Murder Talks Turkey (2 page)

Dickey pulled off the robber’s mask, and we stared some more.

“Not from around here,” No-Neck offered, shaking his big neckless noggin. “Anybody know this guy?”

“No, not, nope.” Heads shook, mouths muttered.

“He’s from the U.P.,” I offered, saddened by the abrupt end of a life.

“Not with shoes like that, ya know, eh?” someone said.

“Expound on that, Gertie.” Dickey, the know-it-all college graduate, puffed himself up.

“He said, eh.”

Everyone waited. Dickey dropped his arms to his waist to suggest impatience.

“Spit it out,” No-Neck said. “He said what?”

“He said, eh. E.H.” Did I have to spell everything out for them? “He said eh at the end of his sentence, like a Yooper. He talked like us.”

Tourists from down state like to compare our speech to characters from the movie
Fargo,
but they’re dead wrong. We have a very distinct pattern of speech in the Upper Peninsula, and this guy had it.

Everyone stared at me like I’d lost my mind. “We do…,” I insisted, “…talk different.” Was I the only one who could tell? Years ago I came to the U.P. with my Barney, so I’m still considered a transplant by the old timers. Most of the locals lived here their whole lives and haven’t even traveled outside of our state borders.

“Well he won’t be saying eh anymore, eh?” someone in the back offered.

Dickey bent down and looked him over. He wasn’t much to see. Scrawny, stubbly face, bushy brows, a scar on his cheek that looked like a dog bite in his past that had required a few stitches.

“Nice shot,” Dickey said. “Who did the shooting?” Nobody said anything. “It’s okay to come forward,” he said. “Whoever you are, you won’t be incarcerated. You’ll be exonerated. You might even be in line for a special medal for bravery. Speak up.”

Muttering among the onlookers.

“Oh, come on,” No-Neck said. “
Somebody
shot him.”

“A guy on the town hall roof plugged him,” I said. “He had a rifle with a scope. Dickey, I mean, Deputy Snell, who did you send up there?”

“I didn’t send anybody to the roof.” Dickey was getting hot.

Cora Mae had been eyeing up the men, contemplating her next victim. She isn’t called the Black Widow for nothing. Cora Mae married and buried three husbands, and she’s on the make for another one.

She stopped preening and said something significant. “The dead robber said he had a partner outside.” She giggled nervously. “He wasn’t dead when he said it.”

“I didn’t see anyone outside until the armed forces showed up,” I said to the acting sheriff. “It had to be one of your men.”

Dickey ran his hands through his greasy hair and readjusted his cat-hair encrusted green jacket. “Deputy Sheedo, I want statements from everybody.”

No-Neck rearranged the alleged witnesses and started taking statements. A moan from behind the counter reminded us that someone had been injured. The new teller rose, holding her forehead. I guessed this would be her last day on the job.

The town’s finest rushed over to offer their assistance. We have our share of emergency medical technicians in Stonely. The local men and some of the women like to join the volunteer fire department so they can play with the red trucks and long hoses, but you can’t qualify without the proper credentials.

While they were administering to the teller, Dickey picked up the pillowcase and opened it. He pulled out a package of bills and ripped off the paper surrounding it. His mouth fell open, which is where it is most of the time anyway.

“What’s wrong?” I said, leaning over the pillowcase for a good look.

Dickey reached in and pulled out more of the contents, peeling each bundle apart. He flung them over his shoulder and pulled out some more.

Pearl’s cash was at the bottom. The rest of the pillowcase was stuffed with Monopoly money.

Chapter 2

“FIRST HE ROBS THE CREDIT UNION,” I said, rehashing the event with Cora Mae while we sat at her kitchen table drinking coffee and eating sugar doughnuts. “Then he doesn’t take the bank’s money. Why would anybody do that? Why risk prison to steal thirty bucks from Pearl, then fill the rest of the sack with play dollars?”

“What if Pearl was his target?” Cora Mae said. She’s always brightest when she has her sights on a man. Right now, the pasture was empty, which explained her dense question.

I laughed. “Pearl’s ninety years old. Who would hurt her? And why go to the bank with a gun just to steal thirty dollars from her?”

Cora Mae draped an old towel over my shoulders and clipped the ends together with a clothespin. “Pearl’s been burning up the phone lines, telling her side of the story to anyone who’ll listen,” she said, mixing the color she was about to put on my head. “She claims she hit him with her purse. Did you see that happen?”

“Pearl probably thinks she did. Her mind isn’t what it used to be. Fred should have been inside with us instead of waiting in the truck. He’d have handled the situation.”

Fred, my police trained German shepherd, raised his head from the floor when he heard his name. He looked at me with adoration in his eyes. Devil Fangs, as I used to call him, was a solid-built black shepherd with red eyes and teeth made for ripping. When the cops retired him, he came to live with me. Give Fred a scent, and he can find anybody or anything. He’s proved his worth ten times over.

I bit into another doughnut.

Cora Mae started griping about the red hair dye I chose.

“The first time your hair turned red was a mistake on my part,” she said. “But why on earth do you want to keep on dying it red?”

I plopped a piece of sugar doughnut in my mouth and chewed on the question.

The truth of the matter was that the red hair changed my personality for the better. I used to be drab and lifeless exactly like my gray-streaked hair. Now I have more pep and vigor. I wake up every day and look forward to whatever new adventure comes my way.

“Remember how I used to be before I went red, Cora Mae? Quiet and retiring?”

“No,” Cora Mae said, squirting color on my head and splashing a dab of it too close to my eyes for comfort. “You never were like that. Not since I’ve known you. You’ve always been bold and bossy.” Then she gave me an affectionate smile. “But you sure are fun.”

Cora Mae and I have been friends for a long, long time. I was there when she buried her husbands in the Trenary Cemetery, and she helped me two years ago when I lost my Barney.

We are almost as tight as the black knit sweaters she likes to wear every since she discovered how great her boobs look in Wonderbras.

I wiped around my eyes with the old towel and thought about the dead robber while Cora Mae worked the gooey mess into a lather on my head. I finished my doughnut.

Cora Mae checked the dye, then snapped off the pair of latex gloves she wore. “There. Sit for awhile.” She poured more coffee for each of us. “Kitty called from Paradise. Her car broke down.”

“She’s supposed to be following Tony Lento,” I said. “Our first paying job and she goes for a joyride? Unbelievable. Tell her to turn around and head home once she gets the Lincoln fixed. She beats that car to death with her crazy driving.”

Lyla Lento had hired the Trouble Busters after her husband forgot to come home one night and couldn’t produce a plausible excuse. It was Kitty’s turn to tail him. Since Kitty was halfway across the state, he’d been loose without supervision for the entire morning.

It’s tough being the boss.

“She’s waiting for them to fix her car,” Cora Mae said. “The mechanic said it would be another hour or so. And for your information, she
was
following him.”

“Was he alone?”

“He was, right before she lost him?”

“Did she call Lyla before taking off?” Tony Lento’s work took him out of town periodically. His wife had expressed reluctance to pay travel expenses.

“Lyla told Kitty to stick with him this time.”

The timer went off. I rinsed my hair and towel dried it. “Looks good,” I said putting a lot of compliment in my voice.

Cora Mae humphed. “What are we getting paid for the Lento job? You’re very closed-mouthed about the fee. I have to think you don’t want to tell me.”

“Of course we’re getting paid,” I said, dodging the question even though my friend would be ecstatic when she found out. However, Kitty might not be quite as enthusiastic if she learned that we were getting paid in trade. That meant free manicures for all three of us for one year at Lyla’s beauty salon.

Since Kitty chews her nails down to the quick and mine chip and break, Cora Mae would be the only grateful beneficiary. But it was worth it for the referrals that were bound to come pouring in after we busted Lyla’s husband.

“Tony Lento is one of Stonely’s finest upstanding citizens,” Cora Mae said. “Lyla must be going through her change. Tony would never cheat on her.”

“Did you ever hear of a wolf in sheep’s clothing?” I replied. Tony was fortyish, a handsome man with a constant grin that said he knew how terrific he was and he wanted to spread his greatness around.

“He’s never looked twice at me. That’s how I know.” Cora Mae is three years younger than me. At sixty-three she looks like a million bucks. She eats nothing but salads and wears slinky black pumps and tight tops that display her perky wonderbra-ed boobs. Every man in Tamarack County notices Cora Mae.

“No way,” I said in disbelief. “He
had
to have.”

“Not once.”

“Ever?”

“Never.”

It was good to know that Cora Mae had one holdout. Two, if you counted George. But that sweet man was a daydream for another time. Right now we had work to do.

I had to figure out how to reconnect with Tony Lento somehow. And Kitty would have to explain to his wife why she lost him. Until she returned from Paradise, I had time on my hands. I hopped into the Trouble Buster truck with Fred, dropped Cora Mae at her house, and headed for the jail. Hopefully, Dickey Snell had some answers by now.

Chapter 3

I KNOW TROUBLE WHEN I see it. Blaze’s family car was parked behind Ray’s General Store, next to the small jail building. My son hadn’t been cleared for driving yet. Our family didn’t know if he’d ever work again, let alone drive a vehicle. He hasn’t been the same since the day he woke up in the hospital’s ICU. After over a week on a respirator without blinking an eye, he’d beat the meningitis at its own deadly game. But he wasn’t the same man. His recovery was slower than the syrup dripping from a maple tree tapped before its time.

Inside the jail, Blaze was hunkered over in a chair with a handheld radio tight between his hands. “I need backup,” he said into it, speaking in a whisper with his lips pressed against the transmitter.

“What are you doing here?” I demanded. He didn’t even look up.

The radio crackled and a voice said, “Who’s playing games on the emergency frequency? If you can’t state your position or your problem, get off.”

“This
is
an emergency,” Blaze said. “I’m behind enemy lines. I need help getting out.”

“Repeat. What’s your position?”

“Blaze,” I said. “Give me the radio.”

He noticed me for the first time. “Oh, Ma, you’re alive. Wait a minute. What are you doing here? There are enemy troops everywhere.” He clunked his head with a beefy palm. “Oh, Jesus, they captured you, too!”

Blaze had that look in his eyes, the one he gets when his infected brain starts playing tricks on him. Meningitis, our family has learned the hard way, is one of the scariest diseases on the planet. If it doesn’t kill you outright, it robs you of your ability to distinguish between fact and fiction. Blaze spends part of every day in a different world, sliding through muddy fields on his belly, fighting for his life, and searching for a way to escape.

That’s one of the reasons why his wife Mary stripped the house of weapons. It’s why I got a hold of his Glock.

Blaze moaned like it was the end of the world, but he let me take the radio from him. I turned it off. “See those keys?” I pointed to his car keys lying on the desk on the other side of his big body. “Hand them to me. We’re going to bust out of here and Fred’s going to help.”

“If they catch us, we’re dead.” His gaze slid to Fred, who was eye level with my seated son. “What the hell is that animal?”

“You know Fred. He’s my dog.”

Blaze scowled, searching his memory for clues.

Just then, Dickey opened the jailhouse door. Fred has good instincts so he growled. Even showed enough incisor to cause Dickey to take a step back. I patted my dog on the head, praising him for his smarts. “Good Boy.”

“Why does he have to growl at me?” Dickey wanted to know. “I used to own him.”

“Maybe that’s why,” I pointed out.

“Did any of them see you coming in?” Blaze said. “They’ll torture us if they find out.”

Dickey glanced sharply at me.

“We’re behind enemy lines,” I explained. My heart ached for my son. I hated to see him this way.

“I need to talk to Dickey,” I said to Blaze. “Then we’ll go turkey hunting.” That was a lie, but it calmed him down. Yeah, right. Like I’d be caught dead out in the woods with him armed and mentally disabled.

“You know I dislike being called Dickey,” Dickey said. “If you can’t address me properly and respectfully as Deputy Snell, at least refer to me as Dick.”

“I wiped your hinder when you were a baby,” I reminded him. “You’ll always be Dickey to me.”

“Hand me the twelve gauge shotgun on the rack,” Blaze said, pointing at the jail cell, which obviously didn’t include a line of firearms. “I’m going to polish it up before we go.”

“Not right now, son.” I shifted my attention back to Dickey, who hung his hat on a hook and ran his hands through his hair. Dickey Snell was skinny as a pole, but he made up for it in strut. He had played cops and robbers since he was old enough to walk, and he took the job seriously. No monkey business. Rules and regulations were sacred, whether or not they made any sense.