Murder on the Ballot

by Elizabeth Spann Craig

  Wanda continued, “Yer competition jest died. An’ now, if you drop out, Erma will be elected.”

  Myrtle stopped. “Oh no. No. I’ve been so caught up in thinking about who killed Royce that I didn’t consider the consequences for the election. Well, there’s only one thing to do. I’ll have to persuade someone else to run.”

  “Ain’t the deadline over?”

  “The deadline was over. But now, one of the candidates isn’t on the ballot anymore. I’m pretty sure I can get the town clerk to overlook a small technicality.” Myrtle pressed her lips together grimly, thinking about the town clerk and how she was going to be forced to be flexible.

  Myrtle and Wanda got ready for garden club and set off. Wanda borrowed one of Myrtle’s small reporter notebooks and a pencil so she could take notes. Myrtle wasn’t at all sure exactly what sort of notes Wanda was going to be able to take, considering she could barely read and write. She supposed there was going to be a lot of phonetic renditions of words, but however Wanda was able to make it work was good enough for Myrtle.

  Tippy’s house was a white-columned estate with well-manicured lawns and an interior full of expensive antiques. Myrtle looked thoughtfully at it as she and Wanda walked up. “I’m thinking Tippy might be just the person to help spread the word about our fundraiser.”

  “Thought you was gonna say she might be jest the person to go on the ballot,” murmured Wanda.

  Myrtle blinked at Wanda. “Do you think so?”

  Wanda shrugged. “She likes to be involved. She’s organized. She knows everybody.”

  Myrtle thought about this for a moment. “You’re right. She might be the perfect candidate. Plus, her husband was political. Maybe some of it rubbed off on Tippy.”

  “Then do you need this money-raisin’ thing?” asked Wanda. Her tone implied it was superfluous.

  “Of course I do! It will be fun for the children. It will raise money for the charity I end up donating it to. And it will drive Red batty.”

  Wanda smiled.

  Tippy, always the gracious hostess, met them at the door. She saw Wanda, dressed in her finest, and said, “Wanda! It’s so very good to see you. I don’t think I’ve seen you at garden club since you were at the last lecture we had. How’s your gardening going?”

  Wanda looked a bit guilty, knowing it had been neglected since she’d started staying with Myrtle. “It’s okay. Could be better.”

  “Well, all of ours could be better, my dear. That’s why we’re here, isn’t it? We get to listen to the experts tell us how to make magic in our yards! Come on in and let me make sure you know people here.”

  Myrtle watched in frustration as Tippy, elegant in a pale blush silk top and white slacks, swept away with Wanda in tow. Wanda looked behind her and gave Myrtle an eloquent helpless shrug of her thin shoulder.

  “Did you bring Miles with you?” asked a breathless voice. Myrtle turned around to see another elderly member of garden club.

  Miles was always quite the draw at either book club or garden club. He didn’t belong to garden club, but Myrtle sometimes dragged him along as her guest. Or, as Miles considered it, her hostage.

  “No, not this time. He was being rather antisocial today. I did bring Wanda, though.”

  The old woman’s eyes lit up. “Did you, now?” She fidgeted, apparently trying to figure out how to gracefully disengage from the conversation with Myrtle and find Wanda. She likely wanted to pump her for information on whether she’d win at bingo the next week. It was all very vexing.

  “You’re dismissed,” said Myrtle coolly, as if back in the classroom again.

  The little old woman gratefully scuttled away.

  There was a chuckle from behind her and Myrtle turned to see her friend Mercedes smiling at the exchange. Mercedes was, like Myrtle, another cane-wielder and had a good sense of humor. She was also a former teacher and was one of the ladies Myrtle gravitated toward during the sometimes-interminable garden club meetings, although she hadn’t been at the one several days ago.

  “You dispatched her really well, Myrtle,” she said with a smile.

  “Well, it takes practice. How are you doing, Mercedes?”

  The other woman said, “From what I’ve heard, not as well as you are. Did I understand correctly that you’re running for town council?”

  Myrtle straightened just a little bit. Although she was eager to persuade Tippy to run for the seat, she might just miss having people admire her for being an octogenarian candidate for office. “You certainly did. I’m having a fundraiser soon, as a matter of fact, at my house.” She tilted her head to one side. “As I recall, you taught Royce too, didn’t you?”

  Mercedes looked sad. “I did. I was sorry to hear the news about him.” She blinked. “I just realized he must have been running against you.”

  Myrtle nodded. “Indeed he was. I believe Red has cleared me as a suspect, though. He better have, anyway. What did you think of him—Royce, I mean? I was wondering if you’d had the same impression of him as I did.”

  Mercedes said, “I had lots of impressions of him and few of them were good, I’m sad to say. Of course, I still feel terrible that such a young person with so much promise should be struck down like that.”

  Myrtle smiled a little. It was only very elderly people like Mercedes and herself that would think of a middle-aged person like Royce as a young person. Age was definitely relative.

  “I was his neighbor for a while, too, you see. Until he grew wealthy and moved away to that huge home he left for.” Mercedes put her hand over her mouth and glanced around, looking to make sure Tippy wasn’t around. “I nearly forgot I am in a huge home. Anyway, I didn’t think Royce was much of a neighbor.” She gave Myrtle a thoughtful look. “Are you just generally interested in Royce’s death, or are you interested as a reporter?”

  “An investigative journalist,” said Myrtle, puffing up again.

  “Goodness but you do wear a lot of hats, Myrtle. Town council candidate and investigative reporter? I don’t know how you do it all. Anyway, I was just going to add that you should speak with John DeMeo while you’re here at garden club. He was talking to me when I saw him in the store yesterday about all this.” Mercedes leaned on her cane and shook her head over the ‘all this.’

  “Royce’s death, you mean?”

  Mercedes nodded. “But more about Preston Cook.” She glanced over near the refreshments table that Tippy had set out. “John is over there.”

  “Thanks,” said Myrtle warmly, setting out to corner John as someone else came up to speak with Mercedes.

  John was chatting with another gentleman as they were adding some of Tippy’s fancy finger foods. Myrtle spotted stuffed mushrooms, prosciutto-wrapped cheeses, deviled eggs, and bite-sized quiches among loads of fresh fruits. Tippy had a way of making everyone else feel insecure about hosting book club or garden club.

  The man John was speaking to quickly left, upon seeing the look of disapproval on Myrtle’s face and perhaps thinking he might be the cause of it. John gave Myrtle a smile and she beamed back at him.

  “Glad to see you today, Myrtle,” said John. “You’ve missed a few of the last meetings, I noticed.”

  Myrtle preened. It was nice for someone to notice she hadn’t been there. “Yes, I’ve been rather busy. Now I’m even busier.”

  “I saw you were running for local office,” said John.

  Myrtle nodded. “Yes. As a matter of fact, that’s what I wanted to speak with you about. I feel terrible about Royce and what happened to him after our debate. I heard you might have some information about Preston Cook.”

  John raised his eyebrows. “Are you trying to track down Royce’s killer?”

  “Is it Preston Cook?” asked Myrtle.

  John clearly did not want any part of tagging Preston as a murderer. He fumbled with his plate but quickly caught better hold of it before it tumbled to Tippy’s pristine rug. John looked around them to make sure no one was listening in. Everyone, however,
was surrounding Wanda. Wanda looked over at Myrtle and gave her a conspiratorial wink.

  John cautiously said, “Myrtle, I have no idea. I don’t want to point the finger at someone who had nothing to do with this.”

  “Which is very honorable of you. I wouldn’t want you to do that anyway because it wouldn’t be in the least helpful. What would be helpful is for you to just tell me what happened.”

  “It won’t go into the newspaper?”

  Myrtle said, “Certainly not. We don’t print hearsay in the Bradley Bugle. That would be a poor business practice.”

  John nodded. “All right. The night of the debate, I was at Preston’s garage. I’d brought my car in to get an oil change and tire rotation. It was busy there—lots of people were there picking up their vehicles. The woman before me left and she was wearing a large ‘vote for Royce’ button and was heading to the debate.”

  “Clearly a woman with poor taste.” Myrtle pursed her lips.

  “Exactly. Anyway, it really set Preston off. He was totally distracted and started talking trash about Royce. He seemed like he needed to unload.”

  “And you were kind enough to let him do it,” said Myrtle.

  “Actually, I really just wanted to get my car back and head home. The weather looked very threatening. You remember, I’m sure. But Preston was muttering about Royce. Said he was going to head over to the debate and interrupt it. He was going to fill everyone in on Royce’s ‘immoral activities’ and ‘not being a faithful husband to Jenny’.”

  Myrtle raised her eyebrows. So Foley had been right. Cindy Cook had been involved with Royce. What was more, Preston had clearly found out about it. “What happened, I wonder? Preston never showed up at the debate.”

  John said, “Well, once I’d paid up and gotten the keys to my car back, Foley Hardy came in. From what I could tell before I left, he and Preston were starting to get into it over a transmission issue. Foley was asking for some sort of payment plan and for Preston to go ahead and fix it. But Preston was standing firm and saying that it was too expensive of a job for his shop to absorb the cost at the front end. That’s when I left.”

  “So Foley held him up,” said Myrtle quietly. “Perhaps for a long time. Maybe, by the time Preston finally made it to the debate, it was over.” Preston, still wanting to fight, might have come across Royce on the staircase. She looked at John who was looking uneasy about what he’d said about Preston. “You’ve been very helpful. I’ll let you eat now before the speaker starts.”

  Myrtle saw that, for an instant, Tippy was actually free from conversations. So she motioned her over.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Tippy sailed over, glancing at Myrtle with concern. “Is everything all right? You’re feeling all right? You’re not eating any of the food.” Tippy frowned thoughtfully at her carefully-arranged buffet of hors d’oeuvres as though analyzing whether something might be wrong with them.

  “Everything is not fine,” said Myrtle firmly. “We’re facing a crisis in this town. I think you might be the only person to stop it.”

  Now Tippy looked alarmed. And somewhat worried, as if Myrtle might have suffered a small stroke when she entered Tippy’s gracious home. “Whatever do you mean, Myrtle?”

  “I mean that Royce Rollins is now dead, which clearly eliminates him from winning the town council seat. I’ve decided that perhaps the political life isn’t for me.” Myrtle decided not to say that she’d only entered the race to stir things up and scold the people who were in office. “But the problem is, if I drop out, the only candidate remaining is Erma.”

  They both looked across the room at Erma who was currently giving her braying laugh at something Erma herself had said to her companion.

  “I see the predicament.” Tippy pressed her lips together. “So you want me to persuade Benton to step into the race.”

  Myrtle scowled at this. She surely did not want Benton Chambers, Tippy’s esteemed husband, to be on the ballot. She didn’t think very much of him and his numerous affairs. Besides, he’d been a local politician for ages and nothing had improved. “Absolutely not. I want you, Tippy, to run.”

  Now Tippy really did look as if she thought Myrtle had suffered a small stroke. “Me? Why on earth would you want me to be on the town council, Myrtle?”

  They were running out of time. The speaker was being herded to the small lectern by one of the officers of garden club. To Myrtle, Tippy was being deliberately obtuse. She snapped, “Because you’re right for the job! You won’t broker any foolishness on the town council. You’ll make improvements. You’re incredibly organized. You know everyone in this town. You’d be a natural, Tippy. Besides, I think it’s your civic duty.”

  Myrtle knew that was the key that would end up making Tippy run. If there was one thing she had in spades, it was civic duty.

  Tippy straightened a little. She already had excellent posture, so this straightening seemed to stretch her out to impossible heights.

  Suddenly, Tippy and Myrtle were both clutched by a gasping woman. Myrtle turned to see Blanche Clark there. Blanche was, as usual, fashionably attired and beautifully made-up. “I just overheard what y’all were talking about. I’m just so excited. Why didn’t I ever think about this before? Tippy, you’ll make the perfect candidate.” She paused, giving Myrtle an apologetic look. “Not that you weren’t the perfect candidate, Myrtle.”

  Myrtle shrugged. “I was simply trying to restore peace and some order to the craziness of town council. And then there was a murder there. But I do believe Tippy can get everyone over there behaving themselves again. As a matter of fact, Tippy, if you want to go ahead and announce and get your paperwork signed, I can have my gnome fundraiser be for your campaign.”

  Tippy froze and looked across at Blanche. Apparently, the thought of a gnome fundraiser for her benefit was taking things just a little far. “I would have to discuss this with Benton first, of course. It will take some time to fill out the paperwork.”

  “You’ll be amazed at how little time that can take,” said Myrtle.

  “So I think your fundraiser should be for your own campaign right now, Myrtle, thanks.”

  “All right. That money will be going to charity eventually, then. As long as you’re really running. Otherwise, I suppose I have no alternative but to stay in the race. We have a lot to lose, otherwise.”

  Tippy and Myrtle turned as another braying laugh emitted from Erma. Blanche said, “Don’t worry, Myrtle. I’ll remind Tippy how great she’ll be as a commissioner.”

  The speaker was better than Myrtle had anticipated, and she even found herself jotting down a few notes that would help with her tomato patch. Wanda, she saw, was laboriously trying to note everything the man said. But a few minutes in, Myrtle remembered that her phone had a voice recording feature on it that she sometimes used when doing interviews for the paper. She showed Wanda that she was taping it and then Wanda relaxed and listened happily for the rest of the talk.

  After garden club wrapped up, Myrtle noticed Wanda was looking very tired. She frowned. She had dragged Wanda all over town and on foot, at that. Myrtle still did have plans for her day. She thought she might make that casserole for Jenny, Royce’s widow. But she doubted Wanda would make it to the grocery store. Then there was the fundraiser to plan.

  “Are you doing all right, Wanda?” asked Myrtle, looking solicitously at her as they left Tippy’s stately home.

  “Jest real tired.”

  Myrtle frowned again. “I did have you walk all over town. Were those garden club women making you give them fortunes?”

  “Not fortunes, really, but some tips.” Wanda shrugged.

  “But the kind of tips that only you can provide.” Myrtle tightened her lips. People seemed to always ask a lot of Wanda. “I know you find that very draining. What would you like to do for the rest of the day?”

  “What do you need doin’?” asked Wanda.

  “No, no. This isn’t about my stuff now. The rest of your day is yours
to do with what you’d like.”

  Wanda considered this. After a while, Wanda said, “Reckon I’d like to listen to the garden club talk on yer phone. An’ mebbe play Solitaire. Would be nice if the cat was with me, too.”

  Myrtle saw how happy Wanda looked at this very simple prospect. “Here are my keys and my phone. Just let yourself in and make yourself comfortable. I’m going to go get a few ingredients for the food I’m making for Jenny Rollins.”

  Wanda tilted her head doubtfully. “Ain’t you gonna need help with carryin’ the food?” She looked pointedly at Myrtle’s cane.

  “Not a bit. I’m only going to get one small bag, which I can dangle from my left arm. I’ll see you soon, don’t worry.”

  Wanda set off slowly toward Myrtle’s house as Myrtle strode decisively for the Piggly Wiggly grocery store.

  Myrtle noticed with irritation that everyone in town seemed to have the same idea at the same time and the store was quite crowded. She picked up a plastic shopping basket to remind herself that she didn’t need to get too many items or she’d have to call Miles or even Red to drive her back home with them. She started mulling over the ingredients for her Chicken Spectacular recipe. Canned chicken . . . of that she was quite confident. Cream of whatever soup. The other ingredients were a little harder to remember. Was it canned green beans? Canned asparagus? Pimentos?

  While she was considering the vagaries of the recipe, someone softly said her name behind her. She turned and saw Jenny Rollins there.

  “Miss Myrtle,” said Jenny with a smile. “I thought that was you.”

  Jenny was still a very beautiful woman. In fact, Myrtle considered that Royce had not had very good taste in straying from her. She was very tall, just as tall as Myrtle was. But where Myrtle was solidly constructed, Jenny was willowy with delicate features and high cheekbones. She had blonde hair cut short, which enhanced her angular face. Now she looked rather pale and drawn, almost certainly from the recent events and the loss of her husband.

  “Jenny! Goodness. Here I am shopping for ingredients to make you a casserole. I am just so sorry about Royce’s death. What a terrible shock that was for all of us, especially for you.”