Miz Scarlet and the Acrimonious Attorney

by Sara M. Barton

  “That’s because I use the cheap stuff, dear, to save money.” Her hushed voice faded as they continued down the hallway.

  “That was close,” I told my canine companion. I kissed his neck and set him down on the floor. “At least we know for certain now that the Boxers are in on the game.”

  Kenny was in complete agreement with that assessment ten minutes later. Of course, it also came with a warning.

  “No snooping, Miz Scarlet. Leave the investigation to the professionals.”

  “I wasn’t snooping!” I retorted.

  “Concealing yourself behind the drapes qualifies as snooping activity, honey buns.”

  “I only did that so as to not get caught.”

  “See? The desire to elude capture means you were snooping.”

  “I wasn’t trying to overhear their conversation, Captain Peacock!” I countered hotly. “I was trying to avoid an awkward situation because I inadvertently overheard them talking as they came up the stairs.”

  “A wise woman would have gone down the back staircase or even back to her own suite on the third floor!”

  “They would have seen me!”

  “So, you panicked and hid behind the drapes.” He crossed his arms across his chest, his countenance clearly showing his disbelief in my explanation.

  “Kenny!” I was spitting mad by now.

  “Scarlet!”

  “That’s not fair! I did nothing wrong!”

  “I agree.”

  I heard those words come out of the mouth I so dearly loved to kiss and did a double take. “What?”

  “I agree with you. But from the perspective of the plaintiffs’ attorney, it appears that you were deliberately spying on the Boxers, which means you probably also spied on Sam and Mimi Kitanen.”

  “Oh, bulldocky!”

  “Do you want to settle with the Kitanens? Or, if you have the insurance company handle it, have them pay out?”

  “Of course I don’t!”

  “Then you need to let me get to work on this. It’s important that you don’t react in any way at all.”

  “But Bob Boxer is planning to sabotage the inn,” I reminded him. “What do we do about that?”

  “You have the inspection report from the review of the Four Acorns Inn, sweetheart,” he reminded me. Kenny softened the blow by taking my hand. “And you know that Bur and I will make sure Bob Boxer’s handiwork fails tonight. Besides, half the fun is going to be watching your guests react when they fall face first. Now, what’s for dinner? I’m starved!”

  Kenny accompanied me back to the inn just after ten thirty. He was a man with a plan.

  “I’ll set up the cameras in the public spaces and will monitor them from the library tonight. Bur will relieve me at six-thirty. Can you unlock the porch door for me after you set up the dining room for breakfast? I don’t want your guests to know I’m here.”

  “I will do that,” I promised. He gave me a kiss that made me want to linger.

  “Now get moving, Miz Scarlet, and make a big show of going up to your suite. I want the little cheese weasel to do his dirty deeds while the night is young. I’ll need time to fix what he breaks.”

  “Sure.”

  After I got everything set up for breakfast in the butler’s pantry and the kitchen, I shut off the lights and made my nightly rounds, to make sure the doors were all locked, before I turned on the alarm system by the front door. I was about to punch in the code when a faint noise attracted my attention. Whirling around quickly, I caught sight of Bob as he tried to flee from the upper landing of the grand staircase.

  “Bob?” I hailed him, throwing a lot more cheerfulness into my voice than I felt. “Is there something you need?”

  There was no answer from the man now hiding behind the drapes. It was hard not to smile at the irony.

  “Scarlet?” Lacey suddenly leaned over the railing. “Is something wrong?”

  “I thought I saw Bob Boxer up there. I wanted to know if he needed something.” In my best attempt at pantomime, I tried to demonstrate that our wayward guest was now concealed behind six yards of heavy slate blue velvet, trimmed in gold fringe.

  “Are you dancing?” she wanted to know. I made a face and tried again. Pretending to grab the fabric, I pulled my arms in to my body in an effort to mimic Bob’s movement. “Oh, wait. I’ll get this. You’re twirling...no, you’re hugging. Oh, that can’t be right. What are you doing?”

  That was the moment I lost it. Taking the stairs two at a time, I rushed up the stairs and led the way to Bob’s hiding place. Yanking one half of the drapery to one side, I triumphantly revealed a very chagrined man.

  “This is what I wanted you to see!”

  “But, ah....” Bob Boxer, caught red-faced and red-handed, threw a punch in my direction before running off to the Red Oak Room. It was lucky for me that my reflexes were sharp enough; his fist landed a glancing blow to my left shoulder.

  “Well!” Lacey was appalled. “The nerve of that man, trying to strike you!”

  “You can say that again,” I told her. I pointed to the screwdriver, pliers, and wire cutters on the floor. “What do you suppose he planned to do with those?”

  “I hope we’ll never know,” was her reply. But I wasn’t content to wait around while Bob and his wife reorganized their campaign of harassment. I scooped up the items and marched down the hallway to the Red Oak Room. With the tools clutched to my chest by my left arm, I rapped loudly on the door with my right.

  Roz opened the door, dressed in her floral nightgown and matching robe. “Oh, Scarlet, is there something wrong?”

  “You bet your sweet fanny there is something wrong! Your husband just left his tools behind my hallway drapes. Here you go!” I took four steps into the guest suite and dumped my load on the bed. “And if I find any damage done to this inn by you or your husband, I will hold both of you personally accountable. Now, pack your bags and get out!”

  “But....”

  “There are no buts, lady! You and your friends, the Kitanens, are going to go to jail for fraud. Every insurance company that you ripped off is going to know what you did! Now move it!” As I stood there, glaring at the flustered woman, Bob Boxer flew out of the bathroom and launched himself at me.

  Chapter Eight

  “Bob, no!” Roz cried out as her husband tackled me with enough force to send me crashing into the wall. While I struggled to breathe, the belligerent saboteur scurried out of the room, ran down the stairs, and threw open the front door, suitcase in hand. Without a backward glance, he fled into the night.

  “Wait for me!” Not bothering to collect her belongings, Roz followed in her nightclothes.

  “She’s getting away, Scarlet,” said my mother’s cousin, poking me in the side.

  “She is, isn’t she?” I replied, suddenly galvanized to get moving.

  Lacey and I took the stairs, our feet flying down every tread. My mother, in her wheelchair, rode the elevator to the first floor. By the time we met up at the open front door, a frigid winter wind had chilled the foyer by twenty degrees.

  “Brr!” Lacey clutched her robe, shivering as she peered out into the night. I was about to do the same when the security alarm trilled. Whoop! Whoop! Whoop! The assault on my ears was painful.

  “Nuts!” I quickly punched in the code to disarm it.

  “That’s better,” my mother told me as the tranquility of the inn was restored.

  “What’s wrong?” Kara Larson leaned over the upstairs railing, concern etched on her face. “Is there a fire?”

  “No. The Boxers decided to depart unexpectedly,” I explained through clenched teeth. “It’s nothing to worry about.”

  The Francos joined Kara. “We heard a terrible racket.”

  “I’m so sorry, folks. The security alarm went off. Please accept my apologies.”

  “Back to bed, dear,” Angelo Franco urged his wife, “before you catch your death of cold.”

  Glancing up at Naomi, shivering as she stoo
d there at the railing, I could see why her husband was concerned. That was my cue to remedy the situation.

  “Let me shut the door, Lacey. We’re letting all the heat out.” I reached past her and closed it firmly. That seemed to do the trick.

  “I can’t believe they left like that,” Naomi Franco replied. “Were they upset?”

  I decided not to answer that. There was no point in drawing attention to the Boxers’ bad behavior.

  “At least it’s not three in the morning,” Kara Larson remarked. “That would have really freaked me out. Well, I’m going back to bed.”

  “We should do the same,” Angelo concurred, wrapping his arm around his wife’s shoulder. “Come on, Nay-nay.”

  Their voices soon faded, a sure sign they had returned to their rooms. As I turned around to encourage the Googins girls to do the same, I found they had reopened the door.

  “It’s cold and late, ladies,” I reminded them. They ignored me. “And you’re letting all the heat out of the house.”

  “Check this out, Scarlet,” Lacey encouraged me, pulling me closer to that blast of cold air. “It’s worth the price of admission.”

  Half way down the driveway, Roz Boxer flapped her arms in the air, jumping up and down. For a brief moment, I wondered if Bob was going to mow her down with his Toyota, but he finally braked the car and slowed down long enough for his wife to slide into the passenger seat. The Corolla turned right at the end of the driveway, no doubt on its way to I-384.

  “Well, well.” Kenny came up behind us. “Game over. It’s Miz Scarlet in the Red Oak Room with a tool kit. That’s a nice way to kill a case, babe.”

  “But I caught him red-handed!” I protested.

  “She did,” Lacey agreed. She slipped a partners-in-crime arm around my shoulder. “The guy was hiding behind the drapes with his tools. And he threw her against the wall! Are you okay, dear? I didn’t have a chance to ask you that.”

  “I’m fine. He just knocked the wind out of me.”

  “We could have gotten evidence that could be used at trial to save your assets, Scarlet. Now we’ve got nothing!”

  “Oh,” my mother sighed. “Why do these things always seem to happen to you? It’s like you have a knack for finding trouble!”

  “Blame your side of the family!” I shot back. “It’s not like the Googins girls were ever able to resist the opportunity to mettle in other people’s affairs!”

  “What’s going on?” Jenny called out from the upper landing. “Did I miss something?”

  “Yes, you did. You missed the infamous amateur detective chasing off the bad guys,” Kenny told her.

  “Good for you!” my intrepid assistant remarked. “Score another win for Miz Scarlet!”

  “Not if the Kitanens proceed with their lawsuit,” said the expert investigator from Mercer Security.

  “I don’t think that’s going to happen,” I responded, bending over to retrieve something from the floor. “It looks like one of the Boxers dropped a cell phone on the way out the door. Do you suppose it has evidence on it?”

  “You’ll never know,” Kenny laughed, snatching the phone from my hand. “You don’t have a warrant.”

  “I don’t need one. I’m trying to return lost property to a guest. How can I know who it belongs to if I don’t check the phone for contact information? And if I happen to see something on there while I am trying to do that, I’m not really snooping, am I?”

  “Actually, you are. Besides, it’s time to report this to the police, unless the Boxers have already paid their bill, in which case we will simply mail this back to them.”

  “Rats!” I grimaced.

  “Rats and double rats,” said Lacey. “I was kind of hoping we could scroll through their text messages.”

  “Really!” my mother harrumphed. “Do you people any sense of decency at all?”

  “Not when my rights have been violated,” I insisted. “And not when they’re working in cahoots with the people suing us!”

  “Laurel, she’s right. Bob Boxer was trying to damage the inn, so that his friends could collect thousands of dollars from her. This is no time to be a Girl Scout.”

  “Is there a reason why you folks don’t want to let the police handle this, or Mercer Security for that matter?” Kenny wanted to know.

  “Can it at least wait until morning? It’s late and the drama is over,” I pointed out.

  “I suppose it can,” he grudgingly agreed.

  “Well, at least they’re gone.” I could hear the relief in my mother’s voice.

  “Good riddance to bad rubbish,” said Cousin Lacey.

  “And on that note, I will say goodnight to you all.” My mother wheeled around and pushed herself to the elevator. Lacey followed her.

  “I guess I’ll get going,” Kenny announced. “There’s no reason for me to hang around now that the Boxers have departed.”

  “Must you go?” I wrapped my arm around his waist and leaned in. “I will make up the sofa bed for you in the library. And I’ll make you French toast and bacon for breakfast.”

  “Is this a bribe?”

  “Is it working?” I gave him a grin.

  “Maybe. I’ll stay on one condition.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You admit that you blew the case by going rogue.”

  “Is that really necessary, Kenny?”

  “Why, yes. It is, Miz Scarlet. We still don’t have enough evidence to be sure that the Kitanens will back off on their lawsuit. And we still don’t have any proof we can take to your insurance company. On top of that, we have the Boxers fleeing in the middle of the night because you caught Bob with some tools before he damaged anything.”

  “Oh,” I sighed. He did have a point.

  “And we only have your claim that they even know the Kitanens. In court, that boils down to ‘she said, they said’. You’re not likely to convince a judge that your version is the right one. All they have to do is deny ever mentioning the Kitanens in their conversation. Unless there is a chain of evidence to link the two couples in an organized crime ring, no self-respecting judge will allow you to vent your spleen about collusion.”

  “I hate it when you’re right, Captain Peacock,” I admitted, calling him by his high school nickname. “I got sloppy, didn’t I?”

  “It’s not the end of the world...at least not yet, babe.” He kissed the top of my head. “I will chalk this up to the fact that the summons you received while at the grocery store upset your emotional equilibrium.”

  “It did. It really did, Kenny. I’ve never been sued before, and to have it be for a fraudulent claim makes me completely crazy.”

  “I know. But don’t worry. We’ll get through this.”

  “I hope so. We’ve put so much into the inn’s renovation this year. We can’t afford this nonsense.” I stifled a yawn. When I looked up at him, his mouth was wide open. The groan that came out of it was worthy of an exhausted lion.

  “Tomorrow’s a new day. We’ll start fresh.”

  “That sounds good. Right now, I just want to climb into bed,” I sighed. He walked me up the stairs, opened the door to the attic, and said farewell.

  “Sleep tight, Miz Scarlet.”

  “You too, Captain Peacock.”

  Just after three in the morning, the security alarmed went off again. Mozzie started to woof, hoping to alert us. By the time the King Charles Cavalier spaniel issued her third warning, Huck had joined in. January took it to the next level, barking and twirling, just in case Jenny and I didn’t understand the immediate urgency. The three-dog concert was loud enough to wake the dead.

  “What’s going on?” Jenny met me in our shared sitting room. The incessant trilling of the security alarm, combined with the dog barking, forced me to shout.

  “I have no idea. Maybe the Boxers came back for their things.”

  “And broke in?” She was shocked.

  “I don’t know, Jen. We have to get down there and find out. Let’s leave the dog
s here, just in case we have an intruder. I don’t want any of them to get hurt.”

  By the time we got to the first floor, Kenny had taken charge of the situation. He stood in the doorway of the living room, dressed in his khaki pants and a white tee shirt. As the lights came on, I could see a window pane missing from the French doors that led out to the back garden. There were tiny shards of broken glass all over the Persian carpet.

  “Someone tried to break in?”

  “It looks that way. Can you turn off the alarm, Scarlet?”

  “Sure, Kenny,” I told him, shouting to be heard over the din. I went back out to the foyer and shut it off. As I passed the window, a dark figure ducked behind the rhododendron.

  “Whoa!” Trying hard not to alert the intruder, I hurried back to the living room to warn Kenny. But before I could open my mouth and spit out those words, there was a thud and the tinkle of broken glass hitting a hard surface.

  “Did you hear that?” I hissed.

  “I did.”

  “That sounded like someone broke a window in the dining room,” Jenny remarked nervously.

  “I’m sorry to bother you, but I heard all the noise.” Kara Larson stood in the doorway of the living room, wearing a short robe and nightie. “Is something wrong?”

  “Ah....” I hemmed.

  “Did something bad happen?” she wondered. She was obviously apprehensive. I couldn’t really blame her. Join our Jell-O party. We’re all shaking and quaking.

  “Well....” I hawed.

  “I think someone’s in the house,” Jenny whispered to her.

  “Should we call the police now?” I asked, worried that the Boxers were now armed and dangerous.

  Kenny stood at the living room window, gazing out at the parking area. “There’s no need.”

  “Oh?”

  “The Francos are making their escape.”

  “The Francos are doing what?” I rushed to his side and peered over his shoulder. Sure enough, two dark figures were tossing their luggage into the trunk of their car. “You’ve got to be joking!”

  “You’d think so, wouldn’t you?”

  “Could someone please tell me what’s going on?” Kara begged.