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Authors: Lorena McCourtney
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another month’s rent then.”
I watched the young woman cut across Effie’s yard. A sudden thought occurred to me. How about asking Kendra to come along on this . . . what was this sort of thing called in those hard-boiled mysteries? A caper. Yes, this was a caper. Kendra was sharp, observant, nice company. She’d want to do this for Thea, just as I did. It would be good to have a partner on a caper.
“Kendra?” I called.
Kendra turned. “Yes?”
She was in white shorts, skimpy red top, and frivolous multicolored sandals, her dark hair piled on top of her head with a tangle of tendrils framing her face.
No, I decided regretfully. Not a workable partnership for this endeavor. Leggy, beautiful Kendra is definitely not invisible.
“Take care.”
* * *
I didn’t leave the house until almost 10:00. I felt reasonably certain the vandals wouldn’t go into action before that hour. I timed the drive. Forty-five minutes. I drove slowly past the metal arch over the cemetery entrance and across the bridge where I’d watched the little boy fishing. This time I noticed there was a name sign by the bridge. Hangman’s Creek. Not a name to inspire confidence, I thought a bit uneasily. Was the person who had inspired the name now under a tombstone at Country Peace?
I turned around at the gravel driveway of a farm a mile or so down the road and made another pass by the cemetery.
The hillside was dark, only a faint glint here and there of starshine on tombstones. I braked and listened through the open window. No sounds beyond a chorus of crickets greeted my straining ears. The vandals wouldn’t advertise their presence with lights or horns, of course, but I was reasonably certain the cemetery at this moment was quite deserted.
Now to find some place outside the cemetery grounds to park the car. I might be invisible, but the big white Thunderbird was not.
After two more passes, I finally found some old ruts taking off at an angle from the main road. They were about a quarter mile from the bridge and led into a thick grove of trees and brush. I cringed as branches scraped the sides of the ’bird— Sorry, Harley —but the flexible undergrowth closed behind the trunk like a concealing curtain slipping into place. A canopy of branches drooped overhead. Perfect.
But when I cut the engine, an unexpected uneasiness also closed around me. No starlight penetrated here. I had a peculiar feeling of being underwater, as if some predatory fish might drift by any moment. The thought also penetrated my brain that I was about to spend the night alone in a cemetery. Isn’t this the stuff of which creepy tales—and gruesome headlines—are born?
I felt a breathless little giggle coming on, but it ended in my throat. Oh, Thea, I wish you were here to giggle with me. It’s so much harder to giggle alone.
I slipped out of the car and pushed the door shut with no more than a barely audible click. Twigs and stickers snagged my blouse and hair as I pushed my way out to the road, and once I stepped on something that felt long and skinny and wiggly.
Just a fallen bough turning under my foot, I assured myself a little breathlessly. Not a snake. Maybe a root.
From the road, I was pleased to see that not a trace of the Thunderbird was visible. It was as hidden as if it was tucked away in the garage back home. I brushed my hands across the grass to hide evidence of exiting tire tracks where I’d pulled off the road.
I tied the dark scarf around my hair and kept to the shoulder, cautiously watching the road in both directions. When the lights of a car flashed over the hill, I ducked into the underbrush. It didn’t cover me completely. I had a definite ostrich-with-its-head-in-the-sand feeling. But the car swept by without slowing.
Invisibility works!
Yet my confidence wavered when I had to step onto the exposed openness of the narrow bridge, and I rather wished I’d found a place for the car on the opposite side of the creek. What if
I watched the young woman cut across Effie’s yard. A sudden thought occurred to me. How about asking Kendra to come along on this . . . what was this sort of thing called in those hard-boiled mysteries? A caper. Yes, this was a caper. Kendra was sharp, observant, nice company. She’d want to do this for Thea, just as I did. It would be good to have a partner on a caper.
“Kendra?” I called.
Kendra turned. “Yes?”
She was in white shorts, skimpy red top, and frivolous multicolored sandals, her dark hair piled on top of her head with a tangle of tendrils framing her face.
No, I decided regretfully. Not a workable partnership for this endeavor. Leggy, beautiful Kendra is definitely not invisible.
“Take care.”
* * *
I didn’t leave the house until almost 10:00. I felt reasonably certain the vandals wouldn’t go into action before that hour. I timed the drive. Forty-five minutes. I drove slowly past the metal arch over the cemetery entrance and across the bridge where I’d watched the little boy fishing. This time I noticed there was a name sign by the bridge. Hangman’s Creek. Not a name to inspire confidence, I thought a bit uneasily. Was the person who had inspired the name now under a tombstone at Country Peace?
I turned around at the gravel driveway of a farm a mile or so down the road and made another pass by the cemetery.
The hillside was dark, only a faint glint here and there of starshine on tombstones. I braked and listened through the open window. No sounds beyond a chorus of crickets greeted my straining ears. The vandals wouldn’t advertise their presence with lights or horns, of course, but I was reasonably certain the cemetery at this moment was quite deserted.
Now to find some place outside the cemetery grounds to park the car. I might be invisible, but the big white Thunderbird was not.
After two more passes, I finally found some old ruts taking off at an angle from the main road. They were about a quarter mile from the bridge and led into a thick grove of trees and brush. I cringed as branches scraped the sides of the ’bird— Sorry, Harley —but the flexible undergrowth closed behind the trunk like a concealing curtain slipping into place. A canopy of branches drooped overhead. Perfect.
But when I cut the engine, an unexpected uneasiness also closed around me. No starlight penetrated here. I had a peculiar feeling of being underwater, as if some predatory fish might drift by any moment. The thought also penetrated my brain that I was about to spend the night alone in a cemetery. Isn’t this the stuff of which creepy tales—and gruesome headlines—are born?
I felt a breathless little giggle coming on, but it ended in my throat. Oh, Thea, I wish you were here to giggle with me. It’s so much harder to giggle alone.
I slipped out of the car and pushed the door shut with no more than a barely audible click. Twigs and stickers snagged my blouse and hair as I pushed my way out to the road, and once I stepped on something that felt long and skinny and wiggly.
Just a fallen bough turning under my foot, I assured myself a little breathlessly. Not a snake. Maybe a root.
From the road, I was pleased to see that not a trace of the Thunderbird was visible. It was as hidden as if it was tucked away in the garage back home. I brushed my hands across the grass to hide evidence of exiting tire tracks where I’d pulled off the road.
I tied the dark scarf around my hair and kept to the shoulder, cautiously watching the road in both directions. When the lights of a car flashed over the hill, I ducked into the underbrush. It didn’t cover me completely. I had a definite ostrich-with-its-head-in-the-sand feeling. But the car swept by without slowing.
Invisibility works!
Yet my confidence wavered when I had to step onto the exposed openness of the narrow bridge, and I rather wished I’d found a place for the car on the opposite side of the creek. What if
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