Mary Clark: Moonlight Becomes You

The chief grabbed a pen. “Where exactly is your exhibit site, Professor?”

When he hung up, Brower said to Haggerty, “I think he’s cracking up, but I also think we may be about to find Maggie Holloway’s body.”

“Neil, look at that!”

They were driving along a narrow dirt road, following the Jaguar. When they left the main road, Neil had turned off the headlights, hoping that Liam Payne wouldn’t realize they were there. Now the Jaguar was turning left, its headlights briefly illuminating a sign Robert Stephens strained to make out.

“Future site of the Bateman Outdoor Funeral Museum,” he read. “That must have been what Bateman was talking about when he said the stolen casket was going to be part of an important exhibit. Do you think it’s here?”

Neil did not answer. A fear so terrible that his mind could not tolerate it was exploding within him. Casket. Hearse. Cemetery.

If Liam Payne had been ordering residents of Latham Manor to be murdered, and then placed symbolic bells on their graves, what would he be likely to do to someone who had put him in danger?

Suppose he had been in the museum last night and found Maggie there?

He and someone else, Neil thought. It must have taken two of them to drive Maggie’s car and the hearse.

Had they killed her and taken her out in that coffin?

Oh, God, no, no, please!

“Neil, he may have spotted us. He’s turning around and coming back.”

Neil made an instant decision. “Dad, you follow him. Call the police. I’m staying here.”

Before his father could protest, Neil had jumped out of the car.

The Jaguar raced past them. “Go,” Neil shouted. “Go!”

Robert Stephens executed a precarious U-turn and pressed down on the accelerator.

Neil began to run. A sense of urgency so profound that it permeated every nerve ending in his body made him race onto the construction site.

The moonlight illumined the muddy, bulldozed acreage. He could see that trees had been felled, undergrowth cleared, paths staked out. And graves dug. Scattered, the holes yawned all around the area, seemingly at random, next to some of them, great piles of clay.

The cleared area seemed huge, extending almost as far as he could see. Was Maggie here somewhere? Had Payne been insane enough to dump the casket with her inside it in one of those open graves and then cover it with earth?

Yes, clearly he was that insane.

Neil began to crisscross the site, shouting Maggie’s name. At one open grave, he slipped, tumbled into it, and wasted precious minutes trying to get a toehold to scramble out. But even then he kept shouting, “Maggie… Maggie… Maggie…”

Was she dreaming? Maggie forced her eyes open. She was so tired. It was too much effort. She just wanted to sleep.

She couldn’t move her hand anymore. It was so stiff and swollen. She couldn’t scream anymore, but that didn’t matter. There was no one to hear her.

Maggie… Maggie… Maggie …

She thought she heard her name. It sounded like Neil’s voice. But it was too late.

She tried to call out, but no sound came from her throat. There was only one thing she could try. With painful effort she grasped her left hand with the fingers of her right hand and forced it up and down, up and down…

Vaguely she sensed from the tugging of the string that the bell must be moving.

Maggie… Maggie… Maggie …

Again she thought she heard her name being called, only it seemed fainter, and so very far away…

Neil was sobbing now. She was here. Maggie was here! He was sure of it! He could feel her presence. But where? Where was she? Was it too late? He had gone over almost all of the bulldozed area. She might be buried under any one of those mounds of dirt. It would take machines to dig through them, to move them. There were so many.

He was running out of time. And so was she. He could sense it.

“Maggie… Maggie…”

He stopped and looked around despairingly. Suddenly he noticed something.

The night was still. There wasn’t even enough breeze to stir a leaf. But over in the far corner of the lot, almost hidden by one of the giant piles of soil, something was glistening in the moonlight. And it was moving.

A bell. Moving backand forth. Someone was trying to signal from the grave. Maggie!

Running, stumbling around open pits, Neil reached the bell and saw that it was attached to a pipe, its opening almost packed with mud.

With his hands he began to claw at the dirt around it, claw and dig and sob.

As he watched, the bell stopped moving.

Chief Brower and Detective Haggerty were in the police car when the call from Robert Stephens was relayed to them. “Two of our guys have picked up the chase on the Jaguar,” the dispatcher said. “But Stephens thinks that the missing woman may have been buried on that outdoor museum site.”

“We’re almost there,” Brower said. “Dispatch an ambulance and emergency equipment out here now. With luck we’ll need both.” He leaned forward. “Turn on the siren,” he ordered.

When they arrived, they found Neil, using his hands like shovels, digging and clawing at the wet clay. An instant later, Brower and Haggerty were beside him, their powerful hands joining in the effort, digging, digging, digging.

Under the surface the soil became looser, less packed. Finally they reached the satiny wood. Neil jumped down into the hole, scraping dirt off the surface of the casket and hurling it away. Finally he yanked out the clogged air vent and brushed the entry site clear.

Sliding to the side of the wide grave, he got his fingers under the casket lid and with a superhuman effort yanked it partially open. He held it that way with his left shoulder as he reached in, grabbed Maggie’s limp body, and lifted it up to the eager hands reaching down from above.

As her face brushed his, he saw that her lips were moving and then heard her faint whisper, “Neil… Neil…”

“I’m here, love,” he said, “and I’ll never let you go.”

Five days later, Maggie and Neil went to Latham Manor to say good-bye to Mrs. Bainbridge.

“We’ll be up for Thanksgiving weekend with Neil’s parents,” Maggie said, “but I couldn’t leave without seeing you now.”

Letitia Bainbridge’s eyes were sparkling. “Oh, Maggie, you don’t know how we prayed that you’d be all right.”

“I think I do,” Maggie assured her. “And your caring enough to let Neil know about the bell I’d found on Nuala’s grave may have saved my life.”

“That was the clincher,” Neil agreed. “It led to my being sure that Liam Payne was involved. If I hadn’t followed him, it would have been too late.”

He and Maggie were sitting side by side in Mrs. Bainbridge’s apartment. He put his hand over Maggie’s, unwilling yet to have her beyond his reach, still living the nightmare of searching for her.

“Has everybody pretty well settled down here?” Maggie asked.

“Oh, I think so. We’re more resilient than you’d think. I understand the Prestige people have arranged to buy the residence.”

“Liam Payne will need a lot of the money he killed for to pay his lawyers, and I hope they don’t do him any good,” Neil said forcefully. “His girlfriend too, although she’s going to end up with a public defender. Realistically, I don’t think either one of them stands a chance of escaping conviction on multiple murder charges. I understand that Odile has confessed to deliberately switching medicines on orders from Liam.”