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Chapter Twelve

“Hmm,” Michael said, running over the diner’s menu. “I really expected something more exotic from the best diner in Moab.”

“Your appetite for caviar is going to leave you disappointed, son.” Hiram cracked a grin.

“In a town named Moab, shouldn’t there be, I don’t know, gefilte fish, or matzo soup, or at least something Jewish?”

Hiram chuckled. “I see we’re going to have to work on your Bible knowledge. Moab was one of the enemies of Israel, not a Jewish land. Most famous for human sacrifice, if I recall correctly.”

“In that case,” Michael said to the waitress, who tried to smile blandly, but whose tapping of her pen on her order notebook noticeably picked up speed at the words human sacrifice, “I’ll have two fried eggs and toast.”

“Give him a side of bacon, too,” Hiram said. “And orange juice. Growing boy. Just eggs and toast for me.” He’d already gotten the hot water, and the little bag from Diana lay on a saucer. He hoped it would work.

He wanted something to work. He felt unsettled.

The waitress stepped away, her shoes clacking.

“Human sacrifice, eh?” Michael asked.

“The king sacrificed his own son to save the city,” Hiram said. “He was sacrificing to his gods, I guess, but the Israelites besieging him were so horrified, they just pulled up stakes and left.”

“Speaking of the king’s own gods, what did you make of that odd little statue on Lloyd Preece’s shelf?”

Hiram had forgotten the statue entirely. “I hadn’t made anything of it. I took it for art. Maybe something Lloyd himself did as a young man. Or, generous like he was, maybe he bought it from some local artist to encourage him. Why, did you make something of it?” He stretched his memory. “Isn’t there an old Greek story about man being three different creatures, morning, noon, and night? A riddle of some kind?”

“The riddle of the sphinx.” Michael squinted for a moment, then changed the subject. “Dad, we can’t leave Lloyd Preece’s murder investigation in the hands of Sheriff Del Rose.” Michael’s voice was urgent, and his facial expression somewhere between indignant and horrified.

“You’re worried he’s not competent.” Hiram sighed.

“No,” Michael said. “Clearly, you’re worried he’s not competent. I’m worried that he’s an idiot!”

Hiram lowered his voice. “Maybe say that in softer tones. This is a small town.”

“The whole world’s a small town. That doesn’t mean it’s wrong to seek justice.”

“I’m in favor of justice.” Hiram nodded. “Almost as much as I’m in favor of mercy.”

“Pap,” Michael said, “I told him there was a dead man. A rich, important dead man, a nice guy, bled out in his own home. And the sheriff practically yawned in front of me. And then hours later he sent his deputy around. And he could barely be bothered to hear your account of what happened, he was more interested in telling me where I could buy rugs and jewelry! Mercy just doesn’t figure into this—there’s a killer on the loose, and no one to stop him.”

“Mercy always figures into everything.” Hiram sipped the tea. It tasted weak and flowery. “The sheriff is investigating now.”

“Don’t you think Lloyd Preece deserves better than whatever investigation that jackass comes up with?” Michael asked. “Preece was generous with us and with everyone. He was the best kind of rich man, as far as I can tell. And he was slaughtered.”

Michael was right. Hiram took a deep breath and sighed. “Okay. But officially, if anyone asks, we came here to dowse a well and we’re sticking around because there’s a ghost out on the Monument.”

“Both of which are true.” Michael nodded, a satisfied expression on his face.

A woman sat down at their table. She wore a violet-colored blouse, and a black skirt that fell below her knee. In her hands she clutched a small purse. She had a soft, rounded face and short dark hair, and she struck Hiram as vaguely familiar.

“You must be Lloyd Preece’s daughter,” Michael said immediately. “He called you Addy. Our condolences.”

Michael was a full minute ahead of Hiram mentally, but of course he was right. The woman, in her thirties, perhaps, was the spitting image of her father, and the only conceivable reason she could have sat down at the table with them was that she knew her father was dead, and she had heard something about Hiram and Michael in connection with his death.

Hiram dreaded the idea that he might be becoming famous.

“Condolences,” he mumbled.

“I prefer Adelaide.” She nodded at Michael and then at Hiram. “You’re Hiram Woolley? The dowser, up from Lehi?”

Hiram nodded. He meant to say “yes” verbally, too, but before he could, Adelaide was talking again.

“I need your help,” she said. “I think my life is in danger.”

Michael’s posture snapped to attention, and Hiram’s thoughts came into focus.

“Who do you think wants to hurt you?” Hiram asked. She’d spoken with her voice lowered, though she sat up and smiled as if everything were normal; he tried to do the same.

Did she think someone might be watching them?

“Whoever killed my father,” she said.

“So you don’t know who that is,” Michael concluded. “Any guesses? You must think it’s someone who might be here in town.”

Again, Michael was quick as lightning. That mind would make him a formidable cunning man—or a scientist.

Or both? Maybe Michael could teach geology at a university and also be master of the craft of stones—there were more stones with special properties than just bloodstones in the world. For that matter, he could prospect for uranium on the side, too.

“I have no idea,” she said. “But I know why he was killed.”

From her handbag she drew a folded sheet of paper. She unfolded it carefully and set it on the table where Hiram and Michael could see. The sheet looked something like a dollar bill, but half again as large, and on thicker paper, with a blue watermark. It bore the name and address of a bank in Denver, but its largest lettering said: Pay to the bearer $500 upon demand.

“Is that real?” Hiram struggled with what he was seeing. He’d heard of bearer bonds but had never touched one with his own hands. If genuine, the sheet of paper basically amounted to a five-hundred-dollar bill. “Was this your father’s, Mrs. Preece?”

“Mrs. Tunstall, as it happens. Married name. It’s real as far as I know. My father gave it to me yesterday and told me to be ready to get out of town. He said there was lots more where this came from, and then, there’s a fortune to be had in a man’s good opinion of himself. He said we’d all go together, even my husband Guy, and start a new life.”

“You father didn’t like Guy?” Michael asked.

Adelaide Tunstall shook her head. “No, it wasn’t like that. My father was a very successful man, because he worked hard and took risks. Being successful meant my father could provide for many people, including us. My husband…”

“Is not a very successful man,” Michael concluded.

“No,” she said. “Not in that way.”

“But you don’t think he and Guy might have, for instance…fought about money?” Michael was asking a very hard question, but his voice was mild, as if he were inquiring about the weather. That was a subtlety he might not need as a geologist, but that would serve him well in the cunning man’s craft, or in the practice of law.

“No. No!” Adelaide’s eyes grew big, and then she laughed. “Look, you’ll understand when you meet my husband. Guy just wouldn’t have it in him. Some women marry their fathers, but other women marry to get away from their fathers. I…” She shrugged. “After growing up with a man who worked hard and was ambitious, I married a man of a different type. I don’t think Guy’s hit anyone in his life. I don’t think he had the will, even before he got kicked in the head by that horse.”

Hiram sat back and tried not to look stunned while Michael talked. Lloyd Preece gave every indication of being a pillar of his community, a deeply rooted and settled man. What would make him want to flee? And was it a sudden flight, or had he been preparing, saving up money for the purpose?

Was it to save his good opinion of himself? Did that mean someone had involved him in an enterprise that was shameful or criminal?

“Your father gave the impression of being wealthy, Mrs. Tunstall,” Hiram said. “Do you know where the money came from?”

“He was a rancher, Mr. Woolley. He ranched for forty years and he was good at it. And he was quick to spend money to help other people, but he didn’t spend very much on himself. When I was a young woman, I asked him if I could get a tattoo—it was a strange whim I likely picked up from reading too many magazines. He told me I could, so long as the tattoo was the phrase, ‘a penny saved is a penny earned.’ That new truck is the only thing I can recall him buying for himself in years. He still lived in the cabin where I grew up when he could have built a mansion in town.”

The new truck, Hiram thought, and the Masonic silver dagger.

“So you’re saying,” Michael asked slowly, “that you have a tattoo with a Benjamin Franklin quote in it?”

Adelaide laughed. “I’m saying my father got rich by being careful with his money.”

“You don’t know anything about buried silver?” Hiram asked. “Money from a bank robbery?”

“I’ve heard the rumors.” Adelaide seemed to consider. “It’s possible Dad had money I didn’t know about. Frankly, if you were going to have bank robbery loot fall into the hands of any man in Grand County, Lloyd Preece would be a good one to choose. Wherever it came from, a lot of cash flowed from him into local charities—firemen’s pensions, poor relief, public parks, as well as churches. That’s right, churches plural, not just his church. And I’ve seen him hand a twenty-dollar bill to more people down on their luck than I can remember.”

Hiram nodded. “I saw that myself.”

“Might he have taken money for the mineral rights on his land?” Michael asked.

“Or is it possible that he made any enemies in developing his land over time?” Hiram suggested.

“You mean, someone who would want to kill him?” Adelaide shrugged. “It’s possible, but if any of those things are true, I don’t know about them. What I know is that my father wanted to leave the state, and he apparently had been setting aside cash to be able to do that. Then someone killed him. I need help.”

“I’m not much of a fighter,” Hiram said.

“That’s not true,” Michael protested. “I’ve seen you go up against four men and come out on top.”

Hiram frowned. “I don’t like to fight.” He turned his eyes to Adelaide. “But I have a truck, if what you need is a ride out of town.”

“What made you turn to us?” Michael asked.

“My husband’s cousin Dick is a coal miner in one of the camps outside Helper,” Adelaide said. “He told us about what you did at the Kimball mine, earlier this year.”

That would be the bloodstone, spreading Hiram’s fame. Hiram sucked at his teeth, wishing he could ask Adelaide exactly what she had heard. He wished he could be anonymous, an unknown, a man on the street. Good works seemed more noble when they were anonymous, but also, he’d rather that anyone who was opposed to him not see him coming.

On the other hand, Adelaide Tunstall had come to him because of his reputation, and that gave him an opportunity to help her.

“You need a ride out of town,” he said. “And your husband, of course. Do you have children?”

She nodded. “Three.”

“I guess we could fit everyone in the truck.” Michael looked skeptical.

“I’ll strap myself to the back,” Hiram said. “And Mr. Tunstall with me. We’ll all fit. But where do you want to go, Mrs. Tunstall?” He held up the bond. “Denver?”

“You don’t have to drive us that far,” she said. “Get us to Provo and we’ll catch a train to…somewhere else.” Abruptly, her eyes took on a guarded, shy look. “Maybe it’s best if you don’t know where we end up, exactly.”

“I agree.” Hiram nodded.

“We can go right now,” Michael said.

“We can’t,” she shot back.

“You need to pack?” Hiram asked. He was offering her a graceful way out, in case she was having sudden second thoughts. The narrow eyes Michael shot his way indicated that Michael knew it. If Adelaide Tunstall feared for her life, why wouldn’t she want to flee immediately? It was Saturday, so the children shouldn’t be in school, and any job she’d walk away from was a job she would be abandoning in any case.

If she wanted more time, maybe she thought she knew where her father’s money was, and she wanted to go collect it.

Fair enough. That was none of Hiram’s business, though it did make him feel as if perhaps he was helping someone who was about to become rich, rather than helping someone who was on the way to poverty.

But she feared for her life, and her fear seemed reasonable, and Hiram could help.

Besides, he wanted to go see the Reverend Majestic Earl Bill Clay preaching.

She nodded. “I do need to pack. And I need my privacy. Believe me, I feel better just knowing you’ll escort me out of town.”

“I don’t want you to be alone, though,” Hiram said. “Would it be okay if Diana Artemis came with you while you packed? With the two of you, I think it’s much less likely that anyone will attack you.”

Adelaide hesitated. Was that reluctance on her face?

“Or we could come, Mrs. Tunstall. Couldn’t we, Pap?”

Hiram nodded.

“Help from Mrs. Artemis would fine,” Adelaide said. “She could keep an eye on the children while I gather my things and Guy’s.” No one seemed to think that Guy Tunstall was competent. Not even his wife, who didn’t mention him as a source of safety for her, or even suggest that he would help her pack.

“We’ll accompany you to her house,” Michael suggested.

“That leaves us little time to get to the other places we wanted to get to this afternoon.” Hiram thought of the uranium prospector and the wilderness preacher. The waitress approached the table with two plates in hand, and Hiram smiled apologetically at her. “I’m sorry, but could we get those eggs packaged to go?”

Encouraged by a fifty-cent tip, the waitress quickly wrapped the eggs and bacon both inside the toast, to convert the meal into a pair of sandwiches, with orange juice in a paper cup.

“You eat,” Hiram told Michael. “I’ll drive to the widow’s.” He tried to sound noncommittal about it. However, he found that he liked the idea of driving to Diana Artemis’s house very much.

“And if you have a fainting spell?” his son asked. “Magical tea notwithstanding?”

“Drop the sandwich and grab the wheel.”

Hiram drove, and Adelaide Tunstall followed in a newish red Ford Cabriolet.

“Do you think they know each other already?” Michael asked around bites into his egg sandwich that caused yolk to well up and flow around the thick sourdough toast, sinking into the bread’s grainy pores. “Or do you think Mrs. Tunstall’s hesitation is only because she wants some time to look for the money?”

“We don’t know that she wants to find the money,” Hiram said.

“No, but you were thinking it, too. And it is rather odd she asked for privacy. And then agreed to let Diana help her.”

Hiram nodded. “It is odd. And you’re right, it might be about the money. We are strangers to her, and men besides. If the money was rightfully Mr. Preece’s, then now it does belong to his daughter. But I hadn’t considered the possibility that Mrs. Tunstall might already know Mrs. Artemis.”

“So formal, Pap. I know you think of Mrs. Artemis as Diana. You can probably think of Mrs. Tunstall as Adelaide.”

“Adelaide, then.” Hiram chuckled. “Diana’s reputation is none too good. That might just be the ordinary talk one hears about an adult woman with no fixed man in her life.”

“You say that like it’s fair, when you know it isn’t.”

“It isn’t fair. But it’s ordinary.”

“Well, if the two women start punching each other, which one should we help?”

“If they fall to blows, we pull them apart until they cool down.”

Hiram parked the car in front of Edna’s bungalow, careful to leave the shadiest spot for Adelaide Tunstall. She parked behind them and stepped out of her car as if hesitation was the furthest thing from her mind.

They passed into the back yard and had only reached the front step when the door opened. Diana Artemis smiled.

And Hiram forgot what he was doing there.

“Ahem,” Michael said.

Hiram tried not to look at her legs, or the curve of her shoulder, or to think about the fact that she was a cunning woman—if not exactly like Hiram, then sort of like Hiram—and a widow.

“Ahem,” Michael said.

Hiram looked down at his feet.

“So we’re here,” Michael said to Diana, “because Mrs. Tunstall needs someone to be with her this afternoon while she packs.”

“For a trip,” Adelaide said. “Hello, Di.”

“Hello, Addy. A trip sounds lovely. I’d love to help. I have some appointments, but I can reschedule them.”

Appointments.

Diana would be giving up work to do this, and it was essentially a favor for Hiram. He was a little surprised they’d greeted each other by their first names, and that they had a certain familiarity with each other.

Hiram fumbled in his pocket and found the remaining twenty-dollar bill Lloyd Preece had given him. He handed it to Diana. “This is paid work,” he said. The words sounded blunt and awkward when they came out. Diana smiled and raised her eyebrows.

“That’s a lot of money to help a girl pack,” she said.

“It might be dangerous,” Hiram said.

“Should I take a gun?” she asked.

Michael tilted his head at Hiram and raised his eyebrows.

Hiram cleared his throat. “I don’t think you need to worry that much. But, just in case—wear this.” He removed his chi-rho amulet and handed it to her.

His own heart was troubled by her presence. He desired her and he knew it, and his desire was clouding his ability to perform even simple charms. But that didn’t mean the medallion wouldn’t work for her.

She accepted the gift and settled it down on her lovely throat.

Hiram was struck by the thought that he had exchanged amulets with Diana Artemis; he wore her cross, and she wore his cross, in the form of the chi-rho medallion. He wanted to make clear that even though it was a bit like exchanging rings, Hiram had no such intention, but he couldn’t bring out the words.

“Why don’t we meet back here,” Michael suggested. “Say, sundown?”

“Eleven p.m.,” the widow Artemis countered. “And turn your lights off before you get to this block. At sundown, there will still be traffic on the street, but by eleven, you’ll know that anyone on the road with you is following you.”

Michael and Hiram got back into the truck, Michael taking the wheel.

“Well,” Michael said, “they didn’t punch each other.”

“They didn’t.” Hiram’s appreciation for the widow had grown. She’d dropped her entire day to help Adelaide. She risked losing clients, which meant losing money. He was glad he’d given her the chi-rho amulet, though he was worried for the women. If the murderer thought the Preece fortune lay in the hands of the daughter, they might be in trouble. However, it was unlikely they’d get into trouble in town, in broad daylight, the two of them—three, including the husband.

“The Saturday wilderness services don’t start until four o’clock.” Michael drove them down onto Main Street. “We can run up to the prospector and see how soused he is. Then we can motor on down to Frenchie’s Canyon. Pretty sure we can make it. Sound like a plan?”

Hiram nodded. Then he sighed.


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