Mother Finds a Body

by Craig Rice

  “She took the cup from me and stirred up the water with her finger. She kept turning the cup one way and then the other. Suddenly she turned it upside down on my desk and twisted it around again. The water spilled all over her and she didn’t seem to feel it. There was something strange about the way she was holding her head, too, like she was listening for something. She looked up at me. Her eyes were almost closed. ’I think I see a gun in my cup,’ she said. She handed me the empty paper cup and said, ‘I can’t read it well. You read it.’”

  The sheriff turned his face from Biff to me.

  “She must have thought it was tea,” I said.

  The sheriff nodded. He scratched the back of his neck with his huge hand. Then, with the same baffled expression, he said: “I’ve seen cases like it before, but I have to admit I didn’t recognize the symptoms in your mother. They all have hallucinations, but they don’t make their stories as plausible. They contradict themselves and get mixed up with the details. Usually their eyes are bloodshot, their hands are shaky. Their eyes are yellow-rimmed, too. I should have known it. I should have known your mother was no coward. Only cowards allow themselves to be blackmailed. She would have told you about it from the beginning and asked you what to do. I don’t think she’d stab a man in the back, either. Like I say, though, if I’d seen the pupils of her eyes, I might have guessed. She must have just taken it up.”

  “Taken up what?” I asked.

  “Why, heroin, of course,” the sheriff replied. “Only I don’t think it was all heroin. There was too much fantasy in the story for that. At a guess, I’d say hashish. They can really weave ’em on hashish. Why, I had a guy here once that convinced me he was …”

  “What are you talking about?” I said. “My mother never took dope in her life. She’s even afraid of aspirin. Weave what story?”

  The sheriff snapped his fingers with irritation.

  “I’m getting so I can’t tell a story straight to save my life. I should have started-right out with telling you where your mother is. She’s at the doctor’s. He’s got her under observation. He just called me a while ago and said she was better, but she was plumb out of her mind this morning. All that rigamarole she signed was made up, made up out of whole cloth.

  “Far as I figure out, your mother never even knew those two men she said she murdered. It was easy for me to check on a few things, like when she married your father. They were married three years before you were born. She was never married before or after. Captain Robinson is a real captain, too. There’s nothing illegal about your marriage. I even checked with your bank. They have no record of money being paid out regularly. If she had been paying blackmail she would have to have done it with cash, and each salary check has been sent in intact. The checks have been made out for hotel bills, customers, and things like that. They never once got a check made out to cash. But even before I checked her story, I knew something was wrong. That teacup thing was the tip-off. So I sent for the doc and he gave her an injection. It was something they use as a depressive, and in a minute she looks around the office here and says, ‘Where am I?’”

  “Then she didn’t kill them?” Biff said.

  “No more than your wife here did,” the sheriff replied. “Where she got that story I’ll never know. Neither will she. Always react like that. They never know when they snap out of it.”

  The sheriff placed the papers back in the drawer and slammed it shut. Then he turned a key in the lock. He closed the roll-top desk and locked that.

  “Come on,” he said, helping me to my feet. “I guess you’d like to see her.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  The boys who were holding down the courthouse steps eyed Biff and me furtively as we waited for the sheriff to lock the door to his office. I think they expected to see us wearing handcuffs, with a ball and chain on our ankles for good measure.

  To put them at ease I pulled out my compact and took a quick look in the mirror. A quick one was all I could stand. My nose was shiny and the Texas dust had settled in little lumps on my sunburned face. My lips were dry with only an outline of rouge. I don’t pride myself on being a beauty girl, but you can carry anything too far. I ran a comb through my bangs and pretended that I was interested in something that was happening down the street as I rubbed the melted lipstick across my mouth.

  Biff spoke to the sheriff in a loud, too-hearty voice. “What’ll it be, Hank, old boy? Do we walk or ride?”

  “Now that’s up to the little lady,” the sheriff said, nodding in my direction.

  It was the “little-lady” dialogue that brought the men to their feet. If they had had any doubts about our standing with the sheriff, his genial smile dispelled them. With the precision of the Rockettes they rose and turned on the personality. They were prettier when they frowned, but I had an idea that if Biff and I wanted to stay healthy we should give them our entrance smiles. That is a fast, brilliant smile. The exit is a long, slow one.

  Two of the men detached themselves from the group and ran toward the sheriff’s car parked at the curb. They almost collided as they opened the doors for us. Then they stood back to make way for our parade. I could feel the eyes of the others following us as we walked down the steps toward the car.

  Of all the days for me to wear my seat-warped tweed slacks, I thought bitterly. A perfectly good pongee pair in the trailer at Restful Grove, and me doing an exit in these.

  One of the men closed the car door behind me. He gave me a chewing-tobacco smile as we drove off.

  “Cute kids,” Biff said.

  The sheriff chuckled. “It don’t take ’em long to catch on. You’ll have to admit that. It’ll be all over town in an hour.”

  “In less than an hour,” I said to myself.

  The nudging of ribs as we passed the corner drugstore could be heard over the knock of the motor. The open mouths turned into broad grins. I wondered if Hank knew the power he had.

  Biff was overplaying the big-friendship scene. He let one arm rest on the sheriff’s shoulder. The other hung limply over the open window; one of the sheriff’s cigars was clutched between his fingers. If he had been a politician in a parade he couldn’t have laughed more often or more loudly.

  “If you heard this one, don’t stop me,” he said. “I like to listen to it myself.”

  I was glad I sat alone in the back seat. Biff’s jokes can be pretty tiresome at times, and this was one of the times. The sheriff either thought Biff was the funniest man in show business or he was just being polite. He didn’t laugh, he roared. That was all Biff needed. He went right through his act, even to the blackout.

  It wasn’t that good, I know, but they both laughed until we pulled up in front of the frame house with Dr. Gonzales’ shingle waving in the hot breeze. Then, as he helped me out of the car, the sheriff sobered.

  “Now be careful that you don’t upset your mother,” he said.

  Biff had said the same thing earlier. It was plain that they still didn’t realize what Mother could go through without becoming upset.

  “She’s a mighty fine little woman,” the sheriff said.

  He was beginning to convince me. Not only his words but the reverence in his voice was enough to convince anyone. I was beginning to see something else, too. If Mother had any use for the Ysleta police department, she could have it for the asking.

  The sheriff removed his hat as we walked into the doctor’s house. He held it tightly with both hands. He tiptoed to a door and tapped lightly.

  “Come in,” Mother sang out.

  The sheriff crooked a finger in my direction and stood aside so I could enter.

  I don’t know what I expected to see when I walked into the doctor’s office. I’m sure I didn’t expect the scene that greeted me. The books on shelves from the floor to the high ceiling, the dark, real leather chairs, the graceful draperies, the subdued light filtering through the Venetian blinds, and Mother, my poor little mother who mustn’t be upset, sitting with an afghan robe around her feet
, at a card table.

  The doctor and several men I had never seen before sat opposite her. The doctor shuffled the cards. His dark hands moved quickly and expertly as the cards fell into place. He wore a black alpaca coat with a white shirt showing at the neck. The whiteness accentuated his swarthiness. When he smiled at Mother his teeth gleamed; he didn’t smile at Biff or me, he greeted us professionally.

  “Bedside manner,” Biff whispered to me, “Ysleta style.”

  Mother smiled wanly at me from over a pile of poker chips. “Louise dear,” she said. She held out her arms, and I walked over to her.

  “Are you feeling all right, Mother?”

  “Oh yes. These men have been so kind.”

  That was an understatement if I ever heard one. They weren’t only kind, they were groveling.

  “They’ve been teaching me how to play poker,” Mother said innocently. “My, it is a complicated game. I told them I would rather play pachisi, but they told me if I was going to stay in Texas for any time at all I had to learn poker.” Mother laughed gaily and went on, “I’m such a dummy, though. I guess I never will learn.”

  Her slender hand touched the pile of chips lovingly.

  Biff and I gulped. Mother was the champion poker player of the troupe.

  “And Biff,” Mother said maternally, “my son.” She held out a hand for him, too.

  The sheriff pushed Biff toward her.

  “Go to her,” he whispered.

  The note of reverence was almost too thick now. I couldn’t blame Biff for thinking twice before he threw his arms around Mother’s shoulders. The “my son” sounded mighty funny from where I stood. But not to the men who were listening. They glanced at each other with an “I’d-die-for-her” expression on their faces. They dropped their eyes and clenched their teeth when Mother said: “Thank heavens, my children are with me again.” A big round tear fell down Mother’s cheek, and she looked up at the sheriff without brushing it away.

  “Is it—all over now?” she asked falteringly.

  “You bet it is,” the sheriff said.

  “And I can go home?” Mother’s face was radiant. She let her eyes rest on one man after the other until they had all seen the love light in them. Then she held out her hand to the sheriff.

  “My friend,” she said.

  I had been looking at the same act all my life, but it was still good. Mother was a born actress, I thought. Then I wondered, wondered if it was all an act. If so, Mother had improved.

  “I took the liberty of having one of my boys bring your own car around,” the sheriff said. “The truck, I mean. I thought you folks might want to be alone for a little while.”

  Biff said, “That’s mighty fine of you, Hank.” Then he helped Mother to her feet.

  The men jumped up and began digging in their pockets. They counted out bills and change while one of them counted Mother’s chips. When they handed the money to Mother, she looked at them with wide eyes.

  “What’s this for?” she asked.

  “Why, that’s your winnings,” one of the men said.

  “You mean, we were playing for keeps?”

  The men laughed sheepishly. I swallowed my gum.

  “Who were those men?” I asked when we were seated in the truck. Mother was too busy counting her winnings to answer me immediately. She looked up for a second. Her forehead was creased from thinking so deeply, and she began counting on her fingers again.

  “I think one of those men cheated me,” she said.

  “Who were they?” I asked, trying to keep my temper under control.

  “Oh, they were just newspapermen,” Mother said. “They wanted an inside story about the murders.”

  “You, uh, gave it to them?” Biff asked. He stared straight ahead as he spoke.

  “Why, of course I did. I told them you were a big lumberman form Oregon. I didn’t think it would sound good if they found out you were a burlesque comic. I told them everything. They wanted pictures, and the only one I had was that baby picture of you, Louise, so I gave it to one of the men. Let’s see now, twenty-seven, twenty-eight, twenty-nine … Yes, I really do think they cheated me.”

  “A lumberman,” Biff said incredulously. “From Oregon, yet.”

  “Is that the picture of me lying on my stomach on the white rug?” I asked.

  “Now you made me lose count,” Mother said pettishly. “I have to start all over again.”

  Mother counted and counted. The motor knocked. The radiator boiled. The windshield clacked.

  “Lumberman,” Biff repeated over and over. “Lumberman.” He was still mumbling when we drove into camp.

  Gee Gee had let out a yelp as the truck stopped; actors and animals piled out of the trailer like an old two-reel comedy.

  “My goodneess,” Mother exclaimed. “You’d think I’d been to Europe or Siam or something.”

  “Evangie’s back!” Dimples shouted.

  Trailerites began gathering around the lean-to tent to add their congratulations. The attention put Mother in a special sort of heaven. She hugged and kissed Mamie and even blew a kiss to Corny. The dogs were whining and jumping up and down. Rufus Veronica, the monkey, squealed to be petted, and the guinea pig looked on with his little beadlike eyes glittering.

  Mamie had just set her hair. It was plastered down flat against her small head, and she wore a pale-lavender rayon mesh cap to hold it. Between that and her old gingham dress flapping around her thin hips, she looked more and more like a real native of Oologah, or whatever the name of that place was. I was afraid she was going to cry, and I was right.

  “Oh, I thought they’d never let you out,” she sobbed, clinging to Mother’s neck. She stood back and looked at Mother: Then she threw herself in a camp chair and cried even louder. “It would have been all my fault, too,” she said between bellows. “I always bring nothing but bad luck to people and here I am doing it again …”

  It was spoiling Mother’s home-coming. Not because Mother doesn’t like to see people enjoy a good cry, as she puts it, but because Mamie and her hysterics were taking the center of the stage. I knew that by the time I had counted a slow ten, Mother would have a fainting spell or she would feel an asthma attack coming on.

  It was an asthma attack, and she had it before I counted past six.

  “Will you get my Life Everlasting, please?” she asked Biff.

  Mamie jumped up and wiped away a tear. “Let me get it. You just sit there and rest now.”

  In a minute she was back with the powder and had sprinkled some in a saucer. She touched a match to the mound and helped Mother cover her head with the turkish towel. While Mother inhaled and wheezed, Mamie clucked in sympathy.

  Mandy emerged from the trailer wearing his bathrobe and carrying a half-empty bottle of rye. His eyes looked sleepy and his hair was mussed. One side of his face was creased from lying on it.

  “Why doesn’t someone let me in on the news?” he said. He patted Mother’s head gently. “Welcome home, baby,” he said softly. Then to Biff, “How’s it?”

  Biff eyed the bottle. “Tough, Mandy boy, very tough. What I need is a little drink.”

  “Me, too,” Mandy said as though it were a brand-new idea.

  Corny got the glasses.

  “… now all we’ve got to do is find out where she gets the dope,” Biff finished his story and the bottle at the same time.

  For privacy we had gathered at the office. The sheriff had told Biff to keep the inside story of the confession from Mother, and that meant keeping it from Mamie, too. Biff didn’t think that Mamie would deliberately tell Mother anything that wasn’t good for her to know, but she was too emotional to trust, especially where Mother was concerned.

  Dimples drained the last drop from her glass and eyed the empty bottle morosely. “Well, I guess it’s up to me to fill it,” she said tonelessly. “I’ll go if somebody’ll drive me.”

  “No,” Corny said. “I’ll go. You stay here.”

  He took the five-dollar bi
ll from Dimples and left.

  “He must be damned thirsty,” Dimples remarked as the door slammed.

  “Or curious,” Biff added under his breath.

  Gee Gee looked sharply at Biff as he spoke. Then she shrugged her shoulders. “It’s none of my business, I guess,” she said, “but I’ll be damned if I trust that guy. From what you say about Evangie being on that stuff since San Diego …”

  “I didn’t say San Diego exactly,” Biff said quickly. “I only said that she started acting funny about that time.”

  “Well, it’s the same thing, ain’t it?” Gee Gee said petulantly. “Always shooting off your big mouth. You never give anybody else a chance to talk. What I wanted to say was this: if Evangie started acting funny since San Diego, then she couldn’t be getting the stuff from here. She either has it with her or—well, some one of us is giving it to her.”

  Biff searched her face for a moment.

  Gee Gee’s eyes met his and she said, “Look, just because I mentioned it, don’t go getting ideas that it’s me.”

  “I wasn’t,” Biff said quietly. “I was thinking about something else.”

  He jumped up and started for the door. “Come on, Gyp,” he said from over his shoulder, “I want to examine that pantry again.”

  I thought he had gone a little insane but I followed him. I was getting used to insanity by then. But I did venture a question.

  “And what pantry are you referring to?”

  “That pantry that had its door open the night you thought someone was in the trailer,” Biff said in the same well-spaced, precise tone.

  “Oh that pantry! The only pantry we ever had …”

  Then I realized that he was serious.

  “Do you think the dope is in there? Do you think it was the murderer who was in the trailer with me? Oh, Biff, wait a minute. Don’t leave me alone. Oh. I’m …”

  Biff grabbed my arm and dragged me along. He was taking such big steps I couldn’t keep up with him. Suddenly he slowed down. As we approached the trailer he whistled a little tune. I recognized it as Mother’s four-leaf-clover song: