A Fair to Die For

by Radine Trees Nehring

  “Or don’t think we are,” he said. “We still know almost nothing about Milton Sales. He could be dangerous.”

  “Too true.”

  He decided not to mention his concerns about what the sheriff’s department might be thinking of Carrie McCrite right now. Their background check on her would reveal she had no criminal record, but probably would tell them about some of McCrite and King’s experiences helping local police departments with investigations in areas where they were, of all things, vacationing. The deputies might think that was odd.

  He could explain it easily. Where other people ignored peculiarities and events going on around them, especially if they had the scent of unpleasantness, or might interrupt planned activities, Carrie not only noticed things, she headed right into the middle of them.

  His wife could probably join Sergeant Friday from the long-ago television program, Dragnet, in saying “Just doing my job.” Which was, as she repeatedly told him, helping people.

  Caution wasn’t a word in Carrie’s vocabulary. Well, it was in his nature to be cautious, and to watch over her when she wasn’t.

  “Are you at all worried about tomorrow?” he asked.

  “Hmm, not really. But I’m sure glad you’re going to be with us all day.”

  “Last day at the fair. Maybe Edie’s last day to connect with Milton Sales?”

  “Yes, I know.” She nodded. “I know.”

  Chapter Eleven

  FOUR WOODEN TOYS

  Roger opened the front door as soon as he heard Henry’s truck pull up. “Y’all come on in. Got supper ready. Beans and cornbread. Shirley and Edie are already eating. It ain’t fancy, but it’s fillin’.”

  Carrie almost wept with gratitude. At this moment she couldn’t think of a bigger blessing than an already prepared supper of beans and cornbread. She couldn’t even manage a protest that she didn’t expect the Booths to serve them supper. She was too tired and hungry to think of anything other than a bowl of Roger’s famous bean soup.

  When she turned to hang her sweater on a hook behind the truck seats, she noticed a box on the floor. It looked like one Shirley used to move things to the fair, so she picked it up, thinking Henry was returning it. They sure weren’t going to need many boxes for quilts or Cuddlys coming back here tomorrow night.

  Something heavy slid across the bottom of the box. “What’s this?” she asked Henry.

  “Oh, yeah. Forgot. Edie found them at the back of the booth. They’re the wood toys you bought for Jeremy and Jemima. I figured at some point you managed to connect with Sales about gifts for the twins. You left them behind when you went with Investigator Burke.”

  “Oh, no! I didn’t buy them. Milton Sales left them under the counter in his booth, and the guy next to him asked me to take them to the fair office. In all the commotion, I just plain forgot. I’ll take them to the office tomorrow.”

  “I seem to recall you told the investigator you went back to Sales’s booth to see if you could find toys for the twins.”

  “Well, I lied. I couldn’t exactly say why I was really interested in him, could I?”

  “Understood. And why don’t we carry them inside now? I’d like to see his work, and I think Shirley and Roger would, too.”

  Roger said he’d clear the table after supper, but everyone insisted on carrying their own dishes to the sink for him. When he came back to take his seat, Henry was just adding the last toy, a cow, to the line-up standing on the red gingham cloth.

  Shirley reached out to pull the heavy cord attached to the cow, and it rolled slowly across the table toward her. She picked it up, and said, “Whoee, these are right fancy, lots of work here. This cow must be eight inches high with the wheels. I wonder how much he’s asking for these. I’d like to buy this cow, but how can I do that, since the fella has gone missing? Guess we gotta find him, that’s all there is to it.”

  She turned the cow upside down. “Lookie there, she even has a bag and teats ready for milking. I wonder how long it took him to make . . . who-eee, this is loose . . . what the dickens?”

  She grabbed at the udder as it fell off and bounced to the table, leaving a large hole under the cow that was now spilling white powder.

  She’d reached out to brush at the powder when Henry said, “Wait, Shirley, don’t touch that stuff.”

  She jerked back, and said a barely audible, “Is it anthrax? Oh, glory. In my kitchen?”

  “I’m sure it isn’t anthrax, but it could be an illegal drug.”

  “Mebee it’s powdered milk and the guy is making a joke.”

  “Well, let’s see.” He picked up another toy, the horse, and, after some looking and poking his fingernail into cracks, discovered the animal’s head came off, spilling more white powder. In turn he explored the chicken, which also had a removable head, and a goat, who’s solid-looking feed bucket came away from the painted grass base the animal stood on.

  While Roger and Shirley, Edie and Carrie sat in stunned silence, Henry took out his cell phone, scrolled through the directory, and punched the number for the sheriff’s department.

  At the end of a short conversation, he told them, “Someone will bring a drug test kit right out. He asks that we all wait here. Sorry, Shirley.”

  She got to her feet. “I’d best make more coffee.”

  An hour later they stood in a circle around the kitchen table, looking at the set of clear plastic drug test pouches the deputy was working with. The contents of every pouch had turned blue.

  “This blue color indicates the powder in these animals doesn’t test positive for any of the drugs we normally find,” he said. “I’m guessing it’s baking soda, but the state crime lab will tell us for sure.”

  Shirley went to a kitchen cabinet and came back with a plate and a familiar yellow box. She spilled some of the box’s contents on the plate.

  “By golly,” Roger said, “the stuff does look exactly like our baking soda.”

  The deputy, who was beginning to nest the labeled test pouches in the chain of evidence box he’d brought with him, said, “It’s not time to trust that conclusion yet. An officer will take all these samples to Little Rock tomorrow. Then we’ll know for sure what it is.”

  He picked up the toy horse. “Whose animals are these? I need to take them with me.”

  “They actually belong to a missing person named Milton Sales,” Carrie said, “Ask Investigator Burke about that. He knows. But for the time being, you can put me down as caretaker of the animals. What I want to know, though, is why somebody would take the trouble to hide a substance that’s possibly baking soda in a way that causes us—or anyone—to think it could be a drug like cocaine or heroin?”

  “Deception. Baking soda is sure a lot cheaper than cocaine, for example. My best guess is the substitution was meant to deceive. I’ve even known poison to be substituted for a drug when malice was intended. That’s one reason we’ll send this to the crime lab. We need to know exactly what we have here.”

  “Somebody is playing with fire,” Henry said.

  The deputy nodded. “For sure. I don’t know how all of you got involved in this, but I’d advise caution if you have any more contact with the person owning these animals. We’ll stay in touch with Ms. McCrite and Major King, and they can keep the rest of you informed.

  “I understand all of you but Mr. Booth will be at the War Eagle Craft Fair tomorrow. Ms. McCrite, I know an investigator will want to hear again how you got these animals, and how you’re involved with the man who made them. If someone from our department doesn’t contact you at the fair, they definitely will on Monday. Actually, it would probably be best if tomorrow seemed to be a normal fair day, with no one in uniform coming near you. However, I’m thinking we might have a deputy in plain clothes on guard, just in case.”

  “We’re Critter Quilts and Baby Cuddlys, fourth space from the front on the right. Tent number three,” Shirley said. “Hours eight ‘til four.”

  The deputy made a note as Carrie spoke up.
“At least one of the exhibitors knows I had the animals. Milton Sales left them behind when he vacated his space. A man named John Harley, in the space next to Sales, said they were expensive, and he didn’t want responsibility for them. He asked me to take the toys to the fair office since he was too busy. But we were covered over with customers when I got back to our place, so I put them in the box and then forgot all about them.”

  “Well, so far as he knows, you did take the toys to the office,” the deputy said.

  “Thanks for doing all the dish washing,” Roger told Edie as he followed them to the door.

  “I enjoy that sort of thing,” she said.

  Carrie wondered how anyone could truly enjoy cleaning up an after dinner mess. She had noticed Edie asked about the location of a bathroom as soon as the deputy rang the Booth’s doorbell and, after her return, by-passed the table and busied herself at the kitchen sink, washing dishes and scrubbing the bean pot. In fact, as Carrie thought about it, there had never been an occasion for anyone to introduce Edie. The deputy may have even thought she was household help.

  Coincidence? She doubted it. But she decided not to mention her observations while the two of them made the short drive home in her car.

  “It seems unproductive to have this rental car just sitting here,” Edie said when Carrie pulled into the garage. “I think I’ll drive myself to the fair tomorrow. Are you going to pick up Shirley like you did today?”

  ”Yes, and there’ll be plenty of room for you going and coming. I’m to bring back left-over stock, but we won’t have much of that. Henry is driving separately in his truck. That way he can help haul things back to Shirley’s, since we won’t have Eleanor’s van like we did when we set up. Roger is coming right before closing. He’ll help take the display racks and backdrop apart and load those in the trucks.”

  “I’d really rather drive myself, Carrie. I’m used to being independent. I’ll meet you at the fair before opening, and I can help haul things back at the end of the day.”

  “You aren’t concerned about those two guys who’ve been looking for you?”

  “Well yes, assuming they haven’t given up and left the area. But in any case they haven’t seen this car as far as I know. I can change again if I get worried.”

  “Okay, but you don’t have a pass for the exhibitor parking.”

  “It won’t matter, will it? I’ll be there early enough that I can easily find a good place in the regular lot.”

  Though Henry moved his truck to let Edie out before 6:30 on Sunday morning and she left immediately, saying she’d get breakfast out, she hadn’t arrived at Critter Quilts and Cuddlys by 9:30. Fair attendance was lighter than it had been the day before, so Shirley and Carrie could easily handle sales with a little help from Henry, who wrote tickets and took payments when they had busy spurts. Nevertheless, Carrie kept looking at her watch. Edie had said nothing about being late. She’d even mentioned she’d be there early enough to find a good parking place in the visitors’ lot.

  “I’m worried about Edie,” she said to Shirley and Henry during a quiet moment. “I wonder if she decided to run an errand, or something, and it’s taking longer than she thought it would.”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised,” Shirley said. “Otherwise, why drive herself? Seems dumb, since she could’ve just as easy come with us.”

  “Yes, I know,” Carrie said as she watched a woman maneuver a stroller holding two children down the grass-covered aisle. Both of the kids were crying, and she wished their mother would look toward Shirley’s Cuddly display. No luck, the woman was too involved in repeating “Shhh, hush” over and over to look at anything but her children and continue shoving the stroller. Carrie resisted the temptation to hand the poor woman a Cuddly for show and tell.

  Shirley said, “You reckon she had an appointment and, and . . . ran into some kind of trouble?”

  “But, why would she risk that?” Carrie asked, coming back to the Edie problem. “She doesn’t seem stupid or foolish, and we’ve heard nothing about an appointment, or her wanting to meet anyone but Milton Sales.”

  “Could be that’s exactly what she’s doing,” Shirley said. “Meeting Milton Sales, I mean.”

  “Him? But how would she work that out? ” Carrie asked.

  “She’s got a cell phone, so could make all kinds of plans you folks wouldn’t hear about. And did you notice how she hung back when that deputy sheriff was at our house last night? The woman’s hiding secrets, mark my words. Haven’t you been wondering why she won’t tell the deputies about her search for Sales? Has she said anything more to you about that? And, how about those two guys in the dark suits who were asking about her? Find out anything about them?”

  “No,” Henry said. “But she’s been with us all the time except now. It would have been hard for her to connect with anyone and make plans for a meeting. Most cell phones won’t work where we live.”

  “She’s been with you except for the time she was on break here, or was with me driving home,” Shirley reminded them. “She spent most of the time going home asking about Hobbs State Park. When I told her it was the largest Arkansas State Park, she seemed mostly curious about the sections near here; Van Winkle Hollow and the visitor center. If I was you, I’d be curious to find out if she decided to have a look over there this morning, and mebee not just to sightsee, either.”

  After a short silence, Henry said, “Interesting. If you two can get along without my help for an hour or so, I think I will look around the area for her. Of course it’s possible she decided to run for some reason, but all her things are at our house and she doesn’t have a key. I’m thinking she might be meeting someone, as you suggest.”

  Carrie said, “I suppose it could be Milton Sales. It’s possible he told her more about how to contact him than just the invitation to meet at his RV on Thursday. Seems to me asking so much about Hobbs is kind of peculiar, since she hasn’t played tourist before. Her only interest in sightseeing around here was War Eagle Mill, and that turned out to be because she’d heard the name in connection with Sales. Hobbs might be a logical place for them to meet. Sales could know it well, and she’d be able to find it easily from here. It is rather public, but, assuming Sales is interested in hiding himself right now, it’s also a huge place where one could remain anonymous or even hidden with little extra trouble. So, you go on, we’ll be fine. I bet the crowds won’t get really big until afternoon, this being Sunday.”

  Henry said, “I’ll check around here and at Hobbs. Even if someone knows you had those hollow toys, you’ll be safe, because I see the sheriff’s office has sent someone in plain clothes to keep an eye on you.”

  “Really?” Carrie said. “Where?”

  “Woman in green slacks and long suit jacket. You probably didn’t notice her working with the candle seller across the way. Does the candle seller look familiar? She been here all during the fair?”

  “Yes,” both Shirley and Carrie said.

  “But, not the woman in green slacks,” Carrie added, “and all she seems to be doing is wrapping whatever sells, though I admit I didn’t see anything unusual in that. But Henry, how on earth would they manage working her in without having to tell the candle maker what’s going on, and getting her all excited about it?”

  “Well, the candle maker could believe they’re working a sting, and she’s proud to have been asked to help. Maybe she was told that the couple selling leather goods is suspected of using skins from endangered species to make their purses and belts. Or maybe someone reported that those bottled seasonings over there have bits of chopped straw as a filler, and the deputy is keeping an eye out while someone at a lab tests whatever the suspect merchandise is supposed to be. They will, of course, find out there is no taint or no endangered species by the time the fair closes. So all that’s happened is a doubly interesting day for the candle maker, and good cover for the undercover officer.”

  “I’ll be jiggered,” said Shirley.

  “Is she carrying
?” Carrie asked, indicating the woman in green with her elbow.

  “Yes,” Henry said. “She has a gun belt. That’s why the long jacket, and why she looks rather, uh, rotund in the middle.”

  Carrie rolled her lips in to keep from chuckling, then said, “They are taking this seriously, then.”

  “You bet. Okay. I’ll be back in an hour or so. While I’m gone, neither of you is to leave this space, right? And I wouldn’t leave myself if it weren’t for that woman in green.”

  Carrie and Shirley both nodded, and began saying hello and smiling at people passing by their counter.

  Henry walked slowly through the crowds, stopping to look at a sign telling the history of War Eagle Mills Farm, where the fair was being held. He’d learned long ago that reading signs or looking in shop windows gave him good cover for surveillance. Next, he walked across the iron and wood War Eagle River Bridge, now more busy with people than cars, scanning the area as he went. On the mill side of the river he stopped as if to read the sign commemorating the hundredth anniversary of the bridge in 2008, and its restoration to safety and sturdiness in 2010. He saw no car like Edie’s, or any woman who resembled her.

  He went inside the mill, pretended to look over a display of grains and flours, climbed the stairs to study the kitchen equipment and crafts on the second floor, then went up another flight to survey the Bean Palace Restaurant as if he were looking for a friend.

  He saw only strangers.

  After hurrying through the aisles of fair booths fanning out from the mill, he got into his truck and headed east on Highway 12 toward Hobbs.

  There was no white car in the parking lot for Van Winkle Hollow National Historic Site, so he decided to go on toward the park’s visitor center and natural history museum.

  Be darned. There were two men sitting in a dark blue car in the visitor center parking lot. Were these the guys that had come to their home looking for Edie? And there, on the other side of the lot, was a familiar-looking white car. He drove around as if searching for a parking place. The lot was nearly full, so what he was doing wouldn’t look odd. Yes. The car was Edie’s.