Death at a Drop-In (22 page)

Sybil’s eyes clouded.  “No, he never was. He’s been happy to go see a movie with me or to eat supper with me, but I’m starting to think that’s all he wants.  The more I’m running at him, the more he’s running away. It made me feel real desperate, too.  Like when Cosette started flirting with him—that drove me crazy, because I didn’t feel like I had enough of a hold on Felix for him to be able to ignore her flirting.”

“How have things been going lately?  Have y’all been going out?” asked Myrtle.

“We haven’t done a single thing.  I’ve been calling him and dropping by the office and dropping by his house and he’s been too busy or has just ignored the phone call or my knock altogether.  Although I know he’s there, because I’d driven by and seen his car there minutes before.”  Sybil looked hurt.

Sybil seemed to be a first rate stalker, with not a single clue that that’s what she was. 

“The last day or two,
I’ve
seen my caller ID and know he’s trying to reach me, out of the blue, without returning any of the calls I made to him.  I’m wondering if he’s wanting to break up with me,” said Sybil, looking worried.

It sounded as if there wasn’t anything really to break up.  “You didn’t answer the phone when he called?”

“I had a bad feeling about it, so I didn’t.  I’ve been avoiding him myself.”  Sybil sighed.

Myrtle said, “This is sort of off-topic, but do you have any idea why Felix might have been spotted walking briskly down the street with a suit on?  Looking out of sorts?”

Sybil frowned.  “You mean on the day of Tobin’s funeral?  I can make a guess.  That was the morning that his car wouldn’t start and he had an early meeting with a client.  He had to walk to work.  It made me really mad when I found out about it because he didn’t even call to ask me to drive him over.  You’d think that even if we were just
friends
that he would ask for that kind of a small favor.  But no.  It made me think that he didn’t feel our relationship was special.”

This somehow irritated Myrtle.  She could recognize pig-headedness when she saw it and if Felix was so determined to be left alone, by golly, maybe he should be left alone.  For him not to even call poor Sybil for a ride… “You know, Sybil?  You deserve better than this one-way relationship.  You really do.”  Sybil might not be the brightest bulb and she might choose truly awful book club books, but she seemed kind.

Apparently, it hadn’t occurred to Sybil that she might deserve better.  An expression of surprise flitted across her face, then she said slowly, “I think you’re right, Miss Myrtle.  Maybe I do.”

There was a peremptory knock at the door and an imperious voice called, “Sybil?  I know you’re in there.  You have a fairly recognizable car, you know.”

Sybil drew in a hissing breath.  “Felix!”  Her face was a mixture of longing and anxiety.

“Remember,” said Myrtle.  “You deserve better.”

Felix pushed the front door open and gave a funny, choppy bob of his head to Myrtle.  “Miss Myrtle.  Sorry for barging in this way—it’s only that I’ve been trying to reach Sybil lately and haven’t been able to communicate with her.  I hope you’re doing well and have continued thinking about those final expenses of yours.”

Myrtle clenched her teeth to keep from responding.  It was Sybil’s turn now.

Sybil summoned up whatever gumption she had and said briskly, “I’m glad you dropped by, Felix.  I’ve been wanting to tell you that our—whatever we’ve had—is over.  And I’ll thank you to stop calling my house, knocking on my door, and following me around town.”  She raised her pointed chin and stared him down.

Felix snorted.  “
Me
follow
you
around?  You’ve got it all backwards.  You’re the one who’s been driving
me
crazy and I’ve come in today to tell you to cease all contact with me.”

Sybil started trembling and Myrtle stood up, feeling sore, but using her cane for support.  “Your little speech is completely unnecessary since Sybil has just stated that the relationship is over.  It’s time for you to leave.”

Felix gave Sybil a scornful look and said, “Miss Myrtle, Sybil has been stalking me all over town for weeks and….” 

Sybil gave a cry.  “I covered up for you at Cosette’s!  And this is how you treat me.”

Felix’s face turned purple.  “You don’t know what you’re saying.  There was no covering up.”

“There was!  You and I didn’t leave together.  And I saw you turn around and head back to Cosette’s.  I almost followed you.”

Felix gave a high-pitched laugh. “You’ve lost your mind.”

“Maybe, but I’m finding it again.  You went back to Cosette’s house.  Did you kill her?  Did you have an argument and she said she was going to tell people you’d had an affair?  That would ruin your business, wouldn’t it?  In a town like this?”

Felix’s face turned purple.

“Trust is awfully important in the insurance business,” said Myrtle thoughtfully.  “And people do talk in Bradley.  They know they shouldn’t gossip, but they simply can’t ever seem to help themselves.”

Felix took several deep breaths, nostrils flaring as he did.  “You and I left together.”

“In separate cars. And then you went back.”

After a few moments of silence, Felix said in a halting voice, “Okay.  I went back.  But I only went back because I’d left my wallet there.”

“A likely story.”  Sybil snorted.

“I certainly didn’t go back to kill Cosette, of that I can assure you.  Now, if things are settled between us, Sybil, I’ll leave you ladies.”  He strode stiffly to Myrtle’s front door, and then turned, one hand on the handle. “Miss Myrtle, if you’d like to talk more about those final expenses….”

She brandished her cane at him and he darted out.

After Sybil left, Myrtle decided she’d go out for a while.  It was a bright, sunny day. She wanted to return the walker to Carolyn Frances with a hearty thanks-but-no-thanks.  She also wanted to pop by the knitting store that Sybil had mentioned to her to see what types of yarns they had in stock.  The psychic had told her to take up knitting, after all.  Perhaps, for once, she should listen to someone else’s advice.

Myrtle decided she would steer clear of staircases of any type or description.  And that perhaps stretching her arms and legs would help her loosen up and not be so sore.

She put her knitting in her pocketbook and gripped the walker with both hands.  The only way to return it appeared to be to walk it there.  Myrtle set off down the street.  She paced herself slowly because of her unfamiliarity with the walker.

She had just turned down a side street to head to Carolyn’s house when she heard a voice beside her.  Myrtle turned and saw Joan in a car next to her.

“I didn’t know you got a walker!”  Joan looked alarmed.  “Was it your tumble down the ramp that did it to you?”

“Actually, I don’t even need it.  I’m in the process of returning it to the person who lent it to me.  Maybe she can give it to someone who really needs a walker.”

Joan said, “It looks like you’re kind of awkward with it.  Can I give you a lift?”

The temperature was rising outside and Myrtle realized she really wasn’t particularly stable.  Those things were trickier to use than they seemed.  “Thanks,” she said.  “I think I can fold this thing up and both it and I can fit in the front, since it’s not a long drive. No Noah today?”

“Noah is visiting his paw-paw right now,” said Joan.

Myrtle folded the walker up quickly and climbed into the front.  Joan drove off.  “Thanks,” said Myrtle again.  “It’s really heating up outside.”  She frowned as Joan sped up.  These young people were always in such a hurry.

Something else was bothering her and Myrtle couldn’t really put her finger on it.  Joan kept making conversation.  “It’s hot, but tolerable.  At least there’s a bit of a breeze today.  I try to get Noah out to play every day I can, and this will be one of those days I can make it happen.  I think I’ll pull out that plastic wading pool we have and let him play with the hose for a while.  That way he can stay cool.”

Myrtle was making all the appropriate
mmm-hmm
noises at all the right times as her brain worked to figure out what seemed ‘off’ to her. 

“Where are we headed?” asked Joan.

“Hmm?”

“I wondered where we were headed,” said Joan in a slightly louder voice as if Myrtle might be getting hard of hearing.

“Oh. Carolyn Frances’s house.”  Myrtle got quiet for a moment.  Then she said, “Joan, why did you say that I fell on the ramp?”

Chapter Nineteen

Joan darted a swift look across at her as she drove toward Carolyn’s.  “Because you did.  Remember? You fell down.”

“No, I was pushed,” said Myrtle tiredly. “I swear to goodness I’m tired of people saying I fell. But you’re the first person to mention my falling down on the
ramp
.  Everyone else has said
stairs
. Even the newspaper printed that I’d fallen on the stairs.”

Joan gave a short laugh.  “Guess I had ramps on the brain for some reason, that’s all.”

Myrtle said in a mulling voice, “There have been some other things lately that have made me wonder.  Like the way your father swore up and down that he never had an argument with Tobin…until he was confronted by more proof than we’d already had.  And the way that you swore you never came back to your mother’s drop-in—until witnesses placed you there.  There are a whole lot of unanswered questions, aren’t there?”

“Oh, I don’t
think
so.”  Joan’s voice was becoming icy.

Myrtle added, “One other thing. Your father had said he didn’t even know about the croquet mallets because he never went outside and didn’t have the slightest interest in gardening.  But then he was able to tell me that I needed to have Dusty spray my whiteflies on the underside of my gardenia bushes.  That’s kind of odd, don’t you think?”

“He was only trying to be helpful,” said Joan briskly.  “If you want to keep your whiteflies, then ignore him.  That’s probably what Mother did.”

“But I don’t
want
to ignore him, that’s the thing.  I want to have Dusty take care of my bushes.  I just want to know how he knew so much about it.”

“Probably listening to Mother,” said Joan with a shrug.

“I was under the impression that he didn’t listen to her much.”

“I’d say that’s a fair assessment.  It’s how they made their relationship work, I guess.”  Joan’s hands were tight on the wheel.

“And, Joan, you’re a nurturing mother.  If you’d seen your mother lying on the ground when you returned to the party, it would have been pure instinct for you to run over to see if she were all right,” said Myrtle.

“She wasn’t that kind of mother,” muttered Joan.

“But for your curiosity, at least, Joan! You’d have run over,” Myrtle was certain of this and that certainty flowed into her voice. “It simply doesn’t make any sense. On my soap opera—
Tomorrow’s Promise
—Kristin and her mother were squabbling over her wedding plans. They’ve been at odds with each other for the last ten episodes.  But if it were Kristin’s mom lying on the ground, she’d at least check for a
pulse
. You’d do that even with a total stranger.”

“Oh sure.  Use a soap opera to try to make sense out of a murder investigation.”  Joan snorted.

Myrtle continued, “With the timing of the events, you’d have returned when Erma, Sybil, and Felix were leaving.  You’d have gone around the side of the house.  If you
had
seen your mother lying on the ground then and
had
run over, as I feel strongly that you would have, then I’d have seen you hovering over the body.  That’s how tight that series of events is.”

“But you didn’t.  You didn’t see me hovering over her body.”

“Because you killed her and left.  I must have discovered her a couple of minutes after that,” said Myrtle slowly. She needed to get out of this car.  Joan had sped up, though, and Myrtle knew that jumping out of a rapidly moving car could engender enough broken bones to be just as fatal as whatever Joan might plan to do to her.

“But Tobin saw you, didn’t he?  He saw what happened, although he didn’t put two-and-two together until he found out Cosette had been murdered.  He was surreptitiously putting that bag of trash out on the porch.  So Tobin’s lying low, watching the party, and sees you go around the side of the house.  Maybe he also saw you still gripping the croquet mallet—is that it?  You might even have forgotten you were still holding it and had to go back around the house to return it.  That would have been pretty definite evidence from an eyewitness, wouldn’t it?”

Joan pressed her lips together.

“Tobin has a long-standing grudge with your family, so he decides to make y’all suffer a little.  Instead of merely going to the police to report what he’d seen, he thinks that blackmailing the family would be restitution for all his troubles with Cosette.” Myrtle’s voice still rang with certainty.  It made perfect sense.

Joan snorted. “Like I have any money for blackmailers.  A single mom living through handouts from her parents. And I already told you that Dad was in a real hole, too.”

“But Lucas and Cosette seemed to have money.  If Tobin had wanted money, and I believe he did, then he would have talked to Lucas about it.  Besides, Cosette had bragged around town that Lucas valued her so much that he’d taken out a large life insurance policy on her.  Not only did Lucas
currently
seem to have more money than you, but he was about to come into a
great
deal
more money.  Plus, you are his only child and the mother of his only grandchild.”

Joan sneered, “So, on the very morning of my mother’s funeral, while I’m toting my child around with me, I drove by the graveyard, saw Tobin, and ran up to kill him with a shovel.  Right!”

“Wrong.  Lucas knew what you’d done, although he must have denied it hotly to Tobin.  He’d already suffered the loss of his wife—a tremendous one, despite how she treated him.  Your father couldn’t bear to suffer the loss of his daughter to prison, as well. And what would happen to Noah?  Lucas felt driven to protect you both.  He knew that Tobin maintained the cemetery grounds and the funeral home may even have mentioned that the time of the service would have to be a particular hour because Tobin would be working on the grounds before then,” said Myrtle.