Elizabeth Lynn Casey - Southern Sewing Circle 08 - Remnants of Murder (19 page)

“I imagine Georgina is fit to be tied right ’bout now,” Margaret Louise summarized. “Specially when she’s up for reelection this fall.”

“But murder is murder,” Beatrice whispered. “If that poor man was killed, surely Georgina would want the bloke responsible to be punished …”

“You’d certainly think so, wouldn’t you? But either way, Victoria and I will find the truth. I owe that to Clyde for inspiring me to write again.”

Debbie lowered herself back to her chair. “You write, Dixie?”

The former librarian’s broad shoulders rose and fell beneath her flowered housedress. “I used to, as a young girl. Clyde encouraged me to start back up. He said it would be a way to work through the library board’s betrayal in a creative way.”

“Did Clyde write?” Tori asked.

“No, he painted. But he said it was that kind of thing—writing, painting, drawing—that allowed a person to be happy in a way money and possessions never could.” Dixie retrieved the fabric from the armrest and held it up for all to see. “That’s why I want us to make these … as a way to help people like Clyde. People who might need a little help from time to time yet still have passion and dreams deep down inside.”

Leona lowered her magazine. “Looks like a placemat to me.”

“It is.” Dixie turned it around to show the back side of the fabric then once again to display the front. “If I hadn’t agreed to deliver Clyde’s midday meal with Home Fare, I’d still be sulking around the house plotting against Winston Hohlbrook and the rest of the library board. But because I did, I’m spending my days writing stories that make me happy … just like Clyde spent his days painting pictures that made him happy.”

“But why a placemat?”

“Because I brought one to Clyde that first day and he said it made him feel special, like he wasn’t just getting some doggy bag dropped at his door.” Dixie passed the placemat to Annabelle first then watched as it made its way from one sewing circle member to the next. “When he inquired about it, I told him I’d made it just for him. That’s when he invited me to stay and talk. The next thing I knew, I was telling him about what happened at the library and he was encouraging me to find an outlet.

“When I finally left that afternoon, I felt like a very different person than I’d been when I arrived on his doorstep.”

Just like that, Dixie’s drive to find the truth made sense. Not only had Dixie given Clyde someone to talk to when she delivered his meals, but Clyde had helped Dixie find purpose in her days again. Her need to help him—even postmortem—was only natural.

Margaret Louise turned the placemat over in her hands, studying the simple stitches before handing it to Rose. “It wouldn’t take us long to make a hundred or so of these.”

“Seems to me we could round the edges on some, leave the others rectangular, like this,” Rose said. “And if we know something about each person receiving the meal, maybe we could pick a fabric specific to them. Lord knows, I’ve accumulated enough remnants over the years to make a
thousand
of these placemats if we wanted.”

“Is that a yes?” Dixie leaned forward, looking from face to face as she did. “Can we consider our next group project to be placemats for Home Fare?”

“I say we do it.” Giving voice to the wave of nods around them, Margaret Louise slipped her hand across the gap between her chair and the couch and squeezed Annabelle’s hand. “You’ll help us, won’t you, Mama?”

Chapter 18

Armed with a peanut butter sandwich in one hand
and a napkin in the other, Tori swiveled her desk chair until she was looking out at the grounds. Everywhere she looked she saw flowers thanks to the hard work and dedication of the Friends of the Library group. Yet even as pretty as the daffodils and hyacinths were, they couldn’t maintain her focus for long.

The sewing circle she’d hosted the night before had been a success. The group had unanimously agreed to make placemats for Home Fare, the gossip batted about had been relatively innocent, and the new brownie recipe she’d tried out had been a smash hit.

In fact, by the time the last straggler had left, she’d been more than ready to curl up on her bed and share the evening’s highlights with Milo. But her phone never rang.

The little voice that had made it nearly impossible to sleep kept saying the same thing—leave the Clyde Montgomery thing to the police. If she listened, she could concentrate all of her energy on Milo and their upcoming wedding.

Unfortunately, every time she’d start to think the little voice was right, another louder voice would push its way to the foreground—reminding her of the countless ways in which Dixie had gone above and beyond to help Tori during Nina’s maternity leave. Besides, the notion that a man had been killed and the perpetrator might never be held accountable wasn’t one she could accept.

Her cell phone vibrated against the top of her desk, bringing a momentary end to her latest bout of soul searching. She laid her napkin on her lap and reached for the device.

“Hello?”

“Good afternoon, Victoria. Mama and I had a mighty fine time at your house last evenin’. Thank you.”

She smiled in spite of the headache brewing above her right eye. “I’m so glad Annabelle came. She looked really good, Margaret Louise. Very clear.”

“It was a good night. Haven’t talked to Leona yet this mornin’ to know whether Mama woke up that way, too. I reckon I’ll hear ’bout it if she don’t. But I didn’t call to talk ’bout Mama. I called to talk ’bout you and that big black cloud that followed you ’round the house last night.”

“There wasn’t any cloud,” she protested. “I was fine. It was great to see everyone just like always.”

“When are you goin’ to quit actin’ like I was born yesterday, Victoria? That sister of mine might like to pretend she’s younger than she is, but I don’t. Livin’ life makes you smarter. It makes you wiser to things happenin’ below the surface. And I know there was a lot more goin’ on underneath your surface last night than sewin’ some placemats and waitin’ for proper gushin’ ’bout those brownies of yours … which, I have to say, were outstandin’.”

Lifting her sandwich to her mouth, Tori took a bite, the act of eating giving her something to do while she mulled over her friend’s words. There was a part of her that wanted to unload all her troubles on the woman in the hopes of gaining clarity where the little voices were concerned. But then there was the other part that needed the lighthearted warmth Margaret Louise provided on a normal basis—the kind of simplicity that came with tales of grandbabies and tried-for-the-first-time recipes.

“The picnic didn’t go the way you hoped, did it?”

Tori paused mid-chew and closed her eyes. So much for simplicity …

“How did you know?” she finally asked as she lowered the sandwich and turned back to the window. “Did you see Milo? Did he say something?”

A long-held sigh filled the line. “So I was right. Why, I knew it the second I saw you last night. You tried to be chipper when Mama and I arrived, but I saw it plain as day.”

Oh, how she wished she could tell Margaret Louise that everything was fine. That plans for the wedding and the honeymoon were all sewn up. That she and Milo were counting down the days until they could start their life together. But she couldn’t. Not with the kind of conviction she should be able to anyway.

“Milo is feeling neglected,” she finally said, staring out, unseeingly, at the library grounds. “But it’s not intentional. I
want
to marry him. I
want
to go on our honeymoon, I
want
to move in together.”

“Have you found your dress yet?”

“No.”

“Have you decided where the reception is goin’ to be?”

“Not exactly.”

“Music?”

She shook her head.

“Victoria?”

Realizing her mistake, she put the action into words. “No. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want to get married.”

A beat of silence on the other end of the phone made her sit up tall. “Margaret Louise, I love Milo. With all my heart.”

“I know that, Victoria. But you have to know that plannin’ a weddin’ is usually all any new bride can think ’bout. The fact that yours is six months away and you ain’t doin’ much plannin’ has to have Milo wonderin’.”

“We have the church. We’ve picked the cake with Debbie, and secured the menu with you. It’s not like I haven’t done anything, because I have.” But even as the words left her mouth, she knew Margaret Louise was right. She also knew her failure to check all the boxes on her wedding to-do list had everything to do with her schedule as of late and nothing, whatsoever, to do with her feelings for Milo. “Oh, Margaret Louise, how do I fix this? I mean, I know the easiest way would be to drop everything and give Milo and our wedding my undivided attention. But how can I do that when I truly believe Dixie is right about Clyde’s death? Especially when I know better than anyone else how ineffective Chief Dallas can be when it comes to doing the work necessary to find the truth—particularly when some of his fishing buddies are on the list of suspects?”

“You let me help.”

She closed her eyes against the sudden mist in her eyes. “Help? How?”

“I could go with you to find your dress. I could make some calls about the reception—Georgina’s backyard would make a lovely spot to celebrate your weddin’.”

“Georgina wouldn’t even come to last night’s sewing circle meeting because of me. You really think she’d want to offer up her yard for my wedding reception?”

“Now don’t you fuss none ’bout Georgina. The only way someone in this town will be held accountable for Clyde’s death is if they’re guilty. And if that happens, she can’t hold that ’gainst you. Wrong is wrong no matter who’s doin’ the wrong.” Margaret Louise’s sigh tickled the inside of Tori’s ear. “I could even talk to Milo if you think that’d help.”

Her eyes flew open at the image. “No!”

“I wouldn’t say anything bad, Victoria.”

She worked to soften her tone, bring it in line with the spirit in which the offer had been made. “I need to handle this thing with Milo myself. I’m just not sure how, short of telling Dixie she’s on her own with her suspicions.”

“Like I said the other day, I could help with that, too.” The sudden smile on Margaret Louise’s face was audible through the phone line. “You know I like investigatin’ with you, Victoria. Why, we’ve made quite a team in the past with this sort of thing and I’d be willin’ to help again.”

“Willing?” she teased, grateful for the sudden lighthearted escape to the conversation. “Is that what it’s called these days?”

Margaret Louise’s answering belly laugh said it all. “I
do
know the folks in this town, Victoria. And my cookin’ has a way of gettin’ all sorts of answers outta people.”

“Oh?”

“You just watch and see.” A hushed thump in the background was followed by the sound of a drawer slamming. “Okay, I got me a piece of paper and a pen. Now who’s on the list besides Shelby Jenkins?”

“Basically everyone who was celebrating Clyde’s death at Leona’s meeting yesterday morning—Lana Morris, Bud Aikin, Carter Johnson, Bruce Waters. Oh, and Councilman Adams, too.”

“I never have liked Granville Adams. Why, when he was up for election ’bout two years ago, he was runnin’ ’gainst a friend of my Jake’s—Carlton Wiperly. Carlton was in the lead on account of most people in this town havin’ watched him grow up.”

“So what happened? Why didn’t he win the council seat?”

“Granville uncovered a shopliftin’ incident in Carlton’s past. Didn’t matter the boy was only six when it happened. Granville pointed to it again and again as a reason to doubt Carlton’s integrity, his upbringin’.”

“And people fell for that?”

“Granville won, didn’t he?”

A flash of movement in Tori’s peripheral vision hooked her focus onto the sidewalk in front of the town hall. Georgina stood underneath a tree talking to two men—one of whom Tori recognized instantly as the police chief. She leaned forward, bobbing her head to the side to afford a better view of the second man she still didn’t recognize.

“Um, Margaret Louise? Would you mind if we table this conversation until later? I think I need to use the rest of my lunchtime for a walk.”

“You’re goin’ to snoop, ain’t you?”

At any other time, she knew she’d have laughed at Margaret Louise’s perceptiveness, but she didn’t want to lose the opportunity to find out what was behind the impromptu soiree. “The chief and Georgina are having some sort of deep discussion outside town hall. There’s another man, too—one I don’t recognize. And from what I can tell sitting here in my office, Georgina doesn’t look too terribly excited.”

“You go snoop and I’ll get cookin’. From what I remember, Bud Aikin likes my sweet potato pie …”

She let the woman’s words wash over her, the meaning behind them chasing the last of her doldrums away. “Margaret Louise, I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

“I’m sure you’d think of somethin’,” Margaret Louise quipped. “But before you go, I need to know if you still want Kate’s number.”

“Kate?”

“You know, Clyde’s friend. The one from my church.”