Harvest of Bones (33 page)

Colm thanked him, but he couldn’t see the point of chasing down every carburetor or clutch. He didn’t know why he’d come really, just an impulse. Jimmy hadn’t been at the Flint farm at all, it turned out; it was his son who’d hauled up the truck. “Howie,” he hollered down the hill, where a middle-aged man was hunkering over a rusted Plymouth, “C’mon up here. Fellow wants to know about the Bagshaw truck. You know—back when? Howie, he got a better memory’n me,” he explained to Colm.

But Howie, a replica of his dad but some twenty years younger, in a misshapen tweed hat, was no more help than his father. Sure, he’d hauled it up—”a back buster,” he remembered. “Nuthin’ in it,” he said when Colm questioned him. “Well, not much—coupla old tools. I recall a wrench, jack, you know, all that kinda stuff. We sold ’em, right. Dad? Police said we could have ’em, right?”

“We wasn’t doin’ nothin’ wrong,” Jimmy said loudly, sticking a bit of chewing tobacco under his tongue. “Nothin’ worth nothin’, you can bet. Denby didn’t have no money—though it were a new truck. That struck me as odd, a brand-new truck. Least was afore he run it in the creek. ‘Now where’n hell,’ I says to Howie, ‘Denby Bagshaw got the money for a brand-new truck?’“

Colm was running late; he had land to show a customer. He thanked the pair, admired Howie’s hat—looked like real Irish tweed. Howie doffed it, then remembered something. “Sure, it came outta that truck, but it weren’t Bagshaw’s. I woulda give it to Alwyn, it had been. Got some other name in it. Someone I never heard of. Figure Denby stole it.” He held it out, looking put-out, as if he’d been accused himself of stealing the hat.

Colm looked in the band, yellow from years of sweat. The letters were faint, in gray thread, but still legible. It was a single name.
Crowningshield.

He promised to return it. Afterward, that is, after the hearing, after the trial, he thought, his imagination leaping ahead of him as he ran to the Horizon.

“You could use a new door there,” Jimmy called out after him, but Colm was already headed for the police station.

Chapter Twenty

Emily was waiting with Gandalf on the covered front porch of the Healing House. She’d had her fill of water, but the smell of incense inside was too much for her; she preferred the aroma of hay and wildflowers. Hartley was getting her massage; she’d made an appointment for Emily, too, for the following week—Emily wasn’t too sure about that, though. Alwyn Bagshaw was in the county lockup, so he couldn’t poison anyone else now. She wondered if she really should include his story in her history project. And then she decided, Why not? No one else in the class would have such a dramatic story to tell. Murder? Well, the next thing to it, anyway. Secretly, she thought
he
might have killed his brother, Denby. She liked that grumpy old Mac; she didn’t want
him
convicted.

Gandalf seemed uneasy; he jumped at the slightest sound. He whimpered now when a car pulled up in front. A man got out, followed by a woman wearing a red plaid suit. The man, she saw, was Kevin Crowningshield. He recognized her; she gave him a stiff nod in return. She’d seen him with her mother, and she didn’t like that.

 She was hoping her father would stay when he came back; she wanted them all together, wanted her family back. Most of her friends had fathers! Though Wilder’s father was never home. She smiled, thinking of Wilder at the football game. He’d asked her to a movie that weekend, and she’d put him off. So he’d broken up with Diamond Nose? She wasn’t going to be that easy to get.

“Hello there,” Kevin Crowningshield said, smiling, like he was already intimate with her, with her mother. He was dressed to the nines: regimental necktie, dark blue suit with wide lapels, and those shiny black shoes. He looked like an undertaker. That hair, slicked back—looked darker than usual. But you could pack a pair of shoes in the bags under his eyes, swing on the lines in his face. She said, “Hi,” and, reluctantly, followed him and the woman back inside. She was worried about Hartley, for one thing. The girl was lying on her stomach, naked, except for her hipster underpants, on the low massage table. Isis was seated at her side, passing her hands over the girl’s back—energy work, Emily guessed. It was as though the woman’s shoulders and arms had grown an extra foot. All that smelly incense, and soft music on the tape recorder— Emily wouldn’t want that.

She didn’t know who the woman with Kevin was. Lawyer? Realtor? Trying to force the women out, close up the place? She’d heard her mother talking to Colm Hanna. The place might not be Emily’s cup of tea, but she liked Isis, and she liked some of the women here. Mostly, she didn’t like people who tried to interfere with other people’s lives. One of her ancestors had fought in the Battle of Bennington, when Vermont called itself a Republic. And Emily was a Vermonter.

She felt a sudden wave of sympathy for old Bagshaw. And now he was in prison. Everybody trying to control him. Of course, he’d grabbed Glenna, but he was confused. Maybe he had a brain tumor. All that pressure. She’d heard of things like that. She’d make a case for him in her essay.

Isis had a sheet now over Hartley; she was working on one foot that stuck out of the sheet. Emily could hear Hartley humming to the music. Isis was poking and rubbing and stroking; Emily could see the muscles bulge in her arms. “You know how to relax,” Isis told Hartley, “that’s good. That helps me. Helps you to get the most out of a massage.”

“Ma’am,” said the plaid-suited woman, poking a snub nose in the doorway. “We called. There was no answer. So we just came. I’m Mr. Crowningshield’s attorney, Karen Close. We have a writ to serve on you. We’re giving you ten days to close up here. Mr. Crowningshield has a party interested in buying. They’ll want to move in.”

Isis went on rubbing and stroking; Hartley went on humming. “I think she’s busy,” Emily told the intruders, and Mr. Crowningshield gave her a superior smile. “I think we’ll let
her
answer,” he said.

“I’ll be with you when I’m done,” Isis shouted. “I’ve a client here.”

Kevin laughed. “That child?”

Hartley sat up, clutching the sheet to her breast. “I’m not a child, Mr. Crowningshield. I’m eighteen—almost. I’m a paying customer.”

“Of course,” said Kevin. “We’ll wait, then.” He nodded at the attorney. So-o condescending, Emily thought.

He and the woman brushed past Emily, like she wasn’t even there. Planted themselves down on a bench, spoke in hushed, urgent tones. Emily went into the kitchen, where two giant piles of greens sat in sieves, one of the women washing them. A tiger cat squatted on top of the refrigerator, washing its face—she’d seen it at Bagshaw’s. “Oh, are those—I mean, you’re not supposed to eat those greens, are you?”

“Oh, no,” the woman said, indicating the left-hand pile, “these are fresh, bought at the local co-op.”

“Could I have a few on a plate?” Emily had an idea. Just a joke, of course.

“Well, take these, dear. Not those,” she said, pointing to the larger pile. “Those are from the poisoned garden, you know, where he buried the bird remains. We’re digging them all up so no one else—human or animal—will eat them.”

“Like my brother’s hawk,” Emily said, and explained about the poisoned birds. She dished up a few of the co-op greens, then went out and offered the plate to Kevin Crowningshield and the lawyer. Kevin was concentrating on something the lawyer was saying; he took a small piece and put it in his mouth. The woman, who had followed Emily into the hall to see what she was up to, glanced at him, then shrieked, “Don’t eat that. It could be poisoned!”

He blanched, while Emily giggled and ran back in the kitchen. A second later, Crowningshield stormed in, dumped the plate in the sink. “Oh, those were from the co-op,” the woman said above Kevin’s noise. “You’re not poisoned, mister.”

“It was just a joke,” said Emily.

But he didn’t think so. “You goddamn women,” he hollered, his face churning like a washing machine. “Killing my wife, keeping her locked up here, brainwashing her ...” He was out of control now, his words incoherent.

He was suddenly caught. Isis was behind him, in her wheelchair, her strong blue-knuckled hands on his elbows. She made him face her. “I have a copy of a will here,” she said, “sent by Angie’s stepmother. You and your lawyer friend might be interested in reading it.” She thrust it at the lawyer, who was standing, hands on her plaid hips, in the kitchen doorway. “Angie owned this place. At her death, it reverted to the stepmother in California. Angie wanted it kept as a healing center. To help other abused women, the way we helped her.”

And when Crowningshield interrupted, Isis said, “You might want to read her diary, too. It would break your heart—if you still have one.” She rammed the man toward a chair with her wheelchair, tossed a small blue notebook at him. Emily was almost sorry for him. He was holding the notebook close to his crumpled face, trying to read it, his eyes blinking a hundred times a minute. It made her ankles wobble. She’d seen Wilder crying once, when his brother was involved in an assault on an old farmer. She’d felt so badly for Wilder then, she’d let him cry it out in her arms. She’d wanted to smash in his brother’s head for doing that.

But there was no time for feeling sorry, because there was a sudden commotion outside, a car door slamming, a pair of policemen running up to the door. Hartley came out, pulling down her Ben & Jerry’s T-shirt. “What’s going on here?” she said, her green eyes shining.

“Wait and see,” said Emily, and flattened herself against the wall. Her heart was jumping, her palms sweating. Something important was happening here and she was in the middle of it. The lawyer was standing between Crowningshield and a policeman, shouting, gesticulating; another policeman pulled her away, grabbed the man’s arms, and snapped on a pair of handcuffs. It was like on
Murder, She Wrote.
Emily watched the reruns—only this was for real. She was breathless with it all.

“You can’t do this. You can’t arrest this man,” the lawyer was screaming. “What has my client done?” The policeman mumbled something about “new evidence,” said she could come along to headquarters if she wanted, that Mr. Crowningshield would probably need her. And before Emily could catch her breath or blow her runny nose, they were gone, careening up the rainy street, the lawyer’s red car racing after.

“Boy, will Fay be pissed,” said Hartley, grasping Emily’s arm for balance while she leaned down to tie her purple sneaker laces. “She’s lost her only boarder.”

* * * *

Kevin had said he wanted Ruth to hear before anyone else did. He’d had the lawyer call her, rout her out of the barn. So here Ruth was at police headquarters, though she felt uncomfortable, out of place, disoriented even. But she’d be there, for Kevin, who had broken down after the repeated questions, confessed to Denby’s killing—or “half a killing,” as he put it, saying Denby was already “half-gone” when he got there.

“But alive,” Colm prompted, “in need of a doctor.” Though Ruth wanted it to be a matter of self-defense, didn’t she? She wanted Kevin to be absolved, to leave Branbury with impunity, go back to Chicago in peace, to bury his wife.

But she didn’t really know what to think; she felt swept away into a limbo, bereft of judgment. She looked at Colm, but his eyes were fixed on Kevin. Colm had gone and ferreted out that letter from Emma, the letter that helped to prove Kevin was being blackmailed; it established motive. She had to admit that Colm had been right to pursue the man— if right was always right and not sometimes wrong.

“Alive,” Kevin admitted, with a piteous glance at Ruth. “He was just coming to. He recognized me. I guess I wanted that. I wanted him to know I knew he was the one blackmailing me—he’d followed me and Emma once when we... Well, I wanted him to see me before I—before I struck him. I was half-crazy. I’d been looking for him anyway. When I saw his truck parked at the Flint farm—a brand-new truck he’d bought with my money—I knew it was the time to finish what we’d started at the Alibi. Get him off my back; I wasn’t going to hand over any more money. I wasn’t making so much then, and I wanted to get married. But then . . .” His eyes sought Ruth’s, but she found herself looking away.

They all waited. Chief Fallon sat in his chair, tapping his fingers on the interview table. Colm was looking at his folded hands. Ruth sank down in a chair, her legs giving way. Kevin was gazing at her still with those sad brown eyes.

“Then I saw him—that fellow, Glenna Flint’s husband. He was coming out of the barn, running. I pulled over into the grass. A minute later, I saw Glenna riding off on her mare. MacInnis didn’t even go in the house; he just left in a taxi— must have called it earlier, I think the only car—a pickup— was Glenna’s. But Denby’s truck was still in the drive. So I got out.”

He pulled out a large linen handkerchief, blew his nose, and stuffed it back into his pocket. He was dressed for something other than this sort of confrontation, Ruth saw, right down to the regimental tie, the blue suit, those shoes—unfit for the Vermont climate. She saw how scuffed and stained Colm’s loafers were, as if he’d been exploring some client’s septic system, or wandering around a junkyard....

“I surmised what had happened,” Kevin went on. “A blow on the head. Mac had done it, I thought. Or maybe even Glenna—you know what a womanizer Denby Bagshaw was. And both of them taking off, leaving Bagshaw for dead. Only he wasn’t dead; he was coming to, as I said. Groaning, you know. He looked so...ugly lying there, crumpled against the side of the barn. So ... subhuman. That’s the way he struck me. Subhuman. Even half-dead, he threatened to tell Angie about me and Emma. If she’d known about Emma, you see, she’d never have ...”

He looked searchingly at Ruth; he was motionless, on the point of collapse, like an unwound doll. Ruth heard the creak of Roy Fallon’s chair, the rumble of the tape recorder. She hardly breathed where she sat, motionless herself, at the other end of the table—trying to sort out her feelings, her sympathies. But her hands lay numb in her lap.

They waited. And waited. Finally, Colm spoke. Colm was anxious. Ruth could see that. He kept stealing little glances at her, his nails digging into the palms of his hands. He wanted the final confession out of the man. “Then what? Get it all out, man. Then what? Tell us and they’ll go easier on you.”