Clam Wake (38 page)

“I'll leave all that to Auntie Vance,” Judith said. “It's clear that everyone seems to like and respect her. I'm an outsider on her turf. Yes, I finally fingered the killer. Our aunt and uncle like living at Obsession Shores. It's a flawed community, but human beings are flawed. When they had to act, they banded together in a common cause against Quentin Quimby's injustices. That speaks well for them.”

Renie nodded. “Now that Quimby's dead, maybe they can work through the property issues. But I suppose they'll go back to quarreling among themselves, having affairs, arguing over sewers, and shooing pesky deer into each other's gardens.”

“Human beings are . . . human,” Judith said, noticing the ferry was almost in the slip. “I'd like to think that removing Quimby from the equation would ease tensions in the community.”

“Let's hope so,” Renie remarked, leaning forward in her seat. “Just be thankful we aren't smuggling illegal Dungeness crab across the Sound. A security guy is making the driver in front of us open his trunk.”

“We don't even have clams,” Judith said. “We ate them. Looks as if the driver doesn't have anything of interest either. Just routine.”

“The ferry's in the dock,” Renie noted. “There still aren't many cars waiting. Our turn to be possible terrorists.”

The fair-haired security guard stopped on the passenger side and asked Renie to open the door. “May I look inside your purse?” he asked.

“Sure,” Renie replied. “Don't swipe my gum. I can't get to sleep without it.”

The guard didn't crack a smile. “Fine. Thank you.” He came around to the other side of the car and made the same request of Judith.

“I don't have any gum,” she said with a smile.

He didn't smile back as he opened her purse. “You don't have any gum,” he said sternly, “but you have a gun. May I see your carry permit?”

Judith gaped at the guard. “I . . . forgot . . . it's not mine . . . I don't even know if it's loaded!”

The guard remained stoic. “This weapon isn't registered to you?”

“No, of course not,” Judith said. “It belongs to . . . let me explain . . .”

He cut her off with a wave of one hand. “Would you please step out of the car and put your hands on the top of your head. You're under arrest for unlawful possession of a handgun. I'll read you your rights before turning you over to the on-duty officer for this part of the island.”

Judith looked at Renie. “I guess we'll have to catch a later ferry.”

“Darn,” Renie said. “They better not be out of popcorn by then. Now I'm really hungry.”

A
UNTIE
V
ANCE
'
S
B
EEF
N
OODLE
B
AKE

(as she would tell you how to make it)

Before you start messing with this, boil a lot of GOOD egg noodles. Don't go cheap. Life's too short.

      
1 lb. hamburger—skip the lean stuff; get the grade with the most fat or you might as well eat a cardboard box

      
½ cup chopped onion

      
½ cup cut-up celery

      
½ cup green, red, yellow or orange sliced pepper—green isn't as good for you as the other three—so what if they cost more?

      
1 can tomato soup

      
½ cup water

      
Dash of Tabasco—BIG dash, don't skimp—nobody lives forever

      
Dash of Worcestershire sauce—see above. You got eyes, right?

      
1 tbsp. or 2 of soy sauce

      
Salt & pepper—plenty of it—you got something against flavor?

Heat a skillet, a frying pan, whatever you call the damned thing, and melt 1 tbsp. of butter. REAL butter. Forget you have arteries. Add hamburger and brown—briefly. Add onion, celery, and pepper. Add everything else and cook until heated. Grease
*
a baking dish big enough to hold this stuff. Add the noodles (don't forget to drain them . . .) and all of the above. Bake in a 350º F oven—you can tell when it's done. If you're too dumb to figure it out, you shouldn't be reading this. Meanwhile, make a green salad. You need those greens, right? Some crusty French bread goes good with all this. When it's ready, wake up your husband/partner/whoever and serve. It tastes better than it looks.

The story takes place in January 2006.

PHOTO BY JEFFREY ENGELSTAD

MARY RICHARDSON DAHEIM
is a Seattle native with a communications degree from the University of Washington. Realizing at an early age that getting published in books with real covers might elude her for years, she worked on daily newspapers and in public relations to help avoid her creditors. She lives in her hometown in a century-old house not unlike Hillside Manor, except for the body count. Daheim is also the author of the Alpine mystery series, the mother of three daughters, and has three grandchildren.

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Just Desserts

Fowl Prey

Holy Terrors

Dune to Death

Bantam of the Opera

A Fit of Tempera

Major Vices

Murder, My Suite

Auntie Mayhem

Nutty as a Fruitcake

September Mourn

Wed and Buried

Snow Place to Die

Legs Benedict

Creeps Suzette

A Streetcar Named Expire

Suture Self

Silver Scream

Hocus Croakus

This Old Souse

Dead Man Docking

Saks & Violins

Scots on the Rocks

Vi Agra Falls

Loco Motive

All the Pretty Hearses

The Wurst Is Yet to Come

Gone with the Win

COVER DESIGN BY RICHARD L. AQUAN

COVER ILLUSTRATION BY BILL MAYER

This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author's imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

CLAM WAKE
. Copyright © 2014 by Mary Daheim. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

FIRST EDITION

ISBN 978-0-06-231772-8

EPub Edition July 2014 ISBN 9780062318084

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*
Use Watkins Cooking Spray. It's a Canadian product, but so what? You want to start a border war?