The Darling Dahlias and the Cucumber Tree

They all fell silent. Bessie wasn’t sure she believed what Roseanne was telling them. But she shivered, thinking of the many times she and Mrs. Blackstone had stood beneath that very same tree, looking up into its branches, laden with beautiful blossoms—too beautiful to be the site of so much ugliness. Did Dahlia know the story? Could it be true?

Well, of course it could, and Bessie knew it. If Colonel Cartwright had gotten wind of illicit goings-on between his plantation manager and his wife, he would have ordered the man hanged without a second thought and felt perfectly justified in doing so. The fact that his wife was already dead might even have given him some secret satisfaction: she had paid for her terrible crime with her life. And of course, he would have gone to great lengths to keep his daughter from finding out what he had done. But you couldn’t keep a secret from the servants.

“And the baby is buried out there somewhere?” Maxine asked.

“In a little wood box,” Mrs. Sedalius said with relish. “That’s what the ghost is looking for. The baby’s coffin.”

“Under the cucumber tree,” Roseanne said unexpectedly.

“Really?” Leticia and Maxine asked, in wide-eyed unison.

Bessie made up her mind. “I’ve had enough of this,” she said. The story was interesting—more than that, it was fascinating. But it had nothing whatever to do with whoever was digging out there in the garden. “I’m going out there and get rid of that trespasser, for once and all.”

“Oh, no!” Roseanne wailed desperately. “Oh, Miz Bessie, you gots to leave that po’ lady be! She lookin’ for her chile!”

Without a word, Bessie went back into her room. She put on her shoes, then went to the closet and found what she wanted. While she was there, putting on her shoes, she heard it again—the clank-clank of a shovel. She went back out into the hall.

“I really wish you wouldn’t,” Miss Rogers said faintly, seeing what she was carrying.

Roseanne whimpered.

“A shotgun?” Maxine asked, both eyebrows going up. “My gracious, Bessie.”

“My daddy’s favorite duck-hunting gun.” Bessie held it out for them to see. “Browning twelve-gauge pump. He taught me how to shoot it. I’ve bagged many a bird in my day. I’m out to bag a ghost.”

“You can’t kill a ghost,” Mrs. Sedalius said firmly.

“Who said anything about killing him?” Bessie retorted. “All I want to do is scare him. The gun is loaded with bird-shot, and I’m going to fire over his head.” She grunted. “Anyway, it’s not a ghost. It’s somebody dressed up like the Cartwright ghost.”

“Maybe it’s the escaped convict,” Miss Rogers ventured timidly.

Roseanne whimpered again.

“That’s it!” Leticia exclaimed, snapping her fingers. “The convict!”

This had not occurred to Bessie, and it gave her momentary pause. A convict might not scare easily. A convict might— But then she shook her head. “I don’t think so. Why would an escaped convict dress up like the Cartwright ghost and dig in the Dahlias’ garden? Doesn’t make any sense.”

“Doesn’t make sense for anybody to be doing it,” Leticia pointed out, and Bessie had to agree.

“Okay.” She narrowed her eyes at the ladies. “You can go to the windows and watch. But keep out of sight, and don’t say a word. I’m going to sneak up on him. I’d like to be close enough to see his face.”

“Her,” amended Mrs. Sedalius, still clinging to her belief that this was a ghost. “She’s wearing that same dark cape she wore the other night.” She paused, considering. “I guess ghosts don’t have much choice in what they wear.”

“You’re going to look pretty silly out there yourself, Bessie,” Maxine remarked critically. “Pink ruffles on your curler cap, Ponds on your face, pink pajamas, and shoes. And that shotgun.”

“I don’t care how I look,” Bessie retorted. “And neither will that intruder, when I get through with him. Now, you stay here. And keep still.”

Carrying her shotgun cradled in the crook of her arm, she went down the back stairs, out through the kitchen, and onto the back porch, silently shutting the door behind her. The only streetlights in town were on the courthouse square, and they were turned off at ten o’clock every night to save on electricity and because nobody was on the streets at that hour. There was a moon, but its silver face was covered with a curtain of racing clouds, and the garden was bright, then shadowed, then black as pitch. On the other side of the street, Mrs. Hamer’s dog, General Lee, was barking fitfully, but that didn’t seem to bother whoever was digging, for Bessie could hear the intermittent metallic clanking of the shovel against stone.