2 A Deadly Beef (6 page)

"Moose,
you know just as well as I do that running a diner is a full-time job.  I
can’t run this place
and
race around town with you at a
moment’s notice."

He
frowned a second, and then said, "I suppose I could call Martha."

"For
that little amount of work?  I’ve got a better idea.  Why
don’t you grab a cup of coffee, find an errant newspaper, and make
yourself invisible until I’m ready to go," I suggested with a grin.

"We
both know how hard that would be to make happen."

"Tell
you what.  Why don’t you give it a try."

He
nodded, and as my grandfather made his way to one of the empty booths, he said,
"It would be a lot easier if I had some pie to keep me company,
too."

"Any
kind in particular?"

"You
know me.  Just as long as it’s pie, I’ll be a happy
man," he answered with a big grin.

I
walked to the display and got him a piece of pumpkin pie.  He used to
serve it year-round when he ran the place, but Dad had scaled it back to
between October and December, and that was one change he’d made that
I’d agreed with.  Being rare on the menu was what made it so
special, and besides, neither Mom nor Greg enjoyed making pumpkin pies, though
they were both happy enough to make just about any other kind we asked them to.

I
added a dollop of real whipped cream to the top of it and delivered it to
Moose.  The man actually rubbed his hands together as I put the slice of
pie down in front of him.

To his
credit, when we locked the doors ten minutes later, he put his own plate in one
of the tubs, and then he grabbed a bar towel.  "What can I do to
speed things up?"

"If
you’ll wipe down the tables and carry those dirty dishes to the back,
I’ll run the reports on the register and get the deposit ready."

"Sounds
like a plan to me," he said as he did as I’d asked.  As I
passed the kitchen pass-through window, I spotted Greg watching Moose work, but
when I started to ask him something, my husband quickly scurried back to his
own work.

We
were finished in record time, and thankfully everything balanced out, so the
deposit was an easy one to fill out. 

Greg
came out front just as I was stuffing the money and the completed deposit slip
into the bag.  "Would you like me to drop that off?  It’s
on the way home, and I figure it isn’t fair to make Moose wait another
second than he already has."

"You
wouldn’t mind?" I asked as I handed it to him.

"Go,
and be safe," he said, and then he leaned in and gave me a peck.

"We’ll
do our best," I said. 

Moose
was standing by the front door, tapping one foot as he kept looking at the
clock.

"I’m
coming, don’t rush me," I said.  "What’s the
rush?"

"We
need to talk to Dave before he goes home for the night.  If we can catch
him at the store, I have a hunch that he’ll be more willing to talk to us
than if we confront him at home."

"Lead
on, then," I said as I followed my grandfather to his truck to interview
another of our suspects.

1 boneless beef chuck roast (2 1/2 to 3
pounds)
2  teaspoons seasoning (I like Montreal Steak)
3 Tablespoons Flour, All Purpose
1/4 cup Canola Oil, or enough to cover the bottom of your skillet
1 can Low Sodium Fat-Free Beef Broth (14.5 oz)
1 can Low Sodium condensed Cream of Mushroom soup (10 3/4-ounce)
2 Tablespoons Butter
1 onion, coarsely chopped
2 bay leaves
Baby Bella Mushrooms, sliced (10 oz)
6-10 New Potatoes (they are small, and we like gold)
1 package Baby Carrots (16 oz)

Rub the roast on all sides with the flour
mixed with seasoning.
Over medium high heat, sear the roast on both sides until it’s brown in
enough Canola Oil to cover the bottom of your skillet.
Place roast in the bottom of your slow cooker.
Add the beef broth to the hot pan and deglaze.
Pour the broth onto the meat in the slow cooker.  Do not add any water!
In the skillet, melt the butter and sauté half the coarsely chopped
onion until it browns slightly.
Spoon out the Cream of Mushroom Soup on top of the roast.
Spoon the sautéed onion on top of the soup, and then add the rest of the
onion, coarsely chopped.
Add half the mushrooms, sliced, to the mix.
Add two bay leaves to the mix.
Cook three hours on High.
After three hours, add baby carrots, new potatoes, and the remainder of the
mushrooms (sliced) to the mix.  An alternative is to add the potatoes
after three hours, and the carrots and mushrooms after two, but either way is
fine.
Continue cooking for three hours on High, and then enjoy!
One option is to make gravy by adding cornstarch to the juices after cooking
and reducing the result  to half on the stovetop by simmering it.

Chapter 4

As we
neared Trudy’s Grocery, Moose and I must have spotted the sheriff’s
cruiser at the same time.  He drove past without slowing down, but I
wasn’t sure that was the right thing to do.

"Maybe
he’s just in there shopping instead of talking to Dave," I
said.  "It might be perfectly innocent."

"Let’s
say you’re right, though I doubt it.  Even if Sheriff Croft is in
the grocery store on some other business entirely, how’s he going to take
it if we show up and start grilling Dave?  No matter why he’s
inside, we’re going to have to come back later."

"That’s
a good point.  I hadn’t even thought of that," I said, though
I wasn’t happy about pushing our investigation until even later into the
evening.  I’d worked a full day, and I needed my rest, but our
search had to take precedence over a little lost rest on my part.

As we
rounded the corner for the third time, I glanced back and saw the sheriff
getting into his patrol car.  It looked as though he was finally
leaving. 

"Circle
the block one more time," I told Moose.

"We
can’t keep doing this all night," my grandfather said.

"We
won’t have to.  I just saw the sheriff leaving."

We
made an even wider loop around town to be sure to give Sheriff Croft enough
time to leave, and sure enough, by the time we pulled back up in front of the
grocery store, he was gone.

But
then again, so was everyone else.  In our caution to miss the sheriff,
we’d also overshot Dave’s regular hours of operation.  It
appeared that we’d have to come back again tomorrow. 

"I
guess we just missed him," I said, though Moose pulled up in front of the
store and stopped anyway.

"The
doors may be locked and the lights seem to all be turned off, but trust me,
Dave is still in here," Moose said as he shut off the engine.

"How
could you say that?  The place is empty."

"Not
completely.  If you look closely, you’ll see that there’s
still a light on in Dave’s office, and I doubt that he keeps it on all night
when he’s not here."

After
we both got out of the truck, Moose pointed to a car parked in the far corner
of the grocery store’s parking lot and said, "Besides, his yellow
Honda’s still here, and that means he hasn’t gone home yet."

I
hadn’t realized that the car belonged to Dave.  "Moose, even
if he’s buried somewhere in the back of the store, how are we going to
get his attention?  Are we supposed to just start pounding on the front
door?"

"That
works for me," my grandfather said as he proceeded to do exactly what
I’d just described. 

"Not
so loud.  You’re going to get us arrested for disturbing the
peace," I said as I put a hand on my grandfather’s arm.

"Well,
at least we’ll get his attention," Moose said.  With a bit of
irritation in his voice, he added, "Has the man gone completely
deaf?"

Moose
was about to start pounding again, and I was considering letting him go at it
full-force, when I looked into the darkened store and saw Dave walking toward
us.

"Here
he comes," I said.

"It’s
about time."

As he
opened the front door, Dave said, "Sorry folks, but we’re
closed.  If you need something for the diner, I can get it for you first
thing tomorrow morning."

"Thanks
for the offer, but we’re stocked up just fine," Moose said. 
"Dave, we need to talk to you."

The
grocery store manager clearly wasn’t pleased with my grandfather’s
request.  "Can it wait?  I’m beat, and I have to be back
here at six tomorrow morning."  He glanced at me and added,
"Come on, Victoria.  You’re the only one in Jasper Fork who
keeps the kind of crazy hours that I do.  Cut me some slack."

"Don’t
worry.  This won’t take a minute," Moose said as he stepped
inside past Dave, though I’d been considering backing down and doing as
the man had asked.  After all, he was right.  Nobody knew the toll
the hours we worked had on us, and the grocery store owner had managed to find
the perfect way to get my sympathy. 

On the
other hand, my grandfather wasn’t about to wait a single second longer to
interrogate a suspect than he had to.

"Sorry
about this," I said as I stepped in after Moose, and Dave just kind of
shrugged as he locked the front door back and followed us into his empty store.

I
suppose that it was the best I could hope for, given the circumstances.

It was
kind of eerie walking through the grocery after everyone else was gone. 
Items on the shelves cast odd shadows in the emergency lighting, which gave
everything a strange red glow.  I normally thought of grocery stores as
warm and inviting places, offering my favorite things, but there was something
darkly ominous about the place in the near darkness, and the haunting quality
of the emptiness surrounding us.

I
followed Moose to the only real light in the place, the single light bulb
coming from Dave’s office, and as we entered the cramped space, it felt
as though the illumination offered safety somehow from the aisles. 

My
imagination was definitely getting the better of me.

Dave
eased down into his familiar battered leather chair and put his feet up on the
old gray metal desk in front of him.  Putting his hands behind his head,
he asked us, "Okay, I’m listening.  What’s so important
that it can’t wait until tomorrow?"

"We
want to talk to you about Wally Bain," Moose said.

Dave
frowned at the mere mention of the man’s name.  "That was a
real shame what happened to him in his own barn, wasn’t it?  It
feels like nobody’s ever really safe anymore."

"We
understand that you two had a pretty public argument recently," I said.

Dave
shot a quick glance in my direction.  "Victoria, I shouldn’t
have to explain it to you.  The produce he was sending me lately
wasn’t worth having."  He sat up for a second as he followed
up his statement by asking, "Unless he gave you better merchandise than I
got.  Was he holding out on me, Victoria?"

"No,
the produce he’d been bringing us lately was definitely not up to his old
standards.  Believe me,
we
understand why you were upset with him,
but what we want to know is, was that the
only
thing you two were
fighting about?"

"It
was enough, wasn’t it?" Dave asked.  "Sure, I was angry
about how bad things had become, but I wasn’t mad enough to kill
him."

"When
was the last time you saw him?" Moose asked, not giving Dave a chance to
even catch his breath after answering my questions.

The
store manager hesitated before he answered, but whether it was because he was
thinking about the question, or planning to lie when he answered, I
wasn’t sure.  "I’m not happy about it, but the truth is,
the last time I saw him was when we argued yesterday morning," he finally
said, and then softened for a moment.  "I hate that the last words
between us were spoken in anger."

"I
didn’t realize that you two were that close," I said.

Dave
seemed to consider my question before answering.  He’d hesitated so
much during this conversation that I began to wonder if maybe it was just a
habit he had that I’d failed to pick up on in the past.  "We
weren’t, not really, but it still leaves a bad taste in my mouth."

Moose
pushed a little harder.  "So, you’re absolutely certain that
you didn’t see him after that?  Think about your answer
carefully.  It’s important."

Dave
nodded.  "I don’t have to.  I’ve already been over
this with the sheriff, and I don’t see any reason to change my story now,
because everything I’ve told you is the truth."  He stood,
stretched, and then started toward the front.  "Now, if you two
don’t mind, I have some paperwork to finish up before I can go
home."

Moose
refused to budge.  "Go right ahead.  We don’t mind. 
We can keep chatting while you work."

I wondered
sometimes about my grandfather’s audacity.  Would Dave throw us
out?  It appeared that he was considering it, but he finally threw his
hands up in the air and said, "You know what?  Forget it. 
There’s nothing on my desk that won’t wait until the morning. 
I’m going home, and unless the two of you want to spend the night locked
up in the grocery store, I’d suggest that you leave when I do."