by Maggie Pill
“Ms. Stilson! I’m so sorry.”
I was glad I’d buttoned my coat all the way to hide the mud Styx had smeared on me, but still, I was a mess from my trip to Sweet Springs. Only a pressing need to visit the bank had made me chance the trip in my state, and of course I ran into the most attractive man I’d seen in weeks.
The best I could do was smile coquettishly. “Totally my fault. I wasn’t watching where I was going.”
Taking my arm, Rick escorted me to a sheltered corner of the bank building. “Your sister called to say you’ve decided to take me on as a client. I appreciate that.”
I was appreciating the way one lock of his dark hair swept over his forehead. “She’s probably on the hunt for your ex-wife as we speak. If travel becomes necessary, that will be my part.”
“Your sisters don’t travel?”
“Barb says she’s seen enough of the world, and for Faye, Allport’s pretty much all there is.”
“But you have a different outlook.” His tone hinted I was the wise one.
“I’ve been a few places,” I said modestly.
“I’d like to hear about that sometime.”
It was the most obvious of hints, and I hesitated for a moment. I’d been seeing Lars Johannsen for several months, but Lars lived in New Mexico. He’d visited a couple of times over the summer, but when he left the last time, I’d been irritated with him. He and Rory Neuencamp had gone out to Rory’s cabin and spent three full days putting a new roof on it. Of course they’d come in to take Barbara and me to dinner each evening, but I still felt neglected. Out of seventy-two hours in Michigan, Lars had spent twenty-four of them with Rory.
Barbara was her usual brusque self when I mentioned it. “Good grief, Retta. The man’s enjoying himself, and the cabin certainly could do with some modernizing.”
That was fine for her to say, since she and Rory could see each other as often as they wanted to. If Lars really cared, wouldn’t he want to spend every minute of his time in Michigan with me?
Rick was waiting for an answer. “I’d like that very much,” I told him, setting a hand on the sleeve of his smooth leather jacket. When we parted, we had a dinner date for Monday evening. Actually, it could have been that very night, but a girl never wants to let a man think she’s got nothing else to do.
Chapter Fifteen
Barb
I had lunch by myself on Saturday, since Faye was at the farm and Rory had gone bow hunting. Though I considered that a strange pastime, I knew enough not to say so in northern Michigan, where many depend on such pastimes for food, sport, and the trade hunters bring to the area.
It was a nice change to choose a restaurant without considering someone else’s opinion. Though Rory didn’t refuse to eat Thai food, I was aware he wasn’t a fan. It’s a common problem with couples, and as Henry Higgins complains in My Fair Lady, in order to take each other’s wishes into account, a twosome often ends up doing something neither of them really wants to do. Loving the smell of ginger and the delicate ambiance of our local Thai restaurant, I often ate there when Rory wasn’t around. In similar fashion I suspected he chose Don’s Dogs when lunching by himself.
After a half portion of Drunken Noodles, I put the remainder in a take-out carton and left the restaurant. A pickup truck was passing and the driver, seeing me, pulled over to the curb. “Hey, Aunt Barb.”
“Cramer!” I walked over and leaned in the passenger side window. “How are things?”
“Good.” He gestured at the restaurant. “Did you have lunch there?”
“Yes. I love their jasmine tea.”
“Me too. Wish I’d come along when you were going in instead of coming out.”
An idea had formed in my head at the sight of him. “Are you really busy with work right now, Cramer?”
He leaned his elbow on the steering wheel. “Everybody wants their computer fixed day before yesterday, but I keep up.”
“Great. I need a little work done.”
“Sure thing. I can come to the office—”
“Um, no.” Opening the door, I got into the truck, which smelled faintly of French fries. “This is something we’re going to keep between us.” I grimaced. “Say no if you want to, because it’s not totally legal.”
Cramer regarded me sideways, a slight smile playing at his lips. “You need a hacker.”
“Yes.”
“What makes you think I’d do something like that—I mean—”
“It’s my understanding that anybody who can hack will, if it’s important to them.”
After a moment Cramer chuckled. “I forget you spent a long time as an Assistant D.A.”
“Met a few hackers in my day, and you, my dear, if you aren’t one already, are a hacker waiting to happen.”
The smile turned to a full grin. “I’m white-hat all the way, Aunt Barb. I’ve done a little, but just a few times, and just for fun.” He scratched at the beard he’d started growing, which made him look like a kid dressed as Noah for a church-school play. “I bet you’re going to entice me farther down the path.”
“It’s a very good cause.” I told him about Lady Tattletale, ending with, “She hasn’t succeeded in putting Rory’s job in jeopardy yet, but she needs to be stopped.”
“And she has the skills to hide her identity?”
“Apparently. Rory doesn’t want to treat it like a big deal, but I can tell it bothers him.”
Cramer’s hand left the beard and scrubbed through his shoulder-length hair. “I’ll see what I can do, but you’ll have to give me all the information you can get your hands on.”
Getting out of the truck I promised, “I’ll talk to Janet at the city office and ask her to help.”
Cramer shifted into gear. “Phone calls I can’t do much with, but if she’ll forward me the emails, I can find out where they came from.”
“Good.” Did I feel guilty asking my nephew to use his skills to sniff out Rory’s pest? A little. But Rory was too noble to help himself, and I suspected Lady Tattletale didn’t intend to stop until she’d destroyed Allport’s chief of police.
Chapter Sixteen
Faye
Iris, Pansy, and Daisy were raised in the church, though the one they’d attended was, to put it in Barb’s terms, “slightly medieval.” Bill and Carla weren’t churchgoers, but they didn’t want to dismiss out of hand what the girls’ now-deceased parents had taught them. The compromise we worked out was that Iris, Pansy, and Daisy came into town with me on most Saturdays when I left the farm, spent the night in my guest room, and went to church Sunday with either Retta or me. Dale, who always made the tired joke about the church roof caving in if he ever entered, generally made himself scarce on Sunday mornings.
Daisy enjoyed getting dressed up, which was the custom at Retta’s church, so she usually went there, her hair curled, her nails polished, and her fragrance upscale. Pansy preferred my church, where things were less formal and they sang “good” songs. Always the diplomat, Iris alternated between the two.
Since we had a guest youth choir at my church that week, all three girls chose to attend with me on Sunday morning. They made a pretty picture, as Barb, Retta, and I must have long ago, similar in looks and like stair steps in height. I won’t say the girls were always perfectly behaved—Daisy giggled at inopportune times and Pansy had a tendency to snort when the Scripture reading included words like breast and ass. Still, they were willing to attend, which was more than my boys had been. I enjoyed the worship hour even more than usual with them beside me.
After the service we went to my house, where we changed clothes and got Buddy before heading back to the farm. Cramer had done the morning chores and then gone somewhere with friends for the day. Bill and Carla had taken the opportunity provided by the girls’ absence to drive to Traverse City for a fall festival. I had the girls and the farm to myself until five.
Carla was a vegetarian, and though she didn’t insist the rest of the family follow her choices, there was seldom
anything in their refrigerator I considered edible. Knowing this, I brought along a cooler of real food I’d prepared for Sunday dinner: fried chicken, shrimp salad, green beans fried in bacon fat with almonds and bacon bits, and a chocolate dessert I invented: brownies covered with cream-cheese-mixed-with-whipped-topping covered with more whipped topping. Everything looked yummy, and there was plenty for us to eat and still have leftovers for the girls’ lunches at school the next day.
My daughter-in-law didn’t mind me treating her girls to comfort foods on my visits. They hadn’t known much indulgence in their short lives, and Carla had once commented to me that a few extra calories were a small price to pay if the girls felt a little spoiled when I treated them to my full array of cooking skills.
After the meal we went for a walk, or as Pansy quipped, “a waddle, since we’re so full.” Autumn makes Michiganders aware of the dwindling number of days left when walking is unhindered by boots, icy winds, and snow drifts. The colors were still brightening, and we followed the path up the hill, past the barn, and into the woods. Buddy and Brenda explored holes and sniffed at trees. Pansy and Daisy ran ahead, finding leaves they liked and putting them into bags for craft-making. Iris, conscious of her dignity, stayed beside me and made polite conversation. “Pansy says you’re working on a case, Aunt Faye?”
We’d become “Aunts,” an easy term for those who are like family but not actually related.
“Two of them,” I told her. “There’s an older woman we’re trying to help, and a man who needs us to locate someone.”
“I’ll bet people are happy when you find out things for them.”
Our work didn’t always lead to happiness. In her case, we’d found that her mother was dead. To steer the conversation away from that, I went back in time to our first investigation.
“In one case we had just about everyone in town mad at us.”
“Everybody?”
“Well, one man in particular was our nemesis. Do you know that word?”
Iris was the reader of the trio. “Your worst enemy.”
“Right. He wasn’t happy, even though we found the truth.”
“Did he at least say he was sorry when it was over and you were right?”
I shook my head. “Stan Wozniak isn’t the type who apologizes.”
“He sounds like a real stinker.”
I chuckled. “That’s a good word for him.”
“I’ll bet Aunt Barb told him off.” Pansy, who’d been eavesdropping, joined us, making the old, dead leaves rustle by dragging her feet. “She isn’t afraid of anybody.”
“Certainly not Mr. Wozniak,” I agreed. “I’m pretty sure he knows by now not to get in her way.”
***
Though I made most of the day-to-day decisions concerning Harriet, Dale visited his mother every Sunday evening. Going to the Meadows was hard for him, both because he hated seeing her so frail and because the buzzing alarms and cries of incoherent patients made him jumpy while he was there and depressed afterward. I provided moral support, keeping up a bright line of chatter both during and after the visits. When Carla and Bill returned that afternoon I went home, changed my clothes again, and drove Dale to the nursing home.
Harriet sat slumped in her wheelchair, a tray of food on a rolling cart before her. Gently pulling her into a more upright position, I looked at the tray and shook my head. The food didn’t look bad, and when I touched a plate, it felt warm, but she’d eaten almost nothing. While I understood the efficiency of feeding almost everyone the same things, Harriet wouldn’t touch the green beans, would only taste the coleslaw, and would cut and chew no more than one or two bites of the meat, since it took effort on her part. Pudding was the one thing on the tray she’d finish. If Harriet had a tooth left, it was her sweet tooth.
“That chicken looks good, Mom,” Dale said as we sat down on her bed.
She surveyed the tray with distaste. “You can have it.”
“No, thanks. We already ate.” It was a lie he told every week, since his presence seemed to awaken some maternal need in Harriet to feed him. Taking up her fork, Dale speared a small bite and held it before her. “Try it.”
Harriet obeyed, which always surprised me. As combative and contrary as she was to everyone else, she complied without argument to any command Dale gave.
When she’d eaten the first bite, he cut another and fed it to her. “How is it, Mom?”
“Good,” she mumbled.
My throat closed at the scene, both pleased and saddened at seeing how our roles reverse as we age. I remembered feeding my own children bite by bite, encouraging and coaxing, as Harriet had no doubt done decades ago for her youngest son.
“That’s good, Mom. Here comes another one, so open up.”
Suddenly I was fighting tears—sorrow for Harriet, so unlike herself, and longing for the past, when both she and Dale functioned with complete, almost fierce independence. “I’m going to look in on Clara,” I said softly. Harriet wouldn’t miss me as long as she had her boy there, and it was good for Dale to do something for her on his own.
Clara was in bed, and her vague greeting revealed she wasn’t sure who I was.
“It’s Faye Burner, Mrs. Knight. You asked if I’d look into—some things for you?” I didn’t specify the things, since Clara’s roommate was awake and listening with interest.
“That’s nice of you, dear.” Though she was polite, I could see Clara didn’t have a clue what I was talking about.
“I went out and made sure your chickens are okay.”
That she responded to. “My chickens, yes. Make sure you scoop out of the brown bag, Gail. They don’t like the other kind.” She smiled weakly and gripped my arm to emphasize her words. “Only the feed in the brown bag.”
As I left the room, the aide I’d spoken to before was pushing a wheelchair containing a semi-conscious patient down the corridor. Stopping her I said, “Clara Knight isn’t doing well today.”
Her dark brows met over her eyes. “I know. She started in again last night, imagining all sorts of things. Today she’s been kind of out of it, sleepy and nauseated.”
“She was fine on Wednesday.”
She nodded. “Isn’t that what I told you? She’s in her right mind one day and out to lunch the next.”
As we drove home, doubt nagged at me. Had I put the agency in a sticky situation? The niece wouldn’t be happy to learn private investigators had responded to her crazy aunt’s complaints. How long before she called and demanded we keep our noses out of her family business?
Chapter Seventeen
Retta
Anyone who saw Barbara prepare for one of her Correction Events would split a side laughing. She takes it all so very seriously—Barbara Ann Evans, Avenger of Grammar Crimes. At first when I’d joined her crusade to fix spelling errors and such around Allport, she hadn’t been thrilled. After a while, though, she’d begun to enjoy my company. We laughed a lot, which was good. Barbara needs to laugh more. In addition, I was pleased to be her partner, with Faye for once the sister with no idea what the other two were up to.
After I fell off the platform, Barbara turned cautious. “What if it happens again?” she asked. “What if there isn’t a convenient clump of bushes to break your fall?”
I’d promised to be extremely careful as we went on another quest. When Barbara proposed changes to a sign in front of a local restaurant, I noted it required no ladders or climbing. The sign was at ground level, made with those plastic letters that fit into a track, so all we had to do was move things around.
We pulled up just after midnight, parking in the alley and skirting the street light. Along with the smell of old grease, I immediately recognized the problem as we approached the sign. In the list of specials for the week one line read: Tuesday-Tacoes. Once we removed the unnecessary E, we’d be on our way. I did that, but Barbara frowned at the Thursday line, which said, Potatoes, Ham & Squash. Taking a pair of scissors and a square of black poster board from her kn
apsack, she made a comma. When she was finished, the Thursday line said, Potatoes, Ham, & Squash.
“Why the extra comma?”
“It’s not extra.” She pointed, as if a glance would convince me. “It’s required.”
Frowning, I considered the phrase. “I don’t see what difference it makes.”
“It specifies there are three separate items. Otherwise one might think the ham and squash are mixed together.”
“What if they are? I don’t see the need for an extra comma.”
“It’s not extra,” she repeated. “It’s called an Oxford comma, and its purpose is clarification.”
Barbara was the Grammar Ninja—some might say Grammar Nazi—and I was just along for the fun of it. I didn’t mind helping her clean up the all-too-common mistakes in local usage. For many in Allport, knowing better than to say, “I seen that movie,” is the height of grammatical correctness. Still, the Oxford comma thing seemed fussy to me.
But then, that’s Barbara to a T.
“If you ask me, it looks dumb,” I said. “Four words—no, three words and an ampersand, and you put in two commas?”
“Nobody asked you.” She was crouched, picking up bits of black poster board she’d trimmed away, but she looked up at me with her “Barbara disapproves” expression.
Reaching up, I took the home-made comma down. “Look at that. It’s perfectly clear without it. If you order Thursday’s special, you get three things.”
Snatching the piece from my hand, she put it back in place. “Now the reader is sure she’ll get three things. Without the comma, it might only be two.”
Knowing I couldn’t win, and aware we shouldn’t stand there all night arguing about it, I let out a big sigh. “Whatever, Barbara Ann. Let’s go before you find something else that doesn’t suit your Oxford sensibilities.”