Airtight Case (24 page)

“I can continue looking through the documents, if you’ll tell me everything to look for,” offered Elaine, “. . . besides Cherry and Eda Mae.”

“Look for documents between the dates 1770 and the time the Gallowses bought the property in 1836. Look for names that you recognize. Also, look for anything having to do with metalworks.” Lindsay paused. “The Gallowses bought the farm from Clarence Foute, Hope Foute’s husband. So, anything that has to do with that family. And if you should find anything that has Miss Tidwell’s name on it, please alert me to that.”

Elaine smiled. “You do all kinds of detective work, don’t you?”

“Yep, that’s me, Detective Chamberlain.”

They put away the documents and rose to go. When Lindsay opened the door, she thought for a moment she saw Erin Blake at the front desk, then saw that it was a much older version of Erin.

“Who’s that?” she whispered to Elaine.

“That’s Bonnie Blake. Alfred Tidwell’s sister.”

Chapter 21

Witches And Old Letters

LINDSAY SMILED AS she approached the woman at the front desk and offered her hand in greeting. “Mrs. Blake, I’m Dr. Lindsay Chamberlain from out at the Gallows farmstead site. I wanted to tell you what a charming, hard worker Erin is. I know you must be proud of her.”

The woman, tall, thin, and blonde like Erin, stood for a moment, wavering slightly, as if by some mysterious breeze. Her mouth stretched itself into a forced smile. “I . . . we are very proud of Erin. I thought, I mean, she didn’t . . .”

Elaine and Afton exchanged puzzled glances. Lindsay turned to Elaine. “Would you mind asking your husband about the thing we talked about? I’ll give him a call later this evening.”

“Of course. Nice to see you, Bonnie.”

“Yes, Elaine . . .”

“Mrs. Blake, may I speak with you a moment?”

“I suppose.” She looked around her, as if searching for an escape.

“You can use the historical society’s room,” said Afton, leaning over the circulation desk, watching as Lindsay led Bonnie Blake into the room and closed the door.

“What’s this about?” asked Mrs. Blake. She set her purse on the table and pulled out a chair, smoothing the back of her lemon yellow skirt as she sat down.

“Your brother asked me to look into the question of items missing from your late aunt’s estate.”

“Yes, I knew he was going to.”

“He was rather vague about exactly what is missing.”

“He would have to be. We don’t know exactly. It’s very frustrating. My aunt wasn’t herself the last few years of her life—if she ever was. We really should have put her in a home several years ago.”

“So, you’re saying there may not have been any papers?”

Mrs. Blake tapped her long polished nails on the table. “Now, don’t you put words in my mouth. I didn’t say that. She had sense about the value of some things. She just . . . well, you should have seen her place. I tried to go see her as much as possible, but I just couldn’t tolerate it. Things piled everywhere. Wouldn’t throw anything away. Depression-era mentality, you understand. She had stacks of ancient empty ledgers she found in the attic of some long-ago bankrupt company. Nobody keeps books with those anymore. Rolls of old stained paper from God knows where. Boxes of mismatched flatware, old clothes, old shoes. It’s a wonder the house didn’t spontaneously erupt in flames.”

“Did she say anything to you about her documents?”

“She said she had papers that would make Erin famous. She adored Erin, you see.”

“How would they make her famous?”

Mrs. Blake shrugged. “Had something to do with Erin wanting to be an anthropologist or archaeologist—why anyone would choose a career digging in the dirt is beyond me. Though, you said you’re a doctor?”

“No. I have a doctorate, so I get to use the title.”

Bonnie Blake shrugged again. “You people are so vague, I don’t see how you get anything done. I want Erin to be a lawyer. She’s a smart girl. I mean, what do you archaeologists do?”

“We’re sort of like historians.”

“You write encyclopedias?”

“Some of us have been known to do that. We use various investigation techniques to find out what happened in the past.”

“Then you are going to find out what happened to the documents?”

“If I can. The problem I’m having is that no one seems to know what the documents are that I’m supposed to be looking for.”

“My brother’s wife Sugar saw them. She spent more time with Aunt Sue than we did. Sugar should have taken a better look when she had the opportunity. She’s a case herself. Birds of a feather, I always say . . .”

“I appreciate your speaking with me.”

“If you can find those missing documents, you’ll be doing us all a favor. And please, steer Erin away from archaeology.”

* * *

Lindsay left the library feeling great for the first time in months. Something about recognizing Erin’s mother and interrogating her gave her a second wind, made her feel in control again, as if her brain was finally kicking into gear.

She arrived at the house to find it in a flurry of housekeeping. Joel, Powell, and Dillon were trying to scrub the worst of the green mildew from the wood of the front porch.

“The woman’s gone nuts,” complained Byron, carrying out a box of trash.

“Who?” asked Lindsay.

“Drew. I’m expecting any minute for her to tell us to paint the damn place before tomorrow. By the way, dinner is either in town or leftovers. Drew has Mr. and Mrs. Laurens helping clean up the place and baking cakes and homemade bread for this Lewis guy. You’d think he was God coming.”

He probably thinks so too,
thought Lindsay.

“Drew and Marina are in town looking for an Airwick or something.”

“Is this guy king of some country?” asked Powell, splashing water and Clorox across the porch.

“Yes.” Lindsay hopped across the wet front porch into the house and bounded up the steps to the second floor. Kelsey stood at the head of the stairs with a broom in her hand.

“I was just about to sweep the stairs. I think Drew should have hired one of those minute-maid services or whatever they’re called.”

“It looks like you‘ve all got everything under control.”

“That’s because we stopped digging at lunch so we could come back and clean.”

“Is Erin up here?” asked Lindsay.

“No. She may be downstairs.”

Lindsay found Erin in the kitchen with Mrs. Laurens, who, judging from the aroma, was baking a cake.

“Erin, I spoke with your mother today.”

Erin blanched and sat down in a chair, dishtowel in hand. Mrs. Laurens gave her a look that Lindsay had received from her grandmother on occasion when she was a little girl. The look that said, “I told you this would happen. Now that you’ve made your bed, you’re going to have to lie in it.”

“I’m sorry. Mrs. Laurens told me I should have said something when they were accusing you of reporting Drew’s whereabouts to the process server.”

Lindsay remembered the brief exchange between Erin and Mrs. Laurens she had seen from her window the evening Drew was served with the papers. So, that’s what it was about.

“If your family believes that Drew may have been involved with your great-aunt’s death, why did they allow you to stay here and spy?”

Erin straightened her body. “I’m an adult. I don’t need their permission.”

“Erin,” said Mrs. Laurens, the way a mother or a grandmother might chastise a child.

“Since Mr. and Mrs. Laurens would be here most of the time, I convinced my parents it would be safe. You have to understand, if this hadn’t been so important to me and my family, I wouldn’t have let Claire blame you.”

“Are you the one who suggested that your uncle ask me to investigate your great-aunt’s death?”

“You seemed different from everyone else here. I thought if anyone would be fair, you would. Are you going to investigate?”

“So far, I can’t find a thing out of place. Does anyone in your family know what documents your great-aunt was supposed to have?”

“You don’t believe she had any, do you?”

“It doesn’t matter what I believe. Right now, there is little evidence of what they were. Even if Drew were to be caught with a bunch of documents in her trunk, there’s no way to prove they belonged to Miss Tidwell. Your mother said that your great-aunt told her she had something that would make you famous?”

“Yes. She told me that many times.”

“And you have no idea what she meant?”

Erin slowly shook her head. “No. It was like it was going to be a surprise. I do remember that she read to me from these old pages when I was little. I’d forgotten about it until I heard the discussion about how older cabins had logs that were close together and later ones had spaces between the logs. I don’t know if they were loose pages from a really old book or from her documents, but I remember when I was little thinking that it must be really old because of the color—kind of brown gold.”

“What do you remember?”

“Something about a man who was really sick. He was staying in a cabin and it was freezing cold outside. There were spaces between the logs, and the wind blew through the cracks. That’s about all I remember.”

“That’s something.”

“It might not even be from the missing documents.”

“Maybe not, but if they turn up, at least it’s something that might give credibility to your claim.”

“You aren’t going to tell on me are you?”

“No.” Lindsay took a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter out of the pantry.

“Let me fix you something.” Mrs. Laurens dried her hands on her apron and turned toward the refrigerator. “You can’t eat that for supper.”

“This is fine. I’m not that hungry. I’ll eat an apple with it.”

“This guy, Lewis,” said Erin. “Why is Drew making over him in such a big way? We had our big boss from Sound Ecology visit a couple of months ago, and he didn’t get this kind of treatment.”

“Francisco Lewis is the kind of guy who can do your career good, if he takes a liking to you.”

“That explains why everyone is going along with Drew making them clean up everything. Lindsay, I’m really sorry about letting you take the blame on the process server business, especially since Claire’s been treating you so badly.”

“Forget it.”

Erin laid her dishtowel across a chair and started out of the kitchen. “I’m supposed to help Kelsey scrub the sofa in the living room.”

“Erin’s a nice girl,” said Mrs. Laurens. “Her family was countin’ an awful lot of chickens when they hadn’t even seen any eggs.”

“What do you think happened?”

Mrs. Laurens opened the oven and tested the cake with a toothpick before she answered. Pronouncing it done, she put the two large rectangular red cakes on a cooling rack.

“Miss Tidwell taught me and my brothers when we were little. She was one of those favorite teachers. She wasn’t easy, but she had that knack of making you interested in learning. She would bring things into class for us to look at. She had a coin that was part of a pirate treasure she showed us. That was particularly popular with the boys. I remember making a rubbing off it when I was in her class.”

Mrs. Laurens took a bowl down from the cabinet and two boxes of confectioners’ sugar from the pantry.

“Will you hand me the bricks of cream cheese and sticks of butter, over there on the table?”

“Red velvet cake? That’s one of my favorites.”

“Mine, too. I thought this Mr. Lewis might like it.”

Mrs. Laurens emptied confectioners’ sugar, butter, and cream cheese into the bowl. “Is Miss Van Horne likely to impress him, do you think?”

Lindsay got the idea that Mrs. Laurens thought not. “Lewis is impressed by people with the potential to do something for him. If she can, then he’ll be impressed.”

“Erin’s always loved archaeology. She’s friends with my granddaughter. I’ve known her family for years. I hope this experience won’t end it for her.”

“Her mother wants her to be a lawyer.”

“Bonnie Blake means well for her children. She just doesn’t know them very well. You asked me if I thought that Miss Tidwell really had valuable papers. I’m inclined to believe she did. Though she said things sometimes I didn’t always believe. She brought in a letter once, said it was 225 years old. I’d seen one 100 years old my uncle had that wasn’t in nearly as good condition as hers, so I didn’t believe it was that old.”

“Do you know what the letter was about?”

“No, I don’t remember. Miss Tidwell’s family has always been around here. I guess you all know, she’s related to the Gallowses, don’t you?”

“Yes. I read that in the reports.”

“I believed the letter was supposed to be written by someone in her family. But like I said, it didn’t look that old.”

After standing there for several minutes with peanut butter in one hand and jelly in the other, Lindsay made herself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and took a bite. “Do you think someone killed her?”

“No, I really don’t. She was old and not in good health. It was her time.”

“About those scratches on the McBrides’ floor . . . Have you ever heard of a Cherry, or an Eda Mae?”

“There was a story my grandmother would tell sometimes about a girl named Eda Mae being haunted by a witch who would beat her up at night. Much like the Bell witch.”

“You mean the Blair witch?”

Mrs. Laurens laughed. “Oh, no. There was a Bell witch in Tennessee long before there was a Blair witch. She haunted the John Bell family over in Robertson County, about thirty miles northwest of Nashville. Andrew Jackson himself had an encounter with the Bell witch. Everyone around here knows about her.”

“What did the Bell witch do?”

“Pull on the bedcovers, make gnawing sounds on the bedposts, beat on the walls, whisper. She’d slap members of the family and houseguests in the middle of the night. That’s mainly what Eda Mae’s witch did. Slap her at night. In the morning, she’d have big red welts like handprints on her face. As far as I know, neither one ever killed anyone.”

“What do you think it was?”

“Don’t know about the Bell witch. As for Eda Mae’s, these days you hear about bad things daddies do to their children. I kind of think it was from something like that. Of course, when I was a little, I thought it was a witch for sure.”