Behind the Seams

by Betty Hechtman

  “Why change anything? If you were Mrs. Greenberg, would we even be sitting here now?”

  I felt a slump coming again. I hadn’t wanted to consider it, but I knew he was right about that. Barry didn’t like that I was friends with Mason and would certainly ixnay it if we were married. And what about all the time I spent with the Hookers? He didn’t seem altogether happy with it now. If we were married and he felt he had a say in my activities—I didn’t even want to finish the thought. It brought forward all the reasons I didn’t want to get married again. I liked being in charge of my own life.

  I saw Mason surreptitiously check his watch and I apologized for barging into his day. “You have someplace to be, don’t you?” I said.

  “Sorry, Sunshine. But I have a dinner meeting.” He started the car and rejoined the traffic. He dropped me back at the bookstore where I’d left my car. “If anything comes up, call me. Anything—like you start thinking of wedding-dress shopping,” he said with a chuckle.

  CHAPTER 5

  MRS. SHEDD CAUGHT ME AS I WAS COMING IN THE door of Shedd & Royal. “Molly, where have you been? You said you’d be here by noon.” She stopped and took a good look at me. I hadn’t seen my reflection, but judging by Mrs. Shedd’s expression, the long day, a tension headache, someone dying before my eyes and the sob fest with Mason must have left their mark. “Did something happen?” Now she sounded concerned.

  I apologized for being late and not calling. By the time I’d gotten my phone back, calling to say I’d been delayed seemed kind of beside the point. I thought it would be better to just explain when I got to the bookstore. I began with Adele’s crochet moment, and Mrs. Shedd rolled her eyes.

  “She didn’t mention Shedd and Royal, did she?” Mrs. Shedd asked with worry in her voice. A little laugh at the absurdity of her concern under the circumstances escaped my lips before I continued to describe the chain of events. I got as far as Robyn’s dying practically at my feet when Mrs. Shedd put her hand on my shoulder. “Not another dead body,” she said, shaking her head. “I’d be afraid to go anywhere with you.”

  I suppose I should have been grateful she didn’t call me a crime scene groupie. She gasped when I mentioned that the victim was the woman she’d spoken to on the phone, and then gasped again when I mentioned that it seemed to be murder.

  “The police don’t think you or Adele had anything to do with it, do they—or me since I did speak with her on the phone?”

  I tried to reassure Mrs. Shedd. “Speaking to someone on the phone once hardly made you a suspect. I don’t think Adele or I are likely to be considered suspects, either.” My voice sort of trailed off at the end. I hated to, but I finally brought up Nell, and Mrs. Shedd sucked in her breath big time.

  “That doesn’t sound good. CeeCee must be very upset,” she said. “Be sure and point out Nell next time she comes in.” Mrs. Shedd paused before she dropped her voice and added, “That is, if she comes in again.” I knew Mrs. Shedd was thinking about Nell getting arrested. I was going to tell her even if that happened, it wasn’t as if they were going to put her right in jail and throw away the key. She’d probably get bailed out in no time, making it possible for her to come in the bookstore again. But it wasn’t worth explaining so I let it be.

  Mrs. Shedd said Mr. Royal had hung around, and between the two of them, they’d managed okay. He’d been a silent partner and out of the picture when I first started working there, and even though they were equal partners and both my bosses, I always thought of her as the one really in charge. Maybe it was because for a long time Mr. Royal had been such a silent partner I’d doubted that he really existed.

  I laughed at that concept now. Once I’d gotten to know Joshua Royal, he seemed like the world’s most interesting man. It turned out he’d been everywhere and done just about everything during his time away.

  “It’s already so late, Molly, take a little more time and get something from the café. You look like you need it.” I appreciated her concern and took her up on the offer. Mason’s coffee and roll had only been a stopgap, and I needed a second round.

  Bob had done a double take when I placed my order but didn’t say anything about how I looked, though as he pushed the coffee with the shot of espresso across the counter, he’d added several chocolate pieces on a napkin. Facing him made it hard for me to ignore that hair growth below his lower lip. Should I call it a beardette?

  “Alain Des Plaines brought the chocolate in,” Bob explained, referring to the guy who wrote the cookbook Melts at Body Heat, which was the centerpiece of Salute to Chocolate. “He wants to know what everybody thinks about him doing a demo of making these. I’ve tasted them, and they seem to be just what you need.”

  Bob watched while I ate one. I bit into strong bittersweet chocolate before hitting something sweet with a smack of heat. “It’s chocolate-dipped candied ginger,” Bob explained, and I nodded with recognition at the flavor of the inner portion.

  Bob was right about it being just what I needed. The kick of the ginger picked me up right away. I took a slug of the coffee and all the flavors blended nicely. “Alain gets a thumbs-up on these as far as I’m concerned.”

  “Alain wanted me to tell you that he’s been getting some strange e-mails complaining that he’s only doing a chocolate demo. He said they even sent him a list of alternative recipes,” Bob said.

  I put up out my hands in a gesture of disbelief. “That’s crazy. It’s called a Salute to Chocolate.”

  “That was just about what Alain said,” Bob said. “I’ll pass along your agreement when I see him.”

  I was about to leave the counter when Rhoda and Elise came in and dropped their canvas bags full of their crochet supplies on one of the tables. I called out a greeting and they suddenly noticed me.

  “What happened to you?” Rhoda said. “We saw you get dragged out of the audience with Adele, and then as soon as the show finished, all these cops came in and started taking down everybody’s name. I must have asked five different officers what was going on, but all they gave me was the silent treatment,” Rhoda said. She gave off an air of authority, and I was surprised she hadn’t managed to get an answer.

  Elise seemed a little distraught by the incident. “It was obvious something serious had happened. We decided the best thing to do was come here,” she said in her birdlike voice. “Sheila’s already back in the yarn department. I saw her when we walked in.”

  “So, are you going to tell us what happened? What could Adele have possibly done to bring out all those cops?” Rhoda asked. I took my coffee and came over to their table, not wanting to broadcast everything over the café. A number of the tables were occupied and several people had already looked up and were eavesdropping on our conversation. A guy in jeans and boots passed me carrying a coffee mug. I was surprised to see him walk behind the counter and help himself to a refill instead of having Bob get it. But then the café wasn’t really my domain, so I didn’t know what kind of arrangements Bob had with regular customers.

  Rhoda and Elise leaned close over the table as I repeated the chain of events in a low voice. Both of them looked like their eyes were about to fall out when I told them about what happened to the segment producer.

  “Poor CeeCee, she takes in her niece and then Nell turns around and murders somebody. And of all times, when her aunt is doing the show,” Rhoda said.

  “If she really did it,” Elise said.

  Rhoda snorted. “Like who else could it have been? It was just Molly, Adele and Nell in there.”

  Elise shrugged uncomfortably. “Remember, somebody is innocent until proven guilty. It’s not nice to jump to conclusions.” Elise had been on the other side of conclusion jumping and so was ultrasensitive. Rhoda gave her a hopeless shrug, and the two of them went to order their drinks.

  The three of us took our drinks and headed for the back of the store. The café might not be my domain, but the yarn department was. At least if I was back there, I would feel like I was working. Ever
since we’d added the yarn department and left the table up all the time, it seemed like there were always people around it crocheting. And even knitting, when Adele wasn’t around. Though right now, the only one at the table was Sheila. She was hunched over her work, and I was concerned that she was having an attack of her nerves, but when she sat up and I saw her work, I was relieved to see that she had nice even stitches on the heathery blue shawl in progress. Previously when Sheila got tense, her stitches turned into little knots and we’d had to get her a smaller hook to pry them open. She pushed her blunt-cut dark hair behind her ears to get it out of her face.

  Her eyes were like saucers when she looked up at us. “I didn’t know what else to do but come here,” she said. “I couldn’t find Adele or anybody when the cops let me go.” She said she’d gotten a ride from some other audience member who was headed for Woodland Hills. Sheila held up about a foot of crocheted shawl with skeins of blue, green and purple yarn hanging off it. “I did this while I was waiting,” she said. Apparently she had turned her nervous energy into speed, which was more productive than the old tight stitches. She put down her work and jumped up to hug us all. “I was so worried. Where’s everybody else?”

  Eventually Sheila thought to ask what had happened. I was getting tired of repeating the story and was actually relieved when Rhoda took over for me. The story lost a little in her rendition, but it was close enough. I tried Dinah’s phone again and was relieved when she finally answered. I told her we were all gathering at the bookstore and she said she was just minutes away.

  I hadn’t thought to ask how she’d gotten back, but when she came in, I realized I had the answer. She wasn’t alone. Commander Blaine had his arm linked in hers. The slender man with thick white hair shared the same high energy of my best friend. They explained together how he’d come to rescue Dinah when she’d discovered she had lost her ride. His eyes were shining, and it was pretty obvious he had enjoyed playing the white knight. He seemed stuck to Dinah’s side like there was glue involved. I was still surprised to see my very independent friend so connected with someone. She didn’t like the title boyfriend any more than I did and referred to Commander as her relationship partner. I wasn’t so cool on that title, either, but it wasn’t really my affair.

  Before Dinah even asked, Rhoda was repeating the story of what had happened. Dinah sucked in her breath and looked toward me. I felt a sense of relief. Together, Dinah and I would make some sense out of what was going on. We’d played Sherlock and Watson before. But then I noticed Commander tug her arm slightly, and Dinah sheepishly said she’d just come to find out what had happened and make sure everybody was okay.

  I said, “Everybody hasn’t shown up yet,” but Dinah just averted her eyes and said they had to go.

  What? I screamed in my mind. Someone died in front of my eyes and my best friend wasn’t going to stay while I tried to figure out what was going on.

  Commander took over for her, and as his gaze moved around the group, staying the longest on me, he explained, “We agreed to help with a wine-and-cheese karaoke thing at the Tarzana Senior Center.” Dinah started to walk out with him but ran back and whispered, “I’ll call you later.”

  I had mixed emotions. I was glad that Dinah had finally met a really nice human being. How could you fault someone for volunteering their services to help a bunch of seniors have a fun evening? Commander had learned to deal with his own loneliness by thinking about other people and putting on social events for them. Dinah had an equally big heart. Who else would have had their ex-husband’s children with his newly exed wife keep coming back to visit her? I knew it was selfish, but I missed my best friend.

  For about sixty seconds, they all sat and crocheted in silence, but then Adele showed up with her hat sitting way back on her head, which was not an improvement. She dropped into one of the chairs with a dramatic sigh.

  “They tried their best to get me to confess, but I wouldn’t do it,” she said before letting out an even bigger sigh.

  “What?” Rhoda said.

  “They thought because that woman dragged me out of the show, I might have wanted revenge. One of the cops even suggested that maybe I carried a supply of poison in case anybody happened to irritate me.” Adele looked around the table at us. “Can you imagine anyone thinking I’d do something like that?”

  Adele saw that everyone had taken out their current crochet projects and joined them. I had been hanging back, straightening up stray skeins that were laying around the counter at the base of the bins of yarn. I longed to join them and finally gave in. Like everybody else, I had a bunch of projects in the works. I kept a scarf in progress stashed in the yarn department for times like this. I took out the canvas bag with the apricot yarn from the cabinet and joined the group. It was a simple pattern of double crochets and chain stitches and perfect when I needed something that was repetitive and relaxing.

  I’d just settled into a rhythm when CeeCee showed up. She was still wearing the outfit she’d worn on the show and appeared the least discombobulated of any of us.

  “I thought I’d find you all here.” She stopped at the head of the table, which was her usual place since she was more or less the leader of the group. “What an afternoon,” she said in a breezy tone. “Thanks to this Oscar buzz, everybody wants to do an interview with me. My publicist had set up a bunch for this afternoon. I just sat there as one group after the other came in and we had almost the exact same conversation.” She settled into a chair and produced a canvas bag with some yarn and hooks. “I need to unwind,” she said with a sigh. “I think the show went very well, except”—she glared at Adele—“I can’t believe you made a scene. Thank heavens no one knew I had any crochet connection.”

  Adele’s eyes flew skyward. “I can’t believe you’d try to deny your crochet heritage. You should be proud of your talent.” Adele picked through the donation box we’d set up to keep all the things we made for different charities and held up a precious baby blanket made in natural-colored organic cotton that CeeCee had made, to illustrate her point.

  CeeCee touched the blanket and said she was very pleased at how it had turned out. “I’m certainly a proud crocheter, but I don’t have to hit everybody over the head with a hook.” She gave Adele a pointed look. “Whatever you did caused all kinds of problems. As soon as the show wrapped, they whisked me out of there so fast I didn’t even get a chance to pick up my things. They just said there’d been some kind of trouble. And I think we know who caused it.”

  So CeeCee didn’t know what really happened. Nobody said anything, and the tension was so thick you could have cut it with a knife. For some reason, everybody looked toward me. “You tell her,” Rhoda said.

  “Tell me what?” CeeCee said, suddenly appearing wary.

  “There was an incident when Adele and I were in the waiting room,” I began. I just gave her the facts, but she did an excellent job of filling the blanks and appeared stricken. “They can’t possibly think my niece had anything to do with it. Besides, how could they tell so quickly it wasn’t some sort of seizure?”

  “Cop instinct,” I said. “Just like they decide who they think did it.” I realized what I’d said and wished I could take it back, but CeeCee went pale and pulled out her cell phone. She had her agent on the other end in no time. He didn’t know anything about the so-called incident but promised to find out all the details. “I think he knows more than he’s letting on,” she said to us in a pointed voice as she pushed the button to disconnect. She turned to Adele and me. “When was the last time you saw my niece?”

  I explained about them separating us, and then Adele made things worse by complaining she’d been grilled by the cops and they’d tried to pin the segment producer’s death on her.

  “This isn’t about you, Adele,” CeeCee said with a worried sigh. “I’m responsible for Nell.” She’d picked up her work but wasn’t crocheting. She leaned back in her chair with a heavy sigh. I said something about her being an adult, and Cee
Cee surprised me by snapping at me. “I can’t believe you don’t understand. You’re a mother. What if it was your son Samuel or Peter?”

  Okay, I got it. I told her about Mason’s offer to help, and she wanted me to call him. “He’s at a dinner meeting. I’d only want to bother him if . . .” I couldn’t bring myself to say it. I would disturb him only if Nell had been arrested.

  Bob showed up with a tray of coffee drinks and more of the chocolate samples.

  “Thank heavens,” CeeCee said, reaching for two of the papers filled with the candy. “If ever there was a time I needed emergency chocolate, it’s now.” As CeeCee was working on saving herself with candy, Bob pulled me aside. He’d figured there was some kind of trauma going on—that’s why he’d shown up with the drinks and samples—and he wanted to know details.

  I gave him the short version and just said a segment producer on the Barbara Olive Overton show had died. I mentioned Mrs. Shedd had said she was a customer of the café. When I gave him her name, he gasped softly and went pale. He mumbled something about knowing her.

  “There’s Nell,” Elise said, standing up. We all looked toward the front as Nell walked like a zombie across the bookstore. Her eyes were glazed like she was in some kind of shock.

  CeeCee sprang into action as Nell got close to the table. “Get her a hook,” CeeCee demanded.

  I’m not sure if CeeCee really believed crocheting was a cure for Nell’s condition or she just felt helpless and it was the first thing that came to mind. Either way, I wanted to help. Bob took off, saying he’d get more chocolate samples and a glass of water.