Grave Sight Page 0,28

The presence of so many old dead produced a constant, mellow reverberation, almost soothing; like giant ancient drums in the distance. Though the grounds were well tended, in the oldest section I spied a few overturned headstones with writing that time had obscured. These stones would belong to families who had died out; there were no living descendants to tend the plots. I amused myself by going from grave to grave, reaching deep to pull from each collection of bones what information I could garner. The glimpses I caught of these faces were often blurred or obscured, as if the dead themselves had forgotten who they'd been. Every now and then I saw the features clearly, heard a name, caught a longer glimpse of death in the past.

"Childbirth," I called to Tolliver, who was sitting half-in half-out of the car while he worked a crossword puzzle.

"Another one," he said, hardly raising his eyes from the page. It was the third childbirth death I'd found.

"Kind of scary." I stepped to the next grave. Since this was simply to pass the time and keep in practice, I'd left my shoes on. It was a nippy day, and I didn't want to catch a cold, especially since I was just messing around. "You know, Tolliver, men didn't used to die of heart attacks."

"That so?"

"That's what I heard on the news the other day. Oh! This guy was crushed by a tree he was cutting down."

Tolliver didn't bother to look up. "Um," he said, so I gathered he wasn't listening. I moved to my right. "Asthma attack," I muttered. "Blood poisoning from a knife cut. Scarlet fever. Smallpox. Flu. Pneumonia." I shook my head. So many of these things could be cured, or at least eased, now. I couldn't fathom people who longed for the past. They weren't thinking about the absence of antibiotics, that was for sure.

The next grave was one of the oldest. The tombstone had broken in half, and someone had tried to set it back together. I couldn't read the name.

"Hey, gunshot wound," I called to Tolliver.

"That's Lieutenant Pleasant Early," Hollis Boxleitner said, from about a yard behind me. "He was shot during the Civil War."

If there'd been an open grave, I would've jumped into it. Tolliver looked up sharply and lay down the clipboard. "Where'd you come from?" he asked, in no very friendly tone.

"I was weeding my great-grandmother's grave over there." Hollis inclined his head toward the north side of the cemetery; sure enough, there was a bucket full of weeds and a trowel beside a grave with a leaning headstone.

"During a murder investigation, you have time to weed?" Tolliver's voice was sharper than necessary.

"It relaxes me." Hollis's broad face remained calm. "And the state guys are in town."

A gust of wind blew dry leaves across the graves. As they crossed the graveled drive that wended through the cemetery, they made a hissing sound. I liked it.

"So, is this kind of... recreation, for you?" Hollis asked, indicating the graves around us.

"Yes. Just kind of keeping my hand in." People always expect me to be embarrassed by what I do. Why?

"Have you ever been to a really old graveyard? Like in England?"

I ducked my head. "Not often. There are the Indian mounds, of course, and even more ancient people. Those are pretty interesting. And we went to a very early American one. In Massachusetts."

"Was it the same? Does the length of time they've been dead make a difference?"

I was pleased at the question. Not many people want to know too much about what I do. "Yes, it does," I said. "I get fainter pictures, less exact knowledge. Someday I want us to go to Westminster Abbey. And Stonehenge." Lots of ancient dead people there, for sure.

"You think you could get any more information by going back to Helen Hopkins' house?" The policeman had switched back to the here and now, putting an end to our conversation.

"No," I said. "I have to be with the body." I didn't want to go through that, not at all. It was very unpleasant, seeing the death of someone you'd known.

"The state police have taken over the investigation," Hollis said, after he'd retrieved his bucket of weeds. "I just answer the phones on my shift. There's a hot line number."

It took me a second to understand that he'd been banished from the investigation.

"That sucks," I offered. I've met enough cops to know that the best of them like to be in charge. The best