The Complete Honey Huckleberry Box Set

by Margaret Moseley

  “Yes, I do. Clover was acting a bit too coy not to know more than she said. And believe me, Janie, Clover is not a coy person.”

  We moved her stuff into the sleeping porch off Mother’s room and chattered more about the mystery of Clover’s book while we prepared for bed. With Bailey walked for the last time for the evening and Janie under Mother’s coverlet, I finally curled up in the wad of pillows of my own bed and stretched. Bailey laid his head on the pillows beside me. No fighting for rights tonight. We were home. Amazing how one gets accustomed to changes.

  I was dozing off when I felt Bailey lift his head in alarm. A car door slammed. How do dogs do that? We both cowered on the bed as footsteps sounded on the stairs to the third floor of my house. It’s the only way to get to the top floor. Isolated as I am in this Mecca of surrounding medical buildings, every little sound carries like trumpets blowing. We heard a key in the lock upstairs. The thump of something heavy dropping to the floor. Even a curse as the unknown person stumbled against something. I grinned in the dark. I had rearranged the furniture upstairs.

  Bailey must have felt the tension leaving me; the fur on his neck unruffled, but he still turned to me for reassurance.

  “It’s okay, sweetie. It’s just Steven Hyatt.” He was the only other person who had a key to the upstairs. “He’ll keep till morning. Go to sleep now.”

  And he did, snoring softly in my ear as I lay awake, exhausted but trying to figure out what tomorrow would bring.

  TWENTY–TWO

  “Good morning, Steven,” I said to Steven Hyatt the next morning, when he showed up at the back door as I was making coffee. I had decided to pretend that his appearance was an everyday occurrence, not that he had landed with a thump in the middle of the night.

  “Good morning to you, Honey,” he replied. He is so quick to catch up on my games.

  Remembering this and all the games of our childhood made me smile, and I broke the pretense and threw my arms around him. “Oh, you goose. You scared us to death last night. What on earth are you doing here?” I hugged his neck, and he smelled like warm sleep and worn travel.

  Steven was holding one hand behind him but brought it around to complete the hug he was giving me. “I came to bring you this,” he said.

  I studied the box carefully. “It’s a computer game. You flew in from New York to bring me a computer game?”

  “No, I brought you ten computer games.”

  I was flabbergasted. “Well, thank you very much. But did you ever hear of UPS?”

  In mock despair he exclaimed, “What? Trust my favorite, tried-and-true games to a shipping clerk? I don’t think so.”

  He poured himself a cup of coffee as I went through the plastic garbage sack I now saw at his feet.

  “These are your games? Your very own?” I could now see that the boxes had been opened. I scanned the titles at the top of the bag. Caesar’s II, Kyrandia, Lords of the Realm I and II, Heroes of Might and Magic. “Excuse me, you won’t send them UPS and yet you bring them in a torn garbage bag? May I ask why?”

  “I wanted to give you something, and since you have all the money in the world to buy whatever you want, I wanted to give you something personal.”

  “Conquest of the New World is personal?” I asked as I pulled another box out of the tattered plastic.

  He feigned being hurt. “Of course it is. I spent hours building those towns, conquering those enemies. My heart and soul are in those CD-ROMs. They are the most valuable and sacred things I own.”

  “Okay. Thank you,” I said again. “But that doesn’t explain why you felt you had to give me something,” I corrected. “Bring me something personal in person.”

  “Well, I don’t have a dog.” He grinned.

  The dog in question took this opportunity to jump high on Steven’s chest, overjoyed to see a same-sex person in the house. Steven put down Deadlock, A Planetary Conquest, to wrestle with Bailey. I smiled to watch them do their guy thing on my kitchen floor.

  Despite its being the middle of July, Steven had a pale Yankee complexion that I could now see could be attributed to hours of unending computer play. Bailey knocked his wire-rimmed glasses sideways in his enthusiasm to lick the face of his new friend. Steven just sat in the middle of the floor while Bailey washed his face with kisses but yelped when the dog started morning ablutions on his frizzy brown and blond hair. When Steven ducked to escape the dog’s tongue, I could see the beginnings of an early bald spot at the top of his head. My heart swelled as I looked at this endearing imperfection.

  I read somewhere sometime that when a mother looks at a baby, her eyes respond to the love by changing size and that when a woman or a man saw the person they loved, their heart swelled and they felt it in the middle of their chest. This is what I felt when I watched Steven Hyatt, wan and vulnerable, on my kitchen floor. I never had experienced this feeling before. Guess I really did love Steven.

  “You don’t have a dog? What does that mean?”

  “Harry gave you a dog. That’s pretty personal in my book. Like giving you a child. I just came down to check out the temperature.”

  “Like a big brother checking to see what his intentions are?”

  “Not exactly, but close.” He smiled.

  I took Bailey outside and clipped his collar to the extra-long chain I have staked in my yard. When the clinic next door did their landscaping, they had included my postage stamp yard in their plans, giving me both a gazebo and a small garden, but their plans had included tearing down the surrounding fence. Bailey immediately strained the chain to the limit, eager as always to dig up my iris bed. The chain fell short by one foot, but he always tried the limit every morning when I put him out.

  I had a reply formulated by the time I returned to the house.

  “You know Harry had an emergency in London. You can’t take a pet into England without a six-month quarantine. I’m sure he will be back soon. That’s all there is to it.”

  “Have you heard from him?” Steven was now sitting at my picnic bench kitchen table, sipping his coffee and adding way too much sugar to it.

  I paused while pouring my own cup.

  “No, and I’m a little worried about that. What if his mother died?”

  Steven’s eyes danced over the top of his cup as he lifted it. “What if his mother isn’t his mother?”

  “Come again?”

  “I got to thinking about the note you read to me on the phone. The one Harry sent you by taxi. When he said ‘Mother is ill,’ that could have meant Mother the country, not Mother my mom. He is retired CIA.”

  “Secret Service, they call it in Great Britain, Steven. Remember James Bond?”

  “Yes, well, whatever.” His eyes gleamed.

  “I’ve got it. I’ve got it,” came a scream as Janie bounded down the stairs two at a time. Not bad for an older woman. She ran just as bouncy into the kitchen where Steven Hyatt’s presence stopped her cold.

  “Steven.”

  “Janie.”

  Neither had known the other was here. I’m not good at small talk.

  I am good at breakfast, though. The only meal at which I somewhat excel. But the two plotters in my house didn’t even notice the strawberry print paper napkins or perfectly poached eggs on their Eggs Benedict muffins with homemade hollandaise sauce. Just a little something I whipped up, I said to myself as they wolfed it down.

  “So, see,” Steven explained to Janie, “Mother is a euphemism for England. They have called him back into service for a special secret project.”

  “Well, it came to me that what Clover meant by being an author is that she wrote For All the Wrong Reasons,” Janie told Steven.

  “Reckon that will put off his wedding plans for Honey anytime soon. Bet he’s not even in London at all.” Steven was weaving his own web.

  “So, when Twyman found out that Clover was writing her memoirs, he came to beg her not to tell the world he was a phony.” Janie matched his declarations tit for tat.

  �
��That’s why he brought her the ring.” Janie said as she topped him.

  But not for long. “Bet Harry’s in a foreign prison right now,” Steven wished.

  “He is?” Steven finally got her attention.

  “She did?” Janie’s words about Clover’s writings sank in.

  I ate my absolutely perfect poached egg in silence. When you can’t compete …

  TWENTY–THREE

  By the time Silas dropped by unexpectedly with donuts, I was out of the egg-cooking mood so I hid the signs of the special sauce and joined him for a little dunking.

  Janie and Steven were in the kitchen, washing the dishes. Okay, Janie was washing the dishes; Steven was hovering over her, telling her what he thought Harry was up to.

  “Didn’t know Hyatt was here,” said Silas, drowning a cake donut.

  “His sleigh landed last night. I don’t know his plans. When he comes down to earth, maybe I can figure them out. What’s up with you?”

  Silas hunkered over his coffee cup, his big hands hiding the tea rose china. “Sometimes I think you’re out there, too. In space. But …” he said in a concessional tone, “this time you might be right. God, I hate to say that.”

  “Of course, I’m right.”

  Pause. Two beats.

  “Okay, I’ll bite. I’m right about what?”

  “Your Towerie thing.”

  I squealed. “Ah ha! It was murder. I’m right. I’m right.” There was a little singsong to my words.

  “Whoa. I’m not saying murder. I’m saying it wasn’t as all cut and dried as it appeared,” Silas replied, not ready to give me the whole enchilada.

  “What do you know? What do you know?” I asked, sounding like a character from Guys and Dolls.

  Silas was a big man in more ways than one. When he was right, he was firm. When he might be wrong, he was willing to look at new facts. Some call that waffling. I call it smart. “You know how I admire you? How I think you’re almost always on target?”

  Well, no. I hadn’t known that.

  He had to go and ruin the compliment by over-explaining. Just like a man.

  “Even when you’re wrong, like you were accusing Bondesky of killing Steven Miller, I know you’re on the right track to something.” He took another donut, his third. “So, I checked a little more on Towerie.”

  I handed him a fourth donut from the box. Like putting coins in a slot machine for the next turn. With enough coins or donuts, you win a prize. “And?” I encouraged.

  “It seems that a blood sample is routinely drawn during an ambulance ride. The EMTs drew one on Towerie on the way to the hospital.”

  “Silas, he was dead.”

  “Nevertheless, they took a blood sample.”

  I guessed. “And they found poison, right?”

  “No. No, that’s not the point.”

  I handed him the last donut. “The point being …?”

  He looked into his empty coffee cup. I pushed my untouched cup over, and he dunked the thing. As it entered his mouth, he said something.

  “What? I didn’t catch that. The vial with Twyman’s blood is where?”

  “Missing,” Janie said from the kitchen door.

  “Stolen,” Steven Hyatt declared, leaning around Janie to get his two cents’ worth in.

  How do they do that? All I had heard from Silas’s crummy mouth was, “Xde thar vireal gore.”

  “Gone? The blood sample is missing? It was stolen?” I asked.

  My perfect detective cleaned out his vocal chords with a gulp of coffee from my cup. “Right.”

  Janie sat down at the table, flipping open her notebook that she fished from her robe pocket. “It could have been a hospital error,” she declared as she wrote down the information.

  “They make lots of errors in hospitals,” Steven agreed. “Look how many people wind up dead in hospitals.”

  “I’m pinning it on Clover,” Janie said. “It goes with my theory.”

  Silas flipped open his notebook. “That theory being …”

  Always glad to have center stage with Silas, my mystery buff friend began telling him about her verdict that Clover Medlock had killed her ex-husband. I could not believe that Silas was writing down her conclusions. I guess if you don’t have much to go on, any straw in the wind is worth scribbling down.

  I took the empty coffee cups and depleted donut box into the kitchen. Steven followed me. “You don’t agree with Janie?”

  “That Clover did it? I don’t like to think so, Steven. I like Clover.”

  “You like Bondesky, too, but that didn’t stop you from claiming he killed Steven Miller,” he reminded me.

  “Maybe I learned something from that mistake,” I argued. “That’s what mistakes are for.” I crushed the box and opened the pantry door to deposit it in the trash. There was a time when I wouldn’t have opened the pantry door on a dare. Now I considered the gaily painted, brightly lit room under the stairs the source from which all blessings flow. That change only confirmed my conviction. “I’m more cautious in my accusations now.”

  I returned to the dining room where Silas and Janie were ending their mutual note taking. “I have a question.”

  “Yes?” they both asked.

  “Would Clover Medlock have had access to the vial? Would she have even known about it?” I figured that would squelch the speculations.

  Silas was ready for that one. “Actually, Clover Medlock has the key to the whole hospital, hypothetically speaking. She was the one who bailed them out of their last fund-raising event. They’ve named the new blood lab The Clover Medlock Laboratory. So, yes, I think she could have had access. And she did show up at the hospital to claim the body.”

  “See?” said Janie.

  TWENTY–FOUR

  An advantage of one having money is giving oneself a holiday. In fact, three days.

  Of course the Day-Timer in me made certain that all bases were covered. I assured Juliana I would indeed not only attend her Friday computer/inventory party but that I also would bring additional help. Then I informed Steven Hyatt and Janie of their Saturday plans.

  And on an impulse, I called Kantor.

  “So why would I want to come to a computer party? Remember, my Honey, computers are why I left the business.”

  “Yes, Kantor, I remember. But I wanted to show you what I’m doing now and I know you want to meet Juliana. Papyrus used to be one of your favorite stores and now that her aunt is dead, Juliana would benefit from your expertise. Please?” I begged.

  We left it with, “I’ll think about it.”

  Business in hand, I turned toward a hedonistic experience and Steven Hyatt and I had three days of a glorious orgy in my war room.

  “Higher, Honey. Aim toward the center.”

  “Steven, he won’t be still. Is he a wizard or a warrior?”

  “There, you got him. Now pick up your prize.”

  “Ahhh, it’s gold.”

  “My turn.”

  Steven was determined to load all ten of the games he had brought me and teach me the rudiments of each. We had worked out a polite ritual of changing places whenever it was the other’s turn to play one of the games. I would play my turn and then get up and quietly move to the chair that he had been sitting in as he instructed and kibitzed through my play. Likewise, Steven would get up and bow when his turn was over and we sidestepped each other to claim our chairs.

  Janie was fascinated. “Seems to me, it would be easier to get two computers,” she observed after one of our place-changing maneuvers.

  “Oh, yes. Steven, let’s go get another computer,” I agreed.

  “Next time, Honey. This will do for now, although it would help to have chairs on rollers.”

  “And you can get a LAN card and play side by side,” said Ms. Potter, who had come to give me another lesson but stayed to play. “I want to be red this time. It’s easier to see on the screen.”

  Who would have thought that our Ms. Potter was a secret game player? />
  “You’ll stay for lunch, won’t you, Evelyn?” asked Janie. She had not joined us for the game sessions; instead, she had turned my kitchen into a version of a local La Madeleine’s. Steven and I reckoned that was how she was working through the separation which, so far, she had refused to discuss. She fixed enchiladas and homemade guacamole when Silas came to dinner and fresh chicken salad for Ms. Potter. Her meat loaf was out of this world, and her pies equal to the Blue Bonnet Bakery. I knew my kitchen had never seen the likes. Not even when Aunt Eddie was alive. Although it was said that Aunt Allie had been the cook.

  Finally though, Steven had enough of home cooking and declared it a Texas ethnic night, and we all adjourned to Massey’s for chicken-fried steak. Silas joined us, and we took one of the long church tables in the back room. I was famished.

  It was a compliment to my hardworking window units that we had all forgotten about the Texas July heat. The one in the war room was newly installed, and I quickly shucked the sweatshirt I had donned to fight dragons on the monitor. Janie hadn’t complained, so I guess the one in the dining room was still cooling the downstairs, even through her cooking frenzy.

  On the way to Massey’s I told my van load of passengers about the “swamp” fans that were still in operation when I was born. “You would go out every hour or so, depending on the heat, and water down the straw pads around the unit. The pump was supposed to circulate water, but it was just so hot that the water would evaporate before it could make it to the top of the straw. Father and I would go out together, and he would always turn the hose on me, and Mother would always fuss,” I recalled with some nostalgia.

  “Oh, right. I remember those units. Evaporative coolers were what they were called, Honey,” said Janie with Ms. Potter agreeing with her.

  “They kept the downstairs fairly cool if a bit damp. I guess those two window units, the one in my bedroom and the dining room, were the first things I bought on my own after my parents died.”

  “Little by little, you’re changing the house,” said Steven. “Making it your own.”

  “You think?” I asked as I slid into a parking place at Massey’s. “Do you think I’m changing, too, Steven?”