• • •
We did a brisk business in the morning, but it didn’t take a village to run the shop. Dab was in the workroom with Fred, and although I didn’t hang out with them often, I had wanted to discuss some new metal-art pieces with them.
“We’re already addin’ more team mascots, missy,” Fred grumped, and pointed the screwdriver he held at a classic blender. “Can’t ignore my fix-it work, you know.”
Dab nodded. “We’re creating a cowboy and covered wagon for the two big Oklahoma teams, a longhorn for the University of Texas, plus a bulldog, tiger, and bear.”
“That’s great, and if you don’t like my new ideas, forget I said anything.”
Fred set the screwdriver on the workbench. “What’d you have in mind?”
“Holiday-themed pieces for Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.”
“I ain’t doin’ no zombies or pilgrims.”
“That’s fine, Fred. I had pumpkins, a cornucopia, maybe a sled for winter in mind, but you decide. The only reason I mention this is because I think they’ll sell.” I paused. “Your work is good, gentlemen. I know holiday stuff can be a dime a dozen, but not what you two will make.”
“I swan, she’s sure dumpin’ the butter boat on us, Dab.”
“She is, but why not give it a shot, Fred?”
Fred shrugged. “You design ’em, I’ll help you build ’em.”
With that, Fred resumed tinkering, Dab winked, and Eleanor sailed through the shop door calling my name.
“Nixy, I just received a call from one of the ladies on my list. Minnie Berry. She’s living at the retirement home.”
We had at least three retirement homes in and near Lilyvale, but I didn’t ask which one. I cut to the chase. “I remember seeing her name. Is she okay?”
“Oh, yes, she’s well, but she’s having cataract surgery Friday, and she wants to talk with us before then. I told her we could come by today.”
“What time?”
“Now. We’ll catch her between lunch and her nap.”
• • •
I’d never had the occasion to visit a senior living center, but I’d heard horror stories. Pines Breeze was a pleasant surprise.
Eleanor informed me that Pines Breeze was both an independent- and assisted-living center. A sister facility housed those who needed round-the-clock nursing. There was a small Alzheimer’s unit in that sister nursing home, but many families took those patients to El Dorado or all the way to Texarkana.
The aroma hit me first when we entered through the automatic doors. The place smelled like its name, as if someone had sprayed Pine Breeze air freshener to cover a slightly stale scent. Not completely unpleasant, but it made my nose itch. I followed Eleanor to the reception desk, noting that the entry décor was a bit tired but not shabby. After a woman with bright red hair and a name tag reading MADGE signed us in, she told us Minnie was waiting in the lounge across the hall.
Minnie sat in a brown checked wingback chair, one of four in a grouping. She wore a loose summer print dress, and champagne-blonde hair framed her face as she peered at us through her glasses.
“Eleanor!” she trilled. “How good of you to come visit. Come, sit.”
Eleanor bent to touch a cheek to Minnie’s. “It’s always good to see you. How are you feeling?”
“Right as rain and ready to get these cataracts removed. I have the cutest doctor!” In spite of the film over her eyes, they twinkled. “Who have you brought with you? Is this the famous Nixy?”
Famous? I didn’t know how Minnie came to that assessment, but I smiled and held out my hand.
“It’s wonderful to meet you, Mrs. Berry.”
“Call me Minnie, dear. Sit so we can gab. Would you like anything to drink? There’s a fridge with soft drinks and water in the corner.”
“No, thank you,” Eleanor said as she sat on Minnie’s right. I took the chair on the left. Slightly threadbare, but comfortable.
“So, you’re investigating Rotten to the Core’s murder?”
Good thing I’d turned down a drink or I’d have choked. “Oh, we aren’t investigating, Minnie.”
She wagged a finger at me. “Don’t give me that song and dance. I know all about your sleuthing.”
I glanced at Eleanor, who looked baffled.
“Eleanor, did you forget Dougie Bryant is my nephew once removed?”
Dougie. That was what the old-timers like Fred’s special friend Ida Bollings called Officer Doug Bryant.
“I do believe I did forget, Minnie,” Eleanor said faintly.
“Well, the dear boy comes to visit now and again, and he’s regaled me with the story of how you got to the bottom of some things.”
I winced. The bottom of one of those things had nearly meant the bottom of a casket for Sherry and me.
“Now then, what can I tell you about our former manager? You knew him longer than I did, Eleanor.”
“We’re hoping to learn who all he might’ve talked to when he came back to town.” Eleanor hesitated, then added, “He came to our emporium on Friday afternoon.”
“My dear, why?”
“He said he’d found religion and wanted to apologize.”
“Humph. Making amends is a classic in those twelve-step programs, but how does one make amends for some of the things he pulled?”
I spoke up. “Eleanor didn’t believe he’d changed, but I saw some signs that he might have.”
“Oh?” Minnie asked, brows arched.
I explained that Cornell had been working at the hot dog stand and had given freebies to both my pets and a child. “And he didn’t fight back when Dexter Hamlin hit him.”
Minnie shuddered. “Hamlin. Now, there’s a nasty piece of work.”
I gave a small nod to Eleanor, our signal for her to go to the next question.
“Minnie, do you know of anyone else Cornell might’ve approached?”
“Can’t say that I do, although he could’ve gone back to the apartment complex. If he was truly bent on apologizing, a few people from our days are still living there.”
She rattled off names already on Eleanor’s list, one of them the married couple, then narrowed her eyes. “You say you want know who Cornell talked to before he died?”
“Talked with or might’ve seen,” I said, “if he did go to the apartments.”
“You’re not thinking one of them killed the man!”
Eleanor and I both reeled back, hands on our chests. We didn’t choreograph that move, but it sure looked like we did.
Eleanor found her voice first. “Heavens, no, Minnie, and we wouldn’t dream of accusing a soul. We’re merely attempting to track his movements before he died.”
“Was murdered, you mean.”
Eleanor caught my eye and shrugged. That was the signal for me to lay it out.
“The main reason we’re involved is because the new detective in town thinks Eleanor or Maise or Aster killed him. Possibly all of us.”
Minnie snorted. “Ridiculous.”
“To us, yes. To her, not so much.”
“Hmm, well, if she comes around again, I’ll give her an earful.”
“So she did interview you?” I asked.
“Yesterday about my lunchtime. I eat early on Tuesdays so I can go to Walmart on the Pines Breeze bus. She near made me miss my ride, but I’ll tell you what I told her. I can’t think of a single, solitary soul who’d give that man two seconds of time. If I do, though, I’ll let you know. Not the detective.”
“Thank you,” Eleanor said, covering Minnie’s wrinkled hand with her own near-smooth one.
“Minnie,” I said, “Did Detective Vogelman ask to search your apartment?”
“No, but then I told her I take all my meals in the dining room. I only keep pretzels and ice cream, protein drinks, and cola
in my fridge.” She paused. “Of course, I would’ve refused had she asked. I know my rights.”
“I’m glad to hear it. May I ask two more questions?”
“Of course, Nixy. What are they?”
I wavered only a second before jumping in. “First, did anyone die at Ozark Arms while you lived there?”
“Oh, my, no! Why do you ask?”
“I’m following up on a rumor.”
“Because sometimes there’s a bit of truth in them?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“There was one young man who suddenly moved. Dennis Moreno. Remember him, Eleanor?”
“I do now that I hear his name again.”
“He worked at the library, and he used to check books out for me—with my card, of course.” She paused. “One day, Dennis was supposed to return some of my library books, but he never came by. Then a few days later, I saw someone carrying boxes out of his apartment.” She shook her head. “When I returned my books and asked after him, Debbie Nicole said he’d moved home.”
“Do you know where home was?”
“I want to say El Dorado, but it could’ve been Camden. Is that helpful?”
“Every scrap of information is more than we had before, Minnie. Now for the harder question.”
“Spit it out.”
“Do you know of anyone who’d want to kill Cornell?”
“Back when he managed the apartments, absolutely. As angry as he made the residents, I think one of them would’ve happily bumped him off long before he was fired.” She winked. “Even me. To wait until now to do the deed? No. I have a saying, young lady. I can wish you well, and wish you well away.”
I grinned. “I’m going to adopt that motto, Minnie. Thank you, and I hope I didn’t offend you.”
“Not at all. Now, Eleanor, tell me. Who do you see from the old place?”
I sat and smiled as Minnie and Eleanor chatted awhile, but Minnie soon announced she needed to get her old bones horizontal.
Back in my white Camry, I turned to Eleanor. “I’m thinking Minnie isn’t the person Vogelman got a warrant to search.”
“I do believe you’re correct,” Eleanor said with a smile.
“I hope just one of them told the detective something to get her permanently off our backs.”
Chapter Thirteen
We discussed going by the apartment complex to see the four people Minnie had named, but in the early afternoon, Eleanor said three of them would be at work. Jim Diller, who had been given the manager’s job when Cornell left, was technically working on-site, and she hesitated to bother him.
We swung by the complex anyway, and I cringed as we parked in a visitor’s spot, then got out to have a look around. Built in the general style of the 1970s, Ozark Arms looked more like the Up-in-Arms. Okay, it wasn’t slumlord bad, but I’d swear it had been outmoded when it was brand spanking new. Six two-story buildings roughly arranged in a wide U shape, the U to the back, made up the complex.
“How many apartments did you say there were?” I asked Eleanor.
“In all six buildings, there are thirty-six. Three downstairs and three up. Those to left of the main doors are the two bedrooms and all the others are one. I lived upstairs in the last building on the right.” She sighed. “Did it look this sad when I was here, I wonder?”
She’d said the last almost to herself, but she was right. The whole place needed paint and landscaping, although I noted as we walked closer that the curbing, the few steps leading to the main sidewalk, and the main and branching sidewalks themselves were in good repair. The only saving grace to the grounds was the smattering of oak and pine trees providing shade. I just couldn’t wrap my head around our own dear Elegant Eleanor having lived here.
“I’m so very grateful I live at the farmhouse now,” she breathed at my side when we stood halfway up the main sidewalk, “but this place was affordable after my husband died.”
I’d never heard Eleanor speak much of her past, other than how she and the others came to live with Sherry. I knew she had been a mechanical engineer, and in a male-dominated field, and that was something in and of itself. I opened my mouth to comment, but she seemed lost in her own thoughts. I let her stay there.
Three children spilled out of the left-hand building in front of us. One tyke carried a plastic dump truck almost as big as he was, and a boy and girl who might have been a year older carried soccer balls. Their chattering broke our quiet bubble. I turned to Eleanor.
“Are you sure you don’t want to track down Mr. Diller while we’re here?”
“We don’t want anyone on our list to feel ambushed, now do we?”
“You’re right. That’s not the way to make friends and influence people to spill what they know.”
But just then, a handsome black man stepped onto the stoop twirling a pipe wrench that looked two feet long. He caught sight of us, looked away, and then looked back.
“Eleanor Wainwright?” he called, breaking into a broad grin.
“Jim Diller, hello,” Eleanor said, and moved toward him.
Diller was in his mid-fifties, dressed in jeans and a cotton shirt, both threadbare and paint splattered. The wrench in his large hands reminded me of the tools a guy I’d dated had shown me. Parker the Plumber and I had sprung a leak in the romance department, but I recalled how much heavy-duty wrenches weighed. If Cornell had been killed by a smack on the head, I’d suspect the wrench was the weapon.
“Eleanor! How are you?” he greeted.
“I’m well, Jim. How about you? Are you still liking this job?”
“I surely am. Between my regular maintenance duties and fixing problems for the residents, I stay busy.” He paused and turned to me. “Now, let me guess. You must be Sherry Mae’s niece.”
“Yes, sir,” I said, and shook his hand.
“I heard y’all had opened a shop all together, but I haven’t been in yet.”
“Quite all right, Jim,” Eleanor said. “I know you’re off to repair something, but could we have a moment?”
“This must be about Cornell Lewis, right? That lady detective talked to me on yesterday afternoon. I couldn’t help her ’cept to say that Barbara Linden told me she saw him at that festival last weekend.” He shook his head. “I was changing the filter on her HVAC unit when she got home, and she was pretty shaken.”
“He came to the shop to apologize to Eleanor and told us he was making amends.”
“So you thought he mighta come to look up folks here.”
It was a statement, not a question, and I nodded. “We’re hoping to track his movements, especially after Sunday morning.”
His eyes narrowed. “Why?”
Eleanor grimaced. “Because that detective believes my friends and I might have contributed to Cornell’s death.”
“That’s a crock, but I’ll tell you what I told the police lady. Cornell didn’t come around here, or I’d have gotten calls to run him off.” He shook the monster wrench. “And I would’ve, too. Fact is, I thought about driving downtown to confront him, but it wasn’t worth the aggravation.”
He glanced at his watch, and I knew our time with him was nearly up. Did I dare to ask if he let Vogelman search his place? Nah, I had more important information to get.
“Mr. Diller, may I ask you two more questions?”
“If you can make it quick.”
“Do you know of a resident Cornell bullied who might’ve died?”
He frowned in thought, shook his head. “Nothing that drastic, although we had some injuries. Connie Baker’s fall comes to mind. Oh, and we had a guy who up and moved out before his lease was up. He worked at the library, as I recall.”
“I’ll follow up on that with Debbie Nicole, then. Do you know of anyone who would kill Cornell? May be holding a grudge?”
“A grudge, no. Plenty of us th
ought about him dropping dead. If any of us had killed him, we’d have banded together to hide the body. He just wasn’t worth the risk of going to prison.”
“Jim,” Eleanor said, jumping in, “we’ve kept you long enough, but thank you for talking with us. Will you call if you hear anything that can help?”
“You know I will, and don’t be a stranger at church, you hear?”
We turned back toward the car, and I gave Eleanor a thumbs-up.
“That’s two down and eight to go.”
“No, only five at best. Remember, we are not at all positive we have the correct phone numbers for everyone.”
“Would anyone else be at home right now? Seems a shame to stop when we’re on a roll.”
She shook her head. “We need to set up lunch with Randy Darby and his wife, and with Lorraine Chandler. Besides, I do believe Maise will have our hides if you don’t get back to help her with the bookkeeping. You are the emporium manager.”
I snorted. “Y’all can run the shop blindfolded and you know it.”
“Perhaps, but you make it more fun. You’re the one who finds the bodies.”
• • •
I didn’t have a math brain, so I’d taken just enough college math courses to earn my degrees, and they had not included accounting. And bookkeeping? That was a whole ’nother skill set.
Working with Maise made that part of my job easier. She’d proven to be a good teacher, giving clear explanations and being patient. Sooner or later I’d have to take over this task on my own, but I voted for later. Figuring sales taxes gave me a headache.
At four o’clock, Eleanor interrupted us long enough to tell me she’d set up a lunch meeting with Lorraine Chandler and Randy and Billie Jo Darby for the next day at eleven forty-five. We’d take them to the Lilies Café. Barbara Linden, the woman who’d spotted Cornell during the festival, already had a lunch date, but we could see her at her office just across the street at one.
By five o’clock, Maise and I had finished the accounting for the four days before the folk art festival and the two days of the festival. We also had a list of items to reorder from the various artists. The craftspeople might send what we ordered, and they might send new art. We took what we got.
A Crime of Poison Page 15