Cookies and Scream (A Cookie Cutter Shop Mystery)

by Virginia Lowell

  “Now, Livie, I’m sure your mother intended to call you as soon as she heard about it, but everything happened so quickly. Ellie was most concerned about finding out all she could about Greta, especially after Sadie Briggs called her. That’s really why Ellie called me: because I’m old enough to remember Greta. I didn’t know her well, of course, but I’d certainly heard about her, mostly from dear Clarisse. They were friends off and on, you know.”

  “Off and on?” Olivia asked. “Did something happen to make Greta and Clarisse stop being friends?”

  Bertha’s forehead puckered as she opened a bag of sugar and set it on the worktable for Maddie, who was impatient to begin measuring cookie dough ingredients. Bertha lined up the remaining sugar bags on a low shelf, and said, “I do hate to spread old gossip, because you never know . . . I suppose it’s possible that Greta has come back to make amends. Maybe that explains why Sadie thought she seemed genuinely sorry to hear that Clarisse had passed away.”

  Make amends? Olivia tried to avoid gossip, but Greta was about to become her client. She wanted to know what she might be facing. Olivia heard the whir of the stand mixer. Maddie’s attention seemed focused on the flat beater as it moved around the bowl, blending flour, sugar, and butter into cookie dough. “Bertha,” Olivia asked quietly, “did Greta hurt Clarisse in some way? Why would she need to make amends, all these years later?

  Bertha’s thin white eyebrows shot up as if the question startled her. “My goodness, Livie, for the usual thing, of course. She had an affair with Martin.”

  Olivia gasped at the same moment the mixer stopped. “Are you sure? Because—”

  “Are you kidding?” Maddie abandoned her half-mixed dough. “Clarisse’s husband? That Martin? Why haven’t I heard about this? I don’t believe it, not for a moment. Clarisse and Martin were totally, absolutely devoted to one another.”

  “Now, now, Maddie,” Bertha said in her firm, yet motherly tone. “I know you’re only just married and all, and Lucas is a fine young man, no doubt about that. I’m sure he’ll be loyal as the day is long. But anyone can stray. If that happens, it doesn’t mean the marriage wasn’t good to begin with, and . . . well, sometimes a couple can weather the storm and feel even closer.”

  “Bertha, I’m confused,” Olivia said. “Clarisse was several years younger than Greta. I heard that Greta left the country at eighteen, so Clarisse would have been about fifteen. She hadn’t even met Martin. If she and Greta corresponded from separate continents, how could Martin have. . . .” Olivia remembered a long-ago talk she’d had with Clarisse about raising children. Although Clarisse and Martin had built several lucrative businesses together, the burden of child rearing had fallen upon Clarisse. She’d hired Bertha to help, but she hadn’t wanted to abandon her boys to a full-time nanny. Clarisse had genuinely wanted to be a mother. So she’d stayed home when the family businesses required travel. “Martin sometimes flew to Europe, didn’t he?” Olivia asked. “Clarisse mentioned that to me maybe a year before she was . . .” The memory of Clarisse’s murder invaded Olivia’s thoughts less frequently now, but it still hurt. “I remember Clarisse seemed to regret never having traveled to Europe.”

  Bertha snorted. “Her regret went a lot deeper than that. There she was, staying home with her little boys because they both had chicken pox, and Martin goes traipsing off to Europe by himself. He didn’t have to go, mind you. The trip was supposed to be part business and part vacation for him and Clarisse. I was planning to stay with the boys. Then they got sick, and what with Clarisse being trained as a nurse, she decided she should watch over them. I know she was hurt when Martin wouldn’t postpone the trip until the boys were well.”

  “I’d do more than feel hurt if Lucas did that to me,” Maddie said. “I’d punch him in the nose. Hey, do you suppose Martin decided to go to Europe alone because he was already carrying on with Greta? Maybe they’d been writing each other and planning how to get together.”

  “Maddie, my friend, you’re making my head hurt,” Olivia said. “I doubt Martin would have planned to take Clarisse with him if he intended to meet up with Greta once he got there. Anyway, I’m fairly sure Martin couldn’t have predicted his sons would get chicken pox.”

  Maddie’s green eyes sparkled like emeralds, a sure sign her imagination had burst its constraints. “Maybe he knew chicken pox was going around. Or maybe . . . you know, Clarisse and Martin’s biggest company dealt with medical supplies, plus they had all those drugstores. What if Martin got his hands on some chicken pox serum or something, and then he—”

  “Maddie, please stop, I beg of you.” Olivia nodded toward the abandoned stand mixer. “Don’t you have dough to mix, roll, cut, and bake?”

  “You never let me have any fun.” Maddie tried to pout but started laughing instead.

  “Oh, you two,” Bertha said. “I never know when you’re joking around.”

  Maddie turned her back on the mixer. “I am now shifting into serious mode. If Martin had an affair with Greta, even a brief one, it isn’t really very funny. So did he confess and all was forgiven?”

  “If you want my opinion,” Bertha said, “there’s a type that strays, and then there’s men like Martin. He adored Clarisse and loved his boys, but he lived to build up those businesses. Couldn’t be bothered with the rest. I believe Martin went off to Europe because it was about business to him, plain and simple.” With a sad smile, Bertha said, “I remember when Martin and Clarisse would throw parties to entertain buyers and such like. Clarisse was a charming hostess. She kept everything going smoothly, while Martin . . . well, he didn’t like to socialize. He’d smoke like a bale of hay on fire and talk business all evening. Never talked to the wives or girlfriends, didn’t even look at them. When the conversation turned more personal, Martin would excuse himself and go to his study. Just like that. Clarisse would carry on until the party ended.”

  “Didn’t Clarisse resent having to do all the people work?” Maddie asked. “Not that it would feel like work to me, except for the talking business part.”

  “Oh my, no.” Bertha sighed. “Clarisse loved it all.”

  “Well, I’m convinced,” Maddie said. “Greta must have initiated the affair. Martin probably didn’t have a clue until it was too late.”

  Olivia smiled to herself. Clarisse had been her friend, older and wiser, but she’d also provided a strong mentoring presence. Olivia was convinced that everything she had accomplished since her return to Chatterley Heights wouldn’t have happened if she and Clarisse had never become friends. Would Martin have risked losing her? On the other hand, Olivia knew from painful experience that marriage was far more complex than a business partnership . . . or even a good friendship.

  Olivia glanced at the clock over the kitchen sink. “We’ll probably never know what really happened all those years ago. Clarisse and Martin are gone, while Greta has reappeared, bought a house, and intends to settle in Chatterley Heights. I’d like to start out on the right foot with her, especially given she has asked me to handle the sale of her cookie cutter collection. I’m thinking it would be a good idea to keep the story of Martin and Greta to ourselves.”

  With a dramatic sigh, Maddie said, “Oh, I suppose you’re right. I’m amazed it isn’t common knowledge already.”

  “I haven’t thought about that episode in years,” Bertha said. “I’m not one to gossip. It’s so destructive, and you never really know where someone else has been.”

  Olivia tried to feel reassured, but she was afraid the story would be all over town five minutes ago.

  * * *

  By early evening, Olivia had dusted all the shelves in the Gingerbread House sales area, as well as every item on those shelves. She’d left the disturbed sparkling sugar display as she had found it in the early morning hours. Neither Maddie nor Bertha had mentioned noticing anything amiss. Olivia wasn’t deeply concerned about how or why the colored sugars wound up
out of order, but she couldn’t let it go, either. The puzzle niggled at her.

  Olivia had begun arranging items on the display tables when the snow and the holiday season popped into her mind. Why? Autumn certainly wasn’t nipping the air, since the outdoor temperatures were stuck in the nineties. Olivia glanced back at the shelf of cookie decorations, where the jars of red and green sparkling sugars were still clustered together, ready for holiday baking. Maybe that accounted for her flash-forward in time.

  As Olivia worked her way closer to the sales counter, the luscious aromas drifting from the kitchen grew stronger. Maddie had begun the baking phase, and Olivia realized at once why she’d thought of the holidays. She smelled cloves and . . . was that cardamom? An interesting choice, cardamom. Delicious, too, though a little went a long way. Why would Maddie choose cardamom-flavored cookies for a summer event? Unless . . . of course, Greta’s family was Swedish. Leaving a display table partially arranged, Olivia entered the kitchen and walked into a cardamom cloud laced with tangerine. Maddie was removing two octagonal shortbread molds from the oven.

  “Maddie, wow, you made shortbread. You must be feeling well rested. Shortbread is labor-intensive. I think it’s better when the batter is kneaded by hand, but I can never get it to work right. Either it comes out too dry, or half the dough sticks to the mold when I try to pop it out.”

  “Aw shucks, nothin’ to it,” Maddie said. “Shortbread takes a bit of practice, that’s all. I’ve certainly dumped my share of failures into the garbage, but eventually your fingers get the feel of it. This recipe is sort of an experiment, so I make no promises. I wanted something productive to do while my lebkuchen dough is chilling in the freezer.”

  “Lebkuchen? Do I detect an ambitious Germanic theme here, Maddie?”

  Maddie’s tangle of red curls looked as if they’d lost a skirmish with a flour bin. “I should take vacations more often. I got way too much rest, so I’m bursting with excess energy.”

  Olivia recognized the maniacal glint in Maddie’s bright green eyes. “Does this mean you’ll be up all night baking? If our event is tomorrow afternoon, you don’t have much time. And now that I think of it, doesn’t lebkuchen take several days to make properly?”

  “Technically, yes.” Maddie opened the freezer door and pointed to a covered bowl. “I found a recipe that shortens the process. The dough stays in the freezer for about four hours, maybe a bit more, till it firms up. Then I’m supposed to scoop out the dough and bake the cookies right away, while they are really cold. I’ve never tried it before, so I have no idea if it’ll be wonderful or dreadful. But no worries. Bertha should be back soon with supplies, in case we need to repeat a recipe or two. Or more. I’ve got bunches more cookie recipes to try.”

  “Try?” Olivia trusted Maddie’s baking skills, but . . .

  “This is such a kick.” Maddie said. “Remember your mom mentioned that Greta’s parents emigrated from Sweden to Chatterley Heights? And her father had a crush on Greta Garbo, so he insisted his daughter be named after her? Which probably explains why she moved to Europe and married all those counts and so forth. Anyway, I didn’t get a chance to tell you that Aunt Sadie said Greta also spent a lot of time in Germany and Sweden, and she even married a Swede or a German or maybe one of each.” Maddie shrugged. “I got a bit dizzy listening to all the marriages Greta lost, one way or another, although she did seem to have a gift for ending up with the money. Anyway, now that we’re hosting a store event to welcome Greta back home, I thought it would be fun to offer cookies that represent some of the places she has lived.”

  “But, Maddie, isn’t it a bit risky to try so many experiments right before an event?”

  “Hey, do I ever express the slightest doubt about your ability to reenvision your business plan? Heck, I don’t even know what that means, yet I’ve put my personal financial future in your hands. Let me do the creative baking; that’s what I do best. You run along and, I don’t know, do something brilliantly businesslike.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Olivia said. Maddie had brewed a fresh pot of coffee, so Olivia fixed herself a cup and returned to the sales floor. When she had finished cleaning and reorganizing the display areas, she settled into a cozy stuffed chair in the cookbook nook to study the list of cookie cutters in Greta Oskarson’s collection. Almost at once, Spunky joined her.

  “Hey, there, Spunks. It isn’t as much fun on the sales floor without your adoring fans, is it? Come on, there’s room enough for both of us.” Olivia patted the large chair’s seat, and Spunky jumped up beside her. After completing a couple of tight circles, he snuggled next to her.

  “It doesn’t get much better than this.” As Olivia turned her attention to the cookie cutter list, her cell phone rang. It was her mother. Olivia considered letting the call go to voice mail, but she couldn’t quite do it.

  “Livie, I’m so glad I caught you.” Ellie did not sound like her normal unflappable self. “I’m down the street at the BookChat Bookstore. I was just picking up a book for my nineteenth-century novel group, and I was wondering if I could drop by the store in ten minutes or so.”

  “Sure, Mom. You sound harried. Is everything okay?”

  “What? Wait a moment, dear.” Ellie’s muffled voice came through her cell as she talked to a companion. “Sorry, dear, I have someone with me, so there will be two of us coming to see you. We’re just—” The line went dead.

  Olivia waited several moments for her cell to ring again. When it didn’t, she settled back in her soft, roomy chair to wait for Ellie and her talkative companion to show up. Gently massaging Spunky’s back, Olivia read through the list of Greta’s cookie cutters. Olivia had picked up some knowledge of antique and vintage cookie cutters, but she hadn’t heard of most of the items on the list. The ones she did recognize were newer and probably less valuable. The collection was predominantly European in origin. Olivia was better versed in early American cookie cutters. Anita Rambert was the most knowledgeable antique cookie cutter expert around, but Olivia didn’t dare share the list with her. Olivia wished there were someone she could talk to, someone who wasn’t trying to get her hands on Greta’s collection.

  The porch doorbell rang, and Spunky’s ears perked to attention. “Down, boy,” Olivia said. “It’s just Mom and whoever is making her act so unlike her always serene, composed self.”

  Spunky growled and yapped.

  Olivia slid her arm around Spunky’s middle and held him against her side. “Better stick with me, kiddo. No ankle nipping allowed, although I’ll make an exception if Binnie is out there.” When Olivia entered the foyer, the doorbell rang again, twice. That wasn’t like her mom, who was known for her otherworldly patience. Olivia tightened her hold on Spunky, just in case. . . .

  Olivia was reaching toward the front door when she heard a sharp knock. She opened the door to find a tall, sturdily built woman with her fist raised to knock again. Olivia guessed her to be about forty. The woman barged into the foyer, barely missing Olivia, who hopped out of the way. Ellie followed, casting an apologetic glance at Olivia.

  “It’s too blasted hot out there to stand around,” the woman said.

  Olivia had to stop herself from apologizing for both the weather and her own unforgivable slowness. Instead, she turned to her mother for explanation.

  “Livie, dear, I’d like you to meet Allan’s cousin, Calliope Zimmermann,” Ellie said with strained enthusiasm. Her unspoken message was clear: this is your stepfather’s kin, so be nice, no matter what.

  Calliope charged through the open door and into The Gingerbread House. “I told you, Ellie, call me Cal, not Calliope,” she snapped. “It might be my name, but that doesn’t mean I have to use it. Stupid name, it makes people think I’m a carousel, which isn’t even the same thing. I’m supposed to be named after some obscure Greek goddess, but most people are too ignorant to know that.”

  Olivia suppressed a giggle as she e
nvisioned a brightly painted wooden horse with Calliope’s stern, sullen face. Come to think of it, she did have a rather long nose. Now, now, Livie, don’t get snarky. It’ll only backfire.

  “Cal it is, then,” Olivia said. Ellie shot her a look of gratitude. “So, Cal, what brings you to Chatterley Heights? Are you visiting Allan?”

  “Allan? Ha! All that man does is vegetate in front of his computer screen.” Calliope gazed around the sales floor with a tight frown, as if she found Olivia’s profession no more defensible than Allan’s. “I’ve decided to move here for good,” Calliope said. “Allan acts like a bump on a log, but he’s about the only family I’ve got left. The climate here is dreadful, of course, but maybe winter won’t be so bad.”

  “Where were you living before?” Olivia asked.

  “All over the place.” A faraway look softened Calliope’s pale blue eyes, and she almost smiled. “I spent a lot of time in Europe, on the move, exploring here and there. I don’t like to be tied down. Makes me feel trapped. But everything good comes to an end, so here I am. Can’t be helped.”

  Her curiosity piqued, Olivia glanced toward Ellie, who shrugged.

  Calliope examined the ceiling as if she were looking for cracks. “Quite a big place you’ve got here,” she said. “You’ve probably got some spare rooms to rent. Ellie said you live upstairs, and I smell baking, so you must have two kitchens.”

  “Oh no, Callio . . . I mean, Cal,” Ellie said. “The kitchen belongs to The Gingerbread House, which occupies the entire ground floor. Olivia and her business partner, Maddie, run a cookie catering business in addition to this store. Olivia does live upstairs in a small apartment, which she shares with her sweet dog.” Sensing an implied threat to his territory, Spunky growled.

  “Well, Allan made it quite clear I wasn’t welcome to live with you two, never mind the empty bedrooms.” Calliope walked over to the cookbook nook entrance. “You could put a double door right here, and you’d have a nice little apartment to rent out. The extra income might help keep this place afloat.”