“No kidding?” I asked as if I hadn’t heard the woman say that very thing while eavesdropping the previous day. I had considered it a figure of speech used to vent frustration with her fellow author. I think I may have even threatened to push Stone in front of a speeding train one day when he had hidden a candy bar from me as a joke. I was just kidding of course, but I’d been craving chocolate at the time, so it was totally understandable.
“Why, as a matter of fact, it was just before you joined us at our table to purchase copies of our books! You might have even overheard her make that comment.”
“Now that I think about it, I did hear her say such a thing. But I didn’t take her remark seriously. It’s the kind of thing anyone might say about another person they were annoyed with. I never for a second thought she might actually do something like that. Do you seriously believe she might be responsible for Fanny’s death?” I asked.
“I think it’s possible, given the hatred and bitterness she felt toward her. For what it’s worth, Norma can be a bit unpredictable, even mentally unstable at times. She spent three months in a pysch ward a couple of years ago after trying to stab the guy she was dating at the time.”
“Wow, that’s a lot to digest,” I said. I really didn’t know what to make of Sarah’s comments but could hardly wait to repeat them to Wendy.
“And, remember, Lexie, this goes no farther than the two of us—and the lamp post of course. I wouldn’t want my suspicions to get back to Norma, you understand. If she could kill once, she could surely do it again to someone who had implicated her in a murder that might get her put away for life.”
“Absolutely, Sarah. My lips are sealed,” I promised, even though I felt as if she was just being melodramatic.
“And another thing,” Sarah continued. “Norma heard Fanny referring to us as ‘aspiring authors,’ and she has not gotten over it yet. She was offended by Fanny’s inference that we weren’t bona fide authors when we’ve both published books that we hadn’t had to resort to self-publishing to get printed. Fanny even expressed surprise that either of our books got published in the first place.”
I didn’t want to tell her that I couldn’t quite believe it either, or that their “aspiring authors” status had been upgraded to “wanna-be best-selling authors” in Fanny’s opinion. So instead of being frank I replied, “How rude! She sounds like she was a real piece of work.”
“Precisely!” Sarah retorted with such vehemence that I had to wipe spittle off my cheek. “And I want you to know that I don’t believe in gossiping, but I consider this more a case of information-sharing.”
“Yes, of course, especially since everything you told me is based on first-hand knowledge on your part and not just assumptions and conjecture.”
“Exactly! And remember, mum’s the word. Oh, by the way, Lexie. I have to commend you, because you were remarkably calm for someone with a phobia such as yours. I’m proud of you for facing down your fear so admirably.”
I had completely forgotten about my earlier remarks about being scared spitless to ride the rather sedate carnival ride, so I thanked her and said, “You just don’t know how hard it was for me to hide my anxiety and not be overcome by my rather irrational fear.”
Just then there was a loud, eerie squealing sound as the Ferris wheel gears began to grind, which caused the baskets to jerk spastically to and fro. The basket Sarah and I were in ground to a halt at the very highest point of the ride. I turned around to look at Wendy and Norma, who were still slowly swinging in the basket behind us. Wendy shrugged, and turned her palms face up in a gesture of uncertainty.
I shouted loud enough to be heard by Norma and everyone else within six baskets of us, “Now do you see why I don’t like these damned carnival rides?”
* * *
What followed the sudden stalling of the carnival ride were the longest two-and-a-half hours of my life. Every ten or fifteen minutes the Ferris wheel would roar to life, make ungodly crunching and squealing noises, advance two feet in its rotation, and come to a screeching halt again. I had figured out that at the rate we were going, it would take about ten to eleven hours for us to get low enough to the ground to be able to disembark our basket, as the people who were fortunate enough to be at the bottom of the ride had done after the Ferris wheel had stopped operating.
I wasn’t totally surprised about the untimely breakdown. I had seen young men, who didn’t look like they had the wherewithal to put a “some assembly required” bookcase together, assembling elaborate carnival rides in the past. When assembling a bookcase, a person might dispose of any leftover nuts, bolts, or other leftover hardware, without any adverse consequences. Granted, a poorly assembled bookcase might crumble to the floor when overburdened with hundreds of pounds’ worth of books, but it wouldn’t be likely to take any human lives with it when it fell. On the other hand, left-over parts cast aside by carnies with an eighth-grade education, trying to put together a more highly complicated carnival ride, could prove catastrophic. I shuddered, just imagining the potential outcome of such a situation.
The operators of the Ferris wheel were aware that people stuck on the ride were getting anxious, frustrated, and increasingly incensed. One young lady several baskets ahead of us was freaking out, crying and screaming to be let off the ride immediately. There was only one way off the ride at that moment, and the operators below were obviously reluctant to point that out to her. The result of exiting the ride in that fashion would certainly be unpleasant, if not lethal, for the hysterical woman.
Frequently, a man on a loudspeaker announced that mechanics were working on the problem and it would just be a few more minutes before the problem was corrected. Liar, liar, pants on fire….
Sarah Krumm did not seem disappointed or frustrated in the least about the situation. It gave her more time to explain every possible thing, no matter how remote, that could come into play in a multi-generational household. Did I know that approximately fifteen percent of elderly adults in the United States were living with their children? No, I didn’t. Did I really care how many elderly adults were living with their parents? No, I didn’t.
Had it ever occurred to me that my “live-in” mother could potentially want a new love interest to move into my house too sometime in the future? No, I didn’t. Had it ever occurred to Sarah that if a person could truly die of boredom, they’d be taking me off this ride on a stretcher, and putting me in a body bag the way they had Fanny Finch? Sarah seemed to think I was as enthralled with our conversation as she was.
I wanted to tell her that I wasn’t particularly worried about my mother moving her new beau into my house. For one thing, she’d always been totally devoted to my father, even after his death in the 1990s. More importantly, there wasn’t enough room for another urn on the fireplace mantel.
Just about the time I began to think my eardrums might start bleeding from Sarah’s incessant talking, the Ferris wheel fired up again and managed to keep running long enough for the four of us to vacate our baskets. Stone, Andy, Veronica, and Wyatt were sitting on a bench, waiting patiently for us to be rescued from our plight. When they had no success looking for us, they’d noticed the Ferris wheel had malfunctioned, and looked up to see us in baskets at the top of the ride. The men appeared to be content to sit on a bench and gorge on junk food while they waited. Veronica just looked bored out of her skull, to which I could completely relate to.
Stone and Andy had on rather gaudy western shirts and carried plastic bags holding the shirts they’d worn to the fairgrounds. They’d also donned the shiny silver and turquoise bolo ties they had hoped to score. I half expected them to break out in a rendition of the old country song, Streets of Bakersfield, because their “costumes” would have made Buck Owens proud.
I had to admit, however, that Stone looked handsome, or at least as handsome as he could look while shoveling spoonfuls of sloppy food in his mouth and wearing a liberal amount of it on his chin. He’d be lucky if his new shirt survived the go
rge-fest, because getting mustard, ketchup and chili sauce out of clothing was not one of my fortes. I’d ruined more shirts with splattered grease spots than I care to admit before Wendy gifted me with a monogrammed apron the previous Christmas. I wondered if Stone would be offended if I gifted him with a monogrammed bib for Christmas.
I had to smile as I watched Stone eating the messy conglomeration in the plastic bowl he was holding. His silver hair and light blue eyes were accented by the silver studs on the pockets and wingtips of the collar of his blue-and-tan, and now chili-stained, plaid shirt. I thought for the umpteenth time in the last year that I couldn’t have landed a better or more compatible husband than Stone Van Patten. The fact that he was easy on the eyes was merely an added bonus as far as I was concerned. He could have been the homeliest man on the planet and I wouldn’t have loved him any less, or agreed to marry him any quicker than I had.
Veronica was filing her fingernails as all three men were working their way through large containers full of Fritos buried under heaped-up servings of chili and cheese. I watched as Stone pulled a roll of Rolaids out of his pocket, tossed two in his mouth and soon after, spooned up another large bite of the Frito pie, complete with jalapeño rings on top. I could have sworn he’d brought a new roll of Rolaids to the fairgrounds, but it was nearly empty. My husband seemed to have an odd green tint to his face, which I feared was a preview of coming attractions.
As we walked back to the shuttle bus loading area, I almost swallowed my own Rolaid when Wendy whispered to me, “Wait until I tell you what Norma told me about Sarah. She thinks there’s a good chance she’s the person responsible for Fanny’s death, and I think she might possibly be right.”
“I have a lot to tell you, also,” I said. “Sarah was wagging her accusatory finger in Norma’s direction, while Norma was apparently pointing hers at Sarah. I’d gotten the impression the two ladies were close, but with friends like that, who needs enemies?”
“Well, Mom, there’s an old saying that one should keep their friends close, and their enemies closer. Maybe the appearance of closeness between the two gals is based on more than a true friendship. And, as much as I hate to admit it, I’m finding that the circumstances regarding Fanny Finch’s murder are getting more intriguing all the time.”
Music to my ears, I thought. It was nice having my daughter, who I rarely got to see anymore, interested in the murder case as much as I was, even though our involvement was only on the peripheral of the investigation. The outcome of the case would have no direct bearing on either one of us. It was the fact there seemed to be a growing list of people who might have wanted to kill the author that piqued my interest, and apparently Wendy’s also.
There was a nagging voice in my head telling me to step aside and let the Cheyenne homicide detectives track down and exact justice on the killer without any interference from Wendy and me. Unfortunately there was a louder voice in there drowning it out, asking, “What harm can be done by snooping around a bit, just in case we accidentally stumble on to something the detectives have overlooked?”
It was not a question I wanted to ask out loud though, in fear that Wendy would present me with a lengthy and detailed list of examples of harm I’d encountered in similar situations in the past.
Chapter 7
There were only three other campers accompanying us on the shuttle bus back to the Cozy Camping RV Park. Because of the incident responsible for my two-and-a-half hours of mind-numbing boredom, it was late, and the fairground was nearly empty of people by the time we boarded the last scheduled bus ride of the day.
As expected, Stone had a well-deserved bellyache, and I was preparing for the unpleasant potential of a Frito pie being unpleasantly hurled all over the occupants of the vehicle. I handed him a sack that had held a handcrafted leather dream-catcher I’d purchased in the Indian Village vendors’ area to hang from my rear-view mirror. The sack was small but would do as a barf bag if necessary.
Fortunately, Stone was able to keep the food down until we got back to our motorhome, at which time he rushed into the tiny bathroom to expel pretty much everything he’d eaten at the carnival—enough to have fed a small Ethiopian village. I was so proud of him. He had obviously put a lot of effort and expense into this nausea episode, and the results were proving he’d been very successful.
My now puny husband went straight to bed with a plastic trashcan on the floor next to him in case of an encore. It was cool outside, as was typical of Cheyenne evenings, but I was comfortable in my ratty old Kansas City Chiefs sweatshirt. So while Stone sought solace from his nausea by falling asleep, I sat in a cheap plastic chair on our patio. I was ruminating over who might have wanted Fanny Finch dead badly enough to commit the crime, when a voice behind me caused me to nearly jump out of my skin.
“Oh, Mom, I’m so sorry I startled you,” she said. “Andy went straight to bed because he could feel the foot-long chili dog he ate staging a comeback. Those men are like little kids when it comes to stuffing themselves with junk food at a carnival. At least they were wise enough to avoid the Scramble, or the Octopus, which frequently precede a hurling incident.”
“Been there, done that.”
“Me too, but I was nine,” Wendy said with a chuckle. “You up for a short chat? I want to tell you what Norma told me today about Sarah, and hear what Sarah said about Norma.”
“Good, I’m glad you’re still up, because I wanted to discuss it with you, too. Stone is sick to his stomach, and I’m beginning to feel a bit queasy myself.”
Speaking as quietly as possible so we wouldn’t disturb any of our fellow campers, I told Wendy what Sarah had said about suspecting Norma of Fanny’s murder. Wendy shook her head in wonderment as I related Sarah’s sentiments about her cohort.
“Wow,” Wendy said, after I had finished my story. “You are not going to believe why Norma told me she suspects Sarah of being involved in Fanny’s death.”
“I’ll believe anything at this point. So go on. I can’t wait to hear it!”
“She’s adamant that Sarah should be considered a prime suspect in the murder.”
“Why? What makes her think Sarah could have killed the woman? I was under the impression that Norma and Sarah were close friends, weren’t you?”
“Apparently not as close as they might lead others to believe,” Wendy replied. “Norma told me that what originally started Sarah’s bitterness toward Fanny was an incidence of sabotage perpetrated by Fanny against Sarah.”
“Go on!”
“Well, according to Norma, the incidence occurred the very first time the three authors’ mutual agent, Nina-something, set them up for a group book-signing at a popular New York bookstore. Fanny’s book had just been released and the initial sales were underwhelming. All three authors were promoting their debut book releases. So Sarah, who had been a client of Nina’s the longest, was assigned the table in the most prominent location in the store. According to Norma, the prime location is almost always assigned to the most noteworthy author, and at that time, Sarah had probably sold eighteen copies of her book to Fanny’s dozen.”
“I’m guessing that didn’t set well with Ms. Finch.”
“It appears it didn’t set well with her at all. While Avery Bumberdinger was bringing in boxes of all three of the author’s books, Fanny ‘accidentally’ spilled an entire thermos of hot chocolate into the case containing copies of Sarah’s tome. Norma used air quotes around the word ‘accidentally’ so I knew both Norma and Sarah thought it was intentional. All but a couple of the books were rendered useless and considered by Sarah Krumm to be casualties of Fanny’s spite and connivingness.”
“Is connivingness a word?” I asked. My experience as a librarian was coming out in me.
“Well, if it ain’t, it oughta be!”
I cringed when my college-educated daughter used two more words that weren’t recognized by Funk and Wagnalls as Standard English to answer my question, but wanted her to get on with her story. “Oh, my!
I bet Sarah was furious. I’d have been a bit ticked off myself, if I were in her shoes.”
“Me too,” Wendy agreed. “So you know what happened next?”
“Sarah pummeled Fanny with a sodden copy of her boring book?” I guessed.
“No; although that course of action was probably considered. The bookstore owner turned the coveted table near the entrance of the store over to Fanny since Sarah now had a grand total of two books she could sell and sign.”
“And because of that nasty but crafty incident, Sarah was incensed enough to commit murder? I don’t buy it,” I said.
“Let me finish. There’s more to the story.”
“Okay, please continue.”
“The first person through the door of the bookstore that morning was the producer of a daytime talk show whose studio was right across the street in Times Square. Because of a major traffic jam, he’d had two last minute cancellations by individuals scheduled to appear on that day’s show. The producer was desperate for a replacement and had but minutes to find one. Because she was stationed right next to the front door, he approached Fanny and asked her if she’d appear on the talk show in a few minutes. Even though he’d never even heard of Fanny Finch or her book, he thought the show’s host could interview her and, with his talent for making even the most tedious conversation seem spellbinding, the interview could make the host almost a shoe-in for an Emmy. Naturally, she jumped at the opportunity.”
“Well, of course,” I said with a nod. “Who wouldn’t have?”
“Then, to make the interview of an unrecognized author even more scintillating, the host managed to make Fame and Shame sound as if it contained a slew of unfathomably sensational and mind-blowing revelations about the popular country and western artist. The talk show host convinced a multitude of viewers that it was the must-read book of the century because, as it turned out, the tell-all book really did contain a lot of unimaginable details of Vex Vaughn’s life, and sales took off like a gazelle being pursued by a cheetah,” Wendy said.
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