Railroaded 4 Murder

by J. C. Eaton

  “And what about the Model Railroad Club?”

  “Louise, Myrna, and I will join.”

  “Do Louise or Myrna know anything about model trains?”

  “Just that they go around in circles.”

  “Dear Lord. This is going to be a disaster. Let the Sheriff’s Office deal with Wilbur’s death. Nate and Marshall, too, for that matter. I think you may be going way over your heads.”

  “Oh, I forgot to mention it. Herb will be joining the Model Railroad Club as well. He got wind of the potluck dinner and wound up at Shirley’s. I’ve always said the man’s worse than a homing pigeon when it comes to food. Anyway, he used to have a model train set when he was a kid. Said he still remembers some of the stuff.”

  “I’m at a loss for words, Mom.”

  “Well, you should be congratulating us for our fast thinking. Operation Agatha is now underway. I’ll talk to you later.”

  I stared at my computer monitor as if all sense of reality had escaped me. I swear, it took me a solid minute to regain my senses and step into the outer office.

  Augusta was flabbergasted when I told her about Operation Agatha. “Look at the bright side. At least it doesn’t involve anything outrageous like their plans usually do.”

  “You mean like dumpster diving or going into someone’s house under a false pretense?”

  “For starters, yes. Although . . . hmm, now that I think of it, those plans started out innocuously enough.”

  “Aargh. This whole thing has disaster written all over it and trust me, somehow I’ll get dragged into it.”

  “You can always tap your way out of it.”

  “Very funny.”

  I didn’t get caught up with Nate or Marshall until late in the day, when we were almost ready to close. The minute I heard their voices, I walked to the front office. The two of them looked as if they had just sat through a screening of War and Peace.

  “Any news?” I asked.

  Nate gave Marshall a look and then turned to me. “If you can call revisiting the timeline with Bowman and Ranston news, then sure.”

  “So they were able to narrow down something?”

  My boss scratched the back of his head and walked to the Keurig. “Good. There’s still water in the cylinder. Oh, the timeline. Seems Roxanne drove her husband to the railroad exhibit at sunrise. Said she dropped him off on her way to her early-riser-yoga-stretching class at Palm Ridge. That’s about a mile or so away from Beardsley. Normally, the guy walks over to the exhibit because they live only a block or two away, but because she was heading out at the same time, she did him a favor.”

  “Harrumph,” Augusta muttered. “Could do without favors like that. And what was the man doing at those train tracks at the crack of dawn?”

  By now, Nate had popped in a K-cup and was waiting for it to fill. “According to the wife, Wilbur got a late-night call from someone in the club telling him the train didn’t make its last run. Thought something went wrong with the circuit box.”

  “Did she say who called?”

  “Nope. No idea. Wilbur took the call, so she doesn’t know if it was a man or a woman.”

  Marshall took a step toward me and gave my shoulder a squeeze. “Bowman plans to get a search warrant for their house. He’s determined to find out if that tap shoe belonged to Roxanne.”

  “And how’s a search warrant going to do that?”

  “If the mate to the shoe is found, it’s pretty clear-cut.”

  A flat, blunt object all right. That rules out the Phillips head screwdriver and the jagged granite rocks. “If she did kill him, and used that tap shoe, she wouldn’t be stupid enough to leave its mate in the house where it could incriminate her. And she wouldn’t have left the shoe there in the first place. This whole thing reeks of a setup.”

  “Bowman doesn’t agree,” Marshall said. “He thinks Roxanne panicked and left the shoe.”

  I bit my lower lip. “This is looking worse by the minute.”

  Then Augusta chimed in, “Not as bad as Operation Agatha.”

  “What?” Nate and Marshall asked, almost as if on cue.

  “I’m sure Phee will be happy to explain.”

  I shot Augusta a look and groaned. By the time I finished detailing my mother’s latest fiasco in the making, my boss and my fiancé were roaring with laughter.

  “Well,” Nate regained his voice, “I can’t really see any harm in that. I mean, those women are in to everything. Remind me to buy tickets for the next tap-dancing show. This I’ve got to see.”

  “Oh, they won’t be around for a show. Trust me. All they want is gossip so they can concoct their own theory and plague us to death.”

  Marshall smiled at me. “Been there before, hon. I wouldn’t worry about it.”

  Maybe he wasn’t worried, but he should have been. Operation Agatha was a plan that needed to be feared.

  CHAPTER 9

  True to form, the Sheriff’s Office supplied ours with a complete list of everyone in Sun City West who belonged to the Model Railroad Club and the Rhythm Tappers. By Monday morning, Augusta was fast at work scheduling interviews with them. I had just returned from a quick run to the deli for breakfast sandwiches, because all of us were hungry.

  The lists were formidable, especially because it was March and the snowbirds were still in town. Nate opted for the Railroad Club, while Marshall wound up with the Tappers.

  “Not that it really matters,” Nate said, “but some of those women go on and on. Do you have any idea how many photos of cats I had to look at the last time we interviewed a club?”

  Marshall, who was a few feet away at a file cabinet, looked up. “From what I hear, I need to be on the lookout for those Choo-Choo Chicks.”

  “I think you can hold your own.” I laughed.

  Between interviewing club members and handling their other investigative work, Nate and Marshall went nonstop for the next few days. But they weren’t the only ones. My mother made sure Operation Agatha was up and running.

  It was a little past three when she called me on Thursday.

  Augusta took the call and then transferred it to my office, announcing, “Trouble in paradise.”

  My mother’s voice was louder than usual. “The most dreadful thing happened at the Rhythm Tappers practice session today. Poor Cecilia!”

  I saved the file I was working on. “What? Did she fall? Break a leg? Break someone else’s leg?”

  “Roxanne was arrested. For murder. Right in front of everyone. Those two barbarians from the Sheriff’s Office slapped handcuffs on her and marched her out of the social hall as if she’d committed a crime.”

  “Um, I think they think she committed a crime or she wouldn’t have been arrested. Did they read her the Miranda rights?”

  “You mean that whole spiel about ‘You have the right to remain silent’?”

  “Yes. That.”

  “Yes. I can’t begin to tell you how distraught Cecilia is over this.”

  “Cecilia? What about Roxanne? How did she appear?”

  “For a woman who just lost her husband a week or so ago and who’s trying to get on with a normal life, she appeared fine. Until those deputies marched in. Oh, I forgot to tell you. Roxanne planned a celebration of Wilbur’s life to be held at the Railroad Club room next week. Catered. Of course, I’m not so sure that will happen if she’s rotting behind bars.”

  “Okay. I’ll let Nate and Marshall know, although I’m sure Bowman will have sent them a text or something. I’ll call you tonight. Tell Cecilia to pull herself together.”

  When the men arrived back at the office an hour later, I learned Bowman had gotten in touch with them regarding the arrest. The term “waiting for the other shoe to drop” now had a whole new meaning for me. It seemed the mate to the tap shoe I found at the crime scene was resting comfortably in Roxanne’s spare closet, along with at least three other pairs. Talk about incriminating evidence. So much for Bowman’s circuit-box theory.

  “It’s w
ay too easy,” I told Augusta. “Only a dunderhead would be so careless.”

  “Yep. Got to agree with you on that one. If you ask me, the woman’s being railroaded. Railroaded for murder.”

  “Do you think Nate and Marshall will still be needed for those interviews?”

  “Hell yes. One shoe might not hold up in court, so the Sheriff’s Office will need more evidence. Those interviews are bound to lead to something.”

  I had to admit Roxanne did have a motive if she thought her husband was cheating on her, but knocking him over the head with her tap shoe in a public place? Unless she was going for the dramatic, it made no sense whatsoever. I tried to picture a heated argument during which someone grabbed the nearest object and hurled it at their target, but again, how do you preplan having a tap shoe in your hand?

  And if it was preplanned, why a tap shoe when another blunt object, such as a small hammer, would make more sense? Then again, those metal taps, depending on the size, can be formidable. One good bang to the right spot on someone’s head and it’s all over. I cringed. Two years ago, my mind never would have come up with gruesome scenarios for murder. Now I was one step away from opening shop in the noir section of the library.

  “You okay, Phee? You have a strange look on your face.”

  “Uh, sorry, Augusta. Just thinking. I’d better get back to work.”

  And while Augusta and I locked the office and left at a little past five, Nate and Marshall remained to get caught up.

  “Want me to pick up dinner on the way home?” Marshall asked. “Or better yet, meet me at Texas Roadhouse. I’ve been dying for a decent steak. We can turn off our cell phones and commiserate in private.”

  “Deal. Sevenish?”

  “Sounds good.”

  Texas Roadhouse was one of those casual places where peanut shells on the floor weren’t uncommon and western music gave the place a down-home feel.

  Marshall tossed his fork around the bowl of Caesar salad he’d ordered and then let it drop. “Nate plans to visit Roxanne tomorrow at the jail. He’s got some names of decent defense attorneys.”

  “Bowman and Ranston think they have a strong-enough case?”

  “They hit the big three: motive, means, and opportunity. Good grief. The woman even admitted to driving her husband to the location.”

  “But it’s too easy. You know that as well as I do.”

  “Too bad the deputies don’t. This whole thing smacks of a setup. The good news is that while Bowman and Ranston have us interviewing club members to gain more solid evidence, we’ll be trying to figure out who set her up in the first place.”

  “That’s a relief. Meanwhile, Operation Agatha didn’t get off to such a great start.”

  “Think your mother will let it go?”

  “Let it go? Not on your life. She’ll be more determined than ever to find the real killer.”

  We tried to focus on other topics of conversation during dinner but kept coming back to Wilbur’s murder. At one point, Marshall jabbed his steak with a fork and then paused. “Who uses a bloody tap shoe when there’s enough cutlery around to take out an army?”

  I thought about it for a moment and bit my lower lip. “Maybe it wasn’t the tap shoe at all. Maybe the tap shoe was a distracter . . . a ruse . . . you know, something that would lead people to assume one thing when it was something else altogether.”

  “Well, you can forget those rocks. They’re all jagged and sharp. Wilbur’s face would have scratches and gouges. The coroner was pretty clear about cause of death from a flat, heavy instrument, and those cleats are pretty substantial.”

  “I suppose.” I bit into one of the mushrooms from my skewered steak and sighed. “Listen, I know we’ve both got a full slate tomorrow, but what does your weekend look like?”

  “Ugh,” Marshall said. “I’ll be working on my smaller cases and picking up with interviews on Monday. You still going in on Saturday?”

  “It’ll be a short morning. Invoices only. Maybe we can find some time for a quick hike, or even a bike ride around Lake Pleasant.”

  “Consider it done. We’ll work around each other’s schedules.”

  It took a bit of maneuvering, but Marshall and I were able to enjoy some decent weekend time before Monday morning came with a vengeance. It started with a call from my mother first thing, as I was getting dressed. Marshall had already left for the fitness center and then the office.

  The words flew out of my mother’s mouth. “Roxanne’s going to be released. Not enough evidence to make that arrest stick. For now. Cecilia found out from the phone tree for the Tappers. She couldn’t wait to call me.”

  No. Waiting simply isn’t in their vocabulary. “That’s good news, huh? I hope she called Nate. He was planning on visiting her at the jail. It’ll save him a trip downtown. Did they tell Roxanne to get a lawyer?”

  “Cecilia didn’t say. But if you ask me, those deputies don’t have a strong-enough case. I saw an episode like that on Law and Order. It was a rerun, and—”

  “Never mind. It doesn’t matter. I really should let Nate know. I’ll catch up with you later.”

  “Wait! Myrna called me last night. She can’t go to the Model Railroad Club meeting with me tomorrow night because of her hemorrhoids. She can’t sit that long. Has to take sitz baths with Epsom salt.”

  Ew! “Too much information, Mom. Much too much. Didn’t you say Louise plans on going to the Railroad Club with you?”

  “She does. But she can’t go tomorrow either. She’s giving a presentation at the Sunshine Bird Club. Said she’d go to the next meeting, but we can’t afford to wait until Thursday. And forget about Herb. He’s not going until Thursday. Something about a beer special at Curley’s on Tuesday nights. So, like I was saying, the Railroad Club meets twice a week. Tuesdays for the G track and Thursdays for the H/O track. I looked it up on their website. Shirley got the letters wrong.”

  Big surprise there . . .

  “Anyway, I thought because Marshall is so busy, you’d be able to join me. It would look too suspicious if I walked in by myself.”

  “And it won’t look suspicious if I go with you? I’m not even a resident.”

  “It doesn’t matter. We’ll both act very, very interested in trains.”

  “You can act very interested in trains because I’m not going to the Model Railroad Club as part of your Operation Agatha.”

  “Fine. Then maybe you’ll consider taking Streetman to the park this week so you can get the lowdown from Cindy Dolton.”

  I took a long gulp. It was the age-old game of “pick your poison,” and my mother was a master at it. True, Cindy Dolton, with her cute little dog, Bundles, was a wealth of information when it came to the local scuttlebutt, but having to contend with Streetman when he got into one of his amorous moods was a situation I wouldn’t wish on anyone.

  “Okay. You win. What time is the meeting?”

  CHAPTER 10

  “So, Marshall was okay with the idea of you infiltrating the Railroad Club?” my mother asked when we pulled up to their meeting room at the R. H. Johnson Recreation Center the following evening.

  “I’m not infiltrating. This isn’t a covert operation, for crying out loud. If anything, I’m fact-finding.” Fact-finding? Who the heck was I kidding? It’d be nothing but gossip and innuendo.

  “What facts have he and Nate uncovered?”

  “You know I’m not at liberty to share that kind of information with you. Even if I did know, which I don’t.”

  “Ha! The two of them and those deputies haven’t budged from square one. Poor Roxanne. Someone’s probably filling out the paperwork already to stick her in the Perryville Prison for Women.”

  “She’s not back in jail and she certainly hasn’t gone on trial yet. Hopefully it won’t get to that point.”

  I parked my car in the large lot in front of the complex and my mother and I walked across the small, interior courtyard to the club room. Large, potted agaves and cacti framed the walls of
the courtyard and small pole lamps gave off an eerie glow. The large hanging sign in the shape of a train made the Railroad Club room impossible to miss.

  “Looks like this is the place,” I said. “We might as well go in.”

  My mother opened the door and stepped inside. A huge model railroad encompassed three of the four walls, and it rivaled anything I’d ever seen in department-store displays. In the center of the room were a few rows of wooden chairs and, with the exception of three or four of them, they were all occupied. A large refreshment table took up the fourth wall, and it was filled with all sorts of yummy-looking cookies and cakes.

  A short, gray-haired lady wearing a striped railroad hat and a matching apron greeted us from the small table where she was seated. “Grace Svoboda. Welcome. Please sign in. It’s so nice to have visitors at our monthly meetings. Of course, we meet every week, but that’s only for work time and train runs. You’ll love this club. And our dues are very reasonable. Twenty dollars for the year, and that includes refreshments. Tonight is G track. That stands for Garden track or Garden scale. Ours are the larger trains. Like the one at Beardsley Rec Center. Of course, you’ve got your N track and your O track, but those aren’t as popular. H/O track meets on Thursdays, and four times a year we have a full meeting of the club in the social hall. Oh goodness. Don’t let me forget to tell you—twice a year we have our Midnight Run at Beardsley. Of course, it’s not really at midnight because none of us would be awake for that. It runs at dusk and it’s lots of fun. Great popcorn, too.”

  “Um, sounds wonderful,” I said.

  Grace smiled. “Naturally, G track is my favorite. Even if you’re H/O scale operators, you should stay for the meeting. It’s always informative, and afterward we mingle, eat wonderful treats, and run the trains.”

  We thanked her and took the only two seats next to each other. First row, smack dab in the middle. The five or six ladies who were in attendance—aka the Choo-Choo Chicks—looked nothing like the harlots, men-chasers, husband-hunters, or wanton women Roxanne had told the book club ladies about. These women were more Betty Crocker than Betty Boop.