Slip and Go Die (A Parson's Cove Mystery) (14 page)

For a moment, I thought I’d lost him again. He stared off into space and resumed his hand clapping at a furious rate. I felt like grabbing his hands and telling him to stop but I knew if I did that, I wouldn’t learn anything from him.

His eyes filled with tears.

“What’s the matter? Did they hurt you, Charlie? Is that why you’re crying?”

He shook his head and wiped the tears off his cheek with his mitten.

“Then, why? Why are you crying?”

“Poor Mabel.” The tears came again. He sniffled. “Now you’ll lose your nice new furnace.”

I touched his arm. “Don’t worry about me. If you tell me who broke into my store, I’ll be able to pay for my furnace. Can you tell me who it was?”

He shook his head.

“You can’t tell me who it was?”

He shook his head again.

“You didn’t know them?”

He shook his head.

“Afraid,” was all he said.

“They’re afraid? Or, you’re afraid to tell me?”

He nodded.

“You’re afraid. Why? Will the person hurt you if you do?”

As quickly as Charlie had opened up to me, he shut down. He stared up at the sky and kept clapping his hands. I knew by the look on his face that he wasn’t going to tell me anything more. At least, not at the moment. With Charlie, I could be patient.

I patted his arm. “That’s okay. I don’t want you to get hurt. When you’re ready to talk to me, come over to the shop. Reg Smee and I will make sure no one hurts you.”

His eyes went wild. “No. No Reg. Don’t tell Reg.”

“Okay, okay. Did they warn you not to tell Reg?”

He nodded. “Nobody,” he whispered. “They said to tell nobody.” He was ready to cry again. “But, I wanted to tell you, Mabel. I had to tell you. I don’t want you to lose your nice furnace.” Tears rolled down his cheeks.

“Thank you. And, don’t worry, Charlie. I won’t tell Reg and I’m not going to lose my furnace. Why don’t you come by tomorrow and I’ll give you a cup of coffee?”

His eyes widened. He shook his head. “No. I stay away. Go, Mabel. I don’t want to talk to you anymore.”

With that, he went back to rocking back and forth and clapping his hands. Some of his tears had frozen to his lashes. If I had any maternal instinct in me at all and Flori says all women do, even me, I would’ve loved to put my arms around Charlie right at that moment. Unfortunately, you just can’t do that to Charlie. All I could hope was that he’d go inside somewhere and warm up before he turned into an ice sculpture.

Chapter Seventeen

The light on my answering machine was blinking wildly when I walked in the door. If it weren’t for Flori, I wouldn’t have the stupid thing. She insists that I try to keep up with technology. It took her years to convince me to get a touchtone phone. I have to admit it’s kind of neat; I press ‘2’ and it dials Flori’s number automatically. Of course, she insisted that number ‘1’ be reserved for the emergency number to the hospital. If I ever do have an emergency, I’ll press ‘2’ anyway but I didn’t tell her that.

I had four messages: all from a hysterical woman named Flori. The messages were basically the same:

“Mabel, where are you? (spoken very shrilly). Why aren’t you answering your phone?” (spoken in a sing-song voice). Then, silence with a bit of humming, as she waited for me to come to the phone. “Pick up. Pick up,” she muttered. “I know you’re at home. I saw you walk out the store. You can’t just disappear off the face of the earth. Are you sick? Did you fall and hurt yourself? Are you really depressed and not answering your phone? If you are, please answer anyway. I’ll come and stay with you. You know you can talk to me anytime about anything. I’m your best friend, Mabel. I feel hurt that you don’t want to confide in me. We’re more than best friends; you know that–we’re family. I meant it when I said that Jake and I would look after you. It’s perfectly normal to be feeling down right now. It’s nothing to be ashamed of, Mabel. Please, please, pick up the phone.” Another few moments of silence. “I’m waiting, Mabel. What’s the matter…?” By that time, the tape had finished.

I thought that I’d better phone her back before she sent Jake over to see if I were alive. She picked up the phone half way through the first ring.

“Mabel, I’ve been worried sick about you. It’s almost five-thirty. Where have you been? I called you five minutes after you left the shop.”

“It’s okay. I’m fine. I just took a longer route home, that’s all.”

Flori didn’t say anything for several seconds.

“You took another route home? There aren’t any other routes. Where did you go? Are you in more trouble?”

“No. I’m not in any trouble. How can you say that when my store was broken into? Whoever did that is the one in trouble.”

“So, where did you go? I thought you said you were depressed and wanted to go home. You were going to go home and curl up with a book. Remember?”

“Well, I think you’re the one who said I was going to curl up with a book.”

“So?”

There was really no sense in prolonging this; eventually, Flori finds out and then, I’m in more trouble.

“So, I dropped by Esther’s to return her scarf.”

The only sound on the line was Flori’s kitchen clock ticking. It reminded me of a time bomb.

“You did what?”

“I returned Esther’s scarf. You didn’t think that I’d keep it, did you?”

Flori was thinking that one over.

Finally, she said, “Mabel, what on earth, have you been up to?”

“Nothing. But, I do have something to tell you. There was, at least, one witness to the crime.”

“A witness to the crime? You mean there was someone who saw the thieves?”

“Yep.”

“Who? Don’t tell me it was Esther! Did you tell Reg?”

“I can’t. The person’s life might be in danger.”

She sighed. “I think you’re letting your imagination run wild again. You always think that someone’s life is in danger. Did Esther tell you her life was in danger?”

“No. Esther’s still claiming to be innocent. But, between you and me, I wouldn’t be surprised if she wasn’t one of the culprits. By the way, she kicked me out of her house.”

“Why? Did you happen to threaten her or accuse her of stealing or, worse still, murder? It’s usually your own fault when people kick you out of their house.”

“You keep track of everyone who kicks me out of their house?”

“Not any more. I lost count.”

“Some friend you are. Don’t you worry about my welfare, Flori?”

“Oh, not at all, Miss Wickles. Why do you think I’ve been phoning all afternoon, half out of my mind? I don’t do this just for thrills, you know. When you left the store, you were upset. Of course, I worry about your welfare, you silly thing.”

And saying that, she sniffed and blew her nose.

“You shouldn’t do that.”

“What?”

“Sniff and then blow.”

“Why, for goodness sake?”

“Because you sniff it up your nose and then blow it out. I’m sure your nose is totally confused.”

Flori let out a screech that, I’m sure, if I hadn’t had the phone to my ear, I could have heard half way down the block anyway. I waited until she was finished. While I waited, I filled the tea kettle to brew a cup of tea.

In between giggling, hiccoughing and sniffing, she said, “You are so funny, Mabel.”

I was glad that I was back in her good graces because when I’m working a murder case and trying to break up a crime ring, I like to have my best friend by my side.

Even if she isn’t fully aware of it.

Chapter Eighteen

“That’s all I can tell you, Mabel. Sorry, but I don’t have anything more. I’m as baffled as you are.”

Reg was sitting at my kitchen table. I had finished watching him drink three cups of coffee and eat two homemade muffins. And, my muffins are not small and dainty. I’m sure Beth, his wife, had prepared a good wholesome breakfast an hour or so before he knocked at my door.

He’d stopped at my shop first. I don’t know what he thought I would do there. It had taken hours and hours to store all my merchandise. I refused to lug it all out again. Somehow, some way, I was going to get Beulah’s things back. I had to believe. Meanwhile, I would lock up my store and leave the shelves empty. It was a crime scene and I wasn’t planning to disturb anything. These two-bit hoodlums were not going to intimidate me. I was also not going to give up my furnace. My livelihood depended on Beulah. Or, at least, on her stolen legacy.

Of course, there was the thought: what would I have done if Beulah hadn’t died? How would I have paid for a furnace then? I certainly hadn’t wanted her to die. Now that she had, however, I needed her more than ever.

I’m the first to admit that I’m not good at keeping a secret. I always mean to but somehow, in the heat of the moment, the words just erupt out of my mouth. It’s a terrible fault to have. After awhile people stop confiding in you. That’s the worst part. The other part is the guilt. This time, however, I knew my mouth was sealed. There was no way that I could ever break the trust that Charlie had shown in me. Besides, if anything did happen to him, he would know who had squealed. I could picture him now–lying in the gutter in front of the library, dying from one single gunshot wound (or, perhaps, a fatal knife wound), calling out, ‘Why, Mabel? Why did you do this to me? I’ve never done anything to hurt you. I thought you were my friend.’ I could never live with a memory like that.

Sheriff Smee was on his own. Which meant that I was on my own, too. And, it sounded like I had a head start.

“How can you not know anything, Reg? Surely, there must be some clue, some talk about it around town, something. You can’t have nothing.”

Reg bowed his head. The hair on top of his head was starting to thin; there was bright pink skin under the strands of gray. He looked tired. I knew that he was hoping nothing even resembling felonious would happen in Parson’s Cove until after his retirement.

He looked up. Bluish-gray bags of skin hung under his droopy eyes. Murray McFerguson’s basset hound looked jolly in comparison. There were an awful lot of red veins running through the whites of his eyes, too.

“I’m sorry, Mabel. Jim and Scully have talked to everyone. If they can’t find anything out, nobody can.” He sighed. I knew it bugged him that his deputies always knew more about what was happening in town than he did. Of course, he didn’t realize that most folks thought of them as part criminal, too.

“Why don’t we start at the beginning?” I suggested.

“The beginning? And where’s that?”

“At Beulah’s death. Why was Esther at her house, Reg?”

He held up his hand as if some evil force was emitting from me and was about to smack him in the face. “Oh, no, you can’t go there. We talked about this before. There is no connection between Esther Flynn and Beulah Henry’s death. I don’t even want to listen to such nonsense.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

“How can you be so sure of that?” I leaned closer. “Why does she refuse to say her reason for being there? You know very well that she never had anything to do with Beulah.”

Reg slowly shook his head. “Mabel, Mabel, Mabel.”

“All right. I know my name, Reg.”

“Did you ever stop to think that perhaps, just perhaps, Esther might have told
me
why she was up at Beulah’s that day?”

“What? Are you serious? You know why she was there? Why didn’t you say so? Why has everyone been keeping this from me?” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “This is all I ever wanted to know, Reg–why was Esther up at the cabin?”

Reg put his head in his hands and groaned. Why was he making this into such a big deal? All I needed was a simple answer to a simple question.