But her stern resolve failed when Maisie reached in her direction and, once Margaret grasped hold of her hand, said, “When you and Dad are married, can I call you Mama?”
“Of course, love,” she murmured. “I want nothing more than for you to call me Mama—”
“Oh, how darling.” Barrister Griffith’s derisive voice slithered into the room like a venomous snake into a warm bubble bath.
Margaret looked over, and Reba leaped to her feet and spun around on the bed. Her hackles went up as her head went down.
Joe, already on his way around the foot of the bed, stopped short as the tall black man accompanying Barrister pointed a shotgun at his chest.
“It’s him,” Maisie said in a small voice. “The man that took me. I smell him.”
Margaret dragged her off the bed and into her arms. Reba pitched her growl to a hair-raising snarl as another person entered the room and closed the door and locked it.
“Who the hell let you in?” Joe demanded.
Orva—or was it Odelia?—moved past the big man and her brother to smirk at Joe.
“Who said anyone let us in?” Her laugh raised hairs on Margaret’s body. “Our mother grew up here. We played here as children. We know where all the skeletons are buried, Mr. Banner. All the house’s secrets. You really think there’d only be one hidden tunnel in and out? Our great-grandfather was smarter than that, Mr. Banner. Smarter than you. And now you’re going to get your comeuppance, you thieving bitch,” she added to Margaret. “And my brother is finally going to get what he should have had over a year ago. Go ahead, Barrister.” She touched her brother’s arm with gloved fingertips. “Take what’s yours.”
Barrister compressed his lips as a faintly panicked look replaced the cold arrogance in his gaze.
Margaret shifted to put Maisie behind her. “George gave Sugar Hill to me—” She almost bit her tongue through when Orva—or Odelia—produced a pistol from her skirt and aimed it at her.
“When you’re dead...When you’re all dead...” She aimed first at Mr. Banner, and then back at Margaret and Maisie. “And these guns are found by your bodies, Sugar Hill will be my brother’s, as it should be.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Joe said. “No one will believe Mrs. Sweeney and I shot each other and Maisie. We have no reason to kill each other.”
Orva—Odelia—chortled. Ice skittered down Margaret’s spine.
“Lyons isn’t the only lawyer in town with investigators on retainer, Mr. Banner.” Whichever twin it was gave him a dead-eyed look. “My brother’s investigators have watched you for weeks. We knew before you went to Atlanta that you had hired Miss Lyons. And we knew before you got back here that you’d learned the truth about George and Simone’s marriage. We had a man following you and Miss Lyons. Why do you think we told this idiot to get rid of the girl?” She gestured to the negro. “But he failed again. So we had no choice but to come and make sure he got it right this time. And when it all comes out about your brat actually being George’s brat, and I weep and tell the sheriff about how you threw my poor brother on the floor during a family luncheon, well...” She turned her deranged smile on Joe. “It won’t be hard to make people believe that you came back here and demanded Maisie’s share of Sugar Hill. And when the Red-Headed Black Widow said no, you threatened her with a shotgun, and she pulled out a pistol and shot your little girl—”
“No.” Maisie tore free of Margaret’s embrace and thrust out through the insect netting onto the terrace.
“Maisie!” Margaret ran after her, and stopped. By the time her eyes adjusted from the light inside to the darkness outside, the terrace was empty. Behind her, sounds of scuffle broke out. She dashed inside.
Joe and the big negro writhed on the floor, fighting for control of the shotgun. Reba had hold of Odelia—or Orva—by the wrist. The girl was spinning a circle, pounding on the dog’s snout, screaming at her to let go. Barrister stood frozen, clearly as confused as Margaret as to whom to help first. Then he glanced at the floor.
The pistol! Margaret lunged and grabbed it up a split second before Barrister’s hand came down. She straightened, and pointed it at his face.
“Tell your man to stop,” she ordered. “Tell him to stop, or by God, I’ll shoot you.”
Someone pounded on the bedchamber door. Then Daniel Banner’s muffled voice demanded, “Mrs. Sweeney? Are you all right?”
“Get the pistol, Barrister,” Orva/Odelia shrieked. “Take it from her. Shoot her—”
“What’s going on in there? Mrs. Sweeney?” There were multiple voices raised in the hall now as someone repeatedly thumped on the door.
Barrister leaped at Margaret—and collapsed to his knees when the bedchamber door flew open with a thunderous crash.
“Everyone, freeze,” Sheriff Klugg shouted as he burst in, pistol extended in both hands as he swept it around, trying to choose a target. Behind him, Magnus and Big Ray rushed in, each carrying a shotgun. Behind them came Daniel and Antonia in their pyjamas, eyes wide and hair in disarray.
“What the hell is going on in here?” Daniel demanded.
“I said freeze!” Klugg cocked the hammer on his pistol. Magnus and Big Ray each chambered a round.
Margaret locked every muscle as Barrister, on his hands and knees, straightened to fling his gloved hands in the air. His sister, blood smearing her calfskin gloves, continued to pry at Reba’s fanged hold as she shouted, “Don’t be a coward, Barrister. Fight. Fight for what’s yours. Let go, you bloody dog!”
The sheriff looked at Magnus, who veered his shotgun in Odelia/Orva’s direction. Big Ray had his weapon trained on the men fighting on the floor.
Tonia gripped Daniel’s arm, preventing him from advancing beyond the doorway as Klugg marched over and touched his pistol to the head of the man sitting astride Joe, pressing the shotgun they were fighting over crosswise on his throat. Joe’s eyes bulged in his reddened face as he fought the man’s attempt to crush his windpipe.
“Let go of that gun, boy,” Klugg ordered, “and get face down on the rug, or by God I’ll pull this trigger and blow the back of your skull out through your nose.”
The big man’s fingers snapped open, and he shifted to flop face down on the rug. Then he did something the sheriff hadn’t demanded, lifting his palms face up and crossing them at the wrists behind his back. Klugg kept the pistol trained on the man as he pulled handcuffs off of his belt and chucked them to Joe, who’d thrown the shotgun aside and was on his hands and knees, wheezing for breath. After a long moment, Joe grasped the handcuffs, staggered to his feet, and knelt on the big man’s thighs to affix the cuffs to his thick wrists, before lurching to his feet. He turned towards Margaret.
“Hey...” he murmured as he approached. “It’s all right. You can let go. Give me the pistol, Margaret. Give me the gun.”
It wasn’t until he cupped her hands with his that she realised she still had the pistol aimed at Barrister Griffiths.
She started to shake as Joe took the weapon from her.
“It’s all right,” he whispered as he gathered her close. “It’s all right. You’re safe. We’re safe.”
She sagged in Joe’s strong arms as Reba released Odelia/Orva and raced out into the hallway.
“Maisie.” She pushed away from him. “I think she climbed on the roof—”
“I’m here.” Maisie’s soft voice came from the hallway.
“Maisie,” the senior Banners cried in unison as they turned and knelt to embrace her. Margaret clung to Joe, her knees softening with relief, as Miss Alma, Rufus, Coral, and Miss Lisette crowded around behind them.
“I climbed down the trellis to get help,” Maisie said, grasping onto Reba, who nosed into the shelter of her grandparents’ combined embraces.
“Thank heaven you’re all right,” Margaret murmured. “Thank heaven we’re all all right,” she added, looking at Joe.
“It wasn’t heaven that saved us, Mrs. Sweeney,” Maisie said. “It was Sheriff Klugg. And Magnu
s. And Big Ray. I told them where to go. I told them Mr. Griffiths and his sister were here to kill us.”
Klugg collected the shotgun off the floor and handed it to Big Ray, who aimed it at the man on the floor without shifting the one he held trained on Barrister. Then Klugg grasped Odelia/Orva by the upper arm and, shoving his pistol in its holster, shook his head. “I didn’t want to believe it,” he muttered. “Still can’t believe it.” He glared at Barrister, who bowed his head in shame, or defeat, while Orva/Odelia lifted her chin to sneer at Margaret.
“Bitch,” she whispered.
Ignoring her, Margaret frowned at Klugg. “How did you know to come back here?”
“I didn’t,” he said. “But the lighter kept niggling at me. So I decided to visit Barrister. I took a bottle and pack of cigars, thinking I’d ask him for a light and see if he pulled out his fancy lighter. But he wasn’t home. Mrs. Griffiths told me he and Miss Odelia had gone out earlier in the evening. She didn’t know where, or when they’d be back. I was getting in my vehicle when Miss Orva ran out to tell me that her brother and sister had gone out the previous evening together, too. She didn’t know where or for what purpose on either night, but she had overheard them discussing your party and Miss Maisie. No specifics, so she couldn’t confirm that they meant to do more than visit...” He shrugged. “I felt compelled to come back. I was just coming around the keyhole when Miss Maisie and a pair of negroes came running out from behind the house. One of them was holding on to her hand, and I thought he was dragging her, trying to steal her again, so I pulled my gun and I yelled at them all to stop. But she yelled that they were running to help you and that I should come.”
Barrister’s head drooped lower. Odelia, however, remained unrepentant, her stare cold and hostile.
“Rufus,” Joe murmured. “Send for the sheriff’s deputies. Miss Alma—”
“Tea, coffee, and sandwiches,” she said. “Coming right up.” Coral and Miss Lisette followed her out while Magnus retrieved a towel from Margaret’s washstand and handed it to Odelia Griffiths, who curled her lip at him. But she took the towel and clamped it to her bleeding wrist.
“Stupid dog,” she muttered.
The Banners remained crouched, clinging to Maisie and Reba as if they feared both would vanish the instant they let them go. Joe looked at Margaret.
“Do you mind taking Maisie and my parents downstairs? I’m sure the sheriff has a few questions—”
“I do,” Klugg said. “But I’ll wait until my deputies are here.” Drawing his pistol again, he towed Odelia towards the man on the floor and kicked his leg. “On your feet, boy,” he barked. “And no sudden moves, or I guarantee you, you will never move again.”
Chapter 40
My One True Love
DAWN WAS BREAKING WHEN Klugg closed his notebook to massage his eyelids with thick fingers and yawn. He blinked a couple of times before leaning to rest his elbows on his knees and look at Joe.
“For what it’s worth,” he said. “I’m sorry.” At Joe’s raised eyebrow, he continued, “You warned me about Barrister. Though to be fair, Odelia was pulling his strings.”
Joe nodded. They’d all underestimated the twins, in particular Odelia, who’d apparently conceived of the plan to first chase Joe and Margaret out and, when that failed, to eliminate them permanently.
Klugg yawned as he hauled his bulk out of the chair to retrieve his hat from the desk. When Joe remained seated, he nodded.
“I’ll see myself out. Thank Miss Alma for the refreshments. She makes the best peach pie I ever tasted. Oh, and tell Mrs. Sweeney I’m sorry I didn’t take her concern about the cottage more seriously, too.”
“Thank you, Sheriff.” Margaret stood in the open door of the study. “Thank you for everything.” She glided in to clasp Klugg’s meaty paw in her small hands and offer him a warm smile. “You saved Joe’s life. You saved all our lives. We owe you.”
A tide of red swept up Klugg’s short neck.
“You don’t owe me anything, Mrs. Sweeney,” he said. “I was just doing my job. Besides, you had a bead on Barrister. I’m sure if I hadn’t shown up, you’d have done what needed doing to protect yourself and everyone else.”
“Yes,” she murmured. “But I am glad you spared me from having to take such...drastic measures. I don’t envy you your job, Sheriff. It’s a terrible matter to hold another person’s life in your hands, and to know that they balance yours in theirs. I can’t imagine facing what I faced last night as an expected part of my chosen profession.”
Klugg nodded, and cleared his throat.
“Thank you for your kind words, ma’am. I’m only grateful I was able to help.” He cleared his throat again and cast a quick look at Joe before nodding to Margaret. “I’d best get on to my office. I’m sure Barrister and Miss Odelia already lawyered up and won’t answer my questions, but with what their accomplice told me, I may be able to make some charges stick. Attempted murder at minimum, I hope, as I was witness to Odelia’s demand for her brother to shoot you all.”
“I’m sorry, Sheriff,” she said softly. “I know it wasn’t easy for you to have to arrest your friend and Miss Odelia. And I appreciate everything you’re doing to try and make things right. Especially in this time of war and political strife, when we need more men of integrity than ever before. I’m grateful to know Quellentown has that in you.”
Klugg’s beefy cheek and neck flared crimson.
“Er, thank you, ma’am. G’day.” He left without looking at Joe, his back and gait oddly stiff. Joe couldn’t blame him.
He wasn’t the recipient of Margaret’s compassion and empathy and his throat ached, a discomfort exacerbated when she closed the door to scowl at him.
“He helped us, Joe. The least you could have done was thank him.”
He arched his brows. “For doing his job?”
Her frown deepened, and then her expression softened as she moved towards him. “Maisie’s asleep. Lisette’s with her, and I told everyone else to go to bed and get some sleep, too.” Her eyes filled, and Joe lurched up to gather her in his arms.
“It’s all right,” he said. “It’s all going to be all right.”
“What a mess,” she whispered. “What a dreadful, dreadful, mess. I can’t imagine what this will do to Esther and Orva once it gets out. Thank goodness for that child. At least she had the good sense to speak up and share what she knew with the sheriff. If she hadn’t...” She buried her face in his shirt.
He gritted his teeth to contain his thoughts on Esther Sweeney-Griffiths.
The woman had helped create the mad, entitled monsters Barrister and Odelia had become, and he didn’t feel the least bit sorry for her. But Miss Orva... For her, and what news of her sister and brother’s mad conspiracy would do to her reputation, he could feel a smidge of compassion. To a much lesser degree, he felt regret for the man Barrister and Odelia had coerced into aiding them, Vincent Champagne. He was Magnus’s equivalent on the Griffiths’s estate.
Seated in the study with him, his parents, Mrs. Sweeney, and Klugg, while Miss Alma and Miss Lisette tended to Maisie and Barrister and Odelia were kept under guard in separate rooms by Klugg’s deputies, Champagne had told a tale about Miss Odelia’s visits to the stables to play with a litter of kittens born in the loft.
“She’d climb up an’ play with those kittens. I told her it wasn’t safe, an’ she told me to mind my own beeswax. So I did. One day, I was out back fixing a broken wheel on the freight wagon when I heard a cry and then a thump. I ran inside and found Miss Odelia at the bottom of the ladder. She said she’d missed the last step on her way down and fell. Her ankle hurt, and she couldn’t walk. I was helping her back to the house when Mr. Griffiths come out and tol’ me to get my hands off her. He took her away inside the house, and I went back to work. The next day...” He met Joe’s hard stare with a beleaguered gaze.
“He tol’ me if I didn’t get rid of you and Miss Maisie, he’d see me hanged for messin’ with his sister. I
gotta wife and two boys.” Tears filled his eyes. “I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t kill you or that sweet child. So I waited until you was in town, and Miss Maisie was at her friend’s, and I set the cottage on fire. I left Mr. Barrister’s lighter there. He’d forgotten it on a fence rail when he come out to tell me what to do, an’ I’d hoped you’d find it and know it was him that wanted you gone, and you’d make him stop. Or leave town, so I wouldn’t have to do nuttin’ wrong. But that didn’t work. You didn’t go, an’ then Mr. Griffiths figured out I took the lighter...They both come out to the stables. Said I’d be hung for thievin’ and for touching Miss Odelia unless I got rid of Miss Maisie permanently. They said there was going to be a party here later in the week, and that there’d be lots o’ people coming and going, an’ so I could sneak in and get Miss Maisie. They tol’ me to bury her in the swamp an’ they’d wait for me at the old mill to drive me home once it was done. When I said I wouldn’t know where to find Miss Maisie in that big house, Miss Odelia said she’d take care of it. I guess she did, ’cause she’s the one that led me in through the woods to the crypt and then tol’ me how to get in the house and where to look for Miss Maisie. She tol’ me to strangle the dog if it made any noise, but I couldn’t do that. So I just gave the dog some of the food I had in my pocket for Miss Maisie, and I asked her to keep her dog quiet an’ I’d let her keep it with her and I wouldn’t hurt her or anyone else. She’s a good girl, Mr. Banner. She done what I asked, and I did what I promised. I didn’t hurt her, an’ put her in the shack with her dog to keep her company, an’ some food and water so she wouldn’t be hungry or thirsty, an’ then I went back through the woods an’ come out the other side where Mr. and Miss Griffiths was waiting, an’ I tol’ them what they wanted to hear. If you hadn’t found Miss Maisie by this morning, m-my wife—she can read and write—we...we was gonna take our boys an’ run away an’ she was going to send an anonymous note about where to look. I’m so sorry, Mr. Banner,” he whispered, shaking his big head, tears spilling down his broad cheeks. “Jus’ so sorry.”
My One True Love Page 37
