Death Pays a Visit (A Myrtle Clover Mystery Book 7) (11 page)

They turned to look at Ruby. Unfortunately, they’d picked a time when Ruby was displaying no signs of devastation at all. She was beaming at the Greener Pastures staff member as they loaded up her ice cream with whipped cream.

Inez said dryly, “I can see that she desperately needed cheering up. Look, it doesn’t matter to me. You’re here for a reason of some kind and I guess that’s good enough for me. It’s just the journalist in me who is always looking for story. You understand.”

“Then you must be intrigued by poor Mickey’s death,” inserted Myrtle smoothly. “Purely from a professional standpoint of course.”

Inez gave her a considering look. “Greener Pastures is convinced that I heard nothing. To them, any headlines about Mickey’s death should read ‘Old Woman Dies in Her Sleep.’ Which isn’t much of a headline.”

“Except that she
didn’t
die in her sleep. And Miles and I are privy to some more information—the police will be investigating her death as suspicious,” said Myrtle triumphantly.

“Well, that’s positively amazing, considering the dubious response that Greener Pastures gave my report,” said Inez briskly. “I live right on Mickey’s hall and I can tell you now that I heard bumping around that night. It was not a peaceful passage into the next life.”

“And yet you didn’t get up to investigate? To check on Mickey? You were planning on having breakfast with her, weren’t you? But you couldn’t spare some time to make sure she was all right?” Myrtle tilted her head to one side and used her most piercing gaze on Inez.

“I figured she knocked down some stuff off her bedside table on the way to the bathroom, that’s all. And no—I certainly wouldn’t call Mickey a friend. But she
was
an early bird. I dislike eating alone and it’s easy to join up with Mickey in the mornings to go to the dining room.” Inez shrugged.

Miles, who’d been displaying an astounding lack of attention to Myrtle’s interviewing of Inez, said, “Excuse me,” and hurried over to a table where Fred appeared to be searching the room for a checkers partner.

Myrtle sighed. It wasn’t helpful when one’s sidekick was so easily distracted. She turned back to Inez. “Still, it could make for an interesting story for your paper, if Greener Pastures allows it with the police attention and all.”

“I tell you what’s good for my paper. What’s good for my paper is not having Mickey’s silly rag around anymore. It was a distraction at best and a nuisance at worst. What people
really
want isn’t scandalmongering. They want upbeat content,” said Inez, a confident shine in her eyes.

“Upbeat content?” asked Myrtle although she had a sneaking suspicion that she knew the kind of content that Inez was talking about. The
Bradley Bugle
was rife with it. Even the horoscopes were happy and positive for every sign. There were cooking columns, the Good Neighbors column. Even Myrtle’s own helpful hints column. The only real news the
Bugle
put out was provided by Myrtle whenever a major crime happened.

“You know what I mean,” said Inez in a bored voice. “People love seeing their name in print. They
love
it. So I mention as many people by name as possible. Then I say nice things about their perky red cardigan or their jewelry, or the twinkle in their eyes, or whatever. That’s what people want and it’s what I deliver.”

“So you don’t report any hard news?” asked Myrtle.

“What kind of hard news are you talking about? The hamburgers being a bit undercooked? The fact that Greener Pastures wastes money on landscaping by not following up with watering the flowers? What?” asked Inez impatiently. She scraped her ice cream bowl to get the very last bit.

“Well—murder, obviously. And theft,” said Myrtle, staring carefully at Inez for a reaction.

The reaction was more like boredom. “Theft? Why? Did you have your pocket picked? Look at it as a sign that you’re one of the in-crowd. I didn’t think visitors usually had things lifted from their pocketbooks.”

“So there
is
theft!” said Myrtle triumphantly.

“If you want to call it that. It’s pretty small-scale stuff. And whoever is doing it is very good at it,” said Inez with a shrug. “Although I don’t
approve
. It’s wicked to steal.”

“But people still leave the doors to their rooms unlocked?” Myrtle frowned. “It seems like an open invitation to trouble.”

“It’s never
that
much that’s stolen. And it’s never the same people all the time. It’s more on a rotation. Half the time the victims probably never even notice their change is missing,” said Inez with a shrug.

“Well,
I
do. I count my pennies. I pick up dropped change in parking lots. And I shop sales,” said Myrtle. She stopped, realizing that she appeared to be going off on a tangent. Myrtle tried to regroup. “If someone
did
want to get rid of Mickey Pelias, who do you think would be the most likely candidate?”

Inez gave her a surprised look. “Her daughter, of course. She had Natalie on a leash for at least the last five years, if not her entire life. If
she
didn’t want to get rid of Mickey, I can’t imagine who would.”

Miles would have given Myrtle a meaningful look—if he hadn’t been enjoying playing checkers so much.

Inez was looking across at the ice cream stand again and Myrtle was afraid she was about to lose her attention. She asked quickly, “Tell me one thing real quick. The man over there—the one who’s playing checkers with Miles—why was he so angry with Mickey?”

Inez raised her eyebrows. “Fred Lee? Who knows? Fred is the kind of person who gets mad all the time—usually over petty things. And you have to remember that Mickey wrote really cruel things in her newsletter. Maybe she said something about Fred.”

“Do you remember if she did? Fairly recently?” asked Myrtle.

Inez gave her a cold look. “I wouldn’t read a rag like that,” she said with a sniff. And she was off for ice cream seconds.

Chapter Nine

Miles, Myrtle reflected, seemed entirely too much at home. He was laughing with Fred Lee as his checker piece got crowned.

Myrtle cleared her throat and looked hard at Miles. He flushed and put his piece down on the board.

Fred Lee, who had looked more relaxed than Myrtle had seen him, now appeared cantankerous again. “Wait your turn if you want to play a game,” he said imperiously. “We’re busy.”

“Actually, Mr. Lee, I had a question for you,” said Myrtle smoothly. “I couldn’t help but notice when Miles and I were visiting the other day that you seemed upset with Mickey Pelias.”

The old man jutted his chin out. His gaze was combative. “What of it?”

“What of it is that she’s dead now,” said Myrtle.

“Lots of people are dead. It’s got nothing to do with me,” said Fred, eyes narrowed.

“Well, lots of people aren’t dead by misadventure,” snapped Myrtle. “The police are now treating Mickey’s death as suspicious. So I thought I’d ask you why you were upset with her.”

Fred shifted in his seat and looked cagey. “There’s no law against being upset with a person. Mickey was the kind of person that got people upset with her, that’s all. Nothing against Mickey.”

Myrtle noticed that every time he said Mickey’s name, his mouth pursed as if he tasted something sour. “Not only that, but it’s clear you didn’t like her much.”

He frowned at Myrtle and his eyes were wary. “No law against that, either.”

“I seem to be running into a
lot
of people who didn’t like Mickey much,” said Myrtle.

Fred asked quickly, “Like who?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Her daughter? You? And Inez didn’t seem especially fond of her when I was talking to her,” said Myrtle.

Fred gave a dismissive wave of his hand as if he couldn’t be bothered with such stuff. “Old news. Mickey’s daughter was probably irritated with her mother her entire life. Inez is too protective of her precious newspaper. As for me—as I said, there’s no law against disliking someone.”

“Do you have anyone else you want to add to the list?” asked Myrtle. “I’m interested in getting as many potential names on it as possible.”

“All I know is that Mickey made a point of knowing everyone’s secrets. She probably found out some poor ninny’s big secret and threatened to publish it in that scurrilous newspaper of hers. The ninny grew a backbone and got rid of Mickey. Case closed.”

“Could you tell me where you were on the night Mickey was murdered?” asked Myrtle in her most official-sounding voice.

“Are you kidding me, lady? It was the middle of the night, wasn’t it? I was either asleep or else I was in the restroom.” Fred was starting to sound exasperated.

“And you didn’t hear any noises?” asked Myrtle.

“What, like gunfire or something?” Fred’s heavy eyebrows drew together.

“No, I mean like sounds of a struggle. Someone calling for help. That kind of thing,” said Myrtle.

“No. I didn’t hear a thing.” He turned away from Myrtle. “Now, if you’ll leave me alone, I’ve got a checkers game to win.”

Miles grinned at Fred. “Oh, feeling confident, are you? We’ll see how that goes.”

Myrtle sighed. Maybe she did need that ice cream. These suspects were not doing a good job at giving her information. What’s more, Miles was entirely too cozy with Greener Pastures. The last thing on earth she’d expected was that her sidekick would want to check himself into a retirement home.

She was just heading toward the ice cream stand and fumbling in her pocketbook for money (she assumed they would know that she wasn’t a resident) when she felt an arm go around her back and she jumped. Myrtle turned to glare at the grinning visage of Winston Rouse—entirely too close to her. “Excuse me?” she asked coldly.

But Winston didn’t appear to be able to take a hint. In fact, he seemed positively delighted to see her. “Myrtle! Did you come back to visit me?”

“Certainly not,” she said briskly. “I’m here to investigate a murder. For the
Bradley Bugle
. I’m a correspondent.” She nearly bit her tongue as a Greener Pastures staff person passed by and turned sharply, staring at her with narrowed eyes before continuing on to speak to the staffers at the ice cream stand.

Winston appeared not to be listening very hard. He looked deep into Myrtle’s suspicious eyes. “I’m so glad you’re here. You’ll share a bowl of ice cream with me?”

Myrtle recoiled. Surely, he wasn’t suggesting that they share a
single bowl
of ice cream? She was certain that Greener Pastures was likely a hotbed of germs with all these people living in close quarters with each other. She said in a cold voice, “Well,
I’m
going to have a bowl of ice cream. And apparently,
you’re
going to have a bowl of ice cream, too. So, in that sense, I suppose we’ll both be having a bowl at the same time.”

Winston howled with laughter. “Myrtle, you were always so clever. So darned clever. Much more than I was, that’s for sure. Yes, let’s have some ice cream and then we’ll talk.”

“About the murder?” asked Myrtle, wanting to be very sure that something would come out of their encounter besides an abhorrent amount of flirting from Winston and her determined attempts to squash it.

“Yes! About the murder. Whatever that is. Was someone murdered? Never mind, we’ll talk about it in a minute,” said Winston in a booming voice that made several women in the room turn around to stare at them. Myrtle flushed. She followed as Winston strode over to the ice cream stand. She saw Inez flash a look of pure venom at her. Did it have something to do with the attention Winston was giving her? Even though the attention was purely unwanted?

Myrtle was in a severe mood and decided on a severe ice cream, asking for a plain-Jane vanilla. Winston looked at the bowl with big eyes. He scoffed, “You’ve got to be kidding me.” To her enormous irritation, he took the bottle of chocolate syrup she was holding and squirted it on Myrtle’s vanilla ice cream.

Myrtle was about to give him a piece of her mind when she stopped, biting her lip. He
was
going to talk to her about the murder, or at the very least entertain the topic. She gave him a tight smile instead.

To her discomfit, Winston led them over to a cozy loveseat in the corner of the common area. “So we can converse in privacy,” he said, giving her a broad wink. Miles gave her a mirthful look from the checkers table, where he was apparently still winning.

“Now, then,” said Winston. He gave her what seemed to be a very practiced carefree grin and Myrtle took the opportunity to study him dispassionately. He certainly seemed well groomed and had become quite the dapper dresser with a jaunty red bow tie, sports jacket, and light blue button-down shirt. Wasn’t he overdressed for an ice cream social at a retirement home? His beard was neatly trimmed and his eyes twinkled merrily at her. How could she have responded to his flirtatious nature so many years ago? Now it was only rather alarming.

“So,” she said, straightening up and giving him her best schoolteacher repressive stare, “what I want to talk about is Mickey Pelias.”

“Okay,” he said. “Although I’m not sure why. She’s annoying as the blazes. Oh, we had a short fling, I’m not going to say we didn’t. But it ended pretty quickly. Did she do something to you, maybe?”

Could he possibly not have heard the news of her demise? Myrtle said, “No. Because she’s dead. And she’s not only dead, she was murdered.”

Winston’s eyebrows rose in astonishment. “Is that so? Mickey? Dead? Why, I just saw her.”

“When?” asked Myrtle impatiently. “It couldn’t have been that recent.”

“Well, I guess it was that day when you and I were having lunch,” said Winston. He seemed distracted by his ice cream, which was rapidly disappearing.

Myrtle was busily working on scraping off the chocolate syrup. “That wasn’t recent. Recent is yesterday or this morning or something. At any rate, that day that I came here for lunch was the day Mickey died.”

“And you’re saying it was murder,” said Winston.

“Ruby Sims is saying it was murder,” said Myrtle. She waited for the usual disclaimer about Ruby’s mental condition, but Winston only looked thoughtful.

“Is that right?” he mused. “Ruby said so?”