Paint the Town Dead (15 page)

“I'm not afraid. I'm allergic,” Georgine said, sticking out her sharp chin. “I need to speak with you. Please, will you hear me out?”

Wow, a please from her? “Speak with me about what?”

“Ernie, of course.” She paused, and grasped her hands at her waist until her knuckles whitened. “Did you talk with your detective friend on Ernie's behalf?”

“I haven't had the opportunity yet,” I said with only a twinge of guilt. We could've discussed Ernie at the grocery store, but I'd flat forgotten to mention him.

Her lips thinned. “Will you arrange time to do so? We'd consider it a kindness.”

Not another please, but I was being asked not ordered. “Has Detective Shoar talked with Ernie again?”

“Yes, and all this stress is taking a toll on both of us, but especially on Ernie. We're not allowed to go home, you know.”

Yes, and staying in the room next to the one where Kim was killed had to be stressful on steroids. Although, bad as Ernie had it, could he look more haggard than Georgine did? And, okay, her tone of voice and body language swung between demanding and pleading, but she was making the effort to be civil. I cut her some slack. After all, I knew the anxiety of having a relative be a murder suspect.

“I'm positive Ernie is innocent, Ms. Nix, but Kim's brother Caleb is telling the police that Ernie and Kim fought.
Which is ridiculous. For one thing, Kim herself told us she and her brother weren't close. We certainly never met the man.”

I frowned. “How do you know what Kim's brother is saying?”

“By the questions that detective asked Ernie.”

“You sat in on your brother's interview?” I asked, puzzled.

“Of course not. I wasn't allowed to accompany him.” She massaged her temples. “Will you please stay on the subject?”

“The subject being how could Kim's brother know if she and Ernie squabbled?”

“Exactly. He could not. He's lying. Ms. Nix, Ernie wouldn't have killed Kim. He loved her.”

Georgine looked away and visibly swallowed, as if she were choked up. Maybe she was, and maybe she wasn't.

“But you didn't.”

Georgine looked up, surprised. “I didn't what, Ms. Nix?”

“You didn't like Kim one bit.”

Georgine glared at me, her hands fisted. “You're right, I didn't care for her. I'm not even particularly sorry she's dead, except for Ernie's sake. She was his choice.”

“If Ernie knows Kim's brother is lying, why doesn't he call Caleb on it?”

“My brother,” she said with dignity, “is a gentleman. He will not call the man out on his lies. Besides that, this Caleb person isn't here.”

“But you'd confront him if you had the chance, wouldn't you?”

“I would, and whether you talk to the detective on Ernie's behalf or not, I'll stand up for my brother at any cost.”

I gave her a long look, then shrugged. “I'll talk to Shoar, but I can't promise you it will do a lick of good.”

Spine stiff, shoulders back, Georgine gave me a regal nod. “Thank you, Ms. Nix.”

She'd already turned on her heel when I thought to ask about the money. “Georgine,” I called, “one question.”

“Yes?” she said, giving me narrowed eyes.

I forged on. “Did Kim have a will?”

Georgine's brow furrowed in thought. “The deaths of two wealthy husbands left her with a large amount of money, and possibly property. So, yes, I think she had a will. Why do you ask?”

“Do you know who inherits her money and property?”

Her mouth twisted. “She never mentioned it in my hearing, but if you think Ernie stands to get it, you're wrong. First, Ernie is quite comfortable. He didn't need her money. Second, he wouldn't have allowed her to make him an heir until after they married.”

“What about the Thomason family. Do they get back any of the estate Kim inherited?”

“I've no idea, Ms. Nix. And I doubt Ernie does either.”

She turned on her heel as sharply as she'd snapped her reply to my question.

“Thanks,” I called after her, just to see if she'd acknowledge me. She didn't.

As I headed back to the emporium, I ran the conversation through my head. Georgine was definitely protective of Ernie. If push came to shove, I could see her killing for him.

What she wouldn't do was let Ernie take the fall for murder.

By the time I returned with the critters and put them in the workroom with Fred, Doralee had gone on back to the Pines Motor Court with Zach's food. Which was fine. As Maise said, they didn't need Doralee present to fill me, Dab, and Fred in on the scuttlebutt. They also didn't have the time to talk with me before our folk painting artist, Melissa Osborne, swept into the emporium like a diva taking the stage. I swear, if it had been the 1940s, she'd have waved a sterling silver cigarette holder in one hand.

Melissa had been an actress in various local theatre companies, including in Atlanta, Dallas, Kansas City, and Little Rock. For all her flamboyance, she wasn't haughty or diva-difficult. She brought a fun sense of the dramatic with her simply by entering a room, never mind by donning the bright colors she favored. Today she sported a hot pink sleeveless blouse, dark blue jeans, and banana yellow flats. Her fire-red hair was piled atop her head in a loose bun. Over her clothes she wore an apron so huge it swallowed her, and so paint-splotched, you could barely see that it was once a solid light blue.

“Hello, hello,” she sang and moved to embrace each of us—Dab included. She'd have nailed Fred, too, but he'd hidden in his workroom.

“So good to see you, Melissa,” Maise said.

“It's good to be seen! I have all the supplies in my car.” She paused and gazed at the arrangements of the demo table and chairs. “Oh, but this won't do.”

“Fifteen chairs aren't enough?” I asked.

“It's not the number of seats, Nixy, darling, it's the arrangement. I'll be painting a large wooden tray as the main part of my program. The table needs to be in the center, and the chairs in a semicircle around it with plenty of space for people to stand around me so they can better see what I'm doing.”

I went to work rearranging the furniture, and a few early bird attendees helped. By the time we'd reorganized, Melissa had set up an easel and a 16 x 20 inch canvas board showing some of the basic brush strokes she'd be using. She launched into her presentation right on the hour.

“Decorative folk art painting is as old as man and paint, and as versatile,” she began. “Classic patterns include Pennsylvania Dutch symbols, florals, animals, and nursery figures. Modern patterns can be accented with scraps of metal or wood if you like mixed-media effect. I believe that whimsy plays a large part in folk art painting, but folk painting is also as fresh as the artist is inventive.”

She pointed at the canvas board. “These are some of the simple brush strokes I'll be using today. If you know anything about Penn Dutch symbols, you'll probably be able to spot the ones used in those patterns.”

Melissa continued her lesson on types of brushes, stroke work, varying strokes to get different looks. Three fourths of the audience nodded their heads as she threw out terms like the comma, crescent, and dots, then touched on brush loading techniques. The remaining fourth looked overwhelmed, but still interested. If I hadn't studied art,
Melissa's rapid fire primer in painting techniques would've had me completely befuddled. It was a win that no one's eyes had glazed over into a blank stare. With luck even the overwhelmed attendees would enroll in the course Melissa would teach for us next week.

“All right, time for the fun.” Melissa rubbed her hands together, then picked up a large wooden tray. “In the interest of time, I've applied a white base coat, although you could certainly use another base color if you like. I'm going to decorate this with a stylized lily in honor of Lilyvale! Now since I need to lay the tray flat to paint it, y'all come stand around the table so you can see what I'm doing.”

Melissa kept up a lively narration, talking her group through her own painting process, and managing to make eye contact with those gathered around her as she wielded her brushes. She fielded questions as she worked, and gave next week's painting class a plug.

During a short show and tell on mixing paints, one of the open bottles of acrylic fell and splashed on the floor. The audience members jumped back and avoided being paint splatted, but the spill of red on our wood floor made me picture Kim as I'd last seen her. Forever still and lying in a pool of blood. For a moment I couldn't move except to convulsively swallow. Then Eleanor shoved a wad of paper towels in my hands. I shuddered, and pulled myself together to clean the mess.

*   *   *

Melissa left in a flurry of hugs with the promise to bring the newly painted tray back to the emporium as soon as the paint had dried thoroughly and was sealed. This was one of the prizes we'd be drawing for at the end of the week, along with the other crafts our demonstrators had completed.

Now beyond impatient to tell me what they'd learned during lunch at the café, Maise and Aster, Eleanor, and
Sherry dragged me into Fred's workroom. They didn't let Dab escape either, insisting that Jasmine could handle customers for a while without any of us.

I went along because Eric had texted to meet up at three forty-five. That gave me plenty of time with the Six. However, I kept mum about what I'd learned from Judy this morning, and about my appointment with her and Eric. My hunch about the blonde's identity might be a bust, and besides, there was no point in me stealing their gossip thunder.

Fred stood at one workbench dismantling a blender and carefully arranging each part on white butcher paper. The rest of us gathered around an adjoining table.

“Do you want to join us for the conference?” Maise asked him.

He waved a screwdriver at us. “I can hear just fine from here while I'm workin'.”

“All right, then,” Aster said. “Now first, Doralee told us about the opal and what it's worth.”

I felt my eyes bug. “She did?”

“We didn't ask about private financial business, of course,” Sherry insisted with a tug on her apron.

“Of course not,” I said. “That's the code of the South.”

“We were quite shocked she shared so many details with us,” Eleanor put in.

“But here's the kicker,” Maise said. “We found out that Ernie could've bought Doralee's opal several times over, and that sucker is expensive.”

“Wait. Doralee told me that most of Ernie's family money was gone when she was with him.”

“I think it was,” Sherry confirmed, “although he—or they—were far from destitute during the marriage. Anyway, she said you got her to thinking about why Kim would be with Ernie.”

“Because she'd already married two very wealthy men,” Maise interjected, “and why break the pattern?”

“So Zach did some nosing around about Ernie's finances,
thinking that he might have motive to kill Kim if he was in her will,” Aster said. “I don't know who his connections are, but Zach called Doralee while we were eating and told her Ernie scored big in the stock market shortly after he and Doralee divorced.”

“As in the high six figures big,” Eleanor added.

I whistled. Guess that's what Georgine had meant about Ernie being quite comfortable. Maybe Doralee should've sold him that stone on Sunday. Or did she get money when she and Ernie split?

“Did Doralee get a divorce settlement of any kind?” I asked. “I'm wondering how contentious the breakup might have been.”

“We only skirted that subject,” Sherry said, “but Doralee said she left the marriage pretty much with what she brought to it. She had her own money from sound investments over the years. She had her personal property—her computer and other electronics, plus her books, knickknacks, clothes, and jewelry pieces like the opal.”

“She also,” Aster said, “had her own set of gourd tools, and some gourd art designs she'd created. They didn't have a pre-nup, so Doralee could have asked for a settlement, but she chose not to take one.”

“Wow, she really was forthcoming about her finances.”

“Only because she knows we're investigating on her behalf.”

I wanted to remind them we were only gathering information, but who was I kidding? In as much as we had the resources, we were investigating. I might be a take-charge sort of person, but I generally did not confront and fire questions at murder suspects like I had lately with Doralee and Ernie, and even Georgine.

“Listen up, though,” Maise said, pulling me back to the conversation. “The bigger news is that Kim's brother Caleb is supposedly coming to town tomorrow. He called Lorna about staying at the inn.”

Eleanor shook her head. “Poor Lorna. I do believe she's about to have a meltdown over having a murder at the inn.”

“She has to be worried it will be bad for business,” I said. I wasn't best buddies with Lorna Tyler, and I didn't much like her husband, Clark, but I should stop by for a neighborly visit.

“The point,” Maise said, “is the brother is Kim's only relative so he probably inherits his sister's estate. Remember, the money Kim inherited from her first husband was a considerable amount. What if the brother killed her?”

Dab straightened, rubbed his chin. We all turned toward him, waiting. Dab wasn't a particularly taciturn kind of man, but when he spoke, we paid attention. “It seems to me that we don't know enough about who gains from Kim's death.”

“Dab's right,” Fred called from his workbench. “We're long on rumors and supp'sition, but short on facts.”

“You're both correct, of course,” Sherry said, fussing with her bangs. “We're getting carried away with gossip.”

I checked the time on the shop clock and realized I needed to be at Great Buns in just a few minutes.

“Can y'all watch the emporium without me for a bit?”

Fred humphed. “Jasmine's running the place right now. You going snoopin'?”

“I need to run down to the bakery.”

“Why?” Maise challenged, narrow eyed. “We have plenty of cookies left.”

She might like Grant Armistead, but she wouldn't serve the bakery's cookies if they were the last ones in town. She's just a bit jealous that way.

“It's not about food, Maise. It's about Kim.”

“Judy knows something about the murder?” Aster asked incredulously. “She didn't breathe a word to us when we canvassed the square asking questions yesterday.”

“If you'll recall, Aster,” Maise said, “we talked to Grant, not Judy. She was out running errands.”

“Oh, you're right.” Aster gave me the eye. “Well then, get cracking, Nixy.”

“Yes, ma'am. Eleanor, did you send any of those photos from Friday's gourd demo to my e-mail?”

“The ones from the presentation Doralee and Sherry did? No, I didn't see the need.”

“Are they still on the camera?”

“I do believe they are. I recall downloading them to the laptop at home, but not deleting them.”

“Fantastic. I need to take the camera with me.”

*   *   *

“I'm positive that's the same blonde,” Judy said, head bobbing in a decisive nod. The bakery was empty at the moment, and bless her heart, she was having a blast answering questions. She'd be part of the Silver Six's posse before long.

Eric looked from the camera's digital display to Judy. “Her sunglasses cover half of her face. How can you be sure?”

“The helmet-head hairstyle, and the way she holds her mouth. Like she's bracing herself to smell something awful at any moment. And, look,” she added, finger swiping at the screen. “Her nose is in the air in that picture. I remember that haughty tilt of her head.”

“All right,” he said slowly. “So the woman in the emporium Friday afternoon is the same one you overheard threatening Ms. Thomason on Saturday morning. And a ring was mentioned. You're certain of that.”

“I'll swear to it if you want. Have I identified a suspect?”

“‘Suspect' might be too a strong word,” he hedged.

“But this
is
a photo of Kim's sister-in-law, isn't it?” I said, turning the camera in my hands to swipe between the two good photos of the blonde and her companion.

“Margot Thomason Vail, yes. D.B. Thomason's only sibling.”

“So you followed up on my tip about her?”

He dragged his hand over the back of his neck. “Not
exactly. I'll say this much because I don't want either of you confronting her. But if this gets on the grapevine, I'll ticket your cars for unlawful parking for a week. Deal?”

Judy mimed locking her lips. I crossed my heart.

“I ran a check on Ms. Vail after she called the station this morning to demand that I release Ms. Thomason's effects to her.”

Wide-eyed Judy whistled. “Wow, that woman has brass. Bet you told her to take a hike.”

“More or less,” my darling detective confirmed. “I need to know who rightfully owns what. I called Ms. Vail's attorney, who also drew up the Thomason family trust. He wrote Ms. Kim Thomason's will, too.”

“I don't suppose you know all the terms yet,” I said, “but at least you have proof that Margot was in town on Friday and Saturday.
Before
Kim was killed. She had motive for sure.”