Case of the Burned Brownies

by Jessica Lansberry

  This would have been suspect enough. But Beatrice almost did a little dance of delight when she saw that the number had been called a mere thirty minutes before Lacey’s car crash. She even remembered the way that he had been checking his phone so persistently right before the crash too. Perhaps it was to this number?

  Using Buddy’s office phone, as she wasn’t going to waste her own phone credit, she dialed the number, hand shaking as the line rang.

  “Mt. Morte Mansion. How can we help you?” the voice on the other end spoke.

  Beatrice slammed the phone down the moment the voice had spoken, as if worried the speaker on the other end might recognize her breathing.

  After the phone call, Beatrice sat back down to wait for Buddy to return. This time however, there was a nice big smile on her face. Unlike before, this one was sincere. Mt. Morte Mansion was the other hotel in Mt. Morte.

  There was only one reason that someone would be placing so many calls to a by-the-hour hotel, and if Stella were here, Beatrice was sure that she would confirm Beatrice’s suspicion. Buddy was having an affair. An affair that he, and the other, didn’t want anybody to know about.

  ◆◆◆

  If Beatrice had thought that the hotel she was currently staying at was a little run down and old fashioned, it was a relative palace compared to the Mt. Morte Mansion.

  It was almost one in the afternoon by the time that Beatrice finally managed to get Buddy to look at her car, and as she suspected, it was a long and arduous process. He treated her like an old blind lady who still called cars, ‘automobiles’, and the movies, the ‘cinemas.’ He then proceeded to charge her far to much, which she had no choice but to pay.

  She may have argued the point a little harder too if she wasn’t in such a rush now to get out. Once she was done with Buddy, she hurried back across the road to get the gals. She was going to go and check out the Mt. Morte Mansion and knew that she would need the support.

  From the outside of the hotel, Beatrice guessed it to be abandoned. There wasn’t a single window pane that had glass in it and most had been boarded up. That wasn’t to mention the roof that sported huge holes in it and a hotel sign that had so many letters missing that Beatrice misread it as “t te ion.” But the inside was worse.

  Indeed, its description as a by-the-hour establishment made sense as Beatrice couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to spend more than an hour in the place. The carpet felt moldy and wet to walk on, the walls were dull and peeling and moldy as well, while the ceiling… actually, it’s best just to imagine the lobby and the entire hotel as one big mold infested trash can.

  The only good thing that Beatrice could find to say about the place was that her allergies were at least gone. It was a small praise, but a praise nonetheless. She shuddered at the thought that if she were forced to remain in Mt. Morte too much longer, she might even have to move to this hotel, something she could never imagine.

  “Can I help you ladies?” a low-pitched voice wheezed at them from across the lobby.

  The owner of the establishment was as vile a man as any Beatrice had ever seen. His thinning hair was black, greasy and hung to his shoulders. His skin was grey and oily. His nose was long and beaky, and although he was sitting behind the front desk, Beatrice got the impression that were he to stand, his back would be severely hunched over.

  “I hope so,” Beatrice asked as the three ladies made their way across the lobby. The whole time, Stella clung to Beatrice like she was scared that she might suddenly disappear, a look of horror on her face. Sophie on the other hand, look absolutely delighted by their new setting.

  “Just so ya know, if there’s three of ya, I’m going to have to charge extra,” the manager said, wiping his snotty nose. “Just cause the clean-up is usually worse.”

  Stella’s face dropped in disgust. Beatrice scrunched up her nose like something very smelly had just been placed under it. Sophie though, clapped her hands together. “Oh, can we stay here? I bet the rooms are magical!”

  “Look,” Beatrice begun, ignoring Sophie entirely. “I’m afraid that we’re not here for a room. We’ve just got some questions that we were hoping you might answer?” She made sure to act as polite as possible, and to also not make any unkind faces as her eyes fell on the bugs and rats that populated the place. She needed this gentleman's help, better be on her best behavior.

  “Oh,” the managers face dropped. “So be it.” He waved his hand at them indicating for Beatrice to get on with it.

  “It’s about… do you know Buddy, the mechanic?”

  “Lady, this town has a population of four hundred and twenty-nine people. Yes, I know Buddy, and his pet dog and his two fish, Bruce and Barry,” he answered, looking very bored as he did.

  Beatrice bit her tongue, tempted to snap back at the arrogance that this man was showing, but she decided against it, yelling would do no good. “Perfect. Then I suppose you know he has been coming here every other day just about for at least the past month.”

  “I know a lot of things,” he answered, looking a little nervous. Beatrice guessed it was because of the nature of the business. This was the kind of place where people didn’t brag about staying. In fact, the opposite was true; discretion was prized above all else.

  “Then I suppose that you also know who he was coming here to see?” she pressed on, leaning in closer as she did.

  To this, the dirty little manager offered Beatrice the most rueful of smiles. It looked to her like he had a big secret that he couldn’t wait to give her, one that he had been holding close to his chest for a while now, and yet, it looked like he wanted to spill the secret too, well, at a price anyway.

  “Oh, I have my ideas. Of course, that particular client is very secretive with their comings and goings. But not too much gets past little old me, not too much at all.” He looked almost pleased with himself, like being a snoop was something to be proud of.

  “And I don’t suppose that you’re going to tell me?”

  “I would, but I just noticed how dirty my… curtains are. It pains me how much they are going to cost to get cleaned.” He pouted his face, trying to look forlorn as he gazed around his filthy hotel.

  Beatrice let out a long sigh as she realized what he was implying. The decrepit man wanted a bribe. “Fine,” she said. “Stella?” she held her hand out to Stella.

  “What? I don’t… oh fine,” she snapped, reaching into her purse where she pulled out a crisp $100 bill. Beatrice knew that Stella always had cash on her. She kept it around for when she was purchasing things that she didn’t want to show on her credit history.

  The dirty hotel manager snatched greedily at the $100 bill, holding it up to the light as if inspecting for its authenticity. It was only when he was satisfied, folding it into his breast pocket that he turned back to face Beatrice and the ladies.

  “I never saw who Buddy was meeting. But one day when cleaning out the room after one of his… visits, I came across this.” He reached below the counter and a second later pulled out a small piece of paper.

  Beatrice took it gingerly, very quickly realizing that it wasn’t a piece of paper at all, but a business card. It was a business card to Susie’s hotel.

  “Oh, we don’t need that, we’re already staying there,” Sophie said. “But do you happen to have a card for this place? In case we decide to move?”

  As usual, Sophie failed to grasp the significance of the situation. That was why she was not the lead detective on this particular case. Beatrice though, who was the lead, knew all too well what this card meant. Susie was having an affair with Buddy. There was no other possible explanation.

  13

  What are you going to do?” Stella asked, breaking the silence as the three ladies made their way back toward the hotel. The first half of the walk was a very somber experience; no talking and minimal eye contact as Beatrice mentally weighed in on what she had just been told.

  “I’m not sure,” Beatrice responded dejectedly. She had no idea at all
how to interpret what she had just been told.

  “Because it’s sounding more and more like it might be Susie,” Stella said, hammering the point home.

  Beatrice knew what it sounded like, and what it looked like, and what it most likely was, but she was yet to buy into the theory one hundred percent. Sure, the circumstances looked suspicious, but she was still willing to give Susie the benefit of the doubt. She just had so many good memories of the girl that it was impossible to even imagine that she might commit murder.

  What she was going to do though, was confront Susie, that was all she could do. Pretending that what she had just been told didn’t mean anything wasn’t going to do anybody justice. If she came at her strong and caught the woman off-guard she might be able to get to the truth.

  But, as luck would have it, Beatrice didn’t even need to do that.

  “Beatrice, can I speak to you for a moment please?” Susie asked as Beatrice and the other two ladies entered the hotel lobby. It was always empty, just Susie sitting behind the desk.

  “Of course,” Beatrice said, gesturing to Stella and Sophie that she would meet them upstairs. “What is it about?”

  “There’s something I need to tell you. It’s been… it’s been eating away at me these last few days and I really need to get it off my chest.”

  “OK,” Beatrice said, taking a seat behind the counter. Her mind was racing with thoughts of what it might be, because really, she had no idea. It never once crossed her mind that she might be confessing to what Beatrice was preparing to ask her.

  “It’s about Lacey. She’s not my daughter.” she kept her head down when she spoke, as if she were ashamed.

  “Oh… I mean, oh wow!” Beatrice said, remembering to exaggerate her surprise at the last minute. Susie didn't know that Beatrice knew this already.

  “Yes. I was talking to Derrick, and he said that he came over here and by the way you spoke, you assumed that Lacey was my biological daughter, well, really, how could you not assume that? It’s my fault really. I should have said something, but… the truth is I just don’t think of her that way. I never did.” She reached out and gave Beatrice’s hand a squeeze, her eyes pleading.

  “That’s really quite the shock,” Beatrice said robotically. “How old was she when you adopted her?”

  “Oh, no I’m sorry, I’m still so unclear… you see, Lacey is my younger sister, much younger half-sister actually. Her father died when she was eleven so I moved here to live with and raise her. And eventually, over time, I came to think of her as just that, my daughter. That’s why I’ve found it so amusing that all these people keep coming over and sucking up to me.”

  “Amusing? Why?” Beatrice asked. She was still trying to process the daughter, step-sister revelation.

  “Well, because I’m not Lacey’s next-of-kin. That honor belongs to Lacey’s closest relative on her father’s side.”

  Beatrice felt a wave of relief suddenly wash over her. Up until now, she was struggling to deny the fact that Susie had the clearest motive for wanting Lacey dead. Money was, more often than not, a prime reason to commit murder, but this new revelation all but destroyed that possibility. It seemed that Susie had nothing to gain from Lacey’s death. She was all but in the clear.

  “I’m also worried about Derrick,” Susie continued, not noticing that Beatrice was off in her own world. “I’m worried that you may have gotten the wrong impression about his and Lacey’s relationship.”

  “How do you mean?” Beatrice asked, curious what she was talking about. Had Ms. Beadly been right? Was Derrick gay?

  “Well, I’ve spoken to Officer Handy and he let slip that he may have told you something about domestic violence between the two?”

  Oh, that makes much more sense, Beatrice thought, shaking her head. “Yes actually, and I wanted to ask you about that. If that’s true then it really puts Derrick at the top of —”

  “But that’s just it. It wasn’t Derrick who was beating Lacey. It was the other way around. Lacey was beating on Derrick, and constantly. I’d never seen such a violent relationship before.”

  “Oh,” Beatrice offered, not sure how, or if she was meant to react. It was definitely not what she had expected to hear.

  Again, her case had taken another ridiculous turn. Any more revelations like this and she would have to start sitting down before she began her conversation. Indeed, her head began to spin again as she processed what this meant. Her second suspect, Derrick, now seemed about as likely a culprit as Sophie.

  “I just… I just keep coming back to Buddy,” Susie continued. She had been speaking this whole time, even though Beatrice was barely still paying attention. “Just with it being a car failure, and the way he was trying to get out of those payments. I seriously still think Buddy is the most likely suspect. What do you think?” She finished, looking at Beatrice hopefully.

  “Yeah, sure.” Beatrice said, taking Susie’s hands and giving them a squeeze. She knew that saying so would make her feel better.

  As Beatrice trudged up the stairs, there was really only one thing that she was sure of and that was that she wasn’t too sure of anything. This case continued to become trickier and trickier. There were no solid leads, no strong suspects and no real motives. With every moment that passed, Beatrice became less convinced that she might be able to solve this case.

  14

  I just don’t understand why she would keep on pushing the mechanic on me if the two were having an affair?” Beatrice called out, her head currently buried underneath her hotel room bed.

  “How do you mean?” Stella called out from her own room.

  “Well, if the two were as frequent as suggested then there is no way she would be so interested in seeing him arrested. Is there?” It was a point that hit Beatrice the moment she entered the hotel room. An affair between Susie and Buddy seemed likely enough and there really was nothing wrong with that, but if it was that case, why did Susie seem to hate him so much?

  “I don’t know,” Stella said, entering Beatrice’s room. “I’ve gone through a lot more extreme measures to stop seeing somebody. Maybe, she just didn’t have the guts to break it off?”

  “What, so she framed him for murder instead?” Beatrice scoffed in disbelief as she pulled her head out from under the bed.

  The moment that Beatrice had walked back upstairs, her allergies had again sprang into action. With this fresh onslaught, she decided that enough was enough and it was about time that she got the bottom of it. She had already looked at the soaps and other products that she applied to her body on a regular basis, and nothing can be found.

  What she was going to have to do, if she really did want to kick these allergies, was to find the source. As such she ordered the ladies to search their rooms, top and tail until they found something that might explain what was causing such extreme outbreaks in Beatrice.

  And now, having pulled her head from under her bed, Beatrice was certain that she had searched every square inch of her room. That included behind and on top of dressers, behind the toilet, in the drawers… everywhere really, and so far, nothing. Although, she was sure that Stella wouldn’t have gone through quite the same lengths, she was still adamant that her room was empty. Sophie on the other hand had fallen asleep mid-search, currently curled up in her homemade fort.

  “You should be relieved,” Stella reminded her. “At least Susie is no longer a suspect. At least not to the degree that she once was.”

  “True,” Beatrice resigned, climbing to her feet before collapsing onto her bed. The only reason she did this was so that she could use the sheets as a tissue. “But now I don’t really have any suspects.”

  “What about Buddy or Derrick?”

  “Derrick, I’m not so sure. I mean he couldn’t even stand up to his wife hitting him. Do you really think he could have killed her? And as for Buddy… I don’t like the guy, but so far, I haven't seen anything that points him to being the murderer. Well, no more than anyone else in this town.”r />
  “So, what now?”

  And that was the big question. Beatrice buried her face into her bed sheets, as she wondered long and hard about what her next step was going to be, and each time she tried to think, she came up blank. She really had no idea where to go from here.

  15

  It was a beautiful day in the little mountain town of Mt. Morte. The sun was shining, the clouds had all but vanished; it was the first nice day that the ladies had experienced since being here. As such, Stella decreed that they were going to put the detective work on hold for a day and go exploring, seeing what the town had to offer.

  “You promised me a vacation,” Stella pointed out before Beatrice had a chance to react. As Beatrice was serving them up breakfast she hadn’t had a chance to anyway. “And therefore, you’re going to give me one.”

  Even if Beatrice didn’t like the idea of taking a day off, there was no way that she could argue. She had felt guilty enough over the last few days for stranding the girls in this small town. She had invited them out here for a vacation and so far, they haven’t done anything to resemble a vacation.

  “I don’t even know what there is to do here.” Beatrice relented. One day wouldn't hurt. She owed her friends that much at least.

  “I asked ahead,” Stella confirmed, looking smug as she grabbed for a freshly baked blueberry muffin.

  “We’re going to go mountain climbing!” Sophie exclaimed, clapping her hands together. For some reason, Beatrice didn’t think this was such a good idea. She knew that Sophie had a hard time climbing into bed most nights, let alone up the side of a mountain range.

  “Not mountain climbing,” Stella corrected. “More like, mountain walking. Susie told us about this lovely mountain pass that is supposed to have the most spectacular views, and better yet, she has agreed to come.”