7 Madness in Miniature

by Margaret Grace

  I parked in the unfinished lot behind SuperKrafts. I had a few minutes before the meeting and took a chance that Skip might be available to answer a couple of questions that could be key to the impromptu gathering I was called to. I tried his cell phone first and wasn’t quite prepared for his opening. I’d always felt that Caller ID gave an unfair advantage to the person on the receiving end. A heads-up. Or a warning.

  “I heard you really hit it off with Bebe Mellon,” he said. “She wants you to visit every day.”

  “You’re so well-informed. No wonder you’re rising in the ranks.” I realized that if that was the best I could come up with, I should stop playing the smart-remarks game.

  “Yeah, I was trying to be a wise guy, but I’m also telling you the truth. Bebe put in a request to talk to you again.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Uh-huh. She’s seeing the handwriting on the wall. She knows you’re the most influential person in the department.” I blew a poor imitation of a raspberry into the phone. “Sorry, there I go again,” he said. “But I am serious about her request. You busy?”

  I gave Skip my current location, mission, and reason for calling, assuring him also that I was more than happy to return to jail.

  “What’s the status of Craig Palmer’s body?” I asked, having no time to think of more euphemistic phrasing.

  “We’re done on this end,” he said. “I believe he’s headed home to New York on Wednesday afternoon.”

  The day scheduled for SuperKrafts’ Grand Opening. “Do you know if Craig’s family is planning to come here to claim his body?”

  “Not as far as I know. They’ve declined the option of escorting him home. I heard they’ve made arrangements with Miller’s for transport.”

  There was never a way around the awkwardness of dealing with a dead person or talking about him. I’d had my own sad business with Miller’s Mortuary when Ken died, and remembered the words and phrases that were meant to be comforting: departed, like a train leaving the station, but scheduled to return soon; passed on, with the implication that the next phase was so much better for the person; gathering in a parlor, where soft conversation might be served along with tea; offerings of sympathy for the loss, as if the person might one day show up in a Lost and Found department. A cleansed vocabulary, falling short of the reality.

  I buried my memories. I had what I needed from Skip. “Thanks,” I said. “I’ll visit Bebe as soon as this meeting is over.”

  “I’ll have someone there to take your official statement. I kind of forgot that our little chat as the night turned into morning didn’t count. I’ll be at the station by then, too.”

  “Where are you now? With June? Nosy aunts want to know.”

  “Sure, that will work. Good luck at the meeting.”

  Apparently Skip was with June. Mending whatever was wrong, I hoped.

  * * *

  I surveyed the parking lot. There was as always a selection of trucks and vans with the SuperKrafts logo on the sides, plus the familiar rental cars—Catherine’s silver Taurus, and Leo’s Ford in a shade of blue they might have revived from the nineteen-fifties. I assumed one of the other cars, a red Camry close to the back entrance, was Megan’s. Nice that SuperKrafts could afford to allow each employee to rent his own car.

  The large metal delivery door was (theoretically) always locked and alarmed, opened by punching a code into the keypad above the handle. Catherine, or some supercomputer in New York, changed the code every day during the preparations phase. Maisie, Bebe, and I and a few other residents were on an “as needed” list for meetings that included us. I had no code for today, and with any luck, my work as a town rep was over and I’d never have one again. I rang the loud, harsh-sounding bell.

  Leo, taller than me by nearly a head, opened the door. His broad shoulders and portly physique were incongruous with some of the more girly products in the store. I had no trouble believing he wanted out of cute retail and back to a sleek office with a view of the Chrysler Building. His attire would certainly be more appropriate in midtown Manhattan. He might have been the only male in Lincoln Point wearing a long-sleeved shirt and tie on this hot summer Sunday.

  “We’ve already started,” he said by way of greeting.

  I checked my watch. Five minutes after three. Shouldn’t I have been congratulated for showing up at all on such short notice? Not that I liked being late, but the time spent praising Maddie’s miniature crime scene tape and then talking to Skip had slowed me down. I hadn’t realized SuperKrafts ran such a tight ship, and in any case, I wouldn’t have given up the chance to applaud Maddie’s achievement, nor the opportunity for police intel, like any good operative.

  “I’ll try to catch up,” I said.

  I followed Leo inside the delivery area, across a wide concrete floor as dimly lit as my garage with its nightlight, toward what would soon be the employee’s lounge. The retail area was dark, thanks to the specially coated front windows. I couldn’t see the spot where I’d figured Palmer had been found. I wondered how long I’d have to wait before reasonably being able to excuse myself to use the rest room, conveniently located a few yards into the main part of the shop where crime scene tape had been up not long ago.

  One short wall of the meeting room was set up with a kitchen counter; two other walls were lined with vending machines, lockers, and a bulletin board. Catherine and Megan sat across from each other at a long table, stacks of paper in front of them. I arrived just in time to hear Megan’s position on the agenda item Catherine had prepared me for on the phone—to open grandly or not to open grandly on Wednesday.

  “I say we proceed as planned,” Megan said, tapping her pen on one of the small notepads on the table. “I vote Grand Opening on Wednesday.”

  “I’m not sure why you even have a vote,” Catherine said. “You know nothing about this store. Have you even walked into the retail area?”

  “I don’t have to. I’ve seen a million like it. I don’t see why we can’t have the opening. It’s not as if Craig’s body is still here in the store,” Megan said.

  Catherine’s face took on a horrified look. “How can you be so callous?” she asked, her voice high and shaky.

  “Oh, really, Catherine. We don’t need to impress Mrs. Porter,” Leo said, pulling out a chair for me and taking the one at the head of the table.

  The room gave off an eerie ambience, with a warehouse-high ceiling and low-level lighting. The hum of the refrigerator and the vending machines competed with the crackling of the fluorescent lights. I was acutely aware that beyond us in the vast store full of merchandise was a particular spot on the floor, where Craig Palmer’s body had lain for several hours. I had too vivid a picture of him in my mind. I regretted the highly effective air-conditioning and wished I’d worn a sweater.

  Catherine crossed her arms, ready to speak again. “I’m sorry if a little respect is too much to ask of you both. Craig Palmer was our boss—”

  “Your boss,” Leo interrupted.

  “—and our colleague,” Catherine continued.

  I cleared my throat. All three turned to me, seeming to take the sound as a maneuver on my part to enter the skirmish, which was not my intent. My intent was to clear my throat.

  “What do you say, Mrs. Porter?” Megan asked.

  I cleared my throat again, this time to stall before I spoke. “I understand that Craig’s remains will be sent to his parents on Wednesday.” I had to admit I enjoyed the surprised glances that were sent my way. I wished I’d been able to impress my ALHS students as easily with my inside knowledge of Shakespeare. “Mr. and Mrs. Palmer won’t be coming to town,” I continued, “but in my opinion, it seems in bad taste to have any kind of celebration until their son’s body is back with his family.”

  “See,” Catherine said, as if something had been proven, or as if my opinion mattered.

  Leo and Megan looked at each other. I thought I detected slight nods. “I suppose postponing the event would be okay,” Mega
n said. “We can open for business, low key, on Wednesday, so we don’t have to change the schedules of the workers and do a truckload of paperwork, but we won’t have the balloons and cake, et cetera, et cetera, until Saturday.”

  Nods all around.

  “Not as good as Wednesday, but better than waiting a whole week,” Leo said.

  “I don’t understand,” I said. “I would have thought a weekend would be the obvious choice for a Grand Opening.”

  The three professional retailers shook their heads. “Too much competition on weekends,” Megan explained. “The outlet malls around here are a big attraction—you can hit more stores at once. The idea was that we’d have Wednesday all to ourselves.”

  “Also, crafters tend to be retired ladies”—Leo kept his eyes on me as he spoke—“and they’re not going to be working on a Wednesday. On the other hand, their kids or younger friends will be at a job so the crafters will have nothing to do but shop.”

  I wondered if Leo realized the incongruities in his final thought—putting crafters and nothing to do in the same sentence. I could have taken the time to point out that the crafter in front of him also tutored adults studying for their high school equivalency diplomas and worked year-round on fund-raisers for local causes. But I was used to the stereotype, and didn’t resent the profiling as much as Catherine seemed to. She shot Leo a look that said, Do you realize who you’re talking to?

  We moved on to important topics like balloons and refreshments, all of which had been ordered, but now would have to be stored longer (the balloons) or rescheduled for delivery on Saturday (food and drink).

  “I think it would be nice if we had a little memorial service with the ribbon cutting,” Catherine said.

  “Listen to yourself,” Leo said.

  “I mean, just a few words to acknowledge that a person very important to this project has been…was…”

  “Is no longer with us,” Megan said.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sakes,” Leo said, probably straining to keep his response G-Rated.

  “Everyone knows Craig was murdered on this spot,” Megan said.

  “Not on this spot,” Leo said. “Out there.” He pointed to the space beyond the meeting room. “And now you’re afraid to even walk that far.”

  “I’m not afraid. There’s just no need to. Maybe that spot will be an attraction. But let’s not flaunt it.”

  “Flaunt it?” Catherine yelled. “What’s wrong with you? You think I want to use Craig’s death as a marketing tool? How can you think that?” She was hoarse by the time she finished.

  I’d had enough of SuperKrafts on what should have been a relaxing, crafting Sunday. I felt I’d given enough input. The rest was about politics, marketing, and sales, none of which I was adept at.

  “Excuse me,” I said. “I’m going to the rest room. I’ll stop by before I leave to see if there’s anything else I can help you with.”

  I wasn’t surprised that I got no argument.

  * * *

  Walking out of the lounge into the store didn’t help me erase the image of a departed, deceased person who had passed away. On the floor a few yards in, I saw bits of packing straw, the kind that was really plastic and familiar to me from shipments of miniatures to my home. I figured that was where the crate of vases had been. I assumed that the vases themselves had been taken into evidence and tested for blood and fingerprints. I pushed away the idea that they’d one day be back on the shelves, and I vowed never to buy a vase in SuperKrafts.

  In front of me, the aisles of the store were beautifully organized. With the equivalent of sunglasses for a storefront and only dimmed overhead lights on, the merchandise was in shadow, but it wasn’t hard for me to make out items I’d seen accumulate on the shelves over the past months. Scrapbooking paper, stickers, rubber stamps, glue, and special pens were in one section; beads, string, and jewelry-making tools in another. The miniatures section held more items than were in the entire inventory of dollhouse stores I’d visited, which of necessity had given over square footage to other kinds of merchandise.

  When I thought I’d reached the spot where Craig had been killed, I squatted and peered at the tiles in the floor, looking for signs of the struggle between Craig and his killer, a scene that would forever be associated with SuperKrafts in my mind. I ran my fingers along the grout, sniffed a piece of straw, squinted at a tiny shard of pottery. Except for my lack of official jacket, anyone watching might think I was a bona fide crime scene investigator. I wondered how the professionals decided what to pick up and bag for evidence, what to photograph, and what was useless and unrelated to the crime. Clearly the ceramic shard and bits of straw left behind were considered negligible.

  I stood for a broader view, trying to guess how much of the area would have been marked off as a crime scene. I wished I’d gotten a look before they removed the tape. My survey took in more ceramics and straw, and at the outer limits of my view, something that caught the light of a low-level safety lamp—a stray blue-green bead on the floor. I walked over and picked it up. I squinted, and thought it might be a metallic-coated bead, with many facets. It was close enough to a rack that held beads in different sizes and colors to have fallen out of a package. Putting it in my purse made me feel useful, as if I’d just saved someone from slipping and falling. Failing that, I’d neatened up the store a bit.

  Toward the front of the store was the display of dollhouses, their tiny roofs forming a miniature city skyline against the tinted windows that faced Springfield Boulevard. I easily picked out the one Maddie and I had built since there were only two half-scale houses and the other was a turreted Victorian. I nudged the mirrors that Maddie had glued to the walls above the bathroom sink and the dresser in the main bedroom. The miniature mirrors were solidly attached. Even in her snit about being banned from the meeting at Sadie’s, she’d done an excellent job on her assignment. I allowed myself a moment of pride in my granddaughter.

  I wandered the aisles, past Floral and Home Décor; knitting and crocheting yarn, books, and needles. I wished I was getting this preview of the nearly complete store under different circumstances. I checked out the art supplies and thought about buying a sketchbook and charcoal for Taylor, who showed great interest in drawing. Maddie could give it to her on her next birthday, if they were on speaking terms.

  I spotted a flyer advertising SuperKrafts’ classes. Stacks of the ads were piled in wire holders at the ends of the aisles. When I noticed one of the workshops on the list was Ceramics with Bebe Mellon, I snatched a couple of copies to take to her at the police station. It might lift her spirits to know she was appreciated and labeled “a master at ceramics.” With any luck, she’d be released from jail in time to show up.

  I walked back toward the exit to the parking lot, deciding not to check in on my friends at the meeting. If they’d needed me, they’d have come to get me. Then again, they thought I’d gone to the rest room. Maybe they were waiting for the sound of a flushing toilet.

  * * *

  Dum dum, da da dum, da da dum. My cell phone, ringing as I walked past the three SuperKrafts’ employees’ rental cars. I entered my car and turned on the ignition and the A/C. I’d think about fuel economy and the environment when summer was over.

  “Hey, Mom,” my daughter-in-law, Mary Lou, said. “Still picking up the pieces after the big quake?”

  “In a way, yes.”

  “I was kidding. Wasn’t it barely over a three?”

  I gave Mary Lou a “Yes, but…” and an update on the quake-related murder. “In a way, the earthquake was a handy weapon,” I said.

  “Wow, I’m sorry. I read about it, but didn’t give it a lot of thought. I didn’t put it all together. You, SuperKrafts, and all.”

  “Why would you? Tell me about the art show.” Mary Lou knew I was her biggest fan, always waiting for the next new technique she’d try with her oils.

  “It’s going pretty well as far as networking and contacts. Not too many sales, but it’s early
yet. I found a great framing place to recommend to potential buyers. Makes it easier for them.”

  It wasn’t entirely out of the question that Mary Lou would call just to say, “Hey,” and to talk about the latest exhibit of her original portraits (beautiful, of course) and offer insights into marketing her work. But I sensed she had something more in mind today. Sure enough: “Have you noticed anything different in Maddie?” she asked. “Like a bad mood?”

  “What do you mean?”

  Mary Lou laughed. “I forgot. You’re never going to admit anything negative about your perfect grandchild.”

  “No reason to,” I said.

  “Then let me do it. I think she and Taylor had some kind of a scrap. She doesn’t go on and on as usual about what they’ve done together and when I ask her about it, she gets sullen—I know it’s hard for you to believe—and shuts down.”

  I admitted to Mary Lou that I’d noticed the same behavior. “When did it start?” I asked.

  “Not long ago. Right when school let out. I’m thinking it might be over a boy.”

  What? I hadn’t thought of that, any more than I knew what was up between Catherine and Jeff, or Skip and June. And right under my nose. I was better with Romeo and Juliet, a nice clean-cut love story. I blocked out the fact the famous couple were teens and died at the end.

  “What makes you say that?” I asked Mary Lou. “Did Maddie mention a boy?”

  “No, but she’s that age, Mom. Twelve is looming.” How did that happen? I wondered. I tried to pinpoint the day I could no longer sweep her off her feet into my arms, then realized not even her father or Skip could do that now. “So, I was wondering if maybe you…you know, could bring it up? The boy thing?” Mary Lou’s voice ended on a light note, as if this would be the easiest thing in the world for me to do.

  I thought back to Maddie’s interaction at Video Jeff’s and pictured the boys who’d surrounded her at the flashy game console. If the cause of Maddie’s estrangement from Taylor was a boy, as Mary Lou suggested, he’d be like those boys. Not one of those boys exactly, but like those boys. I remembered their contorted faces, their mouths tight with concentration, their eyes intent on the screen and the equipment in front of them. I recalled their cries of victory and defeat, winced at their warlike stances. “Oh, no,” I muttered.