A Body at Bunco (23 page)

Myrtle decided that she did still have chicken in the freezer. She was positive she had French-style green beans, too. She found a can of water chestnuts, a box of wild rice mix, and—after a moment’s hesitation—a jar of pimentos, which she believed was also part of the recipe.

Fortunately, she had completed her ingredient deliberations when a thin voice called out to her. “Miss Myrtle?”

Myrtle turned to see Poppy. She was wearing a stained top and was pushing a shopping buggy containing convenience items like boxed meal-makers, mac and cheese, toaster pastries, and frozen pizzas. Myrtle’s stomach lurched just looking at them.

Poppy gave a trilling laugh. “And please excuse my appearance, Miss Myrtle. Someone spilled their lunch on me at the preschool.”

“Hopefully a child?” asked Myrtle in concern.

Poppy laughed again. Her laughter was a nervous, high-pitched sound. “That’s right. Although, maybe it would make a funnier story if it had been a coworker. There didn’t seem to be any point in changing since I’ve got to get ready soon for waitressing.”

Myrtle saw
plenty
of point in changing, but held her tongue. “Nice to see you, Poppy. I was just picking up some things to put together a casserole for Mimsy.”

Poppy’s face brightened. “Are you? That’s very thoughtful. I know she’ll enjoy it. She’s been too busy to cook lately, what with planning and attending the funeral and going through Luella’s effects and all.”

“That’s what friends are for, though, isn’t it? To help out during a crisis.” Myrtle paused for effect. “And you two have been friends for a long time, haven’t you?”

Poppy gave a splotchy flush. “That’s right. A very long time.”

“And what a blessing that is,” said Myrtle. “Many of my lifetime friends are sadly no longer with us.”

Poppy seemed unsure how to react to this news. “Oh.”

Myrtle said, “Were you friends in school? As long ago as that?”

Poppy rearranged a couple of boxes of instant food in her grocery cart. “Well, we were acquainted in school. , Mimsy and I.”

“I’d imagine you were, as small as Bradley High School is. But you weren’t in the same group?” asked Myrtle.

Poppy shook her head. “Not at the time. Mimsy was … well, she was a cheerleader for the football team and even the homecoming queen. And I … wasn’t.”

“No? What group did you belong to in high school?” asked Myrtle.

Poppy’s flush grew a bit deeper. “I wasn’t really in any groups at all. I think I must have been just trying to figure out who I was and how I fit into the whole scheme of things. I spent a lot of time by myself.”

Myrtle could imagine that was the case. In fact, she could imagine that if it weren’t for Mimsy’s kindness, it would still
be
the case.

“Was Mimsy very different back then than she is now?” asked Myrtle. “Somehow I can’t picture her as cheerleader and homecoming queen.”

Poppy took a deep breath. “I don’t think that maybe she was quite as understanding then as she is now. She cared a lot about her appearance and what other people thought and being in the right clique. She hung out with people who also cared what others thought.” She shrugged. “I guess that’s just the way high school is.”

“It can be a rough time, can’t it?” asked Myrtle softly.

Poppy’s tensed muscles seemed to relax a little. “It can be. It was for me. Not so much for Mimsy, though.” There was a tinge of bitterness to Poppy’s words.

“Mimsy does seem to be one of the luckier ones, doesn’t she?”

Poppy might have been holding back her true feelings about Mimsy at first. It certainly seemed that way to Myrtle as words started flowing quicker from Poppy’s mouth.

“She is. She had an easy, fun time in school with lots of good friends and fun times. Then she married her high school sweetheart, and they’ve always gotten along great together. Mimsy hasn’t really had to do any work—she just volunteers. She doesn’t know what it’s like to work two low-paying jobs that make your feet hurt by the end of the day. She’s never been lonely. Her life has always been really comfortable.” Poppy put a hand over her mouth as if trying to hold back any other words.

“What kind of work does her husband do again?” asked Myrtle.

Poppy was rather vague. “I think he does managerial work at the mill in Creighton. He does work from home a lot, I think. And then he does day-trading on the side. You know … like with stocks.” She paused for a minute. “I guess I shouldn’t be saying anything about either of them. Mimsy is my best friend now. People do change and get more mature when they get older, don’t they?”

Sometimes.
Myrtle had seen plenty who hadn’t. They’d become more immature, as a matter of fact.

“And Mimsy isn’t having things so easy now, is she? With Luella’s death and all. Especially with the police checking into everything.” Poppy waved a hand in the air.

“But you don’t think Mimsy is responsible for Luella’s death, do you? Or Alma’s?”

“Of course not,” said Poppy. But she looked away. “Mimsy would never do such a thing. Although the earring thing was pretty weird.”

Myrtle looked curiously at Poppy. It almost seemed as if she
wanted
Mimsy to be a suspect. Could jealousy and resentfulness be behind it? Could Poppy have even taken things farther to make it appear that Mimsy was involved in the murders?

“Although there was something else that was weird. Besides Mimsy’s earring, I mean. Florence. You know Florence, don’t you?”

“I do indeed,” said Myrtle. That harrowing car ride with Florence at the wheel was going to stick with her for a long while.

“The night that Alma died ... well, I saw something.”

Myrtle frowned. “I thought you said that when you were coming back from waiting tables that you
didn’t
see anyone.”

Poppy looked away again. “Well, I was just so tired, you know? It’s so exhausting waiting all those tables when I’ve already worked a full day with little kids.”

Myrtle’s eyes dropped again to the stained shirt.

“And then I have to be peppy and smiling at Geronimo’s when I’m taking orders and so forth. I’m practically a zombie when I leave there. So I didn’t immediately remember anything. But now that I’ve thought it over, I remember that I saw Florence outside. She was walking down the sidewalk.”

Myrtle remembered that Estelle had also mentioned seeing Florence out late at night and that Florence had adamantly denied it. “You’re sure it was Florence?”

Poppy gave a laugh that was more of a snort. “Well, of course I am. It was Florence, plain as day. The reason I remembered it is because I was concerned about her. I wondered if maybe she needed help or if maybe she’d gotten confused and was starting to wander—you know—that happens sometimes when people get dementia.”

Myrtle said quickly, “But taking an evening stroll doesn’t mean that someone has dementia. Seniors might want to stretch their legs. There’s no law against it.” Her tone was a mite more defensive than she’d intended.

Poppy’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “Of course there’s not. And if it had been
you
, Miss Myrtle, I wouldn’t have thought twice about it.”

“Why not?”

“Because you’re so clearly
compos mentis
and because I’ve seen you walking late at night before. Or, I guess, very early in the morning. It’s part of your routine. With Florence, it was outside her usual routine. Besides, she seems sort of scattered sometimes.” Poppy stretched out her hands in front of her as if pleading her case.

Myrtle said, “True. All right. So you didn’t stop and ask Florence what she was doing?”

“That’s right. Oh, I thought about it. But as I was saying, I was super tired from Geronimo’s, and on top of it all, Florence didn’t look as if she were in any trouble.”

“How
did
she look?”

“Furtive,” said Poppy after a moment’s hesitation.

Chapter Eighteen

Myrtle considered her conversation with Poppy as she walked back home with the small bag of groceries. She could feel the underlying resentment in her words. But Myrtle also got the impression that Poppy was proud of her friendship with Mimsy and grateful for it, too. Could Poppy possibly have both resentment and gratitude for Mimsy? Might her jealousy prompt her to do something that she regrets? Because Myrtle definitely also felt that sense of regret from her.

Myrtle walked up her front walk and set the bag down so that she could open her front door. As she did, Pasha bounded in front of her and into the house.

“Pasha! I didn’t even know you were there,” chided Myrtle. Then she frowned. “Can I check your mouth? You didn’t bring any take-away bags home with you from the newsroom, did you?” She certainly hoped the end of her day would not involve trying to bribe Puddin to come by and dispose of a rodent for her.

Fortunately, Pasha didn’t appear to have brought her own snacks. But whatever her hour in the newsroom had entailed, it seemed to have exhausted her. She curled up in a late-afternoon sunbeam and fell right asleep.

Myrtle went immediately to the kitchen. The whole point of the casserole was to keep Mimsy from having to cook supper tonight and it would be rather pointless if Myrtle didn’t get it over to her in time. She quickly found her recipe card in the old metal box. It looked as if it had gone through battle, stained and bent from years of use. Myrtle squinted at the card and then looked again at the rooster clock on her kitchen wall. She was going to have to hurry with this and take whatever shortcuts she could.

The recipe called for an oven temperature of 350 degrees so Myrtle preheated for 450 to make things go a bit faster. Then she started pulling the ingredients out. To her dismay and annoyance, she did
not
have either the chicken or the French-style green beans that she was so sure were at home. Rooting around in her pantry, however, she was able to put her hands on some canned tuna and a can of lima beans. She hesitated for a moment. No, tuna surely was bland enough to substitute. And limas were practically as bland as vegetables came.

The clock was ticking away, so Myrtle decided to go with her substitutions. She mixed the pimentos, the canned tuna, the wild rice, and the limas. The wild rice was uncooked, but Myrtle thought she remembered that it cooked fine with the juice from the canned veggie. If she added more water to the casserole it might be too soggy. And who wanted a soggy casserole?

Still a little worried about the potential blandness of the casserole, Myrtle added a generous portion of salt to the dish and popped it into the hot oven. She decided not to cover the dish, since time was of the essence and she really needed it cooked sooner rather than later. After her labors, she decided to sit in her living room for a while and read. Miles had gotten her to read
On the Beach
by Nevil Shute. He promised her that he would enjoy the dystopian tale but so far she had only been annoyed by one of the characters who appeared to be in denial that the apocalypse had taken place. She thought longingly of the
Little Men
book that she’d borrowed from Miles. Still, she was determined to force her way through
On the Beach
.

Thirty minutes later she was still annoyed with the book. But an interruption occurred with a light tap at the door. Miles stood on her front porch looking groggy. “Miles! Are you all right? You’re not sick again, are you?”

Miles shook his head and walked in. “No, but I just woke up from a nap. I guess this virus must have taken more out of me than I thought.”

“So why are you here? Why aren’t you at home recovering from your nap?”

Miles said, “While I was napping, I had this very odd, very vivid dream that you were about to set out to do some more investigating. When I woke up, I felt as if I’d been left out of the process.”

Myrtle felt herself flushing. She hadn’t been planning on toting Miles to Mimsy’s house with her, and that was a fact. If there was one thing that bothered her it was when someone else took credit for her own good deeds. Myrtle had taken the trouble to bake supper for poor Mimsy and Miles didn’t need to horn in on her brownie points. Aloud she said, “You’ve been spending too much time with your cousin, Wanda. Clearly some of her prognosticating powers are rubbing off on you.”

Miles winced. “I do wish you’d stop referring to her as my cousin. And I only want to come along, Myrtle. I’m your sidekick, after all.”

“All right, you can come,” said Myrtle ungraciously. “But just
absorb
everything, all right? I don’t think you’re in fit shape to really take part in an interrogation.”

Miles’s eyebrows shot up. “Is that what it’s going to be? An interrogation of the bereaved?”

Myrtle said crossly, “Of course not. You’ve got me all out of sorts, Miles. But sure—feel free to come along.”

“It sounds as if
you
could use a nap,” said Miles.

Myrtle glared at him.

Miles said, “I also was wondering how things went with Sloan this afternoon. Did he decide to back off from the direction in which he’s been taking the paper?”

“Well, he listened. But I’m not sure he was convinced. He thinks that the people I’ve been speaking with represent a very small portion of the town. The old portion. Fortunately, I was prepared for that attitude and I have some other tricks up my sleeve,” said Myrtle.

“That’s what I was wondering,” said Miles. “Because a few minutes ago, when I was checking my phone after waking up, I noticed all kinds of alerts.”

“Alerts? What—like severe weather alerts? Today?” Myrtle scowled at the sunlight still wafting in through the windows and covering the dozing Pasha. “Must mean a thunderstorm. Estelle should be excited. Wonder if she’s chasing it.”

“No, no. A notification kind of an alert. Doesn’t your phone give you notifications?”

“Not if I don’t want it to,” said Myrtle with a sniff. “I don’t want it to
presume
. I really just want the thing to let me make phone calls.”

“Anyway, my phone tells me when people mention me on social media or when I have emails or whatnot,” explained Miles.

“Sounds as if your phone thinks rather too highly of itself.”

Miles was now studiously ignoring any interruptions. “I saw that I’d been mentioned on Facebook. So I pulled up the site and saw people had tagged me in a post. It seemed to have something to do with a contest and if you got other people to share the post, you got more entries or something? At any rate, the
Bradley Bugle
was all over the internet.”