Hushed Up

by Elizabeth Spann Craig

  “No, I think our plans have been completely derailed. I need to talk to Sloan Jones about the story I’m writing on Lillian’s demise,” said Myrtle, heading in the direction of the newspaper office that was just a few doors down. Sloan Jones was the editor of the paper and Myrtle was a correspondent.

  Miles said, “If it’s all the same to you, Myrtle, I think I’ll skip that visit. I know exactly how it’s going to go: he’s going to say Red doesn’t want you to write crime stories. He’ll remind you that your helpful hints column is due. Then you’ll argue you’ll have a better perspective on the story than anyone else. Begrudgingly, Sloan will allow you to work on the article. I’ll just sit in my car and wait for you with the air conditioning running and eat the rest of my lunch.”

  “That’s fine. And I think you’re wrong, Miles. Sloan knows by now that I always end up getting my way. He may just skip the whole arguing part. But suit yourself.”

  A moment later, she pushed open the wooden doors of the newspaper office. She let her eyes adjust to the dim interior and her nose adjust to the musty smell of old papers. Sloan was a former student of Myrtle’s and his traditional response to her sudden appearances was to leap to attention and start falling all over himself as if he were late with his homework again.

  This time, though, Sloan barely noticed she’d walked in the doors. She sat down next to him and he finally obligingly turned his office chair toward her, the wheels groaning in protest at his considerable weight shifting. “Hi there, Miss Myrtle.”

  “Everything going all right, Sloan?” asked Myrtle sharply. “You seem a little off.”

  Sloan heaved a sigh. “Is it that obvious?”

  Myrtle said, “Very. It isn’t Sally again, is it? This on-again, off-again nonsense really can’t be healthy for your mental well-being.”

  Sloan shook his head. “Oh, no. No, it’s finally all over with Sally and I couldn’t be happier. It’s like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders. No, this is about Katrina.”

  Myrtle frowned. “I don’t know any Katrinas.”

  “She’s fairly new to town. I’ve seen her a few times when I’ve gone out after work.” He had a silly, mooning expression on his face.

  Myrtle said briskly, “And you have a lot in common? Similar interests? You get along well?”

  Sloan gave her a horrified look. “Miss Myrtle, I haven’t even said hello to her yet.”

  “You mean you’re just worshipping her from afar? Sloan, that’s no way to start a relationship. You need to be friendly. Introduce yourself.”

  Sloan shook his head. “Not yet. I’ve got to move really slowly.”

  “Well, maybe you need to at least move to a closer barstool when you see her. And I probably wouldn’t stare too much.” Myrtle paused. “Sloan, this may come as a surprise to you, but I actually didn’t come to the newspaper to discuss your love life.”

  Sloan said, “Hmm?”

  Myrtle said, “Focus, Sloan. Look, I need to write that story on Lillian Johnson and I have just the angle to do it.”

  Sloan now seemed to be paying a little more attention. In fact, he appeared confused. “A story on Lillian Johnson? What, like a retrospective on her career as a florist?”

  Myrtle gave him a severe look. “No, like an article reporting her violent death.”

  Sloan’s eyebrows flew up on his large forehead. “What? When did that happen?”

  “This morning. And it’s rather alarming the newspaper editor doesn’t know about it,” said Myrtle crisply. “Really, Sloan, you need to pull yourself together.”

  It was her old schoolteacher tone and it seemed to finally snap Sloan into shape. He flushed and sat up a bit straighter in his chair. “So, she was murdered?”

  “She was murdered and Miles found her. And Wanda predicted she was in danger before Lillian’s death,” said Myrtle.

  Sloan’s eyebrows bounced up his forehead again. “That will be an interesting angle. Wanda is very, very popular with our readers for her horoscopes, but it will be good to pull her into an article. I think the readers would really go for that.”

  “I’ll have to get her permission, of course,” said Myrtle offhandedly.

  “Will you?” asked Sloan. “She’s an employee of the paper, after all. And her name is already in the paper every single week. It’s not like she’s anonymous or anything.”

  “Still, I think it’s important,” said Myrtle firmly. She glanced over at Sloan’s desk which was, as usual, a riot of papers and photographs and reference books. Since Sloan’s unfortunate love life had been such a distraction lately, the paper had taken something of a backseat. Some days, the newspaper was barely printing by the deadline. Other days, Myrtle had to correct most of the stories because of Sloan’s lax editing. “How is everything going with the paper?” she asked pointedly.

  “Oh, it’s going all right.” Sloan shrugged. He gave Myrtle a sidelong glance. “Having a few issues with Elaine, though.”

  Myrtle winced. Red’s wife was a wonderful woman and interested in a variety of various hobbies. Sadly, she never seemed to have much talent for any of them, although that never dampened her enthusiasm. “What now?” she asked.

  “Well, she’s still doing social media postings for the paper and those have been pretty good,” said Sloan quickly as if determined to say something positive first.

  “Fewer pictures of her thumbs?” asked Myrtle.

  “That’s right. She seemed to be aware she has thumbs now and that they are fond of getting in the way of the subjects, which is a good thing.”

  Myrtle said, “So what’s the problem?”

  Sloan sighed. “Elaine has a new hobby.”

  “Uh-oh,” said Myrtle. “Although I can’t say I’m surprised. It was about time for one to crop up. What is it this time? Calligraphy? Fishing? Organic gardening?”

  “Writing,” said Sloan.

  Myrtle frowned. “You mean she wants to be a journalist?”

  Sloan looked sad. “No. No, that might be easier to deal with. She’s writing poetry and short stories. Elaine asked me whether I thought the paper might could use a ‘literary corner’ once a week. That she’d be happy to get things rolling with some of her own work.”

  “And did you see this work?” asked Myrtle.

  “I’m afraid so.”

  Myrtle said slowly, “I see.” She followed that briskly with, “Well, that should be easy enough to deal with. You simply have to tell her the paper doesn’t have enough room for any new columns. Or there’s no demand for it. Or your advertisers wouldn’t think literature was a good fit for the readership. And it isn’t! The readers are hooked on Wanda’s horoscopes, for heaven’s sake. They wouldn’t know what to do with poetry.”

  Sloan said glumly, “I know. That’s what I need to do. And I will . . . it’s just that she was so earnest.”

  “And she can stay earnest—she just needs to keep her stories and poetry unpublished, that’s all. Okay, I’ll shoot that story over later this afternoon, all right? Make sure to reserve room on the front page.”

  She hoped Sloan was paying attention. He now appeared to be looking at pictures of his crush on social media.

  Chapter Four

  When Myrtle returned to the car, Miles was fast asleep and snoring lightly, his empty take-out container on the passenger seat. He didn’t even wake up when Myrtle took the container and threw it away in a nearby trash can. He didn’t wake up when Myrtle slammed the passenger door after plopping down heavily into the car. So Myrtle opened and shut the door again with even more vigor until he finally stirred.

  “Thank heavens,” Myrtle said, “I was starting to believe I was sitting next to a corpse.”

  Miles blinked a few times and then rubbed his eyes. “Sorry. I’m just really tired from all that lost sleep.”

  Myrtle gave him a critical look as he continued rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “
I’ll drive, instead. You’re way too sleepy to be alert enough to safely get us where we need to go.”

  This seemed to wake Miles up. “No, no. I can drive.” He paused. “Where do we need to go? Wasn’t the plan to go back to your house? I thought we were going to watch the soap opera.”

  Myrtle frowned. “You’re certainly stuck on the soap opera today.”

  Miles sighed. “I wish you’d never gotten me hooked on them. The way they close each episode with a cliffhanger is very sneaky. I want to find out if Payton and Miranda were able to slip out of the government lab before the security guards rushed in.”

  “You know Payton and Miranda somehow got out of it. It wouldn’t be much of a soap opera if the two of them ended up in jail for years,” said Myrtle.

  “Yes, but I want to know how they got out,” persisted Miles.

  Myrtle said, “And I do, too. But let’s do that after we visit Wanda.”

  Miles looked uncomfortable, as he always did when the psychic was mentioned. He’d discovered he was a cousin of hers and felt a sense of responsibility for her, especially since she always seemed so downtrodden.

  “Let me run by the ATM first,” he said with a sigh.

  They were about halfway there when Miles’s phone rang and he startled. Myrtle barked, “Eyes on the road! I’ll answer it.”

  Miles asked, “Can you see who it is?”

  Myrtle peered at his phone. “It’s Tippy Chambers.”

  Miles clutched the steering wheel with white-knuckled hands. “Oh, no. She’s going to ask how the silent auction collection went. And it was totally derailed.”

  Myrtle quirked an eyebrow at him. “What’s the worst that can happen? You get kicked out of garden club? That sounds like a positive outcome as far as I can tell.” She answered the phone. “Tippy? It’s Myrtle. Miles is driving.”

  “Oh, hi, Myrtle. Listen, I was just checking in to see if Miles was able to pick up the items for the auction. I thought he was going to drop them by my house.” Tippy’s cultured voice was a little strained. Myrtle remembered she tended to get a little keyed up before events.

  Miles hazarded a stressed look at Myrtle and Myrtle gestured pointedly at the road. “Tippy, the truth is that Miles set out early today to start collecting auction items and then ran into something quite tragic. He found Lillian Johnson dead in her home.”

  There was silence on the other end. “Tippy?” prompted Myrtle.

  “I’m so sorry to hear that,” said Tippy. “How absolutely horrible. Was her death . . . I mean, did she suffer some sort of health calamity?” Her voice indicated she certainly hoped so.

  “I’m afraid not. Lillian was murdered,” said Myrtle.

  Tippy paused again and then said slowly, “I see. Oh, goodness.”

  “Clearly, he didn’t pick up Lillian’s donation. And, afterward, he didn’t just feel as if he could continue on picking up donations as if nothing had happened.”

  Miles nodded fervently.

  Tippy said, “Of course not. How awful. This does change things quite a bit. I’m not sure how it would appear to the community if we just blithely continued on with the silent auction as if nothing had transpired. Wouldn’t that seem very insensitive? Lillian was an important member of our club. And what would her family think?”

  These questions didn’t seem to be rhetorical, so Myrtle answered them. “I’m planning on bringing a sympathy casserole to Lillian’s son and daughter tomorrow. I’ll ask them personally what they think the garden club should do about the silent auction.”

  Miles gave her another sidelong look at the mention of the casseroles and Myrtle gestured impatiently at the road.

  Tippy said with relief, “Would you? That would be wonderful, Myrtle. And tell Miles to just put the rest of the auction collecting on hold until you check in with the family. I’ll send an email out to the club to let them know what’s going on.”

  Myrtle hung up the phone and said, “Well, you’re temporarily off the hook for collecting the rest of the stuff for the auction.”

  Miles said guiltily, “I’d actually completely forgotten about it once I saw Lillian. It was as if garden club ceased to exist. It might also have to do with my total lack of sleep. Besides, I can’t even get Lillian’s things. I’m sure they’re in labeled bags and locked up at the police station.”

  Myrtle frowned. “Why on earth would her dog basket items be at the police station?”

  Miles said, “Because the dog feeding station was the murder weapon.”

  “What?”

  “Whoever killed Lillian picked up that heavy dog feeding station and whacked her over the head with it.” Miles looked mildly ill at the thought. “I don’t think it would be an acceptable donation for the silent auction.” He added urgently, “And Red said not to tell anyone. So keep it under your hat.”

  Myrtle said, “You really do need to try and get some sleep. I can’t have a sidekick who doesn’t feed me information. Didn’t you think the murder weapon would be important to divulge?”

  Miles said, “We’ve been with Erma all day. Then you were seeing Sloan. There wasn’t really an opportunity to fill you in. Besides, I wasn’t supposed to mention it.”

  Myrtle said impatiently, “Go ahead and fill me in the rest of the way, for heaven’s sake. What was the scene like? Did you see any clues?”

  Miles wrinkled his forehead in thought and drove a bit slower as he tried to reconstruct what happened this morning. “I knocked on the door and there wasn’t any answer.”

  “Yes, but she’d told you to walk in if she wasn’t there. So I’m guessing you didn’t spend much time knocking.”

  Miles said, “No. I tapped on the door another time and then pushed open the door and called out her name, just in case she was there. But there was no answer. I thought she was going to keep the donation near the door, but I didn’t see the dog items there, so I started looking for them.”

  “Did you see anything out of place? Any physical evidence at all?” asked Myrtle.

  Miles said, “Well, I wasn’t looking for physical evidence. I was looking for a dog grooming set and whatnot. Plus, it was kind of dim in there. All the blinds were shut and the curtains were closed. Lillian didn’t have any lights turned on. I was mostly just trying not to run into anything in the dark.”

  Myrtle sighed and Miles continued, “Anyway, I walked into the kitchen and that’s when I saw Lillian on the floor. There was blood around her head and on the dog feeding station.”

  Myrtle said, “When you say dog feeding station, I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about. Is this just some sort of a heavy bowl?”

  “No, it’s a stand that holds a dog bowl and a water bowl. It’s pretty big. You wouldn’t be able to use it for a short dog—it would be better for a bigger dog. It keeps the dog from having to stoop over the bowl,” said Miles.

  “So when you found Lillian, did you look around for any clues? Any evidence?” asked Myrtle impatiently.

  Miles slowly shook his head. “No. I just made sure there was nothing I could do to help Lillian and then I called for help. And I left the house and tried hard not to be sick. And I wasn’t,” added Miles with relief.

  “I’m glad to hear it,” said Myrtle sternly. “But next time when you find a body, try to take better note of your surroundings.”

  “I’ll do my best,” said Miles dryly.

  Ten minutes later, they were nearing the hubcap-covered shack where Wanda lived with her brother, Crazy Dan off the old highway. The road was now so rarely used that there wasn’t much business for the pair’s psychic readings, live bait, boiled peanuts, or hubcaps.

  Miles said, “And why are we here again? What is it we’re trying to find out?”

  “I need to ask Wanda if I can mention her in the story I’m writing for Sloan. And I wanted to tell her in person about Lillian’s death, since she’d been the one who reali
zed she was in danger,” said Myrtle.

  “We couldn’t have tried to call her on that cell phone Sloan gave her?” asked Miles. He drove onto the red clay of the property and looked around him at the old cars up on cinder blocks and the hubcap-covered shack. His expression was both bemused and dismayed, as it usually was when he encountered Wanda’s home.

  “She doesn’t carry the phone on her. Apparently, she sees it more as a way for her to reach out to the world rather than the other way around,” said Myrtle with a shrug as she pushed the car door open.

  Myrtle didn’t even have the opportunity to knock before Wanda pushed open the dusty screen door and gestured them in.

  Myrtle decided it would be nice not to immediately open with the murder. “Hi, Wanda,” she said cheerfully. “How are you doing today?”

  Wanda gave her a reproachful look. “I done already know.”

  Miles, never one to accept Wanda’s psychic gift outright quickly asked, “Did Sloan call you?”

  Wanda gave him a bemused look. “Phone done run out of batteries.”

  Myrtle frowned at Miles. “You know how she knew. She was the one who said Lillian was in danger to begin with.”

  Wanda gestured at the meager chairs and waited for them to sit down. Miles, as usual, carefully scoped out all the available options before settling on a seat that might be halfway acceptable. He’d be sure to ask Myrtle for more hand-sanitizer as soon as they left.

  When they were seated, Wanda shoved a pile of laundry aside and draped her thin frame over a lumpy loveseat. She shrugged at Myrtle. “Shouldn’t have tried to change the future.”

  Miles said, “What do you mean? That’s what you do all the time in your horoscopes. You’re always telling people to go to the doctor for their cough or avoid standing on ladders.”

  Wanda said, “Yeah, but that’s small potatoes. With life and death, it’s different.”

  Myrtle said briskly, “Well, it’s Lillian’s own fault for being so ridiculously foolish. You’d think if someone was trying to tell her something for her own good that she’d listen.”