Birthday Cake and a Murder

by Kathleen Suzette

  “I bet it is,” I said and walked over to the wall that held the swords and daggers. “Do these sell?”

  “Oh, sure. Those do very well. If you’d like to look at anything, I’ll get it down for you.”

  I nodded. I wouldn’t want my nephews to have one, but I was sure they would like them. “It sure is a shame that Silas Mills was murdered, isn’t it?” I said casually. “Sparrow seems to have a lot of trouble with that kind of thing lately.”

  His mouth formed a hard line, and he wiped his hands on his shirt without looking at me. “I don’t know if I’d call it a shame exactly. People like Silas Mills are nothing but trouble and it’s just as well that we’re free of him.”

  I turned to him, putting a surprised look on my face. “Oh? Why do you say that?”

  “He was my cousin and I guess I know a thing or two about him,” he said, taking a step back.

  “I guess I had forgotten that. I’m still sorry he died. Someone somewhere cared about him.”

  He snorted. “That guy,” he said shaking his head and pausing before continuing. “He was always trying to cause trouble, and not just in the family. Anywhere he could cause trouble, he did.”

  I considered this a moment. “Charlie, don’t you live down at Sue’s boardinghouse? And didn’t Silas live there, too?”

  He nodded. “I still do and he did. He caused trouble for people there, too. Always arguing with them and then telling one person one thing and another something else. People were at each other’s throats all the time because of him.”

  “That sounds like a big mess. How long have you lived there?” I asked and picked up a dagger with a jeweled handle for something to do. The jewels were cheap colored plastic and had been glued onto the handle.

  “I’ve been there a little over a year. I was looking for someplace else to live because of Silas, but I guess I don’t have to bother now that he’s gone.” He smiled.

  “It was that bad down there?”

  He nodded. “Oh, yeah. For example, he went to Sue and told her that old Harry was stealing food from the kitchen at night and that made Sue mad at Harry. I doubt very seriously that Harry did anything of the sort. He’s a grumpy old guy, but he isn’t a thief. Silas told Sue that just because he could. Shoot, a few years ago when I was running for city council, he wrote an article saying I had ties to organized crime.” He snorted and shook his head. “Ridiculous!”

  “Wow. I can’t imagine why someone would say something like that,” I said, hanging the dagger back up on the wall.

  “Silas was twisted. That was the real issue.”

  “Why did you move into the boardinghouse then? Silas had lived there a long time before you moved in, didn’t he? I mean, you knew that, right?”

  “Oh, yeah. He’d been there for years. I didn’t want to move in there, but it was the cheapest place in town. I lost my job from the bookstore and I needed something I could afford. They had a lot of layoffs down there, you know? It’s not like I was fired.”

  I nodded. “That happens sometimes. I guess it makes things hard when you have a major life change like that.”

  He cleared his throat before answering. “I told Sue she needed to kick Silas out. He caused trouble with everyone down there at some point or other, but she wouldn’t do it. They had a thing going on, you know?”

  I turned to him. “Silas and Sue? I thought Silas and Karen Forrest had been seeing each other for years?”

  He grinned. “Oh, yeah. But Sue and him were sneaking around for years, too. I heard Karen wanted him to marry her but he wouldn’t because he was seeing Sue on the side. I can’t imagine why he was since she was so much older than him and she was just very different from him, but I saw her sneaking out of his room late at night a couple of times.”

  Harry had said Sue had googly eyes for Silas. Maybe she had more than that. “Poor Karen. I hope she doesn’t know about that. It would break her heart after being with him for so long.”

  He chuckled. “Oh, Karen knew all right. They had terrible fights over it. One time, right after I moved in, the three of them stood out on the front porch, all of them screaming at each other. It was awful, and I thought I was going to have to call the cops to break it up.”

  “Oh, wow,” I said. “That’s not what you want to have happen right after you just moved into a new place. I bet it made you rethink the move.”

  “You better believe it. But, Karen isn’t a girl scout herself, you know. She had someone on the side, too. That boardinghouse is a regular Peyton Place.”

  I stared at him. “I never would have guessed that. I never hear of any trouble there.”

  “I guess you just got to ask the right people. Trust me. Silas Mills got what he had coming to him.”

  “Who was Karen seeing?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. I just heard it from enough people to know it’s true.”

  I was surprised about the things Charlie was saying. All three of them out on the front porch fighting must have been quite a scene. Either Karen or Sue would have had good reason to kill Silas.

  Chapter Twelve

  “Excuse me, dear,” I heard a voice behind me say.

  I straightened up from the planter I was weeding and looked over my shoulder to see who it was. “Oh, hello,” I said to the elderly woman standing in front of me. Or rather, behind me. I turned to face her.

  She smiled, her white hair was pulled back into a bun and her orange sweatshirt declared fall had arrived in patchwork letters amidst appliqued brown and gold leaves. “My name is Ida Snow, I live next door. I noticed you moved in last week. I hope you’ll forgive me for not coming over sooner, but I was feeling under the weather.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry to hear that, I hope you’re feeling better now,” I said removing my gardening glove and sticking my hand out to shake hers. “I’m Rainey Daye. Excuse my mess, I’ve been pulling weeds and cleaning up the yard today.” A pile of dead and mangled weeds lay at my feet as we spoke, and I brushed the dirt from the front of my shirt.

  “This house was empty for nearly a year. I bet you have all kinds of work to do, don’t you?” she asked pleasantly.

  “You can say that again,” I agreed. “I know the leaves are going to be falling soon and I’ll have to rake again, but I couldn’t wait another minute to get these weeds out.”

  I had survived the three day Labor Day weekend and as a result, I had a day off of work at the diner to work on my yard. My back already ached, and I wished I had stayed on the couch and watched TV instead, but I knew the results would be worth it.

  “I think you’ve already met my husband?” she asked with a twinkle in her eye.

  I forced myself to smile. “I sure did. I apologize for my dog being a nuisance. I think she just needs to settle into her new home and then she’ll be less noisy.”

  “Nonsense, I hardly noticed. Don’t pay attention to Burt. He gets a bit grumpy from time to time, but if you do what I do, you’ll get along fine with him.”

  “What do you do?”

  “Ignore him.” She tilted her head back and laughed.

  I chuckled. “I’ll keep that in mind.” I had the feeling that if I tried to ignore Burt, he wouldn’t let me get away with it like Ida could.

  “Have you lived here in Sparrow long?” she asked.

  “All my life, except for the ten years I was married. I lived in New York then, but I moved back earlier this year after I got divorced.”

  “Burt and I have been married sixty years. It’s not always easy, but you get along somehow.”

  I wasn’t going to explain to her where my marriage went wrong. She was from another generation and as much as I admired a couple’s ability to stick things out, there were some marriages that were not worth being saved.

  “It’s such a lovely neighborhood,” I said. “I feel like I won the lottery when I bought this house.”

  She nodded. “I’ve lived in Sparrow all my life. I still love this town although things haven’t bee
n quite the same in recent years. I don’t know what’s going on around here. Did you hear Silas Mills was murdered, and they found his body right out in our alley? I never would have dreamed something like that could happen around here.”

  “I did,” I said. “It’s a terrible shame.”

  She shook her head and made a clucking sound. “I feel sorry for Harry Adams. It’s a shame indeed.”

  “Why do you say that?” I asked, leaning against my porch railing. I was pretty sure Harry Adams was relieved that Silas was gone.

  “He was Silas’s father. Not that anyone much knows that. Harry never wanted anything to do with him when he was younger, but when Harry tried to start up a relationship with him in his later years, Silas didn’t want anything to do with him. It’s a sad case.”

  I was stunned. “Harry is Silas’s father? How do you know that?”

  “I went to school with Harry and Silas’s mother was my best friend. Back then it was a terrible scandal when a girl was with child and unmarried. Susan went away to an unwed mother’s home and had the baby. The nuns tried to get her to give the baby up for adoption, but she refused and brought him home here to Sparrow.”

  “How did she support him when she moved back? I would imagine it would be hard for an unmarried woman to support a child on her own back then.”

  “That’s the truth. Things were hard. People weren’t accepting of what she had done. Back then we had a clothing factory here in Sparrow where shirts and dresses were made and Susan got a job there and her mother took care of Silas while she worked. That clothing factory was hard work and little pay, but the people were nice to work for. I worked there for a while when Burt was in the army. It helped to make ends meet. But Harry went off to the navy and didn’t move back to Sparrow until a few years ago.”

  “So did Harry have any contact with Susan while he was in the navy?” I asked.

  “Oh no. Susan wrote letter after letter to him. Harry’s cousin finally told her he had married another woman when he got out of the navy. Susan gave up trying to contact him after that,” she said. A dark cloud crossed over the sun threatening rain, and we both looked up.

  “That’s a shame. I’m sure it was hard for Susan. Does she still live around here?”

  “No, she passed away fourteen years ago. Cancer. But when Harry came back to town, he looked Silas up. When he found out Silas lived at the boardinghouse, he rented a room there, too,” she said pleasantly.

  It seemed odd that Harry would move into the boardinghouse when from what everyone else said, the two didn’t get along.

  “Did Silas know Harry was his father when he moved in?” I asked.

  “Oh, sure. Harry told me that he told Silas, but Silas wanted nothing to do with him. It broke Harry’s heart, but it’s not like you can blame Silas. His mother worked hard and made a lot of sacrifices to support him when he was young. When Silas was six, she married Joseph Mills, and he took on his last name. But, they were poor and Susan always had to work. She never got to be a stay at home mother like most women were back then.”

  “I wonder why Harry stayed at the boardinghouse if Silas didn’t want him there? I would think he would have contacted him first, and then when Silas rejected him, he wouldn’t have moved in there.”

  She shrugged. “I guess Harry thought he could change Silas’s mind. The last time I spoke to Harry, which was about two weeks ago, he had been angry. He said he never should have tried to contact Silas, and he wished he hadn’t moved into the boardinghouse. But, money is tight when you live on a fixed income and he doesn’t have the money to move out.”

  That must be why he took the job as the janitor at the newspaper, I thought. “I wonder how Harry’s doing now that Silas has been murdered? It might make him bitter for what he lost,” I said.

  “It wouldn’t surprise me. Harry cussed Silas when I spoke to him last. Said he hated him. But I happen to know that hurt can hide behind anger. I’ve experienced it a few times. I don’t believe for one minute that he hates Silas, but I bet now he regrets not being a father to Silas when he was younger.”

  “I bet he does,” I agreed.

  Cade had said he thought Silas’s murder was a crime of passion. Perhaps it was a crime committed by a father rejected and frustrated by a son that he never got a chance to really get to know.

  “Well, I hate to keep you. I know you have a lot of work to get done. I need to get Burt to working on our yard. He hates yard work,” she said and laughed. “Now, don’t you be a stranger. You come on over anytime you want and don’t let Burt scare you off. He’s grumpy, but he means well. And when he gets to know you better, he’ll soften right up.”

  “I’ll do that. It’s nice meeting you, Ida. You stop by anytime you’d like,” I said. I thought I was going to like living next door to Ida. The jury was still out on whether I would enjoy living next door to Burt.

  I watched her go and wondered about Harry. It would have been a deep blow to have Silas reject him after he moved into the boardinghouse. All the bickering may have been from anger and bitterness coming from both sides.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Hello, Rainey, how are you?” Karen asked me. Her hands were folded together on top of a big oak desk in her office at the newspaper.

  “I’m great, Karen. Are you doing my interview?” I asked and took a seat at one of the visitor’s chairs in front of the desk. I had gotten a call to come in and interview for the position at the newspaper and I was surprised to see Karen at the desk.

  She nodded, barely able to suppress a grin. “Yes. I just got a promotion to personnel. I’ll still be writing a few articles and handling some of the advertising like I always have, but since Silas is gone, there has been some shifting of positions.”

  “That’s wonderful, congratulations!” I said. I was surprised to see Karen so happy even if she did just get a promotion. Her longtime boyfriend had just been murdered after all.

  “Thanks! I saw your application on top of the application pile and I just had to talk to you. I already know you’re qualified with all the writing you’ve done in the past. I think your mom mentioned you were writing a new cookbook?”

  “Yes, I’m working on an Americana themed cookbook. I’m hoping to have it ready by early next year,” I said. “I was told the position was for a lifestyle article writer?”

  She nodded. “Yes, among other things. We may need the person we hire to fill in with other departments and maybe go out to locations and do interviews. It all depends on what’s going on around town. Does that sound like something you’d be interested in?”

  “It does. I just bought a house and I can use the work. Mom helped me get into the house but I don’t want to be dependent on her if I can help it,” I said.

  “Well, I have to interview more people, but between you and me, if I can get approval from our publisher, Walt Jones, I’d like to hire you.”

  I smiled, relieved. She filled me in on the details including the pay, which wasn’t much, but would still help. I looked around the room. There were old bookcases along the wall that looked like they had been there since the newspaper started up. On the shelves were old, tattered books, crowded together.

  “So do you like working here?” I asked. “Haven’t you been here a long time?”

  “Since right after graduating from the junior college. It’s a nice place to work. Sometimes Walt can be cantankerous, but don’t let him scare you. He’s a nice guy with a big heart.”

  “I’ll keep an eye out for him, then.”

  “Oh, and keep an eye out for our janitor, Harry Adams,” she said and chuckled. “He’s a grumpy one, but he doesn’t bite. Or at least, not often.”

  “Will do,” I said, leaning back in my chair. “I’m getting excited just thinking about the possibility of working at the newspaper.”

  She nodded. “I think you’ll like it,” she said, then became thoughtful a moment. “Say, Rainey, I know you’re dating Cade Starkey. Has he mentioned anything ab
out Silas’s murder? It’s been almost two weeks, and I was hoping to at least hear something by now.”

  “He’s kind of tightlipped about that, if you want to know the truth. But I know he’ll get to the bottom of it soon,” I said. “You know, Karen, someone mentioned that Silas had a daughter, but I thought you said he really didn’t have much family?”

  She sighed. “That would be Annie. Yes, he has a daughter all right, but in name only, really. They never got along and she moved to Wyoming or Nevada, I can’t remember which, and she hadn’t spoken to him in years.”

  “That’s really sad. What about her mother? Was Silas married to her?”

  “No, he never married. Annie’s mother has been out of the picture for so long, I can’t even remember her name. She raised Annie to hate Silas, so that’s why she didn’t have much to do with her father,” she said, fiddling with the pen on her desk.

  “That really is sad,” I repeated. It was odd that Karen had forgotten about Silas’s daughter, even if she was out of the picture for the most part. “Have you heard anything going around town about his murder?”

  “No, not a thing. It’s kept me up late at night,” she said. “The more I think about things, the more I think Silas’s cousin, Charlie Rhoades, may have had something to do with his death.”

  My antenna went up. “Why do you say that?”

  She leaned in closer. “When Silas wrote that article on him a few years ago, Charlie went nuts. He came down here, shouting at Silas, threatening him. He told him he would pay him back when he least expected it. Walt had to call the police to get him out of the office. He just wouldn’t go on his own.”

  “He was going to pay him back?” I asked. “How long has it been since this happened?”

  “I think it’s been around three years. I’d have to look up that article Silas wrote to be sure.”

  “That’s a long time for him to wait to pay him back,” I said.

  She shrugged. “I guess it is. But I distinctly remember him saying it would be when he least expected it. Personally, I think he waited until he thought people had forgotten his threat. But Silas never forgot. We just talked about it a month ago.”