by Tonya Kappes
“Don’t be ridiculous, Bernadette.” She shifted to the right, and her head followed. “If you’ll excuse me, we need to call Luke and get this all cleared up.”
“Listen, Angie.” I talked to her like the friends we once had been, but we were not so close anymore. “Let me get Buster looked at by Doc Olson.”
Angie huffed and then sucked in a breath and watched the SPCA employee walk by with one of those loop catchers.
“Please. Buster isn’t a bad dog. He’s good,” I begged, keeping my eye on the SPCA worker. “I’m even a mail carrier. Most dogs hate me. Go get Carl Hirth’s dog. It never lets me deliver the mail.” I was on edge, and my nerves made me shake. Buster was sitting on the front porch just looking out over his domain, and when the SPCA employee approached him, Buster’s tail started to wag.
“Calm down, Bernadette.” Angie walked up to the SPCA employee and must have whispered something about me because they both turned and looked at me.
When he turned and walked back to his truck, I smiled at Angie, almost feeling a sense of compassion from her.
“Thank you.” I bit my lip to try not to cry.
“If the dog comes back with rabies or something, then we will deal with it. Tell Doc Olson to send me the blood work and any other tests he might be doing.” Angie’s eyes shifted past me.
“Oh dear, oh dear.” Millie Barnes hurried through Lee’s gate, closely followed by Gertrude, Ruby and Harriette. “What is all this about? Did Buster bite you?”
Millie and the front porch ladies didn’t give two iotas that Angie was there. They just shoved right past her.
“I knew that dog was going to get someone one day.” Gertrude looked at Millie and nodded, and they all followed.
“Buster isn’t going to bite anyone,” I said through gritted teeth, fully aware Angie’s brows were lifted.
About that time the church cart with Lee’s body was trying to burst through the door, and Jigs Baker was on the other end, trying to push it through. The cart was stuck on the other side of the threshold. The more Jigs pushed, the more I could see the white sheet that covered Lee’s body falling to the side.
“The sheet is caught.” I tried to get it out, but the sheet fell completely off, Lee’s right hand flung down off the church cart, and the front porch ladies got a full view of what was really happening.
“Oh,” Ruby Dean gasped right before she went down. I mean plumb passed out, flat out on the ground.
“Ruby!” The women rushed down to Ruby’s side.
Angie pushed past them to help Jigs get the church cart going again, and I grabbed Buster’s collar so he wouldn’t start running around. That was the last thing I needed.
“Don’t just stand there, Bernie. Help us,” Harriette instructed me.
“I’m not a paramedic. What do you want me to do?” I blinked a few times. “I guess just sit with her?”
I know my words and my unwillingness to help stung Harriette, but it wasn’t that I was unwilling. I just didn’t want to get in the way. Angie had already called one of the EMTs who’d showed up after Jigs to come help Ruby. He’d already had her sitting up. Though she was groggier and talking out of her head, she was alive and had just passed out.
“What happened?” Harriette was the youngest and the ringleader of her little group of four.
“I don’t really know. Heart attack?” I questioned what appeared to be the most logical explanation.
“Or murder?” Harriette’s eyes darkened, and she glanced over her shoulder just as Carla had pulled up in her car to the curb right in front of Lee’s house.
“Murder, huh?” Angie’s ears are trained to hear everything, I groaned inwardly.
“Look at Carla.” Harriette nodded with her chin toward Carla’s car. “She’s been harassing the man for weeks about his house and this stupid pretty award or whatever the heck it is.”
“That’s right,” Gertrude interrupted. “She’s been down here knocking on his door, delivering the fines from the city herself.” She gave a hard nod.
“She doesn’t even work for the city.” Harriette and Gertrude spilled the beans about poor Carla.
“And just how do you think she murdered him?” Angie asked a great question because trust me, there were no signs of visible murder.
Lee had no bloodstains on him. He had his eyes open, and he sure didn’t look like he’d been strangled—not that I was an expert. I’d only been involved in one other murder….
Angie looked very amused by the banter between the two women. She finally stopped them from being the Jessica Fletcher of Sugar Creek Gap.
“Ladies, I really appreciate all of this information, but we are in the preliminary facts of the Lee’s death. There were no visible signs of murder, but trust me, Jigs will do his job as coroner and find out the exact cause of death.” Angie wasn’t going to give any more information. I’d seen this switch of her personality before. “How is Millie?” Angie asked the EMT.
“Honey, she’ll be fine.” Harriette waved off any sort of concern. “She’s just wound tighter than a girdle at the Baptist church potluck.”
Then Harriette did something very non-Harriette. She gestured for Ruby and Gertrude to help her with Millie, and then they all headed back toward their houses. It was definitely out of Harriette’s character not to stick around, so it made me wonder what she was hiding. She was absolutely hiding something.
“What?” Angie asked, bringing me back to looking at her.
“What?” I asked.
“Bernadette, I know that look in your eye. You’re thinking something. What is it?” She could ask all she wanted, but I wasn’t going to say anything about my suspicion of Harriette hiding something.
“I’m just thinking you should go see what Carla wants.” I continued to hold tight to Buster. “And you probably want to call Luke.”
“Thank you for doing my job, but we’ve already called Luke.” Angie’s face pinched.
Just as she said his name, Luke drove up. He jumped out of his car.
“What on earth?” He had a blank look on his face. His hair was messed up, and he still wore his blue-striped pajama pants and UGG house slippers. He noticed Jigs putting the church cart in the hearse. I watched Luke’s body language and expression when he was able to look under the sheet at Lee. Luke ran away from us, his brown overcoat flapping behind him.
“This is terrible,” I whispered under my breath.
“It never gets any easier.” Angie’s warm palm she planted on my arm was somewhat comforting. “Anyway, thank you for calling. I’m sure Luke appreciates how kind you have been to Lee all these years.”
That was odd. Why was Angie apologizing to me? It seemed a little more personal than I thought it should be.
“Yeah. No problem.” I gave her a sideways glance. Buster must’ve been tired of me holding on to him. He wiggled free and went to the side yard to do some business.
“Why don’t you head on out?” she suggested when Luke was walking back. “I’d like to talk to Luke alone.” She straightened her shoulders and took what I liked to call the cop stance—hands on her utility belt, legs spread apart, and her face stern. “I’ll let you know if we need to get an official statement from you.”
“Official statement?” Luke overheard Angie. “Ang, what’s going on? Was my uncle murdered?”
“Why would you think that?” I asked him, thinking it was awfully strange of him to even think such a way.
“There’s all this going on.” He gestured to all the hubbub. He looked back at Carla’s car when she drove off. “Why is Carla here?”
“Luke…” Angie had a more loving tone to her voice. “I’m sure over ninety-nine percent of the citizens in this town have police scanners. You know how they rubberneck.”
“Or chase ambulances.” I couldn’t help but point out that Walter Ward had pulled his car up in front of the hearse and was getting out.
My eyes narrowed as I watched him walk up. He had his own eye
s on Luke.
“Excuse me.” Luke gave us the one finger and met Walter halfway up the sidewalk inside the yard.
“I’ll keep you posted about Buster,” I told Angie and decided it was time for me to go. Something felt off here. I wasn’t sure what it was, but it did.
My phone rang deep in my mail carrier bag. As I searched for the phone, I passed Walter and Luke talking in hushed voices on my way over to grab Buster.
“I told you I’d call you,” I overheard Luke say to Walter in a scorned tone.
“I figured something changed,” Walter responded.
“Come on, Buster.” I patted my leg with one hand and grabbed the phone with the other, taking it out of the bag. “Hey, Iris.”
“Hey, Iris?” A quiet snort came from the back of her throat through the phone. “All you have to say is ‘Hey, Iris’? Or ‘Oh my God, Iris, you were right about your feelings. Something awful happened to Lee Macum…’” She paused. “‘Like death’!”
EIGHT
On my way up Little Creek Road with Buster, I assured Iris her timing was odd but also that Lee had appeared to have died of natural causes. Still, she wanted me to be very aware that her feeling was somewhat spot on when she knew I was a skeptic of her self-proclaimed talent. I did thank her for the heads up, though it would’ve been nice to have gotten her prediction right before it actually happened and not the day of. Either way, Lee was dead, and I told her I’d let her know of any of the gossip I was sure to encounter today.
“Here, Buster!” I called Buster’s name when I unlatched Mac’s gate. Buster happily followed me into Mac’s yard, where he found a lot of new smells to keep him occupied while I took a shot at begging Mac to take Buster to the vet for me.
“I thought I heard someone trespassing.” Mac stood on the other side of his screen door.
Some screen, I thought with an inwardly sigh when the screen didn’t shield Mac’s toned bare chest from my eyes.
“Let me get you one,” Mac said.
“One what?” I gulped. One toned bicep? Two?
“You’re staring at my coffee cup.” He saw me staring? I blushed. “Weren’t you?”
“I’m sorry.” I shook my head. “I was trying to collect my thoughts.”
“Buster, what are you doing in my yard.” Mac unlocked the screen door and walked out in his bare feet and black pajama pants, no shirt.
“Actually,” I put my hands together in pray pose. “We are here to ask for a favor. You see, I found Lee dead in his home.”
I watched Mac’s face go from surprised to confused to just plain blank.
“I’m sorry. Did you say dead?” He leaned a little forward towards me and looked down the street where everyone was still gathered in front of Lee’s house.
His smell…that smell that always had been so appealing to me even when Richard was alive made my heart skip a few beats.
Okay! I’ll be more than friends! I wanted to yell so bad.
“I’ve got to get dressed.” He turned to hurry back into his house. “You had me all tuckered out last night when I got home and I missed my alarm. Every time I take my time going into the office, I miss out on something.”
“Let me assure you that you missed out on nothing. Buster was running around the post office,” My mind literally just heard how he said I tuckered him out. “Tuckered you out?”
He turned around, giving me a half smile.
“Sometimes I wonder where you mind goes.” He reached out with his free hand and touched my temple. “You Bernadette, you confuse me sometimes.” He winked. I gulped, again. “What were you saying about Buster?”
“He was running around the post office this morning, and I decided to take him home. That was when I found Lee’s door open, and I called out to him. I went inside and found him dead.” I made sure to keep my eyes on Mac’s face and not any other body part.
“That’s awful. I can’t believe he’s dead.” He shook his head.
“And Angie was going to send Buster to the SPCA, but I begged her to let me take him to Doc Olson—only I’m short on time. I don’t have any mail in my bag because I figured I was going to drop Buster off and then head straight back to the post office.”
“You want me to take him?” Mac’s eyes softened, and he looked over at Buster, who was still sniffing every single piece of grass in the yard. “No problem. Anything for you.”
“I have no idea how to thank you.” My breath caught in my throat.
“How about cooking me dinner tonight at your house?” He wasn’t shy, was he?
“Yeah.” I blinked a few times. “Sure.”
Then I thought of the million little things like how dirty my house was and how I needed to run to the grocery store, not to mention what on earth I was going to cook for him.
“Great.” He reached out and put his hand on my arm. “I hope I didn’t overstep last night when I suggest we be more than friends. It’s just that we are two fifty-somethings that need companionship, and I find it so easy to be with you. I was up all night thinking about how stupid I sounded. I know we aren’t teenagers anymore, but you…”
“It’s fine.” I couldn’t do this talk at this very moment. “I like you too.”
Oh my God, “I like you too”? Ugh. Now I felt really stupid.
“We can talk about it later.” He squeezed my arm before he let go. “I’ll bring the wine.”
“Great,” I said, only I knew I would need something much stronger than wine. “Buster,” I called to the pup, and he ran up on the front porch. “You be a good boy for Mac.”
Mac opened the door wider. Buster took the cue and ran in.
“I’m sure we are going to be just fine.” He gave me that million-dollar smile one more time before he disappeared into the house.
I took a lot of deep breaths on my way back to the post office to clear my head of anything involving Mac Tabor. If one thing was for sure, he sent me into a tailspin that would last all day if I let it. I hated to even think it, but Lee’s death was gladly taking over the mental space that thoughts of Mac had occupied because everyone on my route was talking about it. Not only did that help take my mind off my “companionship,” as Mac had labeled it, but it also got me off the hook of being late to deliver the mail. Even the shop owners and my parents didn’t have time to properly talk to me. They were all caught up in who was going to fix what for Lee’s repass.
The repass. I’d not even thought about that. I was sure he was going to have his funeral in the Sugar Creek Gap Baptist Church, so when I went there to deliver the mail, I knocked on Brother Don’s office door.
“Bernadette, come in.” Brother Don was the preacher and had been for years. He’d even married me and Richard. That was how long I’d known him.
“Hi.” I greeted him back and took the invitation to come into his office. “I was wondering if you’ve gotten any sort of timeline for when Lee Macum’s funeral will be?”
“Oh.” Brother Don’s office chair squeaked when he eased back, his hand popped up like a tent on his belly. “Such an unfortunate event. You know, Lee hadn’t been in church for years, and he was on my list to go see today.”
“Really? That’s a coincidence.” I wondered if he, too, had the self-proclaimed gift.
“Not really. Luke, as you know, is a very big contributor to the church, and well, let’s just say he loves—loved”—Brother Don corrected himself—“his uncle very much and cared for his well-being.”
“Yes.” I wondered what that meant but shoved it in the back of my head. “Very sad. But I was asking since I was here to deliver your mail.” I reached down in my bag and took out the taco-shaped mismatched envelopes for the church I’d bound with a rubber band. Then I handed him the mail over his desk. “Because I need to take off work. The sooner, the better.”
“Unfortunately, Lee didn’t have those details. They are doing an autopsy to make sure Lee died of a heart attack.” A somber look crossed over Brother Don’s eyes. “I’m sure he�
�s through those pearly gates,” he assured me like I was asking where Lee had moved on to.
“I’m sure he is.” I stood up and said my goodbyes.
Normally, I’d have thought this was a waste of time and I’d have gotten farther along on my route if I’d not stopped to talk, but I couldn’t get the idea out of my head that Luke had already asked Brother Don to go see Lee. Then again, as Brother Don mentioned, Luke did and had really taken extra effort to make sure Lee was taken care of.
No matter what, Lee was dead, and Buster was still at Doc Olson’s clinic. I’d not heard from her, and I wondered how things were going. Instead of going back to the post office to leave my mail bag for the night, I walked down Main Street and carefully crossed over to the other side, where the veterinarian clinic was located. I decided to pop my head in and suddenly Carla’s car zoomed past me.
I jumped up on the sidewalk, narrowly preventing her from clipping my leg. She and her car came to an abrupt stop, I stopped wondering if she was going to jump out and ask me about Lee. Well, I had a few questions for her myself.
But I didn’t have to worry about her. She jumped out of the car with her spray bottle in hand and squirted the lonely weed growing up between the crack of the curb and the pavement. Then she jumped right back in her car and zoomed off to what I figured was more weed hunting.
Poor weeds. They didn’t stand a chance from Carla and that bottle of poisonous weed killer.
“Bernie, you just about missed me.” Doc Jeanine Olson was hanging up her white lab coat on the coat tree just inside the small Sugar Creek Gap Veterinarian Clinic. “I told Kayla to let you know Buster is in great shape. Poor guy.” Her lips turned down. “Anyways, I’ve got to go. I’ve got to go to the beautification meeting and tell them they need to put a stop to Carla and her poison. I’ve had so many sick animals in here from her just stopping wherever she feels and spraying. She doesn’t care at all that she’s trespassing into people’s yards and making their pets sick when they go outside.”
“Oh no. I hate to hear that.” I let go of a deep sigh but perked up when Kayla brought Buster out from the other room. “I’m so glad to hear you’re fine.”