Pretty is as Pretty Dies (A Myrtle Clover Mystery) (10 page)

Erma crooned to the squirrelly hood ornament and it hopped
off the car and up the driveway. It crossed over into Myrtle's yard
and she put her hand on the horn to honk, but thought twice
about it. She was supposed to be at death's door, so probably
shouldn't seem too concerned about rodent eating habits.

If Erma had envisioned Myrtle peeling rubber as she raced off
to the doctor, she was quickly relieved when she carefully pulled
the stick into reverse, looked thoroughly behind her as she backed
up, and drove off down the street at a sedate twenty miles an
hour.

CRAZY DAN'S LITTLE PIECE of the world was located out on the
rural-route highway that had been a major thoroughfare before
the advent of the interstate system. The rural route was dotted
with deserted roadside motels, old farms with some dwarfy cotton
stalks that looked like dried-up sticks, and bait shops with beer
signs in the windows.

The number of Jesus signs increased in proportion to the distance from Bradley. They started out "Jesus Saves" and got lesscomforting as she drove on out. By the time Myrtle was out in the
sticks, the signs warned her of her eternal damnation. She passed
little bitty houses with big satellite dishes on the roof and an expensive pickup in the driveway. A series of rotting wooden signs
proclaimed "CRAZY Dan's Boil P-Nuts, Hubcaps, Fireworks (Fireworks was long-since crossed off, due to state law), Live Bait!" Next
to it was a weather-beaten sign that looked like a palm with
"Madam Zora, psychic" written on it. Actually, it had "sykick" on it, but Myrtle deciphered the meaning. Apparently, Madam Zora
also read "tarro cards."

"One-stop shopping and find out your future," muttered Myrtle as she pulled Erma's car off the street and onto a barren stretch
of red clay that Myrtle guessed was the parking lot. Most of his
yard looked that way, though. His house was the most startling
thing on the lot. At least, Myrtle guessed there was a house lurking
underneath the hubcaps. Everything from the roof down was completely covered with every type of hubcap imaginable. Only a couple of dirty windows remained uncovered. She sat in the car and
just stared at it. What did it sound like during a rainstorm? Who
would do something like this? The kind of person who would have
information about a murder, she decided. She grabbed her cane
from the passenger's seat and opened the car door.

Since no one had come out, she made her way up to the front
door of the hubcap house. She could see no discernible doorbell
and the door was completely covered by hubcaps. How was she
supposed to let him know she was there? She rapped at a hubcap
with her cane, which made a metallic reverberating sound, and she
was rewarded by an opening door. Staring at her was a grizzly little
man with bony features, leathery skin, mangy-looking stubble, and
nicotine-stained hands. He glared at her. "Whatcha want?"

Some salesman. "What if I told you I wanted boiled peanuts or
hubcaps? Aren't you in business to sell things to people?"

He grunted. "Ain't got no boil peanuts. You want hubcaps, jest
looka th' house." He started to close the door and Myrtle stuck her
cane in the doorway. He raised wispy eyebrows and said,
"Whatchadoin'? You crazy?"

"No, but you are. They call you Crazy Dan for some reason. I
need to talk to you for a minute." When he motioned her into his
shadowy and rather rank-smelling house, she added, "Outside will
be fine."

Outside really wasn't fine. It was probably more than 100 degrees, although Myrtle had a feeling Crazy Dan's house wasn't
much better. She saw a decrepit air conditioning window unit sagging out of one window, propped up by a couple of hubcaps. The
unit made a sluggish, chugging sound, then stopped abruptly.
Crazy Dan reached out and slapped the back of it, spawning it into
a lethargic-sounding drone. How he lived in a place that looked
like a giant sun-catcher without central air in the South, Myrtle
couldn't figure. Crazy Dan's mutts lay in shadows of bushes, trees,
and the house, apparently only moving when the shadow moved
or to wet their whistles in their water bowls.

He was working on a huge wad of chewing tobacco, which had
apparently just gotten to the right point to spit out. Squinting over
at a spot, he spat out a stream of the brown juice which splattered
in the red dust.

Myrtle was starting to feel a little like Alice through the looking
glass. She knew there was information to be had, but couldn't figure out for the life of her what Crazy Dan could possibly know.
About anything.

She decided that the direct approach would work best. "Do you
know anything about the murder of Parke Stockard?" Crazy Dan's
leathery face wrinkled even more than it already was. He seemed
to be in danger of losing his features altogether in the folds of
skin.

"Parke Stock-kard?" he rolled the name around on his tongue
as if trying out an exotic dish that wasn't very pleasing to him. He
was thoughtful. "That Yankee, weren't she?"

Former-English-teacher Myrtle repressed a sigh. "That's right."

He thought for a moment and Myrtle wondered if this was the
first time his mind had been exercised in a while. She could almost
hear the squeaks from the rusty cerebral equipment. He opened
his mouth wide and Myrtle leaned in, sure to finally hear the valuable recollection that had prompted this visit.

Crazy Dan burped.

Myrtle turned around and started maneuvering her way around
piles of hubcaps toward Erma's car. "I suppose that's a no, Mr. Dan,"
she called back over her shoulder. She stumbled over an exposed
tree root sticking up out of the red clay of his yard, and would have
fallen if Crazy Dan hadn't caught her with one sweep of his surprisingly wiry arm.

She turned to thank him for his gallantry, but stopped at his
scowl. "Don't be fallin' down in my yard. Suin' me, mos' like"

For reparations in hubcaps and boil p-nuts, guessed Myrtle.
She yanked herself out of his grasp. "Sorry for the imposition,
Crazy. I mean, Mr. Dan. Someone mentioned that you knew something. Obviously an incorrect assumption in every respect."

Crazy Dan wheezed out a laugh. "Well, tha' might be and
mightn't be."

Had she fallen down the rabbit hole? Crazy Dan was starting to
take an amazing resemblance to the Mad Hatter. "Or maybe the
Dormouse?" she mused aloud. "No, that was the one that was always falling asleep. The March Hare!"

Crazy Dan squinted at her suspiciously, perhaps thinking she
should adopt the name Mad Myrtle, then said cautiously, "Dunno
'bout that, though. But I see things. Livin' in the country, y'see
things."

Myrtle bit back a "dammit" and sweetly asked, "What things,
Mr. Dan?"

"Seen tha' politician with the hussy. Lotsa times. Thinks his
runnin' around is safe out in the backwoods. Thinks I don't know
whose BM-dubyer it is!" He snorted in continued disbelief.

Myrtle stared into Crazy Dan's creased face. "That is kind of
weird that he would feel anonymous. Considering cars are your
specialty. So it was definitely a BMW and you're sure it was Benton
Chambers with this hussy?"

"I'm sure it was his BM-dubyer."

Myrtle held out her hand to Crazy Dan, who shook it with a
brown paw. "Thank you, Mr. Dan. You've been very helpful."

He held onto Myrtle's hand for a second, looking at it thoughtfully, then glancing at Myrtle's large pocketbook. He grunted. "You
oughta be talkin' to muh sister. Wander."

"Your sister wanders?" He was losing Myrtle again.

Crazy Dan looked at Myrtle with the same expression he might
give a splinter stuck in his brown paw. "Naw! Her name is Wander."

Must be the psychic with the giant palm next to Crazy Dan's
sign. She started to stop him when he suddenly started yelling,
"Wander! Wander! C'mere! You got a palm to read."

Out came a woman who Myrtle would have thought was Crazy
Dan in drag if Dan hadn't still been standing in front of her. She
looked nothing like the mystic-sounding name "Madam Zora"
would have you believe. The skin-and-bones creature flashed a smile with five or six teeth missing and said hoarsely, "Lemme see
yer palm."

Crazy Dan nodded and looked at Myrtle expectantly, so Myrtle
surrendered her hand to the woman. Wanda held it with nicotinestained hands and looked searchingly at her palm before dropping
it as if it had scorched her skin and turning around to go back in
the hubcap-covered hut. "Hey!" bellowed Crazy Dan. "What about
th' money? Give 'er th' for-toon, Wander!"

But Wanda waved him away with a flap of her hand. She paused
in the doorway before entering the dark interior of the house and
called out in a cigarette-damaged croak, "Stop everything. You're
in bad danger." As quickly as she'd appeared, she vanished.

IN DANGER. THE PSYCHIC'S eerie prediction-more like a pronouncement-bothered Myrtle during the long drive back. Wanda
had seemed genuinely shaken and had refused to take her money,
which hadn't endeared her to Crazy Dan. But the woman couldn't
actually be clairvoyant. It was more likely that she was completely
off her rocker. Who wouldn't be, living with Crazy Dan?

Myrtle did remember to put some gas into Erma's car, in case she
wondered why going to the doctor would put such a dent in her tank.
She pulled into a station and scrounged a couple of dollars from her
pocketbook. Then she saw how far two dollars would go and nearly
keeled over from the sticker shock. Five years without a car and the
price of gas had almost tripled. She dug out more money.

Myrtle pulled up cautiously into Erma's driveway, hoping to
limit the interaction with her. No problems there. Erma apparently
had no desire to catch any stomach/intestinal bugs.

"Hope you feel better, Myrtle," she said briskly, spraying the car
keys with an industrial-sized can of Lysol when Myrtle handed them to her. The last Myrtle saw of her, she was lost in an anti-bacterial cloud as she sprayed down the entire interior of her car.

Myrtle spent several hours that night studying the ceiling crack.
The entire encounter put a very bad taste in Myrtle's mouth. Late
the next morning, she walked downtown to Bo's Diner for an early
lunch. Nothing was very worrisome when you had a greasy slaw
dog and chili fry plate in front of you.

Bo's Diner in downtown Bradley was the place to go for lunch
and had been for forty years, when Bo's father owned it. Plus, it
had the best sweet tea in the South. A bell jangled when she opened
the door and Bo looked up from behind the counter and greeted
her. The diner had frayed vinyl booths around Formica-topped
tables. A sign on the wall stated: "If You Can't Say it in Front of
Granny, Don't Say it Here!" There was nothing new about the
place, but everything was kept immaculately clean.

Myrtle slid into a high-backed vinyl booth and a waitress with
"Tanya" on her name tag approached with an order pad. Myrtle
winced. Tanya was fond of treating her like a particularly slow toddler. "Hey there, sweetheart! Was your little tummy rumbling for
something yummy? Glad you came in to visit ole Tanya, sweetie.
What can I get for your rumbly tummy?"