by Molly Macrae
“Thank you.”
“So instead you can spend the night here with Argyle and me. It will be like in the old movies and quite a lot of fun. A pajama fiesta.”
Bizarre pictures went through my head. “Gosh, doesn’t that sound like fun? I think it’s going to have to wait until the investigation is over, though. We both have important work to do and we should stay focused.” And maybe she would have forgotten about a pajama fiesta by the time it was all over.
The cat roused himself and followed us down to the kitchen. Ardis wasn’t there, but I heard her moving around out front. Argyle trotted over to his bowl and waited for me to tip kibble into it. I gave him fresh water, too. As he rubbed another layer of cat fur around my ankles in thanks, Ardis came back.
“That rock is heavy as the dickens,” she said. “I put it on the counter next to the cash register. I’m counting it as a war trophy.”
“A Piglet War trophy?”
“That’s something to consider, anyway, even if we don’t think the culprit was an idiotic, overzealous actor. Unfortunately, the rock gouged the bejeebers out of the floor. When Ten comes to take care of the window, let’s get him to look at that, too. Did he say when he’d get here? We don’t want Argyle jumping out.”
“Oh, heck, I hadn’t thought of that. Hang on.” I pulled my phone out again. Sure enough, Joe wasn’t answering. I left a message, with a touch of urgency, and disconnected.
Ardis, head atilt, regarded me. “You want to be careful with subterfuge, hon. You don’t want to get one brother in trouble with another.”
“Yeah, I know. I feel kind of bad about doing that.”
“You don’t have to go that far. But do remember what goes around comes around. I don’t want to see you or anyone else hurt.”
“Are you referring to either anyone else in particular?”
“Hon,” she said, “I’ve just remembered we have some old adjustable window screens down in the basement. They’re simple, but they’re useful. I’ve always liked them for their reliability and flexibility. Why don’t you keep track of Argyle while I go find one?”
“How rude,” Geneva said to Ardis’ departing back. “She didn’t answer your question.”
“Yes, she did. I think. Anyway, let’s not start all that ‘rude’ business again.”
“Aye-aye,” Geneva said, saluting, just as Ardis came back up from the basement with a screen, saying, “Exactly what we need to batten our hatch.”
“We’re all very nautical this morning,” I said, trying to lighten the mood. Oops.
Ardis looked around the apparently empty kitchen. “Are you including the cat?”
“Anyone who’s listening. After you put the screen in, let’s sit down and work out our plans for the investigation.”
“Aye-aye,” Ardis said, saluting.
Geneva groused about people stealing her best lines. I distracted Argyle with a piece of crumpled paper and myself from Geneva’s continued fussing. She floated in the middle of the room, muttering, “Aye-aye, honey,” and saluting with either hand indiscriminately and then with both hands at once. I’d finally had enough and planted myself in front of her, hands on my hips, and a stern cease-and-desist look on my face. Ardis caught me in midlook when she came back.
“Hon?”
“Sorry. Don’t mind me. Just thinking about all the questions we need to look at. There are so many directions the investigation can go and there’s been nothing but interruptions all morning. Most of them adding more questions and sending us in more directions.”
“Even with Prescott as suspect number one?”
“But so far there’s nothing pointing a big red arrow and saying, ‘Here’s the proof. He’s the bad guy.’ It’s frustrating.”
“It’s okay, hon. We’ll do what we can, as we can, and we’ll be happy that we don’t have to wrap everything up in less than sixty minutes. So let’s breathe and be calm and go forward.”
I nodded, dropped my hands from my hips, and relaxed my shoulders. Geneva harrumphed.
“And now to test your newfound calm,” Ardis said, “here’s another interruption. Before we can work on the investigation, we need to make plans for the day, because if I’m right, we aren’t just going to be busy—we are going to be swamped.”
She pulled a chair out and sat down at the table. I knew she was right, so I sat down opposite her. Geneva sat in the chair next to her without pulling it out, which was somewhat disturbing. Argyle, being the gentleman he was, leapt up to join us, politely sprawling on a copy of the tabloid rather than the bare table.
“The town is still crawling with tourists,” Ardis said. “They’re looking for things to do, and that includes sightseeing. Not that most of the folks who traipse through here will actually buy anything.” While she talked, Geneva mimicked her, first putting her hands on the table and then leaning forward with her arms crossed and her elbows on the table. “Oh, they’ll pretend they’re interested in buttons or bouclé,” Ardis said, “but all they’ll really want to see is the scene of the crime—the bullet-ridden bathroom.”
“It isn’t, is it?”
“Of course not, but you know how these things get distorted. Spreading stories and going to gape at the scene of a tragedy are ghoulish, but it’s human nature to do both. I say we take advantage of it while we can and try to make up for closing early yesterday. Let’s call a couple of the spinners. See if one of them will sit and spin on the front porch and another in one of the front rooms upstairs. And it might behoove us to call some TGIFs. They can park themselves around the shop and answer questions.”
“And keep an eye on things?”
“That, too, but it’ll save us running back and forth and up and down and leaving the counter unattended. I wonder if we should ask one of them to monitor that dad-blamed bathroom. There’s no telling what might happen if folks take it into their heads they want some kind of macabre memento.”
“We could charge a dollar a head to see the head.”
“Not bad,” Ardis said.
“Really?”
“No, hon. Too crass. It is tempting to lock it for the day, though.”
“But wouldn’t it be a shame to . . .”
“A shame to what, hon?” Ardis asked.
I’d trailed off because Geneva suddenly stopped mimicking Ardis. Her hollow eyes opened wider, she squeaked, and then she zipped up the back stairs. Argyle watched her go and chirruped. He continued to loll in the middle of the tabloid in the middle of the table, though, and I didn’t hear anything else. Such as singing . . .
Ardis’ gaze followed mine toward the stairs. “Hon? Everything all right?”
“Yeah, sorry. I guess I’m kind of spooked after everything that’s happened.” Spooked since Granny died, to be exact.
“Well, I’m not surprised and this old building is full of noises. But do you know what Ivy used to say? A cat makes the best watchdog. All you have to do is look at Argyle and you’ll see there’s nothing to worry about. He’s perfectly calm. He’s making his happy cat eyes and his ears aren’t doing their radar swivel. See? He doesn’t hear anything out of the ordinary. So what were you going to say, wouldn’t it be a shame to what?”
“To lock the bathroom if that’s what people are coming to see.” I rubbed Argyle’s chin in thanks for being such a good alarm. He purred that all continued to be well. “No one is really going to take anything, are they?”
“Never underestimate the public, hon. I tell you what, though, we’ll ask John if he can come in and watch the john. He’ll get a kick out of that and it’ll give him a chance to feel like he’s making up for wiping away all the fingerprints and whatnot yesterday. Now, on to plans for the investigation.”
I glanced at the clock. “If we’re calling in reinforcements, we’d better get on the phone, and that doesn’t leave time to go over much. But as long as we’re calling in John, let’s start our TGIF calling with the others from Fast and Furious.”
Ardis rubbed he
r hands. “The posse. Excellent plan.”
“If they can’t come, no big deal. Mel won’t make it, with her hands full at the café. But maybe we can have a meeting afterward and any who can’t come this afternoon can join us then.”
“With supper from the café. An even more excellent plan.” She rubbed her hands again and then rubbed Argyle between his ears. “All right, I’ll go get on the phone and you, my fine reclining cat, shall be Lord of the Kitchen Table, watching over your kingdom and those who come and go through the back door.”
That brought up an issue I’d been wrestling with. “Um, Ardis, do you think we ought to start locking that door?”
“I hate to think of doing that. We’d lose something that’s very much a part of Blue Plum if we do.”
“But maybe Reva Louise lost her life because we didn’t.”
Ardis slammed both hands on the table. Argyle jumped to his feet, tail puffed. “The very thought affronts the Lord of the Kitchen Table and the Empress of Everything.” The Empress of Everything leaned close and made little kissing noises at the Lord of the Kitchen Table. He head-butted her chin. That goo-goo interval was at odds with his tail and her vehemence.
“Know this, Kath Rutledge,” the E of E said, “whoever killed Reva Louise was intent on killing her. That villain—or villains unknown—would have killed her in another place at another time if the deed hadn’t been accomplished from our bathroom window yesterday. That woman was nothing but trouble all the way around. We will not allow her death to change the friendly way we’ve always conducted business and we will not let anyone tell us that Reva Louise would be alive today if we had kept that back door locked.”
And no one did. Until a couple of hours and a steady stream of “customers” later.
Chapter 22
Ardis was right; most of the people coming into the Weaver’s Cat that afternoon were only pretending they were interested in spinning or knitting or weaving. But enough of them were helpless to resist the lure of the colors and textures of our fibers and fabrics, and left with bags small and large, that we were happy. Jackie (of the PVC and bicycle parts spinning wheel) and Abby (the Goth teenager so adept with a drop spindle) were on the porch, spinning and inviting people to step inside. Jackie was using a smaller, travel wheel and Abby was wearing a pirate hat instead of the white mob cap of the day before, but between the two of them, they attracted plenty of attention.
We had no lack of volunteers from the membership of TGIF. Needlework and chat were pleasant enough ways to spend a Sunday afternoon, but when Ardis threw in the request that they keep an eye on nosy visitors, we ended up with two or three pairs of needles flashing in the comfy chairs in each of the rooms upstairs and down. Ernestine, Thea, and John came to help, too. Debbie couldn’t, being involved with sheep, and another call to Joe went to voice mail. Ardis left a message, adding her urgent plea to my earlier one, throwing in an invitation to supper at the Cat after we closed, and asking for a consultation on another matter.
“We need your skills and your input,” she told his in-box. “We need that window fixed and we want you to rig something better than a tiny tinkle bell on the kitchen door so we know when someone comes in. Plus, Mel wants your opinion. She’s bringing a new sweet potato salad.”
Ernestine must have come from teaching Sunday school. She wore a touch of lipstick and a flowered shirtwaist that she might have owned for fifty years. It was hard to think where she would have bought a new one like it recently. She sat in the kitchen, knitting baby hats for her weekly Fast and Furious quota and handing out flyers advertising the classes we offered for the rest of the summer and into the fall. John said he was delighted to monitor the second-floor john. But as much as he liked the joke, and though his white beard and moustache were well brushed and his khakis pressed, his old blue eyes looked troubled or tired.
“Both,” he said when I asked. He hadn’t had an easy night with his brother. I’d never met Ambrose, but the difficulties he caused for John didn’t endear him to me.
“I did get an old sailor’s laugh on my way in,” he said. “Some landlubber with an indecently iridescent, spanking-new bass boat had both lanes blocked at the curve on Spring Street. The fool was boat-proud and had no clue how to back a trailer.”
“Ooh, that’s a bad spot.”
“I told him he’d better learn fast or his glittery beauty would be broadsided and scuttled before her maiden voyage or even before she’d been christened. He was close to tears. It was mean of me to laugh and it made me realize I’m more like Ambrose than I care to think.”
“You’re not, John.”
“I ended up moving it for him, so maybe I’m not as bad as all that.”
I assured him he wasn’t and went to find Thea. She’d agreed to sit in the study with my laptop instead of knitting needles.
“Do you mind?” I asked her as we climbed the stairs to the attic.
“Nah, threads are all the same to me,” she said. “In my hands or on a screen, doesn’t matter. It’s the process that I like. Log me in, sister, and stand back. If you’re looking for info on Prescott and the Snapps, I will find it. Although, I have to say, I could’ve stayed home, and stayed in my pajamas, and done the same thing.”
“Seriously? It’s past one and you weren’t dressed?”
“I’m an off-duty librarian. My dress code is none of your business.”
I glanced over my shoulder at her. She might be off-duty, but she was as stylish as ever, wearing a burnt orange, sleeveless tunic and chocolate brown slacks a shade darker than she was. No heels, though. Maybe her flats were her concession to having the day off.
“Say no more,” I said. “You’re kind to give up your personal time like this. To tell you the truth, though, I’ll feel better if someone’s up here today.”
“You think the rock through the window is connected to the shooting?”
“I think it’s connected to Prescott.” I gave her my nutshell suspicions of him.
“But except for the rock and the business card, you have no corroborating evidence?”
“No, but . . .”
“What?”
“I think Prescott might’ve been snooping around in here yesterday afternoon.”
“Really?” That piqued her interest. “What makes you think so? How did you know? Was something out of place?” She asked her questions rapid-fire, darting a glance in a different direction with each one, eyes narrowed. “Was something disturbed?”
Of course, the answer to the last question was Yes, my friend the ghost was disturbed; but only disturbed because Prescott wasn’t her type, so she left the room and didn’t watch to see what he was up to. I shrugged instead of saying that, but I glanced around, too, looking for Geneva. I hadn’t seen her since she squeaked and flew off. I still didn’t see her, but maybe she was in her “room.” I also didn’t read any skepticism in Thea’s tone or face, but her questions made me glad I hadn’t called Clod and told him about Prescott’s intrusion.
“There isn’t anything I can put my finger on,” I said. “But haven’t you ever gotten the feeling someone’s been around when you didn’t know it? Forget it; it’s lame.”
“No, hey, you don’t have to convince me. I know exactly what you’re talking about. I know when someone’s been in my office, in my kitchen, in my anywhere. I can tell. And you know what I think it is? Smell. This pretty brown nose isn’t just for decoration.” She tapped her nose, then looked around the study again, taking a few sniffs. “I bet you smelled aftershave or a shampoo you aren’t used to smelling. The trouble is, you’re right; that isn’t anything you can put your finger on and how do you prove or preserve that kind of evidence? Catch it in a jar like a firefly? Not to worry, though.” She smiled a wicked smile and played her fingers along an imaginary keyboard. “Dr. Thea the Infomagician is here. If J. Scott Prescott has left threads of any type out there in the World Wide Web, I will find them, I will follow them, and if I can I will twist them into a rope wi
th which we can hang him high.”
“Um—”
“What? You don’t like my dramatics? Because they’re part of the package.”
“No, you’re fine, just don’t forget to look for Dan, too. Did you know he was married before? To Angela Cobb?”
“To Baby Mercy? I did not. What other useful information are you hiding in that head of yours?”
“I didn’t want to prejudice your search.”
“You know better than that. Tidbits of information, including rumors and scandals, are called access points. Give.”
“Reva Louise had a record. She embezzled money from the church she worked for.”
I counted and Thea was actually quiet for four and a half seconds.
“Yee-ow,” she finally said. “I did not see that coming. Where’d you hear it?”
“Mel told me this morning.”
“Did she know it ahead of time? Before hiring her?”
“Sally Ann told her.”
“My, my, my, my, my. I knew Reva Louise was no good, but I did not realize she was so low, she would steal from a church. My. Okay, I am on this like a cat on catnip. Like I said, log me in and stand back. You are in the hands of a professional. And if Mr. Prescott shows his nose up here today, I will show his nose right back out the door. And anyone else’s nose, too.”
• • •
“You were right, hon,” Ardis whispered to me as the string of camel bells at the door jingled yet again. “A dollar a head to see the head would have been a great idea. And after the stress of being polite to that last bozo, when she told me she loved what she saw and was writing everything down so she could find it cheaper online, I find myself a whole lot less worried about being crass.”
“You are the consummate purveyor of customer service, Ardis.”
“I smile until it hurts,” she said. “And I go home at night and have a little nip.”
“You sound like Granny.”
“I learned at her feet,” said Ardis.
• • •
Sally Ann came in an hour or so after we opened. I was at the counter ringing up another spindle whorl kit, thanks to Abby’s spinning skills out on the porch. The next woman in line had what Ardis called a “guilt offering.” She handed me a skein of cotton embroidery floss and a dollar bill. I smiled and handed her the floss and change.
