Death of a Domestic Diva

by Sharon Short

  Owen leaned over, kissed me atop my head. It felt strange—the feeling of skin brushing skin at the top of my head. Then he said, “You’re beautiful.”

  I went ahead and cried.

  And didn’t stop, until Winnie staggered into the kitchen, blinking, saying, with a thick voice, “What’s all the racket. . . and how’d I get here . . . and—”

  She stopped when she saw me, her mouth hanging open.

  We had to get Winnie a cool cloth, and some iced tea, then spend some time explaining things to her—like how she (and her bookmobile) came to be here at Owen’s, how Paige had gone off with Steve and Linda Crooks, how Billy had confessed to Tyra’s murder and gone off with Chief John Worthy, and how I came to be bald. She kept looking worriedly at me—well, really, at my bald head, jumping in with things like, “you know, the top of your head will freeze in the winter,” and “you know, the top of your head will steam if you get too hot in the summer.”

  Finally, it was her turn to talk. We gathered around Owen’s kitchen table, Owen and me politely quiet, waiting for Winnie to start. Winnie looked even more worried than ever.

  “As you know, Josie, you tasked me with finding out all I could about Tyra Grimes’s background,” she said, finally looking me in the eyes, instead of at my head.

  I nodded.

  “So, all I’m reporting here are the facts. You can’t blame me for what I found out.”

  “Right.”

  She sighed deeply, took a long sip of iced tea, and patted her forehead with the damp cloth.

  “Well, you know Stringtown.”

  Stringtown . . . sure I knew Stringtown. I’d just been there a few days before. I felt a chill, wondering what connection Tyra had to the tiny village.

  “Well, it turns out that Tyra Grimes is actually from Stringtown. She was born there. And she grew up there. Until she left, when she was sixteen, for New York.”

  I shook my head. “That can’t be. Everyone knows Tyra Grimes’s bio. She grew up an only child, in middle-class suburbia outside of Chicago, then decided to become a designer to help people have a sense of proper style, and ended up with a TV show first on a local station, then went to New York—”

  “That’s all spin,” Winnie said. “The story we’ve all heard. The truth is I did my research thoroughly—and lots of it—and believe me, thirty years ago, Tyra was an only child living in Stringtown. I searched everything I could find on Tyra Grimes, going back as far as I could, and I finally found an article, in the National Insight—”

  I rolled my eyes, thinking of the wave of reporters I’d fended off earlier with my Jezebel-the-clown-from-France act. “That rag? They’re still reporting Elvis sightings at 7-11’s in Michigan—”

  Winnie looked over the top of her glasses at me with her best librarian look. “While I’m glad to know your ability to discern good reading from trash is improving, Josie, please bear with me.”

  I shrank back in my chair at that. She knew that, while I was more than glad to read good books, I also couldn’t resist rags like National Insight and Sweet Love’s Salty Confessions—especially if I was feeling blue. And had a box of salty chips handy. Plus Big Fizz diet cola. And a super sized bar of chocolate, of course.

  “Go on,” Owen urged.

  “Well, the National Insight had a little article, about ten years ago, that Tyra Grimes had really grown up in String-town, and that Tyra was not her real name. Seems a widow from Stringtown claimed Tyra was really her long-lost daughter, and especially now that her husband was dead, she wanted in on Tyra’s fame and success—preferably in the form of cash. When Tyra denied her claims, the woman went to the National Insight with her sob story.”

  “Ah—a classic case of fame and fortune suddenly drawing friends and family out of every nook and cranny,” said Owen, warming to the story Winnie was weaving. “A theme covered by all the classicists—Aristotle, Shakespeare . . . why, in one play—”

  I jumped in, anxious to hear Winnie’s story. “So what happened then?”

  “Tyra, of course, denied the story again, in articles published in Chicago newspapers—and the National Insight printed a retraction with an apology to Tyra. Then the whole story disappeared from the press.”

  My eyebrows went up—and my skepticism kicked into red alert mode. “They retracted the story? They never do that.”

  Winnie gave a little satisfied smile. “Exactly. Made me suspicious right off. If they had kept on with the story, I’d have probably dismissed it out of hand. But instead, I did some more digging. And I found out that the woman really was from Stringtown, and had had a daughter, who suddenly left Stringtown at sixteen. I checked at Mason County South High School, where the daughter would have gone, and found out the girl had actually missed most of her sophomore year. No one really remembered her—I talked to a few teachers and the principal, all retired now.

  “But I did find one clipping in an old school newspaper about how this girl had won a home ec contest on how she’d decorate a house, and the article talked about how she always wanted to be a decorator—and she was determined to become a very famous and rich one, too. And that she wanted to go to New York to live.”

  A sudden wash of tingles came over me. I shook my head. “But that could just be coincidence. I mean, there must be thousands of young girls who have dreams like that. . . and plenty of people who’d try to take advantage of someone as famous as Tyra Grimes.”

  “True,” Winnie said. “So I called Samantha.” Samantha is Winnie’s oldest daughter, a financial planner who lives in New York. “And she got in touch with a private detective she knows for me, who checked out motor vehicle records. And what the detective discovered was that the girl had gone to New York, gotten a driver’s license, and an apartment. Then the girl’s name just disappeared from all such records. So he checked the records by address, instead. And discovered, at the same address, a year later, someone with the same license number but another name—Tyra Grimes.”

  Owen hopped up, started pacing. “So Tyra came back here out of sentimentality, perhaps to reunite with her dear old mother, after all. Perhaps under the pressure of the investigation into her company’s activities, she needed the comfort—”

  “No,” Winnie said. “The woman claiming to be Tyra Grimes’s mother is long gone from Stringtown. She just up and disappeared not long after the retraction about Tyra. Eventually their house—which was mostly a shack anyway—fell in on itself. Not a trace of it now—”

  “Okay, this is all interesting,” I jumped in. “But there’s something you’ve been avoiding telling us.”

  Winnie cast her eyes down, took another sip of tea, her hand shaking so that she sloshed some out on her chin. Owen looked at me. “Actually, Winnie’s been quite impressive in her thoroughness—”

  “Yes, except she hasn’t told us one thing—Tyra’s real name when she was growing up in Stringtown.”

  “Why, that’s true,” Owen exclaimed. “Do tell us, Winnie. What was Tyra’s birth name?”

  Winnie looked up at me, a look of apology in her eyes. She took a deep breath. “Tyra was born Henrietta Toadfern. The only child of Myrtle and Henry Toadfern—the son of your great-grandfather’s brother, Clitus Toadfern.”

  I felt myself go light-headed.

  “Josie,” said Winnie. Her voice suddenly sounded very far away. “Do you understand what this means? You and Tyra Grimes . . . why, you’re second cousins, once removed . . .”

  And at that, I took a deep breath—and passed out.

  Mrs. Oglevee was waiting for me in the white fogginess. She had on a hot pink leather pantsuit, white spike-heeled boots, and her auburn Tyra Grimes-style wig.

  She held an extra Tyra Grimes-style wig in her hand—and held it out to me. “Here,” she said, her throat all croaky, as if she’d been up all night, partying. “You’ll be needing this.”

  I crossed my arms, stuck out my chin. “No thanks. I’m fine the way I am, and—”

  Mrs. Oglevee rol
led her eyes. “Suit yourself, baldy.” She tossed the wig over her shoulder, into the fog. The wig disappeared. “So, why’d you call me up, then?”

  I gaped at that. “Me? Call you? Why would I do that?”

  She shrugged. “Beats me. But sure as shootin’, I don’t keep making these trips out to see you because I’m dying for your company.” She paused, laughed herself into a fit of coughing, then laughed some more. “Ooh—that was a good one, referring to myself dying for something, when I’m already—”

  She stopped when she saw I wasn’t laughing. “Okay, I see you’re not in a mood for hilarity, not that I blame you. So what is it you want? I’m a busy woman and I’m expecting some high-falutin’ company.”

  I frowned at that. “I don’t think Tyra Grimes is going to think you look very sophisticated, or—”

  Mrs. Oglevee laughed again. She sure was in a cheery mood. “The look I’m going for isn’t sophisticated. And I’m not waiting for Tyra—I’m waiting for Lewis Rothchild.” She waggled her eyebrows, gave me an evil grin, which made me unsure of where she’d ended up in the afterlife—although I’m pretty sure pink leather is flammable. “We were friends, you know. Soon as he’s through processing, we’ve got a lot of catching up to do.”

  I didn’t want to know what their earthly friendship had been.

  She suddenly looked concerned. “Although . . . once Tyra gets here—assuming she does, which I hear is kind of iffy—things could get pretty tense . . .”

  “Because of her and Lewis being around each other?”

  Mrs. Oglevee rolled her eyes. “Du-u-u-h,” she said. “You don’t think bad karma goes away just because you die, do you?”

  I didn’t think the Mrs. Oglevee I knew would have worn pink leather and talked about karma. But pointing that out was liable to make her disappear, and she seemed to know a few things I didn’t, which I was sorely in need of understanding. “So Tyra and Lewis knew each other when they were, um, back here on earth? A long time ago?”

  “What do you think?”

  “It would make sense,” I said. “Plus, I just found out Tyra really grew up around here—”

  “And you’re her second cousin, once removed!” Mrs. Oglevee laughed so hard that she snorted, slapping her pink thighs at the same time.

  When she finally finished laughing, I said, “Look, I’m glad you’re tickled, uh, pink. But I’ve got a serious problem here. I’ve found out a lot. Like about Tyra’s company and its illegal—and immoral—use of illegal aliens to do her manufacturing. And about Tyra’s real background—or some of it, anyway. But I still don’t know why she came to Paradise in the first place. Or what she was planning to do at Stillwater. Or who killed her—and why. I just know I’ve got to find out, because otherwise Billy—”

  Mrs. Oglevee rolled her eyes again as she said, “Oh yes, dear Billy. He was a lot more fun when he wasn’t being a martyr. Look—”

  She stopped. I waited. Then I said, “Look—what?”

  “Just—look. You pretty much have all the answers. You just need to look a little closer at what you already know.”

  “But—but—but—”

  “Oh, for pity’s sake. Do I still have to spoonfeed you the answers, just like back in school?” She sighed—her old teacher’s sigh. “Let’s try this approach. Lewis was upset about Tyra coming to town. Right?”

  “Right.”

  “And you’ve already figured out that Lewis and Tyra are connected somehow in the past—and that they knew each other way back.”

  “Right.”

  “Okay—who else was really upset about Tyra coming?”

  “Billy.”

  “No, no, no. Not him. He was only upset after she came. Think, please!”

  So I thought. Then, slowly, an idea coming to my head, I said, “Vivian. She was real upset about Verbenia wearing the Tyra T-shirt. And about Tyra coming. And about Lewis dying. And I hadn’t even known she knew him. And . . . and . . . and. . .”

  “Come on, put the pieces together. I haven’t got all day.”

  “Vivian knew Lewis . . . and Lewis knew Tyra . . . and . . .” I hesitated, then blurted out what seemed too incredible to be true. “Tyra and Vivian already knew each other, too. The three of them are connected, somehow.”

  “Bingo! You’re coming along, after all. All right, now, why did Tyra say she was here?”

  “Something about an announcement at Stillwater.”

  “And why is Stillwater so important to Vivian?”

  “Well, because Verbenia’s there, of course, and Verbenia matters more to Vivian than—” I stopped, swallowed hard. “They’re all four connected, somehow. Tyra. And Vivian and Verbenia. And Lewis. So the real reason Tyra came here had nothing to do with her company—”

  Mrs. Oglevee waggled a finger at me. “Careful. Don’t jump to conclusions, dear.” She sounded almost kind and encouraging—which was scarier than seeing her in pink leather.

  “She was here because of her company . . . and something to do with Stillwater. Somehow, that’s connected, too . . .” I stomped my foot—a very unsatisfying thing to do when you’re mad and you’re standing adrift in fog. “But how—besides just wanting to make a donation to Stillwater?”

  Mrs. Oglevee sighed. “I’m not giving you the answers. You have to find out the rest of it for yourself.”

  “And just how am I supposed to do that?”

  Mrs. Oglevee smiled. “You find out answers by asking questions of the people you haven’t asked yet—of course.”

  And with that, she turned and sashayed off, disappearing into the fog.

  Vivian, I thought. I needed to talk to Vivian . . .

  Suddenly, a sharp odor spiked in my nose. I started coughing, and sputtering.

  Owen kept sticking the bottle of smelling salts to my nose even after my eyes had fluttered open.

  I pushed his hand away. I tried to sit up, but it made my head dizzy, so I flopped back down, which wasn’t the best choice, since in passing out at the news of my family ties to Tyra, I’d slid off the kitchen chair and onto the kitchen floor.

  I moaned.

  “Josie—Josie are you okay?” That was Owen, sounding very anxious.

  “Yes—my head just hurts.” I pushed up on my elbows. I felt a little dizzy, so I paused. Then I sat the rest of the way up. I rubbed my head—was surprised by the feel of smooth skin. The happenings of the whole day came rushing back at me—the reporters, Winnie on the side of the road, the bookmobile car chase, Billy turning himself in as Tyra’s killer, getting my head shaved, finding out about Tyra’s past (and her relation to me), passing out and seeing Mrs. Oglevee again. And the most normal of all these events seemed the talk with Mrs. Oglevee. That made me moan again.

  I grabbed the smelling salts from Owen and took a big whiff. I needed to be alert for what was coming next. I started to stand, and Owen helped me on up.

  “Josie, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

  I held up my hand, stopping Winnie. “It’s okay,” I said. “Finding out about Tyra’s true past—or at least some of it—gives me an idea about what I need to do next to find out the rest of the truth.”

  “About Tyra’s reason for coming here?” Winnie asked.

  “That. And about who killed her. And Lewis.” I went over to the phone, mounted on the wall by the fridge. I dialed the number for Stillwater. After a few rings, Susan, the secretary, answered, giving the usual greeting.

  “Susan,” I jumped in, “this is Josie Toadfern, I need to talk to Don Richmond as soon as possible. It’s urgent.”

  I needed to find out how to contact Vivian. I’d been seeing her out at Stillwater for years—but I’d never swapped phone numbers with her, or had lunch with her, as I did with some of the other residents’ family members. In fact, I had never really spent any time talking with Vivian until after Lewis died. And I couldn’t remember ever seeing anyone else talk with Vivian much—which was strange. The rest of us had formed a casual sort of support gro
up—except Vivian. She was a loner, definitely.

  “Susan?” I said again, since she hadn’t responded. “I need to—”

  “How—how did you hear? My God, Josie, I’m so sorry . . . We tried calling you and calling you, but there’s been no answer, at your home or at the laundromat—”

  “Uh, Susan? What are you talking about?”

  There was another long silence.

  “Susan?”

  “Josie—you’d better get over here. Don wants to talk to you. You see—somehow—Guy and Verbenia have been missing since breakfast. We think they may have taken off together in the middle of the night, and—”

  I hung up, whirled around. “Owen.” My voice was tight, thin. “I need to get to Stillwater—now.”

  17

  Owen loaned me his car. He offered to drive me to Stillwater, but I wanted to be alone, to have a little time to think. I told him to go with Winnie instead in her bookmobile, make sure she didn’t suffer any aftereffects from the ether. He didn’t look happy at the idea, but he said he would go with her.

  So Owen and Winnie saw me off, waving at me from the end of Owen’s massive driveway, while I backed out Owen’s car, an old red Volvo.

  Looking back, I’m not sure going by myself was the best decision. It ended up putting me and other people in danger. But if Owen had gone with me, maybe I’d never have found out the whole story behind Tyra’s and Lewis’s murders—and a killer might have gone free.

  As I drove, I tried to pep myself up, telling myself that by the time I got to Stillwater, of course Guy and Verbenia would have turned up. They’d probably just wandered off to look at Guy’s beloved pumpkin plants, instead of keeping to their regular schedule.

  But I didn’t do a good job of making myself believe it. Guy had never, in all his years at Stillwater, gone missing. He loved his routine, his schedule. Verbenia, I was guessing, was the same way. Most of the residents were. So for them to go missing like that had to mean that they were upset—very, very upset—about something.

  And what was worse, I couldn’t shake the feeling that their disappearance had to have something to do with the Tyra-Lewis-Vivian-Verbenia connection I’d just put together. Something to do with why Tyra had come to Paradise. Something to do with why Lewis—and Tyra—had been killed. Which meant if my hunch was correct about who had really killed Lewis and Tyra, then Guy and Verbenia were in trouble, too. None of us are very well equipped to deal with the dangers of the world. Guy and Verbenia, I feared, would be even less so.