"Papa’s Cabin"
Veronica goes to her criminology class but is uncertain whether she should take her regular seat in the front since Keith thinks Landry killed Dean O’Dell (see “Mars, Bars”). She heads towards the back but Landry spots her and tells her that she’s a great student and he’s glad he got to mentor her, so he doesn’t want the situation to change their relationship. Mindy has been brought to the sheriff’s department again and is not happy about it. She points out that Steve’s fingerprints were found on Dean O’Dell’s keyboard, but Keith notes that his prints were on every letter, while the fake suicide note only required 11 letters. Plus, Weevil found gloves in the incinerator, and why would Steve wear gloves, then take them off to type the note? Keith announces that he thinks Landry killed Dean O’Dell, and he wants to know if Mindy’s going to take the fall with him. She finally admits that the man Jeff heard fighting with Landry in the room at the Neptune Grand was Dean O’Dell (see “Spit and Eggs”). In a flashback, Dean O’Dell tells Hank that he’s going to ruin him professionally as Mindy takes the gun away from him.
In the present, Mindy tells Keith that after that, she went home to talk to Dean O’Dell, but he wasn’t there, so she went to his office. Landry called to see what happened. Mindy was the person who arrived at the office just after the egging (see “Spit and Eggs”), and she gave Dean O’Dell the Xanax then. She claims that when she got back to the hotel, Landry wasn’t there. She hired Keith to investigate because she wanted to know who killed Dean O’Dell, even if it was Landry. Landry’s lecture is interrupted by Keith and Sacks, who arrive to arrest him but let him dismiss the class first. They take him to the sheriff’s department, where Keith tells Landry that Mindy flipped on him. Landry announces that her story about the fight in the hotel room wasn’t completely accurate - after threatening to ruin Landry, Dean O’Dell told Mindy he was throwing her out and not giving her any money. Landry claims that she went home to save herself, not Landry. Keith notes that Mindy was back at the hotel when Dean O’Dell was killed, so Landry says Steve must have killed him. Keith shows him the clothes Weevil found and Landry says Mindy set him up. Keith asks for his alibi and Landry says that on his way home from the hotel, he stopped at a convenience store to buy cigarettes. The clerk didn’t even look at him, but he did run into a woman who asked for a cigarette. The mystery woman isn’t much to go on, so Keith still suspects Landry.
Later, Tim visits Landry in his cell and agrees to help him out. Landry asks him to find out who bugged his cell phone (see “Mars, Bars”) and “find a needle in a haystack.” That night, Veronica is working late at Mars Investigations when someone breaks in. It’s Tim, who’s trying to figure out how to trace the bug. He asks Veronica to help him find the woman from the convenience store, since he’s a thinker and Veronica is good in the field. Veronica agrees and they head to the store, where the clerk doesn’t remember Landry and can’t provide surveillance tapes that might include him. Some strippers from the club across the street arrive, and though they don’t smoke, they tell Veronica and Tim of a stripper who does. Logan and Parker meet up at the food court, where Wallace spots them together. Mindy signs life-insurance papers, then takes the money she receives to a marina and buys a boat. Back at the food court, Wallace tells Veronica that he saw Logan and Parker together, but she notes that they’re allowed to hang out. Later, Veronica takes donuts to the sheriff’s department and snags Landry’s file from a cabinet. She’s hoping that his testimony will help her and Tim find the mystery woman, but Keith thinks she should prepare herself in case he’s guilty. He then gets a call letting him know that Mindy has disappeared.
That night, Tim and Veronica head back to the convenience store and discuss Mindy’s disappearance. Veronica wonders if Mindy set Dean O’Dell up for the killer, possibly Steve. Tim thinks anyone could have killed Dean O’Dell, since everyone hated him, though Veronica says not everyone did. As some strippers arrive, Keith comes home and realizes that Veronica isn’t there. He calls her and, glad she’s just outside of a convenience store waiting for strippers and not doing drugs, tells her that Mindy sent the kids to her parents in Surrey. Veronica approaches a woman and learns that she’s the one who got a cigarette from Landry. She and Tim send the woman to the sheriff’s department, where Keith questions her and has to release Landry. Tim and Veronica tell Landry that Mindy has taken off with her insurance money and may be working with Steve. After Landry leaves, Tim tells Veronica that he thinks Steve bugged Landry’s phone, and if they can find tapes of Landry’s phone conversations, they might be able to really clear Landry. Veronica notes that Steve’s keys are still in the custody of the sheriff’s department, so of course she can easily get her hands on them.
Veronica and Tim head to Steve’s house, where Veronica teases Tim for wearing gloves, telling him it’s less creepy to cover his fingers with his shirtsleeves instead. The two search for the recordings and find a CD containing them in the DVD case for Taps. They find a call from 1:30 a.m. the night of Dean O’Dell’s death and hear Landry begging Mindy to come back to the hotel instead of going after Dean O’Dell. They then listen to an earlier call in which Landry told a man from Pepperdine hoping to hire Tim that Tim isn’t that great. Veronica heads back to the sheriff’s department and gives Keith the CD, telling him it sounds like Mindy killed Dean O’Dell. Too bad now Landry has disappeared, too - he’s on Mindy’s boat. Veronica listens to more conversations while working at the library and hears Mindy and Landry talking about “a week at Papa’s cabin.” She calls Tim and asks about a cabin Landry might have mentioned; it doesn’t sound familiar, but Tim tells her to meet him at Landry’s house. Before Veronica can leave, Parker arrives and tells her that she and Logan have been hanging out. Veronica brushes her off and tells her they’ll have to talk later. Parker meets up with Logan and makes it clear that she values her friendship with Veronica, so if she has to give up a potential relationship with Logan, she will.
Veronica heads to Landry’s, where she finds a photo of a man at a cabin and Tim finds a photo of Mindy and Landry at a place that looks like a bar. He’s also found a disposable cell phone in the trashcan. Veronica hits redial and tells the person who answers that he’s won an iPod from a radio station, and they’ll be by later to deliver it. When Veronica (aka Ms. Crockett) and Tim (aka Mr. Tubbs) arrive, they find a guy who knows Landry from the juvie board (see “Welcome Wagon”). They also discover that his mother is the mystery woman from the convenience store. At the sheriff’s department, Keith tells Veronica and Tim that Landry threatened to take the woman’s son away if she didn’t provide his false alibi. Tim gives him the photos from Landry’s house and keep trying to figure out what “Papa’s cabin” refers to. As they debate states where the cabin might be, Keith tells them the man in the photo is Ernest Hemingway. Internet research turns up a Papa’s Cabin in Cabo San Lucas. Keith heads down there and finds Mindy’s boat moored in Cabo San Lucas. Landry is onboard and tells Keith that Mindy killed Dean O’Dell and set him up. He admits to trying to cover for her by switching Dean O’Dell’s computer keyboard with Steve’s in an attempt to frame him. Keith asks to talk to Mindy, but Landry tells him there was an accident - they fought, he hit her, and she fell overboard. Indeed, Mindy’s dead body soon washes up on a beach.
Back at Hearst, Logan tracks down Veronica and asks her if she’s okay with him asking Parker out. She’s fine with it and appreciates him asking. Veronica meets with Tim in his office, where he tells her he’s taking over Landry’s classes until a replacement professor can be found, and he’d like her to be his TA. She agrees and he jokingly asks her to pick up his dry cleaning (something he used to have to do for Landry). In class, the students want to discuss the murder case, so Landry leads them in a recap of the whole mystery. It gets Veronica thinking, and she wonders when Landry called his fake alibi woman. Tim doesn’t have an answer and keeps going, mentioning that the kids are in Surrey. Veronica realizes that he couldn’t have known this unless he’d bugged her phone, and she eventually decides that Tim bugged Landry’s phone, too. In fact, she’s sure Tim killed Dean O’Dell. She turns out to be right, though she notes later that it’s kind of a letdown, as Dean O’Dell is still dead. At home, Keith tells her that Tim confessed to killing Dean O’Dell and Landry confessed to killing Mindy. Plus, Keith gets to stay sheriff until an upcoming special election. He wants Veronica to turn off the TV during dinner, since it exposes her to too much violence and crime, but since that’s what the whole show is about, he turns it back on.
THE DEAN O’DELL CASE: Landry thought Mindy killed Dean O’Dell, so he tried to frame Steve by switching his computer keyboard with Dean O’Dell’s.
Tim killed Dean O’Dell to frame Landry because he contributed to him being turned down for a job at Pepperdine.
MEMORABLE QUOTES: Veronica: “What the hell are you doing?”
Veronica: “Any of you maybe bum a cigarette off him?”
Wallace: “I saw Logan and Parker having lunch.”
Veronica: “I know he says he doesn’t eat them, but leave a jelly if you know what’s good for you.”
Keith: “Are you in trouble?”
“Nice gloves. You headed to the parlor to strangle Colonel Mustard after this?” - Veronica to Tim
Written by John Enbom; directed by Michael Fields
Tim: “I, uh, I’m--.”
Veronica: “Formulating a lie, realising it’s futile, begrudgingly telling the truth?”
Stripper: “Do we look like we smoke?”
Tim: “Yes.”
Veronica: “Here?”
Wallace: “Yeah.”
Veronica: “In the cafeteria? At lunchtime? …Why doesn’t he just run me over with a truck?”
Wallace: “Man, I’m just telling you this because it looked like it was something, like they were connecting, you know? What?”
Veronica: “I’m just trying to figure out which Gilmore girl you are.”
Sacks: “The last time you said that, you didn’t actually get any jellies. I almost had a heart attack.”
Veronica: “Has anyone told you you look very convincing behind that desk?”
Keith: “So is that a no on the trouble?”
Veronica: “If you’re wondering where I am, I’m hanging out outside a convenience store eating corn nuts and watching strippers.”
Keith: “Are you doing drugs?”
Veronica: “No.”
Keith: “Good.”