Wrong Side of the Paw

Chapter 11

The next morning I woke up slowly. There was absolutely no need for me to get out of bed before noon, and I was seriously considering taking advantage of the opportunity. I was set to meet Aunt Frances and Otto for lunch at 1 p.m., but other than that, I had no obligations and nothing I absolutely had to do, so—

“Mrr.”

I looked over at my cat. It wasn’t far to look, because he was snuggled up inside the crook of my elbow, with his back half on the bed and his front half draped over my arm. He was staring at me with wide-open eyes and an expression that meant he was trying to tell me something.

“What do you want?” I asked. “Tell me and I will fulfill your every wish.”

He lifted his chin the slightest bit. “Mrr!”

“Sorry, I don’t understand. I’ll just have to guess.” I took my hand out from under the covers and patted the top of his fuzzy head. “Is this what you want? A little attention?”

“Mrr,” he said.

Pats might not have been what he wanted, but he was purring, so he obviously wasn’t rejecting them. I kept patting and he kept purring, which kept me from rolling over and looking at the clock. “What time do you think it is?” The light coming in the window was gray, but that could mean it was just before dawn or that the sky was thick with clouds. It was unlikely I’d slept through to morning’s double digits, but it had happened before after a late night of reading.

And I had read late. Somewhere on the floor was a copy of Margery Allingham’s Black Plumes, a book I’d picked up at the used bookstore. For some reason I now couldn’t remember, I’d decided to start reading it after dinner the night before and hadn’t managed to put it down until I’d finished.

Eddie, however, remained silent on the time question. “Well, if you’re not going to guess,” I said, “I’m going to have to play all by myself. Let’s see, I think it’s—”

My thought was interrupted by the ringing of my cell phone. I reached out, dislodging a protesting Eddie in the process, looked at the screen, and took the call.

“Hey, Leese. What’s up?” I swung my stockinged feet to the floor and glanced at the clock. Not quite ten, which to me, if not my mother, was a perfectly acceptable hour to get up on a Sunday morning.

“Sorry to bother you,” she said. “I didn’t wake you, did I?”

“Nope.” I stood. “Been up and out of bed for some time now.”

“Great. I just got off the phone with Carmen.”

“Right. About that.” Last night I’d been so taken up with my new suspicions about Leese’s stepmother that I’d decided I wouldn’t call my friend until I’d worked it all through in my head. “I’d planned on talking to you, but . . .” But what? I hadn’t left myself anywhere to go with that sentence.

Leese laughed. “But Carmen was being Carmen and you didn’t feel you could take any more Lacombes in a twenty-four-hour period? I know the feeling. Believe me.”

Though I felt a little ashamed of myself for doing so, I didn’t contradict her. “What did Carmen tell you?”

“I heard the whole Daphne Raab story all over again.”

“Did you wear yourself out from rolling your eyes?”

“Absolutely.” She chuckled, then sighed. “Carmen also told me you think a disgruntled employee killed my dad.”

“It’s a possibility,” I said. “Or do you agree with Carmen that your dad was the best boss in the world and the reason he had so much turnover was because kids today don’t know what hard work means.”

She snorted. “Brad’s told me too many stories for me to believe in that fairy tale.”

“Okay, so that’s something to look into.” I paused. “What do you know about Rob Driskell? He’s a building inspector for the county.”

“Not much, other than my dad didn’t have a good word to say about him, which puts Driskell in the same category as ninety-nine point nine percent of the world’s population.”

“I met him yesterday,” I said, and told her about the conversation.

After a short silence, she asked, “You think Driskell killed my dad?”

I almost said what I’d been told so many times by Detective Inwood, that I was exploring all avenues of investigation, but I stopped myself in time. “It’s another possibility,” I said. “I asked Carmen about him, but we got sidetracked.”

“That happens a lot with Carmen,” Leese said in a matter-of-fact manner. “I’ll talk to Brad, ask if he knows anything.”

By now I’d walked up the short flight of stairs from the bedroom and was starting coffee preparations. “Speaking of Brad, the other day I asked him about disgruntled employees. He said he was probably the best candidate of all.”

“The fight,” Leese said, “and that’s a capital F. It was years ago, but people still talk about it.” She paused, then said, “Minnie, so many people talk about the Fight that the story has grown far bigger than what actually happened. I’m afraid the police are going to start thinking that Brad is a good suspect.”

I was afraid of the same thing. “Yesterday I ran across Daphne Raab and we talked about your dad a little. I’m sorry to say that she didn’t have much good to say about him.”

“No, she wouldn’t,” Leese mused. “Still, from what little I know of her, I don’t see her as the murdering type. Not that I’d know what type that might be.”

In the last couple of years I’d had the misfortune to run across more than one killer. Was there a type among them? I’d never seen it, but I hadn’t been looking, either. Now that I was thinking about it, the only thing they seemed to have in common was murder.

“Let me know what Brad has to say,” I said, pouring water into the coffeemaker. “Other than your stepmother issues, how are things going? Did you meet with that new client?”

“Bob Blake,” Leese said. “We’ve had phone conversations, but we haven’t scheduled a meeting. I think he has health issues—one time we talked I kept hearing hospital noises in the background. Anyway, he said he’d call this week to set up something. It sounded like Saturdays will work best for him.”

I watched the caffeinated liquid dripping down. “Great. How about your other clients?”

“Things will work out,” she said. “Isn’t that what you always say?”

It was mostly my aunt Frances, and I would have given her the attribution if Leese’s voice hadn’t sounded so tight. “Is there anything I can do?” I asked.

“Thanks, but I’ll be fine,” she said a little grimly.

“Here’s an idea.” I got a mug out of the cabinet. “How about a presentation about elder law at the library?”

“Are . . . you sure?” Leese asked.

“Sure I’m sure.” The more I thought about the idea, the more I liked it. “We could do a series of service-type talks for senior citizens, starting with you. No one’s doing anything similar in the whole county, as far as I know.”

Ideas were spinning around in my head. I’d get someone to talk about finances. Someone else to talk about health care. Maybe lots of someones to talk about different aspects of health care. I’d have to get Jennifer’s permission, of course, but why would she object?

“Minnie, you . . . you . . .” Leese’s voice caught. “You’re the best.”

“Can I pass that on to my new boss?” I asked, laughing. “Because I’m not sure she knows.”

After making tentative plans, I hung up and looked at Eddie, who was sitting next to his mostly full bowl of food and staring at me with fierce concentration.

“She’s worried about her law practice,” I said. “She’s not going to come out and say so, but she’s worried. We have to figure out who killed her father and we have to do it fast.”

“Mrr.”

“I’m sure you’re right.” Not that I had any idea what he was saying, but it was always easier to agree with him than to start arguing. Then, as I poured my first coffee of the day, I got the nagging feeling that I was missing something about Dale’s murder, that I wasn’t anywhere close to figuring out who killed him, and that I was going to fail completely to help my friend.

“Mrr!” Eddie said.

“Absolutely,” I told my cat. I opened the cupboard door and shook a couple of cat treats onto the floor. “All yours.”

Eddie gave the treats a harsh glare, gave me a harsh glare, and stalked off.

“Love you, too,” I called after him.

“Mrr.”

I shook my head. Some days there was no understanding cats.

Three hours later, Otto Bingham opened his front door. “Frances is in the kitchen,” he said, ushering me inside. “She sent me out here with orders that we leave her alone to cook for the next fifteen minutes.”

I grinned as we sat on upholstered chairs in what Otto called the front room and I called a parlor. It was a small and elegant space occupied by a few chairs, a bookshelf, a few original paintings, and a fireplace. If this couldn’t be called a parlor, I didn’t know what could be.

After offering coffee from a side table, which I gratefully accepted since the Bingham coffee was outstanding, Otto poured and asked, “So what is the inestimable Eddie doing today?”

I reached down to scratch the chin of his small gray kitty. She and Eddie had met once and it hadn’t turned out well. “Mr. Ed has become one with his slothfulness.”

“It’s good to recognize your strengths,” Otto said, nodding.

Smiling, I said, “If sloth was a marketable cat skill, neither one of us would have to work again a day in our lives.”

The small gray kitty, who up until that point had been lovingly accepting my scratches, had suddenly had enough. “Moww,” she said loudly, and stalked off.

“What was that about?” I asked.

Otto smiled. “Isn’t it obvious? You were doing it wrong. Yes, you may disagree, since you’d been scratching her the same way for the last few minutes, but what she wanted was something different starting six seconds ago. You did not respond appropriately, so she was compelled to voice her objections.”

“My aunt,” I said, “is marrying a man who understands cats. Does she know how lucky she is?”

He smiled. “I’m the lucky one. Surely you know that.”

The lucky part was that they’d found each other. Though it had taken a little Minnie intervention to get the then-shy Otto to approach my aunt, things had turned out well for both parties.

“Speaking of strengths,” I said. “How do you feel about giving a senior citizen–oriented talk at the library?”

His eyebrows rose. “About anything in particular, or would I get to ramble for an hour on whatever topic I choose?”

I laughed. “I’m sure you could give an interesting talk on the history of the phone book, but I was thinking about putting together a lecture series aimed at seniors. I thought you could give them tips on managing their finances.” Though Otto’s career as an accountant had been spent in the downstate corporate world, he’d also done pro bono work at his church and area high schools.

After considering the question for all of two seconds, he said, “I’m in. When do you want me?”

“Well, I only got the idea this morning. I need to get Jennifer’s okay, but I’ll get back to you.”

He nodded. “Just let me know. Glad to help.”

I looked at him. “You really are, aren’t you? I mean, you’re not just saying that.”

“Honesty is far easier,” he said. “Keeps you from having to keep track of different lies told to different people, and then what happens if the people get together?” He shook his head sorrowfully. “Much easier just to be honest in the first place.”

“So tell me honestly,” I said. “How do you really feel about the boardinghouse?”

A long and increasingly uncomfortable silence followed my somewhat abrupt question. Finally, Otto sipped the last of his coffee, set the cup back on the table, and faced me directly.

“I know it’s a decades-old tradition, I know it’s important to Frances, and I know that many people find comfort in its continued existence. I understand all that, but on a personal basis, I don’t want to have anything to do with running it.”

“Oh,” I said blankly.

“If Frances has her heart set on continuing to run it,” he went on, “of course I’ll support her and do what I can to continue its success. And who knows?” He half smiled. “Maybe I’ll come to love it.” The slope of his shoulders, however, indicated that he was dreading the prospect.

But even as I noted that steep angle, he straightened and lifted his chin. “Enough about that. I shouldn’t have burdened you with this knowledge, Minnie, and I apologize. Can you please forget I said anything?”

Though I murmured agreement, I knew—we both knew—that forgetting would be impossible.

• • •

I walked home from Otto’s house with a tummy full of marinated pork tenderloin, steamed vegetables, redskin potatoes, cornbread, and more coffee served with a lemon square dusted with powdered sugar and topped with a dollop of whipped cream.

“It’s possible I ate a little too much,” I told Eddie as I put my container of leftovers into the fridge.

“Mrr.” He jumped up onto the back of the dining table’s bench seating and settled down to stare at me, all four paws in a short white row.

“How do you do that without falling over?” I patted the top of his head, which made it go up and down like a fur-covered bobble head. “No offense, pal, but you’re not the most graceful cat who ever walked the face of the earth.”

He adjusted himself slightly and continued to stare at me.

“Well, you’re not.” I slid into the seat across from him and stared back. “You have other strengths. Lots of them. It’s okay to admit that you’ll never be a candidate for the first feline gymnastics team to enter the Olympics.”

Eddie’s sides went in and out in a visible sigh.

“Don’t worry,” I told him consolingly. “You can always apply to be a coach. I’m sure they’d appreciate your advice.”

“Mrr!”

“You’re right, you’re an excellent life coach for me and I don’t appreciate your guidance as I should. I’ll work on that.”

Eddie slid down from his sitting stance into a lying down position. This relieved me, because I hadn’t been certain his four-in-a-row was stable enough for the back of a bench seat. “Tell you what,” I said. “Next time you give me advice I vow to take it seriously.”

“Mrr,” he said quietly.

“Good. That’s settled, then.” I turned and unzipped my backpack, which I’d tossed onto the far end of the bench the day before. “Right now there’s some work to do. If you help, we’ll get it done in half the time and then we can do whatever you’d like.”

Eddie’s yawn was wide. And contagious.

“None of that.” I pointed my pencil at him. “There’s work to be done. I promised Aunt Frances I’d make a list for moving up to the boardinghouse and I’m going to do it right now so I don’t forget.”

It was more a timeline she wanted than a list, but I wasn’t sure Eddie would understand what a timeline was. Not that he knew what a list was, other than a piece of paper he could shred into bits the minute my back was turned. Still, pretending that he understood even a portion of what I was saying amused me.

I extracted a spiral notebook from the depths of the backpack. “Okay, are you ready?” I flipped to a clean sheet. “Goal number one,” I informed Eddie, “is to get everything moved into the boardinghouse before the weather turns really cold. Everything includes you and me. Aunt Frances wants a date from us because she needs to plan the changeover.”

Every fall that I’d lived in Chilson, I’d helped my aunt with numerous summer-to-winter tasks. Sheer curtains came down, insulated drapes went up. Light summer blankets were switched to thick comforters. Smooth cotton sheets were changed to cozy flannel. The furnace filter was replaced, the fireplace chimney was cleaned, white and pastel colored couch pillows were changed over to deep autumn colors.

And that was just the inside tasks. Outside there were oodles of leaves to rake, plants to cut down, furniture to store, screens to put away, and firewood to stack. Last, but certainly not least, we ceremoniously took the snow shovels out of the back corner of the garage and put them on the porch.

The whole enterprise took two full weekends if we worked hard. My bookmobile schedule of working on three of four Saturdays, however, made that a little difficult. “That’s why she wants a timeline,” I said to Eddie.

He, however, was more interested in playing with my pencil then listening to what I had to say.

“Speaking of timelines,” I said, holding the eraser end of the pencil out for him to bat, “I’m wondering about the time of Dale’s murder. If it was at the estimated two in the morning on Thursday, why wasn’t he home, asleep in bed? It was a weeknight and he was working the next day.”

Or was he? I realized I had no idea what Lacombe’s normal hours had been. For all I knew, he’d been a night owl and was regularly up at that time. But if he wasn’t, why had he been out so late?

“Something to ask Carmen,” I said, but Eddie was still focused on my pencil and not paying any attention to me. “What do you think?” I asked him. “Does the fact that Dale was out in the middle of the night have anything to do with—hey!”

Eddie grabbed the pencil with his pointy teeth, gripped tight, and tugged it out of my hand.

“What exactly are you going to do with that?” I asked, stretching forward to get it back. “It’s not like you can write with it. You don’t have thumbs, remember?”

He sent a glare that should have instantly evaporated me, jumped to the floor, and ran off with my pencil.

I heard him thump down the stairs to the bedroom and leap up onto the bed. Shaking my head, I got a pen out of my backpack and kept on working.

• • •

On Monday, I kept trying to talk to Jennifer about setting up a library lecture series for senior citizens, but every time I went up to her office for a friendly face-to-face chat, she was either on the phone or cozied up with a library board member.

I spent the afternoon trying not to think about that and wasn’t very successful. I didn’t like that she was talking to the board members individually, didn’t like it at all. It looked like she was manipulating the board, giving them her side of whatever issue she was talking about and preempting what should have been an open discussion during a full board meeting. Stephen, as annoying as he’d been in so very many ways, had never done that.

Halfway down the stairs, I stopped. Was it possible that I was actually missing my former boss?

I stood there, hand on railing and one foot in midair, considering the question, but it didn’t take long to come to a conclusion. No. I did not miss Stephen. I missed one particular aspect of his management style, that was all.

Breathing a sigh of relief, I continued down the stairs.

The next day was a bookmobile day, and on the way to the first stop, I told Julia what Jennifer was doing.

“Interesting.” Julia, who, as a successful actress, had endured more than her share of backstabbing, infighting, and alliances that shifted underfoot, made the humming noise that meant her quick mind was hard at work. “What did your coworkers say?” she asked.

“Didn’t tell them.”

Julia glanced over at me across the wide console. “Why?”

I shrugged. “They don’t like her and I didn’t want to give them any more reasons to not get along. Besides, it might be nothing.”

“But you think it is something, don’t you?”

“It kind of has to be. Otherwise, why would she be working so hard to talk to each of the board members separately?”

“I see what you mean.” Julia leaned back and propped her feet on top of the cat carrier. Eddie, who was curled up in his pink blanket, took no notice. “Do you have a theory?” she asked. “No, let me rephrase that. Your name is Minnie Hamilton and of course you have a theory. On a scale of don’t-be-ridiculous to stake-your-life, how likely is it?”

I considered the question. “Somewhere in the sure-enough-to-make-my-stomach-hurt realm.”

“Do you want to tell your aunt Julia about it?”

Her overly warm concern made me laugh out loud. “I thought you were supposed to be a good actress.”

“Only when I’m getting paid.”

“Your husband must find that comforting.”

“He does indeed,” she said.

There was a short pause, then I said, “It’s my guess that Jennifer is trying to persuade the board to buy that new library systems software.”

Julia frowned. “Isn’t the program we’re using just a couple of years old?”

“Four and a half. It was installed just before the move to the new building.”

“How time flies,” she murmured. “But those systems are expensive, aren’t they? Why would they change over to something new?”

An excellent question. “Jennifer thinks a different system would be more efficient.”

“Let me guess,” Julia said. “This other program is what she used at the library where she worked before she came here.”

“Bingo!” The road, which had been narrow and tree-lined, widened to include a turn lane that led to a county park. For a few miles we’d been following a vehicle with a bright yellow kayak on top and now its right blinker and brake lights went on. Since the bookmobile was too wide to go around comfortably, I braked, too.

“I am a genius,” she said modestly. “You, however, are stuck. As someone with more knowledge of library software than most library directors and, I daresay, every library board member, you know that what Jennifer wants to do is nuts. As her assistant, however, you’re obligated to follow her lead, no matter how ridiculous it may be.”

“That sums it up nicely.” The vehicle in front of us, a midsized SUV, turned and I blinked as I recognized it.

“More proof that I am indeed a genius.” She tapped her head. “What are you going to do?”

I had no idea what I was going to do about Jennifer’s machinations, but I did know what I was going to do next. “Hang on,” I said, “we’re going to make a short stop.”

Ignoring Julia’s surprised look, I followed the SUV into the park’s gravel parking area. I circled around, braked to a halt a few yards from the vehicle, told Julia I’d be back in a flash, and hurried out to meet Brad Lacombe.

“Hey, Minnie.” He smiled. “I know I should read more, but you really don’t have to chase me down.”

“Whatever it takes,” I said, laughing. “But as much as I’d like everyone to read more, including me, when I saw you in front of us, I thought I’d stop and ask a quick question about your dad.”

Brad stroked his beard. “Sure. What’s up?”

“It’s the time he died. The estimate was two a.m., right?” Brad nodded and I went on. “So I got to wondering. Was he a night person and this was something normal? If not, what was he doing out at two in the morning?”

“That’s a good question,” he said slowly. “If he was trying to finish a job, it wasn’t unheard of for Dad to stay out half the night, or all night even. But I don’t know if he was on deadline, or not. Have you asked my mom?”

“Not yet.” I made a mental note to talk to both Carmen and Ash about it. Maybe Detective Inwood had already been over this, but maybe not. He was a busy man and it was hard to remember everything. Maybe it took a village to catch a killer. “Thanks, Brad. Sorry for delaying your kayaking.”

He shrugged. “Right now I have all the time in the world.”

Something about his expression caught at me. I’d been about to turn away, but I paused and studied him. “Is something wrong?”

“Just work,” he muttered.

But Leese had told me that her stepbrother was a favored employee at the brewery. And that he loved his job so much he was in danger of losing all perspective about the relative importance of beer to the general population.

“What’s the matter?” I asked.

Again, he shrugged, but this time I was watching his face closely and saw emotion etching lines into his face. Worry? Anxiety? Fear? I would have put it down to his father’s murder except he hadn’t looked like this the night at Leese’s house. He also didn’t seem inclined to talk, and since I barely knew him, I decided I’d let it go after one more attempt. “You sure you’re okay?”

“No,” he said wryly, and somehow he sounded a lot like his older sister. “Actually I’m not. I’ve been suspended without pay.”

“What? Brad, I’m so sorry. What happened?”

“I have no idea.” He stared off into the distance. “It’s my blame to take and I understand why they had to do this, but I lay awake half the night trying to figure it out and I still have no idea what went on with that batch.”

A crawly feeling was starting to creep over my skin. “Something went wrong with one of your beers?”

He nodded slowly. “The first batch of a new recipe I was trying. It tested fine when it was brewing, it tested fine when it was in storage, and I swear to God it tested fine when I put it into kegs for shipping. Then two nights ago, at that new tap room in Petoskey, we debuted it.” He shoved his hands in his pockets. “It was contaminated. Fifty people got sick, nine went to the hospital, and one of them might . . .” He swallowed. “One might die.”

The thought was horrible, and my heart went out to all who were sick, and to Brad. But a tiny idea trickled into my brain: Could this somehow be related to Dale Lacombe’s murder? Could Brad have been the intended victim?