Bond With Death

by Bill Crider

  She had also discovered that she was a pretty good marksperson. No one had to teach her how to shoot. It just seemed to come naturally to her. She liked the feeling of competence that a tight grouping of shots gave her.

  She checked in at the range, glad to see that no one else was there to practice at that time of the afternoon. She put on the ear protectors, then loaded the Ladysmith’s clip. After placing the clip in the pistol, she took a deep breath and took the pistol in a two-handed grip. She let her breath out slowly as she sighted in on the paper target with both eyes open. When she felt as relaxed as she was going to get, she pulled the trigger. The target jumped, and she fired again. And then again, until she had fired eight times.

  The figure on the target was that of a heavyset man wearing a hat. Sally paused to reload as the target moved toward her, wondering how long it had been since she’d actually seen a man wearing a dress hat. Her conclusion was that it had been a long time.

  When she inspected the target, Sally wasn’t pleased with the grouping. Her shots had been all over the place, proving that she was still upset from her visit with Fieldstone and Talon. She’d thought maybe her quiet time with Lola had helped calm her down, but she’d been wrong. She signaled for the target to be moved out again, this time to fifteen yards. She was confident that she could do better even at the greater distance.

  She was right. When she inspected the target again, she had a nice tight group in the crudely drawn figure’s chest. She smiled and settled down to do some more shooting.

  Leaving the firing range, Sally was taken aback by the stifling humidity outside. The range was air-conditioned and quite cool, but there had been a brief rain shower while Sally was in the building, and breathing was like sucking air through a steamed towel.

  The hot and humid air wasn’t doing much for Sally’s hair, either. She often thought that women in dry climates didn’t really know what a bad hair day was. Living near the Gulf Coast, Sally was guaranteed at least three hundred and fifty bad hair days a year.

  She locked the pistol in the trunk of her car, feeling pretty good about just about everything except her hair. The e-mail that had been sent out was, she felt certain, nothing more than a prank perpetrated by some student who was unhappy with a grade. Probably it had been sent by someone in her American literature class, since they were the ones who’d most recently been discussing witchcraft. Sally thought immediately of Wayne Compton, but she knew it couldn’t have been Wayne. He was kind of a pest, but he didn’t have a malicious bone in his body. She was going through a mental list of the other students as she got behind the wheel of the Acura, oblivious of anything going on around her, which explained why she jumped and banged her head on the roof when a loud horn sounded nearby.

  Sally rubbed her head, further frizzing her hair, and looked around. A black Lincoln Navigator was pulling to a stop beside her. Vera Vaughn was the only faculty member who had a Navigator. It wouldn’t have been out of character for her to own something even bigger, like a Hummer, though Sally thought that even a Hummer might not have ten cup holders. But the Navigator did. Sally had counted them once.

  The passenger-side window of the Navigator slid down, and Jack Neville leaned out.

  “We tried to call you,” he said, “but you must have your cell phone turned off.”

  Sally seldom turned on her cell phone, and certainly never in the firing range, where she didn’t like distractions.

  “I thought you might be here taking out your frustrations,” Jack said, “considering the kind of day you must have had.”

  Sally thought that Jack knew her better than just about anyone at HCC. She wasn’t sure that was a good thing.

  “Vera and I would like to talk to you,” Jack went on. “If you have time.”

  “Right now?” Sally said.

  “Now, but not here. We could meet you somewhere. How about the Adobe Hacienda? We could have a margarita.”

  Sally checked her watch. It was five-thirty, not too early for a margarita, and she wouldn’t mind having Mexican food for dinner later.

  “All right,” she said. “I’ll meet you there.”

  The window slid up and the Navigator made its way out of the parking lot. Wondering what Vera and Jack had to say, Sally followed them.

  8

  Sally was pretty sure that the Adobe Hacienda wasn’t made of adobe. For that matter, it wasn’t a hacienda. It was just a Mexican restaurant on the outskirts of Hughes, built to look as if it might be made of adobe and as if it might not have been out of place on a large ranch somewhere in Mexico.

  Sally didn’t know if it really resembled a hacienda, as she had never been to a ranch in Mexico. She did know that the margaritas were good and that the food was even better.

  When she arrived at the parking lot, Vera and Jack were standing beside the Navigator waiting for her. Vera, looking less like one of the Valkyrie than usual, was dressed modestly in jeans, a plaid shirt, and high-heeled boots.

  Sally was wearing the same Kaspar pantsuit that she had worn to school that morning. “Inexpensive, but nice,” was what her mother had always said about the clothing line that Sally favored. Sally didn’t think the pantsuit had been all that inexpensive, but she’d gotten it on sale, and it didn’t pay to argue with her mother.

  Jack and Vera waved to Sally, and she joined them. Heat waves shimmered up off the asphalt.

  “Let’s go in,” Jack said. “It’s too hot to stand out here.”

  They went inside, with Jack allowing Vera to open the door. Vera was a militant feminist, and Sally knew that she didn’t like to have men opening doors for her.

  It was cool inside the restaurant, and the smell of sizzling fajitas filled the entryway. The walls of the restaurant were decorated with colorful serapes and sombreros. Crossed maracas hung beside them, and piñatas dangled from the ceiling. Sally had often wondered if there was anything inside the piñatas, but she’d never been quite curious enough to whack one with a stick and find out. Maybe if she had enough margaritas some night, she’d give it a try.

  There was music playing over hidden speakers, and although Sally hadn’t taken Spanish since college, she could understand some of the words: lágrimas, for one. Corazón was another.

  Vera asked for a back booth, and as they were following the server to it, Sally saw that Jorge Rodriguez and Mae Wilkins were seated at a table on the opposite side of the room. If she hadn’t been wondering about what Vera and Jack wanted, Sally thought, she might have noticed Jorge’s car outside. There had been a bit of chemistry between her and Jorge, and she had thought that they might one day be sitting at a table together, sharing a drink, but Jorge and Mae had hooked up instead.

  They were an odd couple, Sally thought, but maybe that was the attraction. Mae was the most fastidious person Sally had ever known. Her office at the college looked like something out of one of the more elegant issues of Southern Living. There was a rumor that a speck of dust had lingered in Mae’s house for more than an hour, but Sally didn’t believe it.

  Mae had once confessed to Sally, however, that in spite of her addiction to cleanliness and the Martha Stewart way of life, she was attracted to men who might be both dangerous and sloppy.

  Jorge, while Sally had seen no evidence of sloppiness, was certainly on the dangerous side if the rumors about him were to be believed. It was true that he had been in prison. That much had been verified. But the reason for his incarceration was unclear. Some said murder, and that story had never been disproved, though Sally doubted it. One thing was certain: he was an excellent choice to head up the college’s program of teaching in the several prison units located near Hughes. Inmates enrolled in college courses could identify with a man who’d been in their place and made a success of his life after his release.

  Whatever his past, Jorge had one grievous fault that Sally had recently discovered while talking with Mae. It was a fault that in Sally’s mind would have prevented any kind of relationship between them as sur
ely as if Jorge had been an unrepentant serial killer. The sad truth was that he was allergic to cats.

  “Of course, I don’t have a cat,” Mae had told Sally that day in the faculty lounge, without quite implying that cats were filthy, diseased, and most likely covered with fleas. “I know that you do, though, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Many lonely people find them to be a comfort.”

  If it had come down to a decision between Lola and Jorge, Sally wasn’t in any doubt about which one she would have chosen, so she wrote off her brief infatuation with Jorge to temporary insanity. And she wrote off Mae’s remarks as a result of the same thing.

  Sally scooted into the booth across from Vera and Jack, and after they’d ordered their drinks, she asked what they wanted to talk to her about.

  Jack looked over his shoulder to see if the server was nearby. She wasn’t, but Jack said, “Wait until we have our margaritas.”

  The drinks arrived served in frosted mugs rimmed with salt. Sally’s was frozen, with peach flavoring. Jack and Vera had ordered the “gold” version. Everybody had a taste and nodded with satisfaction.

  Along with the drinks, the server had brought a bowl of tortilla chips and two small bowls of salsa, one red, one green. Sally preferred the red, which had little bits of cilantro in it. Sally knew there were people who didn’t like cilantro, but she wasn’t one of them. She took a chip and dipped out some of the salsa. It wasn’t fiery hot, but it would do.

  “All right,” Sally said when she’d eaten the chip. “Now tell me what all the mystery is.”

  Jack looked around again. They were seated at the end of the last row of booths, as far from the entrance as they could get. The closest people were Jorge and Mae, who saw Jack looking in her direction and waved. Jack didn’t wave back, but Sally did. She wasn’t going to let Mae think she was jealous, because she wasn’t.

  Jack turned back and looked at Vera, who nodded as if giving him permission, which Sally thought might be exactly the case. Vera wasn’t one to let anybody else be in charge.

  Jack took a sip of his drink and said, “I had a visit from my friend Weems today. I guess you did, too.”

  “Yes,” Sally said, “and things went downhill after that.”

  She told them about her little chat with Fieldstone and Roy Don Talon.

  “Roy Don should be locked up in one of the prison units at Sugar Land by now,” Vera said. “Not serving on the college board.”

  “They could never prove he had anything to do with the hot car ring,” Jack said. “Too bad, if you ask me.”

  “Did Fieldstone support you against Roy Don?” Vera asked.

  “Not exactly,” Sally said. “And he’s set up a meeting tomorrow with Jennifer Jackson.”

  “Mothers Against Witchcraft,” Vera said.

  “That’s not all,” Jack said. “She and her husband are the leaders of the opposition to the bond issue.”

  “Fieldstone didn’t mention that,” Sally said.

  “He might not know it.”

  “He knows a lot about what’s going on around town,” Sally said. “Especially if it involves the college. That’s probably why he agreed to the meeting without asking me. He can’t afford to offend any of the opposition and give them something to use against him. I’m sure Fieldstone knew, but I didn’t think you were plugged into the community like he is.”

  Jack didn’t say anything in response to that.

  “I didn’t see any need for a meeting,” Sally went on. “I don’t know what I can say that I haven’t already said. But it makes more sense now.

  “The purpose of a witch hunt,” Vera told her, “is to make people afraid. Jennifer Jackson is the kind of person who enjoys trying to scare people. Fieldstone should have refused to set up a meeting even if she is opposing the bond issue.”

  Sally more or less agreed, but she was willing to forgive Fieldstone. She said, “He wasn’t as bad as he was earlier in the day when he told me it would be a good idea if I repudiated witchcraft.”

  “Jack told me about that,” Vera said. “I’m glad you told him it was a stupid idea.”

  Sally had another chip and some more red salsa. Then she had another sip of the peach margarita.

  “That’s not exactly what I said, but I did tell him that he was being ridiculous. How can I repudiate witchcraft? I can’t help it if my husband was distantly related to a woman who was executed for something like that.”

  “It was the male power structure of the community,” Vera said. “They always want women to give in and submit to them. If you’ve read anything about the witchcraft scare in Salem …”

  Sally held up a hand. “I read about it every semester for my American literature class. I know more about Cotton Mather and Samuel Sewall than I want to know.”

  Vera nodded. “Then you know that most of the so-called witches were women who weren’t very well liked and had no friends to defend them. They lived outside society’s norms. Men have always feared women like that.”

  “I’m not like that,” Sally said. “Am I?”

  “Not all of the accused were women,” Jack pointed out, hastily changing the subject.

  Vera waved him off. “I said most. As soon as the governor’s wife was accused, what happened?”

  “The whole sorry mess came to a screeching halt,” Jack said.

  “Right. She was a woman with power and powerful friends. Not to mention that her husband was governor. It’s always been the powerless who get executed.”

  Sally had heard that point of view before, as well as just about every other theory about the panic in Salem. It was interesting, but she didn’t see where it was leading, and she didn’t think of herself as powerless. She was pretty sure Fieldstone didn’t, either, and Jennifer Jackson should have known better, too.

  “You and Jack didn’t bring me here just to talk about the Salem witches and drink margaritas, did you?” she said.

  “No,” Vera said. “We brought you here for something else.”

  Sally looked into her glass and saw that her margarita was just about gone. She was feeling a little giddy, too.

  “We’d better order some food before you tell me,” she said.

  “Good idea,” Jack said, and looked around for the server, who showed up almost as if she’d popped out of thin air.

  Maybe she’s a witch, Sally thought. Or maybe I shouldn’t have drunk this margarita on an empty stomach.

  She ordered a plate of spinach enchiladas, knowing they’d make her feel better. Vera and Jack decided to share chicken fajitas, and when the server was gone, Sally explained that there was no such thing as chicken fajitas. Margaritas always made her a tad garrulous.

  Jack and Vera didn’t seem interested, and so Sally finished off her drink and had another chip with salsa. She looked across the restaurant and saw Jorge and Mae leaving. Mae smiled and waved again. So did Sally.

  The fajitas came sizzling to the table, and Sally’s enchiladas arrived at the same time. Sally no longer wanted to talk. She put some salsa on her enchiladas and started eating, while Jack and Vera rolled up chicken, beans, rice, and pico de gallo in flour tortillas.

  They ate in silence for a while. After she had eaten one entire enchilada, Sally looked up and said, “All right. I feel better now. So tell me what we’re doing here.”

  Vera wiped her mouth with her napkin, while Jack looked around to be sure they weren’t being overheard. He was beginning to look to Sally like a snitch in a bad prison movie.

  “You know that e-mail about you being a witch?” Vera said.

  Sally nodded. “All too well. That’s what got me the meetings with Fieldstone. That’s why Weems was in my office. As if I were a witch. Did you ever hear of anything so absurd?”

  “So you’re not a witch?”

  “Of course not,” Sally said.

  Vera looked at her.

  “Well,” she said. “I am.”

  9

  It was hard to follow up on something like that. J
ack fiddled with his fork while Sally just stared at Vera. After a few seconds had passed in silence, Sally looked at Jack.

  “Did you know about this?”

  Jack nodded. He seemed a little embarrassed.

  “It’s not like I go around turning people into toads,” Vera said.

  “You turn me into an animal now and then,” Jack said, and Sally had to laugh.

  Even Vera smiled. “That’s different.”

  It was getting later, and the restaurant was filling up. Sally said that it might be a good idea for them to finish their meal and then go somewhere else to talk. She didn’t think discussing Vera’s occult leanings in the Adobe Hacienda was a good idea, no matter how private their booth was.

  “We can go to my house,” she said. “I’ll make some coffee.”

  “I could use it,” Jack said. “That was a strong margarita.”

  Sally was no longer feeling in the least giddy. She was as sober as she’d ever been. Finding out that a faculty member was a witch had that effect.

  Sally arrived at her house first and put the Acura in the garage. She got the Ladysmith out of the trunk and stowed it away before Vera and Jack got there. When the doorbell rang, she’d already started the coffee.

  Lola came out of the bedroom to see the visitors. When she’d looked them over with disdain, she went back to the dark room and got under the bed. She wasn’t fond of visitors.

  Sally ushered her guests back to the kitchen where they sat at the table in the breakfast area.

  “The coffee smells good,” Jack said. “What kind is it?”

  “Hazelnut,” Sally told him. “I hope you don’t mind flavored coffee.”

  “It’s fine,” Jack said, looking at her coffeemaker. “What the heck is that thing?”

  “It grinds the beans and then makes the coffee,” Sally said. “It tastes fresher that way.”