Orchids and Stone

by Lisa Preston

  As quietly as she could speak with clarity and without looking at Minerva, Daphne said, “Don’t move. Don’t speak. That woman is looking for us. She knows you’re out of the house. Do not move.”

  CHAPTER 22

  Daphne held her breath and tried to imagine the worst-case scenario as she hoped for the best. They had about two hours of daylight left, but the tree canopy refused most of the overcast sky’s light, making the forest dark. If they were still, if that woman didn’t come into the woods, if she’d done the right thing, then things would be okay.

  She looked at Minerva Watts sitting on the forest floor. The lady looked as though she might like to hum. Her finger stroked the fir-needled ground, a pleasant expression on her face.

  She smiled at me when I came to her house. She remembered my name, called me Daphne.

  She didn’t remember my name today. She asked me who I was today.

  The worst-case, Daphne decided, is I just spirited away a little old lady who was supposed to be in that bedroom. And once she acknowledged her doubt, it built, flooded. I don’t know her. In truth, I don’t know anything about this situation. What if Vic’s right, they’re just some people having a hard time with an older—no, the credit cards. I saw them.

  But people taking care of older relatives have to deal with financial arrangements. They handle the elderly person’s credit cards and deeds and titles. She remembered Vic going over his father’s finances at home, intercepting a charged purchase originating in another state for a fancy stereo, an obvious fraud perpetrated on an old man. Vic never established how the unknown criminal had collected Lloyd’s credit card number, nor could he ever be sure whether the old man had been convinced by a predator to hand it over or if the card number had been outright stolen somehow. He’d gotten the charge reversed, ordered a new credit card number, and offered to store his dad’s cards for safekeeping.

  Feeling the uncertainty, Daphne clung to Guff’s comment to the black-haired woman: Not as Alzheimer’s-y as the others.

  They were bad people. They were, right? She wasn’t, was she?

  And Mrs. Watts said they wouldn’t let her use the bathroom. If that were true, it settled things. If it were true.

  She whispered, “Do you know them, Mrs. Watts?” and swallowed hard. Was she doing the right thing? Her words became a whispered torrent. “Do you remember me? In the park?”

  “Of course, Daphne, I—”

  “And a few days ago?” Daphne’s words came in a rush. “And then, at your house? Do you remember seeing me before today?”

  “Pardon, dear?”

  “I …” Daphne turned and studied the vacation house.

  Suppose she hadn’t run from Minerva Watts’s house when Guff had grabbed her shoulder? Would everything have been sorted out then? Couldn’t she just confront the woman, explain her concerns, and demand the police be called?

  Doubt. When boiled down to the essence, wasn’t doubt what kept people from intervening? A lack of certainty? Because if people knew someone was in trouble, they helped, didn’t they? That was the deal, the bargain of being part of the human family.

  Holding her breath, Daphne tried to decipher her gut feeling. She hadn’t always suspected Minerva Watts was in trouble. On their first encounter—Wednesday in the Peace Park—Daphne had been absorbed in her thoughts, startled and disturbed by an old lady claiming kidnap and robbery. Frowning, Daphne found no gut feeling to fall back to from that day. She wasn’t a gut-feeling kind of girl.

  And then a decade-old memory sifted up. At twenty-one, the evening her father left the house for the last time, she’d gone to bed early, tired of college and feeling like she didn’t belong. The empty spring break stretched ahead before she’d have to go back for her final half semester. She’d kissed her mother good night, then her father.

  He’d held her extra-long, told her she’d always be his good girl, had been steamy-eyed. As she’d gone upstairs to sleep across from Suzanne’s empty bed, an unnerving feeling had prickled her. A doubt. Her father had been behaving strangely.

  But by morning, after hearing he’d taken his own life, she’d reacted like a child, wondering only what her mother had or hadn’t done or said.

  When her mother later talked about his death—in halting, teary words of confusion and loss, repeating endlessly that she didn’t know—Daphne had stood mute. They hadn’t known he was so sad, so bleak, he couldn’t face Suzanne’s birthday.

  Just yesterday she’d realized her dad couldn’t live down the detective’s last talk about handing the suspended homicide over to the cold case unit, but she didn’t blame Arnold Seton.

  She shouldn’t have blamed her mother.

  Minerva had said from their first contact that she didn’t know the black-haired woman.

  As she chose what to do, Daphne squinted at the back of the vacation house. The woman in black cupped her hands to her eyes, making a visor as she peered at the woods from the deck, swiveling as she searched left and right. She stepped off the deck and looked around the house’s side yards.

  Minerva Watts cocked her head and smiled, misty-eyed, at Daphne.

  She’s safe now, Daphne decided. Whatever else, she’s safe now. Shoulders shaking, she thought of things she’d imagined as a teen when she learned bits and pieces of what happened to her sister. They never knew where the murder occurred, just where the body was dumped. She was tied up. She was raped. She was strangled. And, as the investigator hoped, as her father prayed, someone must have seen something. When Suzanne met a man, when the man got violent, when he moved her body, all were chances for another stranger, a good person, to see, to act, to aid.

  But whoever saw something didn’t intervene in a stranger’s life.

  I’ve come this far, Daphne encouraged herself. I will make Minerva Watts safe before I go asking questions.

  Motion would make them more visible, easier to spot. Daphne kept her breathing shallow and watched with one eye between tree trunks, glad she was brown-haired, hoping Mrs. Watts’s calico housedress was low enough in their little divot in the earth.

  If that woman didn’t just plunge headlong into the woods, they might be okay. If the man didn’t return to the house and didn’t come into the woods after them, they were safe. Daphne looked for a stout branch on the ground, moving her head as little as possible in the search.

  Motion caught her eye back at the house, and she aborted her search for a weapon to watch the woman go back inside.

  Twisting on her knees, Daphne leaned into the old lady’s face. “Who are they, Mrs. Watts? Who are those people? They were with you in the Peace Park, the first day I saw you, and then the next day at your house, and here. Who are they?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know them, dear. They’re stealing everything from me.”

  Daphne’s mouth opened and closed as she hesitated, trying to believe.

  Don’t hesitate, she told herself. Do something.

  “Okay, we’re going through the woods to my truck now, Mrs. Watts. When we get there, we’ll drive to the nearest phone and call the police.” Daphne tugged at the frail old arm, making her stand. “It took me ten or fifteen minutes to walk in here. Okay?”

  “I’m not dressed for going out, dear.” Minerva’s protest was demure.

  “Oh, that’s all right.” With continued physical insistence, Daphne forced Mrs. Watts along, feeling she must seem just like the black-haired woman in the Peace Park, bullying an old lady.

  They made forty yards of progress before Minerva lost her footing and tumbled to the ground. Daphne clung to her, trying to cushion the fall.

  “Are you okay?” Daphne hovered, using her fingertips to touch Minerva’s side, knee, and wrist.

  Minerva Watts stayed prone on the musty soil.

  Daphne fell to her knees into the humus and whispered, “Can you get up?”

  “Fairy Slippers,” Minerva cried. “I’ve found Fairy Slippers. It’s been so long since I’ve seen Fairy Slippers. Imagine f
inding such a treasure now.”

  “You’re not making sense,” Daphne said through her teeth, desperation making every muscle knot. Please don’t be a crazy old lady.

  Minerva Watts stayed face down and talked to the ground. “Oh, the Calypso. I haven’t seen one since I was a girl. Younger than you, much younger. Imagine, us finding Fairy Slippers.”

  Dear God, suppose Minerva Watts has dementia? Suppose I extrapolated, imagined things, and drew connections that did not exist? If Vic and Thea and the police were right and there was nothing wrong, what have I done?

  She had kidnapped an old lady.

  “Do you know, dear … Daphne,” Minerva said, her smile growing wistful, “there are flowers you see once a generation?” She reached out a trembling hand, extended a finger, and touched a tiny bearded flower growing between two small rocks.

  “Mrs. Watts,” Daphne began, “Minerva? I think I’ve made a big mis—”

  “These are Fairy Slippers,” Minerva said, pointing to the flower while she twisted her prone body to beam at Daphne. “Fairy Slippers are what you call Calypso Orchids, but I don’t recall their proper Latin name. They’re rare, you see. So rare. And they don’t live very long, not long at all.”

  “Mrs. Watts …” Daphne looked deep into the woods, wished for her truck, and cast a wary eye in the direction of the vacation house. Were they halfway to the truck? No, less than a quarter of the distance, she decided, remembering the steeper hills and the mud she’d traversed.

  Mrs. Watts caressed the two-inch-tall flower’s miniature purple-spotted beard. A doleful look replaced her excitement at her discovery of rare wild miniature orchids in the woods.

  “They haven’t any nectar, you see.”

  “Mrs. Watts …” Daphne pulled at the woman’s shoulders and cast a look down the pink-clothed legs. Minerva Watts didn’t seem to be hurt from her fall. Suppose she just picked the lady up and carried her?

  “You don’t have to call me Mrs. Watts, dear.”

  “Minerva. Minerva, we have to—”

  “When I was a girl, they called me Minnie,” Minerva Watts said. “I always liked that. I liked it when they called me Minnie. And then when they had the Mickey Mouse Club, it was a good joke. Minnie Mouse. Do you know about the Mickey Mouse Club? Yes, I was Minnie, when I was young. Even younger than you, dear.”

  “I’ll call you Minnie, if you like,” Daphne said, flushing at the thought of addressing a lady of Minerva Watts’s years by such a casual nickname.

  Should she grab her and run for it? She could carry someone of Minnie Watts’s weight. She could. But on this ground, chances were high she’d slip and fall if she ran while carrying Minnie. She might hurt the fragile old lady.

  We’ll just have to go slowly, but make it back to the truck. What else can we do?

  And then Minnie’s eyes watered, one tear slipping down the cheek closer to the ground.

  “What is it, Minnie? Minnie? We need to go now, Minnie. Minnie?”

  “I’ll never see them again.” Minnie hovered one index finger above the rare orchid. “Never again. Never. They’re so beautiful. And rare. You have to find them in the wild because … because they can’t be cultivated. Fairy Slippers. I expect I’ll never see them again.”

  I want to see them next week, too. Lloyd’s words, the hope behind them, flooded into Daphne.

  Of course Vic would make his children go visit their grandfather every weekend he had them. Daphne’s mind reeled. How much was missed when a generation—or a part of a generation—disappeared?

  She lifted Minnie to her feet, relieved the lady could stand, could walk a few halting paces.

  In ten yards, the ground got brushier, and Daphne let go of Minnie to reach forward and part a path in the brush.

  “Oh!” Minnie cried as she slipped. Daphne grabbed her but one of Minnie’s loafers fell off.

  Don’t be hurt, Daphne prayed. Please, please, don’t have a twisted ankle.

  “Minnie, are you all right?” She knelt and tried to let go of Minerva Watts’s hands, but the lady clutched at her. Daphne looked up then away from Minerva’s watery eyes. The paper-thin skin of her liver-spotted wrists deserved care, not the hard grasp Daphne had thrust on them when she grabbed to prevent another fall.

  She caressed the old hands. The clutches loosened and Daphne pulled free to smooth the old woman’s stockinged foot.

  “I’m tired,” Minnie said. “I need to take a nap.”

  And you’re probably dehydrated from withholding water from yourself, Daphne thought. “But Minnie, I have to get you out of here. We have to go.” She wriggled the cast shoe back onto Minerva Watts’s foot.

  “Dear, I can’t. I cannot take another step. I don’t go hiking and trekking.”

  “Oh, Minnie.” Daphne swung her arm wide in despair, brushing into nearby leaves. At once, she recoiled, her hand burning as though bitten by dozens of ants. “Ow!”

  “That’s stinging nettle,” Minerva said, pointing to the greenery draping toward them from the mud. “It hurts you the most when it’s in full flower.”

  “Aw, Minnie.” Daphne felt air and much more deflate from her body. She couldn’t ask a frail old woman to make an escape by hiking through undergrowth and hilly, muddy, rutted ground. What had taken her ten minutes on the way to the vacation house demanded a half hour’s bushwhacking over bad footing at an old woman’s pace. Minerva Watts was an old lady wearing loafers. Daphne was asking too much. “Maybe we could just cut across the woods to the next street. I could get my truck and move it closer.”

  Daphne weighed the plan of cutting through to the next street instead of taking the woods all the way to her truck. She stood on a stump, nodding as she looked in the direction where the street between the woods and Rainier Court should be. “We’re close to the end of the next cul-de-sac. If you wait here, I could run ahead and move my truck to that street. Would you wait for me right here, Minnie?”

  Minerva turned a kindly smile as though she were being told dinner wasn’t being served right away, but if she’d be a good guest, it would be hot and on the table in fifteen more minutes. “Of course, I’ll wait for you, Daphne.”

  “Promise me, Minnie. Promise you’ll wait right here, okay?”

  “I promise.”

  Daphne cast one fearful look in the direction of the vacation house. They weren’t far from it, but they were in dense cover. With one parting squeeze to Minerva Watts’s arm, Daphne bolted in the general direction of her truck, running like life depended on speed. She leapt over rocks and roots and stumps. When vines twirled around her ankles, she kicked her feet free. When she crashed to her hands and knees in muddy grime, she shoved herself to her feet and ran on.

  On the main street, she fired up her truck and spun a one-eighty. Her tools flew and clanged in the truck bed. She floored the accelerator, braked hard at the intersection, and zipped down the nearest cul-de-sac, squealing to a stop by the last two houses. Flying from her truck, she ignored a man who gawked at her while checking his mail, and darted through the side yards between the houses.

  Barging straight into the woods, Daphne felt winded. She was no runner and it was tough footing with undergrowth that trapped her legs. She wove between trees, searching for the spot with the stinging nettle, searching for pink and calico.

  “Ow!” Daphne yanked her hands up when the thigh-high nettles slipped their acid onto her palms. “Fuckety-fuck.”

  It hurts you the most when it’s in full flower.

  Where was Minnie? Was this the spot? Daphne swirled, searching the trampled ground, then turned again, casting about in the woods. She found the stump, the exact footprint in the woods where she’d left the little old lady. Daphne saw the path she’d forced into the brush when she’d run for her truck and saw brush she and Minnie had trampled when they’d progressed from the vacation house.

  Had Minnie tried to follow her? Daphne climbed onto the stump, craning her head. The flash of pink was brief and low, a flit
through trees, back toward the Rainier Court Vacation House. Launching herself, Daphne dodged trees, trying to retrace the route that had brought her and Minnie to this spot. By the time she got close enough to glimpse the deck, she could see Minnie, cloaked in a long black wool coat, held close by the black-haired woman. They were walking around the vacation house, heading for the front.

  Daphne charged, gasping, feeling her heart bang against her chest wall. Before she neared the back deck, Minnie and the other woman were out of sight. An engine roared to life and car doors slammed. Daphne pelted around the house, screaming as the threesome pulled away in the white car.

  Minnie Watts sat crammed between the man and woman in the front seat of the white sedan. Daphne’s pulse increased in a crescendo that teased of what she wouldn’t achieve as she chased the car down Rainier Court, falling farther behind with every stride.

  When the car reached the main street and she didn’t, Daphne screamed again. “Stop! No, stop! Wait!” She raced after the car with all her power.

  With the car’s violent lurch as the man took the corner onto the main street, Daphne found new speed, but she couldn’t scream in top flight. She passed the next street, but it was hopeless. Pulling blocks farther away in seconds, the car fled, outstripping her human strength. She thought it turned right on another main street up ahead but couldn’t say which one because it was so far away. Daphne’s lungs demanded several sucking gasps before she had enough breath to cry out to the entire neighborhood.

  “Call the police! Help! Call 911!” Then she ran again making another block before the rank futility of her effort seeped through her core. Too winded to cry, she slumped, elbows and knees on the pavement as she struggled for breath.

  CHAPTER 23

  The threat of screeching brakes forced Daphne to her feet. She rose from the asphalt still gasping for air, and wiped her face.

  A car door opened and a man’s voice asked, “Ma’am, are you all right?”

  She turned. It was a uniformed police officer, with a patrol car behind him. She lurched toward him, then twisted and pointed down the road in the opposite direction.