Murdermobile (Portland Bookmobile Mysteries)

by B. B. Cantwell

  “Heavens no,” Karen panted. “You’d die.”

  Karen, her already full figure accentuated with throw pillows crammed into a size 18 floral print from Value Village, paused at the final landing. A blue-tinted wig completed her disguise.

  Karen moaned and rubbed the heels of her palms against her lower back.

  “Serves you right for making us do this!” Hester gasped, puffing her way to the top.

  The pair tried to be inconspicuous as they edged into the ballroom. They looked over the backs of about 75 nodding heads, about an even mix of blue-rinse pin curls and blond beehives. As they looked for seats, Hester turned and hissed to Karen, “Now we don’t want to get stuck in the center ...” But Karen was already dragging her toward two open seats near the middle of the last row of folding chairs. Hester was thankful for the dim light cast by a single dusty chandelier high overhead.

  At a podium up front, Marge Kenyon spoke solemnly from beneath a black veil atop a black crepe caftan. They were still in the “old business” portion of the meeting, Hester was relieved to hear.

  “We will quickly move to the important and pressing business of the evening, the tragic and sad event that has brought so many of you here.” Marge paused and looked about meaningfully. “But while we have you here, let us hear a quick report on one of the many fine works of the Women Who Care About Children, our Cold Lake Indian Reservation Project.”

  From their back row seats Hester noticed a few other stragglers arriving. To her alarm, she saw that seats had filled at both ends of their row.

  “See that, Karen?” Hester had to jab hard to penetrate the stuffing and get Karen’s attention. “We’re trapped.”

  “Is it really hot in here or is it just me?” Karen hissed back after rebalancing her bulk. A thin line of sweat cut a path through the baby powder adorning her cheeks. The wig was only slightly askew.

  Then Marge Kenyon’s booming voice announced that her son, Paul, would now take the floor to report on his missionary work with the Cold Lake Indian children.

  “As many of you know, Paul has been setting up a permanent computer link for the children of the tribe to access family-friendly computer programs. Through his new company, Paul.com, he has donated the hardware and he generously gives his time to the little ones every Friday night. I don’t claim to know anything about megabits or Univacs. So Paul, come tell the ladies more!”

  Paul, with a self-deprecating smile, shook his head a little as he took the podium.

  “Mother, of course, is a little biased,” he said with a soapy smile. “But seriously, I have had the opportunity to instill some family values in these underprivileged children. Many of you have heard of the Internet’s wonders. Well, let me tell you, it is nothing more than a Pandora’s Box of electronic smut. Opening that box has brought about the ready availability of pornography right into the most devout family’s home. But with every Pandora’s Box comes a key.” Paul paused to let the gathering understand his last words before continuing.

  “The key is limited access via a controlled and protected network.”

  “He really does know about this stuff,” Hester whispered, amazed. “I thought he was all hot air.”

  “Controlled and protected, ha! Spell that C-E-N-S-O-R-E-D. God, I hate these people,” Karen snapped back.

  Hester, curious at Karen’s wrath, saw two bright red patches forming under her baby powder. Karen stared fixedly ahead.

  Paul warmed to the group as he explained the “pro-family” computer games his software company was promoting: “Immortal Kombat” and “Kumbaya Kidz.”

  Polite applause accompanied him to his seat.

  In his place, a heavily buxom, purple-clad matron shambled her way to the podium. Glowering at the crowd for a moment, she let silence descend on the ballroom. Then she suddenly held up a large photo of the late Sara Duffy.

  “Struck down by an assassin’s hand!” Her husky voice echoed through the room. “We must honor her name with a meaningful action. I propose a sit-in at the Children’s Room of Grand Central Library!”

  “Hear, hear!” someone in the group called out. From one corner a small voice whispered, “She’d approve.”

  At this, Marge Kenyon rose again and turned to the crowd.

  “We must, indeed, unite in a dedicated action to remember our fallen colleague, Sara Duffy. We must make a meaningful statement to the governing body of the Portland City Library. A sit-in at the Children’s Room is a good start. But I propose we take this further. I propose we shut Grand Central DOWN. I propose we demand that all the trash Teri June has written be publicly burned in Pioneer Courthouse Square!”

  The hushed crowd sat stunned at the magnitude of her proposal. Mrs. Kenyon plunged ahead like an evangelist preaching to her flock.

  “It is time we take our case to the people. Teri June is a nasty-minded secular humanist. She ridicules old-fashioned standards. May I quote from” – Marge folded back the paper cover of a book and read with distaste – “ ‘Hanna’s Newest Daddy.’ This is from page 32, and I quote:

  ‘Oh, Travis? While you’re doing the grocery shopping, will you get me a box of tampons?’

  ‘Sure, honey, regular or heavy flow?’ ”

  Marge exaggeratedly suppressed a shudder. “This has NO PLACE in anyone’s home. This has NO PLACE in anyone’s library. Teri June has passed all sense of normalcy with this kind of trash. Trash should be BURNT and Teri June should be...”

  Karen could no longer contain herself. She flung her overstuffed figure out of her chair and knocked over two empty seats in front of her. Heads whirling in response to the clatter, the assemblage watched Karen march up the aisle and take the microphone away from Marge Kenyon.

  Hester sat in a frozen daze.

  “I...I just can’t listen to... to any more of these lies!” Karen’s voice trembled with emotion. “I am proud to say that I am – I am a personal friend of Teri June!”

  The audience gasped. An amazed Hester glanced around self-consciously to see if she could make an unobtrusive exit. Karen, shaking, forged on.

  “It’s true! She has a husband and three wonderful girls. And what she writes about, well, what she writes about is life. As it is. Not the way some may want it.”

  Karen turned to Marge and condescendingly patted her shoulder. “Have a seat, dearie,” she said with a push. Marge Kenyon, having never been so deftly outmaneuvered, slowly took her seat.

  Clearing her throat, Karen told the visibly outraged audience, “Burning Teri June books won’t make the world right. Sara Duffy was a librarian, honor her memory. Don’t you think she’d like you to buy books, not burn them?”

  An angry buzz began to spread through the seated group. Marge Kenyon rose again and advanced with a menacing frown.

  Karen looked at Marge, took in the faces of the crowd, and then dashed for the back of the hall. Hester quickly eased from her hard metal seat. Side-stepping down the skinny row of chairs and toward the exit, she turned to pass the man in the aisle seat. Ducking to shield her face, she felt herself suddenly jerked to a halt as wispy strands of her beard brushed his shirt front. Looking down, Hester was horrified to see her beard caught in the man’s tie pin, a small golden sailboat.

  “Take me now, Lord,” Hester prayed silently.

  She tugged quickly at the mess in the tie pin and painfully ripped spirit gum from her face. As the man struggled to steady her, Hester inhaled a strong waft of bay rum. Half-bearded, she finally looked up directly into the cool eyes of Detective Nate Darrow.

  He looked vaguely puzzled, then winked, his face a study in poker-table control. Hester’s cheeks flushed to match the red of the hair stuffed under her Fedora.

  Dropping her head again, Hester turned, grabbed Karen by the wrist and yanked her from the ballroom.

  Chapter Eleven

  Jitters Coffee Co., Portland’s local rival to Seattle’s snooty purveyors of caffeine, had long been Hester and Karen’s chosen refuge when it came time to
commiserate, complain or generally analyze the world’s woes.

  Hester wasn’t really sure “cozy” would ever apply to Jitters’ new Northwest neighborhood cafe, with its bare steel beams and industrial-modern interior. But the individuality appealed to her more than the sameness of the Starbucks across the street, whose clones she had seen in San Diego, Sacramento and Boise.

  Besides, the goateed barista behind the granite counter brewed a Black Ocelot espresso that made your ears waggle.

  “Here’s your drug of choice, my dear,” Hester said, plopping a tiny, froth-topped cup in front of Karen, then plopping into one of the sculpted, white-maple chairs that were surprisingly comfortable for all their modern design.

  In Karen’s car, a painful tug and a quick rub with some cold-cream had defoliated Hester’s chin and removed most of the spirit gum. She’d ditched the hat and substituted her own coat for the red-checked nightmare, which offered little protection against a cold wind that had met them as they’d left the overheated mansion. The remaining shirt, tie and trousers just made her look fashionable among the eclectic evening crowd in the trendy neighborhood they now looked out on.

  Karen, in a fit of perverse humor, had refused to doff her disguise.

  “I feel like the straight man in a Carol Burnett skit,” Hester fumed from between clenched teeth. She took a sip of hot, strong coffee, then looked her friend in the eye. “So – you want to explain yourself?”

  Karen was still giddy. “Did you see how the old ducks spluttered when I started singing praises of Teri June? Lord, they love to demonize people!”

  She dug through her purse, pulled out an evil-looking brown cigarette and quickly lit it with a dainty gold lighter. She blew a cloud of clove-scented smoke toward the rusty beam overhead. Hester winced and waved her hand in the air.

  “Oh, Karen, not those Indonesian things again! The smell gets into my coat and the next day people in the elevator all wonder why I smell like an Easter ham!” She cast a guilty look around the brightly lit coffee house and saw no other smokers.

  “Hester, dear, chill out. I tell you, I’m so excited. I’ve never really talked before about my relationship with Teri June. And you know what? It felt good!”

  “Well, that’s nice, Karen, I know you believe in free speech, and you’re preaching to the choir as far as I’m concerned, but do you really – ”

  “But Hester, I’ve decided! Right now! I want to come out – I want to finally get this out in the open between us!”

  “ – think that riling up those people is going to do any good – ’’ Hester stopped in mid-lecture, her eye suddenly frozen on the cameo brooch fastening a dusty pink cardigan at Karen’s neck. “You – you what?”

  Karen slurped at her coffee, blew smoke from her nose and grasped Hester’s hand.

  “Oh, God, I’ve wanted to tell you for so long, but I promised Steve I’d be discreet back when he worked for McCluskey, Wright & Schermerhorn – that firm was so stuffy. And even now that he’s on his own – well, the old secret just got to be a habit. But if I can’t tell my best friend, who can I tell? Oh, this feel’s so right!”

  Hester carefully set her cup back in its saucer. She studied Karen’s overpowdered face beneath the crazy wig that now sat slightly cockeyed, then cast a wary eye at a nearby table. A professorial man with short gray hair topped by a hound’s-tooth deerstalker was casting dark glances from over the top of his slim volume of Flaubert. Hester adjusted her necktie and blew him a kiss.

  Leaning closer to Karen, she spoke in a near-whisper. “Uh, just what is it you’re telling me, dear heart?”

  “Hester, don’t you understand? I don’t just know Teri June! I am Teri June!”

  Hester slapped a palm to her chest. For a moment, the only sound was a mad hissing as a double-tall-skinny cappuccino was concocted across the cafe. Then Hester’s breath erupted in a braying laugh reminiscent of one of the donkey-boys from “Pinocchio.”

  She covered her mouth. “Oh, my lord, Karen, what are you saying?” Hester wheezed, then caught her breath. “What do you mean you’re Teri June! I don’t know who could write all those god-awful stories, but I know you well enough to know that – ”

  Karen glared at her.

  “That is, I mean, c’mon, Karen, quit kidding around, what’s this really all about?”

  Karen sniffed and furiously crushed out her cigarette in her coffee saucer. She bit her lip through a long, pouting silence and then spoke quietly. “Hundreds of thousands of girls across the country don’t seem to think they’re so god-awful.”

  It was Hester’s turn to stare. “Oh, sweet Jesus, you’re serious.”

  “And no, it might not be great literature, but it says something to girls that I think is important,” Karen said, a defiant note entering her voice. “It lets them know that what they’re going through is, well, normal, and that they’re not some kind of freak without a friend in the world.” She sniffed. “And maybe you thought I was always Little Miss Sweetness and Light, but when I was 12, I, for one, could have used a little more of that kind of reassurance once in a while.”

  Hester grabbed Karen’s hand. “Oh, Karen, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean anything. You’ve just – Well, you’ve kind of blindsided me on this one.”

  Suddenly, a thought transformed Hester’s sympathy. “Boy, are you the faker! All these months of ‘Got any Teri Junes?!’ This is just so bizarre. I mean, I know you’ve been a staunch defender of her’s – uh, yours – but really, all this time I was just clueless!”

  Karen allowed a small smile. “I was pretty good, wasn’t I? I have to say, it was tough at first. But like I said, once it became a habit, it was probably a lot like JFK telling Jackie she was his one and only snooky-ookums.”

  “Wow.” Hester shook her head and gulped the last of her espresso. “Congratulations, I think.” She waved toward the counter and caught the barista’s eye, then called across the room. “Emilio, we definitely need another round!”

  Slowly, a smile spread across Karen’s face. Finally, she giggled. “I’m so glad you know.”

  Hester giggled back. The man in the deerstalker scraped his chair loudly and huffily whisked past them on his way out the door.

  Karen looked down at the table for a moment, then spoke again. “But you can’t tell anybody.”

  Hester raised her eyebrows in question.

  “It’s Steve. I – I don’t want him hurt. He’s such a lamb, really – You’ve seen him with the girls. They adore him. And I do, too, really, though it’s been kind of a long haul. He’s a sweetheart. And ever since McCluskey Wright sacked him – ”

  “What?” Hester blurted. “He was fired? You never told me that!”

  “Oh, dear. My turn to apologize, Hester. I’m afraid it’s part and parcel of the same situation, though. Steve had such high ambitions. You know, I wrote my first Teri June when he was in his final year of grad school up at the U of W. Lord, you should have seen the hovel we called an apartment, up in the rafters of this old firetrap on Brooklyn – of course, at that age, we just called it bohemian. But we were so poor, the student loan payments were coming soon, I was pregnant with Heidi – believe me, it was desperation time.” Karen gave a sad smile of nostalgia.

  “And somehow, I sold the first book I wrote. I sent it in a manila envelope to an agent I picked out of the Yellow Pages, right there in Seattle – she’s now the biggest agency in town, thanks to yours truly. I guess I’m just good at it. Some people are.”

  She turned to welcome a second cup of Black Ocelot from the cheerful Emilio. “Got any rum to put in that?” Hester asked him with a wink.

  “Sorry, loves, just had a busload of blue-hairs through from that Jesus Northwest convention and they drank the place dry,’’ he said, twirling one end of his mustache as he hustled back behind the counter with the five-dollar bill Hester handed him. Karen turned back to Hester, carefully choosing her next words.

  “Steve, unfortunately, isn’t exactly gifted in his c
hosen profession.”

  Puzzlement flashed across Hester’s face. “But all that about setting up his own firm, how clients were wooing him right and left – “

  “None of it true. Guilty as charged. And I am truly sorry.” Karen put her hand over her eyes. “Oh, what a mess. Hester, please forgive me for letting this all go so far. The thing is, Steve couldn’t cut it at the big firm. He did so well in school, honestly. But he just wasn’t corporate. Going straight to the big office was a monumental mistake. All over Portland, architects were doing wonderful things like the Portland Building; KOIN Tower; RiverPlace. And Steve was on the losing side of every proposal, at the firm that was always supposed to win. So they showed him the door.”

  Hester sat in stunned silence. Karen sipped at her coffee, her hand shaking slightly from nerves and caffeine, then continued, broodingly.

  “And his own firm is just as big a disaster. To tell you the truth, Hester, the only thing he’s working on right now is our own house, and that’s turning into a financial nightmare you wouldn’t believe. Without Teri June, we’d have been living out of that old Dodge Dart I used to drive.”

  Hester, still dazed by her friend’s subterfuge, bit her lip as Karen rummaged through her purse and then lit another cigarette. Karen blew smoke rings for a moment and gazed out the window at passing couples, some all in black, some in business suits, of widely varied social strata and mixed and matched genders, hurrying to get somewhere out of the cold.

  “And frankly things haven’t been going so well lately for Teri June, either,” Karen spoke again, almost to herself. Turning back to her present company, her eyes focused again.

  “Hester, you know what’s really gotten under my skin with those old biddies of WWCAC? I’ll tell you. I got a call from my agent about a month ago, regarding the roughs of my latest manuscript. And you know what? She says I have to ‘tone it down.’ There’s a storyline dealing with self-gratification in early-maturing preteens – tastefully handled, mind you, but the unvarnished truth, as it should be.”