One Small Secret

Honor released a deep dramatic breath. “So am I!” she exclaimed, kissing Lockey on the nose.

“Mommy, remember when I told you they were using scary words?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I remember now why they scared me.”

“You do? What did they say?” Honor leaned down closer to her daughter for comfort.

“They said they were here to kill Mr. Griffin, not to rob him.”

Honor knew her face had frozen into a false mask of calm. “That’s terrible, honey. Is that really what they said?” Her mind raced, checklisting and crossing off dangers. Another bout of horror and panic threatened her, but she fought it back.

“Uh-huh.” Lockey stared at her. “They were just going to take his stuff because they figured nobody else would want it after Mr. Griffin was dead.”

“How awful.” Honor wondered if she were fooling her daughter or not with her false bravado.

“They scared me, Mommy. They’re going to bring a tiger here, and they said maybe the tiger would get him, too.”

“They won’t bring any tigers here, Lockey. Now I don’t want you to have nightmares. Those bad men will never come back here. I’ll make sure of that. And Doug will make sure of it, too.” Honor hugged her as if nothing could ever part them. “I promise you, they’ll never come back here.”

She finished tucking in her daughter, her mind racing all the while.

“It’s over now, honey, so go to sleep. I’ll be downstairs if you need me.” She kissed Lockey again, more for herself than for her daughter’s sake, and closed Lockey’s door.

After racing silently down the back stairs to the kitchen, Honor picked up the phone and called the sheriff at home.

“Doug, I just talked to Lockey, and she said that not only were those guys talking about robbing the Hall, they were talking about their real reason for being here—to kill Mark Griffin.”

“To kill him? Not in my county, they won’t,” Doug said angrily. He’d obviously been in the middle of dinner. Honor could hear him swallow.

“What should you do? Go over there?” she asked.

“First I’ll call Griffin Enterprises again and give them this news. But I’ll tell your, they’re very protective of his privacy. I doubt he’ll give permission for me to go over to the Hall and see him personally. They wouldn’t the last time.”

“But you don’t need permission. You’re the law!” she exclaimed.

“Mark Griffin isn’t the criminal here. He has a nght to privacy, even if it kills him.” Doug’s voice dropped to a grave whisper. “Which it may.”

Honor groaned. “Does this guy even get his messages? I can’t believe I’m in this predicament again.”

“What d‘you mean by ‘again,’ girl?” Doug questioned.

Caught off-guard, Honor quickly changed the subject. “Hey, I guess there’s not much else we can do. I was just upset hearing that those creeps staying in my own bed and breakfast were even worse than I imagined. Go on and finish your dinner, Doug. Tell Dons I’ll see her Wednesday. Bye.”

She put down the receiver. To calm herself, she made a cup of hot tea and took it to the back veranda.

The lights of Blackbird Hall shone through the forest of live oaks like a landing UFO. It didn’t seem natural to see them, when for years there had never been lights in that dark grove.

Sipping her tea, staring at the lights, she thought about Mark Griffin.

It wasn’t hard to picture him. Even after all these years, she could still see his eyes, still picture him standing in the candlelight of the parlor of Blackbird Hall with that grin on his face, that terrible, beautiful grin.

It didn’t seem right that she could sip her tea and watch those lights, when the very person who had lit them might even now be the object of a murder plot. Not when she could personally see to it that he was warned.

She was an ordinary citizen. She’d been rebuffed by Griffin Enterprises before. But this time, she wouldn’t go through the bureaucracy of Griffin Enterprises or even the Natchez Police Department. She didn’t need to have proof of a threat to be a Good Samaritan and go warn her neighbor about the men who had stayed at her bed and breakfast.

In truth, she was probably morally obligated to ring the bell at the Hall’s gates and tell the man that there had been a threat against him.

She could give him the information and then move on. He could do with it what he would; she would have no further obligation to see him.

But did she have the courage to do the right thing?

She closed her eyes. In truth, she wasn’t sure. Blackbird Hall was only a few steps away, but she could be opening a hornets’ nest if she were to see him again. There would be questions. God, would there be questions. Questions she just didn’t want to answer after all these years.

Yet, she couldn’t not warn him. If something happened, she would never forgive herself.

And then there was Lockey.

She didn’t know what she would say to Lockey if Mark Griffin were hurt because no one had warned him...how she would explain that she’d had the chance to help. To maybe even put things right, but...

As much as it frightened her, she knew she had to give it a try. Mark Griffin had to be warned, if only to keep her own conscience clear.

She shoved away her teacup and stood. Her housekeeper Vergie was in the next room. Lockey would be fine for a few minutes if she went next door. Trembling, she stepped down from the veranda and across the back lawn to the street, following it until it ended at the notorious gates.

For several seconds she stood there in the darkness, smelling the deep mossy smells of night.

Then, as if it were now or never, she pulled the bronze chain of the gate bell and listened to its raw echo through the shadows.

A light went on at the Hall.

She shivered and crossed her arms over her chest. The alpaca sweater she wore was certainly warm enough to ward off the spring chill; her shivering had nothing to do with the temperature.

Just tell him and go home, she told herself as she saw the movement of someone coming toward her along the Hall’s cobblestone drive.

Just tell him what he needs to know, then get out of Dodge and pray he never comes for a visit at the Retreat. She shivered again as the night-cloaked figure became larger and more ominous.

“Rosie?” she gasped when she suddenly realized the figure coming down the lane was not human at all, but the leggy half-Irish wolfhound mutt she remembered from her last visit to the Hall years ago.

“Rosie, how are you, girl?” she cooed as she stuck her hand through the bars and scratched the dog behind her ear.

They stood almost eye to eye. She might have been afraid of a dog this size, but she remembered how gentle Rosie was, and the funny story of how the mutt had gotten her name. Mark had told her of rescuing a bag-of-bones puppy from a drainage ditch. The starving creature hardly looked like a dog, because most of her hair was missing from mange. He named her Rosie after the pathetic animal’s exposed raw skin. Even now, Honor smiled thinking about the silly wrestling matches between Rosie and Mark when Mark would resort to calling Rosie a “mange brain.

“So where’s your master, Rosie? Where is he?” she whispered, exciting the animal. Rosie barked and jumped up on the gate.

Suddenly Honor realized the gate was not locked. It sprang back under the weight of the dog, and in a second she found Rosie running around her like a Tasmanian devil.

She looked up the dark lane toward the house. Nothing moved.