Mama Rocks the Empty Cradle Read online

  I quickly explained what had happened to me on the highway. Then I told Mama, “That goon had such an angry look on his face, he made me sure that he would have tried something crazy if he could. Thank goodness those kids came by.”

  Mama studied my face. “Would you recognize the man if you saw him again? Or the car?”

  “Of course I would,” I said.

  We were both silent, but it was a packed, thoughtful silence. Then the doorbell rang. The expression on Mama’s face told me that she didn’t want visitors.

  After the third ring, I opened the door to Sarah Jenkins, Annie Mae Gregory, and Carrie Smalls.

  The three women brushed past me and walked directly into the family room. To my surprise, Mama greeted them happily. When everyone was seated, Carrie Smalls eyed Mama grimly. “You feeling better?”

  Mama smiled slightly. “Yes,” she answered. “I guess I didn’t realize how painful the removal of bunions could be.”

  Sarah Jenkins sniffed. “You should have asked me before you had it done, Candi. Couple years back I had a bunion, a callus, and a corn cut from one foot.”

  Mama said, “I’m sure that was some affliction.”

  “It’s a fact,” Sarah Jenkins said, proud of her ordeal. “Doctor had to break a bone in my foot just to set it straight again.”

  Mama nodded sympathetically, then she asked, “Did you ladies find out anything about Cricket’s murder this morning when we left you at the Cherry Ridge apartments?”

  Annie Mae Gregory’s thick jaws wobbled. “We found out that Cricket was in some kind of scam that forced quite a few men in Otis to pay her money each week to keep her quiet.”

  Carrie Smalls folded her arms across her chest, and pushed her breasts up like balloons as she proudly added to their astonishing report. “Mattie Snipes told me her husband was paying Cricket fifty dollars a week to keep some kind of a secret from the deacon board of his church. Mattie said she for one was glad the hussy was dead. Now that fifty dollars of her husband’s hard-earn money could go to her house, where it was suppose to be going all along.”

  “Heaven knows how many other men in Otis was dishing out money to that good-for-nothing Cricket Childs,” Annie Mae Gregory continued smugly.

  Mama gave the women a long, serious look, but she didn’t make any comment. If the news about Cricket being a blackmailer surprised her, nothing in her face showed it.

  Annie Mae Gregory continued. “The way I figure it, if Cricket had ten men whose secret she was keeping and each gave her fifty dollars a week, that’s enough money for a heap of people to want to see that girl gone on to her reward, whatever torment as that may be.”

  Sarah Jenkins’s brow wrinkled. “If I had a husband, and a hussy like that was making him give her money every week, I’d likely kill her myself. Course, that ain’t no reason to steal her innocent baby. The Good Book did say, though, that your sins will go against your children. I suspect Abe will find that child Morgan out in somebody’s field butchered up just like her no-good heifer of a mama.”

  At first I wondered why Mama wasn’t responding to the news of Cricket’s little scam. Then I realized that she probably knew somebody else who would know more about it than these ladies. “Did you know Cricket’s mama or daddy?” Mama asked them.

  Sarah Jenkins coughed.

  “Sure did,” Carrie Smalls answered. “Cricket’s daddy’s name was Archie Childs from Sugar Hill.”

  “You probably went to school with Cricket’s mama, Barbara Williams,” Sarah said.

  Mama looked interested. Annie Mae Gregory shifted. Her body shook like a walrus trying to sit in a chair. “Barbara was stunted. Not five feet tall when she was full grown.”

  Recognition flashed in Mama’s eyes. “She was bright-skinned, had thick lips?”

  “That was Barbara, all right,” Annie Mae Gregory said.

  Mama nodded. “Barbara and I were in the twelfth grade together, and then—”

  “She got knocked up,” Carrie Smalls interrupted. “Archie Childs got Barbara Williams pregnant.”

  “She never graduated?” Mama asked.

  “Naw, back then it was a shame for a girl to carry a child before she got married,” Sarah Jenkins said. “Ain’t like today, when getting knocked up without a husband is like dressing up in your Sunday best and strutting around town.”

  Now, I felt myself squirming uncomfortably. Sarah Jenkins’s description of an unmarried pregnant woman wasn’t exactly my vision of my friend Yasmine. And I knew that wasn’t the way Yasmine saw herself.

  Mama leaned forward. “Did Barbara marry Archie?” she asked.

  “Not right then, not with that baby,” Carrie Smalls told us. “That baby was dead when it was born.”

  Annie Mae Gregory raised her eyebrow. “No matter that the good Lord saw fit to take the child, Barbara didn’t learn her lesson. She kept on fooling with Archie, and two years later, she was big as a watermelon again.”

  “Is that when they got married? When that baby was born?” Mama asked.

  The three women nodded.

  “How many more children did Archie and Barbara have?” Mama asked.

  “Heap of them, eight in all,” Sarah Jenkins replied. “That fool girl was made to have babies, and Archie must have known it from the first time he put his hands on her.” She sighed in disapproval. “Cricket was the last baby Barbara had. Barbara and Archie were killed in a car wreck together. Cricket was in the car with them, but the Lord saved her, though I can’t for the life of me understand why.”

  “The Lord works in mysterious ways,” Annie Mae Gregory said.

  “I suppose we should pay our respects to the Childs family,” Mama said. And I knew from her tone of voice that one of the stops that she expected me to chauffeur her to would be to Sugar Hill where the Childs family lived.

  “Talk to Cricket’s oldest sister, Rose. Rose knows more about Cricket’s scam than she saying, I’m sure of it!” Bitterness crept into Carrie Smalls’s sharp voice.

  Mama smiled thinly. “I know Rose well. She’s a serious young woman, and if she’s keeping something, she’s got a good reason for doing so.”

  Carrie Smalls’s voice grew even sharper. “Rose is the kind who likes to keep people out of her family’s business. That’s why she won’t tell us anything.”

  I smiled, thinking that these three women didn’t like being kept in the dark about anybody’s business.

  Suddenly a change came over Mama’s face. She yawned. Her eyelids drooped. I knew she’d just gotten up from a nap, but now she seemed so sleepy she could barely stay awake. I assumed that she had had enough conversation with these three, and that she had something else she wanted to do more right now. So, I tried to help. “Mama, you’d better lie down and rest,” I suggested.

  Mama opened her lips, then closed them again.

  Sarah Jenkins straightened her back. “Candi, you ain’t been in your bed since you’ve been out and about this morning?” she exclaimed in horror. “When I had my foot operated on, it took me nearly six weeks to feel like getting around again.”

  Mama’s face clouded. “I suppose I am a bit tired,” she said, her voice soft and slightly weak.

  Annie Mae Gregory, Sarah Jenkins, and Carrie Smalls stood. Five minutes later, they were gone. I locked the door behind them and set the security alarm, a system that Daddy had installed when there had been several break-ins on Smalls Lane. The only problem was that half the time we forgot to set it.

  When I returned to the family room, Mama was looking out into her garden. She sat so quietly, I could almost hear the wheels in her head turning. I knew that she was trying to figure out this new information about Cricket. She was so sure that what she’d considered as a rough veneer only masked a very frightened young woman. Now, not only had she learned something new about Cricket’s personality, but it opened up a Pandora’s box of people with real reasons to murder Cricket, and to kidnap her child. “Simone,” Mama finally said very quietly, “Crick
et has a girlfriend that she hangs with. Her name is Sabrina Miley. I want to find Sabrina and talk to her tonight.”

  MIDNIGHT …

  TWO

  The path came to a tiny bridge that crossed a wide pond. The sun broke through the billowing white clouds; the water reflected the sky like a shiny mirror. The hum of blowflies feasting on a dead squirrel got Midnight’s attention.

  After a pause, he turned, and walked along to the straggly path that led deeper into the woods. The air was cool, and dark, because the tall trees filtered out most of the sunlight. Midnight stopped and watched a pair of woodpeckers flitter past his head; he let out an impatient yelp. A chipmunk dashed by. He raced after it, but tripped over the fat root of a maple tree and fell into a thicket of brambles.

  Midnight stood and shook the dead leaves from his coat. He was deep into the woods now, a quarter of a mile along the path that would take him to the old house.

  The dog made a noise, a howl that got caught in his throat.

  Midnight sniffed, stretched his neck, and accepted what he suspected had happened long ago. He looked down the path, an air of resolution in his eyes as he walked toward the empty house, past the back porch, toward the graves.

  CHAPTER

  SIX

  When Mama answered the ringing telephone, I heard the tiredness in her voice. But then she sat straight up in her chair. “Are you all right? … What happened? … Did you see it? … Is Abe all right?” she asked.

  My heart took a loop. Something else serious had gone down. “What’s the matter?” I asked.

  Mama didn’t answer, but stared at me.

  When she put the phone on its receiver, I was standing at her side. “Would you please tell me what’s happened?”

  “James and Coal were standing in front of the courthouse.”

  “Yeah?”

  “James said they heard a noise and looked toward Smoak Street in time to see Abe and Rick in a highspeed chase after Timber and some other guy.

  “Timber and his companion were driving a blue Ford, perhaps the very one that you encountered on the road to Cypress Creek.” Mama breathed deeply. “You did say that Morgan was in a car seat … Did she look all right to you? I mean, did she look like she was being treated okay?”

  “Now, Mama.” I tried to sound more confident than I felt. “There’s no reason to think that the man who ran off with Timber was the same one that tried to scare me. But, to answer your question, Morgan wasn’t crying or anything.”

  Mama didn’t say any more; she was thinking. I went down the hall to the bathroom, something that I should have done the minute I walked into the house. When I got back, Mama sat by the window staring into the garden again. I went over to her and began to massage her shoulders. I was about to tell her that I’d been thinking about spending another week with her in Otis when the key turned in the front door.

  “James?” Mama called out.

  “Yeah,” Daddy answered as he stopped to key in the password on the security.

  “Any news?” I asked, when he joined us.

  Daddy shook his head. There was a resigned look on his face. “Abe didn’t catch Timber and his buddy, if that’s what you mean. Frankly, I’m putting my money on those guys being out of state in a couple of hours.”

  “Did you see a car seat in the backseat of the blue Ford that Timber and his friend were driving?” Mama asked.

  “A what kind of seat?” Daddy asked, looking puzzled.

  “A child’s car seat,” Mama replied.

  “Honey, things happened so fast. And, to be truthful, I wasn’t looking for no child’s car seat.”

  “Why would Timber run from Abe when all the sheriff wants to do is talk to him?” Mama asked softly, like she was talking to herself.

  “ ’Cause he’s guilty,” Daddy replied.

  “If he’s guilty,” I said, “why is Timber hanging around Otis, driving in the heart of town in broad daylight? Why hasn’t he skipped town long before now?”

  “ ’Cause he’s stupid,” Daddy said. He headed for the kitchen.

  Mama sighed. “There are so many questions with so few answers.”

  Midnight started barking.

  “Simone, girl,” Daddy called back to me accusingly from the kitchen, “I bet you didn’t feed my dog!”

  “No, dear father,” I answered, without bothering to give him an excuse.

  Daddy looked in the family room and grinned; he knew that I knew his statement was nothing but a friendly jab.

  “Okay, be that way,” he said as he walked toward the back door. “Midnight won’t suffer, ’cause I’ll feed my own dog.” Midnight kept barking. “I’m coming, boy,” Daddy said.

  When Daddy hollered a few minutes later, I ran. My father was on his knees in front of his dog, gaping down at the grass. It took only a moment for me to understand his bewilderment.

  Midnight stood wagging his tail and looking pleased to have deposited another tiny skull at my father’s feet!

  CHAPTER

  SEVEN

  At nine-thirty, Mama and I were sitting in my Honda, which was parked under the canopy of an old oak tree on Elm Street. Directly in front of us was a shanty. Wooden-framed with four rooms, it was painted red. This was the third of six that are lined side by side in a single row on the street. Townspeople call the area the Redline.

  The June night sky was clear, the quarter moon crisp overhead. Mama sat on the backseat with Sabrina Miley, who wore a light pink robe and whose hair was rolled in fat curlers. “Sabrina, what did you get Cricket caught up in?” Mama asked pointedly.

  When Sabrina didn’t answer Mama right away, I looked back, but the only thing I could make out of the young woman was a silhouette. “I—I ain’t got Cricket into anything that she didn’t want to get in,” she finally answered defensively.

  Mama must have taken note because when she spoke again, her voice was softer, lower. “You’re absolutely right. Cricket was a big girl. She did exactly whatever she wanted to do.”

  Sabrina’s tone hardened. “People like to think that once a person is dead, they never done anything wrong while they were alive. I know better than that. Far as I’m concerned, what you do when you’re alive don’t change just ’cause you die.”

  “I agree with you,” Mama said.

  “My daddy beat me and my mama almost up to the day he died,” Sabrina continued. “At his funeral the preacher said he was headed for heaven. But my daddy was mean and evil when he was alive and I ain’t got no reason to believe that changed once he died.”

  “I see what you mean,” Mama said, her voice even softer.

  “Cricket was my friend ’cause we liked the same things, the same kind of people,” Sabrina continued.

  “That may be true, but it’s possible that there’s one person, perhaps somebody you and Cricket liked a lot, who is a killer,” Mama told her gently.

  Sabrina made a short nervous sound that I surmised was meant to be a laugh. “N—none of our friends would hurt Cricket.”

  “Somebody stabbed Cricket five times, then choked her to death. There is a dangerous man walking around in Otis.”

  “Nobody me or Cricket fool with is like that.”

  Mama took a deep breath. “Sabrina, if one or more of your friends, someone who was also one of Cricket’s special friends, were the kind to get rough while they were playing, who would they be?”

  “Th—the kind of friends Cricket and I played with didn’t get too rough,” Sabrina sputtered.

  “Okay, then if one of your friends got angry because you threatened to tell a secret that he didn’t want told, who would he be?”

  Sabrina drew a shuddering breath. She didn’t answer.

  Even softer, Mama said, “The monster who killed Cricket is loose in Otis, Sabrina. And he might not be done yet.”

  “I don’t like calling people’s name,” Sabrina insisted stubbornly. “Some people are willing to pay a lot of money for their name not coming up at the wrong time.”r />
  “Sabrina, please,” Mama continued, “there’s a killer walking around Otis. If he was a friend of Cricket’s, he might be your friend, too. And if he did what he did to Cricket, you might be the next one on his list to hurt.”

  Sabrina cleared her throat. Still, she didn’t answer.

  “I won’t mention you gave me the name if that’s what you’re worried about,” Mama pressed. “I know how valuable keeping a secret can be.”

  “Miss Candi, I ain’t one for accusing anybody falsely. But if you promise to keep this between me and you, the names of Joe Blake, Sonny Clay, and Les Demps come to mind.”

  “Joe Blake, Sonny Clay, and Les Demps,” Mama repeated.

  “Like I said, I ain’t fingering nobody. All I’m admitting to telling you about them is that when they die, they ain’t going to heaven.”

  “One more thing—” Mama added, as Sabrina opened the car door to step outside. “Would any of these men do any harm to Cricket’s baby?”

  Sabrina looked back toward Mama. Coldly, she said, “I don’t know nothing about that baby—except Cricket told me once she thought Timber might steal Morgan from her and give her to his other woman.”

  It was ten o’clock the next morning. Billowing white clouds did nothing to protect from the sweltering June heat.

  Midnight stretched out on our front porch in luxurious sleep, breathing rhythmically, his shiny black coat gleaming.

  I remembered the day that my father had allowed this full-grown jet black dog to become a part of our lives. Six months ago, the dog had showed up on our doorstep, hungry and sick. He’d been so thin you could see his bones through his fur. Daddy fed the stray, then he took him to Dr. Claims, the town’s only veterinarian.

  Mama insisted that notices be posted all over the neighborhood, in case the dog’s owner wanted him back. Three weeks later, when no one had responded, my father was convinced that he and this dog were destined for each other.

  Daddy christened him Midnight. Then he built him a house and put it in the farthermost corner of the backyard. Midnight got chained to it so that he wouldn’t damage Mama’s carefully manicured yard of trees, shrubs, and flowers. While the dog was recuperating, tilings worked fine.