Bake Sale Murder

by Leslie Meier

  To tell the truth, Lucy wasn’t sure. She was definitely shaken up and thoughts of whiplash and hairline fractures were chasing away all the lovely goldenrod dreams. She took a few deep breaths, to calm herself, and decided to try getting out of the car and on her feet. Moving slowly and carefully, she unlatched the door and pushed it open about twelve inches, stopping when she heard the protesting screech of metal on metal.

  “Well,” she said, squeezing through the opening and surveying the damage, “I seem to be okay but my car’s not.”

  “I’ll call the police,” said Chris, flourishing her tiny little cell phone.

  “Good idea,” said Lucy, observing that although her car seemed to have major front end damage, Chris’s enormous SUV seemed unscathed.

  “Oh, look at that!” exclaimed Chris, joining her and examining the front of her SUV. “My paint is scratched.”

  “You went through a stop sign,” said Lucy, who didn’t appreciate Chris’s attitude.

  “I know,” admitted Chris, who was rather haphazardly dressed in a pair of ratty sweatpants and an ancient Wellesley T-shirt. “It was my fault. I was in a hurry because I ran out of all-natural yogurt for the girls’ breakfast and I needed to get to the store and back before Brad left for work and then there was the stock market fiasco—you know the Dow is down nearly two hundred points?—and how am I going to tell my poor widows they don’t have the money they thought they did and…”

  “I understand,” said Lucy. “It could happen to anybody. You do have insurance, right? Why don’t we exchange information, while we wait for the cops?”

  As Lucy expected, Chris was a model of efficiency and extracted a neat little folder from her glove compartment with all the necessary papers. After a bit of searching, Lucy also produced the current, crumpled registration card and an empty plastic sleeve designed to hold it that was imprinted with the name of her insurance company. That bit of business completed, the two women looked hopefully down the road for an approaching police car. Seeing none, Chris suggested moving the cars to the side of the road.

  “I don’t think we should, not before the cops get here, “said Lucy. “If anybody comes along they can get by.”

  Nobody was coming, there was no sound except the chirping of birds and the buzz of cicadas. The sun was shining, the day was warming up, and the air was filled with the scent of a few late-blooming wild roses. High in the sky, a flock of geese in a straggly V formation was headed south, encouraging each other with an occasional honk.

  “What a morning,” said Lucy, full of appreciation for the natural beauty that was all around her.

  “You can say that again,” moaned Chris. “First this, and now Brad is going to be late for his meeting and there’s no way I’m going to be able to get Pear and Apple to their Gymboree class.” She was tapping her foot impatiently. “At this point I’m just hoping we make it to French class.”

  “Aren’t they a bit young for that?” asked Lucy.

  “Oh, no. The younger, the better. Children’s brains absorb language easily, they have to so they can learn to talk. Think about it: they have to absorb an enormous amount of information. But as they get older they lose that ability. That’s why kids who’ve been kept in closets or raised by wolves or whatnot,” Chris shrugged and shook her head, “well, they have a very difficult time learning any language skills at all. Sometimes they remain mute.”

  Lucy couldn’t help wondering what other interesting bits of information filled Chris’s hyperactive brain, and what she might have observed from her house on Prudence Path. “You’re an intelligent woman,” she began. “I’m curious what you think about the murder. Do you think Fred did it? That Mimi was an abused wife?”

  “Who knows? We’re all so new here, and I’ve been so busy, I haven’t really gotten to know the neighbors. If it wasn’t for the bake sale, I wouldn’t know anybody—but that’s not enough to go on, is it? I mean, anybody can bake something, right?” She paused. “I never saw any bruises, if that’s what you mean.”

  “You live right next door. Did you ever see any other men around, when Fred was out?”

  “Mimi having an affair? Oh, please.”

  Mentally, Lucy put a big question mark against Frankie’s assertion that Willie’s husband had been carrying on an affair with Mimi.

  “Did you ever see Mimi and Fred fighting?”

  “No. They were pretty quiet, except for Preston and that obnoxious motorcycle of his.”

  “You know, I worry about those boys. Are they doing okay without their dad?”

  “I invited them for supper last night but they wouldn’t come. And Brad tried to get them to join him in tossing a basketball around but they weren’t interested.” Chris looked at her watch. “This is ridiculous,” she said, just as they heard the faint wail of an approaching siren.

  “I guess we’re getting the full treatment,” said Lucy. “Sirens, fire trucks, ambulances, the whole works.”

  “No wonder property taxes are so high,” fumed Chris.

  The little message light on her phone was blinking when she finally got to the office. She’d walked over from Al’s Body Shop where she’d been informed that it would be at least two weeks, maybe longer, before her car was drivable.

  “I bet your insurance will cover a car rental,” advised Phyllis, who was an expert in all matters pertaining to automobile insurance ever since her cousin Elfrida hit a moose a couple of years ago.

  Picking up the phone to call her insurance agent, Lucy listened to the message. It was Bill, telling her the dog had been sick again. And again. So after she called the insurance agency, and learned she was indeed covered for a rental car, she called Scratch Westwood’s office and got an appointment. Then she worked on the events listings for a couple of hours before picking up the car and getting the dog.

  “When did Libby have her last bowel movement?” inquired Scratch Westwood as he palpated the Lab’s abdomen. He was exactly as Frankie had described him: tall, with wire-rimmed glasses and a thinning fringe of hair. Personally, Lucy didn’t think he had much sex appeal but he was a big hit with Libby, who was grinning at him in doggy adoration.

  “I don’t really know,” admitted Lucy. “Maybe yesterday morning.”

  “Not last night or this morning?”

  “Now that you mention it, I don’t think so,” said Lucy, recalling the dog had been unusually quiet the previous evening and hadn’t demanded to go out as she usually did.

  “I’m going to take some x-rays,” said Scratch. “Has she eaten anything unusual lately? Chicken bones? Tin cans?”

  Lucy chuckled. “No tin cans, but she did get hold of an old wallet.”

  “Ah,” he said. “C’mon girl. Let’s take some pictures.”

  Libby would have followed him anywhere, wagging her tail the entire time. Lucy sat in the waiting room, trying to think of a way to bring up Mimi’s murder so she could gauge Scratch’s reaction. But when she was called back to the examining room it was clear that the vet had bad news.

  “I’m afraid she’s going to need surgery,” he said, showing Lucy the x-ray. “There’s something obstructing her intestines, “he said, pointing to a bright shape, “right here where the jejunum begins.”

  “Is it risky?” asked Lucy, horrified.

  “Well, there’s always some risk with an operation, anesthesia. It’s not risk free but there’s really no alternative. Whatever it is, we’ve got to get it out.” He patted her on the shoulder. “It’s pretty common, especially with Labs. They’ll eat anything they can swallow. Believe me, I’ve found some pretty weird stuff. The worst was a steak knife. Fortunately the dog swallowed it handle first. Otherwise…” he rolled his eyes, leaving the sentence unfinished.

  “It won’t pass on its own?” suggested Lucy, ever hopeful.

  He shook his head. “I’m afraid not.”

  The house seemed oddly empty without Libby, which was ridiculous since there were four of them gathered around the table for a qui
ck meal before they all went to the Friday night football game. Lucy wasn’t really in the mood—she was worried about the dog who hadn’t come out of surgery yet—but she couldn’t let Sara down. This was the official season opener, the traditional game against the Gilead Giants, and Sara’s debut as a cheerleader.

  “Are you nervous?” asked Zoe, biting into her hot dog.

  “Mostly excited,” said Sara, taking tiny bites of a dill pickle slice. “We’ve rehearsed so much I could do these routines in my sleep.” She paused. “At least I think so.”

  “I’m sure you could,” said Lucy. “You’re going to be great. And the Warriors are going to beat the Giants, too.”

  “In your dreams,” said Bill.

  Receiving a glare from Lucy he amended his statement. “I meant the Giants always win, at least they have for as long as anybody can remember.” He smiled at Sara. “But the cheerleaders will be great.”

  “Can I be excused?” asked Sara. “I need to put on my outfit.”

  Lucy wished she’d actually eaten her hamburger, instead of shredding it into small pieces on her plate, but figured she was too nervous. “Okay,” she said, just as the phone rang.

  Zoe got it, beating her sister to the draw. “It’s for you, Mom. It’s the vet.”

  Lucy took the phone, thinking positive thoughts. Bouncy puppies in a field. Libby leaping up to catch a Frisbee. Apparently it worked because the word was that the operation had been successful and Libby was resting comfortably. “Great,” sighed Lucy, “thanks for calling.” Now she could concentrate on the game. Warriors smoothly executing shotgun plays. Warriors completing first down. Warriors rolling down the field like a machine. Warriors scoring. Cheerleaders turning somersaults as crowd goes wild.

  Or not. At halftime the score was seven Giants and zip Warriors. Positive thinking apparently had its limits, thought Lucy, who was beaming with pride in any case as Sara and the other Tinker’s Cove cheerleaders took the field.

  The girls were adorable in their red and white outfits, little tank tops and short skirts since the weather was warm. She held her breath as Sara was lifted to the top of a pyramid and then dove down into the waiting arms of her teammates.

  “I don’t know why people pick on cheerleaders. It’s a sport in its own right—I mean, how many people can do that?” demanded Lucy.

  “Not me,” confessed Bill as the girls cartwheeled across the field, ending up in a neat circle. Behind them, the band and color guard were filing on the field, preparing for the big finale.

  “I’m going to be a cheerleader, too,” said Zoe, awestruck by her older sister’s transformation into a glamorous icon of femininity.

  The band started playing, the color guard started marching around waving red and white streamers on poles, and the cheerleaders were dancing, showing off some fancy footwork, when the announcement came over the loudspeaker.

  “We’ve just received word,” came the electronic voice, “that the Tinker’s Cove JV Warriors have won their game versus the Gilead JV Giants. The final score: Warriors fifteen, Giants six.”

  The band stepped up the volume, the banner girls waved their poles frantically, and the cheerleaders went flying through the air as the crowd went wild.

  “And hell’s freezing over,” said Bill, amazed.

  Chapter 15

  On Monday morning Lucy was unable to dodge the job of typing in the police and fire log. The log was extremely popular with readers, which Lucy found puzzling since it was nothing more than a chronological listing of calls to the police and fire stations for the previous week. It included items such as “Barking dog, Sycamore Lane, 10:27 p.m. Monday” and “Difficulty breathing, Shore Road, 7:12 a.m. Wednesday.” All names were deleted and only the most basic details were given, so Lucy was forced to conclude that the faithful readers spent the week puzzling over the cryptic notations trying to figure out who the barking dog belonged to. Okay, that was easy, the only dog on Sycamore Lane was a pit bull belonging to Tim Rogers, a former star of the Tinker’s Cove High School baseball team who didn’t hold a job but nevertheless was never short of cash. The more interesting question was which of his neighbors got up the nerve to call and complain, since Tim had a hot temper. Then again, she decided, maybe the readers saw it as a challenge, just like her parents used to approach the crossword puzzle in the Sunday New York Times. Some weeks, it took them well into Wednesday before they finished it.

  Today, however, as she worked her way through the notations she noticed numerous calls reporting a vagrant. The first call was on the day before Mimi’s funeral, from someone on Parallel Street. Parallel Street ran behind Main and offered a back way into several parking areas including that of Marzetti’s IGA grocery store. This was followed by a call on Wednesday morning from Church Street and another later in the day from Blueberry Pond Road.

  With a growing sense of excitement Lucy unfolded the Chamber of Commerce map of Tinker’s Cove and began tracing the various sightings of the vagrant, who she was now convinced was the homeless man. But when she finished she realized she hadn’t actually learned that much. She’d already discovered his camp in the woods between Prudence Path and Blueberry Pond so the fact that he’d been spotted several times in that area was no surprise and neither were the numerous sightings in the supermarket parking lot, where he apparently scrounged for food in the Dumpster. He seemed to spend most of his daytime hours on the move, popping up everywhere from the harbor to construction sites around town, even occasionally in the vicinity of the high school.

  Eager to learn more, she dialed the police station, intending to question the dispatcher. Such conversations were against department policy, of course, but she figured it was worth a try and she figured she was in luck when Bobbi Kirwan answered. Lucy was well acquainted with Dot, the matriarch of the Kirwan clan who worked at the IGA, and her numerous offspring who all seemed to work in either the police or fire department. The new chief, in fact, was Dot’s oldest.

  “Hi, Bobbi. How’s the new baby?” asked Lucy, referring to Bobbi’s nephew, Benjamin.

  “Oh, Lucy, he’s sooo cute,” enthused Bobbi. “He’s started to smile and he’s got the whole family wrapped around his little finger. I mean, Mom and Aunt Janine were actually fighting yesterday over who was going to change Ben’s poopy diaper!”

  “He’s lucky to have such a great family,” said Lucy, remembering lonely days as a young mother newly arrived in Tinker’s Cove when she didn’t quite know what to do with cranky baby Toby. She would have loved to have a few relatives squabbling over diaper-changing privileges.

  “Yeah, but now the pressure’s on the rest of us. Mom wants to know when Jeff and I are going to get serious, as she puts it, and she keeps telling Mandy that it’s risky to wait too long before starting a family.”

  “But you and Jeff aren’t even married,” said Lucy.

  “At this point I don’t think Mom cares. She just wants grandbabies. The more the merrier.”

  “So I guess little Ben is a troublemaker.”

  “You can say that again,” laughed Bobbi. “Talking about troublemakers, I’m pretty sure you didn’t call just to chat about babies.”

  “You found me out,” said Lucy. “Actually, I was going over the log and I noticed lots of calls about that homeless guy, the one who was found dead in the harbor, and I wondered if you took any of them.”

  “Yeah. A lot of people called.”

  “Did any of them have any contact with him? Did he threaten anyone or anything like that?”

  “Not that I heard,” said Bobbi. “He just kind of hung around. One lady found him rooting in her garbage, another got scared when she noticed him lurking in the woods when she was hanging up her laundry. Stuff like that.”

  “And what happened when the officers responded?”

  “As far as I know he was always gone by the time they got there. Nobody got a chance to question him.”

  “It seems like he was always on the move, probably trying to avoid
getting arrested.”

  “It’s too bad, because maybe we could have helped him. At least he would have had a bed for a night or two and some decent meals.”

  “It almost seems like he didn’t want anybody to know who he was,” said Lucy.

  “Well, he succeeded,” said Bobbi. “I’ve got to go, I’ve got calls coming in.”

  “Thanks for your help,” said Lucy, aware that she was just being polite. Bobbi hadn’t really helped at all.

  After she finished entering the police log in the computer Lucy edited some copy for Ted, then took another look at her story about the homeless man. She added the little information she’d gleaned from the police log and closed the file, uncomfortably aware that while she had plenty of what, when, and where she had no who, and more importantly, no why. Glancing over the printout of the log one more time, she stuffed it in her purse and got to her feet. “I’ll be back in an hour or so,” she told Phyllis. “I want to do a little investigating, see if anybody talked to that homeless guy. If Ted gets nervous about the copyediting tell him I can stay late.”

  Phyllis’s eyebrows shot up. “Are you crazy? I’ll tell him you had a family emergency.”

  “That’s true enough,” said Lucy, with a wry chuckle. “My family is in a constant state of emergency.”

  Leaving the office, Lucy walked down Main Street to the IGA and cut through the parking lot to Parallel Street. There she decided a big old white Colonial with a gambrel roof had the best view of the Dumpster and knocked on the kitchen door. A plump woman with frizzy gray hair answered.

  “Whatever it is, I don’t want any,” she said, before Lucy could introduce herself, “and I’m a lifelong Baptist and I’m not interested in becoming a Jehovah’s Witness.”

  “I’m not selling anything,” laughed Lucy, “and I’m certainly not a Jehovah’s Witness. I’m Lucy Stone from the Pennysaver and I just wanted to ask you about the vagrant you reported to the police.”

  The woman’s face softened. “Come on in,” she said, opening the screen door. “I’ve been washing windows and I’m due for a break. Would you like some iced tea?”