Hush My Mouth (17 page)

“A record, huh.”

“Not all juvie, either. Started young, hadn’t stopped. Property crimes, mostly. Graduated to domestic violence—two charges, two different ladies.”

“Gosh. How old is he?” I hadn’t imagined him old enough to get in that kind of trouble that many times.

“He’s twenty-one.”

Violence usually escalates, takes time to build, both in a person and in a relationship. Dirick Timms wasn’t wasting any time.

“Do have some good news, though. Or maybe only good for Mr. Timms. He couldn’t have been in your neck of the woods causing problems last Friday. He has the best kind of alibi.”

“Locked up?”

“Bingo. High-speed chase, cold-cocking an officer at the side of I-285. Five-car call-out for backup. DUI, stolen vehicle, drug paraphernalia, intent to distribute. You name it. Locked up and not getting out anytime soon.”

“When was all this?”

“Thursday night, a week ago.”

“You sure it was him?”

“Don’t have two of them in the system. Not a common spelling. His age sound right?”

“Yeah.” How had Neanna gotten mixed up with him?

“So how come you looking for this loser?”

“Just a good girl who likes bad boys, I guess.”

“Hope that’s a client you’re talking about.” He chuckled. I could picture his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down along his Ichabod Crane neck.

“I’m afraid so. Actually, her sister is the client. The girlfriend ended up dead. Sister doesn’t want to believe it was suicide. I’m starting to agree with her.”

“Least she had a sister who cared about her. Lots don’t.”

Even when they did have family who cared, it was often impossible to pull them back from the edge, once they’d gotten swept into a violent relationship. Had Neanna gone back to Dirick and hidden it from Fran? Or had Dirick sicced some of his friends on her trail?

“Rowly, you think there’s any way he could have gotten to her even while he was in jail?”

“You talking a hit or something?”

Sounded crazy, especially when spoken in his thick drawl. “She is dead,” I said.

“Maybe,” he said. “If he’s in a gang. Don’t know about that, but I can sure check.”

“And could you quietly check out Neanna’s family. Her grandmother raised her. Her grandmother has a cousin you can talk to.” I explained the family dynamic, the aunt’s death, the suicide that might not be, and Fran’s reluctance to trust private investigators.

“Heck, I hang around with P.I.’s now. I can see why she’s reluctant,” Rowly said.

“Gran’s cousin might be able to give you a different perspective on the family. I’m especially interested in why Gran kept a scrapbook and where she got a gruesome death photo of her daughter, Neanna’s aunt Wenda.”

“Can you send me a scan of that?”

“Sure.” That photo was proving a more popular share than Labor Day family picnic photos.

I gave him Fran’s phone number and address. He could get contact information on Gran’s cousin and perhaps charm Fran at the same time—provided she was as much a sucker for his wiry straw-colored hair and scarecrow physique as I’d been when I met him.

After we said good-bye, I picked up an employee handbook and noncompete agreement lying on my desk. Last week, as soon as they’d contacted me, I’d reviewed a new start-up company’s documents. I’d scribbled my comments and corrections in the margins, but hadn’t taken time to draft a transmittal letter or invoice. Those kinds of details always bogged me down more than the actual work did.

I carried the file to Shamanique. After just one day, I was really beginning to like having her here.

“Could you draft a letter? Here’s the contact information. Tell him my comments are on the draft itself, ask him to let me know if he has any questions, and thank him for letting me be of service. Blah, blah, blah.”

I scribbled a dollar figure on a sticky note. “Also prepare an invoice for this amount. There should be a sample form on the computer.”

I’d transferred my files to my laptop and moved the desktop onto Shamanique’s receptionist desk. Might as well find out if she knew how to use it.

My calendar had only two appointments for today: one I’d made last week to have lunch with Emma at computer camp and one for an afternoon trip to the auto-salvage yard. Last night, on my way back from Clemson, I’d stopped by Wal-Mart in Seneca just before it closed to get some supplies for my junkyard trek.

I called Rudy and got his voice mail.

“Hey. Pun over at the junkyard has a wrecked two-door Civic on the lot. He said I was welcome to shoot the windows out of it. Care to join me? I’m heading over about one-thirty.”

As I passed Shamanique on my way to the kitchen, her fingers were flying over the computer keys. She declined my offer of some ice tea. As I returned with a tall glass clinking with ice, who should yet again be jangling the front door closed but Colin, or Mumler or whatever his name was, and his merry band of ghosters.

“Hey! Wait’ll you see what we got last night! You and Mr. Bertram will be amazed!”

He was even more animated than when he’d reported his run-in with the motorcycle gang. Quint carried a computer bag slung over his shoulder, and all three of them stood looking at me expectantly, Colin shifting from one foot to the other.

“Um, let me see if Mr. Bertram is in his office.”

His outer door was closed but unlocked. He sat in a pool of desk-lamp and computer-screen light in his dim office.

“They’re ba-a-ack,” I singsonged.

He blinked at me and closed his eyes, feigning weary resignation.

“They can’t wait for you to see what they got. You’ll be amazed!” I mocked Colin but in a quiet voice. I didn’t want my joke to carry into the hallway.

“What is it?”

I shrugged. “I’m only the receptionist. My guess is, they’ve captured some ghosts.”

He remained at his desk and just stared at me.

“You know you’d hate to miss it, if they really got something on film.”

He rolled his eyes upward but pushed his chair back and followed me.

Quint had unpacked his laptop and had it balanced on one arm, booting it up.

“Come in,” Melvin said, sounding as if he was glad to see them. Breeding does tell.

Colin almost danced on his lanky, Mr. Bojangle legs.

“That was a great lead you gave us. Absolutely incredible. We haven’t slept all night.”

Punch drunk. Didn’t want to be in his head when that wore off.

“Moody Springs. What a perfect name! That place is really spooky late at night, for sure.”

Trini nodded, her face solemn, her dark eyes large.

“But worth it,” Colin said.

Quint’s laptop hummed on Melvin’s coffee table. I took a seat on the sofa, ready for the show, while Melvin pulled the heavy drapes on the eight-foot windows behind us. I was certain he had no intention of investing his or anyone else’s money in this cinematic venture, but the installments had been entertaining.

Quint turned the large-screened laptop to face the sofa and knelt beside it to start the show. Colin and Trini sat in the club chairs.

I felt Trini’s anxious gaze. I glanced at her and smiled.

“This is unedited, of course,” Colin said. “We cut out the boring stuff, when nothing was happening, but this is still raw.”

The screen showed a stretch of two-lane blacktop and, on the left of the screen, a broad, rough-paved pull-off.

Moody Springs. I recognized the CCC-constructed stacked granite wall lining the parking area and thought I could make out the steps cut into the hillside leading to the picnic tables scattered in the woods. It brought back memories of hauling grocery bags full of marshmallows and wienies and picking our way up the steps. Kids laughing, deep dappled shade, my family and friends, my
childhood. And the nasty water in the fountain from the spring, the essence of rusty iron.

“We set the camera facing up the mountain,” Colin narrated.

The film—is that what you call it when it’s digital?—jumped, indicating one of their fast-forward cuts. The sky had darkened into dusk, the thick trees melded into a single darkness, the white line of the highway glowed.

A pickup truck came around the curve at the top of the frame, driving slowly. Its blinker signaled a right turn. The driver pulled off onto the verge some fifty yards from the camera, at the far end of the picnic area parking.

The passenger door opened, the dome light inside backlighting the driver who sported a gimme-hat and bushy hair. The driver, sitting bolt upright behind the wheel, turned toward the open door and waited until it closed. As the truck pulled off, passed closer to the camera, and disappeared from the computer screen, its color became more discernible—a dark blue or brown, rather than black.

The screen once again showed the original scene: empty pull-off, empty road, ominous solid line of trees. No one had been visible in the passenger seat. No one had gotten out of the truck. No one stood at the side of the road.

The camera shot began to swing slowly to the right, the lens focusing in tighter on the opposite side of the road.

“See it?” Colin asked.

Quint, still on his haunches beside the coffee table, pointed to the center of the scene. “Do you see it?”

I squinted at the screen. Melvin too leaned forward.

A faint mist swirled at the roadside, like fresh car exhaust on a frosty morning. But this wasn’t a frosty anything. The air would have clung pungent and sticky, a normal, warm June night.

The smoke curled white-gray for a few seconds, faint against
the almost black trees. Then it evaporated into woods I knew dropped immediately down the mountainside.

“Did you see it?” Colin leaned toward Melvin, trying to read his face. Quint fiddled with some buttons on the laptop, the scene running backward until he could replay the scene.

On the screen, the truck door closed as the driver, sitting stiffly behind the wheel, bid farewell to someone—someone who wasn’t there. When the interior light clicked off, the driver fell into shadow.

The truck pulled away, leaving empty pavement. The camera zoomed in on the smoky dance of fog. I detected no skip in the picture, nothing to indicate that anything had been edited or deleted.

“Any idea who was driving the truck?”

“Naw,” said Colin. “Didn’t see there was any reason to flag him down until it was too late.”

My head flooded with rude questions: Couldn’t you jump in your car and chase him? Didn’t somebody get his tag number? Seemed important to know who or what opened the door and got out.

“Ectoplasm,” Quint announced. His compatriots nodded gravely. Melvin and I just stared.

“You know. A vortex. This is incredible. Usually all you get are orbs, which is the best we’d hoped for. But to capture a vortex or vapor event on camera. This is unbelievable. The only thing better would have been a full apparitional manifestation, but those are really rare.”

Quint could tell from our faces that we weren’t among the converted. His voice grew more animated. “Are you familiar with the various manifestations?”

I shook my head and knew he would explain.

“Most paranormal researchers consider themselves lucky to
capture orbs on camera. A round ball of light representing a concentration of psychic energy.”

“Most of them are friendly,” Trini said.

“Some aren’t,” Quint added with a sober face but no elaboration.

“A vortex is a heavier concentration, usually stationary, where the energy takes an elongated form. Then there’s vapor—what’s probably a moving ghost or possibly a spirit.”

“If you’re really lucky, you get a full manifestation,” Trini said, scooting her skinny backside to the edge of her seat.

“Many documented sightings, relatively few photos of full manifestations,” Colin said. “Some think an ectoplasmic event indicates that a ghost is moving toward or capable of a full appearance.”

Trini said in a near-whisper, “Or about to fade away forever.”

“Like a lost radio signal,” Quint added.

Colin nodded. “Which leaves us with a dilemma. Do we set up at the top of the mountain, where he enters the car? Do we drive up and down the mountain ourselves, hoping he’ll flag us down? Or do we stay with this location?”

From his kneeling position, he looked around at his troops, planning the assault on the hitchhiking spit of fog.

“Full moon next week,” Quint intoned as if pronouncing an incantation.

“Wish we had instruments. Maybe we could’ve told whether it’s building strength.” Colin sounded wistful.

“Equipment?” I couldn’t resist asking since he so obviously wanted to pique Melvin’s interest. The equipment he coveted undoubtedly cost money.

“Professionals use an electromagnetic field detector to record energy fields and such. And infrared cameras. Mostly stuff you can get at an electronics store.”

“Professionals?”

Melvin had obviously picked up on the wrong part of Colin’s description.

“Altogether it can cost over a thousand dollars.”

Melvin kept Colin pinned with his gray-blue gaze, the merest shadow of a bemused smile at one corner of his mouth. “I suppose a notebook, to record car tag numbers and such, would be useful, too,” he said.

“What’s next?” I asked, to cut off Colin’s silent plea and Melvin’s gentle gibes.

“That’s another dilemma. Do we continue with Moody Springs since we had such success there? Or do we move on to a new site? Maybe we’ve got all this site has to offer—at least until the full moon or a rainy night, when this manifestation should be stronger.”

They’d got everything except the name of the truck driver who’d watched someone open the truck door and disappear. Who was that guy?

“If we had a second video camera,” Colin said, “that would solve everything.”

Another not-so-subtle hint.

“Did you get anything at the Heath house?” I couldn’t resist asking, wondering when the sheriff’s deputy had gotten their camera back from Max and the motorcycle guys.

“We might have captured an orb there, near the second-floor balcony. But. . .” Quint shrugged.

“That’s no good,” Colin snapped.

I wanted to ask if it included footage of Max or Do-Rag threatening to beat the crap out of them, but that would be rude.