Miss Ruffles Inherits Everything

by Nancy Martin

  “That sounds so impulsive.” She smiled a little. “Your mother traveled extensively, didn’t she?”

  I smiled, too. “She was always going off on adventures. She never made it to Antarctica, but she got everywhere else on her bucket list.”

  “A bucket list.” Suddenly Honeybelle was looking off into the distance as if starting her own list that very moment.

  Miss Ruffles sat down on the grass and looked up at Honeybelle, head cocked, ears alert.

  “Don’t worry,” Honeybelle said to her. “I won’t leave you alone.”

  Miss Ruffles wagged her stub.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  If you hear a Texas woman say, “Oh, hell, no,” it’s already too late.

  —SEEN ON A T-SHIRT (IN RHINESTONES)

  The day after Ten Tennyson read Honeybelle’s will and turned our lives upside down, I took Miss Ruffles for her usual run … with a lot more apprehension than when Honeybelle was alive. I was exercising a millionaire dog.

  “Is it safe to take her out of the yard?” Mr. Carver asked me as I snapped on the leash by the back gate. He had picked up the newspaper from the driveway where it had been thrown by the delivery boy.

  “She needs her exercise,” I said. “Otherwise, you know she’ll chew the furniture.”

  Mr. Carver looked anxious. “Are you sure this is a good idea?”

  No, I wasn’t. But I said, “If we make her a prisoner, her behavior is only going to get worse.”

  “I see. Just … be careful, Sunny.”

  “I’ll do my best. Shall I bring back doughnuts?”

  His eyes lit up. Mr. Carver had a sweet tooth that Mae Mae rarely satisfied. “Oh, yes, that would be very nice.”

  I’d taken Miss Ruffles out every day since moving into Honeybelle’s house. It hadn’t gotten any easier. We jogged three blocks before Miss Ruffles made a U-turn, tripped me with the leash, and dragged me across a lawn to the edge of someone’s driveway where a trash can sat oozing a disgusting liquid onto the ground. I practically had to strangle Miss Ruffles with the leash to prevent her from lapping up whatever the goo was.

  On the next block, she spotted the Siamese cat that always sat tauntingly in someone’s front window. Miss Ruffles tried to throw herself against the window, but I was ready. I managed to divert her with a Milk-Bone.

  We’d gotten as far as the next corner when a black car pulled up beside me. It didn’t stop but kept pace with us, and the passenger window rolled down. I was close enough to be hit by a blast of air-conditioning.

  A man in dark sunglasses said, “Hey, there, young lady, could you give us some directions?”

  I stopped running. The car angled in front of me and braked. The passenger popped his door open, and a heartbeat later the driver’s door opened, too. Two men stepped out and adjusted their sunglasses against the intense glare of the early morning sun. They both wore dark business suits—one with a tie, one not—and even without an anthropologist around to confirm my opinion, I knew they were from somewhere other than Mule Stop.

  The first thought that popped into my head was The Blues Brothers go to Texas.

  “Miss McKillip? Sunny McKillip?”

  Maybe I should have taken off at a run. But I wasn’t thinking about the safety of Miss Ruffles or myself. No, immediately, I flashed back to the day a man came to tell me my mother was dead. I stopped on the sidewalk with Miss Ruffles at my side, and my brain tried to process all the possible bad things that could have happened. Whatever it was, the Blues Brothers must have shown up to break the news, I thought. So I was momentarily struck silent.

  The men took up position on either side of me and stepped closer until the moment Miss Ruffles flattened her ears and let out one of her most threatening growls. They stopped dead, giving me a chance for a second impression. They could have been brothers, all right. Besides dressing alike, both were heavyset, with lots of curly dark hair, and both with a certain element of menace in their postures.

  “Nice doggie,” said the driver, sounding unconvinced. A splotch of his breakfast stained the front of his shirt—something yellow and something red. Probably eggs with salsa, a local favorite.

  “Miss McKillip?” said the other. He was buttoned up tight, all business. I could see my reflection in his mirrored sunglasses. He tapped a meaty thumb against his chest. “My name’s Costello.”

  When I could gather my breath, I said, “What’s wrong?”

  “Hey, nothin’s wrong.” Costello raised his hands in the universal I-surrender gesture. “Take it easy, there. We’re just talkin’.”

  He wasn’t from Texas by any means. I guessed East Coast by his accent. New York or New Jersey, maybe.

  “We just want to have a conversation,” said his partner. “You’re Sunny McKillip, right?”

  “R-right.”

  “Your mom was Rachel McKillip? The lady scientist who died?”

  “Yes.” I was breathless, wondering what new catastrophe could have occurred.

  “We’re sorry for your loss. We hear she was a nice lady. Pretty, too. Just like you.”

  “What’s going on?” My sanity was returning, and I felt stronger. It helped to have Miss Ruffles beside me, growling softly, ready to spring if needed. “Who are you?”

  Costello came closer, and Miss Ruffles swung on him. He stopped. He said, “We were sent to look you up. Sent by a gentleman who financed one of your mom’s, y’know, big science trips to Mexico. Mr. Postlethwaite.”

  “I don’t know him.”

  “Really? He’s very big in waste management. Revolutionized the industry. Made a boatload of money. You really don’t know him?”

  I knew who he was, of course. Just didn’t know him personally. Because how many people really knew an eccentric millionaire who popped up on television and in magazines to trumpet news about the environment and climate change? Trumpeting in a very peculiar voice and using the kind of shouty talk that only turned people against whatever views he espoused? I said, “Sorry, no.”

  Costello looked surprised and exchanged glances with his partner. “Well, he knows about you.”

  Miss Ruffles jumped in front of me and let out her sharp warning bark. Both men froze again. I had stopped in a tiny patch of shade from a lone tree, but they were stuck in full sun. The heat was already building to intense.

  Costello loosened his tie an iota. “Mr. Postlethwaite, see, he’s like a whattayacallit, philatelist. Gives money to good causes. He paid your mom a whole lotta cash, see. He was happy to do it. He loves bugs, ’specially butterflies. You should see his collection—he’s got drawers and drawers fulla bugs. And your mom said when she finally grabbed that new butterfly she was chasing, deal was, she’d name it after him.”

  Uh-oh. I knew all about the elusive butterfly my mother had pursued. For years, she claimed there was an undocumented species out there, and she wanted to find it. She had held out that butterfly like a carrot to many investors.

  Miss Ruffles must have sensed a change in the dynamic, because she looked up at my face and tried to read my emotions. I rested my hand on the top of her head.

  “Trouble is,” Costello continued, “the butterfly don’t exist. Turns out, she made it up.”

  “She just ran out of time,” I began.

  “That don’t make things right,” Costello said. “Mr. Postlethwaite, he feels cheated. Which is understandable, know what I’m sayin’? He feels like he poured a lotta dough down a rat hole, is what he feels. Boy, it gets hot around here, doesn’t it?”

  “What is there to talk about?” I asked, regaining some of my courage. “My mother is dead.”

  “Yeah, like I said, we’re real sorry about that,” Costello said. “But Mr. Postlethwaite, he thinks he ought to get some of his money back.”

  “From whom?” I asked.

  “Whom, huh?” Costello had a wide smile, and he shared it with his cohort. “What a smart girl. That could work in your favor. We don’t really want to make trouble for you. But Mr. P
ostlethwaite asked us to come down here and talk to you about his money.”

  “I don’t have it. She spent it,” I said. “She always worked under a tight budget, but there was never any profit in—”

  “So if she was good with a budget, maybe there’s some left over. Maybe you got a tidy little bank account, and you could see your way clear to writing a check back to Mr. Postlethwaite.”

  My mother’s scientific trips were her greatest joy, but the cost for a full-blown expedition included travel by air for herself and grad students, wages for local helpers, and equipment that had to be shipped and maintained, not to mention weeks of stay in a foreign country. She often raised a hundred thousand dollars and much more for such an undertaking. The reason every college had reluctantly let her go was that she ran through research money faster than fraternities consumed beer. At the end of her career, she’d been reduced to being hired on a course-by-course basis and relied on grants from less than kosher sources to fund her trips. I’d been left with barely enough money to bury her and buy a plane ticket to Texas.

  “Look,” I said, trying not to panic. “I’m sure Mr. Postlethwaite is disappointed. I completely understand. But honestly, I am flat broke. I’m very sorry you came all this way for nothing, but you might as well go back and tell your boss that I’m not able to accommodate him.”

  “Accommodate. You’re real smart, aren’t you?”

  “Who are you two, exactly?” I wound up the leash, preparing to continue our run. “A couple of wiseguys for hire?”

  He smiled, pleased. “Something like that. Look, we heard a rumor about you.”

  “What kind of rumor?”

  “That you just inherited a million bucks.”

  I had been about to dash off, but I forgot about running and faced the two of them again. “Who told you that?”

  “It’s all over town. We heard it in the … whattayacallit, the restaurant with the wagon wheel out front. Everybody was talking about you at the ice cream machine, while they were putting chocolate and peanuts on their sundaes. Somebody said they heard about you getting a lot of dough from somebody named Moneybelle.”

  “Honeybelle,” I said automatically.

  He smiled broadly. “That’s not what they were calling her, and somebody else said you were just the dogsitter, which is when we figured out they were talking about you. It’s unusual to have peanuts sitting out like that in a restaurant, you know. Half the kids in the country are allergic to peanuts. My little granddaughter is.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  I was even sorrier to hear that I was the subject of ice cream machine gossip. How did the news get out already that we were inheriting a large amount of money? Who had talked? Surely not Ten. And it seemed unlikely that Posie or Hut Junior was going around telling their friends and neighbors how Honeybelle had thwarted their dreams of an immediate windfall. I doubted Mr. Carver or Mae Mae had said a word either.

  Miss Ruffles edged over to sniff him.

  “We got to thinking,” Costello said, holding his position but eyeing her, “that if you’re going to be a millionaire, maybe you could see your way to writing a check to Mr. Postlethwaite.”

  “I’d like to help you,” I said. “But truth is, I won’t get a penny beyond my regular paycheck for a year.”

  “A year? Well, I bet we could work out something with one of those cash advance companies. My brother-in-law is always using those. Maybe—”

  “It’s all very complicated,” I said, “and it’s really not anything I care to discuss, not with you.”

  “Hey, is that any way to talk? We’re just having a conversation here.”

  I tugged at the leash. “I think it’s a conversation that’s going to end with you threatening me. So we’re going to go before that happens.” I turned and started to jog again. Miss Ruffles joined me.

  Costello called after us, “We’re just talking. Hey, come back!”

  It didn’t occur to me to be frightened until they were both back in their car and driving in the opposite direction from Miss Ruffles and me. That’s when my knees turned to jelly, and I wanted to sit down on the sidewalk more than anything. But Miss Ruffles nearly yanked me off my feet by charging after another passing car. She wanted to run it down and eat all the tires. I barely managed to stop her by throwing all my weight against the leash. Then we ran as if chased by demons.

  About half a mile later, I stopped on a corner and bent from the waist to catch my breath. I groaned. My mother had been known for cutting corners, playing fast and loose with donations, wheedling money for expeditions that sometimes didn’t materialize. I should have guessed one of her shady donors might come looking for repayment someday.

  But this possibility, that someone might come looking for cash from me, had never blossomed in my mind. I had nothing to give to anyone—certainly not the kind of money the Blues Brothers wanted for their client.

  “What am I supposed to do?” I said.

  Miss Ruffles jumped against my knee. Puzzlement shone in her face.

  “It’s okay,” I said to her. “They’re after me, not you.”

  She yipped and pulled on the leash. I got the message. We jogged across the street to the next corner and kept going toward the bakery.

  I didn’t want to leave Miss Ruffles outside by herself, so I was glad the Heavenly Treats shop had a drive-up window. Most restaurants in Mule Stop had drive-up windows. It was possible to eat three meals a day without leaving your car.

  The apple-cheeked lady standing at the window was the owner, who sometimes wore angel wings when she worked the counter. This morning she had tied on an apron that had various colors of frosting dabbed on it. She looked like Mrs. Claus, except messy. She smiled at me as she opened the window. “Can I help you?”

  I fished some cash out of the tiny pocket in my running shorts. “I’ll take a dozen mixed doughnuts, please.”

  “You want me to choose for you?”

  “That would be great, thanks.”

  Miss Ruffles jumped up and put her front paws on the takeout window to investigate, and the woman’s smile widened. “Why, that’s Miss Ruffles, right? Honeybelle’s dog?”

  “Yes.” I put a few bills on the counter in hopes of speeding up the transaction.

  But the owner rested one plump elbow on the counter and leaned there for a chat. “We’re all real sorry about Honeybelle. She used to drive up here in her convertible every Sunday and buy all our pink sprinkle doughnuts. She took ’em to church, she said. She said it was good for the whole congregation to have pink doughnuts. I’m not sure what that meant, exactly, but it sounded nice.”

  “She was always very generous.”

  “You want some pink sprinkles?”

  “Sure, that’d be great.” Belatedly, I added, “Thank you, ma’am.”

  “I heard Honeybelle was real generous with you.”

  I opened my mouth to reply but couldn’t think of a response.

  She said, “You’re sure one lucky young lady.”

  She had a glint in her eye that didn’t quite match her cordial remark, and she smiled as if she’d beaten me at Ping-Pong. I thought for a second about what a smart Texan would say to such a clear goad. It didn’t take long to hit on just the right thing.

  I said, “Bless your heart, ma’am. Thank you.”

  Her smile changed, and she said more seriously, “I was real sorry Miss Honeybelle had to die right here in our parking lot we share with the pharmacy. Not that I blame her a bit. She had a big fight with that college man.”

  “Who? President Cornfelter?”

  “The one with the bow tie. They had words right out here.” She pointed at the edge of the parking lot, closer to Pinto’s drug store. “I don’t know what he said to her, but it musta been real mean. It like to have killed her, I guess. I’ll go get those doughnuts for you.”

  She went away, and I stood there thinking about something my mother used to say. Listen to the thing you’re studying
. Let it tell you when you’re going off track. Maybe it was time to think about President Cornfelter.

  When the proprietor came back, I paid and thanked her again and took the box of doughnuts in my arm.

  When Miss Ruffles and I walked past the front window, all the patrons inside the restaurant portion of Heavenly Treats came to watch us go by. I assumed Mrs. Claus had told everybody I was outside and they had run to the window to see the million-dollar dog.

  We were the topic of hot gossip already.

  Balancing the doughnut box and managing Miss Ruffles turned out to be a challenge, and I gave up trying to run, too. By the time we got back to Honeybelle’s, two black cars were idling in the street. None of the windows were rolled down, but I could see the Blues Brothers sitting in the front seat of the lead car, watching. I took Miss Ruffles and the doughnuts through the gate.

  In the house, Mr. Carver was very happy to open the Heavenly Treats box.

  I said, “The whole town is talking about us.”

  His hand paused in the act of selecting a pink-frosted doughnut. “What about us?”

  “About inheriting a lot of money from Honeybelle. Except they’re calling her Moneybelle.”

  Mr. Carver sat down hard at the kitchen table.

  Mae Mae stopped slamming things in the pantry and came out into the kitchen. “Why’d you tell anybody?”

  “I didn’t say a word. But somebody did.”

  To Mr. Carver, Mae Mae said, “It sure wasn’t me.”

  Mr. Carver sighed heavily. “Everything Honeybelle did was news in this town. Why did we expect this would be any different?”

  “Because wills are usually kept secret,” I said. “Unless the Tennysons told someone—”

  “Mr. Ten wouldn’t say a word,” Mae Mae shot back. “He’s no gossip.”

  “Well, then, it had to have been one of the Hensleys.”

  Mr. Carver spoke up. “Hut Junior wouldn’t be caught dead spreading family business around town.”

  “Posie?” I asked.

  “She’s a lady,” Mr. Carver objected.

  “She’s no lady,” Mae Mae said. “You know as much as anybody, that girl came from trash.”