Cat's Claw (A Pecan Springs Mystery)

is already dead,” I said, and told them about the one that Tom Banner had shot.
    “So that’s it,” I said, when I had finished. “Thank you for covering for me here at the shop, Ramona. I really appreciate it. And now that we’ve all heard the story, I vote that we go back to work. I for one am certainly ready to stop thinking about this stuff.” I looked in the direction of the customer and saw that she was still busy with her browsing.
    “But we can’t go back to work, China,” Ruby said, very seriously. “Not just yet, anyway. There are some ladies who are anxious to talk to you about something important.” She gestured toward the door to the tearoom. “I gave them a table and a pot of tea and a plate of cookies. Now that you’re here, they’ll be very glad to see you.” To her sister, she added,“Ramona, if you don’t mind, you could keep an eye on both shops for us while China and I sit down with a cup of tea and talk to the ladies. I don’t think it’ll take too long.”
    “I hope not,” Ramona said. “I promised Molly McGregor that I’d stop in and see her this morning, so we could continue our talk about the possibility of my going into business with her at the Hobbit House. I had to break our date yesterday, you know.”
    I was frowning. “What ladies?” I asked. “Really, Ruby, I’m certainly ready to sit down with a cup of tea, but if it’s all the same to you, I’d rather skip the powwow with—”
    “Sorry,” Ruby said regretfully. “You can’t skip it. They’ve been waiting for almost an hour. They don’t think Larry Kirk killed himself.” She leaned closer and lowered her voice confidentially, glancing over her shoulder to make sure that the customer wasn’t listening. “They think they know who did it.”
    She had my attention. “They think
what
?” I asked, startled. “Who are
they
?”
    “The Texas Stars,” she replied. “You know, the quilting club.”
    “Oh,” I said, feeling deflated. “You mean neighborhood gossip central.” Ruby had taken me to their meetings as a guest, so I spoke from personal observation. The ladies claimed that they got together to make quilts, and their quilts were truly beautiful. But they also got together to trade, barter, and embellish all the local news, about three-quarters of which was garden-variety gossip. I’d be very surprised if they had a single shred of genuine information.
    “Well, yes,” Ruby conceded. “I suppose they do gossip a fair amount. They don’t have much else to do. On the other hand, sometimes neighbors see things they aren’t supposed to see. And they tell other neighbors, who have seen other things, and so on.”
    I had to acknowledge the truth of that. Still— “Who’s in there?” I asked, gesturing toward the tearoom.
    Ruby began ticking the Stars off on her fingers. “Ethel Wauer from next door—next door to me, that is. I think you know her.”
    “Oh, I know her, all right,” I said. “She’s the ringleader. I hope she didn’t bring that yappy little dog. Oodles, isn’t that his name?”
    “Of course she didn’t,” Ramona said in a snarky tone. “She left him at home to annoy the neighbors.”
    Ruby continued. “There’s also Jane Jessup, who lives on the other side of Ethel—the one with the beautiful vegetable garden. And Mildred Ewell from across the street. And Hazel Schulz. She lives on the far side of the Kirks’.”
    “Sounds like a quorum,” I said, feeling resigned. “But if they have some serious information, they should march right down to the police station and tell the cop at the duty desk. Somebody will be glad to take their information and pass it along to the investigators.”
    “Well, it’s not
that
kind of information,” Ruby said, almost apologetically. “I mean, it’s not the kind of report that they can walk into the police station with. It’s more…” She waved her hand. “It’s vague. They’re not really sure what they
know
, you know. They just know what they think they saw and heard. And it’s all kind of mixed up.”
    I rolled my eyes.
What they think they saw and heard
. It wasn’t every day that a neighbor was killed in his kitchen, especially in a small town like Pecan Springs. Larry’s death was likely to be the subject of dozens of wild stories flying around the neighborhood. Somebody had seen a mysterious male visitor in the dead of night. Another person had noticed an unfamiliar car parked down the block. The lady