7 Madness in Miniature

by Margaret Grace

  Dum dum, da da dum, da da dum.

  Maddie on my cell phone. I hoped they weren’t holding dinner for me.

  “Where are you, Grandma?”

  “I just got home, sweetheart.”

  “Uncle Henry said he’d pick you up if you want to come for dinner.”

  “Thank him very much, but I think I’ll pass. I’m beat.”

  “You’re never beat.”

  How nice that I presented an unbeatable image. “You’re right. How about ‘a little tired’ and ‘need a little rest’?”

  “Okay, I get it. Uncle Henry said he’d drive me home in a little while if you didn’t want to come. Do you want me to stay away longer?”

  “Of course not. I just need to sort out all these things I bought for you.”

  Maddie giggled and gave me her new good-bye. “Mwah,” she said, which was so much better than the “Nyah” she’d begun her visit with. I was eager to call Mary Lou and tell her that Maddie’s funk was over, that it wasn’t boy-time yet, and that Maddie and Taylor had reconciled, but I wanted to wait until I had more specifics. Since Mary Lou and Richard were in the same time zone, I could safely wait until later this evening. I doubted my son was even aware of the trauma. He’d married well.

  I poured the tea over a large glass of ice, stirred, and took a refreshing sip. I had an idea I wanted to work on for the miniature police station scene—stationery with the LPPD letterhead, inspired by Leo Murray’s watermarked notepads. Though computer tasks were usually Maddie’s job, I thought I could handle searching online for the LPPD logo and shrinking the image to fit mini correspondence paper.

  Dum dum, da da dum, da da dum.

  Maddie again. It might have been a better idea to simply succumb to the invitation.

  “Hi, sweetheart.”

  “I didn’t want to bother you, Grandma, but if you want to study The Chart some more before I get home, you should use the latest version. It’s in the printer tray. I put in all the new stuff we learned at KenTucky Inn and what the guy said who came over this morning. Then I forgot to give it to you because it got so busy. Maybe that’s why you’re beat.”

  “I’m fine now.”

  “Did you find all the things you bought me?”

  “Uh-huh, there’s a really fancy dress, and a—”

  My granddaughter blew a raspberry at me before clicking off. Imagine.

  I abandoned the mini-stationery project, since computer-based crafts weren’t my favorite anyway. Instead, I retrieved the newest chart from my printer and looked it over.

  UPDATED THE CHART

  Megan

  KenTucky Inn

  coffeemaker/ice bucket shook, glass broke

  Not

  Catherine

  KenTucky Inn

  hotel clock shook and slid (? Maybe)

  W

  Jeff

  inside his store

  games toppled

  W

  Maisie

  home

  no movement

  Bebe

  ?

  ?

  ?

  Leo

  San Jose store

  nothing happened

  Jeanine

  Seward’s Folly

  filters fell, coffee spilled

  W

  Grandma

  home w/Maddie

  vase and bowl fell and broke

  W, W

  The speed with which Maddie had updated the chart—I loved the title—even in her misery over her social life, was impressive, but I’d ceased to be amazed at the wonders of my granddaughter.

  I took The Chart and my iced tea to a soft chair in my living room. In retrospect, it might have been a mistake to lean back and stretch my legs out. Soon after I propped a pillow behind my neck, the lines on the sheet began to blur and the slippery paper slid off my lap and onto the floor.

  * * *

  “Grandma, Grandma.” Maddie’s voice came to me out of a deep hole. I opened my eyes to see that the sun had set and I’d missed anyone’s idea of dinnertime. “You fell asleep, Grandma.”

  “Hi, sweetheart,” I managed, trying to focus.

  Henry emerged through the shadows in my head. He very thoughtfully ran the atrium light up slowly through the dimmer switch. “I guess you really were beat,” he said.

  I smiled. “How did you come up with that term?”

  “It’s all the rage in the Baker household right now.”

  I rubbed Maddie’s head, which happened to be on my lap as she knelt on the floor in front of me. “Thanks for taking care of her dinner.”

  “Our pleasure,” Henry said.

  “Can I get you a drink?” I asked, making no move to leave my overly comfortable chair.

  “Thanks, no. I’ll be moving along. Are you going to be first in the door at SuperKrafts tomorrow?”

  Tomorrow. Wednesday. Opening day, albeit an informal beginning. “Probably.”

  “Shall I pick you up?”

  “That would be great.”

  “See you at nine-thirty.”

  He leaned over and kissed me. All was well. Maddie let Henry out, in deference to my slow wake-up.

  “Do you want me to make you some dinner while you get out my presents?” Maddie asked.

  The great negotiator. “That sounds perfect.” I knew eventually I’d have to leave my chair and its cushions.

  “What do you want to eat?”

  “Surprise me.”

  While Maddie prepared my surprise meal, I forced myself out of drowsiness and gathered my shopping bags. It was about time I sorted through the loot I’d purchased. I’d learned long ago that it was physically impossible for me to spend a couple of hours shopping and not buy things for Maddie. I took the bags in the dining room, spread the contents on the now clear table, and began the process of separating the boring items from the more exciting purchases.

  Under “boring” I had bought Maddie new summer pajamas. I found a pair with a black-and-white image of headphones hanging down the front of the pajama top, as if she were actually wearing them. Also under “practical” were badly needed socks and a few school supplies. I’d also fallen victim to the strategically placed hair clips by the cash register. Under “exciting” (I hoped) was a medium-sized metal chest marked EMERGENCY SUPPLIES in stenciled letters across the front and back, that contained a booklet on safety for earthquakes, floods, and other disasters, and a list of common things that should be stored for such times. I thought it would be fun to fill the chest. I had a ready supply of water and flashlights, but not a complete kit and not everything was in one place. Our next project could be to put together a chest full of blankets, canned food, bottles of water, extra clothing, a battery-powered radio, and so on, down the list.

  “Ready!” Maddie called, summoning me to the atrium where she’d set the little table with a plate of leftovers—a ladleful of fruit salad, and one scoop each of potato salad and a rice-and-cheese dish from not too long ago. On another plate, in front of her seat, was a slice of pizza she must have found in the depths of the freezer.

  Since nothing was going to spoil, we agreed to check out the purchases first. She pulled the pajama top over her head immediately, a sign of acceptance, and clapped at the sight of the official disaster kit. I’d done well.

  There wasn’t too much time between my late dinner and Maddie’s bedtime, but we squeezed in another session in the crafts room. As I expected, Maddie whipped up an LPPD letterhead in no time, and I took pleasure in my contribution of folding tiny pieces of paper into the shape of envelopes. We’d made an L-shaped desk–computer station combination from a block of Styrofoam covered with adhesive paper, and placed the stationery in strategic spots.

  “Did you talk to your mom today?” I asked, using my fingernail to firm up a fold in a miniature envelope that had sprung open.

  “Yeah, I called her and said good night, and I told her that I had a good day today. I wish I didn’t make her worry.”

  “Sh
e knows it’s hard to talk about things sometimes. But as long as you know that we’re always here, and there’s nothing you can’t tell us if you want to, everything is fine.”

  Maddie gave me a sweet smile that said my feeble attempts at parent talk were at least passing. It seemed so much easier when her dad was her age, but then Ken was around to take up the slack of what I might have missed.

  * * *

  At our bedtime chat, we had a lot to talk about. I praised her work on updating The Chart and she praised my shopping skills on her behalf.

  “I’m glad you had a good day with Taylor,” I said.

  “Uh-huh. She said she was sorry she left me out of some things. I didn’t want to complain to my mom or you or anything, but there’s a new girl in Taylor’s class, named Sierra, and she has a swimming pool. It’s right down the street.”

  “You don’t say?” I asked, with a tip of an imaginary hat to June, who’d nailed it.

  “Taylor and all the other kids have been talking about it and even sent around a picture of the pool before we got off school.”

  “But you weren’t invited to join them?”

  “Uh-uh. Taylor said she asked if I could come and Sierra said she only wanted kids from their school right here.”

  “You mean Lincoln Point Elementary?”

  “Uh-huh, no one from out of town, like Palo Alto. But all Taylor’s other friends like me, so I guess it’s okay that one person doesn’t.”

  “You’ve never even met her, have you?”

  Maddie shook her head. “Uh-uh, just emailing with the group.”

  “If she knew you, she’d love you,” I said, tickling the right spots for maximum laughter.

  When she calmed down, Maddie continued to explain. “Taylor said she was sorry and she should have at least told me instead of just ignoring me.”

  “And I assume you accepted her apology?”

  “Yeah, and I was thinking that instead of being mad at her, I should have been happy that she was having a good time in the pool and all. Like a grown-up would.”

  I hesitated to tell her how few grown-ups would have responded differently.

  * * *

  Tired as she was from what must have taken an emotional toll on her, Maddie convinced me to read from one of her favorite kids’ books. I had the feeling she was seeking comfort by revisiting a simpler time, and I thought how tempting it was to wish we could keep her trouble-free for at least a few decades. When she finally dozed off, I went to the atrium to make my own call to Mary Lou who, I knew, was a night owl.

  “Hey, Mom,” she said, in a soft voice.

  Uh-oh. I’d forgotten that Richard had flown to LA to join her on Sunday for his own medical convention. She’d now be in a hotel room with my son, decidedly not a night owl. More like the man who is early to bed, early to rise. “Sorry, I hope I didn’t wake Richard.”

  “No, I’m just a little hoarse today. Too much sales pitching to get people to appreciate, that is, buy, the gallery’s pieces. Believe it or not, Richard’s actually downstairs now schmoozing with his bosses.”

  “I thought he was the boss.”

  “There’s always another boss.”

  “Good point. I’ll bet he’s having a great time with hail-fellow-well-met.”

  “Oh, yeah, you know how he loves to do that.” She paused. “Not. But he has to meet and socialize with the funding agencies and all the people who support the hospital.”

  “I know Maddie called you. I’m sure you’re relieved.”

  “No kidding. Thanks for facilitating that. Whatever you did worked.”

  “I can’t take credit. Skip spent the day with her. And she didn’t just mope. She took some action to help her own cause by sending Taylor a letter—contents unknown, but it worked.”

  “Whatever. I’m still calling you for the next crisis.”

  I could hardly wait.

  Chapter 19

  Eleven-thirty seemed to come too soon, but that’s what happened when a long nap and a very late dinner took over a good part of the evening. I began to wonder if Skip was going to come back as he’d threatened. I had the new, updated chart ready for him, as well as a fresh batch of larger-than-usual ginger cookies.

  I needn’t have worried. I heard his car pull up shortly after I set glasses out and made sure the pitcher of iced tea in the fridge was full enough to get through the night. I opened the door for him, preempting his knocking or ringing the doorbell. I credited my next-door neighbor for the spring that was back in his step.

  He scraped his shoes on my welcome mat, as he always did, as if he, too, had once lived through messy rain and snow in the Bronx. My nephew glanced at the atrium table and studied the two places set with glasses of ice and copies of The Chart, plus an extra sheet at my place with a list of agenda items.

  “I think those months of SuperKrafts meetings have turned you into a top-ranking administrative assistant,” he said.

  “I don’t want to forget anything,” I said, taking my seat across from him. I lowered my voice, in case there was a sleepwalker sneaking out of her room. “First, thanks for whatever part you played in Maddie’s rehabilitation.”

  Skip shrugged. “Once I figured out that it was a swimming pool and not a young buck at the center of their struggle, it was easy. I just told her about the time my best buddy in sixth grade dumped me for a new kid whose family took him and a few other kids to Tahoe skiing, and left me behind. And then when the letter to Taylor worked, well, everything was good.”

  With June it was a pony; with Skip a ski trip to Tahoe; with Maddie a swimming pool. Was I the only one without a story of abandonment at an early age? “Is that a true story? You got left behind?”

  “Yeah. You don’t remember? Uncle Ken’s the one who sat me down and put it in perspective. Plus, he bought me my own plane.” When my eyes got wide, Skip explained that he was referring to the kind of plane that smooths wood.

  I had to restrain myself from calling Richard immediately and asking if he’d ever been left behind because a new kid had something he didn’t have. I was glad it hadn’t fallen only on me to notice such traumas.

  It was time to move on to matters of life and death. I reached for my copy of The Chart and directed Skip to do the same.

  “Wow, this must be the squirt…oops, I better stop using that even when she’s not listening…this must be Maddie’s doing.”

  “What makes you say that? I could do charts.” We both knew how far off that idea was.

  I explained the significance of the Ws in the DIRECTION column and did my best to explain the east/west wall rule of earthquakes. “You know how earthquakes come in a certain direction and affect things on one wall but not the one across from it?” I asked, as if I knew what I was talking about.

  “Always?”

  “Uh, I don’t know. Don’t you have a seismologist on staff?”

  “I guess we should.”

  While we were waiting for the final word from a scientist, I pointed out the consistency of the reports of games (from Jeff), and coffee filters (from Jeanine) falling from a west wall, and Catherine’s claim that her alarm clock at the inn slid.

  “Catherine had the right wall,” I explained. “The ‘maybe’ in her entry is due to the presence of rubber feet that would have made it harder for the clock to slide. But I’ve been thinking, and it’s possible that the housekeepers polished the table that morning and even got some polish on the feet of the clock, so it slid easily. I can check that with Loretta. Whereas, Megan’s report is all off. Amelia, the head of housekeeping at the inn, says there has been no broken glass in any of the rooms.”

  “You’re saying that because Catherine’s clock is on the west wall and Megan may have lied for dramatic effect, we now know that Catherine is innocent and Megan is guilty?”

  Was it that obvious that I wanted my friend Catherine to be innocent?

  “Of course not,” I said. “We still don’t have Bebe’s alibi or Maisie’s. Do we?”<
br />
  “There’s that ‘we’ that I love to hear.” If Skip weren’t eating my cookies with a happy grin, I’d have thought he was being sarcastic. “In fact, we have Bebe buying bagels to go at Willie’s and Maisie calling her daughter in Los Angeles from her landline minutes after the earthquake. Neither of them could have made it to SuperKrafts to fit the timeline. And by the way, thanks to you, Jeff Slattery came in and helped us confirm what we thought about the time of death.”

  “Thanks for sharing. I’m sure you’ve considered how unlikely it would be that Catherine took a piece of the murder weapon back to the hotel with her?”

  “It might have gotten stuck to her clothing or something.”

  “To her sundress? It doesn’t make sense. Someone framed her.”

  I seemed to have made this determination on the spot. I remembered clearly a time when I’d been somewhat relieved to hear that the LPPD had finally arrested Craig Palmer’s killer, with hard evidence to back it up. Whatever was churning in the back of my brain to change my mind hadn’t fully revealed itself yet.

  Skip pointed to the second sheet of paper on my side of the table.

  “Anything else?”

  I scanned my list. “One other thing. Loretta mentioned that Megan is going to check out tomorrow and head back to New York. Isn’t she supposed to stay around until the case is closed?”

  “There’s no reason to ask her to.”

  “Given that you have the killer.”

  “Given that it’s likely, yes. We can’t keep people here if we’re not charging them.”

  I was frustrated, but I saw no use in going forward with Case talk until I could figure out what was bothering me, other than what I’d already expressed, all of which Skip was able to wave away.