The Killer Wore Cranberry Read online

  Now, on the floor, was my newest prize, a polished wooden box, six feet long and three feet wide. It had taken me eight weeks to build it, starting with the best treated wood money could buy. The outside was sealed with a full quarter inch of polyurethane, layer after layer, with internal seams caulked for good measure. The insides of the box and lid were lined with glass coated with a thick layer of wax. The lid, which now stood to one side, had been notched to fit tightly inside the bottom of the box. It would be sealed all the way around with molten metal, a kind of solder on steroids, then bolted into place with strips of steel. A simple, airtight, classic container.

  One that would soon be Brian Wellings’ resting place.

  The box was filled more than halfway with fine tupelo honey, transported in small barrels when Sharon was at some civic function or off getting wriggly with Wellings. There was just enough room to accommodate the displacement that would be caused by Brian’s body. I was pleased with myself; what I was about to do had true historical significance. Alexander the Great was embalmed with honey, his body submerged in it, then sealed in a gold coffin. Two centuries later his corpse was described by visitors to his tomb as surprisingly well preserved. Honey is a natural antibacterial and preservative—no smell, no muss. I’d added the extra layers of sealant just to be safe, since I wouldn’t have time to extract Brian’s internal organs, but I had no doubt it would work. The Egyptians estimated that a corpse tightly sealed in honey would mummify in one hundred and twenty years. In China, pieces of mellified bodies—humans who had been mummified with honey—had been highly sought after as medicinal lozenges. In a way, you might say I was doing Brian a favor.

  I eyed my handiwork with satisfaction. A rectangular pool of liquid amber, succulent, like an enchanted bath in a fairytale land or a dream of Arabian nights. Stunning, eerie, beautiful. I ran two fingers through the seductive thickness and put them to my lips. Sweet decadence. In this shroud, Brian would join my store of prized possessions, far better than a stuffed head mounted on a wall, sealed up in my secret storeroom like in a Cask of Amontillado until I decided to move him—or, if I was feeling Egyptian, until the damn house fell down.

  The killing would be easy. No matter what Hollywood served up, a few classic moves were all that one needed. I’d hit him in the back of the head with my hammer, which would probably make him moan like Sharon only this time it wouldn’t be fake. I’d drag him to the coffin’s edge, wrap a steel wire around his neck, and pull until he went limp. Then I’d tip him face up into the honey and hold him down until there was no sign of air movement. Finally, I’d lay the hammer in with him and seal him up.

  All this would happen on Black Friday. Sharon took gift bags to local nursing homes every year on the day after Thanksgiving. Many of the residents remembered going door to door as kids to solicit treats on Thanksgiving—”Anything for Thanksgiving?” She would be gone all day and that would give me plenty of time to finish the work—work that would, chemically speaking, consign Brian Wellings to the centuries.

  I played out the aftermath in my mind. Emma would file a missing-persons report with the cops, then hire a private detective.

  “When was the last time you saw Mr. Wellings?” they’d ask me.

  “Thanksgiving. We had plans to play golf the next day over in Glenville so we needed to leave before the sun was up. He was going to walk over here and ride with me, but he never showed. I got no answer on his cell, didn’t want to disturb Emma. I went to the club thinking he’d maybe gotten confused, but no one had seen him. I waited a while, then left word for him at the desk and joined a threesome.”

  “Any idea what might have happened to him?”

  I would look down to show my distress. “He’d been complaining that he was bored at home. He said that if he ever got brave enough to leave he would just up and go. I never thought he meant it…”

  Emma would tell them that Brian had taken with him only his cell phone, his laptop, and the clothes on his back. To Emma, this would be proof that the bastard had intentionally deserted her. To me it meant no photos of Sharon to provide a motive.

  In a few weeks the fuss would begin to die down, after the cops had failed to trace Brian, after the cost of the private eye had gotten too steep to maintain, after the missing-person flyers Emma had posted around town had been taken by wind or rain or teens, after she remembered what an inconsiderate bastard Brian had been, after the red rings around Sharon’s eyes had started to lighten.

  For my dear wife I had something else in mind. I would enjoy myself as she fumed, hurt, reeled, spent angry days alone; I would gloat as guilt forced her to say yes more often than no to sex with her husband. In due course, I would make other arrangements for Sharon. For now, it would be enough to watch her suffer—first from abandonment, later from fear.

  * * *

  The Thanksgiving Day celebrations went off without a hitch. Donna Carlton got plastered on Black Russians and her husband had to roll her home. I won ten bucks in gin rummy, and the neighbors said the bacon and pignoli dressing was the best they’d had in many a year. Sharon’s phyllo stack was, as expected, a major hit.

  Brian and I confirmed our plans for the next day and our route to the swanky country club three hours away, tee time at seven a.m. Free passes courtesy of SweetStuff, Inc. Hot coffee and Danish at my house on the way out. Brian was to come to the side entrance to my study so as not to disturb Sharon. Since his new, custom golf clubs had not yet arrived, he would use my second set. He would bring his laptop so we could keep an eye on after-hours stock trading on the road trip.

  * * *

  He was right on time next morning. I heard his soft knock and quietly opened the door. The parabolic listener was out of sight, tucked into the storeroom.

  He laid his laptop—which would go into the coffin with him—on my desk. Later, I’d smash his cell phone into a thousand pieces, drive over the county line, and toss the fragments into a field.

  I handed him a mug of Kona and a strawberry Danish lush enough to satisfy the daily caloric requirement of an entire pro football team. He took a bite of the Danish, grinned, and made orgasmic grunts. In a minute the pastry was gone.

  “I want to show you something,” I said, keeping my voice low. “I did something special with this room.” I pointed to a spot behind the desk. “Stand right there. It’s the best vantage point.”

  He looked at me strangely but did as I instructed. I cocked open the molding, flipped the lever, and swung open the section of bookcase.

  Brian’s eyes grew wide. “Oh, man,” he said, setting his coffee down roughly enough to slosh it onto the desk. “A hidden storeroom….” He stood and stared. “This is incredible, George. You could hide all kinds of stuff in there.”

  “Sure could.”

  “Who did it for you?”

  “I did, from my own design.”

  “Oh, man,” he said again. “I mean, wow.”

  It was pretty wow, if I did say so myself.

  He turned to me. “Does Sharon know?”

  “Nope. And I assume you’re not going to tell her.”

  He grinned. “Why would I tell her? Male solidarity, man. Brothers, right?”

  “Right,” I said. “Brothers.”

  He pointed. “Is that a Winchester?”

  “Annie Oakley’s, to be specific.”

  His mouth opened wider. He was beginning to resemble a guppy.

  “And that…” I pointed to the baseball. “…was signed by Mantle and Maris in the golden year.”

  “Oh, wow,” he said. “Wow, wow, wow.”

  He was starting to bore me.

  He pointed to his honey coffin. “So what’s with the box?”

  “Go ahead, go on in and take a look,” I said with a wave.

  He moved forward into the storeroom.

  I didn’t hesitate. I slid open the desk drawer, extracted my trusty hammer, and came up behind him.

  “That won’t be necessary,” Sharon said from the doo
rway.

  I jumped and turned. Her green eyes glowed as she leveled a semi-automatic directly at my sternum. I felt my muscles freeze.

  “Sharon. What the hell are you doing?”

  “Take a guess.”

  “I don’t understand…what…where’d you get that gun?”

  “You’re not the only one with a bank account, George.”

  Brian took the hammer from my hand, smiled, and patted me on the shoulder.

  “Sorry, man,” he said. “But we can’t have you carrying on like this. It’s just not safe, you know? “

  Sharon flashed me a scary grin. “You better put your head between your legs, dear, you look pale.”

  Brian moved to the coffin and stuck his fingers in.

  “Ummm…very festive,” he said, raising his hand to his mouth. “I think it would make for a peaceful death, drowning in honey. What were you planning to do, buddy? Bean me with the hammer and stuff me in there like a braciole into meat sauce?”

  “Yes,” I said nastily. “After the garrote.”

  I swung back to Sharon. “How’d you know?”

  She sighed. “Honestly, George. You really are the most deluded, self-absorbed man I’ve ever known. Did you really think you could keep all this a secret?”

  “I never gave you a key.”

  “Five minutes with a locksmith. I used to come in and move things around just for fun.”

  “I never noticed,” I said faintly.

  “I know.” She gestured to a painting on the wall. It was a picture of a fox hunt—hounds and horses. “Look at that frame. Look closely, there, beside the black horse.”

  I hesitated, then moved toward the painting. I saw a small round lens, like the eye of a camera. From the dim recesses of my addled brain it began to dawn on me: it was a camera. One of Brian’s many state-of-the-art toys. They’d bugged my study.

  “You’ve been watching me?”

  “In technicolor,” Brian said.

  “That’s despicable,” I spat.

  Sharon gave a sardonic laugh. “Mr. Innocent. And what’s that over there, the thing that looks like a satellite dish?”

  “Why, I do believe that’s a parabolic listening device,” Brian said, his grin widening. “A super microphone. Don’t you think it’s funny, man? That we were watching you while you were listening to us.”

  “Hilarious,” I said.

  “What was that like, George, listening to your wife with another man?” Sharon’s tone thinly masked her rage. Her gun hand shook just the slightest.

  I tried not to give in to terror. “I had to do something to amuse myself, didn’t I? You were certainly having a grand time.”

  “You didn’t notice the security on my computer? I get a daily email report of every file that’s been accessed. I knew you’d seen the pictures, George. I knew you’d be up to something.” She gestured toward the storeroom. “Imagine my surprise the first time I saw this.”

  She dropped any semblance of banter as she re-leveled the gun at me. I felt the air go out of me, a sudden, irreversible deflation. My limbs went limp and useless. It wasn’t bad enough I was going to die; I had to die with Sharon being the winner.

  “Honestly, George. Brian’s camera isn’t even especially well hidden,” she said, her voice ominously level. “It’s what I’ve been trying to tell you for years. You never notice anything.”

  That was not quite true, I thought perversely, as I caught Brian’s sudden movement from the corner of my eye.

  I fully noticed, as I swerved toward him a second too late, his thrill-flushed determination as he brought my trusty hammer down with a thwack.

  A Saucy Kind of Holiday

  By Lesley A. Diehl

  Ten days before Thanksgiving, 1969

  I ripped open the envelope in haste and almost tore the top off the page inside, but my aunt, Aunt Nozzie, short for Aunt Rosalind, never wrote to me, only called and then not often. Something had to be wrong for her to make a request or provide any information or bad news in such a concrete manner. And it was disturbing news. Aunt Nozzie had gone into business. She included in the envelope a brochure announcing her entrepreneurial efforts, “Grandma People’s Homemade Jams, Jellies and Sauces” and a note which said, “You’ve got to come for Thanksgiving. I need help.”

  Oh, no. I couldn’t spend Thanksgiving with my aunt. Much as I loved Nozzie, holidays, especially Thanksgiving, were times of chaos, often punctuated by murder. I’d gotten the reputation for being the one to solve the crimes, but for the last few years I’d avoided spending turkey days with Nozzie and my loony relatives, and no murders had occurred. If I stayed away, I reasoned, the holiday might be normal at Nozzie’s. Probably not, but I didn’t want to take any chances. On the other hand, Nozzie needed me. She was my favorite aunt, and I couldn’t fail her.

  After deciding I had to help out Aunt Nozzie, I made my second mistake. I called my mother, who was about to take off on a Mediterranean cruise with, let’s see now, was it her fourth, no, it was her fifth husband.

  I mentioned Aunt Nozzie’s new business and heard silence on the other end of the line. Actually, it wasn’t silence. It was my mother sighing. My mother is quite the sigher. She can do it silently, but somehow you always know when she sighs. It a precursor to silent clucking of her tongue followed by that one word that spells a long judgmental lecture about someone’s recent choice of car, house, husband, dress, casket, or flatware.

  “Well,” Mom said. She repeated it as if to underscore what was to come was to be worse than anything she’d encountered before. “Well, well, well.”

  Oh, oh.

  “So you know about her new work?”

  “Yes, I do and I think it’s wonderful.” That was a lie. I didn’t know if Aunt Nozzie could run a business, wonderful or not, but I thought I might head off Mom’s negative comments. Shows you what I know.

  “Yes, well, ‘wonderful’ is not the word I’d use. But it’s understandable, I guess. She brought this on herself, you know.”

  Here it comes, I thought.

  “All those years when you were too young to understand, she and your uncle just spent money like it would go on forever. Never saved a nickel. Then came the strike at the printing plant, and they moved the jobs somewhere in Central America.

  “And gave the jobs to all those little brown people down there. I told Nozzie at the time that if she and her coworkers hadn’t chosen to go on strike, they’d still have a printing plant in town. They bankrupted that plant.”

  “No, they didn’t, Mom. The plant owners got greedy. They gave themselves raises, bankrupted the plant themselves, then sold it to some other concern that moved it abroad.”

  Mother sighed silently through the phone line. Sigh. Cluck, cluck. “Well, it’s gone now, and Nozzie needs money so she’s taken your grandmother’s famous recipe for cranberry sauce and started a cranberry plant.”

  “It’s not a plant I don’t think, Mom. It’s probably being run out of her kitchen with Grandma Papa’s help. A cottage industry.”

  Grandma Papa was what we called my father’s mother. My mom’s mother was Grandma Mama.

  “I didn’t know Grandma’s recipe was famous,” I added.

  “No one did. I don’t remember her serving anything but that stuff that comes out of a can.” Mom made a snorting sound to convey her disgust. “Like glue.”

  I decided to interrupt with a change of subject before she could say anything more.

  “Bye, Mom. Have a great cruise.”

  * * *

  Before driving to Aunt Nozzie’s I made the sign of the cross. I’m not Catholic and not much of a believer in a higher being, but when you have the relatives I do, you can’t be picky about whom you entreat for help. I touched the Wiccan air freshener (covering all the religious bases) hanging from my rearview mirror and hit the interstate for Illinois.

  I knew Thanksgiving wouldn’t be the same this year as in the past. My mother would be absent as usual, but my Great Au
nt Clara wouldn’t be with us. She died this past year. My dear Aunt Clara, the one who wore the brown wig with pink ribbons on her hairnet. My aunt who admitted to ninety-four. She died not from heart disease or from liver or kidney failure. In fact, her death certificate did not specify a cause of death, merely the word “dead” on the line. She died the way she lived—watching the Johnnie Carson show.

  Aunt Clara’s death was the first demise in our family of one of its female members in a very long time. The men die off with great regularity, cousins, nephews, uncles, even those men related to us only through marriage. When we talk of “The Curse” we do not mean menopause. We mean the death whammy that hangs over anybody in our family without female parts. That’s probably why I married so young. I was only twenty-one. I wanted a family and needed to get working on it soon before hubby keeled over. But instead I divorced him before he could expire. The family was shocked.

  “Where are you going to find another husband who will risk the family guy jinx of dying young?” asked Aunt Nozzie.

  Frankly, I didn’t care at that point. The man was a drunk who’d soon meet his maker with a bad liver. I decided not to wait for that to happen. Cleaning up the bottles, vomit, broken lamps, furniture and bailing him out of jail had put me right off men. I enrolled in graduate school, a place I thought I’d be pursuing intellectual endeavors. Dumb. I know that now. Instead I found myself along with the few other women in the program dodging randy male professors who seemed more interested in pursuing female students down hallways than filling our heads with knowledge. And they were poor role models for the male students who thought to join them in these daily dashes for body parts to caress. For several months I thought of becoming a nun, but one of my fellow female students who was Catholic said the priests were just as bad.

  As I drove through rolling hills north of Atlanta I mulled over my choice to spend Thanksgiving with Aunt Nozzie. I’d find out for myself exactly what she was up to. I mean, how bad could it be?