Death at a Drop-In (15 page)

“Were you able to get back on the more cheerful subject of murder?”

“Sort of.  He denies all.  He acted as if he weren’t even at Cosette’s party—until I told him I’d seen him there.  Then he immediately started minimizing his brief appearance at the drop-in,” said Myrtle.

“How could he minimize an argument that we witnessed?” asked Miles, tilting his head to one side.  “We could tell Felix was angry, even if we didn’t understand what he was so upset over.  Sybil was clearly the most upset, but Felix was smoldering.  And Cosette looked as if she were part of the argument, too.”

“Oh, it
wasn’t
an argument, you see, Miles.  It was a political discussion. About Congress.”  Myrtle rolled her eyes.  “I do hate it when people treat the elderly as if they’re children.  Felix was completely underestimating me.”

“Which probably moves him to the top of the suspect list,” said Miles with a grin.

“Probably.”

There was a knock at the front door and Miles and Myrtle stared at each other in surprise.  “Am I having a party?” asked Myrtle.  “What a pity we ate all the food.”

She ambled to the front door, clutching her cane.  Myrtle was assuming that she was going to see Red’s face when she looked through the front window, and she did.  He had his police uniform on.

“Is it Red?” asked Miles.  “I don’t think we’re being noisy enough for Erma to come over and tell us to hold it down.”

“Heaven forbid,” said Myrtle.  “Yes, it’s Red.”  She turned and grinned at Miles.  “Should I let him in?”

Red knocked a bit more impatiently at the door and Myrtle sighed and unlocked it.

“Mama, for a minute I thought you weren’t going to let me in,” he said.  He glanced over at Miles, sitting there in his plaid pajamas and bathrobe without any sign of surprise.  “Hi there, Miles. Y’all having an Insomniacs Anonymous meeting again?”

“Apparently, you need to join the group,” said Myrtle sourly.  “What are you doing in your uniform?”

“Well Mama, I’m headed off to work.  It’s almost five o’clock now. Some folks are getting up and starting their day.”

“You’re not usually up this early to go to the police station, are you?”  Myrtle lifted her eyebrows with surprise.

“I am when there are a couple of unsolved murders on my watch, that’s for sure.  The SBI expects it.” 

Myrtle knew the SBI was the North Carolina state police.  “Is that nice Detective Lieutenant Perkins helping you out again?”

“He is.  Although he’s probably wondering what’s wrong with our tiny town to make it have such a high murder rate,” said Red, plopping down in one of Myrtle’s armchairs.

“Small towns brew up strong feelings,” said Myrtle.  “You know that.”  She sat back down in her chair.  “So what brings you by?  Did you want a snack before you go to the station?”

“I remembered I never did get a statement from you at the funeral, although I was with you part of the time in question,” said Red.  He sighed.  “It would be nice if you stopped discovering bodies.  It looks suspicious.”  He took a small notebook and pencil out of the front pocket of his uniform and waited expectantly.

“Well, there’s not a whole lot to say,” said Myrtle.  “Miles and I arrived late to the funeral, as you know.”

“Flat tire,” interjected Miles, for the record.

 “Yes.  Anyway, I saw what appeared to be a body some yards away in the woods.  I mentioned that fact to you,” she said, arching her eyebrows at her son.  “You ignored me.  I investigated further.  It was Tobin.  He was dead.”  She shrugged.  “End of story.”

He sighed.  “Mama, the reason I ignored you is because it was highly unlikely that there was going to be another body.  Especially in the cemetery.”

“I’d think the cemetery was the perfect place for bodies,” said Myrtle.

“Non-buried bodies.  You know what I mean,” said Red, rolling his eyes.

“Considering the number of bodies racking up in Bradley, I’d say there was a fairly high likelihood that I was correct.”

Red pressed his lips together, and then asked, “Did you see Tobin earlier that day?”

“No.”

Miles glanced at Myrtle to see if she was going to elaborate on that, but she didn’t.  Miles cleared his throat.  “Red, are y’all thinking that Tobin died first thing in the morning or shortly before the funeral?”

Red gave him a regretful look.  “I’d like to be able to answer that, Miles, but we’re trying to keep the details of the case under wraps.”

“Surely you can at least confirm that Tobin was murdered with a shovel,” said Myrtle.  “Considering that the shovel was right there next to him and I didn’t notice that Tobin’s body was riddled with bullets or anything.”

Red hesitated.  “Yes, I guess that’s okay.  I can confirm that it was blunt force trauma resulting from a blow from the nearby shovel.  And you know that information doesn’t need to go right into the
Bradley Bugle
.”  He frowned.  “Oh, never mind, I just remembered that the new reporter is covering this story.  At least, that’s what Sloan was saying.”

“Sloan has absolutely no clue,” said Myrtle with a sniff.  “I’ll have a lot more juicy tidbits than that Tina will.”

“Kim,” said Miles.

“Whatever.”

“By the way, I thought that Friday the Thirteenth tip column you did was fantastic,” said Red, a gleam of genuine admiration in his eyes.  “You’ve still ‘got it’, Mama.  People have been telling me how much they enjoyed that article.”

Myrtle glared down at her empty plate.  Great.  A moment of genius that happened completely by accident.

As soon as Red and Miles left, Myrtle sat down at her computer and feverishly started writing a news story.

Chapter Thirteen

Myrtle slept in later than she’d planned that morning.  Considering that she didn’t turn in until six a.m., she didn’t feel too scandalized that she’d awakened at ten-thirty in the morning. What
did
scandalize her was the fact that her doorbell was ringing.

She muttered a couple of choice words for the doorbell, pulled on a bathrobe (inside-out, as she unhappily discovered later), and patted at her white hair, which was standing up like Einstein’s again.  Myrtle staggered to the front door since she couldn’t figure out in her sleepy stupor where her cane was.

She peered apprehensively through the front window, saw Wanda, the psychic, and instantly relaxed.  Wanda, or
Wander
, as her brother called her, lived off the old highway in a shack covered with hubcaps.  The rotting sign on the highway advertised Wanda’s services as:
Madam Zora, sykick
. No dressing up was needed.  But Myrtle did feel a slight frisson of unease. Wanda, as much as Myrtle might pooh-pooh it, did seem to have some sort of gift, although she was rather too fond of giving Myrtle dire prophesies.

Wanda looked steadily at her as she opened the door.  “Rough night?” she grated in her cigarette-ruined voice.

“I guess you could say that.  A sleepless one, anyway.  Come on in,” said Myrtle, opening her door wide.

Wanda was stick-thin with nicotine-stained hands.  She was missing quite a few teeth, and wore nondescript clothing that hung on her bony frame.

“Breakfast?” asked Myrtle, thinking that Wanda looked like she could use a good few meals.  “Let’s see.  I have lots of cereal.  Unless you want eggs, bacon, and toast?”

There apparently was no question which Wanda would want.  Myrtle quickly found herself breaking open some eggs and sticking slices of toast in the toaster.

“How did you get here, anyway?” asked Myrtle.  “I didn’t notice a car out front.”

“The cars is broke,” said Wanda with a shrug of a skeletal shoulder.

“All of them?  The cars in your yard aren’t working?”  Myrtle turned away from the stove to look at Wanda in surprise.  “Why, your yard is filled to bursting with cars.”

“Them?  They’s up on cement blocks.  Broke.”

“Oh.”  Myrtle did recall that there seemed to be a lot of cement blocks in the yard.  She pushed the eggs around in the skillet. “So how
did
you get here?”

“Walked,” said Wanda calmly.

Myrtle stared at her.  “Walked?  From the old highway?  That must have taken you hours!  Can’t you pick up the phone to call?”

“Phone is broke,” said Wanda with another shrug.  She raised a painted-on eyebrow.  “Eggs need movin’.”

Myrtle jumped and quickly started scrambling the eggs again. Then, deciding they were done, she scooped them off onto plates, added a couple of pieces of microwaved bacon, and quickly buttered up some toast.  She poured them both some milk, then sat down with Wanda at her kitchen table.

Wanda made short work of the breakfast and Myrtle watched it quickly disappear, deciding not to question why she was here until Wanda had finished eating.  In fact, Wanda finished so quickly that she never even got a chance to ask her a thing—Myrtle was still working on a slice of bacon.

“Guess you was wantin’ to know why I’m here,” said Wanda, shifting in her seat.  Myrtle guessed that she wanted to have a cigarette and was relieved that she didn’t seem to have any with her.

Myrtle nodded.  “Although I believe I know why.”  She steeled herself.  Wanda always provided her with dire predictions.

“You’re in danger,” said Wanda, looking at Myrtle steadily. 

Myrtle jumped a bit as Pasha leapt through her cracked kitchen window and bolted over to Wanda.  The cat launched itself into Wanda’s lap.  Myrtle opened her mouth to apologize, and then shut it again, noticing that Wanda was languidly stroking the feral cat, cool as a cucumber.

“How did I know you were going to say that I’m in danger?” asked Myrtle, after taking a sip of her milk.  “You never give me any happy predictions, Wanda. It’s never ‘you’ll go on a trip to foreign lands’ or ‘a mysterious man will come into your life and make you happy.’ No, it’s always ‘your life is in danger.’  You’re like a broken record.”

Wanda shrugged.  “And
you
are always in danger.”  She petted Pasha, who was purring loudly.

“We’re a pair then,” said Myrtle.  She waited for more information from Wanda, but the woman was already gently setting Pasha on the floor, standing up, and heading for the door.  “Hold on a minute.  Don’t you have more information than that?  Did your crystal ball suddenly fog up?”

Wanda gave her a disdainful look.  “Wasn’t the ball.  Was the cards.”

“The tarot cards?  Didn’t they at least indicate where this danger was coming from?  Am I going to be stricken with the flu?  Will I unknowingly tread into an open manhole while strolling to the store?  Is a desperate killer going to cut my life short?”  Myrtle threw up her hands in frustration.  “That message is absolutely no good to me.  I need more information.”

Wanda stared at her coolly.  “The cards said you…should take up knitting.”

Myrtle gaped at her, then glanced around her room for signs of knitting paraphernalia—there were none.  “I don’t suppose Red or Elaine paid you to say that, did they?”

Wanda gave her a puzzled look.

“Great,” said Myrtle under her breath.  “Here, wait. Where are you going?”

“Time to go home,” said Wanda.  She walked out the door.

“I can’t let you walk an hour home,” said Myrtle.  “I’ll drive you back.”

The psychic raised an eyebrow and glanced at Myrtle’s carless driveway.

“I don’t drive anymore,” said Myrtle with a sigh.  “That is, I
do
drive and I actually have a license that doesn’t have to be renewed for the next fifteen years.”  She glanced over to see if the psychic was impressed by that, but she didn’t seem to be.  Myrtle continued, “I don’t have a car anymore.  Red convinced me that it’s better for me to get exercise and that I was never really going very far anyway and could use the money from the sale of the car.  But I’m sure it was to discourage me from driving.”

“Does it?” asked Wanda.

“Sometimes it does discourage me.  Sometimes, I’ll borrow someone else’s car if I feel like going for a drive.  Like your cousin Miles’s.”  Myrtle successfully squashed the chuckle that threatened to spill out.  The thought of the oh-so-correct Miles and Wanda being related always amused Myrtle.  They had recently, to Miles’s utter dismay, discovered the familial connection.

Miles wasn’t excited to see either Myrtle or Wanda at his front door.  He was dressed, but appeared very sleepy.  “You want to borrow my car?” He squinted doubtfully at Myrtle.  “I don’t know.  It never seems to work out very well when you borrow it.  I’ll drive you.”  He turned around to head back inside.  “Let me get my keys.”

“In your pocket,” said Wanda, sounding bored.  It must get tiring to always know everything, thought Myrtle.

“Right.”  Miles gave Wanda a sharp look.  “All right then. Let’s head on out.”

Miles was apparently in somewhat of a hurry.  Myrtle clutched the car door as they flew down the road to Wanda’s house.  She’d nodded her thanks, given Myrtle a stern look as if reminding her that she needed to watch her step, and disappeared into the hubcap-covered shack.

Miles gave a relieved sigh. “Well, that’s done.  What was she doing hanging out at your house, anyway?”

“Oh, you know.  She had to issue me a harrowing prophecy,” said Myrtle with a shrug.  “I’m in danger, yada-yada-yada.  And I think that Red and Elaine must have paid her to tell me to take up knitting.  It was most bizarre how she brought that up.”

Miles still had a distasteful expression on his face, just thinking about Wanda.

“I can’t think why you have such an objection to poor Wanda.  Especially since she’s family,” added Myrtle a bit slyly.

Miles shifted uncomfortably.  “I suppose because of that family connection. And maybe because I think I should be doing more for her.”

“Don’t forget her brother,” said Myrtle in an innocent voice.  “There’s Crazy Dan, too.”

Miles appeared to be suffering some indigestion, according to his coloring.  “Yes.  I’m sort of horrified by them, but feel somewhat guilty also.”

“They don’t seem to want anything from you or anyone else, Miles.  They read a few fortunes and sell a couple of hubcaps or maybe some peanuts or live bait, and they make a living.  Not what you and I would call a
good
living, but a living all the same.”