Virginia Lowell - A Cookie Before Dying

While she filled Lenora’s glass a third time, Olivia said, “You need to tell all this to Del as soon as possible. It could be really important.”

“Del?”

“Our sheriff, Del Jenkins.”

“Ooh, that delicious young man with the warm eyes. I’d be delighted to tell him anything.”

Olivia was surprised to feel an instant prick of jealousy. Of course, Lenora was not a serious rival, but Olivia had assumed she was the only one who had noticed those warm brown eyes. A foolish assumption, clearly.

“I’ll give Del a call and tell him to drop by.” Olivia saw Lenora’s eyes stray toward the wine bottle. “Or maybe I’ll just tell him to call you to set up a time to meet. I’ll let you tell him your story in your own words. You do have a superb memory for dialogue.”

“So kind of you,” Lenora said, pouring herself a fourth glass of wine. This time she kept the nearly empty bottle within easy reach.

Olivia thought maybe she would suggest that Del wait until the next morning to interview Lenora. Late morning.

“That Lenora Tucker is a hoot,” Maddie said. “I liked her. We share a flair for the dramatic, and I can remember dialogue, too.”

“Can you polish off a bottle of merlot in twenty minutes and still speak coherently?”

“Would I need to be standing upright, as well?”

“And maintain good posture.”

“Then no, not a chance.” The kitchen timer dinged, and Maddie opened the oven door to remove an enhanced pepperoni pizza. “Perfect,” she said. “It needs a minute to set, then I’ll slice it.”

Spunky trotted into the kitchen, his nose twitching. “Sorry, Spunks,” Olivia said. “It’s the canned stuff for you.” She filled his tiny food bowl and gave him fresh water.

“Did you learn anything else at the baby shower?” Maddie asked.

“Lenora Tucker was more or less it, and I didn’t have to work very hard for that information.”

“Well, it was useful information,” Maddie said. “There was your productive visit to Heather’s barn, too, so overall you did good. See, I can be magnanimous.”

“I never said you weren’t. Is it time to cut the pizza? I’m dying here.”

“Done.” Maddie ran a pizza cutter through the pizza and centered the pan on the table between them. She had worked wonders with a frozen pepperoni pizza. It was two inches thicker with chopped green pepper, onions, olives, fresh basil leaves, and bite-sized pieces of roasted chicken.

“Wow,” Olivia said. “It looks like a decorated cookie.”

“That was a compliment, right?”

Olivia nodded, having already filled her mouth. Spunky leaped to her lap, hoping a chunk of chicken might slip off her slice.

Maddie slid a piece onto her plate and said, “I’ve discovered that I love prying information out of people, especially when they don’t know I’m doing it. Maybe my talents are wasted baking and decorating cookies.”

Olivia paused in mid-chew.

“Naw,” Maddie said, laughing at Olivia’s stricken expression. “As long as I stick around you, I can do both. Now let me eat and then I’ll relate the wondrous results of my sleuthing.” She bit into her pizza. After a second bite, she reached into the back pocket of her jeans and extracted a folded, wrinkled piece of paper. “Notes,” she said, as another bite headed toward her mouth. She smoothed the paper on the table and glanced through it.

“How about I read that while you chew,” Olivia suggested.

“Keep your mitts off.” Maddie rested her half-eaten slice on the edge of the pizza pan. “My strength is sufficiently restored. I will now present a dramatic interpretation of my stunning discoveries.” She wiped her hands on a paper towel.

Olivia plunked Spunky on the floor and got up to start her Mr. Coffee. Maddie’s dramatic interpretations could reach epic lengths.

“Okay,” Maddie said, “let’s begin with Charlene. My favorite suspect, as you know. However, I can be big enough to admit that I didn’t find any solid evidence pointing to her as Geoffrey King’s killer. I talked to several women who remembered Charlene from high school. They all said more or less the same thing: Charlene has certainly changed since then. In high school, she was shy and eager to be liked. Some kids sucked up to her because her family was filthy rich, while others, including my informants—at least, according to themselves—ignored the rich part and thought Charlene was insecure and, frankly, boring. She didn’t date much, purportedly because her parents forbade it.” The corners of Maddie’s generous mouth tightened. “I should warn you that your brother’s feelings for Charlene were well known among her peers. Charlene and Jason hung out together quite a bit during and after school hours, at least to the extent they could without her parents finding out.”

“That matches what Mom told me,” Olivia said, “except she didn’t mention anything about Charlene feeling more than friendship for Jason.”

“It seems your mother was not fully informed,” Maddie said, “which has got to be a first. Jason and Charlene were inseparable. When her folks weren’t watching, that is. Anyway, this close yet unsatisfying arrangement continued until Charlene was almost fifteen, when she had an apparent breakdown. She spent a month in a private hospital before returning to school.”

“Really?” Olivia poured two cups of coffee and found some cream in the back of the refrigerator. “Mom didn’t mention anything about Charlene being hospitalized.”

Maddie said, “Charlene told her friends about it when she returned to school, but kids that age . . . they can be really secretive with their parents. Anyway, it’s not like your mom was cozy with the senior Critches or their rich buddies, so maybe it’s one of the few Chatterley Heights happenings she never got wind of.”

“I guess,” Olivia said. “Mom did mention Jason was having problems about that time. She also said Jason introduced Charlene to Geoffrey King, although Mom wasn’t sure of his name.”

“Affirmative,” Maddie said. “That was after Charlene returned from the hospital. And guess what she’d been hospitalized for? She’d been starving herself. She went for days without food, only water, and finally she passed out in study hall. Chemistry class, I could understand, but study hall? Jason carried her to the nurse’s office. Made quite an impression on the other girls. At any rate, the Critches hightailed it to DC very soon after, dragging their progeny along. Which I realize doesn’t get us very far, but it does confirm Charlene’s instability.”

“Sort of,” Olivia said, “but it also digs Jason in deeper. He has been protective of Charlene since high school.”

“Luckily, I have much more. As it happens, one of Gwen’s favorite aunts became Charlie Critch’s landlady when he moved back here to be with his sister. She had a lot to say about young Charlie, not all of it good. Some of it is downright suspicious.”

“I thought Charlie was generally likable.” Olivia lifted a box of decorated cookies off the top of the refrigerator and switched it with the empty pizza pan. Spunky jumped from her chair onto the table and tried to climb into the box. “Spunky! Bad boy!” Spunky ignored her. Olivia grabbed him around his middle, deposited him in the hallway, and shut the kitchen door. “You and I will be repeating puppy school,” Olivia said through the door. “Again.”

“Poor guy. I feel his pain,” Maddie said as she reached into the cookie box and brought out a peppermint-striped pig.

“About Charlie?”

“Okay, this is good,” Maddie said. “Gwen’s aunt Agnes said that she was about to kick Charlie Critch out of her house, where he’d been renting a room since he moved back to town. It seems he fell behind on his rent and then stopped paying about a month ago. A couple weeks ago, he paid her all his back rent. And last week, he couldn’t pay again. Also, she’d been noticing her food disappearing from the kitchen. He was allowed to cook his own food there, but he was supposed to buy it himself. She rarely saw any food in the fridge that she hadn’t bought, but she figured he was eating fast food. So about a week ago, before the murder, Aunt Agnes gave Charlie an ultimatum: pay on time and stop pinching food, or find another place to room.”