in Houston for years. I almost wish I hadn’t done that, though. Uncle was so upset — completely undone about me being under suspicion. I do so worry about his health.”

  “You did the right thing. If nothing else, you’ll have legal counsel on notice. If Mr. Jeeves can’t help you, he’ll know someone who can. It’s asinine to think you’d have to do that, but I’d do the same thing if I were in your shoes.”

  “I know. I’ve seen it in your books. Even the innocent suspects hightail it for a lawyer when they’re involved in a murder investigation. You’ve told me fiction is written the best when it’s based on facts.”

  Relieved, I took advantage of the distance and non-confrontational face-to-face factor. “Is there anything else you think I should know, Sugar?”

  Katy hesitated until I was afraid maybe the cell phone had disconnected. As I got ready to pull it from my ear and check the menu, she said, “When you get back, Alice. You and Twila both. We all need to talk.”

  “I’m very glad you’re ready to do that.”

  “It’s time. Don’t worry. I’m a grown woman. I can handle things until you get back.”

  “Just don’t forget to hang onto the asafetida. Twila’s bringing more protective stuff.”

  “Roger, dodger,” Katy said with a slight laugh. I giggled at the old childhood saying we’d used in days gone by. “I’ll see you when you get here. Tell Twila I’ll have the Blue Room ready. She’ll like that one.”

  “Roger, dodger,” I said. “I think that’s her in the car pulling in now. ‘Bye, Sugar." I shoved the cell phone in my purse as the bright red T-bird pulled into a nearby space, Twila’s red hair shining even through the tinted windows. She met me halfway across the parking lot, her brown eyes filled with concern.

  “I’m starved,” she said by way of greeting. “Let’s talk over something to eat." But we hugged each other tightly first.

  The lunch hour was over, but there were still a lot of full tables. Plenty of empty ones, though, and we didn’t have to wait. The hostess led us past several elderly couples and even a young couple who stared into each other’s eyes, completely unaware that they weren’t the only two people in the room.

  “Honeymooners,” Twila said after the hostess seated us and took our drink orders — iced tea for Twila and a mug of apple cider for me. “I think they’re in for the long haul.”

  “One of the lucky fifty percent. How are Jess and Caroline?”

  She gave me a run-down of our various, shared relatives, as well as the antics of Ghost, her huge, white cat, in between studying the menu and ordering our meals. We both had healthy appetites and waited until the food arrived and hunger pangs died before we entered the difficult part of our discussion. Twila started with a teasing gibe. “I saw bread pudding on the menu.”

  “Yuk." I grimaced. “You’d think the damn poisoner could’ve picked something else to poison,” I said with a huge sigh. “I’ll probably never be able to eat bread pudding again.”

  “Too, too bad." She slipped me a sly grin. “I can’t imagine not having to sit across from you on the verge of gagging while you scarf down that disgusting mess.”

  “Harrumph! But, given that the poison could have been a form of oleander, it probably had a fairly bitter taste. I bet it was in the lemon sauce, not the bread pudding.”

  “You talk to Jack about that?”

  “Not yet. It’s too soon for the toxicological tests to be back. They probably had to send the samples out to a lab. Besides . . .”

  “Besides,” she finished for me, “Jack’s not communicating real well with you ever since you tried to make him believe there were ghosts involved in this situation.”

  “Speaking of which,” I said, pushing my chair back, “I don’t like leaving Katy there alone too long.”

  “I’m not finished eating." Twila grabbed a French-fried sweet potato and dipped it into her bowl of white gravy. “You can’t let this ghost jerk you around and be at his beck and call. Either one of them.”

  She popped the potato in her mouth and serenely reached for another as I leaned across the table, whispering frantically, “You haven’t seen this other monstrosity, Twila. And you didn’t know Bucky when he was alive. He was a slimy, self-centered SOB. One of those nasty redneck types, who think women are put on earth to bring them a beer with the top already popped!”

  “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree,” she mused.

  “You mean, maybe the senator’s that way, too? But his other son didn’t turn out like that.”

  “We need to understand this ghost, Alice, before we can control it. You spent quite a length of time discussing Sir Gary with Katy before you finally met him at Esprit d’Chene. That gave you an edge over him. What was Bucky’s mother like?”

  I sat back, stunned, mind racing. Twila might have hit on exactly the problem. How the hell did she do that, without having met anyone connected to Bucky? And I hadn’t even told her, my closest confidant, about Katy and Bucky.

  “That’s something we’ll have talk to Katy about as soon as we get to the plantation,” I said. “You see, Bucky blackmailed Katy a long time ago. But I swore I’d never reveal those circumstances to anyone. Katy will have to tell you about it. It involves Bucky’s mother." She didn’t probe. Sworn confidences are sacred.

  “What about this head thing?” I continued. “The spirit’s not part of the physical body. But Bucky gives signs of not being able to see, hear, or think without his physical head. How can we reason with something like that? Even Sir Gary says he can’t make contact with Bucky.”

  “Confusion,” Twila said. She stirred her iced tea and took a sip. “The spirit’s confused as to whether it’s in physical form...or spiritual form.”

  “So,” I deduced, “physically or spiritually, it thinks it can’t...think without its head.”

  “The news reports are making a big deal about all this,” Twila said, changing the subject. “Your local authorities have a leak
somewhere. The media knows Bucky’s head’s missing.”

  “I doubt it’s the authorities leaking info. It’s the small-town rumor mill.”

  “Could be,” she agreed. “What’s the media situation like in the area?”

  I frowned. “Now that I think about it, we haven’t experienced the hordes of reporters you’d think would be crowding into the county with a high-profile case like this.”

  “It’s been less than twenty-four hours since word got out.”

  “It feels like twenty-four days! But you’re right. Maybe the senator has enough influence to keep the media from crowding us.”

  She shook her head. “Initially, perhaps. He can’t control it for long. And it’s extremely hard to conduct a paranormal investigation in the midst of a feeding frenzy of media sharks.”

  “They won’t get into Esprit d’Chene past Katy’s security company.”

  “We’ll need that privacy to deal with Bucky. Now, give me a brief rundown on exactly what’s happened — from the moment you got the first phone call from Katy.”

  I did. She laughed so hard when I described how I chased poor Granny Chisholm through my back yard with handfuls of sea salt, I thought she’d choke on her French-fried sweet potatoes. By now, I could reflect back on the experience and enjoy the hilarity myself. Had we been in a less public place, we’d have given in to one of those rip-snorting spasms of jocularity that befall us at times. Like the time at Eagle Nest, New Mexico, when we got to discussing the attributes of the red-hot candy fireballs she carries in her purse and I nearly drove the car into a flag-lined construction hole due to the laughter tears in my eyes.

  “You should’ve listened to Trucker,” she said through her snickers.

  “Oh, yeah? Like you didn’t listen that time Trucker wouldn’t go into the old Dawson graveyard we found way back in the hills? And you ended up huddled behind a tombstone while that sheriff and outlaw shot it out?”

  We whooped with laughter again, and the diners around us glanced at us uneasily. She lowered her voice. “Don’t remind me. You had to take me back to the hotel to change underwear after that one!”

  “Hell, my panties were just as bad off as yours. And I had to throw that wonderful T-shirt from Angel Fire away. It had engine grease all over the back of it from hiding under the car with Trucker and Miss Molly.”

  We grew serious once again, however, as I described the rest of the hours that had passed since then. We had time to share a piece of strawberry-banana pie, which she ordered when the waitress came by to refill our drinks. Even her psychic senses, though, couldn’t draw out any more information from the other dimension than Howard and Wilma had as to who the being in my study could have been. And the more I told her about how Katy had been acting, the more worry shadowed her brown eyes. I also told her about Uncle Clarence’s terminal illness, as well as Cat’s death. We grew quiet, hands clasped on the table to comfort each other.

  “Another thing is something even Katy doesn’t know that I know,” I said finally. “The rumor mill in Jefferson is saying that a woman meeting Katy’s description was seen in a local hangout called the Holey Bucket. With Bucky.”

  “Katy?" She shook her head in disbelief. “That place sounds like one of those honky-tonks you and I used to sneak off to. Our walks on the wild side, with those biker bad boys.”

  “The guys we played around with at least had a reason for their reputations. And some of them turned out pretty good. Bucky didn’t come from a white-trash home. He turned his back on all his advantages and gloried in being the bad seed.”

  “You never know what goes on inside a person’s family life,” Twila reminded me. “He could have had his reasons. But we need to confront Katy with this.”

  “Definitely. And we have to find Bucky’s head. They’ve combed the grounds twice now. Maybe the murderer took it with him.”

  “Or maybe it’s hidden inside the house.”

  “It can’t be!” I insisted. “Jack’s men searched the manor house also.”

  “Other than those tire tracks and Grandpere Jean’s sword, Jack doesn’t appear to have any evidence at all,” Twila mused. “Why not look where the evidence doesn’t point?”

  I solemnly considered that as the waitress slid our check on the table. Twila grabbed it a half-second before my fingers. “You can get the next one,” she said, our usual way of splitting meal tickets. Conceding, I dug out the tip and left it on the table.

  Before we stood, I said, “I need your help with Sir Gary more than Katy.”

  “We’ll take care of both, don’t worry.”

  In the parking lot, Twila said, “You lead, and I'll follow in my car. But keep your foot out of the carburetor.”