by Duffy Brown
The local consignment shop gal and the owner of stately Lillibridge House didn’t exactly travel in the same social circles, so I knew Steffy Lou Adkins only via tales of the kudzu vine and Auntie KiKi.
“Why, I thank you kindly for that.” Steffy Lou took another long draw off the cigarette, the red tip glowing bright and the nicotine relaxing her a bit. She eyed Old Yeller for a second and, doing the Southern-lady thing, tried her best not to shudder.
“I gave up this completely disgusting habit years ago,” she said, studying her cigarette. “It’s terrible bad for my singing voice and all, but sometimes . . . Well, this has all been so overwhelming with losing Daddy Conway. No one is ever prepared for such a tragedy in their life, and to think that Walker Boone is suspected of doing the deed is devastating indeed. The doctor even gave me some pills to try to calm me down, but nothing’s working.” She took another puff of the cigarette. “This is all so dreadful.”
She looked at me with a critical eye, her cigarette poised midair. “I know you, you’re that girl who was on TV. You said you were trying to get even with Walker because he did you an injustice.”
Steffy Lou shook her head and puffed, the soft curls of smoke fading into air. “Everyone is indeed entitled to their own opinion in this here world, but I must say that you’ve got it all wrong with Walker. I’m sorry about your divorce, I truly am, but he’s one of the good guys. I don’t care what the evidence says; Walker Boone didn’t kill Conway. He’d never do such a terrible thing. It’s just not like Walker at all.” Her voice wobbled and she dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief.
Okay, this did not reflect her husband Tucker’s view on the situation at all. I wetted a towel and swiped at my tea stains, but I was more interested in Steffy Lou’s take on what was going on than my dress. “You know Boone?”
“Oh my, yes. We’re on the Tybee Post Theater committee to save it from the wrecking ball and now from the greedy developers who want to buy it outright. It’s such a lovely theater out there on Tybee Island, and I planned this dinner and talent show coming up to make money to help save the place. Walker did all the legal work for free, bless his heart. We worked together morning, noon, and night to get the papers filled out just right. The committee’s trying mighty hard to get the theater on the National Registry to save it; we’re even having those special car license plates issued to draw interest. The very night Walker was charged with murder and had so much on his mind, he came to warn me that this Grayden Russell person wanted to buy the theater and that I might be in danger if I didn’t go along with it. Now I ask you, does that sound like a cold-blooded killer? He was worried about me more than himself.”
I dropped the towel. “Who is this Grayden Russell guy? He’s new in town?”
“From Charleston. Up there they all think they’re better than we are down here in Savannah, but the way I see it they are the ones closer to those Yankees. Seems Russell came here with his sights set on buying the theater to turn it into a resort of some nature that’s bound to be dreadful. Walker felt that Russell intended to get rid of the two of us as a warning to the theater committee to sell.”
Steffy Lou sat up straight and raised her chin. “Well, let me tell you, that tactic might work up North where he comes from, but it doesn’t stand a chance here in Savannah.”
She snuffed out her cigarette in a little silver compact she obviously kept for smoking lapses and snapped the evidence closed up neatly inside. She stood, shoulders back, head high, eyes set. “That man will never, and I do mean never, get his hands on the Tybee Theater if it takes my last dying breath.” She poked herself in the chest. “I am of the theater, a patron of the arts. A performer. As God is my witness, the theater will be saved.”
I waited for a band to strike up “Dixie,” but when that didn’t happen I offered, “My auntie took me to see Peter Pan there when I was little. It was fantastic.”
Steffy Lou smiled, her eyes sparking. “Oh my goodness, I played one of the Lost Boys.” She cleared her voice and let out a pretty decent rendition of “I Won’t Grow Up” right there in the composition addition bathroom.
I applauded and Steffy Lou bowed. The whole thing seemed a little odd, but Steffy Lou deserved a smile. She’d just lost her father-in-law, who’d seemed to treat her well, and the poor woman had married Tucker Adkins, God help her.
“I best get back,” she said, tossing a mint in her mouth and adding a spritz of something vanilla from a little atomizer to kill all evidence of smoker gone wild. She obviously had this experience down to a science.
“Everyone will be wondering where I am.” She opened the door and glanced back to me. “I sure do hope you change your mind about Walker Boone being guilty. He’s a fine man, he truly is. He deserves better than he’s getting, I can tell you that, but things seem to be stacking up against him and I don’t rightly know how to turn it all around. I’m truly afraid for him.”
Steffy Lou floated out the door in a wave of black taffeta, Southern sophistication, and sweet vanilla. She headed down the hall and I hoisted Old Yeller onto my shoulder, opened the back door, and slipped into the night, my brain fixated on Grayden Russell, whoever he was. The parking lot seemed to be Mason Dixon free, so I headed for the car but changed my mind. Figuring KiKi would be hungry after a night of twenty questions with Mason Dixon and the fact that I’d skipped dinner to catch up on laundry, I suffered the pain of walking in heels and hoofed up Price to York in a quest for food. I could drive the sexy Chevy, but it was easier to leave it moored safely at its present location and walk.
Inhaling deeply, I caught the spicy scent of Walls’ BBQ a block before I spied the little red bench on the covered porch. Walls’ was a hidden-away hole-in-the-wall kind of place, surrounded by small day shops and frequented by locals and tourists lucky enough to find it with the help of Yelp and Google Maps. My mouth started to water in anticipation of tender ribs with a side of collard greens. I’d get the small portions for a change, as pigging down at this hour probably wasn’t a great idea for my waistline or my digestive system, but . . . but someone was following me?
During the day York had its share of foot traffic, but at night I walked alone. The shadows were dark and deep, with lamplight tucked behind oak leaves and layers of Spanish moss. Usually those things offered ambiance with a touch of Southern romance; right now not so much.
I could feel eyes boring into my back, and I did what any woman would do in my situation. I hugged Old Yeller tight like a security blanket and ran like the devil to get my ribs! I ordered quarter portions, then tore back to the Chevy, my feet not touching the ground and basic primal fear spurring me on. By the time I garaged the Chevy I had blisters the size of peach stones and I was walking barefoot.
I took the moonlit path around the side of Cherry House, feeling calmer with Southern cuisine tucked under my arm and BW and KiKi waiting on the front porch with a shaker of martinis. For some, home was supper on the table at five, cookies in the oven, or a fire in the hearth. For KiKi and me it seemed to be a martini shaker and a dog on the porch, and a few of those cookies were okay, too. Home sweet home indeed, even if it did have a hole in the roof.
“So that’s where you hightailed it off to,” KiKi said to me as she eyed the white bag in my arms and inhaled deeply. She had on the blue floral housecoat I’d given her for her birthday and matching rollers already curled into her hair. She handed me a frosted martini glass, with a toothpick speared through a tiny gherkin pickle.
“Out of olives?”
“We don’t want to be boring.”
“It’s been a day of sequins, fire trucks, and funerals.” And stalkers, but KiKi didn’t need to fret over every little detail of my life, now did she? “I think we’re at a ten on the nonboring scale.”
I put the bag from Walls’ between us, and the heavenly aroma surrounded us as KiKi smacked her lips. “Find anything out from Dixon?” I asked, handing h
er a take-out container. I took the other and pulled out a plain hot dog for BW that Walls’ threw in for free. BW parked between us and I broke the hot dog into nice bite-size pieces, and then we all three dug in.
“Dixon is not a happy camper, I can tell you that,” KiKi said, slurping sauce off her fingertips. “My guess is it has to do with you in his office and suspecting him of blackmail. I’d watch myself with that one, dear.”
She patted my knee, then took another bite of rib, her eyes glazing over in ecstasy. “You got to realize that the Plantation Club might be all proper decorum on the outside, but underneath it’s pretty much the Wild West show and last-man-standing mentality.” She expertly caught a drip of sauce with her tongue. “Did you happen to find Mercedes’s mystery man?”
“He was that guy at the funeral in the cowboy hat. He nearly ran me over in the parking lot with his white pickup.”
KiKi stopped the rib bone halfway to her mouth. “Built like a fireplug? Mustache? Crazy eyes?”
“One of your dance students?”
“Angie Gilbert’s husband. She’s my canasta partner and she’s a nurse. She used to visit Conway at his house and give him B-12 shots and a little personal attention to rev up his heart, if you get my drift.”
I licked sauce off my pinky. “Well, the old boy saw fit to kill Conway a second time; do you think he has it in him to do the deed the first time?”
KiKi shook her head. “He was out of town, a flight to New York. He goes every other week like clockwork. Angie timed her B-12 visits that way.”
“He could have doubled back.”
“It’s a 747, honey, not a Honda.”
The stalker event killed my appetite. It was a rotten ending to a rotten day when even Walls’ didn’t look good to me. I packed up the greens and ribs for later.
“Are you okay?” KiKi asked with a hint of concern.
“Too many windmill cookies, is all. So,” I added fast, to keep KiKi from asking more questions, “that takes Angie’s husband off the table for killing Conway, and Mason Dixon doesn’t fit either. Why would Dixon kill the guy who was paying him off? The gold-digger sisters were angry with Conway and Boone, but murder’s a big leap. Tucker hated his dad, but why kill him? Just don’t return his phone calls and don’t invite him for Thanksgiving dinner. Any other gossip floating around?”
Auntie KiKi slurped her martini, the perfect accompaniment to ribs or in KiKi’s opinion anything else. “Some guy is trying to buy the Tybee Post Theater, and no one’s much liking the idea.”
“That’s Grayden Russell; he’s staying at the Old Harbor Inn. I met up with Steffy Lou Adkins in the little girls’ room at the Slumber, and she said Russell was after Boone.”
“Steffy Lou and you chatting it up?”
“She liked my purse.”
KiKi snagged a napkin, mopped herself up, and then finished off her martini. “You know, I haven’t been to the Old Harbor Inn in years, and this Russell person seems to be sittin’ right in the middle of all this mess.”
“That’s a stretch.”
“Honey, all we got is stretch. I hear tell the inn serves up a mighty fine breakfast.”
“Breakfast there is only if you bed there.”
“We’ll improvise. Mess up your hair, wear your bunny slippers, and dream up a room number. I’ll have the Batmobile fueled up and ready to fly at eight sharp.”
Chapter Seven
“WHAT do you mean, KiKi can’t make it?” I said to Chantilly, both of us not quite awake, which was proven by the fact that we were staring blankly into my empty refrigerator at seven thirty in the morning.
“That’s why I’m here,” Chantilly said. “KiKi is having an attack of tummyitis and wants me to fill in even though I didn’t get to bed till after two from catering the Adkins wake, and why don’t you ever have food in this house?”
“I have SpaghettiOs and hot dogs.”
Chantilly stifled a burp. “KiKi said something about breakfast at the Old Harbor Inn. I thought you had to bed at the inn to breakfast there.”
“You do; KiKi and I were going to breakfast-crash.” I gave Chantilly a hard look, as what she had just said about KiKi started to sink in. “A tummy problem? Well, that explains why I can’t find my leftovers of ribs and greens from Walls’ in here. It was right there.” I pointed to the second shelf. “She knows where I keep my spare key and helped herself.”
“Girl, everyone knows where you keep your spare key.”
“Hey, I moved it.”
“Where this time? The second flowerpot instead of the first?”
“Maybe. That thieving auntie snuck over here in the middle of the night in a barbecue frenzy and ate my food and didn’t even leave me the bag.” I sucked in a breath. “Wow, that was a lot of leftovers on top of what she already scarfed down; the woman deserves to have a jelly belly.”
Chantilly closed the fridge door. “The ribs and greens aren’t going to magically appear just because you want them to. Frankly, ribs at this hour isn’t my thing anyway, and if we’re going to crash breakfast let’s get a move on. How are we going to do this?”
“No idea. I don’t do ideas at seven thirty.”
“So is there some special reason for all this?” Chantilly added as I kissed BW good-bye on the snout and watched as he dragged his favorite chew toy to the top of the steps.
“We’re going to see a man about a murder . . . I think,” I said, closing the back door and heading for the garage.
“Oh goody, the perfect follow-up to yesterday. Some people start the morning with the newspaper and Frosted Flakes, you know.”
I backed the Chevy out of the garage and powered down the convertible top. “We got to put on the boot.”
“It’s summer; I don’t do boots in summer.”
“It’s the thing that covers the convertible top when it’s down.”
“That’s a lot of trouble.”
“You’ll thank me.”
Grumping and grousing, Chantilly got out and together we performed the time-honored tradition of snapping on the leather boot, and then we took off.
“This is simply amazing,” Chantilly said, her face to the sky, as sunlight peeked through the low-hanging branches of the live oaks forming a canopy overhead. Two hard hats offered wolf whistles and a wave, and Chantilly and I smiled and waved back. Some women would find this offensive, but in my book a little male appreciation was just what I needed to keep my hormones pumping.
“Thank you.” Chantilly grinned.
“You’re welcome, but we need to be thanking Boone.”
“You know, everyone in this city should have a convertible. It should be some kind of city law,” she purred.
“Until it’s August, one hundred in the shade, and mosquitoes are the size of a bus.” Having a car was really nice; the more I drove Boone’s, the more I wanted one. No bus to wait on, no walking in the rain unless I wanted to, I could pick up Fox supplies and consignment items, and I could make midnight runs to Parkers in my jammies if BW and I felt the need.
I took East Broad heading toward the Savannah River; the tourist traffic picked up the closer we got to the historic district. I crossed Bay Street, eased around Emmet Park, and dropped down onto the stone street below Factor’s Walk, where back in the day factors called out bids from above for the cotton wagons passing below. The lower level of the Old Harbor Inn was to the right; the hotel was sandwiched neatly between Factors Walk and River Street. Prime real estate indeed.
“Look out!” Chantilly braced herself and I slammed on the brakes as a gray sports car gunned up the short lane lined with river rocks, cars, people, and us. It squealed around the corner as pedestrians dived for safety and offered the one-finger salute in reply.
Chantilly stared at me wide-eyed. “What the—”
“Are you okay, Miss Chantilly?” the va
let from the Old Harbor Inn asked, rushing our way.
“I . . . I think so.” Chantilly flipped back her mussed hair, and I felt my heart settle back into my chest. Chantilly did a double take at the valet. “We’ve met?”
“Lamar Jones.” The valet smoothed his smart maroon vest, which was the same color as the Old Harbor Inn’s awnings. “I’ve seen you with Mr. Pillsbury. He got me this here gig and a place to stay. Righteous dude.” Lamar’s lips pulled into a hard line and he gazed toward the corner. “And Grayden Russell’s a jerk.”
“You know him?” I asked.
“He’s staying here and probably taking his car around to River Street on the other side to drop off that heavy surveying equipment he lugs around. He and some other guy get out at the docks early, taking measurements and whatever before it’s congested with tourists waiting for ferries and deep-sea fishing boats. Maybe today someone will push Russell in; he treats the staff and everyone here like dirt.” Lamar’s gaze fixed on Chantilly. “Please don’t be telling Pillsbury I said that. He’ll be pissed I was being disrespectful.”
Chantilly did the lock-the-lips thing, and I passed Lamar twenty bucks and a business card that I had made up for the Fox. “If you could let me know what Russell is up to, I’d appreciate it, and do you mind if we park here for a few minutes?”
Lamar passed back the twenty and added a smile. “There’s a spot behind you for this sweet ride, and be my pleasure keeping you up to date.”
Lamar welcomed another guest to the inn as I parked the Chevy and killed the engine. I turned sideways in my seat and faced Chantilly. “Okay, we need an excuse to talk to Russell. Something friendly and casual.”
“So how does this guy fit into a murder?”
“Russell was after Walker and Steffy Lou Adkins because they wouldn’t get behind his plan to buy the Tybee Post Theater; they’re trying to save the place as a theater for the performing arts. Now Steffy Lou’s father-in-law is dead and Walker is framed for the murder. KiKi thinks there might be a connection of some sort.”