Live and Let Pie Page 16

  Our office hadn’t changed in the renovation. We didn’t need much space for paperwork and both Mom and I agreed that any square footage we would be gaining should go to the pastry counter and espresso bar. The office was cozy with a small desk, filing cabinet, and a whiteboard with ordering information and staff schedules.

  I logged onto my laptop and pulled up the flyer from the last Sunday Supper to use as a template. It didn’t take long to update it with the new menu. Once I had made the changes I hit print. To kill time while I was waiting for the flyers to print, I decided to see what information I could find online about George Mill.

  A quick search returned dozens of articles about his disappearance. Police reports from the sixties surmised that George had opted to “go down with the ship” so to speak. Or in this case, submerge himself under lake waters. I read up on the Mill family. Interestingly none of George’s three sisters had ever married. Two of his older sisters moved to Eastern Oregon after Emigrant Lake flooded their homestead. They lived out their later years on a cattle farm. Each of them died of natural causes within a few years of one another. The Mill family trust had amassed acreage throughout the Rogue Valley. I read up on the family’s preservation efforts. After losing their homestead to the lake waters, they had carved out a policy of purchasing fertile farmland and wild acreage on the edge of the national forest to leave it untouched. I was impressed with their legacy.

  I hit a dead end when it came to finding out more information about George’s youngest sister, Anna. She had stayed in the Rogue Valley after George’s disappearance. She worked as a teacher at an elementary school. I discovered a small article about her starting a farm school in the Applegate Valley in the 1970s but there was nothing after that. She could still be living. I did the math—she would be in her late seventies or early eighties today.

  A new sense of urgency pulsed through me. What if I could find Anna Mill? She might hold the key to George’s unsolved death. What if she knew who killed him? She was probably the only living person who knew if Edgar had been involved.

  Did the Professor and Thomas know about Anna?

  I didn’t wait. I found my phone and called Thomas.

  He answered on the second ring. “Hey, Jules. This time you had better be calling to tell me that you have a pastry emergency and need a taste tester stat! You know, I should add that to our app.”

  I heard someone in the background. I assumed it was Detective Kerry.

  “She’s not feeling me on this one, Jules. Back me up,” Thomas continued. “Pastry 911, this is Torte speaking, what’s your emergency?”

  “Classic, Thomas.”

  “I’m outnumbered, aren’t I?”

  “This time, I’m with Detective Kerry.”

  “Women,” he muttered. “Fine. If you’re not calling about pastry, what can I do for you?”

  I told him about Anna Mill.

  “Thanks for the intel, Jules, but we’ve already followed up on that lead.”

  “Did you find her?”

  “Anna? Yeah. She has a small farm out in the Applegate.”

  “Does she remember anything about George’s death?”

  “She remembers everything. Sharp as a tack. Detective Kerry and I said that we hope our memory is that strong when we’re her age. But she’s feisty. I wouldn’t want to be on her bad side, that’s for sure.”

  “Did she tell you anything that would help with the case?”

  I heard Detective Kerry in the background again.

  “You know I can’t share details of an open investigation with you, Jules. Sorry.” I could hear the regret in Thomas’s voice and wondered if he would have been more forthcoming if Detective Kerry weren’t standing right next to him.

  After we hung up, I placed another call. This time to Lance. If Thomas wouldn’t tell me more about Anna Mill, I knew that Lance would be game to take an afternoon drive out to the Applegate Valley with me. Lance agreed before I could finish my sentence.

  “Be there in thirty minutes, darling. Must have a brief tête-à-tête with my lighting director. For some reason he keeps insisting on floodlights when I want a soft, easy touch. After that I’m yours. All yours. Ta-ta.”

  I knew that Lance and I should leave the investigation to Thomas and the Professor, but I also knew I couldn’t let it go.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Lance and I drove through the lush Applegate Valley past vineyards and lavender farms. Horses and llamas ran free on acre upon acre of grassy organic land. The sun backlit the forested mountains that stretched to our left, casting filtered golden light through their sturdy branches.

  “There’s nothing as ambrosial as a slow drive through the countryside,” Lance commented as we breezed past a father and son fishing in a stream. “It’s as if we’ve stepped into a postcard.”

  “It’s true,” I agreed. “This area still feels untouched by time.”

  “Well said.” Lance gazed out the window.

  The Applegate loop took us through a scattering of tiny towns. Most consisted of nothing more than a gas station, small grocery store, and the occasional bar. Anna Mill’s town resembled the dozens we had passed, with one exception. In the center of Main Street sat a statue of a wooden covered wagon. A sign hanging next to it read: “In Honor of the Mill Family Who Brought Their Pioneering Spirit to the Applegate.”

  “Did you see that?” I asked Lance.

  He gazed out the window. “Yes. Very intriguing. Does this mean that Ms. Mill established this town?”

  “I don’t know. I guess we’ll have to add that to our list of questions for her.”

  Lance steered the car off the main road and followed the directions on my GPS. They took us to a bumpy gravel road with huge potholes.

  “Buckle up, it’s going to be a rough ride.” Lance tugged at his seat belt.

  The road hadn’t been maintained. I held on to the side of the passenger door. We nearly bottomed out twice. Somehow Lance managed to navigate over the rocky terrain and deliver us safely to Anna’s front door. The house needed some serious TLC. It was a one-story bungalow with a wraparound front porch. In its heyday it was probably a lovely family home, but from the looks of the boarded-up windows, moss-caked roof, and weeds growing up between the porch slats, it hadn’t been loved in years. The white paint was chipped and cracked. The porch looked as if it was sinking.

  “Do you think anyone’s living here?” I asked Lance. “It’s in bad shape.”

  “Only one way to find out.” He opened the car door, reached into the backseat, and tossed me a camera.

  “What’s this?”

  “A prop.” He made a beeline for the porch.

  “Be careful,” I called, hurrying after him. “That porch looks like it’s about to collapse.”

  Lance held on to a wobbly railing and placed a toe on the first rotted step. He shifted his weight. “Seems okay.”

  I watched him move with purpose. He reminded me of one his actors prancing on stage.

  “She’ll hold. Move slow,” he said when he made it to the top.

  I mimicked his footsteps, waiting for one of my feet to break through slippery, moss-coated steps at any minute.

  “If Anna is living here, it’s no wonder that she’s a recluse. She has to be,” Lance said, stepping over a broken board to knock on the front door.

  We waited in silence. There was no sound of shuffling footsteps.

  “I’ll knock again,” Lance said after a few minutes. This time he pounded on the door.

  “Are you trying to terrify her?”

  He wiggled his earlobe. “Aging ears. Maybe she can’t hear.”

  We waited again. I was ready to give up and head to the car when Lance pressed his fingers to his lips. “Shhh. Do you hear that?”

  “Hear what?” I cupped my hand over my ear.

  “A creaky floorboard. I’m sure that someone is in there.” He raised his arm to knock again when the door swung open.

  I wasn’t sure what I
had been expecting Anna to look like, but the woman on the other side of the door didn’t match the image I had conjured up in my mind. She was stout and stocky with wiry gray curls. I suppose I had envisioned a frail older woman, but Anna was the opposite. She wore a pair of steel-toed work boots, a pair of jeans, and a bulky sweatshirt that had a map of the state of Oregon in the center with a silhouette of a gun and the word ORY-GUN.

  “I see you understand the correct pronunciation of our great state,” Lance commented.

  Anna bent her head toward her sweatshirt. “I understand how to use a gun and I’m about to go get my rifle if you don’t move on off my property.”

  Lance swept his hand across the dilapidated deck with a flourish. “Oh dear, no, no. There’s no need to get your gun. Although I must say I could cast you in Annie Get Your Gun in a heartbeat. You were made for the role.”

  Anna looked at Lance as if he was speaking a foreign language.

  Lance took no notice. “Now, as I was saying, my colleague the lovely Juliet Montague Capshaw and I are here on important business.”

  Anna folded her arms across her chest.

  “You might recognize me from the newspapers,” Lance continued.

  “I don’t read the newspapers anymore.” Anna’s voice had a twangy quality to it. “Nothing good in them.”

  “Ah, well, that explains the confusion.” Lance gave me a nod. “You see, I am the artistic director at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and Juliet is my literary consultant.”

  Literary consultant? Where was Lance going with this?

  He stood as rigid as one of the queen’s guards. I might have believed he was royalty in his formfitting black suit, crisp white shirt, and skinny black tie. “The festival is working on a living history of the Applegate Valley and its founding members for an upcoming production in partnership with Southern Oregon University. I’ve been told again and again that I absolutely must speak with Ms. Mill. Apparently you’re a legend around these parts.”

  If Anna had had any qualms about our intentions before, now her armor was definitely up. She stared from Lance and then to me out of the corner of her dark eyes. My estimates had placed her in her early eighties, but she could have easily passed for seventy.

  “You want to know about this dump?”

  Lance smiled broadly in an attempt to pacify her. “A dump? However could you say such a thing? Rustic, yes, but a dump, hardly.”

  Anna humphed.

  “As I was saying, we’re trying something entirely new next season—we’re calling this revolutionary experience ‘live history.’ We’ll have displays, historical relics, and hopefully people—not actors—regular people like yourself and your parents and grandparents, who’ve lived through the incredible changes in the valley. The railroad development, the flooding of Emigrant Lake. We need living legends like yourself to share your valuable knowledge and history.”

  Anna flinched.

  Lance shifted tactics. “There will be compensation involved of course.”

  “What kind of compensation?”

  Lance whispered a number in her ear. “That will be for our time today. Juliet and I will take photographs of everything inside your house, with your permission, of course. If you have a few minutes to spare we’ll ask you a few questions today and then I’ll have you come to the theater and we’ll shoot an in-depth live interview that will be aired later. If you’re so inclined you can be one of the living members at the event next spring, or we can simply roll the video that we shoot of your family’s personal journey to the west.”

  I could tell that Anna was swayed by Lance’s offer. She uncrossed her arms. The tight muscles in her neck relaxed. I had to credit Lance for his quick thinking. Compensation in exchange for snooping around her house.

  “What’s this live theater you’re talkin’ about? I don’t need a bunch of people sniffin’ around here.”

  “I assure you we will conduct ourselves with the utmost professionalism. If there’s anything you don’t want us to take photos of, please do let us know.”

  “How long is this gonna take?”

  “Not more than an hour or two.”

  “Okay, but be quick about it. I’ve got beans cannin’ and need to get back to the stove.”

  “Of course. You do whatever you need. We’ll snap photos of the house and property and stay out of your way. Just holler when you’re ready for us and we’ll go over a few preliminary interview questions.” Lance’s typically polished voice had a hint of a twang as he spoke to Anna.

  She returned inside with a skeptical glance at me.

  “Were you planning that the entire time?” I whispered.

  Lance shook his head. “No. I let the moment guide me, and it worked.” His smile was like that of a cougar about to pounce on its prey.

  “How are we going to ask her about George though?”

  “Follow my lead, darling. We’ll dig around as much as we can first, and buy ourselves some time to craft Plan B. Why didn’t we bring pastries?” He shook his head in disgust. “A terrible oversight on both our parts, but wallowing will get us nowhere. Let’s get on with it, shall we?”

  I wasn’t sure what I had gotten myself into, but there was no turning back now. I tagged along with Lance as he tiptoed over broken sections of the porch. Hopefully Anna wouldn’t catch on to our real motive. I had a bad feeling that she wouldn’t hesitate to turn her gun on us if she figured out the truth.

  Chapter Twenty

  “Lance, what are you doing?” I whispered as he pulled up a loose floorboard on the deck and peered underneath it.

  “Looking for bodies, of course.”

  “You think Anna has a body buried under her front porch?”

  He stood, brushed dust from his hands, and straightened his tie. “Isn’t that always where the bodies are hidden?”

  “What?”

  He rolled his eyes. “Really, darling. You have much to learn when it comes to the world of murder.”

  “Wait. How did we go from trying to learn what we could about George from Anna to considering her to be a murderess? Not to mention who do you think she murdered? We already have two bodies. You think there’s another?”

  He scoffed. “You’re no fun sometimes.”

  “How? I’m asking a pretty basic question, and if there’s even the slightest chance that Anna is harboring a body under her front porch, then isn’t it the worst idea in the world to be drawing attention to that fact?”

  “Like I said, way to kill the fun.” Lance whipped his head toward the front door. “Am I allowed to venture inside, or is that off-limits too?” His tone was icy, but his eyes glinted with a devilish playfulness. “Shall we?”

  The door creaked like a scene from a horror movie. The rotting floorboards sagged with each step. This was a bad idea. Every cell in my body screamed to turn around. What were we doing?

  Anna had been less than welcoming. Lance’s excuse for our visit was flimsy at best, and most importantly, she had a gun. No one knew that we were here. What would stop her from shooting us and hiding our bodies under the porch?

  “It’s us!” Lance called in his singsong voice. “Juliet is going to shoot some pictures of your kitchen as long as we aren’t disturbing you.” He turned to me and whispered, “Get the camera ready.”

  Anna didn’t answer.

  An uneasy feeling made the tiny hairs on my arms stand at attention.

  The house smelled of beans and decades of neglect.

  Lance spoke in an exaggerated theatrical tone as he dragged me into the kitchen. “Don’t you absolutely love how quaint this kitchen is? Would it make for a wonderful tight shot?” While he spoke loudly for Anna’s benefit he motioned for me to open the drawers and cupboards.

  I shot him a look of confusion. What was I searching for in Anna’s kitchen? And where did she go? The pot of beans bubbled on the stove.

  “Oh, wonderful shot, Juliet. I adore that angle. It’s a slice of Americana, isn’t it?” He glare
d at me, making a sign to hurry up. I opened a couple of cupboards and drawers to find rusty old canned food, dusty silverware, and what appeared to be the remnants of a loaf of bread, although it was impossible to tell whether it was French or whole wheat from the layer of green mold consuming the crust.

  I fought back the urge to gag from the smell. How could Anna (or anyone) live like this?

  Lance continued talking at a volume that the neighbors a half mile away could probably hear. I wondered if Anna was buying his act.

  We moved into the dining room. It was in worse shape than the kitchen. Stacks and stacks of old newspapers, ripe with mildew, filled every square inch of the farm-style table and had been piled in the corners. Anna might not read newspapers anymore, but clearly at some point she had. Some of the stacks looked precarious, as if they might topple at any minute. That would make a good headline, I thought. Death by newspaper.

  “Give those a look-through,” Lance commanded in a hushed whisper.

  Where would I even start? There had to be decades’ worth of old newspapers in the room. Even if I could manage to take one from the stack without it falling on top of me, reading through them would take years.

  “We don’t even know what we’re looking for,” I shot back.

  “Clues. Remember? Clues.”

  I pointed to one stack that had to contain a month’s worth of daily papers. “A clue to what?”

  “George Mill’s disappearance.” Lance stared at me with expectant eyes. “Why someone decided to bash his head in.”

  “There are probably thousands of newspapers here. That would take forever.” I pointed to the adjoining office. “Let’s try in there.”

  He threw his hands up in exasperation. I ignored him and moved toward the office. It was more of the same from the dining room. Stacks of newspapers, yellowing magazines, books, and old letters. I’d never been inside a hoarder’s house, but I was sure that Anna’s would qualify. This was a lost cause. I doubted that Anna could locate anything in here. Lance and I could be at it for weeks and have nothing to show other than newsprint stains and the need to take a long, hot cleansing shower.