Marta Perry - Murder in Plain Sight

Not alone, in other words. She didn’t have to do this alone.

A flicker of excitement lit Leo’s face when he saw them. “Guess what I’ve found.” He held up a slim book-an old one, judging by the faded, stained cloth cover. She could just make out the title, Legends and Lore of Old Pennsylvania.

“Something about the hex sign,” Trey said. “I figured you’d get so caught up in the research that you wouldn’t quit until you’d found it.”

“Guess I am a bit predictable.” Leo didn’t look as if that bothered him. “I knew it was familiar to me.”

He flipped open the book. Jessica stowed her wet umbrella safely out of the way before she looked. The illustration was of something that looked like a woodcut-a raven, identical to the one on the threatening note.

“What does it mean?” She dropped her bag on her chair and came to look over Leo’s shoulder at the book. Closer examination didn’t help. She still felt the revulsion she’d had the first time she’d seen it.

“Sign of the raven,” Leo said, satisfaction in his voice. “The so-called hex signs have been part of Pennsylvania Dutch folk art for hundreds of years. Most of them are used over and over-painted on barns and pottery, carved or stenciled on furniture, even inked onto documents. This particular symbol is rare, though. It’s almost never seen, except…” He paused.

Trey nudged him. “Quit trying to build up suspense. Just tell us.”

Leo gave him a mock affronted look. “I am telling you.” His face warmed with a smile. “I can’t help getting excited. How often do my antiquarian and legal interests coincide? Anyway, back in the 1700s, this-” he tapped the image on the page “-was the sign of a secret society so powerful it controlled virtually the whole area.”

“Secret society?” Was he making a joke? “That sounds like something out of a comic book, Leo. You’re not serious.”

“It was serious business all right.” Leo pushed his glasses up with the tip of his finger, and his voice had taken on a lecturing tone. “Secret societies were rampant in Europe and the colonies in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It made a certain amount of sense in an era when rulers could control the lives of their subjects. Banded together, committed to the group by its secret signs and rituals, people had more power than anyone could individually.”

“You’re serious.” She found it hard to believe. “This group really had significance?”

“Very much so. Supposedly they became so large and so powerful that they controlled most of the business and political life of the area. Undercover, of course. It was one of those things everyone knew and no one talked about.”

Trey stirred. “So what happened to them?”

“A number of the secret societies became perfectly respectable and well-known, like the Masons and other fraternal orders. Others, including the Brotherhood of the Raven, faded from view.” Leo frowned. “It’s odd, actually, that the brotherhood disappeared. I suppose, in all the turmoil of the American Revolution, things like that came to seem unimportant.”

“Sheds a new light on the things our forefathers got up to, doesn’t it?” Trey obviously took it lightly. “So what does that tell us? That the person who wrote that threatening note to Jessica was a history buff?”

“Or that he saw the symbol someplace and decided to copy it,” she said, trying to chase away the unpleasant feeling in the pit of her stomach. “He thought it would add a creepy tone to his threats.”

“Could be. Must be,” Trey said, but she could see that he was troubled. “It can’t be anything else. Still, I don’t like the premeditation and the violence implied in wringing the neck of that bird and throwing it at your window.”

Leo glanced at her face and then, warningly, at Trey.

“I’m not going to go into hysterics at the idea that this joker is prone to violence,” she said, irritated. “So you two can stop trying to protect me from facing facts. Anyway, it may have nothing to do with proving Thomas’s innocence.”

“Maybe not, but Cherry had that piece of jewelry, and the raven reappeared as a motif in the threats against you. That can’t be coincidence,” Leo said.

“It may just mean that Cherry’s secret lover doesn’t want the person he sees as her killer to get off,” Trey said briskly. “Anything else we should know about this raven thing, Leo?”

“The Brotherhood of the Raven crumbled to dust a long time ago. Still, it’s odd that it should recur in such a context. Among other things, the brotherhood supposedly controlled the legal system. Just a glimpse of the symbol would be enough to keep witnesses from testifying and sway juries to deliver the verdict the brotherhood wanted. So using it to scare away an attorney would fit right in.”

Trey plucked the book from Leo’s hand and closed it with a slap. “Like I said. Interesting, but as Jessica said, it doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with defending Thomas.”

Jessica’s grip tightened on the back of the chair as Trey’s words set up an echoing response in her mind. There was something-some reason why the sign affected her as it did, some connection she hadn’t yet made.

She turned, images clicking together in her mind like tiles. She picked up her briefcase, found the file she wanted and dumped its contents onto Leo’s desk.

“Jessica?” There was a question in Trey’s voice. He and Leo were looking at her with identical expressions of concern. “What is it?”

She shuffled through the crime-scene photos. There it was, the picture showing the area around the body. She pointed to an object in the picture-an object she hadn’t consciously remembered until now. It was a necklace, a thin gold chain that had apparently been ripped from Cherry’s neck in her final struggle. It lay next to her body on the rough wooden floor of the barn.

She pointed. “Tell me I’m not seeing what I think I’m seeing.”

But now that she studied it, she knew. The chain hadn’t just been tossed aside. It had been arranged-its fine gold links formed into an exact replica of the symbol of the raven.

HIS MIND STILL preoccupied with the image of the crime-scene photo, Trey barely noticed when his cell phone rang. He answered automatically, but the sound of Bishop Amos’s voice startled him to attention. His frown deepened as he heard what the bishop had to say, and when he hung up, he realized that Jessica and Leo were both staring at him.

“Bishop Amos, calling from an English neighbor’s house. He wants us to meet him at the Stoltzfus farm as soon as possible.”

“The Stoltzfus farm,” Jessica echoed. “Why?”

“It seems there’s something Jacob has to tell us.”

She lifted the photo in a protesting gesture. “Can’t it wait? We really need to discuss this.”

“If Bishop Amos calls, it has to be serious. Maybe Jacob has remembered something important. Or decided to tell us something he’s been hiding. I think we should go now.” He nodded toward the photo, its image of the dead woman’s necklace repellent. “We can talk that over later.”

“That’s right.” Leo weighed in on his side. “I agree that the symbol is significant, but I can do a little more digging while you’re out.”

Jessica looked as if she thought they were ganging up on her, but then she shrugged and reached for her bag. “All right. Let’s go.”

It took them twenty minutes to get clear of town and reach the Stoltzfus farm-twenty minutes during which he tried to keep Jessica talking and tried to keep himself from thinking about that crime-scene photo. Each time the thought intruded, he pushed it away.