1 Bless Her Dead Little Heart (21 page)

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ARSENIC AND OLD BOOKS

Coming February 2015 in hardcover from Berkley Prime Crime!

I
checked my watch, then glanced at the clock on my computer. They both told me that it was seven minutes after one p.m. I resisted the urge to get up and pace around the archive office. Instead I turned my chair and looked at the large feline dozing on the wide windowsill behind my desk.

Diesel, apparently sensing my gaze, yawned and stretched. He meowed and rolled onto his side, head twisted so that he was staring at me almost upside down. He warbled a couple of times, as if to ask, “Why are you so restless, Charlie?”

“The mayor said she’d be here at one, and she’s late. You know how that bugs me,” I told the cat. “I’m curious to find out about these family documents she wants to talk to me about. The Longs have already given so many collections of papers to the archive I have to wonder what they’ve been holding on to.”

The cat calmly began washing his right front paw.

“You may not be curious, but I am,” I told him. “It’s not every day that I get consulted by such an august person as Lucinda Beckwith Long.”

I heard a cough, and it didn’t come from Diesel.

“I beg your pardon. Are you Mr. Harris?”

I swiveled my chair to face the office door, and I could feel the blush starting. The mayor stood in the doorway, her expression puzzled.

I rose from my desk and walked around to greet Mrs. Long. “Yes, I’m Charlie Harris, Your Honor. Please come in. I was, well, I was chatting with my cat. It’s a habit I have, you see.”

Mrs. Long nodded as she extended her hand. “I quite understand. My husband and I have three poodles, and we talk to them all the time.”

“Won’t you be seated?” I indicated the chair in front of my desk, and Mrs. Long moved forward along with her black leather handbag. She set the latter on the floor beside her when she took her seat. Clad in a chic crimson suit with a white silk blouse and colorful scarf knotted loosely around her neck, she looked cool and crisp and ready to get down to business.

I had seen the mayor on several public occasions, but never this close. She was shorter than I expected, probably no more than five-three, when she wasn’t standing on the spike heels I had seen her wear. Though I knew her to be in her mid-sixties, she exuded an air of youthful energy, as if she could barely contain herself. Even now I could hear her toe tapping on the hardwood floor of my office. I figured a mayor’s life must be hectic, even that of the mayor of a small city like Athena, Mississippi.

Mrs. Long appeared to be assessing me as I waited for her to speak. Diesel hopped down from his perch and padded around my desk to approach the mayor. He sniffed at her bags and then attempted to stick his head in the opening of the tote. Mrs. Long touched his head lightly to discourage him. “No, no, kitty, what’s in there is too old for you to play with.”

The cat stared up at her and warbled as if to say, “Are you sure?”

Mrs. Long smiled. “He seems to understand what I said, like our dogs do.”

“He’s a smart cat,” I said. “He’s also extremely curious.” As I spoke, Diesel batted a paw at the tote bag. “No, Diesel, stop that.”

The cat threw a baleful glance my way. He stood, made a circle around Mrs. Long’s chair, and then came back to his perch in the windowsill behind my desk.

“Apparently he understands a firm
no
when he hears one.” Mrs. Long laughed. “Our dogs aren’t always so compliant.”

“He isn’t either,” I had to admit. “Depends on his mood.” I waited a moment for the mayor to speak again. When she didn’t, I decided it was time to move the conversation to the reason for her visit. “I believe you wanted to consult with me about some family documents.”

Mrs. Long picked up the tote and settled it in her lap. She delved inside and pulled out a large manila envelope. She leaned forward and placed it on my desk. A faint mustiness, overlaid with a whiff of mothballs, wafted out of the open end.

“Inside that you will find a volume of a diary written by Rachel Afton Long. I forget at the moment how many times a great-grandmother she is, but she was born in the late 1820s and died in the mid-1890s, if I am remembering correctly.”

I stared at the envelope before me, my excitement growing over the thought of handling an old document. “How many volumes of her diaries survive?” I pulled open a side drawer of my desk and extracted a pair of cotton gloves. If I was going to be handling a book that was over a hundred years old, I had to be careful with it.

“Four,” Mrs. Long replied. “I have glanced at them, but I find the writing hard to read. From what I could glean, however, I believe she started the diaries a few years before she married my husband’s ancestor. The last diary is dated around 1875.” She shrugged. “I’m not entirely certain. The handwriting is small and cramped, and I got a headache trying to decipher just one page of it.”

“I’ll have a look at it,” I said. I held up my hands to show that I was wearing gloves before I extracted the volume, sliding it carefully out of the envelope. I let it lie on the desk as I put the envelope aside and examined its outward appearance. The cover binding of brown leather was cracked in spots and rubbed thin in others, and the spine was in similar condition. My nose twitched at the strong musty odor. I hoped the diaries hadn’t suffered water damage.

“Where have they been stored?” I asked.

“My son, Beck, discovered them recently in a trunk in the attic while hunting for something else entirely. I’d never seen them before, and I don’t believe my husband was aware of their existence either.”

Andrew Beckwith Long Jr., known as Beck to most, was an aspiring politician. His father, Andrew Sr., had so far served four terms in the state senate. Recently, however, rumors had begun to circulate that Andy intended to retire when his current term expired. Everyone assumed that Beck would easily win his father’s seat, but there appeared to be strong opposition, in the form of Jasper Singletary, a young firebrand who served on the city council. Singletary was openly ambitious, and he had been publicly less than complimentary about the Longs and their political legacy.

“Are you and Mr. Long planning to add these to the collection of Long papers and memorabilia that we already have?”

“Yes,” Mrs. Long said. “They need to be better preserved than they have been. We have no idea how long they’ve been up in that attic, and there could be damage. None of us looked through them much because we were afraid to cause further problems. That’s why I wanted to bring them to you.” She paused. “I’m sure you’re aware of the terrible times that Athena faced during the Civil War and the brief occupation by Union troops. If Rachel Long recorded any of that, her information might be useful to historians.”

I nodded. My knowledge of Athena during the Civil War was sketchy, but in elementary school we had heard tales of the depredations of the Union army in the winter of 1863. Our teacher, Mrs. Bondurant, had seemed so old to us at the time, we figured she was speaking from personal experience. I discovered later, when I was older and possessed a better sense of a person’s age, that Mrs. Bondurant was only thirty-eight and her grandmother, a Confederate widow, was the source of her stories.

“I’m sure there will be graduate students in the history department eager to examine them,” I said. “The Southern history students are always looking for local primary sources for their theses and dissertations.”

“Excellent,” Mrs. Long said. “My husband and son will be delighted to hear it. They’re both avid readers of history, particularly of Southern history.”

“Do you have a few minutes, while I make a quick examination of the volumes?” I asked. “I can give you a rough idea whether we will need to do any conservation work with them.”

Mrs. Long consulted her watch. “I have about ten minutes before I need to be back in my office.”

“Good.” I opened the cover of the volume on my desk with a gentle touch. The inch-thick binding was loose enough so that the cover lay open on the desk without strain. I wrinkled my nose at the smell, but I knew I would soon become accustomed to it. The more the volumes were allowed to air out, the more the odor would dissipate.

The first page of the diary had only a few words in a small, but elegant, hand. I recognized the slightly tilted lettering as Copperplate, a style of handwriting popular in the nineteenth century. The words proclaimed this as the diary of Rachel Adeline Afton, aged sixteen, with the date July 4, 1854. The paper was yellowed but still in good condition. I suspected that it was the more expensive rag paper rather than the cheaper wood pulp. The latter would have turned brown and brittle years ago and begun to disintegrate.

I turned pages carefully and skimmed the contents as I went. There were no blemishes I could see, no water stains, mold, or mildew. Overall, the diary appeared to be in remarkably good condition, other than the state of the binding and the worn cover. “If the other volumes are in similar condition,” I said, “then everything should be fine. Conservation work will be minimal, though we will store them in archival folders. The paper is acid-free and won’t affect the contents.”

“That sounds fine.” Mrs. Long smiled briefly. “We are placing no restrictions on these diaries, Mr. Harris. We want scholars to be able to use the contents for their work.” She stood and passed the tote with the other volumes to me.

I took the bag and pulled out the three remaining manila envelopes, each with a diary inside. “That’s excellent news. As soon as I’ve had the time to check each one more thoroughly, I’ll let the history department know about them.”

“They are already aware of the gift,” Mrs. Long said. “One of my husband’s good friends—and mine as well—is Professor Howell Newkirk. He was dining with us last night, and I happened to mention it to him.”

“I see.” That was unexpected news. I was acquainted with Dr. Newkirk. He was elderly, irascible, and pushy. He was also the most eminent historian on the Athena faculty, and he knew it. He demanded, and was usually given, what he wanted. I was surprised he wasn’t already in my office asking to see the diaries.

Mrs. Long smiled. “I know Howell can be, well, rather insistent on things, but I suggested that he give you a few days with the diaries before he assigned a student to work on them.”

“Thank you,” I said. “Then I will make sure they are ready sooner rather than later.”

“Excellent,” Mrs. Long said. She hesitated a moment before she continued. Her eyes focused like lasers on me. “You might be aware that my son, Beck, plans to run for office in the near future. Also that he is facing a challenge. Rachel Afton Long was an extraordinary woman, and the more the voters know about the history of the Long family and its achievements and triumphs, the more they will want to see a member of the family in office.”

With that, she nodded, gathered up her purse, and departed.

I stared at the pile of diaries on my desk. Why would the mayor think that Rachel Long’s writings could affect the outcome of a twenty-first century political race?