“I’m not a ghost, but maybe I can help?” Dot appeared in the doorway, looking blond and perky and secretarial.
“Not any more than Gracie, I guess. How’s your head this morning?” Eager for escape, Evie produced her feather duster and began cleaning the shelves of New Age gift items.
“I drank lots of water and took aspirin before I went to bed. Last night was more excitement than I’ve ever had in my life. Do you remember anything more about Clancy’s ghost?” Dot studied Mavis’s crystal ball. “Does this thing work?”
“Only for my mother. And Clancy left no more impression in death than he did in life. I wonder if one needs to actually live, instead of count dollars, to have a soul?”
“But you said he talked to you!” Dot studied the papers Evie had been complaining about, presumably to see if she could highlight and annotate. Probably not a good idea.
Abandoning the shelves, Evie shuffled the papers beneath the counter, while dusting off glitter and assorted accumulations from morning sales. “Keeping in mind that spirits really can’t talk the way we do, the best I can describe his spirit is startled, presumably by the intruder. Does anyone have a clue who could have trashed the office or what they might have been looking for?”
Dot shrugged her slim shoulders. “Whoever did it, knew the alarm code and had a key. The building was locked at five and we were there by nine. We could have walked in on them.”
“What about yesterday, when Clancy died? Couldn’t someone have walked in on him?” Evie figured she might as well learn what she could from some other source than R&R’s hacked files. “That was during the day, wasn’t it?”
Dot gave a slight shudder. “Midday, lunchtime. Your mother came in before noon and talked to the clerk about the election. At noon, everyone but Clancy and whoever was manning the reception desk left. I’m on reception today, so I left early for lunch. I don’t know who had the rotation yesterday but whoever was supposed to be there apparently wasn’t. Maybe he sent her away. We all came back from lunch and there was Clancy. It was awful. Did his ghost say why he did it?”
“No, he was just angry about an intruder breaking into the computer. And then when he realized he was dead, he got even angrier and started heaving things. Isn’t there any chart showing who should have been guarding the door yesterday?” Evie thought leaving one person in charge of all those city hall files was pretty lax, but she supposed people locked their offices. She hoped.
Dot made a moue of distaste. “If she wasn’t sent away by Clancy, I don’t like spreading gossip. Let’s just say the calendar changed several times and maybe someone didn’t remember their turn had come up.”
“I suppose that can happen. Have you heard if anyone else has filed for mayor?” Without Clancy or Mavis, Miss Ward had a clear field.
“Everyone is whispering in the halls. They have less than two weeks to file, and you’d think Miss Ward was the devil. I heard Senator Swenson offered her his support, so that sounds as if she must be good.” Dot looked a little puzzled at that.
As she should be. Swenson had never come down on the side of women’s rights, much less transgender rights or anything remotely out of the narrow-minded norm. “I wonder why a California senator took an interest in a town as small as this? Does he know people here?”
Dot shrugged. “One of his sons has an office in Charleston. That’s where his father’s family is from. I guess they must have had an interest. Does Ward support Swenson, do you know?”
Evie was pretty certain the conservative senator was the absolute anathema to everything Ward stood for, but she knew nothing beyond auras and bubbles. It was her turn to shrug. “You know what they say, politics makes strange bedfellows.”
“Oh, well.” Dot seemed a little less perky. “Mr. Clancy always liked me because I kept the cat away. And maybe because I have big boobs. I’d kinda hoped if he made mayor, he might make me his secretary. I could use the raise, even if he was a tit squeezer.”
“The cat?” Evie pounced on this tidbit. “He didn’t like cats?”
“Allergic. He had an aunt with a houseful and almost went into anaphylactic shock once when he visited her as a kid.” Dot sighed.
Anaphylactic shock? Fromcatallergies? Was that possible? Evie needed to call her cousin Iddy.
Dot went on without noticing Evie’s distraction. “So much for buttering him up. Ward doesn’t know me at all. Maybe if I start wearing some of her designs she’d notice me?”
Evie remembered that Dot hadn’t grown up here. She didn’t know Ward’s background. “I think she’ll notice anyone who works hard. I’m not sure Clancy would have.”
Dot shouldered her purse and prepared to leave. “Maybe you should have your mother sign up for the election again. I thinkshelikes me.”
Mavis liked everyone, until she had reason not to. Evie waved Dot off and returned to glaring at the stack of papers Gracie had left her.
She was pretty certain the top sheet she’d been reading was missing.
Fifteen
Jax tookthem to lunch at the Oldies Café. Afterthought didn’t have a lot of restaurant choices, and he figured a kid would be happier here with lively music and cheeseburgers. Loretta ordered a greasy kid’s meal and bounced up and down on the bench seat. Evie had practically lived next door to the café all her life and wasn’t impressed with his choice. He couldn’t blame her. He should take her to dinner in Charleston or Savannah—but that would lead to the overnight debate neither of them was ready to have.
Responsibility sucked sometimes.
“I coordinated Reuben’s call to the mayor’s office with Helena.” Evie didn’t even look at the menu. She ordered a grilled cheese, then glanced up at a TV in the back of the room. “Helena said she thought she could talk the mayor’s secretary into rubber stamping approval for him to inspect the voting machines.”
“Living in a small town has advantages,” Jax conceded, ordering the hamburger and fries.