Progressive Dinner Deadly Read online

Chapter Four

  The next few minutes were complete pandemonium. There was shrieking, people bumping into each other, and several simultaneous calls to the police. Cullen looked like he’d been punched in the stomach. Sherry competently poured him a drink and pushed it into his hand, although Myrtle was fairly sure that Cullen didn’t need anything else to drink that night.

  “I think,” Miles’s voice rose through the cacophony, “that everyone needs to step outside. Probably all the way to the sidewalk, so the police can pull up in the driveway. We’re probably trampling on potential evidence.”

  Everyone poured out the door, some more eagerly than others. “I knew,” mused Myrtle aloud to Miles, “that supper club would mean disaster.”

  “It’s been nothing but disaster tonight,” agreed Miles. “And it’s too bad about Jill.”

  Myrtle nodded gloomily. “I know, it’s terrible. I liked her. Despite the rummaging around in the medicine cabinet thing.” She saw the lights of a police car approaching and felt suddenly very sad. “Such a shame.”

  Red’s car pulled into Jill and Cullen’s driveway and Red stepped out, still buttoning up parts of his uniform. He strode over to his mother. “It’s you—the professional body locator. Where is she?”

  “The kitchen,” she said.

  Red gave everyone instructions to stay back away from the house and grounds and walked in the front door, dialing on his cell phone as he went.

  “Probably calling in the state police,” said Myrtle. “They’ll need to have a forensic team here. And I suppose he’s going to have to question us.” She paused. “You know, Miles, we’re probably one of the last ones to see her alive. She was calling Cullen when she suddenly left to go home. Right after her big fight with Willow.”

  The police questioning wasn’t nearly as interesting as Myrtle had hoped. The state police let many people go home, and the statement she gave was fairly brief, as was everyone’s, probably. There hadn’t been much to report, after all—Jill had been at Miles’s house, talked to a few of the guests, waited for the restroom, made a phone call, fought with Willow, and gone home to check on the food. When the supper club had arrived at Jill’s house, she was already dead. Myrtle did notice that Red and his deputy were trying to get an idea where everyone was when the party was taking place.

  Myrtle remembered lots of coming and going during the party. Red and the state police were going to have their hands full.

  Miles waited for Myrtle to finish her statement before walking home with her. Red gave Miles an appreciative wave when he saw them set out. “I guess Red wanted you to deliver me safely back home?”

  “Well, there is a murderer running around, you know.”

  “I doubt they’d want to kill me, though. Not yet, anyway.”

  Miles gave her a hard look. “You’re not putting on your detective hat again, are you? Last time you almost got yourself killed.”

  “There are several very good reasons why I want to get involved, Miles. For one, I did like Jill and I’m sorry she’s dead. For another—it delights my very soul when I solve mysteries before Red does. Plus, of course, I’m a newspaper reporter. I’m just following the story.”

  “You really just write a helpful hints column, Myrtle. You aren’t a reporter covering a beat, you know.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong, Miles. Sloan has me writing extra news stories for the new Bradley Bugle blog. Which makes another excellent reason for my getting involved. Let’s just say that I am covering the story. What could you add to it? Did you see or hear anything unusual?”

  Miles nodded, slowly. “Well, there’s something unusual at my house right now, actually.”

  “What?”

  “Georgia. Passed out in the back bedroom.”

  “Miles! What will you do with her?”

  “I won’t have my wicked way with her, Myrtle, if that’s what you’re implying. I was planning on getting Red to help me heave her back home but that plan has changed now that Red’s evening is looking like a busy one.”

  “How long has she been back there?” Myrtle tried in vain to remember the last time she saw Georgia. She seemed to remember taking a picture of her at some point when she was acting particularly obnoxious at Miles’s house.

  “I was trying to figure that out,” said Miles, pushing his glasses up his nose. “I don’t think I remember seeing her after she’d upset Blanche at my house.”

  “I guess that takes her off the suspects list for Jill’s murder,” said Myrtle. “’She'd have been a prime candidate, too ... what with her Jill hatred and all.”

  Miles shook his head. “I don’t think it gives her an alibi at all. She could easily have stumbled out my back door and headed over to Jill’s house. Several people warned me tonight that Georgia can have a horrible temper when she’s drunk ... .they told me to keep my eye on her. So she could have gone over there to have it out with Jill, clobbered her on the head with the skillet, and then staggered back over to my house to fall asleep.”

  “Wouldn’t she be covered with blood?” asked Myrtle with a small shiver.

  “Not necessarily. There might have been a little spattering, but on the whole, probably not too much.”

  “Do you want me to try to help you with Georgia?” asked Myrtle. Could Georgia possibly make any sense at this part of the evening? Maybe it would be the best time to talk to her—if she started spilling secrets.

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” said Miles as they passed his house on the way to Myrtle’s. “You’d be off-balance with your cane and everything. Maybe Elaine could help me. Do you think she’s still up? You could stay in Red and Elaine’s house with Jack while Elaine is gone.” He added in a persuasive voice as Myrtle set her lip, “You won’t get any sense out of Georgia tonight. She was talking nonsense the first time I tried to wake her up. That’s when I decided just to let her sleep.”

  Myrtle shrugged. She sat in the house and watched out the window as Elaine and Miles helped a staggering Georgia back to her house.