by Catie Rhodes
“Not necessarily.” Rainey glanced at me, her dark gaze full of meaning, but I didn’t pick up on exactly what she wanted. “We spoke to Alice Leeland earlier today, and she voiced a belief the carriage house itself may have had something to do with Chris’s disappearance. We knew Mr. Dowthitt lived there at one time, and we wondered if he ever said anything about it.”
Mrs. Dowthitt nodded. She set down her cup and stood, slowly crossed the room to the television set, and clicked it off. She returned to her plastic-covered armchair, but didn’t sit back. She sat with her elbows on her lap and her legs tightly crossed.
“I know this is for a school project.” She gestured at the blinking light on the camera. “I also know this is being filmed. I hate to say things that might make people think my beloved James was a kook. I know how people in this town can be.” Her gaze flitted to me, and she flushed.
“I understand that, Mrs. Dowthitt.” Rainey shifted next to me. The plastic squelched. “I can assure you this interview will not be edited in a way that misrepresents what you tell us. Your words will be used in the context in which they were spoken.”
Mrs. Dowthitt frowned and pressed her lips together. “You know what? James would have loved it that you kids were curious about one of his favorite subjects. He’d have told you everything and wouldn’t have cared who heard it. It would be wrong of me to do otherwise.”
Rainey sat a little straighter, almost smiling but not quite.
“James believed the Mace Treasure was in the carriage house. Otherwise, I think he’d have moved on long before he did and argued less when I insisted on buying this place.” She smiled, but not at me or Rainey. She was lost in memory. “Even after we left, James kept a keen eye on who lived in the house, probably wondering if they were going to find the treasure. Over the years, he saw some interesting things. The two of you already know about the Chris Leeland disappearance. But there’s more. That place had an effect on people. Not a good one either. A woman Mr. Dowthitt taught in school moved in there. She had a drug problem. She complained to Mr. Dowthitt about hearing a man crying at night. This crying man begged to be let out and promised to just go away.” She paused to give us a meaningful stare.
“Did Mr. Dowthitt think that was Chris Leeland’s ghost?” I flinched as I asked the question, knowing Rainey didn’t like my interruptions.
“No way to know. But it did happen after Chris Leeland’s disappearance.” Mrs. Dowthitt ate another sugar cookie. “That same woman finally succumbed to her addiction. Another man moved in there who suffered from mental issues—we’d probably call it depression now—and committed suicide. James thought the house somehow sucked away their life force, made the bad things in them take over.”
“But nothing ever happened to you there, right?” Rainey scribbled in her notebook as she talked.
“All I experienced was the fillings in my teeth hurt. And I had a lot of them.” She smiled, showing us a full set of teeth too uniform and straight to be anything other than dentures. “That was most of the reason we moved. The fillings in my teeth would start hurting, and I’d get a headache. The nights I had a headache, I’d go to bed and have odd dreams about being in church, listening to a choir sing a weird song in another language…maybe Latin. Next day, I’d wake up and not be worth a toot, especially not teaching school. So I made a down payment on this place, and we moved.”
Rainey closed her notebook. “This is fantastic, Mrs. Dowthitt. I really thank you for taking the time to sit for an interview.”
“Oh honey, we haven’t even gotten to the creepiest part of it all.” Mrs. Dowthitt refilled Rainey’s coffee cup. “The Longstreets decided to quit renting the Mace House around 1980 or so. After that, it just sat vacant. James couldn’t leave the idea of that place having something to do with the Mace Treasure alone. Finally, he went over there one night with an Ouija board. Still had a key to the place.” She glanced at me, eyes sparkling, as though I’d especially enjoy this part. Truth was, I felt a little sick. “James had the notion he’d contact whatever lived in the house and find out if the Mace Treasure was hidden there. He made contact with something. It asked him to come into the depths.”
Fear iced down my spine. Shivers ripped through me.
Mrs. Dowthitt glanced at me. “Too much coffee, hon?”
“I guess so.” I tried to laugh, but it sounded like a frog getting stepped on.
“Did James ever figure out the meaning of his conversation with the Ouija board?” Rainey made it all sound so official and plausible.
“No. He was dead within a week.” Mrs. Dowthitt rubbed one eye. “He did talk to a local amateur historian but said the guy didn’t have any ideas.”
“Who was it?” Rainey opened her notebook again.
“Eddie Kennedy.” Mrs. Dowthitt brushed sugar cookie crumbs off her skirt.
Rainey turned her head slowly and faced me, gaze boring into mine. This time I caught her meaning loud and clear. It would be my job to arrange a meeting with Eddie Kennedy. After all, he’d stepped in as something of a father figure after my father’s murder. I knew him better than any of the rest of our group.
Mrs. Dowthitt’s tried everything to get us to stay—a hand of cards, knitting lessons, even pictures from her recent vacation to London. We thanked her and left.
In the car, Rainey spoke without looking at me. “So I guess it’s time to make good on my promise.” She drove through the neighborhood and wove her way back across town. She cruised past Bullfrog’s Billiards. Sure enough, Chase’s Tahoe sat at one of the parking places. Loud music seeped from the building. Rainey kept driving. We ended up in front of Felicia’s house. Rainey gathered her pen and notebook. “Come on.”
We went up the walk, and Rainey rang the doorbell. Felicia’s mother, Loretta Brent, answered the door, eyebrows raised in question.
“Is Felicia home?” Rainey delivered the question as though she didn’t know Felicia was with Chase and Tubby.
“Well, no. I thought she was working on the group project with you girls.” Her lingered on my face.
“We took separate cars back from Louisiana. She rode with Chase Fischer and Tubby Tubman. We thought for sure they’d be home by now.” Rainey widened her eyes innocently as she spoke the last sentence. “Peri Jean and I hoped to go over our notes with her, maybe think about our next interview.”
“My daughter’s with Tubby Tubman?” Loretta Brent’s voice raised. She grabbed her purse off a little table and came outside with us. “I’m going to have to ask you girls to go on home. I need to go look for Felicia.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Rainey turned to go back to the Cadillac, took several steps, and stopped as though she’d just thought of something. “You might check at Bullfrog’s Billiards. Chase got a job playing guitar there on the weekends.”
Loretta Brent practically ran to her car. She jumped in and started it, gunning the motor. Rainey and I stood on the sidewalk watching the show. With a squeal of tires, Loretta Brent’s economy car blasted out of the driveway and took off down the street.
“Wow,” I whispered.
Rainey shrugged. “Felicia deserves it. She delights in making people miserable. Here’s a taste of her own medicine.”
We got into the Cadillac, and Rainey drove in the same direction Loretta Brent went, taking her time. We passed Bullfrog’s Billiards just in time to see Felicia being dragged out by the arm, her mother yelling at her the whole time. Tubby stood at the door, shirtless and barefoot, laughing so hard he had to hold his sides.
“In the grand scheme of things, it’s not going to make any difference.” Rainey spoke softly, not taking her eyes off the show. “But I kept my promise to you. You know she’s not throwing herself at your boyfriend while you can do nothing about it.”
“Thank you.” My words came out by rote, me saying them without thinking. A helpless sort of anger dulled the satisfaction of seeing Felicia get into trouble. We drove back to Memaw’s in silence.
* * *
That
evening, I called Eddie about interviewing for our documentary.
“I don’t see no problem. Was gonna come pick up your daddy’s Nova tomorrow anyway. Miss Leticia wants me to get it running for you.”
Despite the dismal day, a smile spread over my face. I couldn’t believe Memaw had decided to let me have the car. She might put a million restrictions on me, but at least I wouldn’t be dependent on someone giving me a ride. I ran into the living room to hug and thank her.
“Tell you what. I’ll cook my special fried chicken for y’all. You’ll eat, interview Eddie, and hopefully this’ll be about it for the project.” She picked up her crochet again. “Call the rest of the group and see if they want to do it. We’ll have to go to the supermarket if they do.”
I had to call Bullfrog’s Billiards to find Chase. It took five minutes of arguing to get him to the phone.
“Why’d y’all do that to Felicia?” were the first words out of his mouth.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” The lie came out before I had time to think it over.
“You do too.” His voice raised. “I was looking out the front window. I saw you and Rainey in her Cadillac.” He paused, put his hand over the phone, and said something to someone. “Felicia wasn’t hurting anything. She was just listening to music.” My music. He might not have said the words, but I heard them in his voice. “The more she likes my music, the more likely she is to introduce me to that record producer cousin of hers. The more you mess with her, the more likely she is to drop the whole thing.”
“But she’s throwing herself at you.” I squeezed my eyes shut, knowing the words were a mistake as soon as I heard myself say them. Ashamed, I picked at a hole forming in the knee of my jeans.
Chase took a long drink of something probably alcoholic. “Doesn’t mean I have to do anything about it. Don’t you trust me?”
I wasn’t sure, so I changed the subject. “Are you going to come or not?”
“I’ll be there, but you’ve got to cut the shit with Felicia. Don’t force me to choose between you and my music career.” He hung up before I could answer.
Around one o’clock the next afternoon, people started arriving. Eddie came first. He parked by the carport, went in, and pulled the tarp off the Nova. I hurried out to meet him. Eddie leaned under the car’s open hood, tinkering with something out of my sight. I couldn’t help noticing his grease-stained jeans and his faded denim work shirt, which he wore unbuttoned, tails flapping.
“You do know you’re going to be filmed, don’t you?” I shifted around, embarrassment already seeping into me.
Eddie pulled himself out from under the hood. “So? This is how I look every day. I want to be natural. Not put on airs.”
I wanted to argue, but Rainey’s black Cadillac eased to a stop next to Eddie’s faded maroon and tan Ford truck. She got out and approached us.
“Thanks for agreeing to let us interview you,” she said to him. “Were you able to find the articles you mentioned last night on the phone?”
Rainey must have called him after she dropped me off. How did she muster the energy to do all she did?
“Took a while, but I found ’em.” He wiped his hands on his pants, making new grease streaks.
“You do realize I’m filming the interview?” Rainey stared at the white t-shirt Eddie wore underneath his unbuttoned denim work shirt. A streak of red stained the front, like maybe he’d spilled ketchup.
Eddie nodded and ducked under the Nova’s hood again.
Chase’s Tahoe pulled into the yard. He and Tubby got out and glanced toward the carport. I waved. Chase waved back but went straight inside Memaw’s house. I stood there, his rejection stinging, and turned back to find Rainey and Eddie watching, varying degrees of sympathy on their faces. Tubby came out to the carport and leaned under the Nova’s hood. Eddie explained some of the things he planned to do to get the car roadworthy.
“You decide this is too much car for you, Peri Jean, I’ll buy it.” Tubby’s grin made him look like a devil.
“Hold your breath.” I smiled in spite of myself. He really didn’t know when to quit.
Felicia’s mother dropped her off about that time. The girl glared out at the carport and stomped into the house.
“Looks like the whole gang’s here.” Rainey sounded less than thrilled.
Eddie shut the Nova’s hood, and we walked toward the house.
A half hour later, we all sat in Memaw’s living room, the smell of fried food making all our stomachs growl. Eddie took the armchair and pulled the coffee table up against his knees for his papers. He nodded at Rainey. “I’m not sure how you want to do this. Do I just start talking?”
“Let me get the video recorder turned on. Then I’ll ask you the first question.” She clicked the remote and turned back to Eddie. “Sharon Dowthitt, the widow of James Dowthitt, mentioned Mr. Dowthitt consulted with you after he tried contacting a spirit he believed resided in the Mace Carriage House. Do you remember what he asked you?”
“I sure do. Mr. Dowthitt wanted to know if the Mace property had a subterranean level.” Eddie used one grease-covered hand to push his papers around until he found the one he wanted. “Whatever he contacted on the Ouija board indicated there was something below the carriage house.”
“Did you have any answers for him?” Rainey sat on Memaw’s beat-up old couch like a visiting queen.
“There’s no basement or cellar on the property, not documented anywhere I could find. Over the years, I thought about Mr. Dowthitt’s question bunch a’ times. Even got Mr. Longstreet to let me onto the Mace property to search for a root cellar.”
“Ever find anything?”
“Naw. Ain’t nothing like that on the property.” Eddie rubbed at his pants again.
Felicia giggled. I twisted in my seat to glare at her, suddenly not afraid of what she could do to me at school. After the way Chase talked to me on the phone, I pretty much credited her with everything wrong in the world. I wouldn’t let her sit in my home and make fun of a man who’d never done anything but be good to me. She smirked at me. I stared until she averted her gaze.
“Do you have any other theories on what the Ouija board might have been trying to tell Mr. Dowthitt?” Rainey gave me a quick, nasty scowl. How did she know Felicia and I were having eyeball wars?
“Not really. But something he said really stuck with me. He said whatever contacted him on the Ouija board claimed to be an old god. Boy, that raised goose bumps on me.” He gave us a sheepish grin. “I sort of made myself forget about it. Then the Gaslight City Gazette got rid of a bunch of their archives, and I found something that creeped me out even worse.” He fished a sheet of paper out of the pile and handed it to Rainey.
“Now that’s a copy of a news article Miss Bruce has there. It was written in 1934, but it talked about something in 1869, the year construction was started on the Mace House. Turns out they found a bunch of artifacts that made ’em believe the area was a Native American temple, a place of worship.”
“Belonging to what tribe?” Rainey asked.
“You had the Nasoni, the Caddo, possibly the Adai, though their numbers were so few by that time—”
“So you’re saying an ancient Indian curse killed Mr. Dowthitt and made Chris Leeland disappear?” Felicia’s voice dripped contempt. “That sounds hokey. Late night horror movie crap.”
Eddie shrugged and flushed. “There was skirmishes when the white settlers decided the land belonged to them. Many innocent people were killed. If you believe in anything like supernatural revenge…”
“I don’t.” Felicia spoke more loudly than necessary.
Rainey never acknowledged Felicia’s outburst. “Eddie, I’d like to go back to the items found at the site of the Mace House and touch on what we talked about last night on the telephone.”
“Oh, sure.” Eddie brightened, sitting up straighter. “The native peoples who originally lived here believed this place had magical properties. Some of the
items found indicated sacrifices might have been made here. Say the site of the Mace property has supernatural powers. Those powers—whatever they really are—could have made Chris Leeland disappear and James Dowthitt die of a heart attack a week after contacting it.”
“Creepy stuff.” Tubby nodded. Eddie grinned and gave him a thumbs-up.
“Now you didn’t ask me to talk about the Mace Treasure, but after discovering this information, I’ve wondered if this force caused Reginald Mace to lose his mind.” Eddie spread his papers out on the coffee table like a hand of solitaire. “The symptoms reported in him might have been diagnosed as Alzheimer’s nowadays. Could whatever James Dowthitt contacted have caused that?”
“Rainey and Eddie’s Believe It Or Not.” Felicia said the words in a deep, shaky voice. I wanted to kick her teeth down her throat.
Rainey still ignored her. “You mentioned last night on the phone other mysterious disappearances around the county.”
“You bet. Not just on the Mace property either.” Eddie handed another sheaf of papers to Rainey. “More newspaper articles. Back when the first white settlers came here and Luther Palmore started his logging company, he lost several men under strange circumstances. There was an incident when the men found a clear pool of water out in the woods. Weather was hot, so several of the younger ones took off their clothes and jumped in. They never come back up. They’s just gone. You got several instances of kids going exploring out in the woods and only one of ’em coming back full of wild stories.” Eddie rifled through his papers some more and handed a sheet to Rainey. “But I think the creepiest one is the story of Robert Latane. This was back in the 1940s. Mr. Latane was a traveling salesman. He left his wife early one morning and never returned. When folks started searching for him, his car was sitting on the side of the road, empty. The door was open.”
“Oh, come on.” Felicia crossed her arms under her boobs. “He could have gotten sick, wandered into the woods, and died.”
“Maybe. But Mr. James Dowthitt, who later died after trying to contact a spirit in the Mace Carriage House, told me himself that he found Robert Latane’s wallet inside the carriage house. First week he moved in. Said it was laying on the broom closet floor.” Eddie leaned forward and held up one hairy hand. “And here’s the kicker. Thing looked brand new, not twenty years old.”
