Shift Burn (Imogene Museum Mystery #6) (6 page)

Sheriff Marge unlatched her door, and Pete and I crowded into the opening for a tour of all the bells and whistles — quite literally. The driver’s capsule had as many switches and buttons and gauges as an airplane cockpit. She had a full computer monitor and keyboard on a stand within easy reach of her right hand and all kinds of communication equipment and a shotgun and rifle rack. The thing was loaded.

“How fast does it go?” Pete asked.

I elbowed him. Sheriff Marge did not need encouragement in the speed department.

“Hit 94 on the way here, but I’m sure she’ll go faster than that. Gotta get used to the handling, but she sure is smooth.” Sheriff Marge stroked the steering wheel.

I grinned at the ‘she.’ Fast, sexy and sleek — the machine had to be female.

Sheriff Marge inhaled and began the laborious process of disembarking with the awkward cast on her left leg. “This isn’t a completely frivolous visit. I brought you something.” She hobbled to the back, pulled a cardboard box from the rear cargo area and handed it to Pete. “Requires some explaining so I didn’t want to leave it with the rest of your wedding gifts.”

We moved toward the picnic table.

Sheriff Marge’s face puckered. “Whew. What’s that smell? Like something dead in a ditch.”

Pete rubbed the back of his neck, a sheepish smile on his face. He explained about Tuppence’s ingestion of Mae Brock’s casserole and the consequences and why all the windows and door of our fifth-wheel were wide open.

The laugh started at her belt buckle and jiggled outward from there. Sheriff Marge plopped onto the bench and removed her reading glasses to wipe her eyes. “I suppose I shouldn’t laugh,” she sniffed. “The poor thing’s probably still in agony. Hehehehe.” And we lost her to another volley of chortles.

“You two really need to get away,” she finally wheezed. “Have a real honeymoon.”

“Just as soon as the shipment comes in,” I said.

“Ahhh, yes.” Sheriff Marge replaced her glasses. I’d consulted her about security measures for the new collection.

Rupert Hagg, director of the Imogene Museum and my boss, had sweet-talked a New York collector he’d met at a convention into gifting his extensive array of Near East artifacts from the Bronze Age to the museum. It would be our most valuable collection to date. I also knew that it was next to impossible to amass a collection this size without some shady dealings because the source countries were usually extremely protective of their cultural artifacts — which made me nervous about what I might find when I started documenting the items. I was rather surprised the donor was willing to part with them, but Rupert is a highly persuasive extoller of the Imogene’s virtues.

The collector had sent a comprehensive list ahead of time, but there’s a big difference between a printed line item and holding the real thing in your hands. My stomach shivered into knots every time I thought about it. I remembered that I’d forgotten to track the shipment’s progress today.

“Go on.” Sheriff Marge gestured toward the box. “Open it.”

I did the honors, slitting the tape with my thumbnail and pulling out wads of newspaper. Something sparkled, and I gasped.

Sheriff Marge’s gray eyes twinkled, and a broad grin bunched her cheeks up.

I lifted out an intricate tea pot — then a coffee carafe — then a sugar and creamer set — then an ornate platter — all in pristine silver plate.

“There are a couple spoons and tongs in there too,” Sheriff Marge said. “Here’s the deal. I have cupboards full of stuff — china, silver, stemware, the works. Most of the items were wedding gifts to us — Big John and me — forty-two years ago. I never use it these days. My occupation doesn’t exactly allow for elaborate entertaining, and with Big John gone—” She sniffed and glanced away. “But I know you’d use it if you had the space. So the rest is yours when you settle down in a regular house.” She cleared her throat, her eyes misty. “I’m counting on you two to put down roots and stick around here for the next hundred years.”

I pressed my hand over my mouth and blinked back tears. Pete wrapped an arm around me.

“Don’t you want to keep it in the family?” I whispered. “What about your daughters-in-law?”

“Not interested. Besides, you are family.” She gave me her and-that’s-that look.

Sheriff Marge is a formidable woman to hug, but I did it anyway. So did Pete. In fact, we squashed her.

“Oooof.” Sheriff Marge pushed away. “I gotta go. Need to check on the Tinsleys.”

My heart lurched. I should have done that earlier, maybe taken them lunch in spite of Harriet’s insistence on self-sufficiency.

“What about the fire?” I asked. “Doc Corn said he’s been hearing it wasn’t an accident.”

“Who told him that?” Sheriff Marge whirled around, a scowl on her face.

I stepped back, startled. “He didn’t say.”

Sheriff Marge whipped off her hat and wiped her forehead. “I do not want that word getting out. It would just encourage whoever’s setting the fires and make him cover his tracks better.”

“So not kids?” Pete asked.

“We’ve had a bunch of fires lately. Some kids, some accidents, some not kids or accidents. Tinsleys’ barn fire falls in the latter class, along with a few others. Bob’s picked up on some similarities between several of the bigger fires.”

Pete whistled softly.

“Yeah. It’s not information I’m excited about sharing with Herb and Harriet. Who’d hurt them?” Sheriff Marge’s habitually worried look had returned.

“Just about everyone in the county was at their place yesterday because of our wedding,” I murmured. “What’s the timeframe? Could the fire have been started small during the potluck but taken a while to reach the size where we noticed?” I glanced up at Pete who was gazing at Sheriff Marge with concerned concentration.

Sheriff Marge exhaled. “Exactly. We’re short on viable suspects. Bob has a couple working hypotheses. He’ll be back this afternoon to have another look around.”

My phone rang in the trailer. I hurried to the door and snagged it off the dining table. The caller ID said Harriet Tinsley. I turned back toward Pete and Sheriff Marge and slowly brought the phone to my ear, determined not to reveal the scary news Sheriff Marge had just shared. Sheriff Marge would handle that in the way she thought best.

“Meredith?” Harriet’s voice shook. “Herb’s not doing so well. He’s been feeling poorly all day, but now he’s having trouble breathing. Will you come?”

I stretched out and grabbed a fistful of Pete’s shirt while shooting a scared look at Sheriff Marge. “Have you called 911?”

“Yes, an ambulance is coming. But will you come too?”

“We’ll be right there.”

I only had to say Herb’s name to trigger Sheriff Marge into crisis mode.

“Get in,” she yelled, stumping rapidly across the grass to her new vehicle.

Sheriff Marge drove cross-country, ignoring the meandering paved loops through the campground. She took the most direct route across the rolling lawn, dodging trees and fire pits and exhibiting her new vehicle’s impressive suspension and horsepower.

Herb sat on a chair at the kitchen table, with Harriet hovering over him. His jeans and boots were caked with mud as though he’d been sifting through the muck left from the fire and the water.

He stubbornly resisted our attempts to get him to lie down, and it was clear he wasn’t fully comprehending his own condition. His ragged breathing stripped him of energy for anything else.

Herb’s blue eyes were dull, and his gaze darted around the room, as if seeking a place of reassurance. As usual, he wasn’t saying much. I doubted he was capable of forming words.

I squatted on the floor next to him and took his hand. He squeezed it so hard I almost cried out. The pressure seemed to be a reflex action, not under conscious control.

Pete rested his hands on Herb’s shoulders, holding him in the chair as much as anything, so he wouldn’t fall to the floor. Then he started talking — my husband who doesn’t waste words — just started talking about the weather and farming and what to expect from the crops next year, what the forecast might do for his tow jobs in the spring. All things Herb would know about and find interesting.

I wiped a tear from the corner of my eye. Pete was giving Herb something to hang on to, something to track with, some comfort through the confusion. Slowly, Herb began to nod along with Pete’s comments.

Sheriff Marge eased Harriet out to the screened-in porch and paced with her, listening to Harriet’s fluttered recounting of Herb’s staggering into the kitchen and collapsing on the chair.

Harriet was borderline frantic, wringing a dainty, embroidered hanky in her shaking hands. She’s usually a stalwart of common sense and sharp humor, a practical joker extraordinaire. But when it’s a twin — and a twin you’ve lived with your entire life — her whole world was on the verge of splitting into a deep, irreparable chasm.

The ambulance arrived, and the paramedics treated both Herb and Harriet with such tenderness. Herb refused to lie on the gurney, so they boosted him between them and gently lifted him into the ambulance so he could sit on the side bench. Then they helped Harriet up, and she perched beside him. Herb was being fitted with an oxygen mask when Sheriff Marge slammed the back doors closed.

“Maybe you won’t need to have that conversation with them now,” she muttered.

The ambulance pulled away, slowly bouncing over the tree root-ridged driveway before picking up speed.

I shook my head. “We still will — when the timing’s better, when we know Herb’s prognosis.” I sucked in a deep breath.

Pete rubbed my arms. “Think the fire prompted this? Pushed Herb over the edge?”

Sheriff Marge grunted. “Didn’t help.”

CHAPTER 7

For the second time that day, we raced into Lupine
— this time to the hospital for people instead of animals. I didn’t want Harriet to be left alone too long, sure that Herb would be pulled into a private curtained area for the initial examination. The ER doctor might not want Harriet to witness that.

Pete drove, and I wedged in beside him on the bench seat. He glanced down at my hands clenched in tight fists on my lap.

“We’re going to be there for them, Babe. Whatever the outcome, it won’t be the way you’re worrying it.”

“I know.” I pressed my face against his shoulder. “I know.”

We found Harriet in the waiting room, the hanky still clutched in her hand. She sat like a lost child, alone in the middle of a long line of green vinyl chairs. She perked up when she saw us coming across the squeaky clean linoleum floor, her eyes as bright as ever.

“He talked to me, told me to check the well pump tonight to make sure it’s primed, so I know he’s going to be fine,” she said in a rush. “It’s something called a TIA.” She dabbed her eyes with the hanky. “A pre-stroke or a mini-stroke. He needs blood thinners.”

I slid into the chair beside her and wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

Pete sat on her other side and squeezed her knee. “I’ll take care of the pump and make sure your garden gets watered.”

Harriet emitted a trembling sigh. “I was hoping we could open your gifts today. I wanted to help you keep track of who to thank for what.”

“I’m sorry they’re clogging up your kitchen,” I murmured.

“Don’t be silly.” Harriet sniffed. “It’s like Christmas, only better.” She flashed me a hint of her usual mischievous smile. “All those pretty packages. I’m going to start peeking if you don’t hurry up and open them.”

I chuckled. “We’ll have a little party when Herb comes home — how about that?”

“Harriet?” A nurse waved Harriet over from the other end of the room.

Pete and I waited fifteen minutes, watching a couple nurses and the ER doctor pass back and forth behind the privacy screen. When it appeared they were finished with their ministrations, we followed and poked our heads into the curtained space.

Herb reclined on a bed — not lying down, of course, but relaxed, an IV line threaded into his arm and a couple other monitoring devices taped to his skin.

His face told me everything I needed to know — our Herb was back. He was weak but alert and still worried about the well pump, based on his first comment to Pete.

Harriet sidled up to me and whispered, “You and Pete go on now. I know you have better things to do.”

I frowned down at her. “Are you staying the night?”

“Yes. We’ll be fine. The doctor gave me a checklist.” She flapped a piece of paper full of small print. “I’m going to badger Herb until he follows it. No more strokes, not even minor ones.” She shook her head emphatically.

If anyone could overcome a health problem by sheer force of will, even if it was someone else’s problem, it was the tiny woman beside me.

“You’ll call? We’ll come pick you up tomorrow. Sills’ taxi service,” I said — using my new last name for the first time. I filled Harriet in about Tuppence who was also spending the night — in a cinderblock cell with doggy accommodations (i.e., a drain hole in the floor) on the other side of Lupine. Why are hospitals so much like prisons?