Mistletoe Man - China Bayles 09

by Susan Wittig Albert

  Lucy's head came up. "Donna's been arrested?" she asked, disbelieving. She was looking straight at me, her dark eyes wide. "Donna?"

  "Lucy," Docia called sharply. "Them eggs is sittin' out here gittin' cold. Come and git 'em."

  With a visible start, Lucy turned, took the plate of scrambled eggs and a small bowl of grits and gravy, and put them in front of me. Her head was down again. I couldn't see her eyes. "I can't believe they've arrested Donna," she muttered. "She's really nice. Such a hard worker out there on that farm, and taking care of her aunt and all. She's the last person in the world you'd think would—" She stopped.

  I leaned forward. "Do you know whether anybody threatened Swenson? Did he get any phone calls or letters? What about his business associates? Did he mention any problems with them?"

  She stood for a moment, thinking. Her glance went to the left and the right, as if she were making sure we weren't overheard. There were red blotches in her sallow cheeks.

  She leaned forward and licked her lips. "Not exactly," she said, "but—""

  Docia banged a plate on the counter of the pass-through. "Lucy!" she barked. "Y'er slow as cold drippin's this mor-nin'. That second coffee urn needs fillin' an' you got customers waitin' for their tickets."

  "Yeah, Mama," Lucy said over her shoulder. "I'll take care of it." But she didn't make a move toward the coffee urn. For the space of ten seconds or so, she stood in front of me, her lips pursed, as if she were thinking what to say.

  Docia raised her voice. "Well, then, hop to it, girl! And stop that moonin' over Carl. Talkin' about him ain't gonna bring him back from the dead, you know. Not that you'd want to. You oughta start thinkin' 'bout your future. Orville Pennyman came in for supper last night, after you went home. Said he'd sure like to take you to a movie Friday night."

  Lucy made a sarcastic face. "Yeah, right, Mama." But she turned away.

  I picked up my fork. Lucy needed to get out from under the twin thumbs of her mother and grandmother, who seemed to dictate everything she thought or said. Anyway, it was clear that I wasn't going to get any information out of her here, where her mother could interrupt us every two minutes—and maybe not at all. But I gave it one last shot.

  "I'll be at Thyme and Seasons all day and at home this evening," I said with a smile. "If you'd like to talk, just give me a call."

  I've got to hand it to Mrs. Kendall—she wasn't just a great cook, she was a terrific organizer as well. I arrived at the tearoom well before eight and went into the kitchen with a cold feeling in the pit of my stomach, wondering what I was going to find when I opened the cupboard doors. But the menus were posted on the wall, every pot and pan was in its place, and the pantry and freezer were full of everything we would need to feed our customers. There was even a loose-leaf binder on the counter, filled with recipes inserted neatly into plastic sleeves. I went through it, locating all the recipes I would need for the day and thinking sadly that no matter how hard we looked, we'd never be able to find anybody as good as Mrs. Kendall.

  I was setting out the ingredients for vegetable quiche when Laurel blew in through the back door, pulling off her knit cap and mittens and blowing on her fingers to warm them. She looked surprised when she saw me.

  "What're you doing in the kitchen?" She pulled off her coat and hung it in the back entry. "Where's Mrs. K?"

  "The tearoom register was short two hundred dollars yesterday," I said. I took down a canister of flour and a bottle of canola oil. I don't think oil pastry is as tender as pastry made with shortening, but it's a lot easier to stir together and roll out, especially when you're in a hurry. "When Ruby and I went to Mrs. K's apartment to confront her about the missing money, we found out that she'd already given notice to her landlord." I reached for a large bowl. "It looks like she won't be with us any longer. Ruby and I will be taking turns in the kitchen until we find a replacement."

  Laurel looked stunned. "But Mrs. K didn't take that money," she cried. "7 did! And what's more, I left you a note telling you what I'd done."

  I whirled around, horrified. "You!"

  "I'm not believing this," Laurel moaned, dropping her face into her hands. "Oh, poor Mrs. K! She must have been terribly hurt when you accused her. Didn't she tell you that she's innocent?"

  "She didn't tell us anything because she wasn't there." I put my hands on my hips and regarded her incredulously. "You're saying that you stole that money? And what's this about a note? Ruby and I didn't find any note."

  "I didn't steal the money," Laurel said, her brown eyes snapping. "That's not the way it was. If you'd just give me a chance to explain—"

  "Then explain already," I said. "Let's get to the bottom of this."

  Laurel flipped her heavy brown braid back over her shoulder. "The Thyme and Seasons register was short of change yesterday, and I was too busy to run to the bank. So I took two hundred dollars in tens, fives, and ones out of the tearoom register. When I closed last night, you and Ruby were closeted in here, having some sort of serious discussion. It was late and I didn't want to bother you, so I just put the extra money into an envelope and left it with a note in the cash drawer. I figured you'd find the extra two hundred when you cleared the register last night."

  "I didn't clear that register," I muttered, feeling awkward and foolish. "I had to talk to Terry about getting a lawyer for her sister, and then Ruby and I drove over to talk to Mrs. K. I left the register for this morning, and then it turned out that I had to cook today and—"

  I stopped. Laurel's revelation changed everything. Since Mrs. Kendall hadn't taken the money, she'd be coming in to cook today as usual, and I'd be off the hook. On the other hand, we knew for a fact that she'd given her notice at the apartment, which indicated that she was planning to leave. But maybe she'd just found a different apartment. Maybe—

  Laurel was staring at me. "A lawyer for Donna? Donna Fletcher? Why does she need a lawyer?"

  "She's being held at the county jail," I said. "She's confessed to running down Carl Swenson and concealing the truck." I frowned. "Did Mrs. K say anything to you about looking for another apartment?"

  "Uh-uh." Laurel shook her head distractedly. "It's news to me."

  "Or leaving town?"

  "No. You know how she is—we don't talk about personal stuff." Laurel was gnawing her lip. "Gosh, China, Donna's such a compassionate person. If she accidentally hit Swenson, I can't believe she'd drive off and leave him lying beside the road. If you'd said it was her sister, I might buy that. Terry has always seemed... well, kind of cold and deliberate. And she doesn't like Swenson. She might—"

  "Good morning, everyone!"

  Laurel and I whirled at the sound of the brisk greeting. It was Mrs. Kendall. She twirled her umbrella outside the door to shake off the drops, propped it against the wall, and took off her coat. "My goodness," she said, "it's cold out there. Do you suppose it will snow?"

  "I doubt it," I said feebly. "It almost never snows here."

  "Well, there's a first time for everything, I always say." Mrs. Kendall rolled up her sleeves. "Where Mother Nature is concerned, one never quite knows what to expect, does one? Perhaps there'll be a white Christmas." She came into the kitchen and stopped short, staring at the things I'd put out on the counter. Her eyebrows went up. She gave me a questioning look.

  "I was just... I mean, I—" I took a breath and tried again. "I came in early to try my hand at that vegetable quiche that you make so well." I managed a smile. "One shouldn't let oneself get out of practice, should one?" Hastily, I put the flour and the oil back on the shelf. "But now that you're here, I'll get out of your way and let you get to work. I can make the quiche another time."

  "Excuse me," Laurel said in a small voice, edging toward the door to the shop. "I've got a few things to do before we open."

  "Actually, I'm glad to have this chance for a private chat," Mrs. Kendall said when Laurel had gone. She reached for her apron and tied it around her waist, and I noticed that her usual cheerfulness seemed dimmed
. "I've enjoyed helping you and Ms. Wilcox find your feet, but I'm afraid I must give in my notice."

  "You're planning to leave Pecan Springs?" I made an effort to appear surprised, but I didn't have to try to sound disappointed. Now that we'd cleared up the mystery of the money, I'd give anything to have her stay.

  She took down a large soup kettle and put it on the stove. "Friday will be my last day. My elderly aunt is quite ill, you see, and I feel that I should be with her." She took several onions out of a bin.

  "But I thought—" I began. She dropped one of the onions and I bent to pick it up for her.

  "I'm afraid it will be difficult for you," she went on regretfully, "but I'm sure you understand." She poured a dollop of oil into the soup kettle and turned on the burner. "I've also given notice to my landlord, who has been very kind to me. He's a lovely man, quite helpful. I'm so sorry to be leaving Pecan Springs, but family matters have to take a high priority, don't they?" She pushed back her graying hair and I saw that her eyes were weary. Her cheerful manner was a facade.

  "Of course," I said slowly.

  She took out a knife and a chopping board and went to work on the onions, slicing and dicing expertly. "I see that you've already discovered my reference guide," she added, with a nod toward the loose-leaf binder that was lying on the counter. "I've put all the recipes into it, with detailed instructions for various quantities and a complete shopping list. I've also included some suggestions for future menus, and several recipes for the Christmas Tour. And I'll be glad to go through everything to make sure that you won't have any major difficulties." She gave me a regretful glance. "I do so hate to leave you in the lurch, just at the holiday season. But I'm afraid it can't be helped. I'm so sorry."

  "We're sorry too," I said. "You've gotten us off to a great start. We appreciate all the work you've done and—"

  The back door opened for a third time, and Ruby came in. "Whew," she said. "It's really nasty out there." She began to unwrap her wool scarf. "I don't think we need to worry about having a big lunchtime crowd today, China. They're already starting to put sand on the overpasses and—" She turned and saw Mrs. Kendall and her mouth dropped open. "Mrs. K? What are you doing here? I thought—"

  "Mrs. K has just given us her resignation," I interrupted quickly, before Ruby could say anything about the missing money. "She has a family problem and has to leave us. Friday will be her last day."

  "I see." Ruby took off her coat, her eyes narrowing suspiciously. "I'm sorry to hear that you're leaving us, Mrs. K." She turned to me. "But what about the—"

  "About the kitchen?" I held up the binder. "She's written down all her recipes, with detailed instructions, even a shopping list. If we study it, it should tide us over until we find a replacement." I gave her a significant look. "And you'll be glad to know that last night's little mystery has been solved. It turns out that we really didn't have a problem. We completely misjudged the situation."

  Ruby blinked. "Solved? Misjudged it? But how—" "Come on," I said, picking up the reference guide and pushing Ruby toward the door to the shop. "Let's leave Mrs. Kendall to her work. Laurel and I will tell you what happened."

  Ruby was right about the weather. Only a few hardy customers braved the sleety rain. After we got the awkward business with the cash register straightened out, Ruby went to her shop and Laurel and I spent the day catching up on all kinds of necessary business—restocking the shelves, calling customers about special orders, even making a batch of kissing balls out of the bag of mistletoe I'd been carrying in the trunk of my car. At lunch, we were the only diners in the tearoom, so Mrs. Kendall went home early to pack and get ready for her trip. At three o'clock, when we hadn't had any customers for an hour or so, I sent Laurel home too.

  I had just settled down at the desk in my cubby-hole office to figure up the payroll tax deposit—one of my least-favorite jobs—when the phone rang at my elbow. It was Blackie.

  "The lab report on the truck came in about ten minutes ago," he said. "It's the vehicle that struck Swenson, all right. The blood on the grille is his ABO type. The DNA test results won't be available for a while, but there's no doubt in my mind that we've found the right vehicle."

  "Damn," I said, under my breath. I sat back in my chair.

  The information wasn't really news, but it had a note of finality.

  "Yeah," Blackie said. I could hear the suppressed excitement in his voice. "But where the prints are concerned, we came up with something unexpected, China. The only ones we found on the steering wheel and the gearshift were Terry's."

  I frowned. "The only ones?"

  "Well, not quite. There were three unidentified prints on the inside of the driver' s-side door, as if somebody had put a hand through the window to pull the door open. But that was it. Terry was the last person to drive that truck."

  My frown deepened. "You didn't find any of Donna's prints? Or Aunt Velda's?"

  "Oh, you bet. All over the dash, on the plastic seat, on the passenger-side door. But not on the steering wheel or the gearshift—where you'd expect, if either of those women had been driving that vehicle recently." He paused, then said grimly: "Donna is covering for her sister, China. And I know why, thanks to McQuaid's phone call last night."

  "You found a criminal record?"

  "More than that. I've just learned that Terry served three years of a six-year term in the Women's State Prison in Sacramento, California. Then she went over the fence."

  "She escaped!" I exclaimed.

  "Yeah—she and three others. They were captured, she got away. Surprise, huh?"

  God, what a mess. I chewed on my lip.

  Blackie went on. "It's clear that Donna was willing to take the rap to keep her sister from going back to jail in California—in addition to whatever time she'd get for Swenson's death. Which could turn into a pretty stiff penalty, especially if she'd been drinking when she hit him."

  "Drinking?" I asked sharply. "What makes you say that?"

  "There's no evidence, of course. But the more I study the situation, the more it looks like drunk driving—either that, or a deliberate hit. Swenson was working along the fence, China, almost ten feet off the road. Visibility was good, and there's no underbrush in that area. No sign of braking, either. It's hard to make a case for a simple accident. Either the driver was drinking—which explains the hit-and-run—or it was intentional." He paused and added: "Meaning vehicular homicide."

  This was not what I wanted to hear. If there was a suspicion of drunk driving or an intentional hit, Dutch Doran would jump on it, especially since Terry was a prison escapee. As far as he was concerned, he couldn't lose on this one. I gave a resigned sigh. "What was Terry doing time for?"

  "Growing and selling marijuana. While she was in prison, they put her in charge of the garden." Blackie chuckled. "It makes a certain kind of sense, I suppose."

  Marijuana. Damn! That threw the affair into an entirely different context. Doran never missed a chance to showboat on a pot case. He wouldn't just jump on this, he'd fling himself into it with wild enthusiasm.

  "Terry's name hasn't turned up in connection with Swenson's pot-growing activities, has it?" I asked apprehensively.

  Blackie hesitated so long that my stomach knotted. When he finally spoke, he sounded disgusted. "What makes you think that turkey Talbot would tell me anything material? I'm not one of his inner circle. But I've formally requested that he keep me informed on the progress of his investigation and specifically that he include me in the action if he busts any locals. If I haven't gotten anything from him by this afternoon, I'll give him another call."

  I thought for a moment. "What about the prints on the truck door?"

  "What about them?" Blackie replied dismissively. "Like I say, they're unidentified. Could be anybody's." "Did you try for a match?"

  "What'dya think? On a hunch, I even had them compared to Swenson's. No dice." He paused and added hopefully, "They aren't yours, are they? You didn't pull that door open when you found
the truck in the shed?"

  "Hey, I know better than that. I looked through the window to see if the key was in the ignition, but I didn't touch the door."

  "How about Ruby?"

  "She didn't even go into the shed."

  "Oh, well. They probably belong to one of Talbot's crew. Or the guy operating the tow truck. They're all supposed to know better, but they don't always follow strict procedure."

  "Wait a minute," I said, frowning. It didn't seem to me that Blackie was taking the fingerprint evidence as seriously as he should. "Doesn't it strike you as odd that Terry's are the only prints on the steering wheel or the gearshift? Donna drove that truck regularly, and her aunt occasionally. You'd think their prints would be all over it, not just on the dash or the seat."

  "Who knows? Maybe somebody cleaned up the truck recently. Maybe Terry wiped them off."

  "That truck?" I laughed skeptically. "It's a ranch truck, for Pete's sake. It hasn't been cleaned in the past decade. And Terry wouldn't have wiped Donna's prints—if anything, she would have wiped her own, after she parked that truck in Swenson's shed."

  "Not if she was convinced that nobody would find it," Blackie said. A stubborn tone had come into his voice. The sheriff is a very nice guy, but he's still a cop. He'd come up with a solution to his crime of the week, and he was going to stick with it.

  "Look, China," he said flatly, "I'm letting you in on all this as a courtesy, because you were the one who told me that the Fletcher sisters were having trouble with Swenson, and because you located the truck. I also thought you'd want to notify Wyzinski that her client's prints aren't on the vehicle." That last sentence was spoken with some sarcasm. Blackie is not one of Justine's fans.

  I hesitated. "Have you had any communication with Terry today?"

  "Not since last night. She visited her sister here at the jail about eight o'clock—that's when we took her prints."