Finding Miranda

CHAPTER 14: THE TROPHY

Monday morning Miranda the Invisible Librarian was re-shelving books in the self-improvement section, enjoying the quiet and the smell of the Starbucks lattes smuggled in by the college students working in the nearby reference section. She had just placed a well-worn copy of Thirty Theorems on Thicker Hair and Thinner Thighs when Annabelle poked her head around the corner.

"Miriam, there's a delivery for you at the front desk."

Miranda started to say, "Be right th--," but realized she was talking to air.

At the desk, a forty-ish balding gnome with wire-rimmed glasses and a handlebar mustache waited with a package wrapped in white butcher paper. It looked like a seven-foot submarine sandwich. The gnome didn't see Miranda approach, though he was facing in her direction.

Accustomed to the phenomenon, Miranda stopped in front of the oblivious little man and spoke softly, "May I help you?"

He jumped and nearly dropped his package. His eyes jerked to Miranda's face and focused. "H-how did you do that?" He glanced left and right beyond her as if he would discover where she had been hiding.

Miranda's smile was resigned. "It's a gift. Is that for me?" She gestured at the parcel.

"You Marguerite Ogilvy?"

"I'm Miranda Ogilvy."

He looked at the label on the package. "Close enough. Gotcher rattler." He pushed the parcel toward her, but she didn't reach to take it.

"I'm sorry. Did you say something about rats?" Wild horses couldn't get her to touch that package. Seven feet of rats?

"Rattler," he said, loudly and slowly. "I said 'I got yer rattler' for ya." He smiled proudly. "Mounted it myself. She's a beauty, too. Congratulations."

Annabelle, stunning in a low-cut, tight-waisted, short-skirted red dress, leaned way across the counter toward the man. "What did you say you mounted, sugar?" she purred.

The man's mouth dropped open and his eyes bulged when he turned to see Annabelle and her girls mere inches from his right shoulder. He forgot Marguerite Ogilvy ever existed and rotated to face Annabelle. "Huh?" he breathed.

Annabelle smiled—half Marilyn Monroe, half cobra—and walked her fingers up his shirtfront. "Were you talkin' about mountin' somethin'," she looked at the name on his shirt, "Ray?"

Ray snapped out of it, overcome with pride in his accomplishment. "Oh, yes, ma'am! I mounted this here snakeskin for Miz Oglethorpe. Six footer, mint condition—except for the missin' head—and a lovely mahogany platform. Look here!"

Before she could stop him, the man had begun tearing paper away and shoving the mahogany plank onto the counter, forcing Annabelle to stand up and back away. Miranda stepped in to look over Ray's shoulder. Within seconds they were looking down at Miranda's trophy rattlesnake skin, professionally affixed to shining rich dark wood.

"Lovely," said Annabelle, meaning, of course, the opposite.

"Is this the snake I shot?" asked Miranda.

"Are you Marianne Oglethorpe?" asked Ray, surprised to find someone standing beside him.

"Close enough," said Miranda. "But who did this?" She spread her arms to indicate the massive trophy.

Ray produced a folded invoice from his pocket and shook it open. "Order was placed by Mrs. Martha Cleary out in Minokee. She brung us the corpse, and I took care of it personally."

Miranda read the figure at the bottom of the invoice. She gasped. "But Martha can't afford this! Neither can I, for that matter!"

"Oh, don't sweat the money," Ray said, folding and pocketing the invoice. "I already got a check from the Shep and Dave Show. Why some crackpot radio program would be buying somebody a snake is a mystery to me, but that's life, ain't it? Ya think you've seen it all, but...." He shrugged.

He admired his product in silence. Miranda looked from one end of the reptile to the other and back again. Annabelle got bored and walked away.

"What am going to do with it?" asked Miranda of herself, but Ray heard and answered.

"Hang it on the wall! Be proud! Tell the story to your friends! Thing like this is priceless!" He patted it fondly as if saying farewell to a pet. "Y'know what's weird?"

Miranda's eyes widened. "There's more!?"

"I don't wanna go into too much detail, but part of the job was to separate the outside of the snake from the inside of the snake. Know what I mean?"

When she nodded uncertainly, Ray continued. "Y'see, this feller had eaten not long afore he 'uz kilt. And he hadn't been livin' in the wild. No, ma'am, he 'uz chowing down on domestic white mice—like lab mice, y'know. He didn't get those in the Little Cypress."

"That doesn't make any sense," Miranda said. "Where would a wild snake get white laboratory rodents to eat?"

"Weren't no wild snake," Ray said. "This snake 'uz somebody's pet." He looked at Miranda in mock accusation. "You sure you don't have a neighbor mad atcha fer shootin' Fluffy here?" He laughed at his own joke and moved toward the door. "Congratulations again!" he called as he left.

Miranda stared down at the bizarre memento spread across the library counter.

Annabelle's voice wafted to her from the office beyond a partition, "For pity's sake, Myrtle, take that awful thing and put it out in your car before somebody comes in and sees it!"

My car! thought Miranda, and spread her arms to measure the length of her trophy. Maybe if I hang it out the window?