No Cats Allowed

NINETEEN

“What’s wrong, Mr. Charlie? You look like a man that’s looking trouble right straight in the face.” Azalea regarded me with concern.

Diesel meowed and put a paw on my thigh. I patted his head and replied to Azalea, “I’m okay. That was the president of the college. He wants me to take over as director of the library until they find a person for the position.”

“Don’t see anything so terrible about that,” Azalea said. “They must think a mighty lot of you to want you to do that.” She sniffed. “Somebody there’s got some sense.”

“Thank you, Azalea, I appreciate that.” I shook my head. “I hadn’t expected this. There will be quite a few headaches with the job, even though it will be temporary.”

“How temporary, you don’t mind my asking?”

“No more than three or four months, I’m hoping. If it’s any longer than that, I may be bald by the time I’m done.” I smiled, yet I was serious. There were significant challenges ahead, and I hoped I was up to the task of leading my fellow librarians through it. Having Melba would be a huge help because she had been administrative assistant to the library director for many years. If there was anything she didn’t know about the day-to-day activities of the director’s job, it wouldn’t be something I’d have to worry over.

Provided, of course, that Melba isn’t in jail.

That unpleasant thought brought me up short. I had forgotten for the moment that Melba was in a difficult position right now. Well, Sean will just have to get her out of it.

Diesel tapped my thigh with his large paw again and meowed. “How would you like to go to the library five days a week? Think you would like that?”

The cat stared at me for a moment, as if he were considering the question. Then he warbled loudly, and I took that as an affirmative.

“What about the public library?” Azalea asked. “You going to have to give that up for a while, I reckon.”

“You’re right,” I said. “I’d better call Teresa Farmer right now and let her know I won’t be able to volunteer for several months.” I felt a sharp pang. I enjoyed my Friday volunteer shifts at the Athena Public Library, and Diesel loved going there and spending time with his friends among the staff and the patrons. There would be a lot of disappointed faces when Diesel didn’t turn up on Fridays. I doubted they would miss me nearly as much. I had to smile at that thought.

Before I could call Teresa, however, Kanesha walked into the kitchen. “I’m going to have to postpone our talk until later today,” she said after greeting her mother. “I need to act on the information Ms. Krause has given me, and that has to take priority.”

“No problem,” I said.

“When you going to let Miss Melba go?” Azalea asked. “You know she didn’t kill that man, even if he needed it.”

Kanesha glared at her mother. “Mama, I am not going to argue with you. I am doing my job, and I’ll do it as I see fit.”

Azalea glared right back at her. “I know that, Miss Chief Deputy. I also know you’re smart enough not to go chasing down the wrong street after somebody’d never hurt no one like that.”

“Mama.” Kanesha packed those two syllables with a mixture of exasperation and affection. “If you must know, we’ll be releasing Melba soon as I get back to the department. I can’t say why, but although she remains a person of interest, she is not an official suspect. Satisfied?”

Azalea sniffed. “Knew you’d have to see sense eventually.”

Kanesha’s poker face did her proud in the midst of such maternal provocation. I was thrilled to hear the news about Melba, and at the same time I was trying hard not to laugh at the interchange between the two women. It wasn’t really funny, I supposed, but seeing the immovable object meet the irresistible force, so to speak, had a certain entertainment value.

Kanesha turned to me, and I put on my best bland expression.

“Miss Krause will be coming to the department shortly to make a formal statement. Thank you for your help in getting her to talk to me.” She nodded in turn at me and her mother. “I’ll check in with you later.”

She left the kitchen, and moments later I heard the front door open and close. Right after that Lisa came in, her shoulders slumped and her eyes downcast.

“Are you all right, child?” Azalea asked. “Would you like more tea?”

“No, thank you.” Lisa raised her head and smiled at Azalea. She turned to me. “Thank you, too, Charlie. You were right. I had to tell Deputy Berry everything. I’m going to keep praying that Brent isn’t responsible.”

“Do you have a friend you can stay with for a couple of nights?” I asked. “I really don’t think you should stay by yourself in your apartment.”

Lisa looked startled. “I guess I could stay with Cassandra. I’ll have to think about it.”

“Please do,” Azalea said.

“I will. Thank you both again for everything.” She bent to rub Diesel’s head. “You, too, Mr. Kitty. You are the sweetest thing ever. I wish I had your twin brother at home.” She straightened. “Guess I’d better go on down to the sheriff’s department and get it over with.”

“That’s best, I think.” I rose to escort her to the front door, and Diesel came with us. Lisa gave him one last pat on the head, then surprised me with a quick hug before she hurried down the walk to the street and her car.

I realized I hadn’t mentioned to her that I was going to be her boss for a while, but that could wait until tomorrow. I imagined Forrest Wyatt would send out some kind of college-wide announcement soon. Given the situation, no doubt he would do his best to allay the fears of everyone on campus.

Time to call Sean, I reminded myself. My phone wasn’t in my pocket, and I recalled I’d put it down in a stupor after my conversation with Forrest Wyatt.

“Come on, Diesel, we’re going to see Sean,” I said. The cat gave an indifferent warble as he accompanied me to the kitchen. He liked Sean, but my son didn’t shower him with the same amount of attention that Laura did.

After a quick conversation with Sean, Diesel and I got in my car and headed downtown to the law office. The cat seemed to enjoy riding in the car. He gazed out the window at the passing sights, as much as his harness and safety rig would allow.

Laquita greeted us when we walked in and sent us straight on to Sean’s office. The door stood ajar, but I knocked anyway. The back of Sean’s chair faced us, and I could see long legs that ended in cowboy boots propped up on the credenza behind his desk.

At my knock the legs came down and the chair turned. Sean had a phone stuck to his ear. “Fine. Yes, first of next week.” He put down the phone. “Hey, Dad, come on in. You, too, Diesel.”

I made myself comfortable in one of the pair of chairs in front of his desk, and Diesel stretched out on the lushly carpeted floor beside me. He yawned and closed his eyes.

“Kanesha left the house not long ago, and she said Melba was going to be released soon.”

Sean nodded. “Yes, they informed me. She should be on her way home now.”

I frowned. “Shouldn’t you be with her? How is she getting home?”

“Right now I imagine all she wants to do is get home, have a hot shower, maybe followed by a nap,” Sean said. “As to how she’s getting home, she has her pick of escorts among the deputies. They’ll be falling over themselves to be the one to drive her.” He grinned. “How come you never fell prey to her charms?”

I snorted with laughter. “Because I’ve known her ever since she was a snotty-nosed, pigtailed little pest of a girl who bossed everyone around like factory foreman. She’s a dear friend, but I’d no sooner get romantically involved with her than I would a, well, I don’t know what.” I threw my hands up. “I just know we’re better off as friends.”

Sean regarded me, one eyebrow arched, as if he didn’t believe me. He didn’t respond to my disclaimer, however.

“Other than the lipstick they found with the body,” Sean said, “they have no evidence that Melba was at the scene of the crime. She says she was at home watching television all evening. Went to bed around ten thirty, alone, and didn’t go near the main library building last night. I believe her. I can’t see that she had a particularly strong motive to kill Reilly.”

“No, she didn’t, and she would never subject even a jerk like Reilly to that kind of appalling death.” I grimaced at the thought of the man’s death by crushing. Those compact, automated shelves would have been relentless.

“There is some evidence he might have been unconscious when the shelves were activated,” Sean said. “It’s possible he didn’t know what was happening.”

“For his sake, I hope he didn’t,” I said. Then the full meaning of Sean’s statement penetrated my image-clogged brain. “What kind of evidence?”

Sean made a moue of distaste. “I haven’t seen the crime scene photos yet, but I’m given to understand by a reliable source that the head, unlike the rest of his body, somehow escaped crushing. Preliminary examination revealed he’d been struck fairly hard in the face. His nose was broken.”

I tried not to imagine how Reilly’s head had escaped crushing, but I knew there were gaps left on the shelves for the times when more volumes needed to be added to a particular range. Somehow he had fallen so that his head was in one of those gaps. That was the only explanation that occurred to me. For a moment I thought I would throw up, I felt so queasy.

“Dad, are you okay? You’re really pale.” Sean sounded alarmed. “Q.C. has brandy in his office. Should I get you some? Or whiskey?”

I shook my head. “No, I’ll be okay. My vivid imagination got the better of me for a moment.”

“Sorry, I probably shouldn’t have told you,” Sean said. He looked upset. “I didn’t realize it would have this effect on you.”

“Really, Son, I’ll be okay. The queasiness is passing. Actually, if you have a can of diet soda, that would be good.”

Sean jumped up from behind his desk and disappeared into the hallway. He was back in less than thirty seconds with a cold can. He popped the top and handed it to me. I had a healthy swallow and felt immediately better. It was probably all psychological, because I doubted the diet drink had that kind of medicinal efficacy. Either way, real or imagined, it did the trick.

“Thanks.” I took a deep breath. “The part about the broken nose is really interesting. There’s a possibility Reilly was attacked by a violently jealous young man whose girlfriend Reilly harassed.”

“How do you know that?” Sean frowned. “This is the first I’ve heard of it.”

Since Lisa Krause was giving a statement to the sheriff’s department, I knew Sean would have the information at some point. I might as well tell him now as further indication that Melba had significant competition as a murder suspect. I filled him in on Lisa Krause’s story.

When I’d finished, Sean said, “I remember him. Tuck the Truck, I mean. He once ran thirty-seven yards the wrong way and scored a touchdown for the opposing team.” He laughed. “Not the brightest athlete on the field.” Then he sobered. “He’s certainly big enough to have done that kind of damage to Reilly’s face without even trying to hit him very hard. But if he’s got a violent temper, well, he could break a guy’s neck with a really hard hit.”

I thought about that for a moment. “If he did hit Reilly really hard and killed him, do you think maybe he panicked and put the body in the compact shelving to cover up what he’d done?”