The Trouble With Tulip

by Mindy Starns Clark

  Please, Danny, she thought urgently. Find me now.

  “The bank’s closed until tomorrow,” he said. “You’ll have to call your chemistry professor and get the copy instead.”

  “Why do you want it?”

  “Because it holds the secrets!” he cried, the gun trembling in his hand. “Because Simon promised it to me.”

  “Where did he get it?” she asked, hoping to keep him talking.

  “He first received it in the late-seventeen hundreds,” he said, his expression utterly serious. “It was given to him by a renowned alchemist. He has guarded it carefully for more than two hundred years, just waiting until he could find an apprentice worthy of the knowledge it contains.”

  “And you’re that apprentice?” Jo asked.

  Even in the dim, yellow light of the garage, Keith McMann did not look crazy. Intense, yes. Insane, no.

  “I am,” he replied. “I have devoted my life to the study of alchemy through the ages. When Simon approached me and told me he knew its secrets and was willing to share them with me, my lifelong dream had been answered at last. I won’t leave town without those notes.”

  Jo studied his face. Was there no way to convince him that Simon was a first-rate con man, that the professor had been sucked into Simon’s lies, just like the women had? Surely, Keith had seen the stories on the news.

  “How do you explain the mug shots of Simon Kurtz?” Jo asked. “What makes you think he was anything more than what the newspeople are saying he is?”

  “Because it’s all an elaborate ruse,” he whispered. “Because Simon fabricated his own past just in case any of this came to light. He always has a fail-safe. The secrets are too important to risk being revealed.”

  Jo’s trembling had calmed somewhat. She figured he would let her stay alive until they had acquired the notebook.

  “Dr. Langley says the notebook is gibberish,” Jo said. “He says it’s nothing but obscure symbols and nonsense notations.”

  To her surprise, Keith smiled.

  “Of course he said that. Only a true devotee of alchemy can understand what those symbols and notations mean. That’s how we’ve guarded our secrets through the centuries.”

  Jo hoped her professor hadn’t simply tossed the pages in the trash. Her mind raced, trying to think her way out of the situation.

  “Where’s your phone?” he demanded.

  “In my car. At Edna’s.”

  “We’ll have to use mine, then.”

  He glanced around, obviously looking for something. The garage was completely empty, however, except for a box of items over in one corner.

  Still keeping the gun pointed at Jo, he went to the box, reached inside, and pulled out a hose.

  “This’ll have to do,” he said.

  Kneeling behind Jo, he roughly pulled her wrists behind her back and wrapped the hose around them. He brought the rest of it around to the front and wrapped it around her ankles and then her legs.

  “That was you I heard arguing with Edna on Friday night, wasn’t it?”

  He shrugged, grunting with the effort of wrapping the hose around Jo’s body.

  “She called and told me she was going to confess everything to the police the next day,” he replied. “I tried to talk her out of it, but she wouldn’t listen to what I had to say. I came over, figuring I could talk some sense into her in person.”

  “Didn’t work, huh?”

  He jerked the hose tightly, pinching her skin.

  “The stupid woman was going to tell the police that she and Simon were involved in a con. She never understood that it was real. She never believed it at all.”

  “So you hit her with the brick.”

  “Just to shut her up!” he hissed. “Then at least I was free to search her house for the notebook.”

  “But you didn’t find it.”

  “No, I didn’t find it. By the time I was finished looking, I realized she was dead.”

  “So you put a dent in the windowsill, mixed some chemicals that would make it look like an accident, and then left.”

  “That’s about right,” he said. “Since then, I’ve been waiting to hear from Simon, waiting to learn where he had put the notebook for safekeeping. Then when you said you were settling Edna’s affairs, I realized that you had it, and that you didn’t even know what it was.”

  Danny was getting worried. The press conference was rolling along in full force, and there was still an empty seat beside him. He could see why Jo might be a little longer than she had predicted, but this was getting ridiculous.

  At the far end of the table, the chief was doing a good job of fielding questions. Danny was surprised to hear him say that though Simon Kurtz was in custody in Florida, he was currently in the hospital there, under full police watch.

  “Why in the hospital?” one of the reporters asked. “Was he injured during the arrest?”

  “No,” the chief replied. “He was having some heart troubles, so he was admitted for evaluation.”

  “Senator Sugarman,” another reporter said, “Simon Kurtz is your uncle. Do you know him well?”

  Danny had been impressed with the senator throughout the conference. She was a real pro at a microphone, articulate and intelligent—and evasive when necessary.

  “Simon was a part of my life, off and on, when I was a child,” she said. “I vaguely remember him. When he went to prison I was only six years old. My mother told me that my Uncle Simon had died. I wasn’t aware that was a lie until this week.”

  That earned a sympathetic gasp from the audience. Danny was impressed. He supposed she had shared that nugget of information to protect herself from the critics who might say she had hidden some potentially explosive facts about her family from the voters. To a politician, an uncle in prison could never be a good thing.

  “Danny,” another one asked, “do you think Jo Tulip will be able to get any household tips from this whole experience?”

  The audience laughed.

  “From what I know of Jo Tulip,” Danny replied, leaning toward the microphone, “she can get tips out of everything.”

  “Open your mouth,” Keith commanded when he was almost finished. He wrapped the final section of hose around her face, gagging her with it. “Good. Now, understand something. I’m going to get the phone from my car down the street. If you make one sound while I’m gone, when I get back I will put a bullet in your dog. Are we clear?”

  Jo nodded, eyes wide.

  She watched as he tucked the gun in his waistband, peered cautiously out the door, and then quietly opened it and slipped out.

  Jo was alone in the garage. Working quickly, she did the only thing she could think of: She started wiggling. The hose, being cylindrical, was bound to give way if she could just shake it off. Sure enough, though at first she could only move her neck and her ankles, soon she was able to move her legs and her waist. Finally, she spit the hose out of her mouth. It slipped down her shoulders, and then she pulled her hands free.

  She had done it.

  Danny had a feeling that something was wrong. Much to the chief’s dismay, he excused himself from the table right in the middle of a reporter’s question. Then he made his way through the room and outside, where he dialed Jo’s cell.

  Her phone rang a number of times but she never picked up. Danny ran to his car, a sense of desperation suddenly overwhelming him.

  He decided to start with his own house because that’s where Jo was headed with the dog. Driving as quickly as he could, he made his way through town, running a few stop signs along the way.

  When he finally got there, he screeched to a stop in his own driveway and ran inside.

  The dog wasn’t there.

  Jo ran to the door of the garage and peeked out, shocked to see Keith only about ten steps way. She was trapped.

  Moving quickly, she dragged the hose to the door, stretching it across the bottom where she might be able to make him trip.

  Sure enough, as he opened the door a
nd stepped inside, his feet were caught on the tangled rubber. He moved quickly, however, reaching for Jo and bringing her down with him as he fell.

  “Thought you could escape, did you?” he spewed.

  She scrambled away from him, trapped in the front corner of the garage. Now she had really done it.

  He managed to stand, pulling out the gun and pointing it at her. With the other hand, he pressed some buttons on the phone then set it on the ground and slid it in her direction.

  “Now, just press the call button,” he commanded, trying to catch his breath. “Tell Dr. Langley that you need the notes you gave him and that your good friend Dr. Keith McMann will be stopping by in just a little while to pick them up.”

  Hands shaking, Jo took the phone and pressed the button. Listening as it dialed, her mind raced. She knew that as soon as the call was over, she was as good as dead.

  “Hello?” the professor said.

  “Dr. Langley? It’s Jo Tulip,” she said, trying to keep her voice from trembling. “I need to ask you something.”

  “Sure,” he replied. “What can I do for you?”

  “You know those notes you looked through for me? The ones you said were just a bunch of junk? I-I need to get those back.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, Jo,” he said. “After we talked, I threw them away. I thought that’s what you wanted me to do.”

  Jo’s mind raced, her heart pumping furiously.

  “Super,” she replied, glancing at Keith. “Listen, could I send someone to get them right now?”

  The professor was quiet for a moment.

  “Didn’t you hear what I said?” he asked. “I threw them away.”

  “Excellent,” she replied. “I can’t get over there right now, so I’m going to send someone else, my good friend Dr. Keith McMann. Do you know him?”

  “Keith McMann? From the history department? Of course I know him, but I’m telling you, Jo, I don’t have those notes.”

  “Okay, hold on,” she said. She looked up at Keith. “He wants to talk to you.”

  She handed him the phone. She hoped he would be distracted enough by the confused professor on the other end of the line that she would be able to get away.

  Unfortunately, before speaking into the phone, Keith stepped closer and held the gun directly at her head.

  Again, she was trapped.

  Working backward, Danny drove to Edna Pratt’s house a few blocks away. Relief flooded through him as he spotted Jo’s car in the driveway. But the relief turned to confusion when he found that the car was running and the door was open, but Jo was nowhere to be found. He reached inside and turned off the ignition, a prayer for her safety stuck somewhere in his throat.

  “Hello, Bob? Keith McMann here.”

  Jo watched his face as he listened to what was being said. Glancing around desperately, she looked at the nearby cardboard box, the one where he had gotten the hose. Jo thought the box was otherwise empty, but in the bottom she could see a few empty packs of lemon Kool-aid and a bottle of oven cleaner.

  God bless Marie. She had left these items here after getting the stains off the driveway.

  Taking a deep breath, Jo rolled away from the gun, knowing it was time to go for broke since she was about to die anyway. She reached the box and grabbed the oven cleaner. Spinning around, she saw that Keith was right behind her.

  With a deep, guttural yell she let him have it, right in the eyes: a long, solid spray of Oven Off.

  He screamed and dropped the phone, grabbing at his face.

  “Call the police, Dr. Langley!” Jo screamed. “Send them to Weeping Willow Way!”

  Then she ran from the garage. Adrenaline pumping, her intention was to scoop up Chewie and carry him all the way to her car. He only weighed 50 pounds or so. She could do it.

  But when she came out of the garage, Chewie was gone.

  Danny hung up with the police, who said they were sending a car right over to investigate the strange disappearance of Jo Tulip. He was just slipping the phone back into his pocket when he saw movement from up the street.

  “Chewie?” Danny cried.

  The dog was coming toward him, but he was walking strangely, weaving back and forth, falling down and getting up again. Danny wanted to run to him and help, but his first thought was rabies. He froze, not knowing what to do.

  Suddenly, a figure appeared in the darkness on the road behind the dog, also coming in this direction. It was Jo!

  “Danny!” she hollered. “Start your car!”

  Without hesitating, he did as she said. He jumped in and started it up and drove to her on the road. She was hysterical, sobbing, saying something about Keith McMann coming after them with a gun.

  Together, they lifted the dog into the backseat, but before they could get back in the car themselves, a gunshot rang out, striking the vehicle directly on the front bumper.

  “Go! Go!” Jo said.

  On the road in front of them stood Keith McMann, a gun in his hand, his face shiny with some sort of white foam.

  They jumped into the car and Danny slammed it into reverse, pressing the gas pedal all the way to the floor. He steered the best he could backward, spinning out in a driveway so he could take off again, forward this time. Another shot rang out, shattering the windshield, and then suddenly, one police car whizzed past, and then another.

  Danny drove to the end of the street, screeching to a stop once he thought they were safe enough to see what was happening. He climbed out of the car, listening at the shouts of the police. Soon, from what he could tell, they had apprehended McMann without more gunfire.

  Everyone was safe.

  Danny looked again at Jo, but she had climbed into the back and was cradling Chewie’s head in her lap.

  “What’s wrong with him?” Danny asked.

  “He was poisoned,” she said, crying. “Please, Danny, take us to a veterinarian. I can’t lose him. He’s my second-best friend in the world.”

  31

  Danny sat at the kitchen table, drinking his morning coffee and looking out across the yard toward Jo’s house. He had seen her cutting through earlier with her backpack and her Rollerblades, but even when she stopped to put a note in the gnome, he didn’t come out and tell her he was awake. Once she was gone, he had retrieved the note, which said, simply, “Chewie’s doing okay. Still at the vet. Went Rollerblading.”

  They had taken the dog to the emergency veterinary clinic last night, where his stomach was pumped and he was intubated. The doctors had been quite confident that he had already seen the worst of it, but they wanted to keep him there until this afternoon, just in case. They said there should be no lingering effects.

  From there, Jo and Danny had gone, once again, to the police station. If they had been heroes before, they were positively stars now. After they had given their statements, the press corps had come out in full, interviewing Jo about how she solved the mystery of who killed Edna and how she had made her escape. The morning’s headlines had a field day with that one: “Household Tip Expert Discovers New Use for Oven Cleaner.”

  Danny had been so impressed with Jo last night as she spoke to the interviewers. She was poised and beautiful, and as the police chief watched from the sidelines, Jo made sure to give him full credit for everything he had done in this case and more.

  “It makes me feel so safe,” she had said, “to live in a community like Mulberry Glen. We have a top-notch police department, led by a very talented and hardworking man, Chief Harvey Cooper.”

  When all of the excitement had finally died down, Danny brought Jo back to her car and then followed her home. Even though Keith McMann was now behind bars, Danny wanted to make sure that she was safe.

  He had hardly slept all night. Instead, he kept thinking about Jo and how close she had come to death. He realized that no matter what happened, he had to tell her how he felt about her. He had to do it today.

  Putting his cup in the sink, he decided to bike over to the park and find her. Maybe
they could talk there.

  It was time to go for broke.

  On the way he glanced down Edna’s street, where he saw Sally Sugarman out in front of her mother’s house. He took the curve so he could say hello, and she smiled warmly as he rolled up.

  “There’s the star of the hour,” she said. “From what I understand, you were Jo’s knight in shining armor last night.”

  He shrugged.

  “She saved herself,” he told her. “I just provided the transportation.”

  They talked for a few minutes. Sally had returned her rental car last night, deciding not to sell Edna’s vehicle after all, but to keep it for her teenage daughter. Sally was leaving today, driving all the way to Texas, the boxes of her mother’s photos and papers and other keepsakes already tucked securely into the trunk and the backseat.

  “If you don’t mind,” she said, “would you tell Jo to cancel the classified ad for selling the car? I added a bonus in her check, to cover the percentage I had promised her.”

  Sally said that from what she could tell, the job was just about finished. She had already written out a check for the balance that she owed and left it on the kitchen counter.

  “I’ll be calling her,” Sally said. “But please tell her I said thank you for everything that she did. Thank you, too, Danny. On behalf of my mother, thank you.”

  Jo rolled down the sidewalk as fast as she dared, realizing as she went that she was missing Chewie. She was counting the hours until 2:00 P.M., when she would be allowed to pick him up. She’d already spoken to the animal hospital this morning, and they said that the tube was out and he was doing beautifully. She had also called a fencing company and arranged for them to come next week and fully fence in the yard—though with an extra gate at the back for Danny to come through.

  Compared to last week, this next week should be a breeze. This afternoon, a policeman was going to accompany Jo to the bank, where she would take out the alchemy notebook from her safety deposit box and hand it over as evidence. Tonight she hoped Danny would be free to help her finish up Edna’s house.