Page 59 of Little Last Words

“Well, no.”

“Then how do you know it’s a man and not a woman?”

“I’m guessing it’s a man. I see shadows flickering behind the kitchen curtain.”

“Wait a minute,” I said. “Did you see an actual person, or are you just seeing shadows?”

She exhaled a deep, long sigh. “What does it matter? Someone is in there.”

I wondered why she had called me and not the police, not that I was complaining. It had been a fortunate day so far, a day of discovery, and I hoped my luck would continue.

“Sit tight, Rita,” I said. “I’m on my way.”

CHAPTER23

Ireached Penelope’s house in minutes, surprised to find the door unlocked when I tried the knob. I slipped inside the house and stood for a moment, listening. All was quiet, and I detected no movement of any kind at first. As I walked toward the kitchen, I heard what sounded like pots and pans being shuffled around. Ready to face the intruder, I rounded the corner, almost busting out in laughter when the ‘man’ Rita thought she’d seen turned out to be an elderly woman. At present, said woman was hunched over, riffling through the kitchen cabinets.

“Excuse me,” I said. “You’re trespassing.”

Startled, the woman jumped up, turning around to face me.

“I know you,” she said. “You’re the private eye, the one everyone in the neighborhood is talking about.”

I recognized the woman. I’d seen her the day I’d discovered Penelope’s dead body. The woman was one of the group of neighbors who’d been all huddled up and staring at the crime scene, curious to find out what was going on at the house.

“What are you doing here?” I asked.

She moved a hand to her hip. “If you must know, a couple of days before Penelope died, I brought her over a casserole. I’d been away when she moved in, and I wanted to … you know, to welcome her to the neighborhood. She never gave my dish back.”

“Hard to give a dish back when you’re dead.”

“It’s still my dish. And like you said, she’s dead, so she hasn’t any use for it.”

“And you thought you’d come over and look for it,” I said.

“What if I did? No one’s here, and the dish belongs to me.”

“This is an active crime scene. You can’t be here.”

She looked around. “It sure doesn’t look active.”

I was irritated.

I had a full agenda planned for the day. Wasting my time with a woman desperate to get her casserole dish back was the last thing I wanted to be doing right now.

“I’m Polly, by the way,” she said. “I live four houses over. I’m a widower. My husband died a few years back.”

“I’m—”

“I know who you are. You’re Georgiana Germaine. You live at the top of the street with that handsome Italian gentleman.”

She knew my name and which house I lived in, and yet,Ihad never been offered a casserole. For whatever reason, I’d been casserole denied.

“Your neighbor Rita called me,” I said. “She thought someone had broken into Penelope’s house.”

Polly shook her head. “Why does Rita need to have her nose in everything? I’ll never understand.”

“I take it you’re not friends?”