Marcia Talley - Daughter of Ashes

‘It’s simple really,’ Kim explained. ‘Each county in Maryland sets their own rules for obtaining a marriage license. Back in the day, Elkton over in Cecil County was a regular Gretna Green for couples wanting a quick, quiet marriage, because until they changed the rules in 1938 there was no waiting period. Lots of famous people got married in Elkton, like Cornell Wilde, Debbie Reynolds, Willy Mays.

‘But you still had to meet their age requirements,’ she continued, ‘which was eighteen, I believe. In Tilghman County, however, you could get married without parental consent at seventeen, but they weren’t very picky about proof of age back then. How old are you? Eighteen? All right, then. And if the girl was over fifteen, and could produce a doctor’s certificate proving she was pregnant, granting a marriage license was pretty automatic.’

Kim broke her donut in half and dunked the torn end into her coffee. ‘What I don’t understand is how they managed to keep the marriage a secret. Tilghman County isn’t exactly New York City.’

I’d wondered about that, too, but based on what Cap had told me about his sister, I had developed a theory. ‘I think she loved him, but he convinced her to keep the marriage a secret, claiming that he needed time to break the news to his family about the baby, or else he’d be disinherited. So she trusted him. Dropped out of school, had the baby alone. When the baby died…’ I paused. ‘She’d lost her mother, her child and her only brother was fighting a war halfway around the world – a POW who might never come home. Perhaps she felt she had nothing more to lose. Perhaps she threatened to tell his parents, so he killed her.’

‘Once Nancy Hazlett was dead,’ Kim said, ‘there was very little chance anyone would find out about the marriage. The original marriage certificates from that time period are on file at the Maryland Hall of Records, but the indexes for 1941 through June of 1951 are conveniently missing.’

‘Couldn’t you just visit the Hall of Records in Annapolis and look them up?’ I asked.

‘You’d think, but the licenses are arranged chronologically by year, then by month, then alphabetically by jurisdiction – that would be Tilghman County – then by the groom’s last name.’

‘Jeesh. So without the index you’d have to know exactly what you were looking for and, even then, you’d have to go through the file of records pretty much one by one. Too bad the index is missing.’

‘ Was missing,’ Kim said.

‘What?’

‘That red-bound volume you brought up the other day?’

‘You’re kidding.’

‘ Eh voila! ’ she said. ‘It covers the missing period. And there’s something else Cap found and brought up to me. Finish up your coffee and I’ll show you.’

On Kim’s desk in her courthouse office sat a cardboard container about the size of a large shoebox. She pushed it across the desk toward me. ‘Cap found this box yesterday afternoon buried under a pile of continuous-feed computer paper. Look inside.’

The box contained about a hundred business envelopes with the return address of the Tilghman County Office of Property Tax Assessment printed in the upper left-hand corner. Each envelope contained a typewritten letter folded in thirds so that the address showed through the glassine window.

‘Open one up,’ Kim said.

I slipped the first envelope out of the box and lifted the flap. The letter was dated July, 1950 and was addressed to a Tilghman County resident who rejoiced in the name Ezekiel Hezekiah Agnew. ‘It’s a foreclosure notice.’

‘Exactly. What else do you notice?’

I scanned the rest of the letter, turned it over then took another look at the envelope. The tax assessors had stamped it with a real stamp, a dingy brown and white one honoring the Boy Scouts of America. ‘Three cents,’ I said a bit nostalgically. And then I noticed that there was no postmark. ‘They were never mailed!’

Kim grinned. ‘Thank you, Sherlock.’

My fingers flew quickly through the remaining envelopes, through the Andersons, Duncans, Fraziers and Gordons until I found what I knew would be there: an envelope addressed to Mary C. Hazlett at a house number and street that I knew as well, uh, as well as my own. ‘She never got it.’

‘No. None of them did,’ Kim said.

‘Rusty mentioned that Clifton Ames had a summer job at the courthouse. Do you suppose…?’

‘If so, it’ll be in the employment records. They’re somewhere down in the basement, too.’

I was about to suggest we go search for the employment records when the telephone on Kim’s desk rang. She picked up and listened. ‘But we’re not done,’ she said. Then, ‘I understand, but I don’t like it.’ She hung up without saying goodbye. Not a good sign.

‘That was Ginny over at the county council office,’ Kim told me. ‘The mold report has come in. I’m afraid it’s stachybotrys chartarum. We’ve been ordered to stand down.’

‘But…’

‘They tell me it’s the “dangerous kind.”’

‘All mold is dangerous in its way, but there are ways to abate…’ I began, but Kim cut me off.

‘Out of my hands, I’m afraid. Come on. I may need a bodyguard when we tell Fran. She’ll go ballistic.’

‘An honest politician is one who, when he is bought, will stay bought.’

Simon Cameron, 1799-1889

I love late summer afternoons, that time of day when the sun casts long shadows, bringing Mother Nature into sharp focus. In a large saucepan, I was bringing turbinado sugar, light corn syrup, dark rum and butter to a boil over medium heat in order to make my mother’s fabulous pecan pie. Kim had challenged me to a duel. She planned to enter her mother’s killer peach pie in the bake-off the following day at the Tilghman County Fair. How could I allow her mother to out-bake my mother?

The telephone rang. Still stirring constantly to prevent burning, I reached for the phone. ‘Hello.’

‘Hannah, it’s Cap. I was passing by the courthouse on my way home when I saw two trucks pull into the parking lot. They had BioClean written all over the sides, so I hung around for a bit to see what they’re up to. Sam let one of them in through the back door. The guy was in there for a couple of minutes, and when he came out, the rest of them started climbing into white moon suits. I asked Sam what they were up to. Apparently they’ve been ordered to clean out the storeroom.’

I dragged the saucepan off the burner. ‘Who gave them permission to do that?’

‘Kimberly, I guess, but I can’t get her on the phone to confirm.’

‘Have you called Fran?’

‘I tried her home phone, but she didn’t pick up.’ He paused, and I heard a sharp intake of breath. ‘Damn. They’re carrying out boxes now.’

‘Where are they taking them?’ I asked, feeling panicky.

‘Hold on. I’ll call you right back.’

It seemed like hours, but it was probably only a few minutes before Cap rang again. ‘Just chatted with the supervisor. He says that because of the mold, the records are going to be incinerated at the county animal shelter.’

I let that information sink in. Knowing how hard we had worked on inventorying the county’s old records, I couldn’t believe that Kimberly had authorized their destruction, especially when our work was only half done. ‘I’ll get there as soon as I can. In the meantime, stick around and see what you can do to delay them until I can talk to Fran.’

When I reached Fran a few minutes later, it was on her cell phone. I could hear merry-go-round music in the background so I presumed, rightly, that she was at opening night of the county fair. ‘Fran,’ I said without preamble. ‘There’s a hazmat team at the courthouse, taking our records away.’