I did visit a couple more houses on Mary’s street, but I was too eager to look up the name Henry in the public records to do more than gather a few more names for later contact. I scribbled contact information in my notebook and then hoofed it back to my car, where I could just get enough Wi-Fi from the church to load the genealogy site.
A quick search of the name Henry with a birthdate around the time I expected and in Octonia yielded too many results to be useful. I tried adding in the search term “Alice” and got no results. So that meant a man named Henry who was approximately her age wasn’t affiliated with her in any official document that the site kept, and thus, it was unlikely they were legally connected at all.
That easy and quick resource exhausted, I turned to a newspaper search. Soon, I was scouring every article in the local Octonia paper that mentioned a Henry in the decade before and the decade after Sheila’s birth. Finally, in tiny piece buried in the middle of the paper from 1944, I saw something that captured my attention.
Henry Lewis, age 29, elected as sheriff of Octonia County. Sheriff Lewis is a lifelong resident of Octonia and was elected by the populace to serve a two-year term as sheriff for the county. When asked for comment, he said, “I look forward to helping make Octonia a safer place for my children, Stan, Susan, and Sheila, and everyone in Octonia.
Henry Lewis, Sheriff Henry Lewis, had a daughter named Sheila. His name was pretty common, which meant genealogy work was harder – A tiny part of me chose Sawyer’s name because it was unusual, and I knew genealogists and historians in the future would thank me – but I couldn’t imagine there’d be that many Henry Lewises in Octonia in the early twentieth century. When I factored in that anyone elected sheriff at that time was almost certainly white, I found him in the 1930 census in seconds.
I fleshed out his family tree – wife, children, grandchildren, and even great-grandchildren – but there was no official record of a daughter named Sheila, and I didn’t find any other researcher’s family trees listing her either.
A quick review of Sheriff Lewis’s life story revealed that he was a World War I veteran and worked for the police department when he returned. He was elected to the sheriff’s office at age thirty-two, served for four terms, and then became a county supervisor before retiring at sixty-five. He died in 1962 at the age of seventy-two. A good life by all accounts.
And yet, there was this secret, that wasn’t really, given that he’d named Sheila in his quote for the paper. He claimed her, it seemed, but she wasn’t listed on any legal document as his child.
I felt certain that Sheila Scruggs was his daughter, but I had no proof. And while I was fairly sure I could find his grandchildren, or maybe even his children, by just asking around, I figured I better have pretty solid footing before I talked to someone’s descendants about their long-lost aunt, especially since that aunt was a black woman.
A quick glance at my phone told me I still had at least an hour before Lucille was home with Sawyer, so I went to the best source of local stories I knew and drove back to see my dad.
He was in the backyard staining chopping blocks he’d made out of recycled wood and singing loudly to some oldies station. My dad loved a good tune, and I loved to hear him sing. I was almost sorry to interrupt. Almost.
“Daddy?” I said as I caught his attention so he wouldn’t be startled if I got too close without him hearing me. “Got a minute?”
“Uh-oh, she pulled out Daddy, so I know she needs something.” He grinned at me and turned off the CD player. “What do you need?”
“Did you know Sheriff Lewis when you were a kid?” I asked as I sat down on a low stone wall near his workshop.
Dad took out his handkerchief and wiped sawdust from his face. “Well, there’s a blast from the past. I haven’t thought about that man in a long time.” He eased himself down onto the wall next to me. “I did know him. He coached my little league team. As I remember it, he had a pretty mean slider.”
I hoped I would remember to ask my dad for pictures of himself in his baseball uniform at another time, but right now, I had a task to accomplish and limited toddler-free time to do it. “A good guy then?”
Dad squinted at me but then said, “One of the best, actually. I was too little to understand it, but he gave a lot of help to a lot of people, and not in the way you might expect a sheriff to help.”
I leaned back and tried to look casual, even while I was fully aware that my dad could read my body language better than anyone living. “What do you mean?”
“You’re onto something, huh? Something about Sheriff Lewis?” Dad leaned toward me with a twinkle in his eye. “You want to tell me now or later?”
“Later,” I said as I gave up the pretense of relaxation and turned fully toward him. “I want to hear what you have to say without you knowing what I have to tell you.”
He nodded. “Well, the law wasn’t always fair for everybody back in my day. But the sheriff was, if you know what I mean.”
Now, he really had my attention. “Do you mean he didn’t enforce unjust laws?”
Dad laughed. “Well, I don’t know that he would have gone as far as to say all that, but he held the same standard of the law for everybody, no matter what they looked like.” My father took my hand. “He was good like that.”
I smiled and squeezed Dad’s fingers. “So he wasn’t a bigot?”
“Nope. Not at all. He spent a lot of time with all the people he was elected to serve and protect, knew their stories, too. There was this little black boy on my team, Hennie Hempstead. Some of the white parents said they wouldn’t let their boys play on the sheriff’s team if Hennie did. Said some awful hateful things about Hennie and to him, too.” Dad put his other hand over mine. “Sheriff Lewis put a stop to the ugliness toward Hennie, but then he let those parents speak their peace. When they’d finished shouting, he said, ‘I hear there are some other mighty fine teams in this league. I’m sure your boys will do just fine on any of them.’”
“He didn’t argue? Didn’t try to show them how wrong they were?” I blurted.
“No use, Baby Girl. You can’t argue with stupid.” Dad winked at me. “But he coached Hennie through that whole season, and we had a good team. We went undefeated.”
I smiled at my dad and his memories, and I felt all the tension of the day fade away. “You have a point, Daddy.”
“Now, tell me what you’ve got.” He pulled me to my feet and then led me over to the rocking chairs beneath his back porch.
I decided to begin with the hook, just like I would in my story. “Sheriff Lewis had a black daughter. Sheila Scruggs.”
Dad whistled through his teeth. “Well, that is something. But that makes sense. Black folks were always at our games, and when he ran for board of supervisors, the black vote was what got him his seat. I remember Mama and Daddy talking about it.”
“Were they happy he won?” I didn’t know if I wanted to hear his answer, but I had to ask.
“I think so. They didn’t talk much with me about politics, you know, but I think so.” He smiled.
I let out a sigh of relief and then told Dad the rest of what I’d learned about the Scruggs family. I was on such a tear of storytelling that I almost blurted out that we’d found over a hundred thousand dollars in the building, but I stopped myself just in time.
“Girl, you know how to research. Way to go. Now, what’s next?” He rocked a bit in his chair as he put his usual toothpick in his mouth. My dad was country boy all the way, and I loved it.
“Well, first, after you, of course, I need to tell the Jeffersons. And then the sheriff. This may be tied up with the murders in the store.”
Dad stopped rocking and sat up in his chair. “You remember what I said this morning, Baby Girl?”
“I do, Daddy, and that’s why I’m telling the sheriff. I don’t need to have any part in figuring out the murders. I’m just interested in the history.”
“The mystery of history,” he said with a smile. “You should use that, just give me credit, okay?”
I smiled and then paused when I realized I hadn’t yet named my newsletter. “I think I will. The Mystery of History newsletter has a nice ring to it.”
At that moment, I heard a small voice bellow “Mama” from the side yard, and a few seconds later, a toddler head rammed into my chest.
“Hi, Saw. It’s good to see you. Did you have fun with Baba?” I snuggled my boy into my lap.
“Uh-huh,” he said as wrapped his arms around my neck and hugged me. “I petted a donkey.”
“You did?”
The rest of the conversation was a detailed account of all the animals Sawyer had petted and how high he had climbed, and by the time he was done, I was worn out just from the listening.
Lucille seized the opportunity to invite us to stay for dinner when Saw headed toward the garden to “dig for worms.” “I’m making yellow cake with chocolate icing,” she said as she waggled her eyebrows.
“For dinner? If so, I’m in!” I said with a quick look at my phone. Only four. “We’d love to stay, but we’ll need to leave by six. Does that suit your schedule?”
“Are you kidding? Your dad already has chili in the crockpot, and I can make cornbread in ten minutes.” She headed toward the door. “Just let me get things baking, and we can eat in thirty and have dessert in less than an hour.”
“Perfect,” I said, but then remembered. “Dad, is it beef in the chile or venison? Tell me the truth.”
“Beef,” he said with a wry smile, “but I bet you couldn’t tell the difference if I was lying.”
I rolled my eyes over to Lucille and waited for her to speak. “Definitely beef. I saw the package.”
“Thank you,” I said. “We’d love to stay. Can I help?”
“No, I help,” Sawyer said as he ran back over covered in dirt but thankfully wormless.
“Okay, Sawyer, but first, we wash your hands,” Lucille said as she scooped him up.
“I’m glad you married her, Dad. At least she tells me the truth.” I slapped him on the leg and went inside to help wrangle the sous chef.
At home that night, somehow Sawyer talked me into taking a bath with him, so there I was in my bathing suit in my own bathtub being splashed by a toddler. It wasn’t the relaxing image of a bath that I often relished, but it was really fun . . . and it spent the last of the little guy’s energy, so when I laid him in bed, he was asleep before he could even say “again” when I finished the story of Little Red Riding Hood.
The day had been exhausting for me, too. My mind was all keyed up, and I needed a long, slow wind-down. I was grateful to have stitches and TV to watch. I was working my way across the canopy of the carousel using the technique my mom had taught me. I picked a color and then worked through the whole thread, stitching everything within easy distance that used that shade. As I went, I marked the squares on the pattern off in pencil.
I knew some cross-stitchers worked a block of ten squares by ten squares at a time, but I found that difficult for me, mostly because I hated even wasting those extra bits of thread I had to sacrifice to begin and end a section. I preferred to follow something through to its natural conclusion, which is maybe why I liked historical and genealogical research so much. It was a story that ended, so to speak, in today. The story itself would go on, of course, but I couldn’t know where it would go. I could just find what existed for now and let the story, on paper at least, end there.
Tonight, while I sewed and pondered my day, I turned on Midsomer Murders. I felt like watching something quaint and charming, and I needed a little mystery to keep my attention while my brain processed what I’d learned that day. I meant what I’d said to Dad about not getting involved in the murder investigation, too, but I couldn’t help feeling like there was something I hadn’t quite put together yet from my day’s research, and I wondered if Chief Inspector Barnaby might not just inspire me to tie up the loose ends.
Unfortunately, fatigue caught up with me before I made much headway on the sewing or the murder solving, and I woke up two hours and two dead bodies later with a stiff neck and a cat playing with my embroidery floss. I packed up the sewing, scooped up the cat, and climbed into bed. All mysteries could wait until morning.
Before first light the next day, Sawyer and I spent a good hour running his wooden vehicles around his toy village. The police car made a lot of trips between the barn and the hospital. But then my son was very committed to watching “dogs and kitties” on YouTube, and I took the opportunity to step into my “office,” aka the back-bedroom closet, and make my phone calls.
First, I wanted to tell Berlinda. It was her family, her story, so she deserved the first call. Plus, I couldn’t wait to hear what she thought of this news. I realized it might not be a story she wanted told widely, given how prominent her grandfather had been in the community, but I knew she’d want to know. And if she didn’t want me to share the information further than the sheriff, who I felt obligated to tell, I wouldn’t.
Berlinda answered her cell with a cheerful, “Good Morning, Paisley. To what do I owe this pleasure?”
I smiled and sat down on the floor of the closet with Sawyer’s pants grazing the top of my head. “Well, I found something, and I thought you’d like to know about it. Do you have a moment?”
“I’m retired. I have lots of moments. Just let me get George. I told him all you shared with me on Wednesday, and he is mightily invested now, too.” She pulled the phone away from her ear and called for her husband.
I took the opportunity to quietly peek out and be sure Sawyer wasn’t elbow deep in the bag of sugar, a lesson I’d learned from experience. But fortunately, the dogs and cats must have been particularly funny today because he and Beauregard were still quite engrossed in the screen as they cuddled on the couch.
“Okay,” Berlinda said, her voice about bit echo-ey since I was now on speaker, “we’re ready.”
“Hi George,” I began by explaining that I’d talked to some people in town and gotten some leads. I decided to forego giving away my sources, just in case Berlinda didn’t like this news and had more reason to dislike Mary Johnson. I had enjoyed my conversation with the woman and didn’t want to taint my news with the mention of her name. I said, “One woman mentioned Alice and Henry in passing when I as leaving. I hadn’t told her your grandmother’s name, but since she knew it and paired it with Henry, I thought that might be something to go on.”
Berlinda cleared her throat. “Pardon my interruption, Paisley, but how do you think she knew the name Henry?”
George said, “Berlinda, we don’t even know why the name Henry matters. Let the woman finish her story.” The tone of his voice was gentle, but it was urgent, too. He really wanted to hear the story.
“Let’s come back to that because I have a theory to explain what she knew and how. But first, let me tell you what I figured out, okay?” I was near bursting with the news, but I also wanted to suss out my theory with Berlinda when we could focus on it.
“Totally fine, Paisley. Please continue,” Berlinda said.
I sighed. “Your grandfather is, as best I can tell, Berlinda, Henry Lewis.” I stopped there, giving them a chance to take in the name and react without me filling in any gaps.
The silence was extended, but I knew that big news could take a minute to sink in. I took the moment to check on Sawyer, and he was now in the bathroom next to me washing his Baby. Poor Baby, it looked like she might be drowning. But Saw was content, so I pulled the door shut quietly again.
I could hear a little movement on the other side of the phone, but neither Berlinda or George had said anything yet. “Should I take this silence to mean you know who that is?”
George’s voice was loud in the phone. “Berlinda is a little overwhelmed, Paisley.”
“Oh no,” I said. “I’m so sorry. I was hoping this would be neutral news at worst.”
“No, don’t misunderstand me. She’s overwhelmed with joy.” He took the phone away from his mouth and said, “Right, dear? It’s joy that’s making you cry.”
When he spoke into the phone again, he said, “Definitely joy. Perhaps I should explain.”
“Please.” I prayed Baby could withstand a full scrub-down because I wanted to hear this.
“When Berlinda was in high school, Supervisor Lewis took note of her academic prowess and offered her a scholarship to attend the Virginia college of her choice.” George’s voice took on the deepening tenor of a natural storyteller, and I found myself imagining the two of them as fresh-faced teenagers, him in dress pants and a button down, her in a poodle skirt and bobby socks. “Berlinda talked to her mother and father, and with a few more conversations with Supervisor Lewis, they accepted what they thought would be a few hundred dollars to offset the cost of Berlinda’s attendance at Virginia State.”
The Historically Black University was a stellar institution, had been since it was founded, and, given the time period, I could only imagine what an opportunity this was for Berlinda. “Wow, what a generous offer.”
“Actually, it gets better,” George said with a smile in his voice. “When Berlinda arrived, she discovered that her tuition for all four years had been paid in full. The donor was anonymous, but she knows that Supervisor Lewis paid for her schooling.”
A small head peeked into the closet, and I gestured to Sawyer to sit down. He plopped into my lap and nestled his head against my chest. At rare moments, he knew the importance of a quiet conversation.
“That’s incredible. And he never said a word?” I asked.
The phone rustled in my ear, and Berlinda came on the line. “No, not one word. But we never got the scholarship check he promised either, so I think it’s safe to say he was my benefactor. Now, I know why.” I could hear the tears in her voice. “Thank you, Paisley.”
“Oh, you’re most welcome, Berlinda.” I circled back to “my sources” slip up about Alice and Henry. I knew my time was running short because a certain little boy was getting fidgety. “So here’s what I’m thinking. I think this person heard something or found something that told them about Henry Lewis.”
“You think so?” Berlinda’s voice was excited. “But how would they know? You think this person is hiding something?”
“I don’t know. Maybe?” I didn’t get the impression that Mary was being cagey, but she definitely wasn’t telling me everything she knew. I just didn’t know why. “But it might be worth asking. If it’s okay with you, I can do, but I wanted to ask your permission before I went back.”
“Oh, please do ask, Paisley. I’d like to know how this person knew about my grandfather.” Berlinda got choked up again.
I couldn’t blame her. And if she had known my source was Mary Johnson, her former sister-in-law, I knew she’d want to know even more. If my brother knew something about my family that I didn’t know, I wasn’t sure how I’d feel. Given, though, that my brother had about as much interest in family lore as Sawyer did in eating brussels sprouts, I didn’t have much need to be concerned.
“I’ll ask, Berlinda, and I’ll let you know what I learn as soon as I do.”
Just then, a tiny hand went up and grabbed my phone. “No talk, Mama,” Sawyer said as he ran out the door with the phone.
I just had enough time to shout, “Sorry, Berlinda and George. Talk soon,” before Sawyer tapped the screen and hung up with the sounds of their laughter in the background.
For the next ten minutes, I tried to act like I wasn’t chasing my son around the house to get my phone when I was, in fact, chasing my son. Finally, though, he tired of my nonchalance and tossed the phone on the couch before beginning a heart-stopping routine of somersaulting off the back of said couch. Never a dull moment.
Clearly, I was not going to be able to call the sheriff with my news about Henry Lewis, so I decided it was time to introduce Sawyer to the world of law enforcement. “Saw, want to go see police officers?”
“Right now. I ready,” he said and went to stand by the door.
I texted the sheriff, told him I was coming by with some news, and asked if Sawyer could see his patrol car. I could see the unmarked car sitting at the edge of our driveway, and I knew they had lights and sirens in there. But I didn’t want Sawyer to get overly interested in our security both for the sake of the officers who might not relish constant company from a toddler and for the sake of a toddler who might just get a little scared if he put it together that we needed a security detail.
The sheriff responded immediately. “Meet me in the parking lot. We’ll do a ride along. I’ll put the car seat in.”
To know a man who would take my son on a ride in his police car and who had a car seat ready for such a ride made my heart flutter. I took a long sip of the glass of water I’d poured myself two hours ago and tried to calm down.
Then, I scooped up Sawyer’s backpack, slid his arms into a coat, and dropped a few treats for Beauregard, who eyed them nonchalantly and then went back to sleep.
It’s amazing what the promise of a ride in a police car can do for a two-year-old. He was in his seat and buckling it before I even wedged myself beside him to do the straps. I was going to have to think of incentives like this more often. Lollipops held nothing compared to sirens and lights apparently.
As I drove the few miles into town, I tried to take deep breaths and keep my mind focused on the former sheriff instead of the current one. I was mostly successful until, that is, I saw Santiago leaning against his cruiser. Then, I lost all thoughts on all trains, not just that one.
Fortunately, my son is charming and cute, and his shyness and excitement smoothed over my tongue-tied greeting when we arrived. Soon, we had him strapped into a car seat in the back, and I was cracking jokes about how I might just need this cage between him and me in our Subaru. “You have no idea how hard it is to focus when a juice cup hits you in the back of the head.”
Santiago looked at me out of the corner of his eye and then adjusted the rearview mirror. “Sawyer Sutton, do you throw things at your mom when she’s driving? Am I understanding this correctly?” He’d adopted the serious voice of a TV police officer.
I turned around to see Sawyer’s eyes wide and his head nodding. “Sorry, Policeman,” he said.
“Well, thank you for apologizing, young man, but you must also give me your word you will not throw anything at your mom again. That is very dangerous.” I could see a hint of a smile coming onto Santiago’s face.
“I won’t,” Saw said very seriously.
“Good,” Santiago said. “Now, do you want to hear the siren?”
A grin broke out over my son’s face, and I knew the one on mine was just as big. “It might be loud, Sawyer.”
“It won’t be loud, Mama,” he said with all seriousness.
“Okay, here goes.” The siren sounded out across the fields outside of town, and Sawyer laughed and laughed.
After a few miles, Sawyer grew bored with the siren, and Santiago passed his radio through the screen between us. “You sure that’s a good idea?” I asked.
“I set the channel to one we don’t use and asked the dispatcher to talk with Saw if he figured out the buttons. They’ll both enjoy it.” He took his eyes off the road for one second to smile at me. “Besides, it’ll give you a chance to tell me what you learned.”
I had almost forgotten about the actual purpose of this visit, what with the pheromones coursing through me and the sheriff’s sweetness and all, but I was still eager to tell him about it.
After I gave him the run-down on Mary Johnson and Berlinda and George’s story, he said, “Well, that is an interesting twist to this, especially considering what we figured out this morning.”
“Oh?” I didn’t want to appear too eager to be involved in police business, given my dad’s warning and my own genuine desire to stay out of it, but I couldn’t stop my curiosity.
“Well, this morning, one of the guys who was set to demo the place went back to study the building for the best strategy for that work. He had our permission to be there, as long as he didn’t go into the back bedroom.” He cleared his throat, and I saw a little color travel up his neck. “Well, he had to, um, take a leak, so he stepped into the woods behind the house. He wanted to be sure he was well away from the road and walked pretty far in.”
I leaned toward him in my seat. “And?”
“And he found a massive, old crop of marijuana. The biologist we called said plants can self-seed and come back year after year if they get some care. We think that’s what’s been happening given the old, dead plants we found amongst the living ones.” Santiago shot a glance at me.
“I know absolutely nothing about marijuana, but could it have been hemp?” I felt naïve asking, but I believe in thinking the best in every situation until I couldn’t do that anymore.
“Nope, this was the good stuff, the smoking stuff. The biologist from Virginia Tech is coming in later this afternoon to take a look. Thinks he can tell us about how long ago the patch was planted.”
I sighed and thought back over my conversation with Mary Johnson. It had seemed like she was not telling me something. “Maybe Luther Angelis planted it?”
Santiago nodded. “That’s what I’m wondering. If so, it might explain a few things.”
“Like why he had over a hundred K hidden in that cabinet?” I said.
“And why someone might have killed him.”
I suddenly realized Sawyer had gone very quiet, and when I turned around to look, I saw he was fast asleep, Santiago’s radio hugged to his chest. “Oh no,” I said quietly, even as I admired his perfect, sleeping face.
Santiago looked into the rearview mirror and said, “No problem. Fancy a drive up on the parkway?”
The part of the Blue Ridge Parkway known as Skyline Drive was just up the mountain at the edge of Octonia County. I didn’t get up there nearly as much as I’d like partially because of the cost of the park pass but also because I had visions of losing my son over the edge of a scenic overlook.
But today, I couldn’t resist the chance to just ride and take in the view, especially with such good company. “You can be away that long?”
“I took the security shift for you this afternoon. So technically, I’m on duty.” He winked and then gestured to the console. “I always pack some Nabs and sodas in case I miss a meal. Help yourself.”
I opened up the arm rest between us and took out two packs of cheddar and peanut butter crackers and two of those tiny Pepsis that were great for calorie counting but never quite enough. “Open them for you?” I asked.
Santiago nodded and then gratefully accepted a cracker. “Now, tell me what theories you have about how all this ties together,” he said.
I munched on my own cracker as I thought about that. “Can I ask a question first?”
“Yep,” he said as he took another cracker from his pack.
“Did you figure out what that red-headed man was doing at the store the other day?” I had some sense that he fit into this somehow, but I wasn’t sure how.
“Oh yeah, we did. His name is Victor Davison. He’s a local guy. Handyman type. Does odd jobs for folks, taking down trees, digging ditches, that kind of thing.”
“Did he say why he was at the store?” I knew I was getting too far into things with my questions, but somehow, I felt like maybe I’d been on that path to “involved” ever since I asked for the salvage job.
“He did. Said he just wanted to be sure the building was secure. But I expect he was lying.” The sheriff gave his head a little shake.
“You’re sure?”
“I’m sure. No one just stops by an abandoned building that they’ve driven past hundreds of times out of curiosity.” He gave me a side-eyed glance. “Okay, maybe you do. But most people don’t.”
I grinned. “I totally do, but I see what you mean. So you think Davison has something to do with the pot?”
Santiago nodded and took another cracker from the packet in my hand. “I think he may have a lot to do with it. It’s clear someone’s been harvesting back there recently. Steadily, too. Not wholesale like they do in a lot of operations, where they plant, grow, and then clear out. Here’s it’s more like selective harvesting.”
“So the stand stays intact,” I said as I watched the gorgeous valleys and hollows of Virginia pass below us. Sawyer was still snoozing hard.
“Right. You know something about growing pot that you aren’t telling me?” The sheriff smiled out of the corner of his mouth.
“Nope. Not a thing about pot. But I’ve lived around here my whole life and watched people timber their land. Some clear-cut, some selectively harvest. I understand why people do both, but it’s amazing how whole the forest looks when it’s selectively harvested.” I didn’t bother to add that I also thought clear-cutting made the land look barren, apocalyptic.
Santiago laughed. “Well, it’s the same with marijuana. It grows stronger and more potent if it’s allowed to naturally reproduce.”
“So very much like a forest then?”
“Yep. But don’t go spreading that information around. Growing marijuana isn’t legal in Virginia.”
“Not yet.” I laughed.
He shook his head and then seemed to drift off into his own thoughts. I smiled and leaned my head back and studied the mountains. Most of the color had fallen from the trees already, but I loved this time of year when the golden trees – the beeches mostly – held their leaves the longest. On a day like today, when the sun was bright, the mountains looked decorated with lights.
I closed my eyes and let my mind play with this new information. Someone had been tending this stand for a very long time, and clearly, given what Santiago said, it was of value to the person or people who were taking care of it. I wondered if Bailey Thomas had come across it. Maybe she’d seen someone harvesting and been a threat. Or maybe someone had seen her and wanted to be sure she didn’t become a threat.
I pushed that line of thought out of my mind though. That was Santiago’s job, not mine. What I was curious about was if this marijuana operation could have been related to Luther Angelis’s murder. If so, how? And was that where all the money came from?
It felt likely that the money was tied to this somehow. It just didn’t seem likely that someone who ran a convenience store on a rural road in the middle of the mountains made enough money to put away over a hundred thousand dollars, even over decades. But then, that money had been accumulating since the 1920s. Maybe if I skipped out on bi-weekly maple bacon bagel from Murphy’s I might be able to save up that much cash over time, but I doubted it. I was pretty frugal, and I couldn’t even manage to save a hundred dollars a month. But then, Murphy’s Bagels wasn’t around when Luther, Sheila, or Alice were alive, so maybe I was being too hard on myself.
I was smiling and thinking about how much I loved that cinnamon pistachio cream cheese when a voice disrupted what was apparently my dream. “Mama, wake up!”
I sat forward with a start of embarrassment and looked over my shoulder to see Sawyer grinning in this newly devilish way he had when he realized he’d caught me doing something he thought I shouldn’t do, like sleep. Then, I looked at the man behind the wheel of the car, and he was grinning, too. These two could be trouble.
When I stretched, I caught a glimpse of a green and white gas station sign and gasped. “We’re in Crozet?! How long have I have been asleep?” I dabbed the corners of my mouth to be sure I hadn’t been drooling.
“About a half hour. I took the long way around, figured we could get a latte and a cookie and then go to Mint Springs Playground.”
The sheriff had said the magic words “Mint Springs” and “playground.” “Playground, Mommy. Let’s go to a playground!” Sawyer was straining against the straps of his car seat.
“You sure?” I said to Santiago. “He’s not an easy one to get back into that seat once he’s got slides and monkey bars at hand.”
“I wouldn’t have said anything if I wasn’t sure.” He winked at me and parked in front of the Mudhouse. “Just don’t tell the barista in Octonia that I visited the competition.”
“I’m fairly sure that forty-five-minutes distance eliminates the threat of this being their competition,” I said with a laugh.
Santiago gave me a serious stare. “You’d be surprised.” Then he opened the back door and asked Sawyer if he could take him out of his car seat.
To my utter surprise, my “Mama Only” son said, “Yes, Mr. Policeman” and not only let Santiago take him out of the seat but held his hand to walk inside. The two of them were so darn cute and deeply enrapt in a conversation about trains that I took it upon myself to order us two lattes, with decaf espresso, and a chocolate chip cookie.
When I came back, Sawyer had his little hand up and was making the train whistle sound as he pumped his arm. Just then a train came by on the raised tracks outside the window, and both Santiago and Sawyer pressed their faces against the glass with glee.
The train was a long one, loaded with tractor trailers that baffled Sawyer. “There’s truck on the train,” he kept saying. I watched my son’s joy and admired the man who had thought enough to share it with him . . . and found myself hopeful.
Sawyer’s father and I had split about a year ago. It had been a hard few months figuring out custody arrangements and moving first to an apartment and then to our farmhouse. But finally, we’d hit a rhythm, and I could see my son’s full self shining like I hadn’t seen it since he was an infant, before his dad and I started feeling the tension of our marriage weighing us all down.
I wasn’t much interested in dating, still had some healing to do, some figuring out the part of me that had made things hard in my marriage. Plus, single parenting a toddler for most hours of the week was exhausting enough that in the hours Saw was with his dad, I only caught up on work and then just stitched and watched TV.
But this moment right here, well, it made me wonder if maybe, just maybe I might think about letting a man into my life again, especially if he could bring my son this much delight.
True to form, though, Sawyer disrupted my contemplative moment with the pronouncement of “I have to poop” and sent me scrambling to find the bathroom. Twenty minutes later, we were back at the table – it’s a long process when you’re two and half – and Santiago had wisely gotten us to-go cups and a bag for Saw’s cookie. Soon, we were back in the patrol car and on our way to the playground.
Sawyer went head-first down the twisty slide, and then he was off playing and talking with two other preschoolers while Santiago and I took a bench that looked out past the playground over the pond and the mountains beyond.
The silence of the afternoon settled over us, punctuated only by the squeals of children playing, and I was loath to disrupt it. Still, I had a question about the Scruggs store, and I knew Santiago might have some thoughts. “Do you think Luther Angelis’s and Bailey Thomas’s murders are connected?”
He tilted his head and then turned to look at me. “I do. Coincidences don’t just happen like that.” He looked back out over the water. “Your question makes me think you have a theory about that, too?”
I sighed. “I really don’t want to have a theory. I’m not interested in doing police work, but given what you told me about the marijuana and Davison’s appearance at the store . . . and the money, it seems like they are.” I felt a lump rise in my throat. “And that makes me sad, honestly. I really wanted to be able to tell Berlinda and George only good things about their family’s history in that place.”
Santiago reached over and squeezed my hand before letting it go again. I missed the warmth of his fingers immediately. “I can understand that,” he said. “But given that they let the building fall into its present condition after Luther’s murder, I’d say they already feel the story is tainted.”
“True,” I said with a shrug, “but until recently, it seemed like Luther’s murder was random, or at least not connected to anything he was doing.”
A smile teased the sheriff’s lips. “You know that most murders happen because the victim was involved with the murderer, often in less than savory ways, right?”
I thought about his statement and nodded. “So what you’re saying is that there aren’t serial killers looking to randomly murder people on every corner despite what TV would have me believe?”
“Precisely.” Still, we don’t know that Luther Angelis was involved with anything unsavory.” He looked at me out of the corner of his eye.
“But someone was.” I let out a hard breath.
“Yes, someone was,” the sheriff said as he jumped up to push Sawyer on the swing.
An hour later, as I loaded Sawyer into the car seat for the ride home, I decided to be bold and do something I almost never did: ask for help. “Santiago, would you be willing to drive back through town and let me pick up my dad’s van so I can get all those cases of soda out of your office?”
“Sure,” he said as I climbed into the passenger seat. “Just tell me where I’m going.”
As soon as we headed toward Dad and Lucille’s house, I regretted the suggestion, not because I thought Santiago minded but because I knew my dad and stepmom would definitely take note of this man bringing me by, a man I was going to let drive off with my son in his car. I was never going to hear the end of this.