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Myrtle smiled reassuringly at her. “You don’t have to look so worried, Pansy. It’s no imposition at all. I’ve already made one for Orabelle and Tripp.”
“Really, Myrtle, it’s fine. I’ve gotten so much food already that I may never eat it all.”
Myrtle said, “Have you? As I was going to say, I’ve found myself in a situation where funds are rather tight until the end of the week and the casserole would have to wait a bit. But if you’re sure you’re covered?”
“Absolutely sure,” said Pansy firmly.
Myrtle nodded and then said, “I’m thrilled you managed to make it to book club. It must be good to have something as a distraction right now.”
“You’re right. It’s been a terrible last 24-hours. Tippy told me not to bring anything to book club, but I couldn’t help myself. I wanted to do something to stay busy, so I made some cookies to bring.” She reached over to the nearby table and plucked a cookie off the plate. “Here, try one.”
Myrtle obediently took a bite and then struggled not to make a face. Something had gone terribly wrong with that cookie. Had she left out sugar? Had she substituted some other white powdery kitchen ingredient by accident? The cookie was vile.
Pansy didn’t seem to notice that Myrtle wasn’t taking any further bites from the offending cookie. She continued, “I just feel so terrible that there I was, getting ready for my day, and Darren was fighting for his life.” She shuddered and struggled to regain control of her emotions.
Myrtle decided to move on to a slightly different topic in the hopes of keeping Pansy’s tears at bay. “Miles mentioned that Carter has been a good friend to you through all this,” she fibbed, throwing Miles under the proverbial bus. Miles narrowed his eyes at her from across the room as if he somehow knew what she was saying.
Pansy blinked at her in surprise. “Carter? Well, he hasn’t been in touch with me for a couple of days. Poor Carter. He’s always been such a kind friend. And he’s been so lonely since his wife passed away.”
Myrtle said, “So you two have always just been friends, then.”
Pansy said sadly, “I just never thought of Carter that way. Not in a romantic way.”
“He wanted you to, though?”
Pansy nodded and said in a conspiratorial whisper, “Poor Carter was terribly upset with Darren. He thought he’d be a much better boyfriend than Darren was.” She hesitated and colored a little. “He had an awful argument with Darren just recently. He was quite violent and unlike himself. You know he’s usually so sweet.”
Myrtle, in fact, did not know this. Carter Radnor always seemed rather intense to her. He’d always struck her as a workaholic. She was surprised to discover that he had another side to him.
“What did they argue over?” asked Myrtle.
Pansy batted her lashes modestly. “Over me. Can you believe it, Myrtle? But it wasn’t the romantic thing it’s always portrayed as in books. Not a bit like two knights fighting over a fair maiden. It was just awful. Those were two people I cared about and they were both shouting at each other.”
“Goodness, that must have been very upsetting.” Although Myrtle couldn’t quite manage to sound convincing on that point. “And it must have been upsetting, as well, that Carter wasn’t really listening to you when you told him you preferred to stay with Darren. Which you did, I presume.”
Pansy quickly said, “Oh, yes. Many times. And anyone could see that Darren and I had a special relationship. I always thought he and I would end up at the altar together. We got along so well and had so much in common.”
“Chess?” asked Myrtle dubiously.
Pansy gave a light laugh. “Maybe not chess.”
Myrtle smiled at her. “Well, it certainly sounds like a lovely relationship. That’s so unusual, isn’t it? Too often couples have spats and things, don’t they?” Like Orabelle mentioned that Pansy and Darren had had.
Pansy kept her unwavering and brave smile. “Yes. What a pity about that. People need to remember the love that was the basis for their partnership to begin with.”
Myrtle said, “So you were very supportive of him when he discovered the painting in his attic, then, I’m guessing. Happy for him. It was quite an amazing find, I understand.”
“Oh, yes. Yes, I was very happy for him. I mean, the painting wasn’t pretty at all and I didn’t think it could possibly be worth anything when Darren first showed it to me. But I was happy to admit I was wrong after he got it appraised. And then the attention from the magazine was so good for him and he was so proud! I was even quoted in one of the periodicals,” she said, flushing a little with pleasure at the memory.
“Isn’t that so very wonderful?” said Myrtle.
Pansy seemed to realize there might be the very slightest edge to Myrtle’s question. She flushed again, this time in annoyance. “You, of course, are in the paper all the time, aren’t you? I think you wrote the article on Darren this morning.” She grudgingly added, “It was a good piece.”
“Thanks,” said Myrtle. She said, “I’m hoping that, as the town’s investigative reporter, I can help track down who did this to Darren.
Pansy blinked at her, then quickly glanced over Myrtle’s form . . . from the top of her gray head to the cane she held sturdily in one hand, to her sensible orthopedic shoes. “That’s, well, that’s remarkable.”
“Yes. And considering this mission of mine . . . do you have any ideas as to who might have harbored such feelings of ill-will toward Darren?”
Pansy looked down as she thought. Myrtle carefully held the horrid cookie behind her back as she did. “Everyone liked Darren. They really did.”
Myrtle said carefully, “Dear, no one is liked by everyone.” She paused. “Do you know anything, by the way, about a potential connection between Darren and someone named Liam?”
“Liam Hudson? Yes. He was Darren’s lawyer. As a matter of fact, he mentioned something about him a couple of days ago. I got the impression he was somewhat at odds with him.”
Myrtle frowned. “Why would Darren be at odds with his lawyer?”
“I don’t really know. I just know Darren kept saying Liam wasn’t who he appeared,” said Pansy. “He mentioned that maybe he could find proof.”
“How very ambiguous of Darren! What on earth did he mean by that?”
Pansy shrugged a thin shoulder.
“You didn’t ask?” Myrtle found some people’s absence of curiosity quite amazing.
“No. I think I was busy at the time. Yes, I was shucking corn.”
Myrtle thought shucking corn was a very poor substitute to finding out more information on a really mysterious statement by one’s boyfriend. “And that was all he said on the matter?”
Pansy’s brow furrowed even further as if she were reaching into the very soles of her feet to try to think of what else Darren might have said. She slowly added, “No, he said one thing more. I didn’t really understand where he was going with it. He said it was the same time as the big snowstorm.”
“Big snowstorm? Here in Bradley?” A big snowstorm in the North Carolina town might be interpreted as one that actually dusted the ground instead of merely elevated surfaces. Even a small amount of white stuff was usually enough to bring the entire town to a screeching halt. And wipe grocery store shelves free of bread and milk.
“Or hurricane?” added Pansy, unhelpfully.
Myrtle sighed. Pansy was clearly not the fount of information she could be.
“No, wait. It was definitely a hurricane. That’s because Darren and I started talking about where we were at the time it hit.”
Since Bradley wasn’t a coastal town, but hours away from the beach, this did help limit possibilities. The number of hurricanes that had any sort of impact on the town were few and far between. “Could it have been Hurricane Hugo?” asked Myrtle.
“Hmm. No. At least, I don’t think so. Darren said it was when he was living in Boston at the time. It was a hurricane that impacted his area there.”
Tippy joined them then. “May I borrow Pansy now, Myrtle?”
Myrtle nodded and Tippy whisked her away; perhaps because Pansy’s furrowed brow and worried expression as she tried to pull up memories made Tippy think Myrtle was somehow making Pansy unhappy. And, judging from Tippy’s censorious look, unhappiness at book club was against the rules.
Miles walked up to Myrtle and she thrust the half-eaten cookie into his hand surreptitiously. “Get rid of this for me, would you?”
Miles did, and then covered his hands with the bottle of sanitizer he conveniently had in the pocket of his khakis. “What was that?” he asked.
“A ghastly culinary misstep by Pansy,” said Myrtle. She rubbed her hand clean on her slacks.
Miles said, “Well, I suppose she might be distracted. Under the circumstances.”
“I’m not entirely sure she doesn’t bake like that all the time,” said Myrtle.
Miles narrowed his eyes. “Sometimes people don’t realize how bad their cooking is.”
“They should be pitied for their lack of self-perception,” said Myrtle with a sniff.
Miles looked to be on the point of elaborating on this subject, when Myrtle’s cell phone started ringing. She startled. “Who on earth could be calling me?” she muttered, fumbling to retrieve the phone from her voluminous purse.
She glanced at it and then answered. “Red! I’m at book club. It’s really not a very good time.”
“I could say the same,” grated Red. “I’m in the middle of a murder investigation and yet I’m getting citizen complaints about a large gnome blocking the sidewalk in front of my mother’s house.”
“A large gnome? How silly. And the perfect example of an oxymoron.”
“And yet it seems to be true. I’ve received several calls.”
Myrtle glanced across the room at Georgia and caught her eye. Georgia gave her a thumbs-up and a grin. Myrtle supposed she was to interpret those gestures to mean Georgia had somehow offloaded the gnome. Apparently onto a public walkway.
“Mama, there’s a town ordinance against blocking a sidewalk.”
“I’ve done no such thing! I’ve been at book club for the last forty-five minutes; setting up the room and speaking with fellow literature-lovers. Ask anyone.”
Red growled, “I’m tied up right now, but then I’m going to have to address this giant gnome. I’m thinking about giving you a ticket, too.”
“Whatever. I have to go.” Myrtle hung up just as Tippy was clapping her hands to get the attention of the group.
“Ladies and gentleman,” Tippy said winking and smiling at Miles. “I want to welcome everyone to our book club. Let’s extend a special welcome to Pansy Denham, who’s just joining us.”
Everyone beamed at Pansy and gave her a round of applause. She teared up a bit at this and Tippy expertly diverted attention away from her again.
“And thanks, also, to Myrtle, who had the brainstorm for us to hold this month’s meeting at the library. Perhaps Myrtle would like to say a few words about this?”
Myrtle decided she would. She stood up and walked to the front of the room. She summoned her classroom voice from years ago. It was a necessary voice to utilize since there were still two members whispering to each other in the back, another seemingly mesmerized by the snack table, and yet another busily spilling punch on the table and one of Miles’s precious books. Miles gaped in horror from across the room.
Myrtle cleared her throat and said, “The reason I wanted us to meet at the library this month was to remind our group what book club is all about.”
“Books!” beamed one of the members, as if she were the teacher’s pet and wanted a gold star.
Myrtle gave her a reproving look at interrupting. “That’s true. And while we do talk about books, I feel we’ve somehow lost our way. We’ve become too interested in socializing.” She gave a significant pause here and stared at the two women who were still whispering together. They blushed and stopped. “We must find our way back to real literature. For inspiration, I’ve picked out some wonderful books from Miles’s own personal library.”
The woman who’d just sloshed punch on one of Miles’s books also blushed and scrubbed furiously at the red stain on the front cover of Ivanhoe.
Blanche raised her hand and Myrtle nodded at her. “Are there any classic novels that are actually easy reading? Because the last thing I want to do with my free time is to work hard at relaxing.”
There was murmured assent from the group and Myrtle raised a hand, stopping the murmurings in their tracks.
“Certainly there are,” said Myrtle smoothly, walking over to the table with Tess of the d’Urbervilles. But she was interrupted by, of all people, Erma.
“I know the best book for us to read,” she chirped up.
Everyone turned to look at her.
“I do, I really do! I got to the library early and I went over to see what might be good for us to read.”
“Is it your month to pick?” asked Myrtle through gritted teeth. She sincerely hoped it wasn’t.
“I’ve never picked,” said Erma beaming. “I’ve always let other people have my turn.”
Tippy cleared her throat. “Well, then, I think we should let Erma determine what book we read for next month.”
Erma nodded. She glanced around at everyone’s eyes on her and preened.
“Let’s have it, Erma,” said Myrtle grimly, steeling herself for the title.
“Frankenstein,” said Erma.
Myrtle said, “All right. By Mary Shelley. That’s actually not a bad choice for the group. An excellent gothic tale that we’re all somewhat familiar with. But it has a good deal of depth, too.”
Erma nodded enthusiastically. “Yes! But it gets even better. I found they have a graphic novel version here at the library. They have quite a few copies, so it must be popular. Then I looked online and there were plenty of used copies, too, for hardly any money. Won’t that be so much fun?”
The book club seemed to think that was a lot of fun. They liked the idea of being able to see the monster and the doctor. They asked what other books the library had as graphic novels and Erma was able to go into a great deal of detail as to the library’s fairly extensive collection.
Myrtle walked back to her seat and Miles looked at her sympathetically. “This wasn’t exactly how you wanted things to go.”
“No.”
Miles said, “But, you know, it may end up that this will lead to the group tackling some good books after they’ve read a condensed format.”
“Miles, I have no hope at all that’s what’s going to end up happening. Let’s move on.”
Tippy was clapping her hands again and started the discussion of that month’s pick: a maudlin little tale of a middle-aged woman battling the inevitable tide of aging. Myrtle rolled her eyes. She’d mastered aging and it was irritating to her to hear about anyone who was struggling with the process.
As it happened, it seemed no one had really read the book. This was excellent news because the actual discussion portion of the meeting was cut short. Then everyone started milling around and visiting again.
Miles said, “Can we get out of here? You’ve already spoken with Pansy.” He looked with misgivings as another book club member picked up one of his books while juggling a chocolate doughnut someone had brought in. He winced as she flipped through the pages.
“Yes, let’s get out while the getting is good,” muttered Myrtle.
“Too late,” said Miles glumly as a woman waved at them and started walking over with great determination.