A Body in the Trunk : Myrtle Clover Book 12

Chapter Twelve

An hour later, Miles returned. He gave a cautious tap on the door.

"Come on in!" hollered Myrtle from deep in her house.

Miles opened the door and cautiously sniffed. He relaxed. There was no acrid smell of burning, which was a good sign.

"Everything all right?" he asked as he headed for the kitchen.

He glanced around wordlessly. There was spilled milk, several used mixing bowls and other containers, and an assortment of spoons and forks on the floor and counter. Shredded carrots were orange accents scattered about everywhere. Additionally, there were muddy footprints all over the place.

Myrtle was glowing with perspiration and looked cross. "This soup was a pain. And I kept dropping things. Call Puddin, would you, and ask her to come out here? I don't have the time or patience to clean this stuff up—I just want it gone."

Miles nodded and tentatively approached the mess. He picked up the nearly-empty milk container that was sitting on the kitchen table and peered at it. "Myrtle, this milk is expired."

She glared at him. "The 'best by' date is just a suggestion. It's the store's way of forcing you to go back in as often as possible. A scam!"

He delicately smelled the container. "It's sour. Did you use this milk in the soup recipe?"

"Naturally—that's why it's not in the fridge. And it's perfectly fine, Miles. It's an essential part of the recipe. It will simply give the soup a distinctive taste." Myrtle spoke between gritted teeth.

"No argument there," said Miles with a sigh. He cautiously approached the pot on the stove and peered inside. "It looks very thin, Myrtle. Did you add flour to it?"

Myrtle hesitated. "Good question. There was a lot going on during the middle of the recipe. Elaine and Jack finished in the yard and talked to me for a few minutes. Jack was so excited to help Elaine water the plants, but he apparently spent some unsupervised time jumping in a mud puddle and tracked it all through the house."

Miles looked around. "Well, I don't see any flour on the floor. There seems to be a sampling of all the other ingredients on the floor."

Myrtle scowled at the floor as if it were responsible for her kitchen malfunction. "Then I'll go ahead and add some now."

"But the soup isn't even steaming now!" said Miles

Miles gaped as she grabbed the flour from the cabinet and scooped out what looked like a half cup, vigorously stirring it into the lukewarm liquid. "There. Now, let's go. I don't want to mess around anymore. We need to make our lunch with Lt. Perkins at one-thirty."

"Hold on. I still need to call Puddin for you. Unless you want to talk to her?" asked Miles.

"I don't have the patience for any of her foolishness today," growled Myrtle. "She's sure to say that her back is thrown or some such nonsense as soon as you ask her to come by."

Miles dialed Puddin's number, which Myrtle had up on the fridge. He cleared his throat.

Puddin answered, a suspicious note in her voice. "Hullo. Who's this?"

"Puddin, it's Miles Bradford. Listen, Myrtle would like you to come over and help her out with cleaning her kitchen—not the rest of the house, just the kitchen. There was some ... ah ... spilling going on in here."

Puddin said, "Be right over, Mr. Miles." And she hung up.

Miles looked at Myrtle and shrugged. "She's coming over."

Myrtle's eyes narrowed. "That somehow makes me even more irritated. She apparently responds better to a male voice than a female one. How irritating."