Grave Designs (21 page)

We sat in silence amid the shouting and laughter of the restaurant.

“I've got to admit,” Benny said, “I could almost believe that Marshall arranged for all this.”

“Even for the recent Canaan personals?” Cindi persisted. “And that crazy stuff in the el trains?” Cindi sat back. “What if there really is a Canaan lottery? Some big secret organization that's still going strong after all these years? God knows, there's enough happening all the time that can't be explained.”

“Maybe,” I said. “But it's almost too incredible to believe.”

“So what do we do?” Maggie asked.

“We wait,” I said. “We keep our eyes open. And cross our fingers. Maybe we'll get lucky.”

“How?” Benny asked.

“Something else is bound to happen,” I said. “And I pray it doesn't happen to one of us.”

Chapter Twenty-nine

Cindi and I were sipping herbal tea at my kitchen table. Both of us were in our nightgowns and ready for bed. Ozzie was asleep on the kitchen floor by my feet.

There had been another message from Paul Mason on my answering machine: “I just wanted to see how you and Ozzie are doing. Give me a call, Rachel. And give Ozzie a hug for me.” It was close to midnight, too late to call Paul tonight. I took a sip of tea. Paul was being awfully solicitous these past two days. Don't be so suspicious, I told myself. It's nice to have someone who's concerned for you.

“I keep trying to fit the Graham I knew into the Graham who ran that secret lottery,” Cindi said. “A man who could calmly decide that two men should die in a plane crash. Two men he had never met. Men with wives and children and friends.” She shuddered.

I blew across the top of my mug of steaming tea. “You knew one Graham Marshall. I knew another. Neither one of us knew this third one.”

“How could he do that?” Cindi said. “How could anyone just decide to kill two men at random? Just for the hell of it.”

“I don't think he saw it that way.” I rubbed my bare toes against Ozzie's side. “He didn't think he was murdering those two men in the plane crash. Graham could have seen it as carrying on his ancestor's master plan. He was arrogant enough for that. I'll bet it was almost a religious cause for him.”

“When do you think he first decided to set up a lottery?”

“In 1984. After he almost died.” I told Cindi about his heart surgery in Houston. “His wife told me that the experience seemed to have a profound impact on him. The man was already a huge success. He'd tried and won big lawsuits, he'd argued major cases in the Supreme Court. What else was left for him to achieve?” I took a sip of tea. “If he really believed he was a descendant of one of the original Elders of Canaan, then 1985—the year after he almost died—would have been a significant year. Think of it. It was the three hundredth anniversary of the first lottery. And the thirtieth anniversary of the bizarre deaths of his mother and sister. Talk about luck of the draw.” I shook my head. “You know you can't underestimate the impact of those deaths on him.”

Cindi nodded.

“To someone like Graham,” I continued, “just back from his brush with death, 1985 must have seemed like that rare moment in time—when all the spheres were in perfect alignment. Maybe he thought, why not?”

“But why stop?” Cindi asked.

“What do you mean?”

“He went to all that trouble to set up his lottery and hire those Canaan operatives. Why would he run the lottery for just one year and then stop? Why didn't he keep on going?”

“Maybe it was just too demanding and complicated to run for more than one year. Or maybe he planned from the outset to run it for just one year—to commemorate those anniversaries and then walk away. Or maybe”—I paused—“maybe he didn't stop. Maybe he was still running it up to the day he died.”

Cindi frowned. “But then why bury the coffin?”

“Because in 1986 he learned he could die at any moment.” I told Cindi about the recall of the defective heart valves and Marshall's decision to leave the valve in his heart.

“How horrible.”

I nodded. “He had his own private lottery going on inside his heart. He must have feared that if he died unexpectedly, no one would ever know what he had done. That's why he buried the coffin and set up the secret codicil. To preserve the record of what he had done. Remember the language in that codicil? He said he wanted a memorial of the small role he had played in the eternal life of Canaan. The guy wanted people to know about it.” I shrugged. “I guess he was proud.”

“God, that's creepy.”

“I agree, but it's creepy on an almost cosmic level. What's going on now is down-to-earth creepy.”

“What do you mean?”

“On the surface it looks like the same old lottery—messages in the personal columns, exchanges on the subways. The Canaan operatives may even be the same ones Graham used. But I'm convinced whoever is running the show now is up to something different.”

“How so?”

“Look at what's happened. A grave robbery, the fake gas explosion, the break into my apartment. Assuming these are all related, someone out there is trying to
eliminate
evidence of what Graham was doing—not preserve it.”

“But why kill me?” Cindi asked. “I didn't know a thing.”

“Maybe this guy thinks Graham told you about the lottery.” I paused, thinking it over. “Maybe Graham told him about the lottery, and he was afraid Graham might have told you too.”

“God. Do you think Graham picked a successor?”

“It makes sense, doesn't it? Someone to take over when he died. Or maybe Graham didn't even realize that he had picked a successor. Maybe he got drunk one night and bragged about the lottery to someone, and that someone decided to take it over when Graham died. Whoever he is, he could have worried that Graham told others too. You'd be a likely candidate.”

“I don't know,” Cindi said. “If this guy's that clever, you'd think he'd first try to find out if I knew anything before he had me killed.”

“Maybe,” I said. “But maybe that was too risky for him. I don't know. Let me ask you something: How could the killer have known you weren't around the night he had someone go up to your apartment to rig the explosion?”

“That part would be pretty easy,” she said. “All he had to do was call the modeling agency to find out my schedule for that week. They would have told him I was out of town on that night.”

“Just like that?” I asked.

Cindi smiled. “Oh, he'd have to pose as a potential client of the agency. You know, like some advertising outfit. A lot of them request specific models. When they're scheduling a specific shoot and they want certain models, they call in advance to see which ones are available on what dates. The agency gets those calls all the time.”

“So if he asked about you, they would have told him you were going to be out of town last Wednesday.”

Cindi nodded.

“That's how he knew you wouldn't be in your condo that night,” I said.

“But the explosion killed the wrong people,” Cindi said.

“It could have been a time bomb,” I said. “Set to go off in the middle of the day—when he thought you'd be around.”

We were both quiet for a while.

“You think it's all a cover-up now?” Cindi finally asked.

“I think it's more than just a cover-up,” I said. “Whoever's running the lottery now must have his own plans. That's the really creepy part. What if this last week is just a prelude? Whoever this one is seems violent enough for anything. I just hope he isn't as clever as Marshall.”

“But what can we do?” Cindi asked.

“Go to the police,” I said. “We don't have much to give them. But we do have you.” I smiled. “A living corpse ought to get their attention.” I stood up and walked over to the sink with my tea mug. “I'm meeting with Ishmael Richardson on Monday morning to give him my report. He has enough City Hall contacts to get the police involved in a quiet way. He'll want to keep a lid on this.”

Cindi and I checked the locks on the doors and all the windows before we got into bed.

Neither of us slept well.

Chapter Thirty

I reached for the telephone receiver on the third ring.

“Hello,” I croaked, my head still on the pillow.

“Guess what the police just gave me?”

“Maggie?” I turned toward the clock radio on the nightstand. Nine thirty-eight Sunday morning. Sunlight was streaming in through the bedroom window.

“Guess what just got returned?”

“What?”

“That coffin we've been looking for.”

“Canaan?”

Cindi sat up in bed.

“Yep,” Maggie said. “I matched the serial number on the coffin against my log book. Same one.”

“Did you open it?” I asked.

“Didn't have to. The police did before they brought it out.”

“And?”

“Bones. Just bones.”

“I'm coming right out, Maggie. Don't bury it yet.” I hung up and looked at Cindi. “Let's go,” I said. “The cops found the Canaan coffin.”

***

We were in Maggie's office in the back of the chapel—Cindi, Maggie, and I. The coffin was on the desk, and the coffin lid was on the carpet in front of the desk.

I was staring at the skeleton inside the coffin. It looked like the skeleton of a small dog. The thin bones were clean and white. Bone-white. One eye socket stared blankly up at me. The skeleton was resting on its side on the satin cushion that lined the bottom and sides of the coffin.

“They found it behind the police station?” I asked again.

“Yep. Out near the back steps,” Maggie said. “Someone left it there. I guess they could tell it was mine because of the stamp on the bottom.”

I lifted one end of the coffin. Stamped in black ink on the bottom was WAGGING TAIL ESTATES—MARGARET SULLIVAN, PROP., along with the address and telephone number.

“One of the boys at the station dropped it off this morning,” Maggie said. “They had already looked inside. They were so relieved it wasn't a human body that they hardly asked me any questions. I made up some story about a client who had decided to transfer her pet from another cemetery to Wagging Tail and lost it in the process. They bought the story.” Maggie leaned back. “Well, maybe that Graham Marshall wasn't so crazy after all. It could be just some punks pulling a prank. The same ones who tried to dig up the other grave.”

I didn't answer.

“You two want some coffee?” Maggie asked.

“Sure,” Cindi answered.

“Let's go on over to the house and I'll put on a pot.” Maggie stood up.

“I'll be along in a minute,” I said.

Maggie stopped at the door. “Your pal Benny called here a while ago, Rachel. Said he's been looking for you everywhere. Tried me as a last resort. Said he had something to show you. I gave him the address and told him to come on down.”

After Maggie and Cindi left, I stared at the skeleton. It was all too pat.

What happened, Graham? Someone pulled your documents out and replaced them with a skeleton. Was someone on to you, Graham? Was someone afraid of those documents? Did you suspect that back in 1986 when you buried the coffin?

If you did, if you thought someone was on to you, then maybe you knew who that someone was.

I sat back and mulled it over. You bury your secret but set up a bizarre legacy in a codicil to make sure your secret gets discovered after you're dead. What if you are worried that someone else might try to spoil your plan? That someone else might get to the coffin first? That someone else might dig it up, destroy the documents, and bury it again? What do you do?

Maybe you leave a clue for the second one who finds the coffin.

I leaned forward again and looked into the coffin. Where do you leave the clue? In the coffin? Maybe. Before you bury the coffin you hide a clue inside the coffin. You hide it where someone interested in the documents won't think to look.

I reached inside the coffin and, with a shiver, lifted out the frail skeleton and set it on the carpet next to the coffin lid. I put the coffin on my lap. The satin-covered padding that lined the sides of the coffin lifted out in one piece, a rectangular belt of cushion. I checked both sides of the satin covering. Nothing. I squeezed it. It felt like foam rubber. There was a sharp-edged letter opener on Maggie's desk. Using the letter opener, I poked a hole in the satin and ripped off the covering. Nothing inside but foam rubber. I looked along the inner sides of the coffin. Nothing.

I reached inside the coffin and tried to pull out the cushion lining the floor of the coffin. It was glued down. I yanked, and it popped out with a tearing sound. I turned the pillow-sized cushion over. Nothing. A piece of the satin covering had torn off when I pulled out the cushion. I tore off the rest of the covering. Nothing. Just foam rubber. I tossed the cushion onto the floor and looked inside the bare coffin. Two small scraps of satin were still glued to the floor of the coffin.

And then I saw it. In the upper right corner of the floor of the coffin, where it had been hidden under the glued-down cushion. Printed in black ink:

00320-1953
GAM

I picked up the coffin and hurried toward Maggie's house.

***

Cindi and Maggie were seated at the kitchen table drinking coffee. I showed Maggie the handwritten code on the inside of the empty coffin.

“Did you write this in here?” I asked.

Maggie frowned and shook her head. “No. Definitely not.”

“What is it?” Cindi asked.

I handed her the coffin and turned to Maggie. “You mentioned something about a serial number over the phone,” I said. “You said that that was how you knew it was your coffin.”

Maggie reached for the coffin and turned it upside down. “This is what I was talking about,” she said, pointing to a twelve-digit number stamped on the bottom of the coffin. “The manufacturer stamps a serial number on the bottom of each of the coffins. I always copy it down in my log book next to the name of the pet and the name of the owner. Sometimes I have two burials in the same day. Keeping track of serial numbers is just a precaution, to make sure I don't bury a pet in the wrong hole.”

“What does the code mean?” Cindi asked.

“I don't know what the number stands for,” I answered, “but I'm sure GAM stands for Graham Anderson Marshall.”

There was a knock at the back door. We turned around to see Benny standing there with a newspaper folded under his arm.

“C'mon in,” Maggie called. “The door's open.”

“Hi, gang,” Benny said as he walked in. “I've got something interesting to show you.”

“So have we,” said Cindi. “Maggie got the coffin back.”

“No kidding?”

Maggie explained how the coffin got back to Wagging Tail Estates, and then I showed Benny what I had found inside it.

“Do you recognize the code?” Benny asked.

“No. There's something familiar about the sequence of numbers, but I can't figure it out.”

Benny stared at the numbers, frowning.

“What was your news?” Cindi asked.

Benny looked up and smiled. “Oh, yeah. You guys are going to love this one.” He opened the newspaper and laid it flat on the table. “I was reading the Sunday paper this morning,” he explained, “and I turned to the classifieds. I've been looking for a roll-top desk, and I wanted to see if there were any available. Then I remembered those Canaan messages you found, Rachel. So I turned to the personals.” Benny opened the newspaper, folded it over, and laid it back on the table. “Look what I found.” He pointed.

I bent over him and looked where his finger was pointing. “Well,” I said. “Another one.”

It was another Canaan message:

Canaan 3: Grand-S
1 a.m., Monday

I stared at the message, my thoughts racing. “One a.m. Monday is tonight. After midnight. This is a terrific break.”

“What do you mean?” Maggie asked.

“Don't you see? Tonight the Canaan drop point is down at the Grand subway station.”

“You're not suggesting that we go down there, are you?” Maggie asked.

I looked at each of them. “Someone has to. We have to find out who's behind all this. How do we know they won't try to kill Cindi again? Or one of us? I'm scared of these people, whoever they are. But I'm also scared to go home at night. I can't go on living like that. If we can find out who these Canaan operatives are, follow one of them to his home, we'll finally have enough to go to the police.” I shrugged. “Right now all we have is a lot of weird incidents. We need something more. We need to find the connection.”

We were silent for a while. Benny studied the Canaan personal. Cindi lifted the empty coffin and turned it over. Maggie walked over to the coffeepot for a refill.

“I'm going with Rachel tonight,” Cindi said, looking at me.

Maggie replaced the coffeepot and looked at Benny. “You going too?”

Benny turned to me and, after a pause, grinned. “What the hell? Subway station, one in the morning. You never know. I might meet some nice chicks down there.”

Maggie shook her head. “What kind of shape are you in?” she asked Benny.

He patted his ample belly. “Two hundred and seven pounds of blue twisted steel.”

Maggie stared at me. “You're crazy, Rachel,” she finally said with a sigh. “But if you cowboys are really going to do it, you ought to do it right. This ain't no Sunday school picnic. Two of you ought to follow the guy who gets the package and two more ought to follow the guy who hands him the package. Maybe both of them are just messengers, but the guy who hands over the package is at least one step closer to the source.”

“Are you volunteering?” Benny asked Maggie.

“Well, I got me a Ford pickup parked out front with a tankful of gas. It looks a little beat up, but let me tell you something: You give that baby some gas and she can shit and split.”

Benny and Cindi both broke up with laughter.

“You shouldn't feel you have to do this,” I said to them. “It could be dangerous.”

“Listen, Rachel,” Maggie said, “somebody stole a coffin out of my cemetery. And tried to steal another one. If it's just vandals, well, there isn't much I can do about it. But if it's connected with this Canaan, I got some obligations to my clients and their pets.”

I looked around the table and smiled. “Thanks, guys.”

“We can't go down there unprotected,” Cindi said.

“Well,” I said, “I can go get Ozzie. Maggie has her brother-in-law's German shepherd.”

Benny shook his head. “I don't know. We'd look like a blind circus down there.”

“Hang on,” Maggie said, getting up from her chair. “I got something that packs a little more wallop than a couple of dogs.” She walked out of the kitchen and returned a few minutes later with two handguns and a box of ammunition cradled in her arms. “My Carl collected these things,” she said as she laid them on the kitchen table. “Taught me how to use them too. Any of you ever fired one of these?”

I shook my head.

“I have,” Cindi said.

“You?” Benny asked her.

Cindi nodded. “I own one. Same model as that Smith and Wesson,” she said, pointing to one of Maggie's guns.

Maggie slid it across the table to Cindi. “See how it feels.”