by Kaye George
A woman walked toward her, but it took her a second to recognize her as Shiny Peth. She looked uncharacteristically disheveled. She was dressed like the model she had been for a time, but her hair was mussed and she had a smear of lipstick on her cheek.
“Hi, Shiny. What are you up to?”
Shiny’s large brown eyes widened. She must have been surprised to see Yolanda. “Why? What are you doing here?” Yolanda cringed at the sound of Shiny’s raspy voice.
That was strange reaction, Yolanda thought. Was Shiny somewhere she shouldn’t be? “I’m delivering a basket to Ranchero Real Estate. They’re celebrating that they’ve been in business for ten years. Do you believe that? It seems like a couple of years ago when they opened up here next to the theater.”
“Yeah. I remember it.” Her pout looked sulky, or at least unhappy. What was wrong with her?
“Were you at the theater just now?” She had come from that direction. “I thought it would be closed, after what happened to Fran. Out of respect.”
“It’s closed. We had to check out a few things. Good to see you, Yolanda.” She hurried on before Yolanda could start discussing Fran’s horrible death with her, leaving behind a faint aroma of something alcoholic. Whiskey, Yolanda thought.
Yolanda thought about that on her drive back to Bella’s Baskets. Who was “we” who were checking out “things”? Was Shiny using the empty, closed theater for a trysting place? She hoped she wasn’t meeting Len there so soon after his wife died. That would be cold.
* * * *
It was noon before Tally got word of her mother getting out of the hospital. Cole called her and said he would take their parents to the hotel.
“You can take them to my house if you want to. Would that be more comfortable?”
“What? Two people sleeping on your couch? With Nigel?”
“They could have my bed, silly.”
Cole had a mumbled side conversation, probably with their dad, and came back to say their parents wanted to go to the hotel. Hotels probably felt like home to them, since that’s where they lived. One hotel after another. Tally wondered what they would do when they finally settled down. If they ever did. Would she have to worry about them traipsing around the globe as senior citizens? She hoped not.
“I’ll get over to see them after I close, if that’s okay,” she said. “You’ll be with them until then?”
“Most of the time. I have to pick Dorella up, since I dropped her off at work this morning.”
Dorella again. What would the poor woman do when Cole left for his next artistic project?
After closing, Lily and Greer were both a big help with cleanup, Tally was glad to find. She turned off all the lights except the ones she left on for security in the front, locked up her store, and dashed home to feed Nigel.
“I’m neglecting you awfully, aren’t I?” she said to the huge fur ball, talking baby talk in a high singsong. He talked back in whirs and clicks, then blinked his big eyes in appreciation, she was sure, and rubbed his head against her leg, hindering her progress in scooping food into his bowl. “I have to go see my parents, then I’ll be right back. After everyone is gone and things settle down”— whenever that will be, she thought—“I’ll spend my evenings with you.”
It was nice to cuddle with Nigel, the purring machine. He was a lap snuggler in spite of his size. He could curl up to seem half as big as he was. She’d had to adjust to having him in her house, but now she didn’t know what she would do if he weren’t there. His arrival drew a firm line between her past and her present, and the line stretched into her future, happily.
She drove to the Sunday House Inn and Suites, where her parents were staying. As she traipsed up the stairs to their second-floor suite, she met Cole and Dorella coming down.
“Glad you’re here,” Cole said. “I didn’t want to leave them alone, but I have to go. I’ll be back soon.”
He trotted down the steps before she could ask him why he had to leave. But it must have had something to do with Dorella. Everything did these last few days.
Tally opened the door to see her mother sitting up in bed and her father arranging pillows behind her.
“I’m so tired of lying down,” she said. “I’ll get so weak that I’ll never walk again if I stay in bed too long.”
“You’re not going to atrophy, Nancy,” her dad said. “You just have to rest and regain your strength. Do you need more to drink?”
“I’m going to float away,” she said, waving him off.
“The doctor said you have to have lots of liquids, poppet.”
“Fine. Later.”
Tally knew that tone. It meant, “We’re done talking now. What I say goes.” As always, her father smiled dotingly at his wife and backed off.
“Here, have a seat.” He pulled the desk chair over to the bed for Tally and went into the bathroom.
Tally gave her mother a peck on her soft cheek and sat beside her on the bed. “Are you feeling better? You look a lot better.”
“It feels so good to be out of the hospital. That’s no place for sick people.” Her mother smiled at her own joke, then sighed, pinching her eyebrows together to wrinkle her forehead.
“What’s wrong?” Tally asked.
“I need another Tylenol.” She waved her hand in the direction of the desk, which was piled with bags and luggage. “There should be some in Bob’s satchel.”
Tally’s dad had always liked to carry a bag, a sort of cross between a briefcase and a man purse. She pawed through the things heaped on the desk and found it buried beneath her mother’s sweater. As she dug through the conglomeration inside it for a pill bottle, she couldn’t help but notice a note with a message in large caps. She froze when she read the message:
BOB H. PAY UP OR THE COPS WILL KNOW YOUR GUILTY IN THE MURDER
She silently corrected the spelling, but wondered what this note, obviously to her father, meant. Her fingers finally closed on the plastic pill bottle and she drew it out. She wouldn’t mention this note to her mother right now. The poor woman needed to concentrate on getting well if she wanted to fly to their next show on Friday.
But what should she do about the note? There were some huge implications. Wrong conclusions could be drawn. Especially by Detective Jackson Rogers.
Chapter 8
Before Tally left for work on Tuesday morning, she got a call from the detective. Dressed and heading for the front door, she saw his number with a sinking feeling of dread. What now?
“Tally, I have some bad news.” Her heart sunk lower and she stumbled back into the living room. “But before I tell you, I have to know each and every person who was in your kitchen between the time the Whoopie Pies were made and when they were served.”
“Fran was poisoned with my Whoopie Pies?” She sank onto the couch, glad she’d been standing next to it. She was also glad she was home and not at her shop. She had to contain this news somehow. She couldn’t possibly let any customers hear that she might have served poison to anyone.
“I’m asking you to give me all the names you can. Then I’ll check with each of them. We have to know about everyone.”
“But that means Fran died of my Whoopie Pies. That’s what you’re saying, isn’t it?” Tally couldn’t keep the sob from her voice. Nigel rubbed against her right leg, gazing up at her with a wide-eyed look of sympathy, as she unconsciously petted him. “What will I do? Can you not tell anyone about it? Until you find out what happened.”
She could hear Detective Rogers take a breath and imagined him counting to ten. “I’m not telling anyone. I’m even not telling you, actually.”
That was true. He hadn’t said it—she had. “I’ll call you back and give you a list again.”
She broke the connection before she became unable to speak. Her fist in her mouth, she muffled her sobs as much as she could, and her cryin
g jag was over in a few minutes. Nigel jumped into her lap. She wondered if he actually sensed her distress, like a person would. His weight in her lap was comforting. He made his strange little chirping noises, which made her smile.
Feeling calmer and strangely cleansed after her cry, she listed the names on a piece of paper. Nigel gazed at them with a wise expression. They were the same ones she already had told the detective: Lily, Molly, Greer, her mother going to the bathroom. The gathering that night hadn’t lasted as long as it could have, even as long as she’d planned for, what with her mother getting sick and with Fran…collapsing. It was probable that some others had used the restroom, too, but she hadn’t kept tabs on everyone. She’d been busy trying to keep up with her help, the food and drinks, and the drama in the Bella family.
* * * *
Something had been bothering Yolanda ever since she remembered about it two days ago, on Sunday morning, the day after Fran’s murder. She had to tell someone about it. She glanced at the clock in her shop. Both she and Tally opened at 10:00 and it was now 9:30. Knowing Tally would be there, she went through the alley to her back door.
“Knock, knock,” she called as she came into the kitchen.
Tally was shoving a batch of something, maybe Twinkies, into the oven. She thought Lily must have been in the front room.
“Whatcha got?” Tally’s face had a pinched look.
“Is everything okay?” Yolanda said. “Something’s worrying y’all.” Yolanda helped herself to a half a cup from the kitchen coffee urn and pulled out a stool to perch on.
Tally glanced in the direction of the front of the store. “I’ll tell you later. I don’t want to talk about it here.”
“Something’s worrying me, too, and I have to tell someone before I burst.”
Tally starting wiping down her counter. That woman was always working. She didn’t have any lazy bones, Yolanda thought.
“Shoot,” Tally said, scrubbing at a stubborn spot.
“I have two somethings, but I’ll start with the good one.”
“You’re smiling. Something to do with Kevin?”
“Is it that obvious? Yes, we had dinner last night and…well, it went very well. He’s growing on me, more and more every day.”
“I think it’s probably mutual.”
“I hope so.” Yolanda sipped her coffee before launching into the other point. “Here’s the other something. Ionia Goldenberger came into Bella’s Baskets about a week ago, maybe longer, and she said something that’s been bothering me. It’s about…the murder.”
Tally stopped working and stood very still. “But this was way before…”
Yolanda nodded. “She asked if I’d heard the rumors about Fran. I didn’t know what she was talking about, so she told me. She said there were rumors that Fran was using material she hadn’t paid for.”
“What do you mean?”
“The theater has to rent the scripts from places that give them licenses to use them. You’re supposed to get enough copies for everyone and pay for them. Ionia accused Fran of not renting enough and making her own copies. Not paying for the copies you need is dishonest and, Ionia said, could get Fran fired as director of the theater. I don’t know if it’s illegal or not, but it’s against the agreement, she said. That is, she told me she was repeating the rumors she had heard.”
“Interesting. She accused my mother of stealing material from her. Mom’s stuff is all original these days. She and Dad write their songs. So Fran doesn’t write her own material?”
“Ionia told me she’s done a few, but mostly puts on plays that everyone has heard of. Not her originals.” Yolanda paused to take another sip of coffee. “When Fran was murdered, I remembered what Ionia told me about the rumors.”
“What does all that have to do with her death?”
“Not that. It’s the rest of what Ionia said. After she told me all of this, she admitted she felt bad—she had started the rumors herself and they weren’t true at all.”
“That’s awful! Why did she do that?”
“Ionia thought she should have Fran’s job. She wanted to, she said, ‘Get Fran out of the way.’”
“Get her out of the way? There’s another method of doing that, besides getting her fired, right? Like…murdering her? Are you going to tell this to the police?”
“I’m not sure. Do you think I should?”
“Yes, you should! They think my dad killed her!”
“Oh, no, Tally!” Yolanda caught her friend’s hand and held it a moment. It trembled slightly.
Lily came into the kitchen. “Time to open?”
* * * *
After Yolanda left, Tally started shaking all over. She retreated to the bathroom to think about what she had just learned. If there was a chance Ionia had killed Fran, her dad was off the hook. She hoped Yolanda would go to the police very soon. She had urged her to do that. Tears of relief streamed down her face. After a minute or two, she emerged from the bathroom, after making sure her eyes weren’t red and her face wasn’t tearstained, to find her father in the kitchen.
“What are you doing here?” She wasn’t upset to see him there, just puzzled.
“I talked to your detective this morning. He gave me a heads-up on something and I want to ask you to help me watch out for someone.”
“He talked to you about Fran?” The detective had been busy on the phone today.
“No, this is nothing to do with her death. It’s about someone who’s in prison. Someone I know.”
Her father knew a person who was in prison? That was surprising.
He continued. “The man, Wendell Samson, is eligible for parole. Rogers says he may be released soon. If you see him around town, I want you to let me know.” He handed her a picture torn from a newspaper, the paper old and yellowed. The man pictured wore a coarse-looking shirt with wide stripes and held a number in front of him. He was obviously going to prison. The picture was black-and-white, but she could tell his too-long hair was darkish. He had a narrow, clean-shaven face and his hostile eyes squinted at the camera.
Tally looked at the picture, then at her father. “Who is he to you? How do you know him?”
“We had a run-in many years ago. It’s possible he holds me responsible for some things.”
“He’s from Fredericksburg?”
Bob Holt nodded.
“Do you want to talk to him if I see him?”
“No! I mean—no, I don’t. I just want to know if he’s in town.” He held his hand out for her to return the picture.
“How old is this picture?”
“I told you, it was a long time ago.”
“But it’s old, right? I’m not sure I’ll know it’s him if I see him. He could look a lot different.”
“Yes, he could. But if someone like him comes around asking about me, don’t tell him anything. Don’t tell him I’m in town. Just let me know, okay, sweetheart?”
He hugged her and she gave him her assurances that she would. She gave him some treats for him and her mom.
She watched him walk out the door, left with an uneasy feeling.
Mrs. Gerg walked in as Tally’s dad was leaving. A string of plastic beads dangled from her fingers.
“Oh, look, the colors are perfect,” she said, holding the beads up to Tally’s apron. “I knew they would be, the moment I saw them.”
Tally was reluctant to accept the cheap necklace, but Mrs. Gerg meant well, she knew. It took very little to make her landlady happy. All she had to do was accept her gifts. And pay her rent on time. Mrs. Gerg was a short, sturdy woman with thin, curly hair, who usually wore a pair of nearly worn-out shoes, run over at the heels. Tally wished she would find shoes for herself at the garage sales she loved to frequent, instead of buying useless gifts for her tenant. Although, maybe those awful-looking shoes were comfortable.
&
nbsp; Tally slipped the beads over her head. The deep purple did look nice with her smock, which was a soft lilac color. Mrs. Gerg bought one Clark Bar and left, a smile on her cherubic face.
That night after the shop closed, she went to the hotel to see her parents, first stopping in to feed Nigel, scoop out the litter box, and sit with him in her lap for a few calming moments. It surprised her that tending to the litter box was turning out to be a less onerous task than she’d thought it would be. The large, lovable cat always stood by and kept a close watch while she invaded what he probably thought of as his personal territory. She knew that she didn’t like people poking around in her bathroom. They could use it, but she had a horror of strangers looking into her medicine cabinets and her toiletries. It wasn’t that she had anything to hide—she just considered those things personal. Maybe Nigel felt the same way.
After a brief, but effective, attitude adjustment brought about by purring and head rubbing, Tally drove to the Sunday House Inn. She paused outside the door when she heard her parents’ raised voices. They sounded distressed. Her stomach clenched. A good loud knock, she hoped, would warn them. She banged on the door.
Her father answered the door. He bent so his face was close to hers and whispered that he didn’t want her to say anything about what he’d told her this morning and she gave him a nod, still puzzled about that, and feeling uneasy about her father holding secrets from his past.
She peeked around him to see that her mother was crying. “Are you feeling worse?” Tally asked, distressed.
“No, she’s feeling a lot better,” Tally’s father answered.
Tally scowled at him for answering the question. “I asked Mom.”