Chapter Seventeen

Early the next morning, Jillie was awakened by loud voices. Cold, and briefly disoriented, she clamped her jaws together to stop her teeth from chattering and peered through one of the knot holes.

Two little old ladies in pajamas and robes sat at a small round table in the center of a brick patio. They each had what looked like crocheted afghans draped around their shoulders. Curlicues of steam floated up from mugs on the table in front of them.

“I know what I heard,” said one old lady. Short white hair resembling a helmet of cotton balls hung over her unnaturally black eyebrows. Her pajamas were made of some silky-looking fabric in a kaleidoscope of greens, blues, and yellows. Her robe was purple. “That gate screams like a banshee every time it’s opened. And I found it ajar this morning.”

“You’re full of beans,” the second old lady said. “You probably just forgot to latch it. Besides, I didn’t hear a thing.” Her hair was white, too, but it was pulled back into a tight bun. Without any visible eyebrows at all, she wore light blue pajamas with a matching robe that looked like it had been made from a huge bath towel.

“You wouldn’t have heard a bomb explode,” Cotton Top said. “Once you take your hearing aids out, you’re deaf as a stump. You wouldn’t even know when you fart, if not for the jar followed by the dead-possum-in-the-woods fragrance.”

The Bun chuckled. “Got me there. But if someone’s been in the back yard, why isn’t anything missing?”

Cotton Top harrumphed and said, “Other than my veggies, there’s nothing back here worth taking.”

“Dix, Dix,” The Bun said. She shook her head, like she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “Just listen to yourself. Not only is there nothing missing, but there’s absolutely no evidence of anyone’s having been in our yard.”

“No evidence except what I heard, and the gate’s being left open.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

“You don’t get it, Lil. I don’t like the idea of someone having to sneak around our house late at night. It might be someone in need of help.”

“Spare me.” A small oblong box on the table squawked and spit static as the woman named Lil moved a knob on its front.

“Good Lord,” Dix said. “Wherever did you find that old thing? Isn’t that your transistor radio from high school?”

“Yep, still works, too.”

“You know listening to the news is the quickest way to get depressed. You can’t change anything; it just messes with your head.”

“I want to hear the stock market report.” Lil fiddled with the knobs, picked the radio up and shook it, then worked the knobs again.

“Is money all you ever think of?”

“It’s called being financially responsible; you should try it sometime.”

The static coming from the radio was suddenly replaced by the clear sound of a masculine voice.

Police report finding the body of an unidentified man appearing to be in his fifties in an abandoned trailer just outside of Los Lunas. The death is being investigated as a homicide. Police reports indicate there are currently no suspects.

Jillie gasped. She’d figured the young guy would help the creepy old man; in fact, she’d thought that was why the old man suddenly stopped yelling. Not only had she listened to someone being murdered, but she’d seen the murderer’s face.

Should she immediately go to the police? But that would mean abandoning Beth. Maybe she could make an anonymous call. But where could she find a phone? Jillie tasted blood and realized she’d been chewing her tongue.

On the patio below, Dix reached across the table and turned the radio off. “I told you, that’s no way to start the day. Murder and mayhem during breakfast, no thank you.”

Lil squinted at Dix. “Were you not paying attention, Pollyanna? I’ve driven past that little trailer a million times; it’s not all that far from here.” She leaned across the table. “You said yourself, you think someone came into our back yard in the dead of night. What if you happen to be right? What if someone’s wandering around killing people?” She stood and draped the afghan over the back of her chair. “I’m going to get an alarm system.”

“You’re kidding, you mean you’re actually going to pay someone to install—”

“Get real.” Lil started toward the door. “I’ll do it myself, how hard can it be?”

Dix choked on the sip of liquid she’d just taken, coughed, and laughed.

Lil cocked her head at her sister. “What’s so funny?”

“Just the supreme irony of your being willing to buy a security system. You’re so tight you squeak when you walk. Always have been.”

“And that, oh pauper sister of mine, is why we have a house in which to live rather than a yurt.” Lil returned to the table, picked up her plate and cup, and headed for the door. “If you need me, I’ll be at the hardware store shopping for a motion detector spotlight.”

Dix scooted her chair back from the table and started toward the house. “I’m going to the library.”

“A suggestion before you go out in public,” Lil said. “You might want to re-do your eyebrows. One of the joys of sitting across the breakfast table from you is tracking their migration. The left one’s not only a full inch higher than the right, it’s arched way too high. Makes you look like you just saw Elvis in pajamas roller blading down Main Street.”

Dix snorted. “At least I’m careful of my appearance, as opposed to your extraterrestrial alien, slab-of-meat-with-eyeballs look.”

“I don’t pretend I’m not getting older. A woman’s hair thins with age, it’s the natural order of things. I would have thought you’d prefer the natural look.”

Dix lifted both hands, cupped and palms up. Her right hand raised as if she were a scale weighing something, she said, “Fake, but somewhat human in appearance?” Lowering her left hand, she said, “Or natural, yet scary enough to frighten children and stampede cattle.”

“Says you.”

“You don’t see your face; everyone else does. Have a little compassion, why don’t you.”

“Hypocrite.” Lil stepped into the house.

“Skin flint,” Dix shouted after her.

In a few minutes, two vehicles pulled out of the garage at the side of the house—one small and tan, the other a red convertible. The tan car moved slowly, but the red car’s tires squealed as it sped away.

Her backpack slung over her shoulders, Jillie climbed down the ladder and glanced around the yard. Morning sunlight sparkled off green, yellow, and red vegetables growing in the garden she’d spotted the night before. In near-perfect rows, tomatoes, carrots, lettuce, cucumbers, bell peppers, green beans, and other plants she didn’t recognize called to her like the Sirens she’d read about in mythology. Her stomach growled.

She pulled up two carrots, plucked a huge tomato from its fragrant vine, and then gathered a fistful of green beans. After washing the vegetables with the garden hose, she ate them, drank her fill from the hose, then washed her face and hands. She pulled her treasure chest from her backpack, selected some things from it and returned to the garden.

When she’d finished her task, she again hurried toward the gate. But she stopped in her tracks at the sound of a car pulling into the driveway.

Holding her breath, she edged backward and plastered herself against the side of the house. Hopefully, whoever it was would find no one home and go away.

The sudden electronic beep, beep, beep of someone punching numbers into a cell phone wafted through the open window above Jillie’s head. “I forgot the library’s closed today; I’m going to work the garden. Lunch will be ready at noon sharp. If you’re not here, you either don’t eat or you fix it yourself.” Dix’s voice grew fainter as she moved away from the window.

Without thinking, Jillie scooted back to the tree and up the ladder where she hunkered down against a wall.

Immediately, she reflected on the stupidity of that move. Why had she not run when she had the chance? She could easily have outrun the little old lady. But with only an instant to decide what to do, panic had taken over. If Dix had heard the squealing gate again, she’d most likely have called the police. Then they’d have discovered Jillie, and the nightmare life at the Elliotts would never end.

How long would the hospital keep Beth’s body before taking it to wherever they burned people up? Or did the hospital do the burning?

The double glass door slid open and Dix came out, her arms filled with gardening implements. She carried the tools to the garden and dropped them onto the ground. Slowly, she moved up the rows, emitting sounds of surprise.

Dix stood in the center of the garden and looked around the yard. As if sensing Jillie’s presence, she stared up at the treehouse, pulled a lanyard from around her neck, took a cell phone from the tiny attached bag and punched the screen. “I don’t care what you’re doing,” she said into the phone, “you have to come home right now.” Pause. “No, now!” Dix jabbed her finger on the tiny screen again, slid the phone back into its little bag, and dropped the whole thing down the front of her blouse.