The Lone Star Lonely Hearts Club: A Debutante Dropout Mystery

by McBride, Susan

  Clearly, Armageddon was near.

  Chapter 10

  I staggered against Annabelle’s desk, grappling for something solid to clutch, because my knees were caving in. I caught her pencil holder and sent it soaring to the floor, scattering pens and No. 2 lead tips in a dozen different directions.

  Holy Mother of Pearl!

  “Oh, honey, did I really startle you like that?” Cissy said, her familiar voice coming from this other woman’s exterior. “I didn’t know how you’d react, but it’s nice to see I had you fooled. Because I did, didn’t I? I’ll bet you didn’t know I took a few drama courses back in college, did you?”

  She sounded so pleased with herself.

  I wanted to puke, but that would be redundant since I’d been there and done that yesterday afternoon. I saw no need for an encore.

  My jaw moved, but aphasia set in, depriving me of any response whatsoever. So I dropped to the carpet to clean up the mess I’d made, my heart and stomach changing places, as I fought to make sense of this upside-down situation.

  Could it be an early Halloween prank?

  A segment for Candid Camera?

  Until I remembered Alan Funt was pushing up daisies, so no chance of him jumping out from behind a piece of furniture.

  There were so many danged reality shows these days, it could be anything, I decided. Were they shooting a pilot titled My Deranged Mother? Only I didn’t see any cameras or a TV crew. Maybe they were hidden in a secret room behind the bookshelves.

  “Andrea, come up off your knees and sit down, so Annabelle and I can explain this to you.”

  Explain?

  How could there possibly be a logical explanation for my dyed-in-the-wool couture-wearing mummy to be dressed up as someone else . . . someone with a diametrically opposed fashion sense? A made-up person named Miriam Amanda Wallace Ferguson, for Pete’s sake.

  Snap, crackle, pop.

  My synapses fired again.

  On shaky legs, I rose and plunked the pencil holder back on Annabelle’s desk, more or less intact.

  “Ma Wallace aka Miriam Amanda Wallace Ferguson,” I said, voice shaking, as it all came back to me, and I stared at my mother in costume. “The first woman governor of Texas and nearly as big a crook as her husband, Jim, also a former governor, who got himself impeached. It’s in every textbook in every school across the state.” I shook my head, incredulous. “So you’re impersonating a dead politician and moving into Bebe Kent’s place with a carry-on bag. Just what the heck are you trying to pull here? And, please, tell me it’s not what I’m thinking.”

  Annabelle and Cissy shared a glance.

  “Well, that depends,” my certifiable mother quipped. “What exactly are you thinking, sweetie?”

  “Besides the fact that at least one of us is clearly on the verge of a nervous breakdown?”

  “Oh, don’t be silly,” Cissy chided.

  “Do have a seat Andy,” my old campmate jumped in. “Let us fill you in on what you missed.”

  “I was only late by fifteen minutes!”

  How on earth could I have skipped enough to amount to . . . this?

  “Ah, but your mother was early, and she knew exactly what she wished to say . . . and do.” Annabelle picked up a silver pen that had rolled across her desk and tapped it in the air, toward the empty wing chair. “Sit,” she said again.

  So I sat.

  “We’ve figured out a compromise,” Annabelle announced, though such an agreement seemed hard to fathom. Rather like selling one’s soul to the devil, which was lose-lose any way you looked at it.

  “And it involved her wearing a costume?” I balked.

  “Well, I am going undercover, darling,” Cissy said, as if her over-the-top attire wasn’t indication enough of that. “Which means having a cover to hide under, you see. And it’s not like you haven’t done it before, so why can’t I do it, too?”

  “Um, because you’re a grown-up?” I itched to scream at the top of my lungs.

  But I couldn’t, not when she’d thrown my own act of lunacy in my face. Lord knows I’d like to forget pulling a Nancy Drew to help a friend, a sacrifice that had involved wearing lavender hot pants and a stuffed bra. Hey, at least Mother was more covered up than I’d been.

  Do as I say, not as I do. That’s what I needed to get across in this crucial moment.

  “What I’ve done in the past has no bearing on this,” I insisted, but Mother’s look of dismissal had me quickly turning to Annabelle. “You’re really and truly letting her into Belle Meade, dressed like that, so she can play snoop? Hello? What’s wrong with this picture? Because I’m thinking along the lines of Picasso on acid. It’s so surreal it’s laughable,” I said and guffawed to show I meant it.

  I didn’t sway Annabelle, either. “It’s her call, Andy.”

  “Because she’s twisting your arm?” I knew how frightened Annabelle was about Mother going to the media with her suspicions about murder. Still, this scheme of theirs seemed entirely too risky. “Seriously, you cannot do this. Call in a private investigator if you must, but don’t go through with this charade. I beg you. Someone could get hurt, or very seriously annoyed.”

  The Woman Formerly Known As Cissy ignored my concerns, recrossing her legs and lifting a shiny black cowboy boot loaded with rhinestones so she could study it with great intensity.

  Annabelle rapped her desk with the pen to get my attention. “Listen up, Andy, and listen good. The last thing I want is a private eye poking around, asking questions and making everyone nervous. I don’t know that the lawyers for the corporation would be any too happy about it, either, and I don’t want to bring them into this. Besides, what harm can your Mother do in a few days’ time, if that’s what it takes to put her mind at ease?”

  How do I count the ways? I mused, but didn’t interrupt.

  “If she hasn’t found whatever she’s looking for by next Sunday, she’s agreed to move out and drop her accusations. She’ll also politely decline further invitations to play with the Wednesday bridge group, and she’ll return Bebe’s borrowed passkey.”

  “That’s your compromise?” I scoffed openly. “She’ll pretend to be Jessica Fletcher for a week and then fade away like an old soldier?”

  “I think it’s bloody marvelous that Annabelle would give me such an opportunity!” my nut-ball Mother crowed, as if she’d been offered the part of Auntie Mame on Broadway.

  Marvelous was not the word I would have chosen to describe the situation.

  “She initially wanted to stay through the end of the month,” Annabelle explained, and I groaned, because a week seemed too long as it was; three weeks would have been unfathomable. “But I agreed to have Finch order some blood tests on Mrs. Sewell. Whenever the results return negative—and they will—the jig is up. So Miss Cissy’s excellent adventure could very well be cut short if the lab works fast.” She pressed her palms together, prayerful. “Until then, the staff will know nothing except we have a new resident on Magnolia, and Cissy has vowed not to call any of her contacts at the papers or in the mayor’s office. So, you see, this solution is a happy medium for all of us.”

  Medium meant average, which implied normal, and I didn’t detect an iota of that here. As for the “happy” part, I certainly wasn’t smiling, although my mother seemed unduly perky.

  I cocked my head, squinting hard at Cissy in the wig and vintage glasses, deciding I’d have to be extremely drunk to find this amusing.

  If I’d had any sense, I would’ve booked her a room at the loony bin. Instead, I continued to pursue the matter, asking them, “What if Bebe Kent’s surviving relatives want to dispose of her townhouse, so another qualifying Belle Meade resident can assume the lease, or however that’s done? What if they’d like to get rid of her furniture in an estate sale? You can’t just move into the home of a dead woman without some kind of . . . I don’t know . . . legal maneuvering”—I swiveled toward Annabelle—“can she?”

  But Annabelle was beaten to the pun
ch.

  “Oh, I can and I will, because Bebe’s cousins agreed to let me do it.” Mother patted the arms of her chair, her bracelets clanging like the bells of Notre Dame. “When I got home yesterday, I phoned Jillie’s cell before she and Stella flew back across the pond. Since Bebe had paid her monthly fees through September, the surviving family members have an option to serve out her month’s occupancy, as per her contract. They’ve spoken to Bebe’s lawyers about appointing me some kind of guardian of her property, if need be, so I can help sort through her clothing and personal effects, weeding out whatever the cousins don’t want to keep. Most of the furniture will stay, as her upfront fee was for a furnished residence.”

  “Stella and Jillie . . . you didn’t tell them you thought Bebe was murdered, did you? Please, say you didn’t mention wanting to stay over at Mrs. Kent’s so you could hunt down her killer?”

  Annabelle twirled a hank of hair around her finger.

  “No, Andrea, of course I didn’t.” Mother looked indignant. “I merely suggested I could be of assistance, since I’m here and they’re out of the country. They won’t have to leave the townhouse vacant while Bebe’s things are still there, and I’ll keep on top of things until the contents can be properly dealt with. The cousins were delighted and Jillie called Annabelle this morning to make the arrangements. So, she’s stuck with me, whether she likes it or not.” Her cat’s-eye glasses fixed on Annabelle, who was busy unraveling her finger from her hair. “Isn’t that right, dear girl?”

  “Stu-uck,” I heard Annabelle drawl.

  “So, as long as I’m at Bebe’s, I’ll make a list of Bea’s possessions that remain, mostly her clothing and less valuable baubles, which I’ll donate to charity, as Jillie and Stella suggested. Oh, and I’ve promised to hand over any mail that arrives while I’m the occupant.”

  “Clothes and mail,” I said.

  “That’s right.” Mother seemed suddenly less garrulous as she fiddled with a chunky gold watch on her wrist, one that would’ve looked eminently suitable on a middle-aged man with a comb-over, an open-necked polyester shirt, and a hairy chest covered with chains.

  “That’s not all you’re going to do, is it? Because it seems a mite over the top to dress up in animal prints and the Wig That Ate Cleveland in order to clean out Bebe’s stuff for her cousins and fetch the mail for her attorneys.”

  Annabelle had a brief coughing fit.

  Cissy shifted in her chair. “Well, perhaps I’ve left out a few minor details.”

  Much as I figured. “Do fill me in.”

  “Well, if you must know, Sarah Lee’s sister Margery asked me to supervise the packing of Sarah’s personal belongings before they’re shipped off to South Dakota, which will afford the opportunity to compare crime scenes before Annabelle sends the housekeeping crew in to get things shipshape for the next person on the waiting list.”

  I stuck a finger in my ear and wiggled, to make sure I’d heard correctly.

  Did she say “compare crime scenes”?

  Why didn’t she just throw on a trench coat, mash on a cigar, and call herself Columbo?

  Annabelle’s face reddened, as if she were no more pleased with Cissy’s use of those words than I was.

  “Let me get this straight. You’re staying at Bebe Kent’s place,” I reiterated, “and you’ll be going through her things, ditto Sarah Lee Sewell’s, playing the part of a new Belle Meade denizen, using a crooked governor’s name, and trying to solve two alleged murders before church next Sunday morning, or until the blood tests on Mrs. Sewell return, whichever comes first. Have I got that right?”

  The black wig bobbed. “I’d say that about covers it, yes.”

  “And you’re really going along with this?” I turned on Annabelle. “You don’t mind her flitting around like Angela Lansbury dressed for Halloween and potentially disturbing the peace and quiet of this lovely community?”

  Annabelle squirmed in her seat, fiddling with her hair again. “You know the situation, Andy. Like it or not, I’m at the mercy of your mother for the next few days. I feel a lot like Martha Stewart when she did her stint at Camp Cupcake.” She thrust her forearms toward me, wrists pressed together in invisible shackles. “Someone whip up a puff pastry stuffed with a nail file, and make it quick!”

  Cissy chuckled.

  I was not amused. “You’re both raging lunatics.”

  This was beyond nuts. It was a freaking disaster waiting to happen. Was I the only one here who could see that?

  “Won’t the Wednesday bridge players recognize you?” I threw the question at my mother in a last ditch attempt to derail this train.

  “You didn’t even know who I was, so how will they?” She wrinkled her nose, and pushed at the bridge of her pointed specs. “The group’s not meeting this week, anyway, not after losing two players. And, believe me, I won’t seek them out. But if they see me around Belle Meade dressed like this”—fingers stacked with cubic zirconium fluttered from her head to her toes—“well, they won’t recognize me any more than you did. And the rest of the residents won’t give a lick who I am.”

  “But people saw you at the reception . . .”

  “Not decked out like a refugee from a Tunica Casino shuttle.” She primped at her frothy black beehive. “Besides, I didn’t stay in the dining hall long. I went looking for Sarah Lee right after I gave you the slip.”

  “Dr. Finch and Patsy saw us both at Mrs. Sewell’s,” I reminded her.

  Annabelle waved that one off. “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of it. I’ll make something up about Miriam being a distant relative.”

  “I’m wondering if they shouldn’t be in on it. The security guards, too. What if Mother gets in a jam”—but Annabelle made short work of my protest.

  “If your mother wants to do this, she has to fly under the radar and not disrupt the staff or the residents. That’s part of the pact.”

  “You worry too much, Andrea,” my mother said.

  “Can you blame me?” I tried to stare her down, but I was no competition for her, not with those freakily magnified eyes.

  Then it hit me. The Mother of All Wrenches to toss in their plan.

  What if—and I’m talking a Big “what if”—there really was a killer?

  Not that I believed it for a minute. Well, I highly doubted it, anyway. But, say, there was a one-in-a-million shot he existed and had gotten away with two murders so far; until “Miriam Ferguson” moved in and started acting like a very grown-up and badly dressed Nancy Drew, threatening to blow the lid on him.

  All right, all right, I told myself. You have something there. Go with it. Stick ’em hard and burst their bubble!

  I fixed a grim stare on my Mother. “Okay, Miss Marple, let’s assume for a moment that there’s a dangerous assassin running around Belle Meade, targeting lonely widows. What if he catches on to you, huh? You won’t have anyone watching your back. What if you get yourself in trouble and need assistance? Who will you turn to? Annabelle? Sam and Bob, the security guards from Mayberry?” I recalled how long it had taken the one to appear in his golf cart after being summoned to the Sewell house. “By the way, Barney and Andy might not see through your costume, but surely they have your plate numbers from the Lexus and Bentley down pat.”

  “Which is why I drove Sandy’s Buick,” Mother said.

  “Who,” I asked again, “will you have on your side during this ruse? Will the rent-a-cops be watching over you every minute?”

  “Great balls of fire, no!” Annabelle declared. “They’ve got enough to do, what with sittin’ in the guardhouse and all.”

  “So you”—I said pointedly, staring straight at her—“aim to play Robin to her Batman?”

  “Me? Oh, no.” Annabelle threw back her head and chortled, before she very primly pointed at me with the silver pen. “You, Sparky.”

  I begged to differ. “Now, wait just a cotton-picking minute.”

  “Yes, sugar, that’s where we figured you’d fit in.” Mother eagerly
scooted toward the edge of her chair, stretching a zebra print arm over the space between us to touch my fingers. “You’ll be my backup.”

  “Your backup?” I nearly choked on the words.

  “Oh, I get it. You’re not the one in charge, so you don’t want to play. Your father was right. You’re a stubborn cuss and something of a control freak, which you obviously inherited from his side of the family.” She withdrew to her chair and sat ramrod straight—something she’d learned at her Little Miss Manners lessons a generation before I—then she fussed with a thing-a-ma-bob on her earlobe that looked like a seashell awash in beads and glitter.

  “I’m not being stubborn, Mother, really.” How could she not see how preposterous this was? What a horrible position she was putting me in, not to mention Annabelle? As for inheriting my control freak gene from Daddy’s side of the family . . . puh-leeze! “I just don’t see how I can support this charade. I won’t.”

  “Oh, Andrea, don’t be like this. I can’t do this by myself, sugar. Every good detective needs a sidekick.”

  “You’re not a good detective, Mother,” I reminded her. “You’re not even a bad one.”

  “Please, don’t fight me on this. It’s something I must do, but I can’t do it alone. You’re here, aren’t you? That must account for something.”

  “That I’m in need of a good therapist?”

  “Oh, pish, don’t be silly. Haven’t I helped you out before, sweet pea? Wasn’t I there for you when you were playin’ dress-up after an old school chum got in trouble? I’m not asking for much, just a short couple of days.” She fluttered the spiderleg lashes on her distorted eyes. “Say you’ll be there for your poor, old mother who gave you life and hasn’t asked for much since.”

  There she went again, using that break-my-heart drawl that had coerced me into accompanying her to Bebe’s service and the reception at Belle Meade. Even if the Wizard of Oz had given me a double dose of courage, it would’ve been impossible to tell her “no.”

  I wanted to drop to the floor and cry, pound my fists.

  Why did she always win?