Easy as One Two Three (A Flap Tucker Mystery) Read online

  Mrs. McDonner sat down. I don’t think she even knew she’d done it. Her husband was shaking his head. Cedar was clearly flamboozled, I believe that’s the technical name for his state of affairs. Dally was just staring at the ghost. I was the only one smiling.

  It was clear that I was smiling at the original little girl of Lost Pines. “So you are Christy Rayburn.”

  Cedar was talking almost to himself. “How is that … how is that possible?”

  Dally finally smiled too. She was smiling at me. “Flap, when you tell a story …”

  “… I just got to get the punch line in the right place.” I turned back to the old lady. “Feel like telling us what’s really happening here?”

  She waved her hand like she was mean-swatting at a fly. “I don’t care.”

  Cedar was stuck on one note. “How could you be Christy Rayburn?”

  She ignored him and lashed out at the McDonners. “This town owes me! That land is mine, by rights. I ought to be the one to make all that money.” She jutted her face at the floor. “Only I couldn’t tell.”

  I lowered my voice. “Tell what?”

  Her shoulders sagged. “Everything. I couldn’t tell.”

  Dally’s voice was very soothing. “But now you can.”

  The old lady was looking away, very downhearted and downcast and down-whatever-ed. “What’s the difference … now?”

  Dally tried to get her to look up. “The difference is … that now you can let all the secrets out. You can open the doors and let everything out. The big one’s already in the open.”

  I knew Dally was sort of fishing for a response, the way I did a lot of times, but it had the right effect. Ms. Rayburn nodded.

  She creaked out a long and difficult sigh. I swear it sounded a little like the cellar door falling open at the abandoned farm. Then she began to speak, staring down at the wooden floor.

  “My daddy used to beat me regular. For nothin’. Got used to it. Stayed away from ’im, mostly. Mama was no help. She stayed away all she could too. I tried askin’ her for help. She’d just say, ‘Don’ make ’im mad, ’at’s all.’ But ever’thing made him mad. He was just mean as a snake. An’ drunk most all the time.” She looked up, right at Cedar. “They all knew. Ever’body in town knew what was goin’ on out there. The law knew. Knew about the moonshine too. Never did the first thing about it. People of this town.” She said it like a curse.

  Mrs. McDonner shook her head like she hadn’t heard any of Ms. Rayburn’s little speech. “You’re my Ginny’s great-aunt Christy.”

  The old lady shook her head too. “Don’ want no parta that family. You all never did help me when I was Christy. Just as soon be Miss Nina.”

  Mrs. McDonner looked at her husband. He looked down. He couldn’t have been any more than a boy himself when all that had happened to Christy, but I could tell, all the same, the guilt that was washing his face.

  Cedar still wanted answers. “Why didn’t you ever tell anybody? Where did you go after the house burned down? When did you come back here? Why did you come back?”

  Miss Nina smiled. It wasn’t pretty. “I come rushin’ home one night to show Daddy that jar of fireflies. He lit out after me like a fire truck. Grab the jar. Broke it on my head. Cut me good. Then wailed into me with a poker from the fire under his still. I just run. Hid out till after dark, when I knew he’d be passed out. I just done had it with all that. Snuck back. Saw him asleepin’ in the still room. Took up a brand from the fire. Set the whole place aflame. Stood by an’ watched it burn too. Burn to the ground with both of ’em in it. Good riddance.”

  Cedar was stone-faced.

  Mr. McDonner spoke up. “You burned the farm?”

  “I did.” She began rocking. “Watched it go to the ground.”

  Cedar’s voice was not his own. “Where did you go then?”

  She rocked more steadily now. “Had kin up in Mossy Creek. Took me two, three days to walk over to ’em. Told ’em the house burned down with Mama an’ Daddy in it. Told ’em it was on account of Daddy’s still. Word got out. Ever’body thought it’s true. I ask ’em not to tell where I was. Said I was scared. This was back … the war was still on. We didn’t have no electric lights ner phone ner even indoor wash. It was a different world from today.”

  Cedar nodded. “And nobody here in Lost Pines knew?”

  She sighed. “Not many.”

  I took a flying guess. “Sydney Wicher knew — something.”

  She nodded. “We was goin’ on bein’ sweethearts. I b’lieve he woulda courted me … if I’d lived.”

  I knew what she meant. The whole town thought she was dead. And she didn’t mind it that way. It was better for the big town guilt, the collective sense that produces ghosts in the first place.

  She was still rocking a little. “I guess I was a wild girl. I didn’t stay over in Mossy Creek no longer than I had to. Went down to Marietta, work for that Lockheed. Good job.”

  Mr. McDonner piped up. “Lotsa people up here in the mountains did that after the war.”

  Miss Nina stopped rocking finally. “But even after a good long while I still couldn’t stop thinkin’ about how I’d been done. I got to thinkin’ about what all this town owed me — what I owed it … in retribution. I come back for my revenge.”

  I was thinking there had to be some kind of psychological name for her particular situation, when it occurred to me what might have been happening with Wicher.

  I lit in. “So you're the reason Wicher went after Ginny.”

  She looked at me like I was nuts — a look I’m used to. “No. Sydney saw those two morons get her, and he followed after all on his own.” Her voice softened. “He was a good man.”

  I tried again. “But he married somebody else. Was he one of your revenge objects?”

  “Sydney? No. I left town — he thought I was dead for a while there too. He did what he had to. By the time I’d come back to town, I don’t believe he even recognized me. Nobody did. You change a lot in thirty years.”

  I folded my arms. “Took you that long to get back up here?”

  She nodded. “Married myself. Had a child. Buried my husband — lung cancer. Child went off.” She looked me in the eye. “I had another life. When it was over, I come back here.”

  Another life. Another story.

  Cedar nodded, thinking. “This place been open about twenty, twenty-one years?”

  She nodded back.

  He looked around. “And in all that time nobody knew who you were?”

  She got a shine on her face. “Oh, I made myself known when I had to.”

  I caught it. “You started most of the rumors and legends about seeing the ghost of the little girl. To keep the guilt alive.”

  She smiled. I believe I’ve mentioned the nature of that particular expression, but the temperature in the room dropped noticeably.

  I leaned back. “So are you ready to fill us in about the deal with the land and the kidnapping?”

  She dropped the smile. “What about it?”

  I tilted my head. “For example the two morons you mentioned? They didn’t work for Hainey …”

  Dally got it two seconds before everybody else. “… Don’t say it.”

  I had to. I fixed hard on Miss Nina. “They worked for you.”

  She froze.

  I shrugged. “They all but told me already.”

  She looked away. “Those morons.”

  I defended them. “They were worried about the kid.”

  She shook her head, disgusted.

  I went on. “So you hired them when you heard Hainey was slingin’ around a wad of big dough. And since you figured the land he really wanted was rightfully yours anyway, you had the idea you could get it from the McDonners and then sell it to Hainey; clean up.”

  She didn’t move.

  I was hot. “But the thugs bungled it. How did you get in touch with them in the first place, anyway? How does a gal like you know customers like that?”

&nbs
p; She tried to decide if maybe she should just stay quiet, or go ahead and spill all her beans into one basket. Then she snorted out a little breath.

  “Husband. He run with a rough crowd out of Atlanta. Knew all sorts in those days. These boys — they was referred to me. That’s all I can say. An’ I’m mighty displeased with ’em.”

  I understood. “Yeah, because they lost the kid within a half hour of nabbin’ ’er.”

  She shook her head. “Morons I call ’em. Had to make a second plan.”

  Dally looked at her. “Wicher.”

  She sighed. “Wicher. He was half gone out his mind anyway. I reckon I’d been in town … ten years, maybe, when he happened to be the last one in the place one night. I set down across from ’im. Said, ‘Don’ I look familiar, Sydney Wicher?’ His wife had died, and I allowed as how it was fair for me to reveal myself. But he didn’t see it. So I said, ‘It’s Christy Rayburn, back from the dead.’ An’ he looked. Finally must have seen somethin’. He knowed it was me. That’s when I started in to tellin’ ’im I could see the ghost of his wife around ’im.” She smiled that smile again. “Really set ’im off.”

  I shot Dally a look. “So, he knew about you for a long while.”

  The old witch nodded.

  I leaped again. “Fade to day before yesterday. When the boys blew the kidnapping, and you found out it was actually Wicher who’d helped Ginny get away, you moved on to what you were just calling your second plan.”

  She was clear. “Had to.”

  “And that plan involved getting Wicher to play along, and keep Ginny hiding so you could get a ransom note to the McDonners.”

  She nodded. “But he didn’t like it. Not one bit. Had a soft spot for Ginny. Used to carve ’er dolls an’ such.”

  I nodded. “I’ve seen one or two.”

  She picked up the rocking again. “I believe what pushed ’im was my tellin’ him that Ginny’s parents’d get hurt if she didn’t cooperate. That’s when he started the nonsense tellin’ the child that Christy was helpin’ ’er hide, and listenin’ to the doll whisper an’ all. He just give over to ’is lunacy, I reckon.”

  Lunacy. From luna, meaning “moon.” It originally meant something about mental derangement associated with the changing phases of the moon — the same beautiful full moon we’d been having the past few nights to help us in searching for Ginny McDonner. The same full moon that helped Moose catch a bullet.

  I asked her about it. “What do you mean, lunacy?”

  “He just couldn’t take it, I reckon — tellin’ ’er somethin’ that hurt ’er.” She lowered her voice by at least half. “Reckon that’s why he … done what he done.”

  I blew out a little breath. “Takes quite a conviction to do what he did.”

  Cedar nodded. “Especially in the heart.” Then he looked over at Mrs. McDonner and Ginny. “I’d imagine you all would really like to go home now.”

  Ginny was nearly asleep, and her parents were too stunned by all the events to even answer.

  Finally Mr. McDonner picked the little girl up in his arms, and got his wife to her feet. “We’ll talk all about this in the mornin’.”

  I waved at the little nipper. Her eyes were slits, but she smiled.

  “G’night, Flap.”

  “G’night, Ginny.”

  They rattled out the door. The place seemed empty and quiet indeed.

  Cedar took over. “Didn’t want to talk about Wicher’s … apparent suicide … not with Ginny right there and everything.”

  I nodded. “Check.”

  He went on. “And I thought you’d be interested in the information on the little altar skull.”

  I sat up. “Oh, right. You got that back.”

  He nodded. No beating around the bush. “The DNA seems to have matched up with Ms. McDonner’s hospital records. It’s the remains of her daughter that she miscarried — Ginny’s little sister.”

  Dally dropped her head suddenly. “My God.”

  I blinked. “They buried her up there?”

  Dark nodding.

  I shook my head. “Just one more reason why they didn’t want to sell, I guess.”

  Cedar let out a breath. He was very tired.

  Dally looked at me. “Mustard used to sing that song, the one you said Ms. McDonner was singing the night of her miscarriage. ‘The Cruel Mother’. He used to sing it at family reunions when he was still trying to get his band together. It’s the last verse I’ve got in mind: ‘Pretty little girls, one, two, three/One was living, just like me/One was dead and never to be seen/And one, poor girl, was in between.’ Ginny’s alive, her unborn sister’s gone — and Christy Rayburn is in between.”

  Miss Nina closed her eyes and just kept rocking.

  27. Family

  Sissy came to the door in a bathrobe with her newborn daughter conked out in her arms. Mustard had been sleeping most of the time since we’d last seen him. We didn’t want her to, but Sissy insisted on waking him up to say goodbye.

  “He’s been asleep near twenty hours all together. Got up once or twice to eat an’ then just went back down. He needs to get himself up now.” She reared back her head. “Mustard!”

  She beckoned, we followed. Their living room was a wreck of presents and leftovers. Dally and I grabbed what was left of the sofa. Sissy sat in the rocking chair by the window and looked out.

  “Snows meltin’.”

  Dally looked at her cousin. “Definitely gettin’ warmer. I think spring’s here now.”

  I’m a dope, but I still got the idea they weren’t really talking just about the weather.

  Sissy petted her baby with a tenderness that was mystical, then hollered like a stevedore. “Mustard!” From deep within the hollows of the upstairs lair, a response flew back.

  “Huh?”

  “Dally an’ Flap are here.”

  “What’d you say?”

  “Dally an’ Flap!”

  “What about ’em?”

  “They’re here!”

  “Oh.”

  Big commotion. Sissy turned ever so discreetly toward the window and started feeding little Rose Abernathy.

  Staring down at her daughter, Sissy explained it all to us. “They say you have to give ’em breast milk. Formula makes ’em strange.”

  I nodded, making a face at Dally. “I was a bottle baby.”

  Sissy smiled. “I rest my case.”

  Mustard came down the stairs. It was touch and go. One second he seemed in control, the next it looked like he might just come down like an avalanche and pile up at our feet. As luck would have it, he made it to the recliner just in time.

  He rubbed his eyes and looked around the room. “Flap?”

  I smiled at him. “Get some sleep?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Dally smiled too. “I think you needed it.”

  He cleared his throat and shook his head. “You’uns find Ginny yet?”

  I looked at Dally, wondering how much I should tell the guy in his somewhat addled state. She shook her head.

  I looked back at Mustard. “Yup.”

  He was satisfied, closed his eyes. “That’s good. She okay?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Well, then.”

  Sissy wanted to know a little more.

  “Where’d you find her?”

  I took a gander at the big boy on the recliner. “Just where he thought we would, more or less.”

  He opened his eyes. “In the tree hut?”

  I shook my head. “Did you know there was a cellar on the property, at the abandoned farm?”

  “Really?”

  I nodded. “She was down there when we found her.”

  Sissy looked back at her daughter. “An’ she’s back home now?”

  Dally smiled. “Back home.”

  Mustard stared hard at the floor. “Reckon why she run off like that?”

  I took a deep breath. Dally shrugged.

  I started. “I don’t know how much you care to know, but the
basics are that she was kidnapped. Then she escaped with the help of Sydney Wicher, and then she hid out for a while because she thought her parents were in danger because Wicher said they were.” I glanced over at Sissy and lowered my voice. “And now Wicher’s dead and Ginny’s safe and warm.”

  Sissy and Mustard shot me a look out of a rifle.

  Mustard sat up. “Wicher’s dead?”

  Dally nodded. “They think he might have killed himself.”

  Mustard nodded. “I’ll be.”

  Sissy was very calm. “Mustard always said he’d die by his own hand, that man.”

  I looked at him. “Really?”

  Mustard nodded. “You know how I get these feelin’s sometimes.” He leaned over closer to us. “He shot hisself in the heart, didn’t he?”

  Dally shook her head in slow wonder. “Close enough.”

  I looked at him. “What do you think are the chances of you an’ me bein’ related in some odd way, bud?”

  He leaned back. “We all jus’ one great big ol’ family, Flap.”

  Dally looked down. “There’s more.”

  Sissy turned her head a little our way. “About who kidnapped ’er in the first place?”

  Dally smiled. “Sort of.”

  Mustard rubbed his eyes. “And why? What’s there to kidnap little Ginny McDonner for?”

  I jumped in. “They own the Rayburn place, the McDonners do. They own that whole mountain.”

  Mustard was very surprised. “Really?”

  Dally tossed her hand like she knew everything in the world. “They don’t like to talk about it.”

  I supplied more information. “Ms. McDonner is related to the family somehow.”

  Mustard nodded. “That’s right. The mother was a Day. Wouldna thought the McDonners ’ud get the land, though.”

  Sissy rocked very gently, had an explanation. “Not no Rayburns up this way. Closest we got’s over in Mossy Creek — an’ they don’t want a thing to do with this part of the mountains.”

  Dally pressed on. “So that guy Hainey that’s been around here for a while?”

  Mustard settled in his chair. “That one that’s wantin’ to buy all the land up here for some business or other?”