AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Crumley swore under his breath. “Recite them, junior.”
I recited the names, one by one.
“Holly Morgan.”
Grey flicked through his file.
“She’s here. Buried 1924.”
“Polly Starr?”
Another quick run-through.
“Here. 1926.”
“How about Molly Circe?”
“Right. 1927.”
“Emily Danse?”
“1928.”
“All buried here, for sure?”
Grey looked sour. “I have never once in all my life been wrong. Strange, however.” He rescanned the items he had drawn out of the file. “Odd. Are they all related, all one family? ”
“How do you mean?”
Grey fixed his arctic stare at the names. “Because, see here, they’re all entombed in the same aboveground Gothic stone hut.”
“How’s that again?” Crumley lurched from his boredom and grabbed the file cards. “What?”
“Odd, all those different surnames, put to rest in one tomb, a memorial dwelling with eight shelves for eight family members.”
“But they aren’t family!” said Fritz.
“Odd,” said Grey. “Strange.”
I stood as if struck by lightning.
“Hold on,” I whispered.
Fritz and Crumley and Henry turned to me.
Grey lifted his snowy eyebrows. “Ye-e-ss.” He made two long syllables out of it. “Well?”
“The tomb house? The family vault? There must be a name on the portico. The name chiseled in marble?”
Grey scanned his cards, making us wait.
“Rattigan,” he said.
“Are you sure?”
“I have never—”
“Yes, I know! The name again!”
