A Second Helping of Murder and Recipes: A Hot Dish Heaven Mystery by Jeanne Cooney Page A

out while the gettin’ is still good.” I think my eyes were glazing over. It was way too much information to process at one time. Besides, that flitting thing was hypnotizing.
    “Anyways,” she said, “what I was gonna tell ya was that Dinky went over to the city office this past Tuesday afternoon, after he got done in the field. And before he even got to the door, he heard Raleigh Cummin’s arguin’ with Janice.”
    She again paused to provide me clarification. But this time she spoke a little faster, apparently suspicious of my attention span. “Janice Ferguson’s our city clerk. Has been for some time. Does a darn good job too. Knows how every dime is spent. And what more could ya ask?” She didn’t wait for an answer. Then again, she probably didn’t expect one. “On the flip side, she can be a real pain in the keester. She’s set in her ways. More stubborn than hammered iron, as William Shakespeare said.”
    “Pssssh.” Coffee spewed from my mouth and squirted out my nose.
    Barbie threw her head back and let go of a guffaw.
    Margie stiffened her spine, set her shoulders, and with a righteous amount of indignation, demanded, “Now what in the dickens is so funny about that?” She glared, first at Barbie, then at me. “I may be a small-town café owner, but I can read.”
    I yanked a napkin from the dispenser in front of me and tended to my face. “I’m sorry, Margie. It just seemed out of character. I didn’t know you were fond of Shakespeare. You don’t seem the type.”
    “Well,” Margie huffed, tugging on her tee-shirt, “that’ll teach ya not to pigeonhole people.” She stepped toward the cash register, grabbed the tube of Chapstick tucked alongside it, and outlined her thin cracked lips. “Durin’ the last couple months, I’ve been tryin’ to broaden my horizons. And not just in the kitchen.” She replaced the cover and returned the tube to its resting place.
    I felt terrible. Hurting Margie was the last thing I wanted to do. “Margie, I’m truly sorry.”
    She brushed aside my words and hopefully her anger. “Anyways, Dinky said . . .” She let her voice trail off as she peered at me with one eye, the other tightly closed. “I think ya met Dinky and his brother, Biggie, when ya were here last.”
    While never formally introduced, I remembered them as the guys who had driven an old tractor to town. They’d lost their driver’s licenses due to excessive DWIs. But since a license wasn’t required to operate farm machinery, they didn’t seem concerned.
    I suspected their carefree attitude ran in the family. Grandpa Donaldson, who was pushing ninety, if not dragging it behind him, recklessly drove a golf cart all over town, refusing to listen to anyone who urged him to hang up his keys. During my last visit, I’d spotted the cart in his front yard, the front end leaning into a hedge, the rear wheels hanging on a garden timber. A bumper sticker plastered on the back read, “If you don’t like my driving, stay the hell off the sidewalk.”
    “Anyways,” Margie said, “Dinky was comin’ in to ask Janice about gettin’ a delay in tearin’ down that shed he owns on the southeast end of town there. It got condemned by the city, and rightfully so. But, of course, Dinky wasn’t thrilled about spendin’ the money to demolish it. See, those Donaldson boys are tight unless they’re playin’ poker or buyin’ booze. Yah, they’re worth millions. Still, for the most part, when either one takes a five-dollar bill out of his wallet, Lincoln is temporarily blinded by the light.”
    Margie snickered while picking up her coffee cup, only to set it right back down again. “Anyways,” she said for the umpteenth time, “Dinky told me that Janice and Raleigh were goin’ on about garbage bags, if ya can imagine that. See, Raleigh was stayin’ in the house his cousin Harvey had been rentin’ here in town before his heart attack.
    “Now I’m not sure if Raleigh didn’t know ya had