“How long does this go on?” I asked after a while. “I mean, it seems to me it could go on indefinitely.” Which would mean we would be locked in a sort of Groundhog Day scenario for the rest of our lives, playing bingo.
“I have no idea,” said Harriet. “Shanille didn’t tell me about this part. Just the general setup.” She nudged her mate. “Look over there, boogie bear. Brian is here.”
“Right,” said Brutus, and immediately I could see him tense up. Your true spy never relaxes his vigilance and is always ready for action. “Just look at him looking,” he grunted. “Like a predator hunting for prey. Three women is not enough. He wants more. He wants them all!”
“Somehow I doubt whether he’ll find what he’s looking for amongst this crowd,” said Harriet. But then we all had the same thought, and our eyes swiveled to Kirsten. And lo and behold: Brian was at that moment making his way in her direction!
“Will you look at that!” said Harriet. “He’s going in, you guys. Brian is going to hit on Kirsten!”
“I doubt that very much,” I said. “She’s his employee, after all, and that would be very much against the…”
But as we watched on, Brian struck up a conversation with Kirsten, causing the latter to listen intently. When the boss speaks, the underlings have to listen!
“Looks like our two missions have just become one,” said Brutus, giving me a serious look.
On the stage Isaac must have noticed the same interaction taking place, for instead of picking the next ball from the picker, he just stood there, gawking like an idiot.
“Next ball!” someone called out.
“Oh, right,” said Isaac, realizing his mistake, and resumed his important task.
“Fun, isn’t it?” said Liz as she placed another chip on her card. “I love bingo.”
“Me, too,” said her sister.
“Me not so much,” Liz’s husband muttered.
“Oh, I’ve been meaning to ask you,” said Liz now, as she leaned into Gran. “I don’t know if you’re into crime fiction, Janelle, or your sister maybe, but Bill and Olivia and me, we love a good murder mystery. In fact when we first got here we talked Brian into adding a nice collection of murder mysteries to the library, and now they’re amongst the most popular books.”
“My favorite is James Patterson,” said Olivia.
“Patterson isn’t murder mystery,” said Liz. “How many times do I have to tell you? Patterson is thriller.”
“I like him anyway,” said Olivia stubbornly.
“It’s important to know the genre,” said Liz. “But anyway, since we love a good murder mystery so much, we decided to form a club.”
“Is that a fact?” said Gran, who clearly wasn’t interested.
“A murder club!” said Liz with relish. “We will pick out some old case, and then try and work through the clues until we manage to solve the case. It’s so much fun. So now my question to you is: do you want to join our murder club? It’s not as much fun as bingo, of course, but it’s still a great way to pass the time.”
“A murder club?” said Gran, suddenly interested. “You mean you actually solve real murders?”
“Oh, no!” said Liz with a chuckle. “Not real murders, of course.”
“There has never been a real murder in this place,” said Bill, and sounded regretful. “But then it might happen one day—you never know.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t!” said Olivia with a slight shiver. “Imagine a murder happening here. I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night!”
“No murder is going to happen here, Olivia,” said Liz. “Not at Happy Home.” She turned to Gran. “There’s plenty of true crime books out there, and there are TV shows, of course, or even podcasts—I don’t know if you know what a podcast is?”
“It’s like a radio show, only not live,” Olivia explained.
“It’s not like a radio show,” said Bill. “It’s on the internet.”
“Well, anyway, there’s plenty of material for us to work through,” said Liz. “And since these are old cases, we can check later who managed to pick the right suspect.”
“I picked out the murderer on the last one we did,” said Olivia proudly.
“Yeah, Olivia is a real pro,” said Liz with a smile. “Me, I never get it right!”
“That’s because you go for the obvious ones. You need to dig deeper, Liz!”
“I know, I know. But even though I never guess who the killer is, I still love it!”
“We’re like real detectives,” said Bill. “Only not really, of course.”
“So what do you say, Janelle? Do you want to join the club?”
Gran gave her a polite smile.“Can I think about it?”
“Oh, sure. But don’t wait too long. We’re just about to tackle a new case, and it’s important to be on top of it from the beginning. If you so much as miss one single clue, it might throw your entire investigation out of whack!”
“I never miss a clue,” said Olivia.
“Bingo!” someone yelled, and that was that.
Once the next game had started, Bob leaned in and said,“Did Liz ask you to join her murder club?”
“Yeah, she did,” Gran confirmed. “Why, are you a member, Bob?”
Bob grimaced.“I wouldn’t want to be seen dead in that club.” Then he realized how his words might be interpreted. “I’m sorry. That didn’t come out right. What I mean is—who wants to deal with murder all the time? It’s depressing.”