by Maia Chance
“Kindly mind your own potatoes,” I heard Berta say.
I caught Cedric as he was padding through an open door into the mansion. “Naughty,” I said into his fuzz.
He panted, wearing his usual oblivious sock-monkey expression.
Berta arrived breathlessly beside me. “What in heaven is your dog doing?”
“Looking for sautéed steak, I’ll bet. Unlike you and me, Cedric ate like royalty here.”
“Well, we really should go. Mr. Inchbald is not here.” Berta threw a worried glance across the lawn. The sunglasses lady was on her feet, talking to one of the male orderlies and pointing at us.
“But now that we’re here, we may as well try to take another look at Muffy’s room.”
“Are you mad?”
“If anyone asks, we could say we forgot something in our room. Besides”—the orderly was striding toward us, waving a hand—“I think it would be best if we took a detour.”
Berta and I darted inside the lobby. Empty, thank goodness, since we stood out like sore thumbs in our everyday dresses and hats. We hurried up the stairs and made our way to the East Ward.
The East Ward’s door was slowly falling shut when I saw it. I held Cedric close and ran. I grabbed the knob just before the door hit home, and peeked through. A maid pushed a big wheeled laundry hamper down the hall.
“What luck!” I whispered to Berta.
We waited until the maid disappeared into a room. Then we slid through the door and tiptoed past—the maid was humming as she worked—and made it to Muffy’s room. We shut ourselves in and looked around.
Neat as a pin. No trace of Muffy’s messy death remained. The bedsheets looked like they’d been steam-pressed, and a new potted fern sat on the windowsill. The bathroom sparkled.
My heart sank. What had I expected? That the police—that Chisholm, of all people—would leave the place a disaster?
“Well, that’s that,” I said. My glance fell on the radiator by the window. My first thought was, Darn it, didn’t I leave a half-eaten Hershey’s bar behind the radiator in my room? My second thought was, I ought to look behind Muffy’s radiator.
I went over and stuck my hand in the crack between the radiator and the wall. I felt something small and hard. I gently wiggled it free.
“What is that?” Berta asked.
I held it up. Brownish liquid trembled inside a small glass vial with a metal screw top. A typed label said M. MORRIS 7-15-1923 P.M. “I think I know how the murderer poisoned Muffy,” I said.
Footsteps clacked out in the hallway.
“Good gravy,” I muttered. I stuffed the vial into my brassiere, tightened my grip on Cedric, and made for the door.
The door swung open. Nurse Astrid blocked our path, two brawny male orderlies just behind her. “Good afternoon, ladies,” she snapped. “May I ask what you are—?”
I pushed past her and ran down the hallway. Berta’s boots tapped behind me.
“Don’t let them get away!” Nurse Astrid screamed.
Then there were two more sets of footsteps pounding behind me.
I shoved through the ward door, ran down the hallway, and jogged down the swooping stairs into the lobby. I’d meant to run out the front doors, but I saw another nurse standing there, speaking with a patient. I skidded to a stop and turned a right angle. Berta huffed and puffed at my heels.
“Excuse me!” the nurse called.
“They’ve been poking about in the East Ward!” Nurse Astrid shrilled. I caught a glimpse of her and the two orderlies pounding down the stairs, and then Berta and I were racing along a hallway.
“The … kitchen,” Berta gasped. “Door … out.”
“Swell notion,” I said all in one go, to pretend I wasn’t as breathless as she was.
We shoved through a swinging door at the end of the hallway and found ourselves in a service passage. We raced down the passage and burst into a steel-and-white kitchen. Deserted. We went out the kitchen door and squinted, wheezing in the sunlight.
A delivery truck rolled out of nowhere. Berta and I stopped. Pink letters on the truck read YELLOW DUCK ICE CREAM.
My mouth watered. But wait. Why the heck would an ice cream truck make deliveries at a health farm? Was this a mirage?
A man in a white cap and a yellow bow tie leaned an elbow out the driver’s window. “You two look like you need a ride,” he said, and winked.
This was a mirage. Surely. Because … how could this be? Ralph Oliver, delivering ice cream to Willow Acres? Impossible on a number of fronts, foremost being that Ralph Oliver was in Cuba.
“They went through here!” I heard Nurse Astrid scream behind us.
Berta was already climbing aboard the ice cream truck. “Do get a move on, Mrs. Woodby,” she cried.
The kitchen door crashed behind me.
I bundled Cedric and myself into the ice cream truck, and Berta scooted over to the middle of the seat. I hadn’t even shut the door when Ralph hit the gas. We zoomed toward the front drive, gravel spraying. I stuck my head out the window just in time to see Nurse Astrid and the orderlies staring after us. Then we rounded the corner of the mansion.
Cedric squiggled in my lap, whimpering and barking. He always went gaga over Ralph.
I glanced at Ralph. He was concentrating on driving at racetrack speed down the front drive. His thick ginger hair was just visible beneath his cap, and so was the white shrapnel scar on his forehead, a souvenir of his service in the Great War. Gray eyes shone in a craggy, lightly freckled face. How the heck did he make an ice cream uniform look manly? If Berta weren’t between us, I might’ve thought about sliding my hand under his suspenders.…
Nix that. Undignified. Besides which, Ralph was a rotter. If he was back from Cuba, why hadn’t he telephoned?
He caught me looking. “How’s business, kid?”
“Nifty.” How I wished I’d reapplied my Guerlain lipstick.
“Looks that way.”
Berta said, “We have been hired to investigate the death of Mrs. Morris. It is very big business.”
Ralph braked at the health farm gates and honked. The gatekeeper scurried out and opened up. “I heard about that,” Ralph said. “Senator’s wife. Murder?”
“Maybe,” I said.
“How’d you get that gig?”
“From Senator Morris himself.”
“Cripes,” Ralph said, pulling through the gates. “That is big business. All right—where are you two headed next?”
“I parked around the back,” I said.
Ralph turned onto the road.
I stole another glance at him. Then I had to look away because of the way things started sizzling and popping inside me. “Nice bow tie,” I said.
“Thanks. Bought it special.”
“What were you doing at Willow Acres disguised as an ice cream man, Mr. Oliver?” Berta asked.
“Yes,” I said. “I’d love to know the answer, because last time I heard, you were in Havana on a case. Remember? You let me know with a one-line note written on the back of your card that you stuffed through my mail slot in the middle of the night?”
“I was in a hurry. Say, aren’t you happy to see me?”
Yes. “No!”
Ralph’s jaw tightened.
“You simply vanished!” I said. “I didn’t expect daily telephone calls, but it’s been weeks. I thought I’d at least get a postcard.”
“Let’s just say things got a little sticky, and getting to the post office in Cuba wasn’t really feasible.”
“Why is it such a contortionist’s feat to get a straight answer out of you?”
“Wouldn’t want to bore you with details.” Ralph’s hands were relaxed on the steering wheel, but his sidelong glance was searching and almost … wary. Could he be as uncertain as I was about where we stood? No. Ralph worked ladies like a sailor works knots.
I glanced behind the seat. Metal refrigerator compartments lined the back of the truck. “Is there any ice cream back there?”
“Nope,” Ralph said. “Only frozen peas.”
Sigh. “Are you working on the Muffy Morris case, too?”
“Nope—”
Phew.
“—I’m searching for young Grace Whiddle. That’s what I was doing in disguise back there at the health farm: talking with the staff. I was wrapping things up with a gardener when I happened to see you two running through the lobby. Went to my truck here. Figured you’d need a lift.”
“Well, thank you,” I said. “Who hired you?”
“Grace Whiddle’s mother, just this morning.”
“That was our job.”
“Mrs. Whiddle told me she had a couple of lady detectives trying to get her daughter’s diary, and I figured it was you two. Said she fired you, though.”
“Well, yes, but—”
“Don’t mention it to anyone,” Ralph said. “Mrs. Whiddle doesn’t want to involve the police yet. Thinks it’ll cause a scandal and ruin Grace’s chances of marrying Mr. Moneybags. If it were my daughter, I’d have every flatfoot on it, and the Feds, too. This is your motorcar, isn’t it?” He braked beside the parked Duesy. “Are you two headed back to the city?”
“Certainly not,” Berta said. “We have several hot leads.”
Several was a stretch, but I nodded.
“I’m staying at the Foghorn,” Ralph said. “I’ve got a few more things to take care of right now, but maybe I’ll see you two there around, say, six o’clock for dinner?”
“Maybe,” I said.
“Of course,” Berta said.
Ralph grinned and tipped his cap. “All right, then. See you soon, Mrs. Lundgren, Mrs. Woodby. Cedric.”
Berta and I climbed down from the ice cream truck and boarded the Duesy. I settled Cedric in the backseat and fired up the engine. We watched as Ralph made a U-turn and rumbled away.
“Oh dear,” Berta said, straightening her hat. She was still flushed and out of breath. “What excitement. If we are to break into the Van Hoogenband house tonight, I must have a lie-down.”
“A lie-down? What about this?” I pulled the glass vial I’d found behind Muffy’s radiator from my brassiere.
“We can wait a bit to discuss that. You must remember that I am over sixty years of age, and before we launched our agency, I seldom took more exercise than kneading bread dough. Although, mind you, kneading bread dough is quite strenuous.”
“How about taking a gander at Alfie’s yacht, then?”
“If there is a neat little berth on which to rest, I shall be as happy as a clam.”
“Neat little berth? If I knew Alfie, it’ll be gold-leaf staterooms.” I put the vial in my handbag for safekeeping.
We motored off in the direction of Hare’s Hollow, and I told myself not to think about Ralph. Things were still popping and sizzling inside me, but I’ll come clean: My heart ached. He had called me Mrs. Woodby, not Lola. For some mysterious reason, Ralph and I had returned to GO on the Monopoly board.
9
I parked the Duesy in front of the Foghorn. Berta and I collected our suitcases and handbags and walked along Main Street. Cedric followed slowly, sniffing for the perfect spot to go. We waited while he went.
“Look, a new bakery,” I said, pointing across the street. An arched shop window read LITTLE VIENNA BAKERY in gilt. Tiered stands displayed treats too far away to identify. Still, I sighed with longing. Cookies can, at least temporarily, fill a man-shaped hole in a lady’s heart.
“Come along,” Berta said with a sniff.
“Are you jealous?” I asked. “Someone else’s baked goods turned my head?”
“Do not be ridiculous.”
Behind Hansen’s Bait Shop, a wooden stair led down to the harbor path. Four docks stretched into a gently bobbing inlet. Dozens of yachts gleamed with white and gold and polished wood. Beyond, Long Island Sound sparkled.
“Do you know where you are going, Mrs. Woodby?” Berta asked.
“Sure.” We tromped down a dock, footsteps hollow, lugging our suitcases. Cedric trailed a few steps behind, sniffing the boards. Everything smelled of sun-heated tar and lapping brine. “Alfie’s lawyer sent me a letter about this yacht and told me it was all mine. Said it was moored in number thirteen. How could I forget that?”
We arrived at number 13. We stood side by side and stared at Alfie’s one remaining yacht. Faded letters on the side said SEA NYMPH.
“It appears to be listing to the left,” Berta said.
My daydreams of maritime splendor came crashing down. While all the other yachts in the marina looked fit for displaying the sunning bodies of motion picture stars, Alfie’s yacht looked as though it had just returned from an around-the-world cruise while manned by ogres. Barnacles studded the hull. White paint curled, and the teak wasn’t that orangey gold it was supposed to be, but gray. A sail flapped limply in the breeze, revealing badly stitched patches.
“Sorry, Berta,” I said.
Berta stepped aboard. “Beggars cannot be choosers.”
I wobbled aboard, too.
Down inside the yacht, mildew itched my nose and the climate was decidedly dank. A hundred things creaked with every roll of the water beneath us. But there were two small cabins, each equipped with a bunk bed, and a tiny galley that had a kerosene stove and a coffeepot. That was all we needed, right?
Berta and I shut ourselves into our respective cabins. I tossed aside my suitcase, kicked off my shoes, lay down on the bunk with Cedric, and fell promptly asleep.
* * *
Ralph was alone in a corner booth at the Foghorn restaurant when Berta and I entered a little after six o’clock. My heart went pit-a-pat. I balked. How could I do this? Be a cheerful lalapazaza when I hadn’t the foggiest why the bonfire we’d gotten going before he left for Cuba had poofed out?
“Oh, for goodness’ sake, Mrs. Woodby,” Berta said without stopping. Even Cedric kept going to the booth without me. He knew where his bread was buttered.
Berta positioned herself and Cedric in the booth in such a way that I had no choice but to sit beside Ralph. My knees sagged like saltwater taffy. Granted, that was possibly the result of having walked from the yacht in my highest heels. I had no intention of looking ankle-less in front of Ralph Oliver.
“Good evening, Mrs. Lundgren, Mrs. Woodby. Don’t the two of you look as pretty as pictures.”
Berta touched her freshly plaited silver hairdo. “Thank you.”
Yes, I’d spent lots of time making my bob shiny and I’d used a hairpin to dig out the last bit of Guerlain lipstick from the tube. But if Ralph was going to play his cards close to his chest, I was going to play mine even closer. “Let’s get down to business,” I said briskly.
Ralph lifted his eyebrows. “Well, okay.”
“You’re working on the Grace Whiddle disappearance,” I said, “and we’re working on the Muffy Morris murder. My partner and I see no reason why we cannot, for mutual professional benefit, trade information with you, our colleague.” Berta and I had talked this over on the walk from the yacht.
“I’m your colleague, huh?” Ralph studied his menu.
Berta was rummaging in her handbag. “I was going to give you one of our business cards, Mr. Oliver, but I seem to have forgotten them all in the city. Have you any, Mrs. Woodby?”
“Of course,” I said. I checked in my handbag. The only business card in there had been floating free amid coins, makeup, hairpins, biscuit crumbs, and the vial of brown liquid I’d found behind Muffy’s radiator. “Here you go, Mr. Oliver. Colleague to colleague.” I slid the card over.
“What’s this?” Ralph poked the inky-black blotch in the middle of the card.
“Oh. Mascara, I suppose.” My cheeks went hot. The hinged lid of the cake mascara compact I kept in my handbag had broken, and I couldn’t afford to replace it.
“Mrs. Woodby,” Berta whispered, “how unprofessional.” She looked at Ralph. “I am sorry, but I must keep this card if it is the only one.” It disappeared into her handbag.
Ralph shrugged, mouth serious, eyes twinkling. “Never mind. Let’s share. What have you got?”
I placed the medicine vial on the table. “This, according to the label, was Muffy’s evening dose of whatever medicine she was being treated with. See? It says ‘M. Morris 7-15-1923 P.M.’ But Muffy never took it. The funny thing is, this morning I overheard an exchange between Chisholm and another doctor to the effect that Muffy had taken her medicine. Chisholm even said that Nurse Beaulah collected an empty vial from Muffy’s room this morning.”
Berta said to Ralph, “Muffy appeared to have died as a result of drinking an entire bottle of rum. We inferred that she did not, after all, drink the rum since she loathed the stuff and there was an untouched bottle of gin in the room.” Berta tapped the vial. “But what to make of this?”
“Here’s my theory,” I said. “The murderer planted the booze bottles in order to make Muffy’s death appear to be the result of excessive tippling, to cover up how he or she really did it, which was poisoning Muffy with a vial that looked just like her medicine vial. I think the murderer dumped most of the rum down the sink—Muffy’s bathroom reeked of alcohol. Muffy took the poison—which was in the vial Nurse Beaulah later removed from the room—and the murderer hid this vial of her real medicine behind the radiator.”
“Adds up nicely,” Ralph said.
I unglued my gaze from Ralph’s rugged profile. Never mind about playing my cards close. Why didn’t he just kiss me, darn it? We’d been doing an awful lot of kissing before he skedaddled to Cuba, and I wouldn’t have said no to starting up where we’d left off.
“I wish I knew what kind of poison was used,” I said.
“Were Muffy’s pupils dilated?” Ralph asked.
“Her eyes were shut.”
Berta said, “She appeared to have suffered a certain amount of delirium. Her room was in disarray.”
“Maybe there was a struggle,” Ralph said.
I hadn’t thought of that. “Wait a minute,” I said. “In Muffy’s lavatory, well, she hadn’t—” I cleared my throat. “—she hadn’t flushed it, and it smelled of, strange to say, garlic.”
Ralph’s eyebrows shot up. “Garlic? Garlic in the urine or on the breath, that’s arsenic. Rat poison.”