Dust to Dust

pointed her middle and index fingers at her eyes, then pointed them at Diane. She did it over and over in a sharp, jerking motion, her brows knitted together, her eyes dark.
    “He did that to me as a child when he wanted me to pay attention to him, to look him in the eyes, to let me know he saw me. I called it his devil look, and I did that to him. That was his last vision—me giving him the devil look. And I’m not sorry I did that to him.”

Chapter 55
    It was quiet in the room. The light from the windows was almost gone and only the harsh halogen light from the overhead fixtures was left. Diane didn’t know what she thought she was going to hear from Maybelle Agnes Gauthier, but she was oddly stunned and affirmed by what she heard.
    She picked up the folder again and took out the like-nesses that Neva had created of the two skeletons from the well and handed them to Gauthier.
    “Who are they?” Diane asked.
    She ran her wrinkled hands over the drawings. “Lovely,” she whispered. “Who did these?” She looked up at Diane.
    “A woman who works for me,” Diane said.
    “I didn’t name them. A name would have only diminished what I was trying to say,” she said.
    Diane took a breath. “What were their names before you met them?”
    “Dust to dust,” Gauthier whispered. “I was taking them back from whence they came. I crushed them to dust and re-created them into something more beautiful. Something their fathers couldn’t hurt. See”—she looked at the mask still in the box in her lap—“even though my father crushed her, she’s still beautiful.”
    “Who were they?” said Hanks. “We need to know who they were.”
    “It was a long time ago. I don’t remember.”
    “Of course you do,” said Lillian, her voice harsher than Diane had ever heard it. “You painted her; you talked with her as you were doing her portrait. What did you call her? She told you about herself. You knew her father hurt her. What was her name?”
    Gauthier didn’t say anything. She stared at Lillian, but without anger. She gazed at the mask again, brushing it with her fingers, and finally spoke.
    “Patsy. It seems as though I called her Patsy. The boy—I called him Steven because he reminded me of my Steven. He was quiet and sensitive. He sat so still as I painted him. He seemed to take joy in just sitting still. He liked Steven better than his name. I don’t remember what it was,” she said.
    “Do you remember their last names?” asked Diane.
    “No. I didn’t care what their last names were. Those were their fathers’ names,” she said.
    “Why didn’t you change your name to Farragut?” asked Diane. “Why did you keep your father’s name?”
    Diane had caught Gauthier by surprise. She looked wide-eyed for a moment, as if trying to understand the question.
    “I don’t know,” she said finally. “I don’t know.”
    “Why did you use a drawing of a bird for your signature?” asked Hanks.
    She smiled. “Mother used to call me her little magpie,” she said, “and I lived in Pigeon Ridge. I liked the idea of being something that could fly away whenever I wanted.”
    Hanks looked at Diane and his lips twitched into a whisper of a smile.
    “How many were there?” said Diane. “How many did you turn into art?”
    “Not many. Not many. Ten, maybe. Perhaps fewer,” she said.
    “Where are they buried?” asked Diane.
    “I don’t know exactly. Everett handled that. Somewhere nearby.”
    Hanks rose to his feet. “Thank you for speaking with us.”
    He said it as if it were all he could do to say the words. Diane understood.
    Hanks reached to take the box containing the mask from Gauthier. She snatched it away.
    “Can’t I keep it? It’s mine.”
    “It’s evidence, ma’am,” he said, and took the box and put the lid back on it.
    They left her there, sitting in the empty sunroom with the harsh light shining on her. No one spoke until they were almost to Rosewood. Lillian broke the silence.
    “All that going on in Rosewood, and no one knew? Weren’t those poor people reported missing?”
    “They must have been,” said Diane.
    “The little boy she said liked to sit still. Poor little thing,” said Harte.
    “He was worked hard,” said Diane. “The muscle attachments on his little bones were too developed. He’d led a hard life. He was undersized for his age. He wouldn’t have looked like the teenager he was.”
    They were silent again until they were pulling up to the crime lab