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IDA BELLE’S PHONE CLICKED over to voice mail. Mary-Alice couldn’t think of any message to leave, so she left none. She kept walking and punched in Gertie’s number next. It went straight to voice mail too. They’d probably confiscated the phones at anger management camp. So it wasn’t any use trying to call Fortune.
Mary-Alice put her phone away and headed over to Harriet’s Books. She loved getting lost among the tall shelves and inhaling the aroma of scented candles and old paper. Harriet herself was a delight, always ready to chew over the latest gossip.
The first time Mary-Alice came into the store, Harriet had shared a rumor about the mayor’s cousin’s grandson going to prison for computer fraud. Mary-Alice had replied that the rumor was true. She herself was that very cousin. And her grandson, to her great disappointment, was indeed a guest of the state. Bonded, perhaps, by mutual mortification, Harriet and Mary-Alice had gotten on splendidly ever since.
Harriet was glad to see Mary-Alice and eagerly shared the latest Sinful news. Mary-Alice heard Harriet out and did not interrupt her. No one who says “stop me if you’ve already heard this” really means it, after all. The well-mannered conversationalist is obliged to act attentive at all times. Even if she has to sit through the same story four times in a single day.
“Now I’m as open-minded as the next person,” Harriet concluded. “But our Yankee visitors seem to be bringing in a lot of their own bad luck lately, don’t you think? I mean, that Fortune Morrow is a nice enough girl, but look at how much trouble we’ve had here since she’s moved in.”
Mary-Alice examined the display of flower-topped pens on the counter.
“Now Harriet, I don’t like to be contrary, but if you recall, Fortune helped save my life. And Celia’s too. The fact that those women were in Mudbug that night, and just happened to be driving right past my house when it went up? Well, I’d call that pretty good luck, wouldn’t you? By the time the fire trucks got there it would have been too late.”
“Oh, I’m terribly sorry, Mary-Alice. You’re right. I forgot Fortune was there. I wasn’t thinking.”
Mary-Alice patted Harriet’s hand.
“Don’t worry, dear. I understand. We’re all in a state over what happened to this poor man.”
“I can’t imagine what Stumpy is going through right now,” Harriet fretted. “Think of it, going out for a nice night of bass fishing and pulling up a body. And I heard the man had a wife. How terrible for her.”
“Yes, her name is Almira. She’s a friend of Gertie’s. And she was on the boat with her husband when it capsized.”
Harriet’s eyes widened.
“Oh, dear. And Celia’s just sent Gertie away to anger management camp. That poor woman, losing her husband just when her only friend is out of town. I’m sorry, Mary-Alice, I know Celia’s your cousin, but honestly, that woman doesn’t know the difference between mayor and dictator. Although you know what they say when there’s a suspicious death. It’s always the spouse, isn’t it? Mary-Alice, do you think the marriage was...troubled?”
“Why, I couldn’t say.”
Which did not mean that Mary-Alice didn’t have an opinion. Mary-Alice did not like Professor Whitbread. She did not expect his wife had, either. He was thoughtless, condescending, and horribly selfish. He moved his family away from everything they knew, to help his writer’s block. He neglected paperwork that would have ensured his family’s financial security. He refused to wear the life vest that might have kept him alive.
But it was bad manners to kick a person when he was down, let alone when he was dead. And even the worst people had their redeeming qualities.
“Almira told me he packed a picnic lunch for them to take on their boat ride,” Mary-Alice said. “And he fixed her sandwich just the way she liked it. I thought that was sweet. My Joe, rest his soul, wouldn’t have done that for me, not in a million years.”
Mary-Alice didn’t like to visit Harriet’s without buying something. She purchased a bouquet of flower pens and a blank journal.
“Are you going to start keeping a diary?” Harriet asked as she rang up Mary-Alice’s purchases. “How about a gardening journal? Do you know, Sinful’s in Climate Zone 28, ideal for camellias. I love camellias, don’t you?”
“I do, and that’s a wonderful idea, Harriet. I could write a gardening journal.”
Mary-Alice had no intention of writing a gardening journal. She would use the blank book to take notes on important events. Geoff Whitbread’s death, she thought, would be a worthy topic. She might call her journal “The Sinful Chronicles.”
Feeling a renewed sense of purpose, Mary-Alice left Harriet’s bookstore and headed down the main road toward the edge of town. She found herself turning onto the even narrower lane to the Sinful Cemetery. This was where Almira had pulled herself up onto shore after her boat capsized. Or so she’d told Deputy Breaux.
Mary-Alice pulled out her new notebook and one of her new pens, which was crowned with an enormous silk sunflower. She wrote:
Sinful cemetery at the far end of town. Looks to be in poor repair, possible flooding, one road but also boat access as bayou runs behind the treeline where the swamp begins. The ground is spongy.
Mary-Alice hesitated. Should she stick to observable facts, or include her thoughts as well? What would a real detective do? She wondered whether she should have asked Harriet for a book about how to be a detective. Had she done so, Harriet would certainly have noticed, and the news would quickly be all around Sinful. No, that would not have been wise.
Mary-Alice hit upon a solution. She would write down the facts first and then add her thoughts and opinions. She would label them so she would know which was which when she re-read her notes.
Thoughts:
I wonder whether the Sinful Cemetery will end up like the one Beulah Monroe from Crafting Circle was telling us she’d seen out in Leeville, where you could only get to it by boat. She was telling us how the water lapped around the rectangular stone tombs which stood like islands. There was an infant’s one, which she said looked terribly lonely, out there in the water.
Mary-Alice wondered whether Celia had a plan for saving Sinful Cemetery. Some of the gravestones looked to be from before the War Between the States, and it would be a shame to let them get washed into the bayou. As mayor, Celia seemed to love calling meetings and digging up arcane laws to enforce, but she didn’t seem to pay much attention to things like roads and water and cemeteries.
Mary-Alice was inspecting a tipped-over gravestone so worn she could barely read it when her phone buzzed in her handbag.
It was Celia calling.
“Mary-Alice, when I was showing those two young people around Sinful, we happened to walk past the old Cooper place—excuse me, I suppose I should be calling it the new Mary-Alice Arceneaux place—and your construction crew was making a terrible mess out in your carport. I wanted to give you a warning, and not issue a citation right away. Because you’re family, Mary-Alice, and you’re new here, I figured you simply didn’t know any better.”
Mary-Alice didn’t roll her eyes—Mary-Alice would never roll her eyes—but she couldn’t help gazing heavenward.
“Mister St. Clair already arranged the permits, Celia. And I do recall his assuring me the carport enclosure had been approved. So I don’t believe I’m in violation of any of Sinful’s statutes. Did you check with him?”
“Well, that’s the same story he tried to give me. And it’s one thing to obey the letter of the law. But the mess he was making, why it was disgraceful, and right downtown where everyone could see it.”
Arguing was quite out of character for Mary-Alice, but even she had a limit.