Classic Revenge (27 page)

Stepping over a pile of newspapers, Trish started flipping through a pile of unopened mail on the end table
by the recliner. It looked like a lot of notices from bill
collectors. Well, you would hardly think that someone
with plenty of money would live like this. She replaced
the mail on the table and looked around. Millie could
probably cover this room by herself, so the smartest
thing to do would be to split up.

One peek in the small bathroom made her quickly
come to the conclusion that nothing would be hidden
there. And, if it was, it could stay hidden. Fighting a
wave of nausea, she moved on down the hall. The next
room was made only slightly more bearable by the open
window. A light breeze ruffled the faded curtains, a welcome reminder to Trish that fresh air was only a few
steps away.

Evidently, this room served as both the master bedroom and the dirty-clothes hamper. Disgusted, she
walked gingerly through the mess, but she was fast becoming dejected. Even if anything was here, it was going to be impossible to find it. A bulldozer would be the
only efficient answer.

She took a deep breath and held it as she bent down
to look under the bed. At that same instant, Millie came
running into the room. "Trish!"

Startled, Trish raised up, banging her head painfully
on the bed frame. "Ow!"

"Hush! I think I heard Edna honk the horn a few minutes ago, and I just saw headlights from the window!"

Trish's jaw dropped. "What do you mean ... `a few
minutes ago'?"

"Give or take a minute or two. We need to get out of
here," Millie whispered and closed the door.

"Why didn't you call out to me?" Trish was looking
around wildly, trying to find some means of escape.
This was not good, not good at all.

"I was busy! Now stop complaining, and let's find a
way out of here. We can't go out the front door," she
said unnecessarily.

Trish looked over at the open window and grimaced.
So much for luck. "Okay, our only chance is the window.
Millie, pull that old card table chair over here-hurry!"
Trish went to the window and opened the drapes fully.
Just as she had hoped, the screen was old and not secured
by any security measures. She pushed hard and it
flopped onto the open ground. "Okay, I'm going first so I
can help you on the other side. I'm warning you, though,"
she said, pulling herself up and over the ledge, "if you
find any reason to stall, I'm leaving your butt here. This
is no time for games or heroics."

Just then, they heard the front door open. Millie was
jumping nervously from one foot to the other. "Just
hurry, for goodness' sake!"

Trish landed on the ground with a thud. It was further
down than she had anticipated, but it was still manageable. Millie's head poked through the opening. "No," she
whispered loudly, "Come out legs-first! I can't catch you
if you take a dive head-first"

"Oh" Millie's head ducked back in and then one leg
jutted out. Soon, she was sitting on the ledge. "Are you ready?" It was a pointless question, because Millie
jumped at the same instant she uttered it. It wasn't quite
what Trish had in mind. She hadn't planned on actually
catching her friend; she'd intended to help her crawl
down. Instead, all she managed to do was break Millie's fall with her body as they both tumbled to the
ground, arms and legs akimbo.

"Are you okay?' Trish asked breathlessly. The
thought of Millie breaking an arm, or a leg, or worse,
had Trish worried.

"I'm fine. Now, get off me so we can get out of here!"

Trish's eyes widened, and she held a finger to her lips.
She thought she had just heard Tom's bedroom door
open. Gesturing frantically with her hand, she motioned
for Millie to follow her. They scrambled over to the next
door neighbor's trailer and ducked behind it a second before a stream of obscenities flew out Tom's open window. Trish saw Millie purse her lips in disapproval, and
she prayed fervently that Millie wasn't about to march
over there and give Tom a piece of her mind. The mud
sticking to her hair just might give them away.

But then the cursing stopped, followed by only low
muttering, and then the sound of his voice died out altogether. Her relief was short-lived as it suddenly dawned
on Trish that Tom might be coming outside to replace his
screen. Grabbing Millie's hand, they made a mad dash
through the mobile-home park-well, as mad a dash as
two older women could make-ducking between trailers
and keeping an eye out for anyone following them. It
seemed that all they left behind, though, was a wave of
barking dogs.

What seemed like an eternity later, they saw Edna
sitting in the car at the entrance of the mobile home park, just as she had been instructed to do. "Let's go,"
Trish said breathlessly as she practically pushed Millie
into the car and then fell in after her.

Edna looked at them in shock. "What ..."

"We'll tell you in a minute. Just get out of here!"

Edna snapped her mouth closed and put the car in
gear. When they were a few miles away, Trish took a
deep breath of relief and settled down in her seat. That
was when she heard the giggling coming from the tiny
woman beside her-actual giggling! In disbelief, she
turned to Millie. Maybe she had gone into shock or
something. Should she slap her, or throw cold water on
her? What were you supposed to do when someone went
into shock?

"Either someone tells me what happened back there,
or I'm going to stop this car in the middle of the road,"
Edna snapped. "You both look like you just went mud
wrestling."

Trish looked at both herself and Millie, and then she
just couldn't help it. She started giggling too, and then
outright laughing. It wasn't fair to Edna, she knew, but
when you looked at the situation she and Millie had just
been in from a distance, it really was quite funny.

"The main thing, Edna," she said between chuckles,
"is that it was a complete waste of time."

"Actually, that's not necessarily the case," Millie said,
sitting up and reaching into her fanny pack. She opened
her hand for all to see. One of Mary's earrings, previously stolen from Sam after Susan's murder, lay nestled
in her open palm.

Edna kept glancing over her shoulder at the earring
in Millie's hand, her eyes wide and her mouth open in a
silent gasp. Trish could excuse the first time the car
swerved, maybe even the second time, but when it happened a third time, she figured they weren't going to do
anybody any good dead. "For goodness' sake, Edna,
pull over now! You're going to get us all killed."

"Oh ... oh, yes, okay." Taking the directive literally,
Edna crossed two lanes of traffic and pulled into a convenience store.

Trish sent up a silent prayer of thanks and then
turned to Millie. "Where did you find that?"

"It was in Tom's den. That's why I almost didn't hear
Edna honking. I was looking for the other one"

"That directly ties Tom to Mary's murder, doesn't
it?" Edna asked.

"I would think so. But does it tie him to Susan's mur der?" Trish shuddered, thinking how close they had
come to being discovered by Tom in his own house.

"That's not the only thing I found," Millie boasted.
She dropped the earring into Trish's hand and reached
back into her fanny pack. "This is strange, though. I'm
not sure what it means."

"What is it?" Trish asked, slightly in awe at what Millie had accomplished that night.

Millie unfolded a crumpled piece of yellow notebook
paper. "It's some kind of list. It was tossed in a corner
with some other trash" She peered at the writing. "Turn
on the light, Edna"

"Don't tell me you found a list Tom made detailing
the steps to murder?"

"Very funny, Trish," Millie said absently, and then
she began to read. "Wife! ... Children! ... House! ...
Job! ... Reputation! These are all written in large letters
with exclamation points beside them and underlined.
Then, at the bottom of the page, he's written the word
`REVENGE!!!!' in all capital letters with four exclamation points, and then, in small handwriting, he's written
'problems are meant to be solved.' This is pretty strange,
huh?"

"It's very strange," Edna agreed.

Trish tried to put her racing thoughts in order.
"Maybe it's actually not that strange"

When Edna and Millie looked at her, she tried to explain. "What if the top part of the list refers to things
he's lost? He could blame Sam for all of that. So to get
back at him, he kills Susan"

Millie nodded slowly. "We always thought someone
was trying to frame Sam."

Edna tilted her head. "So, you think the word 'revenge' refers to Susan?"

Trish shook her head. "It could, but I doubt it. What
if it refers to Mary?"

Millie snapped her fingers. "Of course, that's what it's
got to mean! Mary knew that Tom had killed Susan, so
she must have been blackmailing him to get the earrings!"

Edna frowned. "It still doesn't explain why Tom's
ex-wife was at Mary's house"

"It was pure jealousy," Millie said. "Clarissa Jones
thought Tom bought the earrings for his new girlfriend.
She went over there to confront Mary, to warn her to
stay away from her man."

Trish shuddered. "I can't see any woman wanting to
claim Tom Jones as her man, but there's no accounting
for taste" Then, a thought occurred to her. "What if
Clarissa knows he killed Mary?"

"How would she know that?" Edna asked.

Trish leaned her head back, thinking of different scenarios. "I don't know, but it could explain why she was
at Tom's house that day arguing with him."

Millie put her treasures back in her fanny pack and
zipped it shut. "There's only one way to find out"

"What's that?" Trish and Edna asked in unison.

"We need to talk to Clarissa Jones"

"We absolutely do not!" Edna exclaimed. "We have
to tell Henry"

Millie snorted. "Yeah, right, so he can tell us to go
jump in a lake?"

Trish sighed and twisted her neck from side to side
to ease the sudden tension. "So far, we can't prove
anything. Millie's right, Edna. We need to find out what Clarissa knows. And, more importantly, we need to find
a way to get that one earring and the list back into Tom's
home."

Millie jerked upright. "Wait a minute. I never said
anything about going back to Tom's."

Trish turned her head to look at her. "Sorry, we don't
have a choice. We got that evidence illegally. It will be
worthless unless the police find it themselves."

"You're right," Millie agreed soberly. "But this time
I'm wearing a haz-mat suit."

Trish laughed. "Get one for me too. Have you ever
seen such a mess as Tom's house?"

Millie grimaced. "Never-I'll be surprised if we don't
come down with some awful disease. By the way, how
are you going to explain all this to Joe, Edna?"

"I don't want to talk about it," Edna said primly, and
then put the car in gear. "And, Millie, you'd better keep
your trap shut until I do" Millie grinned wickedly, but
thankfully kept her trap shut!

The next morning dawned bright and clear, with a
soft, warm breeze fluttering the air. It was unimaginable
that she and her friends were investigating a cruel act of
murder on such a beautiful day, Trish thought, vowing to
never again take for granted the simple beauty the world
had to offer, or a selfless act of kindness from a fellow
human being. There was pure evil walking about, and all
that separated it from good was one instance, one wrong
decision made lightly without any regard to the people
hurt and the lives forever changed.

Trish set her lips in a tight line. Maybe today they
could help right that wrong, and hopefully set a good
man free so he could begin to pick up the pieces of his life and once again be able to appreciate the sweet goodness in his world. It would take time-Sam had been
through too much-but she had no doubt he would recover, if he was given the chance, that is.

What they were doing today was probably the stupidest thing they had done so far in trying to help Sam.
Clarissa Jones' part in all of this was an unknown factor.
She could be nothing more than a jealous lover betrayed,
or she could very well be a partner-in-crime. She could
also be very dangerous. Either way, the women knew she
had information that could clear Sam.

Trish found herself second-guessing their decision
not to tell anybody where they were going this morning. It had seemed perfectly logical when they were
laying out their plan that their mission should remain
secret. Part of it was because it would be too hard to explain how they had garnered the information they had
so far without someone blowing a gasket, and another
part was, regrettably, pure pride. Having uncovered so
much on their own, they wanted to see this through to
the end, to solve the crime and tell Sam the nightmare
was over. And, as Millie had stated emphatically, it
would be nice to rub Henry's nose in it too.