I walked up to the old house, jumping a little when an owl hooted and flew down close at me to take a look. “I’m too big to be a mouse,” I whispered.
“What was that?” Agent Walker asked from the van.
“Nothing. Just talking to the owl.”
He didn’t remark on that. I moved steadily across the sandy ground, carefully skirting the rose bushes and gravel that might give me away. I half hoped the back door might be locked. There wouldn’t be anything to do about that but go home. Too bad. Nice try.
But the back door was unlocked, even slightly open. I crept across the dark porch, trying not to step on buckets and shovels left there from the turtle rescue project.
I pushed open the door to the house and walked into the kitchen. I navigated carefully around the table and chairs, glanced at a nightlight glowing from the bathroom. The house was so quiet. No sound from the friendly owl outside, not even traffic sounds from the road.
I wondered, as I approached her bedroom door, if Mary Lou had noticed that the dress and wig were gone. Even with the mess, she might’ve been able to tell the difference. If she’d noticed, would she have thought of me and Tim?
I could hear her snoring softly from the bed. I wasn’t sure what I was going to say. I had a silly image of myself holding a flashlight under my chin, like we used to do when we told ghost stories around the campfire. I walked closer, wondering if I should make some scary sound, booing or something, then I tripped over a pile of clothes in the middle of the bedroom floor.
That was enough to startle Mary Lou out of her sound sleep. I stood completely still, not even daring to breathe, as she turned on a flashlight and pinned me with the beam. “I knew it was you, Lizzie. Come for me, have you? Well, you can’t make me feel any worse than I have for the past two weeks since I accidentally killed you. Go ahead. Take your revenge.”
Chapter 19
“Get her to talk about it, Dae,” Agent Walker said in my ear. “We need as much as we can get.”
Wasn’t it enough already? Mary Lou had confessed to killing Miss Elizabeth. How much more was there? I didn’t move, couldn’t speak. I stood still, the flashlight beam shining in my face.
“Aren’t you going to say anything, Lizzie?” Mary Lou asked. She had slipped her legs out of bed. I could she was wearing the same short brown pants she’d been wearing at the beach. “I don’t blame you for being angry. I made a bad mistake. I’m sorry I tried to blame it on Millie. It was wrong. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
I realized at that moment that I couldn’t go on with the charade. We knew now that Miss Mildred wasn’t responsible for killing her sister. Surely Mary Lou deserved a lawyer now before she said anything else. It was an accident. Agent Walker didn’t need to know more.
I started to walk out of the bedroom. Mary Lou followed me. “Where are you going, Lizzie? Please take me with you. I don’t want to live with all this guilt. Someone else will take care of the turtles. Let me go with you, please.”
“Keep her talking,” Agent Walker advised in my ear.
I walked out of the house into the dark yard, hoping she’d stay inside and have a cup of coffee or something. I couldn’t warn her off any more than I could get her to confess anything else. It was over, as far as I was concerned. We had what we needed to set things right.
“Lizzie! Why won’t you talk to me? Where are you going?” Mary Lou stayed one step behind me.
Between Agent Walker’s proddings and Mary Lou’s plaintive calls, my ears were ringing. I kept hoping she’d give up or I’d find a big bush to hide behind. I couldn’t believe she’d confessed to killing Miss Elizabeth. I’d suspected her and helped catch her, but knowing for certain was different. It was like trading one friend, one piece of my life, for another.
I wished Agent Walker would stop talking. I wanted time to absorb all of this and grieve for another loss.
“Lead her back to the van.” Kevin’s voice replaced Agent Walker’s in my ear. “Let us take it from here, Dae. You’ve done what you could.”
I wanted to scream at Mary Lou to run away and hide. Agent Walker had his information. We could save Miss Mildred with it. I knew Mary Lou would have to be punished. At least my rational mind knew it. With all my heart, I wished she’d get in her car and drive far away. But I kept walking, and she kept following across the sandy ground and down the road.
We finally reached the van where Kevin and Agent Walker waited. I didn’t know if I’d ever been so exhausted. I felt like I could fall on the ground and sleep for days. I thought it was probably a reaction to being so nervous and finding out I was right about Mary Lou.
I heard the van door slide open, then saw a glint of something metallic in the dim light from the interior. Without thinking, I threw myself in front of Mary Lou. She cowered on the ground before me, whimpering, probably thinking I meant to kill her. “Don’t hurt her! It was an accident. She deserves to be judged by a jury,” I yelled out.
“Dae?” Mary Lou looked up at me. “Is that you?”
“I’m Agent Walker with the State Bureau of Investigation.” He stepped beside her as several lights flashed on from outside the van. “We need to have a serious conversation, Mrs. Harcourt. Why don’t you come with me and tell me what happened to Mrs. Simpson?”
“It was the turtles,” she blurted out with a sob. “They need me. I couldn’t leave them during nesting season. Look at the damage done by the storm.”
Agent Walker helped her up. I realized the glint of metal I’d seen was his badge and not his gun, as I’d feared. I fell down on the soft ground, my legs giving out. I didn’t know what to think, but I was glad it was over. I couldn’t have walked another step if I’d tried.
“Are you okay?” Kevin asked, crouching beside me.
“No. Not really. I know this had to be done. I’m glad for Miss Mildred. But I hate that it had to come to this. I’ve known her all my life. This is terrible.”
“Tell me how it happened, Mrs. Harcourt,” Agent Walker coaxed, explaining her legal rights. “I promise it will make you feel better when it’s all out.”
“I couldn’t feel any worse, son,” she admitted. “When I saw Lizzie’s ghost standing next to the bed, I wasn’t a bit afraid of dying. I only wanted it to end.”
She went on to explain that she was frantically trying to save some turtles from high tide the night before the Fourth of July celebration. “I didn’t even notice Lizzie was there. You know how she had that way of standing and watching you, not saying a word. I was using the shovel to mound up some extra sand. I went back with it and hit something solid. I didn’t even realize I’d hit Lizzie in the head until I saw her fall to the ground.”
“You hit her in the head, Mrs. Harcourt, but you didn’t kill her. You should’ve called for help.”
Mary Lou’s eyes were wet with tears that gleamed in the bright lights. “What are you saying? I checked her pulse. There was no heartbeat.”
“There was sand in her lungs. That means she was still breathing when you buried her.”
“No! No! That can’t be true! I checked her. She was dead. I had to bury her to protect the turtles. Then when everyone was looking for someone to blame, I went to Millie and asked her for money for the turtle sanctuary. I was thinking if I could get everything set up, I’d confess. But she told me I had to wait until she died to get the land she promised me. That’s when I thought of blaming her for what happened. Only for a while. Only until the turtles were protected. Then I would’ve told the truth. It was only an accident. I never meant to hurt Lizzie.”