The Darling Dahlias and the Cucumber Tree (Berkley Prime Crime)

curls to her scalp with bobby pins. She used a setting lotion made of boiled flaxseed and always set two rows in the front, three over each ear, two in the back. Then she covered the curls carefully with a ruffled pink net cap, put on a pair of pink cotton summer pajamas, cold-creamed her face with Pond’s in a ritual battle against wrinkles, and opened the window, enjoying the wafting fragrance of the moonflowers and nicotiana blooming in the garden. The window open, she crawled into bed and went to sleep.
    But not for long.
    It was not quite midnight, according to the clock on her bedside table, when she heard it. The clank-clank-clank of a spade against stone—muffled, as if whoever was digging was trying to be quiet. She lay there for a moment, pretending that she wasn’t hearing it. But then there was a hesitant rap on her door.
    “Bessie?” asked a voice. “Are you awake? It’s Leticia.”
    “And Maxine,” said another voice.
    Bessie got out of bed and opened the door. Leticia was wearing a red plaid flannel dressing gown, belted around her thick middle. Maxine’s dressing gown was the same style, but flowered blue and purple. Maxine’s hair was twisted up in rags. Leticia’s long gray hair was braided into a single braid, over her shoulder.
    “Somebody’s digging,” Leticia said in a low voice. “In our garden.”
    “We heard him from our window,” Maxine added. The two of them shared the largest room at the far end of the hall.
    “Not in our garden,” amended Miss Rogers, coming out of her room. “In the Dahlias’ garden, next door.” She was wearing a silky gray gown and her hair was down around her shoulders. Bessie thought she looked ten years younger.
    Another door opened and Mrs. Sedalius joined them, her roly-poly self engulfed in a voluminous gold wrapper. “It’s not a him; it’s a her!” Mrs. Sedalius squeaked excitedly. “It’s the ghost! I saw her. Just now! Out my window!”
    “We thought you went to bed and covered up your head,” Maxine said. She flicked on the hallway ceiling light, and Bessie reached over quickly and flicked it off.
    “No lights,” she warned. “Whoever that is out there, we don’t want him to know we’re awake. Or her,” she added.
    “What ghost?” Leticia asked with interest. “The Cartwright ghost again?”
    “The one looking for her buried baby,” Mrs. Sedalius said mournfully. “Buried in a little wood box.”
    “Or the Cartwright family treasure,” Bessie replied, remembering the story Dahlia had told her once. “It was buried.”
    “Or her shoes,” Maxine said. “I heard that the ghost lost her shoes. That’s what she’s looking for.”
    “With a shovel?” Leticia asked. “Why does she need a shovel to look for her shoes?”
    There was the sound of a chair scraping, and Roseanne, her brown face almost gray with fright, came into the hall, clutching her flannel nightgown to her. “I heard y‘all talkin’ ‘bout that ghost,” she said tearfully. “Is that po’ Miz Cornelia out there agin, diggin’ for that sweet lit’le chile?” She shivered.
    “It’s all right, Roseanne,” Maxine said in a comforting tone, and put an arm around her. “Whatever it is, it’s out there, not in here. You’re safe.”
    Roseanne whimpered.
    “This is all nonsense, you know,” Bessie said firmly. “There are no such things as ghosts.”
    “That is not necessarily true,” Miss Rogers put in, in her dry, precise tone. “Ghosts are a phenomenon of the imagination. To the person who believes that there is such a thing, it is a fact, not a fancy. However, in this case, it was the Cartwright family silver that was buried, not a baby.”
    “It wa’n’t no silver, it was a baby!” Roseanne cried. Despite Maxine’s steadying arm, she was trembling. “Her baby! The one Miz Cornelia birthed while Miz Dahlia was down there in Mobile.”
    “Oh, really?” Bessie asked, interested. “I’ve never heard that. What Mrs. Blackstone told me was that she was sent to Mobile because her mother had consumption.”
    “It’s a tale ain’t often told,” Roseanne retorted, “an’ maybe the white folks don’ know it. But it’s true. My grandma tol’ me, an’ she was there. Miz Cartwright birthed that baby while her husband was off to the War. Miz Dahlia was sent away so she wouldn’t know nothin’ ’bout it.” She shook her head. “She knew all the same, though. She knew.”
    “Ah,” Bessie said, remembering that Dahlia