An Unquiet Grave (Louis Kincaid Mysteries) by P.J. Parrish Page A

and fields, with no streetlights to relieve the darkness, Louis wasn’t quite sure where he was.
    The blue and red bubble lights of a cruiser were visible well before they pulled up to the Hidden Lake entrance. Louis produced the pass Dalum had given him, and the two cops at the guardhouse waved him through. Beyond the administration building, he saw a flurry of lights—small jerking ones, like flashlights. The Ardmore Police Department didn’t have any floodlights, so Dalum was waiting for the state to bring some. The few cops here were protecting the scene and walking the grounds.
    Louis swung the Impala in next to a cruiser, but didn’t switch off the engine. He turned toward Alice. She was watching the flashlights, the Kleenex balled in her hand.
    “It’s going to be hard to go back in there,” she said softly.
    “Maybe you shouldn’t,” Louis said.
    “I have to. I have to finish boxing the records.”
    “You shouldn’t be alone.”
    “I won’t be. The superintendent has arranged for extra security.”
    “Is there anyone else still working here?” Louis asked.
    She shook her head. “It was just Rebecca and me. We were the last ones here. I was packing up the last of the records that were going to the state. She was helping the salvage company.”
    “There was a salvage crew here this week?” Louis asked.
    “Yes, a foreman and his crew. All the buildings have been locked for months and Rebecca had to take them around so they could do inventory.”
    “Who else was around?”
    Alice had to think for a moment. “Three security guards, the old fellow at the guardhouse, and two others who were only here at night. One walked the grounds watching for vandals and the other was posted out in the cemetery to keep an eye on the exhumation company’s equipment.”
    “Anyone else in and out?”
    “Just a few people claiming remains in the last week.” Now Alice had turned toward him. “Why are you asking?”
    “No reason,” Louis said.
    Alice started to rummage through her purse, pulling out her gloves. “Well, thank you for the ride,” she said.
    “No problem.”
    Alice opened the door and started to slide out.
    “Miss Cooper, wait,” Louis said.
    She looked back at him.
    “Why do you think Charlie put flowers on Rebecca’s eyes?”
    She hesitated. “Chief Dalum asked me the same thing. You talk like a policeman.”
    Louis smiled. “I used to be one. It never really goes away.”
    “Do you think Charlie did it?” she asked.
    “I don’t know enough about him or Rebecca to answer that, Miss Cooper,” Louis said.
    She sat back in the seat, looking back out the windshield at the black hulk of the administration building. “Charlie loved Rebecca,” she said. “She was the only one who really paid any attention to him, the only one who worked with him.”
    “Worked?” Louis asked. “How?”
    “She figured out that he loved it when she read to him, and that he could remember things he had heard and recite them back. It didn’t really matter what she read. Charlie just seemed to like to hear the words.”
    A small smile tipped her lips. “She used to read him Shakespeare.” She saw the incredulous look on Louis’s face and her smile grew. “Well, only A Midsummer Night’s Dream . There’s a character in it named Oberon. I guess he was the king of the fairies or something, and Rebecca told Charlie that’s what he was.”
    When Louis said nothing, Alice went on. “She didn’t mean it cruelly, and I’m sure Charlie didn’t understand the play. He just knows his name is in it.”
    Alice’s smile faded and in the faint lights of the dash, Louis could see her eyes, full of questions.
    “He loved her,” she said, more fiercely this time, as if she were trying to convince herself now.
    “People sometimes kill the people they love,” Louis said.
    She looked away. “That’s what the chief said.”
    The heater had fogged the windows, and Louis could barely make out the ghostly play of