Antiques Disposal (5 page)

Read Antiques Disposal Online

Authors: Barbara Allan

BOOK: Antiques Disposal
12.76Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
Peggy Sue, impatient as always, was indeed tailgating me—particularly dangerous under these conditions—so I tapped my brakes to put a little scare into her. She honked at me, to put a scare into me.
Finally, Mother said, “It's my aunt Olive, dear. You remember her.”
“Vaguely.”
“Well, she's lost.”
“I don't get it. Didn't she die a couple of years ago?”
At the ripe old age of ninety-five. At the time, Mother was having one of her “spells,” and I was in the midst of a divorce, so neither of us attended Olive's funeral out in Ohio.
“So, what, then?” I asked. “Was she a sinner and you figure she's lost in the throes of hellfire damnation or something?”
“Don't sound ridiculous, dear.”
“Yeah. I wouldn't want to sound ridiculous. So. Don't turn you into a paperweight?”
Mother's nod was barely perceptible, as if taking a cue from offstage. “After Aunt Olive was cremated, her daughter had the ashes turned into a paperweight.” She sighed. “I suppose it was comforting, still having her mother around the house ... but something tragic happened.”
“It broke?”
“No. Much worse. The paperweight accidently got sold in a garage sale.”
I might have laughed if Mother hadn't sounded so distressed.
“And now?” she said to the car's ceiling. “Now, poor Aunt Olive is in some stranger's house, gathering dust.”
“Maybe she's being put to practical use. Sitting on top of a stack of bills or something. Wasn't she a math teacher? That would be kind of fitting.”
Mother was ignoring my comments. “Or
worse
—thrown in the trash, to be buried in a landfill along with the rest of the disgusting garbage!”
“Don't worry,” I said, too kind to point out that she had just classified Aunt Olive as garbage, and disgusting garbage at that. “You won't end up as a paperweight, Mother, or anything else. You'll have a proper burial, somewhere I can visit you, and weep.”
Mother touched my arm. “Thank you, dear. That's reassuring.”
“I was thinking of a storage unit.”
And to her credit, Mother laughed rather heartily at that.
“Good one, dear,” she said. “Good one.”
By now, the fog was so thick I almost missed the entrance to the storage facility, and when I made a sharp left turn, Mother slid into me, as far as her seat belt would allow.
“Nice save, dear.”
Peggy Sue, having wisely put some distance between us, had no trouble pulling into the graveled drive, and she trailed our car up to the unit, where soon we were all standing while Mother fished around in a jacket pocket for the padlock key.
Peggy Sue, having second thoughts, asked, “These boxes won't get my car dirty, will they? I try to keep the Escalade clean, you know.”
“Should be fine,” I lied. “Of course, there may be a chocolate sprinkle or two.”
Sis frowned. “What?”
I gave her a quick summary of Mother's mouse dropping trick, and if I'd thought that would disgust her, I was wrong.
“Ingenious,” Peggy Sue said admiringly. “The old girl's got a head on her shoulders. Have to give her that.”
That head was wagging side to side, as Mother was having trouble with the lock; but finally she gave it a good jiggle, and it snapped open.
I grasped the door handle, pulling it up, revealing darkness; the ground fog swirled in as if seeking sanctuary from the night.
Mother, poised for action, switched on her flashlight (retrieved from her jacket), aiming its beam inside, light-sabering it around.
We stood and stared.
“Empty,” Mother murmured.
Sis asked, “Are you sure this is the right unit?”
I stepped back, checked the metal number nailed to the outside. “Number seven. This is it.”
Mother had gone on in. “I don't understand,” she exclaimed in disbelief. “It was half full when we left this morning!”
Peggy Sue pointed. “Looks like a rolled-up rug in the corner. Maybe it's a valuable Oriental.”
I took the flashlight from a befuddled Mother, and went deeper, for a closer look.
“It's not a rug,” I said after a moment.
“What is it?” Mother asked.
“Uh ... it's your friend Big Jim Bob.”
“Whatever is he doing in there?”
“Not much.”
 
A Trash ‘n' Treasures Tip
 
Before an auction at a storage facility, rules and regulations will be provided to prospective bidders. Such conditions vary with each site, so be sure you understand them before bidding—if you are required to clean up the unit after you've removed its contents, and fail to do so, the cleaning bill you receive may be no bargain.
Chapter Three
Calling All Units!
I
handed Mother my cell phone so she could be the one to notify the police, knowing how much making a call like that means to her. And she was very businesslike about it, though unfortunately that included using the fake British accent she sometimes affected to sound more important.
“Vivian Borne here,” she said crisply, chin up. “There appears to have been a murder at the Lucky Four Leaf Clover Storage facility. River Road. Mind the fog.”
I couldn't make out the dispatcher's response, but judging by Mother's reply—“My dear, I'm
always
‘for real' ”—you can extrapolate it for yourself.
I was tending to Peggy Sue, who had actually passed out or fainted or anyway melted into a human puddle, after I'd announced Big Jim Bob's presence (and lack of a pulse).
I was doing my best to lift Sis up off the gravel when the flutter of eyelids indicated she'd returned to consciousness. I helped her up, then walked her to the Caddie, and eased her into the front passenger's seat, reclining it for more comfort.
“Please,” she murmured.
“Yes?”
“Please take me home.”
It was fairly pitiful. Did all the older women in my family have to be so childlike? When
I
was the most mature one around, we definitely had problems.
“We can't leave,” I told her. “Not until the police arrive. And then there'll be questions.”
“But I don't want to get involved!”
“You
are
involved,” I said. “You're a witness.”
“I didn't see that man get killed!”
“No, but you were here when I discovered the body.” Then I added, “I'll do my best to keep you out of it.”
Sis moaned. “Just when I thought my life couldn't get any worse, I get dragged into another of your stupid murders.”
My chin wrinkled in irritation. “First of all, it's not one of
my
murders, stupid or otherwise. Second of all, we don't even know if it's a murder. You think I
like
this?”
“No. But
Mother
is relishing it.”
I couldn't deny that.
I patted her shoulder, cutting her some slack. The tragic way her husband had left this life really had been enough of a hardship for her. “You just try to rest... .”
Inside the unit, I found Mother standing near the late Big Jim Bob, his prone form awash in the beam of her flashlight. The owner of the storage facility lay facedown, arms extended, the back of his head matted with blood.
Okay, so maybe it
was
a murder... .
“We have precious little time, dear,” Mother said brusquely.
“For what?”
“Evidence gathering. Appraising the crime scene.”
“We're not detectives. We're a couple of unlucky females who have had the misfortune of getting involved in a couple of ... of—”
“Homicides,” Mother snapped. “We have to complete our preliminary investigation before the boys in blue arrive and compromise the crime scene.”
“Aren't
we
compromising the crime scene?”
“Not as long as we don't touch anything.” She looked at me with her
Mrs. Bug Goes to Town
eyes huge behind the glasses. “Now, take notes!”
“I don't have a pad or pen.”
Mother frowned. “You should always be prepared for this kind of contingency, dear.”
“It's not like murder is an everyday occurrence in our lives!” Even if it was starting to feel that way. “Why weren't
you
prepared?”
“Preparation is
your
job.”
“Why my job?”
“Because
I
am Holmes, and
you
are Watson.”
“How do you figure that?”
“It occurred to me when we began watching that new modern-day Holmes series. The BBC one?”
She was standing over a corpse, the flashlight now dancing nervously against the wall of the unit as she extolled the virtues of a television show. How exactly did this become my life, anyway?
“Such a brilliant idea!” she told Big Jim Bob and me. “Bringing that Victorian duo into contemporary London, with all the gadgetry of the twenty-first century! Holmes with a cell phone! Who'd have thunk it?”
I
wouldn't have thunk it. Apparently Big Jim Bob, either.
Mother is an actress who needs more than her share of prompting, so I said, “Precious time?”
“Quite right, dear. Now, without writing utensils, you'll just have to remember what I say.”
“Okay ... because I'm Watson.”
“Precisely.”
“
Which
Watson?”
“Not following you, dear... .”
“Which
Watson?
The buffoonish Nigel Bruce? The more intelligent Edward Hardwicke? Then there's David Burke—he was a likable chap.” For just a moment I had fallen into Mother's British accent. “Personally, I like Jude Law.”
And not necessarily as Watson.
“Whichever one you prefer,” Mother said impatiently. “Can we get on with it?”
“Think of me as Nigel Bruce—less pressure.”
“Brandy!”
“All right! I'm ready. Go.”
Mother took a deep breath, then her words came rapid-fire. “Note that Big Jim Bob—while wearing the same clothes as this morning—has on different boots. They're dry, so he had to have come back here
after
the rain stopped.”
She touched the corpse's head with her flashlight beam.
Ick.
“Death blow delivered by a heavy, blunt object.”
The light moved to his jeans.
“No bulge in the back pocket, so his wallet would appear missing. Robbery? Possibly,
but
... his expensive gold nugget ring is still on one finger. What does that tell us?”
She turned for my answer, the flashlight coming along for the ride, its beam blinding me.
I shielded my eyes. “That you're getting pretty good at this?”
“Thank you, but no. What does it
tell
us?”
“The killer doesn't dig bling?”
Hey, I was Nigel Bruce—a bit of buffoonery came with the territory.
“Nooooo,” Mother replied. “It tells us the crime scene was hastily
staged
to appear like a robbery.”
“But it
is
a robbery,” I protested. “Otherwise, where are the rest of our boxes? And another thing ...”
“Yes?”
“Get that light out of my eyes!”
She did. “Dear, I'm talking about the murder
itself
being staged to seem part of the larger overall—and very
real
—robbery. We can't, at this stage, know for certain that the killer was the same person who emptied the unit of our remaining boxes. We could have two different crimes here.”
I said, “Well, at least we know the murder weapon.”
“We do?”
“Big Jim Bob's steel cutter?” Wasn't
I
supposed to be Nigel Bruce? “It's lying over there... .”
Mother flashed the beam where I was pointing, the tiny spotlight suddenly showcasing the cutter, a few yards away, its steel jaws blackened with blood.
“Missed that,” Mother said.
A rare admission from Holmes.
“But,” I said, “you're right about the staging of a robbery as the motive. A thief would have taken the ring. And if he couldn't remove it, there was always the cutter to use to get it.”
Mother was nodding. “Very astute, dear.”
A rare compliment for Watson.
“Why,” she said, “that finger would have snapped right off like a tiny twig.”
A nauseated moan came from the entryway—apparently Peggy Sue had been standing there long enough to hear the last part of our conversation.
“I think I'm going to be sick,” she said, clutching her stomach with one hand. Her other hand made a small fist that shook at the air. “Sometimes I think you two are crazy. Demented! There's a man murdered in there, and you banter back and forth like some silly comedy team. Don't you have any respect for the dead?”
Raising her voice, Mother said, “Go back to the car, dear. You'll soon feel better. Brandy and I are old hands at this kind of thing, and no disrespect is meant for—”
“Mother,” Peggy said, “shut up.”
Mother gave me a
whatever-did-I-do-to-deserve-that
expression, and I shrugged in agreement, though of course Peggy Sue was exactly right.
But I didn't think our conduct came out of being “old hands” at this—I think we were numb, even in shock, at finding ourselves caught up in a homicide yet again.
As Sis left, shaking her head, the distant wail of a siren brought an end to our preliminary sleuthing. We scurried out of the storage unit like frightened mice, leaving nary a dropping, to stand by the Buick and await the police.
Soon the wail became a scream that cut off abruptly as the squad car with lights flashing burst through the fog, seeming to leap toward us before coming to a gravel-grinding halt.
This nerve-jarring arrival was followed by that of another vehicle, which pulled up with considerably less melodrama: the unmarked car of the chief of police. Two officers hopped out of the squad car, male and female, both well-known to Mother and me (and vice versa).
The driver was lanky Scott Munson, mid-forties, his oblong Herman Munsterish face in a sorrowful cast, possibly because this was a homicide, or maybe he was just reacting to finding Mother and me at the scene.
His partner, Mia Cordona, was my age, a dark-haired beauty whose masculine uniform couldn't hide her hourglass shape. Mia had once been a good friend but we'd drifted apart.
Exiting the unmarked car was Brian Lawson, interim chief since Tony Cassato had entered the Witness Protection Program. Brian had a leanly muscular athlete's build and was (if it's not bad taste to say so in this context) drop-dead handsome, with sandy hair and the kind of brown eyes a girl could get lost in.
And, once upon a time, I had.
Which is to say I had history with these officers, even before Mother and I had begun making a bad habit of turning up at crime scenes.
Mother was the first to speak. “In there,” she said to Munson and Mia, who had reached us first.
Munson hurried past us, but Mia paused long enough to give me a disparaging look, which I responded to with an elaborate shrug.
Then, with mag-lights shining, the uniformed pair disappeared inside the unit.
Mother faded back, leaving me to deal with Brian.
“Are you all right?” he asked, concern tightening his boyish face.
“I'm fine.” I cocked my head. “But I'm surprised to see you here. The chief himself?”
He lifted an eyebrow. “I was just leaving the station when the call came in. Wanted to make sure you were okay.”
“I'm fine. But Peggy Sue isn't.” I gestured toward the Caddie. “She actually fainted when we found the body. I don't think I ever saw anybody faint before, except in movies.”
“Does she need medical assistance? The paramedics are on the way.”
“She's all right—just shook up,” I said. “Why paramedics? It's not like Big Jim Bob needs them.”
“It's procedure.” His concern, maybe because I was being so flip, switched over to curiosity. “How did you happen onto him, anyway? Guy owned the business here, right?”
I nodded, then filled him in on everything that had happened since this morning. Had it really only been eight hours? On the other hand, I was wiped out enough for it to have been eight days.
I was wrapping up my account when Mia's sharply raised voice interrupted, echoing within the unit.
“Get
out!
” she shouted.
“Why, Officer!” Mother retorted, and hopped out, landing a little unsteadily. “I was merely trying to be useful.”
“You mean use
less
,” Mia said. Like a teacher sending a very bad child to the principal's office, she pointed a finger at Mother, then away from the unit. “This kind of nonsense landed you in jail not so long ago, Vivian. If you don't want to go
back
there, stay
out!
”

Other books

Dead Weight by Steven F. Havill
The Harvest by K. Makansi
King Divas by De'nesha Diamond
Arts & Entertainments: A Novel by Christopher Beha
Minds That Hate by Bill Kitson
Never More by Dana Marie Bell