by Terri Reid
“There’s an old lane about a quarter mile up,” a voice said from beside her.
Mary jumped when she saw Shirley seated in the passenger seat.
“Careful, dearie, you drive into the ditch and those boys will catch you for sure.”
Mary nodded, her hands clenched to the wheel. “Where is that lane?”
“Just beyond this barn,” Shirley said. “Old man Macomb likes to keep it clear for his drives into town. You just follow it through and it will dump you out on Buckeye. You know how to get home from there?”
Mary nodded and took a deep breath. “Yes, thank you, Shirley.”
“No, my dear, thank you,” she said with a smile, as she started to fade away. “For the first time in a long time, I have the feeling I’m going to be found.”
Alone once again, Mary turned down the lane and headed for home.
Chapter 25
“What the hell happened to you, girlie?” Stanley asked when Mary walked into her house twenty minutes later.
Mary’s clothes were torn and covered with mud, her face was scratched, her hair was windblown and her cheeks were chapped. She quickly glanced over at Bradley, lying on the couch with his eyes closed. “Shhhh,” she whispered harshly. “It’s no big deal.”
“What’s no big deal?” Bradley asked, turning his head to the door.
His eyes widened and he tried to get up, but he clenched his stomach in pain and lay back down. “Mary, are you okay?” he groaned. “What happened?”
She limped over to the couch. “Really, it was no big deal,” she said.”I’m sure it looks worse than it feels.”
“It looks like it hurts like hell,” Bradley said.
Mary nodded. Every muscle in her body was screaming in pain. “Okay, well, then, it looks exactly the way it feels.”
She sat on the edge of the couch. “So how are you feeling?”
He shook his head and smiled. “Go take something for the pain, soak in the tub for a bit and then we can talk,” he said. “I’ve been pampered all day, I can wait.”
Rosie walked up with a glass of water in one hand and a container of pain tablets in the other. “Here, take these and head upstairs,” she ordered. “I’ll bring you up a cup of tea to help you feel better.”
Mary tossed down the pills and water and limped upstairs to her room. She went to the shower and set the control panel to hot massage, then walked back to her room to get out of her ruined clothes.
“You were there,” a woman’s voice said.
Startled, Mary looked up to see Peggy standing in her room.
“Yes, I was there,” Mary answered. “I think I found where he buried you. I’ll make sure you’re found and he’s punished.”
“But, he saw you,” she cried, shaking her head in fear. “He saw you and now he’ll hurt you.”
“He won’t hurt anyone anymore,” Mary said wearily. “Least of all me. You don’t have to worry about me.”
“Those people, downstairs, they’ll help you? They’ll take care of you?” she asked.
Mary nodded. “Yes, those people downstairs would protect me. They won’t let anything happen to me, and I wouldn’t let anything happen to them.”
Through her tears, the ghost smiled. “You are a blessed woman,” she said, as she faded away.
“Yes. Yes I am,” Mary agreed.
The full body shower consisted of five sets of vertically mounted spray nozzles that sprayed her body from head to toe. She was able to adjust the volume, the type of spray, the pressure and the temperature. She braced herself against the side of the shower and let the hot water and massage spray pound against her. It was like being in heaven. She stood in the shower for fifteen minutes, until she felt warm all the way through.
She slipped on a thick terry-cloth robe, wound a towel around her hair and walked into her bedroom. A cup of tea lay on the nightstand next to her bed. She sipped the tea and stopped. She could taste the liberal dose of honey Rosie had added to it, but she couldn’t recognize all of the underlying flavors. There was a hint of mint and chamomile, and perhaps some rosemary. But there were some other flavors Mary didn’t recognize. She shrugged and took another sip. Well, it was warm and soothing and that’s what she needed most at that moment.
Pulling out a pair of sweat pants, a sweat shirt and some thick wool socks, she decided she didn’t care what Rosie thought, she was going to be comfortable tonight. As she came down the stairs she could smell the heavenly scent of Rosie’s homemade chicken soup. “Rosie, please tell me that you saved some of that wonderful soup for me,” she said.
Rosie beamed and bustled Mary into the recliner. After placing a quilt on her lap, she returned with a tray laden with a big bowl of soup, a chunk of fresh bread and a tall glass of milk. “Rosie, if I eat all this, I’ll slosh when I walk,” Mary teased.
“You eat every last bite on that plate, young woman,” Rosie said. “You need extra nourishment after that beating you gave your body.”
Rosie sat down on a chair near the fireplace next to Stanley. “So, are you going to tell us?” Stanley asked.
Rosie slapped at Stanley. “Let her eat.”
“She can talk and eat at the same time,” Stanley growled back. “Men do it all the time.”
Mary swallowed a spoonful of soup and sighed gratefully. “I can eat a little and talk a little,” she compromised. “After my very interesting meeting at City Hall...”
She sent Bradley a knowing look. “I decided to go back out to the Thompson Farm.”
“I thought we agreed that you weren’t going to take any chances,” Bradley said.
“Any unnecessary chances,” Mary pointed out. “It was necessary.”
“Mary, she’s already dead. Nothing bad could happen to her anymore,” Bradley argued.
“She came to me at the hospital, in the waiting room,” Mary explained. “Her appearance had changed. She was covered in dirt and debris. Then she told me that he dug a hole and buried her.”
Rosie gasped and covered her mouth.
“Sorry, Rosie,” Mary said, and then she turned to Bradley. “We’re supposed to get snow tonight. I couldn’t let the snow cover the only evidence we might have to find her.”
“You could have asked me to come along, girlie,” Stanley said. “We made a right fine team the other day. Don’t see why we couldn’t have done it again.”
“You wouldn’t have fit on the snowmobile with me,” Mary said.
“Snowmobile?” Bradley asked.
Mary recounted her experience at the Thompson Farm.
“You ditched a snowmobile mid-air?” Stanley asked. “That’s some fancy riding.”
“You could have been killed,” Rosie scolded.
Bradley folded his arms over his chest.
“Well?” Mary asked, waiting for his critique.
“You did a great investigative job,” he said. “But, even though the clump of dirt has blood on it, it’s his word against yours that you found it on the back hoe. And, if he’s smart, after he chased you off his property, he’s washing that back hoe down and pouring bleach on anything that might have blood on it.”
“So, you’re saying I should have waited,” Mary responded, feeling her heart sink. “You think I messed up?”
“Wait, wait,” Bradley interrupted. “I didn’t say that. We still don’t have an official missing person. We still don’t have a murder. We don’t have a victim. Yeah, maybe you tipped our hand a little, but you acted because you wanted to preserve the most important piece of evidence - the body. And you did. Without a body, we have no case. All we can prove is that someone bled near the back hoe. Even DNA won’t help because it will just prove it’s her blood, not that she’s dead.”
Leaning back in the chair, Mary ran her hands through her hair and took a deep breath. “Thanks, I appreciate that perspective,” she admitted. “I just couldn’t let the bad guys win.”
“And they win too often for my good,” Rosie said.
She g
ot out of her chair, came over to Mary and gave her a hug. “Thank you for being one of the good guys and being willing to risk yourself for someone else.”
Mary hugged her back. “Thanks for taking care of us wounded good guys,” she said.
Rosie picked up the tray of empty dishes and brought them into the kitchen.
“So, girlie, did he get a good look at you or your car?” Stanley asked.
Mary shrugged. “I don’t think he got a good look at me, but he might have seen my car. But, that shouldn’t be a problem.”
Stanley rolled his eyes. “Yeah, because there’s got to be at least a couple hundred of those old Roadsters driving down the streets of Freeport, wouldn’t you say Chief?”
Grinning, Bradley nodded. “Oh, yes, I can think of at least...,” he paused and looked up at the ceiling and counted his fingers as if he were calculating numbers in his head.
“One,” he finally finished. “Yes, I can think of one of those cars.”
“Yeah, that’s about my estimation too, girlie,” Stanley snorted. “You’ve got to get yourself another car to drive around until we get this guy.”
“But, I love my Roadster,” Mary complained.
“You can take my car and I’ll drive the Roadster,” Rosie volunteered, as she entered the room.
Stanley stood up and faced Rosie, “Well, if that ain’t the most galdurn stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of,” he growled. “Why do you think we’d want Mary to be safe from some wife-beater and we wouldn’t want you to be just as safe? You ain’t gonna sacrifice your well-being Rosie.”
Rosie smiled and walked over to Stanley and kissed him on the cheek. “You old bear, thank you for caring.”
Blushing, Stanley growled half-heartedly, “I called you stupid, didn’t I? You call that caring?”
Nodding, Rosie smiled at him. “Yes, I do and it means a lot.”
“Women,” Stanley replied with disgust and sat back down.
“Mary can use my car,” Bradley said, with a grin. “I’ll just call my insurance agent in the morning and double my coverage and everything should be fine.”
“Hey, I’m a good driver,” she protested.
“So was Evel Knievel, but it didn’t do his vehicles much good,” Stanley retorted.
“I get absolutely no respect...” Mary said, and then a shooting pain in her abdomen had her grabbing her stomach and doubling over.
Bradley struggled to his feet and hurried to her side. “Mary, what’s wrong?”
Her face was ashen and tiny beads of sweat lined her forehead. “My stomach...the worst cramping,” she groaned, trying to take deep breaths. “It really...hurts.”
Rosie ran to the kitchen and dampened a dish towel. She handed it to Bradley, “Wipe her forehead; I’m going to get a hot water bottle.”
Bradley tenderly wiped the cloth over her face. “Hang in there, sweetheart.”
Rosie rushed back, a hot water bottle wrapped in a kitchen towel in her hands. She laid it against Mary’s stomach and the soothing warmth helped ease the cramping.
“Oh, better, that’s much better,” she breathed. “Wow. That was worse than a kick in the stomach.”
Bradley stood and moved away from Mary. “I think I should go back to my place and recuperate,” he said.
“What?” Mary asked, shaking her head. “Why?”
“Well, it’s obvious that whatever I have is catching,” he explained. “I don’t want to contaminate anyone else.”
“Well, we’re already exposed if that’s the case,” Rosie said. “Besides if Mary gets worse, don’t you want to be around to help her out?”
Bradley sat on the edge of the couch. “Yes, you’re right, I just...”
“You don’t want to get us sick,” Stanley interrupted, “Yeah, we got that. But, what happens if the curse ain’t a curse but a poison and someone’s trying to get rid of you and Mary. You ever thought of that?”
“A poison?” Mary asked. “But why would anyone want to kill law enforcement officers?”
“You never know,” Stanley said. “There’re theories out there that would scare the pants off you. If you only knew what was going on behind our backs.”
“Well, I know one thing,” Rosie said. “You both need sleep. So, Mary you go on up to your room. Bradley, if you’re fine on the couch, I’ll stay in the spare room in case you need help in the middle of the night.”
“I’m fine here,” he said with a smile. “This couch and I go way back.”
Mary stood on slightly shaky knees. “Bradley, I would feel better knowing you’re here,” she said, “Thanks for staying. Rosie, thanks for all you’ve done tonight. And Stanley, why don’t you come by tomorrow so we can talk about your theories. I can’t think straight right now, but I feel you might have something there.”
Stanley grinned. “Well, of course I do,” he said. “And if you don’t mind, missy, I’ll drive your car over to my place and park it in the garage, just to keep it out of sight.”
“Thanks, Stanley, that’s a great idea. The keys are on the holder, next to the door.”
Mary walked slowly up the stairs to her room. Her muscles still ached from the violent cramping. This is crazy, she thought. What is happening to us?
She didn’t even jump when she walked into her room and found Jeannine hovering near her bed. “How are you feeling,” the ghost asked.
“A little rough,” Mary confessed. “But I’ll make it.”
“I’m so sorry; I didn’t think you’d get hurt. I just wanted you to help him.”
Mary walked over to her bed and sat down on the edge. “Jeannine is what happened to me tonight connected with Bradley’s illness?”
“Yes, it is,” she said tentatively, “but I can’t tell you more than that. I’m supposed to only observe in these things, I can’t help.”
“Well, I appreciate that much information,” Mary replied. “I’m going to figure this out, Jeannine. I promise.”
“I know you will, Mary,” she said. “And if I can help you any further, I will.”
Jeannine started to fade and Mary was too tired to call her back. “Good-night,” she murmured as she slipped to the top of her bed to get under the covers.
She turned when she heard the rattling. The empty cup and saucer she had left on her nightstand was jiggling. What in the world?
She reached over to stop them, but before she got there, they crashed to the ground and broke into pieces. Mary dropped her head into her pillow. “I’ll clean it up tomorrow,” she promised herself and then closed her eyes and fell asleep.
Chapter 26
Something was wrong. Mary sat up in her bed, immediately alert. There were sounds coming from the kitchen, that wasn’t unusual, but there was something else. Food! Someone was cooking food. No ghost ever took the time to make Mary a meal. Then she remembered the events of the past day and felt a wave of relief. Bless her heart; Rosie was already taking care of them.
She swung around the bed and was about to step down when her foot grazed something sharp and pointy and she immediately pulled up. She looked down and saw the broken cup and saucer. That was the strangest thing; it was like an unseen hand...
An unseen hand! Mary recalled the last thing Jeannine had said before she faded away. “If I can help you any further, I will.”
“Okay, Jeannine, a clue. My cup and saucer are a clue,” she shook her head. “Shards? Broken Pieces? Shattered lives?”
The sounds below reminded her that Rosie was in the kitchen. She slipped out of bed, avoiding the breakage, and quickly washed up and got dressed before she went downstairs to greet Rosie.
“Good morning,” Mary said from the bottom of the stairs. “How is everyone this morning?”
She peeked around the corner to see Bradley still asleep on the couch.
“Yes, he’s still sleeping,” Rosie said. “I thought sleep would be the best thing for him. But, I made you some muffins and I brewed some of that special tea of yours. I really don’
t like the smell of it, but I made some for you.”
“Tea!” Mary exclaimed. “That’s it! Not broken anything, it’s the tea.”
“Mary, are you feeling okay?” Rosie asked.
Mary picked up the bag of tea Angela had given them when they left the hospital. “Is this the tea you gave me last night?” Mary asked.
“Yes, dear,” she said. “Why?”
“Did you give any more of it to Bradley?”
“No, when I asked him if he wanted some he told me he had had enough of that tea to last him a lifetime.”
Mary jumped up and hugged Rosie. “I’ve got a hunch. Do you know where Bradley’s keys are?”
“In the holder, next to the door,” she replied.
“I won’t be gone long,” Mary explained. “I just have to ask someone a few questions.”
Mary grabbed her coat and Bradley’s keys and quietly slipped out the door. His car had been driven over by one of his officers the day before and sat in front of her house, but it was covered in several inches of snow from the storm the night before. She opened the car, put the keys in the ignition and started the car, so it could warm up while she cleaned it off.
With the windows clear, she climbed into the driver’s seat and adjusted the mirrors. She looked down at the rest of the keys hanging from the chain, hoping that one of the extra ones would let her into City Hall so she wouldn’t have to break in.
It took her only a few minutes to reach Bradley’s parking spot outside City Hall. She dashed from the car to the side door on Walnut Street, the keys jingling in her hand. Before she had a chance to try them in the lock, the door opened for her. “Thanks Jeannine,” she said with a smile. “Oh, and thanks for the clue, very ingenious.”
She hurried up the stairs and down the hall to the old Chief’s Office. Opening the door, she called, “Sam, I need to talk to you. It’s important.”
Instantly the ghost of Sam Rogers appeared before her. “Good morning, Mary, what can I do for you?” he asked.
“Did you drink tea?”
He hovered a little closer. “You came to City Hall before seven in the morning to ask me if I drank tea?”
