Dead End (42 page)

“I told Miz Leach I made it all up, but I didn’t tell her Pepper’s gay. The Church doesn’t approve, Father.”

“The Church is in a difficult position. Some things aren’t up to the Church, though. His motives were the best, but they were stupid.”
Thank God it
would be over.
“Are you ready to go to the authorities? Today?”

She hesitated, and he feared she’d tell him she’d made her confession and wanted absolution. He wouldn’t be able to keep her secret.

“When he didn’t say I was lying, I began to believe what I’d said was true,” she said, straightening up. “I’m ready to tell Spike now. I shouldn’t ask, but would you come with me?”

He leaned to take her hands in his. “Yes, I will.”

They sat there quietly. Cyrus felt an urgency to get Pepper set free, but knew he must go at May Lynn’s pace.

Oribel’s voice, raised in a kind of senseless wail, startled both of them.

“What is it?” May Lynn asked. He could feel her tremble.

“Wait for me here.” Cyrus got up and left the room. Oribel grabbed him by the wrist. She pulled him through the house and out into the garden again where people surrounded the sinking sculpture. Several men Marc must have called in were there, and a pickup with a hoist on the back.

“Lower it,” one man yelled.

Marc said, “Don’t move a thing. Hold it steady.”

Another man, whom Cyrus recognized as a local contractor, removed his baseball cap and swiped a forearm across his brow. He kept the hat off and let the rain beat on his head. “We got to get it high enough to slide boards underneath. Should be okay then.”

“It won’t be,” Oribel said. “It’s never going to be okay again.”

Reb and Marc leaned forward, Madge swung toward Cyrus, and the distress on her face propelled him the rest of the way to join the group.

There had been a mishap. A chain attached to the winch encircled the figure at the left edge of the sculpture and a couple of inches of the deep concrete block beneath. That side had risen until the base just cleared the hole, while the other end had dropped even lower into the earth.

Cyrus saw Marc’s grim expression, and the way Reb kept an arm around his waist. He disengaged Oribel’s grip on his arm and went to stand with Reb and Marc. Spike was on his knees in liquified sludge. A glance at Marc’s pants suggested he’d done what Spike was doing now, got down to get a closer look at what they were dealing with—just how wet the earth was.

“Nothing moves,” Spike said abruptly. “Including anyone here. Stay put. I’m putting in a call to Lafayette.”

Marc got down on his knees, and Cyrus joined him. He heard something splinter and saw what the others had been looking at.

This place had been made into a grave, and whoever did this thing hadn’t thought to make sure the concrete they poured was all around the cheap casket. A foot, what was left of it, hung through a gap in rotting wood.

This had been a day better forgotten—mostly. Marc waited for Reb in the conservatory. He liked being there and thinking about being there with her. Even Gaston’s presence, curled up on the bench beside him, felt good.

He was in bad shape and knew it. He also liked it.

In independent mode, Reb had insisted he return to Clouds End without her, promising she’d be there well before dark. That didn’t give her too much more time.

The police from Lafayette had descended on the rectory in a swarm and by the time he and Reb had been allowed to leave it was late afternoon. They’d walked out past a television crew and turned aside the microphone that was pushed in their faces while they went.

First thing in the morning, Reb would be observing an examination of the body that had been buried in its casket under concrete on the back lawn of the rectory. There had been talk of the possibility that Bonnie’s stealthy and illegal removal from her original resting place threw the diagnosis of accidental death into serious question.

The coroner respected Reb’s opinions and had requested her assistance. He’d told her he hoped that in looking at the evidence in a different light she might help him observe something small but important that had slipped by under the former assumptions. Marc hadn’t given up on being there with Reb, but so far there had been no go-ahead.

A search was on for William and his brothers. Oribel was inconsolable—worried about William and battling guilt because she felt responsible for what had happened with the sculpture.

A yellow Jag convertible traveled toward the house going way too fast. He had a bad moment while he thought Reb might be the driver and trying to prove she could make her own choices when it came to cars, thank you.

It was Oribel’s daughter, Precious, who got out of the vehicle, and Marc felt relieved. Relieved but irritated at the intrusion. There was one woman he wanted to see, and Precious wasn’t the one.

He opened the front door before she could ring the bell.

“Hi,” she said. “I hope you’ll talk to me. I’m Precious Depew, Chauncey’s wife. I’m sure you hate me, but I’m still askin’ you to hear me out.”

“Hate’s a big word,” he said, folding his arms. “What do you want?”

She tossed her shiny black hair, and searched in all directions. “It might not be a good idea to talk here.”

“Why not?”

“Because what I’ve got to say is real personal, and I don’t think either of us wants the world to hear it.”

He thought before saying, “Come in. I don’t have long, so you’ll have to hurry.”

Marc didn’t attempt to take her beyond the foyer or to offer her a seat or any hospitality at all.

Dressed in black pants and a black cotton turtleneck with rhinestones at the hem, Precious appeared almost demure. “I know how you feel about my husband.”

“No, you don’t. But that has nothing to do with my feelings for you. I don’t have any. Not good or bad. You aren’t guilty of anything except real bad taste in men.”

“Real bad,” she echoed. “I saw Reb a while ago. She doesn’t turn people away, no matter the hour.”

Marc simmered. Reb should be giving a lot of thought to the hour, and she ought to be here by now.

“Could I sit down, please?” Precious asked.

He almost refused, but habit wouldn’t allow it, and the woman appeared shaken and unsteady on her feet. “In here.” He took her to his father’s study, his study now, and pointed to the couch.

“I lost a baby a few days ago.”

I
’
m sorry,
would have sounded too harsh. “That’s a sad thing.”

“The baby didn’t deserve it, but I did. I never told Chauncey I was pregnant because I hated him. When I had to I was goin’ to say the baby wasn’t his and name his buddy as the father. I wanted to hurt that man so bad.”

“Shouldn’t you be at home, in bed?” Marc felt inadequate. He didn’t know what to think of her choosing him as a confessor.

“I won’t be going home,” she said. “I’ll stay with Mama till I know what to do. Amy’s alive.”

Marc glared at her. If he’d heard her right, she couldn’t mean what she said. But only a monster would play such a joke.

“I don’t know where she is,” Precious said. “But she isn’t dead, and I just know she’ll find a way to get in touch with you, but you’ve gotta make sure Chauncey doesn’t find out before she’s safe. He wants her dead because she knows all about his so-called business, and he thinks she’ll tell the law. She did come here to Toussaint. Chauncey got her, and he was goin’ to kill her, only I saved her—kind of—to hurt him some more.”

Someone came into the house, and Marc recognized Reb’s footsteps. He found his voice. “In the study, Reb,” he said, and to Precious, “What you can say to me, you can say to Reb, but I think you know that.”

“Hey,” Reb said, walking in. She saw Precious and raised her eyebrows at Marc.

“Precious is telling me a lot of things. I think she’s a ways from finishing yet.”

Reb sat beside Precious while the woman told a fantastic story. When she’d finished they remained quiet for some time.

Finally Reb said, “We’ve got to find Amy.”

“And get Chauncey Depew before he can do more damage. I’ll try to get Spike to bring him in.”

“His friend, Dante Cornelius, will back up my word,” Precious said, avoiding any eye contact. “I know how to get hold of him.”

Marc didn’t wait, he put in a call to Spike, who said he was on his way to “have a chat” with Depew.

“When I told her you were looking for her, Marc,” Precious said, her face puffy from the tears she’d shed, “she told me she didn’t know why you’d care because she’d never brought you anything but trouble. I said she’d messed up but you’d forgive her.”

“He will,” Reb said, sounding far away. She frowned at Marc. He didn’t know what was on her mind, at least he didn’t think he did.

“I’m going to Spike next,” Precious said. “It won’t be easy, but I’m gonna tell him everything, too.”

Lucky Spike, Marc thought. This was the deputy’s day for hearing confessions from badly misguided women. “You’d better get a lawyer lined up,” Marc said.

“That’s right,” Reb said, inclining her head as if listening hard, and watching Precious closely.

“Okay. I’ll do it.”

That was it. That was why Reb looked the way she did.

Reb said to Precious, “Who told you to put a tape recorder underneath my examining table?”

If Cyrus got mad and sent him away, Wally would still do some investigating of his own. Since he’d gotten his bike back, he’d kept it chained to a fence post at the hotel. So far his mama and daddy hadn’t noticed how paint came off in the rain, but they would unless he could get it fixed quickly.

The rectory was mostly dark, but a light shone out back, from the kitchen, and Wally avoided the squelchy ground by keeping his bike to the path around the house.

It wasn’t really raining anymore, but his skin felt wet and chilled. The bayou bubbled and popped in the marshy ground where it had overflowed. Even the lantern over the front door of the church was out. Wally felt creepy and hurried to tap on one of the kitchen windows. If Cyrus was in there, he could be concentrating real hard on a book, but he usually heard knuckles on the window right away.

Wally carried on to the back door, but Cyrus hadn’t come to open it. Through the window, Wally saw papers on the table, so Cyrus must be around. Wally rapped the door, and a face appeared at the window. Wally jumped, then felt dumb. It was Oribel. She quickly opened the door and hurried him inside.

“What are you doin’ here at this hour?” she said. She was already dressed to go home. “I suppose you want to bother Father. Well, some bad things happened here today, and he’s needed somewhere else.”

In spite of wearing only a T-shirt and shorts, Wally was too hot in the kitchen. “Well, I’d better go then.” Guilt over planning to do more secretive things stopped him from leaving at once. “I will just go over to the church—to the shed where my bike was. I want to see if someone left a can of black paint there—the kind you put on bikes.”

“Not in the dark, you won’t. Get along home.”

“I’ll be just dandy,” he told her. “And I won’t make any mess over there. You know how it is when you’ve got somethin’ itchin’ your mind? You gotta do somthin’ about it.”

“With black paint?” She looked like grown-ups always did when they thought a kid wasn’t making sense.

“I’ll be in and out of there in no time. Don’t you worry about me.”

Oribel looked over her shoulder at a wall clock. “I can see there’s no changing your mind. Headstrong, just like all children. I’ll come with you.”

“You don’t need to do that.”

“I don’t need to do anything, but if a boy is going over there, I won’t rest if I let him go alone.”

He smiled at her, secretly grateful he’d have her with him. No one messed with Oribel.

With Wally pushing his bike, they walked together from the rectory, across Bonanza Alley to the churchyard. The shed was on the far side, behind St. Cecil’s and right across from William’s custodial room.

Oribel paused there, and he peered at her. She looked funny. “Something wrong, ma’am?”

She sighed. “We’re all worried about William. He hasn’t been seen since yesterday. I might even have been the last one to see him, and we had words. I don’t like to think it, but maybe I upset him and he took off. He hasn’t even been home.”

Wally touched her arm. “He’ll be okay. You couldn’t have said anythin’ to make him go away.”

“Prob’ly not. Now, it’s black paint you’re after.” She opened up the shed and went in. Wally rested his bike on the siding and followed her.

Oribel’s own bike was in there, and Wally felt sorry for her because although it wasn’t old, it didn’t look as cool as his. He began to look around, moving boxes to check behind and lifting two-by-fours, first one end then the other.

“What are you doin’?” Oribel asked, and she sounded cross. “Those things are nothing to do with you.”

“I’m seein’ if there’s any broken glass been swept away, or fallen somewhere in here is all,” he told her. “It would tell me something.”

“Like what?” She wrapped her cardigan around her and pinched her mouth. It made her look mean.

Wally told Oribel all his recent and new troubles with his bike, and her face got kind again. “I’ve been thinking,” he said. “It went missing right around when poor Bonnie had her accident in the church. Could have been the exact same day. I wondered if she could have borrowed my bike because her car ran out of gas.”

“What kind of sense does that make?” Oribel said. She got close to him. “She went from the car to the church. How would you figure she had anything to do with your bike?”

He heard himself stammer when he said, “She could have come to get it, then used it to carry gas back to the car. Only she wasn’t good at riding it and she fell off and scratched it all up. And broke my headlight. Maybe then she got scared and went to the church to pray.”

“Rubbish,” Oribel said. “I’ll explain why, but first you come to my place and I’ll help you fix that paint. My husband left everythin’ imaginable out in his workshop. There’s got to be the right stuff there. We’ll use a sander to take the old paint down.”