by Molly Macrae
“I gave them to Rogalla for safekeeping.”
After Russell left, I updated the posse on Rogalla’s involvement with Belinda’s estate. Ardis arrived soon after I sent the text, still on a riding-to-the-rescue high. She even greeted the twins and didn’t immediately bolt when they dropped by. Mercy, her arm in a sling, looked on the edge of pain.
“She isn’t supposed to do too much too soon,” Shirley said.
“But we wanted to thank you again for yesterday,” said Mercy.
“Why did you go to Rogalla’s?” I asked.
“We followed that bearded so-and-so,” Mercy said.
“The one we saw sitting in the truck out there by Angie’s,” said Shirley.
“And we followed your advice,” Mercy said.
“What do you mean?”
“Not too closely, though,” Mercy said, “the so-and-so, I mean. We followed your advice to a T, but we stayed back so he wouldn’t spot us, and ended up at Rogalla’s.”
“If we hadn’t been so shocked,” Shirley said, “we would’ve seen it was a scarecrow and not Rogalla’s body in the pool.”
“Also, in our shock, we lost the so-and-so,” Mercy said.
“Where did you follow him from?” I asked.
“We spotted him outside the Vault,” Shirley said. “His movements were highly suspicious, so we did our civic duty and followed.”
When they left, Ardis asked, “Why did you tell them to follow that so-and-so, and what was he doing at Rogalla’s?”
“First, I didn’t, and second, that’s another piece of incomplete information.”
Just before lunch, I dropped an armful of amber and amethyst skeins in the front window display. I’d meant to arrange them more artistically, but the sight of an approaching Clod stopped me. I snatched my phone from my pocket and texted Joe:
Cole about to crow? Stay tuned.
Geneva tsked over the heap of yarn.
“Quick,” I said, “if Ardis isn’t with a customer, tell her the deputy’s here.”
She saluted, whisked away, and she and Ardis flapped back together before Clod had a chance to cast his usual leery eye around.
“That was a fine thing you did, rescuing the dog yesterday, Coleridge,” Ardis said. “No one else even noticed him going down for the third time. Have you learned anything more about that rather odd situation?”
“The Ms. Spiveys are still recovering from the ordeal,” Clod said. “They might be able to tell us more in the next day or two.”
“I imagine they’re home and resting,” Ardis said.
“You’ll find this interesting,” he said. “We made an arrest in the smash-and-grab robberies. And do you remember those two rat-faced McDougals? We also found out the real reason they were in town last week.”
“That is interesting,” I said.
“Congratulations—and do tell,” said Ardis.
Clod was happy to and generously gave credit for their success to an anonymous tip. The McDougals (Calvin and Burt Nave) were with their nephew Riley (Riley Nuckols) when Clod and Shorty went to pick him up. Calvin and Burt had received a tip of their own that Riley’s jig was up, but that he might need help recognizing that himself. Riley hadn’t been ready to confess when the deputies arrived, but Calvin and Burt helped him there, too. They’d suspected Riley was the “gang,” and they’d told him to stop. He hadn’t. Then Gar was murdered, and Riley threatened to go into Blue Plum and find the SOB who’d jeopardized his operation. Calvin and Burt came to town looking for Riley.
“Because in their assessment,” Clod said, “Riley’s as dumb as a box of rocks and he might just find the SOB and get himself killed.”
“Why did Riley think he’d find the SOB in Blue Plum?” I asked.
“No comment,” Clod said, and left.
“So now,” Ardis said, “does that mean Coleridge is operating on a deficit of information, too? Or is he just not telling?”
“And why did the bearded McDougal go to Rogalla’s yesterday? Things missing, things found, incomplete information. A lot of pieces to juggle. And that reminds me—I left something out of my text about Russell’s visit this morning. He said Sierra wants to expand the gallery and wants Belinda’s space.”
“Is that a motive?” Ardis asked.
“Maybe. It’s information, anyway.” I sent another text to the posse and one to Joe telling him Clod crowed, as predicted. Then I scrolled through messages wondering what else I’d missed, hadn’t shared, or hadn’t asked. Pesky unasked questions. Like this one. The colleague who’d told me about the estate sale textiles she thought had gone missing in Alexandria had written “Not the textiles. They’re fine.” Did that imply something else was missing? I hadn’t asked, but that was easy enough to fix with another text. And then it was easy enough to get lost in the world of fibers, customers, and earning a living.
Debbie and Abby came in for their Saturday shifts, but Ardis and I stayed through the lunch hour. After lunch, Ardis left to do her weekly shopping, and I dithered between taking paperwork up to the study and going home to do laundry. Thea saved me from both.
“I did it. I confess,” she announced as she came through the door. “I tried to stop myself, but I was helpless.” She put something loosely wrapped in tissue on the counter, then carefully unfolded the tissue, exposing the Briggs Myers mystery. “I couldn’t resist. I’ve come to apologize, because this means far less money for yarn for months. But I’ll let you hold it, if you want. Are your hands clean?”
I wasn’t sure I should even breathe near it, but her eyes expected me to admire her baby. As it lay in its tissue swaddling, I opened the cover—and stopped. Someone had lightly penciled a design inside the cover, in the upper left-hand corner. I pointed to it.
“Used bookseller’s code,” Thea said.
“I saw one last night in a book Aaron’s cousin had. The one she said her boyfriend took from Gar’s truck.”
“It’s a common practice,” Thea said. “Some are price codes, some are dates, some are a bookseller’s own mark.”
“Mind if I take a picture of it?”
“Get one like this, too.” She held the book next to her beaming face.
I sent that picture to her and the picture of the mark to Angie. I asked Angie to compare the mark to the one in Taylor’s book. Then I went up to the study to do a different kind of paperwork.
“Screen time?” Geneva asked when I opened my laptop.
“Come read over my shoulder. See if you can add anything.”
I opened a document and gave it a heading: things missing, things found, incomplete information, and things we forgot to ask. Then I started typing.
Deputies found used romance paperbacks in Gar’s truck
Twins followed a McDougal to Rogalla’s
Why did the McDougal go to Rogalla’s?
Who let the dog out?
“Is this supposed to make sense?” Geneva asked.
“Not yet.”
My phone pinged with a text, Angie saying she’d check the book when she got home from work. I put down the phone. It pinged again, my colleague getting back to me.
2 books missing. Studies of A&C textiles, embroidery.
This time I knew the next question. My colleague anticipated me, though, and before I started typing, a follow-up text pinged in with the titles, publication data, and identifying marks of the missing books.
“Ooh, Geneva,” I said, “lovely, lecturey books.”
While she swooned across the laptop’s keyboard, I called Rogalla to find out the titles of the dry, academic books Russell had given him for safekeeping.
“Sorry, I’ll have to get back to you,” he said. “Someone tried to break into my office. I’m on my way to meet the deputies there, now.”
“No, ooh?” Geneva asked when I disconnected.
“Just more irritating incomplete information.” I went back to typing.
Unsuccessful break-in at Rogalla’s office
Rogalla
safekeeping Belinda’s books
Simon sold Belinda those books, wants them back
Riley thought he’d find the killer in Blue Plum
Nervie heard Belinda say, “It’s stolen”
Belinda traveled to estate sales, used to live in DC area
A&C textile, embroidery books missing from Alexandria
“You should call the darling twins and ask them who let the dog out,” Geneva said.
I did. Shirley answered—whispering, she said, so she wouldn’t annoy a fussy, uncomfortable Mercy. “The dog was already out,” she said. “It ran at that hairy so-and-so and scared him off. You know the rest.”
I stared at the screen for a long time after that. I didn’t know the rest. Didn’t know how to find the rest. Too many holes, like a moth-eaten sweater. But, no, it wasn’t even as solid as that.
Then Angie’s text came in.
TWENTY-FIVE
Match, Angie’s text said. She attached a photo of the mark in Taylor’s paperback so I could see for myself. Definitely a match. But what did it prove?
That I’d been wrong about the tablecloth being the connection between the two murders. Except for the part where I was right.
“You look confused,” Geneva said. She’d grown bored with the static screen, and my silence, and floated over to settle with Argyle in the window seat. The sun, coming in at its autumn angle with a yellower light, made her look less like a patch of fog and more like a scrap of lace, like an antique lace mantilla.
Lace—full of holes, but substantial enough to throw around my shoulders and dance a tango. Netting—also full of holes, but a net can snare. “I might be confused, Geneva, but when have I ever let that stop me? We’re going to need a trap.”
We’d need the posse, too. But I didn’t want to give away the answer I’d come to; I wanted to see if they’d leap the same holes I’d leapt and land in the same spot. To that end, I gathered my exhibits—photos of our whiteboard work, copies of our “investigation” texts, Angie’s photo and mine (with brief information about the marks and where and when the books were acquired), and the document I’d tapped away at that afternoon (to which I added my thoughts on lace and netting). I attached all that to a group email and wrote a note with simple instructions: Open book test: Read the attached. Name the killer. Text me. Go.
“You’re leading them, a little bit, by calling it an open book test,” Geneva said. “Hit send anyway.”
I did.
“How long do we have to wait?” she asked.
“People are busy. It might be hours. It might be tomorrow before we’ve heard from everyone.”
“We should plan a cunning trap while we wait.”
“I should go home and do laundry.”
“Which is more important? Clean socks or snaring criminals?”
“For that matter, I could knit a pair of clean socks while we plan.”
“A two-fer,” Geneva said. “Except your knitting is slow and painful to watch. You can take notes while I plan. I know about traps and snares. My grandpappy trapped bobcats.”
Rather than take notes on her grandpappy’s skills, I pulled the box of shreds over and started knotting them together into one length.
Geneva interrupted herself to ask, “Isn’t that evidence tampering?”
“It’ll be just desserts when I’m finished.”
Sooner than I expected, though not sooner than I or the poor bobcats would have liked, my phone pinged with a text. Thea—mad as a trapped bobcat. “My baby is a stolen book. Verified on stolen book database. He is toast.”
A few minutes later, John wrote, “Motive for you to kill him, Thea. Doesn’t prove he killed anyone. For record, I agree. It’s Simon.”
Mel sent: “Thanks. Spoiler alert next time?”
Joe: “His motive?”
Ernestine: “Why kill in those locations?”
Thea: “He left cheap romance in Gar’s truck? Why?”
Ardis: “Stage setting. Same with leaving our scissors at scene. Simon loves sets, playing a part.”
John: “Need to wait and eliminate other suspects?”
Ardis: “Wait and he eliminates one of us if we get too close.”
Mel: “LOTS of holes here. None of this is proof. Need more info.”
John: “Give info we have to deputies?”
Ernestine: “Are we credible after W’s mystery man crashed and burned?”
“I’ll never live it down,” Geneva said, reading over my shoulder. “How lucky for me, I’m already dead. Tell them about the trap.”
I wrote, “Two-fer. Give info to deputies. Get ultimate hole-plugger—self-incrimination. Set a trap.”
Joe: “Sycamore trap.”
Ardis: “Ahem.”
Joe: “Gar’s favorite fly, called it sycamore fly. So tasty you have to hide behind sycamore tree to put it on your line or fish crawl right up your leg to get it.”
Thea: “Use a book for bait.”
Ernestine: “Fancy book on fancy stagecraft. Make him drool while he bites.”
Joe: “Better—Gar’s 1st edition script ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?’ autographed by Albee and original Broadway cast.”
Ardis: “Heart just stopped. Gar had that?”
Joe: “No, but Simon doesn’t know that. Bait and switch.”
I wrote, “You all appear to be free for oodles of texts. Are you free to plot and plan?”
Ardis: “On Daddy duty. Make it my place?”
Mel: “Almost suppertime. I’ll bring Hot Browns.”
“And when we catch him,” Geneva said, “Let’s hope he doesn’t crawl up a leg and bite.”
Over Mel’s tasty sandwiches, we devised our tasty, three-part plan: 1) Lure Simon to the script. 2) Trip him—literally—in the act of snatching it. 3) Turn him over to the deputies. Then, to make the nonexistent script as irresistible as Gar’s legendary sycamore fly, we wove a story around it. That Gar, a fan of the play and Albee, bought the script and put a good bit of effort into getting it autographed by the author and original cast. The crowning jewel was Uta Hagen’s signature. Gar had carried a torch for Uta since seeing her in the play opening night.
“Did he carry a torch?” Thea asked, looking dewy-eyed.
“Probably not,” Joe said. “Remember, we’re making this up.”
Ardis would be our storyteller, using her repertory chops to convince Simon of the script’s glory, glamor, and unguarded condition. “I am appalled,” she would tell Simon. “And as a true booklover, I know you’ll be appalled, too. I overheard Joe laughing to Kath about the script, because he borrowed it before Gar died. He figures it’s his, now, because no one knows he has it. But in Gar’s ‘honor,’ he has it in his shop, in the bottom of the box where he keeps his overflow stock of brown trout paintings.” She promised to sound extremely disappointed in both Joe and me. Then she’d tell Simon that she’d confronted Joe and told him to find out the name of Gar’s executor and turn the script over. Or else. “But now I’m even more irritated,” she would say, “because Joe said it has to wait. He’s leaving for Asheville and won’t be back until tomorrow.”
“Will Simon bite?” Ernestine asked.
“If he killed Gar over a book, he’ll believe the script exists,” Joe said. “He’ll know Gar collected rare books on flies and angling. Gar didn’t have many, because he had expensive and eclectic taste, but the Albee script fits in with that.”
“The good thing is,” John said, “if he doesn’t rise to our sycamore fly, we haven’t lost anything but time.”
“And time spent fishing doesn’t count,” said Joe.
Joe doctored an old manila envelope to make it look full. “It’s bulked up with paper,” he said when he gave it to me Sunday morning, “along with a few subtleties to give it tension.”
“The way Albee does in Virginia Woolfe?” I said. “Wily work, Dunbar.”
Ardis stopped by the Vault Sunday afternoon, shortly after it opened, and played her role for Simon. I
sent our collected information to Darla, as the safer deputy. Then I took the box with the knotted together shreds and spent the afternoon “working” in Joe’s shop. Geneva came with me and hung around the teller’s cage kicking her ghostly heels. The envelope went into the bottom of Joe’s box of brown trout paintings.
Sierra waved from the information and sales desk. Midafternoon, Simon ambled over to say hi and ask if Joe would be in.
“Tomorrow or Tuesday,” I said. “He had business in Asheville.”
The afternoon wore on. I hadn’t seen Martha, Russell, or Nervie come in at all. Geneva grew bored or bold and floated off toward Floyd’s. There weren’t any screeches, so I assumed all was well. Sierra offered me a bottle of water. When Simon waved goodbye at the end of the day, I sent a text to the posse. Then I puttered, pretending to restock displays, wondering where Geneva was, until Sierra asked how long I’d be.
“Oh, look at the time. Sorry. On my way.”
“Good, I am, too. After I change. Hot date.”
“Great! Have fun.” Bonus! No need to worry about the resident on the third floor while we sneaked around on the first.
She let me out the front, and I went around to the back, where Joe, Mel, Thea, Ernestine, and John waited in the shadows.
“No Ardis?” I asked.
“No sitter,” Joe said. “But she sends her best wishes for big fishes.”
We waited a little longer, until Sierra came out and hopped in her car. Then Joe let us in to take up our positions. Thea went straight to Simon’s shop to scan the shelves for other potentially stolen books. Joe unlocked the storeroom where Belinda died.
“You two don’t mind being in here?” I asked Ernestine and Mel.
“It will be an honor,” Ernestine said.
“Thanks. The hall light switch is by the back door. I’ll bring the rope.”
Lights were still on in the front of the building so that patrolling deputies could see any shifty characters wandering where they shouldn’t. John and Joe sat in the front corners, out of view of anyone looking in, unobtrusive to the unobservant inside. Trying to keep a low profile, I retrieved the knotted length of tablecloth shreds I’d left in Joe’s shop and took it to Mel and Ernestine in the storeroom.