A Thousand Generations

by Traci DePree

  AFTER SHE GOT HOME from her breakfast with Livvy, Kate decided that a little baking would clear her mind of the clutter that filled it. There was something cathartic about it that sparked new ideas and refocused her troubled thoughts. She was determined not to let the gossip bother her, yet she couldn’t deny that it did.

  So she pulled out several of her favorite cookbooks and paged through, looking for something delicious to make. Finally she decided on cranberry scones with fresh cream. Her mouth watered at the thought of the treat.

  She set the oven at 350 degrees, then moved to the cupboard and got out the needed ingredients, as well as eggs, butter, and sour cream from the refrigerator. She gathered her measuring and mixing utensils and began to mete out the flour into the bowl of her heavy stand mixer on the counter. Once everything had been added, she turned the beater on and let her mind drift back to Phillip and the mannequin.

  Phillip had insisted on his innocence regarding the mannequin’s theft, and she hadn’t asked him about the note she’d found on his desk. He’d give some sort of reasonable explanation that would either be true or false, yet deep down she believed in her friend’s innocence and was determined to prove it.

  She thought of his comment that whoever knew the history of the mannequin had to be behind the attempted break-in. A part of her believed that. Whoever the man with the limp was, he’d been after something. Had he been the one to steal the mannequin, or was he perhaps working with Phillip? Kate didn’t want to suspect her dear friend, but the fact that his watch was found near where the mannequin had syood was compelling. Although Phillip’s story that he left the watch in the Bristol’s restroom was equally believable. If the man they’d seen that night had gone into the bathroom after Phillip and took it, it made sense that he might have planted it at Weston’s to make Phillip look guilty. But without some connection, she was at a dead end.

  She turned off the mixer, then kneaded and rolled out the dough, cutting it into wedges and placing the scones in the warm oven. While they baked, she whipped up the heavy cream and sugar with a small hand mixer, then washed the dishes in hot, soapy water at the sink. Fifteen minutes later, the timer sounded and she bent to pull the perfectly golden scones from the oven.

  She broke off a corner, popped it in her mouth, and allowed it to melt on her tongue. It was delicious! Her thoughts ambled back to the mystery. If she was at a dead end, she realized, all she needed to do was chip away at what little she had to go on. And that meant finding out who the Colt .380-wearing gangster Jack Leonetti was, and what, if any, connection there was between him and Horace Hanlon. Until results came back on whether there were any identifiable fingerprints at Eli’s, it was the best tangible lead she had.

  She turned on her computer to search for Leonetti on the Internet, but there were only a handful of links, and nothing that specifically connected him with Copper Mill. Finally she decided to see if the Harrington County Historical Society in Pine Ridge could offer up any information. At least it was worth a try.

  She called Phillip at the store to see if he needed her there.

  “I’d like to come along,” he said when she told him about her plans to visit the historical society and see what she could learn about Jack Leonetti and his possible connection to Horace’s mannequin.

  “Are you sure?” Kate recalled his earlier offer of help. “You have a lot to do at the store.”

  “You know me better than anyone else in this town, Kate. I’m innocent and I need to prove it for everyone’s sake, so that we can all move on.” The note about the wooden lady flashed into her mind, and she debated about bringing it up. “My reputation is on the line. I know how small towns work; if I don’t get my name cleared, my business might as well shut down before I even open the doors.”

  “You’re right about that, and I know how you feel,” Kate said. Hadn’t they seen evidence of that same phenomenon in the decreased numbers at church the day before? She had seen firsthand how rumors spread and kept those hurt by their barbs at a distance. She realized that the same motive was driving her to research the mannequin’s origins. Like Phillip, Paul’s good name and reputation, as well as her own, were clearly on the line based upon Renee Lambert’s recent comments.

  She agreed to his coming, though she cautioned herself to keep her eyes open and not allow her affection for Phillip to distract her from the truth should it point in another direction.

  AT ROUGHLY ELEVEN O’CLOCK, the two headed to Pine Ridge. Phillip was quiet during much of the drive along the curving roads from Copper Mill to the bigger town.

  Kate studied his profile before saying, “Are you going to be okay?”

  “I don’t know.” He paused, and Kate waited for him to continue.

  “Is it the arrest or what happened yesterday at the store?” she finally asked.

  “No.” He shook his head, then lifted his face to the driver’s-side window as a view of the valley spread to their left. It was a beautiful warm May day. The sky was a vivid blue, not a cloud in sight.

  “It goes deeper than that,” he said, sighing heavily. “This is a chronic pain, Kate. A long-term thing. I thought I was making progress yesterday after talking to Paul. That I was finally forgiving God for taking Ginny away from me.”

  He watched the road ahead. “I’ve been running from reality for three years. Do you know that? Three years of not accepting that she’s really gone. It’s crazy. In all my self-consumed agony, I’ve hurt Eric. I know he feels abandoned by my moving here. He tried to tell me before I left, but I didn’t want to hear it. I wanted to escape. But it’s no better here.” He let out a strained laugh. “It’s much worse, actually!” Then he sighed. “I want to make it right. I want to be close to my son while I still have time.”

  “You do have time,” Kate said.

  “I hope so, Kate...” He shook his head again. “I really hope so.”

  THE HISTORICAL SOCIETY and the Harrington County Museum were housed together in an ancient school in the heart of Pine Ridge.

  Kate and Phillip made their way into the foyer and up the steps. She had taken the time to pray with him before getting out of the car, and it seemed to have taken the weight from his shoulders, if only for now.

  Upstairs on the left was a room with rows of tables, piles of documents, files, and old newspapers, as well as bookcases filled with similar materials. The room had a musty smell of attics and mothballs. To the right was the entrance to the museum, where displays on mining, the Civil War, and assorted events of interest informed visitors of Harrington County’s past.

  Miriam McLaughlin, an active member of the historical society and a Pine Ridge emergency-room doctor’s wife, was seated at a long table in the room on the left, bent over a stack of yellowed newspapers. Another woman, who looked to be in her mid- to late-forties, sat beside her, similarly bent in study.

  Miriam lifted her head when Kate and Phillip made their way into the room.

  “Kate.” She smiled, revealing deep dimples in her cheeks and straight, white teeth.

  “Miriam McLaughlin.” She motioned to Phillip. “This is Phillip Loving...He’s new to the area. He’s opening an antiques store in Copper Mill.”

  Phillip nodded to the ladies.

  “It’s nice to meet you,” Miriam said. “I think there was mention of your new store in the paper?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Phillip said.

  Miriam turned to the woman next to her. “This is Lila Paisley. She’s a volunteer here at the historical society.”

  The fortyish woman offered a greeting and pushed the chair back so she could stand.

  “You can call me Lila,” she said, reaching to shake hands first with Kate and then with Phillip.

  Lila was a petite woman with dark auburn hair that was swept into a neat ponytail that reached just past her shoulders. Sunlight from the large schoolhouse windows brought out the hair’s red highlights.

  “Did you want to tour the museum?” Lila asked.

  �
�Lila gives a great tour,” Miriam added, to which the other woman blushed.

  “Maybe another time,” Phillip said apologetically, nodding at Lila. “We’re actually here to do some research.”

  “Of course.” Lila smiled sweetly and returned to her place at the table.

  Miriam cut in, “What is it you’re researching?”

  “We want to find out about a man named Jack Leonetti...,” Kate began.

  Miriam nodded.

  “You’ve heard of him?” Phillip asked.

  “You mean the gangster Jack Leonetti?”

  “That’s the one,” Kate said, a bit surprised that Miriam already knew of the man.

  “Oh yes,” the historian said, “I’ve heard the name. We have a bit of information on him somewhere in the back, I’m sure.”

  She led Kate and Phillip to the archives, which were no more than stacks of cardboard boxes on deep storage shelves, a scattered nightmare in a section labeled “1930.”

  “Because the historical society is made up of volunteers,” Miriam explained apologetically, “the cataloguing and organization of a particular era’s articles and photographs is entirely random, I’m afraid.”

  “At least it’s a start,” Kate said.

  “I’ll be in the next room if you have questions,” Miriam said. “And if you want to bring boxes to the table to look through, that’s fine too. It’s more comfortable than standing back here.”

  The corners of her eyes crinkled up in a smile, and she returned to the outer room. Kate pulled the nearest box out and took it to the long table in the adjoining room, where Miriam and Lila had resumed working. She began to look through the box’s contents while Phillip followed with another. The boxes were the type used for under-bed storage, so they held a lot of information. Kate sifted through article after article about unrelated topics for more than an hour when she came upon a small paperback book titled The Life and Times of Jack Leonetti.

  “Someone wrote a book about him?” Kate held up the volume. The other three lifted their heads to see what she was talking about.

  “Oh really?” Miriam said, her eyes widening.

  Kate flipped the front cover open. The book was written by a man named Roy Simmonds and printed in Chattanooga by a company called My Book Publishing. The copyright was 1948.

  “Have you heard of this publisher?” she asked Miriam, showing her the name from across the table.

  Miriam nodded. “It was a vanity press. We have several volumes put out by them.”

  Kate cracked open the ancient volume and began to read silently to herself:

  This information has been gathered from newspaper articles, interviews with people who knew Jack Leonetti, and firsthand accounts of his exploits.

  Kate wondered if the author might have interviewed Horace.

  It was July 4, 1895, in St. Louis, Missouri, when Jack Leonetti was born to Andrea Leonetti, a single mother who struggled to meet the needs of her young son. By the time Jack was in grade school, he was already bent on mischief, often getting into fights. By the age of fourteen, he had dropped out of school and was well on the road to a life of crime.

  Kate scanned the chapter that talked of Jack’s early life and first venture into criminal activity. The book chronicled a very sad existence in which Jack seemed bent on nothing more than selfish ambition and monetary gain. So far there was no mention of Horace Hanlon or their fishing encounter.

  The tenth chapter, however, got her full attention. It began with a snippet from a Pine Ridge newspaper, dated August 1, 1930. The headline read: MERCHANTS NATIONAL ROBBED WHILE CAMERAS ROLLED.

  Kate drew a sharp breath when she realized that was the same summer Horace had taken the men and teenage boy fishing.

  “What is it?” Phillip asked, lifting his head from his research.

  “There was a bank robbery right here in Pine Ridge in 1930.”

  “Jack Leonetti?” he guessed.

  Kate nodded, then read the section from the book out loud:

  Employees at Merchants National Bank received quite a surprise yesterday when they discovered that they had been robbed by notorious gangster Jack Leonetti. As the banker at Merchants National, I was there that day, when a supposed film crew arranged to come in and shoot a scene for an upcoming movie involving a bank robbery. Yet when the heist was done, thousands of dollars were gone from the Pine Ridge bank, and it was no act!

  “It all seemed like a real movie,” so said fellow bank executive Allan Todd of the event. “They were very respectful when they came in, asking permission to film a scene of their movie, even joking with the employees and telling them where to stand for each shot. They did several takes too.”

  The alleged producers told employees that there was a chance other filmmakers would see them in the show, perhaps launching their own rise to fame.

  The employees got fame all right, but not the kind they had envisioned. Instead, they’ll be known for falling for a major scam.

  No one questioned when the “actors” went into the vault and filled their bags with cash while the cameras rolled!

  “We’re just thankful there was no bloodshed,” one bank employee said.

  When later shown pictures of Jack Leonetti, the bank employees confirmed that he had indeed been the ring leader of this crime. If anyone has knowledge of the whereabouts of this man or any of the men he hired to act out this scam, please advise the authorities.

  Kate lifted her gaze to Phillip’s when she’d finished.

  “Wow,” he whispered. “So it’s all true.”

  Leonetti had indeed been in the area at the time Horace claimed, and he’d robbed a bank right there in Pine Ridge.

  “So the money?” Phillip asked.

  “My guess?” Kate said. “The cash we found in Eli’s mannequin. Unless there was more than one bank robbery in Pine Ridge that month.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  After getting a quick lunch, Kate dropped Phillip off at his shop. She decided to call Sheriff Roberts to see if he’d found out anything about the origin of the bills he’d sent to the lab.

  When Roberts answered the call, Kate dove right in. “I’m calling about those bills, Sheriff. Did you ever find out where they were from?”

  “Oh, didn’t Eli tell you?” the sheriff said.

  “No...,” Kate replied. “Tell me what?”

  “We got the results.”

  Kate was a bit hurt but not surprised that Eli hadn’t called, given his general lack of communication since the previous Wednesday.

  “And?” Kate said.

  “I’m afraid we have a match, Kate.”

  “A match to what?” she said, though she was pretty sure she knew what his answer would be.

  Kate heard the officer pause, as if measuring how much to tell her. Then he said, “The serial numbers match money stolen from Merchants National Bank in Pine Ridge.”

  Kate’s heart dropped into her stomach. “In 1930?” she said.

  “How did you know?” he asked.

  “I’ve been looking into it.”

  “Since the robbery happened a long time ago, the statute of limitations has run out. We couldn’t prosecute even if the offenders are still living, but the money had to go back to the bank. There’s no statute on that.”

  She thanked him and was about to say farewell when the officer added, “Kate, you’ll let me or Skip know if you recall or discover anything else about the incident at Phillip’s or Eli’s stores, won’t you?”

  There was a pause as if he was waiting for her to say something.

  “Anything else...like what?” Kate asked. “You mean if I find the mannequin?”

  “That would be helpful,” he admitted with a laugh, “but I was thinking of something more subtle—any statements Phillip or others might’ve made to you. That kind of thing.”

  Kate searched her mind for anything Phillip might have said that could point toward his guilt.

  Finally she realized there was something. Sh
e said, “I don’t know if this has anything to do with the case or not, but there was a note on Phillip’s desk.” She knew it was incriminating and wasn’t proof of his guilt or innocence, and she felt horrible for mentioning it, yet she couldn’t stand in the way of justice if Phillip had been involved.

  “Okay...”

  “I saw it just before that man tried to break in. It said, ‘Estimate on wooden lady?’”

  “Is that all it said?”

  “Yes,” Kate confirmed as dread settled in her stomach.

  The sheriff thanked her and hung up.

  THAT NIGHT AFTER Kate and Paul had finished washing the supper dishes and settled down for the evening, Kate went into her bedroom and dialed Rebecca’s number. It had only been a couple of days since they’d last spoken, but Kate was curious to know what Rebecca had learned about her new friend, and if she’d been able to help her in any way.

  The line rang several times, and Kate was about to hang up when Rebecca’s voice came on the line. “Hello?”

  “Hi, honey,” Kate said.

  “Oh, Mom!” Rebecca sounded relieved. “I’m so glad you called. I wanted to talk to you.”

  Kate could hear a television in the background playing the same detective show that Paul was watching in the living room. It clicked to silence while Paul’s droned on.

  “There’s been so much going on.”

  “You mean aside from your day job and play rehearsals?” Kate said, causing Rebecca to laugh.

  “Yeah, I mean besides that. I did call Melody like you said. It seemed weird to just ask her out of the blue if she’d been beaten or whatever, so I asked her to coffee instead. I figured it would be better to talk.”

  “That’s a great idea,” Kate said.

  “I really like her, Mom. When we first met, we had one of those instant connections, you know what I mean? When you meet someone, and it’s like you’ve always known them.”

  “I do know what you mean,” Kate said, thinking of Livvy Jenner. Kate and the town librarian had the same instant connection when they’d met, and friendship seemed a foregone conclusion.