Dead Dancing Women (3 page)

FOUR

I woke up at
six the next morning feeling as if I'd been hit on the head. I took a tepid shower and shook my hair dry, pretending to glamour with my head of streaky blond hair that had grown too long and too wild. I put on a clean yellow cotton sweater and a pair of jeans, and jumped into my yellow Jeep, heading into Leetsville where beavers and crows wouldn't taunt me, and people wouldn't try to scare me to death.

Leetsville was twenty minutes in by some of the worst potholed roads I'd ever driven. It took a lot longer than it should have to get there because of going slow to dodge the holes and stopping for a flock of turkeys. I stopped for the turkeys to be courteous, giving them the right of way. One jenny shook her head at me, scolded, and made as though she was going to attack my Jeep. Disgruntled, I supposed, that I was in her road, that I leaned my head out the window asking them to hurry it up, that I happened to be alive that morning.

Except for the turkeys and the potholes, my drive to town was fairly tranquil.

Leetsville is a mid-sized village. Two grocery stores, one an IGA and the other a Whitney's Discount Foods. A library. A Guns and Ammo store where you can get a Michigan Lotto ticket and a Traverse City
Northern Statesman
(to check last week's Lotto numbers), right along with your shotgun shells, flies for fishing, Pinconning Cheese, and cartons of night crawlers.

I loved planning my trips to town. Maybe it wasn't Ann Arbor—no art, no galleries, no downtown, no lectures, no professors, no visiting writers, no Zingerman's for corned beef sandwiches; but we did have Fuller's EATS, the only restaurant for miles around, owned by Eugenia Fuller, a big, motherly woman who fed everybody in town whether they had the money to pay or not. EATS was where the locals gathered and gossiped and socialized, and where everybody tried to dodge Eugenia when she was on a tear about some relative of hers she'd just discovered. She was a fanatic about her family genealogy. The five-by-five foyer of Fuller's was pasted with charts of Eugenia's family tree. She liked to keep them there so people could watch how far back in time she'd managed to wade. Unfortunately, most of Eugenia's ancestors had been either hung or tarred and feathered, or they had died in jail; but that didn't deter her from tracing them, nor squelch her pride in the whole bunch.

EATS was where most of the town politicking and character assassination took place; where news was spread: someone in need, someone's loss, someone's misfortune. It was the place where money was collected for groceries and clothes after a fire out at the mobile home park on the state road. It was the very place the preachers from the town's three churches came for breakfast after Sunday morning sermons, still bristling with their topic of the week, trying to outdo each other from the center of their flock, and giving blessings over stacks of blueberry pancakes.

Then, there was George's Candy Shoppe (but George's wasn't so busy anymore since Lucky Barnard busted him for selling porn out of the back of the store). At least the front of the store wasn't busy anymore.

Over on the corner of Griffith and Mitchell, a block off the main highway running straight through the middle of town, stood Murphy's Funeral Home—a big, white, peeling, house with leaning pillars across the front. The widow Murphy carried on the family business downstairs, while living above the store with her two dim sons, Gilbert and Sullivan.

Gertie's Shoppe de Beauté was behind Murphy's Funeral Home, on Mitchell. I didn't trust Gertie, that's why I went into Traverse City to have my hair done. Gertie's own hair was very red, a kind of mahogany with orange highlights. And it was very thin. Gertie's scalp shone through all that mahogany hair like a sandy beach with a few patches of sea grass.

Across from Gertie's was Bob's Barber Shop—a decaying storefront so thick with smoke you couldn't see in the windows and, I heard, the magazine racks were filled with Michigan Militia literature, so the place scared me a little, just looking at the cramped little building with a wooden Indian standing at the door, carved from a single log, announcing how retro and politically incorrect the place was. Personally, with the Native American casinos fast making the tribes some of the wealthiest and most powerful people in the state, I wouldn't have set that wooden effigy out there to draw attention to my politics—or lack of them. But then, in Leetsville, like out in the woods, people took pride in their independence of thought, right along with the busted couches sitting on their front porches, their pickups with full gun racks, and their groaning deer pole every November.

And they took pride in their two-minute-long Labor Day Parade for which they elected a Miss Leetsville and invested in a rhinestone crown, which, that past year, was trampled in the beer tent when Miss Leetsville got drunk and lost badly in an arm wrestling contest.

To round out the shops, there was Bailey's Feed and Seed, where I could buy bag balm and hog wash—if I should ever need such items. There was Ernie Henry's small-engine repair, Spinski's Five and Dime, and a resale shop. There was Pansy's bakery, the U.S. post office, and Jamison's Wood Products where most of the town's people worked. The Skunk Saloon. Tom's bowling alley. A few other stores and, for the most part, houses. There was a Catholic church and a Baptist church and a Church of the Contented Flock, which didn't belong to any denomination I'd ever heard of. There were a few municipal offices, and not much else. A bank—but I wasn't happy with the bank because their ATM ate my card without reason and the bank manager, Willy Jensen, wouldn't give it back to me because I could be a wanted fugitive, he said—after knowing me for three years. Anyway, that ATM wouldn't take my deposits either so I figured it wasn't much good and instead saved my banking for Traverse City.

The combined Leetsville Police and Fire Station was just past the Baptist church, on Divinity Drive. I pulled up to the front of the stone building and parked my Jeep. I could see Chief Barnard and Deputy Dolly inside, in earnest conversation with a state police officer.

The two men stood as I entered. Nice, old-fashioned chivalry. Dolly leaned forward in her chair, hat in her hands, a worried look on her face. She glanced up and nodded curtly.

“Emily Kincaid, this is Officer Brent with the state police. He'll be looking into Mrs. Poet's death, along with me and Dolly here. The sheriff's going to do what he can to help, too. It's just that everybody's stretched kind of thin right now,” the chief said, introducing me to a tall officer with a shaved head and a unibrow that took up the middle of his face. The man nodded curtly as I took the only chair left in the room.

“Emily's our local writer,” the chief said, and he gave a smile that never got beyond his tight mouth. “She's the one found poor Miz Poet's head in her garbage can.” He turned to me. “I've been telling Officer Brent, here, what happened.”

“You break the news to her family?” I asked, pulling at a notebook from my purse.

The chief nodded and looked unhappy. “Of course. Did that right away. Only got the one daughter, Amanda.”

“How'd she take it?”

“How'd you imagine a daughter would take that kind of news?”

“You tell her it was just the head?”

“Well, not directly. Just said part of her mother turned up.”

“Tell her where?”

“No need for that much information. Amanda fainted dead away and we had to get a neighbor lady over to take care of her. Amanda's a refined woman. Delicate, I'd say. Very delicate. We'll call on her again this afternoon. Should tell you, too, Emily, Officer Brent and a bunch of us are going to be out by your place tomorrow morning, combing those woods for the rest of Miz Poet. Figure the body—or whatever's left—can't be far.”

“Any idea, yet, who did it?”

He stuck out his bottom lip and shook his head.

“Any idea where, exactly, you'll be searching?” I persisted.

“Around your woods. Cover the whole area, I imagine.” He looked at Officer Brent who stared, frozen-faced, at the ceiling.

I took a deep breath. “I should tell you, Bill Corcoran asked me to cover the story for the
Northern Statesman
. Thought I ought to let you know.” I smiled my best smile all around, though nobody smiled back.

“In that case, Ms. Kincaid,” the very straight-backed officer spoke up, after clearing his throat, “I think we'll keep this interview to what happened out at your place. Everything else will have to come from Gaylord.”

I nodded. What I expected anyway. Gaylord was the main state police post in the area.

“If you'll just go over for me …” Officer Brent took a notebook and pen from his jacket pocket and waited for me to begin. I waited for a question. He looked up, surprised, and not too friendly. “Any idea where the head came from? Anybody have it in for you? Did you know Ruby Poet? Know any reason somebody would want to kill her and put her head in your garbage can?”

I sat back and answered all of his questions, stopping only when Dolly sniffed and twirled her hat.

“You know, Officer Brent,” she said, her mouth drawn down, her eyes looking away from his face. “You're going to have problems with the folks around here talking to you. They're friendly people, all right, but not with strangers. Now, me and Chief Barnard, well, we know 'em. We knew Ruby Poet and her daughter, Amanda. We know their friends.” She shook her head. “Be a lot easier if you let us do most of the checking around.”

“Well now, Dolly … ,” Chief Barnard began but was stopped when Dolly turned toward him, her face tied in an unpleasant knot.

“Chief, I know you've got your hands full, what with Charlie going to the hospital and all. I wasn't trying to make your job harder. It's just that I know the town and the people. I know the folks out there in the woods, too, near where Emily lives.”

“Given all of us a lot of tickets,” I said, nodding in agreement with Dolly. “You sure do know us.”

“Be a lot easier for me … ,” she went on, ignoring me.

“Thank you, Officer Wakowski. We'd appreciate all the help you can give us,” the officer said, and he smiled a cool smile at her. “Got a shoot-out in Petoskey. Bar fight turned ugly.” He made a face and blew air out through his pursed lips. “Appreciate whatever you find out. No reason we can't share information.” He shifted around on his feet, ran a hand over his bald head, then relaxed enough to grin at me. “You, too, Ms. Kincaid. Appreciate any help the press can provide.”

Deputy Dolly nodded and sniffed. She slid down in her chair and twirled her hat between her hands as Officer Brent finished questioning me.

Before I walked out of the office, I told Chief Barnard that I had to call my story in that afternoon. I asked if Amanda Poet had any idea why her mother, or part of her, should be as far out as my place? I asked him what the next move by the police would be, any leads?

Chief Barnard spread his hands. “You'll have to get most of your information from Gaylord, Emily. Sorry, that's the way it is right now. We'll be working with 'em but I won't be able to tell you much. Better you hear it straight from the state boys.”

I nodded to the wooden state cop, to a disgruntled Dolly, to a red-faced chief of police, and walked out. I knew one place in town that would be buzzing with information; one place where the people wouldn't be afraid to talk to me; one place where I could get a warm reception along with a cup of thick black coffee: Fuller's EATS. Before the chief or the state boys learned anything; before a confession could be heard; before the miscreant acknowledged guilt, even to himself; the regulars at Fuller's EATS would know; would have worked out a tragic childhood, bad parentage, and bad lineage. “
Goes back to 'is great-grandfather, Chilton. I remember the man. Tipped over the Johnson's outhouse one Halloween and never had the gumption to admit to it. Bad, right from then on. Coward, you might say. Fun is fun, but telling the truth is something else …”

Fuller's EATS folks would explain the whole thing to me; tell me what happened and why; and probably what was coming next.

I might not get anything I could put in my story for Bill Corcoran, but I'd sure get a lot more than the police were giving out.

FIVE

The dark-paneled vestibule of
Fuller's featured an expanding genealogy chart with new sheets tacked up in tilted prominence, like movie posters. You couldn't miss the Johnny-come-lately dead relatives with big misshapen gold stars stuck around them, bringing attention to yet another of Eugenia's ill-fated ancestors. This one was an uncle—a John Holliday. I read it fast because I was keeping a kind of tally in my head: how many of her relatives had been to jail, how many were hung. It was 41 to 9 so far.

All Eugenia's relatives got equal space on the wall, but the ones who had been hung got just a little more room. Eugenia said it was only fair since they'd been royally screwed in life.

“Hey, Emily, how ya doin'?” Eugenia called as I entered the dark, smoky, low-ceilinged restaurant. She waved her fly swatter in greeting. She stood behind the cash register, keeping an eye on a poor fly just about to land on the counter. For a big woman, Eugenia could bring herself to a breath-holding halt when in pursuit of one of our slow, late September flies; the kind that hung lazily in the air as if they had no idea where to land next. This one had little will to live and was squashed quickly with one of Eugenia's mighty blows.

She delicately scooped up the remains with a napkin and deposited it into the basket behind the counter. “Hate those buggers,” she said, and made a face at me, then quickly changed over to sympathy. “Heard what happened out to your place yesterday. Terrible thing, about Miz Poet. Must've got lost in the woods, there by you. You know how they get when they're old. Think the coyotes got her?” She leaned over the counter, getting closer so she could lower her voice and not upset the appetites of her customers. The woman's small eyes, lost in a nest of smoker's wrinkles, glistened. “You heard about the cougar got a horse not long ago? Somewhere over by Manistee, I think it was. Could've been a cougar got 'er. Who would've thought something like this could happen to such a sweet soul? If you're interested, I mean, like it's something you want to write about, you could go talk to Joslyn Henry. She's right down the road from you and she was a close friend to poor Miz Poet. Those two were closer than jelly donuts.”

Eugenia shook her head, clucking over the loss. I agreed. Maybe I'd go talk to my neighbor, Mrs. Henry, and get a human interest angle on the dead woman. I eased away from Eugenia because when she started talking she could keep you standing for a long time, and her talk always got around to her family tree, to what some long-dead uncle had done—or been accused of doing—since Eugenia had a family filled with innocent and wronged people.

I took a seat in a corner booth. Gloria, Eugenia's youngest and prettiest waitress, came hurrying over. She knelt on the seat across from me, and slapped her order pad on the table, then leaned forward far enough to show the cleavage male customers came in for. “I'm telling you, Emily. A girl isn't safe in her bed anymore. It's those people from down below, you know, in the cities. They're coming up here and killing us off. That's the plan, Simon says. Kill all of us off and take our property.”

“Do you have property, Gloria?” I asked as I buried my nose in the menu I already knew by heart.

“Well, no, but me and Simon are planning on it soon. We're going to build a house out to his father's farm but back in the woods where nothing's been cleared yet.” Her face lit up with her plan; a small, round face with red cheeks and a sweet, innocent smile. Gloria was engaged to my mailman, Simon.

Too early for lunch. To kill time, I ordered a coffee. I sure didn't feel like going back to my house yet. I had to call Bill Corcoran at the paper and I'd gotten nothing from the police. Not an auspicious beginning for my crime-reporting career.

There were only a few customers in EATS, but I could feel the eyes of every one of them on me. Most of the customers waved or nodded when I looked their way, then bent into whispered conversations. I was the talk of the town. Just as long as they didn't get around to deciding I was the murderer, I thought. People in Leetsville didn't like frustratingly oblique answers to things. A duck was a duck was a duck—to their way of thinking. I just didn't want to become the duck they settled on.

Gloria brought my coffee, a napkin, and a spoon. She pushed the sugar shaker over toward me, though I virtuously pushed it back and settled on drinking the thick brew black and straight up.

Normally Gloria was a whirl of energy, bustling around the restaurant, greeting everyone, filling sugar holders and creamers, and taking swipes at a crumby table. This afternoon she hovered across from me, staring up at the ceiling, then down at the toe of one of her tennis shoes. I sipped my coffee, though it was very hot, and waited, smiling at her every now and then, wondering what was coming.

It didn't take long to find out. Gloria leaned over and pretended my napkin holder needed straightening. Her small face worked with whatever she had to say.

“You know, Emily,” she whispered. “I belong to the Church of the Contented Flock. Well, I don't like to speak ill of the dead, but awhile ago Pastor Runcival preached a whole sermon on people worshipping the devil and bringing evil into our midst.”

“What's that got to do with Ruby Poet?” I sat back, startled. You never quite knew what folks up here might fixate on. I wasn't sure about Gloria's opening but at least this was something beyond everybody moaning over “Poor old Miz Poet.”

“Probably nothing, but there has been talk. Now, don't get me wrong. You know I don't gossip like Eugenia does. Still, it's hard to work here and not pick up on a thing or two. I heard that Miz Poet and a group of her friends got themselves involved in nature worship, or some such thing. They meet in the woods, out by you,
at Miz Henry's. Don't ask me what it's all about. I only heard this from somebody saying something in here. Amanda Poet, Miz Poet's daughter, caught what was said—was what I heard—and she got up and flounced right out. Caused a big stink. I asked Eugenia what it was about and she said just a bunch of old ladies dancing out
in the woods because it made them feel young, or it made them happy, or something. Called themselves Women of the Moon. Eugenia didn't seem to think there was anything wrong with it …” She hesitated, looking around to see who was watching or listening. She lowered her voice, “But then, Eugenia's no chicken herself. She thinks anything old ladies do is all right.”

I looked around, too, and would have said everybody was watching—and not watching. They were certainly straining their ears toward us, over what I imagined were cold cups of coffee.

“Well, that was the first I understood what Pastor Runcival was mad about. You know, like there were witches loose in town or something.”

“Witches!” I shook my head at Gloria. “That's crazy.”

“Now, Emily. The reverend says we don't know everything that goes on back in the woods. Those people aren't like town people. I mean, you know, some of them are really odd.”

“I live out in the woods.”

Gloria had the good grace to blush. “I know you do. Well, of course, I know that. But you're new up here …”

“Three years.”

“Phew, that's nothing. My mother came from Grand Rapids thirty-two years ago and they still call her ‘the Grand Rapids girl.'”

“So, you think maybe your pastor had it in for Mrs. Poet?”

Gloria's jaw dropped. Her dark eyes grew huge. “I wasn't saying anything of the kind, Emily. I was just saying, because of the gossip about Miz Poet and her friends … well … who knows what got into somebody's brain. I just thought I'd share that with you because I didn't want to say anything to Lucky Barnard. I don't want to get anybody in trouble …”

She was going to go on with her disclaimers but Deputy Dolly Wakowski walked in and the whole restaurant went silent. The only sound was the angry buzz of one fly beating hard against a smoke-fogged window.

Dolly stood in the doorway, looking around, hunching her shoulders up, hands clutching on to her drooping gun belt. She searched the place, table by table, until her eyes fell on Gloria and me. With a dip of her head, as if she'd found what she was looking for, Dolly walked over, excused herself to Gloria, and slid into the seat across from me.

Gloria was off like a shot with Dolly calling after her that she wanted tea. Dark and straight up.

“Saw your car in the lot.” She stared back at the people staring at us, then sniffed, and took her hat off, setting it on the table beside her. She had bad, dirty-blond, hat hair.

“Well, what did you think of that?” she demanded in what passed as a whisper for Dolly. Her eyes gleamed. A little too bright for comfort. She dipped her head, gave me a conspiratorial smirk, and thumped her broad hands on the tabletop.

“Of what?” I asked.

“Of the state boys taking over.”

I shrugged. “They're not. Officer Brent said they don't have the time, though I'd say they've got more resources than you and Lucky.”

“Comes to the same thing. You watch. They'll be breathing down our necks. Like they could do it without us. Like they know the people around here. They don't have a clue where to begin. Who to talk to. They went out to see Amanda again, poor woman—like she didn't have enough on her hands already. Then what? They won't know where to go next unless we tell 'em.”

“Well, you will, won't you? I mean, you'll all work together. They're trained investigators, after all. You and the chief—well, you're not really used to murder.”

Dolly scowled heavily at me. “You think I'm not a trained investigator? You think the chief and me don't handle all kinds of things? Why, just last winter there was a shooting down at the Skunk. Got the guy right away because we know who's fighting who. We went right out and apprehended the culprit …” She hesitated, giving me a hard look. “Anything I say to you here is not for publication. Hope we got that clear right here at the beginning.”

I nodded, wondering where she was going with all of this.

“I was thinking.” She dipped her head and glared at me. “Because of your problems selling those books of yours, and working for the paper, well, maybe we could, well, kind of work together. The two of us could find out who did this to poor Miz Poet in about half the time it would take alone. I mean, you know old Harry Mockerman, out by you. You got other neighbors. I know the people here in town. I've got some ideas already …”

I smiled. “So you think this experience will sharpen my detective skills? Maybe I'll get a book out of it?”

“I don't know about that.” She looked wary now. “And no matter what comes of this, don't you ever put me in one of your damned books. That's not what I mean. I just figured with my detecting skills and your reporting skills—and maybe because you've got the education—we could look into this tragedy and find out what in hell happened to Ruby Poet.”

Dolly looked fierce, and dedicated. I wanted to laugh but the little woman was serious.

“Where would we begin?” I asked, willing to hear her out because I was a little short of ideas myself and had to come up with something for Bill.

“I thought maybe we'd start with old Harry, across from you. He'd never give me the time of day if I went there alone, but with you—maybe he saw something, or heard something. He'd tell you, wouldn't he? I mean, I hear he works for you from time to time, so he trusts you.”

I nodded then made a decision. It didn't look as though the state police relished giving me information and I wouldn't get much on my own. Maybe, with Deputy Dolly … I sighed. There weren't a lot of choices.

I leaned close after Gloria set a cup of tea in front of Dolly and sauntered off. I was determined to hold up my end, if we were going to do this together. “Gloria was just telling me there's gossip in town about Ruby Poet. That she was some kind of nature worshipper. I guess the pastor at the Church of the Contented Flock preached against what she was doing back sometime this summer. Just before she disappeared.”

Dolly only nodded at my news. “I heard all of that gossip. Tempest in a teapot. Ruby Poet didn't even belong to that church. Amanda does, though, and I guess she was incensed for a while, then she and the pastor made peace.”

Dolly glanced up at a couple in the next booth who'd been listening. She narrowed one eye at them. They looked away, embarrassed.

Dolly hunkered lower in her seat. “From what I heard Ruby and some friends of hers had a little thing going where they'd gather together in the woods at different times of the year and give thanks to the trees and the clouds and such.”

“Like Druidic worship,” I said, shaking my head.

“Whatever.” Dolly shrugged. “Anyway. Harmless stuff a bunch of old ladies might do. Lucky wanted me to go talk to Miz Poet after Parson Runcival started the uproar with that sermon, but I didn't think it was my place. This is a free country, despite what some people might like to think. The women can do whatever they want out in the woods, as far as I'm concerned. Then Miz Poet wandered off and didn't come back and we figured it was all over anyway.”

“What do you think now?” I asked.

“Maybe we should go talk to Ruby's friends.”

“You know who they are?”

“Maybe one of 'em.”

“Look, before I go anywhere with you I've got to call the newspaper.”

“But you don't give 'em any of what we've been talking about here. I need to know I can trust you.” She narrowed her small eyes at me.

“Just the things I know for sure. Where the head was found. What the woman's name was. Next of kin. Who's working on the case. Facts about the search for her.”