My boxing daddy also taught me, “Stay on your toes. You don’t want to get sucker punched.” And those words of wisdom are echoed in the pages of Modern Detection, too. Mr. Lynwood “My friends call me Woody and my enemies call me their worst nightmare” Bellflower says, “Anyone is capable of murder, given the right circumstances. Stay on your toes at all times.”
Are these the right circumstances?
Gosh, I sure hope not.
REASONS WHY I DON’T WANT MR. MCGINTY TO BE THE GUILTY PARTY
I’d like my sister’s and my head to stay where they are and not snipped off with his sharp gardening shears.
We can kiss good-bye to the reward bucks I thought we’d be making by solving the murder, because if he doesn’t decapitate us with his TOOLS OF THE TRADE in the next few minutes, I could never blackmail Mr. McGinty, even I got my limits. And I don’t want the reward I’d get for turning him in to the cops, either. That’d be blood money.
If he gets sent to the Big House, I’d miss watching our red bobbers in the cemetery pond during our late-night fishing trips. When he first invited me to join him, I told him no, because that’s what Daddy and me were doing the day he died and I was scared I wouldn’t be able to stand remembering how I let him down and the horrible missing sadness would come over me and make me feel like I was going under for the third time. But Mr. McGinty finally convinced me that fishing again could be another way to honor Daddy, like me singing for him at the Miss America contest the “Favorite Things” song, and that it might actually help me feel a little better, and he was right. I like watching the fireflies switching off and on under the reflection of the moon that disappears in ripples when frogs chase a fly, but mostly I enjoy the talks Mr. McGinty and me have about everything under the sun after we throw in our lines because sometimes I pretend that it’s Daddy at my side instead of his old friend.
Birdie wouldn’t miss reeling in a bluegill or those pond talks under the stars with our godfather if he gets electrocuted for murder because I make sure she’s deep asleep when I crawl out our bedroom window and meet up with him. My little animal lover has always hated fishing, which is why she wasn’t out on the boat with Daddy and me that afternoon. What would bother my sister is that we wouldn’t be able to visit with Mr. McGinty anymore in his cozy shack that’s another home away from home for us. She just can’t seem to get enough of beating him at gin rummy, and, of course, being the excellent caretaker that he is, he always has windmill cookies and cold Graf’s root beer at the ready when the Finley sisters drop by.
We wouldn’t be the only ones who would join the Lonely Hearts Club if Mr. McGinty got sent up the river. Charlie will be so sad to wave good-bye to our friend who taught him about birds and whittling, and believe me, my fiancé doesn’t need another person he cares about leaving him in their dust-to-dust.
And what will become of our tan and black Siamese that Mr. McGinty dove in to save after that maniac kid, Butch Seeback, threw her in the cemetery pond? Unlike tail-wagging Birdie, I haven’t fallen hook, line, and sinker for Pyewacket, but she loves running her little hand down the cat’s back and purring along with her, and . . .
Wait just a cotton-pickin’ minute!
There I go assuming again.
There’s still a chance that dead Sister Margaret Mary didn’t give the gold medal to Mr. McGinty. There’s gotta be other people in the neighborhood who have M. M. and J. M. initials. Like . . . ah . . . or . . . well, just because I can’t think of anyone right this second doesn’t mean there isn’t anyone. Just the same, until I can get things sorted out, to stay on the safe side, maybe Birdie and me better keep our distances from Mr. McGinty.
FACT: There is nobody I know that takes the famous saying “There is a place for everything and everything has a place” more seriously than he does.
PROOF: Because I’m not where I’m supposed to be—standing upright, instead of still laying on top of the leaf pile—after our neat-to-the-hilt friend comes to a halt in front of my sister and me, he starts acting more fidgety than Suzie “That French Slut” LaPelt does in the Communion line when all the gals in the parish train their Sunday eyes on her.