"Hi, is this where I can paint my own pottery?" a petite young woman with fine blonde hair asked as she came into the shop an hour before closing.
"This is the place," I said, trying to keep my sarcasm to myself. I looked around at the bisqueware, the bottles of paint and glaze, and the tables, and wondered what else she thought it might be. "Is there anything in particular you're interested in?"
"I think I'll look around first," she said.
"Be my guest. If there's anything you need, just let me know." I wasn't exactly worried about shoplifting, at least not from the unglazed section; some of the pieces I had on display were worth quite a bit of money, but I figured it'd be difficult for her to get a teapot under her dress, as snugly as it fit.
It was fascinating watching her study each item in turn, picking it up, looking at all sides of it, then placing it deli cately back down. Forty-five minutes later, she was still just halfway through my stock. "I'm afraid if you don't make a selection soon, there won't be time to decorate it," I told her.
She looked pensively at me. "I just hate to rush my deci sion."
"I understand," which was a total and complete lie if there ever was one. "I just thought you should know."
"Perhaps I should come back tomorrow."
People took less time to choose a mate. "I'll be here."
She thought about that another minute. "That's what I'll do then. I'll come back tomorrow."
That's what she said. What she did was just stand there, staring at the pottery she'd yet to examine. Finally, reluc tantly, she left. I couldn't wait for her return. If David man aged to come into work the next day, she was all his. Maybe with my handsome young assistant she'd make a decision in less than a month.
I normally hated to close the place early, but that woman had gotten under my skin. So what if I lost a customer or two? I flipped the sign, dead-bolted the door, then started cashing out the register.
I'd just started my report when I heard a knock at the front door. "We're closed," I called out without looking up.
"Open up the door, you daft old woman," my husband, Bill, called out from the sidewalk.
I walked over to the door, but I didn't unlock it. "You'll need to talk a little sweeter than that if you expect me to comply."
He stared at me a few seconds, as if deciding what to do, then grinned slyly. "If you don't let me in, you won't know why I'm here. Let's see your curiosity stand that."
"I can take it if you can," I said, turning my back on him. Honestly, the man should have learned by now not to order me around. I gave it thirty seconds, then turned back to him.
He was gone.
But where? I leaned out through my display window try ing to catch sight of him, but my field of vision was limited to a few squares of the sidewalk on each side of my shop. I unlocked the door, and the second I did, he popped out from next door.
"Got you," he said with delight.
"Get inside, you old goat."
"Now who needs to talk sweet?" he asked. "It's not nice, calling your husband an old goat."
"Which part do you object to, 'old' or 'goat'?"
He frowned. "Both of them. What do you think?"
"I think they fit, sometimes," I said. I noticed a few win dow-shoppers looking our way. "Now get inside. You're making a scene."
As he followed me into Fire at Will, he said, "You were the one yelling."
"I was not yelling," I said, trying to keep my voice soft. I had a tendency, when aggravated, to increase my volume, or so I've been told. I wasn't sure it was true, but enough peo ple had pointed it out that I was beginning to doubt it could be a conspiracy. "Now what is your news?"
"Speak up. I can barely hear you," Bill said, cocking one hand behind an ear.
"You heard me just fine, and you know it. What's going on?"
"I got another commission," he said. "It's for five Shaker-style nightstands for a bed-and-breakfast over in Newberry."
"Olive Haslett is working you too hard." Olive owned the business Shaker Styles where my husband was em ployed. What had started out as a hobby after his retirement had developed into a full-time job.
"Olive's got nothing to do with this," he said. "I got this order on my own."
"Do you mean to tell me you're soliciting business on the side? Don't you have enough to do?"
He said, "I thought you'd be happier about it. I'll make twice as much as I do working for Olive."
"We don't need the money," I said. "Besides, you're sup posed to be retired and enjoying yourself."
"If I had to sit on that rocking chair on the porch all day waiting for you to come home, I'd climb up on the roof just so I could throw myself off."
"Gee, thanks. I was wrong before. You know just what to say to get my heart fluttering."
He took me in his arms, something that still managed to take my breath away after all the years. "You know what I mean."
"I do," I said. "You need to stay busy to be happy."
He pulled away and smiled. "That's what I just said."
"In what language, Urdu? That might be what you meant, but it was certainly not what you said."
"Don't quibble," he said as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a card. "What do you think?"
I looked at it and saw an old-fashioned wooden handplane on it, along with my husband's name and tele phone number. Above it all, in bold letters, it said, "Old-Fashioned." I handed it back to him. "Is that the best name you could come up with for your business?"
He took the card back, studied it a second, then frowned. "What's wrong with it?"
"Since I know for a fact that you're not a bartender or a spinster, I'm not sure what you're trying to say."
"It's furniture, and you know it."
I tapped the card. "I know it because I know you, but someone else might not. Why don't you add the word 'fur niture' below it, if you're stuck on the first part."
"I could write it in with a pen," he said as he looked at the card yet again.
"You will do no such thing. You're handwriting's a mess."
"You could do it, then," he said.
"I could, but I'm not going to. Let me think about it a minute." I started playing with names, trying to come up with something more clever than "Old-Fashioned." It cer tainly shouldn't be that hard. "How about 'Brand New An tiques'?"
He thought about it, then said, "Yeah, that's kind of nice. I'll have new cards made up when I run out of these."
"How many did you have made up?"
"I got a deal on a thousand. That's not bad for twenty bucks, is it?"
I reached over into the till and pulled out a twenty. "I'll trade you this bill for the rest of your cards. That way you'll break even."
"You should make it forty for me to do that," he said.
"If that's the way you're going to be, give me back my twenty and you can pay for the new ones as well."
"Not so fast. I was just kidding," he said. "You free for dinner? I feel like celebrating."
"That sounds wonderful," I said, dreaming of a night out on the town. "What did you have in mind?"
He scratched his chin, then said, "You haven't made meatloaf in a while."
"Thanks, but I'll pass."
"How about fried chicken? You make the best in town."
I stood toe-to-toe with my husband. "Bill Emerson, my idea of celebrating isn't cooking for you at home. You should take me out to dinner."
He nodded. "Sorry, I guess you're right. There's just nothing in the world I'd rather have than your meatloaf."
How sweet. I knew when he was conning me and when he wasn't, and the expression on his face told me that my husband was sincere. "Tell you what. Why don't we go out some other time. All of sudden, meatloaf sounds great to me, too."
"I didn't think you wanted to make it."
"Are you going to argue with me, or are you going to take a list and pick up a few things at the store for me?" We had a routine when I was cooking a meal he'd requested: I'd
do the work, but he had to shop. I knew how much he dis liked the grocery store, and if my dear husband was willing to do that, then I knew he was serious.
"Just tell me what you need," he said.
I jotted down the ingredients, along with potatoes and some frozen peas. He took it from me and studied it. "There's no pie on here."
"You didn't ask for pie," I said. "I don't have time to make a crust."
"We could get a lemon meringue from the store," he said.
I knew it was his favorite dessert. "Go ahead, pick one up, too. You're going to get fat if you keep eating those things. You know that, don't you?"
"Are you kidding? For pie, I'm willing to take the risk. Any chance you want to come with me to the grocery?"
I could have managed it, but I still wanted to check in with the Firing Squad members before I left the shop. "I'll be along in half an hour. Now shoo."
He started for the door, then said, "Thanks."
"For what?"
"Understanding your crazy old husband," he said with a grin.
"I don't know that I'll ever understand you," I said, re turning his smile, "but after nearly thirty years of being married to you, I've learned to just accept you the way you are."
"Then it's been time well spent," he said, a surprisingly gushy remark coming from my normally gruff husband.
"I think so," I admitted. I locked up behind him, and sud denly regretted not going with him to the store. After all, he was being such a dear. On a whim, I shoved the cash from the till into the pig, turned off the lights, and locked the shop up. The investigation could wait.
For now, I wanted to be with my husband.
"I'm sorry to call you at home, but this is kind of impor tant," Butch said after I picked up the phone later that night. Bill and I had enjoyed the meatloaf, and I'd even joined him in a piece of pie. I'd walk to the shop tomorrow to make up for it, I promised myself.
"It's okay," I said. "What's going on?"
"I've been talking with Sandy, and we'd like to get to gether tonight, if it's not too much trouble."
"I'm surprised you didn't wrangle Jenna in, too," I said.
"That's part of what we need to talk to you about," Butch replied. "Can you come down to Fire at Will?"
How could I say no, especially since I was the one who'd gotten them involved in the first place? "Give me ten min utes," I said.
"That's fine. We'll be there."
I grabbed my purse and my jacket, then nudged Bill, who had fallen asleep in front of the television, the Discov ery Channel blaring out. "I'm going out for a while," I said.
"You want me to come with you?" he asked groggily.
"No, I'd hate to interrupt your program."
He glanced at the television. "What happened to MythBusters? Did you change the channel?"
"They went off twenty minutes ago," I said. "You fell asleep."
"I was just resting my eyes," he said.
"Then you should have given your snoring a rest, too," I said. "I won't be long."
He nodded. "Do I even need to ask what this is about?"
"You can ask, but I'm fairly certain you won't like my answer, so maybe we should just leave it at that."
"Maybe we should," he said. "Be careful."
I leaned over and kissed his forehead. "I promise."
"I'll be here when you get back."
"I'd expect nothing less," I said.
I could have walked to the shop and atoned for my slice
of pie, but it was dark out, and the wind had picked up enough to put a chill in the air.
The exercise would have to wait. Butch had sounded ur gent, and I needed to get to the shop and learn what my crew had found out.
Chapter 8
"Thanks for coming," Butch said as I walked up to the pot tery shop. "I hate to drag you out like this."
"Where are the others?" I asked as I fumbled with my keys. "Or did you already let them in?" Butch was a re formed burglar, so I knew my feeble security system was no match for his skills. Sometimes I wondered just how "for mer" he really was, but I was too afraid he'd tell me the truth if I asked him.
"I'd never do that," he said. "At least not without your permission. Sandy will be here any second. In fact, here she comes right now."
Sandy approached us with a tray of coffees and a bag from In the Grounds. "I've got treats," she said.
"You didn't have to do that," I protested. "We could have made coffee inside," I added as I opened the door.
"This way's quicker," she said.
After I locked the door behind us and flipped on a few lights, I asked, "So, why isn't Jenna coming tonight?"
"That's the thing," Butch said. "When I called her and asked her to come, she said she couldn't."
"That's perfectly understandable," I said as I sipped some of the warm coffee. "We all can't drop our lives at a moment's notice and come running."
"You don't understand. She didn't bail on us because she was busy. Now that she's representing David, Jenna didn't feel that it was right for her to help us with our snooping."
"It's all for the same cause, Butch," Sandy said. "I still think you're overreacting."
"Sometimes she gets a little carried away with those ethics of hers," Butch said.
"We have to respect her position," I said. "Until Martha gets back, the three of us will have to just muddle along. Was that it, then? We could have had this conversation over the phone."
Butch shook his head. "No, we're just getting started. Sandy and I have found out a lot of important information today."
"That doesn't surprise me at all," I said. "Let's hear it. We're all here, and I'm listening."
"You go first," Butch told Sandy.
"Okay. I went back to the library after hours and tapped into some records for the county."
I wasn't sure I liked the sound of that, even if it was for a good cause. "Is that legal? I don't want you getting into trouble on David's account. One member of the Firing Squad in the sheriff's sights is enough."
"Don't worry, it's all a matter of public record. The thing is, you have to know where to look. They do their best to ob fuscate the information, but I'm on to their tricks. It turns out our fair mayor isn't quite the success he wants everyone to believe. Harvey Jenkins is not really the sole proprietor of his business at all. He barely has a quarter share of own ership."
"Sandy, forgive me, but what does this have to do with Richard Atkins?"
"I'm getting to that. It turns out that the majority owner is a company called ClayDate."
"I'm sorry, perhaps I'm slow because it's getting so late. What's the significance to our investigation?"
"ClayDate is a dummy corporation, and I saw a refer ence to an R. A. Potter in the incorporation papers. It has to be Richard Atkins. Don't you see? Richard Atkins, Potter."
"It doesn't have to be," I said, a little impatiently. "It could be Regina Ann, Reginald Allen, or Rebecca Alison."
Sandy frowned. "I have a hard time believing that. I would have dug a little deeper, but I wanted to get back here to tell you. I actually thought I'd found something."
"You may have," I said. "We just need to investigate a lit tle more. It's true that Richard and Harvey were in business together a long time ago, but from everything I've heard, it ended when Richard left Hannah twenty years ago."
I turned to Butch. "How about you? What did you find out? I don't suppose you were digging around on the Inter net as well, were you?"
"Hardly. I like a more direct approach when I snoop around. I was talking to an old friend of mine, and he had an interesting light to shed on this mess. I know he's your un cle, but Don Rutledge is not a good guy."
"Do you think that's news to me?"
"No, but this might be. From what I heard tonight, he was out at the college asking questions about Charles Pot ter. He doesn't strike me as the crafting type, but I could be wrong."
"You're not," I said. "My uncle is many things, but that's not one
of them. So, you think he knew that Charles Potter and Richard Atkins were one and the same before the rest of us?"
"He had to."
"I'm not as certain as you are, but I have to admit, it doesn't look like he's completely innocent in all of this, does it?"
Butch shrugged. "I don't care so much about guilt and innocence. I'm more concerned with results. We find out who aced the potter and David walks. It's as simple as that."
The Cracked Pot Page 11