by Dale Mayer
“Lots. Several of them are very interested in my hobby.”
Doreen perked up. “Now that is good. What hobby are you talking about?”
She smirked. “You know what the hobby is. I had to stop for a long time. But I’m happy to say that I’m playing again.”
Doreen cast her mind back and forth as she tried to remember any of Nan’s hobbies from the last several decades. But she kept coming up blank. “Why was it you stopped again?”
Nan gave her a droll look. “The police didn’t like it.”
Doreen stared at her and then remembered Ella’s recent words. Doreen closed her eyes and groaned. “Nan, you’re gambling again?”
“No, of course not. It’s just betting pools. Little stuff, you know? Fun stuff. It’s not illegal. I already talked to the cops about it.”
“Gambling is bad. Gambling is bad,” Thaddeus intoned.
“Oh dear,” Nan cried out staring at the now preening bird. “What are you teaching him?”
“Nothing. He picks stuff up all the time. Back to the point, it wasn’t illegal before either, or so you told me, years ago I thought,” Doreen said. “Why would you do this again?”
“I’m very good at it.”
And again into such a bizarre conversation. Doreen leaned forward and asked, “Nan, what are you talking about? There was no need for the police to even know about your gambling before. Unless you were doing something illegal.”
“I got in trouble because I was disruptive at the casino,” she said. “I did have a temper back then, and everyone felt I had a problem. So I had to stop. I’m still not sorry I kicked that man though.”
Doreen sat back in shock. “I don’t think you ever told me the details about that.”
“What can I say? He accused me of cheating, but he was the one cheating. You have to watch out for Walter White. He owns the hardware store on Springfield. Definitely the sort to stay away from.” Nan shrugged. “It’s all good now. Besides, everybody should get arrested at least once in their life.”
Doreen stared at Nan, shocked.
Her grandmother picked up a cookie from the plate on the table and broke off a piece then broke it again to place small pieces on the table. “Thaddeus here was a godsend. I got him soon after I was arrested. He made me realize just how much I had to change. But that was years ago, my dear. And the loan sharks were really very nice. One of them was sweet on me. Basil Champs. I do love that man.”
Oh, my God. Nan had borrowed money from loan sharks? It was much worse than Doreen imagined. Nan’s wording and that soft tone of hers had Doreen wondering at this new side to her Nan. She’d always seen her Nan as a sweet old lady. Now it seemed sweet wasn’t as correct as maybe the term colorful. And did she go to the loan shark Basil out of need or out of want? Doreen wondered just how well she knew her grandmother.
“So, if all that was bad, why would you start gambling again now?”
“Well, because I’m not really gambling. It’s just betting pools. It’s fun.”
“So, no real money is involved?” Doreen asked cautiously. “And what kind of stuff are you actually betting on?”
“How long before Robert’s body shows up.”
Doreen winced. How completely insensitive. “If the police hear about that, they might think you have some insider knowledge that he’s dead.”
“Of course they will.” She gave a crafty grin, taking another piece of cookie and popping it into her mouth. “And the second betting pool is how long before the police solve the case.”
“Oh, boy.” Doreen shook her head. She stared at her grandmother in fascination. She was learning so much new information about her only living relative. Some of it was a little disturbing. But it was like Nan had a whole new lease on life. As if she figured she was too old to pay for the consequences and was just out to have fun. “It almost sounds like you’re courting trouble, Nan.”
“Not really. I’m harmless. Besides, nobody looks at us old people. Nobody thinks we’re constructive or destructive elements. It’s kind of irritating.”
“I can imagine,” Doreen said, her voice soft. “But still, do you want to spend the rest of your years in jail?”
Nan sat back with a thoughtful look on her face. “Only if it was in one of those nice jails. Of course most of them are nice. Especially in Canada. Now some of them in the States, that’s a different story. Some of those are rough.” She picked up her teacup again. “Would you still visit me there, my dear?”
“Yes, I would still visit, but I don’t know how often. It’s not like we have a jail close by.”
“There is one a few hours away.”
“How about you just don’t get into trouble to that extent, and you can stay here and have fun with all your friends?”
“Oh, I intend to do just that.” She held out a small piece of cookie in her hand. “Did you want some of this?”
Doreen looked at the big piece of cookie on her grandmother’s plate and the tiny piece in her hand. “Just give that piece to Thaddeus.”
Happily Nan obliged.
“Have you been eating well here?”
“I’ve been eating just wonderfully. These are Charlie’s cookies.” She leaned forward and whispered, “He put some of that green stuff in them, you know?”
Doreen’s heart stopped and then raced ahead. “Green stuff?” she asked cautiously leaning forward to brush Thaddeus back from the crumbs he was inhaling.
“Yes, they’re healthy cookies. He grows the green stuff in his backyard. I have to admit, when I eat them, I feel really good.”
Doreen stared openmouthed as her grandmother snapped off another piece of the marijuana cookie and popped it into her mouth. Good Lord, what had gotten into her grandmother now that she lived at Rosemoor?
Chapter 26
Heading back home again, Doreen took a different and longer route. Mugs could use the walk, and she could distract herself from her bizarre visit with Nan as Doreen’s mind worried on all the little bits and pieces of seemingly unrelated information on the two dead men related to Nan’s house that Doreen had gathered from her neighbors.
As for Nan’s penchant for marijuana cookies, Doreen couldn’t even begin to think about that and shoved it to the back recesses of her mind.
She also couldn’t imagine Nan having anything to do with this murder mess, but unless some better evidence showed up, Nan was the most obvious suspect. How depressing was that?
And her two betting pools regarding the missing man, Robert, made her even more suspicious.
Doreen would normally have crossed the river on the small bridge, but she headed the other way, staying on the city-street blocks, going through town and then coming alongside the creek. It was a slow sojourn home letting Mugs happily sniff the trail to his heart’s content.
Thaddeus sat on her shoulder suspiciously quiet. She gave him several cautious looks but he appeared to be swaying gently to every movement.
As she stood on the creek pathway, studying the backs of the houses, she realized that this was the same creek leading to the little bridge behind her place also. Farther up was where she’d seen Brenda’s boy in the tree on Thursday. She walked the path, hoping she was heading toward home. If so, she’d see her house in a few minutes. It was such a beautiful walk here with the birds and the sunshine. Quiet and peaceful. Up ahead she could see the houses on the cul-de-sac beside her cul-de-sac.
She was almost home.
With Thaddeus giving a running commentary of oddball noises as he sat on her shoulder and Mugs wandering from place to place, Doreen slowly meandered home. It was a different life here. Despite all that had happened since her arrival three days earlier on Wednesday, it was a good life. At least she hoped it would be.
The creek drifted slowly beside her. The water levels were low, but overall enough water kept things flowing smoothly and curbed the smell of wet mud. She was only about ten or maybe fifteen minutes away from Nan’s place right now by traveling this rout
e.
She stopped and studied the water. They were coming up to her cul-de-sac, as far she could tell.
Hmm. A pretty place to walk—particularly if someone wanted to stay hidden. Could someone have carried a body that distance?
It would be a heavy load. But a wheelbarrow would make it easier. She studied the ground to find it relatively smooth, without big logs to cross over. But still, it would be taking a heck of a chance of being discovered by pushing a dead body along here in a wheelbarrow. Even though all the properties on her side of the creek had been fenced off from this creek, Travis had been playing on the far side. So there were people around regardless.
Although someone might be seen from the back of the houses across the creek, especially from a second-floor advantage, still any witnesses would have to be looking specifically at the creek path to see this hypothetical wheelbarrow transporting a dead body.
She’d never seen anybody walking back there. But then she’d never been looking. And she had only been here three days, and each one had been pretty time-consuming.
A log was up ahead. She walked over and sat down, happy to enjoy the view in the sunshine. Mugs sniffed around her feet and then lay down beside her. She scratched his back. “Hey, buddy.”
He huffed heavily, gave a small bark, then dropped his head on her foot.
“Yeah, you get to roam about, get muddy. It’s a good life.”
She sat, talking with the animals, lightly stroking Thaddeus’s feathers. “We should have brought Goliath with us.”
Mugs gave an odd kind of a noise and bolted to his feet. His nose faced upstream, his nostrils flaring. Then he barked. At what, she didn’t know. She stared at him. “What’s the matter, boy?”
He raced off, pulling on his leash.
She held on tighter and stood. “Okay, let’s see what’s bothering you.”
She didn’t have to go very far when she caught sight of something that had her stomach dropping to her feet. She walked closer to make sure, her phone already in her hand. She hit Mack’s speed-dial number and waited until he answered.
“What’s the matter, Doreen?”
She took a shaky breath. “I found another body.”
After a stark silence on the other end, he exploded, “What?”
“I’m at the creek about one hundred yards—maybe fifty yards—from my house. About ten to fifteen minutes away from Nan’s retirement home. Apparently a man went missing from there. I think this is him.” She took two steps closer. “He’s lying in the water. He looks like he’s been here for a little while.”
“Did you touch the body?”
She shivered. “No. I presume he’s dead. I’ve been sitting on a log here for at least five minutes.”
“Sitting?” Mack asked in surprise.
“Not beside the body,” she cried out. “That would be terrible… and so very gross.” She shook her head. “I was sitting on a log a few yards down the creek when Mugs barked. So I checked it out. The man’s wearing jeans and a hoodie jacket, from the looks of it. I don’t know. Maybe it’s a runner’s jacket. He has running shoes on.” She turned to stare up the creek, then down a ways. “Maybe it’s somebody else. I don’t know.”
“Don’t touch the body. Stay right there. If I come to your house and go through the back gate, will I see you?”
“If you come to my house, go through the back gate and take a left, then carry on down the path, you can’t miss me.”
“Be there in ten.”
She could still hear him on the line.
In a much harder voice he added, “Don’t move.”
This time she heard the audible click as he hung up from the call. She stared at the bright blue sky and sunshine. “Why me?”
Mugs, now that he understood where the smell came from, laid down at her side and proceeded to fall asleep.
Thaddeus, on the other hand, had a whole different thing to say. He stared over her head and screeched at the top of his voice, “Murder in the water. Murder in the water.”
“Stop, you silly old bird. You want all the neighbors to know somebody’s out here?”
Thaddeus crooned a sorrowful song. Almost like a keening, wailing song that she knew some aboriginal tribes sang for their dead. She looked at him in wonder. “You have hidden depths, Thaddeus. But could you possibly keep it down?” She stood protectively beside the body. Although if anybody else came along, she would look darn suspicious.
With her phone, she took several pictures of the body in the water and the area around it. And, because she had to wait anyway, she looked for any signs of what might have happened to him. Surely Mack would understand that much.
The dirt was a little bit scuffed up at the pathway, although no marks resembled wheelbarrow tracks. She quickly stepped back, took a few more pictures of the scuffled area and searched for a murder weapon. For all she knew, the guy committed suicide, or maybe he’d been drunk and fell in the creek and drowned.
She didn’t find anything of interest. But it didn’t stop her from taking lots of pictures. She walked up the pathway and took some more pictures, walked to the other side and took even more. She had no idea what she was looking for but figured he’d be up on the matter a little later. Right now she was just protecting the crime scene.
And, for added measure, she took as many pictures of the creek as she could. And the houses on the far side. Who knew if anybody heard or saw anything? This cul-de-sac wasn’t where her house was. This was the adjoining one. She hadn’t met any of these people yet. Of course, once everyone heard she had found this body, there would be no end to the chaos in her world. And the added notoriety to her as the newcomer.
She waited ten minutes, which stretched to fifteen, then to twenty. Just when pulling out her phone on the half-hour mark to call Mack and to give him crap for being so late, she heard a noise on the far side of the creek. She waited, her heart racing. It could be the murderer coming back—if the body in the creek had been murdered.
That didn’t stop the thoughts from going through her head.
She kept watch nervously.
Suddenly Mack appeared in front of her. He took one look at her and nodded. “Good. You’re still here. Where is the body?”
“I said I’d be here,” she snapped, relieved he’d finally arrived. “I kept my word. You, on the other hand, are late.” She pointed wordlessly at the creek. “The poor man is there.”
They both stared at the man, floating face mostly down with just enough of his face showing to see his open eye, the dirt and water in his mouth. He pivoted to look at her. “Did you touch him?”
She shook her head. “No, you told me not to.”
“Have you been standing here in this vicinity for the last ten minutes?”
“Thirty minutes. That’s how long since I called you. And, yes, I have been here, walking this pathway. I was afraid somebody else would come before you did.”
He nodded, his attention returning to the area, then to the body. “I want you to go home, go inside your house, and stay there until I come.” He glanced at Mugs and said, “Good job, Mugs.”
Mugs barked, walked over to him, looking for a scratch. Mack bent down and gave Mugs what he wanted. Mack glanced at Thaddeus and said to Doreen, “I’m surprised he hasn’t popped up with any comments.”
She snorted. “He’s been crooning some kind of death song for about ten minutes. And then before that, he called out, Murder in the water. Murder in the water.”
Mack nodded. “Go home with them both, please. And you’re sure that Mugs didn’t touch the body or pick up anything else either?”
“Not that I saw. He never went in the water or to the body, never touched or took a bite at anything,” she said defensively.
Mack nodded. “I have to check. You know that.”
She shrugged. “It’d be nice if you kept my name out of this.”
He snorted. “Yeah, in your dreams.”
She rolled her eyes at him. “I’ll put
coffee on. Make sure you get there before the pot turns off.” She turned with her animals in tow and headed home.
Chapter 27
Back in her kitchen, Doreen put on the coffee as promised, noticing the dog food bowl was very low on kibble. She couldn’t imagine Goliath eating it, but she wasn’t about to make Mugs starve regardless. Then realized the cat bowl was empty too. She filled Goliath’s bowl and gave both fresh water. Then checked on Thaddeus’s food. It was fine thankfully. He was nodding off on his roost.
When the coffee finished, Doreen poured herself a cup and settled on a chair on the back veranda. What a day… That poor man… And what was going on in her world that she’d been the one to find the body?
That kind of stuff tended to stick to a person. She’d need to find a way to change this, or the neighborhood would label her as the village crazy lady who found dead people.
She stared at the old dilapidated fence that hid her view of the creek but also gave her a little bit of privacy from anybody walking on the far side. It also gave them cover from whatever secretive things they might be doing. The path hadn’t been heavily used that she could see.
At least Nan shouldn’t be a suspect in the latest death.
Right?
Except for her two damn betting pools. Crap.
The three deaths should all be unrelated… with Nan’s house as the only tenuous connection.
Doreen sat for a long time when another thought entered her mind. What if the men were related? Maybe by a job, a common goal or having tripped over each other somewhere along the line? Or maybe being in the wrong place? What if the most recent deaths were people related to the dead man from thirty years ago? He would have been old enough to have a family. Any chance it was perhaps Jeremy’s children? And the other two bodies were cousins or brothers? Not knowing the ages of the two latest dead bodies wasn’t helping Doreen with her musings.
She pulled out her phone and quickly texted Mack. I didn’t see the man’s face in the creek. And I don’t know the physical features of the man found here on my property. Any chance the two men are related? And how old was each one?