Deadly Cost of Goods

by Margaret Evans

  “Are you sure Ruby won’t mind?”

  “She knows we work hard, and if you work hard, you have to play hard.”

  “That means girls, don’t it?” the first man asked, hope brightening his face, his hands cradling the mug of treasured Pilsner.

  “Not this time, boys. We got a big shipment coming in tonight.”

  The third man looked down at their wood table, scarred and stained from too many decades of good times. Sometimes he wondered if he looked like that. He should, after all he had been through over the years.

  “And we start packing the first batch, right?” he asked.

  The man in the baseball cap nodded.

  “That we do. Time to go disappear until tonight, as usual.”

  And he laughed, dragging the others into the laugh, as if a great joke had been told.

  As the trio believed it had.

  Chapter 3

  Laura had never met Oscar Fulton, but she had seen pictures of him from the row of Raging Ford Public Library directors on the New Library wall. When his son, Peter, opened the front door, Laura thought she was looking at his clone.

  “You look so much like your father’s picture,” she said, shaking his hand.

  Fulton laughed.

  “I get that a lot. Nice to meet you, Laura. I knew your parents. They were good people.”

  Peter also greeted Erica and led the ladies into the home in which he had spent his youth. The storm door was closed but he left the inner door open and stopped halfway down the hall, craning his neck toward his front yard at the sound of a car.

  “Now who is that pulling up out front? The police?”

  Laura and Erica turned to look.

  “Oh, that’s Sergeant Fitzpatrick. He told me he would try to come and help us carry the book boxes.”

  Peter smiled.

  “Well, he must be a really good friend to help out like that.”

  Laura picked up the prickles of a potential retort from Erica, so she grabbed her friend’s arm.

  “That he is,” she agreed. “A very good friend. Tell us what your father said about his time at the Old Library.”

  “Oh, Laura, I could take up hours of your time—even days—talking about my dad’s tenure there. He loved it. You’d never guess looking at it now, but that place used to shine and sparkle. I know it’s not a Carnegie library because the mine had too much iron ore and brought so much money to the town that we didn’t need Mr. Carnegie’s help. But it sure rivaled anything he built! Dad took me there one time before they boarded it all up and showed me how beautiful it was. All those shining brass railings on the two mezzanine levels, the gorgeous stained-glass window on the rear wall—unbelievable. The New Library is bigger and more modern, but it can’t hold a candle to the Old, even without books on the shelves.”

  “I’ve seen pictures of it online—it was beautiful,” Erica agreed, nodding.

  “Did your dad take you into the hidden passages, Mr. Fulton?” Laura pursued.

  Fulton’s face crinkled in remembrance.

  “Sure he took me through them. But I got away from him and he couldn’t find me. I hid inside one of the bookshelves. They have hand-carved wooden caps at both ends of the back-to-back shelves with a small, hollow space at each end under the caps. I found a loose cap and climbed inside. I barely fit!”

  “Did you get in trouble when he found you?” Erica asked.

  He laughed.

  “Of course, I did. But he told me there were lots of passages the librarians used to re-shelve books so they wouldn’t bother the library patrons. Did you know there were also two dumbwaiters for carrying the books in wheeled carts up to the mezzanine levels?”

  “Now that’s something I’ll have to check out online,” Laura said and noticed Connor was standing right behind her.

  “Well, Sergeant Fitzpatrick. Welcome to my father’s home.”

  “Mr. Fulton,” Connor said, hat in his hand and nodding to the man. “You will let us know if there’s anything we can help you with as you get your home ready for sale.”

  “I will. Thanks. The boxes of books are over here against the wall.”

  Erica reached for the box on top and frowned.

  “This is very lightweight for a box of books,” she said and shook it gently.

  They all heard some noise within the box indicating smaller objects.

  “Oh, my niece and her friends helped load all the boxes. That one might not have books in it. She may have left it on top for me to look through. Let me take a look.”

  Connor and Erica turned to the other boxes and opened their flaps, verifying the remaining five boxes did contain books and began to load them onto the hand truck.

  Laura waited for Fulton to open the questionable box.

  All action stopped and all eyes turned to Fulton when they heard a great gasp from him.

  His visitors watched as he delved into the box and brought forth an oddly shaped gift covered in Star Wars wrapping paper with a big yellow ribbon around it.

  “What is it?” Erica asked.

  Connor finished loading the five book boxes onto the hand truck. Then his friends Max Downey and Nicky Rayles showed up at the door and Connor let them in. Nicky, Max and Connor had been friends for most of their lives and helped out whenever Laura needed some heavy work done.

  “I wasn’t sure what else needed to be brought back to the shop, Laura, so I asked the guys to stop by in case I had to leave in a hurry.”

  She nodded, waving to Max and Nicky, and then her attention returned to Fulton.

  “Mom didn’t forget! I knew she hadn’t!” Fulton said, holding up the gift. He noticed everyone was watching him and explained.

  “For my tenth birthday, I asked my parents to give me a Darth Vader action figure—the big one—the one with the telescoping light saber!”

  “Do you have any idea how much an unopened one is worth today, Mr. Fulton?” Nicky asked after waving hi to Peter.

  Fulton looked at him.

  “Yes, I do, Nick. There were very few manufactured—best guess in the tens of thousands of dollars. But this is worth more to me than money. Three days before my birthday, my mother suffered a massive heart attack and was in the hospital for weeks. When she came home, she wasn’t strong, and she suffered another, fatal heart attack. My dad, my sister and I were all devastated. So you can imagine what happened or didn’t happen that year. My dad never found the gift. I thought that maybe she had forgotten to buy it. And here it is.”

  “She must have hidden it well so you wouldn’t find it, Mr. Fulton,” Laura said. “I’m glad your clearing out the house brought it back to you.”

  “ ‘Happy Birthday, Peter. With love, Mom and Dad.’ ” He read the card, then turned the gift over and carefully opened it. “Anyone care to wager if it’s really Vader with that light saber?” he challenged, a twinkle in his eye.

  No one took the bet, but everyone noted the emotion on Fulton’s face as he pulled the paper open. He held up the pristine, brand-spanking new, Darth Vader action figure, and it was the one with the telescoping light saber, in its original, unopened package. The joy on his face brought tears to his eyes.

  “I would have sent this box off in a lot and never found it.”

  “I knew it didn’t have books,” Erica said.

  “Thank you for saying something.”

  Nicky spoke up again as something occurred to him.

  “Mr. Fulton, I’ll text you the URL for a company that manufactures cases for collectible items like yours. They’re not expensive, and it may be something you want.”

  “Thanks, Nick. I know just the place where it will go in my own house.”

  Connor checked his phone.

  “I have to leave,” he said. “Nicky and Max are here if you have other things you need transported. The books are already in Max’s pickup.”

  Laura walked him to the door.

  “Thanks.”

  “Anytime. Good-bye, Mr. Fulton,” Fitzpa
trick called over his shoulder, pulling on his hat. “Remember, call us if you need anything.”

  Fulton saluted Connor.

  Laura walked him to the SUV.

  “Found anybody to do the dunk tank with you yet?”

  “Sam jumped in with both feet, pun intended. He’s been spending more time at the gym with weights. I think he has a girlfriend he wants to impress.”

  “Anybody else?”

  “Not yet. I think I can persuade Maurice Sanchez. Mo’s always ready to do something fun, regardless of how silly he might look.”

  “Good. The more we have, the less wear and tear on your eyes, ears, and nose.”

  “Hey,” he said, putting his key in the ignition and turning on his vehicle. “I’m wearing goggles, a nose clip and ear plugs.”

  She laughed and waved as he pulled away then returned to hear Peter Fulton talking.

  “I’m thinking I better look through the rest of this box before I put it out for sale,” he finished, chuckling.

  “And I think I better have a good look around your home to see if you have other awesome things you want to part with,” Laura said, dragging Erica by the arm and crooking her neck at Connor’s friends to follow.

  Max and Nicky’s time was not wasted when Laura found two matching bedroom lamps, a small, round inlaid mahogany table, and some kitchen cutlery, all of which she knew she could sell in her shop. Erica’s time was not wasted, either, as she discovered an almost-new toaster oven her parents could use. Max and Nicky each ended up buying various sports equipment from the garage, all in the open with price tags.

  By the time everyone ended up back at Second Treasures, Max and Nicky put Laura’s purchases in the workroom behind the shop, and Erica stored her parents’ gift there, too, with a big sign on it, “Do NOT Sell – For Erica’s Parents.” Then Max and Nicky headed home, or back to their jobs, their lunch hours over.

  Erica turned to Laura.

  “How are we doing on the dunk tank?”

  “I signed the initial order and funneled the deposit money to them from the town council.”

  The town council was composed of the Kovacs brothers who were triplets, each with a different lifestyle, and all easily told apart if you were looking at them. Their voices, however, were close, right down to the inflection, so you really had to see them to know with whom you were conversing.

  Harry, the middle triplet, was the head of the town council and led all the town hall meetings and helped steer the funding decisions for what the town needed most; sometimes that included helping a neighbor. He also owned a barbershop next door to Laura’s thrift shop, as well as the building in which Laura ran her business with her apartment on the second floor.

  His brother, Charlie, the eldest, owned and managed the Raging Ford Bulletin, the local newspaper. The paper was almost completely online, except for a weekly print edition available for delivery or pickup in various locations throughout Raging Ford, mostly for the seniors who wanted to touch paper and clip their coupons instead of printing them.

  William or “Will” was the youngest of the triplets and owned the Kovacs Bakery, the town’s elite bakeshop or patisserie—Will’s description—which produced wonders of pastry and dessert delights famous throughout St. Louis County. He was a hippie through and through and sported a long, gray braid down his back. Rumor was he hadn’t cut his hair since college, but Laura doubted that claim as the specified length of time would have made his braid tickle the backs of his knees at this point, which it didn’t.

  “So that’s all done?” Erica asked.

  “Not yet. You and I have to go down to the place, take their training and instruction on the use of the dunk tank, and get a full understanding of how it works. And get everyone who’s participating to sign waivers of liability.”

  “Let’s get Max and Nicky to come with us. They can take the instruction, too, and help us set it up and break it down.”

  “That’s a great idea. I’ll text them. By the way, we’re putting together booklets on the history of the town and a coloring book for the kids with the same theme.”

  “Awesome! Nobody’s ever done that. This year’s Heritage Days Festival won’t be boring,” Erica pronounced and returned to her parents’ florist shop next door.

  Laura keyed in the code to her back door and stopped in her kitchenette behind the shop.

  Once again, her laptop was open to the Old Library. And since it hadn’t gone to a screen saver, she knew it had likely been done by Isabella very recently.

  “Okay, cat,” she said to the air since no feline was visible in the vicinity. “I get the message and I’m going to look into this library very shortly.”

  That’s when she heard a loud, plaintive merrow from somewhere.

  “Okay, okay, now,” she said, pulling a bottle of cold water from the fridge and settling in front of her laptop.

  Chapter 4

  Half an hour into the dictated research on the Old Library on Route 4, Empress Isabella showed up to sit on Laura’s lap and watch the screen shots of the building go by. Another fifteen minutes passed in silence then Laura rose, spilling the cat onto the floor, and stretched.

  “Okay, Isabella. I have done some research and I see nothing of any consequence, as they say. The shop opens tomorrow on Tuesday, as usual, and I absolutely must have the shelves stocked with priced and inventoried goods. And the front window! Don’t forget about that. I see more delivery boxes from the cameras outside and have to get that stuff taken care of, too.”

  The cat hopped up to the kitchenette table and batted a paw at the space bar. At once, a satellite photo of the Old Library, presumably taken in recent weeks, popped onto the screen.

  Laura leaned over the chair’s back to look at it.

  “I still don’t see anything.”

  The cat merrowed, batting its paw on the table and staring at the screen.

  “Okay, I’ll make you a deal,” she said, scratching the cat behind its ears. “Let me get everything inventoried, priced, and on the shelves and at least a design for the front window, and I promise I’ll sit back down to look at this. Deal?”

  It no longer bothered Laura that she had a resident cat to whom she frequently spoke. The pause in her steps came when she realized she had just made a bargain with the feline that nobody else could see but her. She gave her head a quick shake.

  She also noticed the feline suddenly lost interest in the satellite image and began washing its paws, an action she took as acceptance of her offer. She left the laptop open and headed toward the workroom. As shipments of items had arrived, she verified them and placed each batch in its own designated area of the huge work table that ran the length of the room. Up the center of the table was a narrow, platform shelf roughly one foot higher than the table and accessible from both sides. Labels were taped to each section to keep everything organized. A few more boxes had shown up out back, and Laura brought them in, but they had to wait their turn.

  Flags, buttons, and small banners took up most of the table space. She was still awaiting baseball-type caps with soft, pretend sparklers sticking out the top that blinked with batteries, plus red-white-and-blue bead strings, fake tattoos, and wax teeth. Hopefully, those items were in the boxes that had recently arrived.

  Her hands on her hips, she stood back to look at all of this. The shop “holiday” shelves were empty, and these few things would not be enough to stock up, even with the sparkler caps. There would be a lot of signs in empty spots telling her customers that more surprises were just around the corner. She had to think about that. Maybe the Heritage booklets?

  With her mind now at ease, it took Laura about an hour to inventory and price everything on the table. Her computerized handheld labeler added a bar code for each category and item number with a price the customer could see. Bar codes and prices were uploaded into the register, along with a brief description of the item. In the middle of printing and attaching all the price tags, Laura’s iPhone dinged with both a
text message and alarm from her shop’s doorbell app.

  She dropped everything and hurried through the shop to unlock the front door and let in her BFF, Jenna Buckley, who was, coincidentally, carrying two large bags of something so heavy it looked as if the lady might tip. Laura grabbed one of the bags and relocked the door behind her friend.

  “Oh, good. I’m in time!” Jenna cried out, looking around the thrift shop. “I was afraid I’d be too late.”

  “For what?”

  “I thought your shelves might already be filled with Heritage Days and other patriotic things and there would be no room for this stuff.”

  “What was your Plan B if everything was filled?” Laura asked, smiling and leading her friend to the back room.

  “Oh, I would put in a kiosk or two…somewhere.”

  Jenna Buckley was Laura’s closest friend, after Connor Fitzpatrick. Her wealthy family background was no deterrent to a friendship with Laura and her more modest family. The pair of giggling, little girls who played Barbie dolls for hours were inseparable for the first fifteen years of their lives, until Laura’s parents were killed and her Great-aunt Rose took Laura to live in Maryland. Now, nearly twelve years later, Laura had returned to Raging Ford, and their friendship remained solid.

  Laura set the heavy bag in a clear area of the table and took the second bag from her friend and put it next to the first.

  “Okay, what have you done, Jenna?” Laura asked.

  Jenna’s eyes grew big and innocent.

  “Nothing.”

  Laura turned to look at the two bags.

  “Nothing?” she repeated.

  “Close to it. Not much.”

  “May I open them to see just how much ‘not much’ is in here?”

  A grin splashed its way across Jenna’s face, and she emptied the contents of one bag onto the table.

  Laura’s jaw dropped at the oodles of t-shirts with various patriotic pictures on them.

  “Did you make these with iron-on designs?”

  Jenna nodded, still grinning.

  Empress Isabella was suddenly seen meandering among the t-shirts, as if she needed to check them out for approval. Laura focused on her friend. After all, that friend couldn’t see the cat. Hopefully, the feline wouldn’t move or drag anything around, because that would be noticed.