Divas Do Tell

by Virginia Brown

  I was aghast. “That’s over six weeks!”

  “You can do it, Trinket,” said my duplicitous cousin. She perched on a chair across the room, having practically dragged me to my appointment. “It’s for a good cause.”

  “It’s for the garden club to make money,” I grumbled.

  Bitty gave me a reproachful look. “Without fund raisers there wouldn’t be enough money to keep up some of these lovely old homes. People enjoy the pilgrimage. Even your mama likes to put on hoop skirts and tell the history of Cherryhill every year.”

  Since she was right and that made me grumpy, I just said, “I don’t see why I can’t stay at home wearing hoop skirts instead of be at your house.”

  “Because Aunt Anna will be at your house, and I need someone to greet tourists at my house. Six Chimneys is right in town and will draw a lot more visitors than Cherryhill will, even though it’s pretty close to town.”

  “Hold still,” said Jean Buford as I apparently twitched my skirts in annoyance.

  I stood still and stared at the transom over the door. An eternity later I was fitted for my upcoming humiliation and allowed to change back into comfortable clothes. I looked with some distaste at the corset, stockings, bloomers, and horsehair hoop contraption I would be required to wear in six weeks. I was going to look like a beached whale. A shiny gray beached whale. Satin rustled ominously as Jean put the dress back on the form for alterations. My final fitting would be in three weeks.

  “I’m looking forward to it,” I lied as we put on our coats to leave. Jean looked at me and smiled.

  “It won’t be as bad as you think,” she said. “Just remember to adjust the hoops if you sit down, or your skirt will fly up over your head.”

  “I can hardly wait.” I smiled back at her, already regretting being stupid enough to allow Bitty to talk me into this whole pilgrimage thing.

  “Let’s go over to Rayna’s,” Bitty suggested once we were in the car and headed back to her house. “She may have an update on Mrs. Whitworth.”

  Since Bitty was driving and we were in her Beemer, I wouldn’t have been able to refuse anyway, but I did want to find out if Mrs. Whitworth would make it. Rayna would also have all the details of what happened.

  When we arrived she was in the middle of a painting. Dressed in a paint-daubed smock and holding a brush, she waved us in and shut the front doors behind us. Dogs and cats lay in front of the fire, while she had an easel up to catch the morning light from the east windows. A train rumbled past, wheels clacking against the tracks, barely visible out the window. Rayna had captured a scene with a train, the red Victorian depot and historically clad figures milling about.

  “I’m doing this for Gwen,” she said cheerfully as she wiped paint from her brush and put it in a jar to clean. “She’s going to donate it to a craft booth during the pilgrimage. Did you hear the latest about Mrs. Whitworth?”

  “That’s one reason we’re here,” said Bitty. She unwrapped a wool scarf from her neck and dropped it to the back of a chair on top of her coat. I shrugged out of my jacket and slung it to the settee by the fire. One of the dogs on the hearth rug lifted his head, gazed at me for a moment, then went back to sleep.

  “The good news is that she’s going to be okay,” said Rayna. “The bad news is that it’ll take her a while to recover. She has a slight concussion, and her left arm is broken. At her age any fall can be fatal, and whoever attacked her meant to kill her.”

  “Good God,” Bitty said softly. “What is going on? Three murders in less than two months, and now an old lady almost killed? This is just awful. What are the police doing? Do they think whoever hurt Mrs. Whitworth is connected to the other murders?”

  “They’re spending a lot of twenty-four hour shifts trying to track down new leads and tie up loose bits of information. They’ve established a hotline for anyone with possible information about the murders or suspects to call in confidentially. The mayor is offering a reward.”

  I perched on a stool at the former reservation desk now turned breakfast bar/Diva Day wine bar. There was something about the entire thing that really bothered me, besides the fact that an elderly woman had been assaulted.

  “Do the police think she was attacked because she might know something about who killed Billy Joe? Or maybe even about the other killers?” I asked. “Are the murders connected? Are other people in danger?”

  Rayna frowned as she wiped paint off her hands with a smelly rag. “I’m not sure. Since she lives across the street from Billy Joe Cramer that’s probably a good guess. This wasn’t a random attack. She had to be a target.”

  “I don’t understand why someone would think she knows something. After all, if she did recognize the killer, wouldn’t he already be arrested?” Bitty asked.

  “If she contacted the police,” Rayna said. “Maybe she didn’t realize she saw something.”

  “That’s what Sandra said,” Bitty replied. “She suggested we talk to Mrs. Whitworth for the very same reason.”

  “Did she?” Rayna seemed surprised. “So did y’all go talk to her?”

  “Yes, and she did remember a few things, but nothing specific. Except that the visitor she saw go into the Cramer house could have been a man.”

  Rayna’s eyes got huge. “That’s new information that could help a lot. Did she tell that to the police?”

  “I don’t know. It wasn’t really much, just something about boots. She never saw the face or recognized the person. I gave her my card if she remembered anything else, but she never has called me.” Bitty frowned. “Do you think she remembered something?”

  “If she did,” I said, “that may have been what got her almost killed.”

  Rayna slowly nodded her head. “That could be true. Should we tell the police?”

  “Yes,” I said immediately. “If they don’t know it already then they need to now.”

  “That’s what I think, too.”

  Within a half hour the three of us were down at the police station. Since Lieutenant Stone was out we found ourselves talking to Sergeant Maxwell. He knew us, of course. We’d met on a rather uncomfortable basis the year before, and our re-acquaintance hadn’t been that pleasant.

  “Ladies,” he greeted us warily, “you claim to have some information?”

  He spoke to all of us but looked at Rayna, whom I suppose he considered the sanest of the three of us. He was probably right.

  Rayna came right out with it: “We’re here because Mrs. Whitworth saw more than she remembered when first talking to you about Billy Joe Cramer’s murder.”

  Maxwell’s eyes sharpened, but his tone was deliberate. “When did she tell you this?”

  Gesturing our way, Rayna said, “Actually, she confided in Trinket and Bitty.”

  The pencil he’d been tapping against the desk top stilled, and his gaze pinned us to the wall. I could almost feel his scrutiny. “Ladies, what did Mrs. Whitworth say to you?”

  “She said Billy Joe’s visitor right before he was killed could be a man since he was wearing men’s boots,” I answered.

  Bitty chirped, “Well, actually she said it to me and Sandra Brady as well as Trinket, since we’ve become quite close friends with her. You’ve met Ms. Brady, haven’t you, Sergeant? She’s a very nice person, and we’d been telling her all about our past investigations so she wanted to go with us to question possible witnesses.”

  Interrupting, the sergeant demanded, “What made you think Mrs. Whitworth is a possible witness?”

  “Why, because she told us all about seeing Billy Joe’s visitor when we canvassed the area right after the murder.”

  “You canvassed the area, Mrs. Hollandale?”

  I could definitely feel Maxwell’s exasperation and edged my foot closer to Bitty’s so I could kick her at the first opportunity. She edged away, whether by
design or accident, and kept babbling.

  “Oh, we all agreed that any information we found out would be given to you at once, of course. We just haven’t found out a lot until now. I mean, nothing that you probably didn’t find out already. Are the three murders connected, and do you think Mrs. Whitworth was attacked by whoever killed Billy Joe, Abby, and Buck?”

  Sergeant Maxwell, normally able to keep his irritation under control, began to fray at the edges. I could tell by the way his eyes narrowed, the blood vessels in his eyes popped up, and the pencil he snapped in two. Apparently even Bitty got the message. She lapsed into startled silence at last.

  “Miz Hollandale,” he said in measured tones, “the best thing you three ladies can do is go home and let the police worry about witnesses and murder.” He stood up. I’d forgotten what a tall man he was, almost intimidating. “Do not—I repeat, not—investigate on your own. Thank you for the information about Mrs. Whitworth. I’ll have a deputy show you to your car.”

  It was rather embarrassing being ushered out of the police station by a polite but quite determined Rodney Farrell. Once we stood in the parking lot looking at each other, Rayna said, “Well, that was interesting.”

  Bitty wasn’t quite as calm. “Can you believe that? He wasn’t even interested in hearing what we had to say.”

  “I told him what she said,” I reminded, but Bitty was past caring about facts. She fumed the entire time we got into Rayna’s car.

  “I mean, really, we may be private citizens, but we have a right to talk to people about a murder right in our own neighborhood, don’t you think?” she prattled. “And we found out some valuable information they didn’t have, but did we get a thanks? No. We got thrown out. Some people are so ungrateful.”

  Rayna started the SUV, and we drove slowly out of the police station lot. I rolled my eyes and waited for Bitty’s fit of pique to run down. It took much longer than it should.

  “Are you finished?” I asked Bitty as we reached the court square. After griping from the police lot all the way to the red light at Memphis Street, she’d finally subsided.

  “For now,” she said calmly. “Next time we just won’t share information with them.”

  “Yes we will,” I said. “I have no intention of getting myself into any danger like we’ve done before. I’m not that fond of getting hit or locked in dirt cellars.”

  “Or in an old freezer,” Bitty reminded.

  “That was you, not me, and I still didn’t like it.”

  “If not for my brave little Chen Ling we might still be there.”

  I rolled my eyes and didn’t care if she saw me. “She was a fortunate distraction,” I conceded when Bitty said I was being unfair. “By the way, where is she?”

  “Oh, it’s her spa day. She’s getting a bath, nails trimmed, teeth brushed, and a massage.”

  “A massage?” I repeated. “Don’t tell me your masseuse has branched out to the canine population.”

  “Don’t be silly. It’s a new thing they’re doing. They even do acupuncture.”

  I visualized the small brown concrete block doggy grooming shop out on Highway 4. It seemed they’d diversified since last I’d been there. Not that I went often, only with Bitty to pick up Chitling.

  Just as we reached Budgie’s café Bitty’s cell phone rang. Rayna pulled into a diagonal slot and turned off the SUV. No one had mentioned stopping for coffee or pie, yet we all seemed to gravitate there without discussion. As we got out of the car I heard Bitty say to her caller that we would be glad to come out there.

  Since I didn’t know who she was talking to I shook my head and held up my hands palms out to forestall any inclination for her to include me in her plans. Of course, it didn’t help. Bitty went right on.

  “Yes, Trinket and I aren’t doing anything so will be glad to come. See you at four.”

  Rayna had already stepped inside Budgie’s while I remained on the sidewalk with my hands on my hips. “What have you obligated me to without talking it over, may I ask?”

  “Of course you may ask. Sandra has invited us out to her new place for a late tea with her and Mira Waller. She invited Mira so we could ask her a few questions but doesn’t really want to be alone with her. Since she’s not settled in yet she asked we not tell any of the Divas so they won’t be upset they weren’t invited.”

  “Did you ever stop to think I might have other plans?” I demanded, and Bitty gave me her best owl-eyed look.

  “Do you have other plans?”

  “That’s not the point. I could have had other plans. You’re supposed to ask before you obligate me.”

  “Don’t you want to go?”

  I sighed. “Yes, I suppose, although I’m not sure I want to ask Mira Waller any questions. I’ll leave that up to you two. But you still should have asked me.”

  “Next time an invitation is extended I’ll contact your secretary. Don’t eat too much lunch. Sandra will expect us to eat, and you’re on a diet.”

  “I most certainly am not on a diet,” I said as I followed her into Budgie’s.

  “Yes, you are,” she said over her shoulder. “You have to fit in your gown in a few weeks. You don’t want to look like a stuffed sausage, do you?”

  “I don’t want to look like a demented mushroom either, but apparently I wasn’t given that choice before you signed me up as a belle.”

  “Oh, Trinket, you’re going to enjoy yourself. Stop whining.”

  I admit—I often whine. I seem to do so quite a bit since returning to Holly Springs and the company of my dear cousin. But then, I’ve had quite a few reasons to whine, too.

  Since I often react to Bitty’s manipulations with fits of rebellion, I ordered a bowl of soup and a helping of peach cobbler with two dollops of whipped cream for dessert. I felt rather than saw my cousin’s forbidding gaze on me.

  “Don’t forget your diet, dear,” she said sweetly.

  “I’m not on a diet, dear,” I replied just as sweetly.

  Sitting across the table, Rayna snickered then ducked her head to pretend to read her cell phone. It was obvious she didn’t want to be drawn into our battle of wills. Bitty regarded me with silence.

  Then she looked up at Budgie and said, “Do you have sugar-free whipped cream?”

  Budgie gaped at her since she’d never had us order sugar-free anything. The closest we got was sweetener for coffee. Finally she replied, “I have sugar-free whipped topping. Will that do?”

  “Yes, Trinket prefers that on her cobbler, and only a small helping, please.”

  Budgie looked over at me. I glared at Bitty with such fire I’m surprised she didn’t burst into flame. Since she remained flameless and uncharred, I took a deep breath and said, “A small helping of cobbler and only one whipped cream on top, please.”

  One of the secrets of Budgie’s success is that she knows when to keep her mouth shut and when to make suggestions. She went off to the kitchen and returned with our coffee, packets of sugar, calorie-free sweetener, and enough creamers to satisfy a small battalion. Our soup was potato and bacon and served with a basket of corn muffins. By the time she returned with my cobbler, Rayna’s pie, and Bitty’s banana pudding, I’d gotten over my pique, and we were discussing Mrs. Whitworth.

  “Do you really think she remembered something else?” Bitty asked. “I mean, she never called me so I didn’t think she did.”

  Rayna took a sip of coffee before saying, “The elderly often forget small details but seem to remember major events. At least, that’s how Rob’s mama was before she died. So it depends on if Mrs. Whitworth considered what she saw as major or minor, I suppose.”

  “I’d think she’d consider it major in light of everything that’s happened,” I said. “I mean, she knows how important it might be if she could even partially identify the last person to visit B
illy Joe.”

  “The last person she saw anyway,” Bitty corrected. “The killer could have come in the back door, you know.”

  “With all those dogs loose in the back yard?” Rayna asked, her eyebrows lifted. “I doubt anyone would try that, even a desperate killer.”

  Bitty nodded thoughtfully. “True. If Mrs. Whitworth went to the bathroom or the kitchen for more tea, though, she might have missed Dixie Lee or Mira.”

  “So you’ve given up the idea the killer might be a man?” I asked with amusement. Bitty can be so predictable. Once she forms an opinion or theory, it’s hard for her to shake it loose.

  “No, not given it up entirely, but it just seems to me it’s more likely for a woman to have murdered Billy Joe. And I think all the murders are connected. It’s just so improbable that two or three killers are running around town. Don’t you think?”

  “I certainly agree with the last,” said Rayna. “I doubt multiple killers are running amok through Marshall County. But it’s also unlikely that Billy Joe is connected to the Hollywood people in some way, and why else would the three of them have been killed within days of one another?”

  “It is more like five weeks,” I said after a swift mental calculation. “Hollywood has been here since early January, and March is only two weeks away. Does anyone know how much more they have to film?”

  Finishing off the last bite of her banana pudding, Bitty swallowed and said, “Only a week more of location shoots in Holly Springs. They have most of what they need from Memphis in file footage, and some of the interior shots can be done on a sound stage. At least, that’s what Miranda’s column in The South Reporter said.”

  I nodded. “Then they’re almost ready to leave town. I think I’m relieved.”

  “It’s definitely been a whirlwind of drama and trauma since they’ve been here,” Rayna agreed. “Nothing like this happened with the other productions filmed in Holly Springs.”

  “Be that as it may,” I said after cleaning my plate, “I’m glad I missed the other movies during filming here.”