Spinning in Her Grave

by Molly Macrae

  We sat on a couple of the plastic chairs we’d put out front for visitors. Neither of us wanted to be near the back wall of the tent. We were glad it was there, glad we couldn’t see the EMTs and deputies performing their duties. It was awful enough hearing them. Ardis looked slightly wilted. I felt the same and realized how good it was to just sit and hold myself together . . . except that wasn’t how Granny would have met trouble, so I sat up straighter and squared my shoulders.

  Ardis misinterpreted my corrected posture. “You’re absolutely right, hon. Hats.”

  “Sorry?”

  “We can’t sit here doing nothing. We’ll get ahead on the hats.” She raided our inventory for baby yarn and needles, coming back with two skeins in a weird color that was more brown than yellow but wasn’t really either one. “No one will buy this stuff anyway,” she said. “We’ll make hats and I’ll put ears on them and people will automatically think they’re cute.”

  I sighed and cast on sixty stitches, which I could have done in my sleep by then, and stared across the parking lot at the Tent of Wonders. The very quiet Tent of Wonders. We hadn’t seen Aaron Carlin since the shooting and had only caught a glimpse of him earlier. I wondered if I should step away from my ugly hat and go across to see if the doctor was even in. I glanced at Ardis. Talk about fast and furious knitting.

  “Are you okay, Ardis?”

  She stopped knitting and stabbed her needles through the poor, innocent, ugly skein of yarn. “Who mistakes live ammunition for blanks? And what kind of idiots did they have running around out there? And which idiot did it? For pity’s sake, she wasn’t even part of the play, which means those idiots were being even more incompetent and irresponsible because they weren’t even aiming at another idiot. Hon, I want you to know that I admire your ability to keep your cool and maintain focus at a time like this. I’m feeling just that bit scattered, although I will try not to let the authorities notice my distraction. Of course it’s easier for you.”

  “What is?”

  “Murder.”

  I tried not to let her notice my groaning.

  “Although I suppose, technically, it’s manslaughter. Tell you what, if you see Coleridge and it looks like he has a free minute, why don’t you ask him about that? You’re used to discussing these things with him. But here’s something else I’ve just thought of, hon, and it’s horrible.” She put her hand on my arm. “In my eyes, Reva Louise was a pestilence. I spoke of her with unkind words many times.”

  “With words like ‘pestilence.’”

  “Exactly, hon. ‘Pestilence’ and many others just as descriptive and every bit as unpleasant. And I spoke of wanting to wring that woman’s neck. And I meant it and if she were still alive I would gladly follow through and do it. But think about this. There are at least three people who may actually mourn her passing. There’s her husband—”

  “Dan,” I said. “I met him today. I don’t think I liked him. Somehow that’s kind of sad.”

  “We didn’t like her, either, hon, so I’d say that’s perfectly natural. But we need to think of Mel and Sally Ann. We do like them and they are good people and her sisters. This tragedy cannot help affecting them deeply.”

  “Oh gosh, I wonder how they’re taking it.”

  “Hard, hon. I’m sure they’re taking it hard. But here’s the horrible thing I’ve just thought of. I don’t find myself mourning Reva Louise, not even in that abrupt, regretful reversal of opinion that people experience at times like this when they suddenly stop speaking ill. No. I disliked the woman. With a passion. And I admit that. But, Kath—the horrible part—I do find myself worrying that Reva’s passing might disrupt business at the café.”

  “She didn’t like being called Reva.”

  “Whatever. But can you picture me in the morning without my coffee and bagel or a chocolate doughnut? I am a horrible, selfish person.”

  Ardis was babbling, but it seemed to be doing her some good. So much so that when Deputy Clod Dunbar came to speak to us, she asked him her question about manslaughter versus murder herself. He pushed his way around the back of the tent, not that anything actually needed pushing to get to us. But Clod had a way of making everything he did while on duty look as though it took a special, official effort. Ardis posed her manslaughter-murder question and he barked in return.

  “What information haven’t you turned over to us?” His mirrored sunglasses flashed as he looked from me to Ardis and back to me.

  I put my poor ugly little hat in my lap and turned empty hands palms up, not bothering to waste my breath on the word “none.”

  He, in turn, didn’t bother to waste his breath on the words “a likely story.” He used condescending eyebrows and a prissy twist of his lips to communicate them just as clearly.

  Ardis, her knitting needles grasped at an aggressive angle, stood up, erasing any advantage Clod had by standing over us. He was six foot and mulish, but she was also six foot and she’d been both his third- and fourth-grade teacher, back before she found her true calling at the Weaver’s Cat. And, hon, she’d told me once, put me in those skirts and jackets we all wore back then, with the heels and the hose, and I inspired hero worship in little girls, absolute awe in studious boys, and the rascals and rabble-rousers sat quaking in justifiable fear.

  Clod took a step back, tucking his chin into his starched collar, and giving me an idea which type of boy he’d been.

  “We have two more questions for you, Coleridge,” Ardis said. “But first, you take off those sunglasses when you’re speaking to a lady.” She waited. He removed them. “Thank you. Now, we want to know if you have found the irresponsible man responsible for this tragedy and have you impounded his gun or whatever it is you do with weapons used for random acts of mindlessness? It seems to me you should legally be allowed to take a sledgehammer to the thing and then wrap the remains around the guilty so-and-so’s idiotic neck. And when will you be reopening the street? We realize you all are doing your jobs well and thoroughly and we appreciate your competent professionalism. But, sad though we are for the reason you’ve had to block access for so long, we do have a business to run and I am sure the mayor and board of aldermen will be anxious for the festival to continue at full tilt.”

  If I had asked those long-winded questions, no doubt Clod would have interrupted. But he listened to Ardis without even looking as though he had to keep himself in check, looking . . . uncomfortable? Evasive?

  “What?” I stood up, too. My height didn’t prove anything, but standing up made me harder to ignore. “There’s something going on, isn’t there? What information haven’t you given us?”

  Clod opened his mouth, shut it again, and pressed his lips together. He was a poker player, and from what I’d heard he was a good one, so he probably didn’t have many tells. But that thing with the lips was something I’d seen him do a few times before. Always before he delivered bad news.

  Ardis knew that mannerism, too, and possibly in a moment of panic, she grabbed him by the shoulders. “Oh, please don’t tell us she was alive and we could have saved her.”

  Clod, almost certainly in a moment of panic, withstood her anguished plea, ramrod posture intact, and answered her in surprisingly kind tones. “No, Ms. Buchanan, there wasn’t anything you could have done for her.”

  “Thank you for that, Coleridge.” They shared a moment of silence, his somewhat wide-eyed because she still gripped his shoulders. Then she dropped her hands to her hips. “Now, answer my questions.”

  “Ms. Buchanan, Ms. Rutledge, on behalf of the sheriff’s department I’d like to thank you for putting your civic duty ahead of personal concerns this afternoon as pertains to the disruption of your business during our investigation.”

  “It was the least we could do,” Ardis said.

  I decided not to jump in and ask for a clarification. It sounded as though he might think we’d closed the shop as well as the demonstration tent. But if Clod didn’t know that Ernestine and John were over there minding
the store even as we spoke, then how could it hurt to let that bit of information slide?

  “Is there something you’d like to say, Ms. Rutledge?”

  I shook my head, reminding myself never to play poker with him. My face tended to be nothing but tell.

  “I’m going to make this official, then,” he said, “so there are no misunderstandings. Ms. Rutledge, Ms. Buchanan, I regret to inform you that your business will remain closed while our investigation continues and until such time as the investigation concludes. During our investigation we will require access to the premises. We ask that you cooperate in this matter, but if you choose not to cooperate we will obtain a search warrant and gain access in that manner. If you willingly hand me the key to your building, I will give you a receipt. I will also inform you when you may reenter the premises. We will try to cause as little disruption as possible so that you may return to a normal business routine as soon as possible. However, I can make no guarantees. We will also need to know who was in your building this afternoon, working, browsing, et cetera, to the best of your knowledge and recollection or according to whatever sales transactions exist. Ms. Rutledge, it’s obvious that you now do have something to say and I’m sure I will be thrilled to hear it.”

  Sarcastic oaf. But he was right. Two things had sprung immediately to mind. First and foremost was What? Second was Oops, because if they assumed we had closed and locked our doors when they blocked access to the street, then we might have a problem. But I was happy to put off worrying about how big that problem might be by going with that first and foremost thought. Before I vocalized it, though, my phone rang. Someone calling from the supposedly closed Weaver’s Cat.

  “Kath, dear, John’s been quite industrious washing windows. Now he wants to know if you’d like to keep the one in the upstairs powder room open a crack overnight, or should he close it so you don’t forget it later?”

  I didn’t remember opening it, but if we were going to be closed, the window might as well be, too. “Sure, go ahead and shut it,” I said.

  “Righty-o, dear. Consider it done.”

  And that put me right back at Oops.

  Chapter 11

  Oops was not an emotion I hid well.

  “Ms. Rutledge,” Clod prompted with a growl low in his throat, “what—”

  In for an oops, in for a pound. I cut him off with my own growl. “Deputy Dunbar, what happened? Why are you closing our business? Are you saying we, or our business, had something to do with this? Are we a crime scene?” My growl turned into more of a yip at the end, but Ardis added a snarl to good effect.

  “This minute, Coleridge,” she said. “Tell us.”

  Clod sighed and asked us to sit down. We remained standing.

  “At least lower your voices,” he said. “I’m not authorized to speak.”

  “This minute,” Ardis repeated in a hiss.

  Clod pressed his lips together again, briefly, before starting. “We believe Ms. Snapp was shot from a height and direction suggesting a second-floor window at the Weaver’s Cat. It’s a working theory only, but the other buildings along that side of Depot are single-story.”

  The open—now washed and shut—bathroom window. No, there had to be other possibilities. “Someone on the roof of Jenkins’ or the insurance building could’ve done it,” I said. “You should check for roof access. A ladder, if nothing else. And what about the warehouse?” I pointed and Clod turned to look at the old brick two-story warehouse at the end of the block, opposite the insurance office.

  “Thank you for your input,” he said, turning back. He didn’t modify the word “input” with an audible adjective, but a few withering options showed up in the tilt of his head and lifted eyebrow. “Ms. Rutledge, Ms. Buchanan, in all likelihood this was a terrible accident. One of the actors had live ammunition and didn’t know it. He’s probably scared witless and afraid to come forward. Now, come here and look at your open window up there on the second floor.”

  Oops. Ardis stepped out from under the tent with Clod to look at the window. I didn’t bother.

  “John Berry likes to keep busy,” I said when Clod stomped back into the tent. “In the interest of full disclosure, he and Ernestine are minding the shop for us, and during the lull after the, um, incident, John washed the windows. And closed the one he found open in the bathroom.”

  “In the interest of full disclosure,” Clod ground between his teeth, “please tell me why those two are puttering around tidying up the crime scene. Why are they still in the building?”

  “Hey, this is not my fault,” I said, “and if it annoys you—”

  “Annoys me?”

  “This whole problem could have been avoided if someone had told us sooner.”

  “Told you what sooner?”

  “That some nut with a rifle popped upstairs in the Cat and popped off a pedestrian. And if they’d told us in plain English, instead of obfuscatory officialese, we would have locked the doors, sent John and Ernestine home, and your precious crime scene would have been inviolate.” I said that with a lot of spit and my finger jabbing at his chest, because by then I didn’t care who saw me confronting whom in public and, in particular, confronting that annoying clod.

  • • •

  After that the Mennonites seemed leery of us, or maybe just of me. Ardis went across and commiserated with them over their lost afternoon sales, though, and they ended up smiling and giving her a loaf of rye bread. The teenagers were happy to hear from their parents that an uncle was on his way to pick them up.

  • • •

  I made a quick call to Ernestine and told her what was going on. “The deputies will come talk to you. Just answer their questions and don’t worry about balancing the register or anything. Ardis and I will take care of the rest later.”

  “Maybe it will help ease the situation if I make a pot of tea.”

  “Mm, better not.”

  “And no time, anyway. Here come two of them right now. Oh yes, very gruff-looking.”

  She disconnected with a chirp of greeting for the lawmen and I started packing our merchandise back into boxes and plastic totes. Clod had told us that we would be escorted to the Cat with our goods when someone in authority was free from other duties. I was sure we were supposed to feel grateful that they were letting us move everything inside and allowing us to collect our purses and feed the cat. “And touch nothing else and then leave,” according to Clod’s directive. I reflected on how grateful I felt by spitting one more annoyed word and then apologized to Ardis.

  “It’s all right, hon,” she said, patting me on the back. “You did good. That ‘obfuscatory officialese’ put Coleridge right in his place. On the other hand, I think we can understand his position, don’t you? It must be frustrating to be so law-abiding and upright and have to deal day in and day out with people who aren’t. Or worse, with someone who doesn’t have the guts to face up to it.”

  “You’re right.”

  “And when John sets out to clean something, he’s thorough. That must come from his sailing days.”

  “I should probably apologize to Deputy Dunbar.”

  “Oh, I don’t think you need to go that far, hon.”

  “But I should’ve saved my anger for J. Scott Prescott. What part of ‘No, your good old boys with guns can’t shoot them out our windows, much less point them at people and kill them’ didn’t he understand?”

  “He has much to answer for,” Ardis said. “Oh my land.” There was a sudden catch in her voice. “With all this going on, I didn’t realize, they haven’t taken her away yet.” She pointed at the telltale lump distorting the back panel of the tent. She looked at me, moved to the edge of the tent for a quick look, then came back, first nodding her head and then shaking it.

  “What on earth is taking them so long?” she asked.

  “I don’t think it’s really been all that long. It just seems like it.”

  “Well, as long as they haven’t moved her, I wonder if they’ll let
us pay our respects one more time. I’d surely like to.”

  “You would?”

  “Absolutely. Think about it, hon. How likely is it that one of those costumed yahoos, hamming it up for all the world to take notice, actually entered the Cat without showing off so that everyone in the shop knew he was there? And could describe him? And then tell me that he just happened to pick out, target, shoot, and kill the most irritating woman on the street?”

  “You’re saying someone snuck in planning to kill Reva Louise?”

  “Premeditated murder.”

  “That’s . . .” I didn’t like to say crazy, but I wasn’t sure what else to call it.

  “Kath, someone went to an awful lot of trouble to kill Reva Louise. But if you ask me—and you know you don’t need to ask only me, because there are dozens who will agree—she was an awful lot of trouble.”

  “Trouble from beginning to end. That’s a sad epitaph.”

  “Isn’t that the truth?”

  “That might be why no one has come forward, though,” I said.

  “Killers generally don’t,” Ardis agreed.

  “If you’re right, Deputy Dunbar and his buddies will probably figure it out.”

  “Eventually.”

  “Maybe.” I thought for a minute. “The police are talking to Ernestine and John. But there’s no reason we can’t talk to Ernestine and John, too. They were our employees for the afternoon. We need to check on their welfare after such a traumatic event.”

  “Maybe have them over for a nice supper to thank them,” Ardis said. “And debrief them.”

  “Get them to tell us everything they remember. Everything they remember seeing and hearing.”

  “Everyone they remember.”