Mabel, Murder, & Muffins

by Sharon Mierke

  I walked over and put my arms around her and the dishes she was carrying in her arms. Mostly, I was hugging dishes.

  “I’ll be fine, Flori. I know Jake doesn’t want me underfoot. Besides, I’m sure he didn’t really agree, did he?”

  “Of course, he did. I told him it was either you staying with us or me staying with you.”

  “Flori, go home and make lunch.”

  She grinned. “Okey dokey.”

  A half hour later, she was back and we were sitting, slurping up homemade cabbage soup with a dollop of sour cream on top and homemade bread slathered with butter. My eyes watered from the garlic fumes. When we were finished with that, I poured the coffee and Flori brought out two gargantuan cinnamon buns, which she proceeded to slather with more butter. At least, Flori comes by her weight honestly.

  Gossip travels around Parson’s Cove faster and gathers more momentum than a tidal wave does. All afternoon, people came in and out. Fortunately, I guess their consciences were starting to bother some of them; at least, I did make several sales. By the time, it came to close the store, I’d heard everything from Grace being stabbed in my backyard to Reg being shot in a high speed chase.

  “Can you imagine?” I said to Flori, who had kindly come back to walk me home. “How do people come up with this stuff? You won’t believe what Pattie asked me.”

  “What?” Flori’s eyes were big. She loves good juicy gossip; especially, if it’s something Pattie might print in the local newspaper.

  “If it were true that I lost all my money, gambling. I said, ‘Like I’m sure I’d tell you, Pattie. You’d have that splattered all over the front page of the paper tomorrow.’ Actually, I am kind of worried about what she might print. I hope Reg didn’t tell anyone about my threatening phone call. Do you think he would?”

  Flori’s face reddened. “I’m sure he wouldn’t.”

  “What about you, Flori? Did you happen to mention it to anyone?”

  She cleared her throat. “Well, I may have mentioned it in passing.”

  “In passing whom?”

  “Obviously, I told Jake because I was worried about you.”

  “Anyone else?”

  “It might have slipped out a few times while you were at the police station.” Her chin started to tremble and after one giant snivel, she blurted out, “I’m so sorry. I didn’t think what I was saying, Mabel. I was just so upset and worried.” Her face screwed up and tears poured down. “Do you think it will make it worse? Will someone come after you for sure now?”

  I handed her a tissue. The floodgates gave way.

  “Oh Mabel,” she said, through her sobs, “I’ve signed your death warrant, haven’t I?”

  “No, you haven’t, Flori. You don’t have to be quite so dramatic. Now that I think about it, maybe it’s good that it’s out in the open. Now, whoever called me knows that everyone will be on the lookout for me.” I patted her back. “Maybe you did me a favor.”

  She wiped away the tears and patted her eyes. The tissue was smudged black and blue with eye shadow and mascara. We’d reached the front gate to my house.

  “Look at this, Flori,” I said. “Someone was here and left the gate open.”

  “Well, since you won’t come and stay with us, I had Jake go through your house earlier, just to make sure no one was hiding in there. He should’ve known better than to leave the gate open.” She stopped in her tracks and stared at me. “Unless, someone else was here, Mabel.” Her eyes got bigger. “What if it were someone else? I’m sure Jake would’ve closed the gate. I’m sure he would’ve.”

  “Flori,” I said. “Jake never closes my gate. He leaves it open to irritate me. And, besides, I figured you might get him to do a walk-through. By the way, you know I don’t have a phone now so you’ll have to trust that I’ll be all right. No sending Jake over in the middle of the night to check, okay?”

  “Oh, Mabel, you know I wouldn’t do that.”

  “Promise, Flori?”

  “Oh, all right if you insist, but I will call the store at nine sharp and if you’re not there, I’ll send Jake over to the house.”

  “I guess I can live with that. By the way, everyone is talking so much about Grace’s murder but no one told me who found her body. Do you know?”

  We were standing at my back door now. The sun was sinking in the west behind the trees and there were streaks of shade across my lawn.

  “I wish you hadn’t asked me that.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I know you’re going to make a big deal of it, that’s why.”

  “Why would I? I’m curious. Obviously, whoever found the body is not the murderer so why would I get upset? It wasn’t Charlie, was it?”

  I would be upset if it were Charlie. Not that he would be implicated in a murder but simply because he doesn’t need such trauma. Charlie is different from other folks. Some are afraid of him but he’s as harmless as a newborn. He spends most of his days, winter and summer, sitting on a bench in front of the library. He wears the same clothes, day in and day out, and he only talks to the people he wants to talk to.

  “No, it wasn’t Charlie.”

  “So, who then? Esther Flynn?” I laughed, imagining the look on Esther’s face if she ever saw a corpse again. She was the one who found old Beulah Henry and that was traumatic enough. “That would be a good one - Esther returning and wandering around the bush behind the nursing home. How could she ever explain that?”

  Flori scowled but didn’t say a word. I stared at her.

  “It was Esther, wasn’t it? I can’t believe it. It was really Esther? What on earth would she be doing back in Parson's Cove and walking through the woods behind the nursing home?”

  She nodded. “I told you, you’d be upset.”

  “I’m not upset. In fact, for some reason, I find this almost exhilarating.”

  “You should wipe the grin off your face.”

  “I can’t.” I hugged Flori. “Good night. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  I started to shut the door but Flori’s foot got in the way.

  “I don’t like it when you grin like that. What are you planning, Mabel?”

  “Me? I’m planning on finding out why Esther was out in the bush when she happened upon that dead body. I’m also planning on finding out if she’s the one who threatened me. And, in case you’re wondering, Flori, I’m planning on finding out who killed Grace Hobbs.”

  And, with that, I gently pushed the door until Flori removed her foot.

  Chapter Seven

  I lay in bed that night, trying to figure out my first move. Light shone in from the street lamp and I watched the shadows from my elm tree bouncing back and forth on the ceiling. Where would a bona fide detective start? And, by that, I definitely wasn’t including Reg. I’d read enough Agatha Christie books to know that I would have to start at the end and work backwards. Not only that, there had to be suspects and a motive.

  The end, of course, was ‘the body.’ Grace Hobbs. What did I know about the woman? She seemed so ordinary. Why hadn’t I paid more attention? On the other hand, I can’t look at everyone and think that they might be a murder victim, can I? She was younger than me; perhaps, in her forties. Tall? Well, everyone is taller than me. Slightly over-weight. No cause for murder there. Did she have family? I closed my eyes and tried to remember. On the first evening in Las Vegas, we’d all gone out for dinner. It was our ‘getting acquainted’ meal. I closed my eyes and tried to picture the setting.

  The dining room was downstairs in our hotel. It was crowded and noisy. A waitress with eyelashes at least two inches long and a waist about the circumference of a silver dollar, sat us at a round table. The smoking section and bar was on the other side of a five-foot divide. Great protection for all us non-smokers. The dusty artificial plants sitting on top looked very real. They had to be artificial because real ones could have never survived the smoky blue haze that drifted over into our section. I tried to concentrate on the people at our table but th
ere were so many interesting characters in the room, it was hard. Half the men looked like Elvis, wearing sparkling pantsuits so tight it would’ve made Flori blush and most of the women looked like Marilyn Monroe with white-blond hair and enough cleavage to sink a ship. The laughter was earsplitting and rowdy so obviously drinking, smoking, and gambling must bring joy to many.

  Mr. Hatcher stood up and tapped his water glass several times with a spoon. No one paid attention.

  “People! People!” he shouted. Everyone at our table and the three tables beside us stopped talking and stared at him.

  “Like I said, we’ll take turns talking about ourselves. Mabel, you go first.” With that, he sat down. I guess if you have to listen to life stories week after week, it gets boring, and a person might tend to be on the grumpy side.

  What had I said? He’d caught me by surprise so I didn’t have time to get too nervous but my knees were a little shaky.

  “My name is Mabel Wickles. (I realized afterwards that if any of them had forgotten my name all they had to do was look at my nametag.) I’ve lived my whole life in a small town called Parson’s Cove. I live alone except for my cats.” Someone at the next table whispered, “Aww, poor thing” very loudly. I turned to look the woman in the eye and said, “That doesn’t mean for one second that I’m lonely. I have some wonderful friends. In fact, my best friend, Flori Flanders, was planning on coming with me. It just happened, however, that her oldest son's wife was giving birth so Flori stayed home.”

  Someone asked a question. Who was it? Grace. That’s who it was. Now, what was it she asked? My brain almost hurt from concentrating so hard.

  “What’s Parson’s Cove like? It sounds so quaint.”

  That was it. That’s what she’d asked. I said, “It’s beautiful. About a hundred years ago, homesteaders built the town right beside a lake. We have quite a few tourists in the summer who rent cottages and houses in the area. In fact, the house right behind mine is a rental. Actually, it's become known as the house of crime.” I got everyone’s attention when I said that. It was Grace who said, “Why? There was a murder?” Of course, then I had to explain about the different people who rented it and how a few were ones you wouldn't want as your next door neighbors. I tried not to sound too self-important so I told them in my most humble way how without me, some of the cases might never have been solved. Out of all of them, Grace seemed the most interested in my story.

  Now, could I remember what each person said? It isn’t that easy when your brain cells are degenerating at the same speed as your eyesight.

  Sally stood up next. When she stood up, her perfume wafted across the table. Perhaps, ‘propelled’ was a better verb. I was sitting across from her and it was all I could do to keep from gasping for air. I remember what she wore that day because she reminded me of Flori. She was wearing this dazzling blue-green outfit. Those happen to be Flori’s favorite colors (along with bright orange). The only difference was that Flori’s clothes flowed outward from the neck down and Sally’s didn’t flow at all. They clung. The neckline was on the low side and her ample breasts seemed ready to pop right over the top. That, of course, is not Flori. Flori is very prim and proper when it comes to things like that.

  I missed most of Sally’s speech, simply because she mumbled through her swollen Botox lips. I do remember she said that she’d tried out for the movies and would’ve been a big star except for some reason - which I couldn’t make out. She spoke of being a ballerina and I overheard Andrea whisper to Grace that she was probably an exotic dancer. I was more inclined to think of pole dancing. Anyway, she really didn’t have much to say. She’d lived in quite a few states but didn’t say exactly where she was from. One thing she did make sure we knew was that she was happily divorced again and was on the quest for someone new. After saying that, she threw Ralph a ‘look’ and then, Mr. Hatcher. Ralph grinned and turned pink but Mr. Hatcher didn’t even glance her way. He probably had women hitting on him all the time.

  I could understand her making eyes at Hatcher. He was attractive in his own dark way. Sally was probably old enough to be his mother but that doesn’t seem to make any difference nowadays. Especially, in Las Vegas.

  Andrea was next. What’s with Texans? I mean, Texas might be big but it’s still part of the United States of America. Having one’s own language doesn’t qualify you to be a Separatist. After being around her and Grace for a few hours, I was starting to say ‘y’all’ at the beginning and ending of all my sentences. Not only that, I was leaving the ‘g’ off all my ‘ing’ words. A southern drawl is as contagious as the Hong Kong flu. It was probably a good thing those two spent all their time at the slot machines; if not, when I returned home no one would have understood me.

  What did she say about herself? That is, besides the fact that she hailed from Texas. Was she married? Yes, but I detected a bit of anger when she said this trip had nothing to do with her husband. She didn’t tell us her husband’s name. In fact, I’m sure she wouldn’t have even mentioned a mate if Sally hadn’t asked. I was all prepared to hear her call him Bubba or Jimmy Bob but we never did find out. She didn’t tell us if she had a family either or if she carried a gun in her purse. Since nearly all Texas women possess their own firearms, there was a good chance that she did.

  Grace Hobbs. She was from Texas also. Not only that; she and Andrea were from the same place. Andrea, I would think, would be a prime suspect. Why? Well, that I don’t know. It seems strange there’s that connection and it doesn’t mean something. On the other hand, if Andrea for some unknown reason wanted to kill a neighbor she claims she never knew before, why do it after a trip to Las Vegas? She could’ve just as easily drowned her in the Gulf of Mexico. Maybe then, they wouldn’t have found the body. Why would someone from the same city, murder, and then dump the body behind a nursing home in a little one-horse unknown town hundreds and hundreds of miles away?

  Perhaps Andrea wasn’t the murderer but surely, the fact that both of them were from Yellow Rose must mean something. It seemed more than a coincidence.

  I tried to remember what Grace had told us about herself. Every time I thought about her standing there at the table looking down at all of us, all I could envision was a bullet hole in her forehead. My mind went blank. If she said something of significance, I couldn’t remember it.

  Ralph stood up. He was a tall man with gray thinning hair and the beginnings of a paunch. And, of course, the dandruff. That told me he was single before he told us. No wife would allow him to wear dark shirts. He said he was also divorced. I didn’t have to look across at Sally; I could hear her sigh. He was in sales, although I wasn’t familiar with the company. It had something to do with installing lifts for beds in hospitals. His territory covered several states, so he had to travel. No wonder he was divorced. He did mention he had a son in college.

  I asked Mr. Hatcher if he was going to tell us something about himself and he said, quite gruffly, “You have to be kidding.”

  Well, I wasn’t but I left it at that.

  For the time being, this was all I could recollect. I figured that as time went by, more memories would return. Solving a crime is like putting a jigsaw puzzle together and right now, my pieces were spread all over the place.

  Chapter Eight

  I made it to work with seconds to spare. Flori, true to her word, phoned at nine. I’m usually there much earlier but one of the cats decided to disappear and I had no choice but to make some sort of effort at finding her. I firmly believe that cats really do have nine lives and that no matter what, they return home … whenever it suits their fancy. My neighbor, ninety-two year old Hilda Whinegate, tends to differ. She spotted Dottie racing across her backyard chasing a rabbit and was sure the cat had either become lost or had returned to the ways of her primordial ancestors and would never return. I never argue with Hilda because who knows how much longer she’ll be my neighbor; so, whenever she thinks one of my cats is lost, I make a good pretense at searching. The cat always comes back
on its own steam.

  This morning, I was thankful for her eccentric opinion. My chase took me right to the woods behind the nursing home. Well, perhaps, not right behind but I figure two blocks in one direction or the other is reasonable.

  Parson’s Cove’s nursing home is situated on a street that runs parallel with the curvature of the lake. The lake is too far away for any of the residents to see but the forest separating the building from the water is very green in summer and white with snow and frost in winter. Lawn chairs and small tables clutter the back yard, year around. Once in awhile one of the residents wanders off into the woods but so far, we haven’t lost anyone. I think every other day or so, the staff warns its residents of the dangers. I imagine in the same tone that a teacher talks to her first grade class.

  Nothing in our town is exactly north and south or east and west. Personally, I think every street started out as either a covered wagon trail or simply a cow trail. The nursing home, built about forty years ago, is one building that is well maintained. After all, that’s where the majority of us will be spending our last years. The front lobby and dining area faces east, letting the sun shine in on all the happy faces every morning.

  “Here, Dottie. Here Dottie,” I called out. If the cat were anywhere near, she probably wouldn’t have any idea what was going on anyway. I usually call all of them Kitty, except for Phil. Who can keep track of every cat's name? Flori doesn’t even remember the names of all her grandchildren.

  The closer I got to the yellow police tape, the louder I called. No one was around and nothing was moving at the nursing home. I imagine everyone was eating breakfast. Captain Maxymowich and his men had undoubtedly combed the whole area looking for clues. It wouldn’t hurt to have a fresh pair of eyes take a look, however. Even if those eyes don’t work so good close up, as Flori would say.