Sammy Keyes and the Night of Skulls (18 page)

He nods. “Winnie. She’ll bring her sometimes when she visits her dad.” He gives me a curious look, then nods at the grave where we’d been picnicking. “You related to Sophie?”

“Sophie?” I look over my shoulder. “Oh, Sassypants!” I laugh. “No.”

“Then Theodore?” he asks, nodding at another grave.

I shake my head.

“Wayne?” And when I shake my head, he says, “Anna? Penelope?”

Now, Dusty Mike hasn’t looked at any of the gravestones while he’s been talking. He hasn’t had to. It’s like he’s got the whole place memorized.

“No. I … uh … Actually, I don’t have any relatives here. A friend told me about All Souls’ Day and I thought it would be nice to come out and sit with someone who didn’t have visitors.”

He tilts his head a little as he looks at me, kind of stooped over and sideways. It’s like he’s an old raven and I’m some strange object that he can’t quite figure out. “Well, that would be most any of the folks in this part of
the graveyard.” He hoes at some tall grass behind a headstone. “I’m about the only one who bothers to come by.”

I watch him hack away for a minute, then ask, “Do you always work on Sundays?”

He shakes his head. “I don’t work here no more.”

I hesitate. “Since when?”

“Since a couple months ago.”

“But … why?”

He hacks a little harder. “They got new people.”

Casey asks, “So why are you working here if you don’t work here?”

Dusty shrugs and hobbles over to another grave, where he starts hoeing at a weed. “I’ve done it my whole life. I’m not gonna stop now.” He gives Casey that side-eyed raven look. “Someone’s gotta watch over them.”

“Them?” I ask.

He nods, real serious-like. “There’s been shenanigans.” Suddenly he stops hoeing and says, “I didn’t come out on Halloween and I shoulda.”

Casey and I give each other a quick look and then I ask Dusty Mike, “Uh … why’s that?”

He studies me for a minute. “Come on. I’ll show you.”

So we pack up quick, then hurry after Dusty Mike as he goes deeper and deeper into the old section.

Dusty Mike led us to an area with big trees that had thick, mossy bark that looked ready to crack right off the trunks. The paths were more like deer trails, and we couldn’t even see the new section anymore. For the first time since we’d come into the graveyard I started to get a little nervous.

“Where are we going?” I finally ask.

“Right here, missy,” he says, coming to a stop.

I don’t see any signs of shenanigans—no smashed angels or spray-painted grave markers or even evidence of eggings.

There is just dirt.

Fresh, smoothed-over dirt.

“Is this a new grave?” I ask, but even as it comes out I know it doesn’t make sense. For one thing, the headstone has moss on it. For another, all the new graves are down in the new section.

“No, missy,” he says. “It’s been here fifty years.”

Casey looks at him. “And you didn’t just hoe up weeds?”

Dusty Mike shakes his head. “Didn’t touch it.” He gives Casey that one-eyed look. “Someone dug it up.”

My eyebrows go flying. “Dug it up? Why?”

“Must’ve been something valuable inside.”

Casey shakes his head. “But after fifty years?”

Dusty Mike shrugs. “Relations can be strange that way.” Then he adds, “People’ll dig up graves for an old pocket watch.”

“Are you serious?” I ask him.

“Used to be common as all get-out. And that’s nothing. In the old days, folks would steal the whole body.”

“What?
Why?
”

“To do experiments on.” Then he adds, “But that was before modern medicine. Back when doctors had trouble findin’ bodies to practice on.”

I hold my head with both hands. “So they’d dig up graves?”

Mike nods. “They could pull the bodies out in no time. Especially if there was no coffin. That’s why people started puttin’ the heavy markers over graves. The bigger the marker, the harder it was to dig up the grave. Nowadays they’re buried under a heavy liner or inside a vault, which makes them hard to get to … and doctors have folks donatin’ their bodies to science so they don’t have to steal ’em.”

I let this soak in for a second, then ask him, “What’s a liner?” because in my mind it’s like the inside of a jacket and I can’t quite put that together with
heavy
.

“Oh. It’s a big cement box. Goes inside the grave, over
the coffin. Keeps the dirt from settlin’ in.” Dusty Mike gives us the raven look. “But there’s no liners in a lot of the graves in this part. Some of ’em’s shallow, too. Don’t even have coffins. Just a burial cloth.”

I blink at him. “They were just wrapped in a cloth and put in the ground?”

He nods. “Some religions like to go that route. Could be a matter of cost, too. What the family could afford.”

I can’t help staring at the fresh dirt. “But … you don’t
know
someone dug up this grave, right?”

“Why else would it look this way?”

“Maybe a relative just cleaned off the weeds? I mean, if you were here to steal something, why close it up again and put the headstone back and make it look all even and neat and everything?”

He twists his head, first looking at me, then the grave, then me. Finally he says, “It was dug up. I can feel it.” He takes a deep breath and sort of hangs on his hoe. “I told Gordon, but he won’t even come up here and look. Told me I was trespassing.” He shakes his head. “Me. Trespassing.”

“Gordon?” I ask. “Who’s Gordon?”

“The manager. You must’ve seen him. Big man. Likes his ball caps. Suddenly’s got no use for me. But I don’t see him comin’ up here to tend to these graves.” He lets a cackle slip out. “Afraid of ghosts, if ya ask me.”

Casey nods. “That’d set you back if you worked in a graveyard.”

“What he ought to do is embrace ’em. The spirits are your friends, but only if you walk
with
’em. The minute you start runnin’? They’ll chase you.”

“So … what are you going to do about the grave?” I ask him.

He shrugs. “What’s to do? It’s done. The grave robbers is gone. And nobody cares. I checked the records. There’s no next of kin.”

“But somebody arranged to have him buried, right?”

“It’s not a man,” he says. “It’s Ofelia Ortega. She was a nanny for the Roggazini family.”

“As in Roggazini Farms?” Casey asks.

Mike nods. “Adam Senior took care of the burial. He’s since passed. Him and the other Roggazinis are over in the new section.”

“But”—I kind of squint at him—“how could you check the records when you don’t work here anymore?”

He gives me a crooked smile as he pulls a classic-looking ring of keys out of his pocket. “Because nobody bothered to ask me for these.”

“Wow, those are cool,” Casey says, and he’s right. The ring is the size of a bracelet, black and smooth, and the keys are old and sort of brown. There’s even a skeleton key.

Dusty Mike slips them away. “Need to keep visitin’ the folks in the Sunset Crypt.”

“Does that place go underground?” Casey asks.

“Right,” Mike says with a nod. “Fifty-two people restin’ in peace down there.” Then he adds. “It’s got a real good feel inside. I take my lunch down there sometimes.”

Well, okay. Knowing Dusty Mike likes having lunch inside an underground crypt with a bunch of dead people is really kind of creeping me out. But Ofelia’s grave does look like it’s been more than just, you know, gardened, so I shift
the conversation back to that. “If you think grave robbers dug up this grave and that Gordon guy won’t even come up here to look, why don’t you tell someone who can do something about it. Like maybe the police?”

“The police?” He puts some muscle into hoeing at a weed. “They don’t seem to put much stock in what I tell them. Probably best if I just keep doin’ what I’ve been doin’.”

I eye him. “You mean coming over and hanging out with the … spirits?”

He nods, then twists his head like he’s tossed his nose toward the back of the cemetery. “I live ’cross the street. I unlock the side gate and slip right in. No one notices me.” He shakes his head. “Only wish I’d come over Halloween night.”

Now, while we were talking, I guess Casey had turned his phone back on, because all of a sudden it
wah-wah-wahs
, and when he checks the display, he gives me a nod and answers, “What’s up?” as he walks away.

Mike watches him go. “Nice of you two to visit with Sophie,” he says, and just like that he’s done talking and hobbles away.

A short minute later Casey’s hurrying back, telling me, “Gotta go. Danny’s outside Billy’s house ranting.” And I guess whatever’s going on is pretty intense because he doesn’t say a word about Dusty Mike or thank me for the picnic or say anything about calling me later. He just gives me a quick kiss and takes off.

So there I am, alone in a pretty scary part of the old
cemetery, standing beside a grave that may have been dug up by someone looking for antique pocket watches.

Or whatever.

And since squeezing around the gate we’d snuck through to get inside the graveyard on Halloween would be a lot shorter than going out the way I’d come in, that’s what I decide to do.

Trouble is, Dusty Mike’s hoe is propped up against the wall, and I’m worried about him seeing me break my promise.

Again.

But I’m also getting really nervous being in the graveyard by myself.

Dusty Mike may have seemed nice when he helped me track down Elyssa, but he’s definitely strange.

And more than a little creepy.

I decided to stop in at Holly’s to talk to her about maybe keeping the whole Danny thing between us, at least for a while, but the instant I walk through the Pup Parlor door, I get attacked.

Not by a pit bull or a Rottweiler, or even a Doberman pinscher.

Nope.

By my best friend.

“Why didn’t you
tell
me?” Marissa cries, flying at me. “I can’t believe you followed him! And that you called the cops!”

It was just Holly and Marissa downstairs, and obviously Holly had already spilled the beans.

“Sorry,” Holly tells me with a cringe. “She got it out of me.”

I turn to Marissa. “Look, he broke the guy’s ribs! And he stole his stuff! Danny’s turned into a full-on criminal!”

“And you’re what? His judge and jury?”

I squint at her. “What’s the
matter
with you?”

“What’s the matter with
me
? What’s the matter with
you
? You don’t
know
he did it. You weren’t
there
. And I
don’t care what you heard, I don’t believe it! He was probably just bragging or … or … trying to act tough. Guys have to go through, you know, rites into manhood”—her head spazzes around like it’s got some jolt of current overloading it—“or whatever!”

“So you’re okay with a guy who brags about beating someone up, but not okay with someone who actually does it?”

“Quit twisting my words!”

“I’m not, Marissa. I just don’t get how you can stick up for him!”

“And I don’t get how you can go on a
picnic
when Danny’s incarcerated!’

I almost asked her how she knew about the picnic, but I figured she must’ve talked to Grams. So instead I cock an eyebrow at her and say, “Incarcerated? He’s not incarcerated. Right now he’s over at Billy’s house beating down the door.”

“At Billy’s? Why Billy?”

“Because he’s looking for Casey.”

“Casey? Why Casey?”

“Because he thinks Casey turned him in.”

“Why does he think that?”

“Because he saw Billy, Casey, and me coming down the police station steps.”

She throws her hands into the air. “Well! There you go! The whole world knows you narc’d on him.”

For all the things Marissa and I have gone through, there was never, ever a point where I couldn’t see us as being friends forever and ever. But right here, right now,
I caught a glimpse. It was an awful feeling, too. Cold and shivery and scary.

Like walking on a grave.

I shake it off, grab her, and push her into a chair. “Listen, would you? Just
listen.
”

She crosses her arms and looks at me like there’s no way anything I have to say will make any difference.