by Mims, Lee
“So what’d he want?” I asked.
“The usual. Just wanted to know how things were going and where you might be. I didn’t tell him anything.”
“I’m not worried about him, though he is turning into a pest. He’ll get the information he’s supposed to when I’m ready.”
I pulled my field map from my backpack and rolled it out. Mule threw the rig in gear. The sweet crunching, screeching sound of the bit taking its first bite of hard rock was music to my ears. Wink smiled, seeing my big grin, then motioned me toward the front of the rig. He dove into the cab and retrieved some topographic and aerial maps. He flattened them on the door, holding them in place with magnets.
“We’ll need to cross the creek when we finish on this side,” he said, pointing to it on the map. Gladys’s property was fairly evenly divided, east and west, by the creek where I had first seen the granite outcrops.
“I’ve checked out the bridge,” I said, tapping its location on the aerial and penciling it in on my own map, “and I’m sure it will take the weight of the rig. But I’d feel better if you checked it out too.”
“Already did, it’s in good shape. Probably put in by the loggers who cleared this place, what—twenty-five years ago?”
“Something like that.”
“Well, the concrete drainage pipes are still strong, there’s no sign of cracks, and it’s plenty wide for the rig. I did use the bulldozer to push a little extra dirt around the side where we gotta make our turn and a little extra on the far side. Held up the dozer just fine.”
“Let’s go check it out again while they finish cutting this section of core, just to be sure,” I said.
We had finished our inspection of the farm bridge and were heading back to the rig when we heard a shout from Mule. We hotfooted it back and when we reached the rig saw Stick bending over the first box of core. His eyes were the size of saucers. He stood up, wiping his muddy hands on his jeans, and pointed to the box. “Gawd almighty, I ain’t no scientist, but I believe this here’s ’sposed to be impossible.”
Mule, positioning the bit to drop it back down the well and cut another core, yelled over the deafening clamor of diesel and gasoline engines, “I told him that could be some kinda limestone we ain’t never seen! Just ’cause it looks like granite and it’s hard as a wedding dick, don’t mean it is … does it?”
“Yes, Mule!” I yelled back at him. “It does!”
“Holy crap. You got to be kidding,” Wink said, picking up a few small chips of the rock that had fallen to the ground. He clicked them together and cocked his head. “Girl, do you know what this is gonna be worth?”
I laughed. “I might be blond, Wink, but I can assure you, I know what it’s worth. Again, just make sure you guys keep clammed up about this until I’m ready to make it public.”
As the five-foot sections of granite came up, Stick removed them from the core barrel, broke them into smaller sections and fit them into wooden crates. After I logged in the first section, I used my rock hammer to knock off a lime-sized hand sample from a section of core. I got out the small, folding magnifying glass I kept on my keychain and inspected the rock.
“Hello, sweetheart,” I said. “So glad to finally make your acquaintance.” Medium-grained granite gneiss. I turned it in my fingers. “You and I’ll get to know one another real good later on—”
I was interrupted by the change in pitch of the rig’s engine. Mule was adjusting the hydraulic controls, increasing and decreasing the pressure on the bit, which had begun to make screeching noises.
“Sonuvabitch!” said Mule. “It’s so hard it’s already dulling the bit!” I sighed, well aware it would be the first of many diamond-tipped bits. But what the heck, I was going to be rolling in dough soon, right?
About the time we finally got the first hundred feet of core in the crates, Mule threw the rig’s diesel engine into neutral and said, “Ain’t anybody around here hungry but me?”
I checked my watch and frowned. “It’s only noon.” I didn’t want to quit. “Want to cut a few more sections?” Mutinous stares from the crew. “Okay, okay,” I said. “Pull that tarp over the crates. We’ll leave the truck here. I don’t want it parked on the street in town. We’ll take Mule’s truck to lunch. I’m buying.”
On the hike out of the woods, the guys were full of questions about how I’d known to look for granite in this spot. “I don’t understand how it got here. You mean it’s just in this one location?” Stick said.
“Picture the rocks on the West Coast. How they stick up from the beach, the waves pounding them. Well, this rock used to be like that. This is a small mountain of the same type of rock that makes up the basement of the East Coast, the rock that lies hundreds of feet below us. The fact that it’s so hard that it chewed up our very expensive coring bit is why it’s still here. All the other rock around it eventually eroded away and left this little mountain, kind of like Pilot Mountain, or Stone Mountain in Georgia. When we start to quarry it, we’ll expose places that will show us where the waves beat away at it.”
“For real?” asked an incredulous Stick.
“Yup,” I said as we got to the field.
Wink, walking with Mule ahead of Stick and me, looked back at us and said, “Wonder what he wants.”
I shielded my eyes from the burning sun and saw the figure coming toward us. It was Sheriff Evans.
NINE
“Ma’am,” he said, tipping the brim of his hat.
“Sheriff,” I said and swallowed hard, trying to delay the inevitable, “this is my foreman, Mr. Winkler. My drill crew”—I indicated the guys.
“Fellers,” the sheriff said.
“What brings you out today?” I said, feeling my guts twist.
The sheriff fiddled with his hat and looked down.
I sensed he would be more comfortable passing the news to as few people as possible, so I said to the crew, “I’ll catch up with you guys in town.”
Sheriff Evans looked me square in the eyes and said, “M.E. in Chapel Hill has identified the body you found.”
Oh no. It was her. My mouth went dry. “Okay.”
“It wasn’t Miz Walton.”
My knees stopped buckling. “God, what a relief. But who was it?”
“Well, remember you told me about the other lady, her cousin”—the sheriff paused to pull a small spiral notepad from his shirt pocket—“a Miz Irene Mizzell?”
“Yes, yes … ?”
“It was her. Detectives believe the cover that was wrapped around her was off a charcoal grill, but we’ll let them and crime scene people determine that for sure.”
“How’d they make the identification? I mean, she and Gladys were both about the same age, kinda looked similar, you know … Same build, same silvery-gray hair, cut in similar styles … ”
The sheriff stopped my babbling: “Dental records. They don’t lie. It really helped that both women went to the same dentist in town. Had for years.”
I started not to ask, then decided it would be best to know all the details available to me. “How did she die?”
Sheriff Evans looked down, flipped his hat again and said, “Bullet to the back of the head. The hole looks to be made by a bullet from a small-caliber gun, we don’t know the exact caliber yet. We’ll know that when forensics is done. Of course we weren’t expecting it to be accidental, not with her wrapped up and dumped down a well.”
“No. I guess not.” I had to look down at my field boots. I was not going to act all girly and cry. No way.
“Detectives and crime scene guys’ll probably have some more questions for you.”
“That’s fine. Anything I can do, of course. But what about Gladys?”
“We have a Silver Alert out on her. But remember, this isn’t our only case. If you’re thinking a small town like ours never has murders, think again. This ti
me of year we just about triple our population with migrant workers. Some summers we get as many as three killings. This year, we’ve already gotten two, and it’s not even halfway through the season yet.”
“I had no idea.”
“Well, just letting you know, so you don’t expect us to wrap this case up like one of them episodes of Law & Order and end up disappointed.”
“I’ll keep that in mind, Sheriff, and thanks for coming all the way out here. I appreciate it.”
In spite of the sad news of Irene Mizzell’s murder, lunch was a celebratory affair. After all, we were in the process of making a historic strike. One that would not only make a pant load of money for me and generations of my heirs but would lift the economy of the surrounding small towns. Considering how hard the great recession had hit eastern North Carolina, that would be a very welcome thing.
“You two pecker heads need to brush up on your rock identification,” laughed Wink, as two waitresses sat down bowls of cole slaw and field peas, a platter of fried catfish, and a basket of hush puppies.
“I knew what it was,” Mule said. “I just try not to make Stick look dumber than the rocks we drill.”
Stick tipped his chair on its back legs and said, “Hey, I was pretty sure it was … ”
I interrupted him, looking up at the waitresses, “Know what? I think you’re all smarter than a room full of Harvard lawyers. Matter of fact, I know you are. Now, dig in. We’ve got work to do.”
As the waitresses hurried to the next table, Wink looked at the boys, scowled, and pulled an imaginary zipper across his lips. They nodded and switched to a weightier topic: Wrestlemania. I listened to their funny banter, elated on the one hand that my site was proving to be all I had hoped for and deeply troubled on the other that the body of a murdered woman had been found there.
Wink later dropped me off at my Jeep so I could snag a bottled water and some field notes. I decided it wouldn’t hurt to walk off some of the calories from the fried lunch, so I told the guys I’d walk the rest of the way. When I got to the site, all three men were wearing funny expressions.
“What’s up?” I asked.
“Somebody tampered with one of the boxes,” Stick blurted, pointing at the granite core samples in the back of Wink’s truck.
“What?!”
“Whoever did it was in a hurry and cracked the top of one of the boxes. There’s a sample missing.”
“Damnit to hell!” I stomped away about ten paces, hands on my hips, my back to the crew. I was just too angry to speak.
“I’m sorry,” Wink said. “I should’ve done more than just nail those crates shut. I should’ve put metal bands around each one of them.”
“Ya think?” I snapped and was instantly sorry. I held my palms out like a crossing guard, closed my big mouth, and retreated into the woods. I found a perfect time-out stump and sat myself down. What the hell is going on? I thought I knew, but I took the time to ponder the events of the last few days and listen to the birds. How I missed Tulip with her wise brown eyes. When I was sure I was calm and the crew had had sufficient time to think about what they’d done, I went back.
As I stepped back into the clearing Wink said, “I swear, I just didn’t think anyone would go to the trouble to traipse all the way back in these woods and find the crates.”
“Yes,” I said. “You should have, but we were all pretty excited. Just be more careful next time. Anyway, I’ve got this property tied up tight enough, so whoever did this … well, they went to a lot of trouble for nothing. Besides, I’ve been thinking—it’s obvious who did it.”
“Who?” asked all three men practically in unison.
“That numb-nuts, Robert Earle. He’s got access. And he’s proven himself to be a grade-A horse’s ass. Just because he’s been acting like Little Mary Sunshine lately doesn’t fool me for a second. It sucks, but no harm done.
“Now let’s see if we can get the rest of our first core in the box before we break for the weekend. Come Monday, we’ll finish our overburden drilling on the east side of the property, cross that creek, and see what our mountain looks like on the other side.”
Late that afternoon, I waved at them as they drove off, then pulled the gate closed and padlocked it. I was pocketing my key when I saw Robert Earle’s Escalade heading my way. Damn. And I was so close to leaving. Well, at least he was being friendly these days. I decided to keep it that way by playing dumb about the sample and conveying my condolences on the death of his cousin. Still, the thought of him creeping about in the woods, spying on the crew and me made my blood boil.
He got out and walked toward me, a legal-size manila envelope in his hand.
“What’s this?” I asked as he handed it to me.
“Something that says you don’t need to come back here anymore. You’re done. I’ll be taking over the testing of my mom’s property from now on.”
I set my poker face to cool and collected. Then, on second thought, dialed it up to cocky and said, “Number one: I have a legal contract signed by your mother. We’ve discussed this before, Robert Earle. And number two: I asked you already, what is this?” I held up the manila envelope.
“Open it and see for yourself.”
I didn’t move my eyes from him until I’d slipped the document from the envelope, then glanced down at it. It was an option to test signed by Robert Earle and Shirley, and signed by their mother designating them as her agents. I noticed the date too: it had been signed a month ago, five months after my document.
But instead of it being a legal document between an individual doing business as a private consultant and the landowners, like my option, a company name was listed as being the party of the first part, or the one to exercise the option.
I’d never heard of the company—I.T.N.F. TestCo Group—but a quick scan of the pages revealed it was Charlotte-based. I checked inside the manila envelope as if I were looking for something else. I turned it upside down, shook it, and looked inside again.
“Where’s your Power of Attorney?” I asked. “Gladys would have told me if any such document existed.”
“I couldn’t lay my hands right on it when I left to come find you, but I’ll have it in your hands tomorrow.”
I stared into his eyes. He blinked then looked down and to the right. Amateur.
I dialed my poker face to smart-alecky smirk, tossed the envelope and document on top of his size-12 Pumas, and said, “I’ll be back with my crew bright and early Monday morning. Don’t impede them or my testing in any way or you’ll find yourself facing a lawsuit, Robert Earle. A big one.”
He bent and retrieved his option as I got in my Jeep and hit the down button on my window. Then I dropped the smirk and said, “Don’t fuck with me, Robert Earle. ’Cause, trust me, you won’t like it.”
By the time I reached the highway back to town, I realized the reason my teeth were aching was because I was clenching them so hard. I wrapped my fingers around my jaw and massaged until the throbbing subsided. As I did, I noticed my gas gauge indicated I was near empty. I was so furious I had to actually think about it for a minute before deciding a fill-up might be in order. Since the Jeep’s tank was just about empty, I turned right onto Belgrade Swansboro Road rather than heading into Stella.
Within a few miles, my outward appearance was probably pretty normal. Inside my head, however, I was still jumping up and down and screaming. That dumb fucker! Who does he think he’s talking to? Power of Attorney? I’d bet my bottom dollar he didn’t have one. And what or who in the hell is I.T.N.F. TestCo Group?
I.T.? International Testing? Or maybe— The ring of my cell interrupted my furious thoughts: Henri. Well, I didn’t have the time nor was I in the frame of mind to speak with her. I saw the Exxon station I was looking for and pulled up to the pump.
The gas gurgled and foamed as it flowed into the tank. Grackles and cow birds strutted a
bout on the concrete looking for something to eat and all the while information collided in my mind.
Gladys wasn’t dead. The test site was proving to be all that I’d hoped for. The Walton siblings were trying to take over my life’s work. Well, only a little over a year of it, but still, it was what I’d wanted all my life.
Power of Attorney? Is that what that “Mom disappears like this all the time” crap was about? Were they trying to have her declared incompetent? If so, how long had that smarmy scheme been going on? Had it caused the uneasiness I sensed in Gladys sometimes? Did she suspect her children wanted her out of the picture?
It made sense. In the way that two adult children being so lazy and conniving as to try to take their inheritance before their mother was dead ever makes sense.
And another thing: like the old cliche says, there are no coincidences. Robert Earle and Shirley’s cousin was dead. Bullet-to-the-back-of-the-head dead. And cousin Irene looked a lot like Gladys—
same height, weight—and from behind …
I shuddered so violently that the nozzle jerked out of the tank and gas splashed down the Jeep’s side. I blinked and shook my head. “No,” I said out loud, then looked around to see if anyone heard me. No, it can’t be. It was almost impossible to bring myself to contemplate such a thing, her own children trying to kill her? No. I simply wasn’t going there. Better to ask the following question: if Gladys wasn’t dead, where was she?
I sloshed some black, greasy water on the spill with the windshield squeegee and bent to wipe it dry with a paper towel. Then I slowly stood up.
I knew where Gladys was.
TEN
I sat on the edge of my bed at the Morning Glory Inn, booted up my laptop, and looked up the white pages for Venice, Florida, the town where the postcard in Irene’s mailbox originated. Also the town where Gladys’s sister lived.
Gladys always called her “Sister,” but her real name was Penelope and, according to Gladys, she’d never married. That meant her last name would be Gladys’s maiden name, Bulla. How many Bullas could there be in Venice? Three, I discovered easily when I found the name. Two were men. One was listed P. Bulla. Bingo!
