by Laura Childs
“Gasoline,” Suzanne said. She was struggling to make any sort of connection. Then her eyes widened and she said, “Surely you’re not trying to pin the fire at Junior’s trailer on Amber? Wait . . . are you?”
“The gasoline may be circumstantial, but it bears looking into,” Doogie said.
“It’s not mine,” Amber shouted, causing Doogie to jump in surprise. He hadn’t realized she was lurking behind him. “Someone must have put it there!”
Doogie spun around to peer at her. “I’ll be the judge of that, young lady. In the meantime, we need to collect fingerprints. So it’s in your best interest to come along with me to the Law Enforcement Center.”
“This isn’t right,” Suzanne said. “You come in here and humiliate this poor girl in front of everyone. Intimidate her . . .”
Doogie managed an offhand toss of his head. “I’m only doing my job.”
“No, you’re not,” Suzanne said. “You’re trying to make impossible connections. Tell me, what reason would Amber have to burn down Junior’s trailer?” Doogie started to open his mouth, but Suzanne steamrolled right over him. “I’ll tell you what. She had no reason. None at all!”
“Yet Chief Findley found evidence of arson,” Doogie hurled back at her. “Somebody doused Junior’s trailer with gasoline.”
“That could have been anyone. Like you said the other night, kids or someone who passed by and decided to get his jollies.”
“And then we have the fact that somebody gutted Allan Sharp with a hunting knife!” Doogie cried.
“But it wasn’t Amber.”
Still, Doogie stood his ground. “I don’t know what’s behind either case. Or if they’re even related. But I swear to God I’m going to find out. I’ll get to the bottom of this if it kills me.”
In the end, Amber went willingly with Doogie. Suzanne had put up a good argument, but there wasn’t much else she could do.
* * *
• • •
BACK out in the café, Suzanne started to offer a halting explanation to her guests. But Toni, knowing what really mattered, quickly popped Missy’s fashion show music into the CD player. Two seconds later, the music of Imagine Dragons throbbed throughout the Cackleberry Club. Then the models came strutting out and the guests started smiling and clapping.
So much for an apology, Suzanne decided. Sometimes it really was better to keep calm and carry on.
“Holy bejeebers,” Petra called to her through the pass-through. “That had to register a good ten points on the weirdness scale.” Suzanne was standing behind the counter, brewing two more pots of tea, so she leaned down and looked in at Petra. “Do you think Doogie was right to take Amber in?”
“I didn’t at first, but now that I mull it over, I’m not so sure.”
“Why would Amber want to murder Allan Sharp and then set Junior’s trailer on fire?”
“Maybe she didn’t mean to set it on fire,” Petra said. “Maybe she was trying to kill him, too.”
“Petra!” Suzanne watched a swirl of purple and peach mohair go by on one of the models, but she wasn’t so caught up in the fashion show that she couldn’t be outraged.
“I don’t know what to think,” Petra went on. “Because it’s all so awful. The murder . . . the fire . . . it all seems crazy to me.”
“Because it is crazy,” Suzanne muttered. “It’s kapow-crazy.”
At the end of the day, when Suzanne counted up their sizable receipts, she was pleased with the Christmas Tea, but still upset by Doogie’s little storm-trooper routine. In fact, his bursting in to accost Amber had made her want to double down on her investigation. Now she resolved to dig deeper into why Allan Sharp had been murdered and why Junior’s trailer had been set on fire.
Toni poked her head into Suzanne’s office and said, “How’d we make out?”
“With the tickets we sold for the tea and all the knitted Christmas stockings that sold, it comes to well over nine hundred dollars.”
“But some of that money goes to Petra’s church.”
“Um, a hundred and twenty dollars does. As well as fifty dollars to Joey.”
“Still, we did really good.”
“Yes, we did,” Suzanne said. They were heading into the final days of a rather profitable fiscal year. There’d be Christmas bonuses for everyone.
“And now we have to get ready for Allan Sharp’s visitation tonight.” Toni shuddered. “Ugh, I hate going to funeral homes and looking at dead bodies.”
“Then don’t look at him,” Suzanne said.
“Easier said than done. You know what? Junior told me that a person’s fingernails and hair keep growing even after they’re dead.”
“Gross.”
“Yeah, but do you think that’s really true? Could you ask Sam about it?”
“I don’t think so,” Suzanne said. “Why don’t we drop the subject and check in with Petra. See what she wants us to do.”
Amazingly, Petra had lulled herself into a state of almost tranquility.
“I told myself to stop worrying,” Petra said. “I’ve already got the dough for the scones sitting in the cooler and the tea sandwiches won’t take more than a half hour to whip together.”
“What time does the dead-body preview start?” Toni asked.
“It’s a vis-i-ta-tion,” Petra enunciated.
“Seven o’clock,” Suzanne said.
“Wait a minute,” Petra said. “Won’t you two be missing rehearsal?”
“I guess you haven’t heard,” Suzanne said. “The play’s been cancelled.”
“What?” Petra said. “Seriously? It’s been called off? Was this Sheriff Doogie’s idea?”
“I don’t know,” Suzanne said. “Maybe. I’m going to call Sam and let him know about this before he starts memorizing lines. He’s not just a type A; he’s a type A squared.”
She went out into the café, dialed the clinic, and asked to be put through to Sam. When he finally came on the line she said, “Have you heard?”
“Heard what?” Sam asked. There was another voice in the background and then Sam said, “No, it should be amoxicillin, not ampicillin. Amoxi has better efficacy in treating middle ear infections.” He muttered something else and then was back on the line. “I’m sorry, Suzanne, what were you saying?”
“Have you heard that the play’s been cancelled?”
“You mean rehearsal’s cancelled? For tonight?”
“No, forever. The whole play has been called off.”
“Seriously?” Sam said. “Well . . . humbug to that.”
“Come on, you didn’t really want to play Scrooge.”
“Sure I did. I was looking forward to it.”
“Liar.”
Sam’s throaty laugh filled Suzanne’s ear.
“Something else happened, too,” Suzanne said. “Something I need to tell you about.”
“Please don’t tell me extraterrestrials crash-landed. And that you’re about to run off with one that’s cuter and even more charming than I am.”
“One of Doogie’s deputies found a can of gasoline sitting on Amber Payson’s front porch.”
“What’s that supposed to mean? That Amber got macho and bought herself a snowmobile?”
“No. Think about it.”
Silence spun out for a few moments and then Sam said, “Wait a minute, Doogie doesn’t actually believe that she . . .”
“Used it as an accelerant when she supposedly burned down Junior’s trailer?” Suzanne said. “That’s exactly what he thinks. Doogie, in his frenetic pursuit to solve two crimes, seems to have jumped to a rather erroneous conclusion.”
“What if it’s not erroneous?” Sam asked. “What if Amber really did it? What if she murdered Allan Sharp, too?”
“Why would she?” Suzanne said, sounding a little shrill.
“Yeah, but . . . do you think she’d go nuclear over something like that?”
“We may not know the full extent of what happened,” Sam said. “Amber may have been extremely traumatized and forced to hold in much of her anger and emotions.”
“You mean like PTSD?”
“Something like that, yes.”
“And then she exploded? Like . . . bam?”
“Could happen,” Sam said. “Stranger things have.”
“I suppose,” Suzanne said. “Still, murder combined with arson is a pretty quirky combo . . .” She was fumbling for words now. “I mean . . . I’m not sure what to think . . . what to do.”
“I have a gnawing feeling—and I’m pretty sure it’s not acid reflux—that you’re going to ignore my warning and dig a whole lot deeper.”
CHAPTER 14
THE Driesden and Draper Funeral Home wasn’t exactly pleasing to the eye architecturally. In fact, with its turrets, finials, shabby gray paint, and blacked-out windows at the rear of the building (where they carried out the embalming), the building resembled the proverbial haunted house.
Even iced with snow, an appealing factor that made other homes and buildings appear soft and poufy, almost like gingerbread houses, the funeral home still appeared ominous. But that’s where Suzanne, Toni, and Petra were at this exact moment. Fussing around in Slumber Room A—what George Draper was now calling the Somnus Suite—hurrying to set up their coffee, sandwiches, and pastries in anticipation of guests dropping by for the visitation.
Ah yes, the visitation. Allan Sharp, the deceased, was most definitely present and accounted for. In fact, he was lying in final repose on the opposite side of the room, spiffed up in a charcoal three-piece suit and stretched out in a top-of-the-line walnut and brass executive-model casket. What George Draper called their Triton Model.
Toni pretended to ignore Sharp’s body, but every once in a while she dodged halfway across the room, put a hand over one eye, and emitted a shrill little mouse squeak.
“Get back over here,” Suzanne said. “Stop worrying about Allan Sharp’s dead body and help us get this food set up.”
Suzanne had spoken to Toni a little more harshly than she’d intended, probably because she still felt jittery about Amber being unceremoniously hauled away by Doogie. She was also rattled by the fact that Doogie, and apparently Petra, thought the girl was capable of murder.
“Sorry, Toni,” she said as Toni wandered back over to the refreshment table. “I didn’t mean to bark at you.”
“That’s okay,” Toni said. “I was kind of wigging out and you helped bring me back to reality. Still, this place gives me the creeps. All the dusty velvet draperies and swags of black fabric. Then there’s the flowers. I really do hate that funky funeral smell.”
“It’s funny, isn’t it,” Petra said. “You pick flowers in your garden and they smell so lovely and fragrant. Then you bring a perfectly good bouquet into a funeral home and suddenly they’re tinged with that awful hint of decay.”
“Now you’re really creeping me out,” Toni said.
“I think it’s the chemical smell that pervades everything,” Suzanne said. “It’s not the flowers’ fault.”
In reply, Toni pinched her nose closed.
“So we’ve got the three different tea sandwiches, brownie bites, bars, and coffee,” Petra said. She was talking to herself, reassuring herself, as she arranged cups, saucers, plates, and napkins just so on the hastily set-up folding table.
Toni unpinched her nose. “Maybe we should have brought a couple bottles of cheap Chardonnay.” She sounded vaguely hopeful. “Help take the edge off the evening.”
“Shame on you,” Petra said. “This is a visitation in a funeral home. Vigil lights will be lit. Prayers will be said. This isn’t supposed to be happy hour at Bub’s Bar.”
“Hey, no harm done,” Toni said. “It was only a suggestion.”
* * *
• • •
UNLIKE today’s Christmas Tea, the visitation did attract fewer people on account of the snow. Even after George Draper lit the candles, dimmed the lights, and put a soft funeral dirge on the sound system, Slumber Room A looked desultory. Like a party that wasn’t going to happen.
Then Earl Sharp, Allan Sharp’s brother who lived in the neighboring town of Jessup, arrived. Along with Don Shinder, the law partner.
Close on their heels came another half-dozen guests. And then Mayor Mobley strutted in, his face pink from the cold, the entire city council trailing behind him like a gaggle of baby ducks.
“Looks like we’ve got customers,” Petra whispered.
“Finally,” Suzanne said. She was beginning to feel sympathy for the dead-and-almost-forgotten Allan Sharp.
Mayor Mobley’s bulk sidled up to the refreshment table almost immediately.
“What have we got here?” he asked, his beady eyes roving across the sandwiches and bars.
“Let me fix you a plate,” Suzanne offered.
Mobley lifted a pudgy hand and waved her away. “That’s okay, I can manage perfectly well on my own.”
Right, Suzanne thought. Managing on his own meant stacking eight brownie bites on top of six sandwiches—which Mobley was currently doing. He reminded her of customers at a Bloody Mary bar where you were only allowed one pass, so everyone used toothpicks to creatively cantilever shrimp, buffalo wings, pickles, cheese hunks, olives, jalapeños, bacon, and beef jerky sticks off the sides of their glasses.
Good thing the rest of the mourners weren’t so greedy.
Teddy Hardwick showed up and took only a single sandwich with his cup of coffee.
“Are you sure you wouldn’t like a bar, too?” Petra asked.
Hardwick shook his head. He looked dejected and deflated, as if he’d just taken a hard punch to the gut.
“I’m sorry about your play being cancelled,” Suzanne said to him.
Hardwick’s expression seemed to collapse even more. “This cancellation is a tremendous disappointment to everyone involved. Cast, crew, all of us. We’ve worked doggone hard to make this play happen, all for the town’s enjoyment. And now . . . it’s been taken away.”
“Do you know who made the decision to call off the play?” Suzanne asked.
“Not exactly,” Hardwick said.
“Maybe Mayor Mobley?”
“I don’t know. But I’m going to make it my mission in life to find out.”
That’s funny, Suzanne thought. I’m going to make it my mission in life to find out who killed Allan Sharp. And set Junior’s trailer on fire.
Hardwick reached out and touched Suzanne’s sleeve. “Have you . . . do you know?” he stammered. “Has Sheriff Doogie shown up here yet?”
“Not yet,” she said. “But I’m sure he will.”
“I need to . . . talk to him. About something,” Hardwick said. He took a sip of coffee and almost choked.
“Are you feeling okay?” Suzanne asked.
But Hardwick just shook his head again and wandered off, looking dazed and a little lost.
Suzanne watched Hardwick practically collapse on a folding chair, one of several black folding chairs that were arranged in a semicircle like a coven of scrawny crows.
“What’s with him?” Toni asked. “He’s taking the cancellation of the play awfully hard, isn’t he?”
“Yes, he is,” Suzanne said. She wondered if Hardwick really was horribly disappointed or if he was battling a guilty conscience. And what exactly did he want to talk to Doogie about?
Suzanne’s thoughts were quickly cut off as Don Shinder came over to greet her.
“This is just wonderful what you did here,” Shinder said. “The sandwiches and bars, the coffee, just wonderful. I know Allan would have so appreciated your efforts.”
&nbs
p; “We were happy to help out,” Suzanne murmured.
“I was thinking that—” Shinder stopped suddenly. Reverend Ethan Jakes had just walked into the room. “Ah, I see our minister has arrived.” Shinder seemed sadly pleased.
“I didn’t realize that Allan Sharp was a member of the Journey’s End Church,” Suzanne said.
“He wasn’t,” Shinder said. “But Reverend Jakes contacted me when he heard about Allan’s death . . . his murder. He offered his condolences and asked if he could help in any way.”
“And now here he is,” Suzanne said. Interesting.
“He’s also going to conduct the graveside services tomorrow morning.”
“There won’t be a church service?” Petra asked. She sounded shocked—and a little disappointed.
“No, but I do hope you ladies will attend,” Shinder said. “It would mean so much to Allan’s brother.”
“Of course we will,” Petra said.
They all fell silent as Reverend Jakes took his place directly in front of the casket. He waited for the conversation to die down; then he held up a black prayer book. “If you could all come forward,” he said with a brisk motion of his hands. “I’d like to lead everyone in a few prayers.”
Toni glanced at Suzanne. “I don’t think he means us heathens.”
“Shh,” Petra said.
Reverend Jakes was certainly no slouch in the prayer department. He whipped through the Lord’s Prayer, veered into several Bible verses, and then positively galloped through the Valley of Death psalm. His voice was deep and resonant as he gazed out over the mourners with a slightly aloof look on his face.
“’Scuse me,” said a gruff voice at Suzanne’s elbow. She turned and there was Sheriff Doogie, reaching for one of the coconut-pecan bars.
“Here you are,” she said, a note of disapproval evident in her voice.
“Happy to see me?” Doogie gave her a friendly nudge with his elbow.
“Not really,” Suzanne said. “I was even less happy when you crashed my party this afternoon.”
“Couldn’t be helped. Jeez, I love these church basement funeral bars,” Doogie said.