The Traveling Corpse

by Double Edge Press

  “I don’t blame you,” Doc said. “Art, keep her safe. We can’t lose the founder of ‘Our Gang.”

  “I’ll try,” her husband vowed, “but you know how independent she is.”

  Doc changed the subject, “There’s another mystery—and that’s how the two of you got inside the building this morning without my seeing you. You sure gave me a scare when I came back into the kitchen and found you inside.”

  Art agreed, “I don’t know how we could have missed seeing you outside. ‘Course it was a little foggy out. We walked all the way around the building trying to find a door that was open.”

  Doc explained, “You must not have seen my golf cart in the dark and the fog. I parked it on the grass and came in through the patio. I unlocked the kitchen door, and then I unlocked the door to the hallway so DeeDee could get to the restroom. Then I walked outside the building to my golf cart to get the roaster to bring it back into the kitchen. You must have come when I was outside for that few minutes. It’s a wonder that we didn’t see you.”

  Art chuckled, “I think we could make a great Laurel and Hardy-like sketch out of it if we could get the timing worked out.”

  Annie smiled and shook her head, then asked, “Did you say DeeDee’s here? She’s not usually a morning person.”

  “No, she isn’t, but her sciatica was acting up, and she couldn’t sleep,” said Doc. “Anyway, as I said, I went back to get the big roaster. Brad repaired it; he’s great about fixing our appliances. He’s always carrying home coffee pots or roasters that don’t work. He likes to tinker on them out in his garage.”

  Just then they heard DeeDee yelling, “Doc! Doc!” She came running into the kitchen, nodded to her friends, then burst out, “Doc! I jest saw tha strangest thing! C’mon, y’all. Help me; he’s gettin’ away!”

  Trusting her, they followed her outside. She explained breathlessly, “I come outta tha bathroom. I thought I saw somethin’ movin’ in tha courtyard jest outside tha bathroom door. It was dark out an’ a little foggy too, so I wasn’t sure. Tha security light’s on tha far side of tha courtyard; so it doesn’t give out much light. I couldn’t see very well. Anyway, I jest stood at tha door window an’ watched quiet-like. There was somebody there, that’s fer certain. He was bendin’ down between two of those big air-conditioner vents.” DeeDee pointed to the four big sheet metal funnels. Each was mounted on an air-conditioning unit. The funnels directed the air out from under the eaves of the roof. “I could swear I saw a big fella pull somethin’ heavy up from behind that third vent an’ carry it off. I was too s’prised ta say anythin’ at first. As I said, I jest watched, quiet-like. Whatever it was, he threw it over his shoulder an’ started towards tha Shuffleboard Buildin’. You know, they never lock it. I stepped outside an’ called ta him. He mustta heard me, but he didn’t even turn ‘round ta look back at me—jest kept a-hurryin’ ta get inside tha Shuffle Building. That’s when I come ta get Doc.”

  The four of them hurried to the Shuffleboard Building. Doc flipped on the lights. Nothing was amiss. They walked all around and between the 24 covered courts, looking for anything unusual. The two men checked the storage room then went outside to look on the far side of the building.

  While they were gone, Annie told DeeDee about finding and losing the dead body. Her Tennessee friend was shocked and deeply concerned for Annie’s safety. Annie felt that her trusting little friend, DeeDee, believed her story without question; the first person who had believed her unconditionally.

  The men came back, shivering from the cold, shaking their heads and saying they hadn’t seen anything out of the ordinary. Whatever DeeDee had seen had vanished without a trace.

  DeeDee said to her husband, “Annie jest told me ‘bout tha awful thing that happened last night.”

  “She told me already. It’s hard to believe something like that could happen in BradLee.”

  As they walked back to the kitchen, Annie reasoned with them, “There’s definitely something strange going on! Something’s not right. Don’t you see? First, I find a dead woman in a drawer. Then her body disappears—Alakazam! Like magic; Bingo! It’s gone! Now, this morning before daylight, DeeDee sees something weird. She sees a man lift something heavy up from behind one of the air-conditioner units, and then he hustles through the shuffleboard courts. He doesn’t stop or even look back when DeeDee calls to him. He just takes off, and he’s gone!” Annie stopped suddenly, “Why, think about it; he could have been carrying that body! DeeDee, do you think it could have been a dead person he was carrying?”

  “It did kindda fall over his shoulder like a body might. It was the right size fer sure!”

  “Oh, DeeDee, thank-you. Thank-you for seeing that! And thank-you BradLee Park for having security lights so the courtyard wasn’t in total darkness!” said a happy Annie. “Now maybe people will believe me! I’m not in my dotage yet!”

  “Now, don’t get carried away,” Art cautioned her. “We don’t have enough facts yet.” But he was beginning to wonder if maybe his wife really had seen what she said she’d seen in that drawer. Why shouldn’t he believe her? he asked himself. In all the years he’d known her, he’d never seen her hallucinate. He’d always trusted her; he should now, he reasoned. He would.

  “DeeDee,” Annie asked, “can you describe the man you saw? You do think it was a man, don’t you?

  “Oh, it was a man all right. He was big an’ tall. I’m jest sure it was a man. He took big long steps even carryin’ that—that thing—that body!”

  “Could you tell what he was wearing?” Annie persisted.

  “Not really, it was dark, don’t cha know? But there was one thing, he mighta been wearin’ a toboggan.”

  As one, Art and Annie questioned her with raised eyebrows, “Wearing a toboggan? How do you wear a toboggan?”

  Doc roared with laughter. “Guys, you don’t know how to talk East Tennessee, do you? I’m sure I don’t know why, but in East Tennessee, a toboggan isn’t necessarily a sled; it can be a knitted cap. You wear it in the winter. DeeDee taught me that the very first winter I met her—that was some 40 years ago at Auburn University.”

  Surprised, Art said, “I didn’t know you went to Auburn. How did an Ohio boy get that far south?

  Doc said with pride, “One of the best veterinarian schools in the country!”

  Annie looked at her husband, “We do learn new things everyday—‘Another day; another dollar’!” Then she turned to DeeDee, “I am so glad you saw what you saw this morning—a big man wearing a knitted cap, or as you call it, a toboggan. I wonder how that fits our puzzle? Oh, by the way, could you make out any color?”

  “Naw, it was too dark out. Everythin’ jest looked darkish, an’ remember there was still a little fog.”

  “It’s a wonder,” Annie mused, “that Art or I didn’t see him. If we’d pulled in the courtyard just a few minutes later, we’d probably have seen it, too.”

  “I don’t think he’d have picked up that body—if that’s what it was—if you’d been ‘round. I don’t think he wanted anyone ta see him,” DeeDee reasoned.

  They had been walking back to the kitchen as they talked. Art flicked on more of the bright overhead kitchen lights and looked around. The Bingo clean-up crew had left everything neat and tidy, just as was expected of them. They’d swept the floor in the big room as well as the kitchen; so he was a little surprised to see a crumpled tissue on the floor of the hall near the entrance to the hallway and restrooms. He pointed to it and asked, “Did any of you drop that tissue?”

  “Never use them,” Doc said. “What about you, DeeDee?”

  “Tha box I’m using now has a pink design in it; that one’s all white.”

  “I don’t think I dropped it,” Annie added. “Why do you ask?”

  “Don’t you think it’s odd that there’s a crumpled tissue on the floor? If the Bingo crew swept up as carefully as it looks like they did, why is there a Kleenex left here? We’re the first ones in here this morning.”

>   “Maybe the security guard came inside and dropped it,” Doc suggested, then continued. “The volunteers’ shift lasts from 9 to 11 o’clock; then the paid security guard comes on until 5 A.M. He’s the one who checks the buildings and locks up.”

  As Art picked up the crumpled tissue, Annie noticed a bright smudge on it. Pointing, she said, “Look at that, will you? That’s a lipstick blot—bright red—so you know that a woman used it!” Then an idea came to Annie, and she asked Doc, “Who’s doing the park security now? Is it a man or a woman?” Doc said he was sure it was a man. “So,” Annie said, “then we know this wasn’t dropped by the male security guard. This could be proof that there was a woman in here after the Bingo clean-up crew finished.”

  “You don’t suppose he had his girl friend in here, do you?” Doc chuckled.

  “It’s a possibility,” Annie agreed with a smile, “but I doubt it. I suppose we could check it out.”

  Art started to throw the used tissue in the trashcan, but DeeDee stopped him, “Wait! Don’t throw it away, Art! I think we should keep it. It jest might be evidence!” She opened kitchen drawers, looking for something to put it in. Finding a roll of aluminum foil, she tore off a piece and wrapped up the tissue.

  Doc laughed at the women, “We’ve got us a real-life Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watkins here!”

  Annie defended her friend, “DeeDee’s right. It may be evidence. You never know what’s important. I do know something weird happened here yesterday. And DeeDee just saw something very strange outside. There is definitely something going on that is not normal. I’d sure like to know who moved that body. It was moved, you know. And I’d like to know why it’s traveling. Oh!” she rubbed her temple, “this is all very confusing! How do detectives keep everything straight?”

  “In all the detective shows,” Art said, “they carry a notepad and write everything down.”

  “That’s not a bad idea,” Annie said. “I’ll do it when I get home.”

  Doc pulled out a key from his jean’s pocket and turned to unlock the walk-in freezer. Art, laughing, said, “Be careful going in there, Doc! That’s where they always hide the bodies!”

  Doc stiffened.

  “Oh, dear, it would be jest tha perfect place,” DeeDee worried.

  “Whoa!” said Doc. “You’ll have me afraid to go in there. As a matter of fact, just in case, why don’t you all stay here with me ‘til I get these pork tenderloins out of the freezer? Please, don’t leave until I’m out of that freezer and have it locked up good and tight!” One by one, Doc handed the frozen packages of meat out to his friends. They stacked them in a refrigerator to defrost slowly. When he was finished, he carefully re-locked the freezer, “You’re right about the freezer being a good place to hide a body, but it was such a cold night last night that a body wouldn’t have to be stored in any freezer. It’s cold enough outside to preserve it, almost the temperature of a morgue.”

  “Stop it right now!” said DeeDee. “Y’all are talkin’ jest too scary fer anythin’! An’ Doc’s right about it’s being cold out. Everybody’s covered their tender plants in their yards ta protect them from tha frost; it’ll kill ‘em, ya know. Those lovely little triple palms gotta be tented too; they jest can’t take this cold weather.”

  “Talk about killing reminds me that we have a murder mystery on our hands,” Annie said. “If you’re done here in the kitchen, Doc, will you help us look in those drawers? That’s why we came over here this early in the morning. I want to make a thorough search of them all, each and every one of them, before the Coffee Hour Committee gets here to start making coffee.”

  “I thought you said tha deputies searched those drawers last night,” DeeDee said with surprise.

  Annie replied, “They didn’t really search them that thoroughly, except for the tenth drawer. The others, they just pulled them out a little way, and that was that. I wanted to look myself, but I didn’t want to do it while everyone at Bingo was watching. Also, I kept wondering if maybe the murderer just might be watching me. It felt a little too creepy.”

  * * *

  As they searched the big deep drawers, Annie told them her theory, “I’ve thought a lot about this. Last night, I couldn’t sleep, and I just kept thinking and thinking about what happened. We know that someone hid that woman’s body in this tenth drawer. And, it must have been done just yesterday afternoon. You can’t keep a dead body long before it’ll start to smell. I’ve got a pretty good nose, and I didn’t notice any odor coming from her. So, he, or maybe it was a she, must have seen me open the drawer. I can’t prove it, but I don’t think any of the Bingo players did it. It makes a lot more sense to believe that the woman was murdered by one of the Bingo volunteers.”

  “Ya think a BradLee person killed her!” DeeDee shook her pretty head in disbelief. “It’s hard ta believe anyone livin’ in our park would do sech a thing!”

  “It’s hard for me to imagine, too. Maybe it was an accident; maybe it wasn’t,” Annie answered her, “but someone killed her. She certainly wasn’t taking a nap in that drawer!” She continued, “Let’s see, Karl was calling off the Bingo numbers when I first opened the drawer. Jiggs was nearby, and I don’t remember how many other Bingo workers could have seen me. There were three or four sitting at card tables on the stage doing their thing. Nobody could be sure whether or not I’d seen the body because I didn’t scream or panic. However, he or she or whoever couldn’t take a chance; so when the electricity went out, he or she, pulled the body out of that end drawer and re-hid it.”

  “That’s possible,” Art said. “But where’d he put it?”

  “He didn’t know how long the lights would be out, and the room was full of people,” Doc added. “Where could you stash a body in the dark?”

  “That’s the Sixty-four Thousand Dollar Question! I don’t know,” she sighed. “If I did, I’d tell you; I’d be happy to tell you!”

  DeeDee asked a perplexing question, “What about that tissue Art found? Tha one with tha lipstick blotted on it? Maybe it dropped outta her pocket when she was bein’ carried outta this buildin’!”

  “That’s a good possibility,” Doc agreed quickly.

  “Well, someone moved that body, that’s for sure, and it had to be done during the blackout,” Annie said decisively.

  “The lights weren’t out for very long,” Art reasoned, “So, they couldn’t have moved the body very far. I don’t think he’d want to try moving the body out the front doors—not with all those people around. Besides, if he tried, he’d probably bump into somebody in the dark,” Art concluded.

  “Remember, tha tissue was over there near those two doors,” DeeDee pointed toward the west side of the room. .

  “He, and I’m assuming it was a man since he had to carry a body around,” Doc analyzed. “Let’s say he carried the body outside. Because Art found that tissue, we’re pretty sure he went either through the kitchen or out the next door to the little hallway that leads to the toilets and on to the door that opens out to the courtyard. I think we can eliminate all the other doors in Old Main. And, since DeeDee saw a big man lift something heavy up from behind one of the air-conditioner funnels, I don’t think the body was brought into the kitchen. It would make more sense if they used the next door, went past the bathrooms and out into the courtyard.”

  “DeeDee chimed in, “An’ that’s when he hid it behind tha A/C funnel.”

  “That’s a good point,” Art said. “You’d have thought that they would have gone out the east door since it’s closest to the drawer, but that tissue was on the other side of the room. You’ve got a good theory there, DeeDee. Maybe the A/C funnel was the hiding place of choice.”

  “Oh, you do believe me now, don’t you?” Annie pleaded with her husband. She desperately needed to know that he believed her, and if he did, then she knew he’d support her to his last breath.

  “I guess so,” Art nodded his head, and he put his arm around her shoulders and hugged her to him. “Sorry I didn’t at f
irst, but you’ve got to admit, it was a little far-fetched!” Annie felt his strength flow through her.

  DeeDee was still thinking about the tissue, “I’d like ta think we’re on tha right track, but there’s a problem we haven’t dealt with yet.”

  “What’s that?” her husband asked.

  “Well, we’ve been talkin’ about carryin’ tha body out durin’ the blackout, but I don’t think that’s tha way it happened.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t think that tha tissue was dropped until after all tha people were outta tha hall, includin’ the clean-up bunch. Otherwise it would’ve been swept up.”

  “You’re right, DeeDee!” Annie exclaimed, “You’re a real-life Miss Marple.”

  Doc, proud of his wife, said, “She sure is right about that! But, if the body wasn’t taken outside until later, then where was it during the second half of Bingo?”

  “Do you suppose the body was moved twice?” Art asked,

  Now it was Annie’s turn to look at her husband with pride, “Art, I think you’re right. That must be what happened. That murderer sure was busy! That’s what makes it all so very confusing. It’s a hard trail, trying to follow a moving corpse. And without a body, we can’t get any help from the law. They’re the ones who should be solving this mystery, not us senior citizens.” She rubbed her temple, “Can you imagine! He moved the body twice!

  While she was talking, Doc pulled out an empty drawer/trolley and examined it. “Look at this, will you?” he said with excitement in his voice. “See how it’s made? The bottom and ends aren’t solid—just rails three or four inches in from the sides and ends to hold the folded tables. When it’s empty like this—no tables in it, you could easily stuff a body through the end rails, there’s plenty of room, and when you put the drawer back, the body would be pushed further under the stage. That’d make a good hiding place.”