The Case of the Quizzical Queens Beagle

by B R Snow

  “Yeah, I kinda noticed that,” I said.

  “I think you hurt his feelings last night when you didn’t return the looks he was giving you,” Wanda said, laughing.

  “Oh, you saw that,” I said, shrugging. “He’s not my type.”

  “I’d be very disappointed in you if he was. Don’t worry about it. I’m sure Grundella managed to take his mind off you,” she said. “Did you stop by to wish us luck, or do you need something?”

  Up until this point, I hadn’t told anyone from the circus what Josie and I had seen the morning Samantha had gone overboard. But I had pretty much hit the wall as far as new information and clues were concerned. Since Grundella had mentioned over dinner that Samantha had been close to the two aerialists, I’d made the decision in bed last night to open up to them to see what they had to say. I was running the risk of word getting around about what I was doing and having everyone associated with the circus clam up. But Wanda and her brother seemed to be my best option for getting a better understanding of Samantha’s state of mind as well as some idea about who might want to hurt her.

  “I was wondering if I could ask you a few questions about Samantha,” I said, then gave her a small smile.

  “Samantha?” Wanda said, frowning as she glanced at her brother. “How do you know about Sammy? I’m sorry, but that doesn’t make any sense. Were you a friend of hers?”

  “No, I never met her,” I said.

  “Are you a cop?” she said, now studying me closely.

  “No,” I said with a casual shrug. “But sometimes I play one in real life.”

  Wanda stared at me, thoroughly confused, and motioned with both hands for me to continue.

  “Talk,” she whispered.

  I did.

  I spent a few minutes telling them the entire story, except for the part about our visit with Samantha’s mother. When I finished, I slid my hands into my back pockets and rocked back and forth on my heels.

  Compared to their warmup routine, it wasn’t much of a workout, but I decided to count it.

  “You saw somebody throw something off the boat?” Wanda said.

  “Yeah,” I said. “At first, I thought it was a bag of garbage. Then we found Queen B. in the middle of the River, and Samantha’s body was discovered soon after. We sort of put two and two together.”

  “Garbage bag? She was probably wearing that dreadful plastic raincoat of hers,” Wanda said to the brother with a sad chuckle. “I was always giving her a hard time about it.” Then she again turned to Miguel. “I told you she didn’t jump off the boat.”

  Miguel managed a small nod.

  “Do you have any idea who might have wanted to hurt Samantha?” I said.

  Wanda’s eyes flickered as she thought about my question, and I got the distinct impression that she definitely had someone in mind.

  “No one specific,” she said eventually, then glanced around the tent avoiding eye contact. “Where’s Queen B.?”

  “A couple of people who work for me are taking care of her at the moment,” I said. “What do you think we should do with her? She’s a lovely little dog.”

  “She is,” Wanda said. “Find her a good home would be my suggestion.”

  “So, there’s no one from the circus she should go to?”

  “No, absolutely not,” she said. “This is no place for a cute dog like her. Queen B. should be spending her time sitting on someone’s lap, and not in the middle of this nonsense.”

  “Did Samantha know that?”

  “Yeah, she did. But lately, that dog was about the only thing that kept her grounded. I know Sammy hated to do it, but she said she was planning on giving the beagle to her mother.”

  “I see,” I said, one of my suspicions confirmed. “Did Samantha talk about her mother? Or her childhood?”

  “As much as she could,” Wanda said. “Whatever memories she had about those days were buried pretty deep. And whenever they surfaced, I knew I was in for a long night.” She turned to her brother. “Right, Miggy? Remember that night in Iowa when we found her out on the eighth-floor ledge?”

  The brother nodded then stared down at the ground.

  “Sammy had a lot of mental health problems,” Wanda said. “Have you tracked her mother down yet?”

  Seeing no reason why I shouldn’t tell her, I nodded.

  “We have.”

  “Maybe you could give Queen B. to her,” Wanda said.

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said, shaking my head. “The mother is very unstable.”

  “How so?” Wanda said, cocking her head at me.

  “She seems to slip in and out of lucidity. When she’s out, she talks to her dead husband. Actually, she basically yells at him,” I said, frowning at the memory. “And she does this really weird thing with her head.”

  “Something like this?” Wanda said, then did a spot-on impression of the mother’s rotating head.

  My mouth dropped open as I watched her.

  “That’s exactly it,” I said, baffled. “How did you know that?”

  “Sammy used to do it whenever she got really upset. It always freaked me out,” Wanda said. “I had no idea it was something she learned from her mother.” Wanda teared up and exhaled loudly then squeezed her brother’s hand who continued to stare down at the ground. “Ah, Sammy. You poor thing.”

  I thought I heard Miguel choke back his emotions, and he slowly walked away.

  “Miggy,” Wanda called out. He stopped and looked at his sister. “Don’t forget to eat before we go on.” He nodded and resumed his walk. “Miggy was very close to Sammy,” Wanda said as she watched her brother’s departure.

  “Can I ask you something?”

  “Sure. Why stop now?” she said softly as she dried her eyes.

  “Does your brother talk?”

  “With difficulty, yes,” Wanda said. “But he’s not comfortable talking around strangers.”

  “Shy?”

  “Not really. He lost a piece of his tongue that left him with a heavy lisp,” Wanda said. “He’s embarrassed by it.”

  “How do you lose a piece of your tongue?” I said, raising an eyebrow.

  “Actually, he bit it off,” Wanda said with a small shrug. “We were doing an outside show in Colorado a few years ago, and the wind was really tricky that day. He missed the net coming down at the end of our act and landed face first. He was lucky he didn’t kill himself.”

  “Geez,” I said, grimacing. “Yuk.”

  “That’s a word for it,” she said. “For Miggy, it was pretty much spoons and straws for several weeks. Actually, it was Sammy who took care of him while he recovered.”

  “Were Miguel and Samantha an item?” I said.

  Wanda chuckled softly and glanced up at the ceiling of the tent briefly before looking back at me.

  “Well, that’s a tough one to explain,” she said.

  “Why’s that?”

  “Sammy had a really hard time with boundaries,” Wanda said. “You know how most people use a hug and maybe a kiss on the cheek to express their friendship?”

  “Sure,” I said, listening closely.

  “Well, Sammy had a bad habit of kicking things up a couple of notches when it came to showing affection.”

  “I’m not following.”

  “Think it through,” Wanda said.

  I did. Then the penny dropped.

  “Oh, I see,” I said, my face flushing with embarrassment. “Really?”

  “Pretty much,” Wanda said. “And after Miguel, how shall I say this, was the beneficiary of her affection, he fell hard for her. And he was crushed when she couldn’t maintain that affection on a consistent basis.”

  “So, Samantha wasn’t looking for a committed relationship?”

  “Samantha? Committed? Institutionally, maybe. Relationship, not a chance,” Wanda said, chuckling sadly as she shook her head. “You know how some people always seem to flit through life?”

  “I do.”

  �
��Well, Sammy sort of lurched through hers,” Wanda said with genuine affection. “When she wasn’t running into walls, she was bouncing off them.”

  “I see. That’s so sad.”

  “It was,” she said. “My relationship with her was different from the one she had with the others.”

  “How so?”

  “Even though I’m twenty years younger than she was, Sammy liked to say that I was the mother she never had,” Wanda said, again tearing up. “And she was always doing things to test the boundaries. Then she’d expect me to pull her back and get her in line. It was not a role I either enjoyed or was very good at.”

  “So, I guess it’s safe to say that she was what you might call a lost soul,” I said, choosing my words carefully.

  “Welcome to the circus,” she said, then glanced up at the clock hanging on the wall. “Look, I need to get going. If you want to talk later, you know where to find me for the next few days.”

  “Thanks, Wanda. I appreciate it.”

  “Just promise you’ll find a good home for Queen B.”

  “You have my word on that,” I said, nodding. “Can I ask you one more thing?”

  “Tenacious little thing, aren’t you?” she said, laughing.

  “Yeah, I really need to start working on that,” I said, shrugging. “What were you and Mr. Pontilly discussing last night? It seemed really intense.”

  “It was,” Wanda said. “We were talking about our contract. It’s just about up, and Miguel and I have decided to leave the Pontilly family.”

  “And he’s not happy about it?”

  “No, he’s not,” she said.

  “Why are you leaving?”

  “This circus is dying,” she said. “And Pontilly just can’t accept that fact. And as soon as more countries wake up and ban those disgusting wild animal acts, pretty much all he’ll have left is some jugglers and clowns. And Grundella’s dog act until she drinks herself into the gutter.”

  “Unless he can convince you and your brother to stay?”

  “I’m sure that’s definitely part of his thinking,” Wanda said. “But like I told him last night, he can always recruit another aerial act.”

  “But not one as good as yours, right?”

  “Well, thank you for the compliment,” she said, beaming at me. “No, I doubt if he can find another act as good as ours. Especially for what he’s willing to pay.”

  “Maybe he’ll offer you part ownership,” I said.

  “He already has,” she said. “But like I told Pontilly last night, what’s twenty percent of nothing worth?”

  “Ouch,” I said, laughing. “I take it he didn’t respond well to that one.”

  “No, that made him pretty grumpy,” she said, grinning. “He’s still not speaking to me.”

  “Where are you guys going to go?”

  “We’re heading to Vegas. We’ve been offered a slot with one of the Cirque du Soleil shows,” she said. “No more touring. At least for the foreseeable future.”

  “We’re going to have my bachelorette party in Vegas soon,” I said. “Maybe we’ll get a chance to see you up there.”

  “I’d like that,” she said, nodding. “When’s your wedding?”

  “August.”

  “Congratulations. Is your fiancé here with you?”

  “No, he’s away on a work trip.”

  “What does he do?”

  “He’s a disaster relief consultant.”

  “Interesting,” she said, nodding. “We could use someone with his talents around here.”

  Chapter 17

  I headed back to the main tent, gave the scowling Josie a grin and a finger wave as I walked past our seats, then continued up the aisle and found Chief Abrams near the entrance.

  “Not willing to face the music yet?” he said, laughing as he nodded in Josie’s direction.

  “No, I thought I’d give her a few more minutes to cool off,” I said, grinning. “Where did she go after the clowns got her?”

  “I found her hyperventilating outside,” he said. “When she calmed down, she grabbed a couple more funnel cakes and went back to her seat. You do know you’re going to pay for this, right?”

  “I do,” I said. “But it was so worth it. I just had a chat with Wanda, the aerialist.”

  “What did she have to say for herself?”

  “Quite a bit, actually,” I said. “She doesn’t buy the suicide story.”

  “You don’t think she was involved?” Chief Abrams said, gesturing for me to follow him away from the entrance so we could speak without being overheard.

  “No, I don’t,” I said. “Samantha considered Wanda her surrogate mother.”

  “What about the brother?”

  “Samantha broke his heart,” I said.

  “Interesting. Always a good motive,” he said. “They were in a relationship?”

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “Apparently, Samantha wasn’t shy about sharing her affections.”

  “I see,” he said, nodding. “So, Samantha was close to several of the other performers?”

  “According to Wanda,” I said.

  “She didn’t happen to mention any possible suspects, did she?” he said, waving to a group of people who were making their way through the crowd.

  “I floated the question, but she didn’t bite,” I said. “But I got the feeling she had definitely somebody in mind.”

  “Okay, that might be helpful. What’s your take?”

  “At the moment, I’m leaning toward jealousy. If Samantha was making the rounds with all the men who work here, one of them could have done it as payback for breaking their heart.”

  “Or maybe the girlfriend of one of her conquests,” he said, glancing over at me.

  “That’s an interesting thought. But the woman would have to be pretty strong to throw her off the boat like that,” I said, then an idea popped to the surface when I remembered Wanda’s warmup routine. I frowned and stared off into the distance.

  “What is it?” the Chief said. “You’ve got that look.”

  “No, it couldn’t have been her,” I whispered.

  “I’m gonna need a bit more, Snoop.”

  “I was just thinking about strong women and landed on Wanda. I watched her warm up backstage earlier, and she’s incredibly powerful,” I said, still frowning. “No, it couldn’t have been her.”

  “Is she close to her brother?” he said.

  “She certainly seems to be. And protective.”

  “And she decided to take Samantha out because she broke her brother’s heart?” the Chief said, giving it some serious thought. “Yeah, I can make that work. We’ve certainly seen stranger things.”

  “No, I don’t like it,” I said, shaking my head. Then I caught a glimpse of someone sitting by himself about halfway up one of the grandstands. “Well, what do you know?”

  The Chief followed my eyes and spotted the man right away.

  “What the heck is he doing here?” I said.

  “Maybe he’s a fan of the circus,” the Chief said, not taking his eyes off him.

  “Yeah, and I’m a spokesperson for Jenny Craig.”

  “It looks like he’s by himself,” the Chief said.

  “Did you ever hear back from your contact about Bobbie’s background?” I said, staring at Robert Tompkins, Bella Johnson’s friend and caretaker.

  “I did,” he said. “He hasn’t had so much as a parking ticket over the past twenty years.”

  “So, Bella’s caretaker is an upstanding citizen who’s simply devoted to her well-being,” I said.

  “It certainly looks that way,” he said.

  “Then what the heck is he doing here?” I said.

  “Like I said, maybe he’s just a fan,” the Chief said.

  “You really believe that, Chief?”

  “I do not,” he said, glancing over at me.

  “I need to figure out a way to have a little chat with Bobbie,” I said.

  “Well, it’s going
to have to wait until intermission,” the Chief said, as the lights dimmed. “Showtime.”

  I snuck another look at Bobbie as I walked down the aisle to my seat. I sat down just as a spotlight appeared in the center of the ring. Josie glared at me, and I gave her an evil grin.

  “Having a good time?” I said, watching as Mr. Pontilly appeared through the curtains and stepped into the spotlight.

  Josie fumed and ignored me as we focused on the ringmaster. He spread his arms wide and in a booming voice welcomed everyone to the world-famous Pontilly Family Circus. Tonight’s performance started with a group of jugglers and people on unicycles, then transitioned into several people juggling while riding unicycles. Bubs and Chuckles were two of the performers and proved to be quite proficient in both skills.

  “It must be hard riding one of those things with those gigantic shoes,” I said, glancing over at Josie.

  “Shut it.”

  “Yeah, those feet are enormous,” I said, again watching the show play out a few feet in front of me. “They’d probably take up a whole seat.”

  The jugglers finished to a nice round of applause, and the next twenty minutes were filled by a combination fire breathing and sword swallowing act that made my stomach roil. Judging by the oohs and aahs of the people sitting behind us that transitioned into whispered gasps when one of the performers slid a gigantic sword down his throat, everyone else’s reaction seemed to be pretty much the same as mine. The final act before intermission, as Mr. Pontilly made sure everyone in the crowd understood, was Master Claude and the elephant.

  I thought about heading outside but decided to stay and see if Master Claude’s public treatment of the elephant was any better than his behind the scene methods. The elephant, dressed in a ridiculous silver costume wrapped around its head and back, slowly made its way through the opening in the curtain and lumbered into the ring. Master Claude led the elephant through a series of walking tricks, then had the animal stand on its back legs and trumpet loudly.

  “This is making me sick,” Josie said, shaking her head.

  “Yeah, just think how much pain he had to put the animal through to get her to do that,” I said.