Free Mildred Pierced by Stuart M. Kaminsky Page A

hand was broken in the incident and was of little use from that night forth forcing him to become left handed and change his profession to that of itinerant harmonica player along with a hare-lipped Indian who played a broad repertoire of Stephen Foster tunes.
Due to his repute as a drunk there were few who believed Mason’s confirmation of the sighting of Dolly Madison’s ghost. However it must be recalled that my grandfather would have certainly been smashed to blood and bone had not he seen the ghost or vision. Dead he would have been unable to return home where that very night my grandmother conceived my father William which led to the birth of my mother Dolly Madison Simcox which led to me Irene named not for a ghost but a seamstress who had not taken the gesture of my being given her name as payment for a dress.
    I turned off the lights, got on the floor with a pillow under my head and closed my eyes. And the dreams came. Two I couldn’t remember, but the last one—that one I remembered.
    I was in Cincinnati. I don’t know what I was doing in Cincinnati. I don’t know why I dream about Cincinnati. I’ve never been to Cincinnati, but the Cincinnati of my dreams is a vast city without people.
    It was night. Street lights were on. I was standing in front of the door of a modest one-story brick house. The door opened slowly. I wanted to back away but my legs wouldn’t move. Over my shoulder a voice whispered, “Oh-oh, now you’re in for it, bub.” I turned my head toward the voice. It was Koko the Clown. He nodded his head toward the door letting me know I should pay attention.
    The door was open all the way now. The house was dark inside, but a woman stood glowing in front of me. She was wearing a Colonial costume complete with bonnet. In her hands was a crossbow. She was aiming it at me. I knew she had to be Dolley Madison.
    I tried to think of something to say to her, something to stop her, to assure her I voted for her husband, that I’d once been to Madison, Wisconsin, and walked down Madison Avenue in New York.
    She raised the crossbow higher. It was pointed at the top of my head. I reached up and felt an apple balanced in my hair. Koko snatched the apple and took a big bite, and Dolley Madison lowered the crossbow. It was aiming at my chest now. I knew her finger was tightening on the trigger.
    “I told you you were in for it, bub,” Koko said, and a bright light hit my face and a woman’s voice said, “Time.”
    I opened my eyes. Mrs. Plaut stood in the doorway of my room, the hall light behind her.
    “Time,” she repeated. “It’s seven.”
    I left Mrs. Plaut’s a few minutes later and hurried to pick up Joan Crawford.

CHAPTER  7
     
    T HE ROOM, THE size of a small storefront shoe store, was dark except for the low platform at one end bright with overhead lamps. Folding chairs sat facing the platform. I was sitting on one side of Joan Crawford. Marty Leib was sitting on the other. Tony Sheridan, an assistant district attorney, sat directly behind us. There were also two plainclothes detectives and a couple of uniformed cops.
    “Okay?” asked one of the plainclothes detectives.
    Sheridan, tall, lean, and recently discharged from the army after two Purple Hearts and a case of battle fatigue, said, “Okay.”
    I had picked Crawford up at her house just after the sun came up. She was wearing a plain black dress and a floppy hat with a big brim and dark glasses. She did her best to hide her lack of enthusiasm about my Crosley and got in the front seat.
    “Phillip is home with the children,” she said.
    It was Saturday.
    I started driving.
    “He wanted to come, too, but if both of us were there, we’d have to get someone to watch the children, and the likelihood of my being recognized would certainly be increased.”
    “I understand,” I said.
    “Do you?” she asked, looking at me while I drove. “What do you think of when my name is mentioned?”
    “Movie star,” I said.
    “Yes,