The moment she saw him she started to howl. I quieted that by standing on my head, which made her giggle, but every time I stopped she began howling again, and I am not good at asking questions while standing on my head. All the Sheriff did was sit in the corner and scratch at his bald spot, and when we finally gave up, his head must have been as sore as mine.
Then the three witches — excuse me, Mrs. Wyler, Mrs. Loken and Mrs. Dockett — came in from the rear of the house, and about the same time Grandfather entered from the front. I gave the Sheriff my resignation, telling him that a performance before such a large audience would jeopardize my amateur standing.
Betsy was already cooing at Mrs. Wyler, and that gave the Sheriff the bright idea that Mrs. Wyler should ask the questions.
“Nothing doing,” she announced flatly.
“Look,” Sheriff Pilkins said. “You used up an hour of my time this afternoon telling me what a rat Daille is. Don’t you want him convicted?”
“You bet your fat head I do!”
“This is all I need to wrap up the case.”
She was torn. She thought the little innocent shouldn’t be tricked into giving evidence that would convict her own father, but at the same time she had a happy vision of Daille behind bars, and obviously she wanted to help put him there.
“All right,” she said finally. She cooed at Betsy, “Look, honey babe. Remember the little bone?”
Betsy cooed right back at her, “Nooooooo.” And that was how it went.
Grandfather listened disgustedly for a few minutes, then he picked up Betsy’s story book. During the next lull in the cooing he announced, “Old Mrs. McShuttle lived in a coal-scuttle, along with her dog and cat.”
The Sheriff and the women glared at him. Betsy giggled.
Grandfather went on, “What they ate I can’t tell, but ’tis known very well, that none of the party were fat.”
“The bone, honey babe,” Mrs. Wyler said icily.
“Nooooooooo,” Betsy said.
“Old Mother Hubbard went to the cupboard, to get her poor dog—”
“Shut up!” the Sheriff snapped.
“The little bone you were playing with, honey baby. You must remember where you found it.”
“Nooooooooooo.”
“They all ran after the farmer’s wife, who cut off their tails with a carving knife.”
“For God’s sake!” the Sheriff exclaimed.
“She whipped them all soundly and put them to bed… Doesn’t it frighten you to find the children of America being brought up on such unvarnished tales of violence?”
“The little bone, Betsy—”
“Nooooooooooo.”
’Be he live or be he dead, I’ll grind his bones to make my bread.”
The three women blanched, and when Tru Wyler tried again to say, “The little bone—” she choked on it.
“And crime,” Grandfather went on, seeming not to notice. “The Knave of Hearts, he stole the tarts, Tom, Tom, the piper’s son, stole a pig and away he run.” He paused. “I don’t think so much of the grammar, either.”
The housekeeper, whose eyes were now very red behind her glasses, came in to announce that it was Betsy’s bedtime. No one paid any attention.
“The little bone,” Mrs. Wyler cooed. “Where did you get the little bone, honey babe?”
“Nooooooooooo.”
“Mistress Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow? With silver bells and cockle shells, and little bones all in a row.”
That produced a commotion all around the room, but I didn’t pay any attention to it because I was watching Betsy. She giggled. “Little bones.”
“Little bones,” Grandfather said. “Little bones among the flowers, you sit and play with them for hours.”
Mrs. Wyler’s chins were making like an accordion. Mrs. Loken had opened her mouth and forgotten to close it. Mrs. Dockett was leaning forward, and I noticed for the first time that she wore a hearing aid. Everyone seemed absolutely fascinated except Betsy, who climbed onto Mrs. Wyler’s lap, held up both hands pattycake style, and said, “Play.”
Mrs. Dockett, who was sitting by the window, suddenly exclaimed, “There’s a light out there behind your house, Ruth.”
Mrs. Loken looked out. “Something funny’s going on out there.”
The Sheriff started for the door, and everyone chased after him except the housekeeper and Mrs. Wyler. When I left the room Mrs. Wyler was again struggling to get out of her chair, but the only things moving were her chins.
She was the last one to find out that the light was behind her house. Steve Carling and another deputy were digging a hole while a State Trooper held a flashlight for them.
“What’s going on here?” the Sheriff roared.
Steve leaned on his shovel. “It’s Rastin’s idea. Sergeant Reichel is on his way with a search warrant, but in the meantime you were keeping the old dame occupied, and we thought—”
“Who are you working for? Me, or Rastin, or Reichel? What have you found?”
“Nothing, yet.”
“Nothing, yet! Of all the idiotic, lamebrained, imbecilic things to do! Walk onto private property in the middle of the night and start digging a hole. I ought to dump you into it and fill it over you. If you’re that hard up for exercise—”
He stopped, because Tru Wyler came up behind him very quietly and stuck a shotgun into his back. “Get out,” she purred. “All of you — get out.”
Steve turned quickly and fell into the hole. It was only six inches deep, so he climbed out fast and headed for the property line. Grandfather stood his ground. The rest of us backed off, all except the Sheriff, who had been caught facing the wrong way. He marched straight ahead.
Mrs. Wyler made one small miscalculation. She had the shotgun, but the State Trooper held the flashlight. He suddenly thought to turn it off, and when he turned it on again Grandfather had the gun. He handed it to the Sheriff, who checked it and announced that it wasn’t loaded.
“They’re digging,” Grandfather told Mrs. Wyler, “because this is where Daille buried his wife.”
“Here? In my yard?”
Grandfather nodded.
“I don’t believe it.” She thought for a moment. “Go ahead and dig, but I don’t believe it.”
She went back to her house, taking those mincing little steps, and then she spoiled the effect by slamming the door. Just then Sergeant Reichel arrived with his search warrant and seemed pleased to learn that it wasn’t needed. I meant to ask him how far down a search warrant covers but I forgot.
The deputies started to dig again, with Grandfather standing by to examine every shovelful. Things went easily enough for the first couple of feet and then got progressively harder until they struck clay that obviously hadn’t been disturbed for years. The Sheriff said to Grandfather, “Well?”
“It was just an idea,” Grandfather said ruefully.
“Sure. You didn’t say it was a good idea. Why’d you have them digging here? You been using a divining rod, or something?”
“Something like that,” Grandfather said.
“The next time you have an idea—”
A cool voice said sarcastically, “If you’ve finished playing, you can fill in the hole.”
The three women were standing there in the dark, watching.
“Fill it in,” the Sheriff said disgustedly.
“Fill it in neatly,” Tru Wyler said.
She stood by giving orders and enjoying every minute of it, with the other women giggling and offering suggestions of their own, and they raised such a fuss about leaving the yard the way it was that the Sheriff promised to send someone out in the morning to replant the weeds.