Lethal Luncheon (Puzzle Lady Mystery, a short story) (3 page)
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Authors: Parnell Hall
Tags: #Mystery & Crime
“My speech.”
“I see. Did she also talk to the decedent?”
“I don’t recall.”
“Does anyone?”
No one did.
“That’s annoying,” the cop said. “It would appear that she didn’t, but then again we can’t be sure. When she talked to you, did you get up from the table?”
“No.”
“She leaned over to talk to you?”
“That’s right.”
“Which side? The one between you and the decedent, or the other one?”
“She leaned in between us,” Cora said.
“Aha. I think I’d better have a word with Betty Flagstaff.”
The co-chairman, clearly distraught, blinked through tears and tried to answer the officer’s questions. Neither her recollection nor her descriptive prowess were awesome. The cop was less than thrilled with her recitation.
“You remember talking to Miss Felton?”
“Yes.”
“But you don’t remember talking to the decedent?”
“No.”
“Could you be more forthcoming with your answers?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Don’t make me drag it out of you. Tell me what you did.”
“I don’t know what you want me to say. I came to tell Cora I was about to announce her as soon as we began dessert.”
“You did that?”
“Yes.”
“And did the decedent say anything?”
“I told you, I don’t know.”
“Yet you remember standing between Miss Felton and the decedent. You even put your hands on their shoulders.”
Betty Flagstaff could not have looked more devastated had the policeman actually accused her of the crime. “I think so. I’m so confused. It’s so awful.”
“Well,” the policeman concluded, sizing her up. “You have to admit, you had the opportunity. Now, I understand you and the decedent quarreled a lot.”
Betty Flagstaff wilted. She sank into a chair in horror, dissolved into tears.
Cora Felton cleared her throat. “Excuse me, officer.”
“Yes,” he said impatiently. “What is it?”
“I want to confess.”
The policeman kept his cool, but he was clearly taken aback. After a moment, when the startled gasps from the women had died down, he said, “Go right ahead. Ah, before you do, let me remind you that you have the right to remain silent, and—”
“Yes, yes,” Cora said. “I know all that. Not a problem. The only thing is, if you wouldn’t mind, I would prefer to make my confession in private.”
“In private?” He managed to make it sound as if he’d just been propositioned.
“Keep your shirt on. You don’t have to rent me a room. If we could just step off to one side.”
“Yes, of course.”
“Be a dear, Sherry, and stay here and see that no one tries to listen in.”
Cora took the bewildered cop by the arm, dragged him off into the corner of the room.
“All right,” he said. “What is it that you want to tell me? You understand, of course, that you don’t have to.”
“For goodness sakes,” Cora said. “We’re alone. You could always
say
you read me my rights, and it would be my word against yours. Who are they gonna believe, you or me?”
The cop clearly had no interest in a discussion of the merits of the Miranda system. “Yeah, yeah, right. But tell me, you wish to confess to the crime?”
“The murder? Of course not. Sorry to get your hopes up, but I didn’t do it.”
“Then what do you want to confess to?”
“Withholding evidence.” Cora made a face. “Though I’m not really withholding evidence, I just haven’t had a chance to tell you. I mean, I wouldn’t wanna blurt something out in front of the other women, now, would I? So I’m not withholding a thing, and that never was my intention. I just have to confess that I happen to know something about the crime that you don’t.”
“Oh?” the cop said ironically. “And what is that?”
“I know who did it.”
C
ORA
F
ELTON
stood at the blackboard beside the lectern. The other women had returned to their tables. All but Betty Flagstaff, who sat in a folding chair up front. The officer stood behind her, with his hand firmly on her shoulder.
“So,” Cora said. “It’s time for me to earn my lunch. We have a murder to solve, and I don’t think any of you ladies are going to be too happy attending these luncheons until we do. So, if you don’t mind, I’d like to tell you a few things about this crime.”
Cora turned to the blackboard, picked up the chalk. “I’m supposed to talk to you about words, so let’s start with one.”
Cora wrote on the blackboard:
MOM.
Cora turned back to the women, smiled. “There you are. MOM. M-O-M. There are doubtless a lot of moms here; please do not think I am accusing you of the murder. If you stop to consider it, the idea that Felicity Grant was done in by a hundred angry mothers isn’t really going to fly. So what’s MOM all about? Well, the letters happen to stand for something.”
Cora wrote:
MOTIVE.
OPPORTUNITY.
MEANS.
“There you are.
Motive, opportunity, means.
The three elements of a murder.
Motive-,
who had a reason to do it.
Opportunity:
who had the chance to it. And
means:
what was the murder weapon, and who had access to it. How do you solve a crime? Trust your MOM.”
Cora shrugged. “So, what do we have here? The
means
is obviously poison. We’ll know more when we get the autopsy report. But it’s undoubtedly poison. Poison is a woman’s weapon. There are many ways to get one’s hands on poison. No problem there.
“And what is the
motive
? Well, Felicity Grant and Betty Flagstaff are the co-chairmen of this organization. In any situation of that nature, there is apt to be tension, resulting in a power struggle for who is top dog. So there’s your motive. Granted, not deep. Sketchy, surfacey. But as with the means of death, I’m sure more will come to light as soon as the police have time to look.
“That leaves
opportunity.
Did Betty Flagstaff have the opportunity to commit the crime? Absolutely. Just before dessert, she came to the table where I was seated next to Felicity Grant, put her arms over both our shoulders, and gave me a few instructions regarding my speech. Was that while we were still eating? Yes, it was, because we had not begun dessert yet. I know that for a fact, because Betty mentioned that I would begin speaking when the women began dessert.
“So, Betty Flagstaff had the opportunity. No problem there.” Cora raised her finger. “Except for one thing.” She smiled. “Me. I gave Felicity a piece of quiche. There are lots of witnesses. Everyone at the table saw me do it. I took my quiche, handed it to her. And she ate it. Every crumb. This casts serious doubts on the guilt of Betty Flagstaff. Why? Because, clearly, I had a much
better
opportunity.”
For the first time, there was dead silence in the room. No forks scraped against plates. No glasses clinked. There was no murmur of voices. The women were dumbfounded.
“Oh, don’t worry,” Cora said. “I’m not accusing myself of the crime. I’m merely stating the obvious. I had the best opportunity. That is absolutely obvious. It is obvious to anyone. We lose sight of how important that is because we are used to reading mystery books in which the obvious explanation is never right. In real life it almost always is. And in real life, we embrace the obvious explanation, at least initially, because we’re in shock, and our minds can’t handle anything else.
“Which is what happened in this case. The women at my table are all in shock at having one of their number topple over dead. When questioned, they give the usual unhelpful answers, until one of them, Charity something-or-other, recalls me giving her my quiche. Thus prompted, the other women chime in. It is the obvious answer, and the most likely too. A stranger in their midst, someone they don’t know, on whose actions they cannot rely, did something that could have resulted in the victim’s death. I not only had the opportunity, but my opportunity was observed by all. All embrace it.
“All but one.
“Marcy Fletcher comes to my rescue, pooh-poohs my involvement, asks who else it might be.
“And why does she do that? Because my passing the quiche was a coincidence. An accident. I was not
supposed
to be the person with the best opportunity. That person was supposed to be Betty Flagstaff. Who of course would check with her luncheon speaker near the end of the meal. And the luncheon speaker would be sitting next to co-chairman Felicity Grant. The place cards insured that. Just as they guaranteed which tiramisu Felicity would eat, allowing the killer to poison it well in advance.
“Unfortunately, the killer was a little too eager to pin the crime on Betty Flagstaff. And why not? If you want to take over an organization, what better way than to kill one co-chairman and frame the other for the murder?”
Cora jerked her thumb at the blackboard and looked out over the dining hall. “So, what have we learned from good old MOM? Can anyone tell me who did it?”
They certainly could. Some pointed. Some, buying into Cora’s classroom routine, actually raised their hands to be called on.
Cora beamed like a teacher watching her prize pupil recite, as the cop left Betty Flagstaff, marched to table number ten, and put his hands on the shoulders of Marcy Fletcher.
“Well, that wasn’t so bad,” Cora said driving home.
“No, not at all,” Sherry said ironically. “Someone got killed, and because of the quiche you were a murder suspect, but aside from that it went great.”
Cora piloted the car around a curve, cursed at an oncoming driver who had swung a little wide. She came out of the turn, stepped on the gas. “You know the best thing about it?”
“Sure. The case is solved.”
Cora waved it away. “No, silly.” She grinned, her trademark Puzzle Lady grin. “It didn’t involve a damn crossword puzzle.”
CIOPPINO: PUZZLE LADY STYLE
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
3 flat fillets of anchovies, drained
6 cloves garlic, crushed
1 bay leaf
2 celery stalks, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
1/2 cup chopped green bell peppers
1 cup dry white wine
1 1/2 cup water
1 (28-ounce) can of crushed tomatoes
1 tablespoon fresh thyme or 1 tablespoon dry thyme
11/2 pounds cod or halibut, cut into 2-inch chunks
Salt and pepper
8 large shrimp, peeled and deveined
16 to 20 raw mussels, scrubbed
In a large pot over moderate heat combine oil, crushed pepper, anchovies, garlic, and bay leaf. Let anchovies melt into oil.
Add chopped celery, onion, and bell pepper. Saute a few minutes and add wine. Simmer the wine until reduced by about half. Then add water, tomatoes, and thyme. Bring sauce to boil, and reduce heat to a simmer. Simmer 10 minutes.
Season fish chunks with salt and pepper. Add fish and simmer 5 minutes. Add shrimp and mussels and cover pot. Cook 10 minutes.
Serve with crusty bread.
Serves 4.
Books by Parnell Hall
Stanley Hastings private eye mysteries
Steve Winslow courtroom dramas
The Baxter Trust
Then Anonymous Client
The Underground Man
The Naked Typist
The Wrong Gun
The Innocent Woman
Puzzle Lady crossword puzzle mysteries
A Clue For The Puzzle Lady
Last Puzzle & Testament
Puzzled To Death
A Puzzle In A Pear Tree
With This Puzzle I Thee Kill
And A Puzzle To Die On
Stalking The Puzzle Lady
You Have The Right To Remain Puzzled
The Sudoku Puzzle Murders
Dead Man’s Puzzle
The Puzzle Lady vs. The Sudoku Lady
The KenKen Killings
$10,000 in Small, Unmarked Puzzles
Arsenic and Old Puzzles
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