Death on the Family Tree

by Patricia Sprinkle

  She decided to pass up dessert. Before she went outside, she scanned people waiting for valets to bring their cars but saw neither Hasty nor Lamar Franklin. When she was halfway down the hill, though, Hasty rose from a bench just ahead. “Kate? Wait up!” He loped toward her.

  Behind her, Lamar shouted, “Hey!” and she heard him jogging down the hill.

  Being chased stimulates primeval fears. Katharine set off at a dead run—a mistake going downhill in huaraches with slick soles. She slipped, slid, and sprawled on the road.

  “Watch that bag!” Hasty yelled.

  His priorities were clear. As Katharine climbed awkwardly to her feet, she was glad she hadn’t cherished any illusions that he was attracted by her charms. Still, his lack of concern for her turned her fear to fury. She clutched the bag under one arm and wiped her hands on her pants. “How dare you follow me?” she stormed. Her palms and knees were stinging, fueling her fury. “Scat! Both of you!” She shooed them away like two mangy cats.

  Hasty turned to the other man and demanded, “What are you doing following this lady?”

  “This lady obviously does not want your attentions, sir. Leave her be,” the older man said in his gravelly voice.

  “You leave her alone. She’s a friend of mine,” Hasty insisted. “Tell him, Kate.”

  “I never want to see either one of you again.” She hobbled toward the garage with as much dignity as she could muster.

  “You heard her,” Lamar warned behind her. “Leave her be.”

  “You back out of this! I told you I’m—”

  The next sound Katharine heard was a thud. She looked over one shoulder to see Hasty lying on the ground nursing his nose, with Lamar standing over him. “I told you, Dr. Hastings, leave her be. You go on, ma’am. I’ll see he don’t bother you none.” He glared down at Hasty.

  Two women stared from the sidewalk. Red-faced with embarrassment and fury, Katharine limped toward her car.

  Before she got in, she looked around the covered parking garage—an automatic gesture after years of living and driving alone. As she unlocked her doors, Lamar was just coming inside, a black shadow against the light. She jumped in and locked the doors even before she stuck the key in the ignition, then she was immediately ashamed. Why should she feel so leery of him? He had been nothing but friendly and helpful. But his work-callused hands, mountain vowels, tattoos, and long, gray ponytail were so out of place in Buckhead, he could have come from another planet.

  “Difference breeds distrust,” her father used to say. “And we all have a tendency to be prejudiced against those who are different from us. Watch your reactions to people, Kat. You’ll find it inside yourself.”

  “Okay, Daddy,” she muttered to him, wherever he might be, “I’ll admit it. I’m prejudiced toward outdated hippies who butt in where they aren’t wanted and former classmates who want to get their hands on my possessions. I wish they’d leave me alone.”

  When she had started the car, she tucked her purse between her left side and the door, but dropped the tote bag down in front of the passenger seat. She doubted that any snatch-and-grab thief would be interested in an old canvas tote.

  As she left the garage, she saw the hippie heading toward a red Jeep that sat beside a big black truck.

  Going up the drive, she passed Hasty, who was stomping into the garage. He glared at her as she approached and tried to flag her down, but she didn’t stop.

  Traffic was heavy on Andrews Drive, so she had to wait to pull out of the parking lot. Before she could turn left, she saw the red Jeep zoom out of the garage just ahead of the big black truck. Reluctant to head home with those vehicles behind her, she decided to pick up Tom’s shirts at the laundry while she was out. She turned right without changing her blinker. Both vehicles turned behind her. At West Paces Ferry Road, she turned right again. So did they.

  Both also turned behind her onto Peachtree Street, but neither followed her into the laundry. Relieved, she left the drive-through window and headed back to Peachtree. She decided she might as well go somewhere and copy the diary. That way she could make notes in the margins.

  As she stopped at the next light, she noticed a red Jeep a couple of cars behind her. Was it the same one from the parking garage? And was that the same black truck hugging its bumper?

  Katharine had watched enough television to know how to figure out if somebody was following her. She switched lanes as soon as she could and watched her mirrors. Within a few seconds the Jeep also changed lanes, keeping two cars between them. The truck pulled in behind the Jeep.

  Coincidence? She changed lanes again.

  So did they.

  By then she was pretty sure one of them was Hasty and the other Lamar. Two dogs after one bone, but which was which? Back in high school, Hasty had wished for a big black truck instead of the used Volvo his parents bought him. Had he finally gotten one as part of his recent midlife and marital crisis? Was he following Lamar, who was following her? Or was Lamar in the truck, following Hasty in the Jeep?

  Her first inclination was to laugh. “This is so silly,” she muttered. But when she turned right at the next intersection, the red Jeep turned a few seconds later with the black truck right behind. She put on another burst of speed and turned right again at the next intersection, planning to dash to the next corner and lose them. Instead, she got stuck behind somebody looking for an address. She was only halfway up the block when the Jeep turned the corner with the truck behind it.

  Her arrogance turned to anger, tinged with anxiety. “It’s just Hasty,” she reminded herself. “He wouldn’t hurt me.” But what about the other? And how far would either go to get that bag?

  “Get back on Peachtree,” she told herself. “I’ll be fine there.” But when she wended her way back to Peachtree—which wasn’t as simple as it sounds, since no two streets in Atlanta run parallel or perpendicular—the red Jeep was not far behind and the black truck rode its bumper.

  Some people complain about Atlanta traffic, but Katharine was grateful for every car. She felt safe surrounded by all those people. But what should she do? Going home was out, and she would feel silly calling 911 when one of her followers was an old friend. She peered into her mirror at the Jeep, which was now right behind her, but its visor was down and she could not see the driver.

  In spite of her common sense, she was feeling menaced. She tried to think of a smart move, but her brain was sluggish. Articles about what do if you were being followed said, “Go to a police station,” but she’d never needed one before, so had no idea where to find one. Why didn’t police stations fly flags, like post offices? A special flag that could be seen blocks away?

  But even if she found a police station, she couldn’t drive straight through the door. What was to prevent whoever was in the Jeep from grabbing her as soon as she left her SUV?

  She drove up Peachtree Street picturing a perfect world in which bright red flags flew over drive-in police stations.

  When she saw an office supplies store ahead, she made a snap decision. Quickly she changed lanes and barreled through a cacophony of horns into a narrow strip of parking spaces that fronted on Peachtree Street. Then she remembered—the front of that store was at the back, down a narrow alley. Already the red Jeep was moving into the right lane.

  She roared down the alley and swung into a parking place right in front, grabbed the tote bag and her purse, and leaped from her car. The blood on her knees, which had dried to her pants, tore loose, but she ignored the pain and dashed for the steps.

  Yes, steps. Because of a hill, there was a flight of steps to the front door.

  She was still sprinting up when the Jeep screeched to a stop beside her SUV and the big truck roared to a stop behind, blocking them both.

  As the wide glass doors opened, spilling cold air onto the sidewalk, she heard doors slam behind her. Without looking back, she darted inside and yelled, “Restroom?” to the startled clerk at the counter. He pointed toward the copy center to the
left. She ran in the direction he pointed, tote bag pounding against her thigh in time to the frantic beat of her heart.

  The restrooms were tucked inside a large gloomy storeroom, down a hall that led past the break room. Inside, she leaned against the door, trembling. One part of her felt silly, the rest was downright scared. She hurried on rubber legs into the larger stall, locked the door, and leaned against it, gasping for air. How had she gotten into this mess?

  She stood breathing hard for several minutes, wondering what to do next.

  If she went outside, would one of them be waiting for her? Or both?

  No. More likely, one was lying unconscious on the sidewalk right now, while the other prowled the store, hoping to get his hands on Aunt Lucy’s antifacts.

  What was to prevent him from coming into the ladies’ room? Nobody would see him unless they happened to be taking a break. She thought of Edna Buchanan’s Miami It’s Murder and wished she hadn’t. In that book, women were raped and murdered in locked restrooms. This one wasn’t even locked. Did she hear somebody breathing outside her stall?

  She held her own breath and listened, but heard nothing.

  After what seemed like an eternity, common sense returned. She would be safer in the store than in an isolated restroom, so long as she was willing to scream if necessary. Gathering up her purse, her tote bag, and her courage, she crept from the stall into the empty bathroom and opened the door. She saw nobody in the storeroom but a clerk carrying a large cardboard box.

  She walked cautiously into the store and still saw no sign of Hasty or Lamar.

  She headed toward a copier, keeping a wary eye out for either man. All the clerks were bunched near the door, staring at something outside. Blue lights flashed in the parking lot.

  “What’s going on?” she asked a man in a store vest near the back of the huddle.

  “Some woman came running in here yelling and two men started fighting in the parking lot. Probably drug-related or something. The manager called the cops.”

  She edged closer to the glass doors and saw Hasty and Lamar both wearing belligerent expressions while a serious young police officer talked to them. She considered going outside, but decided against it. She didn’t know what either of those men was up to, but they had scared the living daylights out of her. They deserved whatever they got.

  She headed back to the ladies’ room, took off her bright outer shirt, and put it in her tote bag. She tugged her yellow T-shirt out of her slacks and let it hang loose. She dragged her hair back, and secured it with a rubber band. She put on a thick layer of lipstick and rubbed some into her cheeks. She perched her reading glasses on her nose. At the last minute she remembered Aunt Lucy’s peach pits, so she stowed her silver-and-turquoise jewelry in her purse and slung the despicable pits around her neck. Tacky Kat, mistress of disguise, she headed for the copier.

  One man in a store vest eyed her suspiciously. “Aren’t you the woman who came running in here just before all hell broke loose outside?”

  She frowned. “Didn’t she have on a bright shirt?”

  He thought that over. “Yeah, I guess she did.”

  She spent an hour copying the diary, careful of the pages and pleased to see that it became more legible if she heightened the contrast. Perhaps she would spend the afternoon trying to translate it.

  The whole time, though, she kept checking to make sure Hasty or Lamar weren’t lurking behind a display—and that nobody she knew was in sight. She didn’t want somebody asking why she had left her house looking like that. When she left the building, she stopped at the top step and looked both ways.

  She was so relieved to have run into nobody she knew that it took her a couple of seconds to register the fact that her car was gone.

  She wanted to stomp her feet and scream, or sit down and bawl. Screams and tears, however, are only satisfying if there is somebody to calm or console you, so she hitched up her mental socks, headed around the corner, and pulled out her cell phone.

  She wasn’t about to return to the store and explain, so first she called information and got the number of the store against whose wall she was leaning. She told whoever answered that her car had broken down at their curb earlier that afternoon, and that while she was looking for help, it had disappeared.

  “Oh! It was towed!” The clerk sounded horrified. “We’d had a bit of trouble in the parking lot, with the police here and everything, and one of our customers thought that car might be a car bomb. He called and had it towed.”

  “Don’t you think terrorists would use something a little cheaper than a new Cadillac?” she asked. The clerk seemed so baffled by that question that Katharine didn’t ask whether they hadn’t been worried that the bomb might blow up the tow truck and driver en route. Instead, she ascertained that the number of the towing firm was on a sign in the parking lot and hung up.

  While she waited for the towing firm to answer, she murmured to the sky, “Oh, Daddy, can you see the state we’ve worked ourselves into since you left? Terrorists behind every abandoned car.”

  The towing firm informed her that getting the car back was only going to involve showing up at their lot with identification and paying an arm and two legs. Katharine considered calling Posey or another friend to run her down, but she looked a fright and was in no mood to explain.

  Some folks take a cruise on their birthday. Katharine took a cab.

  It was nearly four before she got home, considerably poorer.

  She was also jumpier than she could ever remember being. All the way back from the tow lot, she had watched her rear-view mirror. As soon as she got inside the house, she activated their alarm system—something she had gotten out of the habit of doing during the day when she was going in and out. Feeling like a prisoner and annoyed both at herself for being such a coward and at the two men who had made her that way, she dumped the tote bag beside the diary copy on the countertop, kicked off her shoes, and reached for the phone to retrieve messages.

  The first was from Susan, bubbly as usual. “Hi, Mom! Just calling to wish you a happy birthday. The market’s up and I actually made money! Did you get my package? They promised it would arrive today. Hope you like it. It reminded me of you.”

  Wondering what on earth might have reminded Susan of her, Katharine waited for her second message. It was from Dr. Flo Gadney and did nothing to calm her nerves.

  “Katharine. I am heading down to Butts County for a day or two, trying to track down Maurice’s no-count cousin Drake, but I will call you when I return. Driving home, I finally remembered why the name of Carter Everanes seemed familiar. I’ll call and tell you all about it when I get back. He was murdered, back in the summer of fifty-one.”

  Chapter 7

  When the doorbell rang, her legs began to tremble. Shakes moved up her whole body until she had to lean against the counter for support. She told herself she was being ridiculous, but the message didn’t reach her extremities. Had one of the men followed her after all? What should she do?

  She waited for the doorbell to ring again. It didn’t. Had whoever it was concluded she wasn’t home? Or did he know she was, and alone? Would he try to break in?

  She couldn’t stand the suspense. She tiptoed to the living room on spaghetti legs and peered through the arch to the front hall. Beyond the sidelight beside the front door sat a parcel. Down at the drive, a stocky woman in brown shorts and shirt was climbing into a UPS truck.

  Katharine felt so foolish that she backed into the nearest chair and laughed until tears ran down her cheeks. Laughter provided catharsis and strength to get up and retrieve the parcel. She stood in the doorway for a few minutes vowing not to be so silly again. Still, she made sure the door was locked and the security system reactivated before she returned to the kitchen.

  The box contained Susan’s present: a perky blue kettle for her newly redecorated kitchen. “To cheer you up since we can’t be there.” Dear Susan. Tears stung Katharine’s eyelids as she headed to the sink, washed o
ut the kettle, and put it on to boil.

  Out of the corner of her mind’s eye she saw her daughter’s dark head bent over the kitchen table, coloring. Jon’s fiery mop caught the light as he played with trucks on the floor under her feet. Why hadn’t she cherished every single minute she spent with those children? Whoever coined the term “empty nest” obviously never had one. Children may leave home, but they leave a houseful of ghosts behind.

  A few minutes later she poured a mug of tea and sank into a chair, limp after the shocks she had sustained in the past few hours. As the tea began to revive her, she reviewed what she had learned.

  Fact One: Lucy and Walter Everanes had a brother Carter, whom they never mentioned.

  Fact Two: He was thirteen years old when the 1930 census was taken.

  Fact Three: He was in Austria in 1937, at twenty.

  Fact Four: By 1939 Carter was at home, in Sara Claire and Walter’s wedding.

  Fact Five: Carter somehow ended up with a necklace from Hallstatt, and a diary.

  Fact Six: Carter was murdered in 1951.

  Fact Seven: You got Carter’s necklace and diary today, and two men chased you to get them. The words rose unbidden and hovered in the air.

  None of the facts answered the questions of how Carter got the things or how Aunt Lucy wound up with them. Uncle Walter would have been more likely to be the executor of Carter’s estate, and Uncle Walter would never have given them to Lucy. He’d have taken them straight to somebody to have them identified, then he’d have handed them over to any museum that would promise to put up a plaque stating that they were the gift of Walter Everanes. He’d also have had them evaluated so he could get a tax deduction. Walter Everanes had tight fists and a sense of his own importance—two reasons why he and Aunt Sara Claire got along so well.