wasn’t paying my bills. I had to solve the mystery first. I pulled out, away from the crime scene, towards The Loop, and then got stuck at the traffic light.
And there it was, a Sign. Literally. The electronic marquee, visible only from the front of the sports complex, gyrated upcoming community events. The bus trip to NYC. A wreath-making workshop. The annual Santa Swim. A Noontime New Year’s Dance Party with Miss Minerva and Major the Wonder Dog. Miss Minerva. It had to be. Now I understood why Cindi mentioned Miss Minerva like I should have recognized this local celebrity’s name.
A horn beeped. The traffic light had changed. I stepped on the gas and headed home. I needed to write it all down, look at the facts, and make the connections. The first connection would be with Miss Minerva and her Wonder Dog.
Next noon, as I reached the clearing a mile from Marsden Creek, about a dozen preschoolers and their parents were getting up from the picnic tables while Miss Minerva packed a picture book and several cloth puppets into a pink Powerpuff Girls backpack. Cold weather was holding off for the holidays. Major the Wonder Dog was yapping.
“Listen, boys and girls! Major is reminding us to be kind to all living things,” said Miss Minerva. I was praying her Witchy-Poo outfit was purely for effect. The Chinese Pug charged me, now yapping and snorting. “Ma-jor! Kennel up,” called his owner and pointed to the open door of the small metal crate on the bench next to her backpack. In three leaps, the little dog was nestled inside his carrier and quiet. “Are you a reporter?” Miss Minerva shouted.
“Ah, no, sorry,” I blurted. “I mean, yes, I’m a writer. But I’m not here from any of the local newspapers or anything. Sorry.”
“Ne’r you mind, too late now.” She slung her bag over her shoulder, picked up Major’s carrier, and met me halfway.
“Too late for what?”
“This was our final Story Time till spring.” The older woman nodded back towards the empty tables. “I issued a press release. Someone sends a photographer from the newspapers, at the least.”
I felt bad for her. Miss Minerva must have been, at one time anyway, more famous than I’d given her credit for. She tossed her waist-length, salt-and-pepper French braid. “I suppose we’ll get some coverage at our end of year knees-up.”
“What? Yeah, probably.”
She started out towards the golf course. “That’s when I can tell them about those poor, poor dead squirrels.”
I forgot how to exhale. I was speechless, but I could still walk. I kept pace.
“Oh, yes indeed, right out there.” We paused; she put down the dog carrier, and with her walking stick, directed my eyes towards the overgrown east path that took adventurers to a service road, which petered out shy of the marshy point. “My, it must be a fortnight, Wednesday. Major and I were having a little smoke. This time of year, nobody but us crazy folk venture out there.” She winked. “At first, I thought a crate of cheap stuffed animals from the Boardwalk arcades had somehow made its way across the bay and broken open at low tide. However, when Major ran ahead and retrieved one of the bodies, I knew something was amiss.”
I nodded. Let her talk. Never show your hand unless you have to, Pumpkin.
“My Stars,” the woman continued. “What would dozens of Sciurus carolinensis be doing out there? Dead or alive? Grey squirrels hate to get their little paws wet.”
“Oh, really?”
“Oh yes, absolutely. I reported the situation to Animal Control as soon as we returned home. Nice girl, very helpful, took my information and assured me they’d send out someone to investigate.” Strange. Minerva showed no awareness of that nice, helpful girl being dead. And I wasn’t going to be the one to tell her. Yet. “Very next day, poof, not a single tuft of fur in sight. Given how fast Animal Control responded, I expected to be notified, as I’d been promised, of the necropsy outcome by now.” My professional storyteller paused. “Perhaps I will be better served to test Major’s dead squirrel from my freezer. Would you care to see it?” I felt faint.
By the second cup of eggnog herbal tea on Miss Minerva’s sun porch, all my cards were on the table, and Minnie (as I’d been invited to call her) was in tears.
Minnie dabbed her nose with her hankie. “So now, we are agreed. Cynthia’s accident was no accident.”
“Absolutely,” I concurred. “But how do we prove it?”
“We can’t, I’m afraid. We must leave that investigation to the professionals to locate the hit-and-run vehicle and its driver.”
“If ever.”
“Alice, it’s early days. The squirrels are paramount. We have one. As I’ve said, I’ll ship off the frozen container to my pathologist friend in Chicago immediately and we should have our answer before I return for New Year’s.” Her holiday itinerary gave me jet lag.
From her glass sun porch, you could see Hole 11 at the Pinecone Cove Golf Course and Country Club. The morning clouds had cleared, and a bright December midday sun spotlighted a foursome as they poked around in their bags for drivers.
“Andrew insisted living here would help his game,” said his widow. “It didn’t.” Minnie beamed. “He blamed it on the course. Terrible. Simply terrible. Even I could see that.”
“Looks pretty from here.”
“Pretty does not amount to much when the greens never drain,” chuckled Minnie. “The Association wants to rebuild the Country Club, with the majority of the funding generated from a new-and-improved golf course. A five-million-dollar pipe dream is what it is.”
“Why’s that?”
“You can always rebuild a golf course. Even on a swamp. But there’s the eternal mole problem.” Minnie looked pleased. “Amazing little creatures. Wonderful aerators for the soil. Devastating for a golf course. They make mounds, you know.”
“No, I didn’t,” I replied, although I guess I did.
“Oh, yes, sweetie. Our entire community is infested with them. You mean to tell me you live on the South Side and haven’t seen any indications in your yard?”
“Well, I probably have and didn’t realize that’s what it was. I don’t have much of a yard, mostly gravel.”
“Very smart. But if you ever do have problems with moles, I have some live traps you can borrow.”
“Thanks.” I finished my tea and stood to bundle up to leave.
“Of course, I don’t know what you’ll do with your moles after you catch them,” said Minnie. “I release mine out there on the green.” She winked and walked me to the door.
As I headed down the golf cart road towards Red Horse Trail, I turned to look back at Minnie’s mansion on the green. Those same four golfers were still milling around at the tee. Jesus, how long does it take to hit a little white ball with a stick?
Once home, I dug through my Important Shit lockbox for the community’s fiscal reports Roland’s executor had left me. Murder boils down to love or money. Cindi’s Animal Control connection to the dead squirrels, not a lover, had done her in. So, like any good gumshoe, I followed the money. Back to the fairway.
Pinecone Cove Golf was deep in a bunker. Membership was down, the country club was in the red, and their Greens Renovation Project had closed the front nine through June. Outside play, the bulk of their revenue, had become nonexistent. Yet no mention of mole-burrow damage to the course or a single accounting line for exterminator expense. Curious.
“Salisbury Pest Control. Jimmy,” the man’s voice answered, although I could barely hear him over the sound of a TV game show.
“Hi, I’m calling because I’m having a problem with moles,” I said in a half-octave higher voice.
“Moles? No problem for us, ma’am. Where do-ya live?”
“Pinecone Cove.” The TV faded. “Hello?” I said. “Hello?”
“Yeah, well, everybody out there’s gotta problem with moles, don’t they?” I heard a nervous laugh. “Where you at? South Side?”
“Yes, near the golf course.”
“Okay then, let me tell you all about the little varmints so you’ll understan
d exactly what we’re gonna need to do. You got any kids or pets?”
“No.” That was true.
“Because where you live, lady, we’re gonna have to use poison. Only way to fight ’em. No guarantees, though.”
“But, poison? Isn’t that against the law?”
“See, here’s the thing.” His voice pumped. “Moles aren’t rodents like mice, they’re in-sect-O-vores.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yep. They eat in-sects. So the law says we can feed ’em our yummy grub poison without jumpin’ through any government hoops.” He coughed. “Just gotta be real careful around children and pets and stuff.” (By “stuff,” I assumed he meant wildlife, like grey squirrels.) He hedged. “That’s why we hardly ever get calls from out your way.”
I hung up. Despite the Cove’s great love of its golf, it loved its children, pets, and stuff even more. Discovering poison on their greens would be bad enough, but a fair tradeoff for a pristine fairway. Anything found planted outside of its boundaries, however, would have homeowners ready to board up the Country Club and let its greens sink back to swamp. Not to mention, of course, the small matter of the murdered Animal Control Dispatcher who knew too much.
The sirens that night heralded Santa’s arrival at the Community Center Pool atop the VFD’s hook and ladder truck. Wasn’t ten-thirty at night kinda late for a kiddies’ Christmas swim? Oh well. Not my problem.
My cell phone rang a little after four a.m. It was Minerva.
“They’ve burned
The Mystery of the Dead Squirrels Page 2