Bernie had just gotten to the part about Fisher walking in on her and her father and accusing them of mucking up the crime scene and how he’d had to call a special van to accommodate her dad’s wheelchair so they could cart him off to jail when Marvin walked through the door.
“Hey,” Rob shouted lifting his glass, “it’s the man of the hour. Come on. I’ll buy you a beer.”
As Marvin came towards them, Bernie couldn’t help thinking about what a good couple Libby and Marvin would make. They had the same body type, the same outlook on life, and most importantly Marvin had liked her sister since grade school.
Plus, he was smart, nice, hard working and it didn’t hurt that he was going to inherit his dad’s business. So what if he needed to lose a few pounds. So did Libby. And as for him being a funeral director, at least he’d never get laid off. Now, if she could only convince Libby to loosen up a little and give Marvin a fair try.
Everyone would benefit. Libby would be happier and if Libby were happier then she and her dad would be too. Maybe she’d chill out a little, Bernie thought, remembering how her sister had flipped out last night. In truth, not that she’d ever say this to Libby, but maybe if she got a little more sex—correction: any sex—she’d freak out a little less.
Marvin readjusted his glasses and sat down on the other side of Bernie.
“I called Libby and asked her to meet me but she said she was going to bed. She sounded angry. I hope it wasn’t anything I’ve done.”
Bernie reached for the peanuts.
“Why would she be angry at you? You saved the day last night. If it weren’t for you, Dad and I would still be in jail. Libby just gets cranky when she’s tired.”
“Oh,” Marvin said. He took his glasses off, fiddled with them, then put them on again.
Bernie made to slide off the stool. “You want me to go get her for you because I will.”
Marvin shook his head. “She doesn’t want to.”
“So what?”
“She was really very specific.”
Bernie leaned over and patted Marvin’s shoulder. “Let me give you a word of advice. Don’t listen to my sister. She doesn’t know what she wants.”
“Yeah,” Rob put in. “Just go over to her house, barge into her bedroom, and drag her off into the woods. Her dad would really like that.”
Bernie poked Rob in the ribs. “Hey buddy, no one is talking to you. Don’t listen to him,” she told Marvin.
“She really is tired,” Marvin protested.
“So what?” Bernie countered. “Sleep is a waste of time. Last offer. Do you want me to go get her? Because just say the word and I will.”
Marvin shook his head.
“Sure?” Bernie asked.
“Positive,” Marvin said as Brandon put a stein in front of Marvin.
“On the house,” Brandon informed him.
“It’s amazing your boss hasn’t fired you yet,” Rob told him.
“Hey, if it wasn’t for me half of these people wouldn’t be in here,” Brandon pointed out. “So he can swallow a few freebies. Swallow.” He slapped the bar. “Get it?”
Rob just snorted and shook his head.
“Anyway,” Brandon continued, “when beer’s on tap it’s hard to tell exactly how many have been sold. That’s why in my bar I’d just serve the bottled stuff.”
“You thinking of opening one?” Rob asked.
Brandon glanced around to make sure no one was looking at him then nodded as Marvin took a sip of his beer.
“Foam,” Bernie said, pointing to his upper lip.
Marvin hastily wiped it off. “Here’s something that’s interesting,” he told Bernie, Rob, and Brandon. “My dad just told me that the police released Leeza Sharp’s body. We’re doing the burial.”
Bernie ate another peanut and dropped the shell on the floor. “What about her family?”
Marvin shrugged. “I don’t think she has any. At least I didn’t see any next of kin listed on the paperwork. Jura’s already contacted my dad about the funeral arrangements.”
“Why didn’t he use the funeral home in West Vale?” Bernie asked. “They have one, right?”
Marvin took another gulp of beer and wiped his upper lip off with the back of his hand.
“I’m guessing because they’re way more expensive and he doesn’t want to spend any money.”
“Go on,” Bernie prompted.
“I really shouldn’t. I probably shouldn’t have said as much as I did,” Marvin replied.
“Tell us,” Bernie urged. “You know you want to. We’ll be discreet.”
Rob almost choked on his beer.
“Well I can be when the need arises,” Bernie said as she watched Marvin trying to decide what to do.” She stroked his arm. “Come on, Marvin. I’m sure Libby would want to know.”
She watched Marvin take another sip of his beer. She could tell he was weakening. A moment later he began to talk.
“Okay,” he said in a low voice. “But you can’t tell anyone. Except for Libby.”
“We won’t,” Bernie promised as Rob rolled his eyes. “Ignore him,” she told Marvin as she poked Rob in the ribs.
“Hey, that hurt,” Rob complained rubbing his side.
“It was meant to,” Bernie told him. “Go on,” she urged Marvin.
Marvin fiddled with his glasses for another moment and licked his lips. Finally he said, “Let’s just say that the casket he picked is one step up from a pine box. Plus he’s having her cremated.”
Bernie grabbed another handful of peanuts and began cracking the shells and throwing the nuts into her mouth one at a time.
“All that money he was going to spend on the wedding and nothing for her funeral. Interesting.”
“Some people think that funerals are a waste of money,” Marvin pointed out. “Not that I agree of course. But maybe he’s one of them.”
“Maybe,” Bernie agreed.
“And he’s another interesting thing. He wants Leeza dressed in her wedding dress.”
“How romantic,” Rob said. “Very Edgar Allan.”
“I don’t get it,” Brandon said.
“He means Edgar Allan Poe,” Bernie explained. “You know, he wrote poems about being in love with dead girls. Like Tom Petty.”
Marvin smiled. “Annabelle Lee. Yeah. We read it in high school.” He threw open his arms and declaimed, “And so, all night-tide, I lie down by the side/Of my darling, my darling, my life and my bride . . .”
Bernie clapped as Brandon waved his hand.
“You would remember something like that,” he told Marvin.
“Meaning?” Marvin demanded.
“Meaning nothing,” Bernie told him. “Brandon was just pulling your chain.”
Brandon nodded. “It’s true, man.”
Bernie tapped her fingers on the bar while she thought. “The thing is,” she said slowly, “Jura never impressed me as the romantic type. In fact, he impressed me as just the opposite. Maybe, the impetus for his actions isn’t romantic. Maybe he just wants to get rid of everything having to do with the wedding.”
“And why would he want to do that?” Rob asked.
“Because he doesn’t want to think about it anymore,” Marvin observed.
“Well, he certainly wouldn’t if he killed her,” Bernie said.
Rob looked at her. “Don’t go there.”
“Where am I going?” Bernie protested.
“You can stop that wide-eyed innocent bit you’re doing because it doesn’t work.”
“I’m not doing anything. I’m just speculating.”
“Good. Because you’re leaving this case to the professionals, right?”
“Right,” Bernie repeated.
“You promise? No cross counts.”
“I promise,” Bernie said, raising her right hand. “At least for the time being.”
She was too tired tonight to go into the whole thing about how solving crimes was her karma.
Chapter 12
Three weeks later Sean Simmons was sitting in his bedroom typing on his computer at two o’clock in the afternoon when he heard a knock on the downstairs door. A moment later, he heard footsteps coming up the stairs and Libby popped her head into his room.
“You’re not going to like this,” she said.
“Like what?” Sean asked quickly turning off the monitor before he turned to regard his eldest daughter.
In truth he really didn’t want her to see what he was working on. Not that he was doing anything wrong mind you. He just hadn’t told Libby about the letter he was in the midst of writing because he was pretty certain she wouldn’t approve, and why cause problems if you didn’t have to? Why subject yourself to one of those emotional scenes Libby had a habit of throwing if you could avoid it?
He was as willing as the next man to listen to what someone had to say, but he preferred that it be presented to him in a logical fashion. He didn’t think that was too much to ask. But Libby was like Rose in that regard. She could never manage to talk dispassionately. She always had to bring feelings into it, and then she got mad when he walked out.
All he was doing here was looking for justice. What was so bad about that? On the advice of his attorney—well really he’d had to coax Paul a little bit to get him in back of this—he was in the midst of drafting a letter to the West Vale District Attorney informing him of his intent to lodge a wrongful action suit against Alex Fisher and the West Vale Police Department for the false arrest and imprisonment of him and Bernie.
Sean figured there was time enough to let Libby know about the lawsuit if it came to anything. Who knew? Maybe it wouldn’t. Then he’d have to listen to her blather on about how concerned she was that he not stress himself out, but not before it was necessary.
Anyway a man needed some stress in his life, something to butt up against. Otherwise you might as well be a sack of potatoes sitting on the shelf. And he had to say he was enjoying anticipating the look on Alex Fisher’s face when he was served with the papers. He only wished he could be there to see it.
“The Walker sisters are here,” Libby said, interrupting his train of thought.
“The Walker sisters?” Sean repeated hoping he hadn’t heard correctly.
Libby brushed a piece of lint off her T-shirt. “That’s what I just said.”
Sean groaned. They were the last people he wanted to talk to. “I thought they were in Sumatra.” Or was it Bali? He forgot. Well actually, he didn’t care.
“I think it was South Dakota.”
Sean waved his hand in the air. “Same thing.”
“Not exactly,” Libby pointed out.
“Frankly, I don’t give a hoot if they’ve just come back from the Arctic Circle. Can’t you put them off? Tell them I’ve had a relapse, and I’m on my deathbed. Better yet, tell them I’ve died.”
“You know what they’re like. They’d want to see your corpse,” Libby told him.
Sean had to agree that unfortunately Libby’s assessment was spot on.
“Can’t you talk to them?” he asked.
“They want to speak to you. They said it’s urgent.”
Sean licked his lips. That wasn’t good. Heaven only knows how but the last time they’d said something like that they’d convinced his wife, Rose, to keep a twelve-foot Burmese python for them. Just for a couple of weeks, they’d said. Naturally the two weeks had stretched into two months.
And of course the damned thing had escaped just like he’d predicted it would. And of course, Rose had gotten hysterical just like he’d predicted she would. He’d wasted two whole days looking for the snake when he should have been out patrolling the town. He’d taken the house apart. Nothing. Then the thing had turned up next door. To this day he didn’t know how that had happened.
But there it was wrapped around the toilet bowl when his neighbor Mrs. Peabody had gone to take her morning pee. He could remember her shrieking. He’d thought a murder was being committed. Then when he’d gotten there, having busted through her screen door he might add, he’d thought she was going to stroke out on him.
Lucky for him she hadn’t. But that vision of Mrs. Peabody with her undies down around her ankles had stayed with him. Unfortunately. He couldn’t look the woman in the face after that. He wouldn’t have claimed ownership of the damned thing, if Rose hadn’t been in back of him shaming him into it.
“What would I have told Eunice and Gertrude when they got back?” she demanded when they’d gotten home.
Well that had just opened the door to all sorts of comments he’d been married long enough to know better than to say, so he’d kept his mouth shut. With a great deal of difficulty, he might add.
Libby coughed. Sean shook his head to clear it.
“You want me to bring up tea or coffee?” she asked him.
“Coffee,” Sean said bowing to the inevitable, “and some lemon bars.” From what he remembered of the Walker sisters they didn’t eat sugar, so he’d have them all to himself.
A moment later, the Walker sisters came into his bedroom. He blinked his eyes. The last time he’d seen them, which was not more then three weeks ago when Alex Fisher was carting him off to jail, their hair had been turquoise. Now it was green. Why would anyone do that to themselves he wondered as they took seats on the sofa opposite him.
He watched as they both tucked their skirts under their thighs and sat down in unison. They’d been living together for so long, Sean reflected, that they were like an old married couple. In fact, they looked so much alike it was hard to tell them apart.
Especially since not only did they have the same hair color, they were both dressed in the same clothes, in this case long black skirts and bright pink T-shirts, with the logo We Kick Ass printed on them. The only difference between the two women as far as he could see was that Eunice had brown eyes and Gertrude’s were blue.
“So what can I do for you ladies?” he asked them.
“I hope we didn’t interrupt,” Eunice said.
“Not at all,” Sean lied.
He watched as Eunice looked at Gertrude and Gertrude looked at Eunice.
Finally Eunice said, “You start, Gertrude.”
Gertrude smoothed down her skirt again and coughed into her hand. Sean didn’t say anything. He waited. It was something he’d become good at in his years on the force. He’d learned in his first year that most people couldn’t deal with silence. Eventually they talked just to fill the void.
“I know you don’t like us very much,” Gertrude began.
Sean opened his mouth to deny it, but Gertrude put up her hand to stop him.
“We’re too old for lies at this stage of our life,” she told him.
Speak for yourself, Sean thought. He wheeled himself a little closer to the sisters.
“Go on,” Sean told Gertrude. Never admit; never deny. That was his motto.
Gertrude coughed again. “I know you think we’re strange. I know you don’t approve of the way we dress or the color we dye out hair. I know you think we imposed on Rose over the years. I know you never forgave us for the snake.”
“That’s not true,” Sean protested.
Gertrude snorted. “Even back then,” she told him. “You could never could hide what you were thinking very well. That’s one of the things Rose loved about you.”
Sean looked away. The last thing he wanted to do was discuss Rose with them. Or anyone for that matter.
“And I know you’d prefer that we not be here now,” Gertrude continued.
Did they overhear what I was saying to Libby, Sean wondered. Boy, he hoped not.
“And we wouldn’t be,” Eunice continued. “If we really didn’t need your help. And since you are family . . .” Eunice let her voice drop off.
“That would be stretching it,” Sean said.
Eunice gave him what Rose had called “The Look” and even though Sean knew it was ridiculous, he felt guilty. “All right. Why are you here?” he asked.
He watched while E
unice and Gertrude exchanged another set of looks. A moment later, Gertrude took up the conversational banner.
“You know,” she began. “Marx . . .”
Sean cut her off. “Please not that,” he said. “Don’t rehash that stuff.”
Gertrude opened her mouth and shut it. As Sean watched her casting around for another way to start he wondered where the hell Libby was with coffee and cookies. A shot of Jameson in his coffee would also help, but it was too late to ask for that now.
“Fine,” Gertrude finally said. “At least grant me the premise that the rich have more privileges than the poor.”
“Agreed,” Sean said wondering where this was going.
“And that since they operate in a closed strata unlike, let us say, people in the middle class, what they do tends to be shielded from society at large.”
Sean reluctantly nodded his head again. His work had taught him the truth of that statement—after all that’s why he’d gotten fired—so he couldn’t argue with that either, much as he would have liked to.
Gertrude patted her hair down. “And when I say society, I mean its public institutions such as social services, the courts, and the judicial system.”
Can you just get on with it, Sean was thinking when Libby came in bearing a tray laden with coffee, mugs, sugar and cream and, Sean was glad to see, not one but two kinds of cookies.
Not that he really had to ask the Walker sisters why they were here. Two minutes into the conversation and he’d had a pretty good idea where it was leading. He just wished they’d speed things up. Of course he could bring that about, but that was a last resort.
Usually he found it more useful to just let people chat. It was amazing what you could find out that way. And that was what he intended to do here—if he could stand it. For the next five minutes or so he watched Libby serving everyone.
“Very nice, dear,” Gertrude said after taking a sip of her coffee. “I hope you made this from fair-traded beans,” she said lowering her mug.
“Actually, no,” Libby said. Now she knew where Bernie got her nitpicking abilities from.
“Do you know what fair-traded beans are?”
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