Death on the Family Tree

by Patricia Sprinkle

  Katharine shook her head in amazement. “Why didn’t I rearrange it that way years ago?”

  “Looks wonderful,” Stanley agreed. “You’ve got a real knack, Hollyhock.” A dull flush rose in his cheeks. “Sorry. That slipped out.”

  Hollis grinned. “It’s okay, Stan-the-man.” She turned to Katharine with a pucker of worry between her eyes. “If you don’t like it, Aunt Kat—”

  “I love it,” Katharine assured her. “Want to help me fix up my new study?”

  Hollis wandered over to the arch and considered the room. “What do you have in mind?”

  “I don’t know yet. I just know I hate the rug, I hate those pictures, and I hate the drapery.”

  “Good.” Hollis’s voice carried a trace of relief. “Why don’t you pick out a rug you like and we can decorate around it? Or buy a picture—something you love. Then we’ll figure out what else to do.”

  Katharine wandered into the almost-empty room to get a feel for it without the piano. As she passed Aunt Lucy’s secretary—which looked very at home on the back wall—she saw in its glass-fronted door a thin, dark face with an unreadable expression. She was bending to have a better look when Hollis exclaimed, “I’d better be going. Zach will be wondering what’s happened to me. Good to see you, Stanley. You, too, Anthony.”

  “It’s always a pleasure,” Anthony told her, “so long as you don’t run over my truck.”

  Hollis’s laugh lingered in the room as she ran out the door.

  When everyone had gone, Katharine felt like she had been taken from a place of laughter and light and thrust into a place of shadows and silence. Worse, the silence tonight seemed menacing. She returned to the music room to look in the secretary glass, but saw only her own reflection.

  “Of course, silly,” she told herself as she armed the security system. “There are no ghosts in this house.” Nevertheless, she turned on lights in every room downstairs, put on the television in the den and the radio in the kitchen, and checked all the doors and windows to be sure they were locked—even though the alarm would let her know if they weren’t. She was tempted to open the front door and leave it open long enough to test how fast it took a knight in police armor to come roaring up the drive.

  “Get a grip,” she said aloud. “Check your messages, eat your dessert, and go to bed. And stop talking to yourself. That’s the first sign of senility.”

  She had one message, a gravelly voice that sent shivers up her spine. “Mrs. Murray, this is Lamar Franklin. I was calling to see if you got home safely. Call me back when you get this message so I’ll know you are okay.”

  She considered not complying, but he would probably call again. He answered on the first ring, the sound of televised sports in the background. “This is Katharine Murray,” she said, keeping her voice carefully neutral. “I am fine, thank you. But how did you get my number?”

  “That’s easy for an old researcher like me. I just Googled you.” His raspy laugh came over the wire. “You watch out for that other fellah, you hear me? I was sitting in my truck after you left this afternoon, having a smoke before going back to the library, and he jumped in his Jeep and started following you. I don’t know if you noticed us or not, but we were both right behind you for quite a while.”

  “I noticed,” she assured him.

  “Well, I hope you’ll put that necklace in a safe place. You never can tell who might be after it. Good night.”

  She hung up and cast a look at the darkness outside her breakfast room window. Why hadn’t she put blinds on that window? She felt very exposed. She checked the alarm system again, to make sure it was armed.

  While she was eating her cake with a big glass of milk, the doorbell rang. She almost didn’t answer, but it rang again and she figured it might be Anthony, who had forgotten to take his wife’s quilts. She switched on the porch light and peered out the sidelight to see Hasty standing there, a bouquet of daisies in one hand. Daisies had been her favorite flower since she was a little girl and picked them with Aunt Lucy.

  “What do you want?” she called through the door.

  “To apologize,” he called back. “I won’t come in, but I wanted to tell you I’m sorry. See? I have learned a few things since our high school days.” He held up the flowers. “These are a peace offering—and a belated birthday present.”

  She opened the door, turned and quickly punched the buttons to disarm the alarm. She turned back to see he was wearing a lopsided grin. “Forgive me?” he asked.

  In spite of herself she felt the old tingle she used to get at that grin. To make sure her voice wouldn’t quaver, she gave a huff of surrender. “Sure. And thanks.” As she stepped forward to take the flowers, she exclaimed, “You’ve got a black eye.”

  He touched it gingerly. “And a red nose, not to mention damage to my pride, but I’m sorry I let my temper get away with me at lunch. I didn’t mean to spoil your birthday.”

  She considered inviting him in, but it didn’t feel like a good idea. For one thing, she was lonely and, in spite of herself, feeling some of the old pull toward Hasty. For another thing, he had followed her that afternoon. She stood in the doorway with the bouquet between them. Since he was a step down, their eyes were nearly level. “Why were you following me?” she asked.

  “I didn’t like the looks of that character at the next table—and rightly so. When I picked myself up off the sidewalk and got to the garage, he was sitting in a big black truck, ready to go after you.” He stepped back and leaned against a small column that held up the veranda roof, crossing his arms on his chest. He used to lean against the supports to her parents’ porch like that. Her mother often joked that their porch would fall down if Hasty stopped holding it up.

  The night was warm and sultry, with lightning bugs dancing on the dark lawn. Without conscious thought, she stepped down and leaned against the doorjamb across from him. They used to stand like that on evenings after he’d brought her home, when neither of them wanted to say goodnight.

  “Maybe he was having a smoke,” she suggested.

  “Not a chance. As soon as I got in my Jeep, he started his engine. I didn’t have your cell phone number, so I couldn’t warn you, but I managed to get between you and him. I could tell you had noticed me, but I wasn’t sure you had noticed him, and he stayed right behind me the whole time. I decided to follow you long enough to make sure you didn’t do something stupid, like go home and show him where you live. That was a smart move, by the way, running into the store like that.”

  “What happened afterwards? I didn’t stick around to see.” She propped herself more comfortably and prepared to listen. Hasty always could tell a good story.

  “Yeah, so I noticed. I’d barely gotten out of my car when he jumped down from his truck, shouted something, and came at me like a crazy man. Ripped off my glasses, knocked me down, and blacked my eye before I saw him coming. Lordy, he like to scared me to death. Fortunately, somebody called the cops. I was bleeding all over the sidewalk, woozy as all get-out, not your typical knight in shining armor but willing to get up and defend you again—”

  She chuckled in spite of herself. “So what happened when the police arrived?”

  “I can tell you what didn’t happen. You didn’t come out to vouch for my good character. I tried to explain to the cop—who didn’t look much older than my daughter—that I was protecting you from the other man, but then he jumps in and starts claiming he was protecting you from me. I pointed out that you and I have been friends since Moses came down off the mountain and that the other fellow had been awfully familiar at lunch, but he said—oh, never mind. Anyway, the cop gave us each a warning and let us go.”

  “Well, after that, some customer in the store decided my car might belong to a terrorist who was going to blow them all up, so he called and had it towed.”

  Hasty’s laugh was pleased. “Served you right.”

  As they laughed together, Katharine again considered inviting him in—nothing serious, she tol
d herself, just a cup of coffee between friends. But before she spoke, he spoiled the mood.

  “You watch out for that hippie, you hear me? He had his ears cocked to every word we said about the necklace and that diary, and I wouldn’t put it past him to try and track you down to get them. Where are they, by the way?” As he waited for her answer, she had the feeling he was holding his breath.

  She felt like he had dowsed her with cold water. He wasn’t there to apologize. He wasn’t even there to rekindle old feelings. He was a man on a mission to find out where she had put the necklace and diary.

  “In a safe place,” she replied coolly. She stepped up into the house. “Goodnight. Thanks for the flowers. It was nice of you to bring them.”

  He gave her a little salute. “Goodnight. Sleep well. And happy birthday.”

  When he’d gone, she rearmed the alarm, and put the daisies in a vase. They looked so fresh and pretty, she decided to carry them up and put them on her dresser.

  Her sense of humor kicked in halfway up the stairs. “Nobody was pursuing you,” she said aloud. “Both guys were protecting you. Doesn’t that make you feel a hundred and three?”

  Chapter 9

  Thursday, June 8

  The phone shrilled in the darkness.

  Katharine came instantly awake and snatched the receiver with a trembling hand. Which of those she loved was in danger? Her “Hello!” was a demand for instant information.

  Instead, slightly off-key, she heard, “Happy birthday to you—”

  She pried her eyes open wide enough to see the clock. Only six? No wonder she was still asleep. “Jonathan Herndon Murray, do you have any idea what time it is?”

  “Six? It’s almost dinnertime over here and I wouldn’t have called you so early, but I just finished teaching my first day of classes and was fixing to grab a bite with some guys before we go watch a swordfighting demonstration, so I wanted to call now in case I forgot when we got back.” With that kind of run-on sentence, heaven only knew what kind of English the Chinese were learning from him.

  She didn’t have the heart to tell him he was a day late. A dollar short, too, apparently, since he hadn’t mentioned sending even a card. “Daddy’s taking me to dinner and the symphony tomorrow night. You’re sweet to call, honey.” She propped her pillow behind her back and inched up on it. Then she shoved hair out of her eyes and willed her brain to function. “How’s everything over there?”

  “Okay, I guess. I don’t know if anybody’s going to learn anything, and I don’t know if I’m a very good teacher, but I’ve met some really great people. Speaking of which, I have to be going. We’re going to dinner and a swordfighting demonstration.”

  “You told me that. Don’t get cut or anything.” She wanted to keep him on the line all morning, it was so good to hear his voice. She missed him terribly.

  “I’ll stay out of their way,” he promised. “You have a happy birthday, you hear me?”

  “I will. Thanks for calling—” She was talking to air. He had already gone.

  Katharine got up and headed to the shower. While the hot water ran down her back, she began to think about Carter Everanes again. “Why do I care?” she asked the steam. “It all happened a long time ago, and it had nothing to do with me.”

  But it did. As she shampooed her hair and washed away the last remnants of sleep, she dredged up several good reasons for learning all she could about Carter. First, even though she hadn’t known him, he had been part of her family’s story until a few years before her own birth. Like Walter and Lucy, Carter had grown up with her mother and Sara Claire, and once Walter became family, so did Carter, in a Southern manner of reckoning. Carter’s unknown story was like a black hole in the jigsaw puzzle of her life. A family as small as hers couldn’t afford to have missing pieces. So while she had no idea what she would find when she read the newspaper accounts, she suspected they might clarify some of her childhood memories.

  For instance, she remembered how Lucy and Sara Claire would never let yardmen inside their houses. Katharine used to sneak them glasses of ice water, but when her aunts found out, they cautioned, “Keep away from them. You can’t trust them. They can be violent men.” Was that because of Carter’s murder? Had Katharine herself been wary of Anthony at first because somebody named Alfred killed a man named Carter before she was born?

  Katharine also remembered how Aunt Lucy had given her a new Teddy Bear and she had wanted to name him “Alfred,” but Aunt Lucy had cried, “No!” And her daddy had said, “He looks like a Thomas Bear to me.” When Katharine was introduced to Tom Murray, one of her first thoughts was that he looked a lot like Thomas Bear—a square, comforting figure with soft dark hair and intelligent dark eyes.

  She remembered that when she went to Vienna for spring break during college, Aunt Lucy had mentioned, “I was in Austria once. It is very beautiful,” but she had looked sad and had not spouted reminiscences as she usually did. Katharine had been relieved at the time. Now she understood.

  As she shut off the water and ran a squeegee down the shower walls, she named another reason for learning about Carter. Her mother firmly believed in “things we are given”—certain people and situations that God gives somebody to deal with at a particular time. Katharine had been given that necklace, diary, and Carter himself. She had no idea why, but she would do her best with what she had been given. And she would not let Carter’s things fall into Hasty’s acquisitive hands.

  Still, the thought of Hasty made her smile again. She hummed as she wrapped herself in a towel and wound another in a turban around her head. Imagine him being right there in Atlanta without her knowing it! As she fixed her face, though, she turned her thoughts to Carter again and admitted her strongest reasons for reading newspaper accounts of his death: “I’ll always wonder, if I don’t. And what better do I have to do?”

  She dried her hair and dressed in white cotton slacks, an emerald top, and white sandals. With a white blazer over one arm, she headed downstairs, carrying her birthday daisies. When she reached the kitchen, she was astonished to find it was still not yet seven.

  Her stomach wasn’t ready for breakfast, so she took her secateurs and headed into the yard to deadhead some flowers. The day was still cool enough to be pleasant, the grass dewy enough to exchange her sandals for green rubber clogs. When she had cut off old blooms, she cut a small bouquet of sunny yarrow and spiky blue veronica to add to Hasty’s daisies on the kitchen table. She snipped one perfect yellow rosebud as well.

  As she set the rosebud over the sink, she thought with a pang, this is the first time I ever cut flowers just for myself. Usually she was taking them to friends or preparing the house for the arrival of Tom, the children, or a guest.

  That morning, she prepared breakfast as if for a special guest—a slice of cantaloupe, a sunny-side-up egg, hot buttered toast with strawberry jam—thinking about what she would like instead of reaching for whatever was handiest. Then she sat at the table and ate slowly, savoring each bite. As she looked out at the patio and how pleasant it was out there, she firmed up her resolve to buy a little table and chairs so she could eat out there whenever she liked.

  “I’ll do it today,” she announced to the dishwasher as she put her dishes in. “I’m going to clear off my desk and get ready to move it downstairs. I’m going to box up the books from the music room shelves and roll up that ugly rug. And I’m going out to buy me a new rug!”

  When the maid arrived and saw the changes to the living room and music room, she placed both hands on her ample hips and demanded, “What fer you want to go changing all the furniture around? Nobody plays that piano, so why put it in your living room, takin’ up all that space?” Rosa might only stand five feet tall in her new running shoes, but she could swell like Mighty Mouse with indignation.

  “Because nobody goes in the living room except for parties, when somebody might want to play it, and I plan to make the other room my office.”

  Why did she feel forced to expl
ain? Katharine wondered. Posey, for whom Rosa’s sister Julia worked, never had to justify the many changes she made in her house.

  That, Katharine told herself ruefully, is one of the big differences between us.

  Rosa galloped on to another topic. “What you needin’ an office fer? You ain’t workin’, and you got a perfectly good computer desk in your bedroom fer your little bits and pieces. Nobody can see it up there, which is a good thing, as messy as you keeps it. You put it down here, you gonna have to learn to tidy it up and keep it that way. And you gonna have ridges in the bedroom rug, too, where the computer desk usta be. Just leave it where it is and get on with things. That’s what I say.”

  “Well, I say I want an office,” Katharine retorted in exasperation. “I’m the only person in this house most of the time, yet I do all my work scrunched up in one corner of my bedroom.”

  “You just restless, is what it is,” Rosa muttered, heading down the hall to fetch her supplies. She called back over one shoulder, “Jon and Miss Lucy leavin’ so close together has discombobulated you, that’s what. Or maybe you’re goin’ through the change of life. Why don’t you go up to the lake for a little spell? Or throw a party? Miz Buiton’s havin’ a party in a coupla weeks. I’m gonna help Julia in the kitchen.”

  “I know all about Posey’s party,” Katharine told her, “But today I’m not planning a party. After you vacuum the rug in the front room, I want us to roll it up and I want you to clean that floor real good. I’m heading out to buy a new rug.”

  “What you wantin’ a new rug fer?” Rosa objected. “They’s years of wear in that rug yet.”

  “Probably so,” Katharine agreed, “but I hate it and don’t want to look at it any more. Tom can figure out something to do with it. I’ll bring some boxes back, too, so we can pack up the books and clean the shelves real good. When Tom comes, he can help me move my desk.”