Toni L.P. Kelner - Laura Fleming 02 - Dead Ringer

by Toni L. P. Kelner

  “Oh Aunt Daphine,” I said helplessly. “You don’t think Mama would have thought anything less of you, do you?”

  “I suppose not,” she said, but she didn’t sound convinced. She rubbed her bare finger and said, “Maw wanted to get me a wedding band to wear, but I told her not to. I said I could use John Ward’s name and pretend like we were married for Vasti’s sake, but I wouldn’t wear a ring he didn’t give me.”

  “He would have married you if he had lived, you know that.”

  “I guess so.”

  “Of course he would have.”

  She nodded, and said, “I imagine you’re wondering why I picked now to tell you all of this.”

  Actually, she had caught me so much by surprise that I hadn’t thought that far ahead, but I said, “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Well, like I said, I haven’t told anybody about this in all these years. I know Maw and Paw wouldn’t have, and the Marstons wouldn’t have either. But somebody found out.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know who, Laurie Anne, but whoever it is has been asking me for money for the past three months, and I just can’t pay any more.”

  I stared at her. “Blackmail? In Byerly?”

  She nodded. “I didn’t believe it myself when I got the first letter, but it’s true.” She went over to a table, opened a drawer, and pulled out several sheets of notebook paper. “Look at these.”

  The blackmail demands looked like something out of a Nancy Drew mystery. The letters were cut out of newspapers and magazines and pasted together into words. I read the first one.

  I know that you weren’t married to John Ward Marston. Does your daughter know? Do you want her to read about it in the Gazette? I’ve got proof! If you don’t want me to tell, put $200 cash in an envelope and leave it under the flower pot on John Ward’s grave Sunday morning. Don’t try to look for me, or I’ll tell.

  There was no signature.

  “Did you leave the money?” I asked.

  “I was afraid not to. If this came out now, Arthur would be sure to lose the city council election and Vasti would never forgive me.”

  “You haven’t told her?” I didn’t mean the blackmail—I meant about her father.

  “No.” She looked down at her hands again. “I wanted to, lots of times, but I just couldn’t. This would just kill her.”

  My first inclination was to discount the idea of anything bothering Vasti, but I knew that I wasn’t being fair. How would I feel if I found out something like that about my parents?

  I looked at the other notes. They all said pretty much the same thing, except that the amount of money kept rising. “This adds up to $2400,” I said. “Where in the world have you been getting that kind of money?”

  “I used my savings at first, but I can’t get to the rest without the bank asking all kinds of questions. I’ve been taking money from the shop, but I’m afraid that the tax people are going to find out. I’ve worked as many hours as I can, but there are only so many heads of hair to cut in Byerly.”

  “Why didn’t you tell somebody?” Only I knew the answer to that. She had been ashamed.

  “I suppose you know that I’ve been feeling pretty low ever since this started. Then I got an idea. Laurie Anne, I want you to help me find the blackmailer.”

  “What?”

  “Everybody at the shop today was talking about the dead man at the mill, and wondering if Junior Norton was going to ask you to help because of how you found out what happened to Paw and Melanie Wilson.”

  “Junior doesn’t need my help,” I said.

  “I know that, but it got me to thinking that maybe you can help me. If you can find out who the blackmailer is, we can make him stop somehow.”

  “Aunt Daphine, I’m not a detective. The stuff with Paw was mostly dumb luck. You should talk to Junior.”

  “I can’t,” she insisted. “The letters said not to or he’d tell the newspapers everything.”

  “How would he know? Junior wouldn’t tell anybody.”

  Aunt Daphine shook her head. “He’d find out somehow. Byerly is too small a town for him not to. I know Junior is a good police chief, but if she starts asking questions, people are going to notice.”

  “What about a private detective?”

  “Laurie Anne, do you really think that some stranger could come to Byerly and ask the kind of questions he’d have to ask without people wondering why? Besides, I couldn’t have afforded one before this all started and I certainly can’t afford one now. My sisters would help if they could, but can you see Ruby Lee or Edna trying to find out something like this? And if I tell one sister, the others are bound to find out. You know how they are. I know it’s a lot to ask of you, but there’s no one else I can ask.”

  I wanted to say no, I really did, but how could I? After all these years of keeping her secret, Aunt Daphine had trusted me enough to tell me. “All right,” I finally said. I didn’t really think I’d do any good, but if I tried for a while and couldn’t find the blackmailer, Aunt Daphine would have to call Junior. Then I added, “I have to tell Richard, but I’m sure he’ll want to help, too.”

  Aunt Daphine nodded. “That’s all right, you go ahead and tell him. But you have to promise not to tell anybody else.”

  “I promise.”

  Aunt Daphine suddenly realized that I had been in her house for nearly an hour and she hadn’t offered me anything to drink or eat, and she insisted on bringing me a glass of iced tea.

  I could tell from the way she walked to the kitchen that she felt like a load had been lifted from her shoulders. I was glad of that, but uncomfortably aware of the fact that her load was now on my shoulders. She was counting on me to help her, and I didn’t know what she’d do if I couldn’t.

  Chapter 9

  After Aunt Daphine brought me my iced tea, I quizzed her for a few details, but I didn’t stay much longer because I wanted to talk to Richard. Fortunately he had escaped the perils of Monday Night Football and was waiting for me at Aunt Maggie’s house.

  “So?” Richard asked. “Did you solve the mystery?”

  “Yes and no. Where’s Aunt Maggie?”

  “Already immersed in sore labor’s bath, balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course, chief nourisher in life’s feast.”

  “You could have just said she was asleep.”

  “But the Bard said it so much better. Macbeth, Act II, Scene 2, of course.”

  “Of course. Now do you want to hear what Aunt Daphine had to say or not?”

  “Yes, dear.”

  It took a while to tell the whole story, because he hadn’t heard the original tale of Aunt Daphine’s romance as often as I had. When I finished, Richard said, “ ‘Neither maid, widow, nor wife.’ Measure for Measure, Act V, Scene 1.”

  “That’s about the size of it.”

  “I think we need a pad of paper so we can start planning strategy.”

  I looked at him. “You’re taking all of this rather calmly. Aren’t you bothered by the idea of trying to track down a blackmailer?”

  Richard shrugged. “If you can stand one more quote, ‘What’s mine is yours, and what is yours is mine.’ Measure for Measure again, same act and scene. If Aunt Daphine needs help, we’ll help. I don’t know if we can do any good, but I’m willing to try.”

  “I knew I had a good reason for marrying you.” I kissed him soundly.

  After a pleasant interlude, Richard said, “I do have to insist on one thing. You are not to run off to deserted tobacco sheds or anyplace else where you could get hurt.”

  “Agreed,” I said, remembering the time I had done just that.

  “Good. Now where did I put my notebook?”

  “Let me use my laptop,” I said. “That way we don’t have to worry about anyone seeing our notes.”

  “See?” Richard said approvingly. “You’re already thinking like a detective.”

  “I’m thinking like someone whose cousin Vasti found and read her diary every chance
she got. Her knowing who I had a crush on was bad enough. I don’t want her finding out this particular secret.”

  I ran upstairs to get my computer from the bedroom, brought it back, and spent a few moments opening a file. “What first?”

  Richard put a hand under his chin in his most professorial pose. “The way I see it, there are several categories of people we should look at. One, people who need money.”

  “Anybody around here could use the money,” I said.

  “Having a use for the money and needing it badly enough to blackmail someone are two different things.”

  “What about plain old greed?” I asked.

  “Possible, of course. But then they’d fall into my next category.”

  “Which is?”

  “People who have come into money unexpectedly, or who are spending beyond their means.”

  “Right. What next?”

  “People who don’t like Aunt Daphine.”

  “I think we can leave that one out. I don’t know of anyone who doesn’t like Aunt Daphine.”

  “What about the woman with big hair at the beauty parlor?”

  “Dorinda? As Aunt Nora would say, I can’t say what she is but it rhymes with witch. I’d cheerfully consider her as a suspect.”

  “Now, now, we must remain objective.”

  “You remain objective. I don’t like her.”

  He shook his head ruefully, but went on. “And our final category, people who know that Aunt Daphine wasn’t married to John Ward Marston. This is probably the one we should concentrate on.”

  “Aunt Daphine said she hadn’t told anyone but Maw and Paw, and Uncle John Ward’s parents,” I objected. “Two of those four are dead.”

  “What about the Marstons?”

  “Still alive and kicking. Vasti was always talking about her rich grandparents when we were growing up, and they did their best to spoil her rotten.”

  “Do I detect jealousy?”

  “A little,” I admitted. “They gave her the prettiest dresses and jewelry. Not costume stuff, either.”

  “If they’re that rich, surely they wouldn’t need to blackmail Aunt Daphine.”

  “Well, I don’t know for sure that they’re rich. Vasti talks like they are, but she has been known to exaggerate. Besides, Mr. Marston is retired now, and they’re probably living off of investments and such. Stock market woes could have taken a bite out of their nest egg.”

  “Would they do something to hurt their only granddaughter?”

  “Probably not, but they haven’t hurt her, only Aunt Daphine. They could threaten to expose Vasti’s illegitimacy all day long without ever having the slightest intention of doing it.”

  “Right you are. Now assuming Aunt Daphine didn’t tell anyone else, what about Uncle John Ward? Could he have told anyone?”

  I shrugged. “How can we know for sure? I do know he shipped out for Vietnam two days after they got married. Or rather, didn’t get married. He died about a month later. That means the only ones he was likely to have told are his Army buddies. Unless he put it in a letter, and I don’t think he’d have done that.”

  “How likely are any of these Army buddies to have come to Byerly?”

  “Pretty likely, to tell you truth. I seem to remember that a lot of Byerly boys went over together.”

  “Then we have plenty of suspects.” Richard thought for a minute. “Maybe we’re making this too difficult. Can’t we just watch for the blackmailer to pick up the money?”

  “We can try,” I said, “but unfortunately, the blackmailer is smart. He has Aunt Daphine leave it at the cemetery on Sunday afternoons.”

  “So?”

  “This isn’t nice, flat Woodgreen Acres we’re talking about,” I said, referring to Byerly’s newer cemetery, where my parents were buried. “This is the old Byerly Graveyard. Not only are there trees everywhere, making it a wonderful place to hide, but every Sunday afternoon the place is filled with people coming to tend to their family graves. Half the women in Byerly are there on any given Sunday.”

  “Only women?”

  “Men, too, but mostly women. Tending to the dead folks seems to be a woman’s job. Aunt Nora used to drive Great–Aunt Patsy over there every month, and they’d drag me and Vasti and the triplets along so we could learn about family history.” I snorted. “All I ever learned was that I want to be cremated. Aunt Patsy would tell the most gruesome details about how everybody died and how hard it was to make the bodies pretty for the funeral. Then she’d cry.”

  Richard was trying not to laugh.

  “I’m serious,” I said. “I don’t know if it’s a Southern thing or just an old lady thing. Aunt Patsy would have us pull up the batch of plastic flowers from the last time, trim the grass, and put in new plastic flowers. She’d always say that she’d rather put in fresh flowers, but they wouldn’t last for the whole month and she was too old to get there more often. Then she’d look at us kids like we were just horrible for not volunteering to bring flowers every day.”

  “Couldn’t you beg off from going?”

  “I tried, believe me, but Aunt Nora would just look so disappointed that I couldn’t stand it.”

  “What about Vasti? Surely such tactics wouldn’t work with her.”

  “Actually, she rather enjoyed it. She wasn’t much help with the flowers, but she liked having something to cry about. Vasti was a very melodramatic child.”

  “As opposed to how she is now?”

  “Anyway, the only reason this was at all bearable was because everybody else in town would be there, too, with their own plastic flowers. The old ladies would find a bench so they could compare messy ways of dying while the kids did the work. Pretty much everybody has relatives there. The Nortons, and the Walters, and the Marstons, and of course us Burnettes.”

  “So almost anyone in town would have an excuse for showing up.”

  I nodded. “You know, making Aunt Daphine leave the money there is a pretty nasty trick. It really rubs it in that she and Uncle John Ward weren’t married.” I wasn’t sure what we’d be able to do to the blackmailer if we found him, but I hoped it would be something equally nasty.

  “I’m still tempted to stake out the place,” Richard said, “but since the next payment isn’t due until Sunday, I think we can leave that until later.”

  “Right,” I said. “Who shall we start with?”

  “The Marstons? We can scope them out, and maybe also check on the fellows who went to Vietnam with Uncle John Ward.”

  “Good idea. The only problem is, we need an excuse to go over there. I mean I barely know them, and they’re not really related to me. We can’t just drop in.”

  “Call Aunt Daphine. Maybe she can provide an excuse.”

  “Good idea.” I reached for the phone and did so. “Aunt Daphine? This is Laura.”

  “Hey there, Laurie Anne.” There was a pause. “You haven’t changed your mind, have you?”

  “No, ma’am,” I said firmly. “Richard and I have been talking it out, and we need your help with something.”

  “Just ask.”

  “Richard and I want to go talk to the Marstons tomorrow, but we need an excuse.”

  “Why the Marstons? You don’t think they’re the ones, do you? Laurie Anne, I’m sure that they’d never do anything like that.”

  “You said yourself that they’re the only other people who knew. Maybe they told somebody.”

  “Why would they?”

  “They are pretty old. Maybe it slipped out.”

  “Laurie Anne, things like this don’t just slip out.”

  “Aunt Daphine, we’ve got to start somewhere.”

  There was a pause. “I suppose you’re right. I don’t like thinking that anybody I know would do something like this, but I guess it isn’t likely to be a stranger. Let me think for a minute.” There was another pause. “Vasti said that the Marstons had volunteered to help do something for Arthur’s campaign. Stuffing envelopes, I think. Maybe you could go help
them. That would be a good way to talk.”

  “Perfect,” I said. “I’ll give Vasti a call.”

  “You won’t tell the Marstons what’s going on, will you?” Aunt Daphine asked. “About the blackmail, I mean. It would really upset them, I know it would.”

  “I won’t tell them or anybody else anything about it,” I promised. “We’ll talk to you later and let you know what we find out.”

  “She suggests we call Vasti,” I told Richard as I hung up and dialed Vasti’s number.

  “Bumgarner for City Council. Campaign Headquarters,” an official–sounding voice said.

  “May I speak to Vasti Bumgarner, please?”

  “This is Vasti,” she said in her usual voice. “Laurie Anne?”

  “Hi Vasti. How goes the campaign?”

  She sighed loudly. “It’s going, but it’s so much work. I had people putting up posters all afternoon, and Arthur gave a speech for the Elk Lodge this evening, and tomorrow he’s going to the Byerly Garden Club. I am just exhausted.”

  “Poor thing,” I said sympathetically, though it sounded like it was other people who were doing the work. “I was thinking that since Richard and I are in town for a while, maybe we could help out. We’ve got some free time tomorrow if there’s something we could do. Like stuffing envelopes maybe?”

  “Laurie Anne, you must be a mind reader. I was just talking to Grandmother Marston a little while ago about stuffing envelopes. I took a stack of fliers over there last week because she said she could get them out for me, but she’s way behind. I need to get them in the mail by tomorrow, but she said she wasn’t going to finish them in time. Her arthritis is acting up, and what could I say to that?” She sighed again, even more dramatically. “Can you imagine what a tragedy it would be if Arthur actually lost because of arthritis?”

  “That would be terrible,” I said, hoping I didn’t sound too sarcastic. “Maybe Richard and I could go over there tomorrow and help her.”

  “Could you? That would be wonderful. I’ll call her up and tell her you’ll be there at nine.”