Borrowed Crime: A Bookmobile Cat Mystery

by Laurie Cass

  But I knew it wasn’t.

  I put my head in my hands. What had I done? How could I have created a program that couldn’t be sustained? What had I been thinking?

  Tears stung at my eyes. Tears of self-pity.

  “Stop that right now.” I spoke out loud, and, instead of my own voice, I heard my mother’s. And Mom was right—this was no time to feel sorry for myself. At this point it didn’t matter whether my championing of the bookmobile program had been the right thing to do. This was not a time for self-doubt; this was a time for action. And since, as everyone knew, action was fueled by caffeine, what I needed was a refill.

  I grabbed my mug and headed for the break room. It was half past ten, a typical coffee-refill time. If I was lucky, I might even find someone to talk to.

  Ten feet from the open doorway, I heard Josh and Holly arguing about something. I slowed, trying to get a handle on the topic before I entered the room, then realized they were fighting about the best way to cook a turkey. Since my opinion on that was simple and irrefutable, I was practically whistling when I entered the room.

  “You are so wrong,” Josh was saying emphatically. “Hey, Minnie. What’s the best way to cook a turkey?”

  I picked up the coffee carafe. “Have my Aunt Frances do it.”

  Holly laughed, but Josh gave a snort of disgust. “That’s a cheater answer.”

  I toasted him with my mug. “But accurate.” I couldn’t care less about the turkey-cooking methodology as long as I didn’t have to involve myself with the actual cooking.

  Holly filled her own mug and ripped open two sugar packets. As she stirred them in, she asked, “Minnie, do you know if the Friends are going to have their postholiday book sale?”

  “Haven’t heard.” A tickle at the back of my mind told me that I should have known, that I would have known if I hadn’t been so busy with the bookmobile. I took a tiny sip of coffee, hoping that would get rid of the tickle. “Why wouldn’t there be one?”

  Holly took a sip of her coffee, grimaced, and set it down to rip open two more sugars. “It’s just that Pam Fazio was supposed to run the sale this year, and now that she’s gone, I wonder if anyone else will step up.”

  I’d forgotten that Pam had been talked into doing the sale. “I’ll ask Denise,” I said. The annual postholiday book sale was held in mid-January and was the biggest winter event for the Friends. It was also the only winter event, but the sale was well attended and netted a reasonable amount of money. I would have thought they’d do better having a sale before Christmas, and had at one point said so, but the blank look I’d received had as good as said, “But we’ve always done it this way. Why would we ever change?”

  Josh laughed. “I wish I could have been there to see Pam’s farewell scene.”

  “If we’d known in advance,” Holly said, “we could have sold tickets.”

  I sipped my coffee and realized why Holly had added so many sugars: It was a Kelsey-brewed pot. As I opened the refrigerator door and checked the sell-by date on the small jug of milk, I said, “I was out on the bookmobile that day. I missed the whole thing.”

  “From what I heard,” Josh said, “it was spectacular. Pam just stood up, right in the middle of the meeting, right in the middle of whatever Denise was talking about, and walked out.”

  Holly took up the tale. “Denise asked her where she was going, told her the meeting wasn’t over yet, and Pam said that it was for her.”

  “Yeah,” Josh said. “Denise asked, ‘What do you mean, it’s over?’ and Pam said she was quitting. That the only way she’d ever come back to the Friends was over Denise’s dead body.”

  He laughed again, but his laughter trickled off. “Okay, that’s not as funny now as it was before . . . well, before.” He shifted, obviously remembering Roger’s death and the probable attempt on Denise’s life, which was now public knowledge, thanks to Facebook.

  I wasn’t so sure Josh’s retelling was accurate. When I’d heard it from Denise, she hadn’t used that quote, and when Pam had told me, she certainly hadn’t. Then again, would she have? And if Denise hadn’t remembered the events accurately, it wouldn’t be the first time.

  Then again, maybe Josh’s version was correct. What I needed to do was talk to some other Friends and find out. Of course, what I’d probably hear was yet another version. Who could accurately remember a conversation from that long ago? I could barely remember what I had for breakfast that morning.

  “Say, Minnie, I wanted to tell you.” Josh went to the doorway, looked left and right down the hallway, then came back. “I have another software update to do on Stephen’s computer. I’ll tell him it’ll only take a couple of minutes. He’s sure to stay this time, so I have it all figured out what I’ll ask him to find out if he knows about Eddie. I’m almost positive he doesn’t know, but what do you think about this?”

  Josh sketched out his impending conversation, using an improbable squeaky voice for our boss, but I had a hard time paying attention to Josh’s theoretical questions to Stephen because I couldn’t steer my thoughts away from the darkest part of the just-told tale of Pam’s farewell speech.

  The only way I’ll come back is over your dead body.

  * * *

  Come noon, I held down the main desk while Kelsey and Holly took their lunch breaks. In summertime, I would have scheduled two people, but now that it was December, the tourists were long gone and the snowbirds had flown south. Foot traffic in the library was much slower, and there was occasionally time to breathe.

  I had just tidied up the last of the morning’s book returns when I saw Mitchell slouch his way in. “Hey, Mitchell. What’s up?”

  He gave a one-shouldered shrug. “Nothing.”

  It sounded more like a pronouncement than a social response. “Is something wrong?” I asked, then winced inwardly.

  Why, why had I asked him something like that when there was no Holly around to summon me with a manufactured emergency? A perky Mitchell, which was the normal version, was something I could deal with. A despondent, down-in-the-dumps Mitchell was a different entity altogether, and while I did want to help him, I was also working and couldn’t dedicate the rest of the afternoon to jollying him.

  He heaved out a massive sigh. “Remember you told me to go to the cops with that list I made? After I gave it to them, I expected that they’d, you know, give me something else to do for the case. Some legwork they don’t have time for or something.”

  Why he would have thought that, I had no idea, but the workings of Mitchell’s brain were a deep mystery that I didn’t in the least want to solve. “But they’re not giving you anything?”

  “Nothing.” He put his hands in his pockets and stared at the floor. “Not a freaking thing. I’ve called that detective lots of times, asking if there’s anything I can do, but he says the investigation is progressing, and that’s it.” He kicked at the counter’s baseboard. “And now when I call, I don’t even get the detective—I have to talk to some deputy.”

  I turned a laugh into a cough.

  “So, now what should I do?” Mitchell asked, kicking at the baseboard again.

  He could stop the kicking, for one thing. Then a flash of brilliance struck. “I have an idea.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Well,” I said, “on TV and in movies, when the police are stuck on a case, they always go back to the beginning. Start looking at things all over again, trying to see everything from a fresh point of view.” It was the vaguest of vague ideas, but if Mitchell picked it up, it might keep him busy for a while.

  He was nodding vigorously. “That’s a great idea. Go back to the beginning. Awesome. Thanks, Minnie!” He walked off, his hands still in his pockets, but with his posture straight and tall. He turned and bumped open the front door with his hip, and I was suddenly reminded of Eddie.

  A new thought pinged into my head: If my cat w
ere human, would he be like Mitchell?

  I pondered the notion and finally decided that even if Eddie took on human form, he couldn’t possibly be anything but an Eddie. No way, no how.

  A woman approached the desk and put a stack of books on the counter for checkout. “Something funny?” she asked, smiling.

  I laughed and said, “Almost everything, really,” and got back to work.

  * * *

  The rest of the noon hour zipped past, not so much because I was busy, but because snippets from recent conversations kept echoing around inside my head.

  Anyone can commit murder.

  Wrong place, but I was looking at the right time.

  The only way I’ll come back is over your dead body.

  Go back to the beginning.

  The bits were banging into each other so much that they were starting to create new sentences all on their own. Unfortunately, none of them made sense. It was when I caught myself thinking Anyone can look at the beginning that I knew I had to clear my head if the afternoon was going to be at all productive. As soon as Kelsey returned, I abandoned the front desk, wolfed down my lunch of turkey sandwich and warmed-up mashed potatoes, and went out for a walk.

  The snow from the other night was still on the ground, and talk was that it was going to stick this time and not be gone until April. I counted the months in my head, three times, and got to five every single time. It seemed like a lot. “But you’ll be gone before the end of April,” I said to the snow. “Won’t you?”

  Happily, the snow didn’t answer, which I took as an affirmative. Snow through the first week of April was tolerable; snow after that might be reason to move to a warmer climate.

  I walked downtown, enjoying the chill air in my lungs, enjoying the sight of high clouds chasing low ones, enjoying the cheery holiday displays in the storefronts, and enjoying the nearly empty sidewalks. I was having such a nice time soaking in the world and thinking about as little as possible that I almost didn’t notice when a tall, thinnish man on the other side of the street waved at me. “Afternoon, Minnie,” he said.

  A blink or two later, I recognized the voice and returned Jeremy Hull’s wave. Then I stopped in my tracks as I saw him open the door of a dark blue vehicle that wasn’t quite a sedan and wasn’t exactly an SUV. A dark blue vehicle that had half a dozen bumper stickers on its back end, one of which read THIRTY-SEVEN MILLION ACRES IS ALL THE MICHIGAN WE WILL EVER HAVE.

  I stared as Jeremy started the vehicle and drove away. Stood there staring until my feet got cold, stood there a little longer, then slowly made my way to the sheriff’s office.

  * * *

  When I was ushered to the conference room, I sat in my regular seat. For a moment I debated about walking on the wild side and taking a different chair, but I decided a sheriff’s office wasn’t the best place to start being wild.

  I sat and suddenly realized that, once again, I had no book to read. Worse, there was no reading material anywhere in the room. There wasn’t anything, actually, except the table and chairs. A more boring room couldn’t possibly exist. I considered going to the front window and begging for a copy of Law Enforcement Monthly, or whatever their professional magazine was, but sighed and stayed in my seat.

  I’d tipped my head back and was staring at the water stains on the ceiling tiles when the door opened. “I’m pretty sure that’s an armadillo,” I said, pointing up. “What do you think?”

  “Sorry, but I never thought about it.” Ash Wolverson walked to the opposite side of the table and pulled out a chair.

  I scrambled to sit up straight. “I thought Detective Inwood was going to talk to me.”

  “He had a phone call.”

  “Oh.” I put my hands on my lap. Put them on the table. Didn’t like how that felt and put them back on my lap. Wasn’t comfortable with that, either, and wished they could disappear for a while.

  Ash took out his notebook. “You had something to tell us?”

  He kept his head down, but even so I detected a faint shade of red on his cheeks. It was some comfort to know that he was uncomfortable, too. As the silence started to lengthen, his color deepened, and I saw that he was, in fact, far more uncomfortable than I was. The poor guy.

  “I remembered something,” I said. “From the day Roger was killed.”

  Ash gave me a quick glance, then started writing as I told him about seeing the not-a-car, not-an-SUV, that it had sported a number of bumper stickers, and that I’d just seen Jeremy Hull driving in that same vehicle not far from the gas station. Jeremy had said he was at Jurco Dam, but the dam was miles from there.

  “You’re sure?” Ash asked.

  Once again I saw the thirty-seven-million acres sticker, saw it on the bumper, right next to the decal of the Great Lakes. “I’m sure.” I didn’t like it, didn’t like it at all, but I was sure.

  He wrote a few notes and thanked me, but he didn’t once meet my eyes.

  “You still think a hunter accidentally killed Roger?” I asked.

  Ash’s jaw tightened. “You know I can’t talk about an active investigation.”

  So what else was new? I nodded and left.

  * * *

  My return walk to the library wasn’t nearly as full of cheerful feeling as the walk out had been. Instead of a jaunty saunter, with my head up and my spirits light, I was practically scuffing my feet, with my head down.

  I didn’t want Jeremy Hull to have killed Roger. Didn’t want anyone to have killed him, really. What I wanted was for Roger to be hale and hearty. Swallowing down a clump of sorrow, which didn’t sit at all well in my stomach, I climbed the steps of Older Than Dirt.

  Though the day outside hadn’t been sunny, the snow had brightened things up enough that the interior of the antiques store seemed dark in contrast. Which was my excuse for almost stepping on top of Pam Fazio, who was kneeling on the floor, arranging a display of . . .

  “Are those what I think they are?” I asked, my eyes slowly adjusted to the inside light.

  Pam glanced up. “Hello, Minnie. Lunch boxes, yes, but with a twist.” She moved a Wonder Woman lunchbox to the left, edged a Minnie Mouse lunchbox to the right, and positioned a Bionic Woman lunchbox in the center. On nearby shelves were a dozen more vintage lunchboxes, from Barbie to Holly Hobbie to Charlie’s Angels.

  She bounced to her feet and waved at the display, grinning. “What do you think?”

  I studied the attractive, colorful display. “Are lunch boxes an in thing?”

  “No idea,” she said. “But do you see? Every lunch box features a female. A girl! You could use one of these as a purse, a jewelry box, a cosmetics case, even a lunch box.” Smiling, she reached to reposition Chris Evert. “These are so much fun, I’m not sure I want to sell any of them.”

  As I stood there, watching her, I knew I really, really didn’t want to find any evidence that would implicate her in Roger’s death. Then again, I deeply wanted to find out who’d killed him.

  Two wishes, and there was a possibility that they were in complete opposition to each other. Which one did I most want to come true?

  I sighed. There was only one true answer to that.

  “Minnie, Minnie, Minnie.” Pam was smiling at me. “You look sad. What’s the matter—too many turkey leftovers? I have just the cure.” She beckoned me toward a back corner of her store. The entire place was an eclectic mixture of old and new, familiar and strange, shabby and shiny. Items for sale ranged from a large weathered wardrobe to top hats to leather suitcases to pincushions. Something for everyone, including me, because I often browsed the collection of used books.

  “Sit.” Pam said pointed at a ladder-back chair. “Now take your boots off—yes, all the way off—and slip into these.” She brandished a pair of antique shoes. They were black, had a small heel, skinny waxed laces, and tops that went six inches past my ankle. I loved them inst
antly.

  Pam grinned. “Had a feeling you’d like those. How do they fit?”

  I wiggled my toes. “Perfect.” I pulled the laces through the eyelets. “Where did you get these?”

  “Now, Minnie, you should know better than to ask an antiques dealer that question.” When I started to apologize, she waved me off. “Anyone else, I probably wouldn’t tell, but you won’t say anything. You haven’t spread any gossip about me and Denise, and if you haven’t done that, you’re probably the most trustworthy person in town.”

  I started to stammer an objection, but Pam cut me off. “I know this because I hear things you wouldn’t believe in this store. People think the staff doesn’t have ears, I guess, because it can get worse than a hair salon in here when a group comes in.”

  It was something I’d never thought about, and probably should have.

  “Anyway,” Pam was saying, “I bought those boots in Kentucky. I was down there on a buying trip a while back, about two weeks before Thanksgiving. I was late coming home because I called my neighbor and she said we were supposed to get eight inches of snow—remember that? So I decided to stay south.” She laughed. “Good thing I did. You wouldn’t believe the things in this barn that I wouldn’t have found if I’d left when I’d planned.”

  I was so stupid. If I’d had the sense of a soap dish, I would have found out a long time ago that Pam had been out of town the day Roger had died and thus would have saved myself all sorts of anxiety.

  “Tell you what.” Pam was looking thoughtful. “I’ll sell you these boots for ten percent over cost, and you promise to never again try to scam my morning coffee away from me.”

  “Twenty-five percent,” I said firmly. “And not a penny less.”

  We bargained our way to fifteen percent over cost, and, as I continued my walk back to the library, I realized that my mood had lightened considerably. New boots, even if they’re old, can be a wonderful thing.

  * * *

  My temporarily high spirits crashed that night as I lay in bed, trying to sleep but being all too aware of time ticking away. The court date with Tammy Shelburt was only eight days off and I was no closer to a solution now than I’d been the day I’d met with the library board.