Do or Diner: A Comfort Food Mystery (15 page)

I chuckled. “It’s for Blondie, but I’d be happy to put one on for you.”

“No, thanks. I’m too tired to chew.” He leaned against the steam table. “What did Blondie do to deserve such an honor?”

I showed him the scrap of gardenia material. “What does this look like to you?”

He took the small uneven rectangle and shrugged. “Fabric?”

“Exactly!” I punched the air. “And who wears fabric like this?”

“I don’t know, but I think you’re going to tell me.”

“Antoinette Chloe Brown!” I waited for his reaction, but I could have been waiting until the salmon ran before he responded.

“Ty, she wears those flowing muumuus with the tropical prints. She has a gardenia one, and a bird of paradise one, and probably more, too.”

None of that seemed to hold any weight with him.

“And where did you find this?” he asked, staring at the fabric.

“Blondie found it. I think Antoinette Chloe was hiding by my Dumpster out back, waiting for an opportunity to poison Mr. Cogswell. I found threads caught on a bolt. That’s probably where Blondie found this material.”

“But you don’t know for sure,” Ty said.

“No, but—”

“And why would she be hiding by your Dumpster?”

“To wait for Juanita to be distracted,” I said. “And she was. Remember? Roberta called her to the front of the diner to return Juanita’s cell phone. So, when Juanita was out front, Antoinette Chloe Brown slipped the poison mushrooms into Mr. Cogswell’s pork and scalloped potatoes.”

He stared at me, expressionless.

Why wasn’t he following this?

“Okay. Okay.” He rubbed his eyes. “What’s her motive for killing Mr. Cogswell?”

“Um…uh…I don’t know. I haven’t gotten that far yet.”

“Okay.” He handed the scrap of material back to me.

“Don’t you want to test the threads hanging from the Dumpster to see if they match the material?” I asked.

“Remind me, and I’ll bag it all up tomorrow and send it to the state police lab.”

His enthusiasm was underwhelming. Maybe he was just too tired to appreciate the brilliance of my discovery.

I cut up Blondie’s steak and put it onto an aluminum
pie tin, then popped it into the freezer to cool for a few minutes. I then lowered the pan and watched her lap up the steak. At least Blondie was appreciative. It was gone in seconds.

“You know, Ty. I think that a lot of people have motives to get rid of Marvin Cogswell.”

“Oh yeah? Tell me.”

“I’ve also discovered that Mark Cummings is very protective of Roberta,” I said to Ty, “and he probably didn’t like it that Marvin physically abused her. I also found out that it was a woman who phoned in the mushroom order to Sunshine Food Supply. I think it was Antoinette Chloe Brown who called it in.”

“Why her?”

“Because I think she likes being the Queen of Sandy Harbor with all the business at her restaurant, and because it would look like I was lying about the Silver Bullet never having mushrooms in the place.”

“All good information,” he said, “but I’m not quite ready to rope that steer.”

“Nice cowboy rhetoric, but I’m going to need a translation.”

“You’re just guessing.”

“So what do I do now, Ty?”

He shook his head. “You do nothing. I’m in charge of this investigation.” He snapped his fingers for Blondie, and the dog walked to his side and waited.

Yeah, I knew that he didn’t want me involved in his investigation, but I couldn’t wait forever for
this case to be solved. “Good night, Ty,” I said, walking toward the double doors to go into the kitchen.

“Aren’t you going home?” he asked.

“Can’t,” I said. “We’re open twenty-four hours. You must have missed the red neon sign on the top of the diner.” I grinned and pushed through the doors to the front. “Time to make another pot of coffee, strong.”

“I can’t leave you here,” he said, following me.

“Yes, you can. Go home.”

“Dammit, Trixie, there’s a murderer on the loose. And it’s two o’clock in the morning! Why don’t you just close the place?”

“I can’t, Ty. I just can’t. The Silver Bullet has never closed, not since Porky and Stella bought it and had it towed here.”

“So you’re going to wait in a booth overnight, hoping for a customer?” He shook his head.

“I’m the owner now. It’s what I’m going to do.” I plopped my tired, ample butt into the front booth. I positioned my coffee to my right and my notebook in front of me. I had a lot of lists to write, and I also wanted to write some notes about what I’d discovered so far concerning Mr. Cogswell’s death.

I slipped the piece of material into my notebook. That was my biggest clue, and Ty hadn’t paid it much attention.

“What if I leave Blondie here to keep you company?”

“I’d like that.”

“Stay with Trixie,” he instructed the dog. “Stay.” Blondie looked from Ty to me, and then collapsed in a half circle on the floor, her chin resting on her paws. Poor Blondie was tired, too.

“Call me if you need me.” He took a deep breath and let it out. “I mean it, Trixie.”

I was flattered, but I realized that his concern was just the law enforcement part of him. You know: to serve and protect. It was the protection part that was rearing up.

“Ty, I’m fine. Go already. Go!”

Finally, he left. I could picture him walking down the front stairs and crossing in front of the boat launch to the bait shop. Then he’d walk up the outside stairs and open the door to his room above the shop.

At least there was another person nearby.

I stared at the dessert carousel again. Everything was going to go stale if I didn’t get more customers in here.

I thought about Uncle Porky. I could feel his jovial presence in the diner, talking to everyone, joking with his old pals. I could picture him grabbing Aunt Stella in a big bear hug and planting a noisy kiss on her lips. He was rarely seen without his white chef’s apron and floppy white cap.

And darn, the man could cook.

I’d follow him around like a puppy every rainy day during the summer when I was a little kid, and whenever I’d ask to help him, he’d wrap a bright, white apron around me, find me a floppy hat, and we’d cook orders together for the diner.

Uncle Porky would give his last dollar to anyone who needed it. He was always throwing benefits for someone who was sick, or for the library, or for anything and everything for kids—probably because he never had any of his own.

A tear slid down my cheek. I felt like I was failing him, failing to keep his legacy. I had to solve this murder to save his legacy.

An hour went by and then lights flashed across the diner. For a second I thought it was Uncle Porky sending me a message. But it was a car pulling in. A customer!

I quickly cleaned up my booth and stuffed my notebook back into my purse. I tried to look nonchalant and less like a piranha waiting for prey.

Someone rolling in at two in the morning might want some serious food. Nah, probably not. Probably just coffee. Maybe a cinnamon bun.

I rearranged the buns to show them off.

The bells above the door jingled, and in walked…Mayor Tingsley.

“I didn’t think you’d be open,” he said, looking around at the empty diner.

“Twenty-four hours, seven days a week. We are open even on Christmas, in case someone needs a place to go. They are welcome at the Silver Bullet.”

This was Uncle Porky’s usual speech, and I knew that he never charged anyone for their meal on Christmas Day. I was planning on continuing that tradition.

I sure was channeling him tonight.

“What can I get you, Mayor?”

“I’d like to remind you about my offer for the Silver Bullet, the cottages, the boat launch, and the farmhouse. The whole point. Two million bucks. Cash.”

I stepped back. He sure cut to the chase. “Can I get you a cup of coffee?”

“That depends.”

“On what?”

“If you’re going to jerk me around or not.”

I poured him a cup of coffee anyway and slid it in front of him at the counter. “Mr. Mayor, it’s been a long day. I’m dead tired. I don’t even know my own name about now. It’s not a good time.”

“Just remember these words: two million bucks.”

“I remember them from when you made an offer to me before.” My head was pounding, and I was getting cranky. “What, no flowers this time?”

“Laura and I want this place, and we usually get what we want.”

Isn’t that special?

“The poisoning of the health inspector in your kitchen has turned this diner into a ghost town,” he said.

I wished people would quit reminding me of that.

I remained silent, but I wanted to toss the pompous jerk into the nearest snowbank.

“I can either buy it from you now or when it goes up for auction.” He sniffed. “Obviously, you’re going to go under.”

“I don’t think it’s all that obvious, at least not to me. The season hasn’t even started yet.”

“It’s the diner that keeps this place afloat. Ask Stella.”

He took a big gulp of coffee and grunted. I should have told him that it was flaming hot, but he seemed to know just about everything.

“Where is Stella anyway?”

I didn’t want her involved in this. I was the owner. “She’s incommunicado.”

“Where’s that?” he asked.

I bit back a grin. “Italy.”

“Oh.”

He slammed back the rest of his coffee and winced. “Terrible coffee.” Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a business card and tossed it on the counter in front of me. Then he was gone. He didn’t even offer to pay for the coffee.

I would have charged him for it, too, just because he was an ass.

I read his card:
RICK TINGSLEY, REAL ESTATE AND INVESTMENTS. MAYOR OF SANDY HARBOR, NEW YORK, SALMON CAPITAL OF THE WORLD
.

Did Mayor Tingsley want the point so badly that he’d try to put me out of business? Would he go so far as to kill Mr. Cogswell? Maybe he had something against Mr. Cogswell.

I returned to my favorite booth, got out my notebook, wrote his name down, and circled it.

Mayor Tingsley had a motive. He wanted the Sandy Harbor Guest Cottages and the Silver Bullet Diner. He wanted my Victorian house.

He wanted my memories.

Well, he could just forget it.

I was here, and I wasn’t moving. I’d just moved, and I had the unpacked boxes, bags, and plastic bins to prove it!

I stared at his business card. He probably wanted to develop the property. Condos and private boat slips? Something like that.

A lot of family resort places were selling out to developers. Given the choice, wouldn’t a kid opt to hit a famous resort with thrill rides and high-tech whatnot rather than camp with his family in a sleepy cottage colony that didn’t even have cable TV?

I must have fallen asleep, because the next thing I knew, Juanita was calling my name.

“Trixie? Trixie, wake up. Go home.”

She nudged my shoulder, and I reluctantly tucked away my dream of a full diner and children making sand castles and mud pies on the beach.

I opened my eyes. Ick. Instant headache. I tried to stand, but every bone in my body was sore and stiff.

“You look like something that the dog dragged in,” Juanita said.

The dog did drag in something last night. I scooped up my notebook with the gardenia material tucked inside. As soon as I saw Ty, I’d remind him to get the threads from the Dumpster and send everything to the state police lab.

How could I get into Antoinette Chloe Brown’s
house to see if she had a piece missing from her gardenia muumuu?

It was just too early in the morning for my brain to be swirling like it was. I fished in my purse for some aspirin.

“Juanita, I’m going to go home, take a shower, and crash for a while. Can you take care of things here?”

“Of course,” she said, looking at me like I had the impression of the spiral metal of my notebook tattooed on my face. Feeling my cheek, I realized that I did.

I gathered up all my things, stuffed myself into my coat, laced up my boots, and headed out the front door. Blondie followed me, taking care of her business on a snow-covered dip in the lawn. I made a mental note of the location. Not that I was going to clean it up—hell no!—but I’d tell Ty. He could pick it up.

It was seven-something in the morning, and a strange foreign object was beginning to light up the sky. Could that actually be the sun?

And then I stopped crunching on the snow to hear…what? Was that actually a bird chirping?

I didn’t hear it again, and I decided that the noise must have been me, wheezing from exertion.

My shower felt heavenly. So did the big springy bed when I burrowed under the fluffy comforter, wet hair and all. Blondie curled up on the braided rug next to the bed.

My body was exhausted, but I couldn’t get my brain to shut down.

I kept thinking of tropical flowers, dancing mushrooms, Roberta Cummings storming out of the fire hall, her scarecrow of a brother making deliveries to all the local restaurants, and the late health inspector, Mr. Cogswell the Third.

Who would want him killed? And why?

I thought of Mayor Tingsley’s offer to buy everything, and how I’d never sell to him. Not even for millions.

And then it hit me. No, it wasn’t a breakthrough on the case, or a clue that dropped from the sky—it was that I’d forgotten to eat the piece of Wacky Cake from Juanita.

That wasn’t like me.

The cake was calling to me more than the mystery, so I finally gave in and went downstairs. I got the cake from the counter and sat down at the kitchen table, ready to indulge.

Blondie stretched across my bare feet, keeping them warm.

This was living!

Just as I looked lovingly at the moist cake, the doorbell rang.

Wacky Cakeus interruptus!

Blondie was on full alert, which meant her ears were up. If it was an intruder, she’d probably lick him to death.

But it was Ty Brisco, complete with a white cowboy hat, mirrored sunglasses (the foreign object
was still bright in the sky), jeans faded to perfection, and his snake cowboy boots.

I had bare feet and wore a ratty chenille, snap-up bathrobe over a Mickey Mouse nightshirt. My reflection in the window of the door showed lumpy, still-damp hair, and puffy eyes.