The Witch's Voice

by Iris Kincaid

  “Very understandable. But Vancouver’s an unusual choice for you, isn’t it? Where was your last vacation?”

  “The Hamptons.”

  “And the vacation before that?”

  “A week in Manhattan.”

  “And the vacation before that?”

  “That would be Newport. I just love it there.”

  “How did you get to the Hamptons, and Manhattan, and Newport?”

  “I drove. Oh, it took a little while to get to Manhattan. And once I was there, I didn’t do a whole lot of driving. But I’m used to long drives. I don’t mind.”

  “Isn’t it true that the reason that you chose the vacation spots of Manhattan and the Hamptons and Newport is because they are within driving distance, and you are terrified of flying?”

  “I . . . I don’t enjoy flying. It makes me nervous. I just hate the thought of it. Heather always told me what a silly goose I was about that.”

  “So, why Vancouver? Why a flight to Vancouver?”

  “It seemed like a good time to face my fears and get over this whole fear of flying thing.”

  “Well, the timing of it is rather interesting. But even more interesting about this vacation is that vacation usually means you go away and then come back. Why did you buy a one-way flight from Boston to Vancouver? You weren’t planning on coming back, were you?”

  Misty had to think quickly before she could answer. “I’ve decided to move to Vancouver. What’s wrong with that? It’s a free country.”

  “Before the trial of the murder of your best friend has concluded? Ms. Chandler, sounds to me like you’re ready to disappear.”

  Misty looked away uncomfortably.

  “I see that you have been putting your Powerball winnings to good use,” Jeremy noted.

  “I appreciate the finer things in life. Good designers, good jewelry—”

  “And good causes. Ms. Chandler. Are you personally acquainted with my client, Harley Osborne?”

  “No. I’ve never met him.”

  “Why did you pay his $200,000 bail? He is the man who stands accused of killing your best friend. Why did you pay his bail?”

  “Well, a man is innocent until he is proven guilty. I can’t just assume that he had anything to do with her death. That would be unfair.”

  “That’s commendable. The presumption of innocence is exactly what I hope of everyone in this courtroom. But that doesn’t explain your generosity. Two hundred thousand dollars is a lot of money. Why did you pay his bail?”

  Misty seemed lost for an answer.

  “Do you know his nephew, Eric Osborne?”

  “No, I don’t know him.”

  “And yet you just paid a hundred thousand dollars to support his medical treatment. Why would you do that?”

  “It’s . . . it’s just that I have so much money now. I’ve decided to become a philanthropist. Yes, to use all of my wealth to help people. Poor people. Sick people. People in need. I intend to dedicate myself to that now that I have the means to do so.”

  “That is a noble goal,” Jeremy said with a disbelieving smile. “What other charities have you donated to since you won this money?”

  “Well, I haven’t had the money very long.”

  “But surely, you must’ve given a donation to UNICEF, or the Red Cross, or Doctors without Borders, local churches . . . something of that nature. Could you please name one or two other charitable contributions that you’ve made since you won this money? Who are the beneficiaries of this new program of philanthropy?”

  “Off the top of my head? Well, I just haven’t really had the time to organize my donations. What with moving out of town and everything.”

  “Ms. Chandler. I don’t really want to concern the court with how you spend your time or how you spend your money. Not really. You can buy designer clothes and diamond rings and treat yourself till the cows come home. That is your perfect right. But what we need to understand is how you have given three hundred thousand dollars to Harley Osborne and his nephew, Eric Osborne, who are complete strangers to you. Ms. Chandler, could you please help us to understand your priorities?”

  Misty Chandler looked trapped. “Oh, you know . . . random acts of kindness and all that.”

  “Random would be the word. One last matter, Ms. Chandler. You’ve been playing the lottery for years, haven’t you?”

  “I sure have. And it finally paid off. Just like I knew it would.”

  “I believe that you are the kind of person that plays the same numbers all the time, aren’t you?”

  “I do have my lucky numbers. I would’ve felt so badly if my numbers won and I hadn’t played them.”

  “What are the lottery numbers that you always played?”

  I can’t remember.”

  “Does this sound familiar? 29000700, 29000701, 29000702, and 2900703.”

  “Why, yes. Those are my numbers. How could you possibly know my numbers?”

  “The important thing about your numbers, Ms. Chandler, is that they never won the Powerball. None of your regular numbers won the $360,000,000. The winning number was 41316482.

  Did you buy the ticket, Mrs. Chandler? Or did Heather Kelton buy this ticket?”

  “Heather was my friend.”

  “That has already been established. Were you in any way involved with the death of Heather Kelton?”

  “I most certainly was not.”

  “Was Heather Kelton the person who purchased this winning Powerball ticket?”

  Misty was clearly unwilling to answer.

  “I should probably mention that we do know exactly where and when this ticket was purchased. And we are currently retrieving security video to corroborate evidence of this purchase. But perhaps you could expedite matters? How did a winning ticket purchased by Heather Kelton wind up in your possession? By all accounts, she wasn’t a very generous woman. What are her lottery winnings doing in your bank account?”

  “I think I need a lawyer, don’t I?” Misty said unhappily.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Misty Chandler’s testimony split the case wide open again. The mayor was called back to testify.

  “Mr. Mayor. Did your wife win the $369,000,000 Powerball?”

  “No. Not unless she was trying to hide it from me. Which she never would have done. And besides, you can’t really spend that kind of money without your husband noticing, can you?”

  “Is there any possibility that you and your wife were headed for divorce?”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “I only asked because if your wife had won this money and didn’t want to share it with you, she might possibly have committed it to a friend for safekeeping.”

  “I told you a divorce was out of the question. If there’s anything that my wife loved, it was being the mayor’s wife. It was even more important to her than money. I’m not saying that money isn’t important, but we are sort of the First Family of Oyster Cove, and she really loved that.”

  “Any idea how Misty Chandler might’ve wound up with a lottery ticket purchased by your wife?”

  “That’s a very good question. One I would really like to know the answer to.”

  After court ended for the day, Wanda decided to walk around town to stretch her legs and to meet Lydia for a late lunch. As she approached the restaurant, she could see Lydia communicating to someone in sign language. But as she drew closer, she was amazed to find out that it was Jeremy Todd. He was signing back to Lydia! He knew sign language!

  Wanda walked right past them, signing as she did, “Meet me in the alley, so we won’t be seen.”

  She had already revealed to Lydia that the trial’s defense attorney was her old crush, and that they really couldn’t be seen together in public. They joined her in the alleyway.

  “How did you learn how to sign?” Wanda signed to Jeremy.

  “Same place you did, I guess. Lydia was one of my tutors.”

  Lydia looked between Jeremy and Wanda, and her eyes opened with recognition.
/>
  “Is that him?” she signed to Wanda.

  “Lydia,” Wanda chided. “He can hear us.”

  Jeremy chuckled.

  “Jeremy, there’s a party tomorrow on Martha’s Vineyard. Some of the students from your old class will be there, I think. Will you come?” Lydia signed. “No one from Oyster Cove will be there to see you. And the people who will be there . . . well, we all know how to keep quiet,” Lydia signed, and laughed at her own little joke.

  Jeremy knew that he should refuse. But an evening in Wanda’s company was hard to pass down. And it was true that running into Oyster Cove residents wouldn’t be a problem.

  “That sounds like fun. The time?” he signed.

  “Eight o’clock. Wanda said that you have tomorrow afternoon free. So, take the afternoon ferry so we have time to walk around first. We’ll text you with a meeting place. See you then,” Lydia responded.

  Jeremy nodded at Wanda as he left. She was still in a bit of shock. Did he have deaf relatives? Not a lot of people know sign language. She looked at Lydia’s laughing, scheming face.

  “Party? What party? I thought there were just going to be four of us for dinner.”

  “We tell Ivy to invite six more people and, voila, it’s a party.”

  Lydia’s brain was clearly in party planning mode. She linked arms with Wanda and pulled her back to the sidewalk.

  *****

  The three of them wound up going over on the same ferry, and Lydia and Jeremy had plenty of opportunity to catch up on old times. So, when they got off on the island, she was happy to excuse herself, and run off and help her friend Ivy set up for the party. It was the perfect excuse to give Wanda and Jeremy a little privacy.

  Privacy, was of course a relative thing. The island was packed with throngs of jostling tourists. It was a bit of a jarring contrast to Oyster Cove’s more relaxing ambience. The best course of action appeared to be securing ice cream cones, rum raisin and mint chocolate chip, and getting off the beaten path. The party would be in Oak Bluffs, so it seemed an ideal opportunity to stroll through the residential streets of that historical neighborhood.

  Wanda had never been to Martha’s Vineyard, although her stepfamily had gone once. She couldn’t remember exactly what she was being punished for when they left her behind on that particular occasion. But she had pored through picture books at the library of all the adorable rainbow-colored gingerbread houses in Oak Bluffs. And she had done her best to pretend that she had actually been there… for so long that she had, at times, convinced herself it was so.

  How rapidly her life was changing. Real life now surpassed old dreams and fantasies. Walking with this smart, attractive guy through this lovely town with delicious ice cream cones… It had the feel of an incredible first date.

  “Oh, that has got to be my favorite,” Wanda gushed at a pale blue house with pink and purple trim.

  “Looks like it’s actually a bed and breakfast,” Jeremy noted. “Hold on just a minute.” He ran up the front walkway and stepped onto the porch. He was back in a minute, with something in hand.

  “I got their card. Just in case… I mean, it’s so easy to forget where things are. This way, we’ll be able to remember, how to find it again.” He ducked his head. He was being way too presumptuous to insinuate that the two of them would ever have need for a bed and breakfast on Martha’s Vineyard. Thankfully, Wanda didn’t seem too offended.

  *****

  Right about dinner time, they stopped at a liquor store, where Jeremy picked up three bottles of wine. Then, it was time to head over to the party.

  It turned out to be a big reunion for Jeremy and some of the other students. Many of them hadn’t seen each other in several years. It was the quietest party that Wanda had ever experienced. She and Jeremy were the only two who weren’t deaf. But for all the quiet, it was still pretty darn lively—a lot of laughter, a lot of gossiping, and even a bit of dancing to a booming bass dance track, which could be felt through the floorboards.

  Jeremy was the only man present, which didn’t seem to bother him a bit. He was, in fact, probably the most popular guest. Wanda’s family had never been willing to take classes in signing. Just so they could hear what was on her mind? No, thank you, they always said. A lot of the party guests had suffered similar experiences with their families. A lot of people hadn’t been willing to study sign language in order to communicate with them. So, Jeremy’s fluency in the language was much appreciated by all.

  He and Wanda eventually found themselves alone in a quiet corner.

  “We get a day off tomorrow,” Wanda reminded him.

  The judge was going to be delivering the final sentence on one of her other cases. It was a day off that Jeremy hoped to put to good use. He had a big favor to ask of Wanda.

  “Misty Chandler is looking really bad. But I can’t rule out other possibilities. In fact, to establish doubt, the more possibilities, the better. I’m really not happy with the information I’ve gotten out of Heather’s workplace. People just clam up around lawyers, you know? But, and I can’t believe I’m going to ask this. I have noticed that you have a special talent for black ops. I don’t suppose you could snoop around The Pearce Call Center and see if there’s anything useful there?”

  “I’d be very happy to. It’s always been about getting at the truth for both of us, hasn’t it?”

  Jeremy nodded.

  “But I am going to ask you something in return,” Wanda said pointedly. “I’m just curious. Why did you learn sign language?”

  “Because . . . because I wanted to hear you. I wanted to know you. All those nights at Holloways, when I just rattled off at the mouth, and I wanted to know what you were thinking, what you were feeling. I knew that you knew how to sign. So that was it. I had to learn.”

  There are not a lot of options for learning sign language in Oyster Cove. The deaf population is so small that they have to drive about forty-five minutes to a small private school on the Cape. The price was moderate, reasonable enough, but there was no financial aid available. Still, if it was your only hope for communication, then the expense, the long commute, and the difficulty of communicating in a whole new way was what you had to do.

  But Jeremy didn’t have to do any of that. An hour-and-a-half-long, round-trip commute to learn sign language, to be able to understand someone he barely knew! He had actually done that. For her.

  “Kiss me.”

  Wanda had a strong feeling that even without the witch’s power, Jeremy would have readily complied with that request. She didn’t feel even a tiny bit sorry for ordering him to do something that she was pretty sure that he was really anxious to do. This was the kiss that had hovered over her dreams for over seven years now. Could it possibly have been the same for him?

  Now, a party full of deaf women is going to be somewhat silent. But by the time Jeremy and Wanda pulled away from one another, you could hear a pin drop. Everyone’s eyes were on them. And then laughing at them, and applauding with a room full of fluttering hands. They could only join in the laughter, and Wanda was astonished that her own happiness could bring such entertainment!

  *****

  Amelia Jarvis’s account of life in Heather Kelton’s department had been so distasteful that Wanda hardly knew what to expect. She pretended that she was applying for a job in Accounts Receivable. One of Heather’s previous underlings, Melissa Aiken, had been given temporary charge of the department.

  Both inside the small department and in the larger company, Heather Kelton’s death was a frequent source of conversation and, well, amusement. The snake jokes continued unabated, and people were singing, Ding, dong, the witch is dead, under their breath. Melissa herself spoke pretty freely, having so recently been under Heather’s sadistic thumb.

  “She was a witch,” Melissa declared.

  “She was!” Wanda was shocked. Like Fiona Skretting?

  “She didn’t have a decent bone in her body. Just hateful, thoughtless, selfish. Wanting to humiliat
e people. She was the most awful person you’d ever want to run into.”

  Oh, that kind of witch.

  “But she must have had some kind of supervisor herself. They must have seen how she was treating the people in her department. Why didn’t they do something?”

  “Adam Pearce. He owns the company. Yeah, we complained to him. Plenty. But you know what he did? He just kept giving her anything she wanted. I think she got three raises in the past two years. Just in getting the supervisor position, she leapfrogged over two other people with a lot more seniority.

  “He said that he would do something about the complaints. But he never did. As if he was scared of her. Like she was his boss or something. So, no, there was no one to look out for us. But she’s gone now. And if you’re thinking about working here, you might think we’re a pretty heartless bunch. That’s because you didn’t have to suffer her. So, you’ve worked in Accounts Receivable before?”

  *****

  Adam Pearce, owner of The Pearce Call Center, became a hastily scheduled witness. The prosecution grumbled, but the judge allowed it. In his late fifties, and one of the wealthiest men in the state, he looked grumpy and greatly inconvenienced.

  “Thank you for coming Mr. Pearce. I know you must have a very busy schedule. Can you tell us your relationship to the deceased, Heather Kelton?” Jeremy asked.

  “She was one of my top supervisors in Accounts Receivable, a very important department. That’s where we handle the money for all of our clients, as well as our own profits. She did an outstanding job,” Mr. Pearce said definitively.

  “It sounds as if she was very fortunate to be promoted to the position. There were two others in contention, I believe. With several years’ more seniority. Is that correct?”

  “There were a number of candidates,” Mr. Pearce admitted. “But seniority is not the only consideration. Leadership qualities are even more of an imperative, I think. That was really the deciding factor in choosing her to be supervisor.”

  “You say that she did an outstanding job. And that she had noteworthy leadership qualities? But I checked with your Human Resources department. Would it surprise you to know that in the five years that she’s been supervisor, they had received over fifty complaints about her behavior?”