by Deany Ray
Celeste straightened up her scarf. “I don’t know what you mean.”
Marge had broken the unwritten rule. Celeste didn’t like it mentioned that she knew something on her ex. She didn’t like to talk about her past at all. Which was kind of irritating, because Celeste must know some stories.
“You can’t be married to a guy and not know something that he’d rather the whole town didn’t know.” Marge prodded her a little.
I knew that Marge was right. Information was a weapon if you knew how to use it. Marge had her trusty pistol, and Celeste knew things about the chief…and maybe other people. You should use everything you’ve got. That’s what my mother used to tell me when she pushed down the low-cut blouses when I was dressing for a date. Like most things my mother told me, that saying made me cringe. But I guessed she was right, when it came to guns and exes.
“And those boxes in the rental place?” Celeste leaned back against her seat. “The police have those, I’m sure. Took them in as evidence. So, girls, they’re way ahead of us. I hate it that they know things and we don’t have a clue. They know exactly what’s inside all those mystery boxes.”
Then I had an idea. I hated my idea. I almost didn’t say it. I almost didn’t say it because I was starting to (almost, just a little) kind of like my life. I had a new apartment. I wanted to enjoy it – my quiet, brand new place – before leaping once again into the path of evil. Here I am again, death. Can you catch me now?
But if I wanted to be a detective for real, I couldn’t play it safe. That’s what Alex wanted, for the three of us to stand back and let them solve the case. I looked around the table at the faces of my friends. We were three smart ladies; we could solve this thing if we jumped right into the action. We wouldn’t solve it by eating fries.
So I said it out loud. “We should go back to Baxter’s place.”
Please don’t let me die! My mother can barely stand it that I moved down the road.
Marge looked at me, askance. “Baxter’s place? Oh, hon. I don’t know if that is wise.”
“Do you have a better plan?” I asked.
I was met with silence.
“Maybe he’s got more boxes there,” I said. “I know he emptied out the room the day that we were there. But maybe all the time he’s bringing in more stuff. As part of whatever the scheme is they’ve got going on.”
“Or I wonder if he’s stopped that business altogether,” Marge said. “I’ll bet the whole thing with the van really spooked our buddy Baxter.”
“It could have been him who died that day,” Celeste folded her napkin in two.
“It could have been us.” I added. “If we’d been a little closer.”
“And if there aren’t any boxes at his place, there may be other clues.” Celeste thought about it. “As much as I hate to go there, I think that Charlie’s right.” She punched some numbers into her phone again. Again, there was no answer. Again, there was a string of words that weren’t in any dictionary.
I took one last bite of garlic roll. “But we need to figure out a safer way to get inside his place. The fire escape? No way.” I shivered at the memory of my filthy hiding place. I didn’t dare to hope he’d called a maid or had a pest control appointment. He didn’t seem the type. “Let’s make double sure that the place is empty.”
Marge nodded. “One of us will go in. And the others will be stationed at both doors. We need to come up with a signal. To say get your sweet butt out of there and you need to do it now.”
The question hadn’t come up of which one of us was going in.
A signal that would serve as a clear warning, but not tip off this Baxter dude that someone was inside? I wondered if there was an option to send a sound by text that sounded like a cockroach. Does a cockroach make a sound? Baxter would never notice that one. He probably heard it all the time.
Celeste picked up the bill. “Well, let’s pay this thing and scram. We’ve got work to do.”
“I hope this wasn’t our last meal,” I said. “I would have ordered some dessert.”
“Don’t worry. We’ll be fine, hon.” Marge gazed down at her purse. I knew exactly what that meant. The mighty persuader was coming with us, nestled among fruity gum and mints and several pairs of reading glasses. Baxter best not challenge it. Marge’s inner ninja came out when the gun was in her hand.
“Let’s just take one car,” Celeste decided as she dipped one last fry into her ketchup.
I’d driven myself to lunch, thinking we’d all go our separate ways once we’d finished eating. My plan had been to wait another day before I started work full time. My mom had made me promise I’d get some rest that afternoon.
But then I’d had my bright idea, and we were off to catch a crook.
“I’ll drive!” Marge said excitedly.
Of course. That made perfect sense. If Baxter didn’t kill us, maybe Marge’s driving would.
She glanced over toward the kitchen window, where Ralph was setting down some plates. I turned in time to see him wink, causing Marge to blush. I loved this romance!
“Oh, just ask him out.” Celeste reached behind her for her coat. “He likes you; you like him. Why not just go out on a date? You two are killing me.”
“Not just yet. Be patient.” Marge fluffed her hair and giggled. “He’s gonna have to wait. Cause I’m worth waiting for.”
She paused to study me and smile.
“Hey, Charlie,” she cooed, “I’ll bet you’ve never asked a guy out on a date. You really ought to try it. I promise it’s a kick.”
“Oh, I don’t think I could,” I said. But then, hey, why not? At the rate that I was going, that might be the only way I’d ever get a date before I was the age of my mother’s students.
“It really is the best way,” Marge said. “It puts the power in your hands.”
“I guess you’re right,” I said. That made a lot of sense. I think. “It’s just a little scary.”
Celeste let loose her honking laugh. “You’re braver than you think, girl. If you can crawl into a felon’s window, it shouldn’t be so hard to ask a guy out on a date.”
I guessed she had a point. But first I had to find a guy. So far, the ones in Springston were hardly to my taste. There was Alex, Mr. Know-It-All. And then there was the dude who tried to blow me up. Pickings so far were slim. If I’d had to go solely on physical attraction, then it would have to be Alex. Damn it. I pushed that thought away and concentrated on what was truly important right then. Solving the pinky-mystery.
Marge and I headed for the door while Celeste settled the bill.
“Hey!” Marge said. “I wonder if we’ll see your friends from the fire escape. You remember them? The dancing granny and her man. The ones with all the dance moves.” She demonstrated as we left, looking like the leader of an Egyptian conga line, causing the table beside us to burst into applause.
To be part of a profession that was centered on blending into a crowd, Marge certainly stood out. Celeste could go incognito by toning down her hair and nails, but the spirit that was Marge couldn’t be contained.
She grabbed my hand once we got outside. “Come on, hon, let’s dance. Do you remember how it went?”
But I didn’t feel like dancing. I was too terrified.
Chapter Twelve
“Who’s gonna do it this time?” I asked as Marge pulled out onto the main road. “Whose turn for the fire escape? And I hope the window’s unlocked so someone can get in.” I was glad I’d done my time and lived to tell the tale.
“I’m afraid it can’t be me.” Celeste lit a cigarette. “I have a migraine and a bad back.”
“Oh, not me,” Marge squeaked. “I don’t have a sense of balance.”
I remembered the last time I’d seen her on a ladder hanging pictures on our walls. The girl did have a point. We’d be back at the hospital for sure, and that wouldn’t help our progress.
Well. This wasn’t looking good.
“Sorry, girls, not me this time,” I
said. “This might be a little too much for my first day at work. I’m supposed to be on bed rest, not dangling in a window.” Or running for my life.
Okay, that was good. It sounded more mature than No fair! No fair! No fair! Plus, it was the truth. I’d been the one who’d fared the worst when the van exploded. When the docs said I was okay to go back to work, I don’t believe this was exactly what they had it mind. They thought I’d be behind a desk fixing some computer.
And so, it was decided. We’d do things the simple way. No fire escapes. No hiding. No daring leaps through windows or close encounters with roaches and dust bunnies that might win blue ribbons at some super grotesque fair. This time we’d try something different. We’d knock on the door.
“What will we say?” I asked.
“Well, we can’t sell cookies, that’s for sure.” Celeste thought about it. “Neither of us look like girl scouts.”
“We could say we work for the building,” Marge said. “That we were sent to check the heater or the washer or something.” She thought about it for a second. “What do building people fix?”
“We don’t look like fix-it people.” I braced myself as Marge braked hard for…what? Why was she braking, anyway? There was nothing in her path.
Sheesh. I turned my mind back to our debate. “If we were showing up to fix things, then wouldn’t we bring tools? We don’t have any tools.”
“Oh, yeah, you’re right.” Marge said. “We don’t even have a hammer or a screwdriver.”
“My father has a hammer,” I said. “I’m sure we could borrow it.”
“But what would we do with the hammer once we get inside the house?” Marge asked.
I shifted in the backseat. “I don’t have a clue.”
Had I ever used a hammer? I wasn’t sure I had.
“Hey,” I said. “Should we maybe take some classes? In quick repairs or something? You know, so we’d know what to do if we got into someone’s house and said we were technicians or maintenance workers or whatever.”
“Yes!” Marge cried. “Whoever uses hammer thingies.”
“Perhaps we couldn’t fix their dryers if they let us in, but we could know which parts to unscrew without making the machines refuse to ever work again,” I said.
“No need,” Celeste said. “I’m good with a hammer and a screwdriver and a handsaw too. I just didn’t think to bring my little toolbox with me.”
“Understandable,” Marge said. “Who brings a hammer to a diner? We should keep stuff in the trunk: a tool box, some cleaning products, some fake census forms. Then we can pretend to have lots of different jobs at a moment’s notice.”
“Great idea,” I said.
“I need to write that down,” Marge said. She swerved way over to the opposite car lane as she dug inside her purse.
“Right now, you need to steer.” Celeste put a quick hand on the wheel.
“Right now, we’ll be the new neighbors,” Marge said, pulling the car back in the right lane. “We won’t need any props.”
“That sounds good,” I said. “No special skills required, and I guess we look the part.”
“Oh, goodness, I hope not,” Celeste said as we came in sight of Baxter’s building. “I’ve toned down my sparkle, but do I look like I live here?”
“Okay,” I said, still feeling quite uneasy. “What if he believes we’re neighbors and he lets us in his place? What should we do then? We can’t just say Glad to meet you, neighbor, then start looking in boxes. If there are any there.” I was getting nervous. I hoped he wasn’t home.
“Okay, I think I have a plan,” Marge said. “One of us should try to distract the guy somehow, then the other two can snoop around very, very fast.”
Hmm. I thought about how that might work. Something else they never taught in the self-help section of the bookstore: How to Distract a Thug.
I gazed outside the window as I thought some more. The streets were deserted in this part of town, except for someone’s dog who seemed to be running loose. I looked closer. Such an odd dog with a striped and bushy tail. The tail was humongous. Wait…was that a dog or…?
We got closer and I pressed my nose up to the window. Shaking sugar cookies! It was! It really was. Lou was trotting down the sidewalk, happy as you please.
“Marge! Stop! You’ve got to stop.” I yelled.
She slammed the brakes down hard, sending us forward in a wild tilt reminiscent of the kinds of rides I’d hated at the fair. Thank you, thank you, thank you to whoever thought of seatbelts.
I tried to catch my breath. “I didn’t mean that quick.” Next time I was driving.
“What’s going on?” Marge asked. She put a hand over her heart. “Did I run over something? I didn’t see a thing.” She looked freaked out as well.
Only Celeste was unfazed. She looked down at her fingers. “Did I break a nail?”
“It’s him! It’s him!” I cried.
“It’s Baxter? Where? Where is he?” Marge yelled.
Celeste sat up straight to look. “Which way is he going? Is he walking toward his place or is he heading out? If he’s leaving, we’re in luck. We need to get inside there now. It’s safer with him gone. We only have to figure out how to get in.”
“We’re back at square one, I guess,” Marge said.
“No!” I cried. “That’s not what…”
“Oh, hush,” Marge said, who had finally caught her breath. “Charlie, don’t be scared. We need to be brave. One of us has to go in.”
“Lou!” I yelled. “I was talking about Lou. We need to get the bear.”
Celeste turned around and put one hand on my knee. “Girl, you need to calm down. One case at a time.”
“No! Lou is standing right outside. He’s right there on the sidewalk.”
A hushed surprise took the place of all our chatter. Then we turned in unison to see what the bear was doing now. Lou stuck a curious nose into a pile of trash, then sauntered toward a giant oak that was close by.
“Well, will you look at that?” Marge said.
“What should we do?” I asked.
A horn behind us blared, as if in answer, as a pickup truck rolled to a stop behind us. Oh yeah, I’d forgotten. We were blocking traffic, I supposed.
“I guess the first thing we do is park somewhere.” Celeste gave a little wave to the angry driver. “And Marge, get going quick before that guy behind you scares the bear away.” The guy was laying on his horn.
Marge pulled into a convenience store with prominent advertisements for beer and cigarettes.
“Where’s a good net when you need one?” I asked. “And where’s a jar pickles? Hey, they might sell them in that store.”
I straightened my glasses on my nose while I considered what to do. “There are some boxes that we used for my move in the back. Could we use those somehow?” Marge had lent me packing boxes, and we’d loaded them in her trunk after we moved me in.
“Why not? Go for it.” Marge hit a button that opened the trunk door.
I took a nice, deep breath, and walked back to the trunk. It was now or never. I took a box and slowly made my way toward Lou, careful not to startle him. I set the box down gently in his path. The top flap was open and facing towards him, should he care to step inside.
If this were some other person’s story (someone more fortunate than I), Lou would have walked right in and made himself at home. Then I would have quickly closed the flaps and called my friends for backup.
But no, that didn’t happen.
Lou stared at me, curious. What is this crazy woman doing? the bear was probably thinking. Is this some kind of game?
I moved forward with the box. Lou watched, then backed away. He trotted slowly to the right. I gently walked in front of him and put the box down in his path. Lou moved left and I did too. He moved to the right again, and I was right there with the box.
Celeste and Marge, in the meantime, had gotten out to watch.
“It’s like some kind of weird dance,�
�� Marge said. “It’s kind of fascinating.”
I set the box down and sighed. “Do you have an idea that’s any better?”
Marge got down on her knees. “Here, widdle cutie bear. Come here, come here to Marge. Come here, you cutie wootie.”
Startled, Lou backed away, but, thank goodness, he didn’t run. He watched Marge from a distance.
“It’s not a cat, for goodness sake.” Celeste crossed her arms. “You can’t just call a bear.”
Marge pouted. “I thought he might be lonely and glad that we were here.”
That’s when Celeste took charge. Very, very slowly, she approached the bear.
“He’s really not that big,” she said, keeping her voice low so as not to startle Lou. “I’ll just try to grab him. Then we can put him in the trunk and drive straight to the zoo.”
That would solve the missing panda case. Finally. How long was it safe to keep a panda in the trunk? The zoo was not that far.
Celeste had him…well, almost had him. We all held our breath. Celeste was good at almost everything.
Unfortunately, Marge had to start back up with her cooing. “It’s okay, panda wanda. We’ll take good care of you!” Her voice went up three octaves whenever she talked to animals or children. It was like the sound her brakes made when she screeched to a stop.
I was afraid that Lou was out of there. But, instead, he farted. Was that what he did when he was scared? So far, I’d heard him fart three times, and this one was the loudest.
We all got hit with this one. It seemed that Lou had quite a talent: he could aim his foul air in three directions all at once. The zoo officials had skipped that fun fact when they were describing to Celeste the behaviors of red pandas.
I, tragically, got a nose full (for the second time!) as did Celeste and Marge. No one was left out. Farts for everyone! The bear scrambled up a tree, looking down at us as if we were the crazy ones. Perhaps we did look unhinged. We jumped around and fanned our faces, hoping to find a way to escape that raunchy smell. If we could somehow get that stuff in a bottle and aim it straight at someone’s nose, we could catch any crook in Springston with a single spray of yuck.
