Island of Bones(105)

“Show me this cemetery,” Horton said.

When they got back outside, the fog was dissipating. A bird had started up its morning song somewhere. The empty windows of the seven cabins looked out toward the big house. In the gathering light, the compound had the benign look of a children’s camp, except for the three Fort Myers officers who were standing in a knot. Their guns were drawn and their eyes were traveling over the cabins and the trees.

Louis led them down the path to the cemetery. At the fork, he stopped.

“There’s a cabin down there. That’s where I found Angela,” he said, pointing.

“A cabin? What, like the other ones?” Horton asked.

“No, it’s small, one room.” Louis paused. “I think it might be where they went to have their babies.”

Horton directed one of his men to check it out and they continued on. At the edge of the cemetery, Louis stopped. Everything had changed. The light streamed down through the twisting branches of the giant oak trees, and the morning breeze stirred the hanging Spanish moss like gray veils. A soft blanket of newly fallen leaves covered the ground.

Louis could see the five graves clearly now. And the small, freshly dug open grave with its mound of dirt.

The cemetery was silent, empty.

“So where are they?” Horton asked.

“I don’t know,” Louis said.

The other two officers were staring at the open grave and the table. Louis was scanning the encircling brush. Horton was looking down at the coral markers.

“How in the hell are we going to get forensics in here with all these trees?” he asked, shaking his head. “Shit, look at this. It’s going to be a bitch digging these up.”

The rustle of leaves on the far side of the cemetery made Louis look up. A woman came out of the brush and stopped.

She was in her fifties, her long blond hair streaked with gray. Her blue cotton dress hung on her thin body. Her pale gray eyes stared at them with a strange flatness. The same flatness that Louis had seen in the old newspaper photo.

“Emma?” he said. “Emma Fielding?”

“Emma del Bosque,” she said. She took a few steps into the cemetery, looked down at the markers, then up at Horton.

“Please don’t do this,” she said. “Just leave them alone, please.”

Horton and the other men were staring at Emma. The two younger officers looked as if they were seeing a ghost.

“Look, ma’am,” Horton began. Louis held up a hand. Emma’s eyes were on him.

“Please leave our daughters be.”

“Is your daughter buried here, ma’am?” Horton asked.

Emma looked down at the nearest marker. “Yes.”

“How did your daughter die, ma’am?” Horton asked.

“She was taken,” she said, not looking up.

“By who?” Horton asked. Then he stopped, shaking his head. “Never mind, don’t answer that. Officer, read this woman her rights.”

As the officer started reading, Louis heard a sound in the brush. Two more women came out. They were in their forties, and wearing the same shapeless dresses as Emma. The taller of the two had her stringy blond hair twisted into a braid that hung over her shoulder. The other woman was heavier, with wild dark hair framing a full face.

Cindy Shattuck and Paula Berkowitz.

They waited until the officer was done with reading the Miranda rights before speaking.

“Why did you have to come here?” Paula asked.

“We were looking for you,” Louis said. “All of you.”

“Why?” she asked.

Louis stared at the three women. They were acting like Angela had, treating him and the police not as rescuers but as intruders. He looked down at their hands. All were wearing the coral rings.

“Okay, let’s get this over with,” Horton said. He motioned to the other officers. When the lead officer pulled out his handcuffs, Emma held her hands out in front of her, nodding to the others to do the same.

“This is our home,” Emma said to Louis.

“You have to go,” he said.

“Where are our husbands?” she asked.

“At the restaurant,” Horton said. “And that’s where we’re taking you.”

Emma looked back at Cindy and Paula then started slowly toward the path. The other women followed her.

When they were gone, Horton scanned the cemetery, shaking his head. He shot Louis a look of disgust, then turned on his heel and was gone back up the path.

Louis looked up at the sky. The sun was up over the trees now and the last of the fog had burned off. The Bible Ana del Bosque had given him was heavy in his arms and he hoisted it up, looking at its worn cover.

He opened the cover to the first page. On the frontispiece was an elaborate family tree, illustrated with biblical scenes. In flowing script, someone had written across the top La Familia del Bosque. The tree was filled in, but the ink was so faded and the handwriting so tiny Louis couldn’t make it out without his reading glasses.