What Are the Odds

by Marja McGraw

  Felicity stopped walking. “Okay, let’s say she’s Blondie. What could she possibly want? Why would she go to all the trouble to wear dated clothing and a wig? What’s in it for her?”

  “I honestly can’t give you an answer. I have no idea about what’s going on, but it’ll come to me. I need to quit being on vacation and start wearing my private eye fedora.”

  “Oh, you’re so funny sometimes. You watch too many old movies. Fedora? Maybe we can dig up a fedora in one of the closets.”

  “Let’s hope we don’t dig up anything else, except maybe a few clues. Know what I mean?”

  “I sure do.” Felicity scrunched up her face. “I don’t know what it is, but you’re right when you say there’s something about Marion that doesn’t feel right. Maybe she wanted to tell us something but changed her mind.”

  I shrugged my shoulders, which was becoming a habit like sighing, and we headed up the dirt driveway. Dinner was starting to sound pretty good. I hadn’t realized how hungry I was until I smelled the barbeque heating.

  Bubba trotted off in the direction of Pete and the barbeque grill.

  “I’ll go inside and make the salad,” I said. “For as primitively as we’re living, we sure have a lot of food on hand. Between the refrigerator in the motor home and what we’ve bought and put in the one in the apartment, we’re set for a while.”

  “We bought more than we realized when we first got here and when we stopped after our dinner out. Maybe we duplicated what your mother bought.”

  I quickly changed the subject, simply because the amount of food we had wasn’t an issue. “Okay, back to Marion. I just know there’s something going on with her. I seriously wonder if she’s playing the role of Blondie, but why? Is she nuts or does she have a hidden agenda?”

  “My preference would be a hidden agenda.” Felicity smiled at me. “I don’t want to think some crazy woman is living across the street and she’s able to get in and out of this house at will.”

  “I’m with you. Besides, if it’s her, then there’s no ghost.”

  Chapter Forty-three

  “The idea of no ghost works for me,” Felicity said. “My mind is made up. It’s got to be Marion playing the part of Blondie.”

  I didn’t respond because I simply wasn’t sure.

  We made our way around the house and to the apartment where we found my mother busily spreading butter on French bread. “I’m assuming everyone will want garlic salt and parmesan cheese on their bread?”

  Nodding, I said, “I think so. We’ve got a pretty hungry group for dinner tonight. I think we’d eat anything that made its way to the table. I’m going to put the salad together.”

  I passed my mother and opened the refrigerator, pulling out a fresh head of lettuce, tomatoes, some sliced jicama I’d found at the store and a can of black olives. I searched for anything else I could find, but that was it. Thankfully we had a couple of bottles of salad dressing, although I would have preferred homemade.

  When I turned to the sink, I realized Felicity was already telling Mother about meeting Marion out on the road.

  “…and she said she has nothing more to tell us. I don’t believe her, and I don’t think Sandi does either. And we think she might be Blondie.”

  Mother put the lid on the tub of butter and returned it to the refrigerator. “Well, that’s a possibility. I hadn’t thought about someone actually wearing a wig. We talked about it, but I didn’t really believe it.” She looked thoughtful for a moment. “You know, we only saw her sitting on the couch at the Ellison’s house. I never thought about what she might look like if she stood up. I didn’t notice what she was wearing either. Of course, why would she be wearing vintage clothing?”

  “If it is her,” I said, “she’d probably save the sixties outfit to wear when she had the wig on. I have to assume she’s been trying to look like Barbara’s mother. What was her name? Oh, yeah. Francine.”

  “But why?” my mother asked. “What’s the deal about her wanting to look like Francine?”

  Mother brought a large bowl in to use for the salad, so after washing it, I started picking the lettuce apart and putting the pieces in it. “I’ve been thinking about the photo Stan and I found in the bedroom. I think she knows about something that happened here and she wants us to figure it out without having to tell us. I don’t get it, but… Hmm. Maybe she wants us to think Barbara’s mother tried to look out for her and it didn’t work. Both the mother and the daughter are in the picture.”

  “Yeah, maybe she saw something the police don’t know about from when the murders took place. Who knows? Maybe the ranch hand didn’t really kill those people. Marion takes walks. Maybe she saw what really happened.”

  “You might be on to something,” I said.

  We stopped talking and I thought about that scenario while I cut the jicama sticks into pieces.

  My mother grinned. “You know, girls, we make pretty good detectives. Why, I’ll bet the men aren’t even thinking about what could have happened.”

  “Of course, they don’t know our latest theory about Marion. Let’s put it to them and see what they think.”

  Felicity sliced the tomatoes. “What about our competition to find the details of the murders?”

  “The heck with the competition. I think we need to work together. My gut feeling is something a lot bigger than we think happened here.” I dropped the jicama pieces in the salad and tossed it, knocking some salad on the floor.

  “When they say toss a salad, I don’t think that’s what they mean.” Mother picked up a couple of pieces of lettuce and jicama.

  “Sorry. I guess I got a little too excited. You know, the more I think about it, the more I believe Marion knows something. And I mean something big.”

  Felicity carefully laid the tomato slices on top of the salad. “Don’t you think the police probably had all the facts? Maybe we could get a copy of the police report and see if something seems wrong. We talked about doing that once before, if I remember right.”

  “That’s a good idea. Mom, do you think Frank would drive into town and see if he can get the report?”

  “He’s so anxious to get as much done on this place as possible while he’s got help. I don’t think I want to ask him. We’ll figure something out though.”

  “Are there any more neighbors left to talk to?” Felicity asked.

  I almost slapped my forehead. “What about Tyler’s parents? If we can’t talk to them, he can. I’ll ask him about it over dinner.”

  “Knock, knock.” Racheal stood at the sliding glass door. “What about Tyler? Sorry, I wasn’t eavesdropping, but I couldn’t help hearing his name.”

  “Come on in,” I said.

  She opened the screen door and joined us. “Zoë stayed outside with the guys. So what about Tyler?”

  “I was just thinking about his parents.” I shoved the salad bowl to the side. “We’ve talked to the other neighbors, but we haven’t spoken to the Hansens. I thought if he knew the questions I have, maybe he’d talk to them for me. What do you think?”

  She grinned. “Are you kidding? He’d like nothing more than to become involved in this. I know we’re going to help catch the blonde, but he wants to do something else, too.”

  “Good. We’ll talk about it over dinner.” Mother wrapped the bread in foil. “I’m going to use the oven in the motorhome to heat this. I’ll meet you outside.”

  I nodded and picked up the salad, grabbing a couple of paper towels to set on top of it so the flies wouldn’t land on it, and followed my mother out the door.

  Felicity and Racheal were right behind me.

  We walked past the barbeque and heard Zoë telling Pete how to barbeque the corn on the cob.

  I stopped for a moment and gave Pete a quick kiss.

  As we walked away, I heard Zoë giving him some other barbequing tips. I glanced over my shoulder and saw him nodding, but not responding. She soon caught up to us.

  I glanced at Pete again and there
was no doubt in my mind he was doing the corn her way, but the steaks were his way.

  Bubba had himself firmly planted next to the barbeque, his nose in the air, sniffing for all he was worth.

  “We brought an extra table,” Racheal said.

  “I see that.” I set the salad on one of the tables.

  Frank was setting out paper plates, plastic utensils and steak knives.

  Stanley was walking a few steps behind him, setting out napkins and moving the forks to the left side of plates since Frank had put everything on the right.

  I heard Felicity chuckling. “Frank doesn’t even see what Stan is doing.”

  “That’s probably a good thing,” I said.

  My mother brought out the toasted bread and Pete appeared with a plate stacked with steaks.

  “They’re all medium since I didn’t know how everyone likes them,” he said. His tone almost sounded like he was daring anyone to argue with him. He left for a moment and returned with two plates, one bearing baked potatoes and the other loaded with corn on the cob.

  “Very good,” I said.

  For the next few minutes there wasn’t a sound except that of food being dished up.

  “Pssst.”

  I looked and saw Stanley sitting directly across from me.

  “I decided to sit here so I can keep an eye on the house. If Blondie shows up, I’ll know it,” he whispered.

  “You don’t need to whisper,” I said. “Not only that, but you’ve brought up a subject we want to talk to everyone about.”

  “Oh.”

  While we ate I explained out ideas about Marion and Blondie. I didn’t have much detail, but I told them what I could.

  Tyler scratched his chin. “You know, you could be right. There’s always been something about Marion that didn’t quite settle right with me. She always made me feel like she was secretive, but I couldn’t figure out what she might need to hide. I’ll ask my parents if they remember anything about her.”

  “Ask what they think about the ghost stories, too,” I said.

  Pete reached under the table and squeezed my knee. “There’s no such thing as a ghost. Only nuts like the woman across the road.”

  Chapter Forty-four

  Ignoring Pete, I turned to Tyler. “That’s another thing. I was hoping either you’d talk to your parents about what’s been going on or maybe I could. What do they remember about the murders? Can they tell us anything about Marion? Can they think of anything that might explain why she seems to be directing us toward Francine? You know, that kind of thing.”

  “Sure. Not a problem. I’ll give them a call tonight.” He turned to his brother. “I know you were young, but do you remember anything from when the murders happened? Or do you remember Francine?”

  “I was too young, bro. Mom and Dad shielded me from everything that happened. I don’t really remember Francine, either. I’m not even sure I’d been born when she died.”

  “What about Marion?” Tyler forked a piece of steak and popped it in his mouth.

  “Marion wasn’t living with her grandparents the whole time I was at home. I don’t know her very well. She didn’t seem to like kids that much, either. I vaguely remember her shooing us away from her grandparents’ house. Oh, yeah, and she wanted us to stay away from the llama ranch. She made a point of telling us what a bas… Uh, what a piece of garbage Harry was.” He glanced at the ladies sitting around the table and then pointedly stared at his plate before digging into his baked potato.

  Bubba sat politely next to the table, staring intently at Micah, almost as though he was willing the man to read his mind. Give steak. Give dog steak. Good dog want meat. I had a feeling I was pretty close to Bubba’s thoughts and the corners of my mouth turned up.

  “Okay,” I said. “I guess that tells us at least a little about Marion.”

  “She’s odd. At least, that’s always been my opinion of her.” Racheal reached for another piece of garlic bread. “She comes and goes, sometimes staying with her grandparents and sometimes just visiting, but she’s not social at all. She ignores the neighbors, which is a shame because Zetta is a real sweetheart and loves to visit with them, but when Marion is there everyone keeps their distance.”

  “Interesting.” My mother turned and looked toward the Ellison house.

  “If you’re right about her posing as Blondie, I don’t believe we have to worry about her making an appearance while we eat.” Stanley pointed toward the road. “She’s taking another one of her walks.”

  We each turned and looked, and she was watching us, but abruptly turned and walked the other way.

  Pete shook his head. “I just don’t get her. What are the odds she’s Blondie?”

  “I’d say they’re pretty good.” I believed more and more that we were right.

  We spent the rest of the dinner hour eating and making plans for the next night. Since Micah’s car had tinted windows, he’d pick me up after dark and drive off. No one would know the truck was empty except for me.

  My mother would park their car in the back where no one could see who climbed in it, and leave right after us. Again, by being in the dark no one would be able to see if the car was full of people or not. Pete would do the same thing with our Jeep, and turn the radio up so it would sound like a noisy crowd.

  Then we’d all sneak back to the house, where the rest of the group would be waiting.

  “I’ve got to remember to leave the wedding rings somewhere conspicuous. I was thinking of leaving them on the sink, but she might not look there. I’ll figure it out.”

  “Yeah, where would you look if you’d been searching for years?” Zoë asked.

  Stanley sat up straighter. “I’d look in one of two places. The upstairs bedroom where we found the photo, or the basement where she seemed to be looking for something.” He was proud of himself.

  “The basement,” I said. “That’s the last place I saw her, and she only left because she heard me coming. Of course, I have no idea if she’s really looking for the wedding rings, but what else could it be?”

  “I guess we’ll find out,” Zoë said. “And I think I’ll be hiding in the basement, waiting for her.”

  Micah leaned forward and stared into her eyes. “Not by yourself. I’ll have Tyler drive my truck and I’ll wait in the basement with you.”

  Zoë looked surprised. “You know I can take care of myself. I’ve always taken care of myself.”

  He looked uncomfortable. “This is different. We don’t know what that broad is up to and I’m not taking any chances.”

  Pete and I looked at each other. We’d had similar conversations regarding some of our cases. He winked at me. I reached under the table and patted his knee.

  “Well, okay Mic, if you put it that way.” Zoë’s voice had wonder in it and I guessed he’d never been protective like this before. “But I get first shot at her.”

  Her last comment burst my little bubble. She was humoring him, not admiring his protectiveness.

  “Not if I get to her first,” Micah said.

  “Honestly, I think I should be in the basement with Sandi.” Pete gave the couple a meaningful look. “You two haven’t had experience in situations like this. I was a cop, and I have, and so has Sandi. So here’s the deal. Micah can drive my Jeep out of here and I’ll wait in the basement. Sandi can climb into the truck with Tyler, but let her out right away so she can sneak into the house. If Marion is doing the search, she’s going to wait until she’s certain we aren’t coming right back.”

  “Good point,” Micah said. “You were a cop? Interesting.”

  The conversation took a turn and the men spent considerable time talking about Pete’s experiences with the L.A.P.D.

  The women cleaned up the now empty paper plates before we adjourned to the chairs we’d set out by the swimming pool. My mother and I assured them we’d clean up everything else later.

  “I honestly can’t figure out what Marion is up to,” I said. “I’ve looked at several
scenarios, but nothing seems to fit.”

  “I think you were right when you mentioned thinking she knows something about the murders that the police never figured out.” My mother took a sip of her iced tea.

  “I’m sure they did a thorough investigation though. I can’t imagine what they could have missed.” I opened a chocolate candy bar – dessert.

  Zoë leaned forward in her chair. “She could have seen something that would change everyone’s perception of the murders, although for the life of me I can’t imagine why she wouldn’t have ratted everybody out. They were all dead. What would, or what could, the police do after the fact?”

  “And how would it have impacted her if she told what she knew when it was a done deal? Unless she was involved, there wouldn’t be anyone left to punish. Like you said, they were all dead.” Felicity seemed taken with the idea that Marion had seen or heard something.

  She, Zoë and Racheal began dreaming up scenarios that could have changed the outcome of the police investigation. My mother and I listened, but some of their ideas were pretty far-fetched.

  “Livvie, what do you think?” Felicity asked.

  My mother didn’t hesitate with her answer. “I think she knows where the bodies are buried, so to speak. She knows something, but I think she’s afraid to come forward. She just needs a little encouragement – the kind Sandi can give her.”

  “Felicity and I tried that earlier. She’ll come around though. I think maybe we opened a door for her. I’ll bet she’s thinking about talking to us right now.” At least I hoped so.

  Mother glanced at her watch. “Well, it’s getting late. I’m about done in for the day. This barbeque was a lot of fun and we’ll have to do it again.”

  We stood and my mother gave the Hansen women a hug.

  So did Felicity and I.

  Mother smiled. “It’s been fun getting to know you better, and putting together a scheme. We’ll catch Blondie before she knows what happened to her.”