The Gift of Grift

by Dixie Davis

  Ray glanced down the block, as if he could tell whether his neighbors had been conned with a glance. “Seems pretty likely, doesn’t it?”

  Kim nodded, her lips pressed together in concentration. “That doesn’t look good for us, does it?” she asked.

  Ray already knew that all too well. “I’d better get this soup to Katie before it gets cold,” he said, ending the conversation without having to admit to the answer neither of them wanted to hear.

  “Of course.” Kim waved him off and pushed back through the shop door. “I’ll see if I can figure out whom else Brian might have bothered.”

  “Good idea.” Even if her quest for gossip actually sounded a little more like she’d been deputized to suss out motives along Front Street. “But . . . maybe keep it quiet? Try to be subtle.”

  Kim glanced over her shoulder at the neighbors between them. “Ah. Right. Good thinking.” She saluted and let the door fall shut again.

  Ray made sure to lock it, then carried Kim’s gift into the kitchen. She was sweet to take care of them. But, then, all the shop owners along Front Street tended to look out for one another. Lori was over here with food a couple times a week, Kim at least once, Val from the bakery brought a treat a couple times a month. In return, Katie gave them decorating and business advice whenever she was up for it.

  In her heyday, Katie had been the Dusky Cove Business Owners Association doyenne, their go-to source for everything from marketing to merchandising, from décor to discounting. Now, she was lucky to help once or twice a week.

  But at least she still got to help sometimes, Ray supposed. He scooped a small amount of soup into one of their tiny bowls for Katie and a regular bowl for himself, taking a whiff of the heady steam thick with butter and bacon.

  This might be his favorite dish of Kim’s, but he wasn’t sure. That was entirely because they might all be his favorite.

  Ray threw some green beans and carrots in the microwave, then loaded all their food onto a tray. He carried the food up the stairs to face the person he’d been avoiding all this time.

  He made it three steps into the room before he saw the expression on her face. The one that said isn’t there something you need to tell me?

  “How was your afternoon, Junebug?”

  “How long were you planning on keeping Brian McMurray’s murder from me?”

  Well. They would cut right to the point, then. “As long as I could.”

  Katie scowled at him. Her glare could wither the cheery evergreen in the corner, and that thing was plastic. “I’m an invalid, Ray, not an infant.”

  “I know, dear.” But she also hadn’t been the one to watch her wither from the stress of Debra’s disappearance, and she hadn’t been the one terrified she’d be planning a second funeral after Debra died. She’d only been off oxygen for a couple months. Katie knew how delicate her health was these days, but she would never have to contemplate life without her.

  Ray finally remembered why he’d come here in the first place and crossed the room to set the tray on the table.

  He decided he should remain as calm as possible — and continue avoiding the topic if he could. “Kim brought by some soup. Wasn’t that nice?”

  “Yes. And I hope she brought by some news.”

  “Not really.” Ray busied himself arranging the tray, scooting aside the crossword puzzles Katie had busied herself with. Her latest obsession was that soduku. Soduki? Sudoko? Ray could never remember the name, but she certainly loved her number puzzles.

  “Did I hear Chip Branson downstairs, an hour ago or so?”

  Ray cast a dagger-glare at the air vent. He was sure they’d been far enough away.

  Maybe she hadn’t heard any of the details. “Yes, he came by. Try the soup. It’ll get cold if we wait.”

  Katie sighed but submitted, offering grace before she tucked into her tiny bowl. “Mm,” she said appreciatively. “Kim is thoughtful, isn’t she?”

  “She takes good care of us.”

  “She’s also an excellent source of information.”

  Ray swallowed another spoonful of her rich, creamy soup. “Not all of it accurate,” he added.

  Katie conceded the point and turned to the vegetables.

  “Who could have killed Brian?” Katie mused. Mostly to herself, it seemed. Ray didn’t think she expected him to answer.

  And then he found himself doing just that. “Well, Kim said he cheated her out of ten dollars, and we think he could have been working the whole street if he hit the two of us.” At opposite ends of the commercial block, they made the perfect bookend of victims, unless Brian wanted to skip over several other perfect patsies.

  Then again, he might already have been pushing his luck by targeting two people in the same town. Or perhaps he was only targeting people he already had a personal relationship with, capitalizing on whatever trust might have survived three decades’ absence.

  Before he could stop himself, Ray shared his line of thinking with Katie. She nodded, her eyes sage, taking in all the information.

  “And they’re quite sure it was a murder?”

  Ray drew in a deep breath, contemplating his bowl. Did he dare tell her the rest of it? “Chip said he was beaten with a four by four with white paint. And rope.”

  Katie cringed instantly. She knew exactly what Chip had tried to simply imply to Ray. “Do we need to come up with a list of everyone we sold those to?”

  “Could we even hope to do that with all the tourists?” Ray shook his head. “We might be able to remember everyone who’d bought one locally, but even that would be hard. The best I was thinking we could do would be to give an accurate count of how many of these things there are out there. And,” he added reluctantly, “probably stop making them.”

  “I suppose you’re right.” Her voice was weighed down with defeat. She fell into silence, slowly cutting up her green beans.

  “Can I ask you something?” Ray asked after a few more bites.

  “What’s that?”

  “How well can you really hear through that air vent?”

  Katie laughed. “Depends on who’s talking and where they’re standing. You by the register? I can hear pretty well. A woman in the far corner? Not nearly as much.”

  Ray nodded. He’d known she could hear him and suspected the rest of the shop was safe, but it was good to have that confirmed.

  That meant she hadn’t heard the part where Chip had named him as a suspect. And she hadn’t heard Kim’s plans to canvass the street.

  The less Katie got involved with this case, the better.

  “What about Brian’s accomplice?” Katie asked, obviously ignoring Ray’s line of thinking.

  “Judy?” Ray furrowed his brow, thinking. Could that cute little young lady have possibly beaten Brian to death with a buoy? Didn’t seem even remotely likely.

  Then again, she had bought one just two days ago. And the con they’d tried to pull on Ray had backfired, so they hadn’t gotten the money they wanted out of him. Maybe that had sparked conflict.

  “They say you should always start close to home,” Katie pointed out. “How often is a murderer the victim’s spouse or boyfriend?”

  “True,” Ray said. He polished off his soup and set his bowl aside. “But does that apply to big, strong men who are with a girl half their size?”

  Katie considered that a moment. “You don’t think Judy is big enough to take him. Then who is?”

  Ray didn’t dare say the first answer that sprang to mind: me. That was what Chief Branson had come to the shop to say, whether or not he wanted to. Ray stabbed a carrot and munched on it, but that didn’t do much to relieve his frustration.

  “How did you learn so much about the case already?” Ray asked. “I know I haven’t been discussing it right under the vent.”

  “It’s Doris’s day off.”

  He’d tried to get information out of Doris himself, but she hadn’t just blurted out official police business to him.

  Of course, he
hadn’t been friends with her for over seventy years like Katie had. Maybe some things required an inside job.

  Katie picked up the cordless phone from her table. “It needs to be charged, by the way.”

  “Of course.” Ray hopped up from his seat and took the phone to the nearest charger. Really, they should just move the charger closer to Katie’s bed, but the cord length and the position of the nearest available outlet were conspiring against him.

  Their dinner conversation lagged, and Ray could tell by the look in her eyes that Katie was already mulling over the details of the case. Knowing her, she’d have the whole thing solved and the perpetrator in jail before it was time to open again tomorrow.

  At least, he hoped she would. Another murder was sure to be bad for business. Weren’t today’s slow sales proof of that?

  Ray ducked back downstairs to refill Katie’s water bottle. Before he turned back for the stairs, however, another knock sounded at the shop door. He once again ducked into the shop to see who was bothering him after hours.

  Kim again. Well, that wasn’t a bother. He hurried across the sales floor to the door and unlocked it for her again, a burst of chilly air following her inside.

  “Done already?” he asked.

  She nodded quickly. “The Book Cove had the same stunt pulled as we did, and Val said he tried it on her, but she wouldn’t let him hold the change.”

  “She always was a smart cookie,” Ray commented.

  “Nobody else here had anybody try the diabetes monitor thing, though.”

  Ray contemplated her words for a moment. If Brian made the rounds of Front Street, was anyone in town safe from his crime spree?

  And if he’d gone through all the businesses in town, did that mean that nearly every business owner in town had just as much motive as Ray did, at least in the eyes of the police department?

  “I’m going to give Heidi a call,” Ray concluded.

  Kim agreed. “Good call. Definitely time for an emergency meeting. Tomorrow morning?”

  “If Heidi agrees, I think so.” Ray let Kim out into the cold again.

  Ray retrieved his phone and the directory he kept under the counter. The Dusky Cove Business Owners Association was probably their best resource for tracing Brian’s footprints as he grifted his way through town.

  But that would also mean adding the rest of his fellow victims to the suspect roster. Ray hated to think any of his colleagues could have killed someone for twenty or thirty dollars. It seemed they’d all been through worse — shoplifters, fraudsters, spoilage, failed ventures and more — without resorting to murder.

  The last thing Ray wanted to do was cast blame on an innocent colleague just to move suspicion off him. But even more than he wanted to know who could have killed Brian — and it really could have been anyone — Ray wanted to know how badly the hometown con man had hurt that home.

  And then Ray could figure out whether he’d leave this murder to the police to figure out, or whether he’d need to work harder to clear his name.

  Ray set up one more folding chair and took a seat in the middle of the community center promptly at nine o’clock the next morning. At least two thirds of the DCBOA had assembled after Heidi activated their phone tree last night.

  Good to know they could mobilize in an emergency. At least as long as that emergency involved their own self-interest.

  Heidi called the meeting to order, and then cut straight to the chase: “It has come to our attention that a minor crime wave of sorts has struck Dusky Cove, and we’re trying to find out the extent of it.”

  A murmur passed through the crowd. Ray wondered how many shopkeepers already knew that they weren’t the only victims — and how many shopkeepers were still in the dark about the con altogether.

  “I’ve spoken to a few of our members to describe the frauds perpetrated —”

  “Does this have anything to do with the murder this week?” The harsh, nasal voice of Clark Dutch sliced through Heidi’s directions.

  “That’s quite a leap,” Heidi said, a skillful side step.

  It took everything Ray had not to hate the other local gift (slash swim) shop owner in town — and not because they were business rivals. Clark Dutch had done everything short of actually stealing money from him to try to undermine Ray’s shop.

  Before Heidi could continue where she’d left off, the community center door swung open and Chief Branson walked in.

  The community center was cold with winter chill before, but now the atmosphere plunged into the arctic range. “Chief Branson,” Heidi greeted him, not with a little surprise. “Can I help you?”

  “I heard the BOA was meeting today.”

  She nodded slowly. Not a hair of her blonde fancy bun moved, and yet Heidi looked utterly shaken.

  “And I understand y’all might have some crimes to report.”

  Heidi’s eyes grew wide. While that was accurate, none of them had come here to file a police report. Ray couldn’t account for everyone in the room, but personally, he wanted to see the extent of the damage before he determined whether it was worth legal action when the perpetrator probably wasn’t in a position to return what he’d stolen, unless it came out of his estate.

  “I’m sorry,” Heidi finally said, “but the Business Owners Association bylaws clearly state that we’re not open to the public. Only dues-paying members get to vote.”

  Chip pulled out his wallet. “How much are dues?”

  “Thirty-five dollars a year.”

  Chip began counting out his cash.

  “And we have to see your business license.”

  Ray realized he had no idea whether Chip had a license. He might rent out his boat on the weekends or give private yodeling lessons or sell macramé keychains at the local craft fair.

  Chip’s expression turned hard. “No exceptions for law enforcement?”

  “I’m afraid not. Unless, of course, you have a court order.” Heidi’s request and even her tone were perfectly reasonable and businesslike, but nobody in the room was fooled. That was a line in the sand.

  Chip gave her a nod as if he were tipping his imaginary hat and turned on his heel.

  Somehow, that brief visit brought home the reality of why they were here. Once the door closed behind him again, attention shifted back to Heidi. “Well. We encourage you all to take appropriate legal action, no matter what we find out here.”

  “Maybe we should bring the chief back,” Clark said. “It’s not like we want to keep anything from him, and we don’t want it to look like we’re in here trying to coordinate our stories or something.”

  Ray spoke up at this. “I, for one, want to keep my options open. Remember that the person we believe did this was murdered, and him cheating us could easily look like motive.”

  A murmur stirred through the room. Lest anyone think he was making an accusation, Ray added, “At least, that was what Chip implied yesterday when he came into my shop.”

  This time, silence followed.

  So Ray took the lead one more time. “Brian McMurray came into my shop Monday and conned me out of thirty dollars with an accomplice by the name of Judy Smith.” Ray pulled out the papers he’d brought: two photocopies from Debbie’s high school yearbook with Brian’s photos circled.

  Ray recounted the tricks Brian and Judy had attempted in his shop and passed the papers around.

  Val Cromley took the photocopies and nodded, sharing their failed attempt to trick her on change. She passed them to Clark Dutch.

  “Yes,” he said with a sigh, pinching his narrow nose. “He came in this week, bought a keychain with a fifty, then I was twenty dollars short on the register at close. He did something while counting the change, not sure what.”

  The papers circulated around the circle. The hardware store owner was another victim. His shop was right around the corner from Clark’s and next to Heidi’s, but Heidi shook her head without even looking at the pictures. “Brian and I dated for a little while in high school. He
didn’t come in this week.”

  The photos made their way around the room. The final tally was Ray, Kim Yates, Clark Dutch, Dave Goulding from the bookshop and Louis Golding from the hardware store. Val Cromley was the only one who’d thwarted his attempted con.

  That made five suspects in the murder, including Ray. Of course, Ray hadn’t killed Brian, and he hardly thought the twenty or thirty dollars they’d managed to scam off people was enough to make someone beat him to death with a heavy wooden block.

  “What do we do?” Kim asked. “Go to the police? And make ourselves suspects?”

  “We need police reports,” Dave said. “If we’re going to file with insurance.”

  “That’s more trouble than its worth,” Clark said, and for once Ray had to agree with him. The cons were well within what they’d consider normal “shrinkage” in retail. Clark sniffed. “I’m not going to the police.”

  “I don’t want to look guilty,” Kim said. She seemed unusually subdued today. Normally, she would have probably tracked down all this information, going from store to store.

  But perhaps being a potential suspect in a murder was putting a damper on her gossip mill.

  “For any one of us,” Clark pointed out, “it’s hardly enough to worry about. But all together, it’s over a hundred dollars.”

  “Still a pretty petty sum to commit murder over,” Ray said.

  Clark turned to him. “Would you be happy to lose that yourself? Do you like seeing all of us here, conned out of our livelihoods?”

  Ray scowled at him. Why did he have to make Ray out to be the bad guy?

  “Exactly. It’s not going to look good for any of us when it comes out that he struck all over town.” Clark stood and pointed at Ray. “We all know you’re the one who put two and two together. For all we know, you could be covering up something you did.”

  Ray simply shot an incredulous look at Clark. Nobody really thought that.

  But nobody spoke up either. He looked around the room. A couple people avoided his gaze, shifting uncomfortably.