Death at a Drop-In (14 page)

She half-listened as Felix droned on about annuities, whole life insurance and policies.  Surely, Cosette hadn’t been interested in this man.  He was about as lively and exciting as that fern in the corner.  Oh, he was darkly handsome and meticulously dressed. He was certainly tidy. But his demeanor was stern and taciturn and not at all appealing. Sybil must be paranoid, just as Puddin was saying.

 Myrtle interrupted him. “Yes, it
is
important to think about our loved ones, isn’t it?  Because death can happen at any moment.”

Felix paused and blinked at the interruption.  “Yes, it can.  An excellent point, Mrs. Clover.  As I was saying….”

“Just like poor Cosette Whitlow!” said Myrtle, opening her eyes wide and trying to look as much like a gossipy old woman as she possibly could.

He cleared his throat.  “That’s right.  Tragedies happen all the time.”

“You were there when it happened, weren’t you?” asked Myrtle.  “At the drop-in that Cosette had.”

“No, not really.  I don’t actually enjoy parties very much, so I avoid them as much as possible.”

“But I saw you there.  At Cosette’s drop-in,” said Myrtle.

Felix sighed.  “I really wasn’t
there
.  I was only there for a moment.  Then I left. I paid my respects to Cosette and Lucas, since they’re clients of mine.”

“Did Lucas and Cosette have policies through you, then?”

Felix said cautiously, “They were clients of mine, yes.”

“I know Lucas had a policy on Cosette. Did Cosette have one on Lucas?” She blinked innocently at Felix.

He studied Myrtle for a moment, fingering his bow tie, and then apparently judged her innocuous.  Silly Felix.

“Cosette did not have one on Lucas.  I think it was something they simply didn’t get around to,” said Felix.  “The policy on Cosette was almost a compliment paid her by Lucas.  To show how much value he placed on all she did at their home and in their community,” said Felix stiffly.

“Oh, I see,” said Myrtle.  “Sort of a token gesture.”

“Not at all.  It was a significant policy,” said Felix.  “Everyone has different needs, you see.  Now, moving on to
your
needs….”

Myrtle had absolutely no intention of purchasing any kind of a policy from Felix Nelson.  But she didn’t want to call this visit a total waste, either.  She blinked coyly at Felix.  “I hear that you and Sybil Brown are sweethearts,” she said.  “I think that’s the cutest thing.  Although I don’t see any pictures of her in your office.”

Felix sighed and appeared resigned to the fact that this generation, or at least Myrtle, needed to have some social conversation before jumping right into business discussions.  “I don’t think offices should showcase items of a personal nature,” he said briskly.  “Yes, Sybil and I spend time together.  I’m not sure I’d define us as sweethearts.”  His mouth twisted when saying the word, as if it left a bitter taste in his mouth.

“That’s not what I hear from Sybil,” said Myrtle, taking on a surprised tone.

“Sybil knows exactly what the terms of our relationship are,” said Felix firmly.

Myrtle wasn’t at all sure that Felix was much of a catch.  He seemed to find relationships one more thing to negotiate terms on.   And he was far too complacent.  She felt the need to shake things up.

“Were you having a quarrel there?” she asked in a concerned, tinkling voice that was nothing like her usual alto.  “When I saw you, you certainly seemed angry.  And so did Sybil.  In fact…so did Cosette.”

Felix stared silently at her for a couple of moments.  He finally said coldly, “We were having a political discussion.  We concurred that Congress was the real problem in this country.  It made us all very angry as we discussed politics.”  He paused.  “Very angry indeed.”

Myrtle almost laughed out loud at the thought of Sybil engaging in political conversations, but she managed to bite her lip.  “I see.  Well, I’m certainly glad you didn’t have a lover’s quarrel.  My.”  Felix was still looking quite frosty, so she added meekly, “Can you tell me more about planning for my final expenses?”

Felix’s icy glare told her that he would be happy to arrange for her to need those final expenses sooner than she’d expected.  She noticed how his fingers tightened around a large, glass paperweight on his desk as if he wished it were Myrtle’s throat.

Chapter Twelve

Myrtle couldn’t sleep that night, which she was certain had to do with Felix.  Between his droning on about final expenses, the subject of murder, and Felix’s clear displeasure with Myrtle, she was stuck with insomnia, but good.

She studied the light fixture on the ceiling, thinking for the millionth time that she really needed to change it out.  Then she decided if she were coming up with home improvement projects for herself, then she really needed to get out of bed.

Most of the time, doing something very rote and boring would bore her back into the bed and to sleep.  But after she’d worked for a few minutes trying to clean the mess out of her dryer (which Puddin conveniently had run out of time to do), she found she was just as awake. She knew she had one more
Tomorrow’s Promise
to catch up on, but watching her soap opera was usually more of a stimulant than something to make her sleepy.  She pulled the knitting needles and the yarn out of their bag and sat with them on her lap, looking down at them.  Myrtle couldn’t help it—she simply felt hopelessly clichéd with the knitting. 
An old woman knitting away
. 
Bah
.

She looked at the clock.  Three o’clock.  Myrtle decided that Miles was probably up.  Then she hesitated.  The last couple of times she’d bestowed a late-night visit on Miles, he hadn’t been awake.  Was he changing his sleeping patterns? 

She found herself wavering about walking down to Miles’s house, which made her sad.  One of her favorite things was to share milk and cookies or a coffee with Miles when she couldn’t sleep.  But it appeared that she had worse insomnia these days than Miles had. 

Myrtle jumped, as there was a knock on her front door.  A murderer wouldn’t knock though, surely.  Politeness wasn’t one of their virtues.  She walked to the front door and peeped out the front window to make sure that there wasn’t a frightening figure in a ski mask acting menacing on her front step.

She beamed.  It was Miles.  And for once, he wasn’t meticulously dressed but appeared to have a navy-blue bathrobe on over a set of plaid pajamas.

“Miles!” She pulled the door open wide.  “I was just thinking about coming over to visit you! But then I figured you’d be asleep and I’d wake you up as I have been doing lately.”

Miles said, “On the other hand, I wasn’t worried at all about coming by. Your insomnia has gotten so rampant that I knew you’d have to be awake.  Naturally, if your lights were out I’d have simply turned around and gone back home.”

Myrtle thought that he might be pointing out that Myrtle never really worried if Miles’s lights were on in the house or not.

She said, “Well, come on in! Let’s have a snack.”  Myrtle was pleased as punch that Miles was there.  She’d never actually entertained Miles during a middle-of-the-night visit and now she felt almost as if she were hosting a party.  Myrtle pulled out an old cheese tray that she’d had since the 1950s.  It had a dark wooden back encasing a circular ceramic plate with large yellow daisies on it.  She found a block of cheese in her fridge and some crackers in the pantry.  For good measure, she also placed a few chocolate cookies on the cheese tray and filled up two glasses with milk.

Miles had already sat down at the kitchen table.  “No,” said Myrtle, “let’s go sit in the living room like grown-ups.  We’ll be more comfortable in there anyway.” 

Miles helped her carry everything into the living room and they put the food and drinks on the coffee table, pushing aside some books to make room.  Myrtle gave a satisfied sigh.  “All right then.  Oh! The napkins.”  And she was off again.

When everything was finally set, she said, “Now, tell me why you couldn’t sleep, Miles.”

He blinked at her and didn’t answer until he’d carefully finished swallowing the bit of cookie he was eating.  “That’s what you want to know?  I thought you’d want to talk about what you found out yesterday at Felix’s office and bounce some ideas off me.”

Myrtle said, “No, I really want to know why you can’t sleep.”  She leaned forward expectantly.

Miles seemed pleased by this.  “Well, at first I thought it was because I had something of an upset stomach. But then I realized that I had something on my mind that was keeping me from sleeping.”

“Was it something to do with Cosette’s drop-in?” asked Myrtle.

“No.  It was something to do with Tobin.  Actually, it had to do with Tobin’s attire.”

Myrtle frowned.  She had to admit that Tobin’s clothing hadn’t made that much of an impression on her, one way or another.  “Wasn’t he wearing work clothes? Jeans and a tee shirt is what I remember.”

Miles pushed his rimless glasses up his nose. “He was.  But I realized tonight how very
clean
those clothes were.  His white tee shirt was completely white, and there was no dirt or dust on his jeans.  His boots even looked clean.  I know when I do any kind of yard work, I end up covered with clods of dry grass or weeds or dirt.”

Myrtle frowned.  “I hadn’t thought about it, but you’re right, Miles.  So what does that mean?  Had he already completed the yard work and gone home to change and then return to the cemetery?  Or had he not even started the work yet?  I guess the most important thing the answer to those questions would indicate is the time of death.  If we know the time of death, then it’s going to help us eliminate suspects.  Especially since Red isn’t good about sharing important details like time of death with me.”  Myrtle made a face.  “But didn’t Joan say that she saw Tobin alive and well when she was dropping Noah off at Elaine’s house?  She saw him doing yard work there at ten o’clock.”

“What if Joan is lying?” asked Miles.

Myrtle nodded.  “Right.  If she’s lying, then she really doesn’t have an alibi for the time of the murder.  She says that after she arrived at Elaine’s house, she visited for a while and then went right to the funeral.  So she’s got Elaine for an alibi.  But if Tobin were already
dead
, then she doesn’t.”

“Although it somehow seems unlikely to me that Joan would have stopped on the way to her babysitter’s house, whacked Tobin over the head with his own shovel while Noah waited in the car, and then toddled over to Elaine’s house as if nothing happened.”  Miles took a sip of milk and then carefully dabbed at his mouth with a napkin.

“No, that’s
precisely
the way to commit murder,” said Myrtle.  “Who’s going to suspect the mommy in the minivan?” She nodded.  “So that’s why you haven’t gotten any sleep tonight.  Tobin’s clothes.”

“Did you find out anything yesterday?” asked Miles curiously. “Wasn’t it Felix that you’d been planning to talk with?”

“It was.  Although Felix wasn’t especially helpful.  Guess who was way more helpful than Felix?”

“Who?”

“Puddin,” said Myrtle.  She balanced a piece of cheese on a soda cracker and popped it into her mouth.

“Puddin?” Miles sat back in surprise.  He glanced around the living room, his eye skimming over the mantel over the stone fireplace, the dark wood of various tables, and pausing over the coffee table in front of them.  “You mean Puddin cleaned here recently?”

Myrtle made a face.  “Yes, I know.  Dust is everywhere.  But you know how Puddin is.”

“I sure do.  How on earth could she possibly be helpful with information when she’s not even helpful doing the job you’re paying her to do?” asked Miles.

“She’s extremely good at gossiping and avoiding work.  Puddin is also surprisingly well connected in the housekeeping underworld. She told me that Sybil is practically stalking Felix, who’s really not all that interested in her.”

“Is that so?”  Miles blinked in surprise.  “Sybil actually isn’t a bad-looking woman, by any stretch.”

“Spoken like a man,” said Myrtle in exasperation.  “The problem is more that she doesn’t seem to have a glimmer of an intelligent thought in that attractive head of hers. She is a pleasant space cadet.”

“So what’s Sybil’s motive again?” asked Miles.

“She wants to eliminate a potential rival for her affections,” said Myrtle with some asperity.  Really, Miles must still be half-asleep.  He wasn’t connecting the dots at all.

“
Tobin
?”

“Not Tobin! Sybil was worried that
Cosette
was stealing Felix’s heart.”  Myrtle saw Miles trying to swallow a smile and rolled her eyes.  “You were kidding.”

“I was, sorry.  But seriously, going back to Tobin’s murder.  Why would Sybil murder Tobin?” Miles looked at the cookies, looked away, hesitated, and then decided to take another one.  Myrtle thought that made five cookies for Miles.  Good luck getting to sleep after that much sugar.

“Same reason why anyone else would kill Tobin.  While he was dumping that bag of garbage on Cosette’s front porch, he clearly saw something.  Maybe he saw someone sneaking from around the back of the house.  Maybe he saw someone there who had claimed that they
weren’t
there that night.  The murderer wanted to make sure he didn’t have the chance to tell anyone what he saw,” said Myrtle.

Miles nodded and picked up his glass.  “So the Felix visit was a bust, huh?  Did you at least end up with a life insurance policy?” His eyes were merry over the rim of his glass.

“Just about! I told him I’d have to carefully consider spending that kind of money.  I have a feeling that Felix is going to keep after me, now that he thinks I’m a genuine lead.  He’s going to guilt me into getting a plan to provide for those dreaded “final expenses.”  Myrtle stared glumly down at her empty plate.

Miles choked on his milk and it took him a moment to recover.  “Final expenses.  Wow!  That must have been a cheerful meeting.  Especially since, knowing you, you’ve got your final expenses all prepared and paid for anyway.”

“Exactly. And a meager amount it took, too! Yes, a very cheerful meeting between Felix and me.”  Myrtle made a face.