A Second Helping of Murder and Recipes: A Hot Dish Heaven Mystery

by Jeanne Cooney

  She must have noted the concern in my voice or felt the tension in the air because she quickly gathered her recipe cards, stacked them on the table, and folded her hands in her lap. “Okay, I’m listenin’. What is it then?”

  I closed my eyes and slowly began my story, speaking with as little emotion as possible, for her sake as well as my own. Part way through, I peeked to find her eyes filled with unshed tears, and seeing that, my own grew moist. Yet I continued. In rote fashion, I reported everything from the poker game and Wally’s involvement in it to Buddy’s arrest and my subsequent conversation with his lawyer.

  When I was all done, Margie said, “Well, if that don’t beat all.” She rubbed her red, dry hands together. “On the plus side, I know everythin’ will work out. On the minus side, I don’t wanna wait for the BCA folks. We need to get Buddy out of jail sooner rather than later. Ya see, Emme, he’ll go berserk in there.”

  A lone tear escaped her right eye, and she rushed to wipe it from her cheek before any of the others noticed and decided to follow its lead. “He was accidently locked in a farm shed when he was young, don’t ya know. He was stuck in there for more than twenty-four hours. It was in the fall and really cold out. There weren’t any lights. Rodents were runnin’ around. Uff-da, he was only eight. When we finally found him, he was ‘traumatized.’ At least that’s what the doctors called it. And they were probably right because, ever since, he’s been unable to handle bein’ confined in any way.”

  “I didn’t know.”

  “Well, it’s not somethin’ he’s goin’ to talk about.” She made an apparent effort to find her bearings by redoing her ponytail and straightening her tee-shirt. “I suppose we all have things—secrets and such—that we’d rather not admit to.”

  “Yeah, I suppose we do.” Thoughts of Boo-Boo immediately sprang to mind. I hadn’t shared with anyone—not even my therapist—the details of his recent and increasingly insistent efforts to renew our relationship. To my way of thinking, I should have been able to deter him on my own, without involving others. I felt foolish that I hadn’t succeeded. And I couldn’t help but wonder if I was unknowingly doing something to encourage him.

  “Anyways,” Margie said, thankfully scattering my Boo-Boo-related concerns, “do ya have any idea how we can help him?”

  I recounted my pathetic, two-point plan. “No, nothing specific, but I promise I’ll do whatever it takes.” I then informed her that Barbie was on her way.

  As if on cue, Margie’s cell phone rang. “It’s Barbie.” She answered but didn’t say much other than an occasional “oh, for sure” and “ya betcha.” The call was short. And when it ended, she reported, “Change of plans there. Barbie wants ya to go and meet her for breakfast at the Caribou in Hallock. She said there’s more information we need from the police. And since Guy and Jarod never miss breakfast or their mornin’ whist game at the Caribou, the two of ya should start there, while I do a little phone work from here. Then we’ll get together and compare notes.”

  I rose from my stool and patted my friend’s forearm. “We’ll get this all ironed out, Margie. I promise.”

  She made an effort to smile, but it fell short. “Yah, we will. But I can’t help but worry about the damage that’ll be done along the way.” She shook her head. “Uff-da, what a mess.”

  “Well, I better get moving if Barbie’s waiting for me.”

  “Before ya go, wanna little somethin’ to eat? Ya never know, the Caribou might not have anythin’ good on the menu. And I’ve got some Orange Jell-O Salad. It has fruit cocktail, bananas, and mandarin oranges in it, so it’s good for breakfast. Ruth Hennen gave me the recipe. I think it’s a lot like one of those smoothies some folks always insist on in the mornin’. Only way thicker. And not nearly as expensive.” She winked.

  “No, thanks. I’ll take my chances at the restaurant.”

  “Ya sure?”

  “Yeah, I’m sure.”

  “Well, wait another minute then. I want ya to wear that parka over there.” She jabbed her finger toward the gray down jacket that hung from a hook by the back door.

  “I can’t take your coat, Margie.”

  “It’s an extra. I had it upstairs. I keep a fair amount of clothes up there. Ya never know when someone will need somethin’.”

  “Thanks.”

  “I should of given it to ya earlier, but I forgot.”

  I grabbed the jacket and slipped it on. It was so big a friend could have joined me inside.

  “My word. A bit big, isn’t it?” Margie often stated the obvious.

  “It’ll be fine.”

  “Well, ya don’t hafta wear it if ya don’t—”

  “Margie, it’ll be fine.”

  “If you’re sure then.” She scraped her chair back and ambled over to me. “I guess it’s always better to have a little extra room to move around in.” She zipped the jacket and pulled the fur-lined hood over my head. It practically consumed my entire face. “There, now, ya sure ya don’t wanna little somethin’ for the road?”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  When I walked into the Caribou Bar and Grill, I spotted Barbie right away. She was hard to miss. She was wearing a bright orange sweater and waving her arms high in the air, motioning me toward her booth. Feeling a bit like a plane taxing down a runway, I slowly proceeded in her direction, tossing my borrowed jacket on the glossy wooden bench opposite her and sliding in after it.

  She reached across the table and handed me a menu. “All the food here is really good.” I couldn’t help but think how disappointed Margie would have been to hear that. “Order whatever you want,” she added. “It’s on me.”

  I scanned the laminated card, made my decision, and laid the menu on the table. “Have you come up with anything new since we last spoke?”

  “No. As I said on the phone, first and foremost, we need the specifics on the murder. You know, time and place of death, weapon used. That sort of thing. And I’m hoping Guy and Jarod will be able to help.”

  “You really think they can?” I had serious doubts.

  “Sometimes, they hear things. Important things. And as they demonstrated on Thursday, they enjoy sharing.”

  “You’re certain they’ll stop in here this morning?”

  “Oh, they’ll stop. And if I’m not mistaken, they’ll be here pretty soon. They’re creatures of habit.”

  The waitress sauntered over and set water glasses in front of us. She was a pretty high-school girl with a full figure and a pleasant smile. I ordered a ham-and-cheese omelet, while Barbie went with the special—a traditional eggs-and-bacon breakfast. Both of us asked for coffee and orange juice.

  As the waitress walked away, Barbie grinned, her eyes fixed on the entrance behind me. “Well, speak of the devil,” she muttered.

  I glanced over my shoulder, as Barbie said, “Hi, guys! Come and join us.”

  Guy moseyed over, with Jarod dogtrotting after him. “Cold enough for ya?” Guy asked.

  “Have a seat,” Barbie replied, ignoring the question I’d heard about a zillion times since my arrival.

  “I dunno if we should.” Guy appeared skittish. “I don’t wanna get into any trouble.”

  “Oh, come on. Sit down.” Barbie stuck two fingers in her mouth and whistled, garnering the attention of the waitress as well as a half dozen patrons. “Bring these two their usual,” she shouted to the young woman, “and add it to my bill.”

  I almost laughed out loud. Guy and Jarod were stuck. Barbie was buying them breakfast, so they had no choice but to sit with us.

  With audible sighs, they slipped out of their brown, law enforcement parkas, throwing them in the empty booth behind Barbie. Guy then plopped down next to her, while I scooted over so Jarod with a “J” could perch next to me.

  “How’s it going?” Barbie asked the question in
a tone that suggested we were the best of friends, simply catching up. “I bet the sheriff is depending on you two a lot these days.”

  I almost choked on my water.

  “Well, yeah,” Guy said, sitting a little taller. He just couldn’t help himself. He desperately wanted to be important.

  “I heard you made an arrest last night,” she added.

  Guy snuck a peek at me before answering, “I wasn’t actually there. But, yeah, we did.”

  “So,” she continued, “what did you guys come up with to tie the murder to Buddy? It had to be more than a measly argument in this place.”

  Again Guy glanced at me before training his gaze back on Barbie. “Well, I dunno if we should—”

  “Oh, I’m sorry.” She waved her hand as if erasing a whiteboard. “I didn’t mean to embarrass you. I suppose the sheriff didn’t share many of the details with you two. I get it. He’s holding the really important information close to the vest, allowing only a few of the . . . more experienced deputies to know what’s really going on.”

  “That’s not true.” Guy pulled on the cuffs of his tan uniform shirt. “We know everything that—”

  “No, no, that’s okay.” Barbie played them like a couple of fiddles. “I don’t want to humiliate you. If you don’t know anything, you don’t know anything. It’s not your fault. Not really. I’ll just wait for the probable cause affidavit to get filed. It won’t be long now. Then everyone will know all the details anyhow.”

  Guy and Jarod cast their eyes on each other for only a split second before Guy said in the same authoritative tone often employed by Barney Fife of Mayberry fame, “Well, yeah, the probable cause affidavit will be filed soon, so I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to tell you that the murder weapon was an ice scraper.” He even sniffed like Barney. “The big kind. The ones used to scrape ice off of sidewalks. You know . . . wooden handle . . . about five feet long, with a heavy-duty metal plate on the end. They’re also used to push tare out of beet trucks.”

  “Tare?”

  Guy puffed out his chest. “The dirt and whatnot left in the truck after the beets are emptied.”

  “And?” Barbie said.

  “And,” Guy repeated, “we found it on Buddy and Buford’s farm, in a ditch, not far from the house. It still had some blood on it. Raleigh’s blood. The fact is the murder probably took place right there, near that ditch—and the house.”

  “Any fingerprints?” Barbie asked.

  Guy answered, “Nothin’ that wasn’t smudged. It’d been sittin’ in water for a while. And it was covered with about a foot of snow.”

  “How was it discovered then?”

  “The handle was stickin’ out of the snow.” He smirked. “Just plain dumb luck. But we’ll take it. And now we’ve got our man.” He held out his hand and tapped a different fingertip while stating each piece of evidence against Buddy. “First, he was fightin’ with the victim here on Tuesday night. Second, he fired his ass. Third, the murder weapon was found near his house. And fourth, Buddy doesn’t have much of an alibi.”

  Barbie waded in. “Sounds circumstantial to me.”

  The deputies made eye contact before Guy added, “Then fifth”—he wiggled his thumb like he were playing Where is Thumbkin?—“yesterday mornin’ a snowmobiler came across Raleigh’s pickup in a grove of trees out there, on the twins’ farm, near the river. Someone was obviously tryin’ to hide it until they could get rid of it.”

  “Fingerprints?” Barbie posed.

  “None that didn’t check out.”

  “Buddy’s?”

  “Well . . . umm . . . no.”

  “Could the truck be seen from the house?”

  Barbie was firing questions, and my intuition told me Guy was growing defensive. He rubbed his thumb over the badge on his chest as if reminding himself he was the cop here. “Well . . . umm . . . no, but it was on their property.”

  I didn’t want Guy to clam up, so I decided to give him a break from Barbie by asking a few questions of my own. “So, deputy, do you have a definitive time of death yet?”

  He gladly switched his attention to me. “We’re gettin’ closer. Ed—he’s one of the deputies—well, he’s been doin’ some checkin’. Not that the sheriff asked him to. In fact, the sheriff’s pissed off about it.” Guy shook his head. “Anyhow, Ed found out that shortly after the fight with Buddy, Raleigh came back in here and drank some more. The bartender thinks he left around nine. And Raleigh’s neighbor recalls seein’ his pickup still at home around midnight, when she let her dog out just before goin’ to bed. It struck her as odd since she knew he worked the night shift. But when she got up to use the bathroom around five, she noticed that the truck was gone. So she assumed he overslept and went in late. She said that wouldn’t of surprised her given what a carouser he was.”

  “So,” I said slowly, weaving this information into what I already knew, “he must have been killed sometime between the early morning hours of Wednesday and—”

  “Wednesday afternoon,” Guy finished for me. “We know it couldn’t of been any later than that. We can tell by the advanced stage of rigor mortis.”

  “Really?” I presumed someone at the sheriff’s office knew something about rigor mortis, but I was certain it wasn’t Guy. He was only parroting what he heard.

  The waitress arrived with our breakfast, and we stopped talking, distracted by our food and the aroma of fresh coffee and fried bacon.

  Five minutes later, with my stomach full, though, I was itching to get back to it. “Deputy,” I said to Guy, “once Raleigh was killed, his body was hidden somewhere until sometime after 2:00 a.m. on Thursday, right?”

  “Uh-huh.” Guy swished coffee around in his mouth.

  “Any idea where?”

  After swallowing, he said, “Not yet but we’re lookin’.”

  “Around Buddy and Buford’s place?”

  “Primarily.”

  “Regardless of where it was,” Barbie jumped in to say, “it was ultimately moved to the piler and stuffed down into the scale pit.”

  “Yep,” Guy replied, unsuccessfully suppressing a burp. “’Scuse me.” Another burp. “He was pushed into the back corner. Buddy must have reckoned that since harvest was about over, the scales wouldn’t be inspected again until next year, so the body wouldn’t be discovered ’til then—especially way back there. And by that time, our trail would be cold.” Guy squared his shoulders. “But it didn’t work out that way. And now Buddy has to pay the price for what he done.”

  Barbie set her cup down. “Whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty?”

  “Well,” Guy replied after forcing a mouthful of food into his cheek, “I think we proved him guilty.”

  “Really?” Barbie’s tone was incredulous. “Just like that?”

  “Darn tootin’,” Guy answered. Then he and Jarod chuckled and bumped fists.

  “When are the BCA agents expected to arrive?” I was hoping it would be before these guys had Buddy hanging by his toes.

  “The storm’s easin’, so they’re thinkin’ tonight.” Guy slurped more coffee. “But I don’t see why they’re botherin’. We’ve got this thing all sewed up.” And at that, he and Jarod bumped fists one more time.

  Right around then, the deputies’ long-standing whist partners came in. And since we were done eating, Guy and Jarod left to join the two older men, while Barbie wandered off to pay the bill. I waited for her in the entry, where I perused the bulletin board.

  In addition to the standard postings about homes for sale, upcoming auctions, and library events, I spotted a flier announcing a hot dish contest sponsored by the local volunteer fire department. Below the list of rules was last year’s winning recipe, Mushroom Wild Rice Hot Dish, submitted by Pam Petron. She was quoted as saying, “It’s a must for every Thanksgiving dinner.�
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  “We need to check out that scale pit,” Barbie declared as she joined me. “That’s the only way we’ll know exactly what we’re dealing with.”

  “How will we do that? Won’t it be guarded?”

  “Probably. But since the body’s been removed, it shouldn’t be that big a deal. And if it is, I’ll come up with some kind of lie so we can sneak a peek.”

  “Are you a good liar?”

  “Oh, yeah, I can lie my pants off.” She paused for a beat. “Not literally, of course.” Another beat. “Except for once.” A smile cracked her lips. “But that was a long time ago, and I probably shouldn’t go into it.”

  “Thanks. I appreciate that.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Barbie skidded into the piler, her car nearly fishtailing into the squad car parked next to the scale shack. And me? Well, I elected to park about twenty feet away. My old Ford Focus wasn’t much, but it was all I had.

  When I caught up to her, she was already haranguing the deputy on duty. He was around forty and extremely tall. He wore the standard brown law enforcement parka, but both his hands and his head were bare, and his shaggy blonde hair blew in the wind.

  He stood between Barbie and the yellow crime-scene tape wrapped around four poles, creating a rectangular enclosure about the width and length of a semi-truck and trailer. Three square manhole covers were evenly spaced down the middle. From what Barbie had told me, they offered access to the scale pit below.

  “Ed, I have no interest in tampering with the crime scene,” she said. “But I have every right to take a look at it. So you better let me. If you don’t, I’ll call the county attorney, who won’t be happy about getting bugged on a Saturday. And he will call the sheriff, who’s way too busy to be bothered by the likes of me. Then both of them will call you. And it won’t be to shoot the breeze.”

  Ed scratched his chin. “Barbie, you’re so full of shit it’s a wonder your eyes aren’t brown.” Ed’s eyes were a soft blue, much like the sky, with lines fanning out from the corners like tiny rays of sunshine. “You know damn well you’re not going to call the county attorney or anyone else. You may be able to pressure and lie to Guy and Jarod to get what you want, but I’m not as dumb as them.”