Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  EARLENE FOWLER

  joins the ranks of today’s most celebrated

  mystery authors with her outstanding debut of

  the Benni Harper mystery series!

  “Fool’s Puzzle is a ripping read. It’s smart, vigorous, and

  more than funny: Within its humor is wrenching

  insight ... Not a word is out of place, not a haunting picture

  missed ... A new voice to delight hungry mystery readers.”

  —Noreen Ayres, author of A World the Color of Salt

  “[Fowler] made me laugh out loud on one page and

  brought tears to my eyes the next. Benni Harper and her

  extended family... live and breathe and occupy a real slice

  of California that I haven’t seen before in the mystery field.

  An exquisite sense of place ... I can’t wait to read more.”

  —Margaret Maron, Edgar® Award-winning author of

  Bootlegger’s Daughter

  “I thoroughly enjoyed Fool’s Puzzle ... Fowler’s

  characters are terrific ... A super job.”

  —Eve K. Sandstrom, author of The Devil Down Home

  FOOL’S PUZZLE

  A Benni Harper Mystery

  by Earlene Fowler

  “Fool’s Puzzle,” also known as “Drunkard’s Path,”

  “Falling Timbers,” and “Country Husband,” is a popular

  traditional quilt pattern made with two contrasting

  colors. It is easily cut, but very confusing to set together.

  The overall pattern is not apparent from a single block

  but must be viewed as a whole.

  Don’t miss Earlene Fowler’s next Benni Harper

  mystery, Seven Sisters, available from

  Berkley Prime Crime.

  Berkley Prime Crime Books by Earlene Fowler

  THE SADDLEMAKER’S WIFE

  LOVE MERCY

  The Benni Harper Mysteries

  FOOL’S PUZZLE

  IRISH CHAIN

  KANSAS TROUBLES

  GOOSE IN THE POND

  DOVE IN THE WINDOW

  MARINER’S COMPASS

  SEVEN SISTERS

  ARKANSAS TRAVELER

  STEPS TO THE ALTAR

  SUNSHINE AND SHADOW

  BROKEN DISHES

  DELECTABLE MOUNTAINS

  TUMBLING BLOCKS

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada

  (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

  Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  Penguin Group Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.)

  Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia

  (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)

  Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi—110 017, India

  Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632, New Zealand

  (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)

  Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196,

  South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  FOOL’S PUZZLE

  A Berkley Prime Crime Book / published by arrangement with the author

  Copyright © 1994 by Earlene Fowler.

  The Edgar® name is a registered service mark of the Mystery Writers of America, Inc.

  Quilt designs by Pepper Cory.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014

  eISBN : 978-1-101-50023-1

  Berkley Prime Crime

  Berkley Prime Crime Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  BERKLEY PRIME CRIME is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  The Berkley Prime Crime design is a trademark belongng to Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  For my husband, Allen—

  Without a doubt, I’d choose you again

  and

  For Mary Edith, sister, friend and

  “partner in crime” since

  the day I was born

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  As with most endeavors there are always people to thank.

  First, I’d like to thank God for grace and blessings I did nothing to deserve.

  I’d also like to thank my parents, family and friends for their support, the Fountain Valley Police Department, the staffs at the Huntington Beach and Newport Beach Public Libraries, Steve Bradley for expert gun advice, Darwin Sainz for sharing his knowledge on cattle, my agent, Deborah Schneider, for her hard work and for taking a chance on a new writer, my editor, Laurie Bernstein, for her expert advice and for never failing to make me feel like a million bucks and to Ann Lee, poet and friend, for her unwavering faith in my ability.

  And finally, to Jo-Ann Mapson, writer, critic, friend and cowgirl extraordinaire. If there was a silver belt buckle awarded for teaching, you’d be wearing it.

  FOOL’S PUZZLE:

  A popular traditional quilt pattern best made with two contrasting colors. It is easily cut, but very confusing to set together. The overall pattern is not apparent from a single block but must be viewed as a whole. Also known as “Drunkard’s Path,” “Falling Timbers,” and “Country Husband.”

  1

  MY DAY DIDN’T start with murder, although the thought crossed my mind.

  “Save me,” the voice on the phone whispered.

  I jerked the instrument underneath the down comforter. Perfect temperature control was shattered, causing me to growl at my caller. “Go away.”

  “You’re my last chance.” It was a harsh, old voice, as ratchety as a Las Vegas Wheel of Fortune.

  I laughed in derision. “Tough luck.” It was cruel perhaps, but not without justification. I’d been burned by this voice before.

  “I won’t be held responsible for what I do!”

  There was, I noted with satisfaction, a hint of panic.

  “You know you’ll pay if you try anything rash,” I cautioned. “I wouldn’t mess with her if I were you.”

  “But I can’t take it anymore.”

  “She’s your sister, Gramma.”

  I glanced at the clock-radio on the nightstand next to my bed—seven A.M.—and on a day I didn’t need to be at the Folk Art Museum until ten o‘clock. We’d been officially closed for the last week as we set up our new exhibit, a collection of antique quilts owned by residents of San Celina County.

  A blast of rain rattled the windows of my small Spanish-style house. The Pacific storm that had been camping for days off California’s Central Coast had attacked San Celina during the night. While little mouse soldiers marched double time on the roof, I tried to remember whether I’d closed the windows in my truck.

  “She’s driving me crazy,” Gramma Dove complained. “She’s waxed all the floors twice. Follows me everywhere. Keeps rearranging my pots and pans.”

  Now Dove’s voice took on her normal loud tone. Aunt Garnet must have left the room. “She’s trimmed all my plants down to nubs with those nasty little embroidery scissors of hers. Benni, she’s been eyeing my hair real strange.”

  Dove’s long white braid had tempted her younger sister for years.

  “She hasn’t seen your house yet. She loves craft festivals.”

  “No way. I’ve got too much to do this week with the Folk Art Festival. I can’t babysit Aunt Garnet.” I struggled up, tucked the covers around me, and waited for the attack to begin. I didn’t have to wait long.

  “Who bought you your first brassiere, young lady? Waste of money that it was. Who taught you all you know about poker? Who changed your dirty diapers?”

  “You didn’t come to live with us until I was six,” I pointed out.

 
Another blast of rain slapped the bedroom window. I sank down under the covers and prayed the storm wasn’t as bad as it sounded.

  She tried blackmail. “I never told your daddy what time you and Jack really came in after the senior prom.” She paused for emphasis. “Yet.”

  I laughed, imagining her scheming look. “Dove, that was seventeen years ago. My virtue hasn’t worried Daddy for a long time.”

  She went for the throat. “Your mama, God rest her soul, would have wanted you to help your defenseless old granny.” Her voice cracked dramatically.

  “Mama would have been hiding over here with me. And you’re about as defenseless as a wolverine.”

  I shifted the phone to the other ear.

  “Who would have thought a son of mine would raise up such a coldhearted daughter?”

  “Seems to me I recall spending most of my childhood tagging after you.”

  “It’s a dollar a chip on Thursday,” she said, changing the subject once she knew she wasn’t getting her way.

  “High stakes this year. Who’s coming?”

  “Everyone but Clarence. He’s got some fevered bulls.”

  Every year at Thanksgiving, Gramma Dove’s children, four sons and two daughters and their families, came from all over the country to meet at my dad’s ranch outside San Celina. Everyone wore their best boots and brought a hundred bucks for our no-holds-barred-kick-em-in-the-nuts-when-they‘ re-down poker tournament.

  “What time are you going to be here?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said, my mind drifting back nine months to the last time most of the family was together at Jack’s funeral. I’d sidestepped an invitation to my in-laws’ ranch too; after fifteen years of shuffling back and forth between the Harper and Ramsey ranches, the thought of going either place this year made me feel melancholy and a bit queasy.

  Dove’s voice softened. A rarity for her. “Come up, honeybun. It’ll do you good.”

  “I have a lot of work to get done before Saturday.”

  She tsked under her breath but didn’t press it. “You seen Rita lately?”

  “Not since she left here a couple of weeks ago.”

  “Garnet’s chewing nails because she hasn’t called.”

  Aunt Garnet’s twenty-one-year-old granddaughter, my cousin Rita, moved out from Arkansas two months ago with vague plans of attending college and starting a new life. On the spur of the moment and to everyone’s consternation, she broke a two-year engagement with a wonderfully suitable—Southern for wealthy—man. With a certain amount of doubt and apprehension, I was persuaded into letting her live with me. Aunt Garnet, Daddy and even Dove were convinced the company would do me good.

  The Oreo crumbs all over the house I tolerated; even the long, sniffly phone calls to her girlfriends in Pine Bluff only raised my blood pressure a few manageable notches, but the morning I wandered into my own kitchen wearing nothing but a pink tee shirt and a pair of Jack’s old hunting socks and encountered a sloe-eyed, bare-chested cowboy in a dirty white Stetson, sipping a mug of my chocolate amaretto coffee, I’d had enough.

  “Rita’ll be back in a minute,” he’d said, appraising me from droopy socks to tangled hair, his left hand disappearing behind a silver belt buckle the size of a pie pan. “Went for doughnuts.”

  I played with the phone cord as Dove continued to complain.

  “I could tell Rita was going to be trouble from the day she was born,” she said. “She had shifty eyes even then. Where is she?”

  “As far as I know she’s still working at Trigger’s out by the interstate. She’s renting a room from a bartender there. A girl named Marla who belongs to the co-op. I guess it’s working out okay.”

  “Two of a kind,” Dove pronounced. “Probably bringing home a different fella every night of the week.”

  I made a noncommittal sound.

  “You just get ahold of her and tell her to call Garnet. And you’d better be here on Thursday.”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “As long as you’re thinking, think of some way to get rid of Garnet. Something that won’t throw any suspicion on me.”

  I couldn’t help giggling. Dove and her love-hate relationship with her only sister always raised my spirits. “Chin up, old woman. When does she fly back to Arkansas?”

  “Three weeks, hallelujah. You’re sure that ... ?”

  “Busy, busy, busy.”

  “Stubborn brat.”

  “I understand short hair is much easier to take care of.”

  She snorted and hung up, as usual, before I could beat her to it. The woman had the reflexes of an eighteen-year-old.

  I burrowed back under the covers and tried not to think about what the rain would do to the flimsy canvas tents we’d rented for the Folk Art Festival the co-op was sponsoring this weekend. As curator of the Josiah Sinclair Folk Art Museum and chairman of the Artists’ Co-op affiliated with it, it was up to me to figure out what to do, and at that moment all I felt capable of was turning over and going back to sleep.

  Formerly a morning person, I’d come to dread them since Jack died. There were times, in that moment between sleep and wakefulness, when I’d hear his voice call my name as clear as if he were bending over me, and I would jerk up, my heart beating like a puppy’s, to confront an empty room. But in the last month or two, I’d become wise to my mind’s tricks, and though I still heard his voice, I’d bury my head in my pillow, refusing to be fooled, except for my heart.

  I crawled out of bed and padded into the kitchen. A gust of wind and rain sprayed the windows again, giving me the feeling of being trapped inside a giant car wash. After putting on the coffee and feeding some bread to the toaster, I lifted the shade over the sink and studied my reflection in the dark window. I undid my braid and pulled my fingers through the tangled curls. If Dove succeeded in pawning Aunt Garnet off on me, it’d be my hair as well as my social life she’d be after. Though she’d long ago given up on Dove and Daddy, Rita and I gave her fresh fodder for her self-acclaimed matchmaking abilities. I felt a brief flash of sympathy for my young cousin. Rita was no match for Aunt Garnet’s Noah’s-Ark mentality.

  Flipping on the radio to KCOW, I commiserated with Patsy Cline as she fell to pieces. Brahma Bob gave his usual highly professional and scientific meteorological report—“Rain, rain, rain, as far as this cowboy can see.”

  After burning my throat with the first cup of coffee, I carried the second into the bedroom to root around for something to wear. Yesterday’s jeans hung on the post of my brass bed and looked clean enough for one more day. I grabbed one of Jack’s faded flannel shirts, tucked it into my jeans and rolled up the sleeves. Except for his old Colt .45 pistol, they were the only things of his I hadn’t packed away. I’d followed the advice of friends and family and started a new life, but as I rubbed the soft, frayed collar of Jack’s shirt against my cheek, I couldn’t help but wonder what I would do when they all wore out.

  Pulling on one brown boot, I limped around searching for the other. It still amazed me how disorganized I’d become since living alone. Though I’d maintained the Harper Ranch books for ten years, in the three months since I’d moved to town I’d had two warnings from the electric company, spent more time than seemed possible searching for my truck keys, and had once squeezed Ben-Gay on my toothbrush.

  After a few minutes of half-hearted searching, I gave up and settled for a pair of white hightop Reeboks and quickly rebraided my hair.

  The rain peppered my face with icy needles as I dashed out to the red Chevy pickup truck Jack and I bought the first year we were married. Driving south down University Avenue toward the museum, I became ensnarled in a traffic jam of ranchers’ trucks, students late for class and senior citizens trying to make that last breakfast-special. It was the first storm of the season, and San Celina, like all California towns south of San Francisco, was unprepared for its intensity. A pink-haired old lady in a tan Gremlin shot me the bird when I accidentally cut in front of her. I laughed when she ignored my palm-up apology and sped past me. I guess senior citizens in a college town had to get tough or move on.