A Baked Ham (20 page)

“Victoria, we need to talk,” he
said.
 
“I’ve been thinking about our list,
and I’d like to run some ideas past you.”

“I need to talk to you, too.
 
Why don’t you let me go first?” I asked after
I kissed my grandmother.
 
“We won’t be
long.
 
I promise.”

“Oh, I’ll be fine until you are,”
she said.
 
“Where do we stand?”

I brought her up to date on our
customers and their current status, and then Moose and I went back to the same
booth where I’d been sitting earlier.

“What’s up?” Moose asked.

I quickly told him everything I’d
uncovered since I’d seen him last.
 
He
whistled softly under his breath, and then he said, “You’ve been busy, haven’t
you?”

“They all came to me,” I
said.
 
“I swear I didn’t go looking for
any of them.”

“Easy, Victoria.
 
I approve.
 
I’ve been beating my head against the wall driving around town trying to
figure this out, but I haven’t made a bit of progress.
 
This is good news.”

“Only if we can figure out who’s
lying to us,
and
if the same person
is the killer,” I said.
 
“Those are two
mighty big ifs.”

“Maybe so, but at least it’s
something.
 
Do you think one of them left
that note on your door, or are we dealing with someone else entirely?”

“I believe the murderer is the
same person who left the note, but I don’t have any proof to back it up,” I
said.

“Don’t worry about that.
 
We’ll find the proof after we figure out who
killed Benny,” Moose said.

“I’m not sure that the police
would approve of our investigation methods,” I replied.

“They have their rules, and we
have ours.
 
Just how are we going to
manage figuring out who’s lying to us?”

“I confess, I don’t have a clue.
 
There are still way too many variables in
this case, and we still have too many suspects.
 
We have to remember that there’s a good chance that Marcus and Fred’s
conflicting alibis could easily
both
turn out to be red herrings.
 
As for
Amanda, she’s been a little
too
cooperative lately, and I just don’t trust Garret.
 
None of these issues necessarily point to the
killer, but I surely seem to have a lot of theories dancing around in my
mind.
 
Right now, as far as I’m
concerned, any of them could have done it.”

“If you have any ideas about how
we might go about eliminating a few of our suspects, I’d love to hear what you
have to say,” Moose said.

“Sorry.
 
I haven’t had any more luck than you have in
that department.
 
At this point, I
honestly don’t know what we’re going to do.”

“Are they putting on the play
again tonight?” Moose asked.

“No, the theater was already
booked for a magic act, so they’ve just got tomorrow night’s performance before
they close,” I said.

“It’s not a very long run, is
it?”

“Given that the cast is full of
amateurs, I have a feeling that it’s long enough.
 
Why do you ask?
 
Do you have something in mind?”

“A little pot stirring might be
in order,” Moose said.

“I recognize that twinkle in your
eye.
 
You’re up to no good, aren’t you?”

“And if I am?” he asked.

“Then, I want in on it,” I said
firmly.

“That’s my girl.
 
Why don’t we leave the diner in the capable
hands of your husband and my wife, and we’ll try to figure out the most
effective way to rile folks up around here.”

“That sounds like the best plan
we could have, given how stymied we are at the moment with actually detecting
anything.”

Moose grinned and touched the tip
of my nose with his forefinger, just as he’d done when I’d been a young
child.
 
“You know that, and I know it as
well, but the killer has no idea that we’re stumbling around in the dark, the
same as the police department seems to be doing.”

“We suspect that, but we don’t
know it,” I said.
 
“To be honest, I
wouldn’t mind if Sheriff Croft solved this one himself.
 
As far as I’m concerned, the sooner we can
get this cloud away from our family’s good name, the better.”

“Agreed.
 
Let’s take a drive and brainstorm, shall we?”

“I’m game if you are,” I said.

As we drove around town, Moose
and I must have thrown out a dozen ideas apiece on how to catch this killer
given what we knew at the moment, but we weren’t able to come up with anything
that we both thought might work.
 

“We should just be done with it
and leave each one of them a note with my answer,” I said, half in jest.
 
“If anyone challenges me directly about it,
we’ll know who did it.”

“I thought about that, too, but
it probably won’t work.
 
Everyone is too
closely tied together in this blasted case.
 
I’m afraid that they’ll all compare notes, and then we’re sunk.
 
The killer will know that we’re just taking a
stab in the dark.”

“Hang on a second,” I said.
 
“Let’s not dismiss it that quickly.
 
When you think about it, only Marcus and
Sandra are likely to talk to each other, and we can tailor whatever we say in
their notes so if they do compare, it won’t give us away.”

“I don’t know,” Moose said.
 
“It’s kind of risky, isn’t it?”

“You were the one who said we
needed to stir the pot,” I reminded him.
 
This should certainly accomplish that.”

“You’re right.
 
Let’s go back to the diner and brainstorm
about what the note should say,” my grandfather said as he turned the truck
around and headed back to The Charming Moose.

“Martha, would you mind running
the register a little longer?” I asked as we walked into the diner.
 
It was a slow day, something I was thankful
for, and Jenny had just come on duty.
 
“I’m sure that the worst of the rush is over for now.”

“Do whatever you need to do,”
Martha said.

“Thanks,” I answered, as Moose
offered thanks of his own with a quick kiss.

“We’ll be over there if you need
us,” he said, pointing to an empty booth away from the diners.
 

“I’m sure I’ll be fine,” she
said.

I reached down and pulled out a
notebook I kept under the register.
 
A
pen was clipped to it, and after getting tea for me and coffee for Moose, we
started thinking about what we should say.

After an hour, we had a note that
worked pretty well.
 
The message read,
printed in block letters, I WON’T BACK OFF.
 
CONFESS!

“It’s kind of aggressive, isn’t
it?” Moose asked.
 
“Do you think it’s too
much?
 
We don’t want the killer coming
after you.”

“I don’t think we have any choice
at this point.
 
I’ve been thinking about
it, and I think we need to pick either Sandra or Marcus to get one of our
notes, but not both of them.
 
Otherwise,
they’ll compare them, and then they’ll
know
that we’re bluffing.”

“I see your point, but which one
gets the note?”

“It has to be Marcus, don’t you
think?” I asked.
 

“Why?
 
It sounds as though Sandra had as much reason
to want Benny dead as her boyfriend did.”

“I know, but chances are good
that either Marcus or Fred lied to us about where they were when Benny was
murdered, if we are to believe Amanda’s story.
 
Actually, it occurs to me that we should believe her, anyway.
 
Fred confirmed that he went into the theater
through Sandra’s dressing room, so from Amanda’s point of view, what she saw
was true.
 
I know that Sandra
could
have killed Benny, but I doubt
that it will help us to single her out at this point, since as far as we know,
she
never lied to us.
 
Let’s go with Marcus and see where that leads
us.”

“Agreed,” Moose said.
 
“Would you like to print out the individual
notes, or should I do it myself?
 
I’m
fairly decent at writing in block letters.”

“Then, by all means, you do it,”
I said.
 
The diner was starting to get
busy, and Martha looked a little overwhelmed by it all, despite Jenny doing the
majority of the work.
 
“If you don’t
mind, I’m going to lend your wife a hand.”

“I’m sure that she would
appreciate it.
 
Don’t worry about
me.
 
I’ve got this covered.”

I left him carefully printing out
the first note, and I glanced at him from time to time as I walked past either
taking orders, delivering food, or working the cash register.
 

When I walked past him later,
there was a growing stack of notes in front of Moose, and as he closed the
notebook, I asked, “Are you all finished?”

My grandfather gathered the loose
notes up and smiled.
 
“They’re all taken
care of.
 
How should we deliver
them?
 
I don’t think we should use an ice
pick for each one.”

“That might be a little
too
aggressive.
 
I’ve got some generic envelopes in the office
in back.
 
I’ll grab a handful, and you
can address them to our suspects.”

“We don’t have time to mail them,
Victoria,” Moose said.

“I know that, but I don’t want to
leave the notes out somewhere so that
anyone
could read them.
 
Once it gets dark, we
need to make a little special mail run and hand-deliver them.”

“It’s going to have to do more
than get dark,” Moose said.
 
“I think we
should wait until midnight to hand these out.
 
Otherwise, there’s a risk that someone will see us doing it.”

I thought briefly about how early
I was going to have to get up the next morning, but this was more important
than losing a little sleep.
 
“Midnight it
is,” I agreed.

As I went into the kitchen to
grab the spare envelopes from the office, Greg asked, “What’s going on in the
crime-solving business?”

“Well, we’ve got an idea, but I’m
not sure how well it’s going to work out,” I admitted.

“I’m sure it will be great,” Greg
said.

“I wish I had your confidence in
our abilities, but truth be told, Moose and I are struggling at the moment.”

“Victoria, you worry too
much.
 
You’ll figure it out,” Greg said.

“Thanks,” I answered.
 
“By the way, Moose and I have a few errands
to run.”

“Go on.
 
I’m sure that Martha and Jenny can handle
things here on this end.”

“The problem is that we can’t
start until midnight,” I said.

“Good luck with that,” Greg said
with the hint of a laugh.
 
“Just try not
to wake me up as you leave or when you come back.
 
I need my beauty sleep, you know.”

“Not more than I do,” I said.

My husband stepped away from the
grill for a second and hugged me.
 
It
felt good being in his arms, if only for a few seconds, and the scents of
burgers and fries that filled the air wrapped me in their warmth.
 
I’d associate those smells with my husband’s
embrace long after he passed his spatula over to the next grill-master.
 

“Would it help any if I told you
that you were more beautiful right now than the day I married you?” he asked
softly.

“I’d know that you were lying,
but yeah, it would help a lot.”

Greg laughed as he pulled away
and smiled at me.
 
“You are one of a
kind, Victoria.”

“I surely hope so,” I said.
 
That hug did wonders for me.
 
It was better than three glasses of tea and a
hot shower, and I had a spring to my step as I walked back out into the dining
room.

Moose smiled broadly at me.
 
“Whatever you just got, I want some for
myself.”

“Greg just hugged me,” I
said.
 
“I’m sure he’d be happy to oblige
you, if you asked him nicely.”