If Catfish Had Nine Lives (Country Cooking School Mystery) Read online

  “Yes.” Esther nodded. “It boomed, but from somewhere that didn’t seem like the same spot where the bad guy was standing. Like behind us or something,” Esther said.

  “It startled us all,” Gram added. “And then we all were uncertain and confused as to what was going on, or what we thought might be going on.” Gram shook her head. “Then we saw the fella on the ground. It was bad.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I said.

  The door to Stuart’s shop flew open, causing the bell above it to ring at the same time as it slammed into the wall. We all jumped and turned.

  “Everyone here all right?” Officer Jenkins said. He was wearing jeans and a T-shirt. He normally worked the night shift at the jail. He’d probably been roused when the murder had occurred and hadn’t had time to put on either his uniform or the more casual cowboy gear.

  “We’re all right,” Gram said after she looked at each of us for a confirming nod or blink.

  “Good. I’d like for you to all come with me. We’re gathering as many people as possible at the jail so we can take statements and get contact information in a timely manner.”

  “I was just here in my shop, Officer,” Stuart said. “I didn’t see or hear anything. May I just stay here? I won’t leave until you okay it.”

  Officer Jenkins wasn’t from Broken Rope. He also wasn’t as conditioned as Jim, or even Cliff, who was fairly new to the force, at keeping a neutral facade. Concern and suspicion pinched at his eyes as he glanced outside.

  “No, sir, we’d like to talk to everyone there,” he said.

  I interpreted that this was code for “We don’t know if everyone is safe from danger yet and we’d like everyone where we can see them.” A glance at Gram told me I wasn’t the only one reading in between the lines.

  “Come on, we’ll be nice and cozy in there, but I imagine they won’t keep us long—will you, Jenkins?” Gram said.

  “No, ma’am, we’ll have you out of there as quickly as possible.”

  “Let’s go,” Gram said.

  As we exited the shoe repair shop, I saw Jerome standing beside the entrance to the Jasper Theater, which was the spot where I’d originally noticed him on his first visit to Broken Rope. The theater was only two doors down from Stuart’s, but I thought that Gram might have been in too much of a hurry to get everyone to the jail to notice that he’d returned. If she saw or smelled him, she didn’t give any indication. I lagged behind the group and then hurried to him.

  I didn’t hesitate to reach for his arm, and then his hand, and then his shoulder. My own hand went through him every time. There was nothing solid under my touch.

  Jerome watched my movements, but didn’t comment. When I finished he said, “I think you’re fine for now, Isabelle. I can’t go into the jail, but I’ll be close by.”

  “Why could you help me with the fish in the woods, Jerome? Why could I feel you? It wasn’t dark.”

  “I don’t know, darlin’,” Jerome said as he moved his hand gently toward my face, but he pulled it back before it got even halfway. “I don’t have any idea.”

  I put my hands on my hips and looked around. I didn’t know how the jail was going to hold everyone who’d been in town, but the boardwalk was emptying quickly.

  “What about everyone else? I’d like to know that everyone is okay,” I said.

  Jerome sighed. “Can’t help you there, Isabelle. I wish I could.”

  I wished he could, too.

  “We’ll talk more later?” I said.

  “I think so.” Jerome smiled. “I haven’t left yet.”

  Actually, he’d left me a few times now, but he had come back, so I didn’t point out that nitpicky and self-involved detail. For now, at least.

  I tried to “feel” him one more time, but my hand went right through his shoulder again. I didn’t want to leave him. I wanted to talk to him more, find out more, but I wasn’t even sure what my exact questions were.

  “I’ll see you later,” I said before I hurried to the jail.

  Chapter 4

  “I wasn’t in town,” I said. “I was back there, fishing.” I pointed toward the back wall of the jail. I wished I was still there, beyond the wall and the crowd, with the fake worm in the water or hunting down the evil catfish. “I heard a gunshot, but I couldn’t tell you if it was from a popgun or from something real.”

  “Catch anything?” Cliff asked.

  “Yep. It was huge, but it freed itself, gave me the evil eye, and took off,” I said with a sad smile.

  “The one that got away, huh?”

  There was no good reason for the two of us to have stepped back from the crowd for a moment just so we could both make sure the other one was okay. Cliff had a job to do, and taking time away from that job wasn’t fair, but we’d done it anyway. He’d told me he was glad to see me, because he hadn’t been able to find me in the crowd after the shooting.

  “Do you think we were all in danger or just Norman?”

  Cliff shrugged. “We don’t know, Betts. This is bigger than anything we’ve ever dealt with. I won’t say that Jim and the rest of us are in over our heads, but we simply don’t have the manpower to effectively deal with something like this—someone shot out in the open who was in the middle of a larger crowd. We’re doing the best we can, and we’ve called in some help.”

  “Do you know where the shot came from?” I asked.

  Cliff nodded. “Yes, we think so, but we can’t find any solid evidence; we’re basing our knowledge on measurement and distance guesses, and Jim’s the only one who has had any training with that stuff. Someone more experienced from St. Louis will be here soon to evaluate what we’ve come up with so far.”

  I bit my lip. Were we dealing with someone on the loose who was going around killing randomly, perhaps just building a list of victims, or had someone wanted Norman dead? How in the world could the police begin to figure that out with only measurements and distances?

  As if reading my mind, Cliff said, “Betts, there are ways to investigate this. I don’t want you to think we’re standing around wondering what to do next. We do have some ideas.”

  “I know,” I said, even though I hadn’t until he’d said so.

  For a long moment, Cliff held my eyes with his. Though we were in a corner of the room, there was no real privacy. There were people everywhere. I’d been nudged by the elbows of passersby as we’d attempted the somewhat discreet conversation. And he was a police officer. Even though he was one who’d taken the casual-wear idea seriously, everyone still knew he was an officer. We had to keep it professional. A comforting hug would have been weird.

  Cliff squinted. “I’ll call you later, but it will probably be much later.”

  “I expected as much.”

  He put his hand on my arm, smiled, and then turned to get back to work. I watched him melt into the crowd.

  “Betts! Hi! Is this crazier than a three-horned toad?”

  Cliff’s cousin Jezzie squeezed her shoulders through a small crowd on my other side.

  “Jezzie, you okay?” I said.

  She was still dressed in the period costume she wore for the skit—a yellow dress with a starched white apron. Her long blond hair was pulled back into a low bun and her pleasant face was free of any makeup. I didn’t think she ever wore any, which was only one of the things she and I had in common. We’d also both tried law school and both found that it wasn’t for us, and we both adored Cliff, though her adoration was strictly cousinly. Just the day before, she told me that Cliff was her favorite relative and that she was grateful he’d found his way back to me and to Broken Rope. I told her I was, too.

  “I’m fine, sweetie, just shaken up. The whole thing was so shocking. The skit happened, and then when Norman was supposed to be shot, he really was. Golly, I’ve never seen anything quite like it.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “No need for you to be sorry at all. Unless you were the one to pull the trigger, I suppose.” Jezzie laughed and t
hen put her hand to her mouth. “Good gravy, Betts, why in the world would I laugh about anything at all right now?”

  “Stress, Jezzie. It happens. Don’t be hard on yourself for that.”

  “I’ll try not to be.” She sighed. “He was a nice fella.”

  “Did you get to know him?”

  “Only a little. We did the skit together, but I also saw him over at the campsite last night. I was going to talk to him, but he was busy with the ladies, if you know what I mean. Oh! And he was hanging out with Teddy, too.”

  “My Teddy?” I said, meaning my brother, Teddy.

  “Yes, that one,” she said.

  “I haven’t seen him today. Have you?”

  “No.”

  There was no reason to be concerned about Teddy just because neither Jezzie nor I had seen him today, but the circumstances did make me wonder about his time at the campsite with the murder victim.

  “What was he doing last night?”

  “I’m not sure. I saw him with Norman, but I also saw both of them flirting with the girls.”

  “Teddy and the girls,” I mumbled. Teddy’s ways with girls had frequently caused issues, both when he was paying attention to them and when he was ignoring them.

  “Yeah, he’s adorable,” Jezzie said. There was no added weight to her words, as if she wanted me to fix the two of them up—which was something I frequently dealt with. She was only stating a fact.

  I nodded.

  “Oh my, and the girls were so darn pretty,” Jezzie said. “One had the reddest hair I’d ever seen, and the other looked like a young Elizabeth Taylor.”

  Her description fit the two women I’d met at Stuart’s. I craned my neck to look for them so I could point them out to Jezzie, but I couldn’t find them anywhere.

  “Were they all together? I mean, were the girls together?” I thought back to the two women. Esther had said that she and Vivienne met only the night before. I hadn’t sensed any sort of bond between them, but I wondered about the logistics of them both potentially vying for the attention of the same guys.

  Jezzie seemed to be thinking about her answer, but I didn’t learn anything further from her, because Jim called her over to a spot next to one of the holding cells. Apparently, it was her turn to answer some questions. Once again, I was left to my own thoughts amid the bumps and excuse mes of the crowd. I pulled my phone out and called and texted Teddy, but didn’t make immediate contact either way. He’d call or text back when he got the messages. It wasn’t unusual not to reach him on the first ten or so tries.

  The area that contained the jail—the holding cells and office space for the police officers—wasn’t big, and it was currently so crowded that it wasn’t easy to spot anyone specific. I looked for Gram, for the two women—Esther and Vivienne—for Teddy, for Jake, and then for Cliff again. In due time, Jim called me over, but we didn’t talk for long when he found out I’d been fishing at the time of the murder. As Jim questioned me, my attention went to someone sitting inside one of the holding cells. The doors to the two cells were open, and a few people had gathered in each space; some were sitting on the cots, and some were just standing.

  I’d gotten to know Cody, aka the bad guy from the skit, as well as I’d gotten to know Norman. I’d made friendly acquaintance with them both, just easy small talk as I observed a few rehearsals and offered my little bit of input.

  Cody sat on one end of the cot in the closest cell. He was slumped, as he was also leaning back against the wall. His face was pale and drawn and he seemed to not be in the moment.

  “Jim, have you talked to Cody yet?” I pointed.

  “Oh, yeah, poor guy. He’s pretty shook up.”

  “But there’s no evidence that he killed Norman, right?”

  “Not at all. All indications are that he had absolutely nothing to do with it.”

  “He doesn’t look well. Has he seen Dr. Callahan?”

  “No, but you’re right, he doesn’t look well. I’ll have an officer take him over to the doc.”

  “You’re short-staffed as it is. I’ll take him,” I offered.

  Jim looked around at the crowd and grimaced a moment. “All right. That would help, Betts. I appreciate it. We are certain we’ve secured the area around downtown, but stay alert.”

  I threaded my way through the crowd and into the holding cell. I lightly touched Cody’s shoulder. He blinked and jumped before his eyes focused on me.

  “Hi,” he said uncertainly.

  “I’m Betts,” I said.

  “I know.”

  “Come with me, Cody.”

  He didn’t question my request, but lifted himself off the cot as I held on to his elbow and led him out of the jail.

  “Phew,” he exclaimed when we were outside. “That place was hot and crowded.”

  Though he sounded relieved, he didn’t look much better.

  “You look a little pale,” I said.

  “Yeah, I needed to get out of there. When can I just go home?”

  “Soon,” I said. “But for now, let’s get some air.”

  I’d changed my mind. Cody didn’t need a doctor; he just needed some elbow room.

  “Sounds good to me.” He looked up and down the boardwalk as if he wasn’t sure which way to go.

  “This way,” I said as I turned toward the Jasper Theater.

  Cody was still in costume. He wore jeans and a black Western shirt. Our normal summer costumes didn’t usually include jeans, but Jake had kept to a budget by asking the male cast members to bring their own denim. Cody was young, maybe barely twenty, which had originally given me doubts about his ability to play a husband whose wife had cheated on him, but he proved to be one of the best actors at the convention—one of the best I’d ever seen in Broken Rope, actually. His dark eyes belonged on someone much older and, frankly, much wiser. When he wasn’t reciting lines, the word I thought best described him was goofy.

  “Oh, man, Betts, I just want to get out of here. This was fun and all until Norman got killed. Now, well, now, it’s just bad.”

  “I understand,” I said as we sauntered, the wooden boardwalk creaking every now and then with our footfalls. “But I think the police want to make sure they know who all is here first. Check up on everybody.”

  I heard him gulp before he stopped walking. “Check up on us? What do you mean?”

  “Questions and stuff.” I kept it simple.

  “Damn.”

  “Why are you concerned?”

  Cody looked around. Up and down the boardwalk again. He was a good-looking kid, and even for someone who was goofy, he had an intensity about him that I suspected had made his high school years very social.

  “I have a record,” he said quietly.

  Or maybe those high school years weren’t social as much as they were just spent in juvie.

  “Uh-oh, what’d you do?”

  Cody put his hands in his pocket and sighed. “You won’t tell, will you?”

  “Of course not,” I lied.

  “I borrowed a car. The owner said I stole it, but he lent it to me, I swear. I’d just turned eighteen, so it’ll show on my record.”

  “Oh. Who was the owner?”

  “Just a guy I went to school with. A big group of us were out having a good time, and a girl needed to go home, so I asked if I could borrow the guy’s car and get her home. He said I could, but then he called the police. The girl wouldn’t even back me up.”

  I knew that wasn’t the whole story, but I said, “I think you can explain that to the police, Cody. They’ll understand.” I didn’t know if they would or wouldn’t, but I doubted they’d care too much.

  “Oh, good. That’s a relief.”

  And, just like that, Cody seemed to feel better about everything. The color had even returned to his face.

  “Hey,” he said, “got any money?”

  “Uh. Why?”

  “You think that cookie shop is open? I’d love a cookie. I’d pay you back,” he said with his actor
’s voice, and his actor’s stance and stare, too.

  I laughed at the almost perfect James Dean love-me eyes. I hadn’t been around someone like Cody in a long time.

  “I doubt they’re open, but we’ll see if Mabel, the owner, is in. I bet I could round up a couple cookies.”

  “And milk?”

  “What good’s a cookie without a little milk?” I said.

  “Exactly.”

  So, instead of a doctor’s appointment, I took Cody to Broken Crumbs and got some cookies for us both. I tried to learn more about what he’d observed with the goings-on at the convention, but instead I ended up learning more about Cody—his favorite music, television shows, movies, etc.

  I convinced him that he shouldn’t try to leave town, but it took three cookies to do it. I doubted he had it in him to kill someone, but he needed to stick around for another possible round of questioning. When we were done and as I watched him walk away down the boardwalk, I thought there was a small chance that he wouldn’t listen to me, but only a small one. He was such a good actor that the thought also crossed my mind that one cookie might have done the trick, but he just wanted to see how many he could bilk. I had to give him credit.

  Chapter 5

  Even for April, downtown Broken Rope was way too quiet. There were no tumbleweeds in the area, but I could picture one rolling down the empty unpaved road and stirring up the dry earth.

  “Excuse me,” someone said from behind me.

  “Yes?” I said as I turned. It was the redhead, Esther. “Hi again.”

  “Hi.” Esther smiled. “Thanks for what you did back at the shoe repair place. You and your grandmother were great.”

  “Our pleasure. Is your friend okay?”

  “Vivienne is fine. We’re not really friends . . . oh, no matter. Yes, she’s fine.”

  I had a few more questions for Esther, but it didn’t seem like the right moment to add on to the police’s interrogation, and without a little more information I wasn’t sure how to approach the subject of whatever had happened between her, Vivienne, Teddy, and Norman. I’d have to ease into that conversation, considering that her personal life was truly none of my business.