Canyons, Caravans, & Cadavers

by Tonya Kappes

  There were a lot of uhhuhs, mmms, umkays, while she listened to the guest that I’m sure had already heard about the murder of Scott Goodman and was canceling their reservation. News travels fast on social media and most of our guests were younger and quite media savvy during hiking season. We also got a lot of older RV lovers who traveled the states in their retirement years who weren’t as familiar with social media.

  Violet took a step closer to Dottie, writing something on her notepad.

  “I assure you the campground is safe and you’ll. . .” Dottie pulled the phone from her ear. She pushed a button and shoved the phone in her back pocket just as the phone rang again.

  When she answered, she didn’t try too hard to convince whoever was on the other side of the line to keep their reservation. She simply said, “We didn’t want you at our campground anyways.” She looked at Violet. “What are you lookin’ at?”

  “You.” Violet dropped the notepad. “And the good scoop that our key to the city recipient has just lost some business because of the murder that’s taken place.”

  The phone rang again. Dottie pushed the off button to silence the calls coming in, but it didn’t help. It was call after call of campers cancelling their reservations. We had to quickly get the word out that Happy Trails was safe.

  Wasn’t it?

  THREE

  Violet drew the notepad up and wrote, “In an ironic turn of events, Mae West, recipient of the Key to the City for her economic contribution, finds herself in an economic spiral as Coach Scott Goodman was found dead in one of the rented campers at her Happy Trails Campground.”

  “Fake news!” Queenie adjusted the fanny pack around her waist. “You don’t know what all those calls are about.”

  The door of the camper opened. Colonel held one end of the church cart with Scott’s body on it, hidden by a sheet. He walked backwards down the one step from the camper. Natalie held the other end and carefully stepped down the one step.

  They both gave a little jerk, knocking the steel arms of the gurney down and clicking into into locked position with wheels down.

  “If you report anything that’s not true, you’ll be getting a call from my lawyer.” It was time I stepped in and said something to Violet.

  “Fine. I’ve got bigger fish to fry.” Violet twirled around on the balls of her feet, her hair swinging around as she sashayed over to Colonel Holz and Natalie.

  “That girl’s got some nerve.” Dottie snarled, a cigarette bouncing with each word. “It’s clear what we have to do.”

  “What’s that?” I wondered what Dottie had up her sleeve because I was all ears.

  “We’ve got to find Scott’s killer and fast.” Dottie snapped the top of her old cigarette case.

  “It shouldn’t take too long.” I lifted my head towards Ken Patterson. “I think he killed Scott.”

  “Why would you say that?” Abby Fawn, the Normal Library’s head librarian, jerked her head to look at me. Her brown ponytail swung around and hit her in the eye. She lifted her hand and wiped the sting away. “He and the coach are tight.”

  “Umm, I don’t think so,” I corrected her. “I heard him threaten Scott with my own ears. He told Scott that he hadn’t heard the last of him.”

  “Hey.” Betts Hager shoved her way in between us. “What did I miss?”

  “Ken hasn’t heard the last of Scott. But Scott is dead.” Abby said, getting it all wrong.

  “No.” I shook my head. “Ken told Scott that.”

  “Told Scott what?” Hank had come up without me even noticing.

  “Nothing.” I didn’t want to correct anyone right now because everyone was confused and now they all turned their attention to the hearse as Colonel and Natalie put the front end of the church cart up to the bumper.

  When Colonel gave it a good push from the other end, the legs of the gurney unlocked and folded underneath.

  “It looks like we have a murder on our hands.” Betts vigorously rubbed her hands together. “I’ll hurry over to the Laundry Club and get on a pot of coffee.”

  “I’ll grab the notebook and meet y’all there,” I said with excitement.

  “I’ll drive.” Dottie put her finger in the air.

  “What is going on?” Hank stood there in the same plaid shorts and gray shirt he had on from the party with a confused look on his face.

  “I’m going with my friends.” I pointed towards them as they were walking away. “You did say you’d stop by later after the scene was cleaned up. Right?”

  “Yes, but I clearly heard Betts say we have another murder on our hands.” Hank didn’t miss a thing. He had ears like an elephant. “What exactly did that mean?”

  “It meant nothing.” I played it off knowing what was going to come next.

  “Mae, I’ve told you a million times not to get involved or stick your nose into things,” he warned, looking down his nose at me.

  “Do you really expect me to sit around here and not stick my nose into a murder that’s happened to one of my campers? Clearly, I have an invested interest. Not only for the safety of the other campers.” I looked over his shoulder at all the campers drinking over at Bobby’s.

  “They look like they’re in danger,” Hanks noted sarcastically. “I’m telling you and you need tell your friends to stay out of this.”

  “Umkay.” I ho-hummed and rocked back on my heels. “I’ll see you later. Come on Fifi,” I called for her.

  “I’m not kidding.” Hank called after me when I started to walk away. “I’m not kidding!” He yelled for good measure.

  “You aren’t going to listen to him, are you?” Dottie asked. She sat in the front passenger seat of my car.

  I had to drive since she didn’t have a lot of gas and she claimed she needed to conserve her money if the campground was going to go under, putting more panic than fear in my gut.

  “Dottie, I’m in an odd position.” I gripped the wheel of the old car that I’d purchased from Grassel’s Garage when I moved to Normal because I couldn’t drive the camper everywhere. “I obviously have to save the campground from any bad publicity, but my boyfriend happens to be the lead investigator.”

  “I’d tell you to throw some southern charm at him, but that’s something you didn’t learn from all the schooling Mary Elizabeth put you through.” Dottie was being mean, and I knew it was because she was stressed. “Until he puts a ring on that finger of yours, you better worry about what’s keeping you livin’. The campground.” She huffed, crossing her arms in front of her.

  The silence between us on the short ride into downtown Normal was deafening. Dottie was rarely a loss for words, and the worry lines around her eyes that merged with her smoking lines had deepened.

  “Okay.” I had to break the silence before we went into the laundromat. I pulled into a parking space right in the front of the building. “You’re right. I do have to live and Hank doesn’t pay my bills, but what if we come up with a compromise?”

  “What are you yammering about?” Dottie drew back.

  “What if we just look around and give Hank the clues we find out.” It sounded like a good plan. “That way, I won’t directly be upsetting him. If we all find out something, we can tell him. You and I both know that gossip spreads around here quicker than a controlled burn and that we’ll hear something before he does.” I picked up my phone from the cup holder. “Did you see how fast word got around that there was a murder in Normal at the campground?”

  “You might be onto something.” Dottie was thinking on what I’d suggested. There was a far off look in her eyes. “Maybe we should reach out on social media like they FBI does. Like a tip line.”

  “That’s not a bad idea!” I smacked my hands together. “Abby can help us with that since she runs the Happy Trails Facebook page.”

  Both of us got out of the car happy, having found a solution to our problem.

  The Laundry Club was the name of the laundromat located in downtown Normal. Betts Hager, my friend, own
ed it. She also had a side hustle of cleaning houses. That side job had started to kick up to full time since she was down an entire income now that she was getting a divorce from Lester, the ex-preacher of the Normal Baptist Church.

  The Laundry Club was the first shop I’d stopped at when I drove into town. I was looking for a place to clean my laundry since the facility at the campground didn’t work, one of the many things that wasn’t working when I took over.

  It was a day that changed my life. I remember walking in and seeing Queenie sitting at a table with one of those electric glass balls that shoots lightning to the tips of your finger at the touch. She was pretending to be some sort of psychic to freak me out even though she’d just bought the darn thing from the Tough Nickel Thrift Shop across the street.

  Anyways, it was different from any other laundromat that I’d ever seen. There was a sitting area with a TV, a jigsaw puzzle area, a reading nook complete with comfy chairs and a book library, and a coffee bar, which was where I found my friends.

  “It’s not snooping. We are just talking about it.” Betts had lined up all of our coffee mugs and went down the line with the freshly brewed coffee, filling them to the rim.

  “Yeah. We’re gossiping.” Abby said it as though it made it sound any better.

  “Just a few gals, talking about yet another murder.” Queenie lifted her cup in the air with a nod of her head before she took a sip.

  “I’m not. It’s a murder and it happened at the campground where I work.” Dottie didn’t hold any punches. She sat cross legged on the floor with her plastic bag of pink hair curlers, a nightly ritual. “I swear, whenever there’s a murder in this town, our guests cancel and then it takes up a couple weeks to pick back up. I have to make a living. Besides, Mae and I have come up with a solution.”

  I sat down on the couch and noticed everyone was looking at me.

  “Y’all know this puts me in a weird position with Hank.” They all agreed. “I think we should go about it by keeping our eyes and ears open and collecting clues. We can give Hank the clues we get to help him with the investigation. We’ll be like his personal tip line.”

  “And we would like Abby to put something on our social media accounts that encourages people who might’ve seen something or know something about the case to call us.” Dottie took a strand of her red hair, tightly wrapping it around the pink sponge before clipping it into place. She’d sleep in these and have a head full of curls.

  “I can do that!” Abby blurted out.

  “As much as I don’t like keeping things from Hank, I’m not trying to solve the case, I’m just going to offer a few suggestions about who it could be.” I reiterated what I’d said, probably to make me feel better about our plan. I took a notebook and pen out of my bag. “He’s going to come over and ask me all sorts of questions. I might’s well write them down.”

  “Sounds perfectly normal to me.” Betts sat on the couch next to Abby. She tucked a piece of her brown wavy hair around behind her ear and brushed her bangs out of her eyes. “Start from the beginning where Scott threatened whoever you said.”

  “I didn’t say that.” I stood up, giving Betts the notebook so she could write notes while I paced back and forth. It helped me think better.

  “Just start from the beginning, when Scott moved in.” Abby curled her leg up under her. She leaned on the arm of the couch, pushing herself a little forward.

  “A couple of weeks ago he showed up at the campground. I didn’t think anything of it since I’d heard from Davey Bass that the Archery and Rifle Club was looking for a new place to practice to get ready for the state competition. He said the nature sounds helped them learn how to tune out all the noise inside of a gym when they are competing.” I gestured to Betts to write all that down.

  “Oh, okay.” Her head bobbed up and down a few times before she started writing.

  “When he asked me about a rental, I assumed it was for a family member coming into town. I told him about the Milkery Bed and Breakfast, but he said he needed something more long term.” I left out the fact that he seemed really upset and looked like he’d not slept in days. “That’s when he told me it was for him.”

  “I cleaned for him and Adrienne once.” Betts nodded and took a sip of her coffee. “I was in the bedroom cleaning their tub in their en suite when I heard him come in and slam the door. He was yelling something about the military and testing. Something about failing grades and how she was giving those kids a free pass.”

  “Is Adrienne a teacher?” I asked, taking the notebook from her. I made a few bullet points under his name and wrote military, testing, and failing grades next to three of them.

  “Yes. She’s the choir teacher. And from what I heard, she puts on really great concerts.” The voice came from the door of the Laundry Club. “He also hit her.”

  We all turned and looked over our shoulders. No one commented on what Violet said about Scott hitting his wife. Was I the only one who heard it?

  “I’m looking forward to having the school newspaper write about the upcoming concert.” Violet Rhinehammer’s heels clicked on the tile floor on her way over to us. “May I?” She pointed to the coffee pot.

  “No,” Abby jumped up. “We are closed.”

  “We?” Violet laughed. “I thought it was a twenty-four-hour laundromat?”

  “Do you have anything to launder? I don’t see anything,” Betts chimed in. “It’s not a place to loiter.”

  “Fine.” Violet peeled off the sweater over top her camisole, trotted over to one of the machines, and tossed the sweater in.

  “Stop!” I yelled over at her. “Put your clothes back on.”

  It was bad enough that she was gorgeous, but the matching body was something I didn’t really want to look at while she washed her sweater.

  “Mae,” Dottie groaned through gritted teeth. “She’s an enemy. Remember how much she made Happy Trails look bad in the news?”

  “It’s all business.” Violet tried to pat down the static electricity in her hair after she pulled the sweater over her head.

  It was the little things that made me happy and if she looked ridiculous for only a second, it was worth it.

  “Plus, I have the ability to immediately tell the world the murder had nothing to do with Happy Trails and I want a great story for the Normal Gazette that might get recognized…”

  “Yeah, we know. Your mama always bragged on you on our way to the prison.” Betts rolled her eyes.

  “Listen,” Violet pointed directly to me and then slid her finger to Betts. “You two have no right to throw stones.”

  My eyes narrowed as I stared at her. The nerve of her bringing up our misfortune.

  “You certainly aren’t any better than I am. We are all just trying to make it around here.” She put her hands on her hips. “I think we can all agree that we all want to see Normal thrive. You give me what I want, I give you what you want.”

  “We can offer you coffee.” I pointed to the coffee station. “Along with insider information on the murder since I date Hank. As well as what I heard and saw at the campground today.”

  “Yeah, Mae knows Ken did it.” Queenie had no idea what she’d just said.

  “Ken Patterson did it?” An evil grin curled along Violet’s face.

  “No.” With my mouth gaped open, I gave Queenie a good hard look.

  “Sorry,” Queenie’s brows pinched with worry. “I was just saying she doesn’t have anything we need.”

  “Ken isn’t a suspect, just to be clear.” There was no way I wanted her to think Hank told me that. I’d not even told Hank. “I just know there was some tension between the two of them.”

  Why couldn’t I just shut up?

  “Listen, I have access to databases, and I know a lot of people on the inside. Like I said, I can help you as much as you can help me.” She looked me square in the eyes. “I won’t report anything about Ken or the tension between him and Scott as long as you promise me that you’ll think on w
orking with me.”

  She must have taken my silence as confirmation.

  “Great.” She waved her fingers in the air. “I’ll see you tomorrow. Meet me at Cute-icles at 9 a.m. I’ve got to get my nails done.”

  “That girl has no shame.” Dottie gave Violet an eyeful as she left. “You ain’t gonna tell her nothin’, Mae. Right?”

  “I don’t know. Do you think she’s got some information that’ll help solve Scott’s murder?” I looked over at Abby. She was always the voice of reason because she understood people and how gossip worked around Normal and wasn’t in the middle of the gossip like Dottie and Queenie.

  “It’s true that the press has a lot of contacts. As far as databases go, I’m not sure what she’s talking about.” Abby didn’t shed any light on the matter.

  I gave Betts back the notebook.

  “Write that I need to get a list of the kids in the Archery and Rifle Club and that I need to go see Ken Patterson. He definitely had something against Scott and I need to see if anyone saw him going in and out of Scott’s place, starting with questioning the kids that were there for target practice.” I think that sounded like a good start.

  “I don’t think you can question kids,” Queenie pointed out. “At least not without their parents present. And if Ken Patterson did it, he certainly isn’t going to come right out and tell you.”

  “No, but as a teacher of a six-week long economics course, I just might have the opportunity to talk to them.” I glanced around and met all of their smiling faces with my own grin. “Also put on there to go see his wife.”

  “Sounds good.” Betts rubbed her hands together before sticking the notebook out in front of her. “The Laundry Club is on the case.”

  One by one, we all put a hand on top of each other’s until there was a big pile of hands in solidarity.

  FOUR

  “Any more cancellations?” I asked Dottie.

  She was sitting at her desk, typing on the computer, with a pen in her mouth. She briefly stopped to pat Fifi on the head and give her a treat. One of the reasons Fifi loves her so much. She went back to typing.