Not ready to disclose what was actually on my mind, I tried to formulate a feasible explanation while I struggled with the combination lock on my locker. PMS came to mind, an excuse many women use. But since I’d just come from the Foley, I decided an apartment dilemma would be a good one to tackle instead.
I inhaled deeply and then let loose. “I’ve been living in my brother’s digs with a roommate while he’s been out of the country, but he comes back next week and we still haven’t found a place to stay in our price range.”
Anita flipped the top of her lab coat back to release the cornrow braids stuck inside it. “Boy you’ve got it rough, Mary. Finding a place to live in December can be a bummer, especially if the city gets socked with several snowstorms. If I hear of anything, I’ll let you know.”
The lock finally gave way. “Thanks. I appreciate that. Maybe I should spread the word at lunch time too.”
“It couldn’t hurt,” she said, dabbing her lips with more burgundy colored lipstick.
After I hung my coat and purse in the locker, I snatched my lab coat and hunted for the ugly green hairnet stashed in one of its three pockets. When I found it, I stretched it to its limit and tried to settle it over my short hair, but its staticky condition fought back.
My problem amused Anita. “I’m glad my hair isn’t that hard to manage in the winter.”
“Some people have all the luck,” I complained. “So what’s on the agenda for me today? Opening boxes of new jars again?”
Anita shook her head. “Nope. You’re a quick learner, Mary. Sharon’s been looking at the daily reports I’ve given her regarding your work and she says you’ve graduated to the final step here at the plant.”
Taken aback by the news, I said, “Really? So soon? Does that mean I’ll be spending the whole day shipping pickles out?”
“Don’t worry, girl. You’re not working in the distribution departments of Amazon or Walmart. Our boxes don’t travel down a conveyor belt at speeds up to sixty miles an hour. Most of the work here is done by machines.” Anita glanced up at the huge clock centered on the wall above the lockers. “Oops. Looks like you and I have been dallying too long. We’d better hustle to get our time cards stamped if we don’t want to see a smaller paycheck.”
Even though we rushed down the hall like fox hounds were in hot pursuit of us, I still managed to squeeze out an inquiry regarding Roseanne’s behavior. “Anita, you haven’t mentioned your time spent with Roseanne last night. Did she behave respectfully or did she embarrass everyone?”
Anita stopped jogging for a second and rested her hands on her wide hips. “You’ve never seen her in action have you?”
“Nope. Can’t say I have.”
“Well, be thankful,” she said, continuing down the hall at an even faster pace.
When we finally reached the time card room, we had exactly two minutes to go before we showed our shiny faces in Distribution. I grabbed my card and then waited while Anita’s got marked.
As soon as Anita’s card was taken care of, she said, “Sorry, I didn’t really answer your question about Roseanne’s behavior last night. Are you still interested?”
“Of course.”
“It’s kinda hard for me to explain, but I reckon I can try seeing as how you weren’t there. That hussy brazenly moved among the men from work, clinging to each one like she was scoping out a place for target practice.” She shook her head. “Nothing new for her, but it’s a good thing their wives weren’t around to witness the show. On the flip side, the she-wolf had enough sense to hold shenanigans to a minimum and didn’t express one iota of nastiness towards Paul’s wife, Gloria.”
“Glad to hear it.” I moved up to the machine, stamped my card, and jammed it back where it belonged. “Did you ever find out if she’s delivering a load of cucumbers this morning?”
Anita escaped into the hallway once again and I followed. “Roseanne said she’d see me today so I assume it’s to make a delivery. Why did you want to know?”
“I thought if she came by I might join you two for coffee again. I didn’t get a chance to really chat with her before.”
“Girl, I think you’ve got something up your sleeve. Are you planning on weaseling info out of her about certain men she’s had in her life?”
“Nah. Why would I want to do that? I just thought I’d like to get to know her better. The woman’s traveled the road for many years by herself and I’m curious about the experiences she’s had.”
“Uh-huh. Just as curious as I am to know how many beans of coffee it takes to fill a can.”
~51~
“You gals caught me on the right day,” Roseanne said, leaning into one of the tables in the lunchroom and lifting a cup of coffee to her uneven lips. “I don’t have to hustle out of town for at least another four days.”
“I bet you appreciate your down time,” I said, with a hint of sarcasm.
Not catching the gist of my words, Roseanne touched the brim of her tan cowboy hat and nodded. “You bet your boots I do. I get to spend time at my house like any other homeowner: cook meals, shovel snow, cut down trees, fix leaky plumbing.”
“Ah, yes,” I replied. “The thrills of owning a home, something my roommate and I’d recently discussed. Say, Anita told me she ran into you at Bromley’s Mortuary last night. What did you think of the gathering?”
Roseanne scratched her forehead. “I try to stay away from funeral homes as much as I can. I don’t like the vibes they give off, kind of creepy. But I gotta say, Paul’s viewing was topnotch. When I walked in the chapel and saw the big screen showing off his life, I thought I’d entered a movie theater by mistake and expected an usher to ask for my ticket.” She tilted her head slightly in Anita’s direction. “Do they use those screens a lot?”
“Honey, I couldn’t say,” Anita replied. “None of my friends or family have dropped dead recently.” She bowed her head. “Thanks to the good Lord.”
Roseanne took a sip of coffee and then wrapped her rough hands around her Styrofoam cup. “How about you, Mary? Have you been in attendance at other funeral chapels that use huge screens to display photos of the departed?”
“Ah, yeah, twice last year when relatives died.” I set my cup down and then scooted my chair back so I could stand. “Darn weak bladder,” I explained. “Gotta take a potty break.” I don’t need to go, but I couldn’t think of a better excuse to leave the two women behind and swipe one of the cucumbers Roseanne just delivered.
Matching a cucumber of Roseanne’s with cucumbers the cops found shoved down Paul Mason’s and Don Hickleman’s should be easy. Analysis was the problem. It could take days to be completed once Sgt. Murchinak received it. And even after tests results show conclusively that the cucumbers came from Roseanne’s deliveries, the case can’t be neatly tied up with a bright red bow until three questions are answered. Who stole the pickle recipes? Who caused Chip’s injuries? And, who wrote the note I found in Paul’s pocket?
As far as I could tell, Roseanne had no motive for stealing the recipes, but the quarrel I witnessed between her and Chip may have been significant enough to do him bodily harm.
I sped down the hall at a fast clip to reach the outdoors, hoping my trip didn’t get caught on camera. If Sharon Sylvester saw what I was doing, this gig would be up. You see, the exit I was racing towards led to the location where deliveries were made and is officially off limits to an employee needing a smoke.
The delivery Roseanne dropped off over a half hour ago was still piled on the blacktop in an eight-foot tent like formation waiting to be sorted and graded. I immediately went into overdrive not knowing when workers might show up to handle those chores. After checking to make certain no one was in the vicinity, I squatted down, grabbed a cucumber, stuffed it in a pant pocket, and then dashed back inside.
My luck had held out. No one was standing guard by the door, waiting to haul my butt off to either HR or the police station.
Even though things couldn’t be running more smoot
hly for this sleuth, I still had enough sense to rub my cold hands to warm them in case Anita or Roseanne accidentally touched them. Hands that felt like they’d been playing with ice cubes rather than being held under warm water would definitely raise a red flag.
I’d been gone from the lunchroom five minutes at the most, but it seemed like eternity. As far as I could tell, Anita and Roseanne hadn’t budged from their chairs, but the one I’d sat in and another had been filled by women who worked with the plant’s dill slicing machines.
When Anita caught sight of me, she broke with the serious pow-wow she was having with Roseanne and the other women. “Mary, get off your feet. Grab a chair.”
I snuck a peek at my watch, pretending to be concerned about the time. “Oh, all right. I thought for sure our break had ended.” I swiped a chair from another table and dragged it over by Anita and sat.
Since I hadn’t anticipated additional employees being around when I questioned Roseanne, I wondered how the heck I was going to get info out of her without her going on the defensive. Then it dawned on me. When I returned to the lunchroom I’d passed in front of the board that displayed photos of all the employees. So the second I sat, I pointed to the photos. “Great photo of Chip, isn’t it? Speaking of him has anyone heard how he’s doing?”
Anita and the two other gals from the plant shook their heads.
Roseanne simply remained aloof at first, looking like a deer frozen in its tracks when a car’s headlights illuminate the road where it’s feeding, but her bushy eyebrows certainly made a go at responding as they jetted upwards higher than humanly possible. When she finally came around, she said, “What’s this about Chip? Was he in a car accident or something?”
The woman’s response made me think she was either a darn good actress or she truly doesn’t know about Chip’s close call. Which was it?
Anita lifted her coffee cup. “That’s right. You haven’t been around for a while, have you? Chip wasn’t in any car accident. He got hurt out by the vats this past Saturday.”
I noticed Anita didn’t bother mentioning that Chip was pushed down the steps. Perhaps she too believed Roseanne had a part in his injuries.
“Oh, that’s awful,” Roseanne remarked, laying on the sympathy. “How long will he be out on sick leave?”
Anita shrugged. “No idea. Hey, Mary, as long as these two gals are here why not ask them for help.”
“You mean about my apartment situation?”
“Yeah.”
I briefly glimpsed at the wall clock. “Too late,” I said. “We have to go.”
Anita adjusted her glasses and then stared up at the clock. “You’re right. The people in Distribution probably think we’ve bailed on them.” She hopped out of her seat. “Catch you gals later. Well, not you Roseanne.”
She rubbed her chin. “You never know you might. I’ve got some catching up to do with Sharon Sylvester.”
~52~
Anita had explained a bit about what went on in the distribution department before we went to break, but she never shared why row upon row of stacked pickle products, securely bound by clear wrapping tape, were still waiting to leave the plant, despite the orders that had been filled. So I questioned her about it.
The woman squeezed her round chin firmly between her fingers. “Company policy states that we hold the filled orders for a two week period for safety reasons, one being spoilage. This way if anything bad does show up within our time frame it’s here and we don’t have to post a recall.” She shook her head. “You never want a bad product ending up in the customer’s hands. It ain’t good for business. You know what I’m saying?”
“Yup, the company doesn’t want a big law suit messing things up.”
“Exactly.” Anita pulled a clipboard off a shelf and handed it to me. Several sheets of paper were attached to it. “I want you to keep this with you,” she said. “What you’ve got is a running list of all the shipments that are wrapped and sitting on pallets waiting to be trucked out of here. The list is in chronological order. You’re going to verify that the shipments listed are sitting there and that the release date posted on each one coincides with this list. Only make notations if something isn’t right. If the shipment date is for today and the product looks good to go, I’ll slap one of these green ship labels on it, letting the forklift driver know to move the pallet to the pickup station for the truckers.”
“Sounds like a simple enough process,” I said, as I examined the long list I’d been provided with. The pickle orders weren’t just going to grocery stores and restaurants familiar to me in Minnesota like Cub and Mc Donald’s. They were being shipped to stores and restaurants I’d never heard of throughout the Midwest.
As soon as I finished studying the information given to me, I held the clipboard down by my side, glanced at Anita, and inquired where the first shipments listed were situated.
“Closest to the pickup area,” she said, indicating the spot with a jerk of her head.
I nodded. “Of course, I should’ve thought of that.”
Anita made light of what I said as she followed me to the back of the packaging department. “Girl, don’t go all serious on me now. Take it from me it’s impossible to know everything that goes on at this plant even if you’ve worked here thirty years or more.”
“Even though you might not know what all happens here, Anita, you must have some inkling who might be capable of murder.”
“Shh,” she warned, “keep your voice down. There are too many ears around here.” Before saying anything more, Anita pointed to the aisle we needed to begin our task in and pushed me forward. “Okay,” she whispered, “I think it’s safe to talk here. Ever since Don and Paul’s death, I’ve been looking at the people around here differently, even Roseanne. I gotta tell you its hard imagining any of them as a murderer, but someone has to be, right?”
I didn’t say anything. All Anita needed was a few more minutes to seriously consider who the killer might be. In the meantime, I kept busy comparing the list of dates on the clipboard against the dates on the shipments standing in front of me.
After a brief interlude of silence between the two of us, Anita finally announced in a definitive manner what she’d been mulling over. “Sharon’s been running the show since Don died, but my gut says Chip has to be the one who killed the men and stole the recipes. It makes the most sense. The man worked inside and then suddenly he’s dumped outside with the vats. A switcheroo like that would anger anyone, including Chip. He must’ve felt like it was a demotion.”
I stopped what I was doing. “I understand how it feels to lose a job one’s been doing for a while, but that doesn’t make the person a killer,” I said, thinking of my own circumstances. “If Chip killed the men, why tell Butch someone pushed him down the steps?”
Anita rested a hand on her hip. “Oh, honey, no mystery there. Chip created a phantom. He wanted to throw everyone off the scent. I bet he stole the recipes too, otherwise why bother telling Butch he knew he was innocent.”
As much as I’d like to agree with Anita, her theory didn’t jive. A scorned woman could just as easily take a man out and steal the recipes. The way I see it, one of the gals stole the recipes after being jilted and things continued to snowball until the Hickleman Pickledom came tumbling down.
~53~
I can’t imagine what Sharon Sylvester and Roseanne Harsh talked about for two whole hours this morning. But that’s how much time had elapsed when Roseanne hunted Anita and I down to ask if we wanted to join her for lunch at Tioni’s Pizza Parlor.
Anita was all for it, but I didn’t jump on the bandwagon that quickly even though my stomach was begging to go and I’d been given another chance to loosen Roseanne’s tongue. Another matter of grave importance took top priority, setting up a time this evening to meet with Sgt. Murchiank. I couldn’t do it with them around. “I’ll go,” I said, “on one condition. I have to get back here at least ten minutes before we have to clock-in. My mom hasn’t been feeling we
ll and I promised to check on her over the lunch hour.”
Roseanne tugged on the brim of her cowgirl hat. “There shouldn’t be a problem with that.”
“So whose vehicle are we using?” Anita inquired as we wandered into the locker room so she and I could dump our lab coats and retrieve our coats.
“No need to ask,” Roseanne replied, locking her eyes on Anita whose locker was situated to the left of me and a generous distance away. “I invited you gals to join me, unless someone objects to riding in the truck?”
“It doesn’t bother me,” Anita said as she took her lab coat off and slipped into her jacket.
I had been putzing with the fasteners on my lab coat, waiting for the perfect chance to get the cucumber intended for Sgt. Murchinak out of my pant pocket and hide it somewhere else. Now, thanks to Roseanne’s focus on Anita, the time had arrived. I took the lab coat off and draped it over my arm, hiding the pant pocket with the cucumber. Then, leaning partially into the locker, I hung up the lab coat, stashed the cucumber in the bottom of my purse, grabbed my coat, and closed the locker.
Roseanne questioned me now as we headed for the same exit I used during morning break. “Mary, you haven’t voiced your opinion yet. How do you feel about riding in my truck?”
I raised my hand to fluff my hair and discovered I still had my hairnet on. I whipped it off and stuffed it in my ski jacket. “I guess I’m fine with that.”
I sense some hesitation,” Roseanne said, looking back at me over her shoulder. Are you positive you don’t mind riding in the cab of the truck?”
I tilted my head back and stared up at the cab. I wasn’t concerned about riding with her on the way to the pizza parlor, but after I finished drilling her about who might have had it in for the three men she may leave me stranded. “Nah. It looks like there’s plenty of room.”
Death of the Pickle King Page 24