Batter Off Dead (25 page)

“That—that was Elias?” I finally was able to gasp.

“Yes. As you saw, he’s been squished flatter than a pancake. What’s left of him could fit in a pizza box—if you folded him several times.”

“So the steamroller responsible for this continued on over the side of the mountain?”

“Actually, no. Whoever lugged it up the mountain hauled it back down again.”

“Chief, how’d you find out about this?”

“Mitzi Kramer’s beagle wouldn’t shut up until she took him inside.”

Mitzi is even older than Doc Shafor and has kept a succession of outdoor dogs ever since 1963, when, she claims, she caught Sasquatch—or his Pennsylvania equivalent—peeping in her bedroom window. Unfortunately for Mitzi’s neighbors Hernia’s sound ordinances don’t apply to Buffalo Mountain. The old woman doesn’t know how lucky she is that we are basically good folk and would rather simmer with resentment than harm an animal just because it has an inconsiderate owner.

I stared openmouthed at Elias’s flattened remains long enough to catch a nightjar. “Good golly, Miss Molly,” I said.

“Forgive me, Miss Yoder, but you’re turning into a real potty mouth. You weren’t that way when I first moved here, and I kind of liked that better.”

“Maybe it’s been all of your negative California jives.”

“I think you mean
vibes
—then again, with you I’m never sure. Anyway, the sheriff’s bringing his own dogs. But unless whoever did this to poor Elias drove the steamroller back down the mountain, I don’t expect the dogs to contribute much except for more noise. Shoot, I can hear the sheriff’s siren now.”

“Talk about being a potty mouth; that’s merely vowel substitution.”

“Pardon me?”

“Never mind. Hand me your flashlight, please.”

The chief was loath to do so, but since
loath
is such an underused word these days, one couldn’t begrudge that emotion. At any rate, I took the torch—as they say across the pond—and quickly swept the edge of the clearing for clues. Forsooth, I stayed as far away as I could from the flattened remains of the young but no longer quite so handsome Elias Whitmore. In fact, I wasn’t even tempted to glance his way.

Okay, so maybe I was tempted a wee bit, but as we all know, it’s not the act of temptation that counts, but whether or not we succumb to it. The fallen angel on my left shoulder was making a good case for taking a quick second look. After all, she said, I was unlikely to get another opportunity such as this. How many people had ever seen a human pancake? she asked. And didn’t I realize that my observations might be of scientific interest?

Meanwhile, the good angel on my right shoulder was practically shouting in my ear words to the opposite effect. Elias deserved respect, whereas my desire to take a second gander was merely morbid curiosity. I am happy to say that in the end my good angel and my gag reflex won out, and I truthfully averted my eyes as much as possible.

Of course, the aforementioned is all metaphorical, except for the flatness of poor Elias, which cannot be exaggerated. Neither can my sense of vertigo when I looked down at the unbroken tree canopy far below. I staggered backward, nearly stepped on Elias, and then fled screaming to the far side of the turnaround where it abuts the road. In seconds Chris was at my side.

“You all right?”

“Of course not! I almost stepped—thank the Good Lord I didn’t. But it’s so awful.”

“Miss Yoder, I’ve never seen you like this. You’re known for your sharp wit. To be honest, this new side of you really freaks me out.”

“But I
am
freaked-out!”

“So am I. But don’t you think a little of your macabre humor might make this a bit more bearable for both of us? At the very least, give me a good dose of your famous sarcasm. And, if you have to scrape the bottom of the barrel, I’ll take just plain old-fashioned criticism.”

“Hmm. Was
all right
one word or two?”

“Beats me.”

“Purists and older grammarians would have your head on a paper platter if you made it one word, but common usage will eventually change that. I read recently that even some copy editors permit the use of
alright
these days. I made it two words in the first instance for old time’s sake, but one word just now.”

“You’re really weird, Miss Yoder. Are you
sure
you’re not a closet Californian?”

“Like I said before, anything’s possible. Besides, it worked. I’m feeling much calmer, and here’s the sheriff now.”

 

 

As much as I’d wanted to stay until someone from the sheriff’s team had rappelled down the slope and tramped around a bit, I had to get back to the children. Before leaving, I’d wheeled Little Jacob’s crib into Alison’s room and positioned it next to the head of her bed. Upon returning I found Alison sprawled out under the crib on the floor, with the baby asleep on her stomach. A sheet had been draped over the crib to form a tent.

I lifted my son back into his crib, and then shook my daughter gently. “Alison, I’m back.”

She opened one eye. “Yeah, I can see that.”

“Don’t you want to get back into bed, dear?”

“Nah, maybe later. I’m kinda comfortable right now. What gives, Mom? Where’d you go?”

Her eye closed, and, thinking she was asleep again, I started backing from the room. “Sweet dreams,” I mouthed, and blew them both air kisses.

“Ain’t’cha gonna answer?”

I sat on the bed and rested my chin in my cupped hands. “There was sort of an accident up on Buffalo Mountain; Elias Whitmore is dead.”

“Ya mean that really cute guy from your church?”

“Yes.”

“Who killed him, Mom? How?”

“What do you mean?”

“Ya said ‘sort of an accident.’ That’s Mom talk for it weren’t no accident, so I want the details.”

I swallowed hard. “I’m afraid that it’s privileged information, dear.”

“And that’s Mom talk for ‘you’re too young to hear all them gross details, yet you’re old enough to take care of your little brother while I traipse off and investigate me a murder.’ ”

“
Traipse?
Since when do fourteen-year-olds use that word? And if you don’t mind me saying so, Alison, your grammar is terrible.”

“When they have ya for a mom, and yes, I do mind; you’re trying to change the subject, and ya know it.”

My sigh of resignation blew candles out as far away as Susannah’s apathy vigil in Cleveland (I was informed later that the rally had been canceled for lack of interest). “Elias was flattened by a steamroller up on the second turnaround on Buffalo Mountain. It was not a pretty sight.”

“Cool.

“
Excuse
me?”

“I didn’t mean it in a bad way, Mom. It’s just that if you’re gonna be dead—uh, I don’t know how I meant it, ’cause it ain’t gonna sound right, no matter what I say. But remember that I’m just a kid, and I seen a lot of them horror movies before I came here.”

“Saw.”

“I seen those too. The
Texas Chainsaw Massacre
—”

“Not that. You
saw
the movies. You didn’t
seen
them.”

“Of course I didn’t
seen
them. Who the heck talks like
that
?”

“I was just trying to say that to a kid, being squished is way more cool than just dying of old age, or something boring like that.”

“My parents were squished.”

“Cool—I mean, ouch! I’m sorry.”

“Alison, what are you doing
under
your brother ’s crib?”

“It’s comfortable down here.”

“It
is
? But you hate the floor; when you have sleepovers—”

“Okay, if I tell ya, will ya promise ya won’t get mad?”

“Did you wet your bed? That’s all right, dear—two words, of course—although you have been reminded a million times that the last thing you should do before retiring for the night is use the little girls’ room.”

“Ya see, Mom, you’re already mad, ain’t ya, and I ain’t even had a chance ta tell ya.”

I prayed silently for patience and understanding. This is my least answered prayer. Then again, it is, perhaps, the one into which I put the least amount of effort.

“I’m not mad, dear. Nor am I angry. I’m tired, and in the mood for an
I told you so
. But I’ll try to hold back now, I promise.”

Alison can tell when I’m calling on divine help, and sometimes she even tries to cooperate. “Ya know that picture ya have on your dresser of that mean old woman?”

“Grandma Yoder?”

“Yeah. Well, she was here.”

“A cold cliché just ran up my spine,” I said.

“What?”

“A chill. You saw a ghost.”

“What else is new?”

“You’ve seen her before?”

“Lots of times. That old lady—I mean Great-Granny Yoder—is all the time coming in here and checking on me. She gets really mad if I don’t put away my stuff. And sheesh, you should see how much she hangs around Little Jacob.” She rolled out from under the crib and sat facing me cross-legged. “Ain’t ya seen her, Mom?”

“I have, but not for a long time. Not since I discovered that the Yoders weren’t my birth parents.”

“Yeah, but aren’t your
real
parents the ones who raise ya?”

I smiled. “That’s right, they are. I’ve sort of been forgetting that in my case.”

“There ain’t such a thing as
sorta
, Mom; that’s what you’re always saying ta me. Either something is, or it ain’t.”

“From the mouths of babes, dear.”

“Hey! I ain’t no baby!”

“That’s for sure; you’re a very wise teenager—when you’re not trying to date. So anyway, do you find that hiding under a tent works?”

“Oh, it ain’t the tent so much; it’s that lavender bath junk I sprinkled on top. I read in some book that ghosts don’t like lavender, so they plant it around castles on that account.”

“I thought something smelled good.”

“Ya ain’t mad that I used it?”

“Alison, I don’t have mad cow disease—or rabies. Do I fly off the handle at everything?”

She shrugged. “Pretty much, but ya ain’t too bad, Mom. Ya ain’t never hit me like Lindsey Taylor’s mom. Lindsey’s always covering up for her, but I seen the bruises. Making excuses, ya know.”

I jumped to my feet. “That’s terrible! We have to do something about that.”

Alison jumped to her feet as well. “But Lindsey will get in a lot of trouble; her mom will just hit her harder. And Lindsey will hate me.”

“It sounds as if they both need help. If I notify the right people, Lindsey’s mother can get counseling—in fact, they can both get counseling—and in the meantime, Lindsey can be put in a protective environment where she won’t be abused.”

“Ya mean like an orphanage?”

“No. I happen to know a family—the Kreiders—who’ve been approved as foster parents, and they’re the kindest people I know. They’ve also raised seven children of their own. Why don’t I ask them how to go about this? They can tell me who else to call.”

“Ya mean it? Ya’d do this for Lindsey, even though ya don’t know her?”

“But I know you, and I love you.”

Although I am not Alison’s biological mother, thanks to the genetic web that the Amish, and those Mennonites descended from them, inherit, the child and I are fifth cousins six different ways, and only once removed. Math has never been my forte; nonetheless, by my reckoning, if you divide the five into the six, you get the number one, plus a remainder. Drop the remainder to make up for the
once removed
, and Alison and I are, in effect, first cousins. Thus what happened next was practically off the charts in its remarkableness.

Simultaneously Alison and I threw ourselves into each other’s arms. Whereas we should have repelled each other like black-and-white Scottie magnets, we maintained a loving hug position for almost thirty seconds, without so much as a back slap. Of course it was emotionally exhausting, and we were both panting by the time we mutually agreed to disengage.

“Just so ya know,” my teenager said, “I don’t usually go in for all this mushy stuff, on account of its too weird and all.”

“Yeah, like, really,” I said.

“Mom!
That
was weird too.”

“Sorry.” I yawned. “Well, dear, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to push this little feller ’s crib back into my room and topple into bed. It’ll be time to get up and get you off to the bus before you know it.”

“Ya know, I think I could get myself ready for school; I am capable of fixing my own cold cereal.”

“Yes, but on mornings when Freni’s not here, I make you cinnamon toast as well.”

My beautiful pseudo- but almost-daughter rolled her eyes. “Ya toast the bread, ya butter it, and then ya sprinkle cinnamon and sugar on it. Duh. How hard is that? It ain’t like ya gotta follow a recipe.”

The promise of more than two hours of sleep was too tempting to pass up. “Thanks, dear.” And despite Alison’s loud protests, I kissed her on the top of her head.

 

 

I didn’t get to sleep in as late as my body would have liked. After just one hour Little Jacob woke up and demanded to be fed. I was able to coax him back to sleep, but approximately three hours later my telephone rang a thousand and one times. I didn’t exactly count the rings, but they were woven into the fabric of my dreams.

“Scheherazade speaking,” I said when I at last picked up. “I’m fresh out of stories.”

“Miss Yoder, I’m sorry to disturb you so early, but I need your woman’s intuition.”

“Which is worth two facts from a man.”

“Miss Yoder, are you listening?”

“I don’t have the energy to do anything else, dear.”

“The sheriff just called. He said that a small steamroller—suitable for home landscaping—was checked out from Rent-a-Dent. That’s the home supply store all the way over by Somerset. The individual renting it paid cash in advance for two days’ use of the roller, but supplied their own flatbed truck on which to haul it. Although that too may have been rented—but from somewhere else.”