DEAD AS a DOORNAIL

by Tonya Kappes

“I’m sorry.” His lips pushed together, his face squished up. “I just don’t know what I’m gonna do.”

  “One day at a time.” I patted and rubbed. “Go on and tell me about what you did after you pulled out of the driveway,” I encouraged him.

  “Drat.” Poppa stomped. “Some kids are in the Dixon’s Foodtown about to steal something. I can’t have you leaving this interrogation. I’ve got to go scare them off before Toots Buford calls Betty at dispatch.”

  I took a deep inhale and let out the big breath to clear my head from Poppa talking to me.

  “I’m sorry. I’m just trying to figure out what Lucy’s last actions were and it helps if I know where you were and what was going on. If she was upset and all that. Go on,” I said again.

  “Like I said, I told her I couldn’t go to the wedding.” He shuffled his feet. “I regret it now. All the men were going to go hunting wild hogs and I had to go. I just couldn’t think of them bringing home a hammy and not me. Now I wished I’d just said yes to her. Finn said something about poisoning. What on earth? Do you think maybe she got into something and wasn’t murdered?” He teared up again. “The thought of someone wanting my sweet Lucy Ellen dead is beyond me.”

  I did a little more rubbing and patting. He clearly wasn’t ready to talk.

  “I don’t know. But before I let you go, you did say something about Lucy Ellen complaining about Tina Bower’s salon, Tiny Tina’s.” I wanted to hear it one more time.

  “Yeah. She and Tina have this love-hate thing. Tina cuts Lucy’s hair too short on purpose, Lucy Ellen claims. Then she got the foot fungus thing and blamed that on Tina. But then they go eat lunch and all that.” He sighed. “Women. I just don’t understand them. Why? Do you think Tina did this?”

  “I don’t know. I’m just eliminating everyone at the moment.” I wasn’t going to show any cards to him. With his arsenal of guns and in his grief, I wasn’t sure what Darnell would do when we found out who killed his wife.

  “I’m staying out at The Tattered Cover Books and Inn if you need anything else.” He gripped the plastic bag. “Please keep me posted.”

  “I will. I’ll definitely be calling with more questions.” It was only fair to let him know to expect me to call him. After another day or so, I was sure he’d remember more. “Before I let you go.” I paused. “Did you know she was an organ donor?”

  “She talked about it, and it was just like her to always give to others.” He painted her as a saint.

  “What are you thinking?” Finn asked after we heard Darnell’s truck door slam and drive off.

  “I’m thinking we have to find that bottle of nail polish. I also want Tom Geary to call me with the results of Lucy’s fingernail and I certainly am thinking about that ugly dress I have to wear in front of the entire town on Saturday.” I laughed.

  Finn took me in his arms.

  “We’ll get to the bottom of this. I’m sorry I’ve not found anything to help in the investigation. It’s like the killer has vanished.” He gave me a hug. “I’m going to head on over to Tina’s house and see if she’ll let me look around. What I find over there will help us decide who we look at next.”

  “Sounds good.” I gave him a kiss through the window of the Jeep after I got in to drive away. “I’m going to stop by the library.”

  We said our goodbyes and I called Betty at dispatch over the walkie-talkies to see if anything from Dixon’s was called in.

  “Not a thing going on. Just a lot of calls from the gals about Lucy Ellen and what we’re going to do about bell choir at Christmas.” She ho-hummed. “You don’t want to do bell choir, do you?”

  “Betty, I don’t know. Let me get through this investigation first, then I’ll worry about months from now.” Why was it that everyone started to worry about Christmas months in advance?

  Even stores were already selling wrapping paper and ornaments.

  “Finn’s gone to Tina’s house to talk to her and I’m going to head on over to the library.” I gave Betty the schedule so she’d know where we were in case a call did come in and she’d be able to determine who could get where faster—not that Cottonwood was that big, but I prided myself on the efficiency of a two-officer department.

  “Don’t eat out for lunch. Your mama brought you a salad and she told me to make sure it was the only thing you eat.” Betty snickered on the other end. “Happy fat” was the last thing she said before she clicked off the walkie-talkie.

  Suddenly I had a hankering for one of those big pastries and a hot cup of coffee the library offered to their patrons.

  Chapter Eleven

  The old white colonial house that was centuries old and stood next to the courthouse had been converted to the Cottonwood Library before I could remember. I’d spent many hours getting lost in different fictitious towns as a child while Mama enjoyed her many group meetings there.

  The rush of wind pushed past me when I opened the front door. The smell of paper and old books wrapped around me in a welcoming and comforting hug to my soul. It was such a distinct smell. The kind that immediately brought back those fond memories.

  I waved at Marcy Carver, the librarian, when Duke and I walked past the reference desk. She smiled and continued to talk on the phone that was pinned between her ear and shoulder as she typed on the computer keyboard.

  The library only had three public rooms. The children’s section was probably the most popular, then there was the fiction section that held all of the various genres, and the non-fiction room, which was where I was going to check out the last few weeks of the Cottonwood Chronicle. It’d have been much easier to look up the Chronicle online, if only they put them online as they were published. Unfortunately, Marcy was still in the old-school era and was so very far behind in getting the most recent papers on the internet. Once she told me it was Malina Woody’s job since she was the assistant librarian. I’d even gone as far as bringing it up at one of the town-council meetings that Edna Easterly, the owner of the Chronicle and editor-in-chief, should have the equipment to upload the paper, but that failed miserably.

  The non-fiction room had a few tables with computers as well as a card catalog for the periodicals. It was also the area where the library had the sweets and coffee bar.

  Today was an assortment of cupcakes that definitely didn’t come from Dixon’s Foodtown. These were fancy. The heavenly smell even made Duke stick his nose up in the air and dance around.

  “You can’t have any of these.” I eyeballed the chocolate on chocolate right off. There was a business card from the Sweet Shop. I took one and put it in the front pocket of my shirt. “This one is perfect.”

  With a couple pumps of the coffee carafe in a paper cup and the cupcake, I walked over to the card catalog, setting my goodies on top of it.

  In order for me to get the back issues, I’d have to write down the exact dates I wanted. I drew my finger down the little drawers and pulled the one with the letter C. The little filing tabs clicked along the top of the drawer as it slid to full extension.

  I decided on the last two months’ issues. This way I could look up Page Two and see exactly what Lucy Ellen had reviewed. Two months would seem like a long enough period for someone to fester over her words as well as see any potential loss to their business.

  There was a basket of scrap paper and tiny pencils, like the ones you’d see at mini-golf, in another basket. I grabbed one of each and wrote down the information from the card catalog.

  The squeaky wheels of the book cart screeched from behind me. I turned around when it stopped. Malina was running her finger from one hand down the spines of a row of books and had a book in the other hand.

  “Hey, Malina.” I held the pieces of paper and noticed her hair was cut shorter. “Where is the Sweet Shop?”

  She tucked a piece of her hair behind her ear. She’d gone from long brown hair to a more stylish asymmet
rical bob and even added highlights.

  “It’s a new shop in the strip mall next to Hart’s Insurance. They have the neatest desserts.” Her smile reached her eyes. “You picked a good one.”

  “Yeah. It looks so good.” I didn’t care that I needed to fit into that maid of honor dress. I was going to eat that cupcake for brain power. At least thinking that made me feel better. “I see you’re still keeping the new hairdo. It looks good.” I smiled.

  “Thank you, Kenni.” She raked the tips of her fingers down the bob. She bent down and patted Duke a couple of times behind his ear.

  “Are you still getting it cut at Tiny Tina’s?” I asked.

  “There’s no one else in town.” She stood back up, shrugged, and picked up another book off the cart. With the end of the spine, she shoved a space for it on the shelf.

  “How’s the Tattered Cover?” I asked about the hotel where Darnell Lowell was staying. Malina worked the front desk there part-time.

  “It’s all good. I’ll be picking up more hours during the fall and holiday season, but it’s a little slow right now.”

  Tourists loved to come to Cottonwood during the holiday season since it was on the antique registry. The Christmas Festival also brought in a lot of visitors. Our small town was beautifully decorated, almost dipped in Christmas.

  “You said that you still get your hair done at Tiny Tina’s. Did you ever see Lucy Ellen Lowell in there?” It might be a long shot, but I thought I’d give it a try.

  “Ummm...” She sighed, twisted her lips, and rolled her eyes to the sky. “No,” her head shook slowly, “I don’t think I ever saw her in there. But I did see your mama in there once or twice getting a pedicure from Cheree. She’s just the sweetest. Your mama, that is.”

  “Isn’t she though.” I spared Malina the truth about my mama and her role in me being in Polly’s wedding. “Anyway,” I held the pieces of paper out to her, “can you grab these issues of the Cottonwood Chronicle for me?”

  She thumbed through them. “What are you looking for?”

  “I’m going to look up all the editorial reviews and comments, along with anything I can pull up about Lucy Ellen Lowell. I know she did a lot of reviews in the paper and it seems like a good place to start to see what people knew about her or who had a tiff with her.” I usually wouldn’t say so much to Malina, but she was in the public with gossip fluttering around.

  “Marcy might know a thing or two.” Malina couldn’t hide the devious smile on her face. She leaned in and looked up under her brow to see if anyone was around before she said, “Marcy secretly hates—hated—Lucy. Lucy Ellen came in here to use the computer to do her reviews after someone would make her mad. Marcy told her that she was mean and she wasn’t going to let her do it anymore. Lucy Ellen told Marcy that she paid taxes and she could use whatever computer she wanted and Marcy couldn’t stop her.”

  “Really?” I never figured I’d put Marcy Carver on a list of persons of interest for murder, but she was definitely going on there for me to talk to.

  “It didn’t stop Lucy. She marched right on over to that computer.” Malina pointed. “Lucy Ellen wasn’t smart enough to erase the history off the computer and while she was here, Marcy turned off the internet. When she left Marcy went over to the computer to see what Lucy Ellen had written. Lucy Ellen didn’t write a review for the store she’d intended to when she came in. She wrote a bad review about Marcy and how she didn’t let people use their tax dollars to use all the library has to offer.” Malina laughed. “I’ve never seen Marcy so mad in her life. She erased the history and the review before she turned the internet back on.” She shrugged. “We’ve learned that if we turn off the internet, Lucy Ellen’s review is lost.”

  “Did Lucy Ellen ever come back in?” I asked.

  “Oh, yeah. Only when I was working though.” Malina shrugged. “I don’t care about other people’s business.”

  Sure you don’t, I thought.

  “It’s a free country and Marcy was right.” Malina shook her head. “Lucy Ellen got what she had coming to her.”

  “Marcy said that? It seems a little harsh to wish death on a few silly reviews,” I noted as Malina nodded with pursed lips.

  “You’ll have to ask her about that.” She turned and glanced towards Marcy’s office door that was closed. “Anyways, I’ve got all these issues of the Chronicle on the computer already.” She handed the papers back. “I’ve been trying to get them uploaded the day the paper comes out. Edna is paying me extra to get them up on the new website.”

  “New website?” I asked.

  “Yeah. Edna said there’s a big market with online subscription services, which just sends Marcy over the edge.” Malina laughed.

  “Why is Marcy upset?” I asked.

  “Because she says the internet is going to shut down the library and we’ll all be out of a job. That’s why she doesn’t want anything to go online as quickly as I can do it.” She leaned around me and looked. She leaned back and whispered, “Between me and you, I’m going to go work for Edna and her online subscriptions. I’m going to be giving my two weeks right before the Parker wedding because Edna wants me to cover and write a story on it since I’m invited.”

  “Congratulations. I didn’t know you wanted to work at a newspaper.” I clearly remembered Malina’s nose always being stuck in a book.

  “I want to be a writer like Beryle Stone.” She smiled fondly as she spoke about the only famous (now deceased) citizen of Cottonwood, who was a bestselling author. “Look out, literary world.” She brushed her hands in front of her like she was brushing away anything that might get in her way. “Here comes Malina.”

  “Good luck.” I crumpled the papers in my fist and threw them in the wastebasket on my way over to the computer. The cart squeaked out of the non-fiction room with Malina pushing it.

  I wondered how Marcy was going to take Malina leaving. It sounded to me like there was some tension between the two librarians’ ideas. It was none of my business and I didn’t have time to even think about it.

  Duke laid down next to the computer table I sat down at to look up the back issues of the paper.

  After I logged into the computer, I surfed the web for the Cottonwood Chronicle website. It popped up. In the search box on the left sidebar, I typed in the dates for the last couple months. The articles appeared on the screen with another box overlapping it asking for my subscription information. There were two ways I could do this: I could either get Malina or Marcy to get me the paper copy, or I could easily subscribe through the sheriff’s department and have any sort of access I needed from work or home.

  I opted for the subscription, which was smart on Edna’s part. With the sheriff’s credit card information all typed in and my password set, I was in business and flipping the online paper to Page Two, the social page.

  There wasn’t anything interesting or from Lucy Ellen in the first couple of papers that I looked through, but there was a review in the third paper about six weeks before today’s date.

  Lucy Ellen had written a review about Pet Patch and in particular shaming Faith Dunaway, the owner, for not carrying a certain cat food. For a minute, I tried to remember if the Lowells had a cat because I hadn’t seen one. Regardless, the article said Faith refused to order any in and that she wasn’t a very good business owner because she didn’t cater to the needs of the citizens of Cottonwood. She also went on to say that Faith wasn’t a good citizen of Cottonwood because she didn’t believe in hunting and protested many of the Hunt Club’s events. There was even a picture of Faith where she’d gone to last year’s gun show and threw fake blood on none other than Lucy Ellen Lowell. Edna had gotten a really good shot. Underneath that photo was another one of Faith cleaning out cages at the local SPCA with a snarl on her face. I wasn’t sure what it was about, but I was about to find out.

  The rest of the papers had the r
eviews I’d already known about. The one with On the Run food truck and the latest one on Tiny Tina’s Salon.

  “How are you this morning, Sheriff?” Marcy called on my way past the reference desk.

  “Good. I see the children’s theater is going well.” There was a puppet show going on in the children’s room.

  “Oh, the kids love it. We’re starting to work on the Christmas puppet show for the Christmas benefit. They asked us to join them. I think it’s a wonderful idea since parents will open their wallets up to just about anything that supports their children.” She clasped her hands in front of her.

  “You’re getting a jump on things. We haven’t even had fall yet.” If I didn’t know better, I’d think Cottonwood citizens wanted to skip fall and head straight to winter. Not me. I loved fall in Cottonwood.

  “It’s just around the corner and will be here before you know it. What brings you here?” she asked.

  “I needed to look through some of your back issues of the Cottonwood Chronicle for a little work.” Without even telling her what the work was, I knew she already knew.

  “I’m assuming you’re here to look up the reviews Lucy Ellen Lowell’s always done and narrowing down suspects?” she questioned.

  “We are looking at all possibilities, yes.” I rocked on the heels of my shoes.

  “Let me get those for you.” She gestured to the room behind the reference desk where they kept the paper copies.

  “Malina was very helpful in telling me how they’re online now. So I jumped on your computer and even made me an online subscription.” As I spoke to her, her neck got red and it crept right on up to cover her entire face.

  She cocked a brow. “Is that so?” Her question was followed by a deep inhale and her glare turned toward Malina, who just so happened to be walking by with a fresh load of books to reshelve.

  “She mentioned that Lucy Ellen Lowell came in here to do her reviews of shops and her opinions about the people who own them.” I said. When I didn’t get an immediate response, I asked, “what did you think about that?”