A Night's Tail

by Sofie Kelly

  I leaned across the counter and gave her a hug. “Anytime you need backup just yell,” I said. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Larry Taylor hovering around and it occurred to me that maybe Ethan wasn’t the only person with a crush.

  I paid Georgia, set the two boxes of cupcakes in my canvas shopping bag and resumed wandering around. I made my way around two teachers from the middle school in an animated discussion about onion sets and discovered Burtis Chapman and Lita Clarke, Everett’s assistant, at the stall belonging to The Jam Lady. Lita was insisting that Burtis didn’t need two jars of marmalade, and he was buying those and some plum jam as well in a show of stubbornness.

  I touched Lita on the shoulder and she smiled. “Hello, Kathleen, how are you?” she said.

  “I’m well,” I said, “Thank you. Could I borrow Burtis for a minute?”

  “Of course you can,” she said. “In fact, I may let you keep the old coot.”

  Burtis just laughed. “You can’t get by without me,” he said.

  Lita patted his cheek. “You just keep telling yourself that.”

  Burtis and I started to walk. “What do you need?” he asked. That was Burtis. He got straight to the point.

  “What do you know about Canadian football?” I could have looked up the information, but this would be faster.

  “This have anything to do with that Wallace fellow’s death?” He was wearing his battered Vikings cap.

  “Maybe.”

  His eyes narrowed. “What’re you after?”

  I shifted my shopping bag to my other hand, careful not to disturb the cupcakes. “Right now, just information.”

  “Fair enough. First of all, in Canadian football the field is larger—wider and longer. Second, the end zone is bigger.”

  “Is that it?” I asked.

  Burtis shook his head. “Not even close. Up there you only get three downs to make ten yards. Not four.”

  “So Canadian football is more pass-oriented.”

  He gave me an approving smile. “You learn quick,” he said. He eyed me for a moment. “What kind of information are you really lookin’ for?”

  I wasn’t exactly sure what I was looking for. Melanie had told me that Wallace had “supposedly made a bunch of money” playing in Canada, which didn’t exactly jibe with the whole loaning-money-to-small-businesses scheme he’d been involved in. Simon had said he didn’t think Wallace had gotten rich playing in the CFL. Marcus liked to say two of the most common reasons for murder were love and money. Was money the reason Lewis Wallace had been killed? I had no idea.

  I stopped walking and turned to face Burtis. “I know Lewis Wallace wasn’t good enough to play in the NFL, but was he good enough to be a star in Canada?”

  Burtis took off his cap, smoothed down what little hair he had and put it back on again. “If you’re asking if the man became some kind of superstar up there, I can promise you the answer is no. Football is not big business in Canada. Never has been.”

  “What do you mean?” I said.

  “I mean your average player in the CFL makes less than a hundred thousand dollars a year. Woulda been a lot less in Wallace’s day.”

  We started walking again, dodging my neighbor, Mike Justason, and his boys.

  “So Lewis Wallace didn’t make his money playing football.”

  Burtis shook his head. “No, girl, he didn’t. Whatever money the man had came after he stopped playing.” He eyed me for a moment. “This help at all?”

  “It might,” I said. I smiled. “Thank you. I’ll be out for another game of pinball soon.”

  He pointed at me. One of his huge hands was large enough to cover my head. “I’m not going to take it easy on you next time,” he warned.

  I wasn’t fooled by his stern expression. Like Lita, I patted his cheek. “You just keep telling yourself that.”

  I could hear him laughing as I walked away.

  * * *

  Marcus made supper at my house and we played War, a card game Eddie’s daughter, ten-year-old Sydney, had taught him. Marcus lost.

  He slumped in his chair. “How did you do that?” he asked. “This is a game of chance, not a game a skill, and you still beat me.” He was referring to the fact that I regularly beat him at road hockey and pinball and I’d beaten him at cup stacking at Roma and Eddie’s wedding—another thing Syd had taught him.

  Marcus narrowed his eyes at Owen and Hercules. “Are you helping her somehow?” Hercules got up from the spot by my chair where he’d been lying, flicked his tail and left the room. Owen yawned as though the question bored him.

  “Did you win when you played Syd?” I asked.

  “Not exactly.” His gaze didn’t quite meet mine.

  “You either did or you didn’t,” I said as I gathered our mugs. “It’s not really a sliding scale.”

  “Okay, I didn’t.”

  I kissed him as I moved past him on the way to the sink. “Maybe you’re just not lucky.”

  He caught my hand and pulled me onto his lap. “Maybe I just used up all my luck on more important things,” he said before he kissed me.

  * * *

  Mary was working with me the next morning at the library. “What do you think about Zach Redmond?” I asked. I figured she probably knew him since she’d danced at the club more than once. We were sorting the books from the book drop. At least there hadn’t been any licorice in it this time.

  “You mean do I think he could have killed that a-hole your brother’s friend punched?”

  Trust Mary to get right to the point. I set the book I was holding down on the counter. “Since you put it that way, yes.”

  Mary shook her head. “He’s a good kid and cute as a bug’s ear but I don’t think he has the ambition to actually carry out a crime. My mother would have said he’s not too work-brittle.”

  “Which means?” I asked.

  “He’s too lazy to put in the effort it would take to kill someone.”

  * * *

  The guys got back just after lunch. They came into the library, Milo in his cool-dude shades, Derek looking preoccupied and Ethan bouncing with energy like Tigger from the Winnie-the-Pooh books. It was easy to see things had gone well.

  I gave Ethan a hug. “Did you miss me?” he asked.

  I pretended to think about the question. “Let me see. No one’s six”—I held up the corresponding number of fingers—“different hair products on the side of my tub. Which, by the way, is probably more than Milo travels with. No cupcake crumbs, muffin crumbs or cookie crumbs all over my kitchen floor and no one drinking all the coffee before I even get my first cup.”

  He held up a finger. “First of all, I do not leave cookie crumbs, muffin crumbs or I forgot what the first one was all over the floor.” He paused for effect. “Owen always gets them before they hit the floor.” He gave his head a shake. “And if you think this much pretty comes without upkeep, well, you are very, very mistaken.”

  I laughed, shaking my own head. “Yes, I missed you,” I said.

  He gave me a brief rundown of the three shows. Mary was at the front desk and by the time Ethan had finished telling me about their trip somehow she and Milo had gotten into a conversation about kickboxing. He turned to Ethan. “What was that thing you tried when we were in New York? It was some kind of martial art.”

  “It was hot yoga,” Ethan said.

  “I’ve been telling Maggie she should add a hot yoga class,” Mary said. “I tried it the last time I was in Chicago.”

  Why didn’t I know that? I wondered. And what was hot yoga?

  Derek joined me. Ethan had been pulled into Milo’s conversation with Mary.

  “It sounds as though things went well,” I said.

  “Better than that,” he said. “There was a record producer at one of the shows.”

  “Was he inter
ested in the band?”

  Derek shrugged. “Maybe. He didn’t make any commitment but he’s going to be in Boston next month and he’s coming to hear us again.”

  There was something about the way he said “us” that caught my attention.

  “Us?” I asked.

  Derek nodded. “Milo and Ethan—and Devon—want me to join the band permanently.”

  “Did you say yes?”

  Derek was very talented, there was no question about that, but he didn’t have Jake’s easy-going personality. And whoever the guys hire to replace Jake is none of your business, I reminded myself.

  “I need to think about it,” Derek said. “I have a lot of things on the go, other opportunities.”

  “I hope everything works out for you,” I said.

  Mary seemed to be sharing some kind of kicking technique with Milo and Ethan. Or maybe it was a dance move. I decided I didn’t want to know.

  Ethan tried whatever movement it was that Mary had demonstrated and four books fell off the desk onto the floor.

  I laughed. “I swear, one of these days he’s going to fall off the stage when he’s performing.”

  Derek grinned. “Who says he hasn’t?” His smile faded as he studied me for a moment. “Kathleen, can I ask you a personal question?”

  “I guess so,” I said.

  “How did you do it? I mean, being a teenager with two new siblings? Most kids would have resented the heck out of them, but you guys are so tight.”

  “Oh, I did resent the heck out of them,” I said. “But they were so little and they’d stop crying for me before they’d stop for anyone else. I used to get up and watch those late, late cheesy horror movies on TV. The two of them were always awake. I’d take them into the living room with me. Which is probably why both Ethan and Sara are night owls now.” I smiled at the memory. “They’re my family. I’d do anything for family.”

  Something hardened in Derek’s expression. He nodded. “I know. Me too.”

  chapter 12

  Burtis showed up at the library right after lunch. He set a small metal box on the circulation desk. “Found something I thought you might be interested in,” he said.

  I recognized the box. We used similar ones to store the oldest newspapers in our collection. I lifted the lid. Inside I found three copies of Phil Major’s College Football Preview. Each one was encased in a plastic sleeve, a piece of corrugated cardboard at its back and what I recognized as acid-free tissue separating the front and back covers from the rest of the pages.

  I looked up at Burtis. “These magazines are in excellent condition.”

  “I got some older than you are,” he said with a grin.

  I carefully removed one from the box. “I don’t recognize the magazine.”

  “Unless you’re a big ball fan you wouldn’t,” he said. “They do a college football edition and one for the pros. Been puttin’ them out since 1973. Phil Major wrote for Sports Illustrated in the sixties and then went to work for ABC Sports after that. He died about ten years ago. Sports Illustrated bought the magazine and kept the name. I have every issue right up to the most recent two. These three have articles with references to Lewis Wallace back in his college days. I thought they might save you some time.”

  I carefully removed one of the magazines from the box. The librarian in me was intrigued even without my desire to know more about Lewis Wallace. “Do you know where he played his college ball?” I asked.

  Burtis nodded. “Saint Edwin University. It’s in Pennsylvania. Good football school. Wallace got a degree in business. The boy was a decent player pretty much all four years he was there. Had a couple scouts lookin’ at him in his freshman year but in the end he was just too small. He did stay and even got his degree but he struggled with the academics and had to be tutored to graduate.”

  He patted the side of the metal box. “There’s a mention of a cheating incident Wallace was supposedly involved in during sophomore year.” He smiled. “Don’t mean to ruin the ending but it didn’t amount to anything.”

  “Thank you, Burtis,” I said. “I’ll be very careful with your magazines and I’ll get them back to you as soon as I can.”

  “I know you will,” he said. “I hope you find something to help.”

  * * *

  When I got home that evening, I discovered that Ethan was making spaghetti sauce, Derek was on his phone, Hercules was hiding under that table, Owen smelled like oregano and Milo was standing on a kitchen chair washing the ceiling above my stove.

  Milo was the only one who didn’t avoid my gaze. “Trust me, you really don’t want to know,” he said. Since I saw no need for bandages or the fire department, I decided he was right.

  After supper Milo and Derek headed to their bed-and-breakfast, and Ethan decided to go for a walk. I’d taken Burtis’s magazines upstairs to my bedroom. I set the storage container on the bed and pointed at the cats. “Stay on the floor,” I said. “These belong to Burtis and I don’t want anything to happen to them. That means no kitty paw prints, no kitty drool and no kitty hair anywhere near these magazines.”

  Hercules made disgruntled grumbles and retreated to the closet, probably to rearrange my shoes again. Owen made a show of washing his face even though he’d already done that downstairs. I could see him sneak peeks at me from time to time.

  I was on my second article when Marcus called. He was going to be testifying in a case that went back more than two years and the prosecuting attorney was going over every tiny detail with him.

  “We’re taking a break,” he said. “I just wanted to hear your voice.”

  “I’m glad you called,” I said. “Burtis loaned me several magazines. I’m reading about Lewis Wallace.”

  “Have you discovered anything yet?”

  I shook my head even though he couldn’t see me. “Both articles I’ve read so far are pretty short. The most interesting thing was a photo of Lewis Wallace in his freshman year where he looks more like sixteen than nineteen.” Wallace had been standing in front of a large brick building next to a large wall plaque with what I guessed was the college seal featuring the words “Virtus, Veritas, Honestas.”

  Marcus lowered his voice. “I’ve been looking into some of the people who lost their businesses to Wallace and his partners, but so far I haven’t come across anyone I think might have murdered the man.”

  “If I find anything at all in the last magazine I’ll let you know,” I promised.

  I’d just said good night to Marcus and laid my phone down on the bed when Owen launched himself from the floor. The metal storage box went over sideways and though I thought the top was secure, it opened and the third plastic-covered magazine slid onto the bed.

  Owen made a wide circle around the box and the magazines and made his way up to the pillows.

  “Hey! What did I say?” I asked. Burtis’s magazine seemed to be fine.

  “Merow,” the cat replied.

  “Exactly!” I retorted. I didn’t have a clue what Owen’s response had been but given the way he was ducking his head and looking everywhere but at me I was pretty sure he knew what he’d done was wrong.

  I pointed at the door. “Out,” I said, maybe a bit more dramatically than was needed.

  Owen walked to the side of the bed, jumped down and left, complaining all the way. I got up and closed the door, peeking in the closet on the way by to see that Hercules was asleep, curled up on my favorite black pumps.

  I picked up the magazine that had fallen out of the storage box and slipped it from the protective cover. It turned out to contain a short article about whether or not college athletes were getting meaningful degrees, or as the author of the piece asked, just a useless piece of paper so they managed to stay academically eligible to play. The article referenced the cheating scandal at Saint Edwin University during the previous football season. Lewis Wallac
e and two other members of the team had been accused of selling the answers to an accounting final—a required course for many of the players—to their team members, the same way they were alleged to have sold the answers to the midterm. As Burtis had already told me, Wallace turned out not to have been involved.

  My phone rang then and I stretched to reach it. It was Melanie Davis.

  “I’m sorry to bother you, Kathleen,” she said, “but I have a potential quilt show problem.”

  “What is it?” I asked. I thought Patricia had gone over every detail. What could have gone wrong?

  “Our chef tried the cookie recipes that Patricia dropped off. The lemon crinkle top ones are fine but he thinks the almond shortbread are too crumbly when the recipe is changed to make so many at once. And it’s just not practical to make them in small batches. For what it’s worth, I agree with him.”

  I put the magazine I’d been reading back in its protective sleeve. “How can I help?”

  “Before I tell Patricia, I need a third opinion. I know she doesn’t like last-minute changes and I’m hoping there’s strength in numbers.”

  “I can come down and try a cookie right now if that helps.”

  “Are you sure you don’t mind?” Melanie asked. I could hear voices in the background, which told me she was still at the St. James.

  “You’re offering me cookies,” I said. “I don’t mind.”

  I told her I’d be there in a few minutes and ended the call. I put all the issues of Burtis’s magazines back in their storage container and made sure the lid was secure. I opened the closet door partway. Hercules in turn opened one eye and yawned.