Lights, Camera, Bones, page 21
Tinkie literally looked green. “I don’t know if I can do this, Sarah Booth. A child eaten by a shark? I just don’t know.”
Since her pregnancy and Maylin’s arrival, Tinkie was super sensitive and extremely compassionate. I understood. It was too easy to mentally put a loved one in a tragic situation. “You keep working on the financial aspect and I’ll handle this. I don’t know what I can do to help, but I’ll be there.”
“I wonder where the shark attack occurred.”
I should have asked Coleman that, but I could get the info when I got to Greenville. “I’ll text you. Take care of things here.”
“I’m sorry, Sarah Booth. I feel like I’m not really a full partner. I’m a slacker.”
“Hogwash. You’re working; I’m working. We don’t have to do everything together like conjoined twins.”
Her laughter was my reward.
“Would you take care of the critters? I sure don’t want them around the river if the shark is attacking close to shore.” I forced the words out in a normal voice. Dread almost choked me, but I wouldn’t let on to Tinkie. She felt bad enough about pushing this chore off on me.
“Will do. I’ll cook something delicious for dinner for all of us.” She grinned and I knew my face must have shown shock and horror. Tinkie was a terrible cook. Dangerous, even. She’d made biscuits once that I swear could have been used as devices of destruction if we’d had a cannon to shoot them out of. “Okay, I’ll get Pauline to cook something, and I’ll watch the baby and critters.”
“A much better plan.” And then I was out the door.
* * *
By the time I got back to the sheriff’s office, the search and rescue team had already gone to the lake to get supplies and start a new search. I hurried to the lake and hesitated at the water’s edge. A woman with a child clinging to her leg stood watching an older toddler play in the sand.
“They found the missing child,” Coleman said. “He’s absolutely fine. He just wandered away and everyone panicked. He was never in the water, just exploring.”
“Thank goodness.” I was relieved.
Coleman gave me a kiss. “Keep your eyes open, Sarah Booth,” he said. “I mean it. The town is out for blood regarding the shark. Mary Dayle is supposed to meet us here. She’s given up hiding her role in saving the shark from Bilbo. We have to act fast or it will be too late.”
“I should talk to the boy’s mother. Just in case she saw anything.”
“Her name is Becky Graham. Nice family, the sheriff says.”
Coleman drew my attention back to him. He sounded so serious, so concerned, that my heart dropped. He held out his hand. “Take these.”
I turned my hand palm up. He dropped keys into my hand. I looked at them. They were for a car. “What is this?”
“Your new vehicle.” He nodded toward a gray Solterra SUV crossover. “Gray and discreet, as you wanted. A higher profile than the Roadster to handle the bad roads you love to drive on. And it’s all electric. I’d hoped to surprise you, just not at the lake.”
“Thank you.”
“Tinkie told me what you’d like.”
“It will be wonderful.” Anything as long as I didn’t have to study, compare, or calculate.
“I left the Roadster at the dealership getting it all checked out.”
I put a hand on Coleman’s cheek. “Thank you.” He knew how I loved that car.
Before he could respond, I heard a female voice behind me. “I’m here.” I turned to find Mary Dayle, carrying her own tanks and headed toward the boat. “We’ll get that shark today,” she said. “I know we will.”
“Gotta go,” Coleman said.
I watched Mary Dayle, Nelson, and Coleman load the boat and head off on the lake.
* * *
When the rescue searchers were out on the water, I walked over to Becky Graham and introduced myself. She was relieved to have her son safely back and a little embarrassed that she’d jumped the gun on his disappearance and a shark attack.
“He’s really cute,” I said, watching him roll a ball at the edge of the water.
“He’s seven. A good boy. Really good. His name is Larry.”
“Tell me about Larry.”
Her pride won out over her shyness, and she talked about her son and how well he did in school, sports, and social activities. “He’s just a good all-round kid.”
“Did you see anyone or anything unusual around here?” I asked.
“No. But then again I wasn’t looking.”
“Would you mind if I talked to Larry?” I was curious where he’d disappeared to or what might have prompted him to go off exploring on his own.
“Go right ahead.”
I walked to the edge of the lake and knelt down to be on Larry’s level. “You had an adventure,” I said.
“I’m okay,” he said. “Tell Mama don’t be mad. The man said it was okay to go with him.”
“What man, Larry? What did he look like?”
“The movie man.”
I brought my phone out of my jeans pocket and opened the photos. “This man?” I had a photo of Marlon in my phone, and I showed the boy.
He nodded. “Maybe.”
“That’s a big help, Larry. A really big help. That man has been missing, too, and we need to find him. Where did the movie man go?”
He pointed into the woods. “He was supposed to play with me, but he got scared of something and ran away. He told me to stay back, but I followed him. I wanted to play.”
Was it really Marlon? “He was scared?” I asked, hoping Larry could give me a few more details.
Larry reached into his pocket and brought out three cat’s-eye marbles. “These are mine. He gave them to me.”
“Did he say his name?” I asked. “Was it Marlon?”
Larry shook his head. “No, not that.”
“Was he limping?” I had another thought.
Larry nodded. “I don’t know. He didn’t say his leg hurt.”
“Hey, Larry, was it this guy?” I had a photo of Robert Davis that I’d taken from a poster. He and Marlon both were tall, dark, and good-looking. I showed him RoDa, then flipped the phone back to Marlon. “Or this guy?”
Larry studied both photos. “I don’t know.”
The disappointment was bitter, but I pasted on a smile. “Thank you, Larry.” I’d jumped the gun when the child said movie man. “Do you remember anything about this movie man?”
“He said to give you this. He said a nice lady would come talk to me.” Larry pulled a piece of paper from his pocket and handed it to me. “He taught me this.” He dropped to the ground and drew a circle in a bare patch of dirt. He put two marbles in the center. He used the green cat’s-eye as his shooter. He was a second grader, but he had good aim with a marble.
I unfolded the slip of paper. “Muscogee.” The word was printed in black ink. I didn’t know what to make of the message. Was RoDa or Marlon sending me to the Brandon estate because I would find something there? Or was this clue merely part of a setup?
“Thanks, Larry.” I tousled his hair, then turned to his mother. “He’s a fine young man. You keep him safe.”
“I’ll do that. Thank you.” Taking the younger child’s hand, she headed back to the parking lot and her vehicle.
She had nothing to thank me for. Not really. I just couldn’t figure out what Marlon or RoDa was doing near the water and taking up with a child. Not very smart. I’d point that out to both of them when I finally ran them to ground.
I was tempted to go back to the sheriff’s office to wait for Coleman, but I didn’t. I was going to Muscogee. Against my better judgment. For a moment I walked along the shore, watching the boat traffic. The Mississippi was low, but still navigable. I found myself moving down the lake shoreline until I stopped at an isolated place where a tree had fallen. It was the perfect place to sit and think.
Had RoDa or Marlon attempted to lure Larry into the woods? Still, if one of them was using Larry as a messenger, they were flirting with fire. Even a hint of abduction involving a kid was unacceptable. And what did the message mean? Muscogee was the name of the Brandon estate but also a Native American tribe that once roamed the Delta area. Was that the clue? I felt a stir of excitement.
I whipped out my phone, prepared to call the local library for information on the Muscogee tribe that had lived on the banks of the Mississippi River. I paused when I heard singing. I didn’t recognize the song, but the minor key and the melody were so beautiful, I stopped everything I was doing so I could listen. The song sounded familiar, but I couldn’t catch the words. Without thinking about it, I walked closer to the water’s edge. The singing seemed to be coming from beneath the water, which was impossible.
My body reacted to it before my mind could make a decision. The song promised many things: love, comfort, belonging, acceptance. All I had to do was find the source. I walked to the water’s edge. A dark shadow moving close to the shore stopped me. The shark. The dorsal fin broke the surface forty yards from the shore. The shark dove again, and the fin disappeared. The surface of the lake returned to calm and stillness, almost as if the deadly creature was only in my imagination.
A little shaken, I was ready to head inland, and fast. I needed some time to figure out what had happened to me in that brief moment of delusion. Had I imagined the song, too?
No. The melody floated to me again, this time from the opposite direction, from inland. I fell under the spell of the singer. The song was a compulsion. I had to hear more clearly. It called and beckoned to me. I had no choice but to follow, to find whoever sang with such a beautiful voice.
I thought the song was coming from behind some storage buildings, but the wind shifted, and I realized it was coming from a stand of tall trees. I went there in a daze. Who was singing? When at last I tracked down the source of the song, I stopped, my feet going backward even when I didn’t want to. The singing creature was horrific. She was beautiful, a woman with flowing locks of blond hair and skin as milky as a newborn. But she stood on chicken legs.
“Holy sh—” I was ready to run, but my feet seemed stuck to the ground. This couldn’t be happening. At last I understood the power of the song and the creature that sang it. “You’re a siren.”
The woman turned to confront me. “Yes. I am. And you’ve answered my call.”
“I’m not a sailor.” The music stopped and my senses were returning. I knew exactly what was going on and who was to blame. “You have sway only over sailors. It’s in the literature.”
“Do you believe everything you read?” the siren asked.
“Only when it’s a fact. You have no influence over me; I’m a landlubber. Besides, I know who you are. Jitty, cut it out.” She’d almost gotten one over on me, but I’d awakened to her game. The truth was, though, she had an incredible voice. Jitty could sing, dance, twirl a fire baton, recite Shakespeare, and drive me crazy. Jitty had many talents, and new ones popped up every day.
“I have a message for you,” she said.
My hopes rose on a tidal wave. “From my parents?” Jitty was sometimes the go-between for the Great Beyond and my parents to me.
“Muscogee,” Jitty said softly.
“What?”
“Muscogee,” she said. “That’s all you need to know.”
“But what does it mean?”
Instead of answering me, Jitty walked on her chicken legs toward the water. She stepped in and kept going until she disappeared. She was no help at all.
33
I wanted to go back to Zinnia but it wasn’t in the cards. Instead, I drove my brand-new Solterra to Muscogee Plantation. On the way I called Tinkie, in awe of the fact that my telephone call went through the car radio so I could talk hands-free. There were all kinds of bells and whistles on the car. Since I’d been driving an antique for the past two years and prior to that using public transportation in New York, I’d missed the technology revolution in automobiles.
The sun was shining brightly, so warm I could almost feel the earth awakening and ready to get to work growing things. While I was talking to Tinkie, I pulled over in the shade of a tree. I told her about the new car, the kid who hadn’t been eaten by the deadly fish, and the written message I’d received from the man I presumed to be either Marlon or RoDa. I didn’t mention that Jitty had delivered the same message. Muscogee.
“Where are you, Sarah Booth?” Tinkie asked.
“I’m on the road to the Brandon estate. I’m going to call the library and ask about the Muscogee tribe before I tackle the senator. I’m not sure if Muscogee applies to the Brandon plantation or the Native American tribe. I need to have as many facts as I can line up.”
“That sounds like a good plan. Harold is coming over to help me with this financial information. I’ve tried to figure it out until my eyes are crossed. The figures don’t make sense to me.”
“Harold is coming to help you. Hah! He’s really stopping by to see Maylin.” I knew my friends too well. Harold was as smitten by the baby as anyone. In fact, between his ongoing romance with the sexy writer Janet Malone and his fixation on Maylin, I hadn’t seen him in several weeks. “What’s wrong with the financial information you have?”
“It just doesn’t add up. There’s money that appears, a large sum of it.”
“Campaign contributions?” Lots of elected officials made a hundred times their annual salary by taking gifts and payola from lobbyists. It was illegal but the forensic accounting necessary to find such fraud was in short supply at the IRS these days.
“No, this money came in before Senator Brandon was elected. This might even predate the flood.”
“Maybe an inheritance?”
“It could be, but there should be documentation. It could also be a land sale or an investment into one of the dozens of corporations the Brandon family has operated over the decades. But again, there should be documentation—a paper trail of who gave the money.”
Tinkie got very annoyed at sloppy accounting, which was why I’d never allow her to help me with my private tax returns. Her hair would catch on fire at my lackadaisical bookkeeping. When I needed help I went to Harold, who might disapprove but he never gave me the stink-eye or lectured me. Maybe this year Coleman would take over the tax duties. A delicious hope but not likely to happen. I didn’t think I had enough tools in my arsenal to bribe or blackmail him into that.
“Let me know what Harold says. I’m going to call the local library before I step foot on the Brandon property.”
“Good thinking, Sarah Booth.”
“Give me two hours to check in. If I don’t…”
“We’ll come looking for you. Thanks for letting me know. And remember, play it safe.”
Words to live by.
* * *
Elton McCoy, the reference librarian at the Washington County Public Library, was a pleasant-sounding gentleman with a wealth of knowledge and a set of impressive research skills. When I asked him about the Muscogee people, he had plenty to say.
“The Muscogee wasn’t one tribe. They incorporated smaller tribes like the indigenous peoples of Alabama into their structure,” Elton said. “They were very sophisticated with a mico or chief appointed for life and a council to debate and decide issues of import. They roamed the Southeast from the Mississippi River to the Atlantic.”
“I thought most of the indigenous peoples were removed and sent on the Trail of Tears,” I said, trying hard to remember the smidgen of Native American history that had been included in my textbooks. For the most part the story of the original settlers had been ignored in school teachings.
“Some natives managed to escape capture and hide. Of those, many were affiliated with the Muscogee Creek Confederacy. The majority of them ended up in Georgia, but we believe they were all descendants of the Mound Builders, who created the mounds at Winterville. The Mound Builders predated all the Choctaw tribes.”
I knew a bit about the Winterville Mounds. One of my cases had concluded there. The site of the very impressive mounds wasn’t far from Greenville proper. “Is anyone excavating the mounds now?”
“No, that’s all over and done,” the librarian said. “For a while this spring, a team from the University of Mississippi was here doing a comparison and contrast with Winterville and the mounds in Georgia. I don’t know what conclusions they reached, but they left Greenville the first of this week. Wonderful group of young people. They were all very interested in the movie being filmed.”
College kids would be interested in a major movie on location. Most people would. “The Brandon plantation is named after the Muscogee tribe. Is there a connection there?”
“Now that depends on who you ask,” Elton said.
“I’m asking you.” I was keenly interested now because it sounded like Elton was going to dish the dirt on someone.
“There are rumors that the Brandon family brought several Native American slaves to Mississippi to work the fields. It was illegal to enslave indigenous peoples, but a lot of things were illegal, and folks still did them. Anyway, the story is that Jefferson Brandon, the Brandon who brought his family to Greenville, fell in love with a beautiful young Muscogee woman. When she became pregnant with his child, he freed her and allowed her to return to her people.”
Muscogee. The name of the Brandon plantation made a lot more sense if this were true. The potential link to a lost love left me with a lot to think about. Did Marlon know any of this? Had he planned to hint at some illicit connection in his film? It hadn’t been in the script, but the script had changed. Was this the big reveal everyone was so stirred up about? And, more importantly, did anyone really care about a checkered family pedigree now?
“What happened to the baby?” I asked Elton.
“There’s no record of a baby,” he said. “I’ve researched it out of personal curiosity. I never found a clue that the baby was ever born.”
“What about the woman that Jefferson fell in love with?”
