A Body at Book Club (Myrtle Clover Mysteries) (3 page)

Chapter Three

There was now no question that Naomi had been too ill to come to book club. The stench of a ghastly illness rose from her and her face in death still had found no peace. She wore a soiled tee shirt and cotton shorts and no shoes.

There sure hadn’t been a dead body on Rose’s living room floor thirty minutes ago when they were all greeted and told to assemble in Rose’s backyard. Had Naomi felt desperately sick and come to book club for help?

Myrtle heard the back door open behind her as she stared at Naomi. Then she heard Miles’s voice say, “Myrtle, are you okay? Rose sent me in to check on you. I have a clean tissue in my pocket …” He stopped short.

Myrtle turned to look at him. Miles was staring in horror at Naomi, looking slightly sick himself. “What happened?”  He pulled his gaze away and fastened it with relief on Myrtle.

“I guess she must have come in looking for help while we were outside,” said Myrtle. “Rose said she’d emailed to say she was feeling sick and couldn’t make book club.”

“I’ll say she was sick,” said Miles, appearing a bit green. “I guess I should tell Rose and prevent anyone else from stumbling across this scene. Then we should call an ambulance or the funeral home or something.” He quickly turned and walked toward the back door.

Myrtle stared thoughtfully at Naomi, remembering all the hard feelings against her. “You might want to call Red, actually.”

“Red?” Miles turned around. “You’re thinking this was foul play? Have you noticed how sick she looks, Myrtle?  Maybe it’s a natural death.  She got terribly ill and then she died.”

“Maybe. But that could be by design. Naomi had plenty of people who weren’t very happy with her. Here comes one of them now,” said Myrtle, nodding at the back door as Rose approached.

Miles groaned. “Rose isn’t going to be happy about this. I’ll call Red,” he said, pulling out his cell phone.

Rose was unhappy indeed. Unlike Myrtle and Miles, she’d immediately spotted the body on her living room floor. Her eyes widened in surprise, and then displeasure quickly took over. She pressed her lips together tightly as she surveyed the scene, putting her hands on her thin hips. “Well, this is certainly inconvenient.”

Myrtle could think of many other ways of describing it. “It’s not as if she planned it, Rose. I think she must have walked next door for help, realizing how sick she was.” Myrtle felt a pang of sympathy for the woman. She
had
been a proponent of Real Literature, after all. Perhaps the only one in the club who was, besides Myrtle and Miles.
The November Choice
, indeed!

Rose flapped her hand in the air impatiently. “Yes, I’m aware of that. But at this point, it’s simply bad timing. I’ve got a backyard full of guests. Now I’ve got a dead body on the floor. Naomi had to crawl in like an animal to die? Typical thoughtlessness from that woman. Not only that, but my housekeeper, Sheila, has just recently quit and I haven’t been able to find a new one. What am I going to do?”

Myrtle discovered that she didn’t actually like Rose Mayfield very much. She said, “I heartily recommend my housekeeper. Her name is Puddin.”

There was a strangled coughing sound behind her and they turned to see Miles there. Miles knew that Puddin was a hopelessly incompetent housekeeper in every way.

Rose frowned at Miles as if warning him that the coughing sound had better not indicate an illness…particularly considering the body on her living room floor. She then said to Myrtle, “Yes, if you don’t mind, give me her number. Do you think she has any openings in her schedule?”

“Oh, I’m pretty sure she does,” said Myrtle smoothly, as she reached in her pocketbook for a piece of paper and a pencil. “Miles, is Red coming?”

“He’s on his way,” said Miles.

“Red?” Rose’s voice was cranky. “Why on earth is Red coming?”

“That’s simply the usual procedure,” said Myrtle. She’d made that up, but it
could
be the procedure. She jotted down Puddin’s number and handed it to Rose. “Let’s wait outside for Red,” said Myrtle. “Besides, we need to tell everyone what’s happened.” She also wanted to watch everyone’s faces when Rose told the book club the news.

Rose, Miles, and Myrtle rejoined the book club members, who had given up waiting and were instead, raucously visiting with each other and digging into the crustless party sandwiches and iced tea that Rose had provided. Rose cleared her throat and stood stiffly at the front of the group. No one even noticed. She cleared her throat again and still they loudly talked and laughed. Finally, she clapped her hands together and called out, “Everyone! Please!” and gradually the talking and laughter subsided. “If you could all take your seats again. There is something I need to tell you.”

“There’s been a–” Rose hunted for the right word. “Well, something has happened. Unfortunately, Naomi Pelter has expired on my living room floor.” Her voice was somewhat exasperated. There was a gasp from the assembled group and Rose continued, “That’s right. Naomi is inside now and I don’t recommend that anyone go in there. Red is on his way over to assist us. She’d emailed me to say that she was ill and couldn’t come to book club, and she was, indeed, ill.”

Myrtle scanned the book club members’ faces. Most looked shocked and concerned but there were a few interesting reactions, she thought. Rose, for one. She was more concerned about getting her house clean than about Naomi’s death—but that was surely to be expected.

Myrtle also noticed that mousy Claudia Brown gasped and then looked terribly guilty. Myrtle remembered teaching Claudia many years ago. She’d thought her a fairly simple girl at the time and she didn’t believe she’d acquired any higher thinking skills since then, either. Perhaps Claudia was only looking guilty because she didn’t like Naomi and now has discovered that she’s dead.

Lena Fowler, the Bradley vet, also had an interesting reaction. Myrtle watched as something of a satisfied smile crept across her face until she quickly removed it when she saw that Myrtle was studying her. Myrtle made a note that she’d have to find out more about Lena’s thoughts on Naomi—and also get her to put a
missing cat
poster up in her office.

The last unusual reaction that Myrtle observed was Maxine Tristan’s. She appeared positively delighted at the news of Naomi’s demise. And when she heard that Red was coming over, she reapplied more blood-red lipstick and then powdered her nose.

To be fair, no one in the entire group seemed too brokenhearted at the news. Surprised, yes. But there were no tears shed over Naomi Pelter. This made Myrtle think that she hadn’t been paying enough attention at past book club meetings. Was there all this anti-Naomi sentiment going on that she hadn’t picked up on? Maybe she was losing her touch. Or maybe she should try to attend more book club and garden club meetings. Apparently, that’s where all the action was.

Once Rose finished talking, the buzz of conversation picked up again, this time with an additional fervor. Myrtle decided she’d wait for Red on the porch. As soon as she’d opened the porch door, she saw Red entering through Rose’s front door, so she walked into the house.

Red sighed when he saw Myrtle. “Mama, for once I’d like to have a body called into the station when you’re not involved with it in some way.” He turned his attention to Naomi Pelter. “Poor thing. She really was sick, wasn’t she?”  He knelt by the body and carefully studied her. “I wonder if she’d been sick for a while and maybe got dehydrated.”

Myrtle said, “No, she wasn’t ill at all until late yesterday.”

Red glanced up at her. “You know that for a fact?”

“I do. I saw her yesterday afternoon when I was looking for Pasha. She talked to me for a few minutes and was even making plans for coming to book club. But at some point yesterday evening, she emailed Rose to tell her she’d become ill and couldn’t make it.”

Red said slowly, “So it came over her all at once?”

“Apparently so. Maybe it was food poisoning,” said Myrtle. Then she paused. “Or maybe it was
real
poisoning.”

“Why do you say that?” asked Red sharply.

“Because Naomi wasn’t exactly winning any popularity contests in Bradley. I’m just saying that’s a possibility. Are you planning on treating this as a natural death?”

Red shook his head and slowly stood up. “I’m planning on having the medical examiner make that call. She was pretty young to have died from a gastrointestinal bug, and in such a short amount of time. I’ve also got a call in to the state police. I think Detective Lieutenant Perkins is on his way now. If this needs to be treated as a homicide, we’ll let them determine that.” His eyes narrowed at her. “And this is all off-the-record. You’re not planning on writing this up for the
Bradley Bugle
?”

Myrtle wrote a weekly helpful hints column for the newspaper, but sometimes wrote news stories for the
Bugle
when she had a chance and when her editor would let her. “That depends on whether this is real news or not. It might simply be a virulent virus or something.” Actually, Myrtle was already planning on writing this story up, virus or no virus. Having something like this happen during a book club meeting was definitely newsworthy. Well, at least as far as Bradley’s tiny newspaper was concerned.

“All right. And I’d like to keep it that way, Mama. If this ends up being a murder case…and I said
if
…then I want you to wash your hands of it.” Red busily occupied himself with his notebook so he missed the look of irritation Myrtle shot him.

“Why ever not?” asked Myrtle. “What would be so special about
this
case?”

Red looked up from his notebook and directly into her eyes. “I
never
want you involved in a case. You know that. But this one would be different. The fact that it might involve folks in your book club, somehow. Friends of yours. It could get ugly and I don’t want you involved in any ugliness. At your age, Mama, you should be thinking about relaxing—watching your soap opera, putting your feet up, and just resting.”

Myrtle completely ignored this statement. This was Red’s constant refrain. She’d gotten so that she really didn’t even hear him when he said it. It sounded like
blah, blah, blah
.

“Now, if you could just step outside with everyone else, please. I’ve got to talk with Rose Mayfield for a few minutes before the medical examiner gets here.” Red stood up from his crouching position with a wince. “Man, it’s no fun getting old.”

“I wouldn’t know,” said Myrtle airily as she walked out the back door.

The buzzing voices had quieted down to noisy whispers as Myrtle joined the rest of her book club. “Rose, I think Red wants to speak with you for a minute,” she said.

Rose briskly walked to the house. Miles joined Myrtle. “Did Red give you an earful about discovering yet another body?”

Myrtle shrugged. “He mostly just wanted to warn me off of investigating.”

“Doesn’t he
always
warn you off of investigating?” Miles pushed his rimless eyeglasses up his nose.

“Red managed to find a slightly different excuse this time.” Myrtle lowered her voice. “He said that this case might get messy, since the murderer would likely be a friend or a book club member.”

Miles’s eyes opened wide behind his glasses. “You mean, it
is
murder, then?”

“He won’t know until after the autopsy I think. But I guess it could be, yes. The point is that he simply didn’t want me poking my nose into the case and found a new excuse to latch onto.”

Lena Fowler, the vet, joined them. She had the athletic build of a runner and cropped brown hair that suited her pixyish face. Lena also had a piercing, analytical gaze that always made Myrtle feel as if her slip were showing. “I was sorry to hear about Pasha, Myrtle. I remember when you brought her in to the clinic to get spayed and immunized.”

Myrtle smiled at her. “I suppose you do, since Pasha wasn’t in a very happy mood at the time.”

Lena smiled back and Myrtle realized how infrequently a smile creased her serious face. “That was only to be expected. Feral cats would be even more worried about a cat carrier, car ride, and vet visit than housecats. She did a great job. I’ll be sure to keep an eye out for her.”

That uneasy feeling hit Myrtle again as she thought about Pasha. “Do you think she’ll be all right? Do you think I’ll get her back?”

Miles gave her that concerned look again.

“Was there a precipitating event that caused her to run off?” Lena’s piercing gaze was back.

“There were dogs chasing her or snapping at her or something,” said Myrtle with a sigh. “She looked terrified, but I couldn’t tell if she was hurt.”