Wiped Out

by Barbara Colley

  “Humph! That son of mine is just as stubborn as his father ever thought about being. Why, would you believe he didn’t like my idea about remodeling the kitchen, didn’t like it one bit—said it was a waste of money?” Bitsy snickered. “But I’m still working on him.”

  As usual, Bitsy had her own agenda and had completely misunderstood the question. “Well, maybe you ought to reconsider,” Charlotte told her. “Remember, all those strangers in and out and all of that noise and mess could really be nerve-wracking.”

  “Yes, well…I suppose you do have a point.”

  “Just promise me you’ll think about it,” Charlotte said. “And I’ll see you on Tuesday,” she added. Without waiting for a response, Charlotte then said, “Bye now,” and quickly hung up the receiver.

  Glaring at the phone, she made a silent vow that first thing Monday morning she was phoning BellSouth and having caller I.D. added. At least that way she would know when Bitsy was calling, and she could let the answering machine take Bitsy’s calls.

  Charlotte continued staring at the phone. As long as she was there, she might as well try to call Judith again. She tapped out Judith’s cell phone number, and after the third ring, her call was answered.

  “Judith Monroe here.”

  “Oh, Judith, finally. Can you talk a minute?”

  “Oh, hey, Aunt Charley. Yeah, sure, but I only have a minute. What’s up?”

  Charlotte twisted the phone cord around her finger. “Well, I hate to bother you with this, but rumor has it that the police have made an arrest in the Mimi Adams murder. Ah, I was just wondering, is it true? Have you arrested Mimi’s murderer?”

  Chapter 18

  There was a long pause over the phone line, then Judith said, “Now, Auntie, you know I’m not supposed to discuss an ongoing investigation. And since when did you begin listening to rumors anyway?”

  Charlotte ignored Judith’s question for the time being. “Well, if it’s still ongoing,” she said, “that must mean you haven’t arrested anyone yet.”

  “Where did you hear this so-called rumor?”

  Charlotte had to smile at Judith’s maneuver to avoid confirming or denying her assumption. “Do you want the actual source of the rumor?” she asked. “Or just the person who told me?”

  “This is getting us nowhere fast, and I’m pretty busy right now. How about we talk later?”

  “Will you and Billy be able to come to lunch tomorrow after church?”

  “I hope so, but I can’t make any promises.”

  “Well, you take care of yourself now.”

  “You too, Auntie. Talk to you later.”

  Charlotte hung up the receiver and walked over to Sweety Boy’s cage. “Well a lot of good that did,” she told the little bird. She reached to unlatch the cage door, and when Sweety Boy sidled up to the opening, Charlotte smiled. “Yeah, yeah, and a lot you care, huh, Boy?” She opened the door, stuck her forefinger inside, and the little parakeet hopped on her finger. Once she eased him out of the cage, he immediately took flight. After several swoops around the living room, he landed on the cuckoo clock, his favorite out-of-cage perch.

  With a slight shake of her head, Charlotte headed for the kitchen. She’d long suspected that Sweety Boy actually thought that the bird in the cuckoo clock was real. And though it hadn’t happened yet, she’d often wondered how the little parakeet would react if he happened to be perched on the clock when the cuckoo bird popped out.

  Once in the kitchen, Charlotte opened the freezer and stared at its contents. If she remembered right, she’d bought a nice big roast a couple of weeks ago. Charlotte spied the edge of the package containing the roast hiding behind a bag of chicken tenders. She dug out the roast and placed it below in the refrigerator to thaw out overnight. A roast with potatoes and carrots was something she could cook ahead of time before church on Sunday and then heat up for lunch.

  Charlotte spent the next hour gathering receipts and logging them into her monthly accounts. She’d just finished and was ready to put Sweety Boy back inside his cage when the phone rang. Charlotte narrowed her eyes and tapped her pen against the desk. Probably Bitsy again, she figured. With a sigh, she picked up the receiver. “Maid-for-a-Day, Charlotte speaking.”

  “Hello, Aunt Chardy.”

  “Well, hello yourself, Davy. How’s my favorite little guy doing? Are you being a good little boy for your momma?”

  “I good boy and I love you. Bye.”

  “Ah-Davy, wait—Aunt Charley loves you too, hon,” she told him.

  Charlotte could hear Nadia in the background telling Davy to hand her the phone. “Sorry about that,” Nadia said, after a moment. “But Davy insisted that he needed to talk to his Aunt Chardy.”

  Charlotte laughed. “Well, I’m glad he did. I’ve been meaning to call you anyway to let you know that Janet has agreed to work for you when you have the baby. So, how are you feeling? Madeline said you haven’t been well lately.”

  “Fat and pregnant,” Nadia responded. “That’s how I’m feeling, and for a change, my mother-in-law is right. The last couple of weeks have been pretty hard. And that’s the other reason I called. I went for my checkup yesterday and my doctor wants me to get as much bed rest as possible. Do you think Janet would mind taking over my clients a little sooner than planned?”

  “Whether she minds or not, don’t you worry about it for one second. I’ll manage. You just take care of yourself and that little baby. Now, is there anything else I can do? What about Davy? Do you need some help with him?”

  “Thanks, Charlotte, but no. Between Madeline and Daniel, we’ve got it covered, I think. But I’m afraid we’ll have to miss church and lunch tomorrow, so don’t plan on us being there.”

  “Well, that’s a shame, but I certainly understand. Tell you what, why don’t I bring lunch to you tomorrow?”

  “Aw, Charlotte, that’s really sweet of you, but Madeline has already offered to bring something by.”

  “Hmm, how about this, then? Let me bring something anyway and you can have it for dinner tomorrow night or save it for your lunch or dinner on Monday.”

  “Thanks, Charlotte.”

  On Sunday after church, Judith was the first to arrive at Charlotte’s for lunch, and from the moment her niece stepped through the doorway, the temptation to ask her again if indeed someone had been arrested for Mimi’s murder was eating Charlotte alive.

  All in good time, she kept telling herself, as Judith followed her back to the kitchen. Judith would tell her when and if she was good and ready.

  “Guess it’s going to be just Hank, Carol, and me today,” Judith said, as Charlotte checked on the roast heating in the oven. “Nadia’s doctor put her to bed, and Mom’s busy helping out with their lunch and with Davy.”

  “Yes, I know,” Charlotte responded. “I talked to Nadia yesterday afternoon. But what about Billy? Is he coming?”

  Judith made a face. “He said he’d try to stop by, but for us not to wait on him. I really doubt he’ll make it.”

  “Hmm, that’s too bad,” Charlotte murmured, as she opened the refrigerator and took out ingredients for a salad.

  “Aunt Charley? About that rumor you heard—the one about Mary Lou Adams’s murderer being arrested. This isn’t exactly public knowledge yet, but I just thought you’d like to know that we did arrest someone.”

  Charlotte froze, then firmly closed the refrigerator and turned to face Judith. “Who?” She whispered.

  “Actually we’ve arrested two people, a couple by the name of Mires—Doreen and George Mires.”

  Charlotte frowned. Of all the people she’d considered as suspects, she’d never truly considered Doreen. “What happened? What made you think they were guilty?”

  Judith shrugged. “There were several things that just didn’t add up, but the most damning evidence was a freshly dug spot in their backyard. The Mireses claimed that they were putting in a new flower bed, but our boys found traces of jimsonweed. We figured they were trying to get r
id of it to cover up the fact that they had it to begin with.”

  Charlotte’s frown deepened. “But Mimi had jimsonweed growing in her backyard too,” Charlotte pointed out. “Any one of a number of people could have taken enough of it to poison her…couldn’t they?”

  All along, Charlotte had thought June had to be the “friend” who had suggested that Mimi plant the jimsonweed, not Doreen. And she’d been sure that whomever that “friend” was had to be the murderer. So why would Doreen even suggest planting the jimsonweed when she already had some? The only reason Charlotte could come up with was that Doreen was trying to use Mimi’s jimsonweed as a decoy.

  “Yes, I suppose they could have,” Judith said, “but after interrogating Rita Landers and Karen Douglas, we learned that Doreen had been the one who had uncorked and poured the wine that Rita had brought for Mrs. Adams, the Mauro 1998. With her pouring the wine, it would have been easy enough to slip something in Mrs. Adams’s glass.”

  Charlotte stared at Judith with unseeing eyes. She’d been almost certain that Rita had poured the wine. But if Doreen had poured the wine instead, her theory as to how Rita had poisoned Mimi didn’t hold water. So, did that mean Rita was off the hook? Only if the police were right, and only if Rita and Karen had told the truth, she finally concluded.

  “So what was Doreen’s motive?” Charlotte asked. “And his—her husband’s motive?”

  “We’re still gathering evidence, but it seems that Doreen got on Mimi’s bad side. We figure she was afraid that Mimi was out to get her husband fired. Seems Gordon Adams once ruined another man on Mimi’s say-so, and the Mireses were afraid he’d do the same to them.”

  “Probably Don Landers.” The second the words popped out, Charlotte immediately wished she’d kept her mouth shut.

  Judith’s eyes narrowed. “And just how did you know about Don Landers, Auntie?”

  “Well, I-ah-I might have overheard something to that effect.” She hastily added, “But it was just gossip.”

  “Is there anything else that you ‘might have overheard’ that you’d like to share?”

  “Well, actually, there was something I wanted to talk to you about, but—” She shrugged. “I guess now it doesn’t matter, since you’ve made an arrest.”

  “Something, as in what?” Judith asked.

  A sudden, sharp rap at the front door interrupted them, so Charlotte simply said, “Maybe we can talk later. That’s probably Carol and Hank. Would you go let them in?”

  Judith nodded. “I’ll go, but Aunt Charley—” She leveled a no-nonsense gaze at Charlotte. “If you think of anything else, you will tell me, won’t you?”

  Rain was forecast for Monday, and as Charlotte drove to work, the sky was already overcast with dark gray clouds. She never did get the chance to question Judith further about Doreen and George Mires on Sunday. Halfway through the meal, Judith’s beeper had gone off and she’d had to leave.

  In spite of all the so-called motives that Judith had listed, Charlotte still couldn’t believe that the Mireses had conspired to murder Mimi. Doreen Mires just hadn’t struck her as the type who could do such a thing. Then again, after she’d thought about it, she’d remembered the scene between Doreen and Mimi after the HHS meeting, with Doreen begging Mimi not to hold George responsible for what she’d done.

  Charlotte shook her head. Even so, Mimi was already ill by that time, which meant that, in all likelihood, she had been poisoned before the meeting. And Doreen’s concerns were a result of what had happened during the meeting.

  Charlotte pulled over in front of the Adams’s house and parked the van. As she unloaded her supplies, thunder rumbled in the distance. She glanced up at the sky, then decided to add her umbrella to the supply carrier.

  At the front door, Charlotte knocked first as a precaution, just in case Gordon happened to be home. She waited several minutes, and when no one came to the door, she unlocked it and let herself inside.

  Once she secured the deadbolt and disarmed the security system, she left the vacuum cleaner and supply carrier in the entrance hall. Then she took her lunch bag into the kitchen and left it on the cabinet.

  Charlotte glanced around the kitchen assessing what needed to be done. Though it wasn’t as clean as it had been on Friday, it wasn’t the worst mess she’d ever seen either.

  As she walked around the rest of the downstairs to check out what needed cleaning, she made up her mind to phone Judith and set up a meeting to discuss the arrests of Doreen and George Mires. If they were truly guilty, that was one thing, but if they weren’t, then Charlotte didn’t want the real murderer to get away scot-free.

  For the most part, the rest of the rooms downstairs were just cluttered, and once she toured the downstairs, she returned to the entrance hall, picked up the supply carrier, and went upstairs.

  She’d just set the supply carrier down outside the master suite when she heard a noise downstairs. Frowning, she walked to the top of the stairs, tilted her head, and listened for several seconds. Other than the hum of the air conditioner running and the faint sound of the case clock ticking, there was nothing but silence.

  “Strange,” she murmured, and with a shake of her head she walked back toward the bedrooms. The house was old, and old houses creaked as they settled. Besides, she’d made sure that she had bolted the front door.

  But what about the back door?

  “Oh, for pity’s sake,” she grumbled, remembering how spooked she’d been the last time she’d cleaned. “Just get to work and stop being so paranoid.”

  Though still somewhat bothered by the noise she’d heard, she checked all of the rooms on the second level to see what needed to be done, saving the master bedroom and bath for last.

  Emma’s and Justin’s bedroom suites and the guest bedroom suite looked exactly the same as when she’d left after cleaning on Friday.

  As Charlotte headed for the master bedroom, she made a mental list of what she intended to do first. Laundry was at the top of the list, which meant stripping the bed in the master bedroom. Once she put the sheets in to wash, she’d make up the bed in the master bedroom with a clean set. Then, starting with the master bath, she would clean all of the bathrooms and dust the furniture in all of the bedrooms. The final chore would be vacuuming.

  When Charlotte walked into the master bedroom, the first thing that caught her eye was the king-size bed. Unlike the last time she’d cleaned, when only one side had been rumpled, this time, both sides were. From the looks of it, she decided that either Gordon had had a really restless weekend and had slept all over the bed, or he hadn’t slept alone.

  Charlotte shook her head and felt ashamed for immediately jumping to such a conclusion. Though she couldn’t think of any reason offhand, there could be other explanations for both sides being in disarray.

  She set down the supply carrier, approached the bed, and grabbed one of the pillows. As she tugged off the pillowcase, she caught a whiff of men’s cologne and breathed more deeply. The scent was one that she recognized immediately: it was the same kind that Hank wore. But when Charlotte reached across and picked up the other pillow, she caught a whiff of a different scent. She held the pillow closer and sniffed. The odor was too flowery for a man’s cologne. She sniffed again. It smelled more like a woman’s perfume.

  “The man has some nerve,” she muttered, as she yanked off the pillowcase. Gordon had had company over the weekend all right, specifically, bedroom company. She’d suspected as much but hadn’t wanted to believe it. Thoroughly disgusted, Charlotte flung back the comforter and the blanket, then wrestled the sheets off the bed.

  In the bathroom, Charlotte found further evidence that confirmed her suspicions. There were way too many dirty towels and washcloths in the clothes hamper for one lone man to have used by himself. And there was an extra toothbrush in the toothbrush holder.

  Charlotte glared at the marble countertop to the bathroom vanity. Not only was there an extra toothbrush, but there was also a suspicious-looking
beige smudge and what looked like bits of loose face powder on the countertop. Using her forefinger, she reached down and rubbed the smudge. Yep, just as she’d suspected. The smudge was makeup.

  Growing more disgusted with each passing moment, Charlotte washed her hands, then gathered up all of the dirty clothes in the bathroom. On her way out, she added the pile of sheets to her bundle and then took everything down to the laundry room. Once she turned on the washing machine and added the laundry detergent, she stuffed everything inside the machine, then returned to the upstairs master bedroom.

  After she made up the bed with fresh linens, she went back into the master bathroom. It was while she was scrubbing out the shower that she found the most damning evidence of all.

  “Yuck,” she complained, and using a paper towel, she wiped up the long hair that had collected around the shower drain. Charlotte stared at the hair a moment before tossing the paper towel into the trash. Unless she was mistaken, either Gordon had bleached his hair and had had a world-record growth spurt over the weekend, or the blond strands of hair belonged to a woman.

  As Charlotte went about her chores cleaning the rest of the house, she grew more and more outraged by what she’d found—outraged and suspicious. If Gordon could sleep with another woman so soon after Mimi’s death, then it didn’t take much of a stretch of the imagination to conclude that he could have murdered Mimi to get rid of her.

  There was only one problem with her conclusion, she decided, as she was scrubbing out the sink in the kitchen. One big problem. The police had already arrested Mimi’s so-called killers.

  Much later, as Charlotte prepared to eat her lunch, it suddenly occurred to her that she’d been so disgusted by what Gordon had done that she really hadn’t given much thought to the woman he’d been sleeping with.