The Icing on the Corpse

by Liz Mugavero

  No one had. But plenty of people could’ve been involved.

  And that’s where it got interesting. A local group of young adults was questioned, largely due to the fact that one of them had keys to the library building and there was no sign of forced entry into the basement. A girl named Alice Donahue’s mother was co-librarian, and therefore Alice had access to the keys. It was intimated that the kids used the basement for harmless partying quite a bit, with no terrible incidences or repercussions. Until now.

  Some of them were named on the record, likely based on their ages. The names Maeve Johnson and Helga Cross jumped out at Stan. She didn’t recognize the last name, but how many Helgas could have lived in town then?

  So Maeve had known about the murder. Her confusion at the historical society when Stan asked about it could have been age related. Or she could have deliberately pretended not to remember.

  Stan flipped through the other articles. Coverage continued for a few days, then gradually trickled off as leads became scarce. And that was it for Felix Constantine. Until now. Maybe he felt it had been long enough.

  Stan set the articles aside and picked up her iPad. She Googled Constantine’s name and sifted through the more modern references to other Felix Constantines. She found a Wikipedia piece about her subject that described him as an up-and-coming boxing star. All the other information about his death was the same as Stan had just seen. Apparently news items from sixty-odd years ago weren’t as easy to find on the Internet as she’d hoped.

  Just for the heck of it, she Googled “Tommy Hendricks Frog Ledge.” She’d never heard that name around town. One reference came up—ironically an ad for Hendricks’s fight with Felix Constantine. She deleted the “Frog Ledge” and searched again. There seemed to be a lot of Tommy Hendricks in the world, because forty-eight pages came up. She scrolled through the first few and found nothing interesting. She tried the middle, in case there was an obituary that might match. Then she tried the very end, thinking maybe since he was old it might be one of the last hits. Nothing. Unless he was going by Thomas Hendricks, or Tom. Or maybe he had changed his name altogether after the stigma of the murder had touched him.

  Maybe Betty was on to something. Maybe someone else—someone still alive—didn’t want the story to come out, as Abbie had suggested, and thought silencing Helga would keep it hidden. But someone had tipped Fox off about the murder in the first place. Why? Maybe there really was ghostly activity. Or maybe Fox and team’s presence was a convenient way to bring this story back to life. And then there was the Dale Hatmaker piece, which wasn’t fitting anywhere.

  She gathered the articles and clipped them carefully together to return to their rightful file at the historical society. Someone around here had to know how these pieces fit together. Perhaps it was the ghost of Felix Constantine. But she had a hunch there were some living, breathing people who also may know more than they were telling.

  Chapter 17

  There was absolutely no reason why Stan had to be awake at five-thirty on Wednesday morning, but she was. Years of waking up early for jobs with traditional hours had rewired her brain so it fought sleeping past seven a.m., and usually woke her up a lot earlier. She didn’t mind, usually. It gave her some good kitchen time, and she needed that this week with all her deadlines. Plus, cooking and baking was therapeutic for her. Some people found peace and meditation in their garden, or in a yoga center. Stan had her kitchen. She hoped the rituals would help her sort all the information in her brain.

  She made coffee, let the dogs out, and sketched out a few recipes for secondary wedding desserts while she waited for them to do their thing. She was thinking peanut butter—that was always a hit—and perhaps something with oatmeal for the pupcakes. Then she’d have some regular treats, maybe broccoli and cheese and cinnamon apple, with some fancy decorations on top. Perhaps a batch with an English setter cookie decoration and another batch with a Shih Tzu? That could be fun. And something pumpkin flavored. She could hardly wait to get started.

  After she let the dogs in and fed them and Nutty, she focused her attention on cooking while the pets camped out in their usual kitchen spots, awaiting samples.

  First on the list today were the next few meals for the clinic opening. She had a few more batches of salmon and chicken for both dog and cat meals that she was going to customize with different veggies. She’d tested broccoli, zucchini, and squash so far on Nutty and the couple of neighborhood cats who loitered on her porch all the time. Nutty was the pickiest, and didn’t care for zucchini. The other cats ate it, but loved the squash best. And all of them liked broccoli. She needed more cats to test her recipes on. Maybe Dede Richardson’s cats. She made a mental note to ask her tomorrow when they got together.

  As she cooked and assembled meats and fish with their vegetable counterparts and froze them, she contemplated the state of Frog Ledge. It certainly wasn’t the calm before the spring season. She felt like the whole town was unsettled right now, between the tragedy of Helga’s death, the ghost hunters, and now the dredging up of Felix Constantine’s murder. Not to mention her personal problem with her mother, which she still hadn’t figured out how to solve. She hadn’t laid eyes on her mother since their encounter Monday night at McSwigg’s, and knowing Patricia, she wouldn’t. Her mother was the queen of the silent treatment. Stan wouldn’t see her until she either sought Patricia out to apologize, or they came face to face at a public place.

  Since she didn’t feel she had anything to apologize for, Stan figured she’d see her at Helga’s tribute on Sunday.

  She wondered if Betty had gone back to work yet. Stan hadn’t heard a peep from her since their strange conversation on Monday. Was she still operating under the assumption that Helga had been murdered? It bothered Stan that she had been so adamant but hadn’t offered a reason or a suspect. Now, if she’d said Dale Hatmaker had threatened Helga recently or tried to bully her into handing over some duties, she might be more inclined to believe her. There was something about Hatmaker that Stan didn’t like. But without anything to back it up, it seemed like a stretch. The timing of the ghost hunters and the rekindling of a sixty-year-old unsolved murder bothered her, too. It was enough to keep her cooking for days.

  She called it quits around noon. Today’s additions meant she was up to nine different dishes, and she had at least three servings of each. Time for a break. She needed a second freezer, at this point, as well as another oven. She’d already brought a bunch of meals to Amara’s, who did have an extra freezer.

  Stan made herself a smoothie and drank it while she thought about the strawberry wedding cake. She had to start testing the recipe for that. She also needed to find a heart-shaped cake pan, stat. Somehow that had escaped her list. With a mental smack to the head, she grabbed her iPad and searched for one online. How could she have forgotten that? It was the most important piece of the wedding. From her perspective, anyway. Now she’d have to shell out the cash for two-day shipping. She couldn’t risk the pan not showing up on time.

  Once she’d solved that problem by purchasing three sizes of heart-shaped cake pans—the different sizes would make gorgeous layers—she changed into jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt, grabbed her coat, and headed out the door. She had a date with Cyril Pierce to talk about his dad’s take on the Felix Constantine story. Although he didn’t know it yet.

  Stan knew from Char that the Frog Ledge Holler office was a one-room operation on the top floor of the local flower shop. She wondered if it had always been in the same location, even back in the time of Felix Constantine’s death. She imagined Arthur as a young man—it wasn’t hard, she just pictured Cyril with a cigar—hunched over an old typewriter, pounding out the details of Felix Constantine’s tragic demise, a cloud of foul-smelling smoke enveloping him as he raced against his printing press deadline, those clunky glasses drifting down the bridge of his nose and his impatient nudges to get them back into place.

  She parked on the street in front, squeezing in betw
een leftover mounds of snow, and hurried upstairs. The door had a small but official-looking sign nailed to it with the paper’s name. A business card holder on a tiny table held Cyril’s card with his cell phone number. Stan tried the knob. Locked. She rapped on the door, listened. No sounds from inside.

  Frustrated, she rapped one more time, just in case he was in the bathroom or something. Still nothing. Disappointed, she turned away, wondering if she should wait. But maybe there was breaking news to cover somewhere in town. She grabbed one of his cards and pocketed it, then headed back down the stairs. Shoving the front door open, she almost knocked over Jessie Pasquale. In official cop gear.

  “Oh. Hi,” she said, holding the door open awkwardly.

  Pasquale stepped in with barely a nod, as if Stan wasn’t dating her brother and turning up at family events regularly these days, including Christmas. With a gift. She didn’t return Stan’s greeting. Typical. Pasquale glanced up the stairs. “Coming from the Holler?” she asked.

  Stan hesitated, though she wasn’t sure why. “There’s no one up there,” she said, finally.

  “What are you doing? Reporting breaking news?” Pasquale’s voice had that slightest twinge of sarcasm—so slight it could be easily denied.

  Well, Stan could be sarcastic, too. “I was looking for a bouquet of flowers,” she said, nodding at the flower shop door. “Have a nice afternoon.” She stepped out, letting the door bang shut behind her. Pasquale was always so abrupt. And sarcastic. Why did she care even if Stan had been at the Holler? And what did she want with Cyril? Usually the reporters chased the cops, not the other way around. Maybe she’d heard about the ghost hunters and wanted information.

  Oh well, not her problem. She got back in her car. Before she pulled away from the curb, she fished Cyril’s card out of her pocket and dialed the number. Voice mail. She left him a message asking him to call her, and headed home.

  Chapter 18

  Stan had barely let herself in the front door when Char pulled into the driveway behind her car. Extracting herself from her yellow Volkswagen Beetle, she waved. “I brought us lunch! Well, a late lunch,” she amended. “Or an early dinner. Whichever you prefer.”

  Stan went over to help. “This can only mean you’ve been on a cooking spree. Impressing the paranormal guys, eh?”

  Char smiled and tugged the bust of her green dress back up to a respectable level. “They love my cooking. Max especially. Max is his second in command. He does some technical thing, too. Do you know Max from the show?” Without waiting for Stan’s answer, she continued. “He’s originally from Mississippi, you know. He appreciates the taste of home. Here, honey. Take this.” She thrust a shopping bag at Stan. “I’ll grab the slow cooker. Shrimp étouffée. The fried catfish is in your bag. I had a huge shipment delivered. Don’t smash the bag, there’s a bottle in there.” She winked.

  Of course there was. Char never went anywhere without a drink at the ready. Stan worried about her friend’s liver, but she knew Char would scoff at her concern and call her an uptight Yankee. Which she probably was. Char’s New Orleans roots ran deep even after twenty-odd years in New England. Stan thought she still expected to see her beloved drive-through daiquiri shops on every corner and offer her guests a swamp tour with the B and B stay. She often wondered how much her friend missed her home. Especially in the dead of a New England winter.

  “Come on in. I just got home,” she said, holding the front door wide so Char and her slow cooker could fit through. The dogs immediately pounced on her, noses going a mile a minute.

  “I brought you something, too, pooches!” Char followed her to the kitchen and set the food on the counter. She bustled about, turning on the oven, plugging in the slow cooker. “I made this today, so it’s fresh. I want to keep it warm,” she explained. “So, where’ve you been?”

  “Sweet. I’m starving. I went to Cyril’s office, but he wasn’t there.”

  “Oh?” Char raised an eyebrow. “News to report?”

  Everyone was so . . . curious around here. Actually, that was an understatement. They were downright nosy. But she’d always found Char’s nosiness charming. “No, a question for him. I stopped by the historical society yesterday to read up on the murder from 1949. The one Adrian mentioned. I found a couple of newspaper articles about it written by Arthur Pierce. I wanted to see if he had more information on it, or some old reports or something.”

  “Yes, Adrian mentioned that murder.” Char shivered. “Such a terrible story.”

  “It is. But with the ghost hunters looking into it, I thought it might be interesting to see if Cyril had some insight, or maybe even his father. Do you think he still remembers that far back?”

  Char laughed. “You mean, does he have Alzheimer’s? You Yanks are much too polite. No, he doesn’t have Alzheimer’s. Cancer, yes, sadly, but brain problems, no. Where’s the butter?”

  Stan grabbed it from the fridge and handed it to her. “I figure, it’s Jake and Izzy’s building, I’d like to know what’s going on. Adrian said I could go on the investigation.”

  “He did? Bless your heart.” Char’s eyes widened as she ladled étouffée into bowls over rice. Like clockwork, Nutty chose that moment to rise from his nap and leap onto the counter. Stan plucked him off into her arms. “That stuff makes me have anxiety attacks.” Char fanned herself. “I can barely watch. But I force myself, because he’s such a doll. I just hide when they do the scary things.”

  Stan laughed. She nuzzled her face into Nutty’s fur. He purred, but sniffed the air. He wanted shrimp.

  “You’re really going to go?” Char handed her a bowl.

  “Heck yeah,” Stan said. “I can’t wait. Not sure when they’re doing it yet.” She let Nutty down and accepted the food. Sniffed. “Yum. What’s he like? Adrian?”

  “He’s a lovely guest. Very quiet. He and Max joined us for dinner last night. The rest of his guys went out looking for some action. I told him, honey, y’all are in the wrong place.” She laughed out loud at her own joke and slipped the catfish into the oven to warm it up. “But he said that was okay, it would keep them busy and hopefully out of trouble.”

  They sat. Stan tasted her food. “This is amazing. Not that I expected anything different.”

  “Well, thank you, honey. I love when people enjoy my food. I made Adrian some catfish last night. He told me it was the best meal he’d had in a long time. I darn near swooned.” She sat and picked up her spoon. “Raymond didn’t say much. He doesn’t like celebrities much. But that’s okay. I like them enough for both of us. Anyway, Adrian did tell me there’s a town meeting tonight. Unofficial, but he was asked to be available.”

  “Town meeting for what?” Stan had almost devoured the entire bowl.

  “To discuss the investigation and its potential repercussions.” Char rolled her eyes.

  “It’s private property,” Stan pointed out.

  “I know. The whole thing is absurd.” Char slurped her food. “You’re right, this is excellent. Anyway, I wanted to ask if you’d go with me. I thought we could show our support.”

  “Absolutely. You didn’t have to bring all this food to get me to go with you, silly,” she said.

  Char waved her off. “I wanted to have lunch with you. And ask your advice.”

  “My advice?” Lots of people seemed to need her advice lately. She hoped it was an easier question than her mother’s had been.

  “Yes.” Char pushed her plate away without finishing it. Totally unlike her. Stan noticed she hadn’t mixed herself a drink with the bottle of vodka she’d brought either. “Something’s wrong with Betty. She hasn’t been herself since Helga died.”

  “That’s to be expected. It’s only been a couple of days.” Trying to keep her tone nonchalant, Stan rose when the oven timer dinged and she went to take the catfish out of the oven.

  “I know, but . . .” Char shook her head. “It’s so unlike her. I’ve been trying to call her, and she’s never got time to talk. She was supposed to go
back to work yesterday, but she called in sick. She wasn’t home when I stopped by. I’m worried about her.”

  Stan kept her back to Char while she served the fish. No sense telling her she’d been wondering the same thing just a few hours ago. Then she’d have to explain why.

  “There’s a piece of fish for Nutty and the dogs. With no breading,” Char added.

  Stan served the fish and put the animals’ portion to the side to cool. “Have you talked to her at all?”

  “Once.”

  “Did you ask her?”

  “I did,” Char said. “She got very defensive and said she was handling things the best she could. I told her she could come stay at the inn for as long as she wanted so she had company, since Burt is useless, but she declined. Do you think . . . do you think she’s suicidal? Should I do something?”

  “Suicidal? Betty? I don’t think so.” Stan felt guilty letting her friend worry like this, but Betty had sworn her to secrecy. Although aside from telling her Betty’s theory about Helga, Stan wouldn’t be able to offer any insights into her strange behavior either.

  “I hope not. I researched the signs, and some of them are there. Not showing up for work, withdrawing from friends.” Char ticked them off on her fingers. “She’s supposed to be helping plan Helga’s celebration, and I don’t know if she’s even doing that.” She sighed. “She’s just been . . . silent.”

  “Let’s give it another day or so before you jump to that kind of conclusion,” Stan said. “This was definitely a blow for Betty. Helga was like a mother to her. At least that’s what she told me.”

  “She was, of course. But really . . .” Char’s voice trailed off and she looked troubled.

  “What?” Stan asked.

  “I know Betty loved her like a mother. But the truth was, Helga wasn’t always that nice to Betty.”

  “No?” Betty hadn’t mentioned that.

  “No, she was very critical of Betty. Even tore apart one of her historical displays at the library a month or two ago. Right in front of a roomful, too. They had a bit of a dysfunctional relationship, if you ask me.” Char shook her head. “Honestly, Helga was like that with Sarah, too. Donald, never. But her daughter, and her ‘adopted’ girls? Very tough. I never understood mothers who acted that way. I don’t have any babies, but if I did, that wouldn’t be the way I helped them through life.”