Dixie Divas (42 page)

“But that wouldn’t have gotten Melody the house,” Brandon broke in. “If he died intestate she’d have to wait until probate settled everything, then buy it like anyone else. If he had a will, she still got cut out.”

“Unless they faked a will that left The Cedars to Melody,” I mused. “Or made Sanders sign one. I heard he left an heir. So what does this have to do with Bitty? Why take
her
?”

“Because Mama talked to the banker and found out about Jefferson and the stolen charity funds and was going to tell,” Clayton said, but Jackson Lee slowly shook his head.

“Johnston, I mean Dean, had to know it was all about to fall in on him. Maybe he got desperate. Just because he hasn’t ever killed anyone before doesn’t mean he’s not capable of it. What bothers me is, why take Bitty? It doesn’t fit.”

He was right. Why take Bitty? Unless maybe she knew something no one else knew. But what could it be? And why hurt Cindy Nelson?

“Do you think the police will let me talk to Melody?” I asked Jackson Lee, and he shook his head.

“Doubtful.”

“Ask them. Please. Maybe she’ll tell me something that might help. We have to find Bitty soon, Jackson Lee.”

He had a tortured look on his face that said he felt the same. I imagine what he saw in our faces mirrored his own distress.

“I’ll try,” he said finally, “but it might take some time. Give me an hour.”

Kit drove me home for dry clothes, and Mama and Daddy met us at the door. They had worried looks, and Daddy kept muttering things about high crime in Holly Springs. Mama kept clasping and unclasping her hands, saying over and over that Bitty just had to be all right. For the first time since I’d come back home, she almost looked her age.

“It’s going to be okay, Mama,” I said, and hugged her. “Bitty is going to be just fine.”

Mama clung to me a bit, then stepped back and shook her head. “Bitty never has been one to give an inch or give up. I almost feel sorry for whoever took her.”

“Well, Melody Doyle is responsible for it, and right now she’s in police custody,” I said.

“Yes, I’d heard that.” Mama frowned. “You know, that child always had it rough when she was young, growing up with hate and bitterness, but I never thought Melody capable of hurting anyone. She’s always had such a sweet nature.”

“Hate and bitterness change people,” Daddy said. “Not usually for the better.”

While I went upstairs to get dry clothes, Kit stayed downstairs talking to my parents. By the time I got back downstairs, he held an adoring Brownie in his lap, and had managed to make my mother laugh. If for no other reason, I’d have to like him for that.

Jackson Lee met us at the police station. “You’ve got ten minutes,” he said. “And that’s only because I called in an old favor. See what you can do.”

Melody sat in a straight-back chair with wrists cuffed and a chain running to ankle cuffs. Her pretty brown hair looked dull and matted, her eyes wary. I sat across from her.

“Hi, Melody.”

“Hi yourself. I know you’re not here as a friend, so say what you want to say then leave me alone.”

“I just want to find out what happened.”

“Why ask questions? You won’t believe me anyway. No one does. I don’t care.” She gave me a defiant look, chin lifted, some of her spark coming back.

“My mama says you’re not capable of hurting anyone. She says you’re too sweet.”

Melody stared at me. Her chin quivered slightly and she looked away. “Mrs. Truevine’s always been nice to me. She taught me in Sunday School. That was a long time ago. I’ve changed a lot since then.”

“Yes, people change, but not their basic character. Not that much. Melody, we’re just so worried about Bitty. Do you know where she is?”

“No. I’ve told the police that but they just keep on saying it’ll be better for me to tell them where she is instead of face three murder charges.”

For some reason, I believed her. Incredible, I know, but sometimes it’s the way a person says something that lets you know they’re telling the truth. Not that I’m the best judge of character since I usually figure everyone’s capable of almost anything, but my mama isn’t a fool.

“How did you get mixed up in all this? The police think you killed Philip Hollandale and Sanders, and kidnapped Bitty. They have to have some reason for it.”

“I haven’t claimed I’m completely innocent. But I didn’t kill anyone. I’d never do that. I might feel like hitting someone at times, but doesn’t everyone?”

“Yes. For me, it’s a daily occurrence. But I’m known to be bitchy, so it’s expected.”

Melody smiled. Then she leaned forward. “Trinket, if I tell you what really happened, do you think you can help me? You know, find a real lawyer?”

“I’ll do my best. Jackson Lee knows every lawyer in Marshall County, and that’s a lot better than Legal Aid.”

Chains clinked softly as Melody put her clasped hands atop the table and looked at me. “I admit that Jerry Ray and I came back here for The Cedars. We never meant to hurt anyone, not to kill them or anything. I swear to you, Trinket, neither one of us hurt the senator or Sanders. I may not know who killed Sanders, but I do know what happened to the senator.”

By now, every nerve in my body was thrumming. I nodded, and hoped I didn’t look as on edge as I felt. “I believe you.”

“Jerry Ray and I had a plan. My grandma always told me about how the Sanders stole our house and all our money. I knew I’d never get Sanders out of the house legally, but I knew he had something he didn’t want anyone knowing about, too. I figured I’d make a trade with him, you know, if he gave me back The Cedars, I wouldn’t tell about the hidden gold.”

“Gold? That story is
true
?”

Melody nodded. “I don’t know how much is left of it, or even if any is left, but Elijah Richmond had been hiding gold for a long time once he saw the inevitable coming. Enough to keep the house, get the family back on their feet when the war was over. But he didn’t tell anyone where it was hidden, and then died before he could. He’d left behind papers, but the Yankees came through and burned the businesses, so that destroyed everything. All that was found was what he wanted engraved on his tombstone when he died. ‘Money is the root of all evil.’ If you go out to Hill Crest, it’s still readable, right below his name and dates. After the war ended, no one could find where the gold was hidden, and then it was too late. But the Sanders had plenty of time to look.”

Even though I nodded, my mind was shrieking
Get to the point! What does this have to do with Bitty?

“Anyway,” Melody said as if sensing my impatience, “all this does connect to the senator and Bitty. I just want you to understand first. Jerry Ray and I figured Sanders wouldn’t want to go to jail for hiding gold bullion, so if he signed over The Cedars, then we’d let him take his gold and go. It’d be mine, just like my grandma always said it should be. Elijah Richmond built that house, and it should be
ours
.” She said that last a little fiercely, and I imagined how often she must have heard it.

“But Sanders refused,” I said, and Melody nodded.

“Crazy old goat. Said he already had both, and no one would believe me anyway. Said it was just a rumor, and everyone knew the Richmonds would do anything to get back that house. Then he said he’d make sure I never got it, even after he died. Jerry Ray got mad, and said we should go back out and talk to him again, tell him that he’d be risking prison if we told about the gold bars he’d kept hidden.”

“So you went back out there,” I prodded when she fell silent, and she nodded.

“There was a car in the driveway up by the house. We parked out on the road, then went up, just to see who it was since it had official license plates. That’s when we heard Sanders and the senator arguing, really loud. Sanders kept yelling that he’d killed his dog, and the senator kept saying it was an accident, and the dog shouldn’t have been sleeping in the driveway. I wanted to go, but Jerry Ray said we should hang around, see what was going on.” She shivered, and her voice faltered a bit. “The yelling stopped suddenly. It got really quiet. Too quiet. I looked in one of those long windows, and when we saw the senator lying in a lot of blood on the floor, Jerry Ray and I just took off.

“Then we got to thinking—now we really had something to make old man Sanders sign over the house. We’d go back and tell him what we saw. All I wanted was the house, but Jerry Ray said we should make him give us the gold, too, said he had connections that’d buy it off of us a little at a time so no one would know, said we’d be rich and I’d have my house, too. We had a fight about that, since the house means a lot more to me than the gold, you know? But when we got back out there, Sanders was deader than dirt, lying almost where the senator had been. I didn’t see the senator, so I thought at first maybe he’d just been knocked out. His car was gone, so it seemed likely. We just figured the senator had come to, and killed Sanders.”

“So you hid Sanders,” I said when she paused, and she nodded.

“Yes. We figured the senator wouldn’t say anything about the body being missing, since then the police would know he’d killed him. Politicians don’t usually like to get involved in things like that since it’s bad for their image. Dirt gets swept under their rugs.”

She said the last mockingly. Out of the mouths of babes.

“But why hide Sanders’ body? And why put the senator’s body in Bitty’s house?”

Melody bit her lip. “We were out there when you and Bitty showed up. We barely had time to stick Sanders in the closet before y’all came barging in. We’d cleaned up most of it, just so no one would know Sanders was dead. That’d give us time to find the gold, then be ready to buy the house once it came clear. We knew y’all would go straight to the police, so as soon as you left, we got Sanders out of the closet and took off with him. I thought of the old ice house. It isn’t used now, but since it’s for sale, it still has a back-up generator that works. I thought I was being so smart, thinking of that.

“Imagine my surprise when we got out there to find the generator running and Senator Hollandale frozen stiff as a board in the cooler. We didn’t know what to do. Everything went so wrong so fast . . . and we got scared. Really scared. If the senator was dead, and now Sanders was dead, we’d probably end up charged with both murders. No one would believe us, especially since it’s no secret how badly I want The Cedars. We panicked. Then Jerry Ray said he’d find a place to hide the senator so no one would suspect us, and we’d just put Sanders back in his root cellar for someone to find, hopefully after a long time. Rotten potatoes smell so bad, it didn’t seem like he’d be noticed for a while.”

“It was very bad of you to put Philip Hollandale in Bitty’s coat closet, then in her wine cellar,” I said, a little angrily.

“I didn’t know that was where Jerry Ray put him, really I didn’t. Not until Georgie told me about y’all hiding him in the cemetery. And I don’t know who took the senator from the cemetery and put him in Bitty’s wine cellar. I swear I don’t. It wasn’t me, and Jerry Ray says it wasn’t him.”

“Do you trust Jerry Ray?”

“When it comes to getting money.” Her smile was mirthless. “I know he’s a con man, but we were both going to get what we wanted out of this. I’d get The Cedars, he’d get to scam a few folks before he took off again.”

“But why involve Bitty with Jeff—Jerry Ray? For money?”

“No, nothing like that. I knew none of the Divas would say anything about what happened or was going on, so Jerry Ray thought he might be able to sweet-talk a little information out of Bitty. That was all. We just wanted to know what was going on and when, you know.” She drew in a deep breath. “When I found out, I told Cady Lee about y’all taking the body to the cemetery. We just had to keep folks from thinking we had anything to do with it. I’d never have hurt Cindy, either. I really hate it that things got all messed up.”

I heard someone just outside the door and knew my time was almost up. I leaned closer. “Do you have any idea who else might be involved? Who might have taken Bitty and why?”

Melody shook her head. “It’d have to be someone who wants The Cedars as much as I do, and I don’t know anyone like that. Except maybe Bitty.”

That was true.

After I repeated what Melody had told me to Jackson Lee and the police, who’d already heard everything anyway, I’m sure, we went back to Jackson Lee’s office. He made a phone call to a friend to get Melody an attorney, just as I’d promised her.

“So what now?” he said, frowning. “If Melody and Jerry Ray don’t have Bitty, then who does?”

“Someone as fanatical about The Cedars as Bitty is, and the only person I can think of is Trina Madewell. She’s Bitty’s arch-rival in acquiring houses.” I paused. “But that bothers me. I mean, yes, Bitty loves saving old houses, loves antiques, and loves even more beating someone to the punch, but that’s not enough reason for anyone to kill Sanders. Even Melody, who feels the house rightfully belongs to her, stopped short of murder.”

Jackson Lee shook his head. “The police are ahead of us there. They’ve already checked out Trina Madewell—and most of the rest of the historical society—and Trina has an iron-clad alibi. She’s been in the Baptist-Desoto hospital for knee surgery, and is at home with her leg in a brace. I doubt she could haul around bodies, much less drag an unwilling Bitty anywhere. Or hit Cindy Nelson so hard it nearly killed her.”

“Has Cindy said anything?” Kit asked, and Jackson Lee shook his head.

“Not yet. It’ll probably be tomorrow before we can talk to her, if then. She nearly bled out before y’all got there. Good thing you went on in, Kit.”

“I don’t suppose Rayna’s dog found any scent at the cabin?” Kit asked, and once more Jackson Lee shook his head.

“The rain came down too hard before they got there. Washed away a lot of evidence.”

“That’s not what I want to hear.” I rubbed at the crease between my eyebrows.

“Could it be one of the Divas?”

That question came from Kit, and I gave him a thoughtful look. “Well, they have had a security breach lately,” I said, then explained, “Cindy Nelson was accused of telling Melody that we’d hidden the senator’s body. Only the Divas directly involved knew about it, and all swore to keep it a secret.”