Did Lucy Bedford Have to Die?

By MaryJo Dawson

When Sally is approached by a co-worker, who is terrified that her sister may be involved in a murder, her fifth adventure begins.
Did Valerie Connor’s boyfriend kill his aunt because she refused to lend him money? Was Valerie herself involved?
As always, Sally can count on her friends Anne Carey and George Thomas for assistance. Their search for answers will send them to northern Illinois, Chicago, and rural Wisconsin and Iowa. The more they discover, the harder it is to believe anyone would have a reason to kill Lucy Bedford.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Elderberry Press
• Release date: Jul 18, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311127976

MaryJo Dawson

MaryJo Dawson had a long and satisfying career as a nurse, most of it specialized in Obstetrics. She's lived in several states and one country abroad, but has settled happily in a small town in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains with her husband, Bill.Always a lover of mysteries, biographies, and history, but especially fond of the British mystery authors of the mid-twentieth century, she set out to write a mystery series of her own using these as her role models. There are currently five Sally Nimitz mysteries in print, the latest released in June of 2015. The books reflect the author's own enjoyment of a good story based in solid values, yet realistic, and fun.When not pondering a new adventure for Sally, there is time for family, friends, flowers, hikes, and the used bookstore.

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Did Lucy Bedford Have to Die?

By MaryJo Dawson

Copyright © 2015 MaryJo Dawson

Published in ebook form by Elderberry Press

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

This book is written in American English, so there maybe some differences in spelling to other international forms of English.

This book is a work of fiction and all characters are fictitious or are portrayed fictitiously.

Published in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty One

Chapter Twenty Two

Chapter Twenty Three

Chapter Twenty Four

Chapter Twenty Five

Chapter Twenty Six

Chapter Twenty Seven

About the Author

Other books by MaryJo Dawson

Acknowledgements

Cover design by:

Bill Dawson

Consultants:

Carole Sawada

Jeffrey Norton

Prologue

It was late March when four of my co-workers and I went to Indianapolis to attend a two and a half day seminar on high-risk obstetrics and advanced fetal monitoring. As nursing pro-fessionals we all had to provide proof of continuing education when we renewed our licenses. These were two areas of expertise those of us who worked in labor and delivery could always use updates on, and Indianapolis was only a few hours away. Marsha offered the use of her large van and we all drove up together.

It was a worthwhile experience over all, although one of the main speakers was very disappointing, and we didn’t enjoy our free time exploring the downtown area so much because of cold temperatures and a biting wind. Still, five women who have their careers in common can always make conversation and find ways to enjoy their free time, which we did.

But there was one occurrence that stood out, and the brief event came back to my mind very clearly several weeks later.

Friday—our last morning with one class to go—we had a long break in order to finalize our checkout from the hotel. Since I managed to choose the longest line at the counter my companions had all disappeared by the time I finished. A small room had been put at the disposal of the conference attendees as a safe place to put our luggage until departure.

While adding my own suitcase to the belongings of my friends, I passed an alcove where two women were engaged in a heated discussion. One of the voices sounded familiar and unconsciously drew my attention. It was Lois, one of our group. Her companion was much younger than she, and a stranger to me. Normally they would have noticed me as I paused, but they were too involved with each other, and not in a pleasant way. The younger woman was in a rage, and just at that moment she spewed forth an intense bit of profanity. Lois was glaring back at her. I hurried on my way.

The odd event was intensified by Lois’ further behavior. She did not reappear at the morning class at all. Everyone noticed, of course, but I didn’t volunteer what I had seen, fully expecting Lois to tell us all about it on the way home. But she brushed off inquiries as to where she had been with a vague explanation, and acted as if the encounter had never occurred.

MaryJo Dawson

Did Lucy Bedford Have to Die?

(Fifth Sally Nimitz Mystery)

Chapter One

Life was pleasant and predictable as summer approached. My two children were happily married and leading busy, rewarding lives. My daughter in Massachusetts was four months pregnant, which would bring the total number of grandchildren up to five. Danelle was also a stepmother to the two children by her husband’s first marriage, a boy and a girl, who seemed to like her very much. My son and his wife were the proud parents of two little boys, ages six and seven months.

Our family had weathered some tragedies within the past four years, including the sudden death of my beloved husband in a freak accident. We all still missed Michael, but it is true; time does a lot of healing.

I have a wonderful family, a good career, and good friends. There is no crisis looming and plenty to keep me busy. So why is there this underlying sense of restless discontent?

On a free afternoon, I went for a four-mile power walk in a place secluded enough to talk to myself out loud and analyze the situation. My conclusion was this was a normal behavior pattern. It happens; even the happiest of people are looking for something new or exciting from time to time. The reason this feeling hadn’t popped up for so long was because my life had been full of so many variations over the years.

Plus, Sally, I said conversationally, you have to admit, since Mrs. Marsh died three years ago in September, this is the first time you’ve had such a long stretch of time before finding yourself involved in somebody else’s problems. That has put some additional spice in life. The thing is to admit you feel this way and weather it out, or find a healthy way to deal with it.

Who needed expensive psychoanalysis? I supposed people who engaged in disastrous behavior—such as marrying a guy six days after meeting him on a cruise—were suffering from this malady. Certainly there had to be more constructive antidotes, ones with the potential for less harmful long-term effects.

Over the next two days several remedies came to mind, but they were never implemented. There was no need. On Saturday afternoon Lois called to ask if we could meet privately, and she sounded close to panic.

Lois Johnson and I were not close friends; it would be more accurate to call us work associates. When our shoulders rubbed in line with our careers we always got along fine. Now she had a crisis and wanted to see me, and the only conclusion to draw from that was she knew about my trouble-shooting in the past.

I’m sorry, this is short notice, but can we get together yet today? she asked, trying to sound like her normal self but making a poor job of it.

I’m free. It sounds like you need privacy. Do you know where I live?

She had a general idea and was given my street name and house number.

If I leave now I can be there in thirty minutes. Is that all right?

Her extended cab pick-up truck pulled into the parking space in front of my garage with a couple of minutes to spare, and I met her at the door. She slipped inside without even a hello and looked around in a manner that suggested she wanted to make certain we were alone, although she knew I lived by myself.

Dining area table? I suggested. Or we can stay in here if you’d be more comfortable.

I waved a hand around my living room.

She followed me into the kitchen.

I made some coffee and I can put the tea kettle on. You’re obviously upset; maybe something to drink will help while you tell me what this is all about.

She hesitated as though making even this simple choice was overwhelming.

You like herbal tea, don’t you? I’ll heat the water.

No argument. She was like a child who somehow found where they needed to be and once there didn’t know how to proceed. It was pitiful to see a woman who was normally well grounded and stable reduced to this.

Take a seat, I said gently, as Lois continued to stand next to the table while I found my tea bags and set them out. She obeyed.

We said nothing more until the water boiled; a long five minutes. But it gave her time to collect her dignity and her thoughts. From my vantage point at the stove I silently scrutinized my nervous guest. Her long, graying brown hair was pulled back with a barrette and hung down her back, as it always did. Lois was not interested in fashion, favoring blue jeans and blouses as her typical attire. On a warm day the blouses were short-sleeved or sleeveless, and the jeans might give way to a pair of denim shorts. She was attractive in an uncomplicated way, with clear skin not yet heavily lined, and nice features. Except for the wedding of a co-worker, I never saw her wear obvious make-up. I knew she loved the country life on the five acres she shared with her husband, two teenagers, and a variety of livestock and fruit trees.

Not until I set the mug of hot water in front of her and she absently chose a tea bag and began to steep it did I start to probe.

What’s this all about, Lois? Is your family all right?

Oh, yes. But she had to amend even those two words. That is, Paul and the kids are. She took a deep breath and added, The trouble is about my sister, Valerie, my kid sister.

She got off to a jerky start, trying to explain the event that had driven her to my door, how her sister got involved, and a history of her own troubles with Valerie, mixing everything up. Eventually we untangled it all, including the background, which I insisted was necessary for me to understand the whole issue.

Lois and Valerie were from western Ohio, two of seven children. Essentially it was a happy, middle class existence, with a big house in the small town where her father was an attorney successful enough to support the large family. There were three girls and four boys, and Valerie was the youngest child.

Twelve years younger than the rest of us, Lois said glumly. My mother was over forty and thought the diapers were done.

Where do you fit into the line-up? I asked.

Number five. My younger brother, Chad, lives in Washington, and his idea of keeping in touch is calling my mother on Sunday every few weeks. He hasn’t been back east in years and likes to keep his distance. That leaves me to deal with Valerie.

Lois explained that since her older sister and brothers were in their late teens or older by the time this last baby was born they didn’t know her very well, and as time passed the family drifted apart.

Dad was crazy about Val and spoiled her rotten. She was a pretty little thing, and hard for any of us to say no to. Mom was much stricter with the rest of us, but she seemed to have run out of the energy to keep Val in line.

It was a common story; spoiled youngest or later children were not a rarity.

Dad died suddenly of a heart attack when he was sixty-two. He just keeled over, and that was it. That was a turning point; the last time the whole family was together. It took my mother years to adjust to living without him. Val was sixteen when it happened, and she didn’t want to answer to anybody after that. When she started getting into trouble two of my brothers still lived nearby and they tried to take her in hand, but she wasn’t having any of it. I’m sure they did it for Mom’s sake, but they gave up after awhile.

When she was asked to clarify, Lois said her younger sister’s early ‘trouble’ was the usual sort of thing; skipping school with a subsequent dropping of her grades, staying out late at night, getting caught drinking under age. In spite of her behavior and lack of enthusiasm for learning, Valerie was smart and still managed to graduate from high school. With no interest in a higher education—and according to Lois’ recollections not much interest in anything other than enjoying herself—the youngest sibling got a job at a local furniture factory simply to have the funds to party on her off hours.

Valerie’s anxious mother hoped she would grow bored with this pointless lifestyle and eventually look for some worthwhile goal in life. It didn’t happen. In fact, things got worse. Over the next three years Valerie established a pattern of moving out, perhaps taking up with a new boyfriend, and when that didn’t work out moving back home. Twice she was away for months, once to California. This cycle went on for a while, but the moves back in with her mother got shorter and shorter when Valerie reneged on promises to get another job and help out with expenses. After over four years of widowhood Barbara Connor was finding her way, and a deadbeat daughter who came home drunk at all hours and expected to be waited on hand and foot wasn’t going to be a part of it.

Mom met someone, Lois explained. He’s a nice man. They knew each other when they were kids, and he moved back to Ohio when he retired because he owns land there. We were all glad, except for Val, of course. He backed my mother up when she told Val to keep a job and straighten up her act or she was out for good.

How old is your sister now?

She’s twenty-three.

So I can assume in the years that bring us up to the present your sister hasn’t grown up yet?

The answer was no surprise, because that scene in the hotel lobby in March had already come back to my mind. An obvious choice for the angry young woman who was with Lois that day was her younger sister.

No. Well, Lois amended, after a sip of her cooling tea, it looked like she might be, about six months ago. Val has been staying with friends in the Chicago area. She enrolled in some night classes and had a job. My mom called to tell me, really hopeful things were going to change.

Due to these encouraging developments, her mother lent her youngest child the tuition for her courses. Further communication between them was vague, but everyone thought Valerie was in school and working. Then she showed up in Indianapolis.

There I was, standing in the lobby, and she walked right up to me, Lois recalled. To say it was a surprise is an understatement. We hadn’t seen each other in years. She got my phone number at home and talked to Paul, telling him she had to see me, and he told her where I was.

Her blue eyes clouded at the unpleasant memory. It was the old Valerie and the same old story. She had to have money. She met a guy from Great Lakes Naval Station in Waukegan, somebody special, she said, not like her old boyfriends. But there was a problem and he needed cash. She couldn’t explain, but if I’d do this for her she promised to pay me back and never ask again.

Not too surprisingly Lois said no. Valerie was furious, and after being unsuccessful in changing her big sister’s mind she stormed out of the hotel. Lois heard nothing more—until now. And the news was very bad.

That boyfriend is being charged with murdering his aunt, Sally, Lois said quietly, clutching her cup. And my sister might be mixed up in it.

Chapter Two

The tears so close to the surface spilled over with those words; big sobs and plenty of water. I provided the tissues and encouraged her to cry it out.

Eventually it was time to say gently, Why did you come to me with this?

Because Emma Schultz told me how you helped her out, and she said that wasn’t the first time you helped somebody, that even a police officer around here came to you a couple of years ago, Lois managed to say between gulps of air as her crying tapered off.

I suppressed my curiosity as to why she was talking to Emma about this since it was so confidential. The two of them were not close friends. But Lois volunteered the information. The previous evening Emma put in a few extra hours at the hospital and Lois helped out in the busy nursery; something she rarely did.

I was a wreck and maybe I shouldn’t have gone to work at all, but what could I do sitting at home? Emma saw I was down, and one thing led to another until she found out the basic trouble, that my sister is in a mess, and could be arrested. That’s all I told her, and she said you were good at ‘finding out things’. Are you?

Yes. Sometimes. But I don’t know if this is one of those times. What else can you tell me?

Lois was able to tell me quite a lot, although some of it was not specific, only hearsay and possibilities, and all of it second hand from three telephone conversations: one with her mother, one with an investigator at the Naval station, and one with Valerie herself. My guest was calmer and doing better with her narrative.

There might be something to the soothing effect reputation of peppermint tea.

Six days earlier—on Sunday—a woman named Lucy Bedford was found shot to death in her home. Lucy was the aunt of Clifford Bedford, Valerie’s current boyfriend, an enlisted man stationed at Great Lakes Naval Training Station. The deceased had never married, lived alone, and died sometime the night before her body was found. It was at least a three-hour drive from Great Lakes to Miss Bedford’s residence in a small town in southwestern Wisconsin, and by Monday the investigating officers at the scene knew Clifford had visited his Aunt Lucy on Saturday. They promptly notified Naval Criminal Investigative Service, who promptly interviewed the nephew of the deceased. Within twenty-four hours the nephew was detained.

One more specific fact was that Valerie had already been questioned concerning the murder. She denied being with her boyfriend that weekend, and although her whereabouts could not be verified, no one saw her in the vicinity of the crime, either. The investigator who showed up at Valerie’s door to talk to her strongly insinuated the only reason Clifford’s girlfriend was not in jail was because they didn’t have enough proof to put here there—not yet.

Lois’ younger sister did what she always did when she was backed up against a wall; she got up with her mother, who in turn went to Lois.

Val is usually a tough nut, but this has her pretty rattled. Mom says she was hysterical over the phone with her on Thursday night, and she wasn’t doing much better yesterday. She insists the boyfriend didn’t kill his aunt; he could never do such a terrible thing.

I can hardly believe the authorities arrested him because he happened to be in town the day his aunt died, I commented. Do you know any more about that?

Apparently the gun used to kill her was registered to this guy. Mom told me that. She also thinks he went to see his aunt to borrow money.

But your sister didn’t volunteer any of this to you?

Upon recollection, Lois said the phone conversation with Valerie on Friday had been pretty one-sided.

I only talked to her because Mom begged me to. There didn’t seem to be much point, since we don’t have good communication at any time. And I was right. For about fifteen minutes she cried and cussed and went on about now that maybe things were finally coming together for her, why did this have to happen? Then she actually had the nerve to say if I had only lent her the money when she asked me, none of this would have happened. I didn’t even go there.

Did you ask her where she was last weekend?

Lois asked the question but she had never gotten an answer.

Not long after talking to Valerie Lois’ phone rang again, and this time it was a federal investigative agent from the Navy base. She wanted to know two things; did Lois know Curtis Bedford, and when had she seen her sister last?

The answers had been freely and honestly given, but Lois admitted she did not volunteer the specifics about the March meeting in the hotel lobby, giving the impression it was a chance encounter.

Do you think your sister is involved in this? It was time to ask this crucial and obvious question. I added a couple more. You’ve never met this guy, but what about your mother? And what does she think?

Lois put her head in her hands and stared down at the table in front of her. She raised it again to look at me and answer me, shaking her head. I honestly don’t know if Val is guilty or not. That’s the worst part of this whole thing. Has she sunk that low? She’s self-centered and spoiled, but being a party to killing somebody? As a worst case scenario I’m inclined to think she’s fallen for a guy with a dark side she hasn’t seen, and won’t believe he did it.

And your mom? I reminded gently.

She’s as mixed up as I am. She hasn’t met this guy, so we don’t have anything to go on there except past experience, which is that my sister’s choice of men hasn’t been too impressive before. Poor Mom. She doesn’t deserve this. Pete, that’s her friend, wants to marry her, and now having to deal with this… The sentence went unfinished.

Unasked, I put some more hot water in