Beyond the Grave jq-2

by Bill Pronzini

  But I didn't want to leave. Something held me in this lonely place, some indefinable but strong pull from the past.

  I moved toward the front of the church to where the first rows of pews once had been, the leg of my pants snagging on the charred roof beam. Glaring at it as if it were an animal that had nipped at me, I kicked out irritably. A sharp twinge of pain in my sneakered toe reminded me I was being childish. I just didn't want to let go of the romantic past and immerse myself once more in a life that revolved around balancing the museum's budget, trips to the grocery store, and social obligations such as a shipboard wedding. Sternly I told myself that such mundane activities were the glue that held my life together, and that I'd better get on with them.

  Before I left, though, I decided to allow myself one last self-indulgence. Apparently the church and the pueblo had gripped Quincannon's imagination as much as they had mine, because in his notes he had described them in greater detail than seemed necessary. And one of the things he had written of was finding another grave, that of the parish's first padre, in the floor in front of the altar. Many Catholic churches had allowed persons of importance to be buried within-although that practice had been more common in Europe than in the mission churches of California-and apparently the first priest of San Anselmo de las Lomas had been so honored. I couldn't help but wonder if the marker was still here.

  The search was more difficult than I'd anticipated, however, because the broken brick floor was overgrown not only with weeds but with a carpet of that kind of wild grass that sends out a mass of tough, interlocking runners. I yanked at one plant, cutting my fingers and pulling it up, roots and all. To the left of the altar area, I got down on my knees, bracing my feet behind me, and tugged on a large runner. More of the shallowly rooted plants popped out from the cracks in the bricks, and I repeated the process until I had exposed a substantial amount of flooring and had found the edge of what appeared to be the grave marker.

  My excitment returned as I crawled forward and removed more weeds and debris from the stone. When I was done, it was still covered by soil, and I shoveled it out of the way with my bare hands, until I could read the inscription. It was as Quincannon had described, an elaborate carving that had been made shallow and indistinct by more than a century of exposure to the elements. But the words were still decipherable: FRAY JULIO DEL PRADO, 1751–1826, HOMBRE DE DIOS.

  Once again-in spite of my best intentions-I was there in the past with John Quincannon, looking down at that stone. The pull of those long-ago times was stronger than ever now. As strong as if someone were trying to tell me something….

  I stood, my eyes still on the grave. Then I glanced up at where the altar had once been. And then at the apse, the one to my left, where the wall was still intact.

  Mas alia del sepulcro … donde Maria …

  Maria!

  I drew in my breath and stood very still. Then I released it in a rush as my heart started beating faster. I stepped around the padre's grave and hurried over to the apse. Its floor was littered with trash: paper bags and beer cans and wine bottles. Over by the stones that were piled against the wall, someone had made a charcoal fire, taking advantage of the shelter from the wind.

  Stones?

  I stared down at them, sidetracked from my purpose. What on earth were they doing here? I wondered. They were quite large and of the same type as those on the knoll where Quincannon had been ambushed. Someone had taken a great deal of trouble to move them all that distance and pile them here in the apse.

  Because this was nothing like what I'd expected to find, I was momentarily disconcerted. Then I got down on my hands and knees and began to try to move the stones. They were cumbersome and didn't budge easily, both because of their weight and the way they'd been wedged together. How long had they been here? I thought. Not a great deal of time. There was nothing growing over them, and grass and weeds took hold quickly during the winter and spring rains.

  A few of the peripheral stones had yielded. I grasped a big, jagged chunk of rock and pulled. It moved an inch or so, and a shower of smaller pieces rained down, one striking my knee. I paused to rub the place where it hurt, then grasped the rock more firmly. Leaning back against my heels, I pulled as hard as I could. The rock moved a few more inches.

  At first I didn't recognize what was behind it. It looked like a polished piece of wood. Then I saw it was striated: brown alternating with lighter brown, and above it a curve of dark leather. It was the stacked heel of a woman's boot.

  My heart began to pound as I leaned forward and looked closer. Above the shoe part of the boot was blue fabric. Denim. The leg of a pair of jeans.

  A vague odor rose to my nostrils now, a kind of dusty decay. I pulled back convulsively. For a moment there was a ringing in my ears, a blurring of my vision. And then my senses cleared. I saw the boot and blue-jeaned leg with awful sharpness. Felt the prickling cold that was creeping over my skin. Tasted the metallic dryness in my mouth.

  And heard the footfall behind me.

  I swiveled around, wrenching my back, stones digging into one knee. Then I tried to stand but found my limbs had gone weak. Above me loomed the menacing figure of Gray Hollis.

  TWO

  Gray's face was an almost translucent white, the skin drawn taut over his cheekbones. His lips curled back like those of an animal about to attack. It was his eyes that frightened me the most: black holes in which pinpoints of fury glittered.

  I got to my feet slowly, pain biting into the small of my back where I had twisted it. Gray stepped forward, and I smelled the sharp odor of bourbon. The liquor had not affected his control, however: he was steady on his feet, poised to spring at me, and the bunching of his fists at his sides suggested a brute strength.

  He said, “Doing a little treasure hunting, lady?”

  I said, “Yes, but there's nothing here.”

  “Nothing here.” He laughed, a sound that abruptly cut off before it reached its crescendo. Goose bumps rose over my whole body, and I thought: This is the way it was when he killed her.

  Gray said, “Nothing here but Georgia.”

  Involuntarily I glanced back at the cairn of rocks.

  He smiled, but the feral set of his face turned it into a snarl. He said, “I see you've already met my wife.”

  The goose bumps rippled again, icy cold. My heart was pounding so hard I could hear its thrum in my ears. I took a step backward.

  “Wha's the matter-don't you like my joke?” Gray lunged at me, but I sidestepped, and he staggered, then fell to one knee.

  I turned and ran toward the other side of the ruins.

  “Come back here, you goddamn bitch!”

  I glanced over my shoulder. He had regained his feet and was running after me. Looking down at the ground, I saw a chunk of red tile. I scooped it up, and when he was within a couple of yards of me, I threw it hard. It missed his head but smacked into his left shoulder. He jerked his right hand up, clutched the place where it had hit, and the motion put his balance off. I jumped over the foundation and ran into the graveyard.

  Something-a tangle of weeds, one of the low gravestones-caught my foot, and I fell heavily. For a moment I was stunned, face pressed into the grass. Then I heard Gray rush at me, overshooting the spot where I lay. I pushed up on both elbows and saw him stop, disoriented, midway between the graveyard and the grove of oak trees. As I got up, he whirled and saw me.

  I expected him to run at me again, but instead he stood, fists clenched, feet spread wide apart. “Come on, bitch,” he said, “what're you going to do now?”

  I glanced around frantically, uncertain which way to go. Gray was blocking my path to the road-and the safety of my car.

  He said, “Face it, bitch, you're caught. Thought you could run out on me, didn't you? Clean out the bank account and take off for Peru. Never come back.”

  Madre de Dios! I thought. He's lost his mind. He thinks I'm his wife.

  “We'll see about that,” Gray said. “Now we'll see.
”

  As he started back toward me I turned and ran, not caring where. Pain stabbed at my back as I skirted the high headstone of Don Esteban Velasquez. At the edge of the cemetery my foot caught in a tangle of vines, and I stumbled almost to my knees but kept on going. Behind me Gray had also begun to run; his breath came in grunts and wheezes.

  My own breath came hard, and I heard myself sob. The pain in my back was worse now, a fiery searing that brought tears to my eyes. I ignored it and raced across the field of wildflowers. Ahead was the stone lavanderia. Perhaps there I would find some sort of weapon….

  Gray was gaining on me, only about ten yards away. I rounded the old well and looked inside. Nothing but stones and beer cans, and they were too far down to reach. Sobbing again, this time in frustration, I changed my course, running for the knoll where Quincannon had been ambushed. There were rocks up there. I could throw them at Gray-if I could run that distance….

  But before I could get very far, he hurled himself forward and dived at my feet. His outstretched hands grabbed my right ankle. I bent my left knee, flailed my arms for balance, tried to kick out at him. There was a wrenching spasm in my back, and I fell heavily to the ground.

  Gray was on top of me now, his knees on my back, intensifying the pain. His hands grasped my neck from behind, fingers reaching forward toward my throat. I tried to shake him off, but the pain prevented that. I screamed, my face pressed into the weeds, but the cry came out a mere gurgle.

  Behind me Gray's voice was shouting: “Bitch! You'll never leave me!” The shouts were loud at first, then fainter, replaced by a buzzing in my ears. Tears were running down my face now. I tried to move my arms, but they felt numb. And there was the terrible, terrible pain in my back….

  A second voice began shouting in counterpoint to Gray's. The words were in Spanish: “Basta! Basta! Hijo de puta!”

  Gray's body began to heave up and down, as if something were shaking it. His fingers loosened on my neck. For a moment his hands clutched at my shoulders, pulling my upper body away from the ground. Then he let go, and I fell flat. I felt him being dragged from me, heard grunts and scuffling. Then someone crashed to the ground beside me.

  I tried to roll onto my side, but hands grabbed me again. Terror and rage flooded me and gave me the strength to scream. This time it came out a keening shriek. Above the sound, a man's voice said, “Elena, Elena, esta bien! Esta Arturo. Esta bien, Elena!”

  A hand, lean and long-fingered, touched my cheek. An arm supported me, helped me sit up. I cried out from the pain in my back, pressed my wet face into Arturo Melendez's rough wool shirt.

  “Elena,” he said, “are you all right?”

  I hiccuped, cutting off a sob.

  “Elena?”

  I pulled back from his chest, scrubbed at my face with one hand. “What happened to-”

  “For now, he is unconscious.”

  I opened my eyes. Arturo's face was directly in front of mine, made thin and pale by concern. He knelt beside me, one arm around my shoulders. Gray lay on the ground not three feet away from us, on his back, arms and legs splayed out. His eyes were closed, and blood trickled from a gash on his forehead.

  “Elena,” Arturo said, “what happened?”

  “You didn't see …?”

  He shook his head. “I was walking on the far side of the hill, where I often go, by the ruins of the hacienda. I heard Gray shout. When I reached this side, he was chasing you across the field.”

  I sighed and brought both hands to my face, blocking out the sight of the supine figure. “Gray killed his wife,” I said shakily. “That's what all this drinking has been about. She's buried over there under that pile of stones by the wall of the church. I found her.”

  Arturo sucked in his breath. For a long moment neither of us spoke.

  Then he said, “We must go for the police.”

  “You go. I don't know if I can walk.” And then I remembered what I'd been about to do when I'd discovered Georgia Hollis's body. “When you come back, I want you to help me with something.”

  “What?”

  “Digging.”

  “For what?”

  “You'll see.”

  Arturo looked puzzled, but merely said, “I will not leave you here with that hijo de puta. We will tie Gray up and both go for the police.”

  “What if he wakes up?”

  “He won't, but I almost wish he would before we go.” Arturo paused, and when he spoke again, his voice was low and ugly. “If he did, I would be only too happy to kick him in the head again. Or in the cojones, should you prefer that.”

  THREE

  It was midafternoon before the county sheriff's men were finished at the ruins of San Anselmo de las Lomas and later yet when Arturo, Sam, and I returned armed with a shovel, pick, and pry bar. We were curiously subdued for a trio of treasure hunters, shaken by the grim events of the past few hours.

  Gray Hollis had been taken away immediately under guard in an ambulance, to be treated for a concussion and broken arm. Then the cairn of rocks had been opened, exposing the body of Georgia Hollis, wrapped in a tattered blanket. While investigators took statements from Arturo and me, technicians made their photographs and measurements, and finally Georgia was removed in a green body bag. The proceedings had a mechanical quality that chilled me; out of the improvised grave, into the bag, zip it up-and it was as if the woman had never existed. Even the horror and violence of her death had been negated by these routine and necessary actions.

  In a way, I thought, the police procedure was very like the funeral ritual: a closing off, a signal that while one life had ended, it was time for others to get on with theirs. But there was one important difference: No one was here to mourn Georgia Hollis. As I watched the bag containing her body being bundled off through the grove of oak trees, I wondered if there was anyone who would claim Georgia and go through the formalities of grief.

  When the investigators were done with us, Arturo and I had driven back to Sam's house. Earlier we'd called the sheriff's department from there, and the historian-who had just returned from mailing off the manuscript he'd been working on-had been left with the task of breaking the news to Dora Kingman. The ordeal had left him more angry than upset. Initially, he told us, Dora had gone into hysterics, but as she'd calmed down she'd begun to insist that Gray couldn't have murdered his wife. The more Sam had tried to convince her, the more adamant she'd become, and when he'd last seen her, she'd been on her way to the county hospital to try to help Gray.

  “How can she do that?” Arturo had demanded. “How can she defend that bastardo?”

  Sam shrugged. “She thinks she loves him. And the human animal only sees what it wants to see, anyway.”

  I had merely nodded, thinking of my affair with Dave-and of Mama's reaction to her illness.

  But I had a more important concern than Dora and Gray, and as I explained to Arturo and Sam what I wanted to do, they brightened somewhat. At first Sam said that we would be tampering with a crime scene, but I assured him that I had already cleared it with the sheriffs department. There would be an officer on hand who would observe us and make sure we didn't destroy any evidence. Satisfied, Sam got the tools from the shed in his backyard, and the three of us returned to the ruins of the church.

  The old pueblo seemed even more desolate than before. During the afternoon, the rain clouds had passed, but now the sky was dark once again, threatening a downpour at any minute. The sheriffs man had retreated to the warmth of his car, and he seemed sorry to see us; he donned a rain slicker before accompanying us to the ruins and sat down on the roof beam to smoke a cigarette.

  As he set down the shovel he was carrying, Sam glanced at what remained of the cairn of rocks, and I saw a shudder pass through his body. Arturo was staring up at the sky; when he lowered his eyes, they met mine and I thought I knew what he was thinking: Let it rain; let it wash away the traces of this tragedy.

  I shook my head, as if to clear it of such thoughts, and went
directly to the foundation on the opposite side of the church from Georgia's makeshift grave. Lining my feet up against it where it turned at a right angle to form the apse, I paced off the distance: one, two, three, four, five feet. Then I went to the opposite side-ignoring the place where the body had been-and repeated the measuring in the apse whose walls were still standing. One, two, three feet. And a bit more. But not four feet.

  I turned to Sam and Arturo; they were watching me intently. “Here,” I said, “this is where we need to break down the wall.” I stepped aside as they came forward with the pick and the pry bar. After a moment, Sam told me to move even farther back; the adobe wasn't yielding easily, and he didn't want to whack me with the pick. I'd already been injured enough for one day-Arturo had given me a muscle relaxant he'd had left over from when he'd hurt himself rock climbing last year, but my back still throbbed-so I retreated a few feet. But then I started moving closer again, excited now, sure of what they'd soon uncover.

  John Quincannon had solved one murder, back in the 1890s. I'd discovered another, here in the 1980s. And now I was about to make the biggest discovery of all. I was about to find the long-lost Velasquez artifacts….

  Sam turned and glared at me. I was standing no more than a foot behind him. I gestured apologetically and went to sit next to the sheriffs man on the charred roof beam, annoyed that my back injury prevented me from helping. This was going much too slowly. Wasn't demolition supposed to be easy? Shouldn't that old wall just fall…?