Dylan and I looked at her. She was absolutely right.
He shifted and worry lines creased his forehead. “Yesterday when I signed on to my mother’s online bank account to transfer money for her bail, I noticed a series of withdrawals. About a thousand dollars a week for the past six months. When I asked her about it, she wrote it off as spending money.”
“A thousand dollars a week? That’s quite a shopping spree,” Delia said. “What’d she say she was buying for four grand a month?”
Dylan’s mama could spend that in an hour at the right boutique. Four grand a month was a drop in the bucket of her fortune.
“I didn’t push it,” he said. “Figured it really wasn’t my business what she was buying. But if she’s been paying off someone, then that’s definitely my business.”
That it was. But how did it factor into the case as a whole? “We need to look at the bigger picture. If Hyacinth got a letter, Haywood got a letter, and Doug hinted that he and the mayor got a letter . . . and Patricia’s doling out a thousand a week, then I think we need to assume all the Harpies are involved. I can ask Dr. Gabriel about it when I go pick up Louella in a little bit.” I shuddered.
“You’re not seriously adopting her,” Delia said, eyebrows raised.
“I have to.” I rubbed Poly’s head and hoped he wouldn’t hate me come tonight. “Virgil isn’t going to cross over until she’s settled in a home. I don’t suppose Boo wants a playmate?” I batted my eyelashes.
“Oh hell no. You’re not dumping that dog on me.”
“But didn’t Doug say Haywood sent the letters?” Dylan asked out of the blue. He’d apparently been stewing on the letters and not listening to the news about the dog.
Hmm. I wondered if he’d take her.
“Yeah, but that’s the opposite of what I heard at the Silly Goose yesterday,” I said. “Avery mentioned that Haywood had gotten a letter, the same as Hyacinth. Hyacinth intimated that it was Avery who sent them. If those ashes at Haywood’s were from letters, then I tend toward believing Avery’s version of events.”
Yet, why did Doug think Haywood had sent them? It was something to look into.
“Who is this Avery?” Dylan asked, looking at Delia. “She seems to be in the thick of things. You find anything on her yet?”
“Not much. Just calling up property tax records now.” She tapped away.
Dylan glanced at me. “Okay, let’s say the Harpies are being blackmailed. Why? Is it as a whole or individually? Did the group do something they’re trying to hide? Or did each person in the group do something they don’t want known?”
“I vote individual,” Delia said. “Your mama wouldn’t pay out of her personal account for all the Harpies. That money would come out of the Harpies account.”
“Four grand a month for each of them . . .” I did quick math. “That’s a haul of twenty grand a month. Someone’s making a boatload of money. Either of you know anyone who’s been flashing extra cash lately?”
They shook their heads.
Delia looked up. “How do I know the name Twilabeth Morgan?”
“Twilabeth? That was the name of Haywood’s former wife, wasn’t it?” I asked. “I think he said it the other night, but didn’t mention a last name. Mayor Ramelle told me that Haywood’s ex used to live here in Hitching Post until she and Haywood divorced twenty-some years ago. Why?”
Delia said, “Twilabeth Morgan previously owned the house Avery Bryan is living in, bought it in the late eighties. Avery took ownership last year. It can’t be a coincidence.”
“Hand me the phone, will you?” I asked Dylan.
He reached across the table, grabbed the cordless, and handed it over. I dialed quickly.
“Law offices of Caleb Montgomery,” a voice on the line said.
“Hey, John Richard, it’s Carly. I need a favor.” Attorney John Richard Baldwin and I had forged a friendship last May during a particularly rough patch in both our lives. He ended up quitting his fancy job in Birmingham and moved to Hitching Post. He was now working for one of my closest friends. Caleb Montgomery was the best divorce lawyer in Darling County and his office had access to all sorts of online records that I didn’t.
“Okay, but only because you almost died and all yesterday,” John Richard said.
I rolled my eyes. I’d already heard a lecture from Delia reminding me that she didn’t want mine to be one of the ghosts she helped cross over this weekend.
I’d had to remind her that I didn’t particularly want that, either.
“Can you look up a divorce record for me?” I asked John Richard and gave him Haywood’s name. “The wife’s name is possibly Twilabeth Morgan.”
“Hold on a sec.” I heard tapping in the background. Then he said, “Married in May of ’eighty-seven. Divorced in November of ’eighty-seven.”
Mayor Ramelle had mentioned the marriage had been brief. She hadn’t been kidding.
Twenty-eight years ago, though . . . “Can you do me another favor?”