by Joyce Magnin
"Oh, Griselda, I'm sorry. Want me to go with you?"
"Do you mind?"
"Not at all. We'll leave the dishes. How did they know to find you here?" she asked as she pulled on her brown coat.
"I gave them a few numbers . . . just in case of an emergency. I hope you don't mind."
"Mind? No, of course not. I was only curious."
I pulled the truck out on the main road. "The nurse said Agnes was recovering but seemed agitated. She can get that way after an attack."
"It's good you're going," Ruth said. "I remember her having a few of those really bad attacks when she was still living with you."
"If they served her pickles again I'm going to start screaming at people."
"You? You never scream. You don't even know how to scream. Even that night we screamed under the trestle. It wasn't a real scream just a—"
"You're babbling Ruth. Agnes will be all right."
I parked by the front door considering this was an emergency and it was after hours. An orderly opened the door for us. "Good evening, Griselda," he said. "The doctor is with her now."
"Thanks, Claude."
Ruth and I rushed down the hall to Agnes's room. The doctor, a tall, young man with long hair in a pony tail was listening to her chest. Agnes spied me and waved us in.
"Is she OK?" I asked.
The doctor took the stethoscope from his ears. "She'll be fine now."
"What set it off this time? Do you know?"
The doctor shook his head and patted Agnes's hand. "It's hard to say. I think it might have something to do with the ragweed blowing around out there. All the rain made it grow and now all the sunshine is just making it blow in the wind."
"Maybe we should keep her window closed."
"Probably. I'll add some Benadryl to her chart."
Agnes removed the nebulizer from her mouth. "I hate it when people talk about me like I'm not here when I so obviously am here."
"Sorry, Agnes," I said.
"I'll be on call all night if you need me, Agnes," the doctor said before he left the room.
"I came as fast as I could," I said. "The nurse said you were upset and asking for me."
"It scares me so much," Agnes said. "The attacks—oh, hey Ruth, I didn't see you there."
"Hey, Agnes."
Ruth sat in the visitor's chair while I struggled to keep my rear end on the edge of Agnes's bed. "I was missing you tonight. I might have had a feeling you needed me."
"I've been missing you too. I'm glad you're here. I feel better now."
That was when I decided the asthma had nothing to do with ragweed and everything to do with Agnes missing me, missing home. She could get herself all worked up with sadness sometimes and instead of just admitting it to herself or anyone else, her body seems to take the brunt of it. But then again, her body took the brunt of most of the bad stuff that happened to Agnes. This time I didn't mind that she needed me.
"Guess what, Agnes," Ruth said. "Griselda went flying in an airplane."
"What? The dickens you say. In a big one, a jumbo jet?"
Her breaths became labored again. I replaced the nebulizer. "You just breathe and I'll tell you the story."
Her eyes stayed wide as half dollars through the tale. "I loved it, Agnes. I never had so much fun or felt so free and far away from my troubles."
"But Griselda, that worries me, the notion of you flying around up there. It's dangerous."
"No, it's safe. Cliff is a good pilot. And besides, Agnes, don't you always say God is not taking any of us home until our time?"
"That's true, Griselda, that's what I say. I just don't need something else to worry about." She readjusted herself with the aid of her trapeze bar. "Now tell me about Stella. My sources here tell me that Walter has had no change and that Gilda's been in few times. But she never hangs around very long."
"No change is right. Except a change in Stella. She's finally made her peace with him and is ready to forgive those terrible things he did to hurt her so much."
"Now that's an answer to prayer. I was hoping for that, especially if he were to die. It would be hard living the rest of her life knowing she never made peace with her brother."
Ruth perked up. "She says Walter was up here looking for buried treasure."
Agnes laughed.
"Don't laugh too hard," I said. "You'll set off another attack."
"Buried treasure? Really? I heard about loot from train robberies never being recovered but no one ever looks for it. Least not that I know of."
"It might be true," I said. "But even so, it shouldn't matter. It's not like he robbed the train."
"That's right," Agnes said. "I think it's kind of exciting. Imagine that, buried treasure near Bright's Pond. Funny that none of my sources knew this."
Ruth started to laugh. "That's all we need is for word to get out. Folks will be scrambling all over looking for it. Studebaker Kowalski and Boris Lender, all of them will be out looking for it."
The thought sent a chill down my spine. Ruth was right. "Oh, let's hope not."
We stayed with Agnes until nearly nine o'clock when she finally fell asleep. Ruth was looking a little sleepy herself. "Come on," I said. "Let's head home."
"OK," she said with a yawn. "But I was thinking, can we go by Walter's room? Take a peek inside."
"How come?"
"I've never seen a man in a coma."
"He's not a circus side show attraction."
"I know that. I'm not being mean. Just curious."
The nursing home hallway was quiet except for the sound of televisions and nurses talking quietly to the residents. We tiptoed near. The lights were on but dim in Walter's room. I stopped at the door when I heard voices.
"Shh, someone's in there."
"Probably just a nurse," Ruth said.
I moved closer to the door and listened. I heard a woman's voice first, and thinking it was a nurse, I pushed open the door a sliver and peeked inside. Gilda was on the telephone. I knew I should have just turned around and left, that eavesdropping was not the right thing to do, but I couldn't help myself. I leaned closer. Her back was to me.
"It's too much money," she said. "Too much to just up and run away. I'm gonna stay a while longer. He could wake up—especially with that fat woman praying for him."
18
I backed away from the door. "Come on," I whispered. "Let's just go home."
"Why? What's the big deal?"
In that second my mind scrolled through a hundred possible explanations, and none of them were very good. Gilda was speaking to someone who had an interest in Walter and quite possibly the treasure.
I grabbed Ruth's hand. "I don't want to interrupt if he has visitors."
"So what? It's not like you'll interrupt him talking or anything. What can anyone say to an unconscious man?"
We made it to the exit. "Gilda was in his room," I said in a hushed tone. "She was talking to someone on the phone about the money."
"The treasure money?"
"That's what I'm thinking. I got the feeling whoever she was talking to was her partner or something."
"No kidding," Ruth said. "This is really getting exciting. Bright's Pond in the center of a crime syndicate."
"Now who said that? You have quite an imagination."
We started down the road toward home and were just about at Ruth's house before I said a word. "Maybe I should tell Mildred what I heard."
"Sure," Ruth said. "You could do that. She's on the prowl anyway so you might actually be helping her. Kind of like you're doing a little spying also."
"Not intentionally," I said. "I've been trying to steer as clear as possible from all this."
Ruth twisted her mouth and then smiled. "But you are knee deep in it now."
"I know. If it wasn't for Stella I'd just forget all about it but now I'm starting to worry about her."
"You think they might rub her out?"
"Who?"
"The syndicate. That's
what they do. They rub people out, people who get in the way. Oh, dear, Griselda, maybe you shouldn't tell Mildred anything. I'd just hate if you had to enter one of them protection programs, you know?"
"Oh Ruth, you are so silly. We are not dealing with the mafia."
"I don't want anyone to get hurt."
"I know. But listen. It's not that big a deal. It's only a little treasure not even worth all that much money. I think we should relax and let Mildred handle it—if there is anything to handle."
"OK, Griselda, but do me a favor and lock your doors at night."
"I will. And you do me a favor, please."
"Anything."
"Make sure you're in church this Sunday. We have to start selling dance tickets, and could you remind Pastor Speedwell to announce it from the pulpit?"
"I hope Sylvia remembered to put it in the bulletin. That woman's got a brain like a sieve. But yes, I'll tell pastor."
"That's why the whole committee needs to be there. The dance is only two weeks away. And we want to sell out."
"Don't worry, Griselda. We do great every year. The SOAP ladies will get their money."
Ruth was referring to the fact that every year the SOAP women get the profits from the Harvest Dance to use in their missions. For a secret society they sure had a lot of visibility. But it was how they liked it.
I waited until Ruth was safely inside her house and not because I was afraid of any hit man, I just felt responsible for her. I toyed with stopping by the café. Zeb lived in an apartment above the restaurant. His living room always smelled like grease and french fries. But I changed my mind. I think I would have had a hard time not telling him what I heard Gilda saying, and for now I wanted to keep it under wraps.
For three days I kept my news to myself. But I finally got my nerve up to speak with Mildred Blessing. I asked her to meet me at the library to talk. This way we'd be out of earshot of the town. If I asked her to come by my house someone would surely notice and ask why Mildred was there.
She showed up right on time, at precisely two o'clock, dressed in her uniform with a holstered gun. It was the first time I had ever seen Mildred with her gun. She preferred not to carry it, usually. She wore the holster though, just not the weapon.
"Why the gun, Mildred? It's a little off-putting."
She patted it affectionately. "Just in case. You can never tell."
We sat at the periodicals table. The library was empty except for an occasional mouse flitting about.
"So what's the poop?" Mildred asked.
"No poop. I wanted to run something past you."
"Shoot."
I eyed her gun. "I hope not. Listen, I was over at Greenbrier the other day and—"
"What day?"
"Monday night."
"What time?"
I felt my eyebrows wrinkle. "Why is that important? Around nine o'clock."
"That's late to be visiting Agnes."
"Will you let me tell the story, Mildred, I didn't ask you here to interrogate me."
"Sorry."
"Anyway. I was there to see Agnes, of course. And Ruth and I decided to go peek in on Walter."
"Ruth was with you?"
"Didn't I just say that? Ruth and I went to visit Walter and I heard a voice inside the room. I peeked inside and saw Gilda Saucer on the phone."
"Gilda? Did you hear what she was saying?"
I nodded. "I did. She said something to the effect of it being too much money to leave town now. I figured she must be talking about the treasure."
She didn't appear surprised. But I thought that might be just some on-duty cop training discipline.
"I know," she said. "It's true. And it's not the first time."
I couldn't help taking a deep breath. "What?"
"I have spies at Greenbrier. They tell me everything. They've heard her five or six times and each time she seemed to be almost arguing with someone about the money, about the treasure. I'm thinking she believes Walter knows exactly where it is and is waiting for him to wake up to find out for sure."
My mind swirled with possibilities. "Or, maybe Walter already found it and hid it again before he got hurt."
"That's a possibility also. It could be many things. What I know for sure is that Gilda Saucer and maybe even that Cliff Cardwell are up to no good."
"Cliff? Really?" I had learned not to dismiss Mildred's instincts as quickly.
"It seems a little too coincidental that she would blow into town and then he would make an emergency landing so close together. It's too weird."
"I don't want to think that Cliff is in on anything."
"I know you don't. I know you two been flying around together and—"
"It's not like that."
"I didn't mean it the way it sounded. But brace yourself now. I sent out for information on the two of them—to Wilkes-Barre and Scranton and I should probably call someone in Philadelphia also."
"You'll tell me if you find anything out, right?"
"Oh, sure, sure. Now you got anything else to tell me? Don't hold anything back. You never know when the tiniest detail could crack a case wide open."
I told her about that evening at the Crabby Corral.
"Well, I can't blame a girl for needing a drink. But I'm glad you told me. I'm thinking maybe we need to get our hands on that treasure and then see what happens. Maybe Walter and Gilda are part of a crime ring. He could be, you know."
"Oh, Mildred, I hope for Stella's sake you're wrong. From what I can tell, they've done nothing illegal. Treasure hunting is not against the law. But Ruth is saying the same thing. She's convinced the mafia is in Bright's Pond."
"I doubt that they're anything more than two-bit hoodlums. And you're right, treasure hunting is not illegal, but I got my suspicions that they're looking for more than a payroll safe, and I hope for Stella's sake I get to the bottom of this and right quick."
And knowing what Stella already told me about Walter I wouldn't doubt that he could very well be up to no good.
"Now I am glad you told me all this Griselda. Please keep it under your hat. I don't want Gilda and Cliff getting spooked before we can figure all this out."
"I understand. But do you think we should tell Stella?"
"No, let's keep this between us. She's liable to do something and ruin the whole investigation."
"I guess you know best."
Mildred put her cop hat on, hiked up her holster belt and said, "Don't you worry, we'll nab these perps in no time and I won't let anyone get hurt."
I stood on the library steps and watched Mildred drive off in her cruiser in the direction of the town hall. It made me sad to think that Cliff might be knotted up in a crime ring. I didn't want to believe it. He was one of the nicest people to come to town and I never felt one iota of ill will from him. Not a single bad vibration. It made me even sadder to think that Stella's brother might be part of it. I had hoped he and Stella would reunite and become a family.
I made a quick trip to the bathroom and when I returned to the desk I noticed the SOAP women were seated around the periodicals table with a map of the backwoods spread out.
"Tohilda," I said. "Good morning."
She looked up. Tohilda Best was not what you would call a woman concerned about her appearance. And she didn't seem to mind. In a way her aversion to pretty, womanly clothes made her even prettier. She wore a straight, baby-blue dress that reached near down to her ankles, yellowish boots with a thick sole, and her hair was pulled back in a tight fist of bun. Her eyes were like two nearly purple gems. When she smiled, the edges of her eyes crinkled.
"I wanted to tell you about Mercy Lincoln," I said.
"Lincoln. Charlamaine Lincoln's daughter?"
"Yes. She's been coming by the library a lot and checking out books. I couldn't help noticing she could use socks and shoes, sneakers if you can. She loves to run and climb trees."
Tohilda made a note on her yellow legal pad.
"I saw Charlamaine the other day
," Ruth said. "She was hanging around the Piggly Wiggly. I thought I saw her pull scraps from the dumpster. An entire tray of old donuts—glazed and jelly, I think. And a bag of hot dogs."
"I wouldn't doubt it," Tohilda said. "They are the poorest of the poor. Most of them never get a square meal. The parents do all they can to keep their little ones fed."
I reached into my pocket and found a ten dollar bill. I dropped it on the table. "Buy two meatloaf specials for them. Can you do that?"
Tohilda took the money. "Why certainly, Griselda. Maybe it's time you joined the Society."
I shook my head. "No. Not right now. I only wanted to tell you about Mercy."
After finishing up my chores around the library and the SOAP women made their ritualistic exit. In silence. I locked up for the day.
The air had turned crisp and very cool as October air rustled the leaves on the ground. I could smell wood smoke and burning leaves and rubbish and for the first time that season I believed autumn had gotten a grip on Bright's Pond.
Still not thrilled with Zeb's jealousy over Cliff, I decided to head for the café—just to check on things. He was there and so was Gilda. I hadn't seen her at the café much that week, but there she was in all her skinny, bosomy glory once again dragging a straw through her lips while Zeb watched.
"Hey," I said.
Zeb looked my way and smiled. "Grizzy, hey. Come on in. Sit here." He indicated the stool next to Gilda. I debated whether to sit or take a booth but decided to sit next to her. Maybe I could wheedle some information out of her.
"Gilda tells me the doctors are hopeful that Walter will wake up," Zeb said.
"Really?" I said turning in her direction. "That's good news. How do they know?"
"His eyes fluttered and he seemed to be coming out of it, but then he fell back into that stupid coma."
"Oh, that's frustrating," I said. " But maybe good news. Maybe he's . . . he's closer to the surface."
"We can only hope."
I turned back to Zeb. "Has Cliff been in today?"
"Why do you want to know that?"
"I was just wondering. I might want to take another spin in his plane."
"Now isn't that cozy? Just the two of you up in the air like that. It smacks of a little romance to me."
