Three Sisters (14 page)

Charlie Moon entered the parlor expecting to find his guests sitting in front of a crackling split-pine fire, Gorman Sweetwater nodding off to sleep, Scott Parris entertaining Aunt Daisy and Sarah Frank with highly enhanced tales of his adventures as a Chicago cop. He did not expect them to be on the far side of the room, backs to a dying fire, talking in hushed tones, their entire attention fixed on his dusty television set.

Scott Parris, Daisy, and her cousin Gorman were seated in a small semicircle around the appliance.

Sarah Frank was slipping a thin, shiny disk into the DVD slot to record the latest installment for her collection.

Moon hitched his thumbs under his belt.
What’s this all about?

The girl’s agile fingers danced over the remote control.

A Hungarian basketball game filled the screen. Score 48–46.

Moon grinned at his aunt. “You a big sports fan?”

Sarah glanced over her shoulder. “Cassandra’s coming on in a couple of minutes.”

Daisy snorted. “Charlie don’t watch TV. He listens to the radio. And he
reads books.
”

The alleged scholar defended himself: “I watch television every now and then.”

Parris grinned. “When?”

“Well, sometimes when I go to the barbershop.”
And the TV’s right there in front of me and it’s either watch them soaps and talk shows or close my eyes
. Mostly, he closed his eyes.

Parris cocked his head, made a critical examination of the Ute’s bountiful crop of hair. “Looks to me like you don’t get to the barbershop all that often.”

Moon was about to make an observation that a local chief of police he was acquainted with did not have all that much hair left to cut, when Sarah Frank intervened. “
Cassandra Sees
is a weekly TV show from Granite Creek.”

The Ute nodded. “I’ve heard about that.”

“You ought to remember Cassandra Spencer and her sister Beatrice.” Parris gave Moon the eye, attempted to mentally transmit this addendum:
That night their sister was mauled to death in her bedroom, you threatened to pick both of ’em up and stuff ’em in the back of my unit.

The deputy had not forgotten.
You still owe me for a good ten hours of deputy work. At twelve-fifty per. Which would fill my gas tank.

Unaware of this attempt at nonverbal communication between the best friends, Sarah murmured, “Cassandra is also Astrid Spencer’s sister. Astrid was that poor lady who got killed by the bear.”

Moon thought it best to steer the teenager toward a more suitable subject for discussion. “So tell me—what does Cassandra see?”

“Spooky stuff,” Sarah said.

He pretended to be surprised. “Spooky?”

She clarified: “It could be something that’s happening
right now,
a hundred miles away. Like that truck driver who got shot while he was watching her on TV.”

Moon was well aware of that sensational event.

“Or she might have a vision about a bad car wreck,” Daisy mumbled.

Gorman felt obliged to comment. “Or a house on fire.”

The Granite Creek chief of police had returned his gaze to the television. “Her audience is getting bigger every week. From what I hear, she’s likely to be picked up by one of the big networks. NBC, maybe. Or CBS.” Word does get around.

Sarah was switching through channels. “Cassandra also talks to ghosts.” She found the right spot. “Oh—it’s about to start.” She pressed the Record button, watched the big eye appear. As the orb faded, the girl consoled herself that she would see it several times again before this evening’s program was over. After every commercial break, minuscule details of Cassandra’s pupil, iris, and cornea would be displayed—not to mention eyelashes that looked as large as soda straws, and pores in her skin big enough to throw a brick into. And every time, the huge eye looked right at her.
I wonder how she keeps from blinking?

Moon smiled at the girl.
So Cassandra Spencer talks to ghosts—that explains why Aunt Daisy’s hooked on this program.
Kids always liked spooky stuff, of course, and Gorman would stare at anything on the tube, including a test pattern.
I wonder if they still have those on late at night.
But why was Scott Parris so interested in Cassandra’s weekly extravaganza?
Maybe he likes spooky stuff too.

It was true. Parris liked books with titles like
True Tales of Civil War Ghosts
and
The Haunt of Kettle Mountain.
But there was more to it than that. Quite a lot more.

Aside from Charlie Moon and his guests, there were, of course, many other viewers. According to estimates that would become available an hour after tonight’s show went off the air, seven thousand more than the count for last week’s broadcast. Give or take a couple of hundred.

They watched Cassie’s special guest (all her guests were special) guess eleven out of twelve items that a local Methodist pastor had sealed inside a coffee can. The ten-year-old boy could (so it seemed) clearly sense the presence of everything from a pickup truck ignition key to an 1851 half-dime, but he was unable to discern the presence of a black Brazilian beetle entrapped in amber. None of us is perfect.

Immediately after the half-hour commercial break, Cassandra had a vision wherein she received information from her most reliable source, who went by the moniker White Raven. With a shudder, she reported another drive-by shooting. This one in Denver. The victim was a short-order cook on his way home from work. She provided the name of the café on South Broadway, and the wounded man’s license plate number—which would have been entirely correct had White Raven not substituted a
J
for a
K.
None of us is perfect.

Andrew and Bea

“Well,” Andrew Turner said.

Beatrice arched an exquisitely shaped eyebrow. This was her way of saying quite a number of things, such as: “What are you talking about?” but in this instance: “What do you mean by ‘well’?”

By now an expert on the shades of meanings of his wife’s facial expressions, Mr. Turner explained, “That new spirit must have forgotten to put in an appearance.”

This time she did not bother to exercise the eyebrow. “What are you talking about?”

He clasped the fingers of both hands tightly around a coffee cup. “Your hot tip from Cassie.”

“Oh, you mean about April Something?”

He nodded.

Bea pointed at the quartz clock over the TV, which never lied by more than ten seconds per month. There were six minutes left.

Andrew, who had never liked the uppity clock, gave it a dirty look.

Immune to human ill-will, the 112-year-old mechanism kept right on ticking.

Bea’s pained expression suggested that she was trying to remember something. Then, it seemed to come to her. She smiled at the commercial for a bestselling Mexican beer. “April
Valentine.
I still think it sounds like a dancer’s name.” She turned the smile on Andrew. “Don’t you?”

He shrugged.

“I’m sure Cassie will say something about her.”

Wives are almost always right. Husbands find this trait immensely annoying.

At two minutes before the hour, Cassie looked directly into camera one. “I have, quite recently, been contacted by the spirit of a young woman who died in a most horrible manner. I shall not mention her name at this time—”

“April Valentine,” Bea muttered.

“—but over the next few weeks, I hope to reveal previously unreported information about the nature of her passing.” A sly smile. Behind the smile:
If I can make contact
.

Fade to black.

Final commercial break.

Ratings for tonight’s performance would be up 4 percent from last week.

At fifty-six minutes past 11:00
P.M.
, Cassandra Spencer was alone in her parlor. Wrapped in a black silk Japanese night robe, her small feet clad in matching black silk slippers, she was perched on a cushioned, three-legged stool near the fireplace. Dying pine embers provided a dull orange glow that illuminated her oval face. That ivory mask, framed in the dark locks, seemed to float in the midnight space.

Cassandra desperately wanted to talk to someone. No, the attractive woman was not lonely. She wished to converse with a
very specific
person. A lady who would tell her—But wait. She who Sees also speaks: “April…April Valentine…are you there?”

The heavy silence pressed hard on her chest.

Cassandra inhaled. Exhaled. Breathed in again. She smelled something sweet. Lilac? “I’ve been trying to communicate with you ever since I read the material your mother left with me. But I don’t know enough. If you would provide me with a few details, I believe I could help you.”

She waited.

In the hallway, the brass mechanism in Daddy’s venerable grandfather clock ticked. And tocked.

“I’ve tried every night for weeks. But I cannot see you. I cannot
hear
you.”

Against the windowpane, fat drops of rain.
Plop.

Plop-plop.

“April, if you can hear me—please
say
something.”

April, she say not a word.

Grandfather Chronometer, he say,
Tickety-tock. Tickety tock. Tickety-tock.

Grandmother Rain, she say,
Ploppity-plop. Ploppity plop. Ploppity-plop.

Bearing only a mocking resemblance to the pretty celebrity, the face assumed a severe expression. “Miss Valentine—if you cannot communicate verbally, at least show me some sign that you are present.”

She could barely hear the clock in the hallway.

The rain had ceased.

The psychic clenched her hands, bared her teeth. “Dammit, do
something
—I don’t care what it is!”

Uh-oh.

At precisely one second before midnight, the tall hallway clock, which had, for all these years since Daddy’s death, kept perfect time—began to gong the hour.
Bong… bong… bong…
Count them. Twelve, of course—

BONG!

Make that thirteen.

And the curious display was not yet over. Watch the mantelpiece.

Nothing yet? Patience. Count three more heartbeats…One. Two. Thr—

Aha!

From between the pair of black wax tapers, a silver-framed photo of Cassandra’s dead sister tumbles, strikes the yellow firebricks with a shattering clatter, scatters a dragon puff of wood ash and red-hot ember sparks—the fractured glazing sprays a glittering array of pseudodiamonds onto the psychic’s dark garment. From the hearth, Astrid’s dead face stares at her startled sister. Smiles.

Dramatic, certainly. But a message from Over There? One hesitates to speculate.

Last night, when she had pulled the Columbine blankets and quilts up to her chin, Daisy Perika had been feeling less pessimistic about her prospects. A good night’s sleep might have washed away the conviction that she was of no more use in this world, and the morbid certainty that Death was practically breathing down her neck. Which would have persuaded her to go on living for another year, or even two or three. But the weary woman did not enjoy a restful slumber. On the contrary, the dreamer’s fitful night naps were plagued by a snarling wolf whose long, hairy face peered hungrily from dark, forested places, as if (she would think between these unsettling dreams)
I was little Red Riding Hood all covered with bacon grease and he was pretending to be Granny in her bed, who hadn’t had a square meal in a week. Or like I was a jackrabbit on a spit and he was turning the crank
. During these semiawake interludes, she could not quite make up her mind. And all too soon, she would drift off again, find herself walking the forest path—Mr. Wolf padding along behind.

It was hardly surprising that Daisy, aka Little Red Riding Hood, aka Roasted Jackrabbit Carcass (who had been sleeping under one quilt too many) awakened feeling rather well done. Also in a somber, reflective mood.
I should’ve died years ago, got it over with.

The time had come for making the necessary preparations, and it was better to get the job done while Cousin Gorman Sweetwater was still at the Columbine with his pickup truck. For the serious business she must attend to, Daisy would not think of involving Charlie Moon. Her nephew would smile, insist that she had years and years to live. These assurances would be extremely annoying. Neither would she enlist one of his hired hands to provide transportation to town; those smelly cowboys were nothing but spies for the boss. So it was settled.
Right after breakfast, when Charlie and Sarah have gone out to ride horses, I’ll tell Gorman to take me into Granite Creek. If he asks what do you want to go to town for, I’ll tell him it’s so I can do a little bit of shopping.

Mr. Sweetwater Makes a Delivery

“Drop me off over there.” Daisy Perika pointed with a jut of her chin. “Between that black iron bench and the maple tree.”

As Gorman eased his pickup to the curb, he smirked at a twisting red-and-white spiral mounted beside a shop door. “You gonna get yourself a haircut?”

Daisy was about to say, “Don’t be such a silly jackass,” but that would be like telling an ape not to be ugly. The aged woman opened the truck door and, using her oak staff as a sturdy third leg, cautiously eased her frame onto the sidewalk. “I’m going into the Dollar Store.”
They have nice things there, like white cotton stockings and underwear.

Recalling his late wife’s unhurried manner when shopping (and being of the opinion that all women are cast in more or less the same mold), Gorman frowned at his cousin’s hunched back. “While you go up one aisle and down another, turning every knickknack and doodad over in your hands, what am I supposed to do—sit here and twiddle my thumbs?”

Though sorely tempted to tell him exactly what he could do with
one
of his thumbs, Daisy—who expected to encounter St. Peter before very long—prudently resisted the urge. “I don’t care what you do, as long as you don’t dog along behind me, looking at your pocket watch and mumbling, ‘How much longer is this gonna take?’”

Gorman scratched his skinny neck. “Well, I guess I could drive around Granite Creek some and see the sights.”
I’ll drop in at the Red Owl Cantina, throw back a couple of cold Buds. If Three-Fingers Chico is there, maybe I’ll shoot a few rounds of pool with him…at two bits a game. One of these days, I’m gonna get even with that slicker.
These pleasant thoughts were interrupted by Daisy’s voice.

“You be back here at four o’clock sharp.” For all the good it might do, she added the standard warning: “And I’m not talking Indian time.” Daisy gave the driver a stern look and, as if she had read his so-called mind, added, “Don’t you even think about any beer guzzling or gambling.” Suggesting a Grandma Moses about to part the waters, Daisy raised the wooden staff at her errant cousin. “If you’re not on time and sober, I won’t fill your gas tank like I promised to.” She slammed the pickup door—
bam!

An Unexpected Opportunity

After watching Gorman’s truck disappear down the treelined avenue, Daisy Perika was about to head for the Dollar Store—when a seemingly trivial distraction occurred. The sort that drastically alters the course of a life. In this instance, several lives. What happened was that she glanced across the street, saw a redbrick building at the end of a spacious, well-kept lawn bordered by a meticulously pruned hedge. At the entrance to the grounds, a tasteful sign suspended above a wrought-iron arch advised potential clients of the category of commerce conducted therein.

MARTINEZ & SONS
FUNERAL HOME
AND
COMMUNITY CREMATORY

Entranced by the fateful link between this instance of free-market enterprise and her urgent concerns, Daisy forgot all about burial stockings and underwear. Even red shoes. Oblivious to honking horns, squealing brakes, and shouted oaths, the old woman jaywalked though a jumble of traffic to the opposite sidewalk, trod along the bricked walk, up the concrete porch steps—paused at the door.
This looks like an awfully expensive place.
Doubts assailed her.
What I need is the Dollar Mortuary
. Curiosity trumped doubt.
But as long as I’m here, I might as well go in.
Daisy imagined that when she opened the door, she would be met by a haughty Hispanic. She could already see him. A middle-aged fellow with slicked-back black hair, who would look down his nose at her. Under that nose, just above the curl of his lip, would be a bushy mustache.
If some big-shot Martinez in a pinstripe suit asks, “What do you want?” what’ll I tell him?
To help herself think, the Ute elder clicked her teeth together.
I’ll just say I’m browsing.

She need not have been concerned. Mr. Martinez Sr. (a kindly, big-hearted gentleman) was in Denver, attending the annual convention of the Rocky Mountain Funeral Home Directors. His estimable son Paulo was in the cellar, occupied with a cadaverous matter. The sales manager, a plump, well-done-up brunette with a white rose affixed over her left ear, was occupied in a corner office with prospective customers. Aided by colorful brochures and a slick PowerPoint presentation, she was explaining the Ten Significant Advantages of Funeral Insurance.

With the stealth of a sly coyote creeping into Farmer Martinez’s hen house, Daisy eased her way through the front door, found herself in a small, blue-carpeted atrium furnished with overstuffed chairs and a Tiffany floor lamp that looked to be the real McCoy. Off to her left, Daisy heard a woman’s voice describing various “bereavement plans” to equally unseen persons whom the sales manager referred to as Mr. and Mrs. Murple. A boy’s voice said, “Mom, can I go to the bathroom?” Mom responded, “Not right now, Ronny.” Imagining Ronny squirming, Daisy grinned. Straight ahead were a massive pair of closed oak doors.
That’s probably where they have the funerals.
On her right was a more modest door, this one open just a crack. Peeking in, she saw an array of caskets on display.
That’s just what I need to look at.
Our browser stuck her head inside.
Good—there’s nobody here.

Daisy padded across the plush, cranberry-red carpet, mouth agape, eyes agog. The magnificent caskets displayed on knee-level oak stands included burnished bronzes, gleaming blacks, pale ivories. They had names. Imperial. Hopewell. Shenandoah. And the insides—well, talk about lavish.
Oh my—it almost makes a person want to hurry up and die.
She paused at Sunrise and caught her breath. The pillow was pink satin, which matched the plush, quilted lining. It was smaller than the rest, and closer to the floor.

The shopper reached inside to stroke her fingers across the voluptuous pillow.
That looks so comfortable.
Her gaze darted around the silent room.
Old man Martinez would probably bust a gut if I was to
…Daisy’s wrinkled face produced a wicked little grin.
But what he don’t know won’t hurt him.
She placed her purse on a lamp stand, leaned her oak staff in a corner. It took quite a few grunts and groans for the tribal elder to insert herself into the casket. She scooted this way and that until everything was just so.
Ahhh. That pillow’s soft as peach fuzz.
Caught up in the magic of the moment, the would-be corpse folded her hands across her chest.
And it’s so warm and cozy in here.

No one in her right mind would do such a thing? That is a bit harsh. True, the old woman is not the soul of prudence. But a worthwhile life cannot be lived without some level of risk. It is admitted that our aged adventurer does have a way of creating trouble. On occasion, full-blown Calamity with Red-Hot Spurs On. But, in Daisy’s defense—the disastrous outcome is not always her fault. Not entirely. And in this instance, everything might have turned out quite all right—except for that overhead light. The one up there. Directly above her resting place. The blasted thing was shining in her eyes.

Daisy closed them.
Just for a moment,
she told herself.

Taking pity on Squirming Ronny, the sales manager suggested that Mrs. Murple might wish to escort her son to the gender-neutral facility, and offered detailed verbal directions. Ronald’s mother, who still harbored a childhood fear of cemeteries and funeral parlors, was not eager to leave her husband’s side. At a stern look from Mr. Murple, his wife took their son by the hand and proceeded to go in search of the restroom.

No, do not leap to conclusions. After only a few false turns, mother and son found the his and/or hers toilet. Ronny relieved his bladder and, feeling immeasurably better, rejoined his mom—ready to create some mischief. If she wanted to go
this
way, he would insist on going
that
way.

Now, you may leap, jump, rush, et cetera.

Right. They ended up in the display room.

“Oh,” Mrs. Murple whispered, her hand moving to her throat, “it’s full of
coffins.
”

Ronny might have been at Disneyland. “Yeah. Ain’t it neat!” The range of morbid possibilities boggled his little mind.
I wonder if there’s any dead people in ’em.

Mrs. Murple was looking for the nearest exit.
Should we go back the way we came—or
…She could not remember by which door they had entered, and was suddenly gripped with a cold horror that
one
of these portals might be the entrance into a cold, gray space with a chemical smell and row upon row of granite slabs, each with a nude corpse sprouting tubes of greenish fluid that was being pumped into cold, rubbery veins.

“Hey, Mom.” Ronny was halfway across the room. “Come look at this one.”

Long experience made her suspicious of the offspring. “Why should I?”

She was startled by his frank reply: “Because it’s got a dead person in it.”

He is such a mischievous little boy.
“You should not take me for a fool, Ronny.” She presented a thin, superior smile. “And you should not lie to your mother.”

“I’m not lyin’—honest!”

When I get close, he’ll yell “Boo!” and grab my arm and I’ll scream and then he’ll laugh. Well, I’ll not play his childish little game.
But curiosity overwhelmed her. Like a small child in footie pajamas approaching a dark closet where the hideous night monster is concealed—waiting to pounce—Mrs. Murple came closer. (It may help to know that she did so in mincing little steps.)

And then—she saw it.

Her hand, knowing what to do in situations like this, covered her mouth. The hoarse whisper slipped out between her fingers: “Oh my
goodness
!”

“See—I told you.” The boy’s manner could only be described as smug.

Momma continued to whisper: “What a dreadful thing—leaving the remains in plain view.” Her narrow face hardened. “We shall certainly not do any business with an establishment which follows such shoddy practices.”
Wait…did I see it breathe?
Recalling horrid tales of unfortunates who, though merely unconscious, were diagnosed as completely 100 percent deceased and taken to the embalming room to be pumped full of noxious preservative liquids, she leaned closer to the wrinkled “corpse.”

It might have been the Murple’s mutterings and whisperings, or perhaps some unconscious sense of the nearness of another human being. Or perhaps her brief nap in the comfortable coffin had simply run its course. But it was none of these. It was the hungry wolf in her blood-chilling dream, chasing the Ute elder through a dark forest, fairly nipping at her heels! In a desperate effort to escape, Daisy was rapidly surfacing from the depths of the nightmare.

Ronny’s mother murmured to herself, “No, the poor old thing isn’t breathing. It must have been my imagination. I suppose we should just leave her be and go tell—”