RESORT TO MURDER (21 page)

She was staring at it as she walked closer,
searching for any signs of life, when a dark shape, about the size
and height of a small car, caught her eye to the right, in a
clearing several feet from the road.

Maggie stopped, startled, then puzzled,
trying to identify the shape. It appeared, at first, to be a fallen
tree, lying at about a thirty degree angle to the ground, but with
no sprouting branches. There were two round shapes at its low end,
wheel-like. What was it? She took a few tentative steps toward it,
then suddenly laughed and ran the rest of the way over to it. She
ran a hand over its painted surface and rested a cheek against
it.

A cannon. It was a Civil War cannon. She was
at Antietam.

She turned toward the white building. Dunker
Church. The first stop on the driving tour she had taken this same
day. That meant she wasn't very far from the Visitor's Center. It
must be right there, beyond that cluster of trees up ahead. With
the pay phone out front. She could call for help! Maggie was so
happy she nearly wept. Instead, she limped back to the road and put
her remaining ounce of energy into walking those last few yards to
rescue.

The low-lying Visitor's Center came into
view, and Maggie saw the phone, its gentle light illuminating the
numbered buttons that would connect her to the rest of the world.
She thought she had never seen anything more beautiful. She picked
up her pace, stumbling and staggering by now and finally reached
it, pulled the receiver up to her ear and punched in three numbers:
9-1-1.

"Sheriff's office, please," she said
quietly, her voice husky with exhaustion. When the crisp voice came
on the line, Maggie told her story, condensing it at much as
possible but all the time thinking how wild and fantastic it must
sound. The reaction she got was not disbelief, however, but a
promise of immediate action. Of rescue. She sighed with relief.
"Thank you."

Maggie sagged against the sides of the
telephone enclosure. She closed her eyes, and permitted herself a
moment of rest. It was over. Then she corrected herself.

It was almost over.

***

CHAPTER 21

Tree frogs chirped noisily to each other in
the otherwise silent woods, and the moon cast long, eerie shadows
of the trees around the old barn. Maggie and the sheriff waited
inside the barn, with deputies scattered behind trees and shrubs
beyond, cars hidden and flashlights off. From her description, they
had been able, after a false start or two, to locate the barn, and
if there had been any doubts that they had found the right one, the
presence of the ropes that had so recently bound Maggie erased
them.

Now they hoped to catch her would-be
murderers as they returned to the scene, expecting Maggie to be
docilely waiting, unconscious and tied up. The sheriff had called
his contact at the hotel, and found out that Eric had recently been
seen driving away in a pick-up. A second person was also missing
from the hotel area, as was Maggie's Dodge Shadow. Since Maggie had
not actually seen her second attacker, it was important to let them
both incriminate themselves in front of witnesses.

"Good work, Chuck, Thanks," the sheriff had
said into the phone, and Maggie's eyes had widened.

"Is that Chuck, the waiter? The one who knew
Lori in high school?"

"That's right.” The sheriff set his car
phone down and climbed out of the car with a soft groan. "He's also
my nephew. Studying law enforcement over at the university. I asked
him to help us out by working at the hotel this summer, keeping his
eyes open. We've had our suspicions about things going on at that
place for a while now, but didn't have any hard evidence."

Maggie nodded, hiding her surprise. So the
sheriff had not been as inactive as she thought. And Chuck, who had
been one of her suspects, was the sheriff's nephew! She wondered if
Chuck had been watching her in turn, perhaps suspecting her as she
suspected him?

The sound of a motor came faintly through
the woods, and the tree frogs fell silent. Tension in Maggie and
the other watchers rose as faculties were strained to their limit,
listening, waiting, poised for action. The sheriff had first
insisted that Maggie stay behind, safely in one of the cars, but
she refused.

"I'll stay out of your way," she had
insisted. "But I've come this far, and I must see the finish, to
see if I'm right."

"I have to say, what you told us surprised
me. I was pretty sure about the kid, but had no idea about the
other.” He directed Maggie to the front corner of the barn,
farthest from the door. Someone had slipped a warm jacket over her
shoulders, and Maggie peered through the loose boards, watching and
listening.

Was she right? She had to be. All the pieces
fit, even though she didn't have hard proof yet. But she was sure
the proof would be there, in the newspaper files that she had sent
Joe to look up, in the DNA tests that would be done, but most of
all in the imminent reappearance of her abductors. Lori must have
realized at least some of it, but in her trusting innocence had
laid her head on the block. Maggie shivered and pulled the jacket
more closely around her. Now it would be over, the killings would
stop, the madness would end.

The sound of the motor grew louder, and
gradually a ghostly grey pick-up materialized through the trees as
it bounced toward them on squeaky springs over the rough dirt and
gravel road. It stopped in the small clearing before the barn, and
the motor sputtered to silence. Seconds later Maggie's own dark red
Shadow came up the road and stopped immediately behind the
truck.

The truck's door opened, and Eric Semple
stepped out and stood beside it, looking toward the barn. Maggie
did not breathe. A single frog started to chirp again.

"You coming?" Eric called to the driver of
the car, and for an answer the car's door opened. A large figure
climbed out and stood on the ground next to the small car. Maggie
sucked in her breath as the figure stepped from the shadows and
into the moonlight.

Burnelle Semple had returned with her son to
commit murder. And her intended victim this time was Maggie.

"Where're we gonna push her off?" Eric asked
his mother. He stood by his truck and seemed in no hurry to move
from it.

"Olson's Ridge. There's been plenty of
accidents there before. One more won't arouse suspicion. And
everyone knows she's not used to these mountain roads."

Burnelle's voice carried clearly in the
still night air, and, obviously unaware that other ears beside her
son's were picking it up, she spoke confidently. "She almost
crashed through the guard rails just the other day, you know, and
even conveniently filled out a report on it.” An eerie laugh
followed, and Maggie felt goose bumps rise on her skin. The
exhaustion from her ordeal had long been overrun by adrenalin, and
her breath came quickly as she listened and watched.

"You haul her into her car now," Burnelle
directed her son, "and I'll drive it over to the ridge. You follow
behind.” Eric did not move.

"Can't we just do it here and leave her?”
Eric's voice had taken on a reluctant, whiny tone. "Why take a
chance going to the ridge? Why not...."

"No!” His mother cut him off sharply. "It
has to look like an accident. Lori was a mistake. I acted rashly,
afraid she would start talking to others. And it brought people
poking their noses around. Including her.” She jerked her head
toward the barn. "This time I've planned it right like I did the
first two times, both of us having clear alibis back at the hotel
when people started to notice she was missing.

"I got her car keys from her room as soon as
we got back and moved her car out of sight. They'll think she went
off on her own, got lost and tired, and drove off the ridge in the
dark all by herself. With luck the car will catch fire and burn,
otherwise the crack on her head will look like just one more injury
from the accident."

"I don't know why you couldn't of just let
Lori alone in the first place," Eric continued complaining. "She
was okay. She wasn't hurting nothing."

"She was nosy, asking questions, noticing
too much. She was close to figuring things out that would have
destroyed us. She would have talked to the wrong people, and they
would have taken you from me! All these years, you've been my life.
I couldn't let her do that. I couldn't!"

Maggie could see Burnelle's face, and it had
changed, frighteningly, from the polite, hotel housekeeper she had
known to a wild-eyed fanatic. The pictures of John Brown she and
Holly had recently seen flashed in her mind, his face filled with
righteous fury, eager to do evil for the good he believed would
come from it. The Burnelle Maggie now saw, in her own righteous
fury, would do anything for her perceived good of keeping her son
close to her. The son who she had convinced herself was hers.

"Ma, what're you talking about? So she knew
I was picking up a few things at the hotel. So what? I could have
got her to keep her mouth shut. You didn't have to kill her."

"She knew! From that blood drive. She hadn't
figured it all out, but she would have, with those college books of
hers. And then I would have lost you! After all I went through to
get you, to keep you.” Burnelle's face had become grotesque, her
eyes blazing wildly. "You are mine. We belong together. You know
that. You must know it. Together. Always. Come Eric. Come help me
now, as I have been helping you."

She reached toward Eric with outstretched
arms, but he backed away, his face now filled with confusion,
revulsion. His eyes darted around desperately, as if looking for a
way to escape.

"You can hold it right there!” Sheriff
Burger stepped from the barn, and deputies materialized from the
surrounding woods, guns drawn. At first there was stunned silence,
mother and son frozen in surprise. Then Maggie appeared, coming out
of the barn and moving behind the sheriff into the moonlight.

"No!” The scream, almost a wail, came from
Burnelle, and she rushed at Maggie, hands stretched forward
claw-like. The sheriff reacted instantly, knocking her to the
ground and holding her there, where she writhed and shrieked,
spewing forth hatred and venom. "You meddler! You serpent! Evil
Serpent! Whore of Babylon!"

Maggie jumped back, reacting as if she had
been physically struck, as though the words spouting from this
fearsome, pitiful woman were pointed nails flying at her. She
covered her face, then her ears as it continued, then turned and
took refuge in the barn.

The screaming continued, muffled somewhat by
the closed barn door. Maggie rushed deeper inside, aware at the
same time she fled from it that the barrage wasn't aimed only at
her, but at a world Burnelle must have seen in her own twisted way,
that she had felt always threatened her. It was as sad as it was
terrible. But at least it was over. No more innocent people would
be the victim of her insanity.

Maggie sank down and laid her head on her
knees, finally giving in to her exhaustion. An era of tragic crimes
was over, she thought with relief, Lori's family might be able to
move on now, and – yes, Joe, she thought with a weak smile, -
Maggie would finally come home.

***

CHAPTER 22

Maggie sat on her bed at the hotel, propped
up against several pillows. It was very early morning, the light
just breaking through the grayness of a lingering night. She had
refused the suggestion of going to a hospital, asking only to be
returned to her room, and Charles had summoned the doctor on call
to treat her scrapes and cuts.

"Nothing serious," the doctor assured her,
"but you'll probably be sore for a few days.” He had wrapped a few
bandages around her and given her pills, recommending that she see
her own physician back in Baltimore. "You'll be going there soon?"
he asked before he left.

Maggie dropped her head back against the
pillows. "Yes," she said with a weary but happy smile. "Soon."

Soon! How good it would be to be back in
familiar surroundings, with only those who had always cared about
her and never wished her harm nearby. It seemed like incredible
luxury now, something Maggie had lived with every day before, and
taken for granted, assuming it would always be the same. She
realized now she had come frighteningly close to losing it all.

She thought of her parents. Less than
twenty-four hours ago she had still felt impatient with their
concern, anxious to push it some distance away. Now she knew how
important it was to her, how valuable. Maggie saw the irony that
their healthy parental love had nourished her life, and another's
twisted version of maternal love had tried to end it.

Her thoughts, along with her weariness,
filled her eyes with tears and she gave in to them, finally,
letting them flow unchecked until they came no more and only a
feeling of relief remained. She rested a while, then wiped her face
and mentally shook herself. Then she smiled. "Just don't think this
means I'm moving back home, Mom," she said aloud. "Let's just
consider this a kind of pot hole on my road to independence. It may
have given me a flat tire, but it's totally fixable."

Maggie sat up with a jerk.
My car! My poor car. Where is it, and has
it
survived?

Just then there was a knock on the door.
Dyna opened it and peered around the edge.

"Maggie? Maggie, are you awake?" she
whispered. At Maggie's smiling nod Dyna rushed in and sat on the
edge of the bed, her face anxious and her blond hair a straggling
mess. Maggie saw that one crystal earring was missing.

"Are you okay?" Dyna asked, not waiting for
an answer. "I saw the doctor leaving. I hardly had a chance to talk
to you. I was so worried! You can't imagine what we went through
when we couldn't find you."