“Is that general knowledge?”
“You’d have to be digging through court records to find it. I’m not positive his daughter even knows. It would appear that she put the house up for sale willingly, but let him handle the details, which allowed him to keep the situation private. All she had to do was to give him power of attorney in a weak moment, and he can do anything he wants.”
“Did she do that?”
“Haven’t gotten that far into it. I’m concentrating on him right now. That would be kind of scary, though, giving power of attorney to a man who flunked a psych exam and isn’t considered fit to drive a car.”
“See if you can find out anything major in the next fifteen to twenty minutes. After that, we’re going to be driving over there to take Winnie her clothes and see if there’s anything she needs.”
“Am I allowed to say ‘bad idea’?” SueAnn asked. “I know she’s your friend, and you care about her. But she’s also his daughter, and he seems extremely attached from what I’ve been reading here. And he just might be a borderline wack job. So proceed with caution, and I’ll get back to you with anything else I dig up in the next few minutes.”
“You got Winnie’s stuff handy?” Jesse asked as soon as she hung up.
“What did she say?” Vivian and Sophia demanded in unison.
“I’ll tell you while we drive.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
“I knew that old man was crazy,” Vivian said when Jesse had brought them up to speed.
“None of that means anything,” Sophia cautioned. “Except that he’s getting older and grumpier and possibly has periods of confusion.”
“Well, that’s true.” Riding in the back, Vivian had leaned forward and draped a forearm over the top corner of each bucket seat, making sure she didn’t miss a word. “If I seriously believed either one of them had put a bullet between someone’s eyes, I don’t think I’d be headed over there to confront anyone in person.”
“And we started all this to make sure Winnie got cleared,” Sophia added. “I’d certainly hate to think we ended up getting her convicted.”
“That would be awkward, wouldn’t it?” Vivian slid back in her seat and buckled her seatbelt again. “Well, I’m sure that’s not going to happen. Winnifryd was pretty upset when she found out the bone in her backyard had belonged to Roy Lee’s mother. She was still having trouble believing he had anything to do with it. Then her father showed up and swept her away. I think she’ll feel better when you tell her Hansen has confessed.”
While Sophia and Vivian discussed the details of the morning, Jesse tried to piece together the little she remembered about Moss Harkness. Jesse and Winnie had been classmates, but not great friends until Jesse lost her father to a car accident just before Winnie lost her mother to illness. Then, somehow the two sad little girls had been drawn together. Feeling the luckier of the two since she still had her mother and a grandfather who had always been like another dad, Jesse had taken Winnie under her wing and the rest was history.
As far as Winnie’s dad went, the only memories Jesse had of Mr. Harkness was that she really hadn’t wanted to be around the sad, cold, harsh man who let his grief cast a shadow over anyone around him, his daughter included. In high school, when everyone else began to date, Winnie wasn’t allowed to. And when everyone began to drive, Winnie still wasn’t allowed to. While Jesse spent her spare time pursuing a social life, Winnie got a job after school and filled her time with work and study, two pastimes her father approved of.
Jesse couldn’t help wondering what had distracted Moss Harkness long enough to let Roy Lee slip in under his radar and sweep Winnie away. Maybe, fearing spinsterhood and a life of loneliness, Winnie had rebelled. Or maybe she had never noticed, and her father had simply given up and allowed her to have a life that wasn’t directed by him.
“Hon, that was the turn you just went by,” Sophia said, breaking off her conversation with Vivian in mid-sentence. “What were you thinking about so hard?”
Jesse slowed so she wouldn’t overlook a chance to turn around. “Trying to think of anything I knew about Winnie’s dad. All I can remember is how hard I worked to avoid him, but I was just a kid, so I don’t know how accurate my memories are.”
“He was a strange man. I think he was a little jealous of your friendship with Winnie, and the fact that you had an influence over her. I don’t think he was very fond of me or Vivian either, for the same reason.”
“I was just a little girl, and you were someone being nice to his motherless daughter. How could he resent that?” Jesse asked indignantly.
“He was the same way with his wife,” Vivian answered. “They went to my church when she was still alive, and he didn’t want her serving on any committees or getting involved in any social activities. They came to church and went home, and if she tried to talk to anyone, he stood right there the whole time. I couldn’t tell if he was some sort of fanatic, or just really unfriendly. The church tried to reach out when his wife died, and he just cut them off. Stopped coming to church and wouldn’t have anything else to do with them.”
“Well, then, I guess we can assume this coming conversation is not going to be a pleasant one.” Jesse turned onto a gravel path wide enough for a car to pull in and turn around. A padlocked metal gate set into a clearing in the trees showed two dirt tracks continuing into the woods.
She reversed back onto the blacktop with the car facing the direction they had just come from. “Don’t let me miss it again,” she cautioned as they set out to find the turnoff she had driven past.
Trees pressed in on the sides of the road, forming a natural barrier reinforced by a barbed wire fence. Whatever pasture land Moss Harkness possessed was well hidden.
“Privacy’s one thing, but this is overkill,” Vivian said. “How to you run cattle on land like this?”
“I’m not sure he runs cattle. He owns land is all I know.”
“There’s probably pasture back in there,” Sophia said. “These woods are thick enough you couldn’t see a town back in there behind them.”
Jesse found the gravel drive, marked by a battered street sign proclaiming Harkness Lane. Almost as soon as she turned onto it, she was halted by a “posted, no trespassing” sign nailed to a tree next to where a metal gate barricaded the road.
“Okay,” she said, “this is starting to lose its humor.”
“I don’t see a padlock,” Vivian announced. “And I doubt that he’ll shoot us.”
“If he has cattle,” Sophia said, “it’s probably there to keep them in more than to keep us out. And the posted sign is probably to keep deer hunters from shooting up his land in the fall.”
“I must be really tired, because you’re absolutely right.” Jesse shoved the heavy driver’s door open. “And I should have thought of that myself. Talk about someone getting paranoid.”
With that, she got out, walked to the gate, opened it without any problem, came back to the car, drove through, stopped, got out, walked back and closed the gate, then got back into the car and drove on, giving silent thanks that she wasn’t having to deal with snow or mud while she did all that.
Also, as her mother had predicted, the woods almost immediately gave way to cleared pasture. At the base of a hill a short distance away, cattle gathered around a pond where a few stood belly deep while others watched. More of them clustered in the shade of a tree. Half a dozen of the black cows had calves grazing nearby.
“I love cows,” Jesse said, soaking up the peace of the bucolic scene.
“I love steak,” Vivian answered from the back seat. “And if I’m not mistaken, those are Angus. Plenty of grass, plenty of water, and prime beef cattle. So I’m guessing that whatever Moss Harkness may be, a doddering old fool, he isn’t.”
“He could still be having periods of dementia,” Sophia added. “The day-to-day running of the ranch is one of the last skills he would lose.”
The comments reminded Jesse that her grandfather had begun to
have periods of confusion toward the end of his life, and that Sophia, who was his daughter-in-law, had managed him and everything he owned by herself until Jesse had returned home for the last few years of his life.
“How about finances?” Jesse asked. “Could he be starting to have trouble handling money?”
“Yes. Judgment becomes unreliable. One day he could be in complete control, and the next, he might make a disastrous decision based on a period of confusion. Not that I’m saying Moss Harkness has dementia, it’s just that so long as there’s grass and water, cattle pretty much take care of themselves, at least for awhile. So there’s no way to judge by how this place looks.”
“Ah, Sophia, sometimes I forget that beneath all that sweetness, you are a very accomplished woman.”
“Well, thank you, Vivian.” Sophia’s uncertainty showed in her voice. “I think. You did mean that as a compliment, didn’t you?”
“Yes, dear, I did. You and Jesse both are a gift that I’m not sure what I did to deserve. But I know better than to examine my good fortune too closely, so I’ll just say thank you very much and let it go at that. Oh, good heavens, is that the house?”
Too busy watching the road, which was heavily rutted from the winter, Jesse didn’t look up until Vivian said something. When she did, Jesse realized that her child’s memory had not exaggerated the simplicity of the home Winnie had lived in.
“Ooh, that hasn’t been painted in awhile, has it?” Sophia asked.
The house was a single story wood frame. Its blue paint was faded and beginning to chip in places. The front windows had shutters that were a dingy white, one of which was hanging by the lower hinge and tilted at a forty-five degree angle away from the window. An untrimmed bush at the corner of the house had a sapling growing up through it, far too close to the house for a tree to be allowed to grow. And if a woman had ever planted a flower in that front yard, it had long since been mown out of existence.
“I take back what I said. Either he’s short on money or he just doesn’t give a damn,” Vivian announced. “I certainly hope he’s taken better care of the roof than he has the rest of the place, or that house is going to start rotting down around him.”
“You can see why he would get rid of Winnie’s place before he would this one, though.” Jesse pulled to a halt at the edge of the driveway and shut off the engine. “She hasn’t got the acreage to support the cattle he’s running here. So, how are we going to do this? One at a time, or all get out and walk up to the door together?”
“I refuse to cower in this car,” Vivian announced.
“I’m willing to stay and cower if that’s what you’d like, dear,” Sophia offered sweetly, then shot a wicked glance over her shoulder toward Vivian.
“Oh, my, I didn’t mean that the way it came out.”
“It’s more like hiding under the window outside the library,” Jesse explained, taking her own small jab at Vivian. “And why don’t you two hang back until he’s come to the door, just to soften the impact of having his home invaded. And that way, if he turns into a raging lunatic, only one of us gets shot, and you’re still alive to call the police.
“Well, since you put it that way, I forgot to change shoes in my haste, and I’m not equipped to run for anything, much less cover.” Vivian extended her leg to reveal a stylish strappy sandal, too bare for the early spring, and too high a heel for anything practical.
“We really need to work on your wardrobe,” Jesse said. “You are way overdressed for cow pastures.”
“From now on, the minute someone dies, I’m going to start wearing riding outfits. Jodhpurs, boots, jacket with leather patches. I think my hair in a bun at the nape of my neck would go really well with a riding hat, what do you think?”
“It all sounds fetching,” Sophia answered. “I think one of those little whips could come in really handy, and don’t the riding hats have a hard lining? That could double as a safety hat in case someone tried to hit you over the head.”
“Okay, have your laugh, but I will not be running around in blue jeans and tennis shoes.”
“I’m leaving now,” Jesse announced. “I don’t want you two squabbling while I’m gone.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the two older women said in unison, then started laughing.
As she walked away, Jesse could hear a few seconds of silence followed by more peals of laughter. They sounded like kids at a slumber party. Maybe she should resent that, but she didn’t know why she would. Instead, she found herself smiling as she approached the front door.
That was what everybody needed in their lives—more laughter. And she was lucky to have the two most important people in her life supplying it. Lost in thought, she was doubly startled when the screened door burst open right in front of her and a shotgun barrel was shoved so close to her nose that her eyes crossed when she tried to focus on it.
“Cain’t you read the signs,” a deep, twangy voice demanded. “You’re trespassing and you ain’t wanted here. You got ten seconds to get back in your car and get gone. Then I start shooting.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
Her heart slamming inside her chest, Jesse took a step back onto the ground.
“Hi, there, Mr. Harkness.” She could hear her voice fluttering to match her heartbeat, but she pushed on. “I’m Jesse Camden. You remember, Winnie’s friend? Anyway, you left her clothes and things at Vivian’s, and we thought Winnie might need them, so…”
The gun wasn’t wavering, and in her head she could hear a countdown that made it very hard to concentrate on anything else. Jesse tried to take a deep breath, but the fist clamped around her chest wouldn’t let more than the barest trickle of air pass through.
“Uh-h-h, is Winnie here?” she asked, hoping to goodness he didn’t shoot her where she stood. “We, uh, we brought her clothes. And she’d sent me out to talk to Hansen about the funeral, so I wanted to tell her what I found out.”
Jesse felt like an idiot standing there jabbering into the end of a shotgun barrel. She hadn’t looked up once. Hadn’t seen the man in more than twenty years, and she was afraid to look up for fear she might pass out if the sight was any worse than what she was already looking at. She kept waiting for him to relax, to lower the gun, to say, “aw, yeah, I remember you. Come on in.”
But he wasn’t saying anything, and shotguns made an awful mess. It sure wasn’t any way she wanted to die. But she didn’t want to turn tail and run, either. Slowly, Jesse forced her gaze upward, past the butt of the gun and the worn collar of his shirt, to his face.
He didn’t look anything like she remembered. Unlike Winnie’s round face, his was lean, creased, burned brown by years in the sun. Unlike his daughter’s soft hazel eyes, his were almost black and hard as a lump of coal. What Jesse did remember was the resentment that burned almost like hatred inside him.
He had lost what he never wanted to lose, and he had never learned to let go of the anger. It ate at him, gobbling up any chance he would ever have at happiness and spilling over onto everything he touched.
“Please, Mr. Harkness, don’t you remember me?” Jesse asked softly. She had given up on getting a normal reaction from him. What she was hoping for now was any sign that he still had touch with reality.
“You weren’t invited here,” he growled. “You’re not wanted.”
“Winnie is my friend. I was with her yesterday when we found Roy Lee, right after a tornado passed over our heads. I’m helping her with some things. And the people who broke into her house are in custody by now, so it’s safe for her to go back home if she wants.”
He readjusted the gun butt on his shoulder. “I ain’t telling you again.”
“Here! You!” Vivian’s commanding voice came from the direction of the car, growing louder quickly with each rapid step she took toward the standoff on the porch. “Lower that weapon!”
“Get off my property!” he shouted back at her. “And take this damned fool here with you!”
From behind him, Winnie a
sked, “Dad? What in the world are you doing?” Starting tentatively, she quickly went from confused to indignant. “Is that Jesse you’re holding a gun on? Put that damned thing down before it goes off. And is that…?”
Winnie’s hand gripped his shoulder and pulled him back from the doorway he was blocking at the same time she peeked around him. “Good heavens, that’s Vivian Windsor! Oh, I’m so sorry.”
What followed wasn’t quite a scuffle. It was more like a brief tug of war that ended with the shotgun in Winnie’s possession. She opened it, shook out the shells into her palm and shoved the gun back into her dad’s hands. “It looks like we’ve got company,” she said sternly, staring him straight in the eye. “You might want to put some coffee on.”
He grunted his disapproval, then turned around and disappeared into the interior of the house, holding the shotgun by its barrel. Winnie slipped through the doorway onto the porch, letting the screen door close behind her.
“I swear, I don’t know what I’m going to do with him,” she said quietly. “He’s getting stranger all the time.”
“Is that why you put your house up for sale?” Jesse asked, hoping the solution was as simple as an aging parent and consolidating households.
Winnie shook her head. “That was Dad’s doing. He was determined that Roy Lee was never getting his hands on that land again.”
“So, is he taking it off the market now that Roy Lee is dead?” Vivian asked.
“I don’t know.” Winnie’s shoulders rolled uncomfortably, almost a shrug, but not quite. “We’re going to have to talk about it.” She came down the steps to join them at the bottom. “I’m not sure I can leave him here by himself, and I don’t know if I could get him to move.”
“How long have you been dealing with this?” Sophia’s gentle question was Jesse’s first indication that her mother had joined them.
“He lost his license last year. Didn’t know who he was when the police stopped him, and he’d been weaving into the other lane. Tests showed he’d had a stroke at some point and was showing signs of mild dementia. They said it could get better with time, if the dementia was a result of the stroke, or it could just keep getting worse. For the most part, he’s fine.” She held out her hands helplessly and tears swam in her eyes. “Then he goes and points a shotgun at my best friend. And the worst part is, I can’t even tell if he’s being crazy or just cantankerous.”
Murder Most Thorny (Myrtle Grove Garden Club Mystery Book 2) Page 23
