The Pendant (The Angela Feetwood Paranormal Mystery Series Book 1)

by Lawton Paul

  “What did you have?”

  “Lymphoma. My body couldn’t protect me from infections. I was sick all the time: fever, sweating, fatigue.” He looked up at her, and she tried to imagine this dirty, bearded freak carrying a backpack, clean-shaven, on his way to some Biology lab class at UF.

  “Why here and why all the Jesus stuff?”

  “Here because this is the core of the power. Can’t you feel it? It radiates out in all directions. You’ve shut down because you’ve been through a lot recently. Jesus is just cover. I grow and sell psilocybin mushrooms. And orchids, by the way, which Marlina loved. I didn’t kill her. I miss her.”

  “Why not be a doctor at the university?”

  “Jesus makes more money. And besides, I’ve got to be here. I can’t leave.”

  “I ain’t buyin’ it.”

  “The irony here is too sweet. You can’t be serious, can you?” Dave looks at her and shakes his head. His composure starting to return.

  “What are you taking about?”

  “You don’t get it, do you?” A hint of a smile breaks through his teary, red face. He leans back on the grass and grins, dirt stuck to the dark, wet spot on his shorts, but he’s suddenly lighter and calmer than a moment ago. “Angela, when did you come here?”

  “Almost a year ago.”

  “And where were you before you came?”

  And suddenly Angela has to sit down. Her legs get weak and the rifle feels cold and heavy. Oh, shit, don’t faint. She sits down on the wet grass, the rifle in her lap.

  “Say it!” he says. “Where were you right before you came here? Let it out.”

  She starts to cry a little and tries to cover it with a few loud sniffles. Then she wipes her nose on her sleeve and takes a few deep breaths.

  “I was dying of cancer in Gainesville,” she says.

  “And then you came here.” And he stands up and starts walking away.

  “Coincidence!” she yells.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Wait,” she says. “So you had nothing to do with it?”

  “No. Sorry I’m not the heartless murderer you are searching for. She was a good friend. I miss her. She trusted me.”

  “So now I’ve got nothing. No clues except an old photo and a piece of paper.” She pulls out the paper she found in Walt’s room.

  “M. Indica. Who’s that?”

  He laughs, spits in her direction. “So you shoot a gun at me and I’m supposed to help you?” Angela puts the rifle down and takes a few steps toward him.

  “Please. I think I believe you.”

  “I don’t care what you think you believe. Stay out of my life.”

  “Who’s M. Indica?” she says. He walks away towards the fence. “Please!” she says. And then he stops and points to the small tree he was sitting near.

  “Not who, what. It’s a mango.”

  “Why did Walt have that in his pocket?”

  “Walt asked me about it once. Unlike you, his mind was open to all possibilities. He was seeking the truth. I’m not sure what you are doing.”

  “Why did he ask about it?”

  “Because he knew what I knew. The mango isn’t supposed to be here. It is biologically impossible for it to survive a good solid January freeze in North Florida. This one’s been through about five winters.”

  “How?”

  “How am I healthy here? How are you not dead? I don’t know. There’s an energy field in Chickasaw and the strongest point is right here. It’s holding us together and it’s keeping a tropical plant alive where it has no business being. Now stick that gun up your ass and don’t talk to me again.” He turns and walks away.

  Wheels Turning

  Angela shows up at the back door to the big house holding the rifle with teary eyes, trying not to cry. She stands outside the screened door for a moment to compose herself, hoping Bo hasn’t seen her yet. She walks in, leans the rifle in the corner, casually plops down in her seat, forces a smile, then regrets it because Bo isn’t fooled.

  “So that was you this morning?” Bo says, pointing to the rifle. “I though it was them damn Falkowski boys down the street shooting rats in the bulkhead again. Should’a known.” She put down a cup of coffee in front of Angela. “I ain’t even gonna ask,” she says, and turns back to the burners. She’s got pancakes, scrambled eggs and bacon going. Five large white plates lined up on the counter.

  Angela doesn’t say much for awhile, just sips coffee and watches Bo shuttle plates of food to guests in the main dining room. Once breakfast is squared away Bo sits down at the little table with Angela, and just looks at her. Waiting.

  She knows I’m gonna hit her with something, Angela thinks. “Bo, this is a strange question, but when’s the last time you were sick?”

  “Well, that’s a curveball ain’t it. But let’s see. I had a nasty case a shingles back when Raymond was still with us. That was a pain in the arse.”

  “Oh, so you have been sick?” Angela leans in, a little too happy, and then tries to recover with a furrowed brow, but it was too late.

  “Oh, hell yes. When I was a kid I used to come down with everything. Those were the days when Momma would put us all in the same bed if one of us got sick so she could deal with the illness at the same time.”

  “Oh, cool. So you and your sisters got sick.” Bo gives her a funny look. “I’m sorry, I was going crazy thinking nobody ever gets sick around here, but you and your sisters did.”

  “Well, yeah, but that was in Dinsmore.”

  “Oh,” Angela says, her shoulders slumping towards her coffee cup.

  “If you want, I can jump in the river and turn down the a/c and try to get a cold. If me being sick’ll make you feel better. What are you on about?”

  “How long you been in Chickasaw?”

  “Goin’ on twenty years.”

  “Been sick in any way since you moved here? I’m talking anything from the common cold to whatever.”

  She turns off the gas stove and moves a cast iron skillet of corn bread onto the counter. She looks up, wrinkles her nose and rubs her chin. “Well, had to have stitches once when I cut my finger real good filleting a red.”

  “That doesn’t count. That’s a physical thing.”

  “I guess I been lucky. Pretty healthy. You know what they say: Chickasaw’ll give you a charge. City folk say that.”

  “Well, I’m glad you’re healthy, Bo.” Then Angela pulls out the old photo from Mrs. Kaufman’s house. “Will you take a look at this?” Bo slides on her reading glasses that she keeps hanging around her neck.

  “That looks like Marlina. Didn’t know she was a nurse,” she says. “Where’d you get the photo?”

  “I just found it… uh. You know…” I suck at lying.

  “Where exactly?” she says.

  “In a book.”

  “Where?”

  “The old house.”

  Bo squints her eyes and stares down Angela. “Don’t lie to me,” she says.

  “Okay. Okay. Mrs. Kaufman’s house.”

  Bo issues another of her 1940s movie star gasps. Just like I killed someone and hung them in a tree out front. She does the hand to the chest and the mouth open, air suck thing.

  “Come on, Bo. In-ves-ti-GA-tion.”

  “You went under the DO NOT CROSS yellow tape?” Her hand to her mouth.

  “Yep.”

  “Well… they gonna hang you by your toes.” She shakes her head at Angela for a few moments then leans in to look at the image again, one hand on her glasses. Suddenly she says, “Ooooh! Ooooh!” and throws it down on the table next to the cup. “It can’t be! No. Oh my!”

  “What?” says Angela a little too loud. Bo looks up toward the door to the guest room. Angela can hear a low hum of conversation and the tinkle of good silverware on Bo’s china.

  “Take a look at the boy,” Bo says, quiet and cautious.

  Angela grabs the picture and takes another look. And then she sees it, too. The way the skinny b
oy stood. Sort of leaning to his left side. Compensating for some injury. Just like Walt. Walt had a slight limp he said was from a childhood baseball accident and he never really stood up straight. He was always leaning to one side, even if there wasn’t anything to lean on.

  “Walt?” she says.

  “Looks just like him, don’t it?” says Bo.

  “Well damn. Walt was 48 when he died and this boy is, what, around eight years old, so this photo was taken in 1975?”

  “Nope,” says Bo. “Those aren’t 1975 clothes. It’s more like 1950s.”

  “Okay, well either Walt is really old or this picture was taken in the 1970s and they happened to be wearing old-looking clothes and were standing next to a ‘50s car. ‘50s cars would have been common in the 70s,” says Angela.

  “Okay, then what about Marlina? The numbers don’t add up. 1975 was over 40 years ago. She don’t look mid-twenties in that picture. She looks thirties or forties.”

  “So what’s the Walt and Marlina link? Why was Walt asking about that dumb mango tree in Marlina’s yard?”

  “I guess he knew her,” says Bo.

  They sat there for a few minutes trying to absorb all of the new info. Carl comes to the door with a bucket of shrimp. He sits down and Angela slides the picture over to him.

  “Who are these two people?”

  “Ain’t got my reading glasses, but lemme look,” he says. Then holds it at a distance, brings it in a notch then back out for better focus. “Dang. Looks like old lady Kaufman and boy Walt. He always stood at an angle. Like he was on a ship listing hard to port.” That was a joke, but Angela and Bo didn’t laugh.

  “What year?”

  “Fifties. Hmmm. Can’t place the car but it looks ‘53… ‘54. Clothes are fifties.” He puts the picture back on the kitchen table and Angela waits for him to get it. He dumps the shrimp into the sink and starts pulling out bait fish and bits of moss that got in by accident. Then he stops and looks up at the ceiling. “Hey. How old is Walt? I mean—you know what I mean.”

  “48,” says Angela.

  “Give it to me again,” says Carl. And he takes another look and starts shaking his head. “Walt ain’t that old, is—was he?”

  “No,” says Angela. And then she told them that Jesus was actually, Dave, and that he was sick and believes hanging out near Kaufman’s house cured him.

  “Oh, we also got a mango plant in Kaufman’s yard that Walt asked Jesus-Dave about. Dave claims a mango can’t survive a hard freeze like we get here in Chickasaw. But Kaufman’s mango is healthy.”

  Carl’s face squinches up, he turns to one side, his eyes aimed at the floor, but it’s like he’s staring right through it. He scratches his head.

  “Awright. Let’s lay this big pile o’ nonsense on the table real slow so a river rat can rake through it,” he says.

  “Okay. Here are the facts,” says Angela. “Kaufman, we think, was murdered. We got no motive and now that I think Dave is innocent, no suspects. We also think, based on what the ME is telling me, that Kaufman is younger than her birth certificate.”

  “We’ve also got Walt in a picture that would make him around 75 years old, but he was 48, uh… when—”

  “48, right,” says Bo.

  Angela picks up where she left off. “We’ve got a mango thriving in Kaufman’s yard that, according to Dave who is a plant biology guy, cannot survive a freeze. And Kaufman’s mango has been through five winters here, each with multiple hard freezes.”

  “There’s also the whole ‘there’s something in the air in Chickasaw’ thing going where people here are healthy. People that come here claim they feel better.”

  “So all the Jax elite that come here ain’t coming for my cookin’?” says Bo.

  “Probably both,” says Angela. “But that anecdotal evidence does support Dave’s claim. And Bo hasn’t been sick since she moved here from Dinsmore.”

  “And then there’s me,” says Angela.

  “What about you?” says Carl.

  “I’m proof, too.”

  “Oh, that’s right,” says Bo. “So obvious we didn’t see it. Walt brought you here thinking it was the end. He wanted you to have a nice quiet place to pass on to God. And you got better.”

  “That sounds about right because I don’t think his heart was into shrimping,” says Carl.

  “He was probably just worried about Angie,” says Bo.

  “Naw. It was more than that. Hell, half the time if his nets weren’t hung or he hadn’t strayed off the main drag line, he’d be on the other side of Sand Island scribbling away in his log book. I write down one line per drag just keeping a tally on the weight and catch, but ol’ Walt would spend considerable time taking notes on God knows what. He even stopped me in the middle of a drag once just to borrow a pencil.”

  “What the hell was Walt up to, Ang?” says Bo.

  “How should I know. I was kinda busy—you know, dying.” Angie smiles at Bo to let her know it was a joke but the old lady gives her a sour look.

  “I think I’m gonna find out what Walt was working on,” says Angela.

  “Well that ain’t gonna help Johnny, is it?” says Bo.

  “I got nothing right now on Kaufman’s killer,” says Angela. “But all of this is connected. I think Walt knew what was going on, something that might have led to Marlina’s death.” She takes a deep breath.

  “Maybe he didn’t come down here thinking I was going to die, thinking he’d be a shrimper. Maybe he knew exactly where he was going,” says Angela. “Maybe he brought me here to save me.”

  She could joke about her dying, but not Walt. She started to cry for the second time that day and it wasn’t even lunchtime.

  ……

  The next day Angela drives down to Gainesville to talk to Jan Crenshaw, a former colleague of Walt’s when they were at the University of Florida.

  Dr. Crenshaw opens the door of his small brick house near campus and gives her the once over, his eyes barely visible under bushy eyebrows and thin wisps of white hair, some combed neatly, some floating off in odd directions. Part of his shirt hangs below his old, brown sports coat. She remembers meeting him once before at a luncheon for the economics department a few years earlier. But before she can get a word in he launches into a speech.

  “My dear, grades are in and they cannot be changed especially when you come in a huff at this late hour. Have we not been through this umpteen times? Either the TAs are incompetent or I’m going to lose my mind. Has proper decorum lost its way with youth? What will become of us?”

  He pauses, and properly vented, shakes his head slowly side to side.

  “It’s me, Angela Fleetwood,” says Angela. Great, the old man’s gone nuts right when I need him.

  “Do you know how many students I have? I can’t be expected to remember—” And then he stops, his eyes widen and he breaks into a smile. “Oh, look at you! Ah, Walt’s beautiful wife. Oh, forgive me. My brain is not what it once was.” His expression goes soft and his eyes begin to water. “You are here. Not here, like on my doorstep, but really, here with us. It’s a joy to see you.” He puts his hands on her shoulders and gives her a hug.

  Inside, he opens the curtains and ray of sunlight breaks through the dark room, a bright rectangle on the shag carpet. Slow moving particles of dust fly through the light and go sparkly. He moves a stack of papers from the end of the couch to a wooden rocker so she can sit. Then finally, after tea is served, Angela asks him if he knows what Walt was up to at the university.

  “The short, unsatisfying answer is, I don’t know,” says the doctor. “Ostensibly he was studying the efficacy of penicillin and other antibiotics, with a focus on WWII era numbers, in Europe. As you know he spent some time in Germany gathering data. Walt was amazingly bright. I took him under my wing when he was a grad student. You should have seen him in Germany. He spoke like a native. Had half of them fooled. What a bright mind. He seemed to be a step ahead of everyone his age.”

  “Did he p
ublish?”

  “Nope. At a certain point, before you got sick, he got real quiet. But he had a fantastic data set that he’d worked hard to accumulate.”

  “Did he stop working on the project?”

  “No, on the contrary, I think he found something he considered extraordinary. You know, Walt was never going to be a star at the university. Don’t get me wrong; he was brilliant. But he didn’t care for university politics. He rubbed people wrong. He stood up to tenured professors even as a grad student. The history department hated him and feared him because he’d debunk certain historical facts and get laughed at but later research kept proving he’d been right all along. He was always searching for something, all else be damned. And I think he found it, but then you got sick and his focus was on you.

  He said he moved to St. Pete to get away from the university. That he was tired of it.” She starts to correct him, but let’s it go.

  “That was puzzling to me, but under the circumstances, what with you sick, I could understand wanting to get away.” He puts his tea cup down and smiles at Angela. “You know the doctors at Shands were adamant that you stay there. Walt literally carried you out with an IV needle still in you. Your attending physician, Dr.— uh…”

  “Walsh,” says Angela.

  “Oh, yes, Walsh, that cocky little shit, just about barricaded the door. Said you would die without your medications. Said you didn’t have much time. But Walt carried you out and left. I was there. It was the last time I thought I would see you.”

  “I don’t remember much at that time,” says Angela. “The treatments got worse. One night Walt was yelling at the doctor, then I’m in the car. And then I woke up in the big house. I remember the sun coming in through the window. The sound of seagulls. It was good to feel the sun again.”

  “St. Petersburg is a great place. I’m glad you are back, but sorry I can’t offer much help. If I were you, though, I’d try checking Walt’s laptop. And if I can track down Walt’s former grad student, Larry, he may know something. He was the computer tech and was with Walt right up until the end and also in Germany for a few data gathering excursions. I’ll have him give you a call.”