The Trouble With Tulip

by Mindy Starns Clark

  “Big dog like that,” he said, “can sure mess up your house. Where do you keep him at home?”

  “So far he goes wherever I go,” she replied. “But if he’s going to stick around, I guess I’ll have to break down and install a fence.”

  “Really?” Angus said. “ ’Cause I do odd jobs on the side. I’d be happy to come over and give you an estimate on that.”

  “On putting a fence around the yard?”

  “Yeah, I could come over tonight, take a look, give you an idea of what it would cost. Where do you live?”

  If he weren’t being so pushy, Jo wouldn’t have thought twice about their conversation. As it was, something about his demeanor was giving her the creeps.

  “I’m not ready for that yet,” she said. “First I have to decide if I’m keeping him or not. And right now I have to run.”

  “That’s right,” Angus said, stepping back from the car. “You’re having some kind of meeting at your house at noon, aren’t you?”

  Jo’s pulse surged.

  “How do you know about that?”

  “I, uh, I did a shift for a friend over at the retirement village last night. You know how old folks like to gossip. They got nothin’ better to do.”

  Jo nodded, wondering what else he wasn’t telling her.

  “What kinds of things are they saying?”

  He took another step back, shrugging.

  “I don’t know. I just heard it mentioned that some of them were going over there to your house. Well, you have a nice day. If you want me to give you a price on a fence, let me know.”

  “I’ll do that,” she replied.

  Then she got in the car, locked the doors, and drove away.

  Danny knew Tiffany was mad at him for canceling the noon appointment. But he needed to be at Jo’s when the women’s group showed up, and if that meant one less customer at the studio today, then that’s just how it would have to be. He assured Tiffany that she was such a schmoozer that she should be able to reschedule the appointment without too much trouble.

  He made it to Jo’s fifteen minutes early, surprised to see that there were already several cars in her driveway. When he got inside, there were about five older women there, sipping coffee, nibbling cookies, and making small talk.

  “Oh, Jo,” one of them said enthusiastically, “I just have to tell you, I followed your tip for roasting a juicy chicken, and it really does work.”

  Jo thanked her, flashing the same beaming grin she always gave when someone praised her column.

  “I must have missed that one,” one of the other women said. “What was it?”

  “It’s so simple,” the first woman said. “When you roast a chicken, stuff an apple inside of it first. It makes it much more moist.”

  “Do you eat the apple?”

  “No. Just throw it away. But you’ll be amazed at how much better the chicken is.”

  Danny tuned them out as they continued to talk about cooking, which led to a discussion of the small kitchens in the units at Golden Acres. From what he could tell, about the only one of them who didn’t live at the retirement community was Iris Chutney. Two more cars arrived, so that by 12:05 there were nine women in the room. Danny was shocked that there were so many. Iris Chutney was there, but Danny was disappointed that Louise Parker, the unofficial head of the group, was not. From what he had seen so far, none of the other women made a move without her consent.

  By 12:15 it was obvious she wasn’t going to come. He and Jo brought up some folding chairs from her basement and put them in the living room next to the couch. Then they asked everyone to have a seat as the meeting was about to begin.

  “Ladies,” Jo said once they were quiet, “Danny and I want to thank you for coming today. I know it wasn’t an easy decision for any of you to be here.”

  Danny looked around the room, noting that the friendly joviality from earlier was gone. These ladies suddenly looked quite serious—and very, very wary.

  “It has come to our attention,” Jo said, “that your group has made some recent investments about which you are concerned. To put it bluntly, since Edna Pratt’s death and Simon Foster’s disappearance, you must be wondering if you’ve been had.”

  There was a collective gasp, but no one said a word.

  “I’m sorry to tell you that from what Danny and I have discovered in the last few days, it looks as though there are definitely some unscrupulous things going on here. But until one of you decides to go to the authorities and tell them what happened, nothing is going to change.”

  The women remained silent. Jo looked to Danny, so he took over.

  “Let us make some educated guesses here,” Danny said. “You have been introduced to the mystical secrets of alchemy.”

  They did not respond.

  “You have seen ordinary metal turn into gold, right in front of your eyes,” Jo said.

  At this, several of the women actually nodded.

  “You have been promised immortality,” Danny added. “And you believe you know a man who has already achieved immortality and has the proof.”

  Several more nods, accompanied by some very defensive expressions.

  Jo held up a piece of paper, a printout taken from the Internet, showing a mug shot and prison record.

  “This man is named Simon Kurtz,” she said. “You may know him as Simon Foster. He is sixty-two years old and has served time in prison for counterfeiting, forgery, and consumer fraud. It’s a matter of public record, in case you think we’re making this up. In short, he’s a con man, and all of you have been victims of his latest con.”

  The astonishment in the room was audible. Suddenly everyone was talking at once, and the piece of paper was being passed around frantically.

  “My son will be furious with me!” one of the women cried.

  “Where is our money?”

  “I knew it was too good to be true!”

  “What can we do?”

  Once Danny could get them to calm down, he and Jo listened as Iris Chutney explained how it had worked.

  It started with Edna Pratt, she said, who had come to her and Louise one day and said that she knew a man, a very dear and trusted acquaintance, who had shown her the most remarkable thing. Edna would let them in on it, she said, if they would promise not to tell anyone.

  Danny and Jo shared a glance, and he realized they were both thinking the same thing: So far, they had given Edna the benefit of the doubt, assuming she was just a pawn in her brother’s game. Now they understood the truth of the matter, that Edna had also been working the con. She was just as culpable as Simon. That had to have something to do with the fact that she ended up dead—probably murdered by her very own brother.

  “Sure enough,” Mrs. Chutney said, “Louise and I went to Edna’s house one night, met Simon, and watched him turn metal into gold. Then he showed us some pictures that proved how old he was.”

  “Don’t forget the painting,” another woman added. “I didn’t trust those photos, but when I saw the painting, I knew it was true. I have a degree in art history, you know.”

  Mrs. Chutney gave the woman a silencing look and then continued.

  “Simon said the secrets of alchemy were passed down to him more than two hundred years ago, when he was 62 years old. He took the formula at that time and never turned a day older than that, even though time continued to pass. He said there was one formula for transmuting gold and another for transmuting the body, and that they were both very expensive to make. He told us that if we could raise a million dollars, he could make enough of the formula for everyone.”

  “A million dollars?” Jo cried.

  “We were allowed to share this with only our closest, most trusted friends,” Mrs. Chutney said. “Louise and I thought about it, and we decided that if we could find ten people who would each give a hundred thousand dollars, then we would have our million. Simon said that with that much money, he could make enough formula for ten people.”

  “A hundr
ed thousand dollars each?” Jo asked in dismay.

  “As of last week, we were almost halfway there,” Mrs. Chutney said. “Then Edna died and Simon disappeared, and we didn’t know what to think.”

  “But you had already given Simon your money?” Danny asked.

  “Four of us had. But the rest were ready to come on board pretty soon. He was supposed to do another demonstration of the metal into gold first for the ones who hadn’t seen it.”

  Jo reached into the bag next to her chair and pulled out the metal pin Danny had retrieved from the jeweler.

  “Was this the item he was going to transmute?”

  “Yes,” one of the women said. “It’s mine. Simon told me he needed it ahead of time so that he could do some measurements and calculate how much of the formula would be necessary for the transmutation.”

  “I’m sorry,” Jo said, reaching into the envelope and producing the second pin. “The truth is, he just needed enough time to bring it to a jeweler and have a duplicate made in gold. Using an old magician’s trick, he was going to make it look as if he was changing one into the other right in front of your eyes.”

  Pandemonium broke out in the room. Several of the women began to cry.

  “Ladies,” Danny said, trying to get them to quiet down. “The police can help you if you’ll let them. May we give them a call?”

  The women took a quick vote. It was unanimous.

  Before they had a chance to change their minds, Jo rushed into the kitchen to get the police on the phone. Danny was relieved because once the cops opened an investigation about this fraud, then they might be willing to take a second look at Edna’s death as well.

  Jo returned to the living room a few minutes later, assuring them that the police chief himself was on his way. The women talked and cried among themselves until there was a knock at the door, and then it was flung open.

  Louise Parker stood there, eyes wild, breathing heavily.

  “Ladies!” she cried, holding up one hand. “Not a word to anyone! I’ve spoken to Simon, and he’s assured me that everything is right on schedule.”

  Iris Chutney stood, visible trembling.

  “Too late, Louise,” she cried. “We’ve already spilled the beans. The police are on their way.”

  25

  Jo had to leave for the radio station before the chief was ready to start taking statements. She told him they were welcome to use her home until they were finished, but he said no thanks, that he wanted all of the women to relocate to the police station where they could do it more officially. His deputies took the names and addresses of the ladies present and then began herding them toward their cars.

  Poor Louise Parker was beside herself. Though it had taken a while to convince her of the truth, once she was presented with all the evidence, she had finally given in. Now she was clamoring for justice more vigorously than the rest, even inviting the police to trace back the phone call she had received from Simon a little while before.

  While Jo was glad that the scam was finally getting some official attention, she felt really bad for Sally Sugarman. The Texas senator was not going to be happy when she learned what had happened. Then again, if Edna was indeed murdered, surely Sally would want justice to prevail in the end. Maybe if the story stayed local, the voters in Texas would never have to know the truth about Sally Sugarman’s mother or uncle—or the swindle they had tried to pull.

  The chief thanked Jo before leaving and asked her to come by the station later as well to give her own statement.

  “I’ll come as soon as my radio show is over,” she said. “In the meantime, I’m just glad you’re willing to consider that Edna’s death wasn’t an accident after all.”

  She started to climb in the car, but he stopped her.

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” he said. “I’m not going there. We’re investigating a con game, not a murder. None of this evidence leads me to change my mind.”

  “But, Chief, you see what the woman was involved in. Whether she was a victim or a perpetrator, you can’t tell me her death isn’t suspicious considering all that has come to light.”

  He glanced toward the last car full of women and then looked back at Jo.

  “And who killed her, Miss Tulip?” he asked, lowering his voice. “Do you think one of those sweet ladies did her in?”

  “They might have,” Jo said defensively. “Money can be a powerful motivator.”

  “Yes, but none of those women even knew they were being swindled until today. So much for a motive.”

  “What about Simon? He could have killed his sister. He had motive.”

  “You’re the one who told him Edna was dead. Why would he try to call her on the phone if he had killed her? Nope, as far as I’m concerned, Edna Pratt was doing some housecleaning, mixed the wrong chemicals, passed out, hit her head, and died. End of story.”

  “What if someone wanted to test her immortality?” Jo asked. “What if they wanted to check their investment, make sure it was genuine?”

  The chief shook his head, taking a step back.

  “I’ll keep an open mind,” he said. “But we won’t open her death as a murder investigation unless we get some hard proof or a confession.”

  A confession would be good! That was what Jo prayed for as she drove toward the radio station. It was about ten miles outside of town, a right turn off of the highway and then down a long dirt road. She reached the small brick building just fifteen minutes before she was to be on the air, the closest she had ever cut it.

  Her laid-back producer didn’t seem concerned, however, which only served to remind her what a small-town market this was. If she hadn’t shown up today, he probably would have just put on a “best of” tape—and no one listening would have even cared.

  Jo grabbed a bottle of water, sat in the booth, spread out her papers, and waited for her cue. They had done some promos last week, and every advertisement they had run promised that today’s subject was camping.

  Oh, boy. How relevant to the average American woman.

  The clock ticked straight up to two o’clock, the producer pointed at her through the glass, and she was off and running.

  “Hello, friends, it’s camping time. Want to keep ants off the picnic table? Forget the bug spray. Just put the table legs in water-filled coffee cans and you’re good to go! Stay tuned for more Tips from Tulip after this.”

  The music cued up and Jo sat back in her chair, catching her breath and focusing for the show. Even when it was an off topic like this one, she still enjoyed it. Maybe she really should work on increasing her radio exposure.

  The hour went by quickly. One caller suggested pouring some rice in a tackle box to keep out moisture. That gave Jo an opening to suggest that whenever little ones come along on a fishing trip, the hooks should be kept in a childproof container, like an old medicine bottle.

  One caller wanted to know how to get sap off a tent, and Jo went through the process of rubbing the sap off with margarine and then cleaning with a light dish soap.

  “Here’s my favorite tip for the campsite,” she said, “one you’ll thank me for later. Bring along a hula hoop and a shower curtain, rig it up on a tree branch, and you have an instant dressing room. Throw in an inflatable kiddie pool, and it becomes your own private bathtub.”

  She told one caller how to make waterproof matches by dipping match heads in candle wax, and then she suggested that every camper should bring along the perfect fire starter in a plastic bag: cotton balls dipped in petroleum jelly.

  “They don’t take up much room,” Jo said. “And you’ll be really glad you have them if it rains and all your kindling gets wet. Speaking of kindling, save the lint from the dryer. It’s flammable, makes perfect fire starter, and, best of all, it’s free.”

  Mildew was a big topic, so she went through the steps for getting mildew off a tent.

  “Trust me, folks, you don’t want to clean your tent with harsh chemicals, like bleach or even ammonia. It needs a little more
tender loving care than that.”

  As Jo went down the list of dos and don’ts, she couldn’t help but think of Edna, with her fatal mix of bleach and ammonia. Someone else had to have combined those chemicals on purpose when Edna wasn’t looking. But who? How? When?

  All along Jo had had a hunch that Edna’s brother had killed her. Now, however, she was starting to doubt that theory. Edna’s death had hurt Simon in this con game, not helped him. All of his victims were turning on him, and apparently he was on the lam. Plus, he called her after her death, as if he thought she were still alive. So why did he leave town? Was he the one Jo heard Edna arguing with the night she was killed?

  Suddenly, Jo had a thought, and it was so all-consuming that she could barely finish the segment. When they went to a commercial break, she told the producer she’d be right back, ran outside where she could have some privacy, and called Danny on her cell phone.

  “I’ve got forty-three seconds,” she said quickly once he was on the phone. “Call the chief and ask him to call the coroner. Danny, every time I think about Edna inhaling those fumes and passing out, I wonder how someone could have mixed them right there in front of her without her even noticing. But what if those chemicals were mixed after she was dead? What if someone whacked her on the head to kill her, and then, to cover it up and make it look like an accident, poured bleach into the ammonia? Tell the chief to make sure the coroner examined Edna’s lung tissues. Because if she never inhaled those fumes, then his theory about her passing out from the homemade mix of cleaners just doesn’t hold water. Gotta go!”

  Jo made it back to the booth just in time, and she went immediately to a call so she could catch her breath.

  “Tips from Tulip, you’re on the air.”

  “I want to know how to keep our sleeping bags from getting all musty smelling over the winter,” a woman said.

  “Well, I’m glad you asked,” Jo replied, consulting her notes and trying not to sound flustered. “I’ve got three suggestions for you. First, store them in a cool, dry place, like a closet—never the basement. Second, when you’re finished with them for the season, don’t roll them up too tightly or they won’t have room to breath. Finally, when you do roll them up, slip a fabric softener sheet down inside. Follow those three steps, and your sleeping bags should keep smelling fresh all year long.”