"Hey, you two!" Basil was at the counter and spotted us coming over. He appeared to be the only one here. "Here to finally see the tooth?" He crossed his eyes, and I laughed.
"How did you know I haven't seen it already?"
"You know how it is. Everyone here knows everything that happens."
This town had better security than Washington DC.
He looked at my hair and rearranged a few curls. "I think your hair is some of the best work I've ever done."
It took everything I had to smile. "Your talent does seem wasted here."
"You have no idea. But hopefully I won't be stuck here too much longer." He leaned in conspiratorially. "I've got an interview with a salon in Chicago next month!"
"I thought you couldn't leave here due to your dad's will?" I asked. But I thought, Good for you.
"I've decided that I don't care about that anymore." He winked at me.
I asked, "What do Nigel and Hal think?"
"Nigel's the oldest. He's in charge of everything, and he thinks that means me too. He's got a plan to make money out of this dump of a town. If I play my cards right, I can escape."
"And Hal?" I liked Hal too. Hopefully he could break out as well.
"Hal goes along with Nigel on everything. Such a follower."
"But you're not."
"I am when I have to be." He winked. "So you're here to see the tooth. Make sure to meet Virgil. He's a pillar of the community." Basil's eye roll seemed to be condescending.
"I will. I'm trying to suss out your rumor and see if he's one of the three suitors," I said quietly.
Basil giggled. "I'll leave you to it, then. Bye!" Basil gave my gorgeous husband an appraising look-over and then disappeared through the door.
We were alone. Virgil didn't seem to be around.
"Where's this tooth?" Rex wondered.
It wasn't hard to find. The whole post office was one large room, with a counter on the left and a wall of mailboxes on the right. At the end of the room, under a huge mural, was a very expensive-looking plexiglass box, and underneath that, on a small, black satin pillow, was the tooth, lit up on all sides.
"That is a big tooth," Rex said as we looked down on it.
I had to admit that it really was. "How did he eat?"
"Very carefully" came the reply from behind.
We turned to see an elderly man, thin, and maybe 5'9", wearing a postal uniform.
"I'm Virgil Jacobson." He held out his hand and shook Rex's then mine. "I'm the postmaster and tooth keeper. But you can call me Virgil."
"Thanks," I said. "I'm…"
"Merry and Rex Ferguson," Virgil finished. "Sorry. I shouldn't have interrupted. It makes me look smart if I know who you are. I apologize for grandstanding."
I liked him immediately.
"Can you tell us about the tooth? We heard the story from Nancy, but she was iffy on some of the details."
"Oh sure." He pointed to the mural above.
It was one of those Great Depression murals painted by artists. It had an industrial feel to it, like other murals common to small towns. Who's There has one of a group of Native Americans teaching settlers how to fish in local waters. The problem was that, besides a lake on the other side of the county and a creek that was really just a trickle, there weren't any local waters. In the mural, the waters in question are as vast as the sea. I think the artist had been from out of town.
The mural featured Tubby Thorkelson in a dentist chair as a dentist admired his huge bucktooth.
"Tubby grew up here. He died in 1919. Instead of two front teeth, he had just the one there. And it was a whopper. Oh, he got teased some, but the ladies all seemed to like it. He was married and divorced five times. When he willed it to the town, all five wives sued to get custody."
"Why?" I looked at the mural. Tubby wasn't bad looking. But was it really feasible to think he'd been married five times?
"Don't know, really." Virgil scratched his chin. "Maybe they were really into teeth."
Rex couldn't take his eyes off the tooth. "How did he feel about the tooth when it was still attached?"
Virgil nodded as if he was asked that often. "He had a very distinctive bite mark. It didn't look like a regular human's. Tubby didn't like that none. He told a reporter once that he could never commit a crime where bite marks would be compared because it would be obvious that he'd done it."
"It is impressive," Rex admitted. "I can see why you have it on display."
Virgil nodded as if he heard that every day too. "You're the one who inherited Aunt June's house, right?"
"That's right," I said. "Were you friends with her?"
His demeanor changed ever so slightly, going from warm to tepid. "We were friends."
"More than friends? Sorry to pry," I covered. "But I've heard she had a boyfriend."
Virgil's face darkened, going from tepid to icy. "Where did you hear something like that?"
"It's just that I never knew her," I said quickly. "I didn't even know she was family until I got the urn in the mail."
Virgil looked at me in stony silence.
"And her house is so amazing! She knew so many famous people! And her collection of dangerous insects!"
Rex added, "She seems like someone Merry would've gotten along with. My wife shares a few eccentricities with the deceased."
"I really do."
The postmaster considered this. "Well, she came in here all the time, mailing things to all over the world. Receiving things too. Mostly in the 1960s and 70s, mind you. It slowed down some these past few decades."
That was interesting. "Do you have any idea what she did for a living?"
Virgil scratched his head. "No. But right after she died, a couple of men in black suits and sunglasses came in and asked if she had any mail."
My heart stopped for a moment. Riley had said she wasn't CIA.
