Soup...Er...Myrtle!: A Myrtle Crumb Mystery (Myrtle Crumb Mystery Series) Read online

  And I believed Sunny when she said the food in the school cafeteria sucked. I went undercover there one time to investigate some thefts, and the food does suck. The staff does the best it can with what it has to work with, but Doris takes more pains at the soup kitchen than they do in that lunchroom. Of course, Doris has about five hundred fewer mouths to feed, so that makes a big difference. I ain’t mean-mouthing—I’m stating facts.

  Anyhow, I heated up the French bread while Faye put spaghetti and meatballs on our plates and Sunny got us all drinks. I was having water. Goodness knows I didn’t need any caffeine keeping me up half the night. Faye and Sunny had iced tea.

  We sat down at the table then, and I asked the blessing before we ate. We were always grateful for what the good Lord provided, but this evening, we were even more so.

  * * *

  After Matlock and I got ready for bed, I called Cooper.

  “Hello, darlin’,” he said. “It’s good to hear from you. In fact, I was going to call you in the morning to see if you’d like to go with me to supper Friday night.”

  “I’d like that very much,” I told him. “I wasn’t calling to finagle an invitation though. I just wanted to say hi and ask if you knew anything about any services around here that helps needy people.”

  “Myrtle, you know I’d be glad to help you out with anything you need,” he said.

  “Oh, Coop, I know you would, but this ain’t for me.” I explained about Heather and her little girls. “They plumb broke my heart.”

  “I’ll sure check around the station and see what I can do. They’re a great group of people, and I know they’ll help out if they can.”

  “Thank you,” I said. “I thought I’d go by the store tomorrow morning and get a little something for the girls. Faye and Sunny brought over a coat and a few clothes for Heather.”

  “You’re something, you know that?”

  “I’m blessed is what I am. I’ve got a sweet family, a good dog, and a handsome man taking me to supper on Friday night.”

  He laughed. “If there were more people like you, Myrtle Crumb, I’d be out of a job.”

  “I wouldn’t be too sure about that. Some of us are speed demons, and that poor little old Doris from the soup kitchen must not be able to drive worth a hoot. You should’ve seen how she was parked this morning.”

  “Well, I’m looking forward to Friday,” he said. “In the meantime, if there’s anything we can do to help Heather and her daughters before then, I’ll let you know.”

  “Thank you, sweetheart.” I just threw that sweetheart in there. He calls me darlin all the time, so I thought I’d just slide that one by him to see how it felt. It felt pretty good.

  We said our goodbyes and then I snuggled in beside Matlock and went to sleep.

  * * *

  When I got to the food bank and soup kitchen the next morning, I left the stuff for Heather and her daughters in my car. I didn’t want to embarrass them. Plus, I didn’t want anyone to think I was playing favorites...even though I was. It wasn't anybody else’s business who I wanted to help.

  I’d stopped by the general store and got the girls a set of pajamas apiece, and I got each of them a doll. I also got them that game Candy Land so they could all have something to play together. It wasn’t much, but it was something.

  I walked inside and was surprised that Doris wasn’t the first person I saw. The first person I saw was Tansie Miller.

  I rolled my eyes, but I have to give myself credit for not groaning out loud.

  She came right up to me, flattening her lips to make sure I knew she was none too pleased to see me there. “I thought you worked here yesterday.”

  “I did. But I thought I’d come back today,” I said. “I’m glad. Looks like Doris could use the help.”

  Before Tansie could say anything else, Doris came over and got between us. “I’m so glad to have both of you here today. You M.E.L.O.N.S. sure are dedicated—I’ll give you that. How precious y’all are to volunteer your time like this.” She pulled me to the side. “Myrtle, honey, everybody raved over your cornbread yesterday. Would you care to make some more?”

  “I’ll be delighted to make the cornbread,” I said. “You know, not everybody can make good cornbread. Some people’s cornbread tastes like it’s full of sand.”

  “Myrtle Crumb, you take that back right this instant!” Tansie hollered.

  “I said some people’s. I didn’t say yours. Although, I reckon if the sandy cornbread fits….”

  Tansie went to sputtering and crowing like a hen getting baptized, and Doris all but pushed me into the kitchen.

  “I can’t help that my cornbread is better than Tansie’s,” I said. “She either skimps on the buttermilk or the butter. I’m not sure which. Her with all that money she likes to throw around and then skimping on her cornbread ingredients. She ought to be ashamed.”

  Doris looked pained, and I realized I’d put her in a bad spot. I patted her shoulder. “You go on and do whatever you need to do. I’ll be nice to Tansie the rest of the time I’m here.” Or, at least, I would be as long as she was nice to me. If she knew what was good for her, she wouldn’t run that big mouth to me again today. I hadn’t come here to be bothered by Tansie Miller. I’d come here to bring a few things to Heather and her little girls.

  * * *

  I kept looking for Heather as I stood in the line serving people once we’d opened the doors. When I didn’t see them after a few minutes, I worried that they must’ve found themselves at the end of the line. We had a big crowd today.

  “Why, howdy, Myrtle.”

  I looked to see who was speaking to me. It was Opal Grady, a woman who went to our church. Opal was in her nineties, and I was surprised and concerned to see her out and about on this cold, snowy day.

  “Opal, it’s freezing out! What’re you doing here?”

  “I came to get me some lunch, same as just about everybody else in town it looks like,” she said. “And you’d better know I’m well aware of how blasted cold it is. The locks on my old Dodge were froze up, and I had to use a lighter to thaw ‘em so I could open the door.”

  “Well, bless your heart! Why didn’t you call me if you needed something? I could’ve brought it to you.”

  “You wouldn’t have been home to answer your phone,” Opal pointed out. “You’re here.”

  “Myrtle, you’re holding up the line,” Tansie said. She was standing to my right.

  Don’t you know that attitude of hers burned me up? How dare she jump on me for paying a little attention to poor Opal?

  I started to fire back at her with both barrels, but I caught sight of Doris’s eyes getting as big as saucers. So I just gave Tansie a hateful look and asked Opal what kind of soup she’d like.

  “That beef stew looks awful good,” she said. “And did you make that cornbread, Myrtle?”

  “I sure did.” I smiled.

  “Then I’d like a big piece of that,” she said.

  That beat anything I could’ve said to Tansie. I smirked at the hateful thing as I served Opal her food.

  Tansie just flattened her mouth the way she does and slopped some soup into a bowl for a bedraggled man who was standing there picking his nose.

  I kept looking for Heather and her daughters and was worried when I didn’t see them. Just about everybody had been served and was sitting around eating.

  “Myrtle, is everything okay?” Doris asked.

  “I was looking for that young mother that I helped yesterday. Her name is Heather. I thought for sure she and her daughters would be here today.”

  “They’re here most days but not always. Maybe one of the little girls had the sniffles or something, and Heather didn’t want to bring them out in the cold.”

  “That’s a good point,” I said. “Do you know where they live? I’d be happy to drop some food off to them.”

  “Sorry, hon. I don’t have any idea as to where Heather lives,” Doris said. “It’s sweet of you to think of th
at though. Frank and I have often talked about doing boxed meals to deliver to shut-ins, but we just don’t have the resources.”

  “Maybe you could bring it up at the next church board meeting. It would be nice if some of these people didn’t have to get out and brave the weather in order to have a decent meal.” My gaze found Opal Grady. She was dipping her cornbread in her beef stew and eating like it was the best thing she’d ever tasted.

  * * *

  After helping Doris finish with cleanup, I mentioned I’d be back tomorrow because I was hoping to see Heather.

  “Between you and me, I’ve got a coat my daughter Faye doesn’t wear anymore. She and Heather are about the same size, and I wanted to offer it to Heather.”

  “That’s real good of you,” Doris said. “You could just leave the coat here, if you’d like, though. You don’t have to work here every day.”

  “Aw, it gives me something to do,” I said. I didn’t want to tell her that I was afraid one of the ne’er-do-wells that come in this place would take Faye’s coat before Heather even got a chance to see it.

  Chapter Three

  When I left the soup kitchen, I went to the grocery store to get Matlock and me something for dinner. After everybody else had been served, we volunteers got us some food. Like Opal Grady, I’d had beef stew and cornbread. So I was stuffed to the gills, but I feel like that’s a good time to go to the grocery store. You don’t wind up with a bunch of stuff you don’t need when you go full instead of hungry. Still, it made it harder to figure out what I might want for supper.

  I wandered the aisles trying to decide what looked good. I wound up getting a couple cans of chicken breast meat, some red seedless grapes, and some pecans. I’d make some chicken salad, and we’d eat it with crackers.

  Now before you go thinking that’s all I’d give a big dog like Matlock for supper, his bites of chicken salad would just be to supplement his dog food. And I knew better than to give him any bites that had grapes in it too. So don’t be fussing at me…even in your mind. I don’t appreciate it.

  Anyway, I took my basket of chicken salad fixins up to the checkout lane and was waiting for the man in front of me to pay for his candy bar and pop.

  If I’d known him, I’d have said I hoped that wasn’t all he was having for his lunch. Since I didn’t know him, I kept my mouth shut and minded my own business. I could do that once in a while. Not often…but occasionally.

  I scanned the magazines next to the counter. It has always confounded me to see headlines for “quick weight loss” on the same covers as they have these delicious-looking desserts. I reckon they figure it’s two sides of the same coin.

  I glanced at the tabloids. That little Kate and William are just darlin’…don’t you agree? And that baby…cute as a button. I’ve always thought I’d have liked to have been royalty. I believe I could’ve done it up right. I grinned at that thought, and then tried to quit before people thought I was crazy.

  I looked over at the register and saw a sign taped to it warning the cashier not to accept checks from Opal Grady. Well, you can believe that wiped any traces of that grin off my face!

  I probably wouldn’t have even paid any attention to that sign if I hadn’t seen Opal earlier today. Now it made me think. Was Opal doing even worse than I’d thought? I mean, you have to figure that somebody showing up at a soup kitchen for lunch ain’t doing real well, but I didn’t think she’d bounce checks.

  If she had bounced a check, she hadn’t done it on purpose. And, yet, here her name was up on the side of this cash register for everybody to take a gander at. Opal didn’t deserve to be humiliated like that! I had to do something.

  The man took his pop and candy bar and moved along.

  “How are you?” The female cashier wore a bored look that told me she didn’t give two hoots how I was.

  “I’m perturbed that you have my friend Opal Grady’s name plastered there on your register,” I said. “I find it hard to believe that Opal would pass a bad check on purpose.”

  The girl shrugged and chewed her cinnamon gum as she scanned the items I’d put on the conveyor belt.

  “It has to be a mistake,” I continued.

  She shrugged again. “Store policy—you write more than one bad check on us, you go up on the register.” She popped the gum and told me my total.

  I paid her with cash…and I was particularly glad I had cash because I didn’t think I’d be comfortable writing a check in this store. I mean, they’d had to have made a mistake about Opal. Opal wasn’t the kind of person to go around writing bad checks. She was a soprano in the choir, for Pete’s sake.

  * * *

  When I got home, I let Matlock go into the backyard to pee. After I put my groceries away and got him back in, I dug the phone book out of my junk drawer and looked up Opal’s number. As I punched in the number, I thought how best to tell her what I’d seen at the grocery store. By the time Opal answered the phone, I’d decided to just come right out and say it.

  “Opal, this is Myrtle Crumb.”

  “Oh, mercy. I didn’t leave my pocketbook down at the food bank again, did I?” she asked.

  “No…at least, I don’t think so. That’s not why I’m calling,” I said. “I’m calling to tell you I saw your name at the grocery store. They’re accusing you of passing bad checks, and I believe you need to set the record straight with those folks.”

  “Oh, honey, I appreciate your getting all fired up on my account,” Opal said. “But they must be talking about some other Opal. I ain’t ever wrote a check in my life.”

  “You’ve not?”

  “No. My parents lived through the Great Depression, and they never trusted banks,” she said. “So they taught me and my brothers not to trust ‘em either. I’ve never had a savings or a checking account. I keep my money at my house in a safe with my late husband’s hunting rifle right next to it. And if I ain’t got money, I don’t buy…which is why I’ve been coming to the soup kitchen and food bank a little more often lately.”

  “Well, I’m just glad it’s not you they’re picking on at the grocery store,” I said.

  After we hung up, though, I found myself wondering just how many Opal Gradys there could be in Backwater.

  * * *

  When I got to the soup kitchen Friday morning, Bettie Easton was there. She came over to me and was waving around a piece of notebook paper.

  Bettie is an attractive woman with her shoulder-length blonde bob and her trim figure, but the red lipstick she wears all the time is a little much. A body tended to notice those lips coming at them before it registered that they were attached to Bettie.

  “Sweetie, I’m so sorry you dragged yourself out on this frosty Friday,” Bettie said.

  I didn’t comment on the fact that I hadn’t dragged myself anywhere, and I didn’t mention that Bettie’s annoying alliteration could get on a person’s last nerves either. I was trying hard to be cheerful today.

  Bettie held up the paper. “Take a look at this. Delphine and I are here, and this list shows the other volunteers who’re working today.”

  I took the paper and scanned over it. Heather’s name wasn’t on it, but then I hadn’t really expected her to be able to volunteer unless someone could take care of her daughters…and I had a bad feeling that Heather was pretty much on her own.

  Bettie just kept prattling on. “So you see, sweetie, when I called you the other night, I didn’t intend to make you feel like you had to come down here every day. Why, there’s….” She put out her index finger and started counting the names. She stopped on one. “Huh…Harry Loomis…. I’ll have to ask him how his car is doing.”

  “Who’s Harry Loomis?” I asked.

  “He’s a college kid who came in last week and bought a car from us. He used a credit card,” she said. “We don’t have many people buy cars with credit cards.”

  Bettie and her family owned a big used car lot off the Interstate.

  “Why in the world would anybody buy a c
ar using a credit card?” I asked. “The interest would be awful.”

  “He didn’t have any credit other than the card, so he couldn’t get a bank loan,” Bettie said. “He probably has rich parents who’ll help him pay off the card.”

  “Let’s hope so.”

  “But the point I’m trying to make is that you don’t have to come every day, and I feel awful if I made you think you did.”

  “You didn’t, Bettie.” I explained to her about Heather and her children. “I’m hoping they’ll be here today. That poor girl needs a coat in the worst way. Besides, Doris likes for me to make the cornbread.”

  “Well, your cornbread is a culinary coop!” She laughed. “And I hope the girl and her young ‘uns show up today. Maybe there’s something I could do to help too…or maybe the M.E.L.O.N.S. could adopt the family!”

  Inwardly, I cringed. What had I done to sweet little Heather? To Bettie, I smiled and said I should probably find Doris.

  I went into the kitchen, and Delphine was pouring peanut butter fudge into a long glass baking dish. Delphine can make fudge so good it’d make a body slap his granny.

  “Mornin’, Delphine. That sure does smell good.”

  “Hi, Myrtle. I wish I’d done this at home last night. I’m afraid it won’t have enough time to set up.”

  “Let’s hope it will.”

  Something outside the window over the sink caught my attention, and I moved closer to the glass to get a better look. It was a man on a bicycle. He had on a knit cap, and he’d wound a scarf from his neck to his eyeballs. I didn’t know how the poor thing was breathing.

  “What is it?” Delphine finished pouring her fudge into the dish and came to take a peek too.

  “Some poor goon is on a bicycle and it thirty degrees,” I said.

  The man stopped and leaned the bike against the wall of our building.