A Body in the Backyard

by Elizabeth Spann Craig

  Chapter Three

  Red was taken aback. “A reception? With…food?”

  “Of course with food! This is the South, Red. People want food when they’re grieving. People expect food when they’re grieving,” said Myrtle.

  “They don’t expect the kind of food you cook, Mama.” Red and Miles exchanged grim looks.

  “I think they’ll be delighted,” said Myrtle. She frowned. “Are you trying to be ugly about my cooking again?”

  “I’m just saying that, unless you want a whole bunch more dead bodies on your property, I’d consider getting your reception catered,” said Red. “Okay, that’s it for me. Miles, I’ll be getting back in touch with you soon I’m sure. I better head over to the station and fill out paperwork.” He headed to the front door.

  Myrtle said quickly, “Better watch out. Erma has left her lair and it looked like she wanted to pester somebody.”

  Red peered out the front window at the sea of gnomes. “You know, Mama, you’re not exactly a prize for a neighbor either.”

  “I certainly am!”

  “I’m your neighbor, so I think I’m well-qualified to give an opinion on your adequacy in that regard,” said Red.

  “Miles, back me up,” said Myrtle.

  But Miles looked like he was suffering a nightmarish flashback of some kind. Myrtle trusted it had nothing to do with her worthiness as a neighbor.

  Red said, “At any rate, it looks like Erma has given up and gone back inside.”

  “Pasha is such a good cat,” said Myrtle, pleased.

  “If you say so,” said Red. “And Mama, I’m not sure what’s going on with the murder in your backyard, but please make sure to keep your doors locked. We just don’t know what we’re dealing with right now. And for heaven’s sake, don’t play detective. All I need is for you to stick your nose into the middle of this stuff and muck up my investigation.” He walked out the front door and strode down the front walkway.

  Myrtle hurried after him, thumping the walkway with her cane. “I don’t make a habit of mucking up investigations,” said Myrtle, making her voice as frigid as she possibly could. “As you know, I solve the mysteries. I help you out.”

  Red shook his head. “Maybe you’ve been lucky, Mama. Maybe you’ve stumbled into stuff by accident. Regardless, you need to keep out of it this time. You only just finished getting over that really dangerous virus, followed by an infection.”

  “What dangerous virus? You mean the sniffles?” Myrtle gave what she hoped was a careless, scoffing laugh. “It takes more than a drippy nose to take me down, Red.”

  “It was more than a drippy nose. It got into your chest, as you well know, and you ended up with bronchitis.”

  “Just a little cough,” said Myrtle. This was all starting to make her feel grouchy.

  “Just a little cough, or another reminder that you’re in your late-eighties? You’re no spring chicken, you know. Leave the investigating to the pros.”

  It was lovely being told she was too old to do things.

  Red’s toddler son, Jack, bolted out of their house and saw the lawnmower that Dusty was packing up into his dilapidated truck. Jack was currently fascinated by anything with an engine. “I mow!” he half-commanded, half-begged his father, pointing at the beat-up mower.

  Red picked up Jack and gave him a hug. “Can’t do it, buddy,” he said, swinging the boy around and putting him back down again. “You’re too little to mow the grass. But I’d love for you to help me out in another ten years.”

  Red hurried inside the house. Myrtle looked wryly at Jack. “So I’m too old and you’re too young.”

  Jack furrowed his brow and pointed again at the mower.

  “Lucky for you, I’ve figured out the cure for these types of insults and rejections.” Myrtle fished in her dress pocket. “Chocolate.”

  They beamed at each other. Myrtle broke the chocolate bar in half and Jack put a big chunk in his mouth, then gave her a chocolaty grin.

  “Now I need you to run inside, little man. I’ve got some stuff to do at my house.” Myrtle watched him run safely back inside and headed home.

  Miles was making motions like he wanted to leave. “Have a seat, Miles,” said Myrtle. “After all, that must have been a huge shock for you.”

  Miles sighed with resignation and obediently took a seat but said, “Not particularly. I can’t make myself feel even very concerned about it.”

  He settled into Myrtle’s cushy sofa. Myrtle sat opposite him in an upright armchair and leaned forward. “Okay. Now, let’s hear all about Cousin Charles.”

  Miles blinked at her from behind his glasses. “As I told the police, I really don’t….”

  “And I don’t want that vague story you gave the cops, either. I want the dirt on the guy who ended up pushing up daisies in my backyard.”

  Miles sighed. “I don’t have any dirt, Myrtle. I don’t even know the man. I didn’t want to, either. He was many years younger than me, obviously and always sounded somewhat unsavory, no matter how my aunt bragged about him.”

  “Unsavory. Now we’re getting somewhere! What qualities made him unsavory?” asked Myrtle.

  “Oh, I don’t know. Sometimes one of my other cousins would email me and dish on Charles. Things she’d heard. Apparently he’d struggled with substance abuse, for one,” said Miles.

  “So he was a druggie. Good. That’s something solid we can work with. What else?” asked Myrtle.

  “Maybe not a druggie. Maybe an alcoholic. I’m not really sure. At any rate, if there were any hint from my aunt about Charles’s issues, she’d quickly blame them on a vast government conspiracy of some kind. She always made excuses for her son. I just tuned her out,” said Miles.

  “Mmm. Okay. Well, people do desperate things to get their next fix, right? Even if that’s a bottle of whiskey. So, let’s move on. Who do you think wanted to kill him?” asked Myrtle.

  “Well, I don’t really know that. Since I didn’t know him.” Miles frowned at Myrtle.

  “Let me rephrase that. Who wanted to kill him…besides you?” asked Myrtle.

  “What? I didn’t want to kill Cousin Charles! I said I didn’t even know him,” said Miles, looking as excitable as it was possible for him to look.

  “Except that he wanted to take money from you. I believe you to be fairly tight-fisted when it comes to money. You want to spend it all on good scotch and collector-editions of Hemingway. Not to support your clingy, drug-using cousin,” said Myrtle.

  “I certainly am not! Not like that, I mean. And I have no idea why my cousin was nearby…I’m only guessing that he was trying to find me to ask for money.” Miles glared at her. “It could be that he was trying to break into your house and look for money or something to sell on the street. In that case, maybe you killed him with the gnome, in self-defense. Or, to have something to do. We all know how bored you get and how much you like investigating mysteries.”

  Myrtle spluttered trying to formulate a response and Miles stood up, smoothing out imaginary wrinkles from his carefully pressed trousers. “And now I really must be going. I’ll need to talk with my family about this tragic death.” He stood to leave in a huff.

  Myrtle looked thoughtfully at him. It was funny how death had such interesting effects on people. “Oh, Miles, have a seat. I need about forty-five good minutes to just relax and gather my thoughts.”

  Miles brightened. “Are you proposing that we watch our show?”

  “I sure am. Tomorrow’s Promise just finished taping for today. We can eat some graham crackers and peanut butter and watch our soap,” said Myrtle with satisfaction.

  “Just as long as you remember that you’re not to tell anyone that I have a soap. You got me hooked on it, that’s all.”

  “They’re very addicting shows,” said Myrtle, knowingly.

  “Didn’t it scare you? Finding a body in your yard like that?” asked Red’s wife, Elaine. That afternoon, Myrtle walked across their quiet street to Red�
�s house to visit with her daughter-in-law and grandson. Toddler Jack played on the floor making truck noises and pushing toy cars around on the floor.

  Myrtle shook her head. “Not a bit. But I didn’t find the body, technically. Dusty did.”

  Elaine reached out and absently pulled a toy car out of Jack’s mouth. “Oh, that must have been interesting. Dusty’s always scowling when I see him. Did he even look surprised when he found the body? Worried? Upset?”

  “Of course not. He was as ornery as anything. He acted more concerned that body removal was somehow in the yardman job description. Kept fussing that it wasn’t fair that there was a body out there when he already had to weed-whack around all the gnomes. You know.” Myrtle rolled her eyes.

  “Was Puddin with him when he found the body?” asked Elaine.

  “No. But you should have known the answer to that question already. If Puddin had found the body, you’d have heard her screaming from all the way over here,” said Myrtle. Jack stood up and handed her a very wet toy police car and Myrtle gingerly picked it up and made vroom, vroom noises.

  “You know, I always thought that Bradley was such a peaceful little town,” said Elaine thoughtfully. “It’s got the tree-lined, quiet streets, the quaint shops. No national chains anywhere. A beautiful lake. And here we are with bodies fairly littering the city all the time.”

  “It’s peaceful, Elaine, I promise. Other towns have a whole lot more crime than this. You know the kinds of cases that Red is usually working on,” said Myrtle.

  Elaine nodded. “There’s Mrs. Hatter, who always calls about the kids who trespass in her yard and cut her clothesline. Nuisance calls from the Smiths because their neighbors always play loud music next door and it drives them crazy.”

  “And don’t forget his big task as chief of police,” said Myrtle. “Putting up the town of Bradley’s Christmas decorations each November.”

  “For Red, that’s the hardest part of his job,” said Elaine with a laugh. “He’s convinced some miscreant sneaks into the Town Hall each summer and maliciously tangles up all the lights.”

  They chuckled over this, and Jack, watching them, chuckled too. Myrtle reached over to squeeze the boy in a hug

  Elaine said, “But it’s not all sunshine and roses, Myrtle. Red had an incident just the other day and I was with him.”

  “Did he now?” asked Myrtle absently as Jack clutched at her leg and drove a toy car up her easy-care navy slacks.

  “Yes.” Elaine stood up and moved across the room to a desk that was fairly overflowing with paper. She started shuffling through the stacks. Myrtle winced as she watched her. Elaine must have a new hobby. Elaine took on new hobbies with determination and poured much of her considerable energy into the pursuit, exhausting everyone around her. Sadly, she’d yet to hit on something that she was truly gifted in doing.

  Elaine stopped pawing through the pile of papers, and abruptly turned and looked at Myrtle with an enthusiastic expression that Myrtle knew well. “Did you know that I’ve taken up photography?” she asked with excitement lacing her voice.

  Photography. Excellent! No being subjected to painstakingly created and horrid watercolors or oils. No mysterious-looking sculptures or indecipherable charcoal sketches. “No, you didn’t tell me you’d taken up photography. Are you enjoying it?”

  “It’s fantastic,” said Elaine, searching through the pile again while Jack toddled over to drive his car on her foot. “I love the feeling that I’m looking at the world through a lens. It makes me closer to the world and farther away at the same time.”

  Was she any good, though? Or was this going to be another one of those endeavors where Red and Myrtle gave insincere but well-meant praise on disastrous projects? She had that old familiar feeling of trepidation.

  “Now I’m just starting out,” said Elaine, turning around with some pictures in her hand, “so these will be a little blurry.”

  Great.

  “But ordinarily I’m shooting still-life kinds of compositions, so this action shot was new for me. It’s just to prove that we do have stuff going on in Bradley after all,” said Elaine. She handed the pictures to Myrtle.

  There was Cousin Charles in a vibrant pre-murdered state, in the act of punching Lee Woosley in the face at a poker game.

  Elaine said regretfully, “If it didn’t have that bit of my finger in the corner, it would be even better. I was so excited at having something really exciting to shoot that I forgot how to handle the camera.”

  Myrtle pulled the picture aside and put it on the end table next to her chair. She slowly cycled through the rest of the pictures. There were quite a few of Jack that she thought were absolutely darling but probably weren’t exactly photographic masterpieces. There were a few of downtown Bradley with close-ups of the old Coca Cola sign on Bo’s Diner. Pictures of the American flags flanking the tree-lined main street. And then there were some midrange shots of gatherings. Some old ladies gossiping at the farmer’s market, some old men cutting up outside the gas station.

  And—there was another shot of Cousin Charles. This time he wasn’t fighting but appeared to be having a deep and meaningful conversation with Myrtle’s dentist. She spotted that red hair right off the bat. She frowned. Did Cousin Charles have bad teeth? Why was he being so serious?

  “So—what do you think?” asked Elaine, looking anxious.

  “I think Cousin Charles was a troublemaker,” said Myrtle with conviction.

  “I mean…what do you think about the pictures? Do I have any talent, do you think? And—who’s Cousin Charles? Don’t tell me you have even more relatives.” It seemed as though having potentially more Clover in-laws made Elaine uncomfortable.

  “I think your pictures are very interesting,” said Myrtle truthfully. “Particularly the subject matter. Yes, I think you have a real knack for composition.”

  Elaine breathed out. “Good. Because, I wanted to ask Red for a better camera. He said he didn’t want to shell out a bunch of money unless it looked like I might stick with this hobby.”

  Unlike her other hobbies.

  “Cousin Charles, since you asked, is the victim. Didn’t I mention that? He’s not my cousin—he’s Miles’s. And you’ve got two pictures of him,” said Myrtle.

  “Really? That’s great! When I show Red, maybe it’ll bring him onboard with my photography. You know how he always regards my hobbies with suspicion,” said Elaine.

  And rightfully so. “Do you mind if I make a copy of these pictures before you show Red? For my own records?” asked Myrtle.

  Elaine looked puzzled, then smiled. “Oh, I see. You’re investigating again.”

  “I’ve got to clear Miles’s name, of course. Miles has been a good friend,” said Myrtle nobly.

  “Does Red know? He gets pretty upset when you start nosing around his cases,” said Elaine.

  “I didn’t mention my plans to him, no. If you could keep it on the down-low, I’d appreciate it, Elaine. It’s none of Red’s business, anyway,” said Myrtle.

  Elaine grinned at her. “Technically, as police chief, it is his business. But don’t worry, I won’t say anything.” She copied the pictures on her printer and handed them to Myrtle.

  “You know, Elaine, I bet Sloan Jones could use a freelance photographer for the paper. Maybe you can help him out by snapping some pictures and sending them over,” said Myrtle.

  “Do you really think so?” asked Elaine, squinting doubtfully. “Are they that good?”

  Unfortunately, they weren’t. But it was a small town. “You’ll only get better, Elaine. And think about it—you’re frequently out and about with Jack, so you’re practically designed to be a photo correspondent. I’ll mention it to Sloan.” Myrtle had a helpful hints column in the paper. It was the kind of paper that was heavy on gossip, crosswords, astrology, and want ads.

  “I’m not sure,” said Elaine, watching Jack now crashing the cars into each other in what was probably a cry for help before he end
ed up taking a nap. “What kinds of pictures do you think Sloan needs?”

  “You know the kinds of stories the Bradley Bugle focuses on. A human interest piece on Mrs. Flotman’s prize-winning tomatoes. The new hot dog shop opening up downtown. An Eagle Scout ceremony. The Bradley High School football game. The types of migrating birds at your bird feeder. So-and-so’s new baby. You’ll be perfect,” said Myrtle. “And maybe you’ll even end up taking some more pictures that tie into this case.”

  Elaine chuckled. “I see. So you’re wanting to review these pictures.”

  Myrtle shrugged. “Maybe I can even give you some tips. Not that I know much about photography, but maybe I can think of some places for you to go to get different types of shots.” She said thoughtfully, “Like Cousin Charles’s funeral.”

  “Myrtle! I can’t just go around taking pictures at a private funeral. Sloan doesn’t put that kind of stuff in the newspaper—it would be an invasion of privacy. And grief.”

  “I’m not saying that anyone has to actually see you taking them, Elaine. Maybe you can just use your zoom lens and take some from inside your car. We can study them later on. It could be good practice, taking long distance shots,” said Myrtle.

  “Maybe. When is the funeral?”

  Myrtle said, “I’m not exactly sure. I guess they’ll have to do an autopsy on the body first before they release him to the family. I’d think it would be a few days away.” She paused. “I’m going to be giving the reception for the family after the funeral.”

  Elaine’s eyes opened wide. “You are? At your house?”

  “I thought it would be a good idea. Who knows—maybe Charles’s killer will be in attendance and I can pick up some clues,” said Myrtle.

  “You’re planning on serving food?” Elaine’s voice sounded strained.

  Myrtle gave a frustrated sigh. “Why does everyone keep asking me that? Of course I’m serving food. It’s a Southern funeral. People will be expecting ham biscuits, cucumber sandwiches, pimento cheese, and fried chicken. They’ll want to feel comforted, for heaven’s sake.”

  Elaine gave a quick nod, looking away. “Well, let me know when they set a date and time and I’ll come. I’m happy to bring some food, too, to help you out.”

  “Thanks.” Myrtle leaned on her cane and stood up. “I probably should be getting home now. If I’m going to be hosting this thing, I need to call Dusty and Puddin and convince them to come back. Knowing those two, they probably consider themselves done for the week.” She peered out Elaine’s front window.

  “Is the coast clear?” asked Elaine dryly.

  “No signs of Erma Sherman, although that doesn’t mean she’s not spying on your house and waiting for me to walk out your door. Nosy woman,” said Myrtle in irritation.

  If Elaine thought that was the pot calling the kettle black, she wisely gave no indication of it.