Murder Boogies with Elvis

by Anne George

  “That’s what I heard, Aunt Pat. I’m sorry.”

  We exited into a beautiful spring day. Debbie asked if I wanted to stop and get lunch somewhere, but I didn’t feel like it. Not only did I have the sinus, but I was depressed. There’s tacky, there’s common, and there’s common as pig tracks. Being arrested for suspicion of murder and handcuffed would have to rank in the latter category. Grandmama Alice was probably flipping over in her grave right this moment in spite of the fact that I was innocent. On her list of common as pig tracks were such things as chewing on a toothpick and, God forbid, smoking in public. Compared with those, being arrested would warrant the creation of a whole new category.

  “What do you think could be more common than pig tracks?” I asked Debbie.

  “Nothing.”

  That cheered me up some.

  “I’ve been thinking,” I said as we went up the entrance ramp to the Red Mountain Expressway. “This Griffin Mooncloth is Russian, he’s defected, and he’s been murdered. How come the state department isn’t involved? Or the FBI or something?”

  Debbie checked the oncoming traffic and pulled onto the expressway. “I guess they figure it’s not a political thing. You take all of those illegal aliens who work in the poultry plants up in north Alabama. One of them gets stabbed to death, and it’s up to the local police to find out who did it.”

  “That’s true. But this Mooncloth guy was outstanding enough to be involved in a cultural exchange. And the Russians are still pretty strict about what they allow their citizens to do.”

  Debbie passed a truck loaded with huge steel coils that were bouncing ominously. I breathed a sigh of relief to be past it.

  “I don’t know, Aunt Pat. Just about all of the Russian ice skaters live here now. And I’ll bet if you looked at the rosters of the largest ballet companies, half the names would be Russian. And I think that everyone’s pretty sure that Griffin Mooncloth’s murder wasn’t a political one. Somebody had it in for him personally.”

  “You’re right. I’ve seen too many Cold War movies.”

  I glanced up at Red Mountain and depression descended again. It looked bare without the statue of Vulcan raising his torch and mooning all points south. We needed him back. Vulcan Park was closed, but one night recently some teenagers had sneaked in and painted the dismantled statue’s toenails red. If he wasn’t back on his pedestal soon, there would surely be more vandalism. Whoever had had the bright idea to fill the largest iron statue in the world with concrete should have his head examined. Particularly when they left a hole in the statue’s head that allowed water to get in and freeze.

  I rubbed my forehead.

  “Headache?” Debbie asked.

  I nodded.

  “He had a nice voice. Not much of an accent.”

  “Griffin Mooncloth?”

  Debbie signaled and got into the turn lane. “He left word on my answering machine that he needed an appointment. When I called him back, I got his machine. I told him three o’clock the next day and if that wasn’t okay to call me back. That was the day he was killed.”

  “He had an answering machine?”

  Debbie nodded. “I’m sure it was one of those little portable ones you can stick on any phone. I called the police and told them when I heard what had happened to him. Gave them the number.”

  “So he wasn’t staying at a hotel?”

  “It was a direct line. Some of these business suite motels have them, though.” Debbie took the exit. “I wish I knew what he wanted and how he got my name. He just said I’d been recommended.”

  “Hmm.” I closed my eyes. I was almost home. I would put on my robe, open a can of chicken noodle soup, take another antibiotic. Muffin and I would watch the Rosie show or a movie on Lifetime.

  “Mama’s at your house,” Debbie said.

  I opened my eyes. Mary Alice and Tammy Sue Ludmiller were standing in my front yard talking to Mitzi.

  “Where in the world have you been?” Sister asked as I got out of the car. “Mitzi said you left with two men in suits.”

  Tammy Sue said, “Wasn’t that a movie title? Two Men in Suits?”

  Sister shook her head. “I think it was Two Men and a Baby.”

  “Three Men and a Baby,” Mitzi corrected her. “And she did leave with two men in suits. I saw her out of my kitchen window. She was all hunched over, and I came right out to see about her, but they were gone. I had to put on some clothes, so it took me a minute or two.” Mitzi turned to me. “I was worried about you though, Patricia Anne.”

  All of them looked at me for an explanation as to why I had worried them.

  “I was arrested for suspicion of murder. I’ve been at the police station.”

  “Have mercy,” Mitzi exclaimed, clutching her chest. “And on top of the sinus.”

  “It was the knife,” Debbie came around the car explaining. “But everything’s cool now.”

  Cool? Everything was cool? Dear Lord. I hadn’t heard that expression in ages.

  Tammy Sue rolled her eyes. “They think she killed the Mooncloth guy? That’s ridiculous. She was right in the front row.”

  “They’ve pretty much ruled out her murdering him,” Debbie said.

  “Well, I should hope so. And, besides,” Tammy Sue continued, “Larry caught a glimpse of the person who did it just as they started toward the front doing their kick, so it couldn’t have been Mrs. Hollowell.”

  “Patricia Anne’s not strong enough to stick a switchblade knife in anybody anyway. She’s always been weak as a kitten what with her eating problems,” Sister said.

  The way they were talking about me was beginning to make me feel invisible. I drew myself up to my full five feet and announced that I was going into the house to take some aspirin and antibiotics and open a can of soup.

  “But we came to take you to lunch at Tannehill. I want to show Tammy Sue the church and see what she thinks about the reception.”

  Apparently Sister was making some headway with her soon-to-be stepdaughter by getting her involved with the wedding plans.

  “I want to go with you,” Debbie said, “Can I go? I’ll have to stop by the house and feed Brother first. Can I meet you down there?”

  “We’ll just go by and pick him up. How about that?” Sister turned to Mitzi. “You want to go, Mitzi? I need all the input I can get. Like whether or not long dresses would be a problem.”

  “Just let me get my purse.”

  For a moment I considered climbing into the car and going with them. Then I remembered that Tim Hawkins was going to come by that afternoon to ask some questions. So I waved them off and went in to heat my soup.

  There were three messages on my answering machine, two from Fred and one from Bernice Armstrong. Fred wanted to know how I was feeling, and Bernice was thanking me for calling to check on Dusk the night before. She was sorry they had missed the call. Dusk was feeling much better and would probably go back to New York in a couple of days. Give her a callback when I got a chance.

  I called Fred and told him I was all right. I had decided that I would wait until he got home to tell him about being arrested. That would take more than a phone call. Bernice’s line was busy, so I warmed my chicken noodle soup and sat down at the kitchen table. I was hungry, I realized, when I tasted my first spoonful. Here, at my kitchen table, was normality. The sun was shining through the skylight in the den, Woofer was marking his tree in the yard, and Muffin was stretched out on the sofa. I crumbled some crackers into the soup and relaxed for the first time that day. Handcuffs? Miranda rights? Voice-stress analyzer? The whole morning was becoming as unreal as a trip to Mars.

  But someone had put a murder weapon in my purse. That was real. I could still feel it in my hand—cold, metallic—see the switch shaped like a crown, hear the swoosh of the blade. I shivered and forced myself to think pleasant thoughts. Haley. Joanna.

  I was so lost in those thoughts that the phone’s ringing startled me.

  “Mrs. Hollowell?” a deep ma
le voice said when I answered. “This is Larry Ludmiller. Is Tammy Sue there by any chance? I know she’s with Mrs. Crane, and I called her house and Tiffany said they were probably with you.”

  “They’re on their way to Tannehill for lunch,” I explained. I gave him Sister’s car phone number. He thanked me and hung up. I didn’t think any more about this conversation until hours later. At the time, it didn’t seem important.

  Tim Hawkins showed up alone around four o’clock. By then, I had had a short nap and the antibiotics seemed to be kicking in. I felt better.

  “Do you have your handcuffs?” I asked him when I opened the door.

  “No ma’am. I’m so damned sorry about that, Mrs. Hollowell.” He actually blushed. “Excuse the language.”

  “I know. Policy.”

  “Yes, ma’am. My mama would have a fit. I’m sure you remember her. President of the PTA? Got the stage lights put up? The spots?”

  “Little bitty? Space between her teeth?”

  “That’s her.”

  “Well, how’s she doing?”

  “Just fine.”

  “Give her my regards. Tell her they’re still enjoying those lights at the school.”

  While this exchange was going on, I led Tim back to the den and motioned for him to sit on the sofa. He turned down the offer of coffee and got out his notebook.

  “Mrs. Hollowell,” he said, “I know you didn’t have anything to do with the stabbing, but we need to find out how the knife got in your pocketbook.”

  “We sure do,” I agreed.

  “Do you have a theory?”

  I told him all about the dinner party at Mary Alice’s house and how the purse had sat on the table. I named the people who had had access to it and said how I hated to think that it was one of them because my sister was going to marry Virgil Stuckey and all of them were related to him.

  Tim wrote down the names and allowed as to how Sheriff Stuckey was a good man. “I’ve worked with him on several cases,” he said. “You know who he reminds me of? Willard Scott.”

  I allowed as to how he reminded me of both Willard and Norman Schwarzkopf, and he was, indeed, a good man.

  “Timmy,” I said, when I had told him all I knew about Virgil, Jr., Larry, Tammy Sue, and Olivia, which wasn’t much. “Do you know what Griffin Mooncloth was doing in Birmingham?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  He was lying. Thirty years of teaching is better than any polygraph or voice-stress analyzer for spotting a lie.

  “He made an appointment with my niece, who’s a lawyer, so he needed some legal advice.”

  “Yes, ma’am. Your niece called us. We’re checking it out.” He looked down at his notebook. “What we’ve got to figure out now is which one of these people could have had the knife. I think that would tell us a lot.”

  Tell us a lot? I looked at Timmy to see if he was serious. He was.

  I said, “Any one of them could have had access to my purse, since it was right on the game table. But do you know what doesn’t make sense to me? The fact that whoever it was carried a bloody switchblade around for a couple of days. Why didn’t they just throw it away somewhere in a ditch or something? Why put it in my purse?”

  “Trying to set you up?”

  Again I checked him out. Yes, he was serious.

  I shook my head. “They all knew I was in the audience.”

  “Trying to set someone else up?”

  “By planting a knife on me?”

  “Stranger things have happened.”

  I couldn’t imagine what and decided not to ask. I rubbed my head, which was beginning to ache again. What a weird day this was turning out to be.

  “Let’s just go over again what you know about each of the people who were at the dinner party,” Timmy suggested. “Maybe you’re forgetting something.”

  I simply repeated what I had told him earlier. All I knew was that Virgil, Jr., was an Elvis impersonator; Larry Ludmiller was some kind of talent promoter; Olivia Ludmiller, his sister, seemed smitten by Virgil, Jr.; and Tammy Sue sold real estate. We had had a nice supper with steaks because my sister and Virgil were going to tell his kids that they were getting married, which they did, but Virgil, Sr., had had to leave early and Tiffany, the Magic Maid, had left to go on a date, but she didn’t know anything about what was going on, I was sure.

  Timmy looked at me as if he expected more.

  I shrugged. “That’s it.”

  Timmy closed his notebook and stood up. “Thanks, Mrs. Hollowell.”

  “I didn’t tell you much, did I?” I said, following him to the door.

  “Actually, you did.”

  “What?”

  He leaned over and kissed my cheek. “Don’t you tell my mama I arrested you.” And then he was gone, turning halfway down the walk to wave.

  What the hell had I told him?

  The sun was low in the sky, but the weather was still pleasantly warm. The best thing for my headache, I decided, was a walk. I watched Timmy drive away and, still puzzled, went to get Woofer’s leash.

  The lights were on in Mitzi’s sunroom, so the group was back from Tannehill. It looked, this time, as if Sister were really going to do it, get married. I paused for Woofer to sniff at a telephone pole, and let that fact sink in. There have always been men in Sister’s life, other than her three husbands, whose time with her had been short. But sweet, she reminds me. Men love her, all two hundred fifty unpredictable pounds of her. And I can understand it. Yes, she has the nerve of a bad tooth, like Fred says, but she has a zest for life that’s contagious and wonderful. I hoped that Virgil would appreciate that. Surely he would.

  I walked along the sidewalk scuffing a few pinecones out of the way and thinking about the dinner party and the switchblade knife. It was scary to think that one of those people so close to Virgil was probably responsible for putting the knife in my purse. For putting the knife in Griffin Mooncloth’s back. I shivered. Tammy Sue had been sitting by me, so she was ruled out. Had Olivia been at the Alabama? Virgil, Jr., and Larry certainly had. Right next to Griffin.

  But what motive could there have been? According to Virgil, Jr., and Larry, they had no idea who Griffin Mooncloth was. Did Olivia? Was there some connection there that Tim Hawkins knew about that I had verified when I talked to him? I thought about Olivia and how she had been clinging to Virgil, Jr.

  “It makes no sense,” I told Woofer, who looked around at me and nodded in agreement. “A man gets killed right in the middle of a thousand people and no one sees it happen.” I paused. “Well, Larry Ludmiller got a glimpse, so he said, but Tammy Sue says he can’t see anything without his glasses.”

  Woofer looked at me as if he were puzzling over it, too.

  “And if Dusk Armstrong hadn’t been in one of the Mooncloth guy’s dance classes, no one would have been able to identify him. At least right away.”

  Woofer sighed and sat down. It was indeed a mystery. But my thinking of Dusk Armstrong reminded me that I hadn’t returned her mother’s call. It was chillier outside than I had thought, too.

  “I’ve got no business out in the cold, Woofer,” I said. “I’m courting pneumonia.”

  He turned back toward the house agreeably. Some days you walk a mile. Some days you walk a block. But a treat was always waiting.

  “Dusk is much better,” Bernice said when I asked. “She wouldn’t let me take her to the doctor, but she’s been able to eat some today. It might have been a virus, but I think it was the shock of seeing that man that she knew killed at the Alabama. Lord knows it would upset my stomach seeing someone I knew stabbed like that, dead as a doornail, let alone falling into an orchestra pit.”

  I agreed that it would be unnerving to say the least and that I was glad she was feeling better.

  “What I wanted to tell you, though, was that I’ve got the most wonderful rocking chair that you’re welcome to. Mitzi told me that you were looking for one for Haley, and this is one that I bought for Dawn when she was pregnant t
he first time. It’s one that a man made for Prime Time Treasures, you know the handicraft shop in Homewood where senior citizens sell their work? I was so excited when I found it. I swear to you, Patricia Anne, it’s absolutely perfect for rocking a baby. Comfortable and even creaks just a little bit. Anyway, it was what I took to Dawn’s shower. Even gift wrapped it, if you can believe. You’ve never seen so much paper and tape, and then I had to take Jerry’s van because I couldn’t get it in my car.” Bernice paused to catch her breath. “And would you believe that was what Mary Lou Rider, Dawn’s mother-in-law, brought her, too? Out of everything in Birmingham to buy for babies, we bought the same thing. Of course, Dawn felt like she had to keep the one Mary Lou brought. Didn’t want to hurt her feelings, which I could understand. Not that I could tell an ounce of difference.”

  “You couldn’t take it back?”

  “No, but that’s okay. I figured Day or Dusk would use it someday, but they tell me I might as well give up. Neither one of them is planning on having children. They’re both totally into their careers.”

  “Maybe they’ll change their minds.”

  “I doubt it. But if they do, Dawn can pass along her rocker. Her children are eight and twelve now. Can you believe?”

  I could imagine Bernice shaking her head the way I do when I think about my two grandsons, Charlie and Sam, fast approaching teen age in Atlanta.

  “Come over in the morning,” Bernice continued. “It’s up in the attic, and it won’t hurt my feelings if you don’t think it’s as wonderful as I do. But I’d love to think of Haley rocking her little one in it. You wouldn’t believe how wonderful she was to all of us when Jerry had his heart surgery, Patricia Anne. I hope she doesn’t give up nursing.”

  There’s nothing much better than hearing such nice things about one of your children. I thanked Bernice and told her that I would definitely be over the next morning, sinuses willing. I hung up smiling, got a can of Dinty Moore beef stew out of the pantry, popped open a can of biscuits for a topping, and had supper ready for Fred when he came in.

  “Smells good in here,” he said. He gave me a hug and went to the refrigerator for a beer.