The Sense of Reckoning (4 page)

Not trusting herself to talk, Ann made a dismissive shooing motion.

“But your dog—I was really sorry to hear about that. I remember how much you loved Kali. I know this dog must have meant just as much to you. What was his name—Beau?”

She nodded as tears threatened to spill over.

He gazed at her for a moment. “Are you okay?”

She nodded again.

“Well, I better go. All the best to you, Ann. Give my best to Mike and Scott, too.” He stepped forward again and gave her another quick hug, then turned and walked back to the pickup. He walked quickly, like a man with good news that he was excited to share.

Ann watched him go and in a moment Mike was by her side. “Did that go alright?”

Ann nodded and searched in her pockets for a tissue as the tears finally fell. “Yes. He believed me.”

Mike put his hand on her shoulder. “Of course he did, Ann. He’d be a fool not to.”

*****

They continued on as originally planned to Longwood Gardens. Mike went to the conservatory to see the latest display. He enjoyed the symmetry of the building and the plantings, and had confided to Ann and Scott his secret desire to sneak into the conservatory after hours and lie on the luxuriant, and off-limits, lawns around which the displays were arranged.

Ann begged off the conservatory and headed instead to the Meadow Garden, where she knew from experience that she could walk the perimeters of its eighty-six acres and never have to see a soul—living or dead.

Chapter 6

On Friday, Joe Booth, the Philadelphia detective who had been in charge of the Firth case, drove out from Philadelphia to West Chester for dinner. After Joe had exhausted the more traditional means of investigation, it had been at his invitation that Ann got involved in the case.

Joe arrived on the doorstep with a bouquet of flowers for Ann and a bottle of wine for Mike and Scott, looking uncomfortable in a snug sport coat, which he removed as soon as he saw that everyone else was dressed casually. Joe was a big man, a previously athletic physique softening a bit in middle age. He was in his mid-forties but looked older, due in part to the premature graying of his pale blond hair.

Mike had made rack of lamb, roasted potatoes, and asparagus, and opened a couple of bottles of Palmaz Cabernet Sauvignon. Now, they were all pushed back from the dining room table, too full and comfortable to move into the living room. Even Ann, relaxed by the wine and the company, was eating everything Mike served her.

She was just finishing up her last asparagus spear as Mike and Joe talked sports when she glanced over Mike’s shoulder and said, “Hey, it’s Scooter!”

The three men turned to look.
 

“What?” said Joe.

“Where?” said Scott.

“Our cat, Scooter,” said Mike.

“You have a cat?” asked Joe. “I’m usually allergic—”

“Scooter’s deceased,” said Scott. “Where did he go?” he asked Ann.

“He just crossed the hall, but he was very clear. I could even see the white tuft on his chest.”

“He was always just a gray fuzzy spot before,” said Scott to Joe.

“First Sylvia, now Scooter,” said Mike.

“Who’s Sylvia?” asked Joe, trying to catch up.

Mike looked to Ann. “Can I tell?” After a nod from Ann, he recounted the story of Dan and Amita’s dead daughter.

Joe looked at Ann. “That’s pretty impressive.”

She shrugged, embarrassed. “Now if I can just find a way to do something more productive than upsetting grieving mothers and locating dead household pets ...”

“A.—” Mike began.

Ann stood up. “I made chocolate chip cookies for dessert.”

“I can get them,” said Scott, popping up, but Ann returned him to his chair with a push on the shoulder.

“You guys have been spoiling me all week—I need to start acting like a grown up sometime,” she said, and disappeared into the kitchen.

“So, it sounds like her skills are developing,” said Joe to Mike.

Mike glanced toward the door to the kitchen. “Yes. I was hoping she’d be excited about it, but it doesn’t seem like it’s making her any less conflicted about her abilities. I’ll admit that the little girl’s mother was initially upset, but Ann doesn’t mention that the father was pretty happy she’d sensed his daughter’s spirit.”

“And I’m always happy to get an update on Scooter,” added Scott.

“If she’s really starting to be able to see dead people in detail, there’s a lot of good she could do,” said Joe. “And not just in criminal investigations. There was a plane crash in Lancaster a couple of weeks ago—no one knows what happened, the pilot and passengers died. If Ann could go to the site, maybe check things out—”

Joe’s sentence was cut short by a muffled cry from the kitchen, a crash, and an unmuffled, “Damn it!”

The three men rushed to the kitchen to find Ann standing at the sink running water on her hand. On the floor lay an upended tray, a scattering of broken ceramic, and a pile of sodden cookies in a large puddle of steaming coffee.

“What happened?” asked Mike.

“I got one of those damn pains in my hand right when I picked up the tray, and when I dropped it, the coffee spilled on my hand!”

“Let’s see,” said Scott.

Ann held her hand out to Scott.

He took it gently and turned it back and forth, examining the damage.
“Ouch. And on the same hand you stabbed,” he tutted. “You keep running cool water on it.” He put his finger under the stream of water. “Good heavens, not that cold, you don’t want frostbite.” He adjusted the temperature and moved her hand back under the water. Meanwhile, Mike was swabbing mug shards, cookie fragments, and coffee into a dustpan and dumping the mess into the trash can.
 

“Sorry about that, you guys,” said Ann bleakly.

“It’s okay,” said Mike. “You’ve been having pains in your hands?”

Ann shut off the water, grabbed a dish towel, and flopped down on a kitchen chair. “Yeah, for the last couple of weeks. It’s like getting a charley horse in my hand, and it always seems to hit at the worst time and I end up hurting myself.”

“Is that what happened there?” asked Joe, nodding to her still-bandaged finger.

“No, that didn’t hurt until I impaled myself on a knife when I was unloading the dishwasher. That happened right after I cut my hand on a broken glass. But a couple of days before that, I got one of those hand cramps when I was splitting logs and I almost chopped my foot off.” She thought for a moment. “And before that, I tripped on the porch steps and tried to grab the railing but my hand cramped up and I missed it and fell.”

“Is this unusual, hurting yourself this much?” asked Joe.

“Yes, of course it’s unusual,” said Ann irritably, “otherwise I would have put myself in the hospital by now.”

Joe looked thoughtful.

“Why do you ask?”

“Because I knew someone who hurt his hands a lot, although in his case it was intentional—self-inflicted injuries.”

“Sounds screwed up,” said Ann. “Who was that?”

“Biden Firth.”

*****

They retired to the living room with a plate of store-bought cookies and a fresh pot of coffee.

Joe said, “I remember when I was interviewing him and asked him about the conditions of his wife’s will, he got upset and did something to his hand with a pen or pencil. And at the autopsy, they found evidence of injuries to his hands and nails, likely self-inflicted.”

Ann said suddenly, “You know, I remember something like that. When I was alone with him in the shore house, I remember him playing with a letter opener, pushing the point into his hand ...”

“So what are you thinking—that Ann somehow picked up this habit from Firth?” Mike asked Joe. “I don’t think Ann would be intentionally hurting herself,” he added, a little defensive.

Joe took a drink of his coffee. “I’m not sure what I’m thinking. It just struck me as odd when Ann mentioned all the times she’s hurt her hands since Firth died, especially if it wasn’t happening before.” Joe looked questioningly toward Ann, who shook her head. “Maybe he sort of, I don’t know, hexed your hand?” he ended feebly.

“Hexed it?” said Mike, his eyebrows raised. “Now what do we have to do—kill a chicken to cure it?”

“I think the chicken-killing thing is voodoo,” said Scott.

Ann ran the fingers of her unburned hand through her hair. “I could buy that Biden Firth might be behind the injuries I got at the cabin—after all, that’s where he died—but they’re happening here too. Plus, Garrick checked the cabin when I was in the hospital and he said Biden’s spirit wasn’t there.”

“Let’s keep our minds open to the possibility that the great Garrick Masser might not always be right,” said Mike.

Ann ignored his tone. “But Garrick was there so soon after Biden died, I think he would have picked up something if there had been anything to pick up.”

Joe shrugged. “It was just a passing thought. You guys are the experts.”

After some more speculation about possible causes of Ann’s recent run of manual misfortune, and her assurance that she would finish the painting for Joe as soon as her hands were healed, Joe excused himself for the evening. After seeing Joe out, the three of them returned to the kitchen. Mike and Scott cleaned up while Ann sat at the table, her burned hand agitating for attention, in a state of forced inactivity she found increasingly irritating.

“I think it’s worth considering that Firth may have caught up with you at your cabin,” said Mike. “It’s certainly the kind of situation that could lead to a spirit staying at a location—a violent death, motive for revenge ...”

Scott shuddered. “You need to get out of there, sweetie, and not just for a long weekend. You should stay here with us for a while.”
 

Mike nodded his agreement.

“You’re both sweethearts,” said Ann, smiling wanly. “I’ll think it over.”

“Except you have to stop taking Mike out to eat every day, or he’ll get fat,” Scott said, and poked Mike in the stomach.

Ann levered herself out of the chair, feeling old and creaky. “Do you guys have some aspirin in the downstairs bathroom?” she asked, starting down the hall to the powder room.

“Want a shot of Scotch to knock that back with?” called Mike after her.

“Ha ha, very funny,” replied Ann as she sorted through the contents of the medicine cabinet.

She came back to the kitchen with a bottle of aspirin, which Scott opened for her. Swallowing them with a gulp of wine, she said, “You know, there is a common thread among all these times my hand has hurt.”

“What’s that, sweetie?” asked Scott, drying a platter.

“I had just sensed something.”

“Did you sense Firth at your cabin?” asked Mike.

“No, I had just seen Beau.”

“You’ve seen Beau?” asked Scott, putting down the platter. “That’s wonderful! So you have company at the cabin after all!”

“Well, no ... He’s taken up with someone else.”

“Who’s that?” asked Mike.

“An old woman. Very old. And from very long ago, I think.”

“Well, that’s ...” Scott said as he tried and failed to think of a positive spin to put on this.

Ann continued, “I had seen Beau—and sometimes Beau and the old woman—right around the time I had the pains in my hand. And tonight I had just seen Scooter. Maybe this is my new reaction to sensing—it used to be nausea, now it’s hand cramps.”

“That seems a little ...” Mike began, then stopped.

“A little what?” asked Ann sharply.

Mike considered. “Seeing past pets doesn’t seem like it would trigger such a dramatic reaction. Plus,” he said, perking up, “you didn’t have any pain when you saw Dan and Amita’s daughter, did you?”

“No,” retorted Ann, “but when I saw her, I didn’t realize she was dead.”

Scott put his hands up. “Kids, kids. It seems like there are lots of possible explanations for what’s happening, including just a straightforward, old-fashioned physical explanation. Maybe we should ask a hand specialist to check it out.”

“But you said that sometimes when you hurt yourself it wasn’t because you got a pain in your hand—like when you stabbed yourself when you were unloading the dishwasher. Maybe you’re just being klutzy,” said Mike.

“Gee, thanks,” said Ann. She sighed and finished up the last of her wine, then gave herself a small top-off from the almost-empty bottle of cab. “I’m turning in.”

Ann retired to the bedroom that was reserved for her visits, made snug with quilts, a set of first-edition N. C. Wyeth-illustrated children’s books, and an antique rocker Scott had recently found in Adamstown. She paged through
Treasure Island
for a few minutes, then tossed it aside, got out her phone, and dialed Garrick Masser.

After a few rings, Ann heard the mechanical click of a landline phone being picked up. “Yes,” came the sepulchral greeting.

“Garrick, it’s Ann.”

“The celebrated Miss Kinnear,” said Garrick testily. Ann guessed he was a little put off by the publicity she had gotten as a result of the Firth case. “How may I help you?”