Do or Diner: A Comfort Food Mystery

by Christine Wenger

  Chapter 14

  On the drive home, I realized that I hadn’t done a very thorough job of checking the yearbooks. I felt like throwing something as a tribute to my lack of focus.

  “Damn!”

  I should have looked up the Tingsleys and even Roberta Cummings. They were all Sandy Harbor “townies.” They were all about the same age, and this was a small town. They all had to have gone to Sandy Harbor High School or one of the region’s private schools.

  I didn’t know what I’d find about the others in the yearbooks, but I thought I’d hit the jackpot.

  In high school, ACB had a thing with Marv, and Sal had an interest in botany.

  Maybe it wasn’t a big deal, or maybe it was.

  I stopped in at the sheriff’s department building to see Ty, and he wasn’t there, but Deputy McCoy was. “He’s off for the rest of the day. He said he was going home to get some sleep. Anything I can help you with?”

  “No. I’m good. I just wanted to tell him something, but it’s probably not important. Thanks, Vern.”

  “Don’t thank me. I’m just glad that Meat Loaf Tuesday is back.”

  “Then I’ll see you tonight at the Silver Bullet. You’ll love my meat loaf. I added a special ingredient, just for you.”

  He put his hands over his heart and grinned. “You are the absolute best, Trixie.”

  “Aww…That’s what all the men say.”

  He burst out laughing. I waved good-bye and left the building. I started for home and continued to think about everything that I’d learned today.

  I needed to write it all down in my trusty notebook and get it out of my head.

  I drove into the back parking lot of Brown’s because it was the first place I saw where I could park and write in privacy. I pulled my notebook out of my purse.

  As I began to write, I saw ACB in a muumuu covered in purple orchids and wearing a red turban. She was carrying a plastic grocery bag.

  She looked right and left, and walked as fast as her flip-flops would carry her to the back of the Crossroad’s Restaurant. I was more impressed with Antoinette Chloe plowing through the snow with red flip-flops on than I was with Laura Kingsley wearing white heels.

  I sat, astonished, as I watched ACB toss the plastic bag over a wooden fence. I could see the tops of the green metal Dumpsters of the Crossroads Restaurant, and it appeared that ACB made a direct hit to the middle of the largest one.

  She hurried back to her restaurant, head down.

  Instinctively, I knew what was in that bag—her gardenia muumuu—and I knew what I had to do.

  Dumpster dive.

  Driving around to the rear of the Crossroads, I left my car running in the parking lot, in case I had to make a quick escape. Then I walked to the gated area, which contained the Dumpsters. The wooden gate was unlocked, so I pushed it open.

  The Dumpster that I needed to search was tall and wide, and I hadn’t a clue as to how to climb up onto it.

  Looking around, I saw a bicycle covered in snow. It probably had been there since last summer. I didn’t think whoever it belonged to would mind if I borrowed it.

  I wheeled it into position on the side of the Dumpster and made several attempts to hoist myself up on the seat. Finally, I succeeded and stood shakily on top of garbage bags and whatnot. Ick!

  I scanned the area for ACB’s bag.

  There it was—a bright yellow Dollar-O-Rama bag. I held on to the side of the Dumpster and reached over with my other hand and grabbed it. Peeking inside, I was happy to find the gardenia muumuu.

  Holding the bag, I peered over the edge of the Dumpster, and I saw that the bike had fallen. There I was, standing in garbage without a way out.

  Now what?

  A black SUV drove into the parking lot and headed right toward me.

  Don’t let it be Ty Brisco!

  Of course it was him. Just my luck.

  He got out of his vehicle and leaned on it, arms crossed. “A little industrial spying on the competition, darlin’?”

  “No. I was hungry and couldn’t wait for a table,” I said, sarcastically. “Now help me out of here.”

  “What have you got there?” he asked.

  “A certain gardenia muumuu. I saw ACB toss it here.”

  He grinned. “Excellent work. Shoot the bag over to me.”

  “Not a chance. Help me out of here first.”

  “Why? Would you think I’d leave a lady stranded in a Dumpster?”

  “This isn’t my first rodeo.”

  Laughing, he sauntered over, and I do mean sauntered, as I stood, slowly sinking into some kind of goo like quicksand. I was going to throw out my boots anyway, which was a good thing, but I’d thought I’d toss them after winter, not now.

  I kicked a pizza crust and some chicken wing bones from the toe of my boots.

  “Lift your right leg up and over the side. Straddle it like you were riding a horse,” Ty said. “I’ll help you down.”

  I didn’t see how that would help, but I did as I was told. “Yeow.”

  “Now lift your left leg over your right leg?”

  “I’m not a gymnast, Ty.”

  “Make like it’s a horse. And you’re getting off.”

  “Darlin’,” I drawled, just like he did, “I’ve never ridden a horse in my life.”

  “You city people…I just don’t understand you. Never been on a horse. I learned to ride before I could walk.”

  “There aren’t a lot of ranches in Philly, cowboy. It’s not my fault.”

  “Just toss your left leg over your right.”

  Somehow, I did as he said. I got both legs over the edge of the Dumpster, and I was heading straight to the ground.

  I took a deep breath, just as I felt strong arms catch me and move me away from the battered green steel. He set me down safely on the ground, but my knees wouldn’t lock.

  I swayed toward him, and, just like in the movies, I felt his arms around me, steadying me. I swear that I wasn’t faking!

  I looked up into his sky blue eyes, muttered, “Thank you,” and moved away.

  “Where’s the bag?” he asked.

  I pulled it out from under my coat and handed it to him. “Exhibit A.”

  “I’m not so sure about that,” he said.

  “What?” I wiped some corn kernels and wilted lettuce from my sleeve.

  “ACB claims that she ripped it on her Dumpster while taking out the trash. She said that the wind of the last snowstorm caught her dress and it got hooked on a screw. She said Dumpsters are rotated at random by the garbage company, and that your Dumpster might have been hers at one time.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Yeah, it is. I paid a visit to Dandy Dumpster. And they don’t keep a record as to which Dumpster is where, although they are numbered.”

  “If that’s true, then why would ACB go through the trouble of tossing her dress into the Crossroads Dumpster?” I asked.

  “That’s what I’d like to know.”

  “Ick,” I said, sniffing my parka. The wind shifted, and I caught a whiff of myself.

  “Uh-huh.” Ty had his hand positioned under his nose.

  “I guess I need a shower,” I said.

  “No comment,” he said. “And thanks for this.” He held up the bag. “See you later, Trixie.”

  “See you.”

  I wondered what Ty was going to do with the rest of his day off. I knew what I was going to do: take a long, hot shower and get some more sleep.

  I stunk so bad that I rolled down all the windows as I drove. Finally, turning off Route 3, I drove down the long road that led to the Silver Bullet. I was pleasantly surprised to see a good number of cars in the parking lot. It must be another meeting of the American Legion.

  I called Juanita on the cell phone. “It’s Trixie. Everything okay?”

  “Everything’s fine. I can handle it, and Cindy is going to cover for Bob. We don’t need you.”

  “How’s the meat loaf selling?”

/>   “It’s going like crazy. I’m so glad that you made a lot of it. It’s a little different from Porky’s meat loaf.”

  “Salsa,” I said. “I put salsa in it. There’re a lot of nice veggies in salsa, and it adds a little kick.”

  “Interesting. Well, the customers love it.”

  “I’m going to take a shower and catch some sleep. Call me if you need me. Oh, and I’ll be over later with the paychecks.”

  “Great. I’ll let everyone know.”

  I couldn’t wait to see everyone’s faces when I passed out the checks. I included a little bonus in them for everyone’s hard work.

  I wanted to visit Mr. Farnsworth, too, and see how the stocking of the bait shop was progressing. I hadn’t seen him since his nice speech about me at the fire barn.

  Blondie greeted me at the door, and after I played with her and rubbed her tummy, I let her outside. Instead of taking care of business, she zoomed away, chasing a squirrel. I yelled her name repeatedly, not wanting to lose her.

  Running after Blondie, I kept calling her name. But soon she was out of sight.

  Tears stung my eyes. How could I have been so stupid as to not put her on a leash? But she’d always stayed close to me before. I didn’t want to lose her. It would break my heart and Ty’s.

  I tramped over the lawn, through icy snowdrifts and on crunchy patches of ground, following Blondie’s tracks.

  It started to sleet. Just what I needed. It was a snow-laden sleet, just enough to get my contacts wet and floating around in my eyes.

  “Blondie!” I yelled, not sure if she really knew her name yet.

  After a half hour of calling her name and tramping through the snow, I lost it and began to blubber like a little girl.

  When my tears cleared, I noticed some pink fluorescent survey ribbons dripping in the sleet where I thought my property line ended. I didn’t really know for sure since I’d never seen a survey map. I just knew that I owned “the point.”

  “Who would mark off my property like this?” I said out loud. Then I thought about it, and one name kept rolling around in my head: Rick Tingsley.

  But the pink fluorescent tape didn’t stop at my property. I saw more farther ahead. It seemed like either someone was buying or selling a parcel of land that abutted mine.

  I made a mental note to take a trip to the assessor’s office. Maybe they’d know if someone just bought this land.

  If Mayor Tingsley bought the adjacent land, he’d own quite a chunk of Sandy Harbor. All the more reason for him to want my parcel, too.

  I’d go to the assessor’s office tomorrow. But right now, I needed to find Blondie. I trudged through the sleet, which turned to a wet snow, and followed Blondie’s tracks until I lost them.

  I kept calling her name. As I walked, I noticed a patch of dirt under an evergreen tree. The dirt had been disturbed. Then I noticed a small rusted trowel.

  I squatted down, looking at the dirt. It wasn’t as if I could read dirt like a tracker, but it seemed like the digging had been done before the snow fell—maybe in the fall.

  It didn’t seem like an animal had dug there either. Besides, the shovel was a dead giveaway.

  And Sal Brown had an interest in botany.

  Finally, I heard a bark, and Blondie appeared, her caramel-colored hair flying in the air as she ran toward me.

  I stood up, and she jumped up on her hind legs with her front legs propped against my chest. She bent her head back for me to scratch under her chin, which I did. Then she started sniffing the air and ran off.

  Even the dog couldn’t stand my smell!

  “C’mon, Blondie. Let’s go home,” I said.

  Blondie waited for me; then she walked at my side. Finally, we walked up the slushy steps of my house, and I held the door open for her. She walked in and headed for her water bowl and food.

  It was strange to think of the big Victorian as my home. There were still things that belonged to Aunt Stella that I didn’t want to touch: clothes, knickknacks, pictures and other personal items. I did expect a phone call from her sooner or later, and I’d ask her then what her plans were for her possessions.

  She did have some valuable antiques that I would’ve loved to have. Maybe she’d rather get new, lighter-colored furniture for her new digs in Florida, or maybe not.

  Either way, I’d like to know so I could make the house my own.

  I undressed in the laundry room, putting every article of clothing I had on into the washer, including my parka. I poured in laundry soap, a laundry soap booster, and set the dial for hot water and a large load.

  “I know—I stink,” I explained to Blondie, who was staring at me. I slipped into a robe that was hanging on a hook. Absolutely starving, I searched through the fridge for something healthy to snack on. I settled for peanut butter and jelly on a toasted English muffin. Oh well, the cold glass of milk that I added was relatively healthy, even though it wasn’t low-fat.

  Blondie followed me up the stairs to the shower. There, she stretched out on the tile floor.

  After I scrubbed with every scented gel and soap in the shower and washed my hair with two types of shampoo and cream rinse, I declared that I’d banished the garbage smell from my person. Just in case, I sprayed on some tea rose perfume mist from a bottle on the shelf.

  Just as soon as I could find the rest of my toiletries, I’d box up Aunt Stella’s things and put mine on the shelves.

  As I slipped into my Mickey Mouse nightshirt, I realized that I had bigger things to worry about than finding my toiletries.

  I needed to find out about all those lovely pink survey markers on the border of my land. Wondering if Aunt Stella might have an old survey map, I walked down the stairs to check in her office.

  The shiny wooden floor was cold under my bare feet. Actually, the whole house was cold. I shivered and tucked my wet hair behind my ears, but I kept looking through the old oak file cabinets that lined the wall.

  When I was a kid, some of the land to the south of where the woods began was farmed. Cows grazed on thick green grass almost to the shore of Lake Ontario, but a fence kept them from walking onto the sand dunes and drinking from the lake. The fence didn’t stop us from climbing in and petting the cows or trying to climb up onto their backs.

  My sister, being more daring, tried to milk them from time to time, but nothing ever happened. It wasn’t until the farmer had caught us one time and showed Susie how to milk the cow that we were welcomed through the gate. He was hard to understand, with a very thick accent and sun-darkened skin, but he had friendly brown eyes.

  Oh! An old folder labeled Our First Home. The house was plotted out on a typical survey map, but there was no diner or cottages present yet. The land behind it was owned by—I turned the map around to read the faded printing—Domenick V. Brownelli.

  He had to be related to Sal Brown. Maybe the farmer of my memory was Sal’s father or grandfather.

  I wondered if the land was still in the family, if maybe Sal Brown now owned the property. If he did, it was logical that he might have made an offer to Aunt Stella. If she sold to him, then he’d be the one to have a nice stretch of fairly level land and more than a mile of prime sandy beach on Lake Ontario, not Mayor Tingsley and his campaign strategy to bring in jobs to the region.

  Sal could do a lot of developing with that kind of beachfront, too. Then again, he could have developed his land long ago, but he’d kept it natural.

  I wanted to find out if Sal Brown owned the property, or if he sold it.

  And what about the digging of what could be mushrooms that I found in the woods?

  It was unclear as to how this would help me figure out who killed Mr. Cogswell, but I assumed that if there was land development going on, as the new survey tags indicated, it might affect my business.

  Or maybe the tags were from an old survey, but I didn’t think so. They looked new, not faded.

  Murder or not, I needed to check out the tags.

  And what happened to
the Sandy Harbor gossip hotline? I hadn’t heard anything about a recent land purchase. News like that should have spread like wildfire. Why the secrecy?

  Just as I was about to make the climb back upstairs, Blondie rushed to the front door and started barking.

  Following her, I discovered that a black Amish carriage had pulled up alongside my car. The horse that had been pulling the wagon hung his great head, as if he were telling the driver that he didn’t have the energy to deal with a noisy dog.

  A woman climbed down from the carriage. She was dressed all in black, a long dress, a coat, and bonnet that covered all of her hair. She walked toward my front door, carrying a basket.

  I suddenly realized that I was in my Mickey Mouse nightshirt with bare feet.

  I reached into the closet on my left and pulled out a yellow rain slicker that had to be Uncle Porky’s.

  Shoes. I needed shoes!

  There was no way that I was going to put my feet into my stinky boots that I should have thrown away. I checked the bottom of the closet and found matching yellow boots. I slid my bare feet into them. They covered my knees and were six sizes too big, but they’d have to do.

  I told Blondie to lie down, and surprisingly she obeyed me. Whoever had owned the dog before—no matter how negatively I felt about him for dumping her—had done a great job of training her.

  I opened the door before my visitor had a chance to knock.

  “Hello,” I said.

  “Hello. I’m Mrs. Stolfus. Forgive me for intruding on you, Miss Matkowski, but Juanita said that I would be welcome.”

  “Of course you are! Come in.”

  She tried not to look at my strange attire, but I could see her eyes traveling up and down my Big Bird outfit.

  “Did I come at an inconvenient time?” she asked.

  “Absolutely not. You just caught me in my Mickey Mouse nightshirt, and I didn’t think it was appropriate for greeting company.” I laughed. “But this outfit is just perfect, correct?”

  She chuckled, and I motioned for her to take a seat in the living room. My legs wouldn’t bend at the knees because the boots were so high, so I had to step out of them before I sat down across from her.

  “Sorry, Mrs. Stolfus. My slippers are upstairs.”