“It's about two miles north.” Smoke billowed out with his answer.
“Which side?”
“Look for a green mailbox.”
Walking out, I felt squinty eyes on my back.
Swayney Creek was a thin black tongue that dropped sharply after leaving the highway. The road descended for the next half mile, then leveled off and passed through a long stretch of mixed-conifer forest. A creek ran along one side, the water so clear I could see individual pebbles littering the bottom.
Driving north, I passed few signs of habitation. Then the road curved east, climbed slightly, and I spotted an opening in the trees, a rusty green mailbox to its right. Drawing close, I saw the name “Bowman” carved on a plaque hung below the box with two short segments of chain.
I turned onto the dirt lane and crept forward, hoping I had the right Bowman. Pine, spruce, and hemlock towered above, choking off all but a few shoots of sunlight. Fifty yards up, Luke Bowman's house squatted like a solitary sentinel guarding the forest road.
The reverend lived in a weathered frame bungalow, with a porch at one end and a shed at the other. Together they were stacked with enough firewood to heat a medieval castle. Bright turquoise awnings angled over windows to either side of the front door, looking as out of place in the gloom as the Golden Arches on a synagogue.
The “front yard” was black with shade and carpeted with a thick mat of leaves and pine needles. A gravel path crossed it, leading from the door to a rectangle of gravel at the road's end.
I pulled next to Bowman's pickup, cut the engine, and turned on my phone. Before I could get out, the front door opened and the reverend appeared on the stoop. Again, he was dressed in black, as though wanting to remind even himself of the soberness of his calling.
Bowman didn't smile, but his face relaxed when he recognized me. I climbed out of the car and walked up the path. Small brown mushrooms bordered each side.
“I'm sorry to disturb you, Reverend Mr. Bowman. I left a shopping bag in your truck.”
“You surely did. It's in the kitchen.” He stepped back. “Please, come inside.”
I brushed past him into a dim interior heavy with the odor of burned bacon.
“Would you like something to drink?”
“No, thank you. I can't stay.”
“Please, have a seat.”
He gestured into a small living room crammed with furniture. The pieces looked as though they'd been purchased by the roomful, then placed exactly as on the showroom floor. Only closer together.
“Thanks.”
I sat on a brown velour sectional, the centerpiece of a three-piece grouping still covered in plastic. Though the weather was cool the windows were open, and the perfectly matched brown plaid curtains billowed inward with the breeze.
“I'll get your things.”
He disappeared and a door opened, allowing the muted voices, bongs, and applause of a television game show to drift out. I looked around.
The room was devoid of personal items. There were no wedding or graduation pictures. Not one snapshot of the kids at the beach or the dog in a party hat. The only images were of haloed persons. I recognized Jesus, and a chap I thought might be John the Baptist.
After several minutes, Bowman returned. The plastic slipcover crackled as I rose.
“Thank you.”
“It was a pleasure, Miss Temperance.”
“And thank you again for yesterday.”
“I was glad to help. Peter and Timothy are the best mechanics in the county. I've taken my trucks to them for years.”
“Reverend Mr. Bowman, you've lived here a long time, haven't you?”
“All my life.”
“Do you know anything about a lodge house with a courtyard near the spot where the plane went down?”
“I remember my daddy talking about a camp out that way near Running Goat Branch, but never a lodge.”
I had a sudden thought. Shifting the bag onto my left hip, I dug out McMahon's fax and handed it to Bowman.
“Are any of these names familiar to you?”
He unfolded and read the paper. I watched closely, but saw no change in his expression.
“Sorry.”
He handed back the fax, and I returned it to my purse.
“Have you ever heard of a man named Victor Livingstone?”
Bowman shook his head.
“Edward Arthur?”
“I know an Edward Arthur lives over near Sylva. Used to be Holiness, but left the movement years ago. Brother Arthur used to claim he was led to the Holy Ghost by George Hensley himself.”
“George Hensley?”
“The first man to take up serpents. Brother Arthur said they made acquaintance during Reverend Hensley's time in Grasshopper Valley.”
“I see.”
“Brother Arthur's got to be close to ninety by now.”
“He's still alive?”
“As God's holy word.”
“He was a member of your church?”
“He was one of my father's flock, as devoted a man as ever breathed God's air. Army changed him. Kept the faith for a few years after the war, then just stopped following the signs.”
“When was that?”
“Around forty-seven or forty-eight. No. That's not right.” He pointed a gnarled finger. “The last service Brother Arthur attended was for Sister Edna Farrell's passing. I recall that because Papa had been praying for the renewal of the man's faith. About a week after the funeral Papa paid Brother Arthur a visit, and found himself preaching down the barrel of a gun. After that, he give up.”
“When did Edna Farrell die?”
“Nineteen forty-nine.”
Edward Arthur had sold his land to the H&F Investment Group on April 10, 1949.
I FOUND EDWARD ARTHUR IN A VEGETABLE PATCH BEHIND HIS LOG cabin. He wore a wool plaid shirt over denim coveralls, rubber boots, and a ragged straw hat that might once have belonged to a gondolier. He paused when he saw me, then went back to turning dirt.
“Mr. Arthur?” I asked.
The old man continued jabbing a pitchfork at the ground, then pushing on it with a shaky foot. He had so little strength the prongs barely penetrated, but he repeated the movement again and again.
“Edward Arthur?” I spoke more loudly.
He didn't answer. The fork made a soft thud each time he thrust it at the soil.
“Mr. Arthur, I can see that you're busy, but I'd like to ask you a few questions.”
I set my face in what I hoped was an encouraging smile.
Arthur straightened as best he could and walked to a wheelbarrow loaded with rocks and dead vegetation. When he removed his shirt I saw scrawny arms and hands covered with liver spots the size of lima beans. Exchanging the pitchfork for a hoe, he tottered back to the row where he'd been working.
“I'd like to ask you about a piece of property near Running Goat Branch.”
For the first time Arthur looked at me. His eyes were rheumy, the rims red, the irises so pale they were almost colorless.
“I believe you used to own acreage in that vicinity?”
“Why you coming to me?” His breathing sounded wheezy, like air being sucked through a filter.
“I'm curious about who bought your land.”
“Are you FBI?”
“No.”
“You one of them crash people?”
“I was with the investigation, but I'm not any longer.”
“Who sent you here?”
“No one sent me, Mr. Arthur. I found you through Luke Bowman.”
“Whyn't you put your questions to Luke Bowman?”
“Reverend Bowman didn't know anything about your land, except that it might have been a campground at one time.”
“That's what he said, was it?”
“Yes, sir.”
Arthur pulled a parrot-green kerchief from a pocket and ran it across his face. Then he dropped the hoe and hobbled toward me, his back as rounded as a turkey vulture's. When h
e drew close I could see coarse white hair sprouting from his nostrils, neck, and ears.
“Can't say much about the son, but Thaddeus Bowman was as pesky a man as ever drew air. Ran a hallelujah house for forty years.”
“You were one of Thaddeus Bowman's followers?”
“Till I learnt all that casting out o' demons and speaking in tongues was a heap of horseshit.”
Arthur hawked up phlegm and spat into the dirt.
“I see. You sold your land after the war?”
He went on as if I hadn't spoken.
“Thaddeus Bowman kept hounding me to repent, but I was on to other things. The damned fool wouldn't accept my leavin' until I put it to him from the business end of a squirrel rifle.”
“Mr. Arthur, I'm here to ask about the property you bought from Victor Livingstone.”
“Didn't buy no property from Victor Livingstone.”
“Records indicate Livingstone transferred title to you in 1933.”
“I was nineteen in 1933. Got myself married.”
This seemed to be going nowhere.
“Did you know Victor Livingstone?”
“Sarah Masham. She died in birthing.”
His answers were so disjointed I wondered if he was senile.
“The seventeen acres was our weddin' present. They got a word for that.”
The creases around his eyes deepened with concentration.
“Mr. Arthur, I'm sorry for taking you away from your garden, bu—”
“Dowry. That's the word. It was her dowry.”
“What was her dowry?”
“Ain't you asking 'bout that land t' Running Goat?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Sarah's daddy give it to us. Then she died.”
“Victor Livingstone was your wife's father?”
“Sarah Masham Livingstone. That was my first wife. We was married three years when she passed. Wasn't but eighteen. Her daddy was so tore up, he went and died, too.”
“I'm so sorry, Mr. Arthur.”
“That's when I lit outta here and threw in with George Hensley over t' Tennessee. He's the one got me to taking up serpents.”
“What happened with the Running Goat property?”
“City fella asked if he could rent it, run a little camp. I wanted nothing to do with the place, so I said hell, yes. Seemed like easy money.”
Again he cleared his throat and spat.
“It was a campground?”
“They came up for huntin' and fishin', but you ask me, it was mostly to hide from their womenfolk.”
“Was there a house?”
“They stayed with tents and campfires and all, till I built the lodge.” He shook his head. “Beats me what some fools consider fun.”
“When did you build the lodge?”
“Before the war.”
“Did it have a walled courtyard?”
“What the hell kinda question is that?”
“Did you build a stone wall and make a courtyard?”
“I wasn't puttin' up no friggin' Camelot.”
“You sold the land in 1949?”
“Sounds right.”
“The year you broke with Thaddeus Bowman.”
“Eyeh.”
“Luke Bowman remembered that you left his father's congregation right after Edna Farrell died.”
Again the eyes creased.
“You implyin' something, young lady?”
“No, sir.”
“Edna Farrell was a fine Christian lady. They should have done better by her.”
“Would you mind telling me who bought the camp?”
“Would you mind tellin' me why you're wantin' to know my business?”
I was quickly revising my estimate of Edward Arthur. Because he was old and taciturn I had presumed his faculties might be dulled. The man in front of me was as cagey as Kasparov. I decided to play it straight.
“I'm no longer involved in the crash investigation because I've been accused of acting improperly. The charges are false.”
“Eyeh.”
“I believe there's something wrong in that lodge, and I want to know what. The information may help clear my name, but I think my efforts are being blocked.”
“You been there?”
“Not inside.”
He started to speak, but a gust of wind grabbed his hat and sent it reeling across the garden. Purple lips drew back against toothless gums, and a scarecrow arm shot out.
Bolting, I overtook the hat and pinned it with a foot. Then I brushed it clean and carried it back to Arthur.
The old man shivered as he took the boater and pressed it to his chest.
“Would you like your shirt, sir?”
“Turnin' cold,” he said, and started for the wheelbarrow.
When he'd finished buttoning, I helped him gather his tools and store them with the wheelbarrow in a shed behind the cabin. As he closed the door, I re-posed my question.
“Who bought your land, Mr. Arthur?”
He clicked the padlock, tugged it twice, and turned to face me.
“You'd best stay clear of that place, young lady.”
“I promise you, sir, I won't go there alone.”
Arthur regarded me for so long, I thought he wasn't going to answer. Then he stepped close and raised his face to mine.
“Prentice Dashwood.”
He spat “Prentice” with such force that saliva misted my chin.
“Prentice Dashwood bought your land?”
He nodded, and the watery old eyes darkened.
“The devil hisself,” he hissed.
When I phoned Crowe's office, a deputy informed me that the sheriff was still in Fontana. I sat a moment, clicking my keys on the steering wheel and staring at Arthur's cabin.
Then I started the car and pulled out.
Though fat, black-green clouds were rapidly gathering, I drove with the windows down, the air buffeting my face. I knew wind would soon whip the trees, and rain would wash across the pavement and down the mountain face, but for the moment the air felt good.
Taking Highway 19, I headed back toward Bryson City. Two miles south of town I spotted a small wooden sign and turned off onto a gravel road.
The Riverbank Inn lay a quarter mile down the road, on the banks of the Tuckasegee River. It was a one-story, yellow stucco affair built in a 1950s ranch design. Its sixteen rooms stretched to the left and right of a central office, each with its own front entrance and porch in back. A plastic jack-o'-lantern grinned from every stoop, and an electrified skeleton hung from a tree outside the main entrance.
Clearly, the inn's appeal lay in setting and not in decorating or architectural style.
Pulling up outside the office, I saw only two other vehicles, a red Pontiac Grand Am with Alabama plates, and a blue Ford Taurus with North Carolina plates. The cars were parked in front of units two and seven.
As I passed the skeleton, it gave a warbly moan, followed by a high-pitched mechanical laugh. I wondered how often Primrose had to endure the display.
The motel lobby had the same feel as High Ridge House. A strand of bells hanging on the door, chintz curtains, knotty pine. A plaque welcomed me, and introduced the owners as Ralph and Brenda Stover. Another jack-o'-lantern smiled from the counter.
A man in a Redskins jersey sat beside Jack, leafing through a copy of PC World. He looked up when I jingled in, and smiled at me across the lobby. I assumed this was Ralph.
“May I help you?” Ralph had thinning blond hair, and his skin was pink and Simonize shiny.
“I'm Dr. Tempe Brennan,” I said, extending a hand.
“Ralph Stover.”
As we shook, his medical ID bracelet jangled like the bells on the door.
“I'm a friend of Primrose Hobbs,” I said.
“Yes?”
“Mrs. Hobbs has been staying here for the past two weeks?”
“She has.”
“She's working with the crash investigation.”
“I k
now Mrs. Hobbs.” Ralph's smile never wavered.
“Is she in?”
“I can ring her room if you'd like.”
“Please.”
He dialed, listened, replaced the receiver.
“Mrs. Hobbs is not answering. Would you like to leave a message?”
“I take it she has not checked out.”
“Mrs. Hobbs is still registered.”
“Have you seen her today?”
“No.”
“When did you last see her?”
“I can't possibly keep track of all our guests.”
“Mrs. Hobbs hasn't been to work since Sunday, and I'm concerned about her. Could you please tell me what room she's in?”
“I'm sorry, but I can't do that.” The smile widened. “Policy.”
“She could be ill.”
“The maid would report a sick guest.”
Ralph was as polite as a policeman on a traffic stop. O.K. I can do polite.
“This is really important.” I placed a palm lightly on his wrist and looked into his eyes. “Can you tell me what Mrs. Hobbs drives so I can see if her car is in your lot?”
“No, I cannot.”
“Can we go together to check her room?”
“No.”
“Will you go while I wait here?”
“No, ma'am.”
Pulling back my hand, I tried another tack.
“Would Mrs. Stover remember when she last saw Mrs. Hobbs?”
Ralph laced his fingers and laid his hands on the magazine. The hair on his forearms looked pale and wiry against the calaminepink skin.
“You are asking the same questions the others asked, and my wife and I will give you the same answers we gave to them. Unless served with an official warrant we will open no room, and divulge no information about any guest.” His voice was buttery smooth.
“What others?”
Ralph drew a long, patient breath.
“Is there anything else I can help you with?”
I honed my voice to scalpel sharp.
“If Primrose Hobbs comes to any harm because of your policy,you'll wish you'd never sent away for that hotel-motel management course.”
Ralph Stover's eyes narrowed but the smile held firm.
I pulled a business card from my purse and jotted down my cell phone number.
“If you have a change of heart, give me a call.”
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