Scam Chowder

by Maya Corrigan

  “Uh-huh.” And with some photos, if Val could talk her into it.

  “Don’t forget to stop by the activity director’s office to pick up the doughnut holes. We eat them before the session so we’ll have the strength for all that brain work.” He winked at her. “The winner gets to take the leftover doughnut holes as a prize.”

  “That’s either an incentive to win or a reason to tank, depending on who made the doughnuts. See you there, Ned.” Val stood up and went to the reception lobby.

  Bethany beckoned to her. “I finally met Gunnar. He came into the café looking for you and introduced himself. I didn’t say I recognized him from the picture his ex-fiancée showed me.”

  “That’s good.” Unfortunately, pretending Petra didn’t exist wouldn’t make her disappear.

  “I liked him. He seems like a regular guy. I told him you’d gone home to work on questions for the Brain Game. You should call him.”

  “He cut short our last conversation.”

  “You’re the one who stood him up for tennis.”

  Val put her hands on her hips. “Last month he went off in the middle of a date without any explanation. He had an excuse, which he eventually told me, and then he disappeared for a month. The guy has commitment issues.”

  “So do you. By the way, I kept looking for the musclewoman you described, but I didn’t see her at the café today.”

  Without even waving a magic wand, the deputies had made the woman disappear at least for the day. Now to find out if Bethany’s diet could still work its magic. If eating like a caveman had made her bold on the road three days ago, maybe it would turn her into a sneak photographer today.

  Val lowered her voice, though no one in the lobby was close enough to hear her. “I want you to use my phone and take pictures of Thomasina and Lillian during the Brain Game, but without them knowing it.”

  Bethany rubbed her hands together. “That sounds like fun. But won’t it click when I take a picture?”

  “I can fix that.” Val muted the sound and took a test photo. No click. She handed the phone to Bethany. “Take some practice photos while I stop by the activity director’s office for doughnut holes.”

  “Just keep them away from me. Cavemen didn’t do dough.”

  Val picked up the doughnut holes. They came in boxes from the supermarket. Bethany would have less problem resisting them than if they’d come from the Bayport bakery, which made airy, sugar-coated fried confections.

  Bethany led the way to the game room. She and Val set the boxes on the counter near pitchers of lemonade and water. Assorted board games and decks of cards were stacked on shelves above a counter. Though windowless, the room looked cheery, with three walls painted in lemon yellow and a seascape mural on the fourth wall. Padded club chairs on casters would seat more than thirty at five square tables for four and two round tables for six.

  At each place, Val put pens and an answer sheet with lines numbered from one to ten. The majority of the trivia questions she’d made up dealt with local subjects that residents from the immediate area would find easy. She’d included challenging questions about medical and entertainment subjects to test Ned’s theories about Lillian and Thomasina.

  Bethany welcomed the Brain Game participants at the door and asked whether they’d like water or lemonade with their doughnut holes. Ned came early and offered to help serve the snacks.

  Five minutes before the session was scheduled to start, Thomasina arrived in a black caftan. She came with a retinue, three women, also in black, apparently in mourning with her.

  She frowned when she saw Val, as if trying to remember where they’d met, but then approached her with an extended hand. “Hello, again. I hope your grandfather’s well. I didn’t want to come today, but . . .” She looked toward her companions.

  A thin woman with silver hair patted Thomasina’s arm. “We encouraged her to get out of the cottage. She needs to be with people at a time like this.” The other two women nodded in agreement.

  The four of them took over one square table.

  Four tables had already filled up by the time Lillian arrived. Her outfit was similar to the one she’d worn three days ago—a golfing outfit and pom-pom athletic socks, in pale pink instead of Monday’s light blue.

  She stopped dead when Val approached her. “What are you doing here?”

  “Substituting for the Brain Dame. Thank you for coming.”

  Lillian joined another woman, who was sitting alone at a table for four. A minute later, a man in a wheelchair rolled into the room. Lillian moved aside a chair at her table to make room for him. Ned took the last empty seat at Lillian’s table.

  Val counted six men and fourteen women. “Welcome, everyone. I’m Val Deniston, filling in for the woman who usually runs the Brain Game. Please forgive me if I don’t do everything the way she does. We’ll start with some trivia. Please write your name at the top of the answer sheet in front of you.”

  “Oh heck.” Bethany waved Val’s phone. “I just got a new phone and it’s so complicated, I can’t get a text message I’ve been waiting for. It’s totally frustrating.”

  Bethany sounded like a ham actress reading from a bad script, but nods from around the room showed empathy for her plight.

  “Those newfangled phones are a real pain,” the man in the wheelchair said.

  “I second that,” Ned said. “You gotta be a computer whiz to make a phone call these days.”

  “Sorry,” Bethany said. “Just keep going with the trivia, Val, while I try to figure out this thing.”

  A good excuse for fiddling with the phone for the next half hour.

  Thomasina rested her left arm on the table and crooked it around her paper, like an A student shielding her answers from roving eyes. Apparently, she didn’t trust the friends she’d brought with her. Was she paranoid, or did these senior citizens cheat at the Brain Game? Amazing what some people will do for doughnuts.

  “Is everyone ready?” Val saw heads nod. “Let’s start. University of Maryland athletic teams share a name with the diamond-backed turtles native in this region. What is the name?”

  All the men and half the women, including Lillian, immediately scribbled on their answer sheets, some probably writing Terps, the team’s nickname. Only the full name, the Terrapins, matched the turtles’ name. Thomasina pursed her lips, tapped her pen, and wrote something quickly as Val announced the second question.

  “Which of these organs are not considered vital to life—the appendix, the liver, the gallbladder, the spleen? To get credit for the answer, you’ll have to include all the organs from that list that people can live without.”

  All the pens in the room went into action. Val couldn’t see the answer sheets, but she’d bet that everyone was writing appendix. How many of them would know the liver was the only vital organ among the four?

  “Could you repeat the possible answers?” Thomasina said.

  “Certainly. Appendix, liver, gallbladder, spleen—which can you live without?” From where Val stood, she could see Thomasina write something, hesitate, cross it out, and write again. “Question three. What married couple, both Oscar winners, starred in the 1973 TV movie Divorce His, Divorce Hers and, a year later, divorced in real life?”

  Val had counted on most people forgetting this obscure Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton film if they ever knew it. Thomasina and a woman at another table wrote an answer immediately, everyone else more slowly. Lillian shrugged and scribbled something at the last second. As Val continued with the questions, Thomasina and Lillian glanced sideways toward each other’s table frequently, apparently assessing the competition. Neither seemed to notice Bethany taking photos with the phone.

  “We’re almost done,” Val said. “Question nine. The sweet taste of this antifreeze component makes it dangerous to animals and children who might drink it accidentally. Is it isopropyl alcohol, ethanol, ethylene glycol, or corn syrup?”

  Both Lillian and Thomasina paused briefly and wrote s
omething.

  “Question ten.” Casting around for entertainment questions earlier, Val had remembered the obscure fact Granddad and Gunnar had mentioned Sunday night about the director Alan Smithee. “What name was used by film directors from 1968 to 2000 when they didn’t want their own name to appear in the credits? Was it Stacy Smith, Alan Smithee, John Smithson, or Sandy Shore?”

  Thomasina smiled and wrote on her paper. The man in the wheelchair asked Val to repeat the question and answers.

  When everyone stopped writing, Val asked the participants to pass their answer sheets to the table on their right for correcting and went over the questions again, asking for oral responses. No single question stumped the entire group of seniors. Lillian scored highest with seven correct answers. The man in the wheelchair and Ned got six right. Thomasina and three others scored five. To come out on top, Thomasina would have to make up her losses in the next game, Alphabits.

  Val explained the rules while Bethany collected the trivia answer sheets and gave everyone a blank piece of paper. “I’m going to read a set of letters. You’ll have five minutes to form as many words as you can from those letters. Your words have to be at least four letters long. You score a point for using all the letters in a single word and for any word that no one else has written.”

  When everyone was ready, Val announced the letters—ACEEHLMNO—and started the timer. When the timer dinged, she asked if anyone had used all nine letters in a word.

  Only Thomasina raised her hand. “Chameleon.”

  “Great!” Val said. “That’s worth two points. Anyone have an eight-letter word?” No one did. “How about seven letters?”

  Thomasina had written manhole, but so had three other people. The woman at Lillian’s table earned a point for echelon. Two of Thomasina’s six-letter words, menace and enamel, were duplicates, but she scored a point for enlace.

  Going through the shorter words took ten minutes and yielded few unique ones. Thomasina formed more words than anyone else. Though many were duplicates, her Alphabits score combined with her trivia score put her in first place. Lillian, Ned, and another man tied for second place. Thomasina claimed her doughnut prize and left with her entourage.

  Once the room emptied out, Bethany gave Val the phone. “See what you think of the photos I took.”

  Val scrolled through them. She found an excellent full-face shot of Thomasina and a decent picture of Lillian. “I think you have a future as a paparazza when you give up teaching first graders.”

  Bethany laughed. “What are you going to do with those pictures?”

  “I have a hunch one of our Brain Game rivals lived at a Virginia retirement community before moving here. No one there knows them by name. I want to drive there first thing in the morning and see if anyone recognizes either of them. Can you open the café for me?”

  “I hate getting up early in the summer, but okay. I’ll work as long as you need me tomorrow, but I have to leave right now. Muffin’s waited a long time for her walk.” Bethany hurried toward the door.

  “I really appreciate your help.” Besides paying Bethany for all the hours she’d worked, Val would invite her to a special dinner, but not until she could serve something other than caveman food.

  Val took out her cell phone and checked her messages. She’d missed three calls. Granddad had left a message, saying he wouldn’t be home until late afternoon. Either the fish were really biting, or he’d caught none yet and stubbornly refused to give up. The young real estate agent, Kimberly, had called to say that Mrs. Z liked the idea of renting her compact house for a few months and that Val’s friend should call Kimberly to look at the house. Good news, but did Gunnar still want a place in Bayport? He, too, had left Val a message. He was sorry he’d missed her at the café this morning, hoped they could get together this evening, and would phone her later. Too vague a message for Val to guess why he was suddenly anxious to talk to her after being elusive for the last few days. She called him back, but only reached his voice mail.

  She stuffed the score sheets in her tote bag and tidied up the room quickly, anxious to go home and search online now that she had the name of the man who’d committed suicide. She was about to leave when Lillian marched in.

  “I want to talk to you.” Lillian spoke through clenched teeth.

  Uh-oh. Maybe she’d noticed Bethany sneaking a picture of her and held Val responsible. Val couldn’t lie well enough to get away with denying it.

  Chapter 18

  Lillian ran a hand across her forehead and over her head, mussing up her usually neat hairdo. “I just found out Junie May Jussup is dead. The news reports aren’t saying how she died. I called your grandfather to see if he knew, but he didn’t answer the phone.”

  Val was relieved Lillian hadn’t demanded an explanation of the sneak photos. “I’m not sure Granddad can tell you much. The police are keeping a lid on it.”

  Lillian sank into the nearest club chair, her face gray. “That means it wasn’t an accident. It was another murder. Junie May announced on television that she would investigate Scott’s death. She was asking for trouble.”

  A tremor of anger rattled Val. She stood tall and looked down at Lillian. “It sounds as if you’re blaming the victim.”

  “No. I just don’t want more victims. You questioned me, Omar, and no doubt everyone else at the chowder dinner. Don’t you realize playing detective can put you in danger, like Junie May?”

  Was that a warning or a threat? “Junie May kept her research to herself. I’ll tell the police what I find out. No one will gain anything by harming me.” The tell-all insurance policy for amateur sleuths, Val reasoned.

  Lillian leaned back and folded her arms. “What did you find out about me?”

  “That you own a nice house in Annapolis.” Val took the chair opposite Lillian’s at the square table. “I can’t imagine why you’re living in a tiny apartment here.”

  Annoyance flitted across Lillian’s face. “People downsize, move to a place like this, and then regret it. Before I sell my house, I want to know if I can adjust to a different living arrangement. Is that so hard to understand?”

  “Not at all.” Mrs. Z felt the same way about selling her house. “My grandfather would have understood if you had told him. But for some reason, you didn’t mention your house in Annapolis.”

  “Not talking about my financial assets is how I protect them from swindlers, fortune hunters, or anyone else who wants to go after them.” Lillian drummed her fingers on the table. “Obviously, my financial affairs aren’t safe from snoopers.”

  “I’ll cop to being a snoop, but my grandfather’s no fortune hunter.”

  “I know that. Did you do any research on Irene Pritchard? She and Junie May came to the dinner together.”

  And Junie May died four days later—hardly cause and effect. “I included everyone at the chowder dinner in my research and my report to the police. How long before the chowder dinner did you find out that my grandfather invited Junie May?”

  “A week. Scott was visiting Thomasina that weekend. I told them both. I didn’t want him skipping the dinner because he thought only senior citizens would be there. He was definitely more enthusiastic when he found out Junie May was going.”

  “So you used her to lure him there. And now they’re both dead.”

  Lillian covered her forehead with the palm of her hand as if it were a cold compress. “My head’s throbbing. I’ve got to lie down.” She trudged out of the room.

  Val had never before seen the cool Lillian so upset. She looked almost frightened. Was she worried about her own or someone else’s safety, or worried that the truth would come out and implicate her in two murders?

  On her way out of the Village, Val drove past Thomasina’s cottage and slowed down. One of the black-clad, gray-haired women who’d gone to the Brain Game with Thomasina was carrying grocery sacks up the walk to the cottage.

  Val parked her Saturn. Though anxious to get home and research Arthur Tunbri
dge, she couldn’t pass up the chance to hear Thomasina’s take on Junie May’s death. She hurried up the path to the cottage and rang the bell.

  Thomasina’s grocery-toting friend answered the door and invited Val into the cottage. “I’m Edith. You did a nice job with the Brain Game. This was the first time I went. I only did it to keep Thomasina company, but I really enjoyed it.”

  “Thank you.” The scent of Thomasina’s floral perfume lingered in the empty living room and made Val long for a whiff of garlic.

  She felt stifled by the velvet drapes and rugs on top of wall-to-wall carpeting. Between this overdecorated living room and the cold austerity of Lillian’s apartment, a happy median existed. Granddad and Grandma had achieved it, in the clutter collected over the decades, the books on the sitting-room shelves, and sturdy, well-worn furniture. By contrast, this place had themed collections of brassware and glassware, but not a book in sight.

  “Where’s Thomasina?” Val asked.

  Edith pointed to the hall leading to the bedrooms. “Changing clothes. Excuse me, I should put away the food so it doesn’t spoil.”

  Val followed Edith into the kitchen. Black cabinets and appliances lined two walls. Thomasina’s winnings, the half-full box of doughnut holes she’d carried away from the game room, sat on the counter. A round wrought-iron table and two chairs hugged one corner of the kitchen. Without a window to let in natural light, the room looked stark and gloomy. It contrasted with the plush living room, where Thomasina probably spent most of her time.

  “Do you live nearby?” Val asked.

  “A few doors down.” Edith put a package of hamburger patties in the meat compartment and a quart container of half-and-half on a door shelf in the fridge. Packages of corn soufflé and macaroni and cheese went into the freezer. She set the other items on the counter. Hamburger rolls, ajar of salsa, and taco chips. “Well, that’s everything on her list.”

  Not what the USDA would call a healthy diet. “Does Thomasina eat some of her meals at the main dining room?”