The Darcy & Flora Boxed Set

by Blanche Day Manos

  There was a lot here I didn’t understand. “But isn’t Andrea’s disappearance sufficient reason to have the file opened?”

  “It might be—if there was anything at all that pointed a finger of suspicion at Tom Mott, but there isn’t. Mott was at home all that week of her disappearance. He’s clean as a whistle.”

  “And bank records, I suppose, are all considered confidential.”

  Hopper nodded. “But that changes when a body is found.” He drummed his fingers on the desk. “So we need to figure out where she is. And that, Darcy, is my gut feeling about what happened to Andrea Mott Worth.”

  So Andrea’s story began in the Texas panhandle town of Amarillo and ended in Levi, Oklahoma. I was dialing Lee Davis’s phone number as I slid into my Escape.

  Chapter 5

  After my interview with Steve Hopper I hurried home to Levi, anxious to see what modern technology could tell me about Andrea’s first husband. I also needed to research two other cases of women who had mysteriously disappeared without a clue. Although my book would focus on Andrea Worth, something may have turned up on the other two missing women that would help in our search for Sophie’s daughter.

  The only thing to do was to go to Amarillo and start digging. Even if it turned out that Tom Mott wasn’t involved in her disappearance, their very short marriage had obviously been vitriolic at times, and the repercussions from that were sure to be rooted in Andrea’s hometown. The purchase of an adjoining ranch so soon after their marriage looked suspicious in itself, and even if we couldn’t get financial details, there was bound to be folks around town who knew the family and were willing to talk.

  Mom was sweeping off the front porch when I turned into the driveway. She always insisted the porch should be as clean as the living room floor.

  Putting the broom aside, she walked down the steps. “Well, what did you learn from Grant? Was your trip worthwhile?”

  Before I could reply, she continued. “I’m sure you didn’t stop for lunch and it’s almost three o’clock. Come on in the house. I’ve made sandwiches.”

  When we were seated at the kitchen table, I told her about talking with Steve Hopper. Then I asked, “How would you like to go to Amarillo tomorrow?”

  I thought she’d be surprised, but my mother quite often was one jump ahead of me.

  “I was just thinking last night that we ought to go to Amarillo,” she said. “After all, that’s where Andrea was married the first time, and where she lived and worked for quite a while. It stands to reason there’s stuff there we ought to know if we’re going to find out what happened.”

  “Good. I thought we’d leave early in the morning. I’ve already called Detective Lee Davis. Steve Hopper said he was the officer who did all the background work there, and Davis can see me at four o’clock tomorrow. Maybe we can spend a couple of nights in Amarillo and do a little sightseeing while we’re investigating.”

  Mom smiled. “I’ll bet we can find a little café there, too, just like Dilly’s. I’ll bet this Davis man can tell us if there’s an eating place like that. We can go there for lunch and hear a lot of gossip. Sometimes, Darcy, there’s a nugget of truth in gossip if a person listens hard. I’ll give Sophie a call and tell her we are coming.”

  Taking my sandwich and coffee, I went upstairs to crank up my computer. Stories of the missing women stuck in my mind because they were particularly poignant. Through the internet, I could read accounts from several different sources. They were bound to contain facts that were new to me.

  After a lot of reading, I found that the two women who disappeared into thin air like Andrea Worth were both in their early thirties. One of them lived in Naples, Florida. She vanished in nearly the same fashion as Andrea. Her husband went to work one morning, leaving his wife in the shower. She never did show up for her job as a dental hygienist, but her handbag was missing and her car was discovered later in the parking lot at a local restaurant. That was in October of 1995. No trace of that poor woman ever surfaced. And I found nothing more than that which was similar to Andrea.

  The second woman lived near Fredericksburg, Virginia. She was divorced, with a five-year-old son. She drove the boy six blocks to his kindergarten class, then presumably went to her job in a real estate office. Instead, she apparently dropped off the edge of the earth—until 1999 when her body was uncovered in a shallow grave a few miles from her home. There were no clues, no witnesses, no motive, and no evidence at all. In both cases, the husbands were out of town. Real puzzlers. At least the body of that woman had been found although no one was ever convicted of her murder.

  I made notes on both cases, then turned my attention to Tom Mott. There was no information on his early years, except that he was the only son of Douglas and Clara Mott who owned and operated a small ranch near Amarillo. Douglas Mott was also a partner in a small local trucking company. Both Motts were killed when their car was hit by a drunken driver. Tom Mott, of course, inherited quite a bit of property. But that didn’t seem sufficient to explain the purchase of the ranch he and Andrea bought shortly after their marriage.

  Tom Mott had never been married before he met Andrea, and had always lived on the small ranch with his parents. Perhaps he had some money of his own that he invested wisely. Or perhaps his father was a much shrewder money manager than he appeared to be. I was betting that Lieutenant Davis could fill us in on where Tom’s money actually came from.

  As I sat puzzling over this information, I heard Mom downstairs talking to someone on the phone, probably Sophie. If nothing came from our involvement in this, at least Mom and Andrea’s mother had become friends. They talked back and forth several times by phone.

  Turning off my computer, I pulled my small suitcase out of the closet.

  Chapter 6

  “Wake up, sleepyhead! We are coming into Amarillo.”

  Mom yawned and rubbed her eyes. “Did I go to sleep?”

  “Probably a hundred or so miles back.”

  “I like to get up with the chickens, but 4 a.m. is a bit early, even for me.”

  “I told Lee Davis that I’d meet him in his office at four this afternoon. That was the only time he had available on such short notice. Amarillo is a long way from Levi so that meant we had to rattle our hocks. Sorry for interrupting your beauty sleep.”

  Mom laughed. “Rattle our . . . . I guess being out here on the prairie is causing you to talk like a westerner.”

  “Could be. The air is so clean and light, it’s probably going to my head; affecting my brain.”

  Mom reached behind her for a bottle of water. “Hmm. I’ll keep that in mind. I like being able to see for miles and miles. Sure is different than the hills and trees of northeast Oklahoma.”

  “Flat. Plains, grass, windmills, and several oil wells. Lots of cattle enjoy the grass on these plains. Plenty of room here for ranches. But you’re right, Mom, it is very different from Levi.”

  “It’s beautiful in its own way, and I imagine these prairies hold some surprises, once a person is out in them, maybe riding a horse through that grass. Notice those arroyos, Darcy. A horse or a cow could fall into one of those and break a leg. I’ve heard that after a big rain, some of these dry gulches become flooded creeks. They could be dangerous.”

  Mom was gazing out the window probably imagining what it might be like to live on the prairie.

  “Amarillo is the largest city in the Panhandle of Texas and quite historic. There are lots of interesting sites. One thing that has always fascinated me is the Palo Duro Canyon. I’d like to see it,” I said.

  “So would I. I’ve seen pictures of it. We’ll have to come back when we have a whole lot more time to stay.” She looked down at her map. “Up ahead is where we leave I-40. We want to look for Sixth Avenue. It follows old Route 66.”

  “Shops along Sixth are trying to retain the flavor of the ’40s, ’50s, and ’60s, I hear. They really are attractive! It’s like stepping back in time several decades. Look at those storefronts, Mom. Nea
t!”

  “Yes. Sophie said her shop is right along the street. Can’t miss it, she said. She told me that her sign is on the front window, Sophie’s.”

  “Just ‘Sophie’s’?”

  “That’s what she said.”

  Antique shops fascinated me with items that people used long ago and were no longer needed.

  “If I owned an antique shop, I would think of a more romantic, picturesque name like Past Presents, Bustles and Bonnets, A Backward Look, Lanterns and Lamplight . . . .”

  “Rub Boards and Red Hands, Corsets and . . . here it is, Darcy. Pull in right here.”

  I eased the Escape into an empty parking space. We got out of the car and stretched. “A long drive. Do you think you’re ever going to overcome your phobia about flying, Mom?”

  She frowned. “Phobia? It’s not a phobia, it’s common sense. Just think about it, Darcy; when you’re on an airplane, there’s nothing under you but air for thousands of feet and you sure can’t get out to stretch your legs.”

  A storefront window reached from ceiling to floor on a shop that kids nowadays would call “retro.” “Sophie’s” was in gold letters above a spinning wheel, a kerosene lamp, and a rocking chair.

  A bell tinkled as we stepped inside a room bright with chandeliers fashioned from wagon wheels. A small, gray-haired woman in a floor-length blue cotton dress rushed to meet us.

  Although I had never meet Sophie Williams, this woman acted as if my mother and I were old friends or members of her family. She hugged first Mom and then me.

  Her dark eyes glistened with tears. “I know who you are. You don’t have to tell me. Oh, Flora, Darcy, I am so glad to see you. How wonderful to meet you in person. Come on in. My office is in back. I’m sure you are thirsty. I have a big pot of coffee and a refrigerator stocked with Cokes.”

  Sophie turned to a younger woman standing behind the counter who was ringing up a sale on an old-fashioned cash register. She, too, wore a dress straight out of the 19th century, a red print with white ruffles on the long sleeves. These women’s fashions certainly added to the aura of stepping into the past.

  “Carol, I want you to meet Flora Tucker and Darcy Campbell from Levi, Oklahoma. Carol has been my right hand since Andrea left to marry Gary. Can you please take care of customers for a bit, Carol, while I talk to our visitors?”

  The woman smiled. “Sure. Nice to meet you two.”

  We shook hands with Carol then followed Sophie past butter churns, flatirons, cane-bottomed chairs, coffee grinders, sets of brightly colored dishes, and a bedroom suite complete with canopy bed. She opened a door at the back of the shop and stood aside for us to enter.

  Sophie’s office was snug and homey. Pale yellow curtains covered a small window. A ledger, telephone, and computer sat on her desk. A framed picture of a smiling young woman was turned so that I got a good look at her before I sat down. Andrea. The resemblance between mother and daughter was striking.

  Sophie settled us into two over-stuffed chairs and stood facing us.

  “Would you prefer coffee or a Coke?” she asked.

  We said “Coffee” in unison.

  Sophie laughed. “Nothing like a good cup to restore a person. You both must be tired out. I appreciate your making that long drive. I’ve been wanting to talk to you in person. You said on the phone last night, Flora, that Darcy is to talk to Lee Davis today. I’m glad. I’ve talked to him several times, but I think it’s best if you hear what he has to say firsthand instead of through me.”

  We accepted the coffee that Sophie brought us in white china cups with tiny pink roses around the inside, with a thin, gold ring circling the top. The same pattern was repeated in the saucers. An admirer of antiquity, I handled the fragile cup reverently.

  “While Darcy is talking with Mr. Davis, I thought I would see about renting a room for the night,” Mom said. “Which motel would you recommend, Sophie?”

  “Hotel Sophie Williams,” she said promptly.

  “Oh, no,” Mom protested.

  “Now listen,” Sophie said, “I will feel really hurt if you don’t come home with me. I have a big old empty house and several spare bedrooms. There’s not a reason in the world for you to go to an impersonal motel.”

  Refusing this woman really would wound her sense of hospitality. Mom looked at me and nodded.

  “We thank you, Sophie,” Mom said. “We certainly did not expect you to be burdened with us.”

  “No burden,” Sophie assured us. “I hope you stay long enough to see a few of our Amarillo attractions, and I want you to be sure and go out to look at Andrea’s ranch.”

  “Do you mean the ranch she and Tom Mott bought?” I asked.

  Sophie shook her head. “Oh my, no. What I mean is the ranch that Andrea’s grandmother left her. It’s southeast of town, past the Palo Duro Canyon which, by the way, is worth the trip in itself. This ranch of Andrea’s, the Inglenook, is the biggest ranch around; a whole lot bigger than Tom’s spread.”

  This was an unexpected twist. “So the ranch did not belong to both Tom and Andrea? It was only Andrea’s?”

  Sophie nodded. “Yes. It has been passed down to Williams descendants for four generations. In her will, Andrea’s grandmother Williams stipulated that it must never be owned by anyone who wasn’t a Williams descendant or the spouse of a descendant. So that’s one thing Tom didn’t get his hands on. Yet.”

  A note of bitterness crept into Sophie’s voice. I was about to question her further when I heard a loud noise out in the store.

  “No! I want to see Aunt Sophie! I definitely will not talk to anyone else!” shouted an unseen female.

  Sophie sighed and rose to her feet. “I’m sorry. Sounds like it’s my niece, Charlene, again. I’ll be back as quickly as I can.”

  Before Sophie reached the office door, it flew open and a young woman with stand-up spiky blond hair, whose heavily made-up face resembled a thundercloud burst into the small room. She carried a kerosene lamp with a lovely glass shade, half of it broken off.

  She thrust the lamp toward Sophie. “Look at my lamp! Your hired help didn’t wrap it well and when I got home, I found this. And now the impudent woman won’t refund my money. She said I probably dropped it!”

  “See if you can find a replacement, Charlene,” Sophie said, reaching for the lamp. “If you can’t, of course I’ll give you your money back. If you’ll calm down, I’d like you to meet . . . .”

  But Charlene stomped out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

  Sophie set the lamp on her desk and ran a hand across her forehead. “I’m sorry. That Texas tornado was my niece . . . actually, my husband’s niece, Charlene Williams. Charlene is a story all in herself and I’m afraid it isn’t a pleasant one.”

  “We’re listening, if you want to tell us,” Mom said quietly.

  Sophie sank into her upholstered desk chair.

  “It goes way, way back. Charlene is a few years younger than Andrea and she was always jealous of my daughter. I’m not sure why. And her temperament is not the best, I’m afraid. Maybe she is actually a lot like her grandmother. Grandma Williams was a mean-tempered old gal.”

  I couldn’t muffle a giggle.

  “Excuse me, but she was. And bullheaded! I have never seen anybody as stubborn as my mother-in-law. Anyway, she stipulated in her will that the Inglenook Ranch was to go to Andrea. That didn’t set well with Charlene because there were only the two grandchildren: Andrea and Charlene. She thought Grandma Williams should have divided the ranch, but that piece of Texas has been handed down intact from one Williams to the next for four generations and that’s the way it’s going to stay.”

  Sophie’s strong coffee was beginning to make me feel human again. I carefully set the empty cup with its saucer on her desk.

  “So Charlene didn’t much like Andrea?”

  “No, she didn’t. And I guess she has taken as her mission in life to make me miserable. She wants me to talk to a lawyer about breaking Mom Williams’ wi
ll. She wants Andrea declared dead, but we can’t do that yet. It has been only two years and I keep hoping my daughter is alive—somewhere. Anyway, that little episode with the lamp is an example of one of the ways Charlene keeps needling me. I don’t know about that girl.” She shook her head. “Sometimes I think her brain is addled.”

  “I’d like to talk to her,” I said. “Do you have her phone number?”

  “Yes, I have it,” Sophie said. “But you don’t have to meet Lee Davis ’til 4:00. Let me take you out to my house and get you settled in my guest room. You can unwind and rest a bit after that long drive

  Chapter 7

  Sophie’s white frame house, shaded by giant cottonwoods, sat at the end of a long driveway in a quiet neighborhood. Three round columns supported a wrap-around porch. Low-growing herbs, still green, bordered the walk. When Mom and I walked up the steps behind Sophie, I could see why she loved this place. And Andrea—had she loved it, too?

  Braided rugs were scattered across the pine floor in a large, sunny room. “Sophie, your house is wonderful,” Mom said.

  “Thank you. It is where Andrea grew up. My husband and I moved here after we were married and I’ve lived here ever since.”

  She showed us to our upstairs room. Bright Texas sunlight streamed in through large windows hung with white crisscross curtains. Handmade quilts covered the twin beds. Suddenly, I realized how tired I was.

  We dropped our suitcases on the floor. “This is lovely, Sophie,” I said. “We can’t thank you enough.”

  She waved away our gratitude. “I’m honored that you are here. The bathroom is right through that door. Help yourself to whatever is in the refrigerator in the kitchen and just pull the door closed behind you when you leave. It’ll lock. I’m going to have to get back to the shop.”