Oliver Crum and the Briarwood Witch

by Chris Cooper

  “That’s because there’s nowhere to spend the night,” Anna replied. “The tavern is the town’s only inn, and it’s only got a few rooms. The council’s had a few proposals from hotel franchises, but they felt a hotel would be out of place and inauthentic. So visitors either go home or stay in the neighboring town. Such a wasted opportunity. Everyone from Christchurch, on the other hand, celebrates at the tavern.”

  The Horseman’s ceiling was low. The lights were dim, and dark wood paneling accented the cozy interior. A roaring fire fought off the crisp evening air.

  The trio sat at a booth off to the right of the bar. The place had a social buzz about it—an energy that carried over from the festival. Oliver squeezed his way to the bar to order a beer for himself and Anna and a glass of honey wine for Izzy.

  “Good to see you again,” said someone from the stool next to him.

  Oliver had been so busy trying to grab the bartender’s attention that he hadn’t noticed Martin sitting next to him on a barstool. “Good to see you too,” he replied.

  “Oliver, this is my friend Harry,” he said, gesturing to the man on the stool next to him. “He runs the local music shop. Keeps all our little ones supplied with instruments.”

  “Good to meet you,” Harry said, giving Oliver a nod.

  “What can I get for ya?” the bartender asked loudly in Oliver’s ear, catching him by surprise.

  Oliver turned and ordered.

  “How long will you be in town for?” Harry asked.

  “Not sure yet,” Oliver replied. “Still have some things to figure out back home.”

  “Well, all of the guys get together to play cards here on Wednesdays. You ought to come join us sometime.”

  “I’d love to.”

  That was the second time that day Oliver had been caught off guard by genuine hospitality, and he’d resolved to say yes to any opportunities to get to know the townspeople. His first experience at the town hall had been so jarring that he’d been quick to judge them, but perhaps Madeline wasn’t representative of the people in Christchurch after all.

  “It was nice to meet you, Harry,” he said. He paid his tab and returned to the booth.

  Izzy had ranted about the town being full of cookie-cutter automatons, but Oliver noticed that even she was making small talk with a group of men as they passed her booth.

  Oliver set the drinks on the table and slid into the booth next to Izzy.

  “Just met Harry. Seems like a pretty friendly guy. Invited me to play cards,” Oliver said.

  “His wife is one of the Elders, you know. Could be using you to try to get to me,” Izzy said, taking a sip of the deep-amber wine. “Just be careful.”

  “I don’t know if conspiratorial relationship building is a part of the Elder agenda. Seems a bit far-fetched,” he replied.

  “Oh, you laugh now, but you won’t be laughing when they pass some kind of special tax on muffins that drives us out of business. You’re going to have to let me and Pan come live with you in the city,” she said. “And be forewarned—Pan snores.”

  Living on the edge of social acceptance had apparently led Izzy to develop a few wild beliefs. She also believed the moon landing had been faked and the town was secretly poisoning her bees.

  “Just look at them,” she added, nodding her head toward the back corner of the tavern.

  Madeline sat in the center seat of a circular booth, surrounded by other Elders. Everyone had ordered glasses of red wine, which sat in oddly perfect symmetry on the wooden table. The light from the fire flashed off the group’s matching pewter lapel pins.

  “Automatons.”

  Izzy’s paranoid aura died down by the third glass of wine, and she and Anna got lost in a discussion about updates to the bakery menu.

  After several minutes of listening to their conversation, Oliver caught himself dozing off. He looked at the three empty pint glasses on the table in front of him and realized someone would have to carry him home if he stayed much longer.

  “And where do you think you’re going?” Izzy asked as Oliver stood to leave.

  “Going to stop by the bakery and grab some stuff for breakfast,” he said. Amid all the work leading up to the festival, he’d neglected to stop by the market, and the cupboards were bare at home.

  “Be careful. We’ll be home in a bit,” Izzy said.

  The square was dark and had already been picked clean of litter. Striped booth canvases and tent poles lay neatly stacked at the square’s perimeter, where they would be hauled away in the morning.

  Oliver crossed the square, wobbling from a combination of beer and exhaustion. He saluted the founder statue as he passed and chuckled.

  He decided to take the alleyway to the back of the bakery. A single floodlight lit the narrow path. As Oliver entered the alley, he noticed a crumpled form on the ground ahead of him, illuminated by the overhead light. At first, he thought the shape was a bag of trash, but upon closer inspection, the object came into focus. A person was lying limp in the damp walkway.

  The warm glow of the alcohol was gone in an instant, with the hunched body delivering an effective dose of sobriety. “It” was a “she,” and the woman was oddly positioned, sitting up, with both legs out and head slumped over in her lap.

  “Are you all right?” he asked, kneeling down next to her. He placed a hand on her shoulder. When she didn’t respond, panic set in. He brushed his index finger against her cheek. Still warm. “I’m going to lay you back, okay?” He had no idea if she could hear him. A gentle tug on her shoulders caused the woman to fall backward, upsetting the delicate balance that had allowed her to sit in such an awkward position.

  Her eyes were wide open and unflinching. Oliver had seen people with cataracts before, but her eyes were completely gray, like glass that had been fogged over. Her mouth hung slack-jawed at an odd angle. Her jaw’s been dislocated. The realization made him nauseous. She stared at the dark sky above, no sign of life left in her body. He turned toward the pub and ran, nearly tripping over his own feet.

  The door to the tavern burst open with such force that it caused the entire room to stop midsentence and turn toward Oliver.

  “There’s a body. I think she’s dead! Help!” he said, panting from the mix of fright, overexertion, and alcohol. Gasps came from the onlookers, and several jumped up from their seats to follow him back to the scene. Most sat, frozen in shock, but Izzy and Anna hopped to their feet and ran to him.

  He led the group of pubgoers across the square and into the alley.

  “She’s over here.” He gestured as he sprinted to where the woman’s body lay splayed on the ground.

  As he looked down at the body, he noticed something he hadn’t before—a lapel pin. Although her face had been deformed, he realized the woman on the ground had been the unfortunate victim of his bread attack earlier that day. He stumbled backward against the wall and retched.

  Joy gave way to terror as the rest of the revelers from the tavern poured out onto the street. Oliver sat back against the wall, staring at the scene in front of him. Anna knelt down next to him, not daring to look at the body.

  Martin had been one of the first to arrive and approached the woman. “Oh, Jesus,” he muttered under his breath as Harry approached from behind. Martin turned and blocked Harry’s view.

  “Harry,” he said, gripping the man’s shoulder to keep him from going any farther. His voice trembled.

  “What is it?” Harry asked.

  “It’s… it’s Francis.” He stared down at Harry’s Oxfords as he delivered the news.

  “What, is she okay?”

  Harry tried to push him aside, but Martin sidestepped in front of him. Harry had a good foot in height on Martin, but Martin seemed determined to keep Harry from seeing his wife’s disfigured face. The image was burned into Oliver’s mind, and he was happy that Martin was attempting to spare Harry the mental anguish.

  A crowd had gathered at the mouth of the alleyway, watching the scuffle between t
he two men.

  “Move out of my way,” Harry said, this time forcefully pushing Martin aside.

  “Call Eric,” Martin said to Izzy, who rushed off to the back of the bakery.

  He caught up with Harry, who had already taken several steps forward. At first, he seemed unsure of what he was looking at, but the shape of Francis’s body must have slowly come into focus, the Elder pin sparkling in the lamplight. Harry fell to his knees.

  Martin put his hand on Harry’s shoulder. “Come on. Come back here. You don’t need to see this.” He started to pull the man back toward him, but Harry jerked free.

  “Get away from me!” he shouted, leaning over to embrace his wife. He lifted her limp body from the ground and held her face against his chest. Harry let out a deep moan, but it sounded as if it came from both man and wife, the grand death rattle of a forty-year relationship.

  Several minutes later, a man pushed his way toward the alley, parting the crowd. He wore a tan overcoat with a woolen sweater and appeared to have just been pulled from a deep slumber. He approached Harry and placed a hand on his shoulder. “Let’s see what happened. We’ll take good care of her, I promise.”

  Harry hugged his wife tightly before gingerly setting her corpse down on the ground as if to prevent further injury. The man in the overcoat must have caught a glimpse of the woman’s face, because he let out an audible gasp that he attempted to stifle by clearing his throat. He muttered something to Harry and knelt with him until two additional officers arrived at the scene.

  The man snapped his fingers to get the attention of one of the officers. “Looks like she was running toward the pub. Take a statement from Harry, and get Will to head over to the house and take a look before you let him go home.”

  “Come with me, Harry. We just need a quick word,” the officer said, trying to guide him away from the body. “It’ll be okay. You’ll see her again. I’ll be quick.”

  As the officer guided a shell-shocked Harry away from the body, the man in the overcoat turned his attention toward Oliver.

  “You must be the one who found her. Oliver, isn’t it?” he asked.

  Oliver nodded in silent affirmation.

  The man held out his hand. “I’m Eric,” he said, “the chief of police of Christchurch. Tell me what happened.”

  “I just found her like this, slumped over on the ground,” Oliver replied.

  “What about you? Did you two see anything?” he asked Anna.

  She shook her head. “Izzy and I came with the rest of the crowd after he ran to the pub for help.”

  Oliver recounted the story several times as Eric tried to glean any useful information about what might have happened to the poor woman. But Oliver had witnessed nothing more than the same crumpled body on display for everyone to see.

  Izzy returned from the bakery, carrying a large glass of water. “Did they find anything?” she asked, handing the glass to Oliver.

  “They’re talking to Harry now. No one has seen anything,” Anna replied.

  One of the officers—Will, Oliver presumed—came running from the other end of the alley. “You have to come and see this!” he shouted.

  Eric turned to the other officer, who was preoccupied with Harry, then turned back to Oliver. “You’re going to have to come with me since we’re a bit limited on manpower. I have a few more questions for you.”

  “Can we do anything to help?” Izzy asked.

  “We’ve got things under control here. We’ll be in touch tomorrow. You two go home and get some rest,” he replied.

  He helped Oliver regain his footing then followed Will down the alley to Francis’s house.

  The two-story cottage looked as if it had been picked out of a travel magazine and plopped on the street. The lawn was perfectly manicured, and flower boxes hung from each of the windows. Although the house was perfect at first glance, Oliver noticed a deep crack down the center of the bright-red front door.

  Eric stopped and furrowed his brow. “Do you know how much force it would take to do this?” he asked. “It’s solid wood.”

  “Take a look inside,” Will replied.

  “Stay here,” Eric said to Oliver. He carefully pushed the door open. A scene of complete destruction greeted them on the other side. The entire living room and kitchen had been torn apart. The wooden table lay in a broken heap on the floor, and shards of glass and debris speckled the carpet in the living room. Oliver couldn’t see all the chaos through the doorframe, but he did notice that some of the cupboard doors in the kitchen had been nearly ripped from their hinges and hung loosely like baby teeth.

  The scene looked as if someone had taken a sledgehammer to the place. A chill ran up Oliver’s spine as he realized whoever had caused the damage must still be running around Christchurch.

  Oliver walked back to the sidewalk. The lights in most of the neighboring houses were off. With most people at the tavern, no one would have been home to hear her cries for help if she had been running from someone.

  After a few minutes inside, Eric appeared in the doorway, with Will close behind. “We’re going to need more people than I thought. Get in touch with the station in the next town over.”

  Chapter Nine

  “A heart attack?” Oliver couldn’t believe it.

  The writeup in the local paper was laughable. After a brief investigation, it was determined Francis had a major heart attack and must have hit her head during the fall in the alley. But what did she hit her head on? Oliver had found Francis’s body in the middle of the alley, nowhere near any objects that could have caused her jaw to nearly come loose from her face during a fall.

  “There’s just no way a fall could have done that,” he said. “And the look on her face—it looked as if she had been scared to death.”

  “She was old, and old people fall. Freak accidents happen,” Izzy said. “I nearly fall down the steps every day, and my skin bruises if you look at it the wrong way.” She walked over to a green cupboard sitting in the corner of the kitchen and returned with a bottle.

  “Here,” she said. “Have a little Irish with your coffee. It’ll take your mind off all of this.”

  She poured a healthy splash into Oliver’s mug, and the cream swirled into his coffee, turning it from black to a milky beige. It was a bit more Irish than he had anticipated.

  He looked up from the coffee cup. “What about the house, then? The place was in complete shambles—like a tornado had ripped through it.”

  The paper had an answer for that too. The police had found no evidence of breaking and entering and no fingerprints or signs of foul play. Although this didn’t explain how Francis could have caused such a mess, it did seem to explain away the possibility that someone else had.

  “What are you suggesting then, that she was murdered?” Izzy asked. “There hasn’t been a murder in this town for as long as I can remember.”

  “I don’t know. Maybe someone followed her home from the festival. Maybe she interrupted a burglary. There’s no way that this could have been an accident,” he said.

  “The police didn’t find anything. Maybe Francis caused the mess during the panic of her heart attack. If she had been murdered, don’t you think they would have found some scrap of evidence? Anyway, those sorts of things just don’t happen here. You’ve got to let it go.” She put one hand on Oliver’s. “I know what you saw was traumatic, and the brain tends to make fairy tales out of trauma. No one wants to think it’s possible for someone to just keel over, but it happens. It’s unfair, but there’s nothing more to it than that—no evil forces and certainly no murder.”

  “I guess you’re right,” Oliver said, having a flashback of Maurice flipping over in his office.

  A few weeks passed, and the town slowly returned to normal, with the exception of Madeline. Ever since Oliver discovered Francis’s body in the alley, she had been on a warpath. Although he couldn’t settle for the official story either, he was fairly certain Madeline held him personally responsible for Fr
ancis’s death. In the weeks following the incident in the alley, the bakery had been subjected to a surprise health inspection and another unusual lull in business. This hadn’t been discussed in a town-hall meeting, so Izzy had no one to appeal to. It was an underground effort that stayed strictly off the books. Oliver imagined a series of late-night phone calls and discreet tavern conversations, things that left no paper trail. He couldn’t prove Madeline had been responsible, but the timing was just too coincidental. Izzy’s conspiratorial thinking was starting to rub off on him.

  The drama had taken a toll on Anna’s relationship with her father as well. She hadn’t been herself for several days, and her declining mood was starting to impact those around her. Oliver and Izzy tried to cheer her up to no avail. After a bit of prodding, Oliver got Anna to admit her sourness was the result of a huge argument she and her father had gotten into over the town’s treatment of Oliver and the bakery even though she remained tightlipped about the specifics.

  “What did that bread ever do to you?” Oliver asked as Anna stood at the table underneath the tree mosaic and pounded a ball of dough with her rolling pin. She looked down at the rubbery mess, sighed, and slid the lump into the trash bin.

  “Must have zoned out,” she said, dismissing the question.

  “Can I help with anything?” he asked.

  Anna turned around and pointed the rolling pin at Oliver. “You can stay out of my way and let me do my job,” she snapped.

  Sitting on the stool at the large metal table, Izzy looked up from her accounting sheets, raising her eyebrows at Oliver. She’d clearly chosen not to push Anna’s buttons and resolved to let the girl work her issues out through the dough.

  “All right, all right,” he replied, recoiling from the angry response. “I think it would be good if you got some fresh air. You’re scaring me a little.”

  “I’ve got too much to do,” Anna replied.

  “He’s right. Go get some fresh air, and take Oliver with you. I think I can hold down the fort here.” Izzy gestured toward the empty storefront. “And drop this basket off at Harry’s. The poor man could probably use a fresh bite to eat.”