Grave Secret - Charlaine Harris [75]
“Two-faced and not really honest.”
“Ah, sour grapes,” Manfred said, smiling. “You haven’t gotten to raid the brains of your dead people to get stock tips.”
“What an opportunity I’ve missed,” I said, deadpan. “I need to find a cemetery and look for the grave of a financial wizard, see if he can give me ideas in what I see of the last few moments of his life.”
“That’s kind of what Mariah did,” Manfred said.
When I thought about it, he wasn’t too far off. “I wonder if it was a conscious plan or something that just evolved.” I looked at the picture of the young Mariah, who’d had bangs and a chin-length bob. Red hair and freckles, brown eyes, and a cute nose; all she needed was a straw hat, overalls, and an egg basket on one arm. There’d been steel under all that unsophisticated cuteness.
“I bet she talked real country,” Manfred said. “I bet she made sure she did.”
Deeper and smarter than her surface suggested, Mariah Parish had crafted a way to survive and prosper. And she’d provided good care to those who’d employed her. “Not bad, Mariah,” I said, toasting her with a coffee cup. Our sandwiches had come, and we were all eating like we’d been starved for days.
“Until she got pregnant,” Tolliver said.
“And I wish we knew the name of the father,” I said. “That’s the million-dollar question.”
“Not so much who the actual dad was,” Manfred corrected, “as who thought he might be the dad.”
“I don’t suppose—?” I gestured at the picture. “Manfred, do you think you could find out anything about her, your way?”
“Nah, not without something of hers,” he said. “Since I never met her in life.”
“The dad might have been Rich Joyce himself, or Drexell, or even Chip Moseley.” I was thinking out loud.
“Or anyone else, as long as one of them thought there was a chance he was the dad,” Tolliver said.
“So she had sex with one of these guys, we’re assuming. If she had sex with Rich Joyce, think of what a coup it would be if she was going to have his child! Sure, he’d had a stroke, but he had recovered well and he was definitely active and in his right mind. This child would presumably have equal rights with the other kids, and Lizzie, Kate, and Drexell would be out millions of dollars.” I picked up another triangle of club sandwich and bit into it, then had to dust crumbs off my shirt. “Was Drexell still married nine years ago?”
“Don’t remember. I’ll have to check his file.” Manfred flipped through some pages. “Yes, he was. So was Chip.”
“So,” Tolliver said, stretching his legs out in front of him. He propped his feet on the coffee table, now littered with papers and plates and glasses. “Why now? Why did all this happen now? Mariah and Rich Joyce are both eight years in their graves. Why now?”
“Because Lizzie Joyce started reading Harper’s website after the case in North Carolina,” Manfred said, as if the answer was simple. “She wanted the latest and greatest. And what Lizzie Joyce wants, she makes happen. We don’t know how many arguments her family and friends put up against getting Harper here. We don’t know how many times they told her she was a fool.”
“If what I saw is any estimate,” Tolliver said, “she wouldn’t take real kindly to that at all. She wanted Harper to come, and she had the money to make it attractive to us. Then came the worst part, her huge mistake. She didn’t direct Harper to Rich’s grave right away. She let Harper wander and read other graves, and Harper landed on Mariah’s. Lizzie either had to believe Harper or disbelieve her, and since she’d spent good money to bring Harper, she decided to believe her. So now Lizzie knew that Mariah had been pregnant, and that her death probably could have been prevented; or at least, the birth took place under circumstances that weren’t straightforward and aboveboard, so she didn’t have as good a chance of recovering. And the baby wasn’t in the coffin with her, so something happened to it. Also, the death certificate said infection, but not what kind, so I’m wondering if the doctor who signed it was in on the secret.”
“That’s something we can look up,” I said. “We can find