Murder is the Pits by Mary Clay Page B

that a lot when I meditate. Anyway, I
had to thank you for letting me hang out with y’all last night. You
saved my life.”
    “No problem. We enjoyed your company,”
replied Ruthie, a.k.a. Ms. Manners.
    “How did it go with Officer Brooks?” I
asked.
    “You mean Heather?” Guthrie patted his
temple with his forefinger. “That’s a sharp lady. Her head is
screwed on really tight.”
    I bit my lip. It was all I could do to keep
from saying, “And yours is a little loose.”
    “Did she give you any trouble about your
Glock?” Penny Sue wanted to know.
    “Naw. She’d already run the serial number
and knew it was registered to me. Besides, Florida has some of the
most liberal gun laws, outside of the West. I think everyone
carries a gun out West. They shoot each other all the time. Did you
ever see that show, Deadwood ? Man, those cowboys go at it.
Do you think George Bush packed a gun? I’ll bet he had one in his
desk at the Oval Office. Say the wrong thing, and he could pop you,
like they do in Deadwood . The Secret Service would probably
cover it up. Did you see the episode—”
    Timothy stroked Guthrie’s good leg.
    Guthrie eyed Timothy and smiled meekly. “I’m
babbling, huh?”
    Timothy winked.
    Guthrie sat up straight. “I’ll be quiet,
because Timothy has something to say.” Guthrie twisted his fingers
in front of his mouth like he was turning a key.
    No question in my mind, he’d had another
pink pill.
    Noticeably embarrassed by Guthrie’s antics,
Timothy stared at the ceiling. “After the police left, I took a
look at Guthrie’s hurricane shutters. I agree that they were
sabotaged. A highly reactive solvent of some kind. My specialty is
fuels, and I’ve worked for NASA so long, I’ve forgotten a lot of
basic chemistry. I’ll have to do a little research, but I promise
to look into it. Someone definitely wanted Guthrie’s windows to
blow out.”
    “It’s not only Guthrie’s windows,” I added
quickly. “The water pipe beneath Mrs. King’s condo was sabotaged,
too. They both have the telltale rust.”
    “Whew, that makes me feel better. I thought
someone was out to get me. I can understand that someone might want
to nail my Aunt Harriet, who owns the condo. She has, like, a
personality problem. Crab-b-by doesn’t begin to describe her.
That’s why I moved over here. I couldn’t stand her yelling anymore.
I lived next door to Harriet in my mother’s house. Mom passed a
while back—heart attack. Everything was fine for a while, and then
Harriet went berserk. I don’t know how Uncle Daniel takes it.
Anyway, I rented out Mom’s house and pay them rent on this place.
Works out good. Daniel uses the rent money to hire a nurse, so he
can get away to play bingo and cards. I’m telling ya, the man would
be crazy, too, if he didn’t get away from that old witch.”
    I waited for Guthrie to take a breath, but
he kept going.
    “She wasn’t always like this, so it’s sort
of a love-hate thing. Uncle Daniel wants to hold onto this condo
until Harriet croaks. He figures these places will be worth a
fortune. Then, he can sell and get enough money to go into one of
those elderly homes where all the nurses are young and have big
tits.”
    Timothy patted Guthrie’s knee.
    Guthrie shrugged. “Too much
information?”
    Timothy nodded.
    If I were a writer, this was one pair that
would make a terrific novel. Guthrie was like a big, floppy puppy,
the kind that gets into everything, rolls in dirt, and likes to
give people sloppy, wet kisses. Timothy was flawless—straight out
of GQ in looks and demeanor. What they saw in each other was
beyond me.
    Yet who was I to question relationships? I
had my own inexplicable marriage to Zack. In retrospect, our
relationship was dumb. Back then, young women graduated from
college and got married. Besides, a lawyer was a good catch or so
everyone said. Seemingly perfect at first, our marriage went
downhill fast, which I attributed to the ambitious lawyer