Part 3 (1/2)

”Frame him for the shooting,” Lula said.

”Exactly. So they hustle over with the moving van Biggy always keeps in his yard, not knowing two people have already seen Sam in the abandoned house, load Sam onto the hand truck, park him and the van in a place with foot traffic and plant the gun in Biggy's closet. Or maybe they don't even have to plant the gun. Maybe Biggy took the gun home with him.”

”I think this is all a load of c.o.c.kydoody,” Lula said.

”I saw something like this in a movie,” Grandma said. ”On that Turner Cla.s.sics station. I'm pretty sure it was Abbott and Costello.”

”I'll tell you when I got this brainstorm,” I said. ”It was when Grandma fired off that first shot at Biggy and got knocked off her seat. The first time I fired a forty-five I had it too close to my face and the kick mocked the barrel into my forehead. I still have the scar.”

”That little white mark?” Lula took a closer look. ”Uh-oh, right in the same spot as Lucille's goose egg.”

”Yes! And I bet the police can find trace evidence over Lucille's den.”

”You mean you think there might be some left after she shampooed her rug?” Lula asked.

I'd been so excited about my brilliant deduction I'd forgotten about the rug shampooer.

”No self-respecting burg housewife would leave brain gunk on her walls and floors,” Grandma said. ”We keep our houses clean. Not like in some of them other neighborhoods.”

This was bizarre but true.

”You think we have to tell the cops about your Lucille idea?” Grandma asked.

”It would be the right thing to do,” I said.

”Yeah,” Lula said. ”And we always do the right thing. On the other hand, Biggy Zaremba is a real jerk. I don't like men who beat up on women.”

”And kids.”

I could feel Lula stiffen next to me. ”He beat on his kids?”

”That's what people tell me.”

”A man like that should be locked up.”

”You could be wrong about Lucille,” Grandma said to me. ”You don't have any proof.”

That was true. I could be wrong. But I didn't think so. Biggy had gone unglued when he saw me in the alley. And he said things he should have kept to himself. Like, how he'd done someone a favor, and how I'd been the one to transfer Sam from the house to the van. Biggy wasn't clever enough to orchestrate a scene like that for his own benefit. Biggy wasn't the killer. Biggy was an accomplice.

”Not only that, but you go telling the cops this theory about Lucille it's gonna take all the fun out of it for them,” Lula said. ”Homicide won't get no satisfaction if you don't let them figure this for themselves.”

Jeez, I wouldn't want to ruin it for homicide.