Ding Dong Dead

by Deb Baker

  “And the equipment? What happened to his tools?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she has them, or they still could be in the house. Nothing was ever thrown out.” That’s the truth. All those dolls and the same furnishings. The secrets are still there, too.

  “I’d like permission to search your home,” the detective says. “Do you have a problem with that?”

  “No,” Richard says. “All I had to hide was my institutional history and my insane sister, and even that’s out in the open now.”

  Richard is left alone while the search is arranged. The lock on the interrogation room clicks into place, trapping him. He wonders how long Rachel has been a member of the doll club, masquerading as Julie Wicker. Just like Rachel to gravitate to a bunch of doll enthusiasts.

  He has nothing left to hide from the police, his soul has been stripped bare, but he’s worried anyway. What if they find something inside his house that they can use against him?

  Stranger things have happened.

  Paranoid tendencies, that’s what the doc said. Richard’s never been able to trust anybody. How can he start now?

  “Richard,” Albright says from the doorway, “I’d like you to come along with us.”

  “Of course.” Be agreeable.

  Richard sits in the backseat of a squad car. A uniformed police officer is driving. Albright gets into the passenger seat. Richard thinks of another story to tell on the way over to search his house. One he’s been saving for last. This will seal the deal. They have to believe him now.

  “One of those doll women came to the hall early this morning,” he says. “I saw her go in from my window. Then, a little while later, Rachel showed up.”

  “She did? No kidding.”

  “I thought I’d spotted her on the street outside the hall the day before, walking with some of the others, but I wasn’t certain. She’d changed her appearance. It was the eyes that gave her away. She has my mother’s eyes, the shape, the color, everything the same. But Rachel’s dead, I said to myself. I didn’t want to face the truth.”

  “That must have been a shock.”

  You bet it was. “I knew she was up to no good, either following the other woman or after me for something.” He laughs a sad sound. “With all my talk, you must think I’m paranoid.”

  “Not at all.” But he hears the agreement in the detective’s voice. “What happened next?”

  “I opened the window and told Rachel to get back in her car and get away from my building. I told her I’d call the cops. That’s when I knew for certain it was her under the dyed black hair and different clothes. She said she knew I didn’t have a phone, which was true. Hate the things. Salespeople and political calls. Who needs it? I held up my television remote and told her I had bought one. She thought it was a phone in the dark and left real quick.”

  “What morning was this?”

  “This morning.”

  “This morning?” The detective swings his head to the backseat. “Are you sure?”

  “Why wouldn’t I remember when it happened? I’m telling you it was today. That’s why I came here. We have to stop her.”

  It has taken a whole lot of work to get a reaction from the detective. Finally he has one. Albright is paying attention.

  “What about the woman who went inside?” he asks Richard. “Who was she?”

  “Don’t know. They all look the same to me.”

  “What did she look like? Tall? Short? Heavy? Come on.”

  Richard describes the early-morning visitor. “Young, thirtyish. She’s the one directing the play for that bunch of doll collectors.”

  “Gretchen.”

  “You know her?”

  “Speed it up,” the detective says to the driver.

  At last! Richard thinks. Action!

  53

  Julie placed her tote on the museum counter and looked around at the doll displays. “Caroline really does great work,” she said. “With one of the largest collections in Phoenix, this will be a wonderful museum.”

  Gretchen turned on more lights. Her eyes shifted automatically to the staircase where she’d last seen Jerome. She didn’t want to remember last night, the sheer terror as she and her mother had waited for the intruder to climb the steps.

  “Let’s go upstairs,” Julie said.

  “We better wait by the door. The police will be here soon.” Gretchen had had enough of the upstairs. A skeleton found in the closet and a scuffle with an intruder were plenty for her.

  “Oh come on.”

  “No, really.”

  Julie looked up the spiral staircase. “I’m not going up alone if there’s a ghost around. From what I’ve read, they like to roam on second stories near bedrooms.”

  Gretchen had heard that, too. And the ghostly sounds had occurred upstairs, so there must be some truth to it.

  “Most of the finished work is in the rooms down here anyway,” she pointed out to Julie. “Contemporaries are down the hall to the left, antiques to the right. But you know that.”

  “Yes.” Julie smiled. “I helped April for a few hours, but I’d like to see them again. If you hear me scream, come and save me.”

  Gretchen grinned. “Take your time.”

  While Julie explored the house, Gretchen sat down on a stool by the counter. Shouldn’t she hear ambulance sirens by now? How long had it been? It felt like hours, but had probably only been a few minutes.

  Julie’s cell phone was on the counter next to the tote. She picked it up and checked the time. Almost eleven. She was impatient to put this all behind her. And to get some sleep.

  She checked the cell’s call log to get the specific time of both calls, the one requesting an ambulance for Andy and the second call requesting police protection at the museum.

  That’s odd, she thought. The calls weren’t logged.

  But Gretchen had heard Julie’s end of the conversations.

  Had she been pretending to make the calls?

  Gretchen glanced down the hall. “Aren’t they wonderful?” she called out to get a sense of Julie’s location.

  “Yes.” Julie’s voice came from one of the far rooms.

  “Take your time. The police certainly are.”

  Julie hadn’t called for help. Why?

  Then she realized that Julie had understood exactly what Gretchen meant when they met at the banquet hall and she told Julie that she’d found Richard and the rock collection. Hadn’t Julie been in Tucson when they had canvassed the neighborhood and discovered personal information about Richard and Rachel? April and Nina had agreed to keep their findings a secret.

  Then how did Julie know she should be afraid of Richard? How did she know about John Swilling’s collection?

  Although Julie had been researching on her own. That’s why she had wanted to meet them at the banquet hall, to share information. What had kept her away? What did she know?

  Gretchen heard footsteps coming back down the hall. She hastily put down the phone. Julie slung the tote over her shoulder, put the phone in her pocket, and headed for the stairs. “Let’s go visit a ghost,” she said. “I can’t resist.”

  “I thought you were afraid to go up there.”

  “I am, but curious as well. What if the spirit is Rachel’s? Wouldn’t that be something? To speak with her?”

  “How do you know that Rachel is dead?”

  “I looked it up. That’s part of what we need to talk about. But right now, let’s visit the upstairs.”

  “I’ll wait here.”

  Gretchen watched her make her way up the staircase. What was the woman up to? Was she going to steal something? She better not take the travel trunk. Instinct told Gretchen to be careful, that the woman knew more than she was letting on. Gretchen had to try to find out what she was hiding.

  On the way upstairs, Gretchen walked quietly along the edge of the risers careful not to make any sound that would warn Julie of her approach. The woman might have wanted to find a way into the house to recover a
n object. But what?

  Gretchen slid along the hall and peered into the storage room where she had left the trunk on top of a display case. It was still there. Julie hadn’t been after Flora’s little travel trunk.

  What then? Was she helping Richard? But Julie seemed so sweet, always making sure the women got along, smoothing ruffled feathers.

  She should get out of here. Why hadn’t she waited outside? But what good would that have done? Julie hadn’t called the police. They weren’t coming to rescue her.

  Fear crept into Gretchen’s thoughts. Julie had wanted her inside the house. Why? Was Richard here? Julie had coaxed until Gretchen had fallen right in with her. She’d followed like a lamb to slaughter.

  Ghost, she thought, why didn’t you warn me like you did when Jerome broke in? Where are you?

  “Gretchen.” Julie stood in the doorway. “There you are. I’ve been looking for you.”

  54

  The proper tools and supplies are an important part of a doll restoration artist’s trade. You never know when and where they will come in handy, so my advice is to have equipment for simple repairs readily accessible. When traveling, a small kit or toolbox fits compactly in the trunk of a car. Portable repair items should include the basics: restringing elastic, a variety of hooks, cleaning products and cloths, needles, threads, glue, and cotton swabs. Most restoration artists find themselves adding other useful items to their traveling inventory as they expand their services.

  – From World of Dolls by Caroline Birch

  Julie’s eyes narrowed as she came into the room. Gretchen thought everything about the woman had become more sinister, darker and more suspicious, as if she could read Gretchen’s thoughts and found them unacceptable. But Gretchen had to play along for now. “I’m going back down to wait,” she said.

  “There’s nothing to wait for, but you suspected that already. No one is coming to rescue you.”

  “What do you mean?” Gretchen backed up, squeezing through the tightly stacked boxes, trying to put distance between them.

  “Richard is going to kill you the same way he killed his mother.”

  Richard was inside the museum! And Julie was helping him!

  “Where is he?” Gretchen asked, straining to hear the sound of another set of footsteps.

  “All the clues will point to him. I even have his pipe and tobacco.” Julie produced a small pouch from a pocket. Gretchen recognized it as the same kind that Mr. B. used. She’d watched him stoke his pipe, knew his preference. “That nice cherry aroma should cling in the air long enough. That’ll be the end of him.”

  “Who are you?” Gretchen said. This wasn’t the same doll collector that she’d known through the club. This woman’s face was flushed with rage, almost unrecognizable as Julie’s.

  “I went out of my way to set up that woman’s husband,” Julie continued. “That bumbling fool I hired stole his license and was supposed to drop it near the body. He botched the job, but there’s still hope.”

  “And now you intend to kill me and blame Richard?”

  Blame Richard. The elderly neighborhood women had talked about how they’d learned of Richard’s violent nature through stories told by Rachel. Isn’t that what they’d said? Had the sister been lying to everyone about her brother?

  Several things clicked into place at once. What proof did Gretchen have that verified Rachel’s death? None at all. All it had taken to convince her of the woman’s demise was an obituary in the local paper.

  Julie came closer, weaving through the storage boxes, carrying something that Gretchen hadn’t noticed at first, some kind of hammer with a sharp, pointed end. “You had no business coming into my home,” Julie said. “It belongs to me. You and your mother deserve whatever you get. You had your warning, just like that woman from California had hers.”

  “The note on my windshield?”

  “You still wouldn’t stop, even when you knew what would happen if you didn’t.”

  “How could I know?” Humor her. Gretchen had to try to get through to the Julie she had known.

  “The first time that woman visited the attorney, I knew that Rachel had to die. The California snoop wouldn’t go away, wouldn’t stop asking questions about my mother. I’d been toying with the idea of permanently assuming Julie’s identity. You can’t imagine how tiring it was to keep up two roles. It turned out to be easy to kill off Rachel as well as my past. Just like that…” She snapped her fingers. “Everything erased.”

  Julie’s eyes looked wild, like those of a rabid predator. She was a large woman with a lot of bulk. If she struck Gretchen with the hammer, that would be the end for her. But Julie seemed content to tell her story. At least for a few minutes longer. “Allison wasn’t next in line to inherit the house, so she wasn’t a threat in that respect. But she was trying to get inside the house. For what? She must have suspected something. Then she started talking about Rachel, wanting to get a copy of the death certificate. She wouldn’t quit. When she wanted to see the graves, I offered to meet her in the old part of the cemetery and introduce her to the end of a family line.”

  “You struck her with that?” Gretchen pointed at the hammer. Julie had such a tight grip on it, her knuckles were white.

  “I didn’t want to dishonor my family’s resting place, but I had to act fast.”

  “That’s why you tried to kill her at a different grave site? You didn’t want to desecrate their graves? She was crazier than Gretchen had first thought!

  “The little fool crawled in spite of her injuries.”

  Stay calm. Play for time. “Why did you write the words on the tombstone? Why Die, Dolly, Die?”

  “My dear little relative had several phone conversations with the new me. We were very chummy. She told me that Dolly was her husband’s pet name for her. The police were so inept. It should have been their first indication that the husband was involved.”

  “I had no idea what was going on.” If only the woman would stop staring at her with madness in her eyes. “I’m sorry we caused you so much anguish. Of course, we will return the house to you immediately.”

  “Turn and face the wall,” Julie said. “It will be over quickly. You won’t feel a thing. One minute you’ll be alive, the next you’ll be gone, no conscious thought left. Won’t that be a relief, to be out of this cruel world forever, just like Mommy?”

  Gretchen needed to find a weapon of her own. Her mother had left a few doll supplies on top of one of the boxes, but they weren’t a match for the heavy hammer.

  She looked into Julie’s eyes, refusing to show fear. “No,” she said. “I’m not going to turn my back. That’s how you killed Allison, by sneaking up behind her. You killed your mother the same way. What a coward you are, Rachel.

  “I can understand why you killed your mother.” Yeah, right. “But why try to harm my mother? Why write Die, Dolly, Die and put it under my windshield wiper?”

  “You couldn’t understand how I felt when Mommy started talking as though I was the one with problems. I was always the good one, not Richard. How could she want to put me away? If only she hadn’t forced me to hurt her.”

  “But why my mother? Why try to kill her?”

  “She didn’t belong in my house. Neither did you. I thought Julie was the next in line to inherit the house. I never heard of anyone named Trudy Fernwich. As it turned out, Mommy had secrets of her own, relatives she never told me about. That woman shouldn’t have given my house to the club to turn into a museum. You and your mother should have stayed away but you wouldn’t. It’s your fault that I had to disturb Mommy, why I had to try to move her to another resting place.”

  Gretchen didn’t want to consider the extent of this mad woman’s rage at learning that the home had slipped through her fingers. She didn’t want to think about Flora’s head, either. All this death and destruction because of one woman’s uncontrolled madness.

  Rachel’s mother was dead because of what she knew. Allison was dead because of what Rach
el thought she knew. Gretchen and her mother were next in line for termination because of a simple act of generosity from the new owner. And what about Trudy Fernwich? Would she be next?

  If Gretchen didn’t survive, who would warn Caroline?

  Julie wasn’t moving, but her eyes were wary. “I need to know where Trudy Fernwich is. Tell me, and I’ll consider letting you live.”

  “I don’t know where she is.” She had to find a weapon.

  “The house has to stay in the family. It belongs to me, not to her.”

  Without any warning, Julie lunged forward, bringing the hammer up over her shoulder. For a heavy woman she was quick. Gretchen saw the flat side of the hammer descending toward her and moved sideways, trying to dodge the blow. The weapon slammed into her left shoulder. Gretchen went down, feeling pain and hearing the bone crack.

  Her mother’s repair supplies had fallen with her. A can of enamel spray paint rolled toward her. What would a shot of enamel do to Rachel? Anything? Gretchen knew some of the standard warnings about the chemicals in the compound. Flammable; if exposed wash skin; flush eyes; get medical attention. But would it be enough to incapacitate the mad woman?

  Gretchen grabbed the can with her good arm, fought against the pain, used her left hand to remove the cap. She felt as though she might pass out.

  She’d never wake up if that happened.

  Rachel was above, turning the hammer. She was going to strike her with the sharp end. “You’re making this difficult,” she said. “If you’d listened to me, you wouldn’t be in pain. Mommy didn’t feel a thing. I don’t want to hurt you, really I don’t.”

  “Wait!” The spray can felt full. Rachel hadn’t even noticed. She was focused on her mission. “Let me get up,” Gretchen said. “I want to do it your way.”

  “Yes, that would be best. I can’t stand to see you hurting.”

  What a crazy woman!

  Holding her damaged arm against her body, Gretchen struggled slowly to her feet. As soon as she was upright, Gretchen abruptly turned, raised her good arm, and sprayed Rachel’s face without letting up. Rachel screamed and swung the hammer, striking empty air and throwing her off balance. She staggered. Gretchen got in one last blast before running for the stairs.