Mint Julep Murder (18 page)

Annie resisted the impulse to shred the essay right there in the lobby and stuff the pieces into the nearest ash receptacle. She satisfied the temptation by muttering, “But you don’t sell in my store, buddy!”

She shoved Jimmy Jay’s essay to the bottom of her pile. And picked up the essay by Alan Blake.

Eight phone calls later, Max decided Melissa Sinclair was a woman of parts. Many, many parts. Every time he thought he had a good lead on her past, he ran into another brick wall. Hmm. Okay, he’d try something different after lunch.

He was smiling as he stepped out into the hall. In just a few minutes, he’d see Annie, and that always made his day—any day—better in every way. Dear Annie. His stubborn, determined, serious wife. With the steady gray eyes
and vivid smile. And absolutely impulsive nature. He shook his head. If she hadn’t ducked into the Hazlitt suite yesterday … But she had. And somehow he had to extricate her from the resulting chaos, though the idea that Annie would poison anyone was ludicrous. Maybe Frank Saulter could talk to Detective Wheeler.

Max punched the button to the elevator.

A door at the end of the hall burst open, and two little girls in swimsuits, carrying beach towels, raced past him at a gallop.

“Last one down’s a butthead!” the redhead screamed.

Her companion didn’t say a word, but lowered her head and picked up speed.

They collided at the door to the stairs, struggled with the door, pushed and shoved at each other as they wormed through.

The door was closing behind them when they began to scream.

The elevator door opened, but Max was already down the hall and yanking open the door to the stairs.

The little girls spilled past him. “A body’s down there!” the little redhead sobbed, her eyes huge and scared.

The second girl nodded. “She’s just lying there. Not moving. I think she’s dead.”

Annie studied Alan Blake’s picture. He wore tennis whites and stared quizzically into the camera. Annie noted how clean he looked. No sweat-dampened rings on this idol’s tennis outfit. So how casual was this photo? But that wasn’t fair, was it? Maybe not, but it made her feel better.

Her eyes dropped to the essay.

“Annie.” Winsome, beguiling, soulful.

“Annie.” Crisp, straightforward, incisive.

“Annie.” Clipped, imperious, regal.

Laurel radiated Simplicity in a simple white cotton blouse and powder-blue linen skirt. Her only jewelry was a pair of tiny gold dolphin earrings. She looked like a movie star version of Mother Teresa. She smiled beatifically, her hands folded together, her golden hair cupping her face with a halo effect. Annie wondered if at some appropriate moment she might suggest that the Mother Teresas of the world do not wear shell-pink fingernail polish. Nor do they carry self-advertising placards (
CATCH A WAVE—
From
Simplicity
by Laurel Darling Roethke. Page 22.)

Henny Brawley was the epitome of the well-dressed festival-goer in a pink knit cotton blouse and pastel plaid cotton skirt. Despite her casual attire, she had the confident air of an empire builder. However, Henny had obviously decided that Simplicity, either lowercase or capital, was not for her. She gave Annie an ebullient smile and held up a pink poster with twenty-four-point type in boldface:

Miss Dora—Annie blinked. Surely that wasn’t—It was. Miss Dora wore one of her usual dresses, long, black, distinctly funereal. Annie had often wondered if the old curmudgeon’s attic held an inexhaustible supply of trunks replete with antebellum furnishings. But, instead of her customary head covering, Miss Dora’s shaggy silver locks were topped by a tall chef’s hat. Not, perhaps, that remarkable. Except this chef’s hat was as black as ebony.

Miss Dora didn’t have a placard or a poster. Instead,
she held out toward Annie a tray—of course it was silver—with tiny crisp taco shells filled with—

Annie looked at the spidery handwriting on the card affixed to the tray:

Annie gripped Alan Blake’s essay. She would not succumb and reach for one of those delec—one of those damn salad shells. Even though she was starving. Of course, she was trying to solve a murder. Not, apparently, the main preoccupation of the Three Musketeers.

Perhaps Annie’s face betrayed her thoughts.

“Hewing to the course,” Miss Dora said firmly.

“Perfect for undercover activities,” Henny announced.

“Our every thought has been with
you
, dear child.” Laurel’s husky assurance throbbed with sincerity.

“You saw our poster.” Henny beamed with pride.

“Yes.” Annie reached out, took one of the miniature shells. After all, it wouldn’t help matters if she were faint from hunger. Hmm. Papaya
and
avocado trimmings!

Miss Dora’s reptilian expression softened. Annie wouldn’t have cared to wager whether it was from pleasure in the consumption of the salad shell or fondness for Annie.

Henny nudged the poster with a pink-and-green-striped, ribbed-cotton sneaker. “An exhaustive survey. Rather proud of it. We did keep crossing paths with the local constabulary.”

Annie wanted to point out this wasn’t an Eve Gill adventure, but Henny continued swiftly, “The deputies seem to agree with our conclusion, which definitely restricts the circle of possible perps.”

“Qué será, será,”
Laurel offered. The smile was now not so much beatific as philosophical.

Perhaps it was admirable to be philosophic about the
prospect of one’s daughter-in-law being considered a prime suspect in a capital murder case.

Annie didn’t feel the least bit philosophical.

“The authorities are working quite hard.” Miss Dora’s rusty voice was admiring.

“To put me in jail?” Annie demanded.

“Annie!”

“Annie!”

“Annie!”

She glared at each in turn. “Well, what else are they doing?”

Three voices—one throaty, one distinct, one raspy—spoke at once, then there was a pause.

It was a test of the
tres amigos.

Annie waited with interest.

Who would prevail?

“Alphabetical,” Henny suggested.

Raisin-dark eyes met Nordic-blue eyes met brown eyes.

Miss Dora nodded complacently. “The authorities have interviewed every member of the hotel staff on duty yesterday. A painter was working on the interior stairwells between the fourth and fifth floors. No guest walked up the stairs to the fifth floor.”

Annie shrugged. “Elevators.”

“Certainly, certainly,” Henny boomed. “But it’s reassuring to know the police are considering every possibility.”

It sounded to Annie like the police were busy drawing a thick black arrow that pointed straight to her.

“Karma,” Laurel murmured. “Annie, you simply exude darkness. We must lighten your load. Now, I had the great pleasure of talking with that lovely Captain Wheeler this morning. And he is quite actively looking at
everyone
residing on the fifth floor.”

“That’s nice,” Annie said agreeably. “At least he admits there are others who
are
residing on that floor.”

“Brown, brown, brown aura.” Laurel’s sigh was huskily regretful.

Annie could feel it growing browner by the instant.

But she made a heroic effort. “I do appreciate your hard work on my behalf. I wonder if—”

The wail of a siren shattered the tennis-club atmosphere of the lobby.

Paramedics hustled the gurney past the front desk then wheeled to the left, following a grim-faced Jeff Garrett. The hotel assistant manager’s carroty hair spiked in every direction. A bellman waited at the open door of a freight elevator.

As the door slid shut, Annie gave her companions a startled look.

They looked back at her, equally worried.

“I’d better see.” Annie popped to her feet.

The young woman behind the desk was trying to field a dozen questions from hotel guests.

Annie listened intently, then rejoined the waiting trio.

“A maid’s hurt. She’s unconscious. They think she fell down some stairs. But nobody knows exactly.” Annie and her companions watched the floor indicator. It stopped at IV.

Annie realized they were watching the same action that must have unfolded yesterday. Except yesterday, the elevator stopped at V. And yesterday was murder.

Miss Dora cleared her throat. “In the midst of life …”

There was a respectful silence.

Annie broke it. Whatever the emergency on the fourth floor, it had no connection to the demise of Kenneth Hazlitt, and she had her own emergency to deal with—avoiding a murder charge. She was confident that given time, she’d be able to come up with the right answer. No one matched her expertise in mysteries.

Oh, all right, Henny Brawley. Henny, however, had other interests at the moment.

But there were still so many questions….

“Look.” She gestured for her Dauntless Trio to come closer. Although she felt positive—okay, if not positive, at least confident—that the key to Kenneth Hazlitt’s murder would be found in the lives of the Famous Five, she wasn’t quite willing to dismiss Hercule Poirot’s dictum that in the victim’s life could be found the reason for his death. So—“Here’s what I want you to do …”

They listened with flattering intensity.

Annie really felt good about their devotion to her cause.

She gazed after them fondly as they walked away.

Their voices carried with great clarity.

Crisp, straightforward, incisive: “We’ll fan out. We can cover all the booths that way.”

Winsome, beguiling, soulful: “And, of course, it’s always such an advantage in life—for us, for dear Annie—to make connections.”

Clipped, imperious, regal: “Before dispersing, I suggest we start as a unit with Peachtree Press. Certainly in the course of our visit there, I’m sure we will have an opportunity—”

The front doors closed behind them.

“What’s wrong, Max?”

“I’m sorry I’m late. An accident upstairs. A maid fell down the fifth-floor stairs.”

The door to the freight elevator opened, and the gurney was wheeled out into the lobby. It was occupied.

Annie glimpsed pale, slack features.

The front doors were opened wide, and the gurney was hustled outside. The assistant manager followed. His freckles were the only color in his pale face.

As Annie and Max settled at a table in the dining room, Max described his find. “She’s unconscious. Of course, there’s no telling how long she’d been lying there.”

A sudden sharp wail marked the ambulance’s departure.

“I heard the ambulance come.” Annie looked toward the street. “It must have been almost the same thing yesterday. Just a different floor. Miss Dora always has the bon mot. As the paramedics hurried by, she muttered, ‘In the midst of life

“So how are our intrepid sleuths? Still banded together?”

“Sleuths? Fat chance. Max, they’re out there shopping their manuscripts! I mean, talk about first things first.” She shook her head indignantly.

Max grinned.

Despite her sense of being an also-ran, she couldn’t resist smiling in return. She loved Max’s sexy grin and the way her fingers wanted to smooth his hair and the spark she always saw in his deep blue eyes when he looked at her. Maybe this afternoon—

And he could read her mind. The sudden light in his eyes was unmistakable.

“Max, we have to work.”

“Mmmm. But—”

“And eat. I think I’ll order the pan-fried black-eyed pea cakes.” Talk about
mmmm.
She wondered if Miss Dora had this recipe. Okay, so it was piggy to order hors d’oeuvres at lunch. So—