Christmas Cookie Murder #6

by Meier, Leslie

  Stupid, stupid idiot, she muttered under her breath as she parked the car in front of the school, marched up the sidewalk and down the hall to Mr. Humphreys’s office. She yanked the door open angrily and stopped dead in her tracks. It wasn’t Toby sitting on the bench in Mr. Humphreys’s anteroom, it was Elizabeth.

  “What happened?” asked Lucy, sitting beside her. She felt completely off-balance. This wasn’t what she had expected at all.

  “I was only trying to help.” Elizabeth was so angry her entire body was tense.

  “Tell me the whole story.”

  “This girl named Chantal was having an asthma attack, and I gave her my inhaler.”

  “Did it work?”

  “Yeah. She’s fine.” Elizabeth was picking at the brown paper cover on a thick history textbook. It was filled with multicolored doodles and scribbles and was beginning to tear at the corners.

  “So what’s the problem?” Lucy didn’t get it.

  “Ah, Mrs. Stone. You’re here.” Mr. Humphreys was a tall man with a little potbelly. He had a wispy blond mustache and had trouble keeping his thick eyeglasses up where they belonged. They kept sliding down his oily nose. “Why don’t we all come in my office and discuss this?”

  Elizabeth rolled her eyes and got to her feet, sighing as she stood up. It was the official teen sigh, a protest against the stupidity of adult rules and regulations.

  Lucy flashed her a warning glance and stepped into the office. Elizabeth followed, and Mr. Humphreys shut the door behind them. He oozed across the room and seated himself behind his desk, giving them a little smile. Lucy felt itchy all over.

  “Ah, Mrs. Stone. I’m afraid what we have here is a very regrettable situation. Elizabeth was found in possession of a prescription drug, and she distributed it to a fellow student.”

  “It’s my asthma inhaler, and I gave it to Chantal because she couldn’t breathe and was turning blue.” Elizabeth spat the words out.

  “But the problem is that students are not allowed to carry prescription drugs without a note from the doctor. I checked with Mrs. Irving, the school nurse, and it seems you are not authorized to carry an inhaler. There is no doctor’s note in your file.”

  “Surely that’s a technicality,” said Lucy. “I can tell you that Elizabeth has asthma and her allergist has prescribed medication, including inhalers. She is supposed to carry one all the time in case she needs a quick fix.” Ooh, she thought to herself, that didn’t sound good.

  “That’s very well and good, Mrs. Stone, but Elizabeth neglected to request a drug authorization form from Mrs. Irving and did not have the form completed and returned by the doctor. She is in clear violation of school policies. But what disturbs me even more is that she distributed a potentially dangerous drug to another student.” Mr. Humphreys pursed his lips and fixed his eyes on Lucy, peering over his thick horn rims.

  “Now, Mr. Humphreys, you know as well as I do that there’s a big difference between sharing an inhaler and selling crack cocaine. I’m sure Elizabeth was only trying to help—the girl was having trouble breathing.”

  “That’s right!” interjected Elizabeth. “Mom, Chantal was really in trouble. Her fingernails were turning blue.”

  “Elizabeth has had attacks herself and has been taught to manage them,” said Lucy. “It sounds to me as if she did exactly the right thing.”

  “Is Elizabeth a doctor?” Mr. Humphreys inquired sarcastically. “Is she qualified to prescribe drugs? I think not.”

  “Of course not,” said Lucy, trying very hard to remain polite. “But only a handful of drugs are used to treat most asthma cases, and the inhalers are clearly marked by color. Kids who have asthma all know that the yellow inhaler is for emergencies. Considering Elizabeth’s excellent academic record and the fact that she’s never been in trouble before, I think you ought to make an exception in her case.”

  Mr. Humphreys made a tent of his fingers and slowly shook his head from side to side. “Mrs. Stone, our school board has adopted a zero tolerance policy toward drug use. That means there are absolutely no exceptions. That’s what zero tolerance means. I don’t think there is anything to be gained by continuing this discussion. Elizabeth clearly violated school policy as stipulated in the handbook. She will be suspended for two weeks and a report will be forwarded to the police department.” He gave a little nod. “You can expect the police will want to conduct a thorough investigation.”

  “That’s not fair!’ Elizabeth was on her feet.

  Mr. Humphreys glared at her from his seat. “Two weeks suspension plus one day, for disorderly behavior.”

  “Come on, Elizabeth.” Lucy wrapped an arm around her shoulder and led her out of the office. “Let’s get out of here.”

  As soon as they were in the hallway Elizabeth completely lost control. She jumped up and down in fury and shook her head, the sleek sophisticated hairdo began to fray as clumps of hair worked loose.

  “Come on, baby. You can do that at home. In fact, I’ll join you. But now we’ve got to get out of here before they call the cops on you.”

  “Mom, this is so unfair! I saved that girl’s life. I did. She was in real trouble, and the teacher, it was a substitute, wouldn’t let her go to the nurse’s office and kept telling her to stop making a scene. If I hadn’t given her my inhaler, she would have passed out for sure.”

  “I know you did the right thing.” Lucy hugged her. “I’m proud of you. I’ll always be proud of you. And we’ll figure this thing out. In the meantime, look on the bright side,” she said, pushing open the school doors. “You don’t have to come back for two weeks.”

  Elizabeth shrugged and thumped down the steps in her clunky platform shoes.

  Behind them, inside the school, Lucy heard the bell ring. She quickly followed Elizabeth to the car, hurrying to stay ahead of the flood of students that would soon come pouring out of all the exits.

  The car was blocked in by a line of school buses, so Lucy and Elizabeth couldn’t leave. They sat, watching as a steady stream of students flowed down the steps and onto the buses, keeping an eye out for Toby. When they spotted him, Lucy honked and Elizabeth stuck an arm out the window and waved.

  “Hi, Mom. What are you doing here?”

  “Elizabeth got suspended.”

  Toby’s eyes almost popped out of his head, but he quickly recovered and climbed in the backseat, forgoing the usual argument about who was going to ride in the front seat.

  “Good going, Lizzie. You were probably tired of being on the honor roll, anyway.”

  “Shut up,” growled Elizabeth.

  “Be nice, children,” said Lucy, easing into the flow of traffic as the school buses began moving. As they inched along, Lucy replayed the meeting with Mr. Humphreys in her mind, deciding the whole thing was ridiculous. Ridiculous, she thought, and dangerous. She didn’t like it one bit.

  Neither did Bill when he heard the whole story at dinnertime.

  “Elizabeth, it serves you right. This whole thing could have been avoided if you’d simply followed the rules and gotten a note from the doctor,” he said, taking a big forkful of meat loaf and mashed potatoes. “But, frankly,” he added, glowering at Toby, “you’re not the one I thought would get in trouble for drugs.”

  Just then the phone rang, and he got up to answer it. When he returned to the table, he looked a bit shamefaced.

  “That was Mrs. Williams, Chantal’s mother. She said she wanted to let us know how much she appreciated Elizabeth’s quick thinking. She’s convinced Elizabeth saved Chantal a trip to the hospital.”

  Later, while the kids did the dishes, Lucy and Bill remained at the table, drinking their coffee.

  “What do we do? Do we fight this?” asked Lucy.

  “I don’t get it,” said Bill. “From what Mrs. Williams said Elizabeth ought to be a hero. Instead, she’s suspended. It’s crazy.”

  “Mr. Humphreys said he’s referring it to the police.” Lucy furrowed her brow. “Maybe I should call Barney.” />
  “Wouldn’t hurt,” agreed Bill. “And in the meantime, I’m going to have a talk with Toby, mano a mano. He’s got to understand that if he keeps messing around with pot, he could get in real serious trouble.”

  He cocked an eyebrow and grinned at Lucy, and for a moment he reminded her of the college kid she’d fallen for so many years ago. A college kid who never passed along a joint at a party without taking a toke.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  7 days ’til Xmas

  When Lucy arrived at the police station on Thursday night to cover the sting operation she felt a bit uncomfortable. After all, until now no member of the family had been in trouble with the authorities. Tom Scott immediately put her at ease.

  “I received that report from the school concerning Elizabeth, and I don’t see anything for my department to investigate—she didn’t break any drug laws.” He gave her a big smile. “You ought to be proud of her—her quick thinking probably saved that girl an ambulance ride.”

  “That’s a big relief,” said Lucy, smiling as Barney and Richie Goodman entered Scott’s office. Lucy had known Richie ever since he was a baby, but she was always surprised by how quickly kids grew up. She could have sworn he’d grown a foot since she last saw him. He was at least six feet tall, a lean, good-looking boy with a thick mop of curly brown hair.

  “Now, Richie here is going to try to buy alcohol from license holders in the town,” explained the lieutenant. He’s obviously underage—he’s seventeen and the legal age is twenty-one. Richie, will you tell Mrs. Stone here what your instructions are?”

  Richie looked embarrassed, but he spoke right up. “I’m supposed to ask for a bottle of beer, and if they sell it to me I’m supposed to bring it out to Lieutenant Scott. If they ask me for ID, I’m going to say that I don’t have any.”

  “That’s right. We want to do this thing fair and square,” said the lieutenant. “Right, Culpepper?”

  Barney shrugged and nodded. “Right.”

  Lucy didn’t think he sounded very enthusiastic.

  “Now, just to make it absolutely clear that we’re not planting any alcohol on innocent license holders, I’m noting on the record of this operation that Richie does not have any alcohol concealed on his body. Do you want to pat him down, Mrs. Stone?”

  Richie was blushing furiously.

  “I think I’ll leave that to Barney,” said Lucy.

  Barney quickly checked Richie’s pockets and confirmed that except for a wallet and car keys they were empty.

  “We’re off, then,” said the lieutenant, grabbing his blue jacket from the coat stand in the corner.

  They all piled into a cruiser: Barney was driving, and the lieutenant sat next to him in the front seat. Lucy and Richie were in the backseat. Lucy got out her reporter’s notebook and uncapped her pen.

  “Is this the first sting the department has conducted?” she asked.

  “As far as I know,” answered the lieutenant. “Officer Culpepper’s the one to ask—he’s been here a lot longer than me.”

  “It’s the first,” agreed Barney, sounding glum.

  “Liquor stings have proved to be effective community policing—a lot of departments are trying them,” said Scott, turning to face Lucy. “It lets licensees know that we’re really serious about enforcing the drinking age. And that’s a message we want to get out now, with the holidays just around the corner.”

  “If Richie is able to purchase beer, what will you do? Will you charge the license holder?” Remembering Ted’s reluctance to offend the business community, Lucy hoped not.

  “This time we’re issuing warnings,” said Scott. “And, of course, we’re hoping that having this written up in the paper will also act as a deterrent. No community businessman wants bad publicity.”

  Lucy squirmed in the uncomfortable seat. She didn’t like the feeling that she was being used to punish local businesses.

  Tom Scott seemed to sense her discomfort and hastened to reassure her.

  “This is kind of a personal crusade for me,” he said. “When I first started out in police work I felt the same way a lot of cops do—that my time and energy were best used to fight serious crimes. I tended to ignore minor violations in order to concentrate on cases that involved bodily harm or violence—muggings, bar fights, things like that. Remember, this was in New York City, where there are a lot more crimes against people and property than there are here.”

  He paused a moment, and when he resumed his voice was strained.

  “That all changed for me one night when I got a call to a motor-vehicle accident—a car had hit a light pole. This was in a section of the precinct where we were rarely called. A very nice residential area in the Bronx called Riverdale with fancy homes, lots of trees and grassy lawns, not exactly mean streets, if you know what I mean.

  “Well, when I got to the scene I found a brand-new Mustang….” Scott paused to swallow, as Lucy scribbled his story down in the notebook word for word. “I knew it was bad. Entire front end was gone, like it had disintegrated under the force of the impact. When I got to the car the windows were open, and I could smell the alcohol.”

  He sighed and shook his head.

  “It was too late. There was nothing I could do. Two kids, both dead. All dressed up in their prom clothes. He was wearing a tux, she had on a long dress. Her flowers—white roses—were still on her wrist.”

  He paused, working his teeth.

  “That night I had to stand on two doorsteps, ringing the bell, knowing that the people on the other side of the door were never going to be the same after I delivered my news. It was then I decided that I’d had enough. I promised myself I was going to do whatever I had to do to stop this, this epidemic of alcohol abuse that is killing our young people.”

  In the front seat, Barney pulled a huge, white handkerchief out of his pocket and blew his nose. In the backseat, Lucy finished writing just as they pulled up in front of Mrs. Murphy’s liquor store. She glanced over at Richie and saw his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed.

  “Are you ready?” asked Scott.

  “Ready as I’ll ever be,” answered Richie, climbing out of the car.

  The others remained in the cruiser, watching as Richie approached the brightly lit store. He pulled open the glass door and went in. They could observe him through the plate-glass windows as he walked over to a cooler and chose a bottle of beer which he carried to the counter.

  The clerk, an older man with gray hair, shook his head.

  “That’s Jim Murphy—he knows the business,” said Barney, a note of satisfaction in his voice.

  Tom noticed and looked at him curiously. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you’re hoping this sting is unsuccessful,” he said.

  “Well, we all hope that, don’t we?” asked Lucy. “That means that the laws are being obeyed in our town.”

  “Except for one fact,” said Tom. “We know they’re not. Since I came here last summer we’ve arrested thirteen juveniles for operating under the influence.”

  They looked up as Richie pulled open the door and got in the car. “Mr. Murphy knows me,” he said, apologetically. “Maybe I should have worn a disguise or something.”

  “That’s okay, son,” said Scott. “We’ve got plenty more to try.”

  But as the evening wore on, Richie continued to be unsuccessful. He wasn’t able to buy a single beer. Wherever he tried, in the town’s three liquor stores, in the grocery store, even in the roadhouse out near the highway, he was refused.

  “Are you sure you’re doing exactly what I told you to do?” Tom finally asked him, when he returned empty-handed from the Bilge, a bar down by the waterfront that was a favorite with fishermen.

  “Yeah,” said Richie. “I just go up to the counter and ask for a Bud. I mean, I don’t make any conversation or anything. Should I?”

  “Nah,” grunted Scott.

  “Maybe if I wore my hat,” he volunteered, as they pulled up in front of Richard’s Fine Wines. He pulle
d a navy blue watch cap out of his pocket and jammed it down on his head. But the hat didn’t fool the clerk, who asked to see his identification. Richie was despondent when he returned to the car. “He offered to sell me a Coke.”

  “Well, that’s it,” said Barney, checking his clipboard. “That was the last one on the list.”

  “I don’t understand it,” said Tom, as they drove back to the police station. “I never heard of a liquor sting that didn’t net any violators.”

  “Well, you probably wouldn’t,” said Lucy. “It’s not much of a story if nobody gets caught.”

  “Are you going to write it up for the paper?” he asked as Barney parked the car.

  “Sure. I’ve spent a lot of time on it already. Besides, Ted likes to print good news whenever he can, especially if it puts his advertisers in a good light.”

  Tom picked right up on the cue. “It’s not often in law enforcement that you have such a satisfying outcome,” he said, speaking slowly so she could get every word. “It’s gratifying to know that the department’s efforts to enforce the legal drinking age are working and that our young people cannot purchase alcohol in Tinker’s Cove. And I want to express a special word of thanks to Richie Goodman, who volunteered his time tonight.”

  Lucy got it all down and climbed out of the car.

  “Thanks for inviting me along,” she said, shaking Tom’s hand. She turned to Richie, who was standing beside her. “Do you have a ride home?”

  “Yeah,” he said, stuffing his hands in his pockets and striding off toward his car.

  “He’s a good kid,” said Barney, nodding his approval.

  “Maybe too good,” mused Tom. “Maybe I should have gotten a kid who had more street smarts.”

  “This is a small town,” said Barney. “Everybody knows everybody. The kids probably go a few towns over where nobody knows them. Maybe we should try a joint operation with the Gilead P.D.”

  “It’s a thought,” admitted Tom. “Or maybe we could just try not to tip off the storekeepers in advance.”

  Under the lights that illuminated the parking lot Lucy could see Barney’s face redden. “Nothing like that happened,” he said.