The Mystery Sisters series Box Set

by Karen Musser Nortman

  “Very funny.”

  Finally she could sit up on the counter and let herself down to the floor. In the process, something rolled off the counter and crashed.

  “Give me the light.” She held her hand out the window. Tess put it in her hand and Max turned to see where she had landed.

  “Get the door open first,” Tess hissed. “We’ve been lucky so far, but I don’t want to stand out here longer than necessary.”

  Max bustled around and got the door unlocked. As Lil closed it quietly behind them, Max shone the light around the apartment. A jar of jam lay broken on the kitchen floor. The living room, just off the kitchen, held one oversized recliner, a broken-looking sofa, a huge flat-screen TV, and a large desk in one corner.

  “Dutch wasn’t much of a decorator.” Lil said.

  Max headed for the corner. “We need to check the desk first.” A laptop computer sat closed on the desk top and a printer in the back corner. Max opened the laptop and the screen sprang to life.

  “Good.” Tess rubbed her hands together. “He didn’t even log out.”

  Lil looked around while Max brought up the documents file. “I can’t believe the sheriff hasn’t been here and taken his records.”

  Max scrolled through the file names. “I don’t see anything that looks like a manuscript, unless he’s given it a fake name.”

  Tess went in the bedroom, closed the drapes and turned on a small table lamp. She opened the closet and started pulling boxes off the shelf. “Lil, come in and help me with this stuff.”

  Max peeked around the corner of the doorway. Tess had five or six boxes on the bed and searched through each. Lil started on one at the other end of the row.

  Max went back to the computer screen. The file names looked mostly like news articles: council election, water plant, homecoming court, and so on. She considered that these might be topics in his manuscript and opened one of the council files. It read like a news story—dry statements about votes, budgets and appointments. She tried another one. Same thing. As she scrolled on, a file title caught her eye: Jacobsen plant.doc.

  Maybe this was something. But she opened it to find nothing—a blank Word doc. She closed it and checked the date on the file. It was dated ten years earlier. Why would someone delete the content of the file instead of the whole file? Or maybe Dutch created a file but never wrote anything.

  Tess and Lil came out of the bedroom. “Nothing remotely close,” Tess said. “Check registers, photos, paperback books.”

  “One box has nothing but old ties, all rolled up. Most of them wrinkled and grease-spotted.”

  Max closed the laptop and stood up from the desk. She took the flashlight from Lil and played the beam around the living room again. The couch was one of the saddest pieces of furniture that she had ever seen. The lumpy cushions cantered at odd angles, and the back appeared to be frameless in spots. She walked over and pulled up an end cushion. A box that would hold a ream of printer paper was shoved down in a corner, distorting the cushions.

  “Lookee here, ladies.” She pulled the box out and set it on a wobbly side table. The aqua ceramic table lamp teetered and crashed to the floor.

  Lil rushed to pick it up. “Max! Take it easy.”

  Max eyed the lamp. “Looks like no loss to me.” She pulled the lid off the box and used the flashlight to examine the top piece of paper.

  “I think this is it.”

  A crash from the kitchen made them freeze. Scrambling sounds followed. Max picked up the box and crept toward the door, keeping the light ahead of her. If someone was there—and what else could it be?—she could blind them temporarily with the light while the others got away.

  Tess and Lil followed close behind. At first, they couldn’t see anyone. Max aimed the light toward a scratching sound near the floor.

  Max let out a deep breath. “There’s the culprit, girls.” A grey squirrel nibbled the spilled jam until the light hit him. He froze a moment and then scurried toward the back of the kitchen.

  Lil screeched and dashed for the outside door. Tess followed. “Right behind you, sister.”

  Carrying the box, Max kept the light on the squirrel and backed out the door.

  “Hold this.” She thrust the box toward Tess, pulled the sash most of the way down on the window, and put the chair back. “Let’s get out of here.”

  “What about the door lock?” Tess asked.

  Max shook her head. “Nobody’s going to know whether Dutch locked his door or not.” She led the way down the stairs.

  “You can’t leave that squirrel in there,” Lil hissed.

  “I just did. He’ll find his way back to the window, but by the time he’s done rampaging around in there, he’ll cover our tracks.” They retraced their steps to the car, watching for any signs of observers. “It’s perfect. Dutch left the window cracked for air and the squirrel got in. Knocked the jam off the counter, broke the lamp, who knows what else?”

  Tess started her car, but sat there a minute. “I don’t know, Max. If we find any clues in that manuscript, how are you going to explain to the sheriff how you got it?”

  Max stared out the window, thinking, and then looked back at Tess. “We can go through it tonight, and I’ll put it back early in the morning, before he has a chance to search.”

  “That won’t explain how you know anything you find out,” Lil said.

  Max sighed. “Let’s go back to Carol’s and see what we’ve got. We can talk about the consequences if we find anything. Drop me back at the VFW so I can pick up my car. Are you going home, Tess, or are you going to join us?”

  “I didn’t go through all of this to just go home and go to bed.”

  Chapter Eight

  Lil opted to ride with Tess. She was angry with Max over the incident, which made Max wonder why she went along in the first place. She wanted to be a part of everything, but she was such a chicken. Chickens reminded her of squirrels, and she chuckled to herself about their unexpected accomplice in the break in, as she started the Studebaker and pulled out behind Tess.

  There had to be a clue in the manuscript. She glanced at the box in the passenger seat to reassure herself that it was still there. She drove much slower than Tess on the gravel road to avoid getting her car any dustier than necessary. She got to the farm, retrieved the box, and locked her car. By the time she got in the house, Carol looked at her in disbelief, and Bob gave her an icy stare. Rosie, on the other hand, ran up to her and licked her hand.

  “Couldn’t wait to spill the beans, could you?” Max said to Lil.

  “It was stupid.”

  “Then you shouldn’t have gone.”

  “I didn’t think you’d really do it.”

  Bob shook his head. “It was stupid. What were you—any of you—thinking?”

  Max was surprised and hurt. In the forty-some years that Bob and Carol had been married, he had never criticized or said a cross word to her. They had always gotten along well, and shared a similar sense of humor and political views. This was too much. Didn’t they realize Donnie’s freedom was at stake?

  “I was thinking that someone had to do something. Donnie’s in jail. We all know he’s not guilty, but I’m not convinced your sheriff is sharp enough to look beyond the bird in the hand.”

  Carol put her hand on Max’s arm. “Maxine, please remember that we have to live here. You can take off and not face any of the gossip.” Her voice was gentle and pleading. Always the peacemaker.

  Max shook her hand off. “Maybe I should go stay in the motel. It doesn’t sound like I’m welcome here any more.”

  “Max,” Carol pleaded. “Don’t be like that. We all want to help Donnie. Let’s see what you found and we can talk about the repercussions later. C’mon—sit down. I’ve made some coffee.”

  Max reluctantly put the box on the table and pulled out a chair. She refrained for the time being from glaring at Lil. “All of the suspects we have heard mentioned—Junie Coonley, Cecil Ridley, Charlie Gomar—are someho
w connected to this manuscript. Maybe Sheriff Burns would eventually get to it, but he’s obviously short-handed. Okay, it was dumb to break in there. But we have it now. If we divide it up, we can scan it and look for names. Then I’ll take it back.”

  Tess grinned. “What if the squirrel’s still in there?”

  “Squirrel?” Bob asked.

  “A squirrel got in,” Lil said. “We left the window open.”

  “You went in through a window?”

  “Just Max did,” Tess said. “She unlocked the door for us.”

  “Lord.” Bob smoothed his hair and leaned back in his chair. “I wish I had seen that.” He tried to keep a straight face but started to laugh. Guffaws exploded from deep in his chest until he gasped for breath.

  Finally he took a deep breath and wiped his eyes. “That doesn’t make it any less dumb. All right, let’s see what’s in that box.” He kept shaking his head. “Carol used to tell me stories about you and Tess when you were young, and I thought they were exaggerated. Now I can see they were not. She probably toned them down.”

  Max glanced at Tess, shrugged, and opened the paper box. She lifted out a stack of paper. After looking at the last page, she said, “There’s 150 pages here. So if we each take thirty and skim them looking for names, maybe we can find something.” She divided them up, handing each of the others a stack.

  For the next hour, the only sound was the shuffling of pages, with an occasional scrape of a chair for a coffee refill. Carol had put a package of sticky flags in the center of the table to mark pages they thought might be pertinent. She also added a plate of oatmeal cookies with white chocolate chunks and macadamia nuts for sustenance.

  The first time Lil reached for one of the flags, she said, “I might have something here.”

  Max frowned at her. “Just mark it and when we’re all done, we’ll go through everything we find.”

  Lil’s face fell, but she didn’t say anything and went back to her search. Bob uttered a little ‘oh-ho’ once as he reached for a flag. Tess said ‘hmmm’ or ‘wow’ several times before marking something. Even Max had a couple of eyebrow raises. But they all resisted elaborating until they were finished.

  “Okay, I was going to return this early in the morning, but I should take it back before we go over these. Let’s make copies of the marked pages and then I’ll run it into town,” Max said.

  Carol and Max took the stacks into the home office. Max used the stickies to find each pertinent page, removed the flag, and handed the page to Carol who made a copy.

  Max stacked the pages in order and replaced them in the box. “Well, I’d better get this back to Dutch’s apartment.”

  Carol laid her hand on Bob’s arm. “Honey, you should go with her.”

  Seeing the look of panic on Bob’s face, Max objected. “Absolutely not. You’ll have enough embarrassment if I get caught, but at least you’ll have ‘plausible deniability,’ as the politicians say.”

  Tess got up. “I’ll go. In for a penny, in for a pound.”

  They took Tess’ car again and soon were back behind the house with Dutch’s apartment. Max groaned a little as she got out of the car—this escapade was taking a toll on her knees. And she still had to climb the stairs.

  She huffed up the steps behind Tess. “I’m sure glad we left the door unlocked. I couldn’t do the window again.”

  Tess opened the door and aimed her flashlight inside. “I don’t see the squirrel, but he made a heck of a mess.”

  Max followed her in, and they headed for the living room. Tess held the light while Max lifted the couch cushion and shoved the box back under it. They had just reached the kitchen when a dull thud came from the bedroom.

  “The squirrel?” Tess whispered.

  Footsteps sounded and a door closed. “No. Let’s get out of here.”

  They hurried down the steps trying to avoid a twisted ankle at the same time. They didn’t worry about slamming the car doors or seat belts, and Tess soon had them racing away from the cul de sac.

  Tess got her breath and said, “Jessica Fletcher wouldn’t have run away.”

  “That’s why we’re not on TV.”

  “Who do you think was in there? Couldn’t have been anyone who was supposed to be—like the sheriff, for instance?”

  “The sheriff wouldn’t be there in the dark. My first guess would be the murderer, but it could be anyone who thinks that manuscript would give him—or her—trouble. Or maybe they were looking for something else.”

  Tess shrugged. “You’re right. It’s wide open. It may not even be connected to his murder.”

  It was almost midnight by the time they returned. Bob dozed in his recliner while Carol and Lil still sat at the kitchen table talking quietly about the copied pages.

  “There’s a fresh pot of coffee,” Carol said.

  “Just what I need—more caffeine,” Max muttered.

  Carol got out a yellow legal pad and some highlighters. “Let’s get a few notes on what we found, and then I need to go to bed.”

  Bob stirred and came back in the kitchen, but looked like he could barely keep his eyes open. “How did the reverse thievery go?”

  Tess told them about the sounds they heard.

  “Was it that squirrel?” Lil asked.

  Tess shook her head. “Not unless he was wearing large-sized shoes. We definitely heard footsteps.”

  Carol scratched her head. “How odd. Would they know who you were?”

  Tess shrugged. “We didn’t talk much and then only whispered. It was spooky.”

  “I hope they can’t identify you,” Carol answered.

  Max took a stack of papers and a highlighter. “Whoever it was obviously shouldn’t have been there either, so even if they recognized either of us, they couldn’t say anything without exposing their own guilt. Let’s get this done. First, did anyone find any references to our family?”

  “Not me,” Carol said.

  Lil shook her head, and so did Tess. Max looked at Bob.

  “Uh, no. So that should clear all of us, once the sheriff has a look at the manuscript. Unless you found something?”

  “I didn’t. But that doesn’t clear us. If any of us thought there was something in there, that’s enough for motive.”

  “Sure. But that’s true of anyone. The suspects certainly aren’t limited to the people mentioned in the memoir.”

  “So, what are we looking for then?” Tess asked.

  “Anybody else that’s mentioned, especially in a negative way.”

  Lil held up a page. “He talks about that new editor here—Gomar? Dutch says he was reluctant to sell to him at first because he didn’t have any references.”

  Carol said, “I thought he worked for a big paper in Chicago?”

  “He apparently did—they confirmed that much but wouldn’t give him a reference.”

  “Odd,” Max said. “Sounds like there’s something behind that. What else?” She wrote Charlie Gomar’s name down on a blank sheet of a legal pad and printed “Suspects” at the top, underlined three times.

  “How about Cecil Ridley? Anyone find his name?” Bob said.

  They all shook their heads. Max tapped the pad with her pen. “I wouldn’t expect to, though. If Dutch was going to expose the deal Dad made, Cecil would want that to happen. The only motive he could have would be to throw the blame on us. Nothing that would be in Dutch’s book.”

  Lil said, “What about Donnie’s buddies? It seems like they must have had something to do with placing Donnie ‘at the scene,’ as they say. Any of them have a motive? I don’t remember anything that would tie J.P. in.”

  “Didn’t Pete Murphy’s dad work for your dad?” Tess asked.

  Carol rubbed her forehead. “Bill Murphy was the head of marketing. He and Dad were best friends. They served together in North Africa and Italy during the War. And Bill retired very comfortably a few months before Dad sold the company. Pete would have no reason to hold a grudge.”

  “We sho
uld check out J.P. Prentiss then. And maybe he knows how Donnie ended up in Dutch’s car. He had to have some way to get back from the lake.”

  “Junie Coonley is mentioned on the pages I looked at—not in connection with any affair, but questioning her campaign for mayor,” Bob said.

  Max nodded and added Junie’s name to the list. “Interesting. What other names? Let’s just get the list done and then I need to get to bed.”

  Chapter Nine

  Harsh light filtered through the blinds in the pleasant guest room, striking Max’s head on the pillows. She groaned and threw her arm up over her eyes. She shifted the arm a bit peeking at the intrusion. It must be late. She was usually up long before the sun. She rolled over to check her watch on the nightstand.

  The movement, slow and deliberate as it was, shot a pain up her back. Her first thought was a heart attack or similar dreaded event that lurked in the background of most seventy-something’s minds. Then she remembered her escapades of the night before. What was she thinking, crawling in a window? Or more accurately, being stuffed and pushed through a window? An old rotting window with rough edges. Onto a hard counter several feet from the floor. Ugh.

  She gingerly sat up and swung her feet over the side of the bed. She leaned forward on her hands, thinking about making the supreme effort to get up, when a black-and-white photo in a gold frame on the nightstand caught her eye. She picked it up and held it to one of the errant sunbeams. Four little girls in identical plaid dresses, wayward curls, and barrettes protectively surrounded a toddler boy in a matching plaid shirt and shorts. Max, the tallest and her brown hair straighter than the others, rested her hand on Donnie’s head. Lil, on the other side, had her hand on one shoulder. Sharon and Carol kneeled on either side, each holding on to one of Donnie’s hands. Donnie, for his part, looked like he would do anything to escape.

  Max smiled sadly and set the picture back on the table. That photo pretty much summed up what was wrong with Donnie. No wonder he had always been so rebellious. She thought of Donnie now sitting in jail, and stood with effort. Some light stretches helped. She picked up her linen pants off a chair and examined with regret the three-corner tear in the thigh.