by Carolyn Hart
Troubled, Puzzled, Curious
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321-HELP
Right this minute she was grateful for his laid-back and always cheerful approach to life. She needed all the help she could get.
“They’re in the trunk of my car.” His tone was relaxed.
“Why don’t you bring them in? We’ll add them to the boxes of books. And I’ll check to see if the new Faye Kellerman title has arrived.” She tried to keep her voice relaxed, but she was beginning to feel stressed. So much to do, so little time…
“Will do.” He gave her a reassuring pat. Reassuring and lingering.
Annie’s smile was agreeable, but absentminded. She reached for the doorknob, still talking at top speed, and scarcely heard Max’s good-humored assent. She looked past the poster at the window display, paused just long enough to consider whether it should be changed.
Instead of new releases, the window held collectibles that caught at the essence of past days as memorably as long-ago photographs by Arthur Telfer, Charles J. Belden, or Chansonetta Emmons. The scuffed and faded books lay faceup, mystery treasures all: The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Emma Orczy, The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu by Sax Rohmer, The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan, Suicide Excepted by Cyril Hare, and Ming Yellow by John P. Marquand. Oh hey, she loved all of these books. Let them enjoy another moment in the sun. The baroness’s famous book had been published in 1905. Would a book published in 2005, say by Janet Evanovich or Elizabeth George, grace a bookstore window in 2105? She didn’t give a thought to doomsayers who insisted that readers in the twenty-second century would use electronic gadgets that placed the books of the world a finger-punch away.
She rushed inside, flung a hurried hello to her clerk, Ingrid Webb, at the cash desk. Ingrid gave a distracted smile as she cradled the phone on her shoulder and peered at the computer screen. Death on Demand opened at one on Sundays during the summer. After Labor Day, Annie cut back to Tuesdays through Saturdays.
As she moved swiftly to the central corridor, Annie was filled with pride at the wonderful amenities of her bookstore: Edgar, the stuffed raven, peered down from a pedestal; the children’s enclave featured all the Boxcar books and, of course, had a special section for Harry Potter; hundreds of brightly jacketed titles filled the bookshelves, everything from Above Suspicion by Helen MacInnes to Zero at the Bone by Mary Willis Walker; ferns and coffee tables flanked sofas and easy chairs. Bookmarks were stacked all around the store to discourage readers from bending pages to mark a place.
Annie skidded to a stop near the coffee bar at the back of the store. A sleek black cat lifted her head, regarding Annie with cool detachment.
Annie bent, kissed the top of her head. “Yes, Agatha. It’s me. Your beloved owner.”
Agatha yawned daintily.
Annie cautiously curved a hand under Agatha’s midriff. “You are supposed to take your leisure, my queen, on your throne.” Annie transported Agatha to an emerald silk cushion tucked next to the fireplace. “The Health Department frowns on cat encampment atop the coffee bar.”
Agatha rose, padded four feet, and flowed through the air. She resettled herself on the wooden counter. Her green eyes slitted.
“Okay.” Annie had no illusions about who was in charge. What a cat wanted, a cat got. Particularly this cat. Annie snaked a hand behind Agatha to give her a quick pat. She wasn’t surprised when Agatha’s head twisted faster than a speeding bullet and sharp fangs missed Annie’s wrist by a millimeter. Annie eased behind the counter, tucked her purse on a lower shelf, all the while keeping a wary eye on her adored feline. She automatically reached beneath the counter for dry cat food and shook a mound in a clean plastic bowl. She hesitated, then placed it next to Agatha on the coffee bar. Surely there were no health inspectors skulking nearby.
She replaced the cat food and stood undecided. Should she see about the boxes of books yet to be delivered to the excursion boat or call Henny—Annie craned her head, Ingrid was still on the phone—to see if everything was in readiness for the mystery play or check her list? Where was her list? She bent, rustled through her purse. Oh, of course, she’d left the list in the storeroom.
In a moment, she was back at the coffee bar, list in hand. She scanned the sheet. Almost everything was done. Now she must relax and hope everything turned out for the best. The vague thought was as near as she wanted to come to acknowledging the elephant presently inhabiting her emotional landscape. Would Pudge…
No. She wasn’t going to go there. If her father brought his new lady friend on the cruise tonight, that would be time enough to worry about his intentions. As for Rachel, her teenage stepsister had promised good behavior. Oh dear. Love and marriage might go together like a horse and carriage, but what havoc a late union could wreak on a family, especially a modern-day, complicated family such as Annie’s.
At least she and Max had only been married to each other. She frowned. That sounded funny. Actually, she and Max had only been married once. She shook her head. To each other. Surely that covered it. Anyway, they weren’t the norm. Not in their family. Laurel, Max’s mother, had been married five times. As for relationships…Annie firmly redirected her thoughts. Just because Laurel attracted males from eight to eighty was no reason for her daughter-in-law to make assumptions. As for Pudge, he and Annie’s mom had divorced when she was a little girl, and Pudge had at one time been married to Rachel’s mother. And that’s how Annie and Rachel were connected, but since Rachel’s mom had been killed, the only family Rachel had was her stepfather, Pudge, and her new stepsister, Annie, and a faraway aunt in Hawaii. Now Rachel, with all the turbulent passion of a teenager, was absolutely frothing about Pudge and Sylvia. Annie clenched her fists, admonished herself emphatically, “Stop it.”
Ingrid peered down the central aisle. She covered the receiver of the phone. “I would if I could.”
Annie was shocked to realize she’d spoken aloud. She lifted her hands, waggled them at Ingrid to indicate a misunderstanding. Annie knew she needed to get a grip. Once past the cruise, she could deal with the family vortex. Maybe. But her immediate responsibility was tonight’s cruise. Okay, Max had the Treasure Maps, and he’d help her move the boxes of books into the panel truck she’d borrowed from Ben. Oh yeah, how about card tables and folding chairs? They’d set up sales booths on both decks. Had Ingrid been to the bank yesterday, gotten enough cash for change?
She glanced again toward the front of the store. Ingrid was still on the phone. Looking on the bright side, Annie imagined that a mystery-starved customer was ordering at least ten books.
Ingrid leaned on her elbow on the counter, tapped a pencil impatiently.
So, not a big order. Annie reached into her purse, fished out her cell phone, punched a familiar number. She got Henny’s answering machine. “Henny, Annie. Will you check with your cast and ask everyone to be on board in their costumes by six-thirty?” Annie frowned. “Golly, do you think it’s a fair mystery? Maybe we should make a change? It’s not too late. We could make Periwinkle the thief.” As a special entertainment for the cruise, Annie had created the playlet Heist about the theft of a necklace of matched emeralds from a Lowcountry plantation. Henny served as the narrator, relating the circumstances and outlining the motives. Each character made a short speech describing his or her presumed location at the time of the theft. Cruise attendees were invited to drop a ballot with their choice of the thief into a fishbowl. They were, of course, asked to sign the ballot and give an address and telephone number so the winner might be notified. (And Death on Demand’s mailing list plumped up fatter than a Christmas goose in an Agatha Christie short story.) “Let me know what you think.” She was ready to click off, then, flooded with magnanimity, she added, “Henny, what can I do to thank you?” Even as the words were out, Annie realized what she’d done. Henny loved mysteries. Henny collected mysteries. She had her heart set on the signed VF first edition copy of Sue Grafton’s A Is for Alibi. No, she couldn’t giv
e Henny carte blanche in the store. “I know. Pick out five new mysteries”—the modifier was ever so slightly emphasized—“on the house. Be my guest.” She clicked off the cell phone and gave a whoosh of relief. Saved by quick thinking. And five was a generous number. After all, Henny was no stranger to free mysteries. She held the all-time record for solving the mystery painting contest. Every month Annie hung five watercolors. Each represented a mystery. The first person to identify the paintings by author and title received a new book and free coffee for a month. Annie glanced at the watercolors.
In the first painting, an attractive young woman with a rounded face, honey brown hair, and blue eyes was alone in a narrow, windowless room. A single bulb dangled from the high ceiling, illuminating whitewashed walls and a stone flagged floor. She stood near photographic equipment ranged on a long counter. She held up a newly developed photograph and stared at it with puzzled eyes. It showed a bleak winter scene, a hole broken in a frozen pond, water dark against the ice. A series of irregular gashes surrounded the hole.
In the second painting, a dark-haired, broad-shouldered man was dressed as a pirate in a big floppy silk shirt and blue pantaloons. A red velvet sash served as a belt. An odd note was black Wellingtons in lieu of leather boots. He stood in a dark crypt, wet from rain-water, a Colt in his right hand. Far ahead in the darkness, a candle glimmered.
In the third painting, a disheveled woman in an opulent hotel room wore a crumpled, spotted, mended, blindingly pink fringed dress, kid boots with two-inch heels, peach stockings, and an electric blue plush cloche with an uneven brim. Three broken feathers on the hat dangled near her shoulder. Two strands of glass beads drooped down to her garters. Shoe polish added a grayish cast to her neck. Powder destroyed the sleekness of her cap of black hair. Thick rouge blared from her cheeks. She held a thick black cloak, a gun, cigarettes, and lighter. Her gray-green eyes glowed with excitement.
In the fourth painting, an athletic-looking man in a Palm Beach suit sat behind a white rolltop desk in a long room that served as a parlor and dining room. A bookcase held baseball guides and a collection of works by Mark Twain. He held a horsehide baseball the color of dark amber, rubbing with his thumb the red stitches on the covering. Painted red letters informed: Cin’ti BB Club July 2, ’69.
In the fifth painting, a robed woman with long hair loose on her shoulders sat propped against two pillows on the rumpled sheets of a hotel room bed. A barefoot young man in shirt and pants, his hair mussed, leaned forward from the chair next to the bed and watched intently. She had just unwrapped a hand towel to reveal a vivid blue jewel about the size of four or five 50-cent pieces glued together.
Annie was pleased with the selections. Not only did she enjoy books set in this period, Henny hadn’t figured them out yet and the month was almost over!
Coffee and books. There was no better combination. She stepped behind the coffee bar and reached for a mug. Each mug was decorated in red script with the name of a famous mystery. She chose Mystery on the Queen Mary by Bruce Graeme. She poured the steaming coffee, raised it in a salute. Graeme’s book was one of the finest shipboard mysteries ever written and was inspired by his passage on the first sailing of the Queen Mary. Not, of course, that she was equating tonight’s outing on the Island Packet excursion boat with Graeme’s novel. The only mystery would be her entertainment about stolen jewels. But a good time would be had by—
“I swear.” Ingrid stalked down the central aisle.
“Annie, you owe me big time.”
Annie reached for another mug, held out Why Me? by Donald Westlake. “A voice mail system from hell? Punch one for Perdition, two for Outer Hades, three for Beelzebub, four for Charon, five for the River Styx—”
“Okay, it wasn’t that bad.” Ingrid managed a small smile. “But for all three of them to call in a row.” She flipped up her fingers one by one, “Henny, Laurel, Pamela. I wrote down Henny’s message.” She delved into a pocket of her peasant skirt, pulled out a white pad, read without expression, “She met him on a street called straight.” Ingrid turned up her hands. “That’s all. Not another word. Hung up.” Ingrid smoothed back a frizzled curl. “Do you know that one?” Her glance at Annie was anxious.
Annie was glad she wouldn’t be letting down the side. Ingrid resented Henny’s efforts to confront Annie with a mystery reference she couldn’t identify. Occasionally Henny triumphed (another source of free books), but usually Annie was up to the task.
“She’s supposed to be concentrating on tonight.” Annie’s tone was stern. She retrieved her cell phone, called Henny. Once again she spoke to the answering machine. “She met him on a street called Straight.” Annie automatically supplied the capitalization.
“That’s the opening line in Mary Stewart’s The Gabriel Hounds.” A pause. “Okay, Henny, here’s one for you. Thirty-one novels with Inspector McKee. But what is this author’s other claim to mystery fame?” Annie added cheerily, “I’m sure you will tell me tonight.” She clicked off the cell phone, glanced at Ingrid. “Helen Reilly, who was also the mother of Ursula Curtiss and Mary McMullen.” Not until the present-day successes of Mary Higgins Clark’s daughter, Carol Higgins Clark, and former daughter-in-law Mary Jane Clark, had there been such a successful family mystery triumvirate.
“And Laurel called?” Annie made a distinct effort to remove any trace of concern from her voice, although her mother-in-law’s proclivity for the unexpected—in fact, the outrageous—kept Annie and Max always on the alert. Laurel, of course, would be on the cruise tonight. But surely…Unease quivered within.
Ingrid added two heaping teaspoons of brown sugar to her coffee, stirred vigorously. “I suppose she’s all right.” Her voice was conversational.
“I suppose,” Annie agreed, waiting.
“She gave that whoop of laughter, you know, the one that sounds like Hepburn besting Tracy, and told me to tell you she was quite relieved there would be no alcohol served on the mystery cruise.” Ingrid gulped the coffee. “She pointed out that tigers so loathe the odor of alcohol they are quite likely to make mincemeat out of anyone with whisky on their breath.”
If there was an appropriate response, it escaped Annie. She stared at Ingrid.
Ingrid stared back. “You don’t suppose…”
Annie’s eyes widened. “No.” Not even Laurel would bring a tiger on a mystery cruise. “Of course not. I’m sure she had a reason.” Reason…Oh, of course. Annie felt the tight muscles of her throat ease. It’s not that she really thought Laurel might show up with a tiger. Still, relief buoyed her voice. “It’s her creativity thing.”
Ingrid waited.
“You know, she’s encouraging all of us to”—Annie concentrated, tried to recall Laurel’s precise words—“‘unleash the child within, break the shackles that bind our minds, burst forth like a Yellowstone geyser, astonishing, unforgettable, magnificent.’”
“So what’s a tiger’s antipathy to whisky got to do with…” Ingrid frowned. “Oh. She murmured something about the understanding required to deal with the young, and violent aversions—”
Annie nodded. Laurel was using creativity to equate Rachel’s hostility to Sylvia Crandall with a tiger’s revulsion at the scent of whisky. But all the creativity in the world wouldn’t enable Annie to banish Sylvia Crandall from Pudge’s life as easily as she’d decreed no booze on the boat.
“—and the patience to be forbearing. Anyway, she said to tell you she’d be there with bells on.” Ingrid’s eyes were puzzled. “Then she exclaimed—and it definitely was an exclamation—that bells, even as a figure of speech, lacked flair. That we should think ribbons.”
Annie thought ribbons. The picture it evoked of her elegant, soignée mother-in-law in swirling silk trailing a rainbow hue of ribbons made her smile. And maybe, give Laurel her due, that was the point.
“Anyway”—Ingrid was dismissive—“I’d just got rid of Laurel when Pamela called.”
Annie always reminded herself firmly that Pamela Pott
s meant well. Pamela could be counted on. Pamela was serious, literal, and a fount of good works. Annie sighed. “What did Pamela want?”
“Pamela wanted to talk to you.” Ingrid was long-suffering. “I told her you were up to here”—she lifted her hands to her throat—“with last-minute stuff for the cruise tonight. Pamela bleated that she would certainly be glad to do everything she could to help and she was sorry she hadn’t been able to take part in any of the planning sessions but she’d been very involved—and she told me in excruciating detail just who she’d seen and what she’d done this week beginning with Altar Guild last Sunday and bringing me up to a few minutes ago when she’d delivered a casserole out to the Haney place for—”
Annie flung up her hands, palms forward. “Cease. Desist.”
Ingrid gulped the coffee. “Okay, but you realize I listened to the bitter end. I can tell you about the midwife who delivered the Haney twins and what Mr. Haney said—before he fainted—and what Mrs. Haney said. And the utter amazement Pamela felt upon the warmth with which Meg Heath always welcomed her. Anyway, the upshot is that Pamela is deliriously grateful for your thoughtfulness in providing her with a free ticket for the cruise. She said she could not express her excitement when she found the envelope you’d left in the mailbox. Of course, since it was Sunday she would not have thought to check the mailbox, since mail—”
Annie snapped, “Ingrid, I know mail isn’t delivered on Sundays.”
Ingrid’s tone was obdurate. “What Pamela told me, I am telling you. Anyway, she would not have had the forethought to check her mail box, since—”
Annie joined in the chorus. “—there are no mail deliveries on Sundays, but—”
Ingrid nodded approvingly. “—you—meaning you, Annie—were so clever to poke the envelope out of the mailbox and so she found it. However, she understood it was a federal offense for anyone other than a post-person to place material in a designated mail receptacle. However, she knew you were most likely in a rush, and after all it was Sunday, and mail—”
