The Ladies of the Secret Circus by Constance Sayers (the little red hen ebook TXT) 📕

“Are you okay?” Her brown eyes were wide. He noticed how long her eyelashes were and that one eye was actually green. Heterochromia, they called it.

“Is this some trick board?” He pointed to the Ouija with the planchette still resting on the Z.

“No,” said Caren. “Why?”

“I swear it moved.”

“Oh God,” said Caren. “Not you, too.”

“Huh?” Ben looked confused.

“Lara hates Ouija boards. In all fairness, years ago, at my sister’s slumber party, one went nuts in front of us. There was a house full of screaming girls. Lara thought it was her mind that had done it. To this day, she still thinks it was her doing. My dad said it was likely static electricity.”

“Static electricity?” Ben was a huge skeptic, but even he wasn’t buying that answer. But then what was the alternative? He picked up the coffee cup and empty plate.

“Just leave those,” said Caren. “I’ve got them.”

He stood up, surprisingly a little dizzy. Ben didn’t see things. The world had order as far as he was concerned. “Thanks, Caren.”

Once outside, he realized how shaken he was. It had to be lack of sleep.

At the courthouse, Ben had offered to let himself into the file room, but Esther Hurston assured him it was her job to open the door. She led him down the hallway… well, led was a strong word because Esther waddled very slowly on her bad hips. After she got him to the door, Ben could do what he wanted.

Esther opened the old-fashioned door with a large frosted-glass panel adorning the upper half. It reminded Ben of those old ones from Philip Marlowe. PRIVATE DETECTIVE could be etched on the glass. Ben felt a little like one today. It was tough being a police chief in a town where nothing happened. This mystery held more excitement than he’d had in a long while.

Something about the endless stack of 1944 cases made Ben a little discouraged. The place wasn’t air-conditioned, so he cracked a few windows and a nice breeze made its way in. Dust particles swirled as they hit the sunlight. The files were in chronological order by the date the case was opened, starting with December 1944 and working backward. Opening the first file, he had a hunch and found the October batch. About ten files in, he found what he was looking for. He didn’t even have to go through the pile any further. This was it. “Ah shit.”

Desmond “Dez” Bennett, 19. Missing on Duvall Road on October 10, 1944.

Bennett’s car was found abandoned with the engine running and the driver’s-side door open the morning of October tenth. There were no photos of the scene in the file, but Ben didn’t need any; he’d witnessed the same crime scene twice and bet the car was found at an angle. Yet, he’d never heard of Duvall Road. What was it about this date that was so important? Was there some type of ritual killing happening every thirty years? That had to be it. He even had to admit that Caren’s coven theory was beginning to have merit.

And the Ouija board. As much as he wanted to write it off as lack of sleep, it had spelled out Dez on its own.

God, he wished his father were still alive. He was in over his head with three cases. These disappearances went back sixty years now. Assuming the same person was responsible for all three incidents, that person would have to be eighty years old. Not that it was impossible, but it wasn’t likely. So what did that mean? There was always the supernatural theory, but he still couldn’t accept it. So were these ritual killings or serial killings committed by multiple people? Those ideas frightened the hell out of him.

He closed the file and tucked it under his arm, shutting the file room door behind him. As he walked down the same hall where he’d danced with Lara the other night, Ben realized that if some miracle happened and Todd Sutton returned to Kerrigan Falls, he would take his chances and fight for Lara. He glanced down at the file in his hand; Desmond Bennett’s case was still open, which meant that Bennett had not returned as of 1965 when the file was sent to archives. Given the history, it was unlikely that Todd would come back, either.

He returned the keys to Esther. Something was bothering him. He thought he knew everything about this town, but obviously that wasn’t so. “Do you know where Duvall Road is? I’ve never heard of it.”

She snorted. “You mean was.” Her knotted hands were busy stapling papers together with a fury that made Ben glad he was neither the paper nor the stapler.

“Was?”

“It was the road that ran over the old Shumholdt Bridge. It was a terrible one-lane thing. You’d have to honk your horn and listen to hear if someone else was coming over the bridge in the opposite direction, especially at the bend before they widened it. You’d pray that you wouldn’t meet another car. If you did, one of you would have to back up on a horrible narrow bridge.”

“Wait!” Ben leaned over the desk. “You’re saying that Duvall Road was renamed?”

“Yes, when the new bridge went up they renamed it Wickelow Bend Road. I thought everyone knew that.” As she spoke, the metal stapler vibrated like an instrument every time her hand came down. “Young people today just don’t know their history.”

“Thank you.” Ben turned and leaned against the doorframe. “Hey, you don’t remember a man named Desmond Bennett, do you? Went missing in 1944.”

She looked at him, and her face lit up. “The derby driver? Oh yes, I remember him. He was quite handsome. All of us girls would line up for tickets when the derby came to town. He’d come back from the war… injured I believe… then he got on the racing circuit. Famous around these parts as well