Cat's Claw (A Pecan Springs Mystery)

thought of something else.Unsnapping her briefcase, she took out a small red notebook and a pen. She glanced at her watch, opened the notebook to a fresh page and noted the address, the date, and the time. She didn’t stop to ask herself why she was doing this.
    As she got out of the car, a commotion rippled through the onlookers. “Hey, it’s the chief!” a man in the nearest group said. In his sixties, with thinning hair, he wore a pink-and-green Hawaiian print shirt and red flip-flops. His beer belly bulged out like a beach ball over green polyester pants. He raised his voice. “Hey, Chief, what’s going on back there? What’s the scoop?”
    “I just got here,” Sheila replied in a friendly tone. Community relations, she reminded herself. It was good for citizens to see their police officers at work. “I haven’t checked with Detective Bartlett yet. He’s in charge.” She went over to the group and put out her hand. “What have you heard, sir?”
    Green Trousers grasped her hand briefly. His was sweating. “Just that somebody’s dead in the kitchen.” He swiped his hand across his shirt front and pointed across the street. “Mr. Kirk, is what I heard.”
    “Lawrence Kirk,” an older woman said excitedly. “He’s really nice—came over and fixed my grandson’s computer when it got this really terrible infection. I live right next door.” She pointed, her tight blue curls bobbing importantly over her ears. “I was pickin’ the last of my spaghetti squash in the backyard when Ruby Wilcox’s sister went in the kitchen and found him. Really, you’d have thought somebody shot
her
. Run out of the door and fell right down the steps.”
    Ruby Wilcox’s sister? Ramona Donahue? That was a surprise. Sheila was about to speak, but Green Trousers beat her to it.
    “Hate to think stuff like this can happen in our neighborhood,” he said.
    “What’re you talkin’ about, Joe?” another woman demanded. “This kinda stuff happens everywhere. Why, somebody lifted my mother’s wristwatch right out of the drawer beside her bed. In the nursing home!” She slanted a look at Sheila and added accusingly, “Cops never did find out who did it.”
    “I’m sorry, ma’am,” Sheila said. She wanted to add,
Tell your mother not to put her valuables where somebody on the staff can be tempted
. But she only said, in a regretful tone, “We do the best we can, but we can’t clear every theft.”
    “Betcha
CSI
would’ve solved it,” the woman muttered.
    “We don’t have a
CSI
budget,” Sheila replied smoothly. It was another one of her practiced phrases. “You might speak to the city council about that.” She turned to the next-door neighbor. “Mr. Kirk fixed your grandson’s computer?” she asked. “Is he by any chance the owner of Kirk’s Computer Sales and Service?”
    “That’s him,” the woman said. “But he wouldn’t take any money when I offered to pay. Said he was just being a good neighbor, which I appreciated. A very nice young man.” She pulled down her mouth. “So sad.”
    The green-trousered man was clearly turning something over in his mind. “O’course, people do go a little crazy sometimes.” He squinted at Sheila and lowered his voice. “Don’t mean to tell tales outta school, Chief, but you might oughtta have a little heart-to-heart with Sam Schulz, at 1119.” He pointed to the house just west of the Kirks’. “He’s bore a grudge against Mr. Kirk ever since him and his wife moved in there. About the property line, you know.”
    “The property line?” Sheila asked. She took out her notebook. Kirk’s Computer Sales and Service was the business that George Timms had broken into. A coincidence—or something else?
    “That’s Schulz with no
t
,” Green Trousers said, pleased to see that she was writing in her notebook. “It’s the line between their places, y’see. The Kirks’ garage is two feet over on Sam’s property. Happened by accident, back, oh, forty, fifty years ago, when John Jenson built the place. Kirk wanted to buy two feet on that side to make it right, but ol’ Schulzie, he won’t sell. Stubborn as all git-out.”
    “Thank you,” Sheila said, writing down
Kirk’s Computer Sales and Service
. She added
Garage, Schulz, property line dispute
. “And your name, sir?” She’d pass it along to Bartlett.
    “Al Peters,” the man said, and gave her his address and phone number. He jerked his thumb at the woman who wanted
CSI
to