A Fatal Four-Pack

by P. B. Ryan

  “Smart, I think,” Kitty said. “Impossible to trace to the killer. All evidence would point back to the victim.”

  “Get back on the road,” Cora Mae said to me, “or you’ll be late for court. And didn’t I say to dress up nice. You’re just asking to lose your case.”

  I pulled back onto the road.

  “What’s wrong with the way I’m dressed?” I could sense Cora Mae and Kitty making faces at each other. I wore a brown work jacket over black pants and a green sweatshirt. I had on my hunting boots since the forecast called for more snow.

  Cora Mae was dressed like she was going to hang around the downtown lamppost. She had on purple high heels and a fluffy, quilted red coat that barely fit in the truck considering the space reserved for Kitty’s bulk. At least she wasn’t wearing her funeral black.

  Kitty wore some kind of tent thing over her housedress and hadn’t bothered to take out her pin curls. Apparently, in her mind, a court appearance didn’t warrant a comb-out.

  “What’s going to happen in court today?” Cora Mae asked.

  “They’re going to dismiss the case,” I said. “Blaze doesn’t have a case. He’s probably waiting for me to arrive so he can apologize for doubting me. Then he’ll change his mind about taking me to court.”

  We approached Escanaba, driving along the shore of Lake Michigan, waves pounding onto the rocks, seagulls cruising the wind current overhead.

  “Don’t you want to know about my date with Onni?” Cora Mae cooed.

  “Every last detail,” Kitty said.

  “Only the part about the land,” I said quickly before Cora Mae could start in on more details than I’d ever want to know.

  “Here’s what happened in a nutshell. Way back when, years ago, Chester’s dad won the land from Onni’s dad in a poker game.”

  “Over three hundred acres lost in a card game.” Kitty squealed. “And we play for pennies and match sticks. Imagine that.”

  “But Chester’s family didn’t win the mineral rights because Onni’s dad wouldn’t bet them away. No one knew why, although Onni said there was a rumor going around that traces of gold were discovered back by Bear Creek and if it turned out someday to be true, owning the mineral rights would be important.”

  “Gold,” I straightened up at that. “Gold in the U.P.?”

  Kitty leaned over Cora Mae. “Haven’t you ever heard of Old Ropes Gold Mine over by Ishpeming? That underground mine produced gold for fourteen years. Some folks think Tamarack County is the next hotbed.”

  “This is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard,” I said. “If someone had discovered gold, all of Stonely would be hunting for gold instead of hunting for Big Buck.”

  “Keep your eyes on the road,” Cora Mae said to me in a loud voice as the right tire hit the gravel on the side of the road. I corrected quickly.

  Kitty shook her head and the vibration traveled through Cora Mae and rippled against my side. “Rumor has it some people around here are making their living from secret locations of gold.”

  “Who? And Where?” I wanted to know. “Who do we know? Everyone around here is poor as a wet-rot potato patch. If your theory is right, they must all be hiding their wealth behind broken-down houses. Besides, if that was true, Onni never would have turned the rights over to Barney.”

  “That’s right,” Cora Mae said. “Onni didn’t believe it either.”

  “Why did he give it to Barney in the first place?” I pulled into the courthouse parking lot and crawled along scanning for an empty spot.

  “He traded it for that old Ford tractor you used to have.”

  “Not the one he had to tow off because it had two flat tires and wouldn’t start?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “Dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.”

  o0o

  The Escanaba courthouse is imposing, impersonal, and the last place on earth I wanted to be at the moment. Our footsteps sounded like thunder, our whispers echoed ahead of us, heavy doors cracked close in the distance, and people with suspicion and pain in their eyes sat on uncomfortable benches, waiting and worrying and watching.

  “The ugliest people in the world are in this courthouse,” Kitty said, the harsh florescent lights turning her teeth an unhealthy yellow and enlarging her pores. “Gives me the creeps.”

  We sat outside the courtroom, stuffed together on a bench until Blaze arrived, surrounded by a group of people. They stood across the hall, heads together, and my hopes of a peaceful resolution dissipated like fog at dawn.

  Blaze and I entered the courtroom like complete strangers, without acknowledging each other and without eye contact. Our entourages followed: Cora Mae and Kitty pressed tightly together like Siamese twins, and Blaze’s two attorneys. Apparently one was not enough. He needed two devious legal minds to help him beat down and assure the complete defeat of one helpless woman.

  A hearing was concluding so we slid into more hard benches, Blaze and council on one side, Cora Mae, Kitty, and myself on the other.

  An older woman, who I guessed to be around eighty-five years old, rose from a table at the front of the courtroom and confronted the opposing side, a quiver in her lips, moisture gleaming in her eyes.

  “You can’t keep me from going back to my home,” she said, angrily. “You can’t stop me.”

  I studied the two women she addressed with her comments. They had many of the woman’s same features, her daughters I presumed. The attorney seated next to them, wearing a gray suit, smirked like she’d just crushed her opponent.

  “How can you think this is funny?” the old woman said to the attorney.

  I wondered what she could have possibly done to deserve this kind of treatment from her daughters. I wondered what I had done to deserve it from Blaze. I couldn’t see his side of the picture at all.

  The old woman’s attorney hustled her out of the courtroom before she could cause a scene, and we moved up to the two tables in front of the judge’s bench. The plan was for me to sit alone at one of the tables, and for Cora Mae and Kitty to sit right behind me. At the last moment as my name was announced, Kitty plunked down in the seat next to me at the table.

  The judge, a little bitty man buried in an enormous robe, wore his hair in a military style cropped cut and looked about twelve years old.

  “This is a preliminary hearing to determine whether the case will be contested and to set a court date if necessary. Are you Mrs. Johnson’s attorney?”

  He looked at Kitty’s pin-curled head.

  “Yes, your Honor,” Kitty said, like she spent every day fighting courtroom crime.

  Blaze whispered to his attorney, who then jumped up and informed the court that Kitty couldn’t represent me.

  “That’s fine,” I said into the microphone on the table. “I don’t need to hire an attorney to tell you I’m not insane. I can tell you myself.”

  “Are you contesting the hearing?” the judge said to me, his expression unreadable.

  “Absolutely.”

  “Then we will set a court date, and I advise you, Mrs. Johnson, to consult with an attorney. This is a serious issue, one an attorney can advise you best on.”

  One of Blaze’s legal schmegals rose. “Your Honor, we are asking the court to set a date as soon as possible since there is some immediacy.”

  “The calendar is very full.” The judge shuffled papers.

  “Your Honor, Mrs. Johnson appears to be in need of immediate supervision. She has squandered her life savings, damaged the plaintiff’s home and vehicle, and has allegedly vandalized her own home. In view of the new facts surrounding this case, we would like to request placement as well.”

  I looked at Kitty.

  “That means,” Kitty whispered, “they want to decide where you will live. They want to put you away in a nursing home.”

  I began to feel faint, a hot flush creeping up from the pit of my soul and scorching my face. If I slapped myself, maybe I’d wake up. “This is a gregarious act on my son’s part,
” I shouted, leaping up.

  Kitty leapt up also. “She means egregious, your honor.”

  I stared at her, remembering my word for the day, a remarkable feat considering the circumstances.

  Kitty smiled.

  “We insist on speed,” the other side demanded.

  “Very well,” the judge said. “We’ll put it on the calendar for three weeks from now. That’ll give Mrs. Johnson time to retain council, and I’m also ordering a psychological evaluation for Mrs. Johnson.”

  “We want a jury trial,” Kitty shouted.

  “We demand a psychological evaluation for the plaintiff, too,” I shouted.

  o0o

  Kitty had to drive me home. I was too upset to drive. “If I ever speak to him again, it’ll be too soon. This is it, the last straw. He’s totally disowned. Don’t ever mention his name again.”

  “Now, now,” Cora Mae clucked. “Blaze really believes in his own mind that you need his care. Try to look at it from his point of view.”

  “Whose side are you on? His?”

  “No! But I don’t think he’s intentionally doing it to hurt you. And the placement thing doesn’t necessarily mean he wants to put you in a nursing home. Maybe he wants you to live with him.”

  Wallowing in self-pity isn’t my style, but I was settling in to do a fairly good job of it until I noticed Kitty was driving about a hundred and twenty miles an hour and had taken the last corner on two wheels.

  “Kitty,” I said, “slow it down.”

  “This is one kick-ass truck,” Kitty exclaimed. “Bet I can bury the needle.”

  She glanced over and I could see fire in her eyes. Pin curls were popping and the flab hanging from her arms bounced with the truck as it tore up the road. Cora Mae clutched my arm.

  “Kitty,” I shouted. “Pull my truck over to the side of the road. Now!”

  “Okay, okay, just trying to take your mind off your troubles.” And she slowed down to a few volts under the speed of electricity. “Where are we going next?”

  “We are dropping you off at your house.”

  “No way. I’m your bodyguard. You’re stuck with me till this case is solved. We can hang out at my place and you can pick out the things you want to buy before the rummage sale starts.”

  We argued over her role in my life until she pulled into her junkyard. “You aren’t going anywhere without me,” she said.

  “Out.” I whipped the stun gun out of my purse.

  Cora Mae’s eyes bulged. “You had that thing in court?”

  “Out,” I said again, poking it in Kitty’s direction. “You work for me and you take orders from me, and I don’t need you anymore today. Go find clues. Work with Cora Mae. Between the two of you, you ought to come up with something on the case.”

  “I can’t believe you had a stun gun in court,” Cora Mae said.

  “You, too.” I poked threateningly at Cora Mae. “Out.”

  The two of them rolled out of the truck and as I drove out of the driveway I could see Kitty running for her car.

  I parked the truck inside Blaze’s barn, closed the doors, and spent the rest of the afternoon hiding out in my hunting blind.

  Chapter 10

  Word For The Day

  KERFUFFLE (kuhr FUF uhl) n.

  Disorder; uproar; confusion

  “WHAT’S HE DOING HERE?” Cora Mae whispered to me when Little Donny and I picked her up for the pasty dinner. She wore a short black skirt under her unbuttoned coat, a tight-knit sweater that made her look like a thirty-eight double D, and black fishnet stockings.

  “Couldn’t get rid of him,” I whispered back. “He’s sticking like toilet paper on a shoe. I was cleaning up inside my house and he appeared. He won’t go away.”

  I managed to stay one step ahead of him, though. I had the driver’s seat of my truck and I wasn’t giving it up.

  Little Donny had on his fancy loafer shoes with the little tassels, beige dress pants, a blue shirt, and a long wool overcoat. I wore black cords and a black sweater with fall leaves swirled on the front that matched the color of my hair. I had styled it loose and curly. My feet were cold, as usual, so I decided to wear my boots. I didn’t plan on dancing anyway.

  “You’re turning the wrong way,” Little Donny informed me.

  “We have a stop to make first,” I said.

  The house was dark but the yard light illuminated the front and side of the house. Remembering our last fiasco, I made one pass on the road, looking for a good place to hide the truck. There wasn’t one. Banks of snow on both sides of the road made it impossible to pull off. I turned into Bill and Barb’s recently plowed driveway and stopped to mull the situation over. If I left the truck in the driveway under the yard light, anyone driving by would see my truck.

  I backed up for a running start, gunned the engine, and headed for the snow in the shadow on the far side of the drive. Little Donny clutched the dashboard and I heard him suck in his breath. Cora Mae, sitting between us, gripped my arm.

  The truck settled into a snow bank next to the driveway. I turned off the ignition. Little Donny rubbed his head where it had hit the dash.

  I hopped down, waded through the snow, and lifted a toolbox out of the back. “Let’s go, Cora Mae. Not you,” I added when Little Donny opened his door. “You stay here and guard the truck.” Breaking and entering was okay for us, but I didn’t want my grandson involved. Wasn’t that a perfect example of competent thinking? The very thing Blaze accused me of lacking.

  “Blaze is going to kill us,” he called after me. “We’re stuck good, you know.” His voice trailed off.

  We went around to the back of the house. Cora Mae began complaining that her black boots were going to be ruined, but I steered her onto the same path Kitty and I had made going through the night before, and she quieted down.

  “What did you bring the toolbox for?” she said, her voice coy and cooing.

  “How else are we getting in?”

  “Maybe we should try these first.” Cora Mae held up a ring of keys and dangled them.

  “Hot dog,” I said. “Where did you get those?”

  “I snitched them from Kitty. She took them from a hook by the door when you two were running your brilliant surveillance scheme.” Cora Mae giggled. “When you ditched us today, she showed them to me and I lifted them.”

  “Way to go.”

  “I feel terrible about leaving her behind. You should be kinder to her, Gertie.”

  “All I needed was a little time away. She’s pretty intense. I didn’t know she was going to take the bodyguard job so seriously.” I did feel a few pangs of guilt. “She’s beginning to grow on me,” I said. That comment surprised both of us, earning a quick double take from Cora Mae, but it was true. I missed her.

  We let ourselves in, and Cora Mae put the keys on a hook by the door. I pulled two flashlights from my jacket and handed one to Cora Mae. “You search the closets, I’ll do the drawers. And be careful. Put everything back right where it belongs. We don’t want them to know we were here.”

  Within minutes I found a handgun in Barb’s panties drawer. I wrapped a pair of undies around it to avoid fingerprints and held it up for Cora Mae to see, wondering out loud, “If Bill hates guns like I hear he does, do you think he knows about this?”

  Fascinated with Barb’s clothes, Cora Mae didn’t answer. She held up a sheath dress. “I’d look good in this,” she said.

  “This isn’t Kitty’s rummage sale,” I said, stuffing the gun into the drawer. “Put it back.”

  Cora Mae reluctantly hung the dress in the closet and followed me into a small bedroom used as an office. I scoped out the desk while Cora Mae worked through a three-drawer file cabinet.

  Nothing.

  “I’m looking through Bill’s desk again,” I said, rooting through his papers. I pulled out and examined each folder, then did the same with the file cabinet. There wasn’t anything bearing Chester’s name in the whole bunch, nothing about the land.

>   “My chief two suspects at the moment are Barb and Bill, with Onni running a distant third,” I said, perplexed. “There has to be something here.”

  “Maybe Onni killed Chester because of the land,” Cora Mae whispered. “Maybe I dated a killer.”

  “Killing Chester wouldn’t get Onni’s land back. With Chester gone, the land belongs to Bill. Onni doesn’t have a motive.”

  “Whew. That’s a relief. For a minute there I was worried.”

  “But he could have killed Chester in a fit of rage that he’d lost the land. Whoever vandalized my home knew a lot about rage since he went beyond a normal search.”

  “Now I’m worried again.”

  Discouraged, I collected my toolbox from the kitchen and we trudged back to the truck.

  “I saw lights come on in the house,” Little Donny said. “Don’t tell me you two broke in.”

  “All right, I won’t.” I hadn’t planned on telling him anyway.

  “You’re going to have to get out and push,” I said to him after I’d been rocking the truck back and forth like I’d watched Barney do. Every time I spun the tires, we slid sideways a foot or two. We needed to go backwards but it wasn’t happening.

  Little Donny looked down at his fancy tassel shoes and sighed. Then he opened the door and stepped out into the snow.

  He threw his weight against the truck while I revved the engine. Over and over we tried. Finally Little Donny stood up, panting, “Granny, are you sure you have it in reverse?”

  I looked at the gear stick. “Oops,” I said, moving it from neutral to reverse.

  A few more tries and we were out.

  “Looks like a snow plow ran around their yard,” Cora Mae pointed out as we swung into the road.

  Little Donny ran up covered with dirty snow from the knees down.

  “Next time you better wear more practical clothes,” I said to him. Then I remembered that Little Donny wasn’t exactly a willing conspirator. I dug through the glove compartment for paper napkins and helped him wipe off his shoes. Little Donny’s a good boy and a great grandson. I’d have to think of a way to make this up to him.