The Cemetery Club (Darcy & Flora Cozy Mystery Book 1) (14 page)

Chapter 20

Levi’s weekly newspaper was
delivered to my mother’s front yard every Thursday by 7 a.m. If Jackson Conner
was right, the danger we were in would be doubled when her notice of probate
was filed.

Stepping onto the front
porch with my cup of coffee, I breathed deeply of the peony and rose-scented
morning. No paper yet lay in the yard, but then it was only 6:55. As I turned
to go back into the house, I noticed a pickup truck parked on the road beside
our driveway.

A cold twinge of unease
caused me to pause. Who was that? Could Ray Drake have changed vehicles and
still be stalking us?

As I stood on the porch, the
door of the truck opened and a gray-haired man stepped out. “Good morning,
Darcy!” he called. “Is everything all right with you this morning?”

Although I had not seen
Chuck Sullivan for several years, I recognized him immediately. A few years
ago, he retired from the Oklahoma City police force after being shot in the
leg. I remembered hearing that he returned to Levi and moved into his parents’
old home place outside of town.

Pushing open the front gate,
Chuck limped toward me. He stuck out his hand. I liked his warm, firm grip.

“Good morning to you too,
Chuck. What are you doing out our way so bright and early?”

“Grant is worried about you
and your mom. He asked for volunteers to keep an eye on you two. There are
three of us who take eight-hour shifts, just to make sure nobody is hanging
around who shouldn’t be.”

So this was how Grant solved
his deputy shortage problem. The
rush of
gratitude I felt toward Grant and these unselfish men warmed
me.

“Thanks more than I can say,
Chuck. You must have been out here all night. Come on in for a cup of Mom’s
coffee.”

“Don’t
mind if I do. Miss Flora makes the best coffee in the whole
state.”

“I believe she has some fresh
cinnamon rolls too,” I told him. “You’re welcome to both.”

A familiar yellow Volkswagen
Beetle slowed down as it reached the gate and Levi’s morning paper sailed into
the yard.

Trotting down the steps, I
called, “I’ll just pick up the paper, Chuck, and be right in.”

Compared to big city papers,
this hometown paper was thin. I
flipped it
open as I walked back toward the house, skimming through
to the back
page. There, in bold black print was the notice I had been expecting:

In the Probate Court
of Ventris County, Oklahoma, in the Matter of the Estate of Benjamin W.
Ventris, notice is hereby given that a petition to admit to probate a
handwritten instrument to be the Last Will and Testament of Benjamin W. Ventris
was filed in this court . . . .

Reading further, the clerk’s
signature was followed with Jackson Conner’s name, address, and phone number.
Mom’s lawyer had worded the notice so that my mother was not mentioned but I
knew that people would start guessing and the murderer would know for sure he wasn’t
the petitioner. He almost surely would have a pretty good idea of who it was
that beat him to the punch.

Chuck Sullivan had been
reading over my shoulder. Now, he followed me up the porch steps.

“You know, Darcy,” Chuck
said, “most folks around here believed old Ben was dirt-poor, but I always
suspected otherwise. I investigated a case in Oklahoma City involving a
murdered rancher. The dead man’s land bordered some oil land that belonged to
Ben and Skye. Since this showed up in my investigation, I knew that Ben had to
have a pretty good wad of money to buy that chunk of real estate.”

Both Chuck and I saw the
package at the same time—a canister-shaped box wrapped in paper decorated with
pink roses with a big bow on top. It was in the lee of the porch just behind a
pot of Mom’s red geraniums.

Before either of us could
speak, Mom opened the front door. “Good morning, Chuck,” she said, smiling.
Stepping out of the house, she looked down and spied the package.

“Why, look at that!” she
said. “Where did that come from? Did you bring it, Chuck?”

Chuck Sullivan shook his
head. “Afraid not, Miss Flora. Wait a minute. Don’t pick it up just yet. Let me
take a look at it. I’ve been parked in front of your house all night and the
only person I’ve seen anywhere close has been that newspaper boy a few minutes
ago. Whoever put that package there must have come by foot. If it wasn’t there
yesterday, somebody was on the porch last night.”

Bending closer to squint at
the attached tag, Mom said, “It’s got my name on it.”

Chuck motioned us back.
“Move away from it, Miss Flora. You too, Darcy. I want to check this out.”

Chuck carefully picked up
the package and turned it around, frowning as he did so. “It’s not very heavy.
Can’t weigh more than three or four pounds. Were you expecting something, Miss
Flora?”

My mother shook her head.
“No. The only thing I can think of is a couple of weeks ago, I worked two days
at the church rummage sale for Emily when she got sick. She said she was going
to send me some flowers or candy. I’ll bet that’s what it is.”

Chuck lifted the canister
above his head to examine its underside. That’s when I saw a tiny spot on the
bottom that the wrapping paper had not completely covered. An inch of fine
copper wire protruded. Realization hit me like a freight train as I remembered
a case I had covered for my newspaper a few years ago. If this thing had a
timer that had been activated by the movement of picking it up, we all might
have only a few seconds to live.

Grabbing the package from
Chuck’s hands, I ran down the steps and flung it toward our neighbor’s pasture.
It tumbled end over end and lodged against the trunk of an elm.

“What . . .” began
Sullivan.

All three of us heard it—a
small pop like the breaking of a balloon. Mesmerized, we stared at a cloud of yellow
dust pouring out of the box top. The dust cloud lasted for thirty seconds, then
disappeared.

My heart hammered against my
ribs and I turned toward my mother. She stood like a marble statue, staring at
the pasture.

Chuck started down the
steps.

“No! Wait, Chuck!” I yelled.
“Don’t go near that thing!”

He kept walking. “I’m not
going anywhere close, Darcy. I’m going to my truck for my cell phone. Grant has
got to get out here. If it’s what I think it is, we’d all be dead right about
now if you hadn’t thrown that thing when you did.”

Mom’s eyes were big and
scared. She tugged at my sleeve. “What under the sun are you two talking about?
What was in that package?”

Putting my arm around her
shoulders, I said, “I’m afraid it’s poison dust, Mom. I wouldn’t have guessed,
but my newspaper covered a case like this a few years ago when a similar
package was sent to the mailbox of a state senator. According to what we found
out then, that yellow dust was made from a deadly plant that grows only some
place in Africa.”

Chuck climbed back up the
porch steps, his cell phone in his hand and joined the conversation. “I
remember that too, Darcy. The Dallas cops determined the device was
gang-related. Nobody found the bad guys, but the police report said that not
many people knew about that particular poison. That timing mechanism was a
devilish trick.”

Mom was shivering as if she
were in a blizzard. “How about the senator? Did he die?”

Chuck nodded. “Afraid so,
Miss Flora. He was dead when his wife found him but by that time, the poison
had mostly dissipated. Enough was left, though, for the crime lab to analyze
it.”

Leaning against the porch
railing, I whispered, “It sounds as if we are dealing with a big-time criminal,
a professional crook.”

Mom wobbled to the porch
swing and sank down into it.

My head was swimming. As if
from a great distance, I heard Chuck talking to Grant. “We’ve got some pretty
heavy stuff out here at Flora Tucker’s place,” he said. “Somebody left them a
surprise package that nearly killed all of us. Yes, certainly, they are both
all right.” He paused for a moment, then said, “Right. Will do.”

Within ten minutes, the
sheriff’s white truck roared down the road and skidded to a stop beside Chuck’s
vehicle.

Grant
sprinted up the porch steps and grabbed my arms, his face
pale.

“Thank
God you’re safe, Darcy,” he said hoarsely. “You too, Miss
Flora.”

Turning to Chuck, he said,
“The crime lab boys will be here in a few minutes. Let’s take a look around.”

I noticed that deputy Jim
Clendon did not make an appearance.

Mom and I went back into the
house. I felt as weak and shaky as she looked. Grant and Chuck were
professionals. They could do their job with no assistance from us; besides, I
felt the need for a cup of coffee.

My mother and I were sitting
at the kitchen table, warming our cold hands around our coffee cups when Grant
came into the kitchen, thirty minutes later.

Pulling out a chair, he sat
down facing us. “Miss Flora,” he said, “you’ve got to promise me something.”

Puzzled, Mom gazed at him.
“What is it, Grant?”

“You both need to get out of
town for a while. I don’t know why you haven’t left before now.” His voice and
face looked grim. “Darcy may not have enough sense to realize the danger, but
you do! The men I had patrolling your house didn’t catch this guy who left the
booby trap, whoever he is. He seems to always be one step ahead of us, and I
don’t know what he’s going to come up with next. So I’m ordering you to leave.
Go to Florida or somewhere else far away. Take Darcy with you. And leave
immediately before your enemy knows what you are up to.”

My face felt hot. I could
think of no retort. This blunt man certainly wasn’t the boy I had a crush on so
many years ago.

Mom answered for us. “Thank
you, Grant, for your concern and patience. You’re right. The good Lord expects
us to use the common sense he gave us. We have been a worry to you and those
kind men who have been keeping watch over us. Darcy and I will leave for a
vacation somewhere. The fault is mine, though, not Darcy’s. She wanted to leave
some time ago but I’ve been the willful one. Just trying to prove a point, I
guess.”

Chapter 21

After Grant and his men
left, Mom and I continued to sit at the kitchen table, talking about what had
happened and wondering where we should go. Knowing that someone hated us enough
to kill us felt like a cold knot in my stomach. I had never come up against
that kind of deadly thinking.

We knew of no way to combat
an unknown enemy who struck, then disappeared. The next attempt against our
lives might be successful.

“There’s a killer roaming
these hills who is quite inventive about thinking of ways to commit murder,” I
said. “I’ve been wanting to visit Georgia since finding out about Dahlonega and
the gold. I’m sure Georgia is beautiful this time of year. I vote for going
there as soon as we can.”

My mother nodded. “I’ve
wanted to go for a long time too. We could drive to Bet’s in Fayetteville
tomorrow, stay overnight, then drive on from there.”

“Still not wanting to fly,
Mom?” I teased, knowing what her answer would be.

“Not unless absolutely
necessary,” she answered.

I should have confessed to
Grant everything we knew about Ben and his will and Jasper. If he jailed us for
obstruction, that might not be the worst thing in the world. At least, maybe we
would be safe in jail. I also should tell him about our plans to leave and our
destination, but my wounded pride was still smarting. After being the recipient
of his sharp tongue, I had no desire to talk to him again, although common
sense told me this would be the smart thing to do.

Gritting my teeth, I dialed
the sheriff’s office. He was not in, his receptionist Doris Elroy said. I
dialed his home. He was not there either. Feeling vindicated, I decided that
I’d try again tomorrow.

Thunder rumbled in some dark
clouds approaching from the west. Mom’s toe and those clouds probably meant we
were in for a rain. Ordinarily, I welcomed a good spring storm, but not this
time. Thunder was noisy and might mask the sounds of an intruder trying to get
into the house. On the other hand, what normal person would purposely be out in
an Oklahoma thunderstorm? The answer to that came on the heels of the question:
we weren’t dealing with a normal person. Murder was not an action that a sane
person would take. This thought did nothing to reassure me.

The rain began an hour
later. It continued throughout that long day, while we ate supper and packed,
and it accompanied my mother and me up the stairs to our bedrooms. Usually,
rain on the roof was like a lullaby, but that didn’t hold true tonight. I
strained my ears listening for a noise not related to the storm, and heard my
mother tossing in her bed across the hall.

“Mom!”
I called, “Do you want one of those sleeping pills from Dr.
McCauley?”

“No, I don’t,” she answered.
“If someone is going to murder me in my sleep, I want to know about it.”

The logic in that statement
escaped me.

With rain pounding over my
head, wind rattling loose windows, and old boards creaking and popping to
accommodate pressure changes, I got very little sleep but, somehow, Mom and I
survived the night with no visitor.

At six the next morning,
rain still sluiced from the sky. I hoped that Jasper was safe and dry at his
mother’s house.

The aroma of frying bacon
wafted up the stairway as I pulled on my old blue housecoat. For a second, I
didn’t recognize the disheveled woman with flyaway hair and bloodshot eyes that
stared back at me from the mirror. If she were to see me now, the New York
receptionist would certainly think I needed her beautician.

“It’d be nice if the rain
let up at least for our drive to Fayetteville,” I grumbled as I stumbled into
the kitchen.

To my surprise, my mother
was as bright as a sunbeam. “Oh, I don’t know,” she said, smiling. “I like a
good rain and I’m looking forward to going to Georgia. Our ancestors came from
northern Georgia, Darcy. Have I told you that?”

“Seems I’ve heard you
mention it,” I mumbled around a mouth full of toast.

“Maybe
we can do some family research while we’re there,” Mom said, pouring coffee.
“Wouldn’t it be nice to discover some long-lost
cousins?”

“M-m-m,” I answered.

“Hurry, now, Darcy. Shake a
leg. I’ll take care of the dishes while you go get ready.”

I gulped down most of the
bowl of oatmeal and headed for the stairs. At least one of us felt cheery this
morning.

By the time I showered,
tugged on blue jeans, a yellow t-shirt and matching long-sleeved top, I felt
better. Lugging our suitcases downstairs, I found Mom waiting by the front
door. She wore what she called her “city clothes”—a blue denim pantsuit with
flowers embroidered on the lapel and hem of the jacket. Blinking, I looked
twice. She was actually wearing makeup!

“I’ll pull the car out of
the garage and get as close to the porch
as
I can,” I told my mother while fishing in my purse for keys to the
Passport.

“I won’t melt,” Mom assured
me.

She sang “Amazing Grace” as
we drove east toward Fayetteville.

Laughing, I said, “If I had
known a trip would do you this much good, I would have insisted we go a month
earlier. As a matter of fact, I believe I did suggest it.”

“I know,” she said. “I don’t
understand why I’m so happy, unless it’s because this nightmare may soon be
over. We just need to get out of the way now so Grant won’t have to worry about
us, and let him find and arrest the perps.”

Grinning, I said, “The
‘perps,’ Mom?”

“Didn’t I say that right?”
she asked. “I think it’s short for perpetrators. Isn’t that what they say on
TV?”

A conversation with my
mother is never dull.

As we crossed the Ventris
River Bridge, rain came down harder. Switching my wiper speed to “fast,” I made
sure the headlights were on. Driving in rain was never fun and the oily surface
of the highway could become slick when wet. I didn’t want to hydroplane.
However, to me, a dangerous road was much more preferable to the man-made threat
that surrounded us in Levi.

We both lapsed into
thoughtfulness. The regular slap-slap of the wipers had a lulling effect and
the rain seemed to be a curtain, shutting us off from the rest of the world.
The shower, however, was increasing to a downpour and I slowed even more.

Mom must have been concerned
about road conditions too. “You know Deertrack Hill is coming up,” she
cautioned. “That hill is treacherous enough in good weather.”

“My thoughts exactly,” I
answered.

“The highway department
installed a heavy-duty guardrail a while back, but I don’t want us to be the
ones to test it. This is not the time to mention it, but you do remember that a
few people have rolled off that hill, don’t you?”

Evidently, her euphoria of
the early morning was evaporating. Driving in rain did nothing to help my
nerves either.

“Yes, Mom,” I said. “In
fact, according to newspaper files, five cars have rolled off that hill. Two
people survived. Three did not.”

She sighed. “Well, just
drive carefully.”

“The only way to be truly
safe is to pull off the road and wait for this rain to let up,” I said, “but I
keep feeling that we need to hurry. Do you sense that too?”

My mother was twisting her
hands together nervously. “As a matter of fact, I do,” she said. “I wasn’t
going to say anything about it.”

Once again, the only sounds
were the rain and the wipers and the hum of tires on the pavement. Not even one
motorist had passed or met us since leaving the city limits.

Lightning cut a jagged path
across the sky in front of us. I strained to see through the torrent pelting
the Passport. Even with the wipers turned to high, the rain obscured my vision.

When I noticed fuzzy
headlights in my rearview mirror, I felt a sense of relief.

“I guess we aren’t the only
goofy people out for a drive today,” I said.

Mom craned her neck to look
behind us. “Misery loves company,” she said. “That car must have pulled in from
one of the side roads because I didn’t notice anyone following us out of Levi.
Maybe they are going to Fayetteville too.”

“The driver must be surer of
the road than I am,” I said, noting the speed the car was traveling. “Seems to
me he’s driving too fast. He’s coming up behind us pretty quickly.”

A mile before reaching
Deertrack Hill, those headlights moved up even closer. In the mirror, the car
reminded me of a dark monster with glowing eyes. Lightning flashed and I got a
better look. I gasped and Mom turned to look at me.

“What is it, Darcy?”

My throat felt dry. “That
car following us, Mom; I can’t see it well, but it is a big car like the Buick
Ray Drake drove.”

My mother shook her head.
“Surely it isn’t, Darcy. Maybe it just happens to resemble Drake’s car. There
are lots of Buicks on the road.”

I decided to check him out.
“I’m going to slow down and give him a chance to go around me.”

When I let up on the
accelerator, the other driver did the same. A cold finger of fear traced its
way down my spine.

I increased my speed. Our
follower increased his speed. Trying to keep my voice steady, I said. “My cell
phone, Mom. Get it out of my purse and punch in 911.”

Mom fumbled through my purse
and flicked open the phone. She groaned. “Darcy, the battery is dead.”

Gritting my teeth, I
realized I had forgotten to plug it into the charger last night.

“It’s all right,” I assured
her. “I’ll look for a driveway and pull in.”

My mother shook her head. “I
don’t think we’ll find a driveway until we get down the hill.”

With the next flash of
lightning, I knew the car following us was not Drake’s. The silhouette was
different. It was more square-topped with darkened windows. It appeared black
in the eerie light. Something else seemed odd about the car. The windows looked
recessed. But why would a car have recessed windows unless it was an armored
vehicle? It looked like pictures of limousines used to protect dignitaries and
government officials. Were we being followed by an armor-plated, bulletproof
sedan? If so, for goodness sake, why?

If the other car was not
carrying an important personage, why was it so equipped? Who else would need
such a vehicle? With a quiet certainty, a word popped into my mind: mobsters.
The sophisticated explosive device yesterday, the three murders committed while
leaving no clues to the murderer, this bulletproof car behind us, all pointed
to one suspect—a member of the underworld. The only organized crime figure who
had visited Levi lately, to my knowledge, was Ray Drake, alias Cub Mathers.

But why drive a car so
heavily protected if the driver’s enemies were two widows? My mother and I were
not known to be dangerous, but that car would have been worthy of the likes of
Al Capone. Whoever our pursuer was, he must be paranoid.

The headlights following us
which at first had seemed friendly now seemed ominous and threatening.

Mom twisted around to look
behind us again. “Oh, no, Darcy! It is coming too fast. It’s going to hit us!”

The big car nudged my back
bumper. Mom cried, “Oh, my Lord, help us!”

The Passport fishtailed
across the highway and I wrestled with the steering wheel until I finally got
back into the right lane. My face felt stiff and I tasted blood where I had
bitten my lip. Gritting my teeth, I muttered, “I can’t let him pass.” Newspaper
articles of people being forced off the road raced through my mind.

The pursuer’s headlights
grew larger in my rearview mirror. The car was coming at us again.

“Hang on!” I hissed and hit
the accelerator. The Passport responded and we surged forward. A road sign
cautioning that the speed limit was twenty-five miles per hour passed in a
blur.

Behind us, our tormentor
came so quickly that we seemed not to be moving at all. The car was going
around me, despite my best efforts. But then, I saw that the driver had no
intention of passing. He pulled into the lane beside me. Now even with us, nose
to nose, the sedan was pacing me.