A Body at Bunco (7 page)

So she certainly would have opportunity. And if Luella had had such a big bank job and Mimsy were indeed her only living relative…then the financial motive was there, too.

By the time the questioning was over, Luella’s body had been removed, and the SBI had left, it was much later than she’d thought it would be. Myrtle remembered that she needed to feed Pasha and opened up a can of tuna to put outside. Her eyes opened wide as Pasha rushed past her and bounded into Myrtle’s house and up on Myrtle’s bed, blinking at her. Pasha
never
spent the night inside. But here she was, appearing ready and willing to curl up with her while they slept.

Amazingly, for once, Myrtle slept the night through and didn’t wake up once.

Chapter Five

A tapping sound woke her up the next morning. For once, it was Miles tapping on her front door that woke
Myrtle
up, instead of the other way around.

And, even more shocking, the normally polite Miles didn’t even seem to notice that he’d woken her up despite Myrtle’s appearance at her front door with sheet lines all over her face and wearing a fluffy pink bathrobe.

“Hi Myrtle,” he said solemnly. “I’ve been worrying over last night and I thought I’d pop over and we could talk over a cup of coffee.”

“Sounds good,” she grated in her early-morning voice. “As long as you’re the one making the coffee, that is.”

As Myrtle sat at her kitchen table, her gaze kept drifting over to her backyard. Although she enjoyed investigating, the fact that someone had murdered one of her guests was truly appalling. Committing a crime, literally in Myrtle’s backyard, was entirely too disrespectful. At least the crime scene tape around her gnomes had vanished with the state police. But the memories from last night were vivid enough to stick around in her head for a while.

While the coffee perked, Miles swiftly moved around the kitchen, putting out sugar, half and half, and even a plate of store-bought muffins. As he moved, he talked, almost to himself.

“It doesn’t all add up to me,” he said. “The crime was such a random thing. It wasn’t as if Luella were misbehaving. She wasn’t even doing anything—she was simply sitting at the table and talking with
you
until she went off for a smoke break. Luella didn’t have the opportunity to stir up any trouble or make someone that mad at her.”

Myrtle said, “True, but anger against Luella might have been brewing for a while. Maybe someone had been looking for the opportunity to kill her over a period of time.”

“But during a Bunco game in a gnome-filled backyard?” Miles looked skeptical.

“Why not? It was perfect timing. Luella was by herself. People were coming and going so much that no one would notice if one person slipped out really quickly.” Miles handed Myrtle a coffee cup and she stirred in a couple of teaspoons of sugar.

“Exactly—people were coming and going so much that it would be
easy
for the killer to be seen returning from the scene of the crime.” Miles waved his hand around to emphasize his point, sloshing coffee on his arm in the process.

“But think about it, Miles. Luella was a known smoker. She could be counted on to slip outside and take a break. She clearly knew her killer, so she wasn’t going to scream in horror when confronted by them. If the killer couldn’t find a handy weapon, she could simply pretend that she’d stepped outside to catch up with Luella and skip the attack,” said Myrtle.

“Except there
was
a handy weapon.”

Myrtle raised an eyebrow. “I hope you aren’t suggesting that Dusty left his wrench there on purpose. What are you thinking…that Puddin wielded a wrench at Luella White? Whatever for? Because Luella wouldn’t hire Puddin as a housekeeper? I can assure you that Puddin and Dusty don’t have the mental capacity to be murderers. Besides, Dusty leaves his tools lying around all the time—it’s incredibly annoying to me. No, the killer was just lucky. She’d have stepped outside, seen a huge wrench lying around, smacked Luella over the head with it, and then probably rubbed the handle off with her shirt or something to get all the prints off.”

“It just seems really brazen to me,” muttered Miles before taking a sip of coffee.

“Murder is brazen,” said Myrtle. “This was just someone taking advantage of an opportunity. This was someone at my party. Let’s figure out who it was. And for the sake of time, let’s eliminate each other, okay? And any other women who didn’t seem to have much of a connection to Luella.”

“I would have thought that was almost everyone at your party,” said Miles. “That’s another reason why I was awake all last night. I simply can’t imagine who might be behind this—Mimsy—she’s the only one I could logically come up with. She’s Luella’s last living relative. Luella appeared to be a woman of some means. There could be a financial motive there.”

“Exactly. And, although Mimsy did seem very upset last night by Luella’s death, we can’t go on appearances.”

“Although her grief and surprise did seem very genuine,” said Miles.

Myrtle resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Miles’s gallantry was a real impediment to him.

“So we’re agreed that Mimsy has a motive. But do we know if Mimsy had the opportunity to kill Luella?” asked Myrtle. “She was vague about her movements when I asked her about them. You were up and about a bit more than I was, Miles. When Luella took her smoking break, where was Mimsy?”

Miles said, “Well, I was hardly trying to keep track of her. I was talking with you and Elaine about Elaine’s plumbing problem, remember? I know she got some wine at some point. I know she was talking to different groups of people. There was a missing earring at one point, I believe. I think she could have slipped out. But I was busy trying to search and destroy those resilient and determined cookies. You should thank your stars that Luella wasn’t poisoned. Everyone would have been suspicious that it had something to do with your cookies.”

“Very funny. Okay, so Mimsy had opportunity. Tell me your impression of where everyone else was and I’ll see if it matches mine,” said Myrtle.

Miles was thoughtful. “Tippy couldn’t even sit down or go get food or wine because Puddin cornered her at the front door and was telling her a very long story that Tippy was too courteous to cut short.”

“I would feel sorry for Tippy except for the fact that she so clearly needs to learn assertiveness,” said Myrtle. “Wine apparently brings out the raconteur in Puddin. I’ll have to remember to keep her away from the cooking sherry.”

Miles took a big sip of his coffee. “Georgia Simpson couldn’t have done it. She was close to Tippy and Puddin near the front door. She even asked me for something to eat and drink.” His voice, as usual whenever he spoke of the loud, tattooed woman, was awestruck.

“Did she think you were a waiter as you hovered nearby her?” asked Myrtle. “You must have been hovering near her, Miles. You’ve simply got to curb your admiration of Georgia.”

Miles glared at Myrtle’s rooster-covered kitchen tablecloth, a bit flushed. “I don’t
admire
her per se. She’s just very different from everyone else in Bradley.”

“And thank heaven for that. Okay, so that leaves…everyone else. Where were Alma, Poppy, Estelle, and Florence?” asked Myrtle.

Miles looked a bit shocked. “Oh, I don’t think Florence had anything to do with this. She’s an old lady.”

“Miles, you are
speaking
with an old lady and I am quite capable of murder, I assure you. Florence Ainsworth is a good decade younger than I am. She could kill someone with a wrench in a skinny minute, I’m sure.”

“But
why
? Why would Florence want to kill Luella? Why would Estelle, Alma, or Poppy, for that matter? I could see Mimsy having a financial motive. But why on earth would these other women want to commit murder?” Miles waved his muffin around, punctuating his question as crumbs flew.

“All I know is that Luella knew things. She somehow, despite her short time in Bradley, had her finger on the pulse of the town. If you’d done something you weren’t very proud of, Luella White knew about it. And Luella apparently sometimes didn’t mind gossiping, either, although she was disappointingly reserved with me last night. Her gossiping is why Sloan Jones asked me to spend time with Luella…to get the dirt on what was happening around town and put it in the paper,” said Myrtle. “I guess her knowledge killed her.”

“Were you able to pump information out of her at the table?” asked Miles.

“There was little pumping required. Luella intimated that she knew all kinds of things. It was almost as if she were showing off. Unfortunately, although she named names, she didn’t give me the specifics I was looking for. But she mentioned Alma, Florence, and Estelle.”

Miles took another thoughtful sip of his coffee. “And so all these people
could
have done it?”

“Sure they could. And apparently they got away with it, too, since no one came forward last night to say that they spotted one of those ladies coming in the back door with a bloody wrench.”

“So what’s next?” asked Miles. “Are we making the rounds?”

“Yes indeed we are. Because I’m taking this one seriously. The gall of someone to commit murder while I’m hosting Bonkers! It’s appalling.” Myrtle fumed.

“All right, well let me get home and get ready for the day.” There was another knock at Myrtle’s door. “More company? You
are
popular,” said Miles.

Myrtle frowned and then sighed. “Oh, it’s got to be Puddin. I made that deal with her that she could play if she’d come back and clean. It had better be her, anyway. This place needs cleaning now, for sure, after that party and the police with their dirty shoes.”

Miles opened the door and sure enough, Puddin was there. She still had no cleaning supplies, but at least this time she’d brought her trash bag with her—unless it was one of Myrtle’s trash bags from a previous visit.

Miles left and Puddin started the slow process of throwing away trash and collecting glasses and plates for the dishwasher. Myrtle said, “I’m going to go ahead and get dressed, Puddin. All those dishes won’t fit in the dishwasher, so if you could hand-wash what doesn’t, please.”

Puddin’s response was to give her a mulish look as she shook the trash bag to open it.

By the time Myrtle got dressed and put a dab or two of makeup on, Puddin was still practically in the same spot as she’d been when Myrtle left her. She wasn’t washing dishes, either, which to Myrtle was the clear priority. Instead, she was slapping a dishrag resentfully across the coffee table. Dusting was always something of an act of aggression with Puddin.

Myrtle frowned. She needed to redirect Puddin to the important tasks at hand, but motivating her would be impossible unless she found out what was bothering Puddin. When Puddin had something on her mind, she couldn’t be reasoned with.

“Puddin, are you feeling all right?”

Puddin jumped violently, clearly not having realized that Myrtle was in the room. “Course I am!”

“No aftereffects from last night?” asked Myrtle.

Puddin gave her the suspicious stare that indicated she hadn’t understood what Myrtle said.

Myrtle revised her question. “Your head doesn’t ache from the number of alcoholic beverages you consumed?”

Puddin shook her head vigorously. Vigorously enough to make her wince after doing so. Apparently there
was
some sort of physical repercussion that might be affecting her already slack work ethic.

“So, do you have something on your mind then? Because you seem extremely preoccupied, Puddin. I’m thinking you’re either nursing a sore head, or dwelling on the events of last evening, or both,” said Myrtle. “We need to work through it, whatever it is, so that I can get those dishes washed. Do you want to talk?”

Stupid question. Puddin
always
wanted to talk, especially when the alternative was working. She happily trotted into the kitchen, sitting down at the kitchen table and shoving aside dirty dishes so that she could rest her elbows on the table.

Myrtle sat across from her. “All right. Let’s think this through. Puddin, what are your recollections from last night?”

Puddin gave her a sideways squint. “Do what?”

Myrtle tried a different tack. “I mean, what do you remember about last night?” She paused since Puddin was still looking stumped. “Do you remember
anything
from last night?”

Puddin looked indignant. “Didn’t drink
that
much! I just didn’t know what you meant. You’re talking about Miz Luella’s murder. I can tell you all about it.”

Myrtle sighed. Puddin did love her time in the spotlight. If she had anything at all helpful to offer them, it would likely take forever to get it.

“Let me show you how it was. I know you couldn’t really see anything, sitting where you were. I was talking to my friend Tippy…you know Tippy, don’t you?” Puddin gloated at counting wealthy socialite Tippy as a friend. “Anyhow, she and I were talking at the door, but I like to look around, right? So this is what I saw.” Puddin grabbed the saltshaker, the peppershaker, and the bottle of ketchup from the middle of the table. “This pepper is Alma, right? Alma was sort of hanging out over by the drinks.”

“Lingering because…she was drinking a lot? Or why, Puddin?”

Puddin screwed her face up in thought, loving every second of someone needing her insight on something. “I’d say that she was drinkin’
some.
They all was. But I think she was at the drink table so as she could keep shiftin’ her eyes over at Miss Luella.”

“So she was watching Miss Luella.”

“And sort of snarling.”

Myrtle was pretty sure Puddin’s imagination was running riot since she couldn’t quite picture the rather demure Alma as a rabid beast stalking Luella. But she’d let Puddin continue, at least. “Okay, so Alma is the salt shaker. Who else did you see?”

“No, Alma is the
pepper
shaker. Who else did I see? Well, Mr. Miles.” Puddin looked a bit cagey now. “You know. He’s got the energy sometimes. He had the energy last night and he was all over the house, wasn’t he? He kept poking around, acting like he was looking for something. In the living room, in the kitchen, in the back of the house. Him was everywheres.”