A Body at Book Club (Myrtle Clover Mysteries) (9 page)

Myrtle muttered under her breath, fumbling with the remotes again until she pulled up the station that
Tomorrow’s Promise
ordinarily showed on. “Tennis!  For heaven’s sake. Tennis is on.”

“I rather like tennis,” said Miles in a mild tone. He took a big bite of his chocolate ice cream with chocolate syrup.

“I only watch tennis when it airs on Sundays,” said Myrtle stoutly. “Why is it coming on during the week in the afternoon?”

“It’s a tournament,” said Miles. “It’s not as if we missed anything. The show didn’t come on today. So when it’s back on tomorrow, they’ll pick up where they left off.”

“Yes, thank you, I understand the way preempted shows work,” groused Myrtle. “I’m just annoyed that a sporting event is messing up my plans.”

“We could watch tennis,” suggested Miles, “since you don’t mind watching it either. This Russian woman who is playing now is supposed to be very good.”

“No, because now I’m annoyed at the tennis game for bumping off my show,” said Myrtle. She fumed for a moment, staring at her melting ice cream. “Now I feel restless again. Maybe I should go put out more flyers for Pasha.”

“Myrtle!  Haven’t you done enough today? Besides, you’ve covered the area, and talked to enough suspects for one day, too.”

“I don’t want to talk to more suspects today,” said Myrtle. “But putting out more flyers makes sense.”

“It doesn’t, actually,” said Miles in a patient voice that set Myrtle’s teeth on edge. “I’ve been reading up on data about missing cats. One article I read said that cats could become quite disoriented when they’re in even slightly unfamiliar territory…particularly if they were driven out of their usual stomping grounds by a catfight or by being chased by a dog. They hide, apparently. Even if they’re very close by, they might be too scared to come out and are worried about where they are.”

Myrtle was in a mood where hearing logic annoyed her. And she was already put out with the change of plans for the rest of the afternoon and the fact that it didn’t involve her soap opera. And maybe the busy day had taken more out of her than she’d previously suspected. There was also the fact that, despite the positive message Wanda had given her, she was worried sick over that cat. Being worried sick wasn’t particularly good for Myrtle, either. So it was in an unfortunate icy tone that she asserted, “You’re just saying that because you think Pasha isn’t coming back home to me. You’re trying to let me down easily. You think she’s been run over by a car or something. Or that she’s sick or injured and crawled off into the woods to die.” These were her worst fears and something that she hadn’t allowed herself to voice earlier.

Miles glanced away briefly. “I’m only saying–” he started out, stiffly.

“You don’t even
like
Pasha,” shot back Myrtle in a furious voice.

Miles just blinked at her, his eyes stunned behind the rimless glasses, a bit of chocolate on the corner of his mouth. Then a hurt expression flickered across his face and he carefully took his empty ice cream bowl into the kitchen, rinsed it, and put it into the dishwasher.

“We can talk more about this after we’ve calmed down,” he said quietly. He didn’t seem as if he needed to calm down. He picked up his keys and left.

Chapter Nine

The unusual quarrel with Miles was the catalyst that set Myrtle’s night into a downward spiral. She slept restlessly that night and was plagued with insomnia at two-thirty in the morning. She’d had to squash her first instinct, which was to go over to Miles for their milk and cookies.

Myrtle decided to channel her insomnia and restlessness into something more productive. She started a load of laundry, emptied her dishwasher, and then sat down at her computer to write the news story about the mushroom poisoning. She wrote about Naomi and her involvement in both book club and garden club. She mentioned that the garden club had brought in a special speaker from the county extension office who had talked at great length about poisonous mushrooms, as well as other garden problems. Without coming right out and making the connection, since it was a news story, she wrote that not long after that meeting, Naomi had been poisoned by a
Destroying Angel
mushroom.

Myrtle read over the story carefully, tweaking her word choice and ensuring the article was as factual as she could make it.  Then she opened up another document and wrote her regular, helpful hints column. She had several decent things to put in there this time…it really all depended on what people emailed over to her. A couple of times she’s unapologetically made up tips, not having any material. It kept her creativity alive, she’d decided. But this time she had a tip for putting a dry towel in with a wet load in the dryer to speed up the drying process. And a tip for using old milk containers as watering cans by poking holes into the plastic cap.

Myrtle ended her tip column with an appeal to the public to keep an eye out for Pasha.

She hopefully looked outside her front window to see if her newspaper had come—at this point, it was four o’clock in the morning. It hadn’t, but it arrived thirty minutes later with a skidding sound on her front walk. Myrtle fetched it, and quickly finished the crossword puzzle. Then she read over the tips column and the news story one more time and emailed them to her editor, Sloan.

Myrtle was walking into her kitchen for a refill of coffee when her computer made a chiming sound to let her know she’d gotten an email. She frowned and headed back over to the desktop.

There was an immediate response from Sloan there. She was amazed that he woke up this early. The email said:
I’m sorry, Miss Myrtle, but I can’t run this story. Thanks for the tip column, though, and good luck with the missing cat. It’s always a good idea to add a bit of human interest to a column—great job.

Myrtle hadn’t been trying to add human interest to the column. She’d just wanted to get her cat back. And it was extremely annoying about the news story. Red continued shutting her down at every turn. It was turning out to be a most unsatisfactory day already…and it was only five a.m.

It was after breakfast when things became worse.

Myrtle’s phone rang at eight-thirty and she frowned at the wall phone. Phone calls before nine o’clock in the morning were tacky. She walked over and picked up. “Hello?” she asked.

A nasal and insistent voice said, “Is this Myrtle Clover?”

“Tell me who this is, first,” said Myrtle impatiently. “You’re the one making the call.”

“This is Nan, a representative from Greener Pastures Retirement Home. Is this Myrtle Clover?”

“Yes it is,” said Myrtle guardedly.

“We understand that you want to be placed on the waiting list for Greener Pastures,” said the woman in a rather pompous tone.

Myrtle spluttered, “That I
want
to be on the waiting list? Pardon me?”

The voice continued, nasally. “We don’t take every applicant to Greener Pastures. Some are simply not suited. You will need to come in and demonstrate that you’re able enough to be a resident at our facility. And we’ll want you to take our tour so that you can get a better sense of the kind of residence we provide.”

Myrtle was struck speechless. Then she rallied enough to say in a dangerous growl, “
You
interview
me
?”

“That is the procedure.”

Myrtle said in a voice so angry it shook, “I can assure you, that if I get to that point of sheer desperation where I need to be shipped off to a retirement home,
I
will be the one interviewing
you
. And I doubt very much that you’ll measure up. I do
not
want to be on your waiting list. I’ve no intention of residing at your facility.”

“We received a phone call,” droned the woman.

“Only because my son is being obstreperous.” And Myrtle slammed down the phone, breathing hard. Her eyes narrowed with determination. The only possible response to this foolishness was to pull her entire ceramic gnome collection out into her front yard. There was no more effective means of displaying her displeasure with Red than to force him to endure a vista of gnomes when he gazed out his front windows.

Myrtle's mind worked overtime as she lugged out the gnomes, positioning them as close to the road as she could. Surely, it was time for things to start looking up. A fight with Miles? A rejected article for the newspaper? A recruitment call from the retirement home? And all of this on top of her missing cat. Myrtle decided she needed to get out of the house and focus on the case. Sitting around the house worrying about stuff that was out of her control was for ninnies.

But where was she? What did she need to do next? Talking to Miles was always good to help her figure out a clear path. Now she’d have to figure out her next step on her own and she frowned as she focused. She’d talked with everyone once. But where did she need to follow up?

Rose was the obvious suspect. But something made her feel uneasy about Rose and she couldn’t put her finger on it. Was it the fact that she alluded that she knew someone who had a grudge against Naomi? Did she know more than she was letting on? Or did Myrtle feel uneasy simply because Rose held some latent, or not-so-latent, animosity against her?

Rose would be her first visit today. Her manner bothered her, if nothing else. Maybe she could catch Rose off-guard today and get her to be more forthcoming. When she’d talked with her yesterday, Myrtle felt as if she didn’t do a good job really pushing her for information. She’d let Rose push her away a bit. Today, she might push more on the topic of poisonous mushrooms. Then she could try to gauge her reaction.

Thinking about garden club made Myrtle take a peek into her backyard. Dry as a bone, as she’d figured. She’d run the sprinkler in the front yard a couple of days ago, but neglected to water the back. She attached the sprinkler to the hose, turned the spigot on, shook the water from the leaking connection off her hand, and then hurried back inside.

Myrtle finished getting ready and found her cane. She was glad that all the activity from the day before hadn’t made her sore today because it looked as if she was going to be doing some walking.

As she stepped outside, she automatically looked for Pasha. But all she saw was crabgrass…and Erma driving off, giving a toot of her horn and a wave to Myrtle as she left. Myrtle decided to take this opportunity to fling more of that homemade weed killer into Erma’s front yard, close to the border of Myrtle’s yard. A natural boundary to keep the stuff from creeping over. Feeling pleased for the first time that day, Myrtle put the container back in the house, locked the door behind her, and headed over to Rose’s house.

It seemed unusually quiet on Rose’s street this morning. Surely, everyone must be awake. It wasn’t as if it were early. Myrtle double-checked her watch to make sure. No, it was a perfectly reasonable ten o’clock. But there was no one walking down the street, no one doing yard work. And, of course, Naomi was dead—no activity at her house at all.

Myrtle walked up Rose’s front walk and to the front door. She rapped on the door and waited for an answer. Nothing. She rang the doorbell—surely, Rose was up. Her car was in the driveway, so she should be home. It seemed rather late in the morning for Rose to be taking a shower or some such thing…she was an early bird. No answer. Myrtle rang it again, and then rapped on the front door again—still no answer.

Then Myrtle tried the door handle and found that it turned and the door opened. Was Rose the kind of person who left her door unlocked all the time? She knew Bradley was a small town, but Red had always drilled into Myrtle’s head that small towns had bad guys, too. Myrtle cautiously stuck her head in through the front door. “Yoo-hoo!  Rose! It’s Myrtle Clover.”

She listened for an answer, but heard none.

Myrtle paused for a moment, then opened the door farther and said in a louder voice, “Rose? It’s Myrtle Clover. Can I come in for a few minutes?”

Nothing.

Myrtle suddenly reached into her tremendous purse and fumbled inside until her fingers closed on a small object. She pulled out the pepper spray that Wanda had given her and proceeded into the quiet house.

Myrtle gripped her cane tightly in her hand as she walked. “Rose?”

She walked across the hardwood floor and into the living room…and swayed just a bit as she saw a figure on the floor in nearly the same spot as Naomi Pelter’s body had lain. It was Rose Mayfield, dead in a pool of blood, with a fireplace poker lying next to her.

Myrtle’s head swam as she surveyed the scene in front of her. She glanced quickly around her with a sharp eye, but saw no sign that the killer was still here. The door had been unlocked—it seemed likely that Rose knew her murderer and had let him in. Perhaps he left by the same route.

She needed to call Red. Myrtle opened up her purse, sticking the pepper spray back inside, and reached for her cell phone. Then she paused. Red was going to shut her down, but good. Was there anything, anything at all that she could see quickly before he got here?

Myrtle dialed Red’s number slowly, glancing around her. No signs of a struggle that she could see. Everything was in the right place, except for the fireplace poker. The only injury that Myrtle spotted was the gash on the back of Rose’s head…and Rose was lying face down, which suggested to Myrtle that she’d been hit from behind. Which suggested something else—that Rose felt comfortable enough to turn her back on her attacker.

Red picked up on the fourth ring. “Mama? Is everything okay? I was going to call you later to see if you wanted me to take you to the store.”

“The store? Maybe. I don’t know. Listen, Red, I’m in Rose Mayfield’s house—”

“
What
?”  Red’s voice was loud enough for Myrtle to pull the phone away from her head.

“Calm down, Red. Rose and I have been dealing with some…garden club business. Anyway …”

“Since when have you become a gardening fanatic? Last I saw, Elaine had to practically drag you to one of the meetings,” said Red in a grumpy voice.

“Since Erma Sherman has been driving me crazy by allowing her nasty crabgrass to creep over into my yard,” said Myrtle with a sniff. “Now
listen
. For once.” Red stopped talking and Myrtle took a deep breath. “I came over to Rose’s house and her door was unlocked. I walked inside and found that she’s…well…she’s dead.”

“
What
?”

Red was starting to sound like a broken record. Or perhaps he was getting hard of hearing. He
was
in his forties, after all. She loudly repeated, “Rose Mayfield is dead! In her living room. With a fireplace poker. You might want to see about it.”

Myrtle hung up the phone as Red continued spluttering. She continued looking around the room, standing very still so as not to disturb anything.

And she found that Rose kept her house very tidy. Disappointingly tidy. As a matter of fact, there really weren’t even any clues to Rose’s personality here in the room. No photographs of family. No books lying around.

The only thing anywhere in the room was a spiral-bound crossword puzzle book. As a fellow crossword aficionado, Myrtle walked closer to get a look at the book, stooping down to see it without touching it.

Rose was apparently the kind of crossword puzzle solver who liked to pen firm answers to the crossword clues in ink. She even jotted down ideas for clues in the margins of the book in pencil until she was sure that the possibility would fit. Then she appeared to erase the penciled-in idea. This alone spoke to her personality. But there was something even more interesting on the page.

Rose had written down
seating arrangement?
in the margin. But, as Myrtle scanned the puzzle, she couldn’t see a potential clue that fit the answer—or a spot on the puzzle that the answer would fit in. As a matter of fact, Myrtle didn’t think that Rose had jotted that down in conjunction with the puzzle at all. She’d written it in ink, too, as if she were too distracted to use her usual method of penciling something in.