Laurie Cass - Bookmobile Cat 02 - Tailing a Tabby

by Laurie Cass

  My smile dropped off as my feet hit the asphalt. “Rotten cat,” I muttered. “If he does this one more time, I swear I’m never going to bring him on the bookmobile ever again.”

  It was a hollow threat and Eddie wouldn’t have taken it seriously if he’d heard it. “Eddie? Here, kitty, kitty, kitty.” I turned in a small circle, scanning the area. “Where are you, pal? Eddie!”

  A distant “mrr” caught my ear. I called his name again and listened carefully. A second “mrr” had come from the opposite side of the marina, close to the office. Instead of taking the sidewalk, I trotted across the lawn, keeping an eagle eye out for the fuzzy escapee.

  I kept trotting, dodging picnic tables and pieces of playground equipment. “Eddie? Here, kitty, kitty. Here, Eddie kit—”

  And there he was, occupying the top of an already occupied picnic table. At the table were two men sitting on opposite sides, one of whom was fussing with what looked like a very expensive camera. Both men looked vaguely familiar.

  Brett, that was it. And the baseball guy. What was his name… ? I snapped my fingers. “Greg,” I said out loud, and he looked up at me.

  “Hey,” he said easily. “Minnie, right? From the marina. Thought this cat looked familiar.” He scratched Eddie behind the ears, which was just the way he liked it. “He pounded across the lawn like a bat out of you-know-what a minute ago.”

  “Faster than a speeding bullet,” Brett said, laughing.

  I moved closer to Eddie, but he slid backward, out of my reach. “He has a habit of doing that. But you don’t look as if you’re having a stroke, so you should be okay.”

  “A stroke?” Greg frowned. “That golf ball got me pretty good the other day, but other than that I feel fine.”

  Me and my big mouth. I gave a quick explanation that didn’t make much sense. Then, needing to change the subject, I said the first thing that popped into my head. “Too bad about that woman who was killed. Did you know her? Carissa Radle?”

  Greg, who had been tickling Eddie’s toes, glanced over at Brett. “Carissa,” he said. “I knew of her, I guess. But I didn’t know her know her if you know what I mean.”

  Sort of. “Where did you meet her?” I asked.

  “Don’t really remember. Ready to head out, Brett?” Greg stood, and so did his friend. “We need to get going,” Greg said. “Chris Ballou sent me over here to look at a boat, and these pictures aren’t quite what I wanted, so I need to get some more. See you later, okay?” He sketched a quick wave and walked briskly toward the parking lot.

  “Well, that was weird.” I scooped an unresisting Eddie into my arms and we headed back. “If he’s going to take more pictures of that boat, he’s headed in the wrong direction.”

  “Mrr.”

  Then we were at the bookmobile. I had to introduce Eddie to a new circle of admirers, and I put the odd conversation to the back of my mind.

  • • •

  After an early dinner, Eddie and I hung out on the front of the houseboat, watching the boats cruise past and enjoying the gentle breeze and sunshine that was just starting its evening slant.

  I picked up the newspaper and watched as the sports section slid out down to the deck. Convenient for me, since I never read the sports section. “Say,” I asked Eddie, “did you see the look on Thessie’s face when I told her I’d been talking to Greg Plassey? I think the girl was a wee bit starstruck.”

  One of Eddie’s ears twitched, but other than that, he didn’t seem to care about retired Major League Baseball players.

  “That conversation with Greg was a little weird, wasn’t it?” I asked. “Kind of makes you wonder. It was almost as if—oof!”

  Eddie’s leap from his chaise longue to mine ended in a wild sprawl halfway across my lower abdomen and all over the newspaper. The now-crumpled newspaper.

  “Jeez, cat,” I said, pulling the newsprint out from underneath him. “You could have given me some warning. I know that kind of thing isn’t part of your genetic makeup, but maybe you could evolve a little? Just for me?”

  He rotated one and a half times, settled onto my legs, and started purring. Which I’m pretty sure was cat for Not a chance, but it’s cute of you to ask.

  I muttered about rotten cats, gave him a few pets, then tried to uncrumple my paper. I wasn’t one of those people like my father, whose day could be ruined by a newspaper that wasn’t pristine, but even I preferred my printed news to be on sheets that didn’t have peaks and valleys in every paragraph.

  “You know,” I told Eddie as I smoothed the pages, “you could have jumped on the end of the chaise and walked up. That way you wouldn’t have crinkled anything. Okay, I know, I know. The way you did it was much more fun for you, and that’s what really counts.”

  Outstanding. Not only was I talking to my cat; I was also answering for him. The habit was getting a little out of hand and—

  “Huh,” I said. “Would you look at that?”

  Given his body language, Eddie wasn’t going to look at anything except the insides of his eyelids, but I kept going anyway.

  “There was a boat explosion a couple of weeks ago, remember?” I was sure I’d read the short article to him. “That big one that blew up out on Lake Michigan? Well,” I said, scanning to the end of the article, “it turns out that the guy on the boat was Hugo Edel, can you believe it?”

  Eddie apparently did, because he sighed and settled down deeper into my lap. I kept reading.

  “This says Edel was out on the big lake alone. He was thrown from the boat in the explosion. Then another boat zoomed over to the site and picked him up.” Except for Edel’s name, that much had been in the newspaper before. Eddie started moving around, but I kept sharing my stream-of-consciousness thoughts.

  “Anyway, the investigation is over and they’re saying it’s an accident. I wonder how close that boat explosion was to Carissa’s murder, timingwise. Which kind of makes you wonder if the two things are related somehow. And I wonder if Faye has called the sheriff’s office about Edel. Do you think I should—”

  “Mrr-rrrooww.”

  I lowered the paper and looked at my cat, who was now lying along the length of my shins with his chin propped over the tip of my right flip-flop. “Was that a yawn,” I asked, “or is your dinner disagreeing with you?”

  “Mrr.”

  “Back at you, pal.” I dropped the newspaper and pulled him onto my lap for a good snuggle. “Back at you.”

  Chapter 10

  Sunday passed as my Sundays often did, with morning chores, a few hours at the library, and dessert with Kristen. Monday I didn’t have to work at all, so of course it started out cloudy with a spattering of rain. Then, just as I was gathering my dirty clothes to haul to the marina’s coin laundry, the sun broke through the clouds. What had been a gray day of mild summer gloom instantly transformed into an outstanding morning.

  Eddie, who had been following me, twining around my ankles and criticizing my cleaning efforts as only a cat can, spotted his favorite square of sunshine and settled down in the middle of the kitchen floor with a purring sigh.

  I looked at the piles of laundry, looked out at the enticing blue sky, looked at my cat. “What do you think, Eddie? Should I be a responsible adult and do the chores that need doing, or should I skip out into the sunshine and play the rest of the day?”

  He opened one eyelid, gave me a brief look, then went back to sleep.

  Play. He’d clearly said play. No doubt about it.

  I ate a quick lunch of peanut butter and jelly, scrawled my vague plans on the kitchen whiteboard as I promised my mother I would always do, and headed out.

  • • •

  “So much for playing,” I said. Or that’s what I would have said if I’d had the breath to talk. The hill up which I was riding my bike was far steeper than any hill had a right to be. And I had a feeling that the hil
l wouldn’t seem nearly as precipitous when going the other way. How a hill could be twice as steep riding up as riding down, I didn’t know, but it was one of those harsh realities of life.

  After leaving the snoring Eddie, I’d decided a bike ride was a good idea and hauled my bicycle out of my marina storage unit. Then I’d decided it would be an excellent idea to take a look at Carissa’s house. I used my cell to call Jari for the address, then set off. Then up. As in serious amounts of up.

  At long last, I topped the hill and turned onto a tree-lined street. The houses on the right were set back from the road, perched on the edge of the hill with a fine view of Janay Lake. These were old homes, built in the early nineteen hundreds by upper-middle-class people come north from Chicago or the Detroit area for the summer. Lots of clapboard, lots of gingerbread trim, lots of porches and swings and irrigated lawns.

  The houses on the left were a little different. Most were ranch houses set close to the road, and looked as if they’d been built in the last thirty years. Nice enough, but none had anywhere near the class of their across-the-street neighbors.

  I had slowed to the point of wobbliness while reading the house numbers. Carissa’s address was half of a duplex. The left side of the house had curtains drawn across every window, so I swung down my bike’s kickstand and walked to the front door on the right, where the windows had half-open blinds. On a Monday morning in July, the people who lived here were probably at work.

  Knocking on the door, I imagined a young family renting this place while trying to save money for a down payment on a house. I had started visualizing their dog as a golden retriever when the front door was flung open.

  “What do you want?” The man barking at me was tall and wide and hadn’t shaved in at least two days.

  I smiled at him, which wasn’t an easy thing to do in the face of his glower. “Hi, I’m Minnie Hamilton. A friend of mine knew your neighbor, Carissa, and he’s so upset about her death that I thought I’d stop by and ask—”

  His frown went so deep it was probably etching grooves in his skin. “You got a warrant?”

  “A what? No, of course not. I’m not a police officer. I’m a friend of—”

  His bloodshot eyes glared at me. “I’m not talking to nobody about nothing unless they bring a warrant.”

  “Sure, I understand, but—”

  The door slammed so hard that the wind of its passing rocked me back a step. I retreated to my bicycle, toed up the kickstand, climbed aboard, and pedaled off.

  The road felt much rougher than it had a few minutes ago. I glanced at the asphalt. Didn’t see any noticeable cracks, bumps, or potholes. Why, then, were my bicycle handlebars quivering so much that I was afraid of being tossed onto my head?

  I slowed to a stop. Put my feet on the ground, released the rubbery grips, and stared at my hands.

  They were shaking.

  I took a deep breath. Another. Looked at my hands again. Still shaking, so I swung my leg over the bike’s crossbar and looked around for somewhere to sit. Providence was with me, because there was a nice Minnie-sized rock at the end of the driveway across from the duplex. Perfect. I walked my bike over, leaned it against the rock, and sat down.

  The stone was in the sun, and its warmth spread into my skin, soothing and relaxing me. Soon my breaths came easier and my hands stopped shaking.

  Yep, I’d been silly to let that man get to me. I was used to dealing with recalcitrant types—it was part of being a librarian—so why had this particular brand of crankiness bothered me so much? Was it because part of me had been afraid that he’d killed Carissa and that I might be next?

  “Hello.”

  I jumped high enough that, when I landed, I came down half on the rock and half off, then slid in a very ungainly way to the ground.

  “Oh, dear.” The woman frowned in concern. “Sorry about that. I didn’t mean to startle you. I just saw you sitting on my rock, looking like you lost your best friend, and I wondered if you needed some help.”

  I clambered to my feet, my brain still stuck firmly in awkward mode. “No, I’m fine, thanks. I just… had an odd encounter and I needed to sit for a little. Sorry about using your rock.”

  The woman peered at me, her short salt-and-pepper hair framing a square face that topped a body trending to, but not quite achieving, plumpness. “You look familiar. Do I know you?”

  “Minnie Hamilton. I’m the assistant librarian here in Chilson. That’s where most people have seen me. Or on the bookmobile. I drive that two or three days a week.”

  She was shaking her head, then switched to nodding sharply. “Three Seasons. You’re Kristen Jurek’s friend, aren’t you?” She grinned wide, exposing teeth with wide gaps. “You look like you could use something to drink. Come on up to the house.”

  Ten minutes later, we were sitting in white wicker chairs, the kind that lived on almost every front porch in Chilson, only we were sitting on a back porch of the home’s second story with an amazing view of Janay Lake, the channel, and beyond.

  “That’s a great view of Lake Michigan,” I said, taking in the watery vista.

  “Only from the second floor, though,” Abby said, “because of all the trees. That’s why my great-grandfather designed the house backward, or so the family story goes.”

  My hostess was Abby Sterly, who was the head honcho loan officer at the bank where Kristen had applied for the money to fund her restaurant’s renovations. Abby had given me the nickel tour of the rambling cottage she’d inherited. “No one else wanted to take care of the old place,” she told me, “let alone pay the taxes. But it would have broken my heart to have the property go out of the family, so I found a way to make it work.”

  She’d made it happen thirty years ago by building the duplex where Carissa Radle had lived. “Those rents have paid the property taxes nicely, but now I’m thinking about selling it. Don’t suppose you would be interested, would you?” She eyed me over her glass of soda. “No, never mind answering. I can tell already what you’d say.”

  I laughed. “I’m not a property-owning kind of person. My houseboat is about all I can deal with right now.”

  She made a “hmm” sort of noise and I suspected my name was being entered into a mental list titled “Contact at a Later Date.”

  “Besides,” I said, “the guy who lives there gave me the creeps.”

  “Rob Pew?” Abby blotted her glass on a coaster. “He’s not a bad guy.”

  My mother had taught me, if I couldn’t say anything nice, not to say it at all. And maybe someday her lessons would sink in. “He scared the snot out of me,” I said honestly.

  Abby half smiled. “He works the night shift at Northern Fabrications. He hates being woken up before his alarm goes off. I’m surprised he even answered the door.”

  So there it was: a simple explanation for the extreme surliness of a large man named Rob. Not justification, of course, because there was none for rudeness, but a little explanation could go a long way.

  “What did you want from Rob, anyway?” Abby asked.

  She’d been so nice to me that I almost told her the whole truth and the entire truth right then and there, but something in her sharp gaze stopped me. There was no reason for her to know about Cade, and you never knew who might say what to whom and then the whole town would know that the famous artist guy had been tossed into the slammer—however briefly—for murder. And they’d also know that the bookmobile librarian was trying to help him clear his name, and that was a complication I could do without. Certainly the library could do without it. So I sort of made something up.

  “Carissa Radle and I came from the same town,” I said. “It’s just a little weird, if you know what I mean.”

  “You grew up in Dearborn, too?” Abby toasted me. “Dearborn High or Edsel Ford?”

  “Dearborn High.”

  “Hail, fellow g
raduate well met!” She held her hand high and leaned forward so we could slap palms. “Was Mrs. Koch still teaching Latin when you were there? I loved that woman. Did you know she spoke five languages?”

  “She’d retired by the time I got there,” I said.

  “Too bad. And how about the Beefeater?” She switched easily from education to food. “My grandparents took us there every Sunday after church. Short dresses and tights and those shiny black shoes with the strap across the instep that was always either too tight or too loose.” She laughed, but it ended fast. “So long ago.”

  “Lives on in your memories, though,” I said.

  Her face brightened a little. “Yes, it does, doesn’t it?” Then she sighed. “Just like Carissa will for her parents.”

  After a pause, I said, “Kristen said she would have liked to hire Carissa, but she needed people with experience.”

  “Makes sense, but I’m sure Carissa would have learned fast.” Abby put her feet up on a low table. “From what I heard, she was already getting a return clientele at Talcott. Still…” She stopped talking to kick off her sandals.

  When she didn’t start up again, I asked, “What’s that?”

  “Well, it’s just a little odd. When Carissa was moving in, I stopped by the duplex to see if she needed anything. We got to talking, so I helped her unpack a few boxes. In one of them was a framed diploma from Wayne State University, and textbooks with all sorts of medical titles. So… it’s a little odd.” She shrugged. “But then lots of people can’t find jobs in their fields these days, so I didn’t ask about it.”

  “What degree was the diploma for?”

  But she shook her head. “I didn’t get that close a look at it.”

  After a pause, I asked, “What was Carissa like? Her personality, I mean.”

  Abby pointed to Janay Lake. “Like that. All shiny and sparkly. She was one of those happy people, the kind that make you smile when they walk into a room. I can’t think of anyone who didn’t like her.”