by Ellen Riggs
“That’s probably it,” Kellan said, sounding as if he was making a case to himself for the unexplainable.
“There’s no point overthinking anything,” I said. “I mean, except about the case. Have you found anything more to clear my mom?”
He shook his head. “No, but I haven’t found anything more specific to tie her to the murder, either. If it helps, I don’t think she attacked Portia, even in self-defense. I’ve known your mother too long.” Getting up from the bench, he started pacing. “I just wish she’d stop getting herself embroiled in things without a good alibi. I waste a lot of time proving your mother’s innocence.”
“I know. I hope you’ve chatted to Dina Macintosh and Belle Tremblay. They’re two of many who had grudges against Portia.”
“I’m working my way through the list. Maybe you could leave that to me.”
“Of course,” I said. “I’m going to be busy with my new guests anyway.”
“Glad to hear it.” He turned to face me and while I couldn’t see his expression, I sensed another warning coming. “Ivy, try not to follow this dog’s so-called magic into danger, okay? Keats may be brilliant but he doesn’t know everything.”
Keats shifted under my arm, as if planning to dispute that, so I squeezed him hard as a signal to desist.
Jilly was right about the value of practicing restraint. Keats could afford to do a little work, too.
Chapter Eighteen
The last time I’d slept past six a.m. was the day before I moved to the farm. But this morning I managed to sleep right through the Aladdin alarm clock, and the rooster kept on crowing until Jilly rapped on my door.
“Up and at it,” she called. “We have guests arriving, remember?”
I remembered, and it was nice that the thought brought pleasure rather than the usual dread. Michael and Caroline Bingham were lovely company. This would give us a chance to hit our stride at last.
Keats didn’t seem to share my enthusiasm and trailed after me down the stairs. He even let Percy get out the door first, which was a constant point of contention.
“What’s wrong, buddy?” I asked, on the way to the barn. “Did you eat some bad crackle yesterday?”
Although Keats had few of the shortcomings of regular dogs, he did enjoy snacking on rabbit and deer scat, of which there was plenty around. Now that mornings were frosty, I could often hear crunching as we walked to the barn. It didn’t thrill me, but I reminded myself that dogs needed to be dogs. Especially if they were going to spend the night being superheroes.
“It’ll pass,” I said. “Although hopefully not while we’re driving into town later. Too much of that stuff and you might rot out Buttercup’s leather.”
He continued to lag as I collected the eggs, and then showed little of his usual verve when he released the livestock. Driving them out of the barn was typically one of the happiest moments of his day. They wanted to run and he loved hitting the “on” switch. It was an explosion of fleece and fur that never got old for me.
By the time we were on the road to town, however, his spark was back and I heaved a sigh of relief. He put white paws on the dashboard and urged me to turn left off Main Street as soon as we entered town.
“No can do,” I said. “Jilly made me promise to come straight home with the groceries. Otherwise there will be hungry guests at lunch.”
Keats turned his blue eye on me and mumbled something.
“I’m sure it seems important, but it can wait. How about we come back this afternoon once everyone’s settled?”
The blue eye continued to pin me, unrelenting.
“Okay, fine,” I said, making the next left and circling back. “This errand of yours had better be quick. Jilly deserves to have everything go right this time.”
Keats’ mouth dropped open in a happy pant that lifted my spirits immediately. Whatever bothered him earlier had passed now. Maybe he was just happy to have an hour of time together without—
“Percy!” The cat emerged from the rear footwell, bounced off the seat and landed on my headrest. “Oh my gosh, you sure know how to make an entrance. But you won’t be making an exit this time.”
The cat moved over to the headrest on the passenger side, squished against the roof of the car. I knew his strategy. When I opened the car door, he’d slingshot out of here. It was almost impossible to stop him, even with Keats to slow him down.
When I saw the destination the dog had in mind, however, I had a change of heart. His paws bounced off the dash repeatedly to signal for me to park in front of The Langman Legacy, an antique store owned by sisters Heddy and Kaye Langman.
“Okay, got it,” I told the dog. “Unfortunately there’s a ‘no dogs’ sign on the door, and if you want me to get information out of them, it would probably be better to ask first.”
Seeing his tail and ears droop was a little heartbreaking. And when I released the cat, Keats curled up in a small ball in the passenger seat.
“It’s not personal,” I said. “These ladies were clients of Portia Parson. They’re cat ladies, first and foremost. Establishing that connection really helps with sleuthing.”
He tucked his nose under his tail and closed both eyes.
“Buddy, I’ll come back for you. I promise.”
“Lady, stop talking to your dog and watch your cat,” someone said. “I nearly tripped over him.”
I turned to find Percy sashaying down the middle of the sidewalk. He’d always had a swagger, but since I’d put a rhinestone collar on him from The Hound and the Furry, he seemed to have delusions of royalty.
Following him to the door of The Langman Legacy, I said, “Can we make this fast, Percy? Keats is upset with me and I really can’t handle that.”
He looked up at me and blinked once, as if to agree. Perhaps he wasn’t as unreasonable a creature as he often seemed.
I hadn’t been in the store since I was a child, but you didn’t forget a place like that. Or a smell like that. Not surprisingly, the air was full of… old. Old wood, old leather, old fabric, old books, old wax and old stuff I couldn’t even see because the place was so full. I thought I remembered the round oak pedestal table covered in china from when I was a kid, but it probably just looked the same.
The Langman sisters were not antiques themselves, despite having been in business so long. They’d inherited the store from their dad when still in their twenties and were about the same age as my mother. That’s the only reason we’d dropped by now and then, because while my mom loved secondhand clothing, that’s as far as her interest in “old” went. Her apartment was small and the furniture modern and streamlined.
Kaye was behind the tall oak counter that definitely hadn’t changed since my last visit.
“Why, Ivy Galloway, how nice to see you.” She got down off the high stool and came around to hug me. I took it like a champ, although I would just as soon have hugged one of my farm animals. Not that there was anything particularly off-putting about her. She looked like pretty much any woman of her vintage in Clover Grove. Hair short and low maintenance. Minimal makeup. Clothes that could take you from grocery store to the neighbor’s pot luck and back. I’d probably end up just like that myself, because this apple had fallen pretty far from her mother’s tree.
“Nice to see you too, Miss Langman,” I said, slipping out of her grasp as soon as it was polite to do so.
“Kaye, please,” she said. “You’re all grown up now.” She evaluated me as if I were a rare bit of porcelain. “And the prettiest of the Galloway Five, if you don’t mind my saying.”
“I don’t mind, but the other four might,” I said, laughing.
“Heddy, come out here,” Kaye bellowed. “Ivy Galloway, lady farmer, has paid us a visit.”
I managed to slide behind a display table of glass vases before Heddy Langman could snatch me up in a hug, too. “I hope you don’t mind but I brought a friend,” I said.
“Who?” Heddy asked, peering around. “Where?”
“Pe
rcy,” I called. “Show yourself.”
The cat leapt lightly onto the table I was lurking behind, somehow managing to avoid touching a thing.
The Langman sisters screamed a little louder and longer than the situation really required. Either they had a flair for the dramatic or the vases were more valuable than they looked.
“Ivy, you can’t just walk around town with a cat off leash,” Kaye said. “People will think you’re crazy.”
“If he were on leash they’d think I was even crazier,” I said, shrugging. “Percy stowed away in the car today and I heard you liked cats. I’d like to bring my dog in, too, if you—”
“Nope,” Kaye said. “There’s a sign on the door for a reason. But we do like cats. I have two and Heddy has three.”
Percy wasted no time in beginning his seduction, sinuously coiling around their outstretched arms.
“This is an extraordinary cat,” Kaye said. “He’s not only handsome, he’s also gregarious.”
“More social than my dog by far,” I said. “And sneaky as heck. I don’t even know how he gets past me and into the car but it’s becoming a regular thing.”
“What does your mom think of him?” Heddy asked, a smirk playing on her lips.
“Oh, you know Mom,” I said. “Not much of a pet lover. And now I have over sixty animals, if you count the chickens.”
“You’ve had quite a time of it since you came home from Boston,” Kaye said. “That farm’s always been cursed, you know.”
“Cursed? Really?” I watched Percy rear up on his hind paws to beg someone to pick him up. No takers. “Sometimes I’ve wondered, I have to admit.”
Heddy walked over to a glass jar in a corner. “This is sage. Have you smudged the place?”
“I’m rather surprised to tell you I have. Well, Daisy did right after I moved in. You see where that got us.”
Heddy laughed as she snipped the price tag off the sage with familiar gold-handled scissors and then handed the bunch to me. “Smudge again,” she said. “But I’m glad you’ve kept your sense of humor.”
“Yeah. I’m the glass-half-full Galloway Girl. If we hadn’t smudged once, there could have been even more fatalities.”
They both laughed, although Kaye looked slightly scandalized. I’d just provided an excellent sound bite for the rumor mill.
Heddy finally took Percy’s bait and picked him up. She let him snuggle into her neck and patted his back firmly as if burping a baby. “What a charmer.”
“That’s how he gets away with murder,” I said. Oops. Poor choice of words. Sound bite number two. I would have to get to business before I set the grapevine completely on fire.
“What can we do for you?” Kaye asked. “Gift for a sister? Or a handsome boyfriend, perhaps?”
“Actually, I was just on my way to get groceries and thought I’d stop in. Mom found some old junk in one of those vintage stores she’s always visiting and wondered if it’s valuable.”
“Probably not,” Heddy said, rolling her eyes. “Nothing she’s shown us before has been anything special. We make regular rounds throughout hill country so there’s nothing we haven’t seen.”
“That makes sense,” I said. “But what if just this one time she found a true treasure?”
“Fine, tell us about it,” Heddy said, relenting. It seemed like she couldn’t keep up the attitude with Percy wooing her with the purr. “Not another cheap crystal bowl, I hope?”
“A vase,” I said, touching one on the table. “Shaped like this one, but a pretty shade of red.”
“Cranberry glass,” the sisters said in unison.
“Vases like that are a dime a dozen, Ivy,” Heddy said. “That won’t finance your mom’s new venture.”
“Figured as much,” I said. “A little extra cash would have been nice for her about now.”
They nodded in unison, too. “Such a shame about Portia passing where and when she did,” Heddy said. “Not that there was any love lost between us.”
“Heddy.” Kaye eyed her sister. “We were on good terms with Portia for many years. She minded our cats and even the store when we travelled. Few small business owners have the luxury of vacations.”
“But then she went nuts,” Heddy said.
“Heddy!” This time Kaye sounded like the older sister she was. “Portia was clearly cracking under strain. She wanted that manor so badly but had no idea how much it would cost to maintain. I offered to help her out by buying some of Hazel’s old things but she wouldn’t hear of it.”
“Personally, I got tired of Portia’s lectures,” Heddy said. “Mostly she ranted about brushing my cats regularly. Then last spring I came home from a trip to find she’d shaved three of our five. For their own comfort, she said. They looked ridiculous.”
Percy pulled away to stare at her with wide eyes.
“It’s almost as if he understood,” Kaye said, reaching out to pat him. “It’s okay, handsome. We fired her after that. And then she badmouthed us as terrible pet owners.”
“Which didn’t help our reputation in this homesteading town,” Heddy picked up. “Clover Grove isn’t far behind Dorset Hills with its fads.”
“We had no choice but to cut her off completely,” Kaye continued. “And since we have so many friends in town, her work dried up quite a bit, I’m afraid.”
“I’m really not surprised someone stabbed her,” Heddy said.
“Heddy!” This time Kaye was so exasperated, she took Percy out of her sister’s arms and handed him to me.
“Well, it’s true,” Heddy insisted. “I’m only surprised it was Dahlia. I didn’t think she had it in her.”
“Heddy!” Now the protest came from me. “You’re friends with my mom and you know full well she couldn’t murder anyone.”
“I suppose not,” she said, grudgingly. “Even if she wanted to, Dahlia’s always been a delicate flower. There may be another explanation.”
“I’m quite sure the police will find out what it is,” I said, setting Percy on the floor. “Then Mom will get to reopen, instead of spending her time in junk stores. This week she came home with these crazy stacking dolls. Only shaped like a rhino.”
The glance they exchanged was so fleeting I might have missed it if I weren’t watching closely.
“A rhinoceros? How odd! Are you sure?”
“Well, it may have been a hippo. Or a manatee. Something fat, I think. What I do know is that there were five of them, each smaller than the last, and they fit together like a dream.”
“It sounds like a child’s toy,” Heddy said. “I doubt it’s worth a dollar, but we’ll take a look at it, if you like.”
“Okay, I’ll bring it along next time I’m in town.”
“Or we could visit and save you the trip,” Kaye said. “You must be so busy handling all that livestock.”
Handling livestock, especially Wilma, the bottomless pit, had shown me what true hunger looked like. Kaye and Heddy were starving for the nesting hippo doll recovered from the salon hidey-hole, that much was clear. There was a gleam in their eyes I’d seen on other collectors. Their craving would never be satisfied because there was always something more to acquire.
“No hurry. Mom isn’t sure she’d want to sell anyway. She might save it for her next grandkid—if she ever has one. Daisy’s done and the rest of us are in no hurry.”
“Now we’re curious,” Kaye said. “And after nearly forty years in the business, there isn’t much in the way of collectibles we haven’t seen.”
“I can believe that,” I said, turning to head for the door. A spot of orange made me look up to find Percy sitting on a tall shelf beside a glass case. He turned his sharp green eyes to look inside, and I saw a glass figurine of a bear that looked very much like the original Bartoli creations Kellan had taken into custody. Right beside it sat a wooden circus poodle. Unless I was much mistaken, it was the smallest in a set of stacking dolls. Perhaps they kept the rest out of sight.
“Where’s the cat gone?�
� Heddy said.
By the time she finished her question, he was weaving through her feet.
“Will you come out to the car and meet my dog?” I asked. “He’s in a terrible funk that he couldn’t come in.”
“Anything for Dahlia’s girls,” Kaye said. “Say hello to her for us, will you? We’ve wanted to reach out but figured it was better to let the dust settle first.”
“She understands completely. Everyone who had words with Portia is a little on edge right now. But we’ll all get through this together as a town, right? That’s what Clover Grove does.”
When we got to the car, the women oohed and aahed over Buttercup, a collectible that was apparently well worth having. Keats unfurled from the passenger seat and got out to say hello.
The Langman sisters weren’t dog lovers, and seeing his ears flatten and his hackles prickle did nothing to change their opinion.
“I’m sorry,” I said, letting both animals into Buttercup and sliding behind the wheel. “He’s been a little moody since Percy arrived to steal his thunder.”
“If you ever want to give that cat up, I know the perfect home for him,” Heddy called, as the car’s engine turned over and let out quite a roar. “Mine.”
“At least I know he’d never be shaved,” I said, waving merrily as I pulled out into traffic.
Chapter Nineteen
Jilly was gifted in many things, headhunting and cookery chief among them. Spontaneous event planning turned out to be another. When I told her I wanted to hold a celebration of life for Portia, she was on board before the words were out of my mouth.
“I don’t even care what you’re scheming,” she said, “and I know you’re scheming something. What I see is an opportunity to gain back some credibility for both the inn and the salon, and do something nice for the Binghams at the same time. Let’s do a fundraiser for cat rescue while we’re at it.”
