Calamity Jayne and the Sisterhood of the Traveling Lawn Gnome (12 page)

 "You can use Ceres there," Dusty pointed to the four-wheeler closest to me. "We'll use Eris."

I raised an eyebrow.

"Dwarf planets," Frankie explained.

"Well, technically, Eris is a plutoid, not a dwarf," Dusty corrected before giving me an abbreviated tutorial on operating a four-wheeler. "We'll take it slow and easy," he said, backing the ATVs out of the garage one-by-one. "Just ease up on the throttle if you get to going too fast. Brake's here. Like I said, we'll take it slow."

"Shouldn't we be wearing helmets?" Frankie asked, and I shot him a dark look. A flattop on Frankie was no big deal. With my hair, it was a
'do
don't.

"Oh. Sure. Here." Dusty handed me a forest green helmet and a camo one to Frankie.

"Gee. Thanks." I said and gave Frankie the stink eye before checking the helmet to figure out the front from the back before I set it on my head. (I'd committed a bike ride faux pas when I couldn't tell the difference.) I cinched the chin strap tight and straddled the four-wheeler, revving the motor and listening to the purr turn into a roar.

Would you look at me now? Tressa Turner, four-wheelin' phenom!

"Take it easy, Calamity Jayne," Dusty warned from his seat on the four-wheeler ahead of me. "It's got horsepower, but it's no old, gray mare."

I idled down and nodded.

"Sorry. It's just a really sweet ride. Right, Frankie?"

I smiled as Frankie attempted to mount in back of Dusty, who, despite his short stature, wasn't exactly average weight.

When he finally did manage to get on the ATV, Frankie's knees were almost up to his armpits. I took advantage of the opportunity to snap a couple of pictures on my phone. You never knew when you might require blackmail material.

"You ready?" Dusty called back, and I gave him a thumbs-up. "Just follow me. And don't get too close!"

I gave him a second thumbs-up.

"Let's get this wagon rollin'!" I yelled and erupted into the theme song from
Rawhide
about heading 'em up and movin' 'em out.

Just as Frankie turned to give me what I was sure was his trademark 'I knew it' look, the ATV he was on surged ahead. He reached out and grabbed Dusty around the waist to avoid being pitched off. I grinned.

This moment alone was worth a case of helmet head.

For the first mile or so, we stuck to a well-established trail. As we continued, the timber became more dense and the trail less of a trail and more of an obstacle course.

The ATV ahead of me slowed and stopped. I followed suit.

"I think we've gone as far as we can," Dusty said. "We'll have to go in on foot from here."

"Thank God," I heard Frankie mutter.

I shut my Honda off, pulled the helmet off, and rubbed the top of my damp head and winced. It was gonna be a hot oil conditioning night for sure.

"That way," Dusty said and pointed to the thick woods ahead of us. "We go in about a quarter of a mile, and that's where we'll find the signs."

"Lead on," I said, getting another chuckle watching Frankie perform strange and terrifying contortions as he struggled to get off the vehicle. "I give you a three," I teased.

"What are you talking about?"

"Your ATV dismount."

"You think it's so amusing, you can ride double with Dusty on the way back…little Miss

Helmet Head."

I was about to counter with a suggestion that perhaps Frankie might want to duct-tape himself to the ATV on the return trip, when Dusty called out.

"This way, Calamity! Frank!"

"Frank? Would that be Frank James? And how nice that you're on a first name basis already."

"Would you give it a rest?" Frankie said and adjusted his makeshift mask.

"Here! Over here!" Dusty motioned to us.

We tramped over high grass, fallen logs, weeds, and vines. I swiped at a buzzing near my left ear.

"Are we there yet?" I asked, sweat trickling down the valley between the girls.

"Just about," Dusty answered. "We're just about there."

For the first time it occurred to me that I really didn't know all that much about Dusty Cadwallader. For all I knew, we could be walking into an ambush.

I shook my head remembering that the Knox County deputy had seen me leave the courthouse with Dusty. He'd hardly try anything nefarious knowing he was the last person I'd been seen with—and by an officer of the law at that.

"Shhh! Quiet now!" Dusty stopped and put a finger to his lips. "We go in silent from here just in case there's someone—or some
thing
about."

I nodded, by now breathing heavily.

"He said silent," Frankie said. "If anyone's around, they'll hear that huffing and puffing of yours a mile away. Would you like a kerchief to muffle it? I brought extras."

"I'm good," I said, trying to get a handle on my ragged respiration.

"Shhh, now. Quiet. Here we go," Dusty said and motioned for us to follow.

I obliged, keeping close on his heels, attempting to breathe through my nose rather than my mouth.

Dusty stopped. "What was that? I thought I heard a whistle."

I winced. Damned nose whistle.

"I didn't hear anything," I said.

We continued through the timber, thick and dense, for another hundred yards or so until we came to a small clearing.

"This is it," Dusty said, stopping to look and listen before crawling over a row of fallen logs and into a circle devoid of trees. I followed, making my way over the downed trees and bending down to avoid a low-hanging branch before straightening to peer around me.

"Ouch!"

"Frankie?" I whispered. "You okay?"

"Thorns," he said.

I winced.
Indiana Jones
Frankie wasn't.

"There! There they are." Dusty pointed to four trees that formed a circle around the clearing. "Signs!"

I followed his finger and caught my breath.

Holy chocolate-coated candies. They do exist!

I motioned to Frankie who also stared at the graffiti. We walked from tree to tree, observing the artwork. He pulled his kerchief down to reveal a puzzled frown.

"Interesting," he said.

I nodded. "Yet somehow…kitschy. So. Do your stuff, oh mighty geek," I instructed.

He nodded and pulled his backpack off and put it on the ground, kneeling down to remove his equipment.

Dusty moved to a circle near the center of the clearing.

"Here's where they danced," he said. "And that's where the leprechaun or whatever you want to call it was." He pointed to a small circle of stones.

I could see where the ground had been disturbed by foot traffic, and it did appear to form a circle around the stones.

"Did you burn something out here?" I asked Dusty, and he shook his head.

"No. Why?"

I crouched down by the stones. "Someone started a small fire here," I pointed out. I took a stick and stirred the ashes around, uncovering a tiny scrap of what appeared to be a paper product of some kind. I squinted down at it. The edges appeared to be singed.

"Look at this, Frankie. What do you make of it?"

A second later, Frankie's hot breath hit my neck like a blowtorch, and a long pair of tweezers held in a latex-covered hand swooped by my ear and picked up the itty-bitty sliver of white.

"Looks like it could be the corner of a photograph," Frankie said. "It's stiff like a photo, but I can't be sure."

"Why would someone bring a picture out here just to burn it?" Dusty asked.

"I guess for the same reason they paint pink tornadoes on trees," I said.

"And why is that?"

"I have no idea," I said. "Frankie?"

He pulled a small plastic baggie from his pocket, deposited the charred scrap, and secured the top.

"It sounds like some sort of ritual," he said.

I swallowed. "Ritual? You mean as in the dude down
there
type of ritual?" I pointed to the ground.

Frankie shrugged.

"Could be anything really. A Satanic cult, pagan idol worship, druid worship, Wicca, or witchcraft."

"Witchcraft? You think we have a coven here? In Grandville?" My mouth suddenly felt dry as the cinnamon sticky rolls my gammy made for the county fair the year she tried to bounce the queen of yeast, Abigail Winegardner, from her blue ribbon throne.

"I didn't say that. I'm just throwing possibilities out there."

"I still say it's not of this world," Dusty said. "It's extraterrestrial. That's what it is. An alien life form bent on infiltration and annihilation."

"I don't know." I stood and brushed off my khaki pants. "I'm not sure hot pink is E.T.'s color." I conducted a visual search of the area, extending the search area to include a wide sweep extending beyond the clearing, stopping when the sunlight reflected off an item sitting back in the brush.

I picked up an empty bottle of vodka and handed it to Frankie to bag.

"You're serious?" he said.

"Vodka is the alcohol of choice for minors, dude," I said. I made my way through the underbrush to the object. I stooped to get a better look.

"Faith 'n' Begorrah, I think me found me
Lucky Charms
!" I said in my best Irish lilt.

"What? What did you find?" Dusty asked.

"A pot of gold, Danny boy," I said, with my lilt. "A pot o' gold."

"It's Dusty, not Danny," Dusty said, totally spoiling the moment and pulling the rug out from under my Irish jig. "And what exactly do you mean by 'pot of gold'?"

I sighed. Someday someone will recognize and appreciate the piquancy of my personality. I'm sure of it.

"I found a can of spray paint," I said, thinking that without my Irish brogue that sounded about as momentous as announcing you'd discovered lint in your belly button or a long hair where it shouldn't be.

"You did?" Frankie asked.

"Hot pink spray paint if my eyes don't deceive me," I said. "It's me lucky day. If you would be so kind as to fetch me an evidence bag, my good lad."

Frankie sighed, but hurried over. He carefully lifted the silver container into a bag and sealed it.

"Do you know what this means?" I asked.

"Fingerprints, DNA, forensic evidence," Frankie said.

"Well. Sure. There is that, of course."

"What else?"

I grinned. "It means Sheriff Sitsalot is about to have his lunch handed to him by Frankie the Kid, Marvin the Martian, and Miz Calamity Jayne. And crow is on the menu!"

Vindication, baby. It's magically delicious!

We completed a more thorough search, and Frankie drew a diagram of the area before we collected our gear and headed back to Dusty's. I'd galloped to my ATV and taken off ahead of my team, giving Frankie no choice but to ride double with Dusty.

He'd sulked (and hacked) and complained about not having time to shower before work all the way back to town. I'd dropped him off at the Dairee Freeze for his afternoon shift before heading back to the newspaper, our evidence secured in sealed evidence bags with labels filled out and initialed by crime scene tech Barlowe.

I hurried into the newspaper office, bags in tow. Shelby Lynn was just coming out of Stan's office when I walked by.

"I got your text. Sorry. I was…indisposed. What did you want?"

I waved her off.

"Oh, nothing really. Just a tiny, insignificant thing like breaking this case wide open." I put my hand out. "Fist bump!"

She stared at my hand and shook her head.

"What planet do you live on?" she asked.

"Planet Pulitzer," I said.

She shook her head.

"Ah. Fifty shades of delusional, I see," she said.

"That's what you think!" I explained what had occurred since we'd parted ways that morning and what we'd found in the woods near Dusty Cadwallader's farm.

"It looks like Dusty Cadwallader was right about visitors in his woods. And if those 'signs' Dusty showed us are any indication, it looks like those visitors of his are responsible for the recent vandalism around the county. Plus, with the evidence we collected, we might even be able to finger the culprits," I added trying not to sound like I was tooting my own horn.

"You need help patting yourself on the back there?"

I winced.

Guess I'd tooted after all.

"So how did you fare?" I asked.

"You mean with the have-you-seen-this-gnome identifications?" Shelby asked. "I think you'll be pleased."

"Oh? Did the Colbys recognize Cedric?"

Shelby nodded.

"Both of them?"

She nodded again.

"And there's no doubt?"

"Pretty sure. When Mrs. Colby said no one would forget a face like that and Mr. Colby mentioned something about gremlins, I figured the identifications were valid."

"What about the Keefers? Did they recall seeing Cedric anywhere near their residence?"

Shelby Lynn shook her head.

"No. Not near
their
residence."

I lifted an eyebrow.

"I sense a
but.
"

"But…they're pretty sure they saw it at H&F, Home & Farm Hardware. It was out by the clearance lawn ornaments, gazing balls, and wind chimes."

"When? When did they see it? Him?" I asked.

"That's where it gets interesting. They say they saw it early this morning. They were bringing in a load of late sweet corn to sell at their stand by the vet clinic and pulled through the drive-through next door to get some coffee and took a short cut through H&F to avoid that ridiculously long traffic light."

"Well then, let's go!"

I jumped to my feet.

"Better pull back on the reins, Calamity," Shelby said. "I already drove by H&F. Your little friend has flown the coop."

I sank back into my chair only to pop back out of it.

"You can stay in the saddle there, cowgirl. I already checked. There's no video. The store uses dummy cameras."

I sighed. "What about nearby businesses?"

Shelby shook her head. "Nothing useful, sorry to say."

"Great," I said. "What did you find out at Harve's place?" I asked. "Stan says he'll run the entire piece if we have definitive proof. Do we?"

Shelby handed me a stack of photographs.