I have a basic idea for the fourth novel also. After that, I’m not sure, but I think the world I’m building has enough in it to last for a while—I hope!
Most fun? Returning to Ireland both in real life for research and in my imagination. It’s a little like returning home. Most challenging? Balancing how much context from the previous books to include. Readers need to understand what’s going on—I’d like my novels to be readable as standalones—without giving away too many spoilers from the previous books. That’s a tricky proposition.
MG: I was going to ask you, “What’s next?” You’ve already mentioned your third novel, Touch of Death.
LA: I’m writing the first draft in the midst of revision work for Whispers in the Mist. Whew! But it’s going well. In addition to continuing Danny’s and Merrit’s stories, one of the minor characters in Whispers takes center stage in Touch of Death. His name is Nathan Tate, so look out for him in Whispers!
Kathleen Cosgrove
Kathleen is a humor and fiction writer living in Nashville Tennessee. Her Maggie Finn novels, Engulfed and Entangled are comedic mysteries set in Florida’s southwest coast. She is currently working on the third novel in the series, Entrapped. Her short stories appear in several anthologies and magazines. Her collection of Sam Heart shorts, a send-up of the Dashiell Hammett Sam Spade novels, will be available on audio by late 2017. She writes and performs her humorous memoirs in different venues in the Nashville area and those will be available as a collection called, “The View From Under My Desk,” by 2017.
SHORT STORY
Sam Heart and the Case of the Pinned-Up Knickers.
I was sitting at my desk, cleaning the gum from my shoe and watching the 5:06 pull into Union station right at 6:30 when the sound of footsteps on pavement told me I’d better grab the Colt 38 and check the barrel. Most of the time what’s on the other side of that door is trouble, and I mean with a capitol T and that rhymes with P and that stands for trouble. I don’t look for it, but it looks for me, and usually finds me too, here, at my desk, in my office.
You see, I’m a dick, a private investigator, a gumshoe, a flatfoot, a sherlock, a bizzy, a tracer, a snoop, a shamus. My name is Sam Heart, but the folks around here call me Sam. When I say around here I mean Nashville, the home of bright lights and shattered dreams, beautiful music and ugly…well, some ugly things too.
What I could see from the other side of the glass was definitely not ugly. She had a shape like a real shapely dame and it was clear from her tight dress that she wasn’t packing. I put the Colt back in the drawer and called out, “Door’s open sweetheart, come on in.”
She was even more beautiful than her silhouette, full red lips, an hourglass figure and silky golden hair that looked like gold silk.
“What can I do for you Miz…?”
“You can get me one of whatever it is you’re drinking,” she pointed to the glass of gin in my hand. “And put some ice in it. I like my gin cold and my men hot, if you get my drift.” She grinned like the cat that swallowed a little yellow bird. I was tempted to grab her and kiss her, but she looked like more trouble than a big sack of trouble.
“So doll, how’d you get that blood all over your dress, you shoot someone?”
“Say, what kind of detective are you anyway?” she asked. “I’m the one that got shot. See the hole in my chest where my inside stuff should be?”
“All you broads think you’re so clever, but I’ve seen it all before; you shoot your lover, put a hole in your chest and call yourself the victim.”
“But I am the victim,” she said, starting to cry.
“Here,” I handed her my handkerchief, “blow your nose and spill your guts.”
“But I have no guts, can’t you see? I’m dead, and when I say dead I mean not living, deceased, a corpse, a used to be an alive person. Didn’t you notice I came through the door instead of opening it?”
The broad was making sense now, but I still didn’t get her angle.
“What do you want from me? Looks like you need an undertaker, not a PI, a dick, a gumshoe, a…”
She broke in with more crying, “It’s not me who needs the help, it’s too late for me.” She finished her drink and handed me the glass, “More please.”
She downed the next one like a man...like a man that drinks gin, and then she walked slowly over to the window. “I used to love to ride the trains, they’re so connected to each other,” she said
She turned back to look at me, “It’s Little Johnny Knickers, you know, the guy who plays guitar and sings over at the Opry, he’s famous. They’re blaming it on him. The cops have got him locked up tighter than a guy in jail. He didn’t do it, I know, I was there.”
“Well, if he didn’t kill you, than who did?”
“If I knew that, I wouldn’t be here, asking you for help. You see,” she stopped and looked at the cigarette in my hand, “you gonna keep those all to yourself?”
I lit one and gave it to her. She inhaled. I couldn’t take my eyes off of her, watching that smoke pour out of her like smoke from a thing that’s burning.
“Go ahead,” I told her. “You were gonna tell me how you don’t know who shot you.”
“I don’t know who shot me.” She dragged hard on the Camel. “It was dark, and the shooter was wearing a hat and coat.”
“This is 1943 doll; everyone wears a hat and coat, even in August.”
“You see, Little Johnny and I were in the bushes and this... person in the coat walks up and just shoots me. Little Johnny’s knickers were up in a tree where I threw them, just playful like. Anyway, there wasn’t time for him to get them down before the cops got there. I was laying there, on the ground, watchin’ him trying to shinny up there and get them. I was saying, ‘Run Little Johnny, run, don’t worry about your knickers now’.
But he just kept jumping and grabbing and saying, ‘Shit, this is gonna be real bad for my career.’ But anyways, he couldn’t get a good foot hold, you know how that is.
By the time the cops got there, I was too dead to say anything, so they put the cuffs on Little Johnny and took him off... without his knickers.”
“Ok, so the two of you were havin’ a roll in the hay when…”
“No, not hay, bushes, or a hedge, or maybe even a flower bed, but not…”
“Never mind all that, tell me about the shooter. Could he have been the blackmailer?”
“How did you know…?”
“Doll, there’s always a blackmailer.”
“Well, someone’s been getting backstage at the Opry and pinning notes on his knickers,” she said, making smoke rings from the hole in her chest.
Then she walked over and picked the 38 off of the desk and pointed it at me. “Is this a gun in my hand, or are you just happy to see me?”
“Put that down and come with me.”
“Where are we going?”
“To the Opry, it’s show time.”
*****
The cabbie that brought her to my office was waiting for us at the curb.
“I hope you don’t mind,” she said, “the only cab I could get was this dead guy.”
“Hey, how many times do I gotta tell you, I ain’t dead?” he yelled out the window.
“Sure you are honey, don’t you feel a breeze where the back of your head should be?” she asked him.
She whispered to me, “Look at the size of that hole in his head, you could hang drapes in there.”
“You’re right, but in this town, the last thing you need to drive is a brain.”
*****
The Opry is a mixed bag of rhinestones and cheap whisky; of dames with soft voices and stiff hair; of men with cowboy hats and big city type things.
Little Johnny’s dressing room was now being used by Mrs. Maybelle Carter and her three girls. They looked innocent enough, but I smelled a rat, or maybe it was Old Spice. I knocked on the open door.
“What can I do for you PI?” she asked. “Why don’t you take off your beige tr
ench coat and wide brimmed hat and have a seat?”
“Thanks,” I said. It sure looks like you made yourself real comfortable in Little Johnny’s dressing room.”
“Say, are you accusing me of blackmailing Little Johnny so there would be a red herring into the investigation of the murder of his girlfriend and then murdering his girlfriend and letting him take the blame for it so that I could have this dressing room?”
“You’re real sharp for a dame, a doll, a skirt…”
“But I love Little Johnny like a brother. He promised that one day I can even perform on stage ‘stead of just playing my guitar back here, in the dressing room and sewing sequins on his under drawers.”
“You seen anything suspicious since you been here, in Little Johnny’s dressing room?”
“You don’t believe anyone here at the Opry could be a murderer do you?” Mrs. Maybelle asked. Why, we’re just plain folk who like to sing, play guitar, go to church, read our bible, drink our own home made whiskey, beat our wives, put things in our hair to make it look like something other than hair and cheat when there’s a good song in it.”
“That’s right,” said the oldest girl, little Junie, who was dressing her dolls all in black. “Everyone here is real nice to us, except for that lady who comes in here and puts notes on Little Johnny Knickers’ knickers, she was rude.”
I could see that I broke this kid good. She was ready to spill her guts and I was ready to catch ‘em.
“Tell me everything you know kid and I promise the feds will go easy on you.”
“The feds?” she started crying
“Why, you don’t suspect little Junie of doing anything wrong, do you?” asked Maybelle.
“In this town, every man with a guitar across his back and song lyrics on a matchbook is a suspect.” I said. “Every woman with a tune on her lips and an agent in her bed is a suspect. Every...”
“Ok, I’ll tell you,” yelled out little Junie. “It was Miss Bitsy, the one who owns the bar back behind here. She gave me the notes and a nickel and told me to pin them on, but I didn’t kill anyone, honest. Don’t make me go to prison.”
“You’re not goin’ to prison. Just keep your nose clean and steer clear of drunks. Here, clean your nose.”
*****
Our cabbie took us around the corner to Bitsy’s Fuschia Lounge.
Every bar stool in the joint was filled with people sitting at the bar. Someone on the stage was yodeling, so I shot him in the foot. I needed to get everyone’s attention and that guy was askin’ for it.
“Someone go get me Miss Bitsy.” I said
“I’m standin’ right here in front of you PI”
I had to look down to see her. She was three feet if you didn’t count the hair, four if you did.
My ghost dame was standin’ at the bar, hustling cocktails from a guy with a stab wound. The place was crawling with dead drunks. “Hey,” I shouted to her, “This dame look like the shooter?”
“Who the hell are you talkin’ too?” Bitsy asked, “Are you off your nut or somethin’?”
“Oh, didn’t I tell you?” my client said, “No one else can see me, just you and other dead people. Can we stay a while? I think the drowned guy over there is giving me the look over.”
I looked back down at Bitsy, “Don’t try to change the subject. I know it was you that was blackmailing Little Johnny. The kid you paid to do your dirty work sang like a canary that tells on people.”
“Are you saying Little Johnny and me were lovers?” asked Bitsy. “That we used to roll around in the costume trunk and play ‘hide the choo-choo in the tunnel’? That I found out that he was two-timing me with that floozy of a tramp of a floozy and ratted her out to her husband? That I’d been planning it all along and that’s why I let the kid pin the notes on the knickers, so a PI would come along and think Johnny was being blackmailed?”
“Sounds like you covered all the angles Bitsy, all but one.”
“What is it PI, dick, shamus, flatfoot, snoop…?”
“You’re holding the murder weapon in your hand.”
“Damn it, you’re smarter than you look, PI.”
“And you’re wearing Little Johnny’s knickers.”
“I thought you said there was only one thing.”
“And the coat and hat you wore the night of the murder.”
“OK, OK, you got me.”
“And the guy on stage is holding up a sign says he saw you do it.”
“Are you still talkin’ or am I gonna have to call the cops on myself?”
*****
I was sitting at my desk, scraping gum from my shoe when I heard footsteps on the stairs.
“Come on in sweetheart, door’s open.”
It was a red head, and I have always been a sucker for red heads, especially when they’ve got red hair.
“What can I do for ya’, good lookin’?”
“You can help me find my killer,” she said.
EXCERPT
Engulfed
”I couldn't stop laughing and couldn't put it down. Engulfed is a great read full of a cast of characters that any Florida town would recognize. From a cop born again as a hippie complete with a halfway house full of unusual taco dip, to a nursing home with bodies falling everywhere, to a senator with an unusual hobby to a middle aged heroine whose life has never been so exciting, this book is a funny, fantastic, free for all of twists with its own Yoda in the form of a seagull named Sherlock Holmes. I loved it and can't wait to read it again! - Amazon Reviewer Susan B
CHAPTER THREE
Edison invented the electric lamp in 1879. He also invented the talking doll in 1886, but that’s beside the point. The point is, if we’ve had electric lamps for 130 years and had wind and rain for at least that long, it should stand to reason we would have come up with a way to make electricity work even when it’s windy and rainy.
I knew these Edisonian tidbits from the little Thomas Edison brochure I found lying on the kitchen counter in my parents’ home. It seemed Thomas Edison lived and worked, and thought about talking dolls just a few miles north of here in Ft. Myers.
There were all kinds of little touristy brochures my mother left for me, which I was reading, by candle light, to remind myself that this is a nice state, a friendly state, a happy state, a state that tourists pay lots of money to come visit. It’s a place that’s just fine for my parents to live out their golden years. I had to remind myself of these things because right then it felt as though I were living in one of the nine circles of hell.
Hurricane Fanny. What a stupid name for a hurricane. If you wore a T-shirt that said I Survived Hurricane Fanny, people would think you’d won it in a mud wrestling contest.
I was surrounded by all the supplies the helpful man at Home Depot advised I get. There was duct tape, bleach, batteries, canned food, bottled water, first aid kit, candles, flashlight, and a bottle of wine. Ok, the wine was actually my idea.
Cut off from the world save my little battery operated TV, I was second guessing my decision to stay here instead of going to one of those hurricane shelters. After convincing myself earlier that one could be just as easily blown away there, as at home, that logic now no longer appeared as sound and the idea of cots and port-a-potties didn’t seem so bad after all.
Three hours after the storm started Fanny was in her full glory. The wind made roaring, window rattling sounds, hail was hitting the windows and there was lots of lightning. By lots, I mean the sky was almost continually lit. In fact, it was the only illumination I could see besides an occasional flashlight beam from the house behind mine. There was one exception though, and that was the intermittent large blast of greenish blue brilliant light, with its accompanying ear splitting crack and boom. These were, in fact, Mr. Edison’s great-grandchildren exploding as wires come lose and hit the ground. I was not quite sure if one of those monsters of power was outside my parents’ home. That’s not one of those things you look for when you’re negotiating a sales price fr
om your crooked real estate agent and simultaneously toying with the idea of feeding her to an alligator.
I had learned from the lawn guy that the alligators here were free to wander around Florida hunting our poodles and de-clawed cats and he took it upon himself to warn me about all the creatures lurking just outside my door waiting to bite, chew, claw, and sting or eat me. “Great,” I’d said, “my parents are living in a jungle, isn’t that swell?”
The power went out after the first 12 raindrops fell so there was no air-conditioning and the house had become a fifteen hundred square foot sauna. I was sweating profusely and at some point, regardless of what might happen, I cracked open a window.
I wandered from room to room, unconsciously turning on light switches and wishing I had bought unscented candles; the house smelled like a new age shop.
Staring at the patio doors, I was afraid something, or God forbid, someone would come crashing through them. The very concerned man on the TV was talking about how I should have boarded those up, as if he could see into my home. “A little late for that now,” I yelled at the TV, “Thanks for the heads up, Home Depot guy.”
Going back out for boards was out of the question so I emptied and flattened packing boxes, taped them to the doors and windows and stood guard. I was reminded of a scene from a Winnie the Pooh book I read to my granddaughter. Pooh stayed up all night marching back and forth, in his little Pooh house, with his little pop gun, protecting hearth and home from Heffalumps and Woozles. That was me. “Stay away you Heffalumps and Woozles, I’ve got duct tape and I’m not afraid to use it.”
The sustained wind speed, according to the news reports, was eighty five miles per hour but occasional gusts were much stronger, tearing tiles from roofs and uprooting trees, one of which went down in the neighbor’s yard and put a hole in their roof. I was very glad they were away in a regular state that God was not smiting, instead of being pinned under a large coconut palm in their bed.
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