How the Finch Stole Christmas

by J. R. Ripley

“Fine.” Esther thrust her hands in the pockets of her robe. “My sister told me.”

  “Your sister?” This was the first I was hearing of such a person.

  “I didn’t know you had a sister,” Kim said. At least I wasn’t the only one who’d been in the dark. “Who is she?”

  Esther’s jaw tightened. “Gertrude is my sister. My older sister.”

  “Gertie is your sister?” I felt my world crumbling. Derek had been holding meetings with Gertie and Robert.

  And Toby Kinley.

  “Of course she’s my sister,” scoffed Esther. “You don’t think I’d stay in a house with a complete stranger, do you?”

  I refrained from reminding her that she and I had been strangers when I bought the house with her already in residence.

  “But you’re a Pilaster! She’s a Hammer!”

  “And you’re a kook who gave up the best guy she could ever hope for in the whole world. What’s your point?”

  I bit down hard on the inside of my cheek in a monumental effort to remain conscious.

  “Speaking of work . . .”

  Esther and I stopped at Kim’s soft interjection.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “I have an announcement to make.” Kim set her mug down on the counter and clasped her hands. “I’m quitting real estate.”

  “Why?” Esther and I asked as one.

  Kim shrugged. “Because of the murders and bad memories. And, it’s not fun anymore.”

  I gave her a hug. “Even after the peace offering from Irma?” William had dropped off one of Irma Fortuny’s famous Christmas plum puddings as a peace offering. We hadn’t dared cut into it yet. Mrs. Fortuny’s plum puddings were famous for containing more suet than raisins. I had suggested we save it for the birds.

  “I’m afraid so,” Kim answered.

  “What will you do?” I asked.

  Esther couldn’t help putting in her two cents. “I hear Christmas House Village is hiring!”

  Kim visibly shuddered. “Never.”

  “I don’t blame you,” I said. I shot Esther a warning look.

  “Maybe I could use you around here, part-time, that is,” Esther said, rubbing her chin between her thumb and forefinger.

  Kim drew herself up and planted her fists on her hips. “I’m already a partner, Esther.”

  Esther looked at me, hurt in her eyes. “How come she gets to be a partner and I’m only assistant manager?” Her arthritic hand fiddled with her assistant manager nametag. Yes, she even wore it when she was in her bathrobe. Possibly even when she was in the bath. She probably pinned it to her shower cap.

  “Because Kim invested startup money in the business. You didn’t.”

  Deep lines formed in Esther’s face as she frowned. “How much would I have to invest to make me a partner?”

  Kim and I looked at one another.

  I so wanted to say that there was not enough money in the world for that to happen.

  Before I could form any words at all, Kim blurted, “Twenty thousand dollars!”

  Esther threw her right hand up. “Sold!”

  “What?” I felt my knees buckle.

  “I said sold!” Esther threw both hands up in the air this time.

  Kim was dancing. “Twenty thousand dollars! Yea! Not only can we make all the necessary repairs, now we can really expand this place!” She squealed loudly. “And I can work here full-time!”

  “No, no twenty thousand dollars!” I attempted to jump between them. They had actually joined hands and were doing some ridiculous jig. “No sold!”

  “What’s sold?” Mom had appeared at the bottom of the stairs. Her hand clung to the rail. Her brow was etched in furrows as she looked first at Esther and Kim doing their crazy dance and then at me.

  I was doomed and I knew it.

  There was only one answer to Mom’s question.

  I hung my head. “My soul, I think.”

  Please turn the page for an exciting sneak peek

  of J.R. Ripley’s next

  Bird Lover’s mystery

  FOWL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER

  coming soon wherever e-books are sold!

  1

  It all started innocently enough. Life is like that, at least, mine is. I was rearranging boxes of merchandise in my storeroom to make space for an expected shipment later in the day when I saw it.

  There was a dead body in the middle of the floor.

  A rat.

  I yelped and dropped a case of squirrel-proof birdhouses on my feet—squirrel-proof because the clever feeders contained a mechanism that effectively shut the seed ports. That didn’t stop the hungry squirrels from scooping up every morsel the birds dropped. And they seemed to drop as many seeds as they consumed.

  My yelp turned to a curse that would have caused my mother to blush had she been present. Fortunately, she wasn’t. Because she probably would have laughed, too.

  I repeat: A RAT.

  No, not an old boyfriend, ex-lover or cheating husband. A real rat. Cash Calderon, he’s my contractor, had warned me that once he starting ripping open walls—we were in the middle of some extensive renovations—we could expect to see some critters who were being driven from their residences deep within the nooks and crannies of my three-story Queen Anne Victorian-era house.

  Those critters had, thus far, included rats, gray squirrels, a raccoon and two snakes.

  Plus, the brown rats. I had a feeling some of those rats were direct descendants of the house’s Founding Rat Fathers.

  And I was alone in the store with the beastie.

  Not a pleasant thing, alive or dead.

  With the number of creatures popping out of the woodwork, I could have opened a pet shop rather than a store selling bird food, bird houses, birding gear—everything for the bird lover.

  In addition, a small section of the store was devoted to beekeeping. Depending on the season, we also carried a selection of plants specific to supporting local bird and bee populations.

  I moved the fallen box out of my way and limped toward the ripe rodent remains.

  This rat didn’t look homeless. And it didn’t look like it had succumbed to old age. This rat looked like it had been…I wrinkled my nose and bent down for a closer look…gnawed.

  “Esther,” I muttered.

  Esther Pilaster, or Esther the Pester as I sometimes called her when she was out of sight but in the forefront of my mind whenever she did something particularly irksome, had a cat.

  She denied it but I was sure of it. Each time I broached the subject of her hiding a cat, she stalwartly repudiated my claim. That did nothing to lessen my conviction that she did.

  Now the evidence was right here in front of my eyes.

  Maybe it was circumstantial but, under the circumstances, that was good enough for me.

  “Let me see you get out of this, Pester,” I grumbled to no one but the walls and the walls had long ago stopped listening to me. If they had been listening, they would have done a better job of keeping out the rats.

  And the cold.

  Esther lived on the second floor. When I’d bought the building that would become my home and home to my planned business, Esther had been a tenant. One of the owner’s conditions of the sale to me was that Esther’s lease would be honored. I now had a second renter, Paul Anderson, also on the second floor. Mom and I lived on the third.

  The rats had no floor preference. They apparently lived everywhere.

  I retreated to the hall closet for the broom and dustpan. I’d scoop up the dead critter and give it the best burial I could considering how frozen the ground was outside. I snatched my charcoal down jacket off the nail by the rear door and bundled up, popping a knit cap over my head and gloves on my hands.

  It was winter. In western North Carolina that meant
temperatures dipped and we got our share of snow and ice. Nothing like the northerners got, sure, but that was their fault for choosing to live in such climes.

  I set the little dead guy down outside and went to the toolshed against the back of the building. I pulled out a garden shovel that probably hadn’t been expecting to see duty again until nearer to spring.

  I spied around for a nice spot to bury the rat and settled on a space near the holly along the back fence that separated the shops on Lakeshore Drive from the single-family homes behind us.

  The hard ground gave way slowly. Fortunately, rats don’t take up much space. I laid the little guy inside a shallow hole and covered him up.

  I returned the shovel to the shed and hurried back to the relatively warm interior of Birds & Bees. I removed my outerwear and walked to the front of the empty store. The original fireplace in what had been the house’s living room had long ago given up the ghost. The chimney stack had been sealed shut with cement.

  The simple stone fireplace had a narrow wood mantle and slate hearth. We now used the fireplace as display space. Currently, that display was winter-themed and featured roost boxes, suet and a couple of heated birdbaths.

  Happily, somebody along the way had added a woodstove in the rear of the first floor, in the space that now held a small kitchenette and seating for customers to relax, enjoy a drink and a snack and read from our small library of birding books and magazines.

  As I approached the sales counter, Mrs. Gruber came in waving a photo of an owl. Her nose glowed red from the cold. As gelid as the tip of mine felt, it was probably glowing, too.

  “Look!” Mrs. Gruber flapped the letter-sized paper in front of my face. “I shot a photograph of a barn owl in my backyard.”

  She set the picture on the counter and turned it around to face me. Mrs. Gruber was a mature woman and enthusiastic backyard bird watcher. She wore a knee-length, multicolored houndstooth wool coat, red gloves and a red hat that covered the tops of her ears.

  “It’s a great shot,” I replied. “But I’m afraid it’s not a barn owl.” I handed her back the photo of the mottled brown and white bird.

  “It’s not?” Mrs. Gruber’s face fell.

  “No. This is a barred owl.” The medium-sized owl was perched on a branch up against the trunk of an oak. Its eyes were closed. “The barn owl is much more ghostly in appearance and has a heart-shaped face. Your owl has a rounded head. Did you hear it speak?”

  Mrs. Gruber shook her head in the negative. “I believe it was sleeping. It never moved the whole time I watched.” She studied the picture more closely. “Is it a male or a female?”

  “I can’t be sure. There isn’t much difference in plumage or coloration between males and females of the species. If you see two of them together and one appears larger than the other, it’s likely that the larger bird is the female.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind. We get a lot of birds in our yard. We back up to a nature preserve.”

  “Lucky you.” I lived in the middle of town. With my business also being home, and that business relying on the presence of people, I needed to be someplace that the people frequented, not necessarily the birds. If it hadn’t been for the need to be where the action was, albeit small town action in a place the size of Ruby Lake, North Carolina, I’d have chosen something more rural for myself as well.

  “If you see the bird again, they have a distinctive call. People say it sounds like ‘Who cooks for you? Who cooks for you?’”

  Mrs. Gruber laughed. “I do all the cooking in my house. The mister can barely toast bread.”

  I grinned. “Being single, nobody cooks for me either.” That wasn’t strictly true. Mom lived with me and spoiled me with her home cooking.

  Mrs. Gruber held the photograph in front of her nose. “Now that you mention it, Amy, on occasion I’ve heard a sound like ‘who cooks for you’ coming from the woods.”

  She matched her eyes with mine. “During the daytime, however.”

  “That’s not unheard of,” I said. “Put the picture on the bird board. The others will love to see it.”

  Mrs. Gruber’s bird photo wasn’t exactly headline material but that particular bulletin board was for posting bird photos. I should know, I’d hung it there myself on the thick support beam in the center of the store. The board was an excellent way for myself, my staff and customers to let others know what birds they were seeing and when.

  “I will.”

  “Good.” I handed her a felt-tipped pen. “Don’t forget to write down the location, date and time of day of the sighting.”

  Mrs. Gruber filled in the data and tacked her photo proudly to the bulletin board.

  “If I had a trained barn owl like that one in the store at night, I wouldn’t have to worry about the rats,” I quipped.

  Mrs. Gruber pulled her purse close to her chest as her eyes darted anxiously across the floor. “You have rats?”

  “Huh? No, I was only joking,” I assured her.

  I wasn’t sure Mrs. Gruber quite believed me because she did the remainder of her shopping very quickly and beat a hasty retreat.

  Esther came down to work at noon and would be staying until closing. She’s a small, narrow-shouldered woman with long, uneven teeth, a hawkish nose, sagging eyelids, and silver hair habitually worn in a sharp four-inch ponytail. Wispy white eyebrows sit atop her gray-blue eyes.

  Esther had never married, at least so I thought. For a woman who didn’t like to keep her opinions to herself, the septuagenarian was the keeper of a lot of secrets, including the cat.

  Esther not only worked for me and rented from me, she was now a partner in Birds & Bees. Truth be told, it was her recent investment in the business that was allowing us to go forward with the long-needed and heretofore unaffordable repairs to the property.

  Esther once thought I was a killer. I once thought she was a pain in the patooty. In the months we had gotten to know one another, we had gotten past those initial first impressions.

  Well, mostly.

  Mom was out and I didn’t feel like eating alone upstairs. It would only mean peanut butter and jelly or baloney sandwiches with a side of baby carrots and cheese puffs, anyway. I’d been there, done that a hundred times or more already since returning home to Ruby Lake.

  “I’ll be back in an hour or so, Esther.” I was running next door for lunch at Brewer’s Biergarten. “Can I bring you back anything?”

  “No, thanks. I’ll take my lunch upstairs when Kim gets here.”

  “Okay, see you soon.” I grabbed my wool coat from the coatrack by the front door and wrapped a cashmere scarf around my neck.

  This time of year, I kept a coat at the front and rear of the store. Not only did it facilitate going in and out, I often helped customers to their vehicles with some of the heavier items, like bulk birdseed. “Please let Kim know I’ll be back in an hour or so.”

  “You got it.” Esther popped open the register and began counting the cash money in the till. She was a stickler for knowing how much was in the register when she started each day.

  The Kim in question was Kimberly Christy. Kim’s a long-legged, blue-eyed blonde. My shoulder-length hair was the color of chestnuts roasting. My eyes were blue but not as blue as Kim’s. I had all the same parts that she had, somehow those parts just seemed to look better on her.

  While we rarely shared our wardrobes, we shared the same age, thirty-four.

  Kim and I had grown up together. She was my best friend and proverbial partner in crime. She was a literal partner in Birds & Bees, too. She had started out as a small investor, helping me out when the store was nothing but a crazy idea in my head. Recently, she had quit her real estate gig and asked to work full-time with me at the store.

  How could I say no?

  How the store was going to manage the additional payroll I, as yet, had no clear idea.


  I opened the door and closed it quickly behind me. The air was cold and the wind was hard. My house is on Lake Shore Drive, one of Ruby Lake’s main thoroughfares. Many of the town’s businesses, like mine, occupied the road, especially those catering to tourists because Lake Shore Drive was the road most of those tourists drove in and out of town on.

  Across the street to my left was our namesake Ruby Lake with a lovely park and marina. Directly across the street was the quaint Ruby’s Diner.

  I slogged down the brick path to the sidewalk, avoiding the icy patches that refused to disappear. I’d asked Cousin Riley over and over again to do something about them, but he hadn’t gotten around to the job yet.

  From Birds & Bees, it was only a matter of steps to the entrance of Brewer’s. Brewer’s used to be a garden supply store. Now it was a brewpub and a thriving one at that. The space between Birds & Bees and the main portion of Brewer’s Biergarten had been transformed from an outdoor plant sales area to an outdoor dining room.

  I couldn’t help but be a little jealous. I had opened Birds & Bees long before construction of Brewer’s Biergarten had begun, but judging by the often filled to capacity seating and the lines out the door most Friday and Saturday nights, their business was booming.

  It seemed there was more money in beer than birds. No matter, I loved my birds and if I wanted a beer I could buy one.

  I approached the front door of the brewpub. A waiter at the door pushed it open and welcomed me. “Hi, Amy. Table for one?”

  The cozy outdoor seating area was open except during the worst weather. In the winter, like now, large propane heaters generated plenty of warmth. Nonetheless, I opted to sit indoors. “Hello, Mitchell. Inside, please.”

  Mitchell took a quick look and escorted me to a small two-top in the middle of the dining room. There were plenty of seats at the bar but I avoided sitting there alone. I had learned that being a woman alone at a bar was a man magnet.

  I wasn’t looking to attract any.

  I had one. His name was Derek Harlan. My mother liked to tease me that I had come home to Ruby Lake and I had found my own jewel.

  She wasn’t wrong.