African Violet Club Mystery Collection

by Elise M Stone

Lilliana had no idea. She’d been preoccupied with trying to save Ruby’s life. Then she remembered what had happened. “You might ask Nancy Gardner. She pulled it out.”

  Cartwright’s eyes bulged, the brown of his irises standing out starkly from the white sclera. Bug-eyed is what they’d called that look in her youth.

  “She obviously didn’t know what would happen. That’s why you see all the blood. The ice pick was acting kind of like a stopper, you know. It must have kept the blood from coming out. But once Nancy pulled out the ice pick, it was like removing a finger from a dike.”

  Cartwright swallowed hard. “Don’t go anywhere. I have more questions for you, but first I have to find the murder weapon.”

  He turned and marched over to Nancy. Lilliana couldn’t hear the conversation clearly, but after the chief had spoken, Nancy looked scared as she shrugged her shoulders. Obviously she’d dropped it like a hot potato once she realized what she’d done.

  Lilliana pushed her chair back and bent down to look under the table. The ice pick had rolled to almost dead center beneath it. She sat up and beckoned to the chief.

  He hurried back.

  “Under the table,” Lilliana said. “You’ll have to crawl underneath to get it.”

  Cartwright looked doubtfully at the rug, then edged down a few steps before getting on his knees. He disappeared for a few seconds, then emerged with a paper bag, holding the ice pick Lilliana assumed. Paper because the pick was probably still covered in blood and plastic bags would keep in the moisture and allow bacteria, and possibly mold, to corrupt the evidence.

  She’d learned that from Willie while they were watching one of those police shows on television. He always got annoyed when they pulled out a plastic bag and put wet evidence in it.

  Cartwright put the bag on the table and pulled a notebook from his pocket. “Who all was at the meeting?” He directed the question at Lilliana. Willie would have been another good choice, but he was still shaken by what had happened to Ruby.

  “Well, that’s difficult to say,” Lilliana said. She gazed around the room at those who remained, many of whom she didn’t recognize. A woman with fluffy white hair and glasses sneaked out the door when she saw Lilliana looking at her.

  “Why?” The chief looked frustrated. “It had to be people who live here. I doubt there were any strangers.”

  “It depends on how you define strangers.” Lilliana described the horde of newcomers at the meeting and how they hadn’t gotten around to the break yet, which was when they usually had new people introduce themselves. “So, in addition to our regular members—Frank, Lenny, Sarah, Mary, and myself—we had Willie and Ruby and Nancy. And a whole lot of other people whose names I don’t know.”

  Listing the club members made her realize Pieter Joncker, one of the regulars, hadn’t attended. She hoped he wasn’t ill.

  “Who would know?” Cartwright asked.

  Lilliana shrugged. “I guess you’ll have to ask those we do know about. And those who are left,” she added as she realized almost everyone had vacated the room. Except the man with the cell phone, who even now was taking pictures of her talking with the police chief. She pointed at him. “He’s one of the new people.”

  Cartwright looked up and scowled. “Hey!”

  The stranger turned and took a step toward the door.

  “Wait just a minute.” Cartwright strode toward him.

  Lilliana took a closer look at the man. He wasn’t very tall, definitely a few inches shorter than the Chief, who was under six foot. His face was a roadmap of wrinkles, his eyes two slanted slits between drooping lids and the puffy skin below. When he gave Cartwright a smile, he revealed teeth stained and cracked. Were the stains due to coffee, tea, or tobacco? Or just old age? Because of the color, Lilliana assumed he still had his own teeth, which many of the residents did not.

  “What’s your name?” Cartwright asked once he was standing next to the man.

  “Harlan. Harlan Taft.”

  The chief wrote the name in a notebook which he’d pulled from his pocket. “Mr. Taft—“

  “You can call me Harlan, officer.”

  “Harlan,” the Chief said, “were you at the African Violet Club meeting?”

  Taft flicked a glance in Lilliana’s direction. “I think you know I was.”

  “And can you tell me why you attended?” He waited, pen ready to write down his reply.

  “Do I really need a reason? Other than that I recently moved here and was looking to meet people?”

  “I suppose not, but growing African violets seems like a strange hobby for a man.”

  Lilliana bristled at the chief’s remark. For such a young man, the chief had some very old-fashioned attitudes.

  Cartwright continued his questioning. “Did you know the deceased?”

  “The deceased? Oh, you mean the woman who was taken out of here on a stretcher. No. No, I didn’t. Like I said, I’m new here.”

  “Did you see who stabbed her with the ice pick?”

  Harlan shook his head. “I’m sorry, officer. I was too busy watching the demonstration, just like everyone else. I only noticed what was going on when that woman screamed.”

  “Which woman?” Cartwright’s pen hovered over the notebook, ready to write down this valuable piece of information.

  “I don’t know. It might have been the one who got stabbed. I think more than one woman screamed, though.” His tone was uncertain.

  While they’d been talking, Lilliana had moved up behind the chief so she could overhear more of the conversation. She tapped him on the shoulder.

  Cartwright’s head swiveled toward her, and Lilliana bent over so she could whisper. “Ask him about the photos.”

  “What photos?” he asked in a normal tone of voice. Whispering had been lost on the chief.

  Lilliana pointed at the cell phone still in Taft’s hand. Since the chief hadn’t whispered, she didn’t either. “The photos he’s been taking with his phone.”

  Cartwright’s eyes widened, and he used his gruff, authoritative voice. “I’m going to have to confiscate your phone as evidence. Please hand it over.”

  “But what will I use to call people?” Harlan Taft whined.

  “I’m sure you’ll figure out something. Now give me the phone.”

  Lilliana noticed Harlan’s hand trembled when he held out his phone. Nerves? Or something else?

  The chief slid the phone into a pocket. “Did you take any photos of the victim?”

  “I wasn’t interested in her,” Harlan said. “I was more interested in the demonstration.”

  And me, thought Lilliana. And the chief. It surprised her that he wasn’t interested in Ruby. She was a striking woman and, in Lilliana’s experience, men always noticed an attractive woman. She’d be surprised if a photo of Ruby wasn’t on the phone.

  “Is that all officer? I’d really like to go lie down for a while. This has been quite an upsetting experience.”

  “As soon as you give me your apartment number.”

  “No problem.” He mumbled the number, then left the room.

  That left only Willie and Lilliana there with the police chief.

  “Could I ask you a few questions, sir?” Cartwright asked deferentially. Willie O’Mara had been in charge of the Violent Crimes Division before his retirement, putting him several ranks above Cartwright when they worked together at the Tucson Police Department. Although Violent Crimes included homicide, Cartwright’s tenure had been in the Robbery Unit before he left to become Rainbow Ranch’s sole police officer.

  Willie raised his head to meet Cartwright’s gaze. “Sure.”

  “I know this is a bad time for you...” Cartwright seemed to have picked up on Willie’s reaction to the murder, realized his relationship to the victim must have been personal for a detective hardened by years of investigating homicides to react the way Willie had. Lilliana’s estimation of the young police chief went up several notches.

  “No, that’s okay. You hav
e a job to do.” Willie rubbed his hands on his thighs.

  “How did you know the victim?” Cartwright asked.

  Willie stared out the window at the end of the room. “It was a DV situation. I went to her house several times when I was on the night shift.”

  “That had to be a long time ago,” Cartwright said, then waited. Lilliana wondered what DV was.

  Willie nodded. He continued to look out the window, even though he probably couldn’t see much from where he was seated. “It was a bad situation. There were several calls to 9-1-1 over the span of a year.”

  “And you recognized her when you saw her again?”

  “I did.” Willie finally looked back at the chief. “I recognized her right away, even after all this time. I took it upon myself to introduce her around, get her to feel at home here.”

  “Is that why you brought her to the club meeting?”

  Willie nodded.

  The police chief took a deep breath, let it out slowly. He scratched his cheek, and Lilliana saw beads of sweat on his upper lip. “Tell me what happened leading up to the murder.”

  “I’m afraid I can’t be much help there,” Willie said. “Everyone was pushing forward to see the plant demonstration. I wasn’t really interested in that—sorry, Lilliana. Next thing I knew, people were screaming, and Lilliana was trying to get the bleeding to stop.”

  “So you didn’t see who stabbed her?” The chief sounded disappointed.

  “Sorry, Cartwright. I didn’t.” Willie’s breath caught, and he turned his face away from them. Lilliana wondered if he were crying.

  After a few seconds, Cartwright turned to Lilliana. “Did you know the victim?”

  She shook her head. “Willie had introduced me to her right before the meeting. That was the first time we’d met.”

  Chief Cartwright looked as if he didn’t know what to do next.

  Lilliana solved that problem for him. “Chief, if you don’t mind, I’d like to go upstairs to shower and put on some clean clothes.”

  He brightened, the request obviously suggesting his course of action. “Yes, that would be fine, only come with me to my vehicle so I can give you an evidence bag to put your clothes in.”

  “An evidence bag?”

  “You’re covered in the victim’s blood, Mrs. Wentworth. That makes your clothes evidence.”

  Not again. “Surely you don’t think I...?”

  “I don’t think anything just yet. It’s too early in the investigation to start drawing conclusions.”

  Lilliana sighed. Yes, that had to be the official police position, but it was a bother. “Fine. But let’s do it now. I don’t want to stay in these clothes any longer than necessary.”

  Cartwright nodded, then looked back to where Willie still sat at the table. He was slumped over with his head in his hands. “Lieutenant O’Mara?”

  Willie raised his head and looked at the chief.

  “Please don’t let anyone enter this room until I get back with the crime scene tape.”

  Willie nodded, the gesture appearing to take all the strength he had left.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  A cool breeze washed over Lilliana and Chief Cartwright when they stepped out of the building. She wrinkled her nose as the wind blew the coppery odor of the blood covering her clothes around her face. A shower couldn’t come soon enough. She followed the chief to the back of the white Chevy Suburban with the Rainbow Ranch Police Department logo on the side. He raised the hatch, exposing a plethora of police equipment stored in plastic bins. Cartwright rummaged in one of them until he ferreted out what looked like a large grocery bag, only it had a panel printed on the side of it with blanks for a tracking number, description, location found, and a series of spaces labeled “chain of evidence.” He handed the bag to Lilliana and bent back inside the SUV.

  “Chief,” Lilliana said.

  Cartwright looked back at her from the depths of the cargo area.

  “It’s probably going to take me fifteen or twenty minutes to shower and change.”

  Deep furrows formed over the bridge of his nose. “I’m sure that won’t be a problem. I’ll likely be here for several hours collecting evidence and interviewing people.”

  “It’s the interviewing part I’m concerned about. I’d prefer you wait for me before you start questioning the people who were at the meeting.”

  Cartwright pulled his head out of the SUV and straightened up. “Now, Mrs. Wentworth, I admit you were a lot of help to me in figuring out who killed Bette Tesselink, but I don’t want your amateur sleuthing to become a habit. Poking your nose into other people’s business can be dangerous.”

  “Oh, fiddlesticks,” Lilliana said. She could certainly handle herself. Firearms weren’t allowed in the retirement community, and as long as she kept her distance from ice picks, she doubted she’d be in any danger. Seeing the look of disapproval on the chief’s face, she decided to take another tack. “I was just thinking that people might feel a little more at ease if I were with you. You know how sensitive some of the elderly residents can be, especially around policemen. We come from a different time, you know. A time when police were respected, if not outright feared. And some of us, uh, aren’t quite as sharp as we used to be.”

  The chief looked doubtful as he weighed what she’d said.

  “They might not be as intimidated if I ask some of the questions. I’d hate for anyone to be frightened by the thought that you were grilling them. Not that that’s what you intended, mind you.” Lilliana held her breath waiting for his response.

  “You might be right, Mrs. Wentworth,” he finally said. “Just don’t take too long.”

  “Oh, I won’t,” she assured him. She hurried off to change her clothes before the chief changed his mind.

  LILLIANA held the top of the evidence bag with two fingertips as she carried it into her living room, which had an area just outside the small kitchen for a dining table and chairs. She dropped the bag on the table and examined her fingers for traces of blood. They were clean, as was she. She needed to get downstairs and rejoin the chief before he started questioning the witnesses, but she wanted to check on her plants first. With no children and no pets and Charles gone, there were times it seemed as if her plants were her closest friends.

  She turned back the way she had come, pausing briefly to place her hand on the door to the second bedroom. She closed her eyes for a minute and fought back the grief that threatened to overcome her. She knew the room was empty of furniture now, but the memories lingered behind. She pulled her hand away and sighed, then turned to the other side of the hallway and another closed door.

  Opening it, she was greeted by the miniature jungle of African violets in her guest bathroom. African violets in the tub, on the top of the toilet tank, on shelves mounted on the walls. It was a peaceful retreat, the only sound the hum of the humidifier. The first thing she did was check the water level. In the desert, the water evaporated quickly. She checked the humidifier twice a day to make sure the air surrounding her plants remained moist. There was plenty of water for the next few hours.

  She told herself she was looking forward to moving the plants into what was labeled on the apartment floor plan as the second bedroom. Her throat tightened, and she had to remind herself not to cry. That had been one of the reasons she’d decided to put plants in the bedroom. To make it hold happiness as well as memories.

  The second bedroom was where Charles had spent the months after his stroke. The room where he’d passed. Though Charles hadn’t been in that room for over a year, the air in it was weighted with the hours she’d spent by his side, nursing him as best she could, knowing there was no hope. It pressed on her every time she entered it, which is why she most often just touched the door, a tenuous connection with the man she had loved.

  She hoped that by filling it with cheery African violets, the flowers would be able to banish the sadness she felt. She’d sold off the hospital bed, donated the clothes that hung in the closet to Good
will, given the dresser to Mary Boyle, who had said she needed one, and let Shirley, the housekeeper, give it a thorough cleaning. Now it stood empty, waiting for the lighted plant shelves she’d ordered.

  As she turned to catch up with Chief Cartwright before she missed any part of his questioning, she heard a funny little noise.

  Zzzzt.

  She glanced up at the light fixture, wondering if there might be a short in it.

  Zzzzt.

  The second time she was sure it wasn’t the light fixture making the noise. It seemed to be coming from the tub.

  Zzzzt.

  There it was again, this time accompanied by a tinkling sound that reminded her of a set of miniature wind chimes.

  “Lilliana,” the wind chimes seemed to say.

  Was she losing her mind? She’d seen many of her contemporaries drift away into dementia, and losing her mental acuity was one of the things she feared most. She stopped a moment, remembering an Emily Dickinson poem.

  Much madness is divinest sense

  To a discerning eye;

  Much sense the starkest madness.

  ’T is the majority

  In this, as all, prevails.

  Assent, and you are sane;

  Demur,—you’re straightway dangerous,

  And handled with a chain.

  Her memory appeared to be intact, even if it was a bit disturbing that the first poem that came to mind was titled Much Madness.

  Zzzzt. “Lilliana!”

  Lilliana stopped worrying about her sanity and bent over the plants in the tub.

  Zzzzt. A tiny blur of green zipped across her field of vision and hovered near a Saintpaulia joyfully displaying a crown of crimson flowers. The same plant from which she’d taken a leaf to propagate the African violets still sitting in the flat in the library.

  Lilliana caught her breath. Now that the blur had stopped moving, she could tell it was a fairy come to visit her.

  The town of Rainbow Ranch held many secrets, but the one most closely guarded was the presence of a troop of fairies. Lilliana had only discovered them recently, and she was careful not to share her knowledge with anyone else. Not just to protect the magical creatures, but herself. Anyone who heard her talking about fairies as if they were real would be certain she was losing her mind.