Murder Comes to Eden

by Zenith Brown

  A moment later a small whitewashed cottage, windows and doors heavily shuttered, came into view. Through another tangle of vines and swamp myrtle in front of it they could see a glimpse here and there of the shining blue water of the Devon.

  “I let it stay like this to keep fishermen and hunters away,” Miss Fairlie said. “We must go now, I think. You can come back and take the shutters down. There are two rooms. The blood is on the table. I’d like for Tip to live at Eden. I think he’d enjoy it very much. If the price is too high . . .”

  “Oh, no. It’s not high enough. It’s——”

  “But Daddy, it’s what she said. Isn’t it, Miss Fairlie? You do like it, don’t you, Daddy? And you like it, Mother? Don’t you?” Tip’s face was passionately alive with pleading, but his voice still its sober self.

  “Of course, darling. It’s wonderful. But——”

  “Then don’t talk any more,” Miss Fairlie said. She turned and led the way back into the gardens. At the gate she stood, blinking absently for a moment. Then she said, “I must go away now. Good-bye, Tip.”

  She put her hand out as gravely as he took it.

  “Good-bye, Miss Fairlie. Thank you very much for the house and land. I enjoyed the gardens very much, too. You’ll take care of my little ducks till I come back, won’t you?”

  “Yes, I will.”

  She turned and walked down the oyster shell drive, around a circle of boxwood, past the old coloured man, and into the house.

  “She gave me six little ducks,” Tippy said.

  They got to the white-pillared office where the ticket taker was counting her cigar box of money by the door. She smiled at them.

  “There’s a hundred and ten dollars, we made to-day. Everybody came very early in case Miss Fairlie suddenly changed her mind. It’s the first time Eden’s ever been opened.” She looked at Tippy. “I see you got him back. I didn’t mean to alarm you, but Miss Fairlie’s very . . . well, I expect you could see it. She’s quite mad, as mad as a hatter, really, you know. It was all right with David there. He watches out for her. Well, good-bye. Come again, won’t you?”

  “Miss Fairlie wasn’t mad, Mother,” Tippy said, when they were on their way through the shaded lane to the outer gate. “She was glad. She liked us there. She told me so. She said she didn’t let people come in her house because they made a noise and there was a child asleep. But I don’t make a noise when Kitsy’s asleep, do I, Mother?”

  “No, Tippy. She’s asleep now, so why don’t you take a nap too?”

  “Yes, because we’ve had a very hard day,” said Tippy.

  Neither Spig nor Molly said anything till she looked back and saw him sound asleep.

  “I can’t bear it, Spig,” she whispered. “I just can’t. How can we explain to him? It’ll break his heart.”

  “I know. I’m sorry. We should have got out of there when she started talking about the blood. You could see she was bats . . . the look in her eye. Do you want to go to the Camerons’? I don’t.”

  Molly shook her head. When they got to the Devon Manor sign, she said, “No. Somewhere else. Virginia, maybe. I wish we’d never come.”

  She cried herself to sleep that night in Spig’s arms, and he felt like crying himself. He couldn’t get the hurt, completely not-understanding look on Tippy’s face out of his mind. “I’ll go to a real estate agent in the morning,” he said, and he was shaving, getting ready to go, when the phone rang. Molly had taken Kitsy to market, and Tip with with them.

  “Devonport calling Mr. Tipton James O’Leary, Senior.”

  “This is Mr. O’Leary.”

  “Go ahead, Judge,” he heard the operator say, and a dry, precise voice came on.

  “Mr. Tipton James O’Leary, Senior?”

  “Speaking.”

  “This is Judge Nathan Twohey in Devonport. I understand you were at Eden, Miss Celia Fairlie’s place, yesterday.”

  “That’s correct.”

  “I understand you were offered a tract of her land?”

  Judge Nathan Twohey sounded as if O’Leary had not only been offered it but had picked it up and carried it away with him and Judge Twohey wanted it back at once.

  “Right,” said Spig.

  “Then I must ask you to come to Devonport and discuss the matter here in my office.”

  Spig’s jaw tightened. It was not a request but an order. He was just about to say, “And I must ask you to go to hell, Judge Twohey, sir,” when he thought of Tip’s face. Even if they had to pay more than two thousand—even if they could only get a piece of it . . .

  “The property is for sale, is it?” he asked instead.

  “That’s a matter I prefer to discuss in my office.”

  “I’ll come down right away.”

  Don’t count on this, he said to himself in the mirror. He scribbled a non-committal note—“Business. Back around five. Love, Spig”—and went down the service stairs so he wouldn’t meet them coming back from market.

  CHAPTER II

  HE DIDN’T see the dingy yellow line on the kerb when he parked in the somnolent tree-shaded square in Devonport. The courthouse was a faded brick building with a squat, rusty, gold cupola and a porch with pillars, like the little Greek Revival building outside the wall at the Gardens of Eden. There were broken-down green benches under thirsty trees whose exposed roots ribbed the dry ground where a few unhappy blades of grass struggled to live. He went up the uneven brick walk. A big man with curly black hair and deep-set dark eyes was lounging against one of the weater-beaten pillars in the sun.

  “Can you tell me where I’ll find Judge Twohey?”

  “Other side.” The man shoved a big fist out across the square. “That little round arch in the wall, upstairs to your left. And that heap you’ve got. It’s parked on a yellow line. I can make you a deal, if you want to turn it in. I won’t give you a ticket this time.” He grinned at Spig. “I’m the law in these parts. Yerby’s the name. Tell the judge I killed the fellow stealing his wife’s chickens. He’s a black snake about seven feet long. Don’t forget when you want a car.”

  “I’ll remember when I get the dough. My name’s O’Leary.”

  “Oh.” Yerby looked at him with alerted interest. “You’re the guy. Well, good luck. Be seeing you around . . . maybe.”

  Judge Twohey was behind a beat-up oak desk across one corner of a musty room lined with old law books and dog-eared file boxes. He was very old, very neat in his black poplin suit, fragile and semi-transparent as a potato shoot in a dark cellar. But all Spig was aware of were the eyes examining him, intensely alive, unfriendly.

  Judge Twohey spoke abruptly. “Here is the plot of the land you propose to buy.”

  Spig took it. He looked at it. “Oh, no,” he said, his heart taking a sickening nose-dive into the pit. “Oh, no. There’s some mistake. She said several acres, not fifty. She said a . . . a pleasant piece of beach—not thirty-three hundred feet of it. She said two thousand dollars . . .”

  “You’re not interested in the property, then.” Judge Twohey’s voice sounded a shade less hostile.

  There was the sudden, sharp taste of tears in Spig’s mouth. “It’s not that, sir. We are interested. But we don’t have that kind of money. We couldn’t expect to buy . . .”

  “It’s your opinion that if Miss Fairlie wishes to sell you this land for two thousand dollars, she hasn’t the legal right to do so?”

  “Not that, sir. Not if she’s of sound mind.” He flushed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. Except that there was this dame with a lot of teeth taking tickets out there yesterday said Miss Fairlie was mad. Mad as a hatter.”

  “That dame was my wife, Mr. O’Leary.”

  In the silence, of the kind commonly called abysmal, the sweat trickling down between Mr. O’Leary’s shoulder blades was very cold.

  “My second wife. A capable and efficient woman with only the normal dentitional complement, I believe.”

  “I’m sorry, sir.”

  “Qu
ite. It does suggest the practical wisdom of keeping one’s big mouth shut.”

  “You’re understating it, sir.”

  Judge Twohey smiled a little. “Also, here in Devon we say ‘eccentric,’ not ‘mad,’ Mr. O’Leary. But you needn’t have any anxiety on the score of Miss Fairlie’s eccentricity in financial affairs. She has an uncanny gift. A good many people think she has second sight. Her tenants especially. If she plants early, there’s never a frost. If she doesn’t put tobacco in, that’s the year of the blue mould. Yesterday’s the first time she’s ever opened the Gardens of Eden . . . and if I were superstitious, I could easily believe she knew you were coming.”

  He picked up a typed letter. “There is one stipulation. In case of resale, in whole or in part, during her lifetime, Miss Fairlie must approve the vendée or have the option to buy the property herself at the price you’re now paying, plus any actual cash you’ve put into it.”

  “That’s more than fair,” Spig said.

  The judge looked at him intently. “This land may increase greatly in value.”

  “It’s still fair. We’re very grateful to Miss Fairlie.”

  “Gratitude is highly volatile, Mr. O’Leary,” Judge Twohey said dryly. “In my experience, it seldom withstands the impact of hard cash. Miss Fairlie asked only for your word; but I’ve put it in the form of a written agreement. There’s no legal obligation . . .”

  “There’s a moral one.” Spig read the letter and signed it.

  “I’m glad you say that. Because it’s my duty to tell you that such a stipulation is not legally binding. At most, it could be used only to show intent.” He looked steadily at Spig. “I’m asking you for your solemn word, as well as your signature, Mr. O’Leary. There must never be any threat to Eden during Miss Fairlie’s lifetime.”

  “You have my word, sir.”

  “Thank you. May I say I’m greatly relieved about you? Miss Fairlie has refused a good many offers for this tract—one recently from her neighbour Mr. Sudley of one thousand dollars an acre. I didn’t know what form of hypnotism——”

  “Not mine, sir. My son’s. Age four and half.”

  “Ah,” Judge Twohey was silent for an instant. “Yes, that would explain it. In any case, there was nothing I could have done about you. Short of a touch of cyanide.”

  He went over to the dingy corner cupboard and got a bottle and two small glasses. “I did ask Yerby to stand by. He’s the sheriff. Just back from the Marines. If necessary, he might have persuaded you Devon wasn’t the place . . .”

  Spig grinned. “He said to tell you he’d killed the seven-foot black snake stealing your chickens. I’m only six.”

  “My wife’s chickens,” said Judge Twohey equably. He took the stopper out of the bottle.

  “One other thing, sir.” Spig’s face had sobered. “I don’t know how to put it. Miss Fairlie’s . . . eccentricity. My wife and kids’ll be out there all day. There was something said about blood . . . and the big house being haunted.”

  Judge Twohey stood with the bottle stopper motionless in his hand.

  “There was blood, Mr. O’Leary,” he said quietly. “A great deal of blood. And possibly the house is haunted. It well may be. But the blood was a long time ago, and as you’re not living in the big house, its nature is no concern of yours. You’ll find many tongues anxious to relieve your curiosity. But Miss Fairlie took you on faith. She makes no inquiries about you. That’s all, Mr. O’Leary. Take the property or leave it.”

  “I’m sorry . . . we’re glad to take it.”

  The judge’s face, grave as he poured the liquor into the glasses, lighted with a sudden flicker. “I’ll tell you why my wife thinks Miss Fairlie is crazy,” he said amiably. “She and another estimable lady, hell-bent on good works, went out to Eden one hot September day. The gate was padlocked. They climbed it. They walked the half-mile to the garden gate, sweating virtuously. They were climbing that when Miss Fairlie let fly with a bushel basket of rotten pears, one at a time. My wife’s corset caught on one of the pickets.”

  He handed Spig a glass. “This court may feel that the defendant acted hastily and without due regard for the plaintiff’s position, socially or physically. But you the jury must consider the provocation and weighing the undeniable fact of trespass, it will be your duty to determine the credibility of this witness.”

  He raised his glass. “To Miss Fairlie’s continuing eccentricities, Mr. O’Leary. And to your own long life and happiness at Eden, sir.”

  “Thank you,” Spig said. “No cyanide?”

  Judge Twohey smiled. “On the contrary.” He put the bottle back in the cupboard and took out his black straw hat. “We’ll finish our business after lunch,” he said, still smiling. “The Board of County Commissioners meet to-day. We’ll see them at Devon House.” He stopped at the desk, looking down at the plot. “Actually, you have nearer sixty acres than fifty here. This is a very old survey. The marsh you see indicated has filled in. Mr. Harlan Sudley had his line resurveyed last February. He found his fences well over on Eden’s side. But Miss Fairlie said it was a reasonable exchange, as the land that filled the marsh was Sudley land, due to Sudley bad farming practice.”

  He put the plot in a desk drawer. “Malice, I’m afraid, is a sin not even old age can cure.” Spig thought it was Miss Fairlie’s malice about Sudley farm practice he meant until they got across the square to Devon House and he met the six commissioners. They were eating in a small dining-room with Rotary and Lions club banners under the flag over the piano in one corner. Harlan Sudley, president of the board, was at one end of the table.

  Miss Fairlie’s neighbour, the one who offered her a thousand dollars an acre and had had his land resuveyed. Spig noted as they shook hands. Sudley was a big burly man with a soft voice, grizzling sandy hair, a ruddy sunburned face and shuttered pale blue eyes.

  The judge took his place at the other end of the table, Spig beside him.

  “Mr. O’Leary has bought the Plumtree Cove tract,” he said very casually—by way of explanation, Spig thought, until he heard the crashing silence, and the loud burst of guffaws that broke it. But not from the president of the board.

  “Hear that, Harlan?” The man sitting next to Sudley gave him a boisterous thwack between the shoulder blades.

  “I did. I’ll be glad to have Mr. O’Leary for a neighbour.”

  That took a definite effort and brought another round of hearty mirth. This was the malice Judge Twohey meant. It was friendly, but it was malice just the same. Sudley had really wanted that land; an unknown young man had got it. Spig was too dazed at the miracle of the O’Learys having it to think below the surface. All he could think of was getting back to Judge Twohey’s office, writing his cheque for two thousand dollars and then calling Molly . . . when it was done and nothing could possibly slip. He could see her face and Tip’s there in front of him as he ate, with no idea what he was eating. It never entered his mind to ask why Judge Twohey had insisted on the stipulation, or Sudley had offered a thousand dollars an acre for the tract, or why the silence and the loud guffaws.

  Nor did he listen to the sharper warning three months later when he and Molly—with a new son named John Eden O’Leary—their hearts full to overflowing, bursting to share their boundless good fortune, decided to give Molly’s sister Kathy the ten velvet acres for a wedding present.

  “This is seven hundred feet of waterfront you’re giving away, Mr. O’Leary,” Judge Twohey said. “I strongly advise you to keep it. It may greatly increase in value. Family dissension over land and money is as bitter as it seems to be inevitable.”

  “Not this family, sir. Miss Fairlie’s seen Kathy and she’s agreed. Kathy’s wonderful. Stan Ashton, this lad she’s marrying—he’s one of the best. He’s an idealist. I don’t think he even believes in money. He’s a sociologist, works for the Town Planning Commission in Washington. He can drive back and forth with me. Kathy’ll have their car and be down here with Molly. It’s the perfect set-up for a
ll of us. None of us’ll ever have money enough to fight about, anyway.”

  “Perfect set-ups have a way of becoming imperfect. Life and circumstance—both change.” Judge Twohey shook his head. “Well, Mr. O’Leary, I understand that God takes care of fools and children—my experience to the contrary notwithstanding. I wish you’d listen to me. But if you won’t, you won’t.”

  CHAPTER III

  IF SPIG O’LEARY had asked, no one would have told him. The site of the bridge that was to cross the Devon River, picked by the Corps of Army Engineers, and the location of the super-highway, Devon County’s link in the new coastal defence system, were top secret in the hands of the State Roads Commission. There were rumours in Devonport, but Spig O’Leary was clearing honeysuckle, week-ends and nights when he got home. It took him another three months to find out that the bridge site and almost a mile of the dual-lane approach to it were on the Plumtree Cove tract, on the Eden’s Landing side of Harlan Sudley’s fence line. The reason for Judge Twohey’s warning was also clear. The bridge site and a good two-tenths of a mile of the approach were on the ten velvet acres the O’Leary’s had given Kathy for a wedding present—very velvet for Kathy and Stan Ashton. The bridge, fifty feet from Sudley’s marker on the shore, took two hundred feet of the Ashtons’ beach. The two-tenths of a mile right-of-way on it took four of their ten acres. The Ashtons took eight thousand dollars. The next section of right-of-way was five acres belonging to the O’Leary’s, but it was through the filled-in marsh and not good for much. The O’Leary’s got the standard fifty dollars an acre.

  But there wasn’t any dissension. The O’Leary’s could have used the eight thousand dollars. They were a little rueful, but they weren’t bitter, and by the time the cheque came, they were glad it gave Stan Ashton the chance to take a couple of years off and write his book, “Safety Factors in Highway Control.”

  “It’ll make him famous and we’ll all be so proud of him . . .” Kathy was starry-eyed and confident. And it did make him famous, but not at once—not until a paper-backed edition of the book was brought hastily out when Kathy was killed in the first hideous accident on the new two-million dollar bypass around Devonport. Coming home from a strawberry festival at the church, she put on speed to pass a gasoline truck in front of the Breezy Inn as six punk kids roared out into the road, cutting directly across in front of the truck. Seven people were dead, before or after the truck exploded no one knew, and the driver died that evening. That was just three months after the Governor had come down to open Devon’s link in the new highway. The O’Learys were bitter then, not about land or money but about the road and about Stan Ashton and his book. It had a new title, “Death Takes the High Road,” with a lurid picture on the front cover, maybe not Kathy but somebody like her, and a sub-title, “An Author’s Personal Tragedy,” with a note about the author’s three-year-old child. Maybe none of it was Stan Ashton’s fault, but having a best seller certainly eased his personal tragedy. The O’Learys and Molly Ashton, the three-year-old who’d come to stay with them, saw him on television but seldom in person. Until one Sunday afternoon, not a full five months after Kathy’s death, he came out driving a Cadillac convertible that belonged to the blonde girl in the seat beside him.