by Shari Hearn
Ida Belle, Walter and Gertie shouted a resounding “No!”
Trixi stood awkwardly, then cleared her throat. “I best be on my way. I have a book to pick up at the library. I need to get back into the social scene and thought that book club next week would be a good fit.”
“The Sinful Express?” Gertie asked. “Fortune will be leading the discussion. Ida Belle and I are going as well.”
A huge grin formed on Trixi’s face and she said, “Really? Now I’m super excited about it,” before bidding everyone a farewell and leaving the store.
“Holy crap!” Gertie said the second the door closed. “Batten down the hatches because Hurricane Trixi is back.”
“We all need to go over our insurance policies, make sure we have enough coverage,” Ida Belle said.
Walter walked over to the cold case and put the bags of peas away. “Maybe I should increase my fire insurance.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked.
Gertie gestured to the cans on the floor. “Trixi is a disaster waiting to happen.”
“She’s the ultimate shitstorm magnet,” Ida Belle said. “Wherever she is, something always goes wrong. And if you’re next to her when it happens, she takes you down with her.”
Gertie’s face blanched. “And I thought being stuck in a room with Celia for a week was going to be bad.”
Chapter Two
MONDAY MORNING CAME too quickly. I’d spent Sunday afternoon in my hammock reading my required fifty pages of Fickle Finger of Death, a mystery set in a Palm Springs resort, as well as scanning a stack of research Gertie had assembled to prepare me for the week. Sunday night I’d spent with Carter. He dropped me off at the library and we were in the middle of kissing goodbye when once again the hairs on the back of my neck stood at attention.
Our lips parted. “Is she watching us again?” I whispered to him.
He pulled his eyes away from mine and tilted his head to the left. “Hello, Madigan.”
“Good morning to you, Deputy. And Fortune.”
Madigan was walking her bike toward us. “I confess. I was riding my bike on the sidewalk. Shame on me. I know there’s an ordinance against it.” She leaned the bike against her hip and held out her hands. “You can cuff me now.”
He gave her a pained smile. “I’m not on duty.”
“Oh right, hence the jeans and tight T-shirt.” She gave him a thumbs-up. Her eyes scanned me. “Yoga pants. Oh.”
Last time I’d volunteered at the library I wore clothes Harrison had bought me to pass as librarian Sandy-Sue. In fact, Madigan was wearing almost exactly what I had worn the day I met her—khaki slacks and a blue-striped boatneck top.
I shrugged. “I figured it was just a book club discussion. It’s not like I’m working the circulation desk. If I was, I’d wear something along the lines of what you’re wearing. In fact, I think I wore that same outfit when we met.”
Madigan blushed. She smoothed a wrinkle in her pants.
Carter cast a glance my way. “Well, you two have fun sleuthing. I’ll see you Friday.”
“Friday? What are we doing Friday?” Madigan asked.
“I think he was talking to me,” I said. I felt bad for her, I really did. She was crushing on Carter something fierce.
Madigan blushed again. “I knew he was talking to you. What I meant was, are you off on a little trip?”
Carter nodded. “A little fishing getaway in Florida.”
“Ohhh,” Madigan said, looking at me. “And you’re stuck here with us.”
Did I detect a bit of glee?
“We’ll take good care of her, Deputy,” she said.
“You do that.”
We waited a moment for Madigan to leave. She didn’t. Carter cleared his throat, then leaned in quickly and gave me a quick peck on the lips.
After watching him leave, Madigan locked her bike in the bike rack and we walked together toward the library steps. “I am so excited to be in the Sinful Express with you. The first fifty pages of Fickle Finger of Death were thrilling, don’t you think?”
Before allowing me to answer, she plowed on. “Beheading. Now that’s something you don’t normally see in a cozy mystery.” Without so much as taking a breath, she added, “So summer’s almost over. Guess you’ll be moving back to your old library job up North.”
“Actually, I’ve been thinking about staying in Sinful.”
“Oh.” Concern crossed her face. A pill bug was making its way across the concrete. She lifted her foot and I half expected her to smash it. Instead, she nudged it slightly and it rolled into a little ball.
“Did you know roly-polies roll up to protect their undersides? Of course, if I were them, I’d just avoid trouble altogether. That’s the smart thing, don’t you think?” She pursed her lips. “Take their little roly-poly bodies and roll right out of Sinful.”
Was she threatening me? I couldn’t quite tell. I’d never been threatened by a mousy librarian before. Maybe that’s how they do it.
A familiar honk interrupted my thoughts. Gertie’s Caddy pulled into the library parking lot. “Your friends are here,” Madigan said. “See you on the Sinful Express.” She reached her hand up and yanked an imaginary cord. “Whoo! Whoo!”
She scurried up the steps and into the library. Gertie and Ida Belle stepped out of the Caddy. I had to do a double take. Gertie wore a man’s black suit with a white shirt, bow tie and bowler hat. And a black mustache. She pulled an old-fashioned suitcase from the back seat.
“What is that on your face? And why are you dressed like that?”
“The bigger question is, why you’re not. I thought you were going to call Fortune about her outfit,” Gertie said to Ida Belle as they approached me.
“I forgot.”
Gertie shook her head and stared at Ida Belle, who was dressed in white slacks and powder blue T-shirt. “You two are going to stand out like sore thumbs. You could at least have dressed the part.”
Ida Belle held up a blue-striped cap and placed it on her head. “I’m dressing for the club. I’m a conductor.”
Gertie rolled her eyes, then looked at me. “At the first club meeting the ladies all dress up in costume. Some dress as passengers on the Orient Express, and some come dressed as their favorite sleuths. I’m Inspector Poirot. Ida Belle was supposed to call you about it.”
“Thank you for not doing that,” I said to Ida Belle who just winked.
Gertie set the suitcase down, opened her purse and pulled out a plastic bag filled with fake mustaches. “Luckily I carry spares.”
I wasn’t about to ask why.
She fished around in the bag and pulled out a small, blonde rectangular mustache. She held it up to my face and grimaced. “Yuk, you look like my Aunt Molly.” She dropped it back in the bag and pulled out a thin, pencil mustache.
“I’m not wearing a mustache.”
“You’ll look silly if you don’t.”
“Ida Belle’s not wearing a mustache.”
“That’s because she skipped her last waxing. She already has one. Look real close above her lip, you’ll see it.”
“My lip’s just fine.”
Gertie coughed and let the words, Fuzzy Wuzzy slip out as she dropped the mustache back in the bag and placed it in her purse. “Fine, be the odd ones out, I don’t care. Did you study the cheat sheet I gave you last night? Remember, the librarian you’re filling in for is an expert on the Golden Age of Crime Fiction. I told Lucy you were well-versed in classic mysteries as well.”
“You mean the ‘cheat sheet’ that turned out to be your eighty-page dissertation from college analyzing the mystery genre? I scanned it.”
“Scanned it?” Ida Belle said. “They’ll expect you to give your thoughts on Fickle Finger of Death in relation to classic mysteries.”
“Eighty pages,” I reiterated. “Single spaced.”
Gertie sighed. “Who are the four Queens of Crime?”
I rolled my eyes. “Agatha Christie, Dorothy L.
Sayers, Margery Allingham, and... and...”
The fourth name momentarily left my head. I snapped my fingers and it came back, but before I could say it, Gertie blurted out, “Ngaio Marsh!”
Ida Belle shook her head. “I knew we shouldn’t have let you spend the night with Carter.” She glanced at Gertie’s suitcase. “Luckily we brought some props to help run out the clock so you don’t have to say much.”
“Props?”
“Just play along,” Gertie said. “Whatever we say or do, just nod.”
Never a good sign.
“ALL ABOARD FOR THE Sinful Express Reading Group!” Having changed into blue-striped overalls and a conductor’s cap, Madigan stood in the doorway of the Sinful Library Community Room and directed her words to the patrons waiting in the magazine section of the library. Gertie, Ida Belle and I took our seats at the head of a long conference table. Madigan then pressed a button on a toy train engine she’d brought from home. It flashed a red light and emitted an obnoxious train whistle and chugga-chugga-chugga sound.
The “passengers” (as Madigan called them) filed in.
“Where are the donuts?”
My shoulders slumped as I watched Miss Cookie wheel inside the room in her electric wheelchair. As old as the dawn of time and twice as cranky, Cookie wore a Sherlock Holmes cap on top of her curly white hair. A two-liter bottle of Pepsi sat in her wheelchair basket.
“We have the donuts set up on the refreshments table, Miss Cookie,” Madigan screamed, no doubt aware that Cookie never turned up her hearing aid, “as well as some coffee and sweet tea and cups for your Pepsi. And what character are you portraying today?”
“Little Bo Peep. What the hell does it look like? Get your foot out of my way or lose it.”
Madigan stepped back and let Cookie pass.
Cookie’s daughter, Delphine, wearing the same Sherlock Holmes cap as her mother, followed in her motorized scooter, mouthing a beleaguered “I’m sorry” to Madigan as she passed.
The next to enter was Mindy Swenson, a retired actuary I’d had the misfortune of meeting several weeks back. Her nickname was the Grim Reaper because she delighted in bringing down a room of seniors by calculating everyone’s odds of being alive in ten years. She was dressed in a tweed skirt suit and hat and held a magnifying glass along with today’s book.
“Hello, Miss Mindy,” Madigan said.
“I’m not Miss Mindy. I’m Miss Marple.” She held up her magnifying glass and looked closely at Madigan’s face. “Oh dear. It’s me, Mindy, talking. You really ought to have that mole removed.”
“My mama says it’s my beauty mark,” Madigan said defensively.
“Hmm-hmm,” Mindy said glumly. “We’ll see what you say in twenty years. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Mindy came to our end of the table and began to take a seat next to Gertie, but thought otherwise when Gertie went into a fake coughing fit. She changed course and sat several seats away, holding her hand over her mouth and nose.
Two Sinful Ladies, Bea and Edilia, entered together, each sporting a Poirot mustache and bowler hat. They waved to Ida Belle and Gertie as they took their seats.
The next woman to step inside drew a grunt from Gertie: a gal in her seventies wearing an I Heart My Grandchildren T-shirt and a Sherlock Holmes cap. “Anna LeJeune,” Gertie whispered to me. “The PI wannabee.”
Anna took a seat as Celia stepped into the room, followed by a couple of her God’s Wives minions, each one of them sporting a Poirot bowler hat and fake mustache.
“The Queen of darkness and her royal court,” Ida Belle said, not bothering to lower her voice.
Gertie held up a mega-sized bottle of Tums and placed them on the table. “If anyone needs something for her suddenly sour stomach, feel free.”
Bea and Edilia snickered.
Celia shook her head. “Why Miss Fortune, can’t you go anywhere in this town without your two wrinkled old playmates? One almost wonders if you need their assistance to convince everyone you’re really a librarian.”
“You’re looking rested, Mayor,” I said. “Oh I forgot. You’re no longer the mayor.”
“Something about voter irregularity,” Gertie said, popping a Tums into her mouth.
“Which I’m sure is our fault,” Ida Belle added.
“Oh, I think there’s no doubt it was your fault,” Celia snapped as she sat in the chair next to Anna.
The squeaky shoes announced the last woman to enter. Trixi, the recent returnee to Sinful, wore huge red glasses and a scarf wrapped around her neck with a string of pearls over her button-up yellow blouse. She announced herself as Jessica Fletcher, then promptly sneezed. A mousy sneeze. Like a little girl’s sneeze. She looked down at Anna. “Holy moly, what is that you’re wearing?”
“A comfrey salve for my bursitis. One Shelley Gaudet made before she passed.”
Trixi sneezed again. “It’s just about to kill me as well.”
“You don’t hear me complaining about your squeaky shoes. Just take a seat away from me if you’re sensitive to it.”
“Oh, I definitely will.”
“Please God don’t let her sit near me,” Ida Belle whispered.
Trixi looked over and squealed. “That seat’s mine!” she said as she raced over and plopped down in the chair next to Ida Belle.
“Oh my, is that Trixi Meunier?” Mindy asked Bea. “I’ll have to redo my actuarial tables. Lop off a few years for everyone at this table.”
“Oh now,” Trixi said. “I know you’re just kidding, Mindy.”
Cookie held up her magnifying glass. “Is she the gal who burned down Miller’s barn?” she asked loudly.
“Mama, hush! She can hear you,” Delphine hissed.
“Indeed it is,” Celia said.
Trixi stood. “Number one, it wasn’t my fault. Old Man Miller was trying to sell that space heater and left it plugged in to prove it worked. If he hadn’t done that, I wouldn’t have tripped on the cord and started everything on fire. Number two, he was going to tear the barn down anyway and there were no horses or people inside at the time.”
Ida Belle cleared her throat. Trixi turned to her. “Oh that’s right. Sorry about your singed eyebrows, honey.” She patted Ida Belle on her shoulder. “I had no idea you were inside picking up some old tools you bought from him. But if you ask me, I think your eyebrows grew in better than they had been before.” She gazed at all the other members of the book club. “Anyways, I am so glad to be back in Sinful. I hope to be a welcome addition to your book club.”
Trixi sat back in her seat as Madigan clasped her hands together and greeted the group members. “Before we begin to dissect Fickle Finger of Death, I have a couple of announcements to make. Number one, a big Sinful Express thank-you to Anna LeJeune who brought her famous chocolate cake to add to our snacks selection.” Madigan clapped. Others followed.
“It is my pleasure, as always.” Anna pointed to the refreshments table. “My only request is that there’s one big slice for me to take home for dessert tonight. Other than that, pig out and take slices home for yourselves.”
“I know I will,” Madigan said, patting her stomach. “Speaking of Anna, according to our leader board, she’s leading Mindy by one point.”
Celia patted Anna on the back as Madigan turned to me. “We award points to the sleuth who correctly solves the current book’s ‘whodunit,’ with extra points given for how soon in the book she solves it. At the end of the year, we add up the points. The winner will receive five Agatha Christie novels of her choice.”
I nodded. “What if someone cheats and reads ahead?”
Mouths dropped, eyes widened, arms folded.
Anna glared at me. “What kind of thing is that to say?”
“We took an oath,” Celia said. “We swore to God we wouldn’t read ahead. I know every Catholic in this room is honorable and respects her oath to God.”
Gertie stood. “And us Baptists are just toothpick-sucking, armpit-scratching liars?�
��
“You said it, we didn’t,” Anna said, giving Celia a high-five.
Ida Belle looked at Gertie. “Wasn’t last Sunday’s banana pudding the best Francine has ever made?” She looked at Anna. “I’m sorry. I forgot you Catholics haven’t had Francine’s banana pudding on Sunday for two months now.”
That earned smiles from every Sinful Lady in the room, all of whom were Baptists and, thanks to me winning the banana pudding race every Sunday, scored the coveted dessert.
“Anyhoo,” Madigan said, “I’m sure we have a very honest group.”
Mindy sighed. “Well, this nonaligned, honest Baptist, who hasn’t tasted the banana pudding in years, is only one point away from tying you.” Translated, she was Baptist, but not a member of The Sinful Ladies Society. “I wouldn’t be crowing so soon, Anna.”
“We’ll see, won’t we?” Anna said. “With books, as in life, no one can pull anything over on me.” She shot me a look.
A warning.
But what I found odd was the look she also shot at Madigan. Another warning. But why?
Chapter Three
MADIGAN FROZE MOMENTARILY under the gaze of Anna. She averted her eyes to the floor and took a moment to center herself before looking back up with a smile.
What does Anna have on her?
“Without further ado, I’ll turn everything over to our conductor, Marge Boudreaux’s great-niece and librarian from up North, Fortune Morrow.” Madigan scurried to her seat next to Gertie.
“Thank you and welcome to this month’s book club meeting,” I said. “While this is a different format than most book club meetings I’ve held at all the many libraries I’ve had the privilege to work in,” I said, putting some oomph into the word many, “I think it’s a great way to dissect a mystery. I see you all have your books and ‘sleuth’s notebooks.’ Why don’t we just dive in? Who wants to give her thoughts on the character of Mona? What’s driving her to get involved in helping to solve the Widow Jenkins’s murder?”
“She’s in love with Carter, the police officer,” Madigan said.
I raised a brow. “You mean, Cody. The police officer’s name is Cody.”
