Ed Lynskey - Isabel and Alma Trumbo 03 - The Ladybug Song Page 21

  “The address tag belonged to the suitcase’s previous owner. Sheriff Fox with Helen and Oscar’s encouragement traced it back and determined the previous owner was a distant cousin of Ladybug’s. Her cousin passed away and left her a nice pile of money. She probably brought the three mango yellow suitcases back when she returned from Cleveland after squaring away the legal affairs of her inheritance. She kept it as a big secret from the rest of us.”

  Sammi Jo smiled at Phyllis. “You should recheck our family tree for any distant cousins who owned an oil well or gold mine,” said Sammi Jo.

  “You never know about the eccentric Garners,” said Phyllis. “Meanwhile what happens to Ladybug’s millions?”

  “Dwight and Helen are checking into her estate,” replied Isabel. “So far, they haven’t tracked down Ladybug’s will and testament, but they haven’t given up looking.”

  “Why did she go to such bizarre lengths to protect her money?” asked Alma.

  Again, Sammi Jo addressed Phyllis. “Did Ladybug ever mention to you that Curt was a compulsive gambler?”

  “I don’t recall it ever coming up in our conversations,” replied Phyllis, shaking her head. “How bad did the gambling bug bite Curt?”

  “Very bad, it appears,” replied Sammi Jo. “He ran up tremendous debts, and I’m not talking about with his credit card limits either. He owed money to the unsavory characters we only want to watch in the movies or read about in crime novels.”

  “Shylocks,” said Isabel with an unpleasant grimace. “Of course I should have picked up on that. The grim detail explains a lot about Curt’s motives.”

  “Who are the shylocks?” asked Phyllis.

  “They are the bad apples among the hard-money lenders better known as loan sharks,” said Isabel.

  Ossie gave a low whistle of amazement between his teeth. “Those cutthroats mean business. Trust me. I know.”

  “Yes, and those cutthroats pressuring Curt account for why he was so desperate to get Ladybug’s money,” said Isabel “It was becoming a matter of life and death for him to pay them off.”

  “That’s also the way I put it together,” said Sammi Jo. “I went into Google News and browsed across a small item run in the crime blotter of the Chicago Sun-Times. The Vice cops arrested one Curt Miles during their raid on a gambling house for playing dice. Most of the gambling arrests the police make in Chicago are for the illegal dice games. Anyway, his given residential street address corresponds to Ladybug’s old residence.”

  “The loan sharks charge extravagant interest rates,” said Ossie. “Curt’s nonpayment only increased what he owed them. He’d gotten in over his head and was down to making his last ditch moves.”

  Alma summarized the probable version of Curt’s last days alive while in Quiet Anchorage. “In disguise, he must have tailed Ladybug closely enough to know she’d taken her money from the banks. She had discovered or strongly suspected he was operating in the area. Perhaps he threatened her, and she was frightened out of her mind to act as erratically as she did. At any rate, she outsmarted him and buried her money suitcases at the swimming hole, perhaps by moonlight, to escape detection.

  “After he plotted and then staged her murder as a drowning in the river, he couldn’t figure out where in the dickens she’d concealed her money after he didn’t find it in her townhouse. Remember Isabel’s theory of how somebody had broken into it, searched it, and left it looking too neat and orderly before leaving.”

  “The housecleaning maids didn’t tidy up Ladybug’s townhouse,” said Sammi Jo. “Curt did it.”

  “Ladybug also mentioned to me Curt was meticulous like Felix Unger was on The Odd Couple,” said Phyllis.

  “Unable to find Ladybug’s money tormented Curt like the cash-strapped Cartwright family trying to dig up Farmer Cartwright’s buried Ball Mason jars of money,” said Isabel.

  Alma continued. “Since Curt was unable to put his hands on her money and pry the loan sharks off his back, he saw no other way out, so he just gave up and dove headlong off the old highway bridge. Death was instant. He probably didn’t have the time to shout Geronimo like he did in San Francisco.”

  “Did he make the leap before we dug up the first money suitcase?” asked Isabel.

  “Most fortunate for our sakes, yes, I believe he did,” replied Alma.

  “How did Curt murder Ladybug?” asked Ossie.

  “That’s a real puzzler,” said Isabel. “My leading guess is he poisoned her with something easy to administer like cyanide. Getting close enough to her to do it undetected took some daring. She ate her lunches daily at Eddy’s Deli, so maybe he capitalized somehow on that personal habit.”

  “Did he slip her a lethal Mickey Finn?” asked Ossie.

  “If Curt was crafty enough, quite possibly he did,” replied Isabel.

  “Where did Curt stay while he plotted his murder and theft of Ladybug?” asked Ossie.

  “Deputy Bexley told me Curt rented a budget motel room in Warrenton,” replied Sammi Jo. “The deputies found his rental car hidden near the old highway bridge. In searching his motel room, they discovered a cheap disguise kit with a bald cap, black-framed Buddy Holly glasses, and fake buckteeth. He’d gained a few pounds, grown bushy sideburns, and dyed his sandy blonde hair jet black. There was also an extra arm sling left in his motel room.”

  “Was his arm broken?” asked Phyllis.

  Sammi Jo nodded. “He’d fractured his left arm. Draw your own dark conclusions.”

  “The loan sharks can be very persuasive if they have to be,” said Ossie.

  “Is there any word about Ladybug’s elusive garden shovel?” asked Phyllis.

  “Deputy Bexley also said they searched her townhouse again, and the garden shovel lay hidden under the sheets of pink fiberglass insulation,” replied Sammi Jo. “I took a peek in the attic, but I wasn’t thorough enough.”

  “Nobody wants to handle that itchy fiberglass insulation without gloves on,” said Alma.

  “Ladybug must have fibbed to me although I can’t say I blame her,” said Phyllis. “Maybe I should be angry with her, but I’m not. She was distraught because of her dreadful suspicion Curt’s leap off the Golden Gate Bridge was a phony. His real aim was to come after her and get her money he needed to make his gambling debts go away. His stunt in San Francisco never fooled the loan sharks.”

  “They kept close tabs on him, and they probably knew he’d show up here where Ladybug now lived,” said Alma.

  “If the loan sharks were in the area, they probably knew about Curt’s suicide before anybody else did,” said Ossie. “They couldn’t squeeze the money owed them out of a dead man, so they cut their losses and returned home.”

  Isabel nodded. “The news of our discovering the money suitcase never reached them.”

  “I never had any idea Ladybug was living under so much strife,” said Phyllis.

  “It’s easy to understand why she divorced Curt, legally separated their assets, and moved away from Chicago,” said Alma. “Even so, she knew she better keep track of what he was up to most likely by keeping in regular contact with their mutual friends.”

  “Ladybug was either too ashamed or embarrassed to ask anybody for advice or help,” said Isabel.

  “The best I can do for her now is to hold a proper funeral and bury her in our town cemetery,” said Phyllis.

  “I’m sure Reynolds and his guys from the drag race track will be happy to serve as the pallbearers if you like,” said Sammi Jo.

  “Corina at Azul Largos does lovely funeral flowers that will honor her memory and life,” said Isabel.

  “Do we forward our new information to Sheriff Fox?” asked Sammi Jo.

  Isabel’s questioning glance met Alma’s, and they couldn’t reach a consensus. Isabel switched her attention to Phyllis who felt as uncertain to offer any opinion. They looked at Ossie, the wise elder among them, for his take on their next course of action.

  “The two principals involved are no longer with us,”
he said. “I can’t see what purpose will be served by giving your information to Sheriff Fox. Let him do his own investigative work for a change. Ladybug’s autopsy will soon tell him she was poisoned, and he can tie it back to Curt Miles and why he did it without too much trouble.”

  “Slowpoke Sheriff Fox won’t make too much effort,” said Sammi Jo. “That is unless Judge Redfern and Oscar hold his feet to the fire.”

  “As Ladybug’s closest friend, I say we let the chips lie where they’ve fallen and consider the book closed on this case,” said Phyllis.

  “The Trumbo sisters wholeheartedly concur,” said Isabel.

  “Speaking for the Three Musketeers, I vote likewise,” said Ossie. “The ayes have it, and so the motion carries.”

  “It looks as if we are all done here,” said Sammi Jo.

  “Oh darn, I just remembered we ran out of doggie treats,” said Alma.

  “Petey Samson will make do until we go grocery shopping,” said Isabel.

  “I believe he’s well-earned getting his doggie treats before then,” said Alma. “After all, his keen bloodhound nose is what led us to the money suitcases.”

  “Then we’ll shop at the IGA but not before we do something else important,” said Isabel.

  “What else important comes before your precious Petey Samson?” asked Alma.

  “We sit at the table and play Scrabble using Ossie’s game board,” replied Isabel. “I can’t hold out any longer, or I’ll snap my cap.”

  “Hearing you say that puts me on cloud nine,” said Ossie, smiling.

  “I’ve got a dictionary to look up any word challenges,” said Sammi Jo.

  “Then tee it up,” said Alma. “I’m ready to play.”

  Sammi Jo turned off and moved the laptop from the kitchen table while the others took their seats. She removed the pitcher of iced tea from the refrigerator and opened the take-out box of bear claws Alma had brought with her. She grabbed the first one with Isabel a close second behind her.

  “Maybe the next time we can play Monopoly for a change,” said Phyllis.

  “Maybe,” said Isabel but in a decisive tone suggesting otherwise.

  Alma didn’t see any reason to bring up Isabel’s declaration she made at the start of the Ladybug Miles murder mystery to retire from the sleuth trade after solving her case. Alma didn’t need the 3X magnifying glass from Isabel’s pocketbook to see how she still took pleasure in every minute of her snooping adventures.

  The Trumbo sisters were back to their old lives of baking pies (they still hadn’t swapped their specialty pie recipes), solving crossword puzzles, and reading mysteries. Tomorrow Isabel would phone Louise to give her the case’s outcome. Alma also noted with pride how their friends the Three Musketeers, Helen Redfern, and Eustis Blake along with their pooch Petey Sampson had played instrumental roles in cracking the mystery. By working together, they’d just plugged in most of the large holes.

  In fact, to Alma’s way of thinking as she enjoyed chewing her bear claw, everything had returned to pretty much normal in drowsy Quiet Anchorage, Virginia. For now, anyway.

  The End

  Reference

  “Golden Gate Bridge Suicides Brochure.” Dr. Kim Norman, M.D., Professor of Psychiatry, Langley Porter Institute, University of California, San Francisco. 2007.