by Amy Vansant
“They found my gun,” said Penny.
“What gun?”
“My gun. The one you bought me. The one I nearly killed you with.”
George shot a look at the three other ladies.
“What are you talking about?”
“They know I tried to shoot you. But you need to tell me what happened.”
“Penny, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I sold that gun eons ago.”
“They have it!” said Penny, stamping her foot. “And the bullet matches. Frank’s coming to get you!”
“Matches what?” George looked at Darla. “Is Frank here?”
“No. But he wants you. You and Junior.”
“Junior headed for home when we left the boat. What do you mean the bullet matches? What bullet? Matches what?”
“My gun. They found it and they matched it to the bullet that killed Erin Bingham.”
“That’s impossible!” said George, meeting eyes with everyone in the room in quick succession. “The gun’s never been used!”
“Except by Penny,” said Charlotte.
“Yes. Except by Penny. Apparently, she told you about that. She scared the crap out of me and I took it away. I had no use for it so I sold it to the pawnshop. I’d bought it in a pawnshop in Tampa and it was the first idea that came to mind.”
“You bought it from a pawnshop?” echoed Penny, her lip curling. “But you had it engraved for me?”
“No, it just happened to have an ‘S’ on it. I was in there looking for golf clubs and saw the ‘S’ and…anyway, I sold it.”
Penny scowled. “Why didn’t you just go to CVS and get me a cheap teddy bear?”
“Honey, you really have to work on your priorities,” said Darla.
“Can I ask you about the floorboards?” asked Charlotte.
“What floorboards?” snapped George.
“In your closet. The ones that were replaced.”
“Replaced? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Can we go upstairs?”
“This is insane,” said George, gritting his teeth. He found everyone staring at him and relented.
“Fine.”
He stormed up the stairs towards the bedroom with everyone in tow.
George reached the closet and threw out his hands.
“Here we are. What can I do for you?”
Charlotte glanced at Mariska and Darla and then took the lead.
“When Penny shot at you, where were you?”
“I was standing about where you are,” said George. “We’d been arguing. I came upstairs and Penny came into the room with the gun. She was very upset. She didn’t mean for it to go off. But it did, missed me, and went into the wall.”
“Here?” said Charlotte, pointing to the rough patch beneath the paint that she’d noticed the night before.
“Yes.”
“The inside isn’t painted, so you can see where the bullet exited,” said Charlotte, stepping into the closet and turning on the light. She crouched down to pull up the carpet as George stuck his head inside.
“Mr. Sambrooke, do you want me to put the fish in the refrigerator?” asked Maria, stepping into the room. George ignored her.
“Under here, three floorboards were—” Charlotte pulled up the rug and froze, cutting her sentence short.
“Were what?” asked George.
“Blood,” said Charlotte, in an exhaled whisper.
“What?”
George squatted beside Charlotte and inspected the floorboards.
“Is that blood?” he asked in an aghast whisper.
Charlotte stared at the floorboards, doubting her eyes. The night before the three slightly different floorboards had been there. Now, boards that matched the rest of the floor were there, dark with a deep red-brown stain.
Darla and Mariska clamored to push their heads into the closet.
“Oh my,” said Darla. “But last ni—”
Charlotte pounded her fist into Darla’s toe.
“Ouch!” she cried, stepping back out of the closet.
Charlotte glared at her until she caught her eye.
“Darla, you have to call Frank.”
“Did you kill her and put her in the closet?” asked Mariska, staring at the stains.
“We didn’t kill anyone!” said George, straightening. “This is the first time I’ve ever seen this!”
Penny moved away and sat on the bed. As she did, Maria moved forward, walking slowly, focused on the closet. George watched her, and stepped out of her way as she approached, such was her determination. She looked down and saw the floorboards. As she did, she gasped and covered her mouth.
“Maria, what’s wrong with you?” asked Penny.
“The girl,” said Maria.
“What girl?”
“Ms. Erin. She came to see Mr. George.”
“Who? When?”
“A long time ago,” said Maria. “She came to see Mr. George. She said it was very important. I told her to wait in the office. But—” Maria looked from George to Penny and back again.
“Maybe I should not say.”
“Maria, don’t be afraid,” said George. “Tell us. What happened?”
“I was asking her if she wanted something to drink, and you both came home. Mrs. George was screaming. I—I knew it was about the girl. I…I knew.”
“You knew I was having an affair with Erin,” said George, his voice tired. He refused to look at Penny, who stared holes through him. “Go on.”
“She said, ‘What do I do?’ and I said, ‘Hide!’ but there was nowhere to hide in the office, so I pointed to the bedroom. Here she could hide under the bed or in the closet or in the window seat like the children used to.”
Charlotte and Darla exchanged a look.
“Mrs. George, you were so upset. Mr. George ran after you. I forgot about the girl until I saw her opening the front door. She ran out of the house.”
“Was she okay?”
“I don’t know. Yes… She ran out of the door.”
“Did you ever see her again?” asked Darla.
“No. Right after that Mr. George, you took the gun and drove away. Mrs. George, you went out on the patio with the bottle.
“The bottle?” asked Charlotte.
“The almonds,” said Maria.
“Amaretto,” said Penny. “I used to be quite fond of it.”
“So Erin ran out of the house…” said Charlotte. “Was she hiding in the closet? Maria, this is important. Was she hiding in the closet?”
Maria paled and looked at the bloodstained floorboards. “As I left the room, yes, I saw her run into the closet.”
Darla and Mariska gasped in unison.
“Penny!” said Darla. “You shot Erin!”
Penny grabbed the post of her bed to steady herself.
“That’s impossible…” she mumbled.
George looked pale. “I never saw her. I didn’t know she was here…Penny?”
Penny shook her head.
“But who buried her?” asked Mariska.
All eyes turned to George.
“It wasn’t me!” he said. “I took the gun and drove to PJs to have a few beers. Then I went and stayed at my brother’s for a night…maybe two. I left the gun in the glove compartment and sold it back to the pawnshop a few days later.”
“Oh PJs!” said Darla. “I totally forgot about that place.”
“They made the best Stingers,” said Mariska.
“Didn’t they? I liked—” Darla caught sight of Charlotte’s hard stare and stopped. “It was a nice little bar,” she mumbled.
“Maria, did it look like the girl was bleeding?”
Maria shook her head and shrugged. “She went very fast. She didn’t talk.”
“But the stain?” Charlotte looked at Penny. “You must have seen the blood? Replaced the carpet?”
“We had hardwoods then,” said George. “We installed the carpet years later.”
Pe
nny nodded.
“What about when you patched the wall? You had to have seen the blood on the floor.”
“I didn’t patch it.” said George. “By the time I came back it was fixed.”
“I did it,” said Penny, her voice nearly a whisper.
“You patched it?” asked George.
Penny nodded. “I had my drink and then I had it patched. I was so upset. I couldn’t bear the idea of looking at the hole in the wall…”
“You had someone do it? So you didn’t do it yourself?”
Penny huffed a mirthless laugh. “Of course not. I told him George was cleaning the gun and it went off. I was mortified.”
“Him? Who?”
Penny stood. “I need a drink,” she said. “I feel sick. My nerves…I need a drink. I couldn’t have killed her. It was an accident…”
“Penny, this is important,” said Charlotte. “Who patched it for you? Who saw the blood if it wasn’t you and George?”
Penny shuffled down the hall towards the stairs, clutching her stomach with one hand and waving the other above her head as she went.
“Harry, of course,” she said. “He did all our handiwork.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Frank and Darla came to Mariska’s house while the technicians removed the bloody flooring for DNA testing. Charlotte was already there.
“You have to go pick up Harry,” said Charlotte. “I mentioned seeing the floorboards before I could stop myself. Who else could replace the old floorboards but the guy who cleaned up the mess?”
“Let’s think about this a second,” said Frank, taking a sip of bourbon. “Why would Harry get involved?”
“Harry was George’s foreman and all-around right-hand man back then, right? He would have been the guy at the building site. The guy who found Erin’s body.”
“But why would he bury her? Why wouldn’t he just call the police?”
“He knew George was having an affair with her. Or maybe he saw the bullet hole and the blood and found her body the next day. He put two and two together and buried her to protect George. To protect his job.”
“Maybe. But why try so hard to find the bullet now? The bullet that is the most damaging piece of evidence against George? He could have buried George years earlier.” He realized what he said and winced. “Figuratively.”
“Did he find it?” asked Charlotte. “Or did he already have it? Wasn’t it strange that the professionals didn’t find it? Isn’t it weird he bought a metal detector? And wouldn’t a guy who kept bloody floorboards probably keep a bullet if he could?”
“It was stuck in the floorboards?” said Darla.
“Oh my god,” said Charlotte.
All eyes trained on her.
“What?”
“The bullet chipped her rib. It couldn’t have been in the floorboards.”
Frank jaw fell slack.
“Oh no…he didn’t…”
“What?” asked Darla.
“If he found the body… There was a chip in her rib where the bullet lodged. A chip with scratch marks around it. He didn’t find the bullet. He dug it out of her.”
“Charlotte!” said Mariska, horrified.
“He pulled it out of her before burying her for insurance. So he’d have some way to attach the crime to George in the future.”
“That is disgusting,” said Darla.
“Do you think Harry has been blackmailing George all these years?” asked Frank, thinking aloud.
“That happens on Dateline a lot,” said Darla.
“This is crazy,” said Frank. “You’re sucking me into your craziness. Why would Harry bury the body, let alone dig a bullet out of it? George had to have done it. He’s unaccounted for. He said after the blow-up with Penny he went to his brother’s house, but his brother died of cancer years ago and can’t corroborate his story.”
“But Al can,” said Charlotte. “He saw Erin on the side of the road wearing a red belt. Only, it wasn’t a belt. She was bleeding out. Running for help and home, bleeding with a bullet in her gut. She was embarrassed for Penny to find her and thought she could make it.”
Frank shook his head. “It’s too much. You’re saying Harry finds her body, knows she was sleeping with George and figures he shot her? And then what? He buries her to protect George? Protect his job? And why protect him all these years only to throw him under the bus now? And if he was the anonymous tip about the love letters, how did he know about them?”
“He was the only one who knew I saw the clean floorboards. Who else could have replaced them?”
“Penny?” said Darla. “She slept there last night.”
“So you’re sure you told Harry about the floorboards last night?” asked Frank.
Charlotte nodded, recalling their conversation. She gasped.
“What?”
“I told him Penny shot at George and he said, ‘Why would she shoot a gun in her own house.’ Only I never said she shot him in the house. In fact, I was doing everything I could to be sure he didn’t know we were in the house before I slipped up with the floorboards!”
“Hm. At the very least, I need to question him,” said Frank.
“No. We have to get him to confess. We don’t have anything to prove any of these theories.”
Frank rubbed his hands over his head.
“I don’t know Charlotte. I don’t know. We should turn over what we know and let the big boys find the truth.”
He stood. “Harry isn’t going anywhere and it’s getting late in the day. I’m going to sleep on this. Darla?”
“I’ll come home in a bit,” said Darla.
“You and the gossip,” he muttered. He waved goodbye and shuffled out the door looking tired and annoyed.
The moment he left Darla looked at Charlotte.
“What are we going to do?”
Charlotte chewed on her fingernail, deep in thought.
“We need to get into Harry’s.”
“How?” asked Mariska. She looked at Darla who was already poised to speak. “I know you can break in Darla, but what if he’s home?”
“I know he takes a walk every night. There has to be a pattern.” Charlotte looked at Darla. “This sounds like a job for Tilly.”
Tilly was the biggest busybody in the neighborhood, and that was saying something.
“I’m on it.”
Darla fished in her purse for her phone while Charlotte mulled her plan.
“Tilly,” said Darla. “What time does Harry walk and what’s the pattern and time?…Harry Wagner, right…Okay…Left or right?…Okay…Time? Got it. What’s that? I don’t know what you’re talking about…You live on the other side of the neighborhood, how could you…never mind. Okay, well, I’ll let her know. Thanks. Bye.”
“What was that?” asked Charlotte.
“She saw us breaking into Penny’s.”
Mariska scowled. “But she lives—”
“I know,” said Darla. “I don’t know how the old bat could have seen us sneakin’ into Penny’s. I think she’s a witch.”
Charlotte put her hands on her cheeks. “That means we’re in The Book.”
Tilly’s obsessive-compulsive personality had spawned a mythical book of charts that everyone in Pineapple Port had heard about, but no one had ever seen. In the book, she logged every movement in the neighborhood. If it happened in Pineapple Port, chances were good that Tilly logged it in The Book.
“What did she say about Harry?”
“He leaves at seven p.m. during the summer, six after daylight savings time. He always goes to the right. He does the main loop three times and it takes him exactly thirty minutes unless he stops to talk to someone.”
“Good,” said Charlotte. “If he stays on the main loop, that means he doesn’t pass his house again. Darla, I need you and your lock picks. Mariska, you stand post at the end of Harry’s street so if he comes back early or it takes us longer than we hoped, you can chat him up and stall.”
“Got it.”
Mariska looked down her hallway. “Do you think I should bring Bob for protection?”
They all looked down the hall. They could hear Bob snoring.
“You’ll be fine,” said Charlotte. “But if he has a shovel, run.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Charlotte and Darla hustled through Harry’s yard to get to his back door. It was still too light to spend time picking the front lock beneath the watchful eye of the Pineapple Portians. Especially since Tilly apparently had a crystal ball.
Darla unzipped her fanny pack, retrieved her lock picks and went to work.
“Can you teach me how to do that?” asked Charlotte, watching with interest.
“Sure Sugar, as long as you promise to always use your powers for good.”
Charlotte held up her hand. “I promise. I’ll use my powers for good and for breaking into your houses when I run out of chocolate.”
“That works. My definition of ‘good’ is pretty loose so you should be safe. I once broke into my neighbor’s house to steal her peach jelly recipe.”
“Shame on you!”
“Well, the she-devil wouldn’t give it to me after I asked nicely and gave her my shoofly pie recipe.”
“Oh, well then, she got what she deserved. You didn’t say it was a shoofly infraction.”
“Exactly.”
Charlotte heard a pop and the door opened.
“Ta da,” said Darla, shoving her picks into her pack.
“You need to get a utility belt, like Batman. The fanny pack just isn’t as cool.”
Darla grinned. “It’s a diversion. It tricks people into thinking I’m less cool than I am.”
They crept into the house, listening for signs of life. A low buzz combined with a steady percolating caught both their attentions and they turned in unison to see a large saltwater fish tank happily bubbling against the far wall of the living room. A yellow tang and a blue dory gawked at them from behind their glass prison.
“I didn’t know he had fish,” said Darla.
“Me neither. But then, people tend to shut down when you try to tell them what a cute thing your fish did that day.”
Darla barked a sharp laugh. “Like boring the pants off someone ever stopped him.”
Charlotte looked down the hallway. The layout of Harry’s house was similar to Mariska’s with a large combination kitchen/living area and a hall that led to the bathroom and bedrooms.
