Murder at the Art & Craft Fair (18 page)

Chapter
Thirty-
Two

“What do you think, Lou?”

“Well, Cross did refer to Kincaid in the past tense,
he hasn’t been answering his phone, he was the only one who had a grudge
against Kincaid who said he wasn’t glad he was dead, and he did leave early,
maybe just after the murder.”

“But Delmont didn’t like Kincaid either, and Edmonds
was there about the time of the murder, and Pitts has a temper and a delinquent
nail-pounding son, and Clements might have brought the murder weapon, which he
or Joan Arrington could have used to murder Kincaid.”

“I see what you mean, Cy.”

“It looks like the only two left are Lois Weddington
and Kincaid’s wife.”

“I’d be in favor of Kincaid’s wife if Sheriff Offutt
hadn’t said he had seen her in Murray Saturday afternoon.”

“Maybe you should check to see if Kincaid had a
plane.”

“Or if his wife has anything going on with the
sheriff.”

“That does it. It has to be that Weddington woman.
She’s the only one who didn’t have a motive or the opportunity.”

“Unless she was the one standing next to Joan’s tent
when Clements walked up.”

“You mean it might have been her instead of Joan
Arrington?”

“Well, that doesn’t seem likely, but it is possible.”

“But it seems weak.”

“Exactly.”

“Guess we’re down to Maureen Eidorn or that security
couple.”

The two of us laughed. I knew what we were down to. We
were down to our wits end. I wondered if the girls could help us recover.

+++

Lou parked in the Days Inn lot, and we went inside and
down the hall to our room. We knocked on the connecting door, and hollered,
“Room Service.” Someone hollered, “It’s open,” and I opened the door and saw
each of the girls stretched out on her bed, watching TV.

“Is that all you have to do?”

“It was until now,” Jennifer remarked. “Pull up a
chair and tell me your troubles.”

“You mean a penny for my thoughts?”

“Cy, I think your thoughts are worth more than a
penny. Inflation, you know.”

I tried to figure if she’d given me a compliment or
not. I decided to move on before Lou jumped in.

“How about a nightcap?”

“Sounds great. There’s a McDonald’s right across the
street.”

The four of us walked over to McDonald’s. Each of us
ordered a milkshake and a late night snack we didn’t need, and sat and talked
for a while. It was then that Jennifer informed me that she was leaving for
home on Thursday. That meant we had the rest of our road trip together, and
then she was on her way back home, and I was left with our case, my books, and
Lou. She had originally planned to go home on Monday, so we had three extra
days together, minus my outhouse experience.

It was almost 10:00 when we left McDonald’s, and all
of us were tired. I knew we had a busy day the next day, so we called it a
night.

+++

West Liberty didn’t exactly have a plethora of places
to dine, and some of those appeared to be open for lunch only. I’d had more
golden arches than I wanted for a while, but we decided that the third time in
two days was the charm and walked over for breakfast before we checked out.

We ate, walked back to our rooms to brush our teeth,
pack, and check out. I had almost finished packing when someone knocked on the
door. I went over, puckered up, and opened the door. The maid stepped back, not
the least bit amused.

“Sorry, I thought you were my girlfriend.”

“I doubt if my husband would like that. Anyway, I was
just checking to see if you’d checked out yet. No hurry. I’ll clean some of the
other rooms first.”

“We’ll be checking out of this room and the next one
within ten minutes.”

“Like I said, no hurry.”

I closed the door and Lou couldn’t contain himself.

“I guess you got turned down, Cy.”

I didn’t bother with a reply.

But then I remembered I had to talk to Lou.

“Hey, Lou. You haven’t given me our clue for today.”

“I’m not sure how much of a clue it is. It’s denial.”

“You mean, like the river in Egypt? Are the four of us
going to Egypt?”

“I don’t know. Do any of the vendors live there?”

“Doesn’t look like it. I can think of a couple of
people I’d like to send there, though. Like my next-door neighbor and that kid
with the hammer and nails. But anyway, I guess you mean denial, like someone
can’t come to grips with what happened. Like the two of us spending the night
in that outhouse.”

“I’m all for forgetting that night, Cy. I don’t ever
want to experience anything like that again. But I suspect that our clue of the
day has more to do with someone telling us that he or she didn’t do whatever we
or someone else is accusing them of doing.”

“You’re probably right about that. And as for the
other, I was going to ask you if you want to go back to that outhouse next
Tuesday.”

“Sorry, I already made plans to count the pages in my
new books, but you can go. Maybe you can find a one-holer closer to town, and
go by yourself. Maybe walk so nothing will happen to Lightning. As for the
clue, in time we’ll know for sure what today’s clue means. Now, we’d better
hurry up and get out of here or we’ll be late getting home tonight.”

“Don’t blame me. The girls are supposed to knock on
the door when they’re ready. Why do you think I puckered and opened the door
when the maid knocked? I thought it was Jennifer.”

“What if it had been Thelma Lou?”

“Then I guess she would’ve enjoyed an upgrade.”

Lou was about to respond when someone knocked on the
door. Instead, he hurried over, peeked out, and then threw the door wide open.
It was Jennifer. Lou leaned over and planted a big kiss on her lips, just as
Thelma Lou was coming out the room next door.

“Okay, Hot Lips. Why did you do that?”

“Cy said he was going to do it if you came to the
door. I just wanted to give him a taste of his own medicine.”

I reached over and wrapped my arms around Thelma Lou
and planted a big kiss on her lips.

As I was putting the luggage in the trunk, Jennifer
came up and whispered in my ear.

“So, Other Hot Stuff. How was it?”

“You’re better. And you?”

“Same here. Lou can’t compete with my Cy.”

Chapter
Thirty-
Three

Unless you are a crow or some other bird that flies
straight, there is no direct path from West Liberty to Danville. Google Maps
recommended that we take the Mountain Parkway from West Liberty to Lexington,
and then proceed south to Danville. This meant that it would take us
two-and-a-half hours to get to Danville, and approximately the same amount of
time to get back to Hilldale, even though Hilldale is nowhere near West
Liberty. At least Lou was driving. And I was in the back seat with Jennifer.

+++

We were on the Mountain Parkway, my thoughts flitting
back and forth between the case and Jennifer, when Thelma Lou interrupted my
cross pollination.

“Are you boys in a big hurry?”

“Not especially, but I would like to get back today.
Why did you ask, Thelma Lou?”

“Well, Cy, someone told me about this restaurant in
Lexington that’s really good. I thought if we have time we might eat lunch
there.”

“What’s the name of the place?”

“Sutton’s.”

“What kind of food do they have?”

“Mostly Italian, and they use fresh ingredients in
their dishes.”

We had a case to solve, but time to spare, and I
didn’t want to deprive Jennifer from eating at some nice place they’d heard
about. Besides, she had me at Italian. But the way we’d been eating the last
couple of days, I thought I’d better not be in any hurry to leave the house the
next few days, because I’d have to Wii until lunchtime in order to continue
losing weight.

“Do you know where it is?”

“Not exactly, but I know approximately where it is.”

“You mean like somewhere in Lexington.”

Jennifer poked me in the ribs for picking on Thelma
Lou.

“Better than that, Cy. I know it’s on Richmond Road,
near Kroger. I checked on the map and it’s only a block or so out of our way.
And since you’re not in any hurry, there are a couple of places in Danville I
want to stop, too. They’re less than a block from each other.”

“Is this sort of a progressive lunch you have
planned?”

“No, the other two aren’t restaurants.”

“Oh, what are they? Clothing stores?”

“No. Bakeries.”

I laughed.

“Remember, Cy, Jennifer and I have to fatten you and
Lou up again after that almost twenty-four hour fast you took part in.”

“Believe me, it was not a voluntary fast.”

I thought of pies, and cakes, and pastries of all
sorts, and envisioned the groan my Wii would give me when I stepped on it the
next day, not to think of the disparaging remarks it would make to me, asking
me what I did to gain so much weight, and pointing out that I was already
obese. I made a mental note to mute my TV before I stepped up on the Wii, and I
wouldn’t bother to read anything on the screen until I started my first
workout.

It was a good thing we didn’t have to make any stops
in any other towns besides Lexington and Danville. Of course the Wii could only
scream at me once a day, no matter how much I gained, and the mute button would
solve that problem. But then I thought of Doc, and he could relieve me of my
job if I didn’t keep the weight off, and I didn’t know where his mute button
was. Of course, if I lost my job it would mean I would be less frustrated and
get to spend more time with Jennifer. I considered pigging out. I contemplated
asking Thelma Lou to think of more restaurants and bakeries while Lou drove.

+++

Sutton’s Restaurant was hidden from all traffic
passing by on Richmond Road. It was a good thing Thelma Lou knew to take the
first right off of Man O War. Once we turned right, it was right there. We had
no trouble seeing it.

We got there a little before noon, so we managed to
beat some of the lunch crowd. We even found a parking spot near the door. We
got out, walked in, and were greeted and seated promptly.

Luckily, none of us had gotten a big breakfast at
McDonald’s, so we perused the lunch menu and were ready to sample a few things.
We started off by splitting two appetizers, pepperoni pups and baked stuffed
mushrooms. After they arrived and we allowed them sufficient time to cool
before eating them, we each plucked one of each and plopped them into his or
her mouth. I thought about sneaking back there sometime all by myself and
ordering pepperoni pups. The crust, the cheese, the spicy pepperoni were all
delicious. It was hard for two of us to nibble and munch, but we followed the
girls lead. Both appetizers received thumbs up from all four of us and we
figured if everything else Sutton’s served was nearly as good, we had found a
winner of a restaurant.

We waited until the appetizers arrived to order the
rest of our food. We looked over the lunch menu and each of us selected
something different. Thelma Lou ordered French onion soup and a house salad.
Jennifer selected a club sandwich. Lou chose a hot brown, and I opted for
spaghetti and meatballs. All of us were very pleased with what we ordered, and
we were all willing to share. Each of us saw other items on the menu we wanted
to try, so we made a note to make a return trip, and told Thelma Lou to thank
whoever it was who recommended the restaurant to her. The menu definitely had a
good variety, and at reasonable prices. When we had finished, we turned down
dessert, and even turned it down a second time when we noticed a Baskin-Robbins
across the street when we left. Besides, Thelma Lou planned to storm two
bakeries before dinner, and we still had a case to solve.

+++

When we left Sutton’s, the Lexington traffic in no way
resembled the traffic we had left behind in West Liberty. West Liberty’s idea
of a traffic jam is when two farmers stop in the middle of the road to talk
about the weather. Lexington, on the other hand, has lots of farmers of some
sort, and traffic engineers to see that they don’t move. I heard that drivers
in Lexington used to mind all the stoppages at lights, but that was before
someone invented texting.

We waited for an opportunity to dash out of Sutton’s
parking lot into lunchtime traffic. Eventually, Lou prayed and floored it. Once
we got out onto Locust Hill Drive, we had stop lights to aid us until we hit
the countryside again, and stop we did at most of the lights. Just about every
corner had one. It seemed like it was three days later when we turned off of
Man O War and headed out Nicholasville Road on our way to Danville. According
to what I remembered from studying Google Maps, it was approximately an hour
from Lexington to Danville, probably a little more considering the time of day
it was. We had gotten to the other side of Nicholasville before we saw more
countryside, and before we left the traffic lights behind. A little over an
hour after we left Lexington, we arrived in downtown Danville, home of at least
two bakeries, and who knows what else. If Danville is like most towns, those
most likely to occupy space downtown are lawyers.

We hit the bakeries before searching for Joan
Arrington, because we weren’t sure how long those small town bakeries stay open
each day. For Thelma Lou’s sake, we got to both of them before they closed for
the day. Compared to a lot of Kentucky towns, Danville isn’t small, but it’s
not exactly Lexington or Louisville, either.

Our first stop was at Burke’s Bakery, right on Main
Street, which according to Thelma Lou, has been around for several decades.
Before we went in, we decided to get less than half of what we wanted. That way
we could keep the cost of our purchases below one hundred dollars. We walked
in, studied the cases, and huddled together. We all agreed that we’d get a
brownie loaded with nuts to snack on right then and three different kinds of
cookies to nibble on in the car, all of which looked like something I could eat
by the dozen in one sitting. Plus, we thought a pecan pie would travel and hold
up well until we got home. We were proud of ourselves for being so
conservative, but a few nibbles told us that we needed to make a return trip to
Danville.

We took our purchases to the car, then walked to the
corner, and up a couple of blocks until we came to Church Street. We turned
left and soon arrived at The Twisted Sifter. The name scored extra points with
me. I hoped what they had to sell was just as good as the name.

I walked in and lost it. Cakes. Pies. Cheesecake. I
looked at all the choices of cupcakes they had. There must have been one
hundred; chocolate Bavarian cream, chocolate caramel, red velvet, apple spice,
chocolate peanut butter banana, pink lemonade, sour watermelon, spiced rum raisin,
pineapple upside down, peach cobbler, honey cinnamon, chocolate bourbon-Maker’s
Mark, and caramel banana were just a few of them. My eyes were worn out. I’d
gained three pounds just looking. Again we huddled. We decided to buy two
cupcakes, and eat them then, to see how good they were. That was a bad idea.
Once we nibbled, we realized that we weren’t getting out of there empty handed.
We huddled again, wondered how many cupcakes we could eat before they got
stale, if we ate cupcakes for all three meals. Then, we realized that wasn’t a
good idea, so we settled for a dozen. We also found a turtle cheesecake with
our names on it. The Twisted Sifter found a lot of our money with their name on
it. But everyone seemed happy with the trade. Well, my Wii Fit board wouldn’t
be too happy, but it would have to get over it.