My mouth watered as I looked at the butter softening on the kitchen table next to a bottle of maple syrup. But first things first.
“I was with Detective Martinez last night when you called him on his cell phone.’’ I added a spoonful of sugar and a splash of cream to my coffee. “What’s the story between you two?’’
“Why don’t you ask Martinez?’’
I noticed he didn’t try to deny that he’d called.
“Oh, yeah. Well he did mention that thing about before.’’ I was bluffing, trying to convince Sal I knew something—anything.
He measured pancake mix into a glass bowl. “Which thing?’’ he asked, watching the bowl and not me. “And what happened before?’’ He poured in some milk.
“You know,’’ I said lamely.
He replaced the milk carton in the refrigerator and shut the door. Turning around, he leaned against the sink, folded his arms and plopped them where his belly met his chest. “No, I don’t know, Mace. And, it’s obvious, neither do you.’’
I studied my coffee.
“I’ve told you before.’’ He patted his pompadour. Was it gel, or just naturally stiff? “Certain things I can’t say, no matter how much you might want me to.’’
“Want you to what, Sally?’’ Mama came into the kitchen, tying a silk scarf around her neck. It was the same shade of boysenberry as everything else, from her earrings to her heels.
“Don’t you think you’re a little over-dressed for the livestock auction, Mama?’’
I wanted to see what I could find out from Jeb Ennis’ ranching buddies at the weekly auction. I’d convinced Mama and Marty to join me. I didn’t even ask Maddie. As Martinez’s new best friend, she wouldn’t approve of me ignoring his warning about investigating.
Mama checked her reflection in the glass window of the microwave. “You can never be too well-dressed, Mace.’’ She aimed a pointed look at my own scuffed boots, frayed jeans, and T-shirt. “Besides, I have to go to work after our mission. The girls at Hair Today would fall off their chairs if I showed up in boots and jeans.’’
So, instead, she’d go to the livestock market looking like Queen Elizabeth on a royal visit. Go figure.
Mama lifted the head off a dog-in-a-gingham-baseball-cap cookie jar. Teensy started cutting circles around her legs, nails scrabbling on the tile floor. The dog jumped onto a chair, leaped into midair, and snatched the bone-shaped biscuit from her outstretched hand.
“Lookit Mama’s little baby! Just like in the circus,’’ she cooed. Still smiling at the dog, she lifted onto her tiptoes so Sal could stoop and give her a kiss. Better him than the dog, I guess.
“Your boyfriend and I were just discussing how he’s cooked up something secret with Detective Martinez.’’
“Oh, honey, Sally’s not my boyfriend.’’
Finally! Mama had come to her senses.
“He’s my fiancé,’’ she squealed, shoving her left hand under my nose. The sun coming through the gingham kitchen curtains glinted off the diamond weighing down her ring finger.
___
“Marty, help me out here. Mama can’t marry Sal. What do we really know about him?’’
The three of us were sitting in the air-conditioned interior of Marty’s Saturn in the parking lot at the livestock auction, planning our investigative strategy. Of course, the topic of Mama’s betrothal had been well-covered first:
How Sal had cooked her veal piccata (“I almost swallowed the ring, girls. He hid it in a lemon slice!”). How he’d gotten on one knee (“I had to help him up!”). And how he hoped to make her forget Husbands Two, Three, and Four (“He knows I could never forget your daddy!’’).
Now, my pleas to Marty were falling on uncharacteristically deaf ears.
“Mace, Mama’s a grown woman. Your suspicions aside, Sal has been nothing but loving to her. I’m sorry to say it, but you need to butt out.’’
Mama shot me a triumphant look. “Close your mouth, honey. No telling what might land in there with all this livestock around.’’
She was unswayable with Marty on her side. But I knew my argument would win once I got Maddie involved.
Navigating the rickety wooden stairway to the Himmarshee Livestock Market can be tricky, but Mama was managing—despite the purple footwear. Marty climbed ahead of her; I stayed close behind. That way, one of us could catch her if her heel hooked on a splintery plank.
The market, the largest in Florida, dated to the 1930s. And it looked it: a ramshackle wooden building, white with barn-red trim, perched on top of a sprawling maze of livestock pens. As we made our way up, calves bawled from below. The ammonia stink of urine filled the air. Whistles and shouts came from the “alley rats,’’ the workers who move cattle down the long, dark rows that branch off into holding pens.
Upstairs, cattle buyers were just beginning to make their way to seats that surround the sunken sales pit below. We opened the door to Miss Ruth’s Restaurant, a little nook in the corner above the ring. A sign overhead said, Cows May Come and Go, But the BULL in This Place Goes On Forever.
Ruth Harris favored patriotic colors. Flags decorated the napkin holders. The curtains were stars-and-stripes. A cowgirl hat in cherry red topped Ruth’s towering white beehive. She wore a red-and-white checked shirt, tucked snugly into a blue denim skirt. A white belt with a buckle the size of Texas cinched her still-trim waist. The only thing missing was a six-shooter on a holster around her hips.
“That’s the cutest outfit you’ve got on, Ruth.’’ Mama hugged the café’s well-preserved namesake like a long-lost cousin. “You’ve sure got a theme going here.’’
We did greetings all around.
“You look awful pretty too, Rosalee. That shade is sure becoming to your coloring. It must be nice to dress up again after being in prison.’’
“Oh, honey, that was nothing but a misunderstanding.’’ Mama waved her ring hand airily.
Ruth hadn’t noticed the diamond. I figured her cataracts must be bad, as big as that stone was. Mama picked up a cow-shaped creamer from the table, turning it this way and that. She pretended to be admiring it, but really she was just trying to catch the light with her ring.
Grabbing the dappled cow from Mama, I glared at her to quit showing off. “Miss Ruth, we dropped by because we’ve been looking into who really might have killed Jim Albert,” I said.
“Of course,’’ Marty chimed in, “we knew all along Mama wasn’t the guilty party.’’
Ruth nodded, still looking sideways at Mama. She didn’t seem convinced. Or maybe she was thinking that a woman who’d murdered a man and stuffed his body in her trunk wouldn’t think twice about stealing the cow creamer she’d picked up and was playing with again.