Harvey and Del regaled a smirking Kenny Cowper with the latest excitement at the town’s biggest business. Kenny had gone upstairs for an apple he split with Charlie to go with her split pea Soup of the Day, the healthiest thing offered.
“All the Mexicans vanished. Mary Lou just up and quit and poor old Elmo kept calling to Mildred,” Del said around a cheeseburger. “And she said, ‘I forgive you, Elmo dear,’ and turned as pink as her hair. And old Elmo just up and died with Charlie standing there holding a pillow.”
“Charlie?” Kenny’s eyebrows arched and he leaned back in the booth. “You didn’t—”
“No. I wanted to. But I think he died without knowing where he was. So he won after all. Do you suppose he and Mildred had dallied, too? I mean, besides Isobel? He must have been quite the young Staudt in his day. Wonder why he didn’t marry and produce the male heir that Edwina’s father didn’t. And I wonder why Edwina has paid no attention to old Fatty up at the Oaks. She talks about him fondly cutting up watermelons at family reunions out at the home place and then says he’s not that same person.” Edwina had stayed up at the Oaks. “My mother should be rejoicing, not grieving, for her favorite relative. He had a right to not have to be a vegetable.”
“Charlemagne, you believe in euthanasia? How can you live with yourself?” Harvey Rochester was obviously “taken aback.”
Kenny lost his smirk. “So, Del, what did Mildred do when he died?”
“Shed a few tears.”
“That woman can cry on cue and we all know that. But Nurse Hogoboom defecting without notice is inexcusable. We have to have one RN per shift. They work twelve-hour shifts and are expensive. I have one RN returning from vacation—but this is not the way it’s done—without notice.”
“Don’t you use LPNs or whatever they’re called now?”
“No, they can’t give meds. RNs and aides are all we need, really.”
“So when is Darla Lempke’s funeral?”
“I have no idea, Kenneth. Whenever Coroner Mosher releases the body, I expect.”
“Man, I’m going to have a bunch of digging to do, huh? But Ken, you should of seen the fireworks when old Elsina woke up from her nap in her office and discovered Mildred was in the place. You ought to get a movie out of that, Charlie.”
“I don’t make movies, Delwood. I’m just an agent.”
One of Kenny’s secret weapons brought the special coffee he’d promised if they were good and told him all the news. “Kenny, Marlys is always missing, but me and the mayor are really getting worried about Ben. He still hasn’t shown up anywhere.”
“What do you think, Del? Should we notify Sheriff Drucker of yet another possible murder in Myrtle? At least there’s one dead who died on his own terns.” Kenny stood and raised his cup of special coffee and said above the not-very-much hubbub in the place, “Here’s to Elmo Staudt, who managed to die after less than an hour at Gentle Oaks.”
A cheer went up from everyone at Viagra’s but Harvey Rochester.
CHAPTER 32
“LOVELY, FAT, AND ancient Mildred necromanced, or whatever those creatures do, over poor Elmo’s body while no one attempted to revive him.” Harvey wiped his brow with his napkin and Charlie wondered if he, like she, wondered how much more grease came off on his face than sweat on the napkin. “I kept pleading for someone to do something, but unholy hell exploded in the hall, which I’m sure our Mary Lou could have handled had she not turned turncoat.”
“They got this professor with Alzheimer’s in today and he’s singing at the top of his lungs and the bottom of his mind. He taught at Iowa U, but his family’s from Fertile. Enabnits. I mean, the man is driving the nuts nuts.”
“They are not nuts, but merely confused, as you, Marshal, have been since birth. Surely you are not all listening to this jackal? Harvey’s blood pressure was blotching his face. “I mean, he’s Delwood and a Brunsvold, for godsake.”
“But the other morning upstairs, you called them ‘ancient psychopaths’ and Gentle Oaks ‘bedlam’ when the moon was full. Why, your grandfather is one of the sanest of the crazies there,” Charlie said. “Would you take him home to live with you because he’s merely confused? You even have servants, one a woman and both a minority yet. The people at that place are more than confused.”
“Yeah, Charlie’s confused,” the proprietor pointed out, “but she’s not ready for the Oaks.”
“And did the Mexicans come out of hiding or did somebody stumble across their hiding place?” Charlie asked. “You got an underground railway from Mexico, Harvey?”
“I think they split up and have their own hidey-holes,” the marshal said. “Probably under towels or sheets or something.”
The pea soup, apple, and milk were just right for whatever ailed her and, unlike her mom, Charlie took strength in Elmo’s passing. “Okay, not passing. Death. Uncle Elmo died dead. Sorry, Harvey, but after a half hour in Gentle Oaks, that sounds like Oz, man, nirvana, paradise. Even if it’s just a big nothing. I couldn’t be happier for him.”
“So what did the poor confused Fatties do to the singing professor?” Kenny asked. “Come on, you guys, earn your coffee. And you’ve got to admit, Charlie, those two appear to be having a pretty good time of it.”
“They told him in the vilest of terms to ‘shut his yap.’ Called him every unspeakable epithet invented before nineteen fifty. And when he continued his caterwauling, they simply dumped him out of his chair,” Harvey said.
“And me and the sheriff’s deputy standing right there,” Del added. “Happened so fast, it was over before we could stop it. Just got their chairs on each side of him and lifted up his wheels till he slid out on the floor. Looked like a wiener squeezed from a bun. Beautiful timing for people so confused.”
Kenny Cowper stared at Charlie. “You thinking what I’m thinking?”
“Yeah. Just because you can’t go potty by yourself or walk, doesn’t mean you can’t plan and execute murder. Being outrageous and obnoxious doesn’t necessarily translate into the inability to reason.”
“There’s this myth that murderers are smart for some reason. Committing murder is the dumbest thing you can do. Have our Del here after you, you’re not careful.”
“And old Elsina wakes up from her nap—great napper that lady,” Del continued, flipping off the barkeep.
“She’s not napping in her office, she’s doing business or praying,” Harvey came to his administrator’s defense—interesting ambivalence here. “You act as if the most profitable business in all Myrtle and possibly Floyd County is a comedy of errors.”
“Well, then, she snores a lot when she’s on her knees. Everybody says so. And Jesus tells her Mildred the godless heathen is in the building, threatening her beloved children. I mean, we had eight, ten murders recently, and a lot of them since the Greenes arrived. Don’t take it personal, but Sheriff Drucker says one or both of you is a catalyst. And Mildred agreed.”
“Oh, thanks, Mildred. I don’t know about Edwina, but this catalyst sleeps in Mason City tonight and gets on a plane first thing in the morning. Just thinking about it makes me feel better.”
“You’re not staying around for all the funerals? You must be related to half the dead, especially Elmo.” Harvey looked hurt. “I even ordered a piano.”
“Oh, you did not. And ‘especially Elmo’ won’t know the difference.”
“How can you be sure what Elmo knows?” Kenny put his hands behind his head and leaned back in the booth to show off his biceps. He wore a white T-shirt with a great green Budweiser alligator on it. “You haven’t been dead yet. And don’t you want to solve the murders?”
“Besides, Jesus will hate you for it,” Harvey added. “And tonight’s ribs and kraut at The Station.”
“Do they get ribs and kraut at the Oaks?”
“Absolutely. Most popular meal of the week. We have to take the pork off the rib bones and grind it and the gristle up for the toothless, but I was going to give you and your mother a free dinn
er at The Station.”
“Aren’t you worried about Marlys? You’re not human. Is it because you’re bionic?” the marshal asked.
“Charlie’s bionic?” Kenny and Harvey said together.
“Yeah, she got new parts after that accident.”
“Which parts?” Kenny wanted to know. He put his biceps down and the alligator undulated. It had a Budweiser lizard hanging out of its mouth.
“Charlemagne,” Mr. Rochester said patiently, “if it’s fear that is driving you away so soon, Mildred the psychic is patently a fake. You are worldly enough to know that, if our administrator is not. Her prophecy concerning you is about as useful or accurate as Depends is in keeping the denizens of the Oaks from fouling everything with which they come in contact. Their revenge against the living and healthy. But gentlemen of the law are quite taken with psychics these days and the local constabulary is proud of the fact we have one of our own.”
Mildred the psychic had wandered Gentle Oaks, Mr. Dolores in her arms, which meant she was a lot stronger than her disintegrating hair, her wandering taking her to the most desperate of Elsina’s beloved, in spite of Elsina’s dire warnings. The psychic was unerring. Fakes usually are. And she and Dolores had come back down the hall and stopped at the next most deprived bunch—including Kenny’s grandmother.
Harvey had asked her why she was carrying the damn cat around the building. “That creature weighs a ton.”
“Because cats have such power. And this is the most powerful feline I’ve come in contact with.”
“I can believe that,” Harvey said. “You know his fur balls stain concrete?”
“Their senses are so acute,” Mildred had said. “They not only divine the thoughts, fears, and feelings of these poor souls who cannot speak for themselves, but can pass on the vibrations of these emotions and, in a garbled language, relay the meaning to those of us who are sensitive.”
“She moved from the rooms or wheelchairs of the most vegetative first, carrying the cat, both looking real spooky,” Del told Kenny. “And then onto those who still talk or think in their way, and the confused nuts who move or walk, too. And when she got to old Mrs. Bublitz, who told her and the ceiling how hard it was to be alive now, the cat moaned and Mildred the sensitive had a revelation. ‘This woman is in such pain and distress, she prays for death.’ Duh.”
“And when she’d carried the animal hither and yon and hither once more, she finally stopped in front of Charlemagne here and returned the beast to his rightful place on the floor, where he promptly relieved himself on the carpet, such was his sensitivity,” Harvey added.
“And her whole pink-lace front was a mass of cat hair and snags and loose lace threads,” Charlie offered, to pay for her coffee.
“And Charlie asked her if there was a message in all the sensitivity and fear bouncing off the walls there—and Mildred said, ‘I’m afraid there is, poor dear. The consensus seems to be that you are next.’”
“Just like Marlys wrote in the snow on Myrtle’s grave.” Kenny squinted with mock importance. “And you still don’t believe in the wisdom of the demented or in the curse of Myrtle?”
The tough agent from Hollywood leveled him a look to match the gravel in her voice. “You got pea soup on your alligator, Cowper.”
Over the unkind remarks concerning how hard-nosed California women were, Charlie heard a welcome reprieve from her purse and scowled at her companions as she answered the call from the real world. It was Larry and he said the words all agents and writers love to hear. “Charlie? I hope you’re sitting down.”
“Out of the blue,” Charlie told the startled men at the table after her conversation and followed it by a victory whoop she’d learned from her daughter the cheerleader, “from whence all good things flow.”
“That doesn’t even rhyme,” Myrtle’s lawman, gravedigger, plow person said with obvious disappointment.
“I wish I could make a woman that happy,” Harvey said wistfully.
“Kenny, if you take Visa, I’m buying whatever’s on tap for everybody at this table and your secret weapons, too.”
Charlie dialed Shelley MacArthur and woke him up. He worked security all night and wrote and tried to get some sleep in the daylight hours. “Shelley? I hope you’re sitting down.”
“Charlie, I’m flat on my back in bed, as you know. Tell me this call is what I think it is. I’m getting too old for joking around, babe. Tell me you sold my historical and not as a children’s book so I don’t have to take out all the good stuff.”
Charlie told him what he wanted to hear: “And not just to Pitman’s, but to Constellation. I’m out of town, I’ll get home tomorrow. Don’t do anything till you hear from me and we’ve signed. Looks like a deal we can’t refuse. I’m so proud of you and happy for you. I knew this idea would fly.”
They were both crying when she hung up and raised a huge stein of whatever was on tap to the guys at the table and said, “I don’t have a screenwriter or book author, male or female, who doesn’t have a beloved historical in a drawer that I can’t sell. They’re not ‘in’ right now. I never thought in a million years Shelley would sell that project, but he’s going to make some real money for once. And me, too.”
“But you just told him you knew his idea would fly,” the marshal said.
“That’s agent talk.” Kenny crossed his arms over the alligator and the lizard.
“Here’s to sheer dumb luck, a proposal on the right desk at the right moment, and to Harry Potter.” She raised her stein.
“It’s a children’s book?”
“No, but it’s really imaginative, been turned down by every publisher in town twice. It’s unique. Which is hard to sell these days because you can’t compare it to anything that’s been a success. Just like Harry Potter was turned down everywhere, which proves that the current wisdom is fallible. I can’t say any more but I feel like dancing on the table—on air. To hell with curses and dementia and Depends. I have a life, a future, sanity. And tomorrow I’ll be home.”
“Don’t forget,” Kenny said. The Budweiser lizard had a Budweiser frog hanging out of its mouth. “You are next.”
CHAPTER 33
“I ARE NEXT. I are next for the deal of a lifetime. I are joyous,” Charlie rhapsodized, rubbing it in as she, Kenny, and Del cruised up to Cousin Helen Bartusek’s house in the official red Cherokee. The day had continued to warm and melt and they had the windows down. The streets were rivulets where they weren’t mud. “What’s that smell?”
“Spareribs and sauerkraut,” Del said, inhaling a sigh. “Cooked slow most of the day. That aroma draws people from as far as Mason City.”
“Smells like everybody at Gentle Oaks died at once with all the windows open. I will sleep in Mason City tonight and fly out of Iowa from there in the morning.”
“So you keep telling us.” Kenny sounded bored. “Did you know Mason City is River City of Music Man fame?”
“You’re kidding. I didn’t see a river.” The show was currently enjoying a new life on Broadway.
“You were probably only looking for a bed and the airport. Meredith Wilson was raised there. He’s even buried there. So, have you thought over my Myrtle proposal?”
“Jeeze, how many propositions you guys got going?” Marshal Sweetie asked.
Charlie explained patiently to them both that she kept her professional and personal lives separate. “And I told you I’d look at it, Kenneth.”
“What about Mitch Hilsten?”
“He has never been a client, nor will he ever be. I handle writers, not actors. And our relationship is highly overrated.”
“Lucky guy. So, I have a decision to make?”
“Actually, no.” Nothing like menstrual cramps to put you back in control of your life. “What do you suppose Mildred was forgiving Uncle Elmo for?” She changed the subject. “Think he was her lover, too? He has blue eyes.”
“Heard stories he was quite the Romeo in his day,” the marshal said.
&nbs
p; “I heard the same thing about you, Brunsvold.”
“Really?” Del turned off the engine. They all stared at Buz and Helen’s house.
Edwina had called from the Bartuseks’ asking Charlie to come up. Kenny and Del were on their way to search for Ben and Marlys. “I wonder how fast I’ll lose my high once I get inside.”
“I haven’t been inside since Arly and Ida Mae Truex owned the place. Sat down with Buz and Helen at The Station to eat, keep a bottle of single malt at my bar for Buz. Picked up some expensive habits in Arizona, as he tells it.”
“It’s Helen. She doesn’t approve of the pool hall, for women anyway. Wonder why she’d let me in her house? Buz drinks?”
“Drink or two—then supper on nights when she’s working at the Oaks. He’s particularly fond of Jack’s fried chicken.”
“He’s retired, huh? From what?” Charlie was reluctant to leave them for Cousin Helen.
“He drove things—trucks, hauled grain and hogs to market, gasoline—even drove a bread truck,” Del said. “That man could drive anything in any kind of weather.”
“Drove the combine that ran over my dad. Too bad he retired before Elmo started looking for a way out.” Kenny left the backseat to open her door, looked way down at her, and grinned.
“Your dad was trying to escape the Oaks, too?”
“That’s what everybody says, but who knows? It sure wasn’t Buz’s fault. A barkeep has little business being out in the way of a combine. Dad didn’t even hunt. Hey, that’s only part of the reason I have problems with people deciding to check out early on their own. And, Charlie Greene, I really think you should try the ribs and kraut at The Station tonight. Del and I’ll get you back to Mason if your mom needs the Lumina longer than you do.”