Divas Do Tell (18 page)

Sandra nodded. “I hope so. Oh my. I’m just worn out. I think I cried half the night after I heard. It was so awful. And those terrible reporters—the tabloids are the absolute worst. They’ve been hounding all of us. Security keeps them off the set as much as possible, but getting to and from locations can be a nightmare. Simon had to temporarily halt production.”

“How long will the movie be interrupted?” asked Rayna.

Sandra’s face was drawn. “First call is five in the morning. Shooting was suspended so the police could do their inspecting of the scene, but they’ll have it cleared by then. The production has to go on. Every day without work costs a hundred thousand dollars.”

Bitty’s jaw sagged. I felt lightheaded. “That much?” I squeaked.

“Close to it. Production costs on location are steep. There’s rent on the locations, salaries, food costs, equipment . . . it all adds up quickly. So we’ll begin shooting again in the morning.” She put a hand to her cheek. “I feel so flushed. I haven’t slept, so I’m going back to my place to see if I can nap. I have to be up early to go over my lines.”

Sandra had chosen to rent the entire upstairs of Court Square Inn, a small bed and breakfast on the square. It wasn’t a big house like Mira Waller had rented—demanding that the owners completely vacate with all their things while she stayed there—but it had luxury suites. Buck Prentiss had rented a smaller home behind the square, and there were rumors he had a party almost every night. The neighbors were ready to have him evicted, movie star or not.

Kathy Adams, who played Desirée alias Dixie Lee, had rented a nice little bungalow not too far from Bitty’s house. Since most of the locations were within two square miles, there shouldn’t have been high transportation costs. That was the good thing about shooting movies in Holly Springs. So many great locations are in a small area. Most of the crew had motel rooms near 78 Highway where all the fast food restaurants and liquor stores are clustered.

Simon Donato had rented Montrose. It was the crown jewel of Holly Springs’ antebellum homes and owned by the garden club, so shooting the movie there and living there seemed to go hand in hand. He had been put out of his living quarters by Abby’s death, and I couldn’t be the only one who wondered if he had anything to do with killing her. Maybe she’d wanted more from their relationship, and he hadn’t wanted to leave his wife. Maybe she had broken it off with him, and he killed her. These were questions I was sure the police would ask, too.

We walked outside with Sandra. Cold and rain of the day before had turned into a bright, cool day. Sunlight glinted off the court house clock tower across the street. Reporters waited on the sidewalk, cameras clicking as we came out. Four huge security guards, each one the size of Mama’s refrigerator, surrounded Sandra, rudely shoving aside the photographers and reporters as they escorted her to a waiting car. She got in, waggled her fingers at us just before the door closed, and the security guards got inside. The car drove around the corner and stopped just beyond the court house lawn at the bed and breakfast on College Street. The rest of us looked at each other. Gaynelle said she had to go to the grocery store. Rayna said Rob needed her back at the office since his insurance investigation and bail bonds business kept him busy, and he was going a little nuts trying to make sure everything stayed on track.

“Are you working today?” Bitty asked me, and I shook my head.

“With all the movie people in town, people are hanging around watching them instead of buying silk lingerie. I did learn that Rose’s side has done a brisk business since production started, though.”

“That figures. Hollywood people can be so twisted. Your parents will be back in a few days, so what are you going to do with the rest of your free time?”

I looked at her. “Free time? I’ll have more free time when they’re back to put pet food in one end and clean up after it at the other end. I didn’t realize how exhausting that is. I don’t know how they do it. I’m pooped.”

“An appropriate sentiment. Come on, then. I have an idea.”

I hesitated. “What kind of idea?”

Bitty turned to look at me. Her stilettos sparkled in the sunlight. I think they had sequins all over them, and I put up a hand to ward off the blinding reflection. “I don’t think Billy Joe was murdered by his wife or someone who knew him well,” she said. “Something about the way it’s supposed to have happened just doesn’t sound right.”

“The paper said the pistol was left beside him, so that’s why it was first assumed he’d shot himself. Only the coroner’s more thorough investigation showed the angle was all wrong for him to have done it himself. The police are looking at Allison.”

“I know. I don’t think she did it.”

I gaped at her. “Why not? Don’t you remember her coming after you with a baseball bat? She’s certainly capable of violence.”

“Dixie Lee did it.”

“What? What are you saying?”

Bitty looked obdurate as a mule. If she’d had on a straw hat I’d have put a feed bag over her head.

“I’m saying, Trinket, that I think Dixie Lee did it. She had motive and opportunity.”

“How do you figure that?”

“Billy Joe threatened her. That’s motive. He knew her and would have let her in the house, so that’s opportunity. I think she’s the killer.”

“I think your shoes are too tight. They’ve cut off the oxygen to your brain.”

“Trinket, I’m serious.”

“What makes you think I’m not?”

Bitty gave me an exasperated look, then grabbed my arm and dragged me toward her car. “Come on, and I’ll tell you what we’re going to do once we’re in the car.”

For a small person on stilts she can walk very fast. I found myself at her car before I could come up with a good enough excuse to walk the three and a half miles home. So I went with the truth.

“Take me to my car, Bitty. I don’t want to get involved in any of your insane vendettas.”

Bitty had unlocked the door and slid behind the wheel. She motioned for me to get inside, and I did, although warily. Sometimes she does inexplicable things.

“This isn’t a vendetta, Trinket,” she said calmly. “I’ve thought this over pretty carefully.”

I shut my door and reached for the seatbelt. “No. Whatever it is you want to do, no. I don’t want to be a part of it. I like not being chased by people with sharp implements or firearms. I like not being hit in the head. I like not being terrorized. So no. I don’t want to do it.”

“Honestly, sometimes you’re so skittish. I have no intention of being chased, stabbed, shot at, or hit in the head. We’re just going on a reconnaissance mission.”

“Oh lord. Have you been watching the Military Channel again?”

“Not last night. Listen. First we’re going over to Billy Joe’s house and talk to the neighbors.”

“And run into Allison Cramer? I think not. Unlock the doors. I’ll get out here.”

“I happen to know Allison is at the police station. And even if she isn’t, she can’t say anything about us talking to neighbors, can she? We’ll pretend we’re asking about the dogs.”

“Are you insane? Never mind. I know the answer to that. Most of their neighbors know you, Bitty. You only live two streets over. Even if you lived in another county they’d know you. You’re one of those memorable people.”

“Thank you, Trinket.”

I smiled encouragingly at her. “Now just let me out at your house, and I’ll get my car and go home to take care of my parents’ animals.”

“Not a chance. The way I think it happened is that Dixie Lee rang the doorbell and when Billy Joe came to the door,
bam!
She shot him and dropped the gun next to him.”

“At the door. Where anyone could see her shoot him. How did she think she’d get away with it? Most suicides don’t do that right at the front door. Most
homicides
don’t do that right at the front door.”

Sounding a bit testy she said, “Okay, Miss Marple, how do you think she did it?”

“If I thought she did it—which I don’t—I’d say she talked him into letting her into the house, then lulled him into a sense of false security by apologizing or saying she didn’t mean to do it, then when he sat down she shot him. All she’d have to do after that is leave the house.”

Bitty nodded thoughtfully. “What about the gun? Who would it be registered to? I mean, she wouldn’t just leave it to chance that he’d have a gun so she’d have to take it with her.”

“That wouldn’t be hard. This is Mississippi. Everyone has guns. She could have bought it at a store or on a corner. It wouldn’t have to be registered to her or Billy Joe.”

“I’m sure the police have covered that angle. So she shoots him, then—what? Walks back to Cady Lee’s house? To Budgie’s? Has she left her car on the street somewhere?”

I thought about it a moment. “She left her car in the parking lot at Piggly Wiggly. It’s not that far a walk from here. It wouldn’t be noticeable there.”

“Okay, so she shoots him, calmly walks out the front door, down the sidewalk and across the street, up the block, and she’s away. Cool as that.”

Bitty stopped the car, and I looked out the window at Billy Joe Cramer’s house. The yellow tape was gone. Someone had picked up the trash in the front yard, and the dogs were quiet behind the fence. The Confederate battle flag hung limply from its pole. It was eerily silent.

“I don’t think it was Dixie Lee, Bitty. She strikes me as too squeamish. I’d go with Allison before I would her.”

“It was Dixie Lee. Billy Joe was being too loud and about to ruin everything for her. She shot him and probably danced down the sidewalk afterward.”

“Honestly, Bitty. Sometimes you’re scary.”

“So who do we talk to first?”

I looked out the window again. Then I sighed. “Let’s try the neighbors on the left.”

It wasn’t until we talked to an elderly woman who lived across the street from the Cramers that we got any information at all. White-haired and about as big as a jaybird, Mrs. Whitworth let us inside.

She had us sit down on flowered couches. I eyed a huge vase of plastic magnolia blossoms that were thick with dust and cobwebs as she did the Southern thing, offering us something to drink, a snack, asking after Bitty’s sons away at college. Then she got down to business.

“Oh, Billy Joe used to have women come see him all the time when Allison was at work. He’d come home from his shop, and sometimes they’d meet in the front yard by her car. Those were the women he didn’t mind anyone knowing about.” She smiled, her dentures clicking as the smile got wider. “Then there were the women he’d take into the house. They’d be in there an hour or more, then the front door would open and the woman would come out, get in her car, and drive away like she’d just been delivering milk. She delivered something, all right.”

I could tell Mrs. Whitworth was enjoying this. She probably didn’t get much company. I asked, “The day Billy Joe was killed—did you see anyone then?”

She smiled. “I’ll tell you the same as I did the police when they asked: A woman in a raincoat and scarf showed up during lunch time. She was fairly tall for a woman, slender, blonde. I saw her long hair sticking out from under the scarf. Didn’t get to see her face, though. A pity. I could have solved the whole crime for them.”

“You’re pretty observant,” I said, and she bobbed her head.

“I am for a fact. I don’t have much else to do until
Jeopardy
and
Wheel of Fortune
come on. If I watch the noon news I get either mad or sad, and I’m too old to dwell on that stuff very long. So I leave my front door open, and when I see something interesting, I watch. Billy Joe was interesting.”

When we left, Bitty looked at me and said, “Tall, slender, blonde. Dixie Lee.”

I sighed. “Maybe. But would Billy Joe have really let her in? He was pretty mad. I don’t know if he’d have let her cross his threshold.”

“Obviously, he did.”

“We don’t know that for sure. Since the police already have this information, I say we leave this alone, Bitty. Mrs. Whitworth gave them the same description she gave us, and they’re a lot better at this.”

“I’d like to think so, but look at how well we’ve done this past year.”

I stared at her. We’d arrived at her car, and she hit the button to unlock the doors. “How
well
? Have you been paying attention? I was there. We haven’t done that well. We’ve been shot at, hit, locked in a cellar and an ice house, generally terrorized, and you think we’ve done well?”

“We found the killers, didn’t we?”

“By accident most of the time.” Since Bitty had opened her door and slid behind the wheel I had to get inside to continue my reminders. “We’re not that good, Bitty. I know it may seem like it to some people—apparently just you—but we stumble around like the Keystone Cops. The Three Stooges. Wile E. Coyote. That guy on
Psych
. People have started calling us Lucy and Ethel.”

“Oh, Trinket, those are just people who don’t realize how hard we worked. Even Rob Rainey thought we did well, or he wouldn’t have considered hiring us as insurance investigators.”

“Past tense, Bitty. He decided against it. He said it was too much like giving us a license to bungle.”