This is the second half of a short story featuring characters from my new mystery novel, A BOX OF PANDORAS. If you enjoy the story, try the novel, which is available on Kindle-only for now. Click here to see more.
The front door
opened without a knock, and Nannette blew inside, scrawny and brittle, a
scarecrow in a pantsuit. Her puckered face flushed when she saw us standing by
the orchid.
"We were just
admiring this beautiful plant," I said. "Mitzi said someone gave it
to you?"
Nannette glanced
outside before she closed the door. Sounded like other cars were arriving, but
I couldn't see the long driveway from where I stood. Just endless plains out
every window.
"I can't talk
about that," Nannette said as she crossed the cluttered living room.
"Why
not?"
"It's a
church thing."
Nannette attends
Wildweed Community Church, one of those strict evangelical outfits where you're
guilty until proven innocent and it's perfectly acceptable to shout during
Sunday services. They're a busy congregation, knocking on doors at dinnertime
all over Pandora. We Presbyterians do not approve of such fervent intrusion. A
shameful number of us refer to Nannette's bunch as the "Wild-Eyed
Community Church."
"You a priest
now?" I said. "You hold people's confessions secret?"
Nannette flushed
redder, and there was venom in her narrow eyes.
"I wouldn't
expect you to understand," she said. "You've never kept a secret in
your life."
I couldn't have
been more shocked if she'd slapped my face. I'm perfectly capable of keeping a
secret. If anyone in this room had a big mouth, it was Mitzi Tyner, which she
proved at that moment by speaking up.
"What secret?
What are you going on about?"
Nannette didn't
get a chance to answer. I'd recovered from the insult enough to sputter,
"That orchid is stolen!"
"What?"
Mitzi acted surprised. "What is she talking about, Nannette?"
"I can't
discuss it!"
Voices rose
outside, the buoyant sound of joshing men. I recognized the booming baritone of
Hugh Lindenpool, the banker who sings in our church choir. I was running out of
time.
"Tell us
now," I said, "or tell us in front of the entire committee. I won't
sit still while you try to--"
"Somebody at
church asked me to get rid of that orchid." Nannette addressed her
comments to Mitzi, but I mentally recorded every word for future courtroom
and/or Garden Society testimony. "This person felt guilty about how it had
been acquired. And that's all I will say about it. Now or ever."
The door burst open,
and Hugh Lindenpool flooded in with a couple of his loud golfing buddies.
Before I could even get my thoughts straight, the meeting was under way.
Well. Let's say I
didn't do my usual thorough job keeping the minutes. The yellow orchid was
right there in the room with us! But nobody else around the dining table
recognized it. Of course, most of them were men, and they wouldn't know an
orchid from okra, but still. You'd think one of these geniuses could put two
and two together.
Mitzi chaired the
meeting in her usual haphazard fashion, idiot smile pasted in place the whole
time, and I'm sure they couldn't tell she'd just been accused of receiving
stolen property. She wouldn't look at me, though.
Nannette sneaked
out midway through the meeting. I resisted the urge to chase after her.
Grilling Nannette Hoch was a job for the Llano County sheriff.
From the sound of
it, Nannette was just a conduit anyway. The real thief was the person who gave
her the orchid. The church member who'd stolen it from Betty Sue Lybrand.
I remembered with
a jolt that Betty Sue, too, attended Wildweed Community Church. She's always
such a friendly, levelheaded person, I forget she's a holy roller. Betty Sue
undoubtedly knew everyone in that congregation. She'd certainly know which fellow
believers visited her home around the time the orchid went missing.
As soon as the
committee meeting clattered to its usual uneventful conclusion, I high-tailed
it for Betty Sue's house.
She was out in the
rose garden when I drove up her dusty road. Betty Sue grows beautiful roses in
the unforgiving New Mexico sunshine, and an amazing variety of exotics in a
greenhouse Archie slapped together behind their garage.
She waved me
toward the house. Her ginger hair was the usual frazzled mess as she met me at
the front door, and perspiration dotted her round face. I practically chewed my
tongue off, waiting for her to finish inviting me into her cool kitchen and
offering iced tea and asking after Harley and the kids. When I could finally
get a word in edgewise, I blurted out everything I knew about her missing
orchid and Nannette and Mitzi and the mysterious Wildweed connection.
Betty Sue flushed
and fidgeted through my hurried narrative, and I mistakenly assumed she was
thrilled by my sleuthing. When I paused for breath, she said, "You need to
drop this, Loretta."
"What?"
"Drop it.
That orchid already caused enough friction. I don't want Archie to get riled up
again."
"Don't you
want to call the sheriff?"
She shook her
head, but she wouldn't look at me, too busy watching her freckled hands
fretting with each other on the tabletop. Silence filled the tidy kitchen.
And then I got it.
No wonder Betty
Sue didn't want the sheriff involved. She'd known the thief's identity all
along
I don't know why I
hadn't seen it sooner. Betty Sue never would've dared to spend hundreds of
Archie Lybrand's hard-earned dollars on a single houseplant. She'd stolen the
orchid from that flower show in Albuquerque.
Once people like
me started gushing over her new acquisition, how wonderful and rare it was,
Archie would've asked questions she couldn't answer. The orchid had to
disappear.
Betty Sue couldn't
bring herself to throw away such a beautiful flower, so she gave it to
Nannette. She probably hoped that would be the end of it, but Archie blabbed
her fib all over town.
I glanced around
her kitchen, at the faded wallpaper and the aged appliances. The only joy in
the drab house came from the pots of colorful flowers at every window. We need
such things of beauty in our lives, little gifts to ourselves, what Mama always
called "orchids for the soul."
Betty Sue got so
carried away by beauty that she made a terrible mistake. I could sympathize. I
myself am sometimes afflicted by enthusiasms.
"If that's
the way you want it," I said softly, "we can let it go."
"That would
be best, Loretta."
I got to my feet.
Betty Sue teetered over her nervous hands, and I got the impression she was
waiting for me to leave so she could put her head on the table and have a good
cry.
"Despite what
some people say, I can keep a secret," I said. "You can trust me,
Betty Sue."
She nodded, but
still couldn't look at me. I cast about for a parting kindness.
"Mitzi will
take excellent care of that orchid." It pained me to say so. "She'll
smile at it all the livelong day. That's got to make for a healthy
flower."
Betty Sue looked
up at me then, her eyes red and wet.
"I'm glad it
found a good home."
