The Rampant Reaper

by Marlys Millhiser

  And all of a sudden, she was laughing. So were Kenny and Ben and Edwina. Kenny was doing the cooking again, his staff laid off until people could get into town. Supposedly, they were to be treated to “the catch of the day.” Smelled a lot like beef.

  “What kind of line did you catch it on?” Edwina wanted to know. “A steel cable?”

  “Where’s Uncle Elmo?” Charlie looked around. “Don’t tell me he drove our rental back to the home place.” Her messed-up metabolism felt better already with a little cheese and beer in her.

  “Hitched a ride on the county plow. Don’t worry, Charlie. He knows the ropes out here.” But Edwina looked worried as she cut her daughter another cheese slice. “Kenny and I were going through the album and a few other mementos from the museum—asking him all kinds of questions. We upset him. He’s got his own ghosts to deal with. He doesn’t need ours.”

  Charlie took another grateful swallow of beer, and energy chased the ditzy bubbles away. “So what’s for dinner, barkeep?”

  It was a three-inch-thick grilled sirloin, medium rare. There would be enough left over for hash tomorrow for the whole restaurant, big cow. Fresh veggies were gone, so they had frozen string beans with basil and garlic, and grilled hash-browns from the freezer with rosemary and sage and grilled onion. The barkeep rhapsodized on each ingredient.

  They all ate side by side on bar stools.

  The marshal of Myrtle stopped by when they were halfway though the meal to claim his share.

  “God, you can write books that actually sell and cook, too? Anything you can’t do?” Charlie asked the barkeep.

  “Not really.”

  “So, when do you serve your shift on night watch up at the Oaks?” Charlie asked Del.

  “I heard about that being your idea. I spent all day and all night plowing and moving food and dirty dishes to and from that place, moving people, digging up Ida Mae—and you want me to work tonight, too? You’re one cruel woman.”

  Kenny stretched comfortably. “I suggest we watch the evening news over a cup of my special coffee, kick back, and then go up to the Oaks to find Charlie’s purse. She may well be leaving town tomorrow.”

  The marshal bent to look out a window at the darkening sky. “Anybody know how long a full moon stays full?”

  CHAPTER 24

  “THE DAKOTAS, NORTHERN Iowa, and Minnesota are just beginning to dig out of a snow-and-ice storm, the likes of which have not been seen for a century.”

  “Lot worse in ’thirty-six and ’forty-seven. Had a lulu sometime in the sixties, too. And more since. He don’t know nothing,” Ben scoffed.

  “In an era of climate upset due to global warming leading to dry winters even in the nation’s upper mid-section, this region was unprepared for what happened.”

  “Hell, every street in Myrtle’s plowed and sanded already,” said the gravedigger. “Whadaya mean, unprepared?”

  “The National Guard in three states was called out to rescue travelers stranded in cars, many of them overnight.” Pictured—a guy in heavy camouflage brushing snow from a car window to peer inside. “There are no confirmed deaths as yet but many are missing and deaths are expected from this killer storm.” Pictured—cars skidding off a freeway and into a ditch. “Farmers and livestock were particularly hard hit.” Pictured—a farmhouse with the snow drifted up against one side to hide the first-floor windows, and aerial shots of snow with roofs and trees but not roads.

  “There was, however, a bizarre story out of a tiny town in Iowa named Myrtle, which a reporter, Duane Webber, from our affiliate station PORK-TV, was able to reach by helicopter.” Pictured—moving shots of the shadow of helicopter blades on snow.

  “Duane, can you tell us what’s happened there?”

  “Yes, Dan, apparently there have been six suspicious deaths—the coroner of Floyd County has termed possible homicides—in this nursing home named Gentle Oaks in this tiny village of Myrtle, Iowa.” Pictured—Duane on the porch of Gentle Oaks, his breath steaming, his demeanor serious but obviously distracted by events off-camera. Probably the Mexicans racing to avoid what they thought was the INS. “This home for the sick, elderly, and disabled has been virtually saved and provisioned during the power outage and blockage of the roads by valiant local men on snowmobiles.” Pictured—Buz Bartusek helping Elsina Miller out of a snowbank, rows of snowmobilers grinning and waving in the background.

  “But, Dan, inside these doors yet another, this the seventh, alleged murder has taken place during the storm, when no one could enter or leave, not even a murderer.” Pictured—camera moving through doors into lobby. And then through the double doors into the “stench” zone.

  “This isn’t live,” Charlie said. “It all happened hours ago. The rest has got to be outtakes. I know, I was there.” And there she was all right.

  “Which means, Dan, that the murderer must be someone from within. Allegedly.” Pictured—Charlemagne Catherine Greene shoving Fatty Staudt’s wheelchair into Fatty Truex’s knees and, as both men rear their upper torsos in combat, racing off down the hall with the expression of someone intent on committing yet another murder. At least the sound had been an outtake. When the skeletal Fatties let loose, the obscenity quotient far outdid the stench quotient.

  “I’d just got my period,” Charlie whispered to her mother, who patted her hand.

  Charlie hated it when Edwina did that. She knew it was supposed to be comforting but it seemed more like “that’s okay, sweetie, I know you’re weak. I’m your mom.”

  “Ben, you been seeing old Abigail through this?” the barkeep asked suddenly. “We all kind of depend on you to keep watch—when we get busy with storms of the century and such.”

  “Oh, yeah, she’s fine. Nasty, but fine. If she turned nice, I’d call in the doctors. Maybe the governor.”

  Without the odor and even with the dishabille, because the real working staff had not yet come on duty, the residents of Gentle Oaks did not appear as gruesome as they had to Charlie during the day. Of course Marlys must have been an outtake. But no, she was there, too.

  They’d been unable to interview Harvey Rochester, who owned the home, because he was currently with the aforementioned coroner. Pictured—Rose reading from her pamphlet, Sherman poking his cane into the back of a vacant-looking woman in a sweatsuit and walker, and a head shot of an ethereal Marlys Dittberner floating by with white hair streaming as she passed behind Elsina Miller.

  “But, Dan, we were able to talk to the administrator and spokesperson for Gentle Oaks.” Pictured—the spokesperson looking benign, all-knowing, and unperturbed by the obvious jostling of those who were perturbed by being caught up in the cables and the crush and the added confusion outside their minds.

  “What’s she saying, Duane?”

  “Well, Dan, there seems to be some problem with the mike.”

  “Yeah, right, Duane. We can hear you just fine,” Charlie said and watched Elsina’s lips moving between beatific smiles and repeating the word, “Jesus” joyously and often.

  “She seems to think these deaths were God’s will and not murder and that the deceased are happy with Jesus now.”

  Dan Rather was cracking up. “She’s delivering a sermon.”

  “Right.” Now the man from PORK-TV was being jostled.

  “Thanks for that report, Duane,” Dan said to PORK and then addressed the studio behind his own cameras. “Anybody talk to edit about this?” And then he looked out at the few people eating at the bar in Viagra’s. “We’ll get back to you on this late-breaking story when the coroner of Floyd County has weighed in. And thank you, Duane.”

  Brief cut to Duane, who, along with the camera, was shoved into the double doors behind them. “What the bleep?”

  “We got plenty of that.”

  Dan Rather lost it.

  “Keegan Monroe is your client?” Kenny said when Celebrities Tonight came on and Charlie wouldn’t let him turn it off.

  “My purse will keep a while longer. I just want
to see him.”

  “Never heard of him,” the marshal said.

  “You heard of Phantom of the Alpine Tunnel, Shadowscapes, Glory Boy? He wrote the screenplays.” The barkeep was impressed, anyway.

  “Don’t look like much. He gay, too?”

  “No,” said Charlie. “Just very rich. Now be still a moment.”

  Keegan was not an actor and didn’t come off as well as Mitch Hilsten would have. He’d put on a lot of weight since he’d gotten out of prison last spring, but when he began talking about the new project, Open and Shut, he just came alive. He talked about his weight gain—a reaction to prison food once he was released—and how it fit into this project, which was really about making love with food.

  “Oh, sick.” Marshal Sweetie.

  “Shut up, Del.” Kenny.

  “Like what? Bananas?” The watchman.

  “I’ve got to get home,” Charlie said. “I have a life, damn it.”

  “You all right, Edwina?” Kenny the host asked.

  “Got any scotch, Squirt?”

  The lights on inside had attracted a few die-hard customers now that the streets were plowed. So Kenny called Lorna to come tend the bar and Delwood drove him and Charlie up to the Oaks in the official Cherokee.

  “Your mother’s about at the end of her rope,” Kenny told Charlie. “Too much history here.”

  “So’s her daughter,” Charlie replied, fighting cramps. “And I don’t have any history here. I can’t believe anyone would expect Edwina to give up her life to care for the Wicked Witch of the Midwest. Her family has lost all touch with reality.”

  “Men sacrifice their lives in war,” the marshal said tentatively.

  “For glory, right? And when they’re too young to know better or defending their families from slaughter by other guys out for glory.”

  They were met in the lobby by Mr. Rochester himself. He looked awful.

  “Did the INS come for all the Mexicans?” Charlie knew she felt more awful than he looked.

  “We do not hire illegal aliens, forsooth. And we are once again fully staffed and running smoothly. No, the problem is—”

  “I just want my purse.”

  “Miss Greene has gone testy on us,” Kenny explained. “What’s your problem, Harvey?”

  “God,” Marshal Del said. “Don’t tell me you’re looking for Marlys.”

  “No, it’s Darla Lempke. We can’t find her.”

  “Her grandpa probably picked her up in his titanic tractor with lugs.”

  “He came for her, she wasn’t here. He called from home—she’s not there. You were here today, Charlie. Can you remember the last time you saw her?”

  They looked under Marlys’ bed. No purse. No Darla. Marlys wasn’t in her bed, nor was Gladys in hers.

  “They wander. They do not sleep much. They are warm and fed and showered and Marlys has clothes,” an aide who could speak English assured them. “Even though the moon’s not so full, all here are restless still. Like they are called somewhere they don’t know how to get to.”

  “So, Marlys is wandering around this place with clothes on?” Del’s skepticism was lost on the Latino, who had no badge, whose smile was more weary than angelic, like that of the administrator who was actually in the stinky zone.

  Elsina Miller came out of the ladies wiping her hands on a paper towel. Somewhere Dolores the cat moaned venom, but the rest of the place was surprisingly quiet. Only two room buzzers called for help and the only voiced request was the woman who considered it so hard to be alive now. No blaring televisions.

  “God is in His heaven, Jesus is here with us, and all is well at Gentle Oaks. The residents all sleep comfortably in their beds.”

  “We just saw you on TV,” Del said. “Your sermon sent Dan Rather into hysterics, but all sound was deleted. PORK panned you bad, babe.”

  “I think it’s cool Jesus is here, but have you seen Marlys or Gladys? And have you ever been here at night with the moon just short of full?” Charlie was getting real anxious about her purse now and worried that somehow being more involved in the insanity here would lengthen her stay.

  “Elsina’s never been here at night at all. Tonight I think should be her baptism,” Harvey said. “She, Darla, the families, and the doctors of course, are the only ones who have no clue about the realities of caring for ancient adults twenty-four hours. Seems to me it’s time for management to taste reality. After all, Elsina, Jesus is here with you.”

  Kenny looked around, posed with his hands on his hips, and shook his head. “Listen, hear it? It’s too quiet in here.”

  “They are all asleep in their rooms,” the administrator insisted.

  They were not all asleep in their rooms, but they were very quiet. Dolores the big tom with big hair stalked the halls of both wings, nervous, watching the shadows, hissing at the slightest sound.

  “I haf never seen him act like that,” said the tired aide. She wore a back brace. Charlie had read that the percentage of nursing-home staff with serious back injuries incurred on the job is higher than that of any other occupation. Adult babies are heavy.

  There were plenty of shadows and many slight sounds. These poor souls wandered, those who could get out of bed. Some who couldn’t sat on the edges of their beds and watched the shadows of those who could.

  Charlie, Kenny, and Del stepped out onto the smoker porch, where they could see the moon. It still looked whole to Charlie and had a mist around it that made it seem even bigger. It was white tonight, mirroring the ground below.

  The deputy sheriff joined them and lit up. He looked at the moon, too. “I used to work the kill in the packing plant in Mason City—but I’ve never seen anything like this place. That was just blood and guts and the terror of animals so thick it seeped through your skin and made you sick. This is terror so strong of folks so weak and bewildered it makes you even sicker. It’s in the air here like it was at Armor’s, only worse. Man, I can’t explain it.”

  “I think you explained it very well,” Charlie told him with a shiver.

  “Everybody’s a writer these days,” Kenny griped. “That was beautiful.”

  “I’m no writer. I get this duty again, I’m no deputy.” He took another deep and satisfied drag and started a continuous slow, thoughtful, determined nodding. “Tell you another thing—I’ve always been mildly religious. But I have another run-in with that Miller woman and I’m going to take up heavy drinking. Just to get even with Jesus.”

  They followed him inside—Charlie humbled somehow— to find Elsina Miller and Mr. Rochester embracing, she screaming, he roaring.

  And Rose reading, “Darla Lempke. Activities Director.” Reading from the badge. Rose had found the badge.

  Elsina had found Darla.

  CHAPTER 25

  “CHARLEMAGNE CATHERINE, GET in here,” Mr. Rochester roared.”Miss Miller, be still now. And where the hell is that damn deputy?” They stood in front of the door to a room Charlie had never seen inside.

  It was lit by a bright light from above that reflected off-white, ceramic-tiled walls and floor. The only color in the room was the royal-blue waterproof cushion, seat and back on a shower chair, and Darla Lempke. The chair frame, formed of white poles, sat on casters over a drain in the floor between two waist-high walls, also covered in white tile, that jutted out into the middle of the room. A cabinet stood on one side of the low walls, a high-wheeled stool on the other, with Darla Lempke sort of wrapped around the wheels, her thick black hair splayed up against the white wall.

  A shower curtain, pulled open now, divided this portion of the room from a sink and hair dryer and shelf with hair spray and shower caps, plus a commode stool into which the sheriff’s deputy was busy upchucking whatever he’d managed to find to eat today. And in the interim, between the poor wretch’s retching and Mr. Rochester’s enraged intakes of breath, came Rose’s starkly flat and unemotional eulogy, “Darla Lempke. Activities Director.”

  Harvey managed to disengage himself from h
is now merely whimpering administrator—rather reluctantly, Charlie thought. She, Kenny, and Del exchanged raised eyebrows at that but chose to ignore the implication. Now was not the time.

  “Well, this sure blows my theory,” Charlie said instead.

  “Mine, too,” said the marshal.

  “And mine,” echoed Kenny Cowper. “Guess it just goes to show, real life’s not a murder mystery, huh?”

  Charlie could not have agreed more, but she wasn’t about to tell the hunk of Myrtle that. Like police and mystery readers and editors, she preferred patterns when dead bodies multiplied, especially in a short time in the same place. This would have been a perfect locked-place murder scene if anybody’d locked people out—so Duane from PORK was right. It had to be somebody from within, at least during the snowstorm.

  Darla Lempke had a clear plastic hose with a shower nozzle on the end of it wrapped around her neck. The other end attached to the spigot on the wall where the water came out. This allowed somebody to sit on the stool on the other side of the tiled wall and keep reasonably dry while showering someone in the bath chair. Bathing helpless, way elderly, full-grown babies—Charlie hadn’t even thought about how that was done. She’d hung up on the bowel movements instantly and not moved on very far.

  Stupid Hollywood silliness, which Charlie was ever making fun of even while working it, seemed suddenly dear when confronted by a reality so awful and unalterable it didn’t have to face edit. She could better understand why people looked for a reward in death for suffering in life, why the Hemlock Society and Dr. Kervorkian made good sense to others.

  Unfortunately, that was all too early and too late for Darla the activities director at Gentle Oaks.

  “Get on your cell phone,” Kenny told Del. “Looks like the deputy’s busy at the moment.” He knelt down to get a better look at Darla in one easy movement. Nothing even cracked in his knees. “What do you think, Charlie?”