False Nails and Tall Tales (The Teasen and Pleasen Hair Salon Cozy Mystery Series Book 5)

by Constance Barker

  "His name was Frank, Nellie. Her father’s name was Frank. Of course it was his fault. He inflicted this psychic damage on his family and gave no clue why. No one could think of a reason he would hang himself. Even if he wanted to die, that isn’t a pleasant method. He didn’t leave a suicide note and no one ever thought he’d be the kind of guy who would kill himself. They had no financial problems. Their house was paid for. So there must’ve been something deep… and dark. Unfortunately my power creature wasn’t willing to help me explore what his secrets were."

  "A little psychic privacy is a good thing," I said. "Hurrah for a little discretion on the part of your power creature."

  She scowled. "She can be quarrelsome at times, and I only asked for that information so that I could learn something to help the family in their time of trouble."

  "Sorry," I said. "And here I was thinking you were snooping."

  "I didn’t know Frank well, but I sense he was a weak man. He became a powerful spirit, however, and that usually means that he drew on some evil force."

  "You’ve seen him?"

  "No, but I felt his presence—a dark and powerful presence. It was strong around the front door of the salon as if he’d been waiting for her. I’m not the only one either. Months after his death a number of people saw his apparition in the yard, lurking around the house. I think that his presence made Trinity see the whole thing as a punishment of some kind. She seemed to think she deserved the punishment, because she refused my offers to lead an exorcism."

  "So she stayed to face the spiritual music but mom split?" Nellie asked.

  "More or less. Debbie couldn’t handle Frank haunting the house the way he was. She hung around until Trinity was released, but she wanted out of that house. Trinity wouldn’t leave. I think she thought that would be a way of abandoning her father to his fate a second time. Debbie tried to get her to leave, but eventually she gave up. She put the house in Trinity’s name and disappeared."

  "Wow."

  Nellie stroked her chin. "So she found her father hanging, and now she hears about Old Joe being hung and it stirs up old memories."

  "And maybe old visions," Selina said. "A thing like that feeds the darker spirits, encourages them to resume their old ways. Maybe the haunting had died off and now it’s restarted."

  "Oddly enough, that makes sense," Nellie said.

  It did. Selina’s logic made a certain tragic sense. I wasn’t ready to believe in her father’s spirit wandering around the old homestead, but I could see Trinity believing it and with the sordid news of Joe’s death, those nightmares might grow stronger.

  “That poor kid. She doesn’t have to imagine what it’s like to see a man hung."

  "Neither do we," Nellie said. “I wish I did.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The next day we were blessed with a lazy, warm, absolutely gorgeous Louisiana afternoon and I’d propped open the front door of the salon so we could enjoy the fresh air. Knockemstiff is still a small enough place that the traffic out front is no bother and leaving your door open is friendlier and cheaper than turning on air conditioning.

  Pete finished up a fancy cut he was doing on a woman we didn’t know. She’d called for an appointment and then driven over from Baton Rouge just to have him cut her hair. I thought that was a lot of trouble to go through to get your hair done, but ever since Pete won the styling competition it had started happening more and more and he was loving it.

  It was bound to continue. When people admired this woman’s hair she’d tell them about Pete and he’d get more customers. I think the very fact that women had to come all the way to Knockemstiff to get him to cut their hair added to the prestige somehow. Not only had there been television coverage of the awards, but Ellen Hart, in her capacity as mayor had done her best to make sure that the word was out about Pete’s success. She’d put out a press release and there was a little pop up ad on the town web site now that announced his victory. The nature of our business was changing, and I felt like I owed it to Pete to do more to promote him myself.

  I’d been too wrapped up in myself and my need to make decisions to give it much thought, but Nellie had jumped on it. She’d made up a big poster with a photo of Pete getting his award and Betina, who’d been his model, standing next to him, and it now hung on the wall. Ellen Hart was all excited and had arranged for the fashion editor from some online site to come to town the next week to interview Pete and do an article on Bayou Chic.

  And now I was daydreaming, idly watching Nellie doing a manicure on a teenager who had a fondness for dark purple. Her eyeshadow and lipstick were purple. Her yellow hair was streaked with purple. And now Nellie was finishing up a set of acrylic nails in a bright purple streaked with gold. As Nellie put the finishing touches on the nails, Nadine Hines came in.

  “I broke a nail," she told Nellie, sounding sad and holding up her hand.

  "Luckily, I might just know how to fix that. Seems it’s a big nail day here at Teasen and Pleasen."

  The girl got out of the chair and walked to the register. I went over to run her credit card and I saw her name was Flo Lasiter. The girl didn’t look familiar, but the name was. "Your father is Chuck Lasiter?"

  Being recognized didn’t please her a lot. "Yeah."

  "You guys left town quite a while back." That explained why I didn’t recognize her. When they left she was about the age Sarah was now.

  “Thank goodness too. How do you stand it?”

  “We manage. Are you back for a visit?”

  “We came to visit my granny," she said. “The visit is as boring as the town. I managed to escape."

  It always amazed me how many people actively disliked small towns.” Well, thanks for escaping here."

  She looked at her nails and then signed the credit card slip. "Whatever."

  As the girl left Nadine slid into Nellie’s chair. Nellie took her hand and held it up. "This nail looks like it suffered a classic typing tragedy. It got cracked, but someone, I can’t imagine who, kept typing until it tore."

  "Don’t talk like my mother. I have a lot of reports that I have to fill out—about Old Joe. Did you know his last name was Hancock?”

  “It never occurred to me that he even had one,” Nellie said, laughing at herself.

  "A death creates paperwork for you, I suppose," I said, trying to sound sympathetic.

  "It sure does. And this one isn’t even in our jurisdiction. I’m helping out because the Chief is big on interdepartmental cooperation. The paperwork isn’t all what you might think, either. There’s all sorts of extra work with this one. For instance, yesterday Leander came in and asked about Joe’s guitar and that added a lot of work."

  "Joe’s guitar? He had a guitar?"

  "Apparently Old Joe had some old guitar. Made out of steel. Leander wanted to know how he could arrange to buy it, if there was an estate or anything. As far as we know Joe had no living relatives and no will."

  "No relatives at all?"

  "Not that we know of. But then we didn’t know about a guitar either. It isn’t on the list of items collected from the scene. Leander said Joe always had it near his favorite chair. Of course the chair was broken, but we didn’t find a guitar anywhere. So that meant, after filling out Leander’s request, I had to file a missing property form."

  "No wonder you broke a nail," Nellie said.

  "The stress is what does it."

  "So the guitar is valuable?" The idea that Joe kept an expensive guitar around surprised me.

  "So Leander says. Maybe three or four thousand dollars."

  Nellie whistled. "Wow!"

  "Of course at this point in the investigation we can’t even know it’s missing for sure. He could’ve sold it recently, although Leander swears that Joe wouldn’t have ever sold that thing no matter how broke he was."

  "Leander would know as much as anyone."

  "Chief Tanner is working under the assumption that he is correct," Nadine said. "Leander found a picture of the correct
model so we can check around for one like it.”

  I coughed. "Digby Hayes will check around town for the missing guitar? Knockemstiff doesn’t even have a pawn shop, much less a store that sells second-hand instruments. Where would he look?"

  Nadine’s expression told me that she hadn’t considered that part of the equation. "Well, the police will keep their eyes out. If they run across any stolen goods they will know to look for it."

  Even Nadine had to realize that made no sense. I decided I needed coffee. “It’s most likely that if the guitar was stolen, it will be sold in New Orleans, not here. There are going to be lots of buyers there and no one looking for that guitar.”

  "Besides," Nellie said, "I can remember the last time we uncovered a series of thefts in this town and the loot all Christmas stuff. That doesn’t bode well for finding it before next Christmas."

  Nadine scrunched her face up in an attempt to look sternly official. "That won’t happen here again. The Grinch was taught a lesson."

  “I doubt that lesson made her enjoy Christmas more," Nellie said, holding up her hand. “Now you need hold still a second. I know you can’t talk without your hands, so be quiet." The conversation paused as we watched Nellie carefully put a tiny drop of epoxy on Nadine’s damaged nail and spread it along the crack, then put a piece of paper on it. "There, it’s repaired. Now let me clean that up, polish it and see if I can match the color to the other nails."

  "You used that Green Grape color you found for me," she said.

  Nellie snapped her fingers. “Right. You picked that one out. It isn’t exactly the way it looked online and if it was a little brighter it would make a nice Christmas color.”

  “It would!” That seemed to please Nadine immensely.

  “Well I hope they find the guitar,” I said before the mention of Christmas got them back on the subject of Christmas past. “I can understand why Leander would want it. He probably played his first chords on that one, before he got his own."

  “Giving it maximum sentimental value," Nadine said. “And they’ll find it. Chief Tanner is on the case.”

  Nellie snorted. "Hearing that I feel better already."

  I sat in my chair, wishing someone would walk in and ask me to cut their hair and talk silly idle gossip. “Of course, in addition to adding to your workload, now they have a possible motive for murder.”

  "They do?" Nadine said.

  “If the guitar was valuable and if someone stole it, they do. It’s possible that someone killed Joe for it."

  “People kill for less,” Pete said.

  "I hadn’t thought of that," Nadine said. "Imagine killing someone for an old guitar."

  “That’s worth a lot of money. That’s why they’d take it to the city. If Leander’s right, no one here is going to pay what it’s worth anyway.”

  "Oh." Nadine smiled. "That makes much more sense."

  “Unfortunately, it also makes the chances the police finding it a lot worse,” Nellie said and we all knew she was right.

  It could be gone already.

  # # #

  That afternoon I had to pick Sarah up from school early. Mrs. Lacy had to go to the city to renew some school paperwork with the state education department. Paula was working and had asked me to pick up Ginny. The girls were waiting for me and the three of us walked back, making only a minor detour to get some juice at Paramabet’s store.

  At the best of times going into Paramabet’s with children is dangerous and today the place smelled of coconut. Rashmi held out a plate. "Freshly made Nariyal Ka Ladoo," she said. “Free sample.”

  "Coconut candy!" the girls both cried and I knew any sort of intention I had of keeping them away from sweets was gone along with the free samples.

  "You are a menace to society, Rashmi Paramabet,” I said. "You are too good at creating irresistible temptations under any circumstances and passing out free samples…”

  "That’s called good marketing," she said. "It’s as American as red, white, and blue samosas."

  "Which you sold a ton of on the fourth of July."

  She smiled. “We call it savory patriotism," she said. I handed her some money and watched as the girls each devoured another one of the coconut ladoo.

  "Works for me." The girls stared at me, trying to look like they hadn’t eaten in weeks. "You better give me a dozen of those to go," I said. I glared at the girls. “Some of these are for the adults."

  "A few," Sarah said reluctantly. “I suppose that’s reasonable."

  “A bit of a waste, though,” Ginny added.

  When we got to the salon, Pete and Nellie were as happy about the purchase as the girls. I passed them out, eating one myself (and it was delicious) and then sat the girls down at a table to do their homework. I held out the bag. “Okay girls, I’ve saved the last two. I will guard them for you, but first comes homework."

  That got the desired response, and they got out books and started writing out spelling words.

  "Any exciting news?" I asked. "I’ve been gone at least half an hour."

  "Earlier today I saw something unpleasant downtown," Pete said. "The peasants are getting ugly, and it’s kind of worrying."

  "What’s going on?" I asked him.

  "There are protest marches at the city hall. It’s all that Dr. Fimbus. He manages to gather quite a crowd."

  "In this town?"

  "It is kind of amazing. I saw Dolores there, along with a few others you’d expect, the church regulars, but there are also people I’ve never seen. And Digby tells me they’ve been out there every day this week. Ever since Dr. Fimbus started his campaign."

  "His campaign?"

  "Cleanse Knockemstiff of sin."

  "Oh."

  "He’s got them fired up. They are demanding that Chief Tanner round up all the moonshiners. He keeps telling them that his real authority ends at the town limits and the moonshiners are all in the swamp. The nasty part was the rumbles about taking care of it themselves if the police won’t.”

  "That could be volatile."

  "I’m worried," Pete said. "Their immediate concern seems to be alcohol, both legal and illegal, although their idea of sin is a lot broader than that. If they have any leverage… well, they certainly don’t think people like me deserve a place on the planet."

  "Well, most of the town is more reasonable than that."

  "I thought so too. But this Fimbus character really gets them worked up and I think reason starts to fail them."

  "We need to keep an eye on it," Nellie said.

  "Why would God want someone as nasty to people as Dr. Fimbus to speak up for him?" Sarah asked.

  Ginny tapped her nose with her pencil. “Even if people are doing bad things, why would God need people like that to punish them. I thought that was his job—punishing sinners."

  I almost laughed. "Well, I happen to think you are two very smart girls and that the people who are joining this crusade are mistaken. The problem is that we don’t have any hard facts to tell us who is right and wrong."

  Ginny put her pencil down. "Then, without any facts, isn’t it wrong to force your thinking on other people?"

  "I think it is, Ginny."

  "Welcome to the world of kids," Nellie said, "where logic, their logic, actually plays a bigger role than tradition or the perceptions of mere adults."

  "Of course," Ginny said.

  "Well, I have an important fact in mind right now," Sarah said. "The fact is that if I get back to work I can have my homework done in just a few minutes."

  Ginny grinned. "And then we get…"

  They looked at each other and, in unison, said: "Nariyal Ka Ladoo!" and gave each other a high five.

  “Paula is going to be angry at me when Ginny isn’t hungry at dinner time.”

  Nellie put her hand on my shoulder. "Have her tell her mom that she was involved in an after-school, multicultural culinary experience. When you use lot of big words it can make the idea that you let her kid stuff her face with candy sound okay.
"

  “That’s sneaky.”

  "That’s wisdom from a three-time mother who survived the experience."

  "At least so far."

  She laughed. "Point taken. But Aubrey is nearly a man, and I feel more confident getting the other two through their teenage years."

  She went to refill her coffee and then turned around. "Well look who’s here."

  I turned and saw James Woodley. He gave me a smile, but something was wrong. I knew all his smiles and there was something wrong with this one.

  # # #

  When James walked straight up to Nellie I worried even more.

  “What’s going on?”

  He ignored me.” Nellie, Rudy doesn’t have anything to do with the Ratkovich family does he?"

  "He knows them causally," she said. "Why?"

  "I meant that he doesn’t hang out at their place to swap stories or anything does he? Is it likely he’ll be over there this afternoon?”

  Woodley’s uncharacteristic nervousness bothered me and I could tell Nellie noticed it too.

  "Not as far as I know."

  "Do you know what he’s doing today?"

  Nellie put her hands on her hips. “Listen I know he’s a suspect, but what’s this about?”

  "Just answer the question." His voice had an edge to it.

  "The last I heard, he and Aubrey were going to take a look at some old death trap of a car that Rudy’s father found. They are making noises about fixing it up for Aubrey, Obviously they don’t think I have enough to worry about without him having his own car."

  Hearing that Woodley seemed relieved.

  I touched his arm. "You could just tell us what’s going on, you know. That would make this conversation less awkward."

  "Actually, I can’t," he said. "I haven’t a clear idea of what is going on."

  "But something is going on about Rudy?" Nellie asked. "Do I need to warn him about something?”

  “You can’t say a word to Rudy," he said. "I shouldn’t have asked. I was just curious.” He ran his hand through his hair. “I mean he and Bogdan are our chief suspects and I was concerned they might get together and compare notes, is all. I asked them not to and if he ignored me he could be charged with obstructing justice." He looked at me meaningfully. "I don’t want Rudy to get into any trouble."