Lemon Larceny (The Donut Mysteries) (18 page)

Momma stood and
studied the screen, partially obscuring the images for a moment until she moved
over to one side.
 
“That was Easter
Sunday afternoon on my sixth birthday,” she said as she returned to her seat.

As we spoke, the
girls continued to pose, with the younger girl smiling broadly and the older
one barely tolerating the situation.

“How can you be
that sure?” I asked.

“See those bangs
of mine?” she asked me.

I looked a little
closer and saw a ragged set of bangs on the smaller girl.
 
“Did you cut them yourself?”

“Jean did
it.
 
She said it would make me look
like a princess, so I let her.”

I studied the
image for another moment.
 
“Well,
she was wrong.”

“I know.
 
Momma was furious,” my mother said with
a laugh.

I started
laughing with her, but our mirth was suddenly interrupted by the sound of
crashing glass downstairs.

“What was that?”
I asked as I turned the projector off, plunging us both in darkness.
 
Evidently the light had faded outside as
we’d been watching the old movies.

“I haven’t a
clue, but it sounded bad,” Momma said as she reached for the light switch.

“Don’t turn it
on,” I said strongly.

“Why not?
 
Suzanne, we can’t just sit here in the
dark waiting for something else to happen.”

“Momma, that’s
exactly
what we’re going to do.
 
I’m calling Chief Kessler.”

“I didn’t think
we could trust him,” Momma said.

“We can’t, at
least not completely, but there’s a chance that he’s a good guy, and we need
one of those pronto.”

“Call him, then,”
she said firmly.

I dialed the
number, and thankfully, the chief answered quickly.
 
“Kessler here,” he said.

“Chief, this is
Suzanne Hart.
 
We’re at my aunt’s
house, and we just heard the sound of shattering glass downstairs.”

“Those blasted
kids,” he roared.
 
“They must be at
it again.
 
Stay right where you
are.
 
I’ll be right there.”

I wanted to tell
him that it most likely wasn’t vandals, but he had already hung up.

“What do we do
now?” Momma asked.

I walked over and
locked the attic door, and then I shoved a chair under it for good
measure.
 
“Now we wait until the chief
shows up and tells us that it’s all clear.”

Chapter 16

Nineteen minutes
later, my cellphone rang.

When I answered
it, I heard Chief Kessler say, “You might as well come out from wherever you
two are hiding.
 
I found your
problem.”

“We’ll be right there,”
I said, and then I hung up.

“He’s here,” I
said as I flipped on the light.
 
It
certainly made it much easier to see to pull out the chair and unlock the attic
door.

“I’m not entirely
certain how to act around one of our suspects, even if he is the chief of
police here,” my mother said softly.

“Momma, for now,
try to pretend like he’s just another cop.
 
If he senses that we might be on to him, it could have some pretty
severe consequences for us both.”

“Do you mean that
he might try to kill us, too?” she asked me as we walked down the stairs.

“That’s one
option.
 
Who knows?
 
He might just run, or he may even try to
hurt someone we love.
 
Killers are
notoriously dangerous when they’re cornered.”

“Understood,”
Momma said.

When we got to
the first floor, I saw the chief outside and noticed that something was lying
on the floor of the front parlor.
 
I
walked over to it, but the chief shouted, “That’s close enough.
 
Let me in.
 
I need to see it first myself.”

I reluctantly did
as I was told, but I wasn’t about to go very far from the police chief while he
examined the evidence, and I didn’t care whether he liked it or not.

There was a brick
lying among the broken glass on the floor, a piece of paper wrapped around it
and held in place with a rubber band.
 
The chief took a few photos with his camera phone and then carefully
removed the rubber band.
 
Taking the
paper in hand, he studied it, and then he deposited it into a clear evidence
bag.

“Hey, we want to
see that, too,” I said.

“Give me a
second.”
 
As he sealed the bag and
wrote something on it, he asked, “What took you so long?”

“What are you
talking about?
 
We called you as
soon as it happened.”

“I’m not talking
about that.
 
I waited out here a
good three minutes for you to come out after I called.”

“We were in the
attic,” Momma said before I could stop her.
 
I didn’t want the police chief to think
that there was anything important up there, especially since that was where
we’d found my aunt’s journal.

“Watching old 8mm
movies,” I said.

“In the attic?”
he asked skeptically.

“What can I
say?
 
We thought it would add something
to the atmosphere.”

He shrugged at
that, and then he finally handed me the evidence bag.
 
“Don’t try to take it out.
 
You have five seconds to study it.”

“Fine,” I said as
I pulled out my cellphone.

“Who are you
calling now, that Statie boyfriend of yours?”

Interesting.
 
I hadn’t mentioned Jake to him before,
so he had clearly been doing some investigating, not of the potential killer,
but of me.
 
“No.
 
I want a photo of my own.”

“I’m not sure that
I should allow that,” the chief said, but I already had my hand on the plastic
bag.
 
Good luck to him to try to get
it away from me now.

“Chief, if you’d
rather, I can have my attorney here in an hour, but do we really want to take
that particular road?”

He shrugged.
 
“I suppose not.
 
Okay.
 
You’re allowed to take one photo only,
so make sure that it’s in focus.”

“Thanks,” I
said.
 
“Momma, would you hold this?”

She did, but
instead of holding it up where I could see it, she read it aloud instead.
 

BUTT OUT!
 

WHAT HAPPENED HERE IS NONE OF YOUR
BUSINESS.
 

IF YOU DON’T STOP DIGGING, THE NEXT THING THAT
WILL BE DUG WILL BE BOTH YOUR GRAVES.
 

GO HOME.
 

BEFORE THE TWO OF YOU ARE NEXT!

“Well, that’s
rather emphatic, isn’t it?” Momma asked as I took a quick snapshot of the
bagged note.

The chief
snatched it back.
 
“So I was
wrong.
 
I figured it was just
vandals again, but there was nothing random about this.”
 
After he put it away, he asked me,
“Suzanne, who exactly have you aggravated lately enough to make them do this?”

“Honestly, I
would have to make you a list,” I said sarcastically.

He pulled out a
little notebook like Jake carried and handed it to me.
 
“Thanks, that would be great.”

“Are you
serious?
 
Should I add motives,
too?”

“If you wouldn’t mind,”
he said with a self-serving smile.

I started to tell
him that I wasn’t going to do it when I realized that chances were that it
wouldn’t hurt to tell him what we knew, at least most of it.
 
“Sure, why not?”

“Suzanne,” Momma
said, and when I looked at her, she shook her head almost unperceptively.

“It’s fine,” I
said.
 
I jotted down the names:
Greta Miles, Anna Albright, Adam Jefferson, and Hank Caldwell.
 
I wasn’t stupid enough to add the
chief’s name to the list.
 
Beside
the names, I put, in order, “Fear, Avarice, Greed, Love.”

“Those motives
are a little broad, aren’t they?” he asked as he frowned at the list.
 
“Not that it matters.
 
You’re way off base with all of these
people.
 
I’ve known them for years,
and there’s not a coldblooded killer in the group of them.”

“Chief, I
shouldn’t have to tell you that you can’t spot a murderer just by looking at
one.”

“I know that, but
this is just plain wrong,” he said as he slapped the notebook with his free
hand in disgust.
 
“You’re slandering
at least three of these people, if not all four.”

“How is that
slander?
 
We’ve only told you,” I
pointed out.
 
“If you share what
we’ve told you with anyone, then you’ll be the one guilty of that, not us.”

“Maybe you should
both consider taking the note’s advice,” he said softly after studying us for a
few seconds.

“While we appreciate
your input, we choose to decline your suggestion,” Momma said stiffly.
 
“If that will be all, thank you for
coming so promptly.”
 
It was as
though she had invited him to have tea with us, but I knew that tone.
 
She was angry, and if the chief
proceeded with this, he was soon going to regret it.

“Suit yourself,”
he said.
 
“I’ll drop a report off in
the morning.”

“That won’t be
necessary,” Momma said.

“It’s not for
you; it’s for the insurance.
 
Replacing
that window isn’t going to come cheap.”

“Fine,” Momma
said, clearly done with him.

After he was
gone, Momma let loose.
 
“Of all the
arrogant, egotistical, condescending—”

“I get it,” I
said.
 
“He was out of line.
 
Now let’s see if we can patch this
window up tonight before it rains again.”

“I have a better
idea,” my mother said.
 
“Call Hank and
have him do it.
 
He still needs to
replace that hasp, so he can add this to the list.”

“Do you actually
want to have another suspect over here tonight?” I asked.

“Why not?
 
This is the perfect excuse to grill him
again.”

I thought about
it and realized that my mother was probably right.
 
“Okay, I’ll give him a call, but I’m not
going to make any guarantees that he’ll actually show up.”

Momma looked
surprised.
 
“Is it honestly going to
be that easy?
 
Are you offering no
debate at all?”

“Why would
I?
 
It’s a good idea.
 
When you’re right, you’re right.”
 
I made the call, explaining that we’d
pay extra for one-hour service, and, to my surprise, Hank agreed to come right
over.

“Well, what do
you know?
 
He agreed, and he’s on
his way,” I said, and then I spotted two people walking toward us.
 
“Uh-oh.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Don’t look now,
Momma, but Anna Albright is on her way up here, and worse yet, Greta Miles is with
her.”
 
 
Whether we liked it or not, our
interrogations were about to intensify, and unless I missed my hunch, things
were about to get interesting.

“What was that
police cruiser doing up here?” Anna asked us as the two women approached.

That’s when Greta
spotted the broken window.
 
“Oh,
no!
 
There must be glass
everywhere.
 
Don’t you worry
yourself one little bit.
 
I’ll have
it cleaned up in two shakes.”

“Thank you, but
we can do it ourselves,” Momma said.

“On the other
hand, it would be truly nice of you to pitch in, if you don’t mind,” I said, quickly
overriding her.

Momma shot me a
quizzical look.
 
My reply was a
slight shrug.
 
I’d explain my
rationale to her later, but for now, I just hoped that she’d go along with it.

“It would be my
pleasure,” Greta said as she walked inside.

“Momma, you’d
better check your cellphone,” I said.
 
“You might have missed a call in all of the excitement.”

My mother
understood in an instant what I wanted—at least I hoped that she did.
 
“While I’m inside, I’ll see if I can
give Greta a hand.”

Good.
 
That meant that she had understood after
all.
 
“That would be great.”

“If you’ll excuse
me,” Momma said, leaving me alone with Anna.

Once she was
gone, Anna and I approached the window from the porch side, and I looked at the
shards of glass still sticking within the frame.
 
It was an older home, and there were
only single panes instead of the more efficient double glazed ones they used
now.

“How did Greta
happen to be at your place?” I asked her.

“Oh, there’s no
mystery there.
 
We eat our evening
meals together two nights a week; once at her place, and once at mine.
 
After all, we’ve been friends since
elementary school.”
 
As Anna studied
the broken window, she added, “What would make someone do this?”
 
Neither woman knew about the note
attached to the brick, and Momma and I weren’t about to enlighten them.