Lilliput Bar Mystery

by Curry, Edna

  Ben laughed. “Well, where did you pick up that hick saying, Missy? In Vegas?”

  “Oooh,” she said, glaring at him.

  Ben read her rights to her and asked her if she wanted a lawyer present.

  “I didn’t do anything, you dummy,” she said. “What do I need a lawyer for?”

  “It’s your right to have one, if you want one,” Chance said. “We just need to ask you a few questions.”

  “Well, hurry up. I’m sick of being stuck here. I want to go home and take a hot bath.”

  “That’ll have to wait a bit, I’m afraid.”

  “Huh.”

  “Where were you on Thursday night last week?”

  Sue flipped back her long blonde hair and shrugged. “I don’t keep a diary. Let’s see, that was what, three days ago?”

  “Yes, the night of the snowstorm,” Chance said.

  “Oh, yeah,” she said, “You caught me having a scuffle with that bitch, Jody, in the Dalles House parking lot.”

  Chance grinned. “Right. And after that?

  “I told you that night. I was meeting Bob.”

  “And then what?”

  “Then he wanted to go meet his buddies. So we left and went out to dinner in Forest Lake instead.”

  “What time was that?”

  “I don’t know. Eight, eight-thirty, maybe.”

  “And came back around what time?”

  “I don’t know. Midnight?”

  “What route did you take returning to Canton?”

  Sue frowned. “I don’t know the number. It’s a blacktop road.”

  “Were you driving or was Bob?”

  “Bob drove. He hates it when I drive. Claims I’m a bad driver. Only I’m not!” She raised her chin and narrowed her eyes at them.

  “Did he drink at the dinner?” Ben asked.

  “Not at the dinner, but we barhopped a while after that,” Sue said.

  “So he’d had a few drinks before driving home?”

  “Well, sure, some. But he wasn’t drunk, if that’s what you want to know.”

  “Anything happen on the way home?”

  “I don’t know. I fell asleep on the way.”

  “So you came straight home?”

  “Yeah, I guess. I woke up when that stupid Bob turned into Mildred’s driveway too short and got stuck in a snow bank. I walked in and let him shovel himself out. Served him right. He was cold and wet when he came in.”

  “What time was that?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Very late. Maybe two or so.”

  “What did you do the next day?” Chance asked.

  “The roads were all plowed by then, so we went to Maplewood Mall shopping. Thought I’d get a head start on Christmas shopping, because all the stores were offering to match the price if you found something cheaper before Christmas.”

  “Really? Did you find some good deals?”

  Sue suddenly looked worried. Her brow furrowed and she fidgeted in her chair and shrugged. “Nothing special. Just clothes and stuff.”

  Chance turned on the video player. “I need you to look at these pictures. Tell me what you see.”

  Sue stared at the screen, seeing herself checking out several large items. She gasped and said, “Where did you get that?”

  “Do you recognize the picture?”

  “It’s me, shopping at the mall.”

  “And this picture?”

  “Yeah. Me going out to the car with my cart.”

  “Where was Bob while you went shopping?”

  Sue shrugged. “Drinking with his buddies again at a bar. I picked him up later.”

  “What did you do with all the stuff you bought, Sue?”

  “I…I gave it to someone else. I was helping out a friend. He paid me back for the stuff.”

  “And what credit card are you swiping there?”

  “My own, of course.”

  “May I see it, please?”

  “What?” Sue sputtered.

  “Show me your credit card, Sue,” Chance said quietly.

  “I…I don’t have it anymore. I…I lost it.”

  “Did you report it lost to your company?”

  “No, I…I don’t have the company’s number,” Sue said. “I only brought the credit card with me. I’ll do it as soon as I get back to Las Vegas.”

  “Someone could have charged a lot on it by then,” Chance said, exchanging a knowing look with Ben. “You really need to cancel that number right away. If you know the company’s name, I can look up the number for you.”

  “No, that’s okay. I’ll take care of it myself,” Sue said. Obviously nervous now, she kept glancing around as though looking for a way to escape.

  “But you might have to pay the charges if you don’t report it right away,” Chance said.

  “No, I mean, they can’t charge anything more on it, because the card was maxed out,” she said. “The last time I used it, the lady said so.”

  “So you had to use another card for that purchase?” Chance asked.

  “And you maxed that card out, too?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you still have that one?”

  “No, I lost them both. I mean, I lost the little pouch I keep that stuff in.”

  A likely story. “How did Bob’s rental car get damaged?”

  “Huh? It’s damaged? How?”

  “There’s a long scrape along the passenger side. Didn’t you notice it?”

  “No. I don’t pay much attention to stuff like that. It didn’t happen when I was driving. Maybe somebody parked too close at the mall or something, I don’t know. I’m sure the rental company has insurance to take care of it. They charged us enough.” She squirmed in her chair again. “Are we done now? You said a few questions. This is more than a few.”

  “Sure. The deputy will take you back, now,” Chance said.

  She rose. “I’m not released yet? Why not?”

  “We have a few more things to sort out.”

  “Oh. Then I can go?” She looked from Chance to Ben hopefully.

  “We’ll see,” Ben said.

  With a frustrated snort, she flipped back her long blond hair and went out of the room with the deputy. The door slapped shut behind them.

  “What do you think?” Ben asked, getting up to refill his coffee cup. “Each claims the other drove home the night of the storm.

  Chance refilled his cup as well and they returned to their chairs. “I think it’s more likely Bob was driving, even if he’d been drinking. She’s not used to our weather and he is. I can see her panicking when the snow started and letting him drive.”

  Ben nodded. “And maybe Frank had just run out of gas, then decided to stay in his car until help arrived, with the snow so heavy.”

  “Right. And Bob may not have seen him until the last minute, then tried to avoid him, just scraping the side of his car and forcing Frank off the road and into the ditch where he slammed into the pole.”

  “True,” Ben said.

  “But I don’t think that’s what happened at all,” Chance said.

  “Why not? It makes sense, doesn’t it?”

  “Think about it. You run out of gas along the road. What happens?”

  “Your car stops running,” Ben said.

  “Right. But the coroner said Frank died of carbon monoxide.”

  Ben slapped his forehead. “I forgot! So the car had to keep running after the accident.”

  “And remember the mound of snow blocking the tailpipe. Looked to me like Frank was just forced off the road, then knocked unconscious by hitting the windshield. The car kept running and someone shoveled that snow behind it to fill the car with exhaust to finish him off. That time of night, that highway is pretty empty, so nobody came along to notice in time to save him.”

  “Then why did the gas gauge read empty?” Ben said, rubbing the side of his crooked nose.

  “Who knows? Maybe a coincidence? Or he was close to out of gas and it ran long enough to finish it off?�
��

  “Or maybe whoever forced him off the road siphoned off most of the gas as well as stole his money and credit cards? With the price of gas so high, now?” Ben guessed.

  “Let’s get Bob back in here and see if we can get anything more out of him.”

  Ben buzzed the deputy and told him to bring Bob back.

  Bob sauntered in and grumpily asked, “Now what do you want? I just got to sleep.”

  “Sleep? It’s not even nine o’clock.”

  “Well, I don’t feel so good,” Bob said.

  Chance nodded. “Okay, we just need to clarify a few things that don’t jibe between your story and Sue’s.”

  “Huh. Well, she’s lying, whatever she told you. She lies all the time.”

  “Is that so?” Ben murmured.

  “Yeah. What did she say?”

  “Well, she says you drove home Friday night after dinner with your friends. And she said it was very late, maybe two in the morning.”

  “Huh. Well, it might have been pretty late. I don’t remember much. Like I said, I’d had a few and she drove home.”

  “It was snowing pretty hard by then, wasn’t it? Windy, too.”

  “Yeah, it was.”

  “Isn’t she from Vegas? Doesn’t know how to drive on snow and ice?”

  “Well, yeah, I guess.”

  “And you let her drive in that anyway? Weren’t you afraid she’d have an accident?”

  “Uh, well. Maybe she did talk me into driving. Weather was pretty bad.”

  “Sure was,” Ben agreed. “So you turned off eight onto thirty-seven ‘cause there’s less traffic there?”

  “Yeah, guess I probably did. Like I said, I don’t really remember much about it. I had a few drinks, you know?”

  “Yes, you said that,” Chance agreed. “Then what happened?”

  “What do you mean, what happened? I told you earlier, when we got home, I got stuck in Mildred’s driveway and had to shovel my car out.”

  “Nothing happened on the way home?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Did Sue stay with you and help you shovel your car out?”

  “Naw. She was pissed and cold, so she walked up the driveway to the house. It’s not very far.”

  “It must have been cold, working there in the snow and wind. Why didn’t you just walk up with her and leave the car there until morning?”

  “I don’t know. Never thought of it, I guess.”

  “How long did it take you to get the car out?”

  Bob shrugged. “Can I have a cigarette?”

  Ben shook his head. “Sorry, this is a non-smoking building. How long?”

  “Stupid new laws,” Bob grumbled. “Maybe an hour or so, I guess.”

  “And then what did you do?”

  “Went in the house and took off the wet clothes, got into dry pajamas and went to sleep. Like I should be doing right now,” Bob said, frowning at them.

  “I don’t think so,” Chance said. “I think you saw Frank’s car along the road, maybe stalled out in the snow or stuck. So you went back to finish him off.”

  Bob snorted. “You have quite an imagination. I was so danged cold and wet after shoveling my car out, I wouldn’t have gone anywhere except in the house to get warm and dry.”

  “Then you saw him along the road coming home? And Sue was asleep, so you took a chance and pushed him off the road with your car, then, when he’d crashed into the pole and was knocked out, you helped yourself to his money and credit cards and even siphoned off some gas from his tank to make it look like he’d run out of gas, causing the accident. Right?”

  “Where’d you get a crazy theory like that?”

  “Remember the picture of Sue swiping a credit card at the mall?”

  “Yeah, so what? She uses them all the time.”

  “Well the two credit cards she used that day were registered to Frank and Martha Johnson, not to her.”

  “Sonavabitch!” Bob exploded, jumping to his feet. “I told her not to use them yet. I…I mean—”

  Evidently realizing he’d given himself away, he sank back into his chair.

  “So you did take them from Frank and give them to her?”

  “Yeah,” Bob said, his head bowed. “Ma promised to leave everything to me. I didn’t even know about him until after she died. It’s not fair. She hardly even knew him, still she left him the same amount that she left me.”

  “So you tried to even things up a little?” Chance asked gently.

  “Yeah. I thought we’d get some of it back through the credit cards. We were so damned short of money—”

  “And you owe a lot of money back in Vegas, right?”

  “Yeah.” Bob raised his head. “How did you know about that?”

  “I have friends in the Vegas police department,” Chance explained.

  “So whose idea was blocking the tailpipe with snow?” Ben asked.

  “Mine, I guess,” Bob said with a sigh. “It started as just an accident. I didn’t see him in the storm until I was almost up to him. He’d stopped along the road. I swung the wheel and side-swiped him and his car went flying into the ditch and hit the light pole. I stopped and went to his car and heard him moan a bit, so I knew he was still alive. And I thought he should have died and made life easier for me. It seemed like an easy way out at the time. Pretty stupid, wasn’t it?”

  “Sure was,” Ben said. “Did you kill your mother, too?”

  “No, way. I told you, we were in Vegas, then. I didn’t even come up here until after a cop came and told us she was dead.”

  “You could have hired someone to kill her.”

  Bob swallowed hard. “But I didn’t.”

  “I think you did. I’ll figure out how you did it. In the meantime, Bob, you’re under arrest for murdering your brother.”

  Chapter 10

  The next morning, I sat at my kitchen table drinking coffee and knew I couldn’t put it off any longer. Thanksgiving was coming fast and I had to at least invite Chance to go with me to my mother’s dinner. I could only hope he’d have a good excuse not to go. Mom would be satisfied that I’d invited him.

  So, with butterflies in my stomach, I dialed his number. When he answered, I drew a deep breath and said the words I’d been practicing for days. “Would you like to go with me to my mother’s house for Thanksgiving Dinner on Thursday?”

  Silence. Oh, God, did he hate the idea and was trying to think of a way to get out of going? Suddenly, I really wanted him to go with me. What did he want?

  “Really? You’d want me to go with you to your family dinner?” Chance asked.

  My breath whooshed out in relief. Yes! He did want to go! “That’s what I just said, didn’t I?”

  “Yeah, but…I mean, I’ve never met your mother. How does she know about me?”

  I burst out laughing. “My mother used to live here. The grapevine told her we’ve been seen dating. She’s been bugging me about meeting you.”

  Chance laughed, too. “I’ll never get used to small town gossip.”

  “It’s not so bad. Usually, they mean well.”

  “I suppose, but it’s …disconcerting.”

  “Yeah, I know. So, will you go?”

  “Sure,” Chance said. “I’m always up for a home cooked meal. What time?”

  “How about two o’clock?”

  “Okay. I’ll pick you up. Where do they live?”

  “About an hour from here. See you Thursday, then.”

  ***

  Chance hung up and glanced at Ben, who’d been listening openly.

  “So you’re going to Cassie’s mom’s house for Thanksgiving?”

  “Yeah. A home-cooked meal sounds good. But I haven’t even met them.”

  Ben laughed. “I’ve known them forever. Good luck on the inquisition.”

  Chance eyed Ben. “What am I getting into?”

  “You’ll find out. Have fun.”

  “What’re you doing for Thanksgiving?”

  “
Eating at the Flame. Someone has to hold down the fort here, you know.”

  “I guess so.”

  ***

  Late Thursday afternoon, we sat around Mom’s big dining room table. We were stuffed with turkey and all the trimmings.

  I asked Chance, “Are you having fun, despite Ben’s warning?”

  On the drive over here, Chance had told me what Ben had said.

  Now, he nodded. “Your family is friendly and open. Though they do ask a lot of questions,” he added under his breath.

  I made a face at him and he started laughing.

  “What’s so funny?” Dad asked him.

  “Ben said you’d all ask a lot of questions, today. And you have,” Chance replied.

  “Just looking out for our little girl,” her father explained.

  “Dad!” I exclaimed. “I’m not a little girl.”

  “No, you sure aren’t.” Chance grinned at me, making me blush.

  I glanced around the table. Everyone looked curiously at me. I tried to think of a change of subject. “What’ll happen to Mildred’s property now? I mean, Frank’s dead and with Bob up for murdering him?”

  “I think it’ll go to Martha and Sally, as Frank’s heirs. Jack wants to buy the bar, so they can cash it out if they want to,” Chance said.

  “Really?” I said. “That would be great!”

  “What about Bob’s girlfriend? Sue?” Mom asked.

  “That’ll depend on if Bob left a will. As far as I know now, he didn’t. So, Frank’s daughter is his next of kin. Ironic, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah. Bob killed Frank to keep him from getting his mother’s property. So he ends up going to jail and Frank’s family gets it all.”

  “Karma,” I said, and forked up some pumpkin pie. “Delicious pie, Mom, as always.”

  “Delicious everything, Mrs. Jennings. You’re a great cook. What’s Karma?” Chance asked, his brow dipping.

  I shrugged and sent him a suggestive grin. “Fate. You know, you get what you deserve.”

  Chance lifted a brow and grinned back. My heart flipped over. Did he have ideas for our trip home?

  ***

  When I got home after work the next evening, my stomach growled. I’d missed lunch and hadn’t even had any granola bars or apples left in my van. I’d found a frozen chocolate bar in my glove box, but that sugar boost had worn off hours ago.