Asking for Truffle

by Dorothy St. James

  “I’m not talking about the festival. I’m talking about Mabel’s will and that quirky piece of law that says if you die by Wednesday, Mabel’s children automatically inherit everything she left to you.”

  I nodded. I hadn’t forgotten.

  “If someone is trying to kill you in order to change the inheritance, they’ll need to do it before midnight on Wednesday.” He put his hand on my shoulder. “Please, be careful.”

  * * *

  Stella’s growls grew louder and louder as we climbed the back staircase that led to Mabel’s apartment. I scanned the adjacent marsh, trying to figure out what had spooked my little dog. All I could see in the muddy flat was an army of black fiddler crabs with their claws held high as they performed a funny little dance in the pluff mud.

  The cold front had moved away, taking its biting winds and its freak snowstorm with it. The winter sun, hanging high in the clear sky, provided a surprising amount of warmth to the air. Even though it was still January and the deepest part of winter back in Wisconsin, here in this tiny Southern island, it felt like spring.

  “Calm down, Stella,” I said to my growling pooch and tossed her a treat. She ignored it. That was odd. She never refused a treat.

  I paused on the top step and leaned my elbows on the porch’s rickety handrail. I took a slow, deep breath of the clean salty air.

  “I could get used to this,” I said to myself.

  “Not if I have anything to say about it,” a gravelly voice replied.

  I began to turn to see who had spoken when something smacked me in the side of my head—something brutally hard.

  I vaguely remember hearing Stella barking. Luckily, I had enough sense to drop her leash. I threw my arms out to my sides in an attempt to stop myself from taking a deadly nosedive down the steps, but whatever had hit me had scrambled my brain to the point that I didn’t know up from down. My head slammed against the side of a splintery tread. After that, I tumbled down, down, down into a deep, black hole of unconsciousness.

  * * *

  “Penn?” a soft voice whispered from a distant shore. “Penn? Can you hear me?”

  “She’s breathing,” someone else said.

  Stella barked. It was higher in pitch than usual. She sounded panicked. I needed to go to her, to reassure her. I tried to get up, but none of my limbs worked.

  “She’s twitching,” someone said. “Does that mean she’s having a seizure?”

  “I think it means she’s trying to wake up.” The voices were starting to sound closer. “EMS is on its way.”

  That was good to hear. My entire left side felt as if it was on fire.

  “She must have tripped and fallen down the stairs, the poor dear.”

  “Pushed,” my voice rasped.

  “What did she say?”

  It took a Herculean force of will, but I managed to pry open my eyes. Cal hovered over me. His wide-eyed gaze mirrored the concern I’d seen in his brother’s not ten minutes earlier. Bertie stood behind him, wringing her hands. Althea stood a few feet away with her cell phone pressed to her ear.

  “Pushed,” I tried to say again. It came out kind of garbled.

  “Don’t strain yourself,” Cal said and laid a strong hand on my shoulder. “You fell down the stairs. You’re bleeding.”

  The thought of blood made the world spin back into tones of gray. I fought like the devil to keep my wits about me.

  I drew a slow, steady breath in an effort to gather every ounce of strength I could muster so I could say as clearly and loudly as possible, “Who pushed me?”

  “You were pushed?” Cal squinted as his gaze shifted from me to the landing. “Are you sure?”

  “Something . . . slammed . . . side of my head. That’s why . . . fell. Not . . . not an accident. There was . . . a voice.”

  “A voice?” His frown deepened. He kept his gaze glued on the stairs. “I was passing on the street and heard you call out. I arrived in time to see you land at the bottom of the stairs.”

  “I came running from the back door of the shop,” Bertie said. “When I saw what had happened, I ran back inside to get Althea and her phone.”

  By this time, all three of them were studying the flight of steps. And all three of them were frowning.

  I followed their gazes and, blinking hard to chase away the blurriness, fixed my eyes on the wooden stairwell.

  Those half-rotted steps provided the only access up to the second floor. The only access. (I applauded my badly rattled brain’s ability to make such an important realization.)

  Despite everyone’s protests, I sat up. The world spun only a little bit. Upon seeing my movement, Stella’s barking grew more urgent.

  “Bertie, could you get my dog? I’ve never seen her so stressed.”

  “I’d better go instead,” Cal said. He jumped to his feet and practically vaulted up to the second floor.

  Stella let him grab her leash, but when he tried to lead her down the stairs to see me, the little dog laid her huge butterfly-shaped ears flat to her head and, crouching, backed away from the steps.

  “She must be afraid she’ll fall too,” he called down.

  I never knew Stella to be afraid of anything. She seemed to enjoy ruling over everyone in her noisy, autocratic way, biting and nipping anyone who dared to defy her.

  “Take her into the apartment and give her a piece of bacon to help settle her down. You’ll find some in the fridge,” Bertie called back up to him.

  Cal nodded. His mobile gaze kept a careful watch on the second-floor landing as he headed toward the apartment door and disappeared from view.

  Sirens blared in the distance.

  “The ambulance will be here soon,” Althea said.

  I nodded, which wasn’t the best thing to do. It only made the world wobble.

  Stella, growling and tugging on her leash, reluctantly followed Cal into the apartment.

  “Wait a minute,” I said and tried to stand. I needed to go after Cal. I ended up landing on my rear just as a pair of EMTs came running toward me. “Cal’s up there. And whoever pushed me could still be up there.”

  Althea blinked several times before rushing toward the stairs after him. “Mama, call the police.”

  “Not again,” Bertie groaned.

  The two burly EMTs knelt down beside me. One took my pulse. The other pressed something cold to the side of my head as he questioned me about what had happened, asking my name and other kinds of nonsense, like what day it was and what year.

  “Harley had warned me. Not ten minutes ago, he’d warned me to be extra careful. He was afraid that because of Mabel’s will, the killer would strike again, and strike soon. But I don’t understand it. I’ve told everyone that I was going to give the shop and the property to Mabel’s kids. So why would killing me solve anything? What do you think is going on?”

  “Honey, I don’t know,” Bertie said, her eyes fixed on Althea as she climbed the stairs. Her daughter had just stepped foot on the second-floor landing.

  Not a heartbeat later, a deafening blast crackled through the air.

  Althea screamed.

  Chapter 26

  “He ran at me with a look of murder in his eyes.” Cal shook his head with dismay. A handgun, presumably Cal’s, lay on the ground. “I had to protect myself. I had to.”

  Althea hugged herself. Fat tears fell from her large brown eyes.

  By this time everyone had made it up to the top of the landing. The EMTs were the first to run up the stairs, taking two at a time. Bertie had nearly knocked them over in her haste to get to her daughter. Holding the icepack to my bleeding head and fueled by a jolt of adrenaline, I managed to make it up to the back porch not that long after everyone else.

  We found Cal standing in the open doorway to Mabel and Bertie’s apartment. His arms hung limp at his sides. Behind him, fully inside the apartment, was a man sprawled out facedown on the floor. My gaze latched onto the soles of the man’s feet.

  “What? Who?” I stammere
d. I dropped the icepack and scooped Stella into my arms.

  My traumatized little dog looked ready to bite anyone who came anywhere near her. She snapped at the air several times before tucking her muzzle into the crook of my arm. She shivered so hard, I slipped her inside my jacket.

  For a moment, no one moved. No one spoke.

  A distant heron shrieked tik-tik-tik.

  Harley’s apartment door flew violently open and bounced against the wall with a crash. I jumped. It couldn’t be Harley. He was still in his office.

  I prayed it wasn’t his son. No child should be witness to this.

  Luckily the person who emerged from the apartment was Jody.

  “What’s going on?” she demanded.

  Since I happened to be standing closer to her than anyone else, I answered. “Someone pushed me down the stairs and then attacked Cal. He defended himself. What are you doing here?”

  “Gavin had left his school notebooks the last time he stayed overnight. He needs them to finish a project that’s due on Friday.” She had two loose-leaf notebooks tucked under her arm. “Who attacked you? Was it . . . Harley?”

  “I don’t know.” I supposed that if Harley had wanted to do me harm, he could have rushed back to his apartment ahead of me. It wasn’t as if I had been in a hurry. Stella had stopped several times to sniff and to do her puppy business. If Harley had taken one of the side roads, he could have made it back to the apartment without me seeing him.

  Jody stood with her arm nearly pressed to mine as we watched the EMTs nudge Cal aside. They knelt down next to the man lying on the floor. My heart thumped in my chest. Maybe he wasn’t dead.

  “Who is it?” Bertie asked.

  “Is it Harley?” Jody demanded.

  Althea swallowed hard several times but only managed to shake her head.

  “He ran at me, like he was going to hurt me. He’d already kicked Stella,” Cal explained to no one in particular. His voice shook. “I had no choice.”

  One EMT made a call using the radio attached to his uniform. The other rolled the body over. He looked up at his partner and shook his head much like Althea had.

  Althea started crying harder.

  Bertie whispered a silent prayer.

  Both Jody and I squeezed our way through the crowd around the door to see for ourselves. There, on Mabel’s ancient Linoleum kitchen floor, was the man who must have attacked me. His limp arms were flung wide. His sightless eyes were fixed in a staring contest with the ceiling. A bloody wound stained the white polo shirt he’d worn beneath his tan blazer.

  “Well, I guess I don’t need to visit Edward Maybank anymore,” I said, because stupid things pop out of my mouth whenever I feel nervous or stressed.

  But it was true. The dead man on the floor wasn’t Harley. It was Edward’s youngest brother, Derek. I hated being right about him. He seemed like such a nice guy, coming to help us out with the shop and suggesting we sell Mabel’s special hot chocolate during the snowstorm.

  Of course, he’d probably only offered to work at the shop so he could rob us after we had closed up for the night.

  And he’d tried to kill me . . . why? Why would he want me dead?

  I’d told everyone I was going to give Mabel’s children the shop as soon as the festival ended. So Derek didn’t have any reason to want to hurt me. None at all.

  And yet, instead of talking with me, instead of telling me what was going on in that thick head of his, he’d hit me in the head and had sent me tumbling to what he’d probably hoped would be my demise.

  Had he also driven Harley’s car and tried to run me over?

  And the attempted break-in at the motel, had that been him too? Why? Why would someone do that to a fellow human being? Why?

  The world seemed to spin faster and faster as the questions kept coming at me, questions Derek would never be able to answer, like how a man who professed to love his mother could put chocolate in her pills.

  “I need to sit down,” I said. My voice sounded thready.

  Bertie took one look at me and grabbed one arm. Althea grabbed the other. Their strength and determination were the only things that kept me from falling on my face.

  They helped lower me to the porch floor. Bertie pushed my head between my knees. Stella growled a reminder that she was still nestled within the folds of my coat. I sat up to give her more room.

  A second later, her little black nose popped out of the coat. She turned those big puppy eyes toward me. I held my breath, thinking she might feel grateful that I had rescued her and had comforted her when she was frightened. I half expected her to lick my nose when she moved closer to my face.

  Silly me.

  She bit my nose and then wiggled and growled her way free from my jacket.

  “Is it bleeding?” I asked as I cradled my nose.

  “No,” Althea said, but she winced. “Not much.”

  “Althea, you’d better go catch her before she gets too far,” Bertie said as my ungrateful dog bound down the stairs.

  “Yes, ma’am.” She paused only long enough to wipe her eyes dry with the back of her hand before she followed after Stella.

  “What’s happening to this town?” Bertie found the icepack I’d dropped and handed it to me to press against my nose. “Violence. Murders. In my own apartment. It’s never been like this.”

  “At least it’s over,” I said as I looked over at Cal. He’d left the open doorway and propped his elbows against the railing as he gazed out over the wintry brown marsh grasses. “Thanks to him, it’s all over.”

  Chapter 27

  Unfortunately, it wasn’t over. Not by a long shot.

  The Sweets on the Beach festival was slated to begin on Thursday . . . in just two days. Because of my tumble down the stairs, I woke up early on Tuesday morning with several bruised ribs, a concussion, and a sprained ankle. What I didn’t have was the money Derek had stolen from the shop. I was sure it was long gone. Nor did I have Mabel’s chocolate that he’d pilfered.

  Feeling depressed at the state of things, I found myself in bed staring at the ceiling when someone knocked on the apartment door. I hobbled into the living room only to find Bertie welcoming Detective Gibbons inside. He looked larger than life, dressed in a crisply pressed dark brown suit. An oversized envelope was clasped in his hands.

  He reluctantly refused Bertie’s offer to whip him up some eggs and sausage. “I have to get downtown for an early precinct meeting, but I wanted to bring this by, and I also wanted to talk to you about what happened yesterday.” He placed the envelope on the kitchen table and came and sat down on the sofa. I’d managed to hobble that far before plopping down next to him with my sprained ankle elevated on several throw pillows.

  “What’s in it?” I asked, indicating the envelope. It wasn’t nearly big enough to hold the store’s worth of chocolates Derek had stolen.

  “It’s a copy of the DNA results your friend had ordered shortly before his death. They arrived yesterday afternoon.”

  Which meant the envelope contained the paternity results for Harley’s son. I nodded. “Why give them to me?”

  He gave me a hard look. “Because after everything you’ve been through, I thought you deserved to see them.” He gently patted the sofa next to my propped-up leg. “How are you faring?” he asked with a long sigh.

  “I’ve been better. I’m supposed to stay off the ankle for several days, but I don’t know how that’s going to happen. The festival starts on Thursday. And we hardly have any chocolates made. Are you sure you can’t release the truffles your officers found in Derek’s apartment?”

  Looking decidedly uncomfortable, he shifted on the sofa. “As I already told you on the phone, even though the man is no longer living, we still have to move forward with the investigation. I’m sorry, Penn. The chocolates are evidence.”

  Bertie looked up from the eggs and sausage she was busy frying. She’d been cooking in the kitchen all morning. I’m not sure who she thought she was going to fee
d with all that food. “It’s a sorry way to end things,” she said.

  Detective Gibbons rubbed the back of his thick neck. “Uh, that’s one of the reasons I’m here, ma’am.”

  “What’s going on?” I asked. I couldn’t imagine he had any more questions for us. The police had questioned everyone for hours last night. After I’d been released from the hospital, a cop had driven me directly to the county sheriff’s office located on the outskirts of the city of Charleston so the detective could take my statement.

  “It’s not over,” he said. He frowned so deeply his entire face seemed to droop.

  “But you said—” I started.

  “He didn’t do it,” Gibbons snapped. He then punched a fist into his hand and swore. “Derek Maybank had an alibi for your friend’s time of death.”

  I shook my head. “He didn’t have an alibi. Sure, he was with Cal for most of the night. But Jody told me that she clearly remembers seeing Cal drinking alone at some point in the evening.”

  “That’s what we thought too.” He ground his teeth for a few moments before continuing tightly, “Late last night Derek Maybank’s sister comes flying into the precinct, shouting and raving like a madwoman that they killed the wrong man, that her brother was innocent.”

  “Which sister?” Bertie demanded.

  He ground his teeth some more as he pulled a little notebook from his jacket pocket. “A Florence Corners. Her husband is some bigwig business owner in the area.”

  Bertie made a sucking sound through her teeth. “The woman can screech.”

  “But she couldn’t be right. You found the chocolates when you searched his apartment, right? He robbed the shop.”

  The detective tilted his head to one side. His gaze slipped away from mine to stare at a far wall. “He may have robbed the shop. It’s true that we found the shop’s chocolates in his apartment.”

  Last night the police had sounded certain that they’d caught their man, that they’d be able to quickly close all the cases: the robbery, the murders, and the attacks on me. Now he didn’t sound certain about anything.