A Catered Fourth of July (5 page)

A
s Libby and Bernie pulled into RJ's parking lot they could hear the sound of fireworks going off in Cedar Bay Park.

“Nice night for it,” Bernie commented wistfully as a rocket exploded in the dark, sending down showers of white lights. She loved fireworks and was sorry they were missing them, unlike Libby who couldn't have cared less. Bernie looked around for Marvin's vehicle and didn't see it. In fact, aside from Brandon's truck, they were the only other vehicle in the place.
Strange.

Libby bit her lip. “I wonder where Marvin is?”

“He'll be along soon,” Bernie said as she got out of the van.

“I'm not so sure,” Libby replied, shutting the van door behind her. “We should have picked him up.”

“You worry too much, Libby. He'll be here.” Bernie looked at her watch. “We're five minutes early.”

Libby shook her head and walked inside. It was all very well for her sister to tell her not to worry, but it had taken all her powers of persuasion to get Marvin to come to RJ's. She just hoped he hadn't changed his mind.

When he arrived five minutes later, Libby heaved a sigh of relief.

“See,” Bernie said. “Told ya.”

He's moving like an old man,
Libby thought as she watched Marvin walk across the floor. She patted the stool between her and Bernie. “Sit here.”

“Yeah. We saved you a place, seeing as it's so crowded and all,” Bernie cracked.

Despite himself, Marvin smiled. “I've never seen the place this empty.” They were the only people in the place.

“I think the word is
dead
,” Brandon replied. “Everyone's probably watching the fireworks display.”

“And talking about what happened this afternoon,” Marvin reflected gloomily.

Brandon reached under the counter, came up with a bag of pretzels, and refilled the bowl sitting between Libby and Marvin. “Nothing like a murder to inspire communal bonding.”

Marvin flinched. “We don't know that it was a murder,” he protested. “It could have been an accident.”

Brandon turned and got a bottle of McClelland's off the shelf. “If you say so.”

“I do.”

Brandon got a glass out. “Glad I missed it.”

“I wished I had,” Marvin said.

“I bet you do.”

“A good time was definitely not had by all,” Bernie said.

“Certainly not by Jack Devlin.” Brandon poured Marvin a shot of the single malt Scotch and put it down in front of him.

“His face . . .” Marvin's voice trailed off. He shuddered at the memory.

Brandon indicated the glass in front of Marvin. “On the house.” When Marvin didn't pick up the glass, Brandon ordered, “Drink it.”

“No thanks,” Marvin said. “I don't do hard liquor.”

“Yes, you do. You drink vodka,” Bernie pointed out. “That's the same thing.”

“No. It's different,” Marvin said.

Brandon pushed the glass closer to Marvin. “Seriously, take it. You look like crap.”

Marvin raised an eyebrow. “And this is going to help?”

“Well, it's certainly not going to hurt,” Brandon retorted.

Marvin sat there for a moment deciding. “What the hell,” he finally said. “You're right. It can't hurt.” He took a sip and then he took another. “Not bad,” he allowed.

“Not bad?” Brandon squawked. “This stuff is top of the line.”

“How come you never give anything like that to me?” Bernie asked.

Brandon laughed. “Because I give you me instead.”

Bernie rolled her eyes. “Jeez. Talk about overwhelming ego.”

“Then how about because you don't like Scotch. How's that for a reason?”

“That would work,” Bernie acknowledged.

“Anyway, Marvin has had a tough afternoon. He deserves something good,” Brandon said as he watched Marvin drain the glass.

Marvin hiccupped twice.

“That stuff is meant to be sipped,” Brandon told him.

Marvin hiccupped again. “Sorry. Very rude of me. I promise I'll sip the next one.” He slapped the palm of his hand on the bar. “Give me another, my good man.”

Brandon shot Libby a questioning look.

“Only if I'm driving,” she told him.

“If you insist,” Marvin said, putting on a sorrowful face. “Drive if you want. I don't care.” He let out a theatrical sigh. “Never mind that this might be the last time I get to drive my car. I don't think you can drive if you're in jail.”

Bernie laughed. “Marvin the drama queen. Who would have thought?”

Marvin's mouth turned down. He crossed his arms over his chest. “I can't believe you're saying something like that at a time like this.”

“That's precisely my point,” Bernie told him.

Marvin shook his head. “Which is what?”

“That you're exaggerating.”

Marvin uncrossed his arms, turned, and faced her. “Me, exaggerate?”His voice rose a notch. “
Exaggerate?
Are you kidding me? They're going to arrest me. I've never even gotten a traffic ticket. Nothing my whole life and now
this
. I can't believe this is happening. It's like a nightmare. No. It
is
a nightmare.”

“Calm down,” Libby told him. “They're not going to arrest you.”

“They might. In fact, they probably will. My horoscope said this was going to be a bad day. I should never have gotten out of bed.”

“You read your horoscope?” Brandon asked incredulously.

Marvin gave him a defiant stare. “So what if I do?”

Bernie gave Brandon a dirty look.

His eyes widened. “Did I say something wrong?”

Bernie ignored him and turned back to Marvin. “Don't worry. We're not going to let anything happen to you,” she said in the best soothing voice she could manage.

Marvin looked anything but reassured.

“No. We're not,” Libby echoed. “You can count on that.”

Brandon leaned over and refilled Marvin's glass. He then pulled two Blue Moons, took two orange slices, put them on the glass rims, and handed the drinks to Bernie and Libby. “My treat. You look as if you can use these, too.”

“Well, I know I can,” Bernie said as she took a sip. She liked wheat beer, especially in the summer. It was light and cold and had a pleasant flavor. She liked the golden color and the small bubbles that worked their way up the glass, too. “It's been a bad day.”

“But not as bad as mine,” Marvin replied.

“True enough,” Bernie said. “You win the My Day Sucketh prize.”

Marvin took another sip of his Scotch. Libby put the plastic bowl of pretzels in front of him. He fished a couple out of the bowl. As he ate them, he realized that they were the first things he had eaten since breakfast.

“Did Clyde say anything to your dad about what the DA is thinking?” Marvin asked Libby.

“No,” she lied.

“You're a lousy liar,” Marvin said, looking at her face. She'd developed a tic under her left eye, a sure sign she wasn't telling the truth. “Tell me,” he insisted when she didn't answer. “I really want to know.”

“You don't,” Libby replied.

“I do,” Marvin said even though what she'd said was 100 percent correct.

Libby ate a pretzel and had another sip of beer before answering. She noted the pretzels were the saltless kind. Not a good choice in her opinion.

Marvin leaned forward. “Well?”

“Well, what?” Libby asked.

He took a deep breath and exhaled. “What did Clyde say?”

Libby sighed. She hated to be the bearer of bad news.

“Spit it out,” he ordered.

“Okay.” Libby looked him in the eye and told him. “Clyde said the DA was thinking of charging you. But that's different from saying he's
going
to charge you,” she added hastily, trying for upbeat and failing. “We have to remain positive here.”

Marvin snorted.

“Seriously,” Libby said.

“It's marginally different. A hair's breath different.” He shook his head. “God, I wish I'd told my dad no.”

B
ernie raised an eyebrow.

Libby leaned forward. “What do you mean?”

“I told you. Being in the reenactment was his idea. He wanted me to do it. Said it would be good for community relations. You know, giving back to the town and all the rest of that—” Marvin almost said
crap
, but stopped himself—“stuff” instead.

“Well, you can't say it didn't get you noticed,” Bernie said, trying to be funny and failing. “Your dad was right about that.”

Marvin glared at her.

Bernie backtracked. “But not in the way he had in mind, unfortunately.” She picked up her orange slice and ate it. “Sorry.” She put the rind down on her napkin. “That was out of line. I was just trying to lighten things up. Obviously, I didn't succeed.”

“Obviously,” Libby said.

Marvin gulped. Loudly. Bernie, Libby, and Brandon looked at him.

“I can't do jail time,” Marvin wailed as pictures of prison movies he'd seen in his youth flashed through his head. “I just
can't
. I wouldn't last a day in there! Not even an hour!”

“Can we go for five minutes?” Bernie asked.

Libby glared at Bernie and she shut up. Libby leaned over and patted Marvin's arm. “You're not going to. I repeat, don't worry. We're going to find out who did this and have them arrested.”

“Yeah,” Bernie added. “We've done it before and we can do it again.”

“And Dad will help,” Libby said. “So you've got all three of us in your corner.”

Brandon poured himself a ginger ale. He didn't drink on duty. “Make that four of us.” He took a sip of his soda. “Maybe Marvin's right. Maybe it was an accident.”

Libby turned to Bernie. “Back in the park you said that in the days of the Revolutionary and Civil War guns discharging accidentally were a common occurrence.”

“See.” Brandon gave Marvin an encouraging smile.

Bernie nodded. “True. Soldiers got scared in the heat of battle and loaded their guns a second, third, and even fourth time, at which point the barrels exploded.”

“Maybe that's what happened at the reenactment,” Brandon suggested as he began washing glasses.

“I don't think so, Brandon,” Bernie said.

“Why not?”

“Because, no matter how much powder you put in one of those muskets, it never would have shredded Jack Devlin's face like that. The musket was loaded with shot.”

Brandon put the glass down and looked up. “Shot?”

“That's what I just said,” Bernie replied.

“You can get that at any sporting goods store,” Brandon noted. “Hell, you can even make it yourself.”

“They did during the Revolutionary War.”

“Some guys do it now. You know, for kicks. Are you sure it's shot?”

Bernie nodded again. “I saw some scattered on the ground around Jack Devlin's body. The shot . . . shots?”

“Shot,” Brandon told her.

“Okay then. The shot looked black and they were about this big.” She made a small circle with her thumb and forefinger to show the size.

Brandon turned off the water. “There goes the musket as a prop theory. However, that still wouldn't be enough to make the musket explode the way they said it did on television.”

Jack Devlin's story had been featured on the six o'clock news, much to the dismay of Marvin and his dad.

“No, it wouldn't,” Bernie agreed. “Clyde said the muzzle was also stuffed with mud and sticks, which means that once Devlin pulled the trigger, the thingie—”

“The thingie?” Brandon said. “What's the thingie?”

“The thing that ignites everything.”

“You mean the percussion cap.”

Bernie waved her hand. “Whatever. The percussion cap then. It caught, the shot had nowhere to go, and blammo! Instant Jack Devlin hamburger.”

Marvin turned white. He'd already seen Jack Devlin's face. He didn't need reminding.

“That's disgusting,” Libby informed her sister.

“But true,” Bernie said.

Brandon cleared his throat. Everyone turned toward him. “That wouldn't necessarily have killed Devlin. It could have just maimed him pretty badly.”

“Maybe that was the intention,” Bernie noted after thinking for a moment about what Brandon had said. “Maybe someone wanted to take away Devlin's looks. He certainly would have needed extensive plastic surgery if he'd survived.”

“I could see this being a punishment,” Libby added.

“Like the guy who throws acid in a woman's face because she'd rejected him,” Brandon said.

“Exactly,” Libby said. “Or maybe in this case, a woman getting her own back.”

“Or a guy,” Bernie said.

“Then the motive would be different,” Brandon said. “I can't see a guy doing something like that. I can see him killing Devlin, but maiming him? Not so much.”

“We really don't know a lot, do we?” Libby observed.

Bernie ate a pretzel. “We do know a couple things. We know that screwing around was Devlin's favorite occupation and we also know that someone had to hand Devlin the musket. Those two facts we are sure of.”

“Are we?” Brandon asked.

“Yes, we are,” Bernie answered. “That is, if we're proceeding under the assumption that the purpose of this little exercise was to kill or maim Devlin.”

“And we know I didn't do it,” Marvin said. “We're sure of that. That's a third fact.”

“But we don't know who did,” Brandon stated.

“Correct. If we did, we wouldn't be having this conversation,” Bernie pointed out.

Everyone was quiet for a moment.

Bernie ate another pretzel. The crunch echoed through the room. “We have eight people, seven excluding Marvin, who were directly involved in the reenactment. That's another thing we're sure of.”

Everyone was quiet again. They could hear a freight train tooting its horn in the distance.

Brandon poured the last of the ginger ale from the bottle into his glass. “Let's go over this one last time.”

Marvin groaned. “I've already repeated this at least a hundred times.”

“Then one more time won't make any difference,” Brandon told him. “So who was responsible for the muskets?”

Marvin raised his hand. “I was.”

“How did you get them?”

“I picked them up at the costume place along with the rest of the garb.”

“Did they seem all right?” Brandon asked.

Marvin shrugged. “Sure. I guess.”

Brandon took a sip of his ginger ale and put the glass down. “What do you mean
I guess?
” he demanded. “Did you look at them? Inspect them, look in the barrels to see if they were clean?”

Marvin looked miserable. “No,” he whispered. “I didn't.”

“Why not?” Brandon asked.

“They weren't real. Even if they were, it wouldn't have made a difference. I don't know one end of a barrel from another. I've never shot a gun in my life. I've never been near them.”

“So it would seem,” Brandon said. “So what did you do with the muskets then?”

“I stored everything in the shed by the rose garden just like Rick Evans told me to. It was the easiest thing to do. I figured I'd give everyone their costumes before the reenactment and they could change in the Longely Historical Society bathrooms. Inez said it would be all right. That way no one would lose anything.” Marvin bit his bottom lip. “I thought I was being smart.”

“That's when I make my worst mistakes,” Libby volunteered, trying to make Marvin feel better. “Why is that, I wonder?”

“What kind of lock did you use on the shed door?” Bernie asked Marvin, declining to go through the door her sister had opened.

Marvin shook his head. “I didn't.”

Brandon frowned. “You didn't? Why not?”

Marvin slunk lower in his seat. “Because Rick told me the shed had a padlock. He even gave me the key for it. But when I got there the lock was already open. It was hanging on the hasp. After I was done putting things inside, I tried closing it, but I couldn't. The padlock was broken. I knew I should have gone to the hardware store and gotten a new one, but I was running late. I figured everything would be fine. As it turned out, I was wrong.”

Bernie almost said
I'll say,
but stifled the comment. Instead, she asked if anyone had seen Marvin storing the clothes and the props.

“Maybe.”

“Maybe?” Bernie repeated. “What do you mean
maybe?
”

“Well, there were people around. I mean, there are always people around so I'm sure someone saw me.”

“Like who?” Bernie asked.

“I don't know,” Marvin said angrily. He was suddenly tired of defending himself. “I wasn't paying attention, okay? I was thinking about other stuff.”

Libby lifted her hands then brought them down in a calming gesture. “Maybe we should try another tack.”

Marvin gulped down the last of his Scotch. “I'm listening.”

“Let's start off with who besides Rick Evans knew that the reenactment stuff was in the shed,” Libby said.

“That is
the
question, isn't it?” Bernie said.

“One of them,” Brandon said. “I can think of several others.”

Bernie shot him a look and he shut up.

“Everyone knew,” Marvin said, answering Libby's question. “I sent out an e-mail to everyone who was involved in the production.”

“Then the second part of the question is, who knew that the shed's lock was broken?” Brandon asked.

Marvin shook his head again. “You got me, but I can't believe it was a secret.”

“What else is the shed used for?” Libby asked.

“Nothing,” Marvin replied. “It's empty. The Longely Rose Society used to store their gardening tools in there, but they moved them to the outbuilding on the other side of the garden.”

“How long has the shed been empty?” asked Brandon.

Marvin shrugged. “I'm not sure. Maybe a year. Maybe six months.”

Everyone was silent for another minute as the weather announcer forecast the weather for the rest of the week. It was going to be in the nineties for the next three days.

“I never thought I'd say this,” Brandon said, “but I'm actually looking forward to winter.”

“Well, I for one, refuse to complain about the heat,” Bernie said.

“Ha!” said Brandon

Bernie lifted an eyebrow. “Ha?”

“Yes, ha. You've been complaining about the heat nonstop.”

“Have not,” Bernie protested.

“Have so.” Brandon turned to Libby. “Isn't that right?”

She threw her hands up in the air. “I'm staying out of this.”

“You know your sister does.” He shook a finger at Bernie. “You complain about the winter, you complain about the summer. What does that leave you?”

“Spring and fall, of course,” Bernie replied.

Marvin waved a pretzel in the air. “Could you two stop bickering and get back to me?”

“I suppose that's only fair,” Brandon said.

“I think so,” Marvin replied. “Especially since I'm the one who's going to be indicted for murder.”

“Manslaughter,” Libby corrected.

“I'm still going to jail,” Marvin said.

Libby reached over and patted him on the back again. “You won't. Okay. So let's go over this one last time.”

Marvin groaned. “You're worse than the police.”

“Please,” Libby said. “We're just trying to help.”

Marvin hung his head. “I know,” he said in a contrite voice.

“Okay.” Brandon took a sip of his drink. “One more time. Did anyone hand Jack Devlin his musket?”

“How many times do I have to tell you I don't remember?” Marvin demanded.

“You're sure?” Brandon asked.

“Of course I'm sure,” Marvin cried. He took a pretzel out of the bowl and crumbled it into little bits. “If I knew, don't you think I'd tell you. I've tried remembering, but I can't. Things were so hectic and I was so hot. All I was thinking of was how long it would take before it was over.” Marvin shook his head. “I've tried picturing what happened, but I can't. My mind is a blank.”

“Someone had to have handed the damn thing to him,” Brandon observed.

“Why?” Bernie said. “Devlin could have picked it up by himself.”

“But then how could whoever wanted him dead make sure that the musket reached its intended target?” Brandon asked her.

“I don't know,” Bernie told him.

“How about Rick Evans?” Libby asked Marvin. “What about him?”

Marvin pounded the bar. “How many times do I have to tell everyone I didn't see anything?”

Brandon leaned forward. “So tell me what you did see.”

Marvin frowned. “I put the guns in a pile on the bench and everyone took one.”

“Where were you when this happened?”

“I already told you, Brandon. I was there, but I wasn't watching.”

“What were you watching?”

“I was watching Libby walking toward the gazebo. I was thinking how nice she looked.”

“That's so sweet, Marvin,” Libby said.

Marvin blushed.

“And then?” Brandon prompted.

“And then I turned back and all the muskets except the one I was going to use were gone.”

“And none of them looked any different from any of the others?” Brandon asked.

Marvin shook his head. “Not that I noticed.” He buried his hands in his face again. “I am so screwed. So, so screwed.”

“Don't say that,” Bernie told him.

“But we're not getting anywhere,” Marvin told her. “We're just going around in circles.”

Bernie drummed her fingernails on the bar. “You're right. This tack is getting us nowhere. We might be better off figuring out who among the people at the reenactment had a motive to kill Devlin.”