A Whisker In The Dark

Seth appeared visibly upset that Millie was cross with him. His sad gaze flicked to the cookies. His voice softened. “Now, Millie, you know I need to follow all the rules. I just want to question her.”

“Question who?” Flora appeared in the doorway that led up the back stairs with a mop in her hand.

“I was just looking for you, Flora,” Seth said.

“Oh really? What for Sheriff?” She looked around, noticing the grim looks on our faces. “What’s going on?”

“Someone was killed on the grounds last night,” Millie said.

Flora’s brows shot up, her eyes getting even bigger behind her round glasses. She looked genuinely surprised, not that I had suspected her for a minute. “Really? Again?”

“I’m afraid so. Whacked over the head.” Mom’s comment earned a look of reproach from both Millie and Seth.

“I didn’t see nothing.” Flora opened the closet to put the mop away.

“Where were you last night?” Seth asked.

Flora turned and scowled at him. “What do you mean? I was at home.”

“Are you sure you weren’t here… Maybe digging for treasure?”

Flora’s eyes flicked from Seth to Mom to Millie.

“Digging? I already told you I didn’t see anything, what does it matter where I was?” She thrust her scrawny left arm, bent it at the elbow to make a muscle, and pointed to it with her right hand. “Does this look like an arm that could hit someone over the head hard enough to kill them?”

Seth looked at Flora uneasily. “Well, it’s hard to say.”

Flora rolled her eyes. “I don’t have time for this.” She looked at Mike. “Surely you don’t think I killed someone, do you Mr. Mike?”

As if to show their support, the cats ran over to Flora. She bent down to pet them, her knees popping and creaking. They sniffed her shoes gingerly, then rubbed their faces against her old wrinkled hands.

“Of course not, Flora. They don’t have any concrete evidence against you, do you, Sheriff?” asked Mike.

Seth sighed. “No evidence. Just that someone saw her there.”

“And who might that be?” Flora demanded.

“I can’t really give out my sources,” Seth stammered.

“Oh, come on. We all heard her say it.” Millie turned to Flora. “It was Paula.”

“The lush?” Flora waved her hand in the air. “She’s not reliable. I’ve got things to clean. When you guys have something concrete then maybe you could come and arrest me, Seth. But don’t forget I used to change your diapers and I’ve got stories to tell.” Flora grabbed a roll of paper towels from under the sink and shuffled off upstairs.

I remembered Arlene’s comments about the cleaning, so I called after her, “Could you double back into Earl and Arlene’s room and make sure it’s extra clean?”

She whirled around and scowled at me. I figured she was going to say she doesn’t clean rooms, but instead she said, “What do you mean double back? Isn’t that the green room?”

“Yes.”

“Well, for your information, I haven’t cleaned that one yet. If I had, it would be clean. I can only do one or two rooms a day, so I haven’t gotten to the green room yet. But I will.” She turned and we heard the stairs creaking as she went up.

“There you have it, Seth. Are you satisfied? Flora didn’t do it. Now why don’t you go try to dig up a real suspect,” Millie said.

Seth stared at Millie with his sad eyes for a second, then he turned to Mike. “I’m ready to take your statement.” As he and Mike started out of the room, Seth glanced over his shoulder at us. “Don’t run off. I’ll take all your statements but Mike’s first. I’m sure he has to get back to work.”

“Yes, I’m sure he does have to get back to work. He doesn’t need to hang around here and help us,” I said.

“Nope we can help ourselves,” Millie added, then under her breath. “And find the real killer even if the cops can’t.”

Mike shook his head and followed Seth out of the room.

Millie watched them leave then she opened the box of cookies and put them in front of us. We all took one. Snickerdoodles. “I had just baked these at home when I heard the police call on my scanner app. Lucky thing I thought to bring them. We might need them for sustenance. We need to get on top of this investigation before Flora gets into trouble.” She glanced at the doorway. “Those men think they know everything. We’ll show them.”

I bit into my cookie. “Yeah, we’re good at investigating. Do you think it has something to do with the treasure? Maybe Bob really did find it and someone killed him to take it away.” Had there been a treasure buried in this yard the whole time I’d been struggling to pay bills?

Millie scowled. “That’s just a stupid rumor. There was no hole or signs of digging near Bob and, besides, the odds of treasure being here are pretty much nil.”

“Then why were you guys out here digging last night?” I asked.

Mom and Millie laughed. “What else are we going to do? Besides, half the town was here, and it was fun seeing them all. People get up to shenanigans at night and we wanted to spy and eavesdrop.” She looked at my mom, a mischievous glint in her eyes. “Did you see Myron and Stella Dumont?”