Armed and Outrageous (An Agnes Barton Mystery)

by Johns, Madison

  I patted Eleanor's hand. “You okay, El?”

  “Sure thing, Aggie.” She tore into her purse, and retrieved her inhaler and taking a puff, “I like finding dead people.”

  “You do?”

  “Not so much.” She smiled. “Why can't we just see them at the funeral home like everybody else?”

  “Cause, El, we're not like everybody else.”

  “Damn straight we're not!” She flashed me those wicked eyes I knew all too well. “Do we have to do the fundraiser today?”

  “Yup, how else are the old folks at the nursing home gonna go on all those fancy trips?”

  Eleanor scoffed. “Fancy trips? I'd hardly call taking them to McDonald's a fancy trip. I have half a mind to take them on a real trip, like to the zoo in Saginaw.”

  “That would be a trip.”

  Eleanor hinted. “Trying to pry them off the carousel would be priceless.” Her expression soured. “That nursing home just makes me nervous.”

  “You afraid they're gonna give you a room, eh El?”

  “That's no joke Aggie! Hell, that nearly happened.”

  I remembered all too well all the paper work I had to file, plus the two months of waiting before they released Eleanor. Hardest part was convincing El to stay put until it was legal.

  My mind was elsewhere, but no point in worrying about who may have killed Billy Chambers. Life had to go on, and if I were lucky, I'd get an idea of where to go from here... somehow.

  I drove into the parking lot of the County Medical Facility or nursing home to most of us, dreading the next step. It’s a modern brick building with extensive gardening beds, an outdoor fountain, patio, and it possessed over a half mile of pathways that lead through the park and woodland setting. If I ever ended up in a nursing home, the CMF was precisely where I’d want to be.

  When Eleanor and I walked up, we saw a large line already forming. They had two bake sales a year, the summer one being the most attended. All proceeds paid for trips for the residents. Insurance certainly didn't pay for that.

  Two long tables were set up along two of the walls with the receptionist desk to the left of the entrance. Directly behind the receptionist desk, and through a closed door, was the administrator’s office. All the other couches and chairs had been removed for the event. All things considered, it was quite spacious. They even allowed the residents to participate in the event.

  Rosa Lee smiled and appeared to be having the time of her life. She winked at me from across the room. She was wrapping up brownies that I knew contained specialty herbs from her garden. Not just any brownies, but hashish brownies.

  When I saw the administrator buy one, I hoped it would loosen the bitch up a bit, because she walked around and acted like something unpleasant had been shoved up her ass.

  Melanie Paxton had been appointed administrator some years ago, and although she was fair, she could be a royal pain in the ass. I knew of people that had worked here, and they never lasted more than a year. Melanie would tell them that at orientation too, taking pride in running good people off. What a hard ass. I know state inspections can be a real pain, but it failed to excuse her for running off all the good staff, the ones that actually cared about the residents. As my dear departed father always said, “You can have a box of apples, and maybe they all look shiny red and great, but there are a few bad ones in every bushel.” Melanie treated all employees as bad apples, and that simply was not right as well as short-sighted on her part.

  I watched her so intently that I hadn’t noticed Mr. Wilson walking up. I should have known by the squeaky wheels of his rolling walker. It was like fingernail across a chalkboard.

  “Hello sweet Eleanor,” he said. “What you selling?”

  His gray eyes made him look like the Grim Reaper. I gave him a dirty look and glanced away.

  “What I’m selling, I can’t give you here,” Eleanor teased to which I rolled my eyes and turned my back.

  “Agnes, you are looking so fetching today.”

  “I don’t give a damn... “ I looked up into Andrew’s smiling eyes. “Oh, I-I’m so sorry, I didn’t see it was you.”

  He nodded. “I’ll be right back. I’d hate to miss out on the brownies. I hear good things about them.”

  He ran over and Rosa Lee pressed one into his hand, winking at him. For some reason that bothered me, but I tossed it off as irritation because nobody wanted to buy what we were selling, but when I looked down, I saw we were selling chocolate chip cookies that looked to be burnt near black!

  “What?” Eleanor asked. “It was the best I could do on short notice.”

  “You could've picked up something from Rogers' bakery.”

  “I tried but they were all sold out. Look around the room!”

  I did so and realized why Rogers' bakery was sold out. I frowned but as with every frown these days, I fretted over developing deeper wrinkles, so I admonished myself to stop it at once.

  “Want a brownie?” Andrew asked.

  I shoved it into my mouth. I might as well because just about everyone else was eating them including a few residents. Had all these people gone loco? These people were on all kinds of medications, and who knew what, so the last thing they needed was something that may interact with their meds.

  Mr. Wilson had a brownie in one hand, and his walker in another, rocking to the music that obviously was only playing in his head. I rolled my eyes, remembering not to frown when I noticed a few residents joined in.

  “Hell no, I’m not gonna go,” they chanted.

  I looked around and saw two nursing assistants trying to bring the residents back through the double doors. They ran around the lobby like scurrying squirrels with the workers in pursuit. It was at least entertaining. I was impressed by the residents' agility today; perhaps it could be the brownies.

  “Stay away, you hear,” one of the residents named Jenny said. She had a large cane, and I knew she wasn’t afraid to use it. She intended to use it as a lance from the way she swung it, and I almost pitied anyone she used it on.

  “Come on Jenny,” encouraged a nursing assistant. “Let’s go back inside.”

  Why that crazy nursing assistant put her face so close to Jenny was beyond me. Jenny grabbed the woman by the hair and proceeded to knock the young woman upon the head. Melanie, always the effective administrator, ran to help her, but Jenny caught her just under the chin with the cane. Melanie flew backward onto a table. It wobbled a few times, and fell straight down, taking Melanie with it. A banana cream pie flew into the air and planted itself atop her head.

  She laid there for a few moments, shaken, but when she stood her face looked red as a fire engine. She raised her head a notch and limped to her office.

  Obviously too enraged for words.

  I knew she wanted to kill Jenny, but that is just not possible, and she should have known how this particular resident was. Rule number one: never get close enough for Jenny to grab a hold of you. Rule number two: leave her alone until she calms down.

  They finally herded Jenny through the double doors, distracting her with an offer of ice cream. Seconds later she had forgotten all about the encounter.

  I saw the crowd step over the broken parts of the tables and continued to buy the brownies. After eating them, even our burnt cookies looked good. I didn’t have the heart to charge for them though. I planned to give a donation before I left.

  Andrew hung around until the bake sale ended to help with the clean up. It really was our mess after all, but I blamed the brownies. I noticed Eleanor had gone missing again, so I waited outside with Andrew.

  It may be the brownie, but he looked more fetching than before, dressed in Bermuda shorts and a clinging gray tee that displayed his well-muscled frame.

  “I found another body today,” I said.

  “Who?”

  “Nobody you would know. It was someone I wanted to question about the Robinson case.”

  “You’re still stuck on that?”

  “Yes,
of course, Stella’s murder was so similar.”

  “And so copycat.”

  “I think that too, but what else do I have to go on?”

  “Maybe you should just forget about it altogether.”

  I gasped. “There is no way I’m doing that.”

  “Do you hate William that much, or are you hoping it will somehow bring your granddaughter back from the dead?”

  “Hold on! Just who do you think you are?”

  “I think someone needs to tell it to you straight. You have no evidence about William, and your granddaughter is most likely dead.”

  “How do you know for sure?”

  “It makes perfect sense. It would be better if you just faced the facts.”

  “Faced the facts? There are no facts in Sophia’s case, and unless they find her decomposing body somewhere, I refuse to believe she’s dead.”

  “I can understand why you’d want to hold out hope, but Aggie, you’re just not being realistic.”

  “You are a complete ass, and I have no idea what I ever saw in you.”

  I walked away and tried to still the tears that were now pouring from my eyes. He didn’t know. He couldn’t know she was dead. I believed against all reason that she remained alive. She was out there somewhere. She had to be because that is all I lived for this last year. I promised my daughter I’d find her, “And I will, somehow,” I told myself again. I knew I was all out of leads, but something had to turn up. It always did.

  Eleanor joined me at the car, and I was so distraught that I asked her to drive. With any luck a truck would kill us on the way home. But it didn’t happen, and I just sat in the car when we got to Eleanor’s house.

  El asked, “Do you want to talk about it, Aggie?”

  I shook my head. It hurt too much to think about, let alone speak about. I still couldn't believe Andrew would be that harsh. Obviously, William meant more to Andrew than even what we shared or me. I willed myself to quit thinking about Sophia dead somewhere, but how could I not entertain the notion? It's hopeless. Instead of mulling over it further, I gazed at Eleanor as she sat next to me like a sidekick.

  I gave my anger five more minutes and then joined Eleanor inside.

  Chapter Twenty -Four

  As I walked through the open door Eleanor held, I finally spoke. “Okay, I suppose you think I'm acting like a child for sitting in the car so long.”

  Eleanor shrugged. “Since you don't want to talk about it, not much I can say.”

  I trounced through Eleanor’s house and whipped open the patio door and whirled around. “Andrew seems to think my granddaughter is dead.”

  Eleanor stood and looked puzzled. “He said that?”

  I slumped into a chair on the deck. I saw Eleanor out the corner of my eye, but I ignored her. I felt depressed and pissed at Andrew for making me see things I just wasn’t willing to accept. “Sophia is out there somewhere, El, possibly with Jennifer. Will I ever find either of them?”

  “Andrew's a fool if he thinks that, but I guess you don't want my opinion as you're not talking to me again.” Eleanor threw her arms upward and walked away. “Make up your dang mind, Aggie,” she muttered as she slid the patio door back open and moved back inside; after a long moment, she returned with two dishes of ice cream.

  Eleanor pushed a dish of ice cream covered with hot fudge, whipped cream, and nuts toward me. I ate without looking at her. I stared at the lake instead, watching the sun go down. It cast a finger of orange pointing to a shadow on the beach. It looked like a young woman, but when I raced down to the lake, she was gone, and when I found no one, I at first questioned my sanity, but as soon as I discarded that foolish notion, I said to the trees, “I saw a woman. I know I did. I can’t give up hope.”

  I walked along the shore, hoping to catch a glimpse of the young woman I'd seen, but it looked like she was long gone. Maybe I had imagined it. The sunset had that affect on me sometimes.

  Eleanor waited on the deck and looked worried.

  As I strolled up the ramp to the deck, I explained, “I thought I saw a young woman down there, El.”

  “Maybe the sun is playing tricks with your eyes.”

  “No.” I shook my head. “I’m sure I saw someone down there, I even walked up the beach.”

  “Aggie, you’re upset. It’s no telling what you thought you saw. It just wasn’t real.”

  “You didn’t see her! If you had, you wouldn’t be arguing with me. I know what I saw.”

  I was pissed again: this time at Eleanor. I knew I had seen someone standing down there, but where had she gone? All the other cabins looked empty, but I wondered. What if Jennifer or Sophia were being held against their will?

  I thought of calling Trooper Sales, but walked through El's house and out the front door, and made my way toward the cabins nearby. I pounded on doors. Five cabins and not one door opened.

  I realized only then that Eleanor had followed me. I frowned when Eleanor looked at me with concern. That was supposed to be my job.

  “I guess nobody’s home,” Eleanor said.

  I let out with a sad, long sigh. “I guess not.”

  “That or they don’t want to open their door to some half-baked old crone who looks like she just flew in on a broom.”

  I jerked my head up and glared at her.

  “Seriously, you should look at yourself in the mirror,” Eleanor said.

  “And maybe you should follow your own advice! You have lipstick on your cheek.”

  Eleanor wiped it off with the back of her hand and followed me back to her house. She waited for me to enter first. I had a sneaking suspicion she didn’t trust me.

  Once settled in at my place on an overstuffed sofa, Eleanor said, “I’m making you a cup of tea, Aggie.”

  I sat mulling about what to do next, and drank the tea down in a few swigs as Eleanor always made it on the lukewarm side.

  “What kind of tea is this? It tastes kind of bitter.”

  “Oh does it?” Eleanor asked. She spared me her glaring eyes, looking everywhere but at me.

  I knew what she’d done, and I’d kill her if I could get up from the sofa. I closed my eyes and felt Eleanor cover me with a blanket.

  “Good night, Aggie.”

  I woke up with a raging headache, and it took me a moment to realize where I was. I saw Eleanor busying herself in the kitchen and heard something snapping in the frying pan, bacon. The aroma had infiltrated Eleanor's entire house. She needed to turn burner down before...

  Eleanor cried out, “Ouch.”

  “You need to turn the burner down.”

  “It’s done now. I guess it had to have the last word.”

  I smiled and made the eggs while she ran her hand under cold water. She showed me her finger, but it didn’t look too serious. I slathered butter on it. I had no idea if that helped, but it’s what I always did, one of those old wives tales that was passed down through the generations.

  I put plates on the table, and we sat and ate breakfast while watching the sunrise.

  “What did you drug me for?” I asked her.

  “I can’t let you wake up half of Tadium.”

  “It was only nine.”

  “What person our age, that you know, stays up past nine?”

  I knew she was right. If it were up to me, I’d be in bed by eight. I had mixed feelings about what Andrew had said last night, and I wondered if I would ever talk to him again.

  I knew at my age it didn’t make any sense to hold a grudge, but it was easy for him to say those things; it wasn’t his granddaughter gone missing. I said to Eleanor, “I’ll face it, El. The real reason I can’t let this go is Sophia.”

  Eleanor leapt to her feet when someone rapped on the door, and she waddled over to open it.

  Trooper Sales stood just outside the door. “May I come in, please?”

  Eleanor waved him in, and I stood to greet him.

  “What’s going on, Sales?” I asked.

  “I just wanted to tell yo
u that the Hill boys both have an alibi at the time of Billy Chambers’ murder.”

  “That isn’t possible,” I replied.

  The trooper pressed. “How did you know where Billy was hiding out in the first place?”

  “You mean living?” Eleanor added.

  “He was only a suspect in the Robinson murders. He was never charged,” I said.

  The trooper looked more serious than ever. “You’re the main suspect in Stella’s and Billy’s murders.”

  “You have to be joshing,” Eleanor said. “Aggie is no more a suspect than me... I mean I am just as guilty... I mean if she's a suspect, what am I, chopped liver?”

  Trooper Sales shuffled his feet. “I know, you’re both suspects and the sheriff thinks I should arrest you both!”

  I nodded and said, “All adds up nice and tidy in that small brain of his... yeah, figures. I see how this works.”

  “That lame brained sheriff is telling you stories,” Eleanor said.

  The trooper turned to me. “You searched through the Robinson files.”

  “You gave me permission, or did you forget?”

  “I know but I’m just trying to do my job.”

  “Elsie Bradford drew me a map to where Billy was living. I had no idea that he was her son.”

  “Who said that?”

  “One of the girls, Rosa Lee Hill.”

  “I see, and you said Roy told you about Stella.”

  I nodded. “Ask Andrew if you don’t believe me. He was there.”

  “Yup, is he a suspect too, Trooper?” Eleanor asked.

  “No, but ladies, I need to find out who was responsible for their murders before someone else gets killed.”

  I stood there with a puzzled look. “In all honesty, I can’t imagine who that might be as I don’t have any more leads.”

  We watched the trooper leave, and I felt fit to be tied. “Of all the nerve! That crooked sheriff is trying to set us up.” I quickly got myself together, although I had only the clothes I slept in to wear. “Get ready, Eleanor, we’re going to pay that sheriff a visit.”

  Eleanor threw her arms up. “You’re going to get us arrested.”

  I smiled. “Perhaps.”

  Eleanor suggested. “Maybe we should bring Andrew. He’s a lawyer after all.”