Shades of Midnight (32 page)

"I suppose I should be satisfied that Viola now knows Alistair didn't kill her, but... it's not enough. The person who killed them should be made to pay!"

"It's been thirty years. The killer might be dead. He might have moved on years ago."

"But he might be right here in Plummerville."

Their conversation ended when Garrick Hunt sidled up alongside Eve. His usual smile was missing. He didn't even try to make Lucien jealous by placing his arm around Eve or telling her she was especially beautiful today.

"I spoke to my mother," he said bluntly.

"Did she remember anything odd about that time?"

For a moment he was silent. "I imagine she did, but she refused to tell me about it." He reached into his inside jacket pocket for a flask and uncapped it, but he did not drink. After a moment, he capped the flask and returned it to its place, without ever tasting a drop. "She's been bedridden for as long as I can remember," he said. "When I was younger she did have good days when she came downstairs and perhaps even walked in the garden, but... it's been years."

"What's wrong with her?" Eve asked gently.

"Everything, apparently," Garrick answered darkly. "She's delicate. Always has been. My birth almost killed her, or so she has always told me. You cannot imagine how guilty I used to feel..." He stopped speaking suddenly, shook his head as if to throw off the burden. "She told me, when I asked, that Viola Stamper was a lovely woman and her death was a terrible tragedy." Garrick looked directly at Lucien. "Is there another kind of tragedy? A wonderful tragedy, perhaps, or a funny tragedy?" He waved a hand, dismissing the aside. "She talked about how awful it was, how tragic." His eyes narrowed, his nose wrinkled. "And damned if I didn't know the whole time that she was lying through her teeth." Garrick stopped walking, and so did Eve and Lucien.

"For some reason, my mother dearly hated Viola Stamper. She didn't say so, but I could see it in her eyes. I swear, I could almost smell the hate. Why would my mother hate a woman who's been dead thirty years?"

* * *

He had intended to ask Buster and Garrick to stand guard at the church doors while he and Evie questioned the reverend, but on second thought the precaution seemed silly and unnecessary. They walked toward the church without anyone to watch over them.

After all, Reverend Younger was an older, frail-looking man. Evie could probably best him in a fair fight.

"Maybe Douglas Hunt was the man who slept with Viola and kept pressuring her for more," Eve said as they approached the church. "I sensed all along that he loved her."

"You sensed all along that every man she met loved her. Alistair, Douglas Hunt, the good reverend..."

"She was very beautiful..." Eve said defensively.

"Men might lust after beauty, but only a fool falls in love with a woman because she has a pretty face."

"Men are fools, sometimes," Eve countered.

Beyond the church doors, all was dimly lit. The last light of day filtered through the stained-glass window and the two clear windows to the north. A touch of light broke through from the back of the room, where the entrance to Reverend Younger's office was located.

"Hello?" Eve called in a tentative voice as together she and Lucien walked down the aisle. "Reverend Younger?"

When they received no response, a warning prickle danced up Lucien's spine. The reverend knew something. Perhaps he was involved in the thirty-year-old murders and perhaps he was not, but he certainly knew more than he was telling. If the real murderer was still in Plummerville and had seen them talking to the reverend, was Younger's life in danger?

"Hello?" Eve called again as they approached the office door. Just beyond the opened door they saw the desk, piled high with papers. Another step, and they caught sight of the reverend sitting in his chair with his head resting on the desk.

"Wait here," Lucien ordered, stepping in front of Eve. He would not allow her to discover a dead body! Not even that of a sour preacher who was, at this moment, her prime suspect in the murders of Alistair and Viola Stamper.

Very slowly, the reverend's head lifted. "No. I imagine you should both come in," he said.

Lucien breathed a sigh of relief. He didn't care for preachers, for the most part, and he definitely didn't like Younger. But they didn't need a dead preacher on their hands for Halloween.

They sat where they had on their first visit, in the two chairs facing the desk and Reverend Younger.

"Viola came to me in confidence," he said, not wasting anyone's time with more protests. "It pains me to break that confidence, even now, but if that's what it takes to make you cease this tireless investigation before things go any more wrong than they already have..."

"I want what's best for Viola," Eve interrupted.

"So do I," the reverend said softly. He took a deep breath. "She wasn't from Plummerville, you know."

"I had heard that. Alistair met Viola in Savannah, married her, and brought her home."

"Yes. Word was that she came from a family who was in shipping, but her parents had both passed on, and she had no siblings."

"I did hear that, also," Eve said.

The reverend gave Eve his full attention. "Lies. Every word. Oh, Alistair Stamper did meet Viola in Savannah, and as far as I know he died believing the stories about her family. But... it wasn't true."

Lucien saw the heartbreak on Eve's face, even though she said nothing. She had come to like Viola, and only wanted to believe the best. "Why would she lie?"

"Did you ever wonder, Miss Abernathy, why Viola would risk taking another man into her bed on the mere possibility that she might find herself with child? I suggested that perhaps she was the one who had not been blessed with the ability to have a child. That perhaps it was not meant to be. On that afternoon she told me that she had a child. A boy, the son of a man who had kept her as his mistress for two years. She did live in Savannah, that part of the story was not a lie, but a harsh life and dire circumstances forced her to..." His face hardened. "It was not a life she would have chosen for herself. She was desperate."

"What happened to that baby?" Eve asked softly. "Did he... die?"

"No," the reverend said sharply. "The father took the baby into his home and passed him off as his wife's own child. Viola knew it was best for the boy, but it broke her heart to see this child she could never claim as her own."

"See
him?" Lucien asked sharply. "Are you telling us that the child was raised here in Plummerville?"

"Yes."

"Who?" Eve asked. "Who was it?"

The preacher's eyes narrowed; his chin quivered. "I can't tell you that. Think of what you're doing! If you continue to stir up this old story, eventually that secret will come out! People in this town know bits and pieces of the truth. If they ever put all those pieces together..."

"Does your wife know?" Eve asked. It seemed she held her breath. "Is that why you didn't want me to question her?"

Suddenly the preacher looked tired. Older. "Alice suspected that there was more between Viola and me than was made public. I was young. Rash. I grieved too much and too openly, I suppose, after she was murdered." He shook his head. "No, she doesn't know Viola had a child. Her suspicions were always more common than that."

"She thought you loved Viola."

"Maybe I did," he said beneath his breath. "A little." His eyes grew stronger. "I did care for her enough to keep some of her secrets, even now. It would do no one any good to reveal who her son is, after all this time. What's done is done."

Eve looked like she wanted to press the issue, but recognized the futility of such an effort.

An effort which was unnecessary. "We know who Viola's son is," Lucien interrupted.

"We do?" Eve turned her attention to him.

"We know because the father of this child came to your door one day and told you that he was the one who introduced Viola to Alistair."

"Garrick!" Eve brought a hand to her mouth. "Oh, my. No wonder his mother hates Viola, still."

"He doesn't know," Reverend Younger said in a low voice, as if someone might be listening beyond the open doors. "If you have any decency at all within you, you won't tell him or anyone else. What purpose would it serve?"

"Reverend Younger," Lucien began, "you said you cared for Viola."

"Yes."

"That perhaps you even loved her, a little."

"Perhaps."

"Were you the man she came to asking for assistance when she decided to..."

"No," he interrupted.

"Then who?" Eve asked. "Who?"

The reverend shook his head. "I have no idea. She would never tell me. I will tell you that she regretted her decision immediately. In her heart she was a good person, and she knew what she had done was wrong. She just..." He swallowed hard. "She came to that realization too late. Dear God, I should have stopped her, somehow. I should have found a way. Alistair might not have killed her, if I had only done my job properly."

For the first time, Lucien felt sympathy for the aging preacher. He held himself responsible for Viola's mistake, he blamed himself, still, for her death. It was a heavy burden to carry for thirty years.

"Don't feel guilty, Reverend," Lucien said as he and Eve stood. "Alistair didn't kill her."

Younger looked properly confused. "Then who did?"

"That's what we're trying to find out."

* * *

The temperature had dropped with the sun, so as they sat by the bonfire, with many of the other residents of Plummerville, Eve held Lucien's hand and leaned in to him, stealing a bit of his warmth. Some of those who were gathered here sat directly on the ground, as she and Lucien did. Others had come prepared with blankets and pillows.

All the members of the Plummerville Ghost Society were present, but they were spread around the U-shaped gathering. Daisy and Buster were talking in low whispers about something, Katherine sat next to Miss Gertrude, who gave Lucien the evil eye every now and then, and Garrick sat near his father.

Garrick. Viola's son. Was Douglas Hunt the man she had invited into her bed in order to make another child? It made a kind of twisted sense. She'd kept his secret about Garrick, and he would keep hers. She doubted he would have found the invitation distasteful, in any case.

Lucien had told her that none of them, not the spirits or those still living, were perfect. In her mind, she had made Viola perfect. The loving wife, a kind woman. And she had been those things, Eve imagined, but she had also harbored dark secrets.

Would Douglas Hunt have killed her to make her keep his secret?

Eve recognized many of the faces around the fire, other than the society members. The man who ran the general store with his wife; a few of the ladies from church, including the preacher's wife; Gerald Porter; a few courageous children; Douglas Hunt and Mrs. Markham, who sat side by side.

Most of the ghost stories that had been told thus far this evening were old tales she had heard many times. Occasionally a name or place was changed, but the tales... and the endings... were familiar. People jumped and shuddered and squealed in the appropriate places, as the tales were told.

Lucien was oddly quiet this evening. He studied the faces around the fire pensively, occasionally frowning. He had been as shocked as she by the news about Garrick. No doubt he was also dismayed by the request to keep that news to himself. She knew how he detested lies of any kind.

He was so lost in thought that now and then he seemed to forget she was here, but he always made up for the lapse with a gentle smile or a squeeze of her hand.

The crowd thinned as the hour grew late. It had been a long day for most, and one by one, and sometimes two at a time, they said good night.

Most of the children who had been around the bonfire when the ghost stories had begun were gone, some carried by their parents, some led away by a mother or a father's guiding hand. Only four children remained. Zeke, his friend Seth, Miss Gertrude's nephew Chester, and the little girl who had so easily charmed Lucien.

"Zeke," Lucien said, glancing across the way and capturing the child's attention, and everyone else's, with his deep, clear voice.

"Yes, sir?"

"I believe it's time for you and your friends to get to bed."

One did not question the dictates of a fortuneteller, especially not when the command was delivered in a voice like that one.

"Lucien?" Eve whispered as the children said good night and ran toward home.

He squeezed her hand and spoke to the crowd. "I have a story to tell. One you haven't heard before. At least, not in its entirety. It doesn't have an ending. Yet." He had the attention of the entire crowd. "I'm talking, of course, about Alistair and Viola Stamper."

Someone seated at the far end of the U-shaped gathering scoffed; it was a man Eve had not seen before. "We've heard that story a hundred times!"

"Not like this," Lucien said. "You were told a story, I'm sure, but it wasn't the truth. I'm the only one here who knows what really happened that night, thirty years ago."