“Armagnac, stop!”
Her nephew connected hard with the scaffolding right across the neck. “Waullgh!” Boyle strangled, and his flailing fist punched the underside of a plank. A paint can wobbled, and a workman cried, “Hey! Watch it there!”
The scaffolding swayed hard, then slipped right off the cinder blocks and began to tip over. It hit the asphalt driveway with a tremendous metallic clang. The painters managed to leap clear and roll onto the grass, but the paint cans spiraled their contents down the marble steps. At the last second Armagnac tried to force the scaffolding upright, but the weight was too much for him. He was dragged face-first down the front stairs directly through the paint. Dazedly, he sat up smeared with pink latex.
“Workman’s comp,” moaned one of the painters as he lifted his skinned forearms.
“Assault and battery,” whimpered the other.
“Oh, my lord!” exclaimed Katherine. “Is everyone all right?”
In a few moments she was able to determine that, except for some scrapes, no one was seriously hurt. However, with their scaffolding down, their paint spilled, and their bones jarred, neither of the workmen wanted to continue. Rapidly, they disassembled the scaffolding and loaded everything back into their truck. In the meantime, Armagnac watched, paralyzed. Not until the painters were gone did he move. Then he faced his aunt. His rabbitish face showed nothing but a frozen dignity.
“Have Mrs. Marshpool take a suitable set of clothing to the carriage house,” he said stiffly. “I will change my clothing there.”
“Excuse me,” said Willowby, tiptoing around the paint spill with a stuffed dog under each arm.
“Hey! What are you doing with Tig and Mary?”
“They’re going to be buried!” replied Katherine.
“Blast it all! You know you can’t do this until after the will is read!”
“Try and stop me,” the old lady taunted.
Armagnac gulped in rage and started in the direction of the disappearing dogs, then remembered his pink clothes. He woofed in frustration and scrambled off to the carriage house.
Katherine shook her head and went into the kitchen, seeking the housekeeper. Mrs. Marshpool was filling a pitcher of juice while the young cook, Sheila, turned pancakes. Rose was setting down a plate on the breakfast nook table for Arthur. The housekeeper had insisted that the children eat here instead of the dining room, because children were always so messy.
“There’s been an accident, Mrs. Marshpool. Armagnac has paint on his clothes and needs a change at once. He is in the carriage house. There is also paint on the front steps.” Katherine’s dignity as she spoke could not have been bettered.
“Oh heavens,” the housekeeper moaned, and dashed out of the room.
Arthur watched with interest. He couldn’t believe that Mrs. Marshpool actually cared for somebody.
“What did that goofball Armagnac do, auntie? Here’s your breakfast, hon; if you want any more pancakes, just ask Sheila.”
“He stopped my painters,” said Katherine, in a ‘he’s-just-made-an-ass-of-himself’ sort of way.
Rose sighed. “Is my lavender tea ready, Sheila?”
“In a moment, ma’am.” Some blonde strands had escaped the cook’s ponytail and headscarf, falling across her eyes. “Your sage gruel is about ready, too.”
“Do you think Father’s death has made him worse?” Rose said to her aunt.
Arthur was glaring down at his plate. “I like my peaches fuzzy,” he sulked.
“It’s a nectarine, honey. It’s supposed to be that way.”
“Remember,” said Katherine, “you haven’t seen your brother for a while. He’s been growing more pompous with age, but it’s partially James’ fault, as well. They have been having some dreadful fights these past few weeks. Your father wanted Armagnac to get a job, and Armagnac refused. You know your brother’s always been lazy. About three weeks ago James cut off his allowance to try to force him to work, but Armagnac only vowed to resist any sort of coercion. It really would have been better if your brother had found a job right after college. None of you has ever had to work, and I think that was wrong, in retrospect.”
Arthur gave up on his nectarine. As he examined the kitchen, he could see tall glass jars filled with stupid things like noodles and flour instead of cookies. He slid off his chair and went to see what the cook was making.
“Arthur, you’re getting in Sheila’s way and being a pest,” Rose said. “If you’re hungry, go eat your breakfast. Oh, that must be Richie I hear on the stairs. There, now you can eat breakfast with your cousin. Won’t that be nice?”
Arthur was through the swinging door and inside the summer room before she could finish her sentence. He wondered what it was with grownups. They always claimed to have been kids once, too.
Cautiously, he hid behind the summer room table until Richie passed, then rushed upstairs to go bat-hunting. His nervousness about bats had vanished with the daylight, and now he wanted to see one. All he could recall about them, however, were the featureless black silhouettes he cut out of construction paper at Halloween.
The stairs ended at the third floor, but there had to be another flight somewhere since this house had an attic. The carpet was so thick he couldn’t hear his own footfalls. A black velvet curtain hung at the end of the hallway, and he studied it. They wouldn’t hang a curtain over a bedroom door, would they?
As he drew closer to the curtain, he heard a sniff from behind the door on his right and crept on past. He recognized that sniff. This was Briarly’s room with Briarly in it. The next door had a piece of paper labeled ‘Enter and Die,’ taped to it. Richie’s room, of course.
Then Arthur caught a glimpse of something inside a vast shadowy room on his left. In a far corner he could see the jut of a skinny chin at the height of a man’s head. Above it were teeth, seen in profile, but there was no nose where one ought to be.
Arthur stood frozen and strained his eyes. He felt for a light switch inside the large room but couldn’t locate one. Then he stepped inside. He was only a few feet away from the strange outline when he realized he was looking at a skeleton. For a second the boy stared, blinking, then he turned around and something struck him right in the face.
Arthur yelped and ran out of the room. When he looked behind, he saw something flitting back and forth. He was about to label his bat-hunt a success and leave, when he realized the moving thing was long and threadlike. It was only the pull cord of a light switch, he saw with disgust. It was hanging from the light fixture. He had hit the little metal bit at the end with his face.
He entered the room again and turned the light on. A few faded maps with strange countries hung on the walls, along with a blackboard. A chart of multiplication tables stood in one corner and a child’s record player in another. This was a schoolroom, he realized. How horrible it must be to have one in your own house.
He swaggered over to the skeleton with the air of a doctor about to examine a patient. But the nearer he came the less confident he felt. Hesitantly, he touched one of its skinny arm bones and poked a hip. The skeleton swayed slightly, dangling from a wire through its skull. Its bones were wired together as well. It certainly looked and felt real.
The boy gave the skeleton one disdainful push to show he wasn’t scared of it, then ran for his life when it rattled violently and swung back at him. He was about to start shrieking for help when Briarly’s door opened. Her face appeared around the doorframe, probing for the source of the noise.
Arthur walked boldly past, giving her a severe look. She scowled at him and shut her door again. The boy gasped with relief. That skeleton had almost been too much.
Then he remembered he still didn’t know where the attic was and retraced his steps to the black velvet curtain. When he drew the curtain aside, a door was behind it. A hidden door! He had been right!
Beyond it were stairs leading upwards. The attic, he thought with triumph. He climbed up, opened the door at the top, and stepped into a
small room. Anemic light came from a dirty window. The roof slanted above his head, showing the undersides of some rafters and plenty of cobwebs, but no bats.
Disappointed, he approached the window, stirring up dust as he walked. There were two sets of footprints in the dust, one his own, and the other a larger set, an adult’s prints. Someone had walked over to the window, then back. From the lack of other prints, Arthur could tell no one else had been in the attic for a long time. He looked out the window and saw Heydrick climbing out of a pickup truck with a paper sack. The gardener must have been shopping. Then Arthur glanced aside and saw something resting on a pair of dusty cardboard boxes.
It was a CD case, and he picked it up. Though the insert was still there, the case held no disk. On the cover was a truculent-looking black guy holding a gun and scowling through sunglasses. The case was labeled ‘Jazzy F*KU.’
Arthur frowned. He couldn’t remember where he’d heard that name before. One of the grownups must have lost the CD case or something. He set the case back on the boxes and left the attic.
He was careful to shut both doors and slide the curtain back, then he galloped downstairs to the first floor. At the bottom he collided with Bert, sending a cylinder of whisky sour shooting out of his father’s glass.
“Sorry, Dad.”
“Kid--!”
“Hey, I found a CD case,” said the boy hurriedly. “Jazzy F*KU. Did somebody lose it?”
Arthur was not used to being able to distract his father at moments like this, so when Bert emptied the rest of the glass all over the carpet, the boy was surprised.
“Where?” Cummings demanded.
“In the attic.”
Bert set his glass down on a side table and the two climbed rapidly, Arthur impressed at the speed his hefty father was making. But Cummings balked when his son tried to make him climb the attic stairs in the dark.
“Hold on, where’s the damn light switch?”
“There isn’t one.”
“There has to be. I’m not walking face-first into a bunch of cobwebs. Here it is. And it doesn’t work,” Bert added morosely. “Are you sure you saw a CD case?”
“Yes!” Arthur protested. He had already raced to the top of the attic stairs.
With a sigh, Bert trod upwards while his son opened the attic door. As the two stepped into the attic, Arthur bounced excitedly along the floor down to the boxes.
But the CD case was gone. Baffled, Arthur looked behind the boxes, and it wasn’t there.
“Well?” said his father, fists on hips.
“It was right here,” the boy insisted. “A black guy with a gun on the cover.”
“That describes plenty of rap CDs. Are you sure you weren’t imagining it?”
“I saw it! Somebody must have taken it.”
“And who could that have been?”
Arthur’s eyes narrowed. Briarly’s door was close to the black velvet curtain.
“Briarly might have heard me. Maybe she took it.”
The two traveled down the stairs again. Cummings knocked on Briarly’s door, then opened it. The girl was lying on her bed, drawing in a coloring book. A little dirt was already decorating her cheeks. “Have you seen a CD case?” Bert asked lightly. “We’re looking for one and Arthur thought you might have found it.”
The girl scowled at Arthur. Plainly, she thought her cousin had accused her of theft. Arthur made an ape-face in reply.
“No,” Briarly said firmly.
“Are you sure?” Bert smiled.
“Yes!”
“Well, Arthur, you must have imagined it. Never mind us, Briarly. And you might want to clean that stuff off your face before the lawyer comes.” Hands in his pockets, Bert made his way back down the stairs. Arthur was frowning.
“You did that just to give me some exercise, didn’t you, kid?”
“But it was there!”
“Kid! Don’t joke about CD cases right now, okay? They’re a very sensitive topic in this household, especially ones by the name of Jazzy F*KU. If you try to sucker me again I’ll spank hell out of you. Got that?”
Arthur was defeated. Once his father threatened a spanking, no one could argue with him. Yet Arthur knew he had seen a CD case in the attic, and that somebody had stolen it.
“We’re getting ready for the funeral service,” Bert continued, “so don’t run off. Now where did I put that glass? It must have had at least a teaspoonful of drink left.”
Arthur watched his father disappear. He considered hunting for the CD case again, but there was another question he had to ask. He found his mother in the kitchen and tugged wordlessly on her arm until she let herself be guided upstairs.
“What is it, honey?”
Arthur didn’t reply, instead urging her up to the third floor and into the schoolroom. When they reached the skeleton, he asked, “Is that Grandad Boyle?”
“No, that’s Herbert Maxillamus. Or that’s what we named him. He’s a skeleton your great-grandfather bought so his children and grandchildren could learn the bones of the body. This is our old schoolroom. Your uncle and aunt and myself all had private tutors back then. No, your grandfather’s in a coffin at the Chichiteaux Cemetery, and we’re going to be burying him in an hour or so.”
The boy felt much better. He had been positive that the skeleton was actually his dead grandfather. Now that it was nobody, he felt braver about it.
“Is there anything else in this house that’s frightening you?”
“I am not scared,” Arthur bellowed, puffing.
“That’s good. Now, we need to get ready to leave. Try to behave, will you? The service is probably going to be a little dull.”
Humiliated, the boy followed his mother downstairs.
The cars decanted their passengers near a freshly dug grave in the Chichiteaux Cemetery. An unseasonably cold wind was rising and the clouds threatened rain. Douthit’s Funeral Parlor had already delivered the polished brass casket, and it lay on top of two iron rails next to the grave. Someone had hidden the excavated earth under a green tarp, and a wreath of flowers, donated by Katherine, lay on top of the casket. Crosgate, who was one of Douthit’s men, had just laid out two rows of folding chairs in front of the casket.
Katherine, Rose, Jac, and the children took the front row, with Richie squirming and grinning. Jac glared at him and the boy subsided, to Arthur’s surprise.
In the second row sat Bert, Phil, Mrs. Marshpool, and Armagnac. There was no minister or priest because James Boyle had never been a churchgoer. And except for the housekeeper, none of the other servants had chosen to come, despite invitations. Nor were there any family friends, for Mr. Boyle had none.
The relatives contemplated the casket silently. Crosgate stood with hands behind his back, his expression curious. He was obviously wondering what the family was going to do.
Armagnac stood up and took a position at the head of the casket. With a tight expression, he began to speak. “We are gathered here today to bury James Elmont Boyle; our father, brother, father-in-law, and grandfather.” Armagnac paused, trying to decide what should come next. A cry interrupted him.
“Cease! Stop the funeral!” a man shouted.
“What the hell?” asked Jac.
A hefty man was running towards them. Crosgate paled.
“Oh Christ,” said Jac, “it’s Douthit. What can he want? And what’s wrong with his face? My God, he’s wearing makeup!”
“He practices putting cosmetics on his own face so he can get the corpses’ makeup right,” Katherine whispered to her niece. “Sometimes he just forgets to take it off before he goes out in public. I thought you knew that.”
“Well, NOW I do,” Jac groaned.
Arthur gazed hard at the approaching man. Douthit’s eyes did appear to be rimmed with black. The undertaker was bald, and his powder-white face was strangely hairless on top of his formal black suit. Arthur decided that he had never seen anyone who looked so much like Uncle Fester from ‘The Addams Family.’
“Is anything wrong, Mr. Douthit?” Katherine asked in a stately way, a hint to the undertaker to compose himself.
“See here, Douthit,” said Armagnac. “We’re in the middle of a service. Can it wait?”
“Absolutely not. Something has been forgotten,” the undertaker gasped. “Crosgate, assist me.”
Before the eyes of the startled family, Douthit began to open the casket. A moment later, James Elmont Boyle lay before them on red satin plush. His arms were crossed over his chest and his face bore a sour expression. His hat and cane were in situ.
“My God,” said Bert. “They buried him with his bowler on!”
Arthur goggled. Briarly’s little black purse slid out of her lace-gloved hands. Even Richie was impressed. The boy leant forward and sniffed hard, expressively. Jac yanked him back down into his seat.
“Doesn’t he look magnificent?” Douthit sighed.
“Is this all!?” yelled Jac. “Do you mean you’ve interrupted us just to show Father off?”
The undertaker drew back, offended. “Can it possibly be that you don’t care to see him? You didn’t take a look at him when you stopped by the funeral home.”
“Mr. Douthit,” began Katherine in a pained way.
“Douthit,” Armagnac interrupted. “None of us came by to see him because none of us wanted to see him! Now will you close that goddamned casket?”
“But doesn’t he look wonderful?” the undertaker insisted. He gazed down at James with the satisfaction a chef might give to a well-garnished entrée. Crosgate was clutching the wreath, eyes closed. Judging from his expression, he had obviously witnessed this type of scene before.
“Douthit. I’ll say it again. Close the damned casket and let us get on with the burial.” Boyle’s narrowed eyes and protruding teeth made him look like a were-rabbit.
“The families always say that they adore my handiwork,” complained the undertaker peevishly.
“He looks wonderful, Mr. Douthit. Now will you let us go on?” said Katherine.
A Will To Murder Page 5
