by Deb Baker
"Three deaths, April. Count them." Gretchen held up her hands and ticked off the fingers on her left hand.
"Brett, Ronny, and this Percy O'Connor."
"Yeah, so?"
"I accidentally inherit a box of Kewpie reproductions. Never mind that they are awful copies. Focus on the fact that there's a Blunderboo in the box. Then Ronny's killed, and a Blunderboo is delivered to me with a message inside."
"The Blunderboo could have come before Ronny was murdered."
Gretchen nodded. "Next, we learn that this doll collector in Boston was murdered, and what's found at the scene?" Gretchen clapped her hands together. "A Blunderboo Kewpie doll."
"A coincidence?" April said weakly. Even she was no longer convinced.
"Afraid not."
"But why you?"
"I keep asking myself the same question."
"Maybe you saw something at the auction, but you don't know that you saw it, but the murderer knows you know and has to silence you before you realize that you know what you know and expose the killer." April stopped for breath. Gretchen decided not to ask April to repeat her theory.
"Why grind off the bottom of Chief Wag's feet?" she said.
"You're being tested? To see how smart you are?"
"Whoever sent it knew I wouldn't be fooled," Gretchen said. "I think I'm being watched. It's a spooky feeling."
April opened a large bag of potato chips and crunched on one. Stress seemed to increase the woman's hunger.
"I'll bet it is. Where's Nina?"
"She's walking the dogs with Eric."
Walking the dogs reminded Gretchen of the "Wag, the Dog" note hidden inside the Blunderboo. "Maybe the first message had two meanings."
"You sure do switch topics quickly," April said. "I can hardly keep up. What message?"
"Wag, the Dog."
"Two meanings? Like a double entendre?"
Gretchen thought about it. "Sort of. The sender wanted to alert me to Chief Wag's appearance so I would discover the piece of paper."
"How could the sender know you would crack open the doll head?"
Gretchen shrugged. "If someone sends a doll for repair, I usually check it over very closely. I guess it's possible that I would have opened it regardless and attempted a better repair."
"That's a stretch," April said.
"But 'Wag, the Dog' still could have meaning. Like in the movie. Maybe I have to stay smarter than my tail." A thought occurred to Gretchen. "I had a tail yesterday."
"Very funny," April said. "Ha, ha. Was it long and hairy or short and bushy?"
Gretchen smoothed a Ginny doll's dress. "I mean someone followed me. A woman in a black Jetta. When I stopped, she pulled up next to me and told me that I would pay, then she sped off."
April stopped munching. "That's scary. Maybe you should tell Matt and have him assign a bodyguard. Maybe, if you're lucky, he'll volunteer to personally protect you. That is, if he isn't too busy guarding Steve."
"I wonder how Steve's doing." Gretchen had forgotten all about him.
"Maybe he and Matt are bonding."
"This isn't funny, April."
"Have to laugh," she said. "Or you'd cry."
Gretchen watched her return to her table. A steady stream of people continued to stop and look at Gretchen's Ginny dolls and Barbies, but business had been better the day before. Not many were buying today.
Gretchen's cell phone rang. The caller ID displayed her mother's mobile number.
"Hey," Gretchen said.
"Hey, yourself. How's business?"
"Great," Gretchen said, forcing a light tone that she didn't feel. She wasn't about to alarm her mother with disturbing news. "I'm almost sold out of Ginnys, and the repair basket is full. I can't seem to work through it."
Caroline laughed. "Take them home, and I'll help you when I get back. Things are going well here, too. This was a whirlwind tour. I'm taking the day off from working to visit friends. Is Daisy still staying at the house?"
"She came around but vanished like she always does."
"Daisy's good for Nina. My sister needs to be reminded of social issues occasionally. It keeps her grounded on earth."
"When are you coming back?"
"I'd like to stay a few extra days. I want to drive along the coast and visit bookstores."
"No problem," Gretchen said. "By the way, the Boston Kewpie Doll Club is in town."
"Stuffed shirts, aren't they?"
"Eric Huntington likes Nina."
"Who's he?"
"The president of the club's son. Helen's son. Remember him?"
There was a pause on the other end of the line. "Can't say as I do."
"He says he met you."
"Maybe he did. My mind is going in my old age. Say hi to Nina. She could use some male attention for a change."
Gretchen closed the phone and glanced down the aisle, her eyes scanning the crowd. She had that feeling of being watched again but didn't see anything, or anyone, out of place.
18
It isn't a fair fight from the very first punch, but Albert Thoreau learned long ago that life isn't fair. He has no false illusions, therefore he isn't prone to indulge in emotions such as disappointment or recrimination.
This he firmly believes.
He has no illusions.
What he does have are delusions.
Drinking helps him escape the worst of reality. But, as another blow lands on the side of his face, he wishes he had waited until a little later in the evening before imbibing. Or possibly he should have started earlier and passed out someplace safe.
As he goes down, knees all rubbery and head spinning, he notices specks of blood on his shirt.
The blood is the same color as the sky, he notes, staring upward, flat on his back. The entire world has lost its vivid colors.
Monochromatic. Just like life.
"Tell me where it is, and I'll stop." His attacker's breath is warm and smells like sour milk.
Once, long ago, Albert had done a little boxing, the old two-step in the ring.
Lightweight.
"Tell me."
Albert thinks about taking a swing. No point. His assailant has an arsenal of lethal weapons.
He'll take his chances surviving a pair of fists rather than a heavy metal flashlight or police baton. Maybe Nacho will happen along and rescue him. Then he remembers he is supposed to join Nacho at their usual meeting place.
No help coming from that quarter.
"All any of you miserable derelicts understand is pain. Have a little more."
The man leans down and delivers another blow, and Albert feels his eye swelling shut. There is only one chance to escape.
A last look up at the colorless sky, a roll to his side. Then Albert goes limp and plays dead.
19
Gretchen had learned quite a bit from her first doll show. For one thing, she learned never to turn away without keeping a watchful eye over one shoulder.
She learned this the hard way when she turned back to the table after talking to her mother to find muscular, solid Milt Wood holding Chief Wag in his hand.
"What do you want for it?" he asked, beaming with delight. Gretchen sighed. "Mr. Wood, you have the misfortune of admiring dolls I can't sell to you. This one also belongs to a client."
"Tell me who, and I'll approach the owner personally with an offer."
"I can't tell you at the moment."
"You are remarkably obstinate, Ms. Birch, for a woman who hopes to make it in the doll business." Milt wore a smile, but his eyes were steely.
Gretchen picked up the packaging she'd discarded on the floor and showed him the label. "No return address,"
she said. "I don't know who sent it."
Milt turned the Kewpie over. "It looks like it's in perfect condition."
Gretchen took the doll from his hands and returned it to the box before he thought of removing the red shoes.
"Once I find out who it belongs to, I'll pass along
your name."
"I won't take no for an answer."
Gretchen looked at him sharply. Something about the man left a bad taste in her mouth. The slightly raised tilt to his head gave her the impression he was looking down on her.
Am I psychic? Or a good judge of people?
Gretchen snorted self-derisively. A good judge of character? Come on, I'm the one who spent seven years on Steve.
If Steve was an example of her stellar judgment, she should give up on men while she had a little self-respect left.
She glanced at Milt, hoping he hadn't heard her snort, but he was bent over the box, still coveting the doll. Gretchen pushed Steve from her mind with one final thought. Let him stay in jail for awhile. Serves him right.
"Did you know Percy O'Connor?" she asked Milt, pulling the doll box away and closing the cover. Of course he would know the man if Percy had belonged to the same club.
Milt nodded. "What happened to him was horrible. And to that reporter yesterday. What is the world coming to? I don't envy that detective."
"Detective Albright? Have you seen him here?"
Gretchen had been keenly aware of his absence from the show today.
"Oh yes," Milt said. "Hasn't he been by your table?
He's been questioning exhibitors most of the day. Haven't you seen him?"
"Why, no."
Maybe Matt was simply trying to gather more evidence against Steve. In any case, Gretchen was glad that he was being thorough. Strange though, that he hadn't stopped by.
"Have you seen Matt?" she called over to April.
"He asked me a few questions earlier," she called back.
"What kind of questions?"
"Oh, I don't know."
"You don't know what he asked you?"
A pink flush spread across April's face. "I didn't want to tell you. You've been under enough pressure."
"What? Tell me."
"He wanted me to vouch for you and Nina, to make sure you were accounted for around the time that Ronny was killed."
"And?"
"And I knew that Nina was right here with the dogs the whole time."
"I was here, too. Did you tell him that?"
April squirmed like a giant nightcrawler on the end of a fishing hook. "I couldn't, because you weren't. That was right around the time that Bonnie offered to watch your table so you could go see the Boston Kewpie Club's table. Remember? I had to be honest with him."
Gretchen turned to Milt. "I was at your table when Margaret explained the different kinds of Kewpie dolls to customers. Maybe you can tell that to Detective Albright."
"He asked me about you," Milt said. "I remember seeing you and told him that. But I think it happened after Margaret's demonstration."
Uh-oh. This isn't good.
"There you are," Nina said, as though Gretchen and the entire table had shifted to a new area and Nina had been looking everywhere for her. "Take Tutu and wrap the end of her leash around the chair leg for me, would you?"
"Good day, ladies," Milt said, moving along. "Let me know about the doll, Ms. Birch."
Gretchen made a mental note to quiz Milt later about Percy O'Connor.
Nina had Sophie and Nimrod on tiny leashes, and they ran wildly around each other until they were hopelessly tangled. Gretchen secured Tutu and went to work untangling the puppies.
"There you go," Gretchen said, handing them back to Nina.
"I ran into Bonnie on the way in," Nina said. "She said to remind you that cocktails start at five at her house. We'll finish up here at four o'clock, pack up, and head right over."
Nina hung the empty traveling purses on each side of Gretchen's chair and scooped the puppies onto her table.
"I've signed up enough clients to keep me busy for two months," she announced. "This show has been great for my business."
April leaned against Gretchen's table. The entire table shifted. "It's wrecked my business," she grumbled. "I've never had so many customers, yet so little business, at the same time." April lowered her voice while Nina fussed with the dogs. "Next show I'm going back to a solo enterprise. Either that or…" she glanced at the dogs, "I'm changing careers."
"Nina, can you watch my table for a few minutes?"
Gretchen asked, already making her way down the aisle.
"Sure," she heard Nina say.
She found Matt on the far side of the hall near the main door, leaning against Shelley Mack's doll table and writing in a notebook. He was dressed in shorts and T-shirt, sunglasses on top of his dark hair, the faint smell of Chrome cologne hanging in the air.
Gretchen took a deep breath of the scent. "You're asking people about me?" she said, trying but failing to keep the concern out of her voice.
"Routine," he replied, looking at her with those deep, piercing eyes. "Didn't your mother teach you any manners? It's polite to greet me warmly to throw me off guard before any type of verbal assault. It's a rule. Care to start over?"
"Keep my mother out of this." Gretchen crossed her arms defiantly, then thought better of the defensive poseand swung her hands to her hips. Being around Matt always threw her timing off. "You're going about the entire investigation all wrong," she said.
"Ah, so you came over to tell me how to do my job." He tucked the notebook in a back pocket and pushed off from the table.
Shelley Mack leaned across her doll table, squeezing her arms together to expose as much cleavage as possible.
"Anything else I can do to help, Detective Albright?" She was obviously even more affected by the cologne than Gretchen. Shelley batted goo-enhanced eyelashes.
"Thanks, Shelley. That pretty much wraps it up. You've been a big help."
"I'll be right here if you need me."
Matt stepped away from the doll table, and Gretchen followed.
"Let's go outside," he said. "I can't breathe in here."
"Don't you want to hear my alibi?" she said when they found a slice of shade under a palm tree.
"Do you feel you need one?"
"I think I do, since you've been asking everyone else about it."
"Shoot."
"Shoot?"
"Tell me where you were when Ronny Beam was
killed."
Gretchen told him about Bonnie's offer to watch her table and about the Boston group discussing Blunderboos.
"Milt remembered that I was there, and your mother can tell you that she wanted me to see the club's Kewpies."
"I still see a gap in time where you aren't accounted for," Matt said. "But I don't think it matters. I think we have our man."
"Steve? You don't still think he did it?"
"He argued with the deceased shortly before the murder. His fingerprints are on the knife, and several witnesses saw him out in the parking lot before Ronny was killed. How much more evidence would you like?"
"But what about the real murder weapon?"
"The tire iron didn't have any prints on it."
"Steve isn't capable of murder."
"Everyone has the potential."
Brett, Percy O'Connor, and Ronny Beam were connected through a trail of Kewpie dolls. So was she, for that matter. The messages inside the Kewpies made her fear she was involved more deeply than she wanted to be. Should she tell him everything she knew?
If she told him about the deliveries, he might think she was making a clumsy effort to shift suspicion away from Steve. Would he look more closely at her?
Matt Albright was too full of himself to see the truth. Arrogant, selfabsorbed, stubborn… She searched for more adjectives to describe him. Why did she even think for one moment that she could confide in him?
The detective standing in front of her with the ridiculous smirk would probably scoff at her concerns and dismiss them out of hand as sheer fantasy.
"Has Steve requested legal representation yet?" Gretchen asked instead.
"I offered, he refuses. Says he's waiting for you. That's one of the reasons I circled your name in big bold red pen. Any idea wha
t he's talking about?"
"None," Gretchen said. Was Steve trying to protect her?
How chivalrous of him to come through for her. Finally. But too late. "Can I see him?"
"No. He's still in a holding cell. Until he's charged, he can't have any visitors."
"How long can you hold him without charging him?"
"Not much longer."
His eyes locked onto hers. Gretchen squirmed under his gaze. What was it about this man? He induced too many conflicting emotions.
"I wouldn't have pegged him as your type," Matt said.
"I thought you'd go for someone… I don't know… more sensitive, more artistic."
"Really?"
"Anyway, I'm sorry it happened to you. Your boyfriend's in a heap of trouble."
"I don't know how many times I have to say this…"
Gretchen didn't finish the sentence. Why bother?
She stomped back to her table, plopped into her chair, and selected a five-piece toddler doll from the repair pile. Before Gretchen could immerse herself in repair work and temporarily forget all the peripheral intrigue going on, Nina, canines in tow, walked the few steps from April's table. "I kept an eye on your table, but nobody wanted to buy anything. The place is starting to clear out. What's wrong? You're so pale."
"Steve's still in jail. I guess witnesses saw him in the parking lot." She leaned back in the chair. "Matt must think I know what happened or that I'm an accomplice of some sort."
"Your knife and Steve's fingerprints? It doesn't look good." Nina bent down to stroke the three dogs on the floor around her feet. Tutu put her jealous little muzzle under Nina's hand every time Nina gave Nimrod or Sophie attention. "I bet that's exactly what he thinks."
Nina straightened, and her face turned the color of Elmer's glue. At first Gretchen thought it was because of what she'd just said, but Nina was staring at Gretchen's arm. "Don't move," Nina said, jerking her hand out in front of her like a cop stopping traffic. "I don't want to panic you, but sit very, very still."
April, coming up behind her, looked at Gretchen and screamed.
"Quiet," Nina commanded.
Gretchen did what Nina asked. "What?" she said, barely breathing.
April had her hand at her mouth.
