Mother's Day, Muffins, and Murder

by Sara Rosett

  Mrs. Kirk unclipped the walkie-talkie from her waist as she scanned the parking lot. Her gaze fixed on a yellow school bus that had turned into the street at the far end. Normally, the bus would wait on the street behind the cars as they filtered through the car circle pickup line, then continue on to the bus circle, which was positioned past the car circle. “Bus six, do you have any students on board?” Mrs. Kirk asked.

  Static cracked; then a faraway-sounding voice said, “No.”

  “I need you to turn into the exit lane of the car circle and park there.”

  “Did you say the exit of the car circle?”

  The space where Marie was trying to turn was narrow and she had to inch forward, then put the car in reverse again and move back a few more inches before she could make the turn.

  Mrs. Kirk put the walkie-talkie to her mouth. “Yes. I did. Come in the car circle exit and park.”

  The faint voice came out of the speaker again as the bus lumbered closer to the school. “I can’t to that. Mrs. Kirk would kill me.”

  Marie had finally gotten the car turned around. The horns and shouting continued. Some of the parents had half emerged from their cars to yell, adding to the confusion. “This is Mrs. Kirk,” she said into the walkie-talkie above the din. “Now go around that line of cars that are stopped and come in the exit. Do it quickly.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  The bus swung around the cars, taking the lane the wrong way as Marie had. The bus turned its nose into the exit just as Marie accelerated. The front of her car crashed into the front bumper of the bus. Her hood crumbled and the air bags deployed just as Detective Waraday appeared on foot, running along the chain-link fence, his gun drawn but held pointed toward the sky.

  He dodged around the bus and, as he circled the car to the driver’s side, lowered the gun so that it was aimed at Marie. He reached out and cautiously opened the door, peered inside, then holstered his gun. Marie’s body sagged forward over the air bag. I moved quickly around the two minivans that were still trapped in the double lanes. “Is she . . . ?” I called as I neared him.

  Over the melee of angry shouts, car horns, and the kids’ excited chatter, he said, “No, but she is out cold. I’ll call for an ambulance.... I don’t know how it will get here, but I’ll call for one.”

  * * *

  It took over an hour to sort out the mess that was the car circle. Eventually, the students and parents were matched up and the car circle line cleared. The bus driver was unharmed, and the bus itself only had one long scratch on its bumper. Marie came around in the ambulance, and Detective Waraday questioned her there, but she refused to say anything. He called for a deputy, who accompanied Marie to the hospital. She wasn’t severely injured. Detective Waraday said she would probably be treated and released from the hospital, and then the deputy would take her into custody.

  Detective Waraday tapped the ledger and papers that now sat on Mrs. Kirk’s desk. “This will be all we need to hold her until we can charge her with the murders of Mrs. Burris and Ms. Watson.” As soon as things had settled down in the parking lot, and a search of Marie’s car hadn’t turned up the envelope with all the evidence that Klea gathered, I’d told Detective Waraday that it must still be in Klea’s house. Detective Waraday dispatched a deputy, who returned with the envelope, saying that it had been on the floor of the living room. In her pursuit of me, Marie had run out without it.

  Detective Waraday, Mrs. Kirk, and I were all in Mrs. Kirk’s office with the door closed. Abby had taken the kids home with her and told me she wanted a full rundown later. Detective Waraday had asked me to go through what had happened this afternoon. I was glad Mrs. Kirk was sitting down as I recounted what Marie had said.

  Mrs. Kirk shook her head. “Marie? I’m so—stunned. I don’t even know what to say. I would never have thought she would do anything like steal money from the school. And the thought of what she did to Klea and Peg . . .” Mrs. Kirk’s voice faded as she gazed at the papers spread across her desk. “I trusted her. She’d been here longer than me. I never once thought she was anything but honest.”

  “That’s what she counted on,” Detective Waraday said. “These all-cash fundraising things are the easiest way to skim money.”

  “Well, we’re going to have some very strict rules around her from now on . . . if I get to keep my job, that is.”

  “In most cases of this sort,” Detective Waraday said, motioning to the ledger, “the organization doesn’t press charges. I know the DA will be much more concerned with the murder cases.”

  Mrs. Kirk nodded, but didn’t seem to be too reassured. She looked like she was still stunned at the news, and I felt a little guilty that the thought she could be involved in the murder had even crossed my mind. Since Mrs. Kirk was still processing the details of what had happened, I turned toward Detective Waraday. “Klea’s list . . . she must have suspected . . .”

  “That either the blackmailer or the person skimming money worked in the office,” Detective Waraday said, finishing my sentence. “She seemed to be a collector of secrets.”

  I agreed, knowing he was referring to Mrs. Harris’s pen name.

  “Do you think she knew about Ms. McCormick’s past?” I asked, avoiding mentioning Mrs. Harris.

  “I haven’t seen anything that proves she did. We do know that she liked to know things so it’s possible she found out.”

  “But her list,” I said. “Those names, every one of those people had a secret, except Mrs. Kirk.”

  Startled, Mrs. Kirk rejoined the conversation. “Sorry, I was a bit distracted. Did you say Klea had my name on a list?”

  Detective Waraday said in a soothing tone, “No need to get upset. Whether or not Mrs. Burris knew about the other . . . illegal things going on in the school, we know she was aware of the skimming.” He tapped the envelope. “These pages prove that she was collecting evidence. She probably made that list when she first discovered the skimming and listed the people she thought could be involved. . . for one reason or another.”

  He didn’t say it, but I thought that Mrs. Harris had probably been at the top of the list because Klea had known she’d hidden her pen name. Klea had probably wondered if Mrs. Harris was hiding other activities as well.

  “She must have narrowed it down to the office staff as the most likely culprits,” Detective Waraday continued. “That’s why the list included people who worked here, like you, Mrs. Kirk.”

  “I promise you, I had no knowledge of what she was doing,” Mrs. Kirk said.

  “I understand that, and a preliminary look through Marie Ormsby’s check register—she was old school and still wrote down everything in her checkbook—matches up with amounts in the ledger. She was an excellent record keeper, I’ll give her that. No, she kept everything for herself. I don’t see any indication that she gave anyone else a cut.”

  “Well, thank goodness for that,” Mrs. Kirk said faintly.

  “Speaking of Ms. McCormick,” Detective Waraday said, “you’ll be happy to know she came into the sheriff’s office of her own accord this morning. Apparently, her boyfriend convinced her to come in, with a lawyer, of course.”

  “What will happen to her?” I asked.

  “That’s another matter for the school board. If she had bribed someone to falsify records, it could be a criminal matter, but there’s no evidence of that. She’s claiming the misspelling of her name on the original application was a mistake and that she never noticed it. She thought that somehow her record hadn’t come up in the background search. She decided to keep her head down, do her job well, and hope it never came up again. I’m afraid this will be another of those cases where the district would rather the whole mess go away and it will fade away,” he said, his tone regretful.

  “Well, I know one thing—she will not teach again after this. I’ve already had several calls from the media, asking for a comment. The story is out and has been reported. Someone must have spoken to the media about it. She won’t be able t
o pull the same trick again in another state.”

  “I don’t think she has any interest in that,” Detective Waraday said.

  “She’s going to release the computer game?” I asked.

  “I believe so. Her lawyer was insistent that they get the flowchart schematics back or, at the very least, copies of them, because they had no direct bearing on the case. I expect to see Adventure-matics for sale in a few months.”

  “It’s a shame because she was a good teacher. Livvy did really well with her in math,” I said.

  “I think she’s much more suited to working outside the classroom,” Mrs. Kirk said with finality.

  Detective Waraday said to Mrs. Kirk, “Moving back to the other incidents here at the school over the last few weeks, the broken pipe and vandalism. It appears they were related.”

  Mrs. Kirk closed her eyes briefly. “You’re saying that Marie was responsible for those things, too? I see what you’re thinking, that Marie did those things to make sure no one could discover what she did after she retired. It does explain why we’ve had such a run . . . of . . . bad luck. Marie moved all her old files into the records room right before the leak, and she handled the destruction of the damaged files,” Mrs. Kirk said, her voice getting tighter and tighter. “And I didn’t have a second thought about it when she said she would take care of the removal of the damaged files—that gave her a free hand to destroy whatever she wanted.”

  Detective Waraday said, “And the damage to the office could have been to cover the real reason for the attack, the destruction of her hard drive. I had my suspicions that something was off with the vandalism once I saw the destruction.”

  Mrs. Kirk said, “What do you mean?”

  “Well, in the first place, your janitor described cleaning up some glass from the concrete porch. It could have been tracked there if someone walked through the glass, but it did make me wonder if someone had entered the school with a key, then broken the glass out from the inside to make it appear as if there had been a break-in. She must not have realized that breaking the glass from the inside would give away that it was an inside job.”

  Mrs. Kirk sighed. “Marie occasionally had access to my keys to the main doors. I keep them with me, but there have been times when I was out of town on vacation when I gave them to her as my backup.”

  “And then the damage inside the office was uneven.... Special attention had been given to the computers. They were pulverized, in particular the hard drives,” Detective Waraday added.

  “But you didn’t say anything at all,” Mrs. Kirk said.

  “I couldn’t,” Detective Waraday said, then looked at me. “Just like I couldn’t say anything to you to confirm your suspicion that Ms. Watson’s death wasn’t a suicide.”

  “So you didn’t think she’d killed herself?”

  Detective Waraday said, “No, but I couldn’t reveal that to you. The less you knew, the better. Several things brought up questions, including the ones you mentioned, the typed suicide note, and the appointment. But there were also other strange things. The autopsy showed Ms. Watson had ingested chicken soup, but we couldn’t find a trace of any can or container of chicken soup. If she was as sick as everyone reported her to have been, I couldn’t picture her going home and making chicken soup from scratch. If she’d picked up some at a store or restaurant, there should have been something in the trash, but there was nothing.”

  “Marie must have taken the container away in case it had residue of the drugs in it,” I said.

  “I was interviewing the employees at the sub shop a few blocks over when I got your initial text, Mrs. Avery,” Detective Waraday said. “They serve soup there and the owner recognized a photo of Marie as a customer who came in and purchased a bowl of soup to go on Thursday afternoon.”

  “If you were so close, why did it take you so long to get here?” I asked, thinking of the long minutes inside Klea’s house.

  Detective Waraday shook his head. “I came in from the south. I wasn’t thinking about the time of day and got caught in the traffic around the school.”

  “Oh, I see,” I said. “No wonder.” The traffic, especially the road that Detective Waraday had arrived on, was awful in the afternoon. Parents began lining up in the car circle line twenty to thirty minutes before school let out, causing terrible gridlock.

  “It took me fifteen minutes just to get to a place were I could park and come in on foot. I had no idea that Marie was there, or I would have sent a deputy.”

  A tap sounded on the door, and we all looked up to see Gabrielle poking her head through a crack in the door. “Oh, am I interrupting?”

  Detective Waraday gathered the papers from Mrs. Kirk’s desk. “No, I think we’re done for now. I’ll contact you both for formal statements later.”

  He shook hands with Mrs. Kirk, then turned to me. “Stay safe, Mrs. Avery,” he said. I looked at him closely to see if it was a dig, but he seemed to be completely sincere.

  He left, and Gabrielle came in the office, then dropped into the chair he’d been in. “Such excitement. I heard all about it. Sweet little Marie! Hard to believe,” she said as she put a folder on the desk. “So glad that’s all cleared up, and so glad I caught you both. I have a proposal.”

  I blinked, marveling that this was the woman who had been so freaked out about being associated with a possible murder that she’d dragged me into investigating Klea’s death. Her ability to switch tacks was truly amazing. I wasn’t in the mood to hear any proposal. I just wanted to get home, hug my kids, and see Mitch. He was due to arrive back from his trip later tonight.

  Mrs. Kirk said, “I don’t think this is the time—”

  “But it is,” Gabrielle said. “It’s perfect, really. You know I’ve finished the last of my organizing projects, except for the digital organization class for the teachers proposed for next year.” She tapped the folder. “But an opportunity has come up that I just can’t say no to. Fitzgerald has asked me to take on a complete overhaul of their systems.” She grinned as she looked from me to Mrs. Kirk. Clearly, she expected congratulations.

  “That’s great,” I said.

  “Thanks.” She wrinkled her nose. “I’m so excited, but the downside is that I can’t do any more work for the district. I simply won’t have the time. But Ellie will. She can take over the digital organization class. Mrs. Kirk, I’m sure if you recommend her, the district will approve. And, Ellie, you’re here at the school all the time anyway. You might as well get paid for it.”

  “I’m not sure I’ll have any pull left at the district after today,” Mrs. Kirk said, dampeningly.

  Gabrielle flapped her hand at her. “Don’t be so pessimistic,” she said, then leaned forward and whispered, “Just between you and me, out of all the schools I’ve worked in here in the district, you are the best principal, hands down. I’ll be happy to put in a good word for you, and I’m sure your students and teachers will as well.”

  “It’s true,” I said, for once agreeing wholeheartedly with Gabrielle. “I’d be happy to let the district know that I wouldn’t want anyone else as principal, and I’m sure the teachers and parents feel the same.”

  “That is very nice of you both,” Mrs. Kirk said. “I’m touched. It makes this day not quite so bad.”

  “Bad?” Gabrielle said, rearing back in her chair. “What are you talking about? Ellie rooted out a murderer from the school and you,” she said, speaking to Mrs. Kirk, “were instrumental in capturing her. I heard about your quick thinking, having the bus block Marie in the parking lot. You’ve got to frame these things the right way. You’re a hero, not a victim.”

  “You know, I think you’re wasted in organizing,” I said to Gabrielle. “I think you should be in public relations.”

  “Oh, no. I have plenty to do with Fitzgerald, which brings us back to the district’s contract with me,” she said, eyeing first Mrs. Kirk and then me.

  Mrs. Kirk said, “If the district is interested in my opinion, I’d certainly
be in favor of working with you, Ellie.”

  “You’re giving me the contract you have with the school district?” I asked Gabrielle in what I was sure was an unbelieving tone.

  “Yes. Don’t you think it’s a perfect solution?”

  * * *

  “And you think she won’t demand you give it back to her later?” Mitch asked the next morning as we stood in the hallway, waiting for Nathan to find his shoes so we could go to lunch for my delayed Mother’s Day celebration. Mitch had arrived last night after the kids were asleep. I’d been glad about his late arrival because it had given us time alone, and I’d been able to tell him everything that had happened. Once we’d rehashed everything, he’d said, “So, next year, private school?”

  Livvy appeared in the hallway. “Where are we going to lunch?”

  Mitch looked at me with eyebrows raised. “It’s your day.”

  “Portofino’s,” I said, naming North Dawkins’s fanciest Italian restaurant.

  “I better get another book,” Livvy said and turned away. Portofino’s had more leisurely service than the restaurants that we usually frequented. As she went to her room, I said, “Getting back to Gabrielle, I wouldn’t put anything past her, but I have a feeling Fitzgerald will keep her too busy to worry about one contract with the North Dawkins School District. Imagine the contacts she’ll make! I bet her business will be one hundred percent corporate by this time next year.”

  “So you don’t mind that?”

  “Are you kidding? I don’t like the corporate stuff. I’ll stick with the school and helping individuals. That’s my line.”

  Nathan came around the corner holding a rather crushed gift bag with a picture of Spider-Man on the outside. I recognized it as one of the extra bags I’d saved after his last birthday celebration. He held out the bag. “Happy Mother’s Day.”

  Livvy, who had just returned with books, said, “Oh, I have something for you, too,” and darted away.

  Mitch sighed. “Glad we don’t have reservations.”

  I shushed him, and Livvy was back in seconds with another package wrapped in newspaper and decorated with hand-drawn flowers.