Murder of a Smart Cookie: A Scumble River Mystery (17 page)

Starting on the west side of town, Skye planned to work her way through the entire yard sale route and end up over by the original location of her family’s boom on the eastern boundary. Since the sheriff had released the crime scene, she wanted to take a closer look at it.

On the morning the body was discovered, it had taken all her concentration just to keep her relatives and other spectators from removing or destroying any important evidence, so she hadn’t had a chance to carefully inspect the site and get a clear mental picture of what had happened.

Skye’s first stop was the new Leofanti/Denison farm stand. It was even better than the first one. The men had rebuilt the booth to resemble the front of a barn. Dante’s daughter-in-law was handling the food side of the stall, where business was brisk. People were snatching up homemade baked goods, preserves, pickled peppers, and fresh-from-the-garden vegetables as if they were about to disappear off the face of the earth forever. Skye had never seen the beautiful Victoria so harried.

On the other end of the stand, Jed’s older brother was handling the tool and farm implements, which were selling at a slightly less frenetic pace.

Skye approached him and said, “Hi, Uncle Wiley. How’s it going?” Wiley looked a lot like Jed, with the same compact build and farmer’s tan, but he had inherited his father’s Swedish blue eyes and wore his white hair in a pompadour.

“It’s going.” None of the Denison men were even close to being chatterboxes.

“Did you and Dad have a good time last night?” Skye probed. Jed had evaded Skye’s question as to where he had been the night before, and she was determined to find out, just in case he
had
been with Bunny.

“Huh?” Wiley’s leathery forehead creased in confusion. “Kitty and I watched TV. We didn’t go out. What are you talking about?”

“Oh.” Skye knew she had to distract her uncle before he started asking questions she didn’t want to answer. “I must have misunderstood.” She held up an object that defied description. “Hey, what’s this?”

Wiley took off his John Deere cap and scratched his head. “1920s cattle dehorner, I think. Found it in an old barn we tore down last summer.”

Before she could put it down, a man in a cowboy hat snatched it from her hands. “I saw it first.” His belt buckle was bigger than a dinner plate and held his beer belly in like a girdle. “It’s mine.”

Wiley raised an eyebrow at Skye, who nodded slightly and grabbed it back. “No. I want it. Finders keepers.” She snuck a quick peek at the price tag as she cradled it against her chest. It was marked twenty-five dollars. She said to Wiley, “I’ll give you fifty dollars.”

The cowboy wrenched it out of her hands. “One hundred bucks.”

Skye gauged her opponent’s interest. He was sweating and licking his lips. “One-fifty.”

“Two hundred.”

Skye opened her fanny pack and peered inside, pretending to count her money. “Two-fifty-five.”

“Three hundred.” The cowboy reached into his jeans pocket and produced a gold money clip. He peeled off three hundred-dollar bills and slapped them into Wiley’s hand. “Cash on the barrelhead.”

Wiley tucked the money away and said with a sly smile, “Sold to the cowboy.”

After the guy walked away carrying his prize in a blue-and-yellow striped bag with a stylized
D
and
F
on its side, Skye said to her uncle, “Well, that was a strange one.”

“Maybe.” Wiley winked before turning to wait on a new customer. “But everybody is somebody else’s weirdo.”

Skye’s next stop was the Lemonade ShakeUp booth. She hoped Justin would appear for his noon shift, or at least call and say he wasn’t coming. Bitsy’s mother, Joy, was the adult on duty working the lemon juicer; and Bitsy and a new boy, who had joined the student newspaper staff only a couple of weeks before school got out, were handling the sales window.

“Hi, Bitsy, Rusty.” They waved, but were too busy taking orders to talk. Skye walked around back and went inside. “How’s it going, Mrs. Kessler?”

“Busy.” Joy wiped her forehead with a paper towel. “I’ll be glad when the next shift gets here.”

Skye looked at her watch. It was ten to twelve. “They should arrive any minute.”

Before she could say any more, the screen door opened and Xavier Ryan entered, followed by Frannie. He nodded to the women. “Mrs. Kessler, Miss Skye.”

“Hi.” Joy whipped off her apron and thrust it at Xavier. “Sorry, I’ve got to run. I need to get home.” She held open the door. “Come on, Bitsy. We don’t want Alex to be home alone too long, do we?”

Skye had worked with Joy’s son that past school year. He had attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and his parents had chosen not to medicate him. He had made some gains on the behavior-management program Skye had set up, but he was still a handful, especially in an unstructured situation like being home alone.

While Joy waited impatiently for her daughter to wash her hands and take off her apron, she turned to Skye. “I’m opening up a new business this fall. It’s a workout place just for women. You should come try it out. The first session is free.”

Skye narrowed her eyes. Was Mrs. Kessler insulting her? She couldn’t tell, so she joked, “Thanks, but I get enough exercise just pushing my luck.”

Joy looked puzzled, but rushed out without answering.

Skye turned to Xavier and Frannie. “Any word” from Justin?”

Both shook their heads.

“I was hoping he’d at least call.” Skye chewed her lip. “As soon as I finish my morning check of the yard sale, I’ll get Mrs. Frayne and we’ll look for him.”

Frannie nodded. “I can’t believe he’s doing this.” She appeared to be torn between anger and the urge to cry. Her voice quavered when she asked, “Who’s going to help me at the window?”

Rusty had been silent, which was not unusual. In the short period of time he had been a member of the school newspaper staff Skye could barely remember him saying three sentences.

Now he added a fourth. “I can stay.”

Frannie hugged him. “Thank you.”

Skye looked at Xavier. “Okay with you?”

He nodded.

“Great.” Skye turned to go. “Leave me a message at Mrs. Frayne’s if Justin turns up within the next couple of hours. After that, call me at my parents’ house.”

The last loop on Skye’s inspection tour was to the east and included Doozier territory. As she steered the golf cart around the curve, she braced herself for turmoil. It was even worse than she’d expected.

Pandemonium stretched out in front of her as far as she could see. Faith Easton’s TV crew had set up their camera in the middle of the road, blocking traffic, and people were honking their horns because they could
edge past only one car at a time. Others were stopping their vehicles completely and getting out to see what was happening.

It was one giant gridlock, and Earl Doozier stood in the center of it, toe-to-toe with Burnett Parnell, the goat cheese guy. Burnett was heavily muscled and wore a leather vest, jeans, and motorcycle boots. The guy towered over Earl like a Great Dane next to a Chihuahua.

Spittle flew from Earl’s semi-toothless mouth and spattered on the other man’s bare chest as Earl yelled, “I keep telling you, Burnett, I ain’t seen your goats!”

Burnett picked Earl up, his feet dangling several inches off the ground. “Then what are you feeding that mangy lion of yours?”

Skye tensed. Everyone in Scumble River knew you didn’t accuse a Doozier of wrongdoing, at least not to his face and without backup, but this guy was from out of town.

Just then, Earl’s wife, Glenda, had materialized next to her husband, holding a shotgun. His son Junior and nephew Cletus had crept up behind Burnett; one had a shovel and the other a bow and arrow. Flanking the fighting duo to the right was Elvira, Earl’s niece, who flicked open a switchblade as Skye watched.

Skye knew she had to step in before blood was shed. She just didn’t want it to be her blood. Maneuvering her cart through the crowd, she pulled up to the left of the two men, snatched a bullhorn from the backseat, and barked in her most authoritative voice, “Put the Doozier down and step back.”

Burnett dropped Earl and swung on her. “Are you in charge?” When she nodded, he pounded on the front of the golf cart, causing it to tilt downward. “This guy is stealing my prizewinning goats and feeding them to his lion.”

Skye paled at the horrifying image.

Before she could respond, Earl bleated, “No, I ain’t, Miz Skye. I loves goats. Honest.”

Skye climbed out of the cart and asked Earl’s attacker, “How do you know Mr. Doozier is taking your animals?”

Burnett snarled and pointed at Junior and Cletus. “They told me.”

All eyes swung to two skinny boys wearing dirty shorts and flip-flops. The redhead froze for a moment, then tried to dart away.

His mother grabbed him as he ran past her. “Junior Doozier, you explain yourself right this minute!”

“Ma.” He tried to wiggle away, but Glenda’s grip tightened. “Shucks, Cletus and me was just havin’ some fun.”

“What kinda fun?” Glenda shook him slightly.

“Burnett kept yelling at us to stay away from his goats, so I told him Pa would feed them to the lions if he didn’t quit it.” Junior finally squirmed free and looked at the muscled man. “We was just funnin’ you.”

“Then what happened to my goats?” Burnett turned to Skye, a tear on his cheek. “One’s disappeared every night this week.”

Skye squatted down and gently turned the boy to face her. “Did you have something to do with that, Junior?”

He scuffed the dirt with his toe. “Cletus and me lured them out of their pen, and we corralled them up yonder behind the old barn.” He glared at Skye. “They’re fine. We made sure they had food and water.”

Burnett hurried away in the direction Junior had indicated, but said over his shoulder to Earl, “This isn’t settled, Doozier.”

Before he could respond, someone screamed, a roar ripped through the air, and Earl took off running toward his petting zoo.

As Skye stood frozen, a man yelled, “Oh, my God, the lion’s got Wanda!”

Skye, along with the rest of the crowd, looked toward where the man was pointing. The lion was standing over a middle-aged woman he’d pinned to the ground and was sniffing her. Her brown eyes bulged from their sockets, and she was breathing in shallow gasps.

Suddenly Earl appeared, brandishing what looked like a giant butterfly net and yelling, “Here, kitty, kitty.”

The animal glanced at him, gave Wanda one more sniff, and loped away.

Skye rushed up to the woman. “Are you okay? Do you need an ambulance?”

Wanda brushed off her red stretch pants, pulled down her orange T-shirt advertising a nearby bar, and shook her head. “I’m okay.”

“Are you sure?”

The woman nodded and poked at her beehive hairdo, dislodging a twig and some gravel. “Boy, that animal’s breath was worse than my ex-husband’s.” She paused, then added, “And he was about as subtle in getting me on my back.”

After verifying that Wanda was unharmed, Skye attempted to follow Earl and the lion, but it was too late. Faith had spotted her and blocked her path.

The TV star spoke rapidly into a microphone, not allowing Skye time to answer her rapid-fire questions. “Here is the person in charge, Skye Denison. Skye, can you explain to our viewers why you’ve allowed a lion to run loose through the Route 66 Yard Sale? Are you a member of some
renegade animal rights group? Is this a statement against caging animals or just a publicity stunt?”

“Get that thing out of my face.” Skye shoved the microphone away and tried to push past Faith. “Are you nuts? I didn’t allow the lion to run free, and I’m not a member of any animal rights group.”

“So, you are in favor of animal experimentation?” Faith still blocked her way.

“Yes. No. No comment.” Skye finally squeezed past the TV star and ran after Earl and the lion.

Faith and her crew followed.

Skye stopped a few feet from where the animal had paused to sniff and paw at the ground.

She looked around at the crowd that had gathered in a semicircle around the scene, and raised her voice. “Has anyone notified the police or animal control?” No one answered. “Does anyone have a cell phone?” Several small devices were waved at her. “You there in the Cubs hat, dial 911 and tell them to bring a tranquilizer gun.”

That taken care of, Skye turned to Earl. “How in the name of all that’s holy did that lion get loose?”

Earl moved his skinny shoulders in what might have been a shrug. “Miz Skye, I don’t rightly know. Probably some more snafoolery the boys got up to.”

“You told me you had a padlock on the lion’s cage and the only key was on a string around your neck.” Skye forced her voice to remain calm. “How could this be the boys’ fault?”

“I plead contemporary insanity.” Earl stared at his feet.

Skye closed her eyes and prayed for the strength to resist swatting Earl upside the head. After regaining control of her urge to do the little man bodily harm, she opened her eyes and asked, “So, how do you plan on getting him back into his cage?”

Earl’s face crumpled like a used tissue. “The guy who rented him to me gave me this here net. Said if you put it over old Kitty’s head, he’s trained to lay down and go to sleep.”

Rented? Who rented out lions for a living? The same person who named a lion Kitty, no doubt. As Skye was puzzling out these last bits of information, Earl’s wife marched up to him, still carrying the shotgun. “Earl Doozier, you are too stupid to be a moron.”

“Glenda, honey, don’t you be saying stuff like that.” Earl drew himself up straight and attempted to stick his sunken chest out. “That’s definition of character. I could sue you.”

Although he was right, it was a definition of his character, Skye kind of figured Earl meant “defamation,” but she wouldn’t waste her time explaining it to him. It would be like trying to put makeup on a hog—annoying for the pig and frustrating for her.

Glenda grabbed Earl by the ear and screeched, “If you don’t get that lion back in his cage in the next ten seconds, I’m going to knock you into the middle of next week!”

Skye stared. When had Glenda found a way to time travel? Skye tore her attention away from the feuding couple to check on the lion.