Read on Arrival

by Nora Page

  Dot fished out another cookie, chocolate chip with shiny flakes of salt on top. Cleo used to think she’d never tolerate salt on a cookie. Now she couldn’t do without it.

  Dot set about wrapping each cookie in neat waxed paper. She added them to a hefty paper lunch sack, listing the items already inside. Ham and pimento-cheese sandwiches on potato rolls, two bags of chips, and two dill pickles.

  “Do you want extra pickles?” Dot asked, anxiously retying the sash on her pumpkin-print apron. “Pickled eggs?” Dot believed that problems must never be faced on an empty stomach.

  Cleo assured her cousin that they would have more than enough.

  “You can’t forget to eat,” Dot said.

  Forgetting to eat was rarely Cleo’s problem. A library cordoned by a crime scene and undone repairs were her problem. Threatening notes were too, and a bully chasing her best friend off the road. And a killer roving free? Cleo wished she believed the chief’s theory of Belle Beauchamp, double murderer. She couldn’t. Not with the notes and what had happened to Mary-Rose last night.

  “So,” Dot said with sudden subject-changing briskness, “when’s the library reopening again?”

  Instead of cheering Cleo, the words sent an anxious jolt up her core. “Next Saturday,” she said. “The invitations went out ages ago, and Leanna and I took an ad out in the paper that ran last week. It’s too late to issue a retraction, but how can we still hold a party? Who will come?”

  “I will,” Dot said firmly. She handed over the bulging lunch sack. “Now be careful out there. I’ll be looking out once in a while to check on you.”

  “I’m in a public park in the middle of town,” Cleo said. “With a bodyguard and a guard dog. Nothing bad has happened in the middle of the day.”

  “So far,” Dot said darkly. She walked Cleo to the door and was still there when Cleo reached the park and looked back.

  * * *

  A fine mist fuzzed the air and clung to Cleo’s hair. It wasn’t the best day for a picnic, but Henry was set on seeing the positive.

  “No bugs out today,” he said. “No need for sunglasses or sunblock.” He and his pug wore matching tartan scarfs. Rhett refused to leave Words on Wheels and the warmth of his peach crate. Other than the fine picnic and company, Cleo could see her cat’s point. It wasn’t worth coming out today. Only two visitors had stopped by the bookmobile, neither with borrowing privileges.

  The vacationing sisters first wanted photos of the “super-cute” bookmobile. They returned soon after for a different angle, selfies with the “cursed” bookmobile that they planned to splash all over social media. Cleo hoped she’d convinced them that the library, bookmobile, library cat, and head librarian were all innocent bystanders to the Catalpa Springs crime spree.

  “Do you still smell smoke inside?” Cleo asked Henry after the sisters left, giggling about getting the shivers and smelling evil.

  “ ‘Ill vapors,’ I think you mean?” Henry said, quoting the sisters. He and Cleo sat in canvas folding chairs, finishing off their picnic feast. Henry brushed potato-chip shards off his knees. “No, I didn’t smell any vapors,” he said, “but there is a little whiff of smoke. It’s this damp weather. Some heat will bake it right out.”

  “Or bake it in,” Cleo said grimly. She reached for her cookie. She was unwrapping the chocolate-chip masterpiece when bickering voices floated their way.

  “Jefferson and Jacquelyn,” she whispered to Henry.

  They were arguing loudly for a couple dressed as mimes. White leggings and puffy pantaloons peeked out from their matching beige raincoats.

  “The mime school will pay off,” Jefferson was saying. “It will if we get the house for free.”

  Jacquelyn replied with unhappy oaths about Amy-Ray stealing the house out from under them. “Best case, you two both inherit. Then we all sell the place and split the proceeds.”

  Cleo put away her cookie and got up from her chair. “Good afternoon,” she called out, waving brightly at the unhappy couple.

  Jacquelyn stopped and scowled. Jefferson waved and bounded up to her. “Miss Cleo! I meant to stop by and thank you. I asked you to help me, and you did! You caught the killer. Red-handed. Right, Jacquelyn? She saved us.”

  Jacquelyn looked down her nose at Cleo. “Did she? Then why did we feel like someone was outside watching us last night?”

  “There are some unanswered questions for the police to wrap up,” Cleo said. She wasn’t about to reveal Gabby’s surveillance. Had they spotted Gabby? Is that why they hadn’t left? Cleo had checked in with Gabby this morning. Gabby reported having a pleasant time with her “friend,” but no luck in surveilling. No new coffin threats had been reported, to Cleo’s knowledge. Did that mean Jefferson and Jacquelyn were responsible? But what about Mary-Rose’s crash? Jacquelyn and Jefferson had a dark-blue sedan. However, if they were home, they couldn’t have run her off the road. Tension tapped out a beat in Cleo’s temple that continued after the couple left, Jefferson with more hearty thanks and Jacquelyn with grumbles.

  Cleo and Henry sat for another hour, Cleo quiet in her thoughts, Henry engrossed in a book. A few patrons passed by but didn’t stop. Fifteen minutes before the appointed hour, Cleo decided it was time to pack up. She tried to sort out her thoughts too, but that wasn’t as easy.

  “I can’t piece it all together,” she said, summing up the troubles of who had alibis, motive, and means.

  “I’ve been trying to work something out too,” Henry said as he folded up their chairs and packed up the picnic. “Why haven’t you gotten any threats?”

  Cleo stopped short. Why hadn’t she? “I don’t mind being left out of that,” she said, aiming to make light. But it was a good point. “Maybe the perpetrator hasn’t noticed me,” she said.

  “You’re hardly covert. You’re all over the newspaper,” Henry said. “If anything, I’d guess it’s your reputation. Maybe they don’t dare mess with you.” He hefted the folding chairs, ready to walk them back to his shop. Cleo began to invite him over later, but her phone interrupted.

  “Pat,” she said, reading the caller ID. “I owe her a call and an update. I missed her last night.”

  Cleo barely got out a hello before Pat interrupted, speaking in excited bursts. She’d seen the coffin-note leaver. Maybe. Possibly. At her office door. A man in a hoodie, lurking at the door and running off when she yelled at him. Could Cleo come?

  “I’ll be right there,” Cleo promised. “I’m already in Words on Wheels.”

  Henry loaded the chairs and his dog in behind her. “We’re coming too.”

  Chapter Thirty

  Words on Wheels bumped over the railroad tracks and crunched onto the gravel parking lot of Holmes Homes Cleaning Company. Pat hovered behind the glass door, a blur of nervous shifting and shuffling. As soon as Cleo parked, Pat hustled outside.

  Cleo opened the door and Mr. Chaucer woofed.

  Pat jumped. “Oh!” she said, running a palm across her forehead, dislodging her bangs. “I’m sorry! You didn’t say you had company, Cleo. You were probably hard at work too. Here I am, interrupting again! I shouldn’t have bugged you. I just … I got so nervous and didn’t know who else to call.”

  “Did you call the police?” Cleo asked, unbuckling and stepping down from the bus. Henry and Mr. Chaucer followed, the little dog woofing again when he reached ground level. Rhett remained stubbornly napping.

  Pat mussed her hair some more, tucking and retucking the sides behind her ears. “No, I didn’t call the police. I couldn’t be sure of what I saw. I knew what they’d say: a neurotic woman, a chronic complainer, just like my doctor says.”

  Pat sniffled. The sniffle turned into a nose twitch aimed up the steps of Words on Wheels. “Your bookmobile still smells of smoke.” Pat edged by Cleo and climbed the steps, nose first like a pointer hound on the hunt. “I have an air-freshener and a detergent that would work wonders in here,” she declared, sounding confident again. “My best cleaner, Ida, just came back to
the office. Her job got cancelled. She’d have time. I’m sure she wouldn’t mind. If you leave the vents and engine running, Ida can give everything a spray and air it out.”

  Cleo gratefully agreed. “But only if I can pay Ida the going rate and a big tip too,” she added. She knew Ida, a hardworking mom of five kids. The kids were all voracious readers, and Ida did her cleaning to audiobooks.

  Pat waved Ida over from the office. Ida was happy for the job, and Pat looked eager for company. “You and I can have some tea, Cleo,” she said. “All of us can, I mean. Mr. Lafayette and his dog and Rhett Butler, if he wants to wake up.

  Henry nodded to the pug, sitting next to his shoe, tongue lolling to one side. “Chaucy here is demanding more outdoors time. How about I coordinate with Ida and keep the four-legged crew out of the way? I’ll feel more useful, and you ladies can chat.”

  Pat didn’t argue. She was already excitedly telling Cleo about the hooded man. “I wish I could sketch. I should have taken a photo! Why didn’t I? If he comes back, I’ll be ready. I’ll have my camera and my phone. Albert has a gun over at the house, but I don’t dare use it. Oh, but I hope he doesn’t come back. Come inside and we can have some coffee—decaf only, sorry!”

  Cleo shot Henry an apologetic look that got her a wink and a twinkling smile in return. She left the keys in the ignition for Ida. “I’ll try not to be too long,” she whispered.

  “Take as long as you like,” he said. “I have a book to keep me company, and I’ll keep Rhett and Chaucy on their leads so they don’t wander off.”

  Cleo raised an eyebrow at that. Rhett Butler detested his harness. Whenever she put it on, the silly Persian flopped on his side, legs stiff out, tail twitching. To her amusement and slight vexation, Rhett didn’t put up a fuss when Henry snapped on the harness and leash. Henry explained it as unfamiliarity. Rhett didn’t see him coming, Henry claimed. Cleo had read about “bromances” in magazines and thought her cat might have a crush.

  Inside, Pat was bustling around, making decaf. Cleo took a seat at the enamel table, with its view of the lawn and lot beyond. Rhett pranced proudly on his long lead. The furry traitor, Cleo thought with a smile. An ominous aerosol cloud filled the bus, masking the form of Ida. Cleo tried not to worry about what industrial air freshener might do to books, not to mention the ozone layer.

  Pat ripped open a package of gingersnaps and poured them into a bowl. Coffee burbled, and Pat shut her eyes, trying to recall the possible prowler’s features. “Youngish,” she said. “Thirties? Dark gloves. I didn’t see his face or skin color or eyes. Maybe he had a big nose? Oh, I’m no good at this. I’m the world’s worst witness!”

  “It’s a good start,” Cleo said encouragingly. “It shows he doesn’t only go out at night. That’s good to know. And it was definitely a man? That narrows down the suspects.”

  “I think so,” Pat said. “At first I thought it was the mailman. He’d already been here, but sometimes the mail gets mixed up and he comes back.” Her eyes drifted to an envelope, marked with the return address of a local medical lab.

  “Didn’t you say you had some blood work done?” Cleo asked. “Did you get your results?”

  Pat’s whole body sagged, from face to shoulders, with her back melting down her seat.

  Cleo’s heart clenched. Oh no, more bad news. Poor Pat. She reached across the table, preparing to console.

  “There’s nothing abnormal,” Pat mumbled.

  “Well, that’s wonderful!” Cleo exclaimed. “Nothing bad is fine news.”

  “They missed something, surely.” Pat reached for the envelope and turned it in her hands, as if waiting for something unsavory to fall out.

  Cleo reached across for a happy squeeze this time. “No, it’s good news when we need some the most. In fact, you should add it to your jar of good things.” She nodded toward the jar of happy thoughts, stuffed with folded papers. Perhaps Pat was cheerier than she let on, although she certainly didn’t seem like it today—or any day that Cleo had seen.

  “I know what I know,” Pat mumbled. “No one in my family had anything wrong with them, and then boom—gone by seventy. Well, except my aunt who had that tumor, and my granny with her lungs …”

  “There!” Cleo said, feeling off-kilter for cheering deadly diseases. “See, this is good news, a happy thing.”

  “Oh, all right,” Pat said grudgingly. She got up and scribbled something down on a little notepad. When the paper was torn off and folded, she stuffed it in the ceramic jar labeled “Grandma’s Cookies.”

  Two jars of goodness? Pat had more cheer than Cleo had imagined. “I need to work on some good thoughts myself,” Cleo admitted. “I could hardly sleep last night, and not only because of poor Mercer Whitty. I have a bad feeling. I was sure someone was following me recently, and then my friend Mary-Rose got run off the road last night, and now you saw prowler.”

  Pat drew a sharp breath. “Mary-Rose? Is she okay?”

  Cleo gave the full report, assuring Pat that Mary-Rose was fine.

  “She didn’t see the person either?” Pat asked. She got up to pour their coffee.

  Cleo nibbled a gingersnap as hard as cement. She dipped it in her coffee for the next bite. “No, you’re the best witness so far.”

  “A lousy one,” Pat said. “This awful business is distracting me from work too. I can’t concentrate.”

  Cleo could relate. She sympathized and added, “The library reopening is coming up soon, and we have so many uncertainties.”

  “But you can get back to your original renovation plan now,” Pat pointed out. “My ladies are still scheduled to clean right before the big party. It’ll be all nice and fresh, and you have the pretty new paint on the exterior and inside too, and your overdue book is back, and the party could be part wake for Mercer Whitty too. Everyone loves a wake! Well, not loves them, but you know what I mean. Everyone will attend. You’ll get a huge crowd, and it’ll be respectful and festive all in one.”

  Cleo marveled. Pat had come up with a whole list of good ideas. It would be nice to honor Mercer. Only fitting too, given his service as library president, not to mention his place of demise. Her mind filled with concrete, doable tasks. She’d acquire a photo of Mercer, some black cloth for the table, a massive batch of Henry’s funeral potatoes …

  “Belle Beauchamp is locked up,” Pat continued, on a good-points roll. “I read what she said in the newspaper about charging for library use and getting rid of books. I was shocked, and of course I’m stunned about what she did. A killer! You never know how people will turn out. Do you know, I found a photo of her from that camp in one of my scrapbooks? I went to that camp one summer. Only once because my parents couldn’t afford it every year, like Dixie’s. Let me go get it. Belle looked nothing like she does today.”

  Pat bustled down the hallway. Outside, Ida descended the bookmobile steps, a cloud of freshening spray billowing in her wake. Cleo ticked off ideas for a party/wake. They’d need separate buffet tables and a more somber invitation. She sat back, staring out the window. Something nagged at her, like a sliver, so fine she couldn’t see it but felt it prickling. Nice thoughts, a wake … your overdue book back …

  Cleo jolted upright. Could Pat have meant Amy-Ray’s copy of Luck and Lore? But Cleo had told Pat how she didn’t count that as a return. She hadn’t told Pat about finding the original. She hadn’t even told Mary-Rose, and Henry wouldn’t have said anything. He was beyond discreet. How did Pat know?

  Cleo dunked a gingersnap in her coffee until it dissolved. She let it sink to the bottom of her mug. Pat’s ladies got all over town. They heard the gossip and saw things. Plus, news in a small town moved at light speed. Someone working at the police station could easily have mentioned it to someone else, and the word would have shot out from there.

  Cleo heard drawers opening and shutting in the back. A dark thought grew. Dixie’s killer would have known her fears … Her best friend would too. The killer had access to Dixie’s home and medicine. Di
d Pat? Cleo pushed back her chair, checking to make sure Pat hadn’t returned. She reached for the “Happy Thoughts” jar.

  Her hand hovered over the lid. She shouldn’t. She was being a bad guest, a worse friend, but the jar had seemed at odds with Pat’s think-the-worst nature from the start. Now it felt downright off. If Pat didn’t use the jar for good news, like her happy medical report, what did she keep in it?

  Cleo rationalized her snooping as she opened the lid. She could be adding some nice thoughts of her own. She would, if that’s all the jar turned out to contain. Cleo pulled out a tightly folded slip. She read it and then reached for more, her heart beating harder with each word of blame, bile, and misplaced vengeance. One note wished death on Doc Bliss for mocking Pat’s complaints. Another blamed the mailman for delivering “false” lab results. Two others chilled Cleo’s core: “Mary-Rose must die so Cleo and I can be best friends.” “Henry Lafayette was in the way again. He won’t be soon.” The handwriting was jagged and pressed hard into the paper. Like the coffin notes.

  Cleo no longer cared about looking rude. Now she was worried about how she could leave without revealing her horrible revelation to Pat. She pocketed a handful of notes and replaced the jar and its lid. When she turned, Pat stood at the threshold, a scrapbook cradled in the crook of her elbow. Had she seen?

  Cleo forced a grimace that she hoped resembled a smile. “I shouldn’t keep you,” she said, smoothing her slacks with sweaty palms. She felt shaky, from her knees to the tips of her fingers. Her heart thumped so hard she felt sure Pat could see it.

  Pat stared at her, small eyes assessing.

  “I should get Henry and Mr. Chaucer home,” Cleo said. Her own voice sounded far away, overshadowed by the ringing adrenaline. She wanted to run, to flee, to grab Henry and the pets and Ida too and speed off to safety in her bookmobile. The engine was running. Cleo glanced outside and then sharply turned back, not wanting to betray her escape plans.