Gayle Trent

by Between a Clutch

  “What?”

  “A cross-dresser. You know, a man who dresses up like a woman, or vice versa.”

  “I know what a cross-dresser is, Ms. Crumb. I just meant ‘what’ as in—” He waved his hand. “Never mind. What makes this guy think Jim Adams is a cross-dresser?”

  “Well, I asked him that. I said, ‘Is it because he brings in both women’s and men’s clothes?’ And he said, ‘No, man, a lot of people do that,’ and then he told me that he’s seen Jim dressed up as a woman and that when Jim’s dressed up as a woman he goes by the name Flora.”

  “One old person could look like the next to this guy. I’ve used that dry cleaners a few times myself, and that guy seems a little weird to me.”

  “He seemed weird to me, too, but all along I’ve wanted to see a picture of Flora and this just makes it worse. Now, do you have her pocketbook, or not?”

  “I’ve got her pocketbook, but I don’t have her driver’s license.”

  “If you found her car abandoned with her pocketbook in it, and there was no driver’s license in her pocketbook, then how did you all know it was Flora’s car?”

  “The officer ran the tags and they were registered to James Adams. There was other identification in the purse, and since he wasn’t with her, we figured it was her car.”

  “How do you know he wasn’t with her?” I asked. “You find an abandoned car and no one is inside it, then how do you know who got out of it?”

  Sheriff Norville ran his hand over his face. “When we went to his home and he was there and she wasn’t, we figured it was her car then. Are you satisfied with that?”

  “Maybe . . . but why don’t you get her pocketbook so we can go through it and see if there’s any pictures of her in it?”

  “If it’ll make you happy,” he said, letting out a great big breath as he pushed himself out of his chair, “I’ll go down to the stupid evidence room and get the stupid pocketbook, and I’ll see if there are any stupid pictures in it. Would that make you happy?”

  “Can I go to the evidence room with you?” I asked. “I’ve never been to an evidence room before.”

  “No,” he said through gritted teeth, “you cannot go to the evidence room with me. I’ll bring the purse back here, okay?”

  I shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

  As soon as he went out of the room, I whispered to Matlock that this guy had a real chip on his shoulder and that he was selfish, too. Like I’d take anything out of his nasty little ol’ evidence room. I just wanted to see in it was all. Like it would’ve killed him to let me take a peek in there.

  Here Sheriff Norville came back then with Flora’s pocketbook . . . or Jim’s pocketbook to hear the manager of the dry cleaners tell it. He sat back down in his creaky leather chair and sat the pocketbook on the desk. It was a brown shoulder bag— roomier than the black clutch I now own, but no way near as elegant.

  “I’m going to take the items out of Ms. Adams’ purse one at a time,” he said. “Please do not touch anything.”

  I huffed at him but didn’t say a word.

  He took out a pack of cinnamon gum and laid it on the desk. I’d have liked to have had me a stick of that gum—my mouth had been dry as a gourd ever since I talked with the man at the dry cleaners—but I didn’t dare ask and give Sheriff Norville the satisfaction of telling me no, I couldn’t have a piece.

  Next came her wallet. I leaned in closer. Sure enough, there wasn’t any driver’s license in there, just a few credit cards. There weren’t any pictures either.

  “You know, I think it’s sad that Jim and Flora didn’t have any pictures,” I said. “Don’t you think that’s sad? Maybe they were the kind of people who thought that if you took a picture of them the camera would steal your soul or something. Maybe I ought to try to take a picture of Jim and see if he gives me that vampire-crossed-fingers sign or something. What do you think?”

  Sheriff Norville blinked . . . and then he blinked again. “I don’t think you truly want to know what I think at this moment, Ms. Crumb.”

  “Are you always this stuffy?” I asked. “Are you this grouchy with your employees? Your secretary? Your wife?”

  “My wife and I divorced several years ago,” he said.

  “Oh . . . I guess you were grouchy with her then.”

  He put his hands up to his head, and for a minute it looked like he was gonna try to rip it off his neck. Then he looked back at me and said, “And I guess we know why your husband went to an early grave.”

  “You know what?” I asked. “I’m gonna be nice to you. I’m not gonna repay your anger and hostility in kind. I’m gonna repay your attitudes with sweetness and light.” I smiled.

  “Sweetness and light?”

  “Yeah. It’s probably some kinda Zen thing I heard on ‘The Young and The Restless.’ That Damon is into that strange stuff. I’m a Christian myself, so I guess what he’s talking about sort of goes hand-in-hand with ‘turning the other cheek.’ Anyway, he meditates and talks about stuff I couldn’t begin to understand—and wouldn’t want to understand anyway—but he’s a pretty man, I’ll give him that.”

  “Why don’t you repay my bad attitudes with silence?” he asked. “Maybe that’d teach me a lesson.”

  “That’s a handsome tie you’re wearing today, Sheriff Norville,” I said. It was a handsome tie, by the way—blue with little white diamond-looking things on it.

  “Thank you.” He ground it out like he had a mouth full of coal dust, and he didn’t sound at all grateful, but at least he was polite about it.

  “What else has she got in that pocketbook?” I asked. Figured we’d better get back to business. I didn’t have all day.

  He took out a packet of tissues, some hand cream, a lipstick and a compact.

  “That’s it,” he said.

  I sighed and sat back in my chair. “Well,” I said, “I’m at a loss as to what to do next. Do I confront Jim with what the manager of the dry cleaners said? Do I ask him to fork over a picture of Flora? Do I—”

  “You let the police handle this!” Sheriff Norville shouted. “Don’t confront Jim Adams with anything! Don’t ask him—”

  Matlock growled a little, and Sheriff Norville lowered his voice. “Stay out of it, Ms. Crumb. If this man murdered his wife, do you think he’ll hesitate to hurt you . . . maybe kill you, too?”

  “But maybe he didn’t kill his wife. We aren’t gonna know until we find the body or he confesses. Now, he’s sure not gonna confess to you . . . but he just might confess to me.”

  “You are not a police officer, Ms. Crumb. You’ve not been trained in the art of detection and investigation.”

  “Well, be that as it may, I still kept Ada Miller off death row for a crime she did not commit this past Spring.” I frowned. “Only she’s not a ‘Miller’ anymore; she’s married, but I can’t remember her married name off the top of my head.”

  “So, you got lucky once,” Sheriff Norville said. “You might not be so lucky the next time. And as much as you’ve made me want to tear my hair out the past couple of days, I’d hate for anything to happen to you.”

  I smiled, picked up my own pocketbook and stood up. “Come on, Matlock. We’ve taken up enough of this man’s time.” I nodded at the sheriff. “If I come across anything else, I’ll be sure to let you know.”

  Matlock had to stop and pee before we got back in the car.

  “It all makes sense now, doesn’t it?” I asked, after he’d watered a dogwood. “Sheriff Norville has taken a romantic interest in me and doesn’t want me to get hurt.”

  I have to admit I was flattered. And I might be a little interested in him, too, if he’d quit being so grouchy.

  Since I still didn’t feel up to confronting Jim, I decided to go on home. It was quite a drive and I was feeling a little tired, so I put on a Frank Sinatra CD.

  “‘When somebody loves you,’” I sang along with Frankie, “‘it’s no good unless he loves you all the way!’”

  Poor Sheriff
Norville. I hope I didn’t wind up breaking his heart.

  The first thing I did when I got home was called Jim. After all, he’d been expecting me over there with his tablecloth and maybe to make him dinner.

  I was relieved when C.C. answered the phone. “Hello, C.C. It’s Myrtle. I’m so glad you’re there. I was supposed to have come by there today; and I even went and picked up Jim’s tablecloth from the dry cleaners, but then I got to feeling bad and thought I’d better come back home.” And that was the truth, you know. I felt lousy after I came out of that dry cleaners.

  “Bless your heart,” C.C. said. “Are you feeling better now?”

  “A little . . . I’ll probably be over it by tomorrow.”

  “Myrtle, honey, hold on just a second. Mary, don’t mess with those! Sorry, about that.”

  “That’s okay. How’s Jim feeling today?”

  “I think he’s feeling better. He got up on his crutches and walked a little bit earlier. It tuckered him out, though, and he’s asleep on the couch now. You want me to have him call you when he wakes up?”

  “No, that’s okay. Just let him know I’ll be over tomorrow afternoon, okay?”

  “Will do, sweetie. Hope you get to feeling better.”

  “Yeah,” I said, “me, too.”

  The next call I made was to Sunny.

  “You ain’t gonna believe this one,” I said when she answered the phone. Then I told her about my day. She liked to have killed herself laughing when I told her the manager of the dry cleaners thought Jim was a cross-dresser.

  “I saw those on Montel once,” she said, “and if you didn’t know they were guys, you’d have thought they were totally gorgeous women.”

  “Yeah, I’ve seen shows like that, too. So, what do you think?” I asked. “Do you think Jim is . . . one of those?”

  She laughed again. “No way, Mimi. The guy’s as straight an arrow as Ward Cleaver.”

  “How do you know Ward Cleaver?”

  “Duh,” she said, “TV Land.”

  I told her that I just saw Tansie’s car pull in and that I was gonna call and see if she got any pictures of Flora from the library. “I’ll call you later to see if she came up with anything,”

  Sunny said. “You’re the wildest grandma ever.”

  I called Tansie, and she said she’d come over as soon as she got her groceries put away.

  “Did you find any pictures of Flora?” I asked.

  “I’ll tell you when I get there.”

  “Hmph. I’ve got some pretty interesting news of my own.”

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “I’ll tell you when you get here.” Then I hung up without even saying “bye.” That’ll teach her to be snotty with me.

  I sat down in my recliner by the window, kicked off my beige pumps and pulled out the footrest. I thought about Jim . . .about everything he’d said and done since I’d known him . . .about his manners and his good-heartedness. Sunny was right. Jim was about as straight an arrow as Ward Cleaver. He couldn’t possibly be a cross-dressing wife-killer. Right?

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  When Tansie came over, she wouldn’t fork over the pictures until I told her what the manager of the dry cleaners said about Jim.

  “He must’ve been a lunatic,” Tansie said. “Or maybe he was jealous. What did he look like?”

  “A hippie.” I shrugged. “He wasn’t ugly; he just looked like a flower child.”

  “Well, that explains it. He probably did a lot of drugs at one time or another, and it drove him crazy.”

  “You never know,” I said.

  Matlock eased closer to me. I believe Tansie was makin’ him nervous.

  “That has to be it,” Tansie said. “Jim is as manly as he can be.”

  “I agree.” I nodded at the manila envelope she was clutching. “Let me see those pictures now.”

  I was sitting on the couch, so she got up out of her chair and came and sat beside me. You know Tansie; she has to make a big deal out of everything. Heaven forbid she should hand me the envelope and let me take a look at the pictures myself.

  Tansie opened the envelope and took out a single sheet of paper. “These are all the pictures they had of Flora.”

  I looked at the paper. Tansie had put four photographs on the copier and had made one copy. The pictures looked like they’d been taken at some sort of office party.

  “Didn’t you think to get the pictures blown up?” I asked.

  She sniffed. “There’s no need. We can see everything we need to see plain as day.”

  “How do you figure that?” I asked, pointing to one of the pictures. “In this one, she’s got her back turned.”

  “Exactly, and blowing up the photograph wouldn’t have turned her around.”

  I had to give her that. Score one for the blue head. I pointed to another picture. “This one’s so blurry you can’t make out a thing.”

  “Yeah. The only way I knew it was her was because I could make out the top of her head.”

  In one, somebody’s thumb got in front of the camera lens and obliterated Flora’s face. Tansie had been able to recognize the sweater she’d had on. In the best photograph we had of Flora, her face was turned almost entirely away from us. Still, we could make out a little bit of her profile.

  “You know,” I said, studying the picture, “her nose does look sort of like Jim’s nose.”

  Tansie’s eyes bugged out. “Don’t tell me you believe what that lunatic at the dry cleaners told you.”

  I lifted my chin. “I’m trying to conduct an investigation. I have to explore every angle no matter how absurd it might seem.”

  She grabbed the paper away from me. “I don’t think that looks like Jim’s nose at all.”

  “I’ll find out tomorrow. Let me take this with me when I go to Jim’s house.”

  “What’re you plannin’ to do? Turn Jim’s face to the light and hold up the picture to see if the noses match? Maybe you can get him to position his face the exact same way to make it easier on yourself.”

  “You’re being ridiculous,” I said. “He’s on that high-powered pain medication. I’ll wait ‘til he dozes off, and then I’ll compare the noses.”

  “Are you insane?”

  “No. I’m a thorough investigator. I’ll give you your pictures when I get back.”

  “Oh, no, you won’t,” Tansie said, putting her paper back in the envelope. “If my pictures go, I go.”

  “Fine. You can help me fix dinner.”

  * * *

  I’d just got into my pink floral pajamas when the phone rang. I started not to answer it because I was getting ready to get in bed and watch a movie. I changed my mind, though. You never know when it’ll be something important. And if it wasn’t important, I’d just tell whomever it was I had to go and hang up.

  As it turned out, I was glad I answered. It was Faye.

  “What’s the matter?” I asked. I always worry that something’s wrong when Faye calls. She seldom calls just to chat. “Is anything wrong with Sunny?”

  “No, Mother; Crimson is fine.” She hesitated. “Is everything okay with you?”

  “Yeah . . . far as I know.”

  “That’s good.”

  It was gettin’ close to time for my movie, so I wished she’d hurry up and tell me what was on her mind. “How’s work?” I asked.

  “It’s going okay. Actually, it’s a little better than okay right now.”

  “Why’s that?”

  It took her a minute to answer me. “There’s a new vice president of marketing. He has a lot of terrific ideas. He’s very dynamic.” She trailed off.

  I closed my eyes. She finally gets interested in somebody, and he’s somebody she works with.

  “You still there?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” I said slowly, “but I’m wonderin’ why you called me.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “What is it you’re wrestling with? Is it this man? You wouldn’t have called
me if you were a hundred percent sure about pursuing a relationship with him. Are you undecided because he’s somebody you work with? I know I don’t have to tell you that’s never a good idea.”

  “That’s part of it,” Faye admitted. “Plus he’s going through a divorce.”