The Tail of the Tip-Off

by Rita Mae Brown

  Cameron cleaned her tack. Her mother was strict in that. No pleading or trying to get out of work. If Cameron didn’t do the ground work she didn’t ride.

  Anne opened the small refrigerator in the tack room, removing a needle with a thin point. She needed to tranquilize Cameron’s pony. The fancy little guy hated having his ears clipped, his nose whiskers trimmed. Without the chemical help, he could demolish the barn as well as Anne and Cameron.

  She walked into his stall and slipped the needle upward into his neck as he munched apple bits. He flinched for a second but she had removed the needle before he really knew what stung him.

  Sheriff Shaw closely cruised the opened highways. Thanks to accurate weather reports no stranded motorists needed pulling out or carrying home. For once people had the sense to stay home.

  Deputy Cooper manned headquarters with the dispatcher. The quiet was refreshing. She took the opportunity to go over Mychelle Burns’s bank accounts. In her neat hand, sloping forward, she’d written every deposit and withdrawal. Apart from the five-thousand-dollar withdrawal from her savings account, which she’d gotten up to seven thousand two hundred and nineteen dollars, her accounts were pretty much like everyone else’s: electric bill, oil bill, gas bill, the occasional restaurant bill.

  Mychelle’s sense impressed Cooper. She kept only one credit card and she used it sparingly even at Christmas when most of us throw caution to the winds, overcome by seasonal cheer as well as guilt. She maintained no gas credit cards, no debit cards. She owned no cell phone, and according to Sugar McCarry, the secretary at the county office, Mychelle did not abuse the business cell phone.

  When Cooper questioned Mychelle’s mother, the sorrowing woman said although she didn’t know about the money she thought her daughter might be saving for the down payment on a house. Mychelle had wanted to move into downtown Charlottesville, hopefully around the Lyons Court area. If she couldn’t swing that then she’d look around Woolen Mills, which was lovely except for the sewage treatment plant. When the wind shifted you knew it.

  As Cooper read the neat notations she had a sense of a life lost. Mychelle may not have been the most personable woman, but she was tidy, efficient, hardworking, and to all appearances, she kept her nose clean.

  Was she having an affair with H.H.? Cooper could find no sign of it in these white checkbook and savings book pages.

  So the call from Mrs. Burns startled her.

  “Are you keeping warm out there, ma’am?” Cooper tried to put the nervous, grieving woman at ease.

  “Wood-burning stove. Works a treat,” Mrs. Burns replied in her working-class accent, which was noticeably different from the speech of Harry, Big Mim, and the others.

  “What can I do for you, Mrs. Burns? I know this is a painful time.”

  A little intake of breath, a moment, then the wiry lady said, “You take what God gives you.”

  “I’m trying to learn that, ma’am, but it’s hard.”

  “Yes, ’tis. Yes, ’tis. Sittin’ here. Can’t get to work. Mind’s turnin’ over.” She paused, longer this time. “I lied to you.”

  “I’m sure you had a good reason.” Cooper, like all law enforcement officers, was accustomed to people lying to her. In fact, they lied more than they told the truth. She was fighting not to have it pervert her sense of life.

  “Wanted to protect my little girl—but can’t. She’s gone to the light of the Lord.” Another pause. “She was seeing a married man. I read her scripture and verse.” Mrs. Burns used an expression meaning they’d had a knock-down-drag-out argument. “Uh-huh. She said I was old, forgot what it was to be in love. You know, she was right about that. Don’t really want to remember, I guess.” Cooper held her breath and Mrs. Burns finally got to the point. “Was H. H. Donaldson.”

  “Ah.”

  “Never met him. Might have been a nice man, but he was married, had a child. Didn’t want to meet him. Didn’t want her being no backstreet woman, no colored girl waiting around for her vanilla lover.”

  “Mrs. Burns, he must have loved her very much. He left his wife for her.”

  “Mychelle swore he would. Didn’t believe her. They all lie like that.”

  “But he did leave. Did she tell you?”

  “No.” Mrs. Burns stifled a sob. “I said some mean things. Oh Lordy, I wish I could take ’em back. And I didn’t talk to my baby for three days before she was taken from me.”

  “She knows you love her, ma’am. I promise you she knows what you told her was right.”

  Mrs. Burns composed herself. “But he left his wife and child?”

  “He did. For a little while.”

  “Mychelle was afraid of his wife.” Mrs. Burns carefully spoke. “She knew. Said she’d kill him if he left her.”

  Cooper didn’t jump on this right off. She tacked toward shore instead of sailing in a straight line. “I guess it’s so humiliating for a wife. It’s easier to be angry at the other woman than at your husband.”

  “Doesn’t work. Put up with it or throw him out. I threw mine out fifteen years ago. Mychelle knew better, Officer Cooper, she did. That’s what got me crossways with her.”

  “I can certainly understand that. Do you think Mychelle was afraid that Mrs. Donaldson would become violent? Take out her revenge?”

  “Feared for him. And maybe for herself, too. Said he could be blind sometimes. Like most men.”

  “Did you . . . fear for your daughter?”

  “My fear was about a different kind of hurt. I didn’t imagine this. When I got the call”—she breathed heavily again—“I didn’t think about nothin’. Had some time to order my mind, kind of like arranging furniture. You find stuff behind the sofa cushions. And I remember that Mychelle said she found something. She didn’t say what it was, but she said she told H.H. Said he’d put a stop to it.”

  “Maybe someone was gossiping, getting close to the affair?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do you know why she withdrew the five thousand dollars? Do you think they were going to run away together?”

  “No. Know that for a fact. I didn’t know she had withdrawn the money. I told you the truth about that. Like I said, we hadn’t spoken for three days. She said H.H. was going to help her with a house.”

  “Did she say he was going to live with her?”

  “No.” Mrs. Burns considered this. “Even though she was in love with the man, she would have waited. You know, it’s oh so easy to move them in and oh so hard to move them out.”

  “Yes, ma’am. When Mychelle talked to you about finding something, did she sound frightened?”

  “More surprised. She said, ‘Momma, people do the damnedest things.’ That was all she said ’cept H.H. would take care of it. And I was so mad at her I didn’t care ’bout that. I wanted her to stay away from that man. And I believe she’s dead because of him.”

  “You think his wife killed her?”

  “She had the reason.”

  “Did Mychelle ever talk to Mrs. Donaldson?”

  “No.”

  “Mrs. Donaldson never tried to contact your daughter, to scare her off or shame her off?” Cooper gently prodded.

  “Mychelle would have told me.”

  “Do you think she told anyone else? A best friend?”

  “She had her running gang but Mychelle didn’t ever get close to people. She would tell me things but I don’t think she talked to her girlfriends. When she did get close, it was with H.H. He was her world. When he died in the parking lot, she died, too, I think. Part of her, but I tell you, she never let on. Iron will, my girl.”

  “I see.” Coop kept writing as she talked. “Apart from Mrs. Donaldson, can you think of anyone who bore your daughter a grudge?”

  “Oh, sometimes contractors would fuss at her. She was strict.” A note of pride filled Mrs. Burns’s voice when she said, “They couldn’t get ’round my girl no way. But none of them said they’d kill her. Be crazy to kill someone over a roof shingle.”

>   “The world’s full of crazy people.”

  “You got that right.” Mrs. Burns sighed. “But I tell myself whoever done this, Mrs. Donaldson, whoever, they et up with guilt, just et up, and sooner or later it will all come out like a poison.”

  She was wrong.

  The murder didn’t bother the killer one tiny bit.

  * * *

  39

  Although their Friday game had been canceled, the storm moved off more quickly than the weatherman predicted. Coach Debbie Ryan saw no reason to waste the evening so she had the girls come in for practice. Those with dates were disappointed. Others, like the Hall sisters, ate, slept, and breathed basketball.

  Tim Berryhill had told coaches that he had to oversee an extensive inventory because of purchasing errors. He apologized to all. Most of the coaches, under pressure to perform, would work around the inconvenience. Those few coaches without tunnel vision might wonder, to themselves at least, why such an exalted person as Tim Berryhill was performing the actual work, but they wouldn’t dwell on it. Coaches had far too much to do and too little time in which to do it.

  The only person or persons who would worry were the ones pilfering the equipment.

  Since Irena Fotopappas was new to the force, Sheriff Shaw had her dress as a student and assigned her to Coach Ryan. Debbie Ryan, wanting to assist Rick in any way, explained Irena was a graduate student in sports psychology. Coach’s words to the team were, “Ignore her.”

  Irena watched, fascinated, as the girls drilled. Repetition was the best thing in the world in any sport. Master the basics, the fancy stuff will take care of itself. Games were won and lost on the basics. Maybe a trick play would win a football game in the last second or a full court desperation shot, but ninety-nine percent of the time, basics.

  Andrew Argenbright, the assistant coach, kept feeding the girls balls as they ran downcourt in a passing drill. Tammy Girond grabbed the basketball and flipped a crisp pass to where she thought Isabelle Otey would be. However, Isabelle tripped and was a step slow.

  “The best pass is a caught pass,” was all Coach Ryan had to say.

  Tammy, red-faced because she hadn’t kept her eye on her teammate, wouldn’t make that mistake in a game.

  Basketball, a fluid game, calls for constant adjustment. Even soccer, a game similar to basketball, has a goalie socked into the goal, or midfielders assigned to a portion of the field. A player can defend turf because there is so much of it, but in basketball, the dimensions are small, fifty feet by ninety-four feet. You keep moving or you lose.

  As the two women crossed under the basket to turn back up the court, Jenny Ingersoll brushed by Tammy. The other woman ignored her, but the tension between them crackled.

  Ego is a part of sport, a part of any endeavor where a human being wants to excel. Basketball is a team sport. A player needs to keep that ego in check, in the service of the team. Many a coach has spent a sleepless night trying to figure out how to make a team player out of a talented selfish egoist.

  One other thing Irena, a good observer, picked up: Tammy and Andrew spoke to one another only when necessary. As hot as the friction was between Jenny and Tammy, the space between the assistant coach and Tammy was frigid.

  After practice, after the girls showered, Irena visited the equipment room, then patiently walked through the two levels of the building. She also went back to the basketball court to familiarize herself with the setup.

  As she was walking around the aisle behind the topmost row of seats she heard snow slide on the roof. She noticed, as had Pewter, that a little trickle of water, just a small bit, wiggled down the back wall.

  * * *

  40

  Saturday, cold and clear, exhilarated the Reverend Herb Jones not because of the weather but because the carpet men actually showed up. The white van doors slid open with a quiet metallic noise. The two men shouldered the heavy rolls of carpet and floor protector, the cushy rubber pad placed under the carpet. They returned for a five-gallon drum of powerful glue as well as a few carpet tacks for those difficult corners.

  In a fit on Friday night, the Reverend Jones had torn up all the old carpets. He had had to vent his anger on something. The carpet men, JoJo and Carl Gentry, brothers, happily carted out the old and since the Reverend Jones tipped them they wedged it into the back of the van to haul to the dump later. Otherwise the good pastor would have had to haul it himself or pay someone else to do it. This was easier and JoJo and Carl always liked pocket money.

  “Inbred.” Cazenovia sat on the stairway above the communion wafer closet.

  “Oh, Cazzie, you’re mean. Just because JoJo and Carl don’t have chins doesn’t mean they’re inbred.” Elocution had heard enough Cazzie theories on bloodlines to last forever. The point was always the same: cats are better genetic specimens than humans.

  Saturdays, sermon day, made the Rev, as Harry called him, tense. He’d find a myriad of things to do to delay writing the sermon, then he’d finally sigh, surrender, and sit down at his desk. Once he was in the middle of his task he enjoyed it. It was getting there that was so hard.

  The bare floor felt odd under his shoes as he squeezed into his desk chair. JoJo decided they’d do Herb’s office last.

  The color, a rich forest green, was quite attractive and Matthew surprised Herb by paying extra, out of his own pocket, for a simple mustard yellow border inset four inches from the edge. Once down it would be very handsome.

  The carpet, precut at the factory, proved easy to install. The men made a few adjustments but technology had invaded their craft, too.

  The vestibule, finished in an hour and a half, looked splendid. The two cats tested it.

  Cazenovia kneaded the carpet, smelling of dye and glue underneath. “M-m-m, what fun.”

  “Don’t get any in your claws or he’ll pitch a fit. For a preacher, he can swear when he has to.” Elocution smiled as she, too, worked the carpet.

  “It’s bad manners to give orders to your elders.” Cazenovia pulled up a thread of carpet, dangling it in front of the slender cat. “I’ll drop this in front of you.” Her eyes glittered.

  Elocution ignored her as she listened to JoJo and Carl carry the padding down the hall to the closet containing the communion wafers. They propped up the rolled padding on the foot of the wide stairway behind the closet. As they slopped down glue, the brothers laughed, talked about friends, turkey season, the new pro-football league which both thought would bomb.

  “Hey, it’s twelve o’clock. No wonder I’m hungry.” Carl checked his square Casio watch.

  “Let’s go to Jarman’s Gap.” JoJo cited a local eatery.

  “JoJo, you’re on.” Carl laid his brush, full of rubber cement, across the top of the five-gallon drum which he closed first, gently tapping the lid so it wouldn’t be on too tight.

  “Brush will be useless.” Carl pointed to the dripping bristles.

  “I’ll get another one out of the truck. I’m too hungry to care.” He wiped his hands on his overalls. “I’ll pay for it.”

  “Yeah. Yeah.” Carl closed the box of carpet tacks, placing his small hammer next to the box and five-gallon drum.

  Hunger must have clouded their minds because they grabbed their coats without realizing they’d left a section of floor exposed, full of glue, in front of the communion closet. Perhaps they forgot, or perhaps they figured they could sand it off if it hardened by the time they returned.

  Cazenovia and Elocution watched them leave.

  “Bet the skinny one could eat you out of house and home,” Cazenovia remarked of JoJo.

  “Yeah. It’s quiet in Poppy’s office. Think he’s having a brainstorm?” Elocution loved Herb.

  “Let’s see.”

  He looked up as the two cats walked into his office. “Hello, girls.”

  “Hello. The carpet looks good as far as it goes,” Cazenovia replied.

  “Epistle, Romans chapter thirteen, verses eight through ten and Gospel Matthew chapter eight, verse
s twenty-three through twenty-seven. I’m torn. Do I take my sermon from Romans, ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself,’ or do I take it from Matthew? That’s such a great story about Christ calming the seas. ‘Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith?’ They’re both so complex, so many levels of meaning.” He looked down at his cats, now at his feet. “’Course, I never know what people will hear. Some hear nothing. Others hear a rebuke. Someone else finds comfort. But each parishioner usually believes I am talking only to them. Well, I am.” He smiled, warming to his subject. “You know, I wouldn’t be surprised if Jesus practiced His sermons with cats. Our Lord loved all creatures but surely He must have loved cats best.”