Authors: Susan McBride
“
I
SAW YOUR
car out front, but I never imagined you’d be inside my house, going through my things.” LaVyrle’s gaze didn’t waver from the balled-up pillowcase in Helen’s hands. “You got something that’s mine, Mrs. E. So why don’t you just hand it over t’ me now?”
Helen backed away from the toilet but merely ended up bumping against the sink. “I thought you were at work,” she said, never having imagined LaVyrle would return before five o’clock when the hardware store closed.
LaVyrle plucked off her baseball cap, revealing closely cropped brown hair. “I got a sense you were up t’ something,” she said. “I told my boss Justin was sick and I had t’ leave.” She shook her head. “I wish I’d been wrong.”
“Me, too,” Helen whispered.
LaVyrle reached a hand out, gesturing with pink-tipped fingers. “Give that back, Mrs. E. Don’t make me hurt you.”
Hurt her? Like she’d hurt Grace Simpson? Murder was a powerful kind of pain, wasn’t it?
“Oh, LaVyrle,” Helen sighed. Her heart felt broken. “I didn’t want to believe it was true. I did everything to convince myself otherwise. But in the end, it was the only answer that made sense.”
LaVyrle gave up on getting Helen to relinquish the pillowcase. She braced her hands against the doorjamb instead. “What exactly d’you think you know?”
Helen patted the pillowcase. “You’re the serial burglar who stole from Mavis White, Violet Farley, Mattie Oldbridge, and Hilary Dell. I’m guessing you meant to rob from Grace Simpson, only she returned home and surprised you.”
LaVyrle laughed, but she didn’t move. She had Helen effectively trapped, and she knew it. “You’ve got a wild imagination, Mrs. E. But then you always were a lively old broad. I think that’s why I liked you best. Now hand over my stuff.”
Helen didn’t relinquish the bag. She maneuvered around the sink and pressed her back to the tiled wall. “We trusted you,” she said. “We all left our purses with you when we went to get shampooed. You had ten minutes at least to take out our keys and find the one you wanted.”
Dark eyebrows arched. “You think I stole keys from my clients? Don’t you figure someone would’ve noticed?”
“You didn’t steal them exactly.” Helen shook her head, thinking of Nancy’s makeover and rummaging through LaVyrle’s drawer, looking for Kleenex. “The blocks of wax,” she said and met LaVyrle’s angry stare. “You used the paraffin wax meant for manicures to make impressions of the keys. Then you used that as a mold.”
“Give me a break,” LaVyrle said with a snort. She pushed away from the doorjamb and grabbed a towel bar. “And who’d make me a key from a wax impression?”
“You,” Helen answered, wishing her legs didn’t feel so unsteady. “The hardware store has the equipment for making keys. I saw it myself. It wouldn’t be hard to find a close match and copy the notches if you knew how. Even if you had to use a locksmith’s file and do it by hand.”
“You think I did all that?” LaVyrle rattled the towel bar, which nearly came out of the wall.
“I know you did.”
LaVyrle tapped her chin. “And just when do you think I had time t’ go breakin’ into people’s houses? I work two jobs, as you managed to find out.”
“You’re the one who told me the answer to that, LaVyrle,” Helen said. “You know more about the women in this town than anyone. Who lives alone, who’s leaving town.” Helen paused. The cold from the tile seeped through her clothing, and she shivered. “You’d probably even heard about favorite pieces of jewelry, treasured ornaments, cash. You even knew where things were hidden. People told you their secrets, and you took advantage of that.” Helen wet her lips. “Using keys you made yourself, well, you didn’t even have to break in. You let yourself inside like you belonged.”
“No one can prove anything.” LaVyrle rattled the towel bar again. “No one’s gonna believe you, Mrs. E, not without evidence. I heard from Sarah Biddle herself that the sheriff never found a single fingerprint.”
“The plastic gloves,” Helen said and closed her eyes, picturing all the times she’d seen LaVyrle with them on her hands. Every time she gave a perm or colored hair. She had boxes of them, the kind you could just toss away after you’d used them. Helen opened her eyes and sighed. “You always wore disposable gloves so you wouldn’t leave behind your prints.”
LaVyrle smiled. “You figure I’m as smart as that?”
Helen nodded. “I always did.”
“You can’t show what you found t’ the sheriff,” LaVyrle said. “I’ve seen enough cop shows to know that what you’re doin’ is illegal. In fact, I should call the sheriff and have you arrested.”
“Yes, call him,” Helen told her. “The sheriff isn’t stupid. He’ll put all the pieces together soon enough. He already knows that Charlie Bryan isn’t the thief.” Helen paused as LaVyrle’s eyes narrowed. “Didn’t you know Hilary Dell had a surveillance camera? You were caught in the act.”
LaVyrle’s mouth tightened. “You couldn’t understand why I did what I did. Not in a million years.”
“I know you’re in financial trouble.”
“Financial trouble? Is that what you call it?” LaVyrle made a noise of disgust. “You and your widow friends, you’re all sittin’ so pretty. You got your big fat nest eggs to roost on what with your husbands gone and everything you own. It’s not your kind fighting like hell t’ survive. Your old man didn’t run off and leave you with an empty pocketbook and a kid. He didn’t leave you with bills and rent and a business to support. You don’t know what it feels like to get sucked under.”
“That doesn’t give you the right to steal,” Helen told her, “or to kill. Why’d you do it? Why’d you kill Grace?”
For the first time, LaVyrle’s face showed real fear. “It was an accident,” she said in a hoarse whisper. “It wasn’t supposed to go down like that.”
“You broke into her place, thinking she’d be gone for hours. But she wasn’t. She forgot the manuscript, so she had to turn around and go home.” Keep talking, Helen’s mind instructed. Keep talking and maybe you’ll talk your way right out of this. She didn’t want to believe LaVyrle would really hurt her. She couldn’t. “You were trapped, and Grace found you. You panicked and picked up the bat. Then you hit her and took the manuscript. You knew she’d intended to meet her publisher. You took it so you could throw suspicion on someone else, and that someone else ended up being Nancy.”
The snap of the towel bar being wrenched out of the wall cut off further words.
Helen’s knees shook.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. E. I really am,” LaVyrle said, and she truly looked sad. “But sometimes ya just don’t have a choice.” She took a step toward Helen and raised the metal bar above her head.
Helen squished her eyes closed and braced for a blow.
Then she heard a grunt, a strangled cry, the clatter of the bar hitting the tiled floor, and the sheriff’s deep voice.
“It’s all right, Mrs. Evans,” he said. “You can open your eyes.”
Slowly, she let her lids flutter up.
Frank Biddle stood inside the pink-tiled bathroom. He had LaVyrle pinned against the far wall, her face turned away from Helen. With a snap of metal on metal, he cuffed her hands behind her back.
“My God, Sheriff”—Helen released the breath she’d been holding—“whatever in the world took you so long?”
At that point, her shaky knees gave out and, without a hint of grace, she slid to the floor.
H
ELEN
SAT IN
a wicker rocker, gently moving to and fro. Amber filled her lap entirely, and her fingers stroked his yellow fur. The cat rumbled beneath her touch and closed his eyes, perfectly contented. She could swear his pink-gummed mouth was smiling as he kneaded his paws on her thighs. Every now and then his claws pricked through her warm-up pants, and Helen would carefully disentangle them from the fabric, not missing a beat as she continued petting him with her other hand.
A breeze pressed through the screens, bringing with it the familiar smells of cut grass and a tinge of goldenrod, the latter no doubt contributing to the sporadic sneezes she heard coming from nearby porches.
An occasional car crawled past, its tires grinding over gravel. She could hear a dog barking in the distance and the faint hum of cicadas. Otherwise it was blissfully still.
Helen drew in a deep breath.
The town seemed to have settled back to its usual slow pace after all the recent hullabaloo over Grace’s death and the arrest of poor LaVyrle.
“If only she’d asked for help,” Helen said aloud, and Amber pricked up his ears. She scratched between them, and his purring grew louder. “If only I’d known she was so desperate.”
But LaVyrle hadn’t been the type to ask. She hadn’t wanted anyone to realize the trouble she’d been in. She was too strong, too proud. So she’d stolen from her clients instead.
“And look where that got her,” Helen murmured, shaking her head. “A cell at the Jersey County Jail.”
The screen door snapped open and shut, and Helen looked up with a start. She half rose from the rocker, so that Amber spilled from her lap.
“Sorry, Grandma,” Nancy said, taking a hesitant step in. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I hope I’m not interrupting?”
Helen brushed yellow fur off her pants, watching Amber as he flipped his tail into the air and stomped away. “No, honey, you’re not interrupting,” she said. “I was just thinking is all.”
“Were you on the phone?” Nancy looked around her. “I heard you talking.”
Helen laughed. “Yes, to myself. Like a crazy old woman, huh?”
The girl’s slender face relaxed. Her bright blue eyes crinkled. She came toward Helen and gave her a bear hug. “Like someone with a lot on her mind,” she said into Helen’s ear before she drew away. “I still can’t believe what happened. That LaVyrle did all those horrible things.”
Helen could hardly believe it either. “It’s an awful world we live in that makes a woman resort to breaking the law to keep her home and family. Now her son will grow up without his mother.”
“But he already was,” Nancy said. “His grandmother’s raising him.”
“LaVyrle tried to do her best—”
“No, she didn’t. She was a thief and she committed murder,” Nancy reminded Helen. “No one made her do any of that. She doesn’t deserve your sympathy.”
“Maybe not,” Helen said, but she couldn’t help feeling sorry for LaVyrle nonetheless. She believed that LaVyrle hadn’t meant to hurt anyone, that LaVyrle had killed Grace impulsively, not with malice. She wanted to believe, too, that LaVyrle would never have hurt her, that she had enough goodness left inside her that she would have put the towel bar down if given the chance.
And still, Helen was glad that Sheriff Biddle had stepped in when he had. Thank goodness she’d taken him along even if he hadn’t approved of her means of investigating. “Don’t ever,” he’d told her sternly after, “do anything like that again.”
“Come sit,” Nancy said and tugged her hand, guiding Helen over to the sofa and settling down side by side. “Did the sheriff say what’s going to happen?”
“She’ll be charged with involuntary manslaughter in Grace’s death and at least five counts of burglary, including the theft of the manuscript from Grace.” Helen stopped, and tears sprang to her eyes. “To think LaVyrle would have let you go to jail for the murder, and she would have let Charlie Bryan take the heat for everything else.”
“But it all worked out, didn’t it?” Nancy said and patted her knee. “I’m okay, and Charlie’s free to jack the mayor’s car again.”
Helen smiled weakly.
“It’s not your fault, Grandma,” Nancy whispered, laying her head on Helen’s shoulder. “You’re not responsible for LaVyrle’s troubles.”
“You’re right, I know.” Helen sniffed, brushing away her tears. “Still, if I hadn’t been so nosy—”
“Then I’d be locked up in Jersey County and not LaVyrle. You wouldn’t want that, would you?”
“No,” Helen said firmly. “No, I wouldn’t.”
The pretty face that stared at her so solemnly made Helen recall an old photograph she had, of herself when she was Nancy’s age, and she felt almost as if she was talking to her younger self.
For a moment, they didn’t speak; they simply sat side by side.
“Thanks for believing in me,” Nancy whispered, “even when no one else in town did.”
“How could I not? You’ve never lied to me before,” Helen said, then paused. “At least not that I know about.”
Nancy laughed, and Helen realized it was the first time she’d heard the sound since the whole mess with Grace had started.
“So, what are your plans?” she asked her granddaughter. “Will you stick around?”
Nancy lifted her head from Helen’s shoulder. She bit her lip, as if afraid her decision might not sit well with her grandmother. “I’ve been thinking—”
“Yes?”
“I think I might go back to school,” Nancy confessed. “I’d like to get my master’s in social work. Does that sound okay to you?”
“Does that sound okay?” Helen pulled back. “It sounds fantastic.”
Nancy shrugged. “Maybe someday I can help someone like LaVyrle so she can make better choices before it’s too late.
“I like that idea.”
“You do?”
“I like it very much.”
Nancy grinned.
“There’s just one thing,” Helen started to say, and Nancy looked worried.
“What is it?”
“Just that I’ll miss you,” Helen admitted, at which point Nancy flung her arms around Helen’s shoulders and buried her face in the crook of her neck.
“Oh, Grandma, I’ll miss you, too,” she said.
A
FTER
N
ANCY
LEFT,
teary-eyed but happy, Helen made sure the shoelaces on her sneakers were securely tied. She patted her jacket pocket, checking for the good-bye gift Nancy had given her, then she set out on her daily walk.
The sun shone down brightly, showering her in its warmth. She kept her gaze straight ahead, glancing down only now and then to avoid bigger cracks in the sidewalk or an errant pile of doggy-do that had somehow missed the grass.
She slowed her steps when she reached the center of downtown, and she found her eyes drawn across the street.
The plate-glass window with the purple script advertising LaVyrle’s Cut ’n’ Curl winked back at her. A
CLOSED
sign dangled from the door, causing a knot in Helen’s chest. She wondered if that sign would ever again read
OPEN.
A shadow crossed her face, blotting out the sun, and Helen turned to see Frank Biddle blocking her path.
“Hi, Sheriff,” she said.
He nodded, replying with a clipped, “Ma’am.” He stood with thumbs hooked into his gun belt, the overhang of his belly straining the buttons on his shirt. He tipped his hat so it sat well back on his head. “I thought you’d appreciate hearing a bit of good news about Grace Simpson. That is”—he wrinkled his brow—“if Sarah hasn’t told you already.”
“What about Grace?” she asked.
“It appears that the woman had a will,” Biddle said, “a handwritten one, all perfectly legal.”
“Is that right?”
“Yep.”
“Did Max get everything?” Helen said, hoping that wasn’t the case. The man didn’t deserve a bloody penny.
“Apparently, she left all her worldly goods to a half dozen charities,” Biddle told her, grinning. “Max Simpson’s protesting, of course.”
“What a weasel.” Helen scoffed. “It is nice to know Grace had a soft spot in her heart after all.”
“Or else she just wanted to make sure that poor excuse for a husband didn’t get his hands on her money,” the sheriff suggested.
“Somehow
that
sounds more like her,” Helen said and looked past the sheriff, suddenly impatient to resume her walk.
“Um, ma’am?”
“Yes, Sheriff?” Helen felt the breeze tug at her gray curls. Though she was still half a mile at least from the Mississippi, the wind coming off the river teased her nose with its ripe, muddy smell.
He cleared his throat and ran a finger under his collar. “I, um . . . well, I just wanted to tell you that I’m sorry for what I put you through, and I appreciate what you did.”
“You do?” She cocked her head and raised a hand above her eyes to block out the sun peeking over Biddle’s shoulder. “I thought you didn’t like me poking my nose where it didn’t belong?”
“Well, I don’t, of course,” he told her, fumbling to find the words. “But maybe sometimes the end does justify the means.”
Helen grinned. “Even when that means involves being a busybody?”
“I, um, don’t know that I’d put it that way,” he muttered.
“I’m just glad that it’s over.”
He tugged the beak of his hat back over his brow. “Except that it isn’t,” he said, “not entirely.”
“Oh?” Helen’s pulse thumped a little bit faster. “Why’s that?”
“You don’t happen to know anything about that missing flash drive, do you?” he asked, watching her far too closely. “Grace Simpson’s publisher has been breathing down my neck about it since LaVyrle made toast of the physical manuscript. I know Nancy said she gave it back to her boss, but I never found it with any of Grace’s possessions.”
“Hmm,” Helen murmured.
“You don’t know if your granddaughter still has it, by chance?”
“I’m sorry, Sheriff, but she doesn’t,” Helen told him, putting her hands in her pockets. “I guess Mr. Faulkner won’t be publishing Grace’s book after all. Such a pity.”
“Yeah, a pity,” Biddle echoed, but Helen caught his dry smile.
She gave a wave and took off, pumping her arms as she walked, not stopping again until she reached the river. Instead of stopping at the edge of town where a clipped field of grass met the River Road, Helen looked both ways, then dashed across the double lanes of asphalt. She didn’t pause until she safely reached the bicycle path on the opposite side.
Then she stepped over the guardrail and carefully picked her way down the rocky incline until she stood just above where the brown waters sloshed and slapped at the waterline.
She reached in her pocket, withdrawing a small piece of plastic no bigger than her thumb. With a grunt, she tossed it unceremoniously into the river, as far as she could throw.
“I didn’t lie,” she whispered to herself. “Nancy really didn’t have it.”
Her granddaughter had given her the flash drive before she’d taken off, telling her, “You’ll know what to do with it, Grandma. Whatever you think is best.”
And that was exactly what Helen had done.