by Lynn Bohart
“Well, we found the garrote he used on all the women he killed, at least the ones we’ve found. It was in that basement,” David said. “But here’s a news flash – Rose wasn’t his sister. Not by blood, anyway. She was adopted. She was the daughter of a distant cousin of Judge Foster’s. He and his wife agreed to take her in when her parents were killed in a car accident.”
“Wow, did Mansfield and Emily know?” Doe asked.
“Yes,” David said. “Emily told us when we interviewed her in the hospital.”
“That’s why there wasn’t much of a family resemblance,” I said.
“And now Emily is in a mental institution again,” Rudy said
“She’s being processed now,” Sean said. “She’ll be transferred within the next day or so. It was Mansfield who got her out of the inpatient mental facility after her mother died. She hadn’t displayed any dangerous tendencies, and the doctors felt if she stayed on her medication, she would do fine. Mansfield wanted her to take care of their father, and he wanted an accomplice. He knew how to manipulate her. Besides, it appears he cut her medication when it suited him. We found various bottles of meds in his home.”
I saw Blair flinch at that. “What a monster,” she mumbled.
“Well, they’ll never hurt anyone again,” David said.
“But Mansfield murdered for what? Ten years?” Rudy said.
David shrugged. “Looks like it. Emily remembered seven women. We’ve found five,” he said. “And most likely he was killing before he recruited his sister. But with him gone, we’ll never know for sure.”
I felt sick to my stomach, thinking of the five female ghosts in the tunnel. “She didn’t want to help him, you know? He tortured her.”
David took a deep breath. “We know. He used the threat of violence to force her to befriend the women. Sometimes she feigned car trouble. Other times, she would strike up a friendly conversation about something and walk out into the parking lot with them, where he would drug them. But you’re right, the doctor says Emily shows evidence of long-term abuse. Broken fingers. Burn marks.”
“Will you ever be able to identify all the women you’ve found?” Rudy asked.
“We’ve already ID’d four. Emily might be able to help with the last one.”
“What about Judge Foster?” Blair asked. “Did they kill him, too?”
“No. The ME says he died of natural causes. But then Emily mummified him. She wasn’t stupid, whatever you think of her. She worked in the library, remember. She read up on how to do it, and I think Mansfield might have helped. He wanted to keep her dependent on him. We think that’s one of the things they used the basement for – the mummification,” Sean reported.
“And probably why the house smelled so bad,” Blair murmured with a sneer.
“Mansfield also used the basement for the women he abducted,” I added with a shudder.
Sean shifted his gaze to me. “We found jewelry and personal belongings to a number of the women down there, plus blood and fibers. The crime scene guys were there for a long time.”
“So, who burned our barn down?” April asked.
She’d been very quiet, and I glanced over at her. Although the reception hall had been her idea and everyone applauded it, I knew there was a part of her that mourned the loss of her bakery.
“Emily,” Detective Abrams said. “She had never told Mansfield about the accident with the baby. From what she says, her father wouldn’t allow the baby in the house. So while he looked for an institution that would take her, Emily’s mother, Rose and Emily all took turns taking care of her out in the barn. Emily most of all. She loved Marigold and was distraught when the baby died. She knew it was her fault and was deathly afraid of what her father would do. So she lied and made up a story about the baby being abducted. She was only thirteen after all. I’m sure they didn’t believe her, and that’s probably why she was shipped off to a mental institution so soon afterwards.”
“That’s really sad when you think of it,” Doe said.
I glanced at her and recognized a softening of her attitude toward the woman who had nearly gotten her killed.
“Anyway, Emily panicked when she realized that she’d told you about the room and the fact that Rose had had a baby. She thought you might put the pieces together, so she hoped to burn the building down so that you wouldn’t find the diaper bag and the candlestick she’d hidden up in the rafters. She was especially afraid of what Mansfield would do if he found out.”
“Little did she know that we’d already found the diaper bag,” I said. “So did Mansfield kill Rose’s boyfriend?”
Sean turned to me. “We don’t know. But Emily thinks he did. Her father sent him off to boarding school right after that. He was home for a break when he killed Rose.”
“So will Emily be locked up for good now?” Rudy asked.
“Most likely,” David replied. “She has a lawyer. Even though she helped her brother abduct all those women, he physically and mentally abused her and did threaten to kill her in a horrible way if she didn’t do what he wanted. Anyway, there’s really no way to prove what happened to the baby all those years ago. My guess is that it really was an accident.”
“I think she’s better off,” Blair said quietly.
“What about Jake?” Doe asked.
“Oh, he’s out of intensive care,” Rudy spoke up. “I was going to tell you. I stopped by on my way here.”
When Jake had had his accident off Highway 97, he had exited the car with a head wound and wandered off into the woods. It had taken a high mountain rescue team to find him and get him to a hospital.
“What did he have to say?” I asked.
“He was run off the road by some big guy in a small red pickup.”
I inhaled and glanced at Blair. “Didn’t Frank Miller’s goon own that small red pickup outside the Hardliner Pub the day we were there?”
“Sure did,” she agreed. “My money is on Frank Miller for that one.”
Sean stood up and pulled out his cell phone. He stepped into the breakfast room to make a call.
“Excuse me, Mrs. Applegate?” a voice said.
We all looked up to find the demolition crew chief standing at the bottom of the steps. I got up and walked over.
“Yes, what is it?”
“We found something I thought you should see,” he said.
“Oh, God, not again.”
I turned to the group on the deck, and suddenly everyone was in motion.
We followed the crew chief out to the slip of land the barn had once stood on. They were just finishing loading charred pieces of lumber into a dumpster. We followed him to the end of the property, to an area that would have been directly behind the barn, perhaps even right up against it. When the skip loader used its big scoop to pick up piles of lumber, it had dug down into the earth a foot or two.
“Here,” the crew chief said, pointing to the hole.
We formed a half circle and gazed into it.
Buried deep within the hole was a jumble of old bones.
“Oh, my God, Lollie,” I murmured.
The moment I said her name, a flock of birds lifted from the trees above us and a voice whispered past my ear, forcing a chill to snake its way down my spine.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
The four of us settled back into our normal routines, which brought us to the final night of the art class. We’d missed the third class due to our command performance on Camano Island, and I, for one, was eager to spend a night lost in creating something positive. Unfortunately, the moment I stepped into the room, I was approached by Milton Snyder.
“Are you going to finish your book?” he asked churlishly. “After all that has happened?”
“Yes, but we’re taking a break for a while.”
“What is it with you women, anyway?” he asked, the corners of his mouth pulled into a frown. “What’s wrong with staying home and doing what normal women do? Isn’t there enough laundry at the inn?”
Snyder was a good six inches taller, so it wasn’t hard for him to look down on me, even without his antiquated belief system. But his sanctimonious expression and mocking tone pushed me over the edge. And then there was that new found sense of confidence I had.
“Oh, there’s plenty of laundry, cooking, and cleaning, Milt. May I call you Milt?” I said with a snap. His eyes flared. “But since there are men like you out in the world constantly gumming things up and creating bigger problems than local authorities can deal with, we occasionally feel the need to lend a helping hand. And speaking of hands…” I said, glancing over towards Mabel. I used my index finger to entice him to come in closer to me. “If I ever see thumb-prints on Mabel’s wrists again, I’ll call the police and have them throw your ass in jail, naked or otherwise. Are we clear? I have a close working relationship with the police, as I’m sure you know.”
His mouth opened and closed twice in quick succession, but he didn’t utter a sound. Instead, he slunk away to the other side of the room.
“Jeez, Julia,” Rudy said from behind me. “You’ve become a verbal ninja.”
I turned to find Doe and Rudy putting their belongings down on the table. Doe was watching Milton as he approached Mabel.
“I wonder if your threat will do any good,” she said.
“I have an idea on how we can keep a close eye on her,” I responded. “Why don’t we invite her to join our book club?”
They both gave me skeptical looks.
“Wouldn’t that bring Milton into our universe more than we want?” Doe asked.
“Maybe,” I replied. “On the other hand, he might just leave her alone if he knows we’re on the lookout.”
Rudy shrugged. “Okay by me. I’d love to find out if Mabel has ever had a thought of her own, anyway.”
“Speaking of women who have minds of their own,” I said looking around. “Where’s Blair?”
“She said she had to be late, but she’ll be here soon,” Doe said.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
Welping was ready to start. Tonight, there was a curtain drawn between stanchions at the front of the room. I suspected he had a surprise in store, so we all sat down.
“Tonight, we’re going to try our hand at sculpting,” he said with a smile. “So cut off an eight inch chunk of clay and get out your tools.”
We donned our aprons and did as we were told. Once again, Snyder merely sat with his arms crossed, stubborn as a mule, shooting nasty looks at the teacher.
“Okay,” Welping said, once everyone was ready. “I’m pleased to say that we have a volunteer tonight who will serve as a model. This will be a little more difficult. So far we’ve worked with animals, flowers, and utensils. Tonight I give you, Venus!”
With that, he pulled a cord and dropped the curtain.
The room erupted in gasps.
Every mouth dropped open, including mine.
Snyder jumped from his chair, his eyes nearly bulging from his head.
Sitting demurely on a stool was Blair, wearing nothing more than a Mona Lisa smile and a purple scarf — an elongated purple scarf — drawn over one naked breast and draped down in between her long, shapely legs.
The rest of her was bare.
“Oh, my,” one older woman murmured.
While everyone stared in shock, Snyder was apoplectic. His face had turned red, and I thought I saw spittle at the side of his mouth.
Blair saw it too. She merely raised a slender shoulder and gave him a single, seductive wink.
Count to three.
The room broke out in a thunderous, standing ovation.
Damn, she was good!
THE END
Author’s Notes
In my mid-twenties, I spent three years of my life working at and then running a psychiatric board and care facility. It was really just a run-down, old motel that had been turned into a halfway house that the owner used as a tax-write off.
Five of us took care of 52 adult schizophrenics; we gave them daily medication, fed them, and provided counseling. A licensed psychiatrist visited the facility once a week to meet with clients to largely adjust their medication. It was some of the most difficult, and yet rewarding work I’ve ever done.
I realized that these were mothers, fathers, teachers, secretaries, and students who had had their lives turned upside down by their illness. They wanted nothing more than to be “normal” like the rest of us – to work, to play, to be with family. But they were trapped in the revolving door of their illness and the mental health system.
Mental illness is a systemic problem in our country. The National Alliance on Mental Illness has estimated that 61 million people suffer from some form of mental illness in any given year. The cost to the country in lost earnings is over $193 billion a year.
We all know that mental illness is one of the leading causes of homelessness. And as so many news broadcasts have shown us, mental illness has now stepped front and center as the cause of a number of mass shootings.
Politicians keep saying that we need to have a national conversation about mental illness. Well, yes, we do. But more than that, we need to do something about it. Too many people are relying on the services and support they need to reintegrate into society as productive citizens. Unfortunately, we keep letting them down.
Thank you so very much for reading A History of Murder. If you enjoyed this book, I would strongly encourage you to go back to Amazon.com and leave an honest review. We “indie” authors survive on reviews and word-of-mouth advertising. This will help position the book so that more people might also enjoy it. Thank you!
About the Author
Ms. Bohart holds a master’s degree in theater, has published in Woman’s World, and has a story in Dead on Demand, an anthology of ghost stories that remained on the Library Journals best seller list for six months. As a thirty-year nonprofit professional, she has spent a lifetime writing brochures, newsletters, business letters, website copy, and more. She did a short stint writing for Patch.com, teaches writing through the Continuing Education Program at Green River Community College, and writes a monthly column for the Renton Reporter. A History of Murder is her sixth full-length novel and the third in the Old Maids of Mercer Island mysteries. You can check out her other books, including the Detective Giorgio Salvatori mysteries, on Amazon.com. She is hard at work on the fourth book in this series. All Roads Lead To Murder will take Julia and the girls on a road trip and should be out summer 2017.
If you would like more information, please visit Ms. Bohart’s website at: www.bohartink.com, where you can let the author know you’d like to be added to her email list to be notified of upcoming publications or events. You may also join her author page on Facebook.
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