Red Velvet Cupcake Murder (Hannah Swensen, #16)(28)

“Oh.” Lisa thought about that for a moment. “Maybe. Fox terriers are awfully bright. Dr. Hagaman told me that. But I meant what I said about not telling Barbara’s story.”

“Good. I don’t want you to tell any stories about Barbara. That would be a horrid thing to do.”

The kitchen coffee pot was on and Hannah went to pour a bracing cup for both of them. When she came back, Lisa looked calmer, but the frown lines were back. “What else is wrong?” Hannah asked.

“I just remembered something. I said Barbara’s fall was a horrible, awful accident. And you said, not exactly. Did you mean it wasn’t horrible and awful? Or did you mean it wasn’t an accident?”

“I meant it wasn’t an accident. And you can’t tell the story, okay?”

“I don’t want to tell the story. I said that already. What’s going on, Hannah?”

“Barbara’s confused. She seems to think that her brother tried to kill her.”

“Her brother?”

“Yes. And Barbara doesn’t have a brother. She also asked about her father. And when we told her that he was dead, she was practically inconsolable that she couldn’t see him again.” Hannah sat down and took a sip of her own coffee. Lisa could keep a secret and she was an expert at the invisible waitress trick. Customers didn’t even notice when Lisa came around to refill their coffee cups and they kept right on talking, even if the conversation was personal. It didn’t happen every day, or even every week, but once in a while Lisa would pick up some tidbit of information that helped Hannah solve a murder case.

“Two things,” Hannah told her. “I’ll start with Clayton Wallace.”

“The dead bus driver for the band?”

“That’s right.” And Hannah proceeded to tell Lisa about the M.P.D.’s conclusion and what it meant to Clayton’s son.

“Oh, dear!” Lisa said when Hannah was finished. “I’ll keep an ear out, but it’s pretty unlikely I’ll hear anything about someone from Minneapolis, isn’t it?”

“Maybe, but stranger things have happened. We do get a few customers who commute to Minneapolis for part of the week. And a lot of folks from Lake Eden have relatives there.”

“Okay. How about that second thing you mentioned? It’s about Barbara, isn’t it?”

“Yes.” Hannah got up to refill their coffee cups and then she sat down again. “Where were you when Barbara landed in the rose garden?”

“I was serving Doctor Bev and Roger their fourth cupcakes.”

“You served them when everyone else came over to the display to serve themselves?”

“Yes. Roger came over and asked me to bring the cupcakes to their table. He said they were Doctor Bev’s favorites. And since he was paying us for the catering job, I thought . . .”

“You had to do what he wanted,” Hannah finished the sentence for her. “The customer is always right.”

Lisa gave a little laugh. “Even when they’re wrong, they’re right. It’s the first rule of retail sales.”

“You like that night class you’re taking, don’t you?”

“I adore it. Dr. Schmidt is wonderful! I just have to be careful not to call her Dr. Love.”

Hannah laughed. Nancy Schmidt was one of Delores’s closest friends, and Hannah had learned early on that Nancy moonlighted as Dr. Love, the Love Guru on KCOW talk radio. No one at the college knew and the few who did were careful to protect her alter-identity.

“She’s got such a good sense of humor and the psychology of retail sales is really interesting. I just wish I had her for my stat class.”

“Nancy teaches statistics?”

“Yes. It’s offered by two departments, psychology and mathematics. I tried to get into Dr. Schmidt’s section, but her class was full. I’m stuck with Dr. Lyman from the math department and he’s as dry as dust.”

“Statistics is pretty boring, no matter who teaches it,” Hannah said, remembering her own stat class and how she’d barely managed to stay awake. Of course most of her sleepiness might have been due to the fact that her class had met first thing in the morning and she had been spending most of her nights with Bradford Ramsey.

“Dr. Schmidt’s class isn’t boring. They meet right next door to Dr. Lyman’s class and we can hear them laughing right through the walls. She’s a great teacher, Hannah.”

“Mother knows a nurse who’s taking statistics as part of her psychology degree. She has a great recipe for Easy Fruit Pie. I made it last night.”

“What’s her name? Maybe I know her.”

“Jenny Hester.”

“There’s a Jenny in my retail psychology class. Does she have dark brown hair with lighter highlights?”

Hannah shrugged. “I really don’t know. I haven’t met her.”

“Do you want me to talk to her on break and ask her if she’s the right Jenny? I’ve got class tonight.”

“Sure. And if she is, tell her I tried her Easy Fruit Pie last night and it was a huge success.”

“She’ll like that. People always like to know that somebody else loves their recipes.”

“Okay. So tell me what happened when you delivered the cupcakes to Roger’s table,” Hannah said, bringing them back to the subject at hand.