MacPherson's Lament

twenty minutes if traffic permits.

They pulled off into the sand and piled out of the car. I parked across the road, then strolled over, trying not to look threatening. There were five of them-all well past seventy, I judged-and they were wearing the sort of crepe old-lady dresses that one usually sees at tea parties, not on beach excursions. They paid no attention to me because they were arguing among themselves and trying to haul something out of the trunk of the Chrysler.

“Can I help you ladies?” I said, grateful for an excuse to strike up a conversation.

One of them glared at me suspiciously, but a sweet-faced Helen Hayes type smiled prettily and said that they’d be ever so grateful if I could hoist that old piece of machinery out of the cavernous trunk of their automobile. I peered in to see what was giving them problems, trying not to think about that scene in The Great Escape when the Germans pull machine guns out of the truck and mow down the prisoners. These absconding felons looked harmless enough.

“What is this?” I asked between gasps as I hauled a vacuum-cleaner-sized machine out of the trunk.

They looked at each other with worried frowns.

“It’s a vacuum cleaner,” said the tall, suspicious one.

“We have sand in the backseat of our car,” said a short one in a black dress.

Like hell it was a vacuum cleaner. It was a metal detector. In college I’d had a boyfriend who used one to look for Civil War bullets at battlefields. I decided, though, that it would be detrimental to this budding relationship to call the old swindlers liars at this stage. It was obvious, though, that they were anxiously awaiting my departure, and I realized that between airline schedules and Virginia grand juries, I really didn’t have time to worm my way into their confidence through days of charm and patience. I decided to come straight to the point, a maneuver practically unheard of in Southern circles, but occasionally necessary.

“Which one of you is Flora Dabney?” I asked.

They all gasped, and the sweet-looking one turned to the suspicious one and said, “Don’t tell her anything, Flora!” which pretty much settled the identity question right then and there. After an awkward pause, Flora introduced me to her cohorts: Mary Lee Pendleton, Lydia Bridgeford, Dolly Hawks Smith, and Ellen Morrison.

“Where are the others?”

“Back at the inn,” said Dolly Smith. “Two of them are invalids. Are you a police officer?”

“I’m Elizabeth MacPherson,” I said. “My brother is that naive young attorney who sold your house for you in Danville.”

“Such a nice boy,” one of them murmured. “He’s well, I trust?”

“He’s about to be disbarred. Or worse. The buyer of your house just discovered that the state of Virginia had claimed it. So he wants his money back, and everyone thinks Bill has it.”

“I can’t imagine how you found us,” murmured Mary Lee Pendleton, twisting her string of pearls. “We really worked hard on our getaway plans.”

“Until you went and blabbed to that young man in uniform at Stone Mountain,” said Lydia Bridgeford. “You always were a fool for a handsome man, Mary Lee!”

I motioned to a picnic table set back under the trees. “Let’s talk about this,” I said. “I need to know exactly what’s going on, and I hope I can persuade you to return to Virginia with me.”

Flora Dabney shook her head. “We’re not going to become prisoners of the state. They’ve taken our house, haven’t they?”

“Yes. And they’re about to charge my brother with murdering you.” They listened thoughtfully while I explained that no one but Bill had ever seen them, and that there was no proof they were still alive.

“I didn’t want to leave a paper trail,” said Dolly Smith. “I understand that’s very important in the fugitive business. Perhaps I overdid it a bit.”

“Your brother is a very nice young man,” Ellen Morrison ventured. “I wouldn’t want him to get into trouble on our account.”

“So you didn’t plan this to incriminate Bill?”

Flora Dabney shook her head. “No. The fact that he was so trusting was helpful, of course, but we couldn’t have counted on it. You see, we received a notice that the state wanted to take over the Phillips Mansion as a historic building, and that we were to be sent to a nursing home.”

“We had to do something!” said Ellen Morrison with a quaver in her voice.

Lydia Bridgeford patted her hair. “I decided to see if there was something we could do. I spend a lot of time at the courthouse doing my genealogical researches-”

“She’s almost back to Noah,” muttered Dolly Smith.

“So I asked Bonnie-she’s the clerk, such a sweet girl-”

“Although perhaps too trusting for a public official,” murmured Flora.

“Just Bill’s type,” I said.

“Well, I watched Bonnie for a while and I learned how things work at the courthouse. All the paperwork goes to Bonnie’s desk. When she gets time, she enters the information in the record book by hand and she types it into the computer records. Well, I got to thinking about this, and I realized that if the piece of paper disappeared from Bonnie’s desk before she entered the information, no one would ever know! I kept going to the courthouse, doing my historical searches, and when Bonnie left for lunch, I’d check through her paperwork. Sure enough, one day the notice of-what was it?”

“Eminent domain,” said Dolly Smith.

“So you took the paper before it could be filed anywhere?” I asked. “That means that Bill did the title search correctly. He didn’t find any lien on the property because there wasn’t one to be found.”

“Oh, yes. We knew that any lawyer would balk if he found a lien,” Mary Lee Pendleton explained. “But we knew we’d have to work fast, before the state did anything else.”

“The newspaper ad was my idea,” said Flora Dabney. “And I said we’d have to get cash on the barrel head.”

“Yes, dear, but the Cayman Islands was my suggestion,” said Mary Lee. “You know I asked that kind gentleman banker-”

“But why did you have Bill run the ad and show the house and sign the deed?”

“We didn’t want too many people to see us,” said Ellen Morrison. “In case they decided to come after us. We didn’t want to be caught.”

“And now we are,” sighed Dolly Smith.

“Rubbish!” said Flora Dabney. “This young lady can’t make us go back. She’s not a policeman.”

“I don’t want my brother to go to jail,” I said. “But I don’t want to see you all go to a nursing home either-if you don’t want to.”

“Perhaps we could send back some sort of proof that we’re still alive-and that Bill is not to blame,” Flora said. “Just don’t expect us to go back.”

“Couldn’t you get people to support your cause?” I asked. “Surely the Sons of Confederate Veterans, or perhaps some state politicians-”

Dolly Smith shrugged. “People are afraid of the Confederacy these days. Too many people linked the battle flag with racism, and no one in government wants his name linked with our cause.”

“You’re politically incorrect,” I said.

“I suppose so,” sighed Flora. “People do want history to be simple. It is inconvenient to remember that the Southern soldiers used to infuriate the Union ones by calling them abolitionists. Most Yankees deemed it a great insult. They thought they were fighting to preserve the union, just as we assumed that we were fighting for independence. Now, of course, it is more pleasant for people to think otherwise. People do like there to be heroes in their histories.”

“My father, Thomas Bridgeford, was a hero,” said Lydia stoutly. “He was a great Southern gentleman. Of course, he lost all his money after the crash of ’29. He was quite old then, of course, and I’ve never blamed him.”

“Which brings us to this,” said Dolly Smith, tapping the metal detector. “I suppose we can tell you about it now. We might need your help.”

“Help for what?” I asked. I hoped they weren’t looking for World War II land mines to carry on the rebellion.

Flora Dabney smiled and patted my arm. “We’re trying to locate the Confederate treasury, dear.”