The Diva Digs Up the Dirt

by Krista Davis

  Unfortunately, she headed to the dining room. Bernie and Big Daddy had outdone themselves. My mouth watered when I saw the gorgeous platters on the table, and I realized that I hadn’t eaten since the caramel banana muffin. Not only did I deserve to eat, but wouldn’t it make me look more natural? I slathered a bagel with cream cheese, topped it with a gorgeous rosy piece of salmon, and bit into it.

  Mars zoomed by me, backtracked, grabbed the bagel, and kept going. Rotten scoundrel!

  I was about to fix another bagel, but Mindy floated over to the living room. I grabbed a cupcake because they were close by, then realized it was probably time for me to do my thing and give her an excuse to leave the gathering. Carrying the cupcake, I kept an eye on her as she waltzed through the living room. She disappeared into the den.

  I had to dodge the guests to catch up. By the time I reached the entrance to the den, Mindy was gone and the door to the patio was closing.

  I rushed to the window and peered outside. Mindy glanced around nonchalantly and headed straight to the guest house. I hadn’t had to do a thing. I backed up a little bit, so she wouldn’t see me if she turned around, lifted the cupcake to my mouth, and bit into the wrapper.

  I peeled it back, and Mars came up behind me. He still held half my bagel. I waved the cupcake under his nose. “The price of observing through this window is the rest of that bagel.”

  His mouth twisted around. “Only if I can have half your cupcake.”

  “Deal.”

  Mars ate cupcake, and I chewed on the bagel. Nothing happened at the guest house.

  “Now I need tea,” said Mars.

  “Me, too.”

  “Who’s going to get it?” he asked.

  “You stole my bagel.”

  “I returned it. Half of it. We’re even.”

  And then it happened. Kenner stepped out of the guest house and signaled someone. Roscoe, I presumed.

  It didn’t prevent Mars and me from barreling out the door and running across the lawn. Kenner made us wait for Roscoe.

  “Well?” Mars demanded of Kenner.

  Kenner didn’t twitch a muscle. He waited patiently.

  Roscoe hurried as fast as he could. He entered the guest house and the rest of us followed.

  Mindy’s eyes flew wide open. Her arms appeared to be pinned around her sides. I assumed Kenner had handcuffed her.

  “Roscoe! You’re alive!” She seemed confused. “Is Audie dead?”

  The bottle of Italian salad dressing sat on the kitchen counter. It couldn’t have been more glaring if it had been flashing neon.

  Roscoe saw it and sank into a chair. He lowered his forehead into his hand and muttered, “I am an old fool. And Audie nearly paid for my foolishness with his life.”

  “So no one is dead. Take these handcuffs off me so I can hug my husband properly,” Mindy barked. Her voice changed. Gentle and soft, she said, “Roscoe, sweetie, I need your help. This is all a big mistake.”

  He heaved a deep breath. “It’s my big mistake. It’s too late, Mindy. I can never forgive you for trying to kill my son.”

  “Kill? Why, Roscoe, what kind of nonsense have they been telling you? I just came over here for a bottle of dressing. Last I heard, there was nothing illegal about that!”

  Roscoe’s shoulders shook. “It was about my money. There’s plenty to go around. You couldn’t have split it with Audie? I guess I should have recognized your greed when you bought yourself that ridiculous diamond crown.”

  “It’s called a tiara, and they’re very fashionable!”

  Kenner’s phone buzzed. He answered, and acknowledged the caller, but hardly spoke at all. When he finished, he said, “Cricket and Audie are almost here.”

  “Is that why you’re keeping me here? So Audie can confront me? I want a lawyer!”

  “You want a minute alone, Roscoe?” asked Kenner.

  Roscoe stared at Mindy. She raised her chin, and if anything, I’d have said she appeared defiant.

  “No. I’m done with this one.” Roscoe walked out of the guest house.

  Mars and I went with him. The three of us traipsed to the front of the house.

  Olive saw Roscoe from the porch. She ran down the steps. “You horrible old man!” But she wrapped her arms around him so tightly that everyone knew she didn’t mean what she’d said.

  Applause broke out. Applause! None of those people had any idea what had transpired, but they cheered and slapped him on the back like he was some sort of champion back from the dead.

  Kenner brought Mindy to the front of the house as Cricket and Audie arrived.

  Audie stepped out of the car but held on to it as though he was still weak. “What’s going on? Dad?

  A police car pulled into the driveway behind Cricket’s car. Two uniformed officers disembarked. One of them helped Mindy into the backseat.

  Roscoe looked as drained as Audie. Evidently, Olive wasn’t letting go of his arm, so they walked to their son together. Cricket came around to the passenger side of the car.

  She held out her arms. “Roscoe! Oh my gosh, I can’t believe it. You’re a rascal for tricking us like this. I’ve been beside myself all morning!”

  Roscoe didn’t go into her embrace. He swallowed hard. “I’d like a minute with Audie. Why don’t you get a bite to eat, Cricket?”

  She blinked hard and appeared surprised but said, “Of course! Audie first.” After a moment’s hesitation, she climbed the stairs and called out, “Who needs a drink?”

  Mars muttered, “There’s an offer I’d turn down.”

  After a brief and quiet discussion, Audie gave his permission to search the car.

  It took the uniformed officer all of two minutes to locate the quilted duffle bag underneath a seat. The officer opened it, inserted a gloved hand, and withdrew Mindy’s scotch decanter.

  Kenner gave a little jerk of his head. The officer understood. He bagged the evidence and went after Cricket.

  There was only one problem. She was gone.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  Dear Natasha,

  I loved your recent TV show about reusing items in an effort to live green. I have a bag full of old pantyhose with runs. Is there anything I can do with them besides toss them out?

  —Living Green in Lavender, Tennessee

  Dear Living Green,

  They’re wonderful for tying tomato plants to stakes because they have some give and won’t cut into the vines. You can also store your freshly harvested potatoes and onions in them. And if they’re a pretty color or have a nice pattern, stuff a piece with lavender from your garden, and tie it off with a purple ribbon for potpourri!

  —Natasha

  Those of us who hadn’t recently been sick fanned out to search the house and grounds. Kenner called in more police, but I had little hope that Cricket was still on the property. If I had been in her shoes, I would have made a beeline for the woods, hiked through them, and hitchhiked when I reached the road on the other side. With her good looks, it wouldn’t take her long to catch a ride.

  The day had been emotionally draining. By the time Francie asked me to drive her home, I was dead on my feet and hoping I could sneak in a late-afternoon nap.

  I parked Wolf’s car on our street, and Natasha materialized on the sidewalk before we had a chance to step out of the car. Her hands were on her hips, and her expression was stormy. “Where have you been? You promised to repurp, and Troy made me walk both dogs twice!”

  “It’s still early,” I protested—but not with much vigor because it was anything but early. “Don’t have a cow.”

  Alas, Natasha’s sedan waited in front of my house. I slid into the passenger seat, and she pulled into the street.

  “This is all the rage, you know. It’s part of the green movement to give new life to discarded objects. Don’t you adore that idea? There are whole shows about it. I would love to go national with a repurp show. Leon scoped out stores for me, and said The Flee Market has the best selection. Which is so str
ange, because Heath recommended it to me, too. I mean, I could have just gone straight there, without having Leon check out other places. Who knew Heath would be an expert? It’s a combination of new and used items, but Heath said the owner is very selective about what she’ll carry.” Natasha parked in front of a warehouse with a huge clock on the front.

  “That’s weird. There are no hour or minute hands on the clock, just a hand ticking by really fast,” I observed.

  “Leon told me about that. Isn’t it cute? It’s a second hand store!”

  I groaned. I trusted Leon’s taste, though, and hoped we could make quick work of finding something to repurp. The large piles of broken concrete near the door of the building didn’t inspire me, though.

  We walked into an overwhelming assortment of architectural artifacts, old furniture, linens, knobs, and light fixtures.

  “Well!” said Natasha. “At least it’s not too dirty.” She hurried down an aisle of broken chairs.

  I wandered aimlessly, wondering what someone might do with a garden umbrella whose crank had broken or a chair missing two legs.

  “Sophie!” I could hear her shouting across the massive hall.

  Natasha found me and tugged me to a worn-out rubber mat on which many people had wiped their shoes. “It’s perfect! We’ll paint it purple, and gild these ridges with sheets of that sticky-tacky gold stuff. Then a good coat of polyurethane, and we can hang it as outdoor art.”

  “I hope they have a mangled steel car bumper to go along with it.” Apparently she didn’t recognize my sarcasm.

  She screeched and hugged me. “I’m so glad you’re getting into the spirit of this. That’s very clever.”

  It was neither clever nor original, but the idea made her happy. If she bought a car bumper, would the regular trash people pick it up, or would I have to schlep it somewhere to get rid it?

  “Excuse me, ma’am,” trilled Natasha. “Do you have any steel car bumpers?”

  A tall, thin woman wearing makeup that looked like it had been applied with a spatula drifted over to us. “They fly out the second we get them. I can put you on a waiting list, but I have to warn you that they aren’t cheap.”

  Natasha frowned at her. “Used. You do understand that we want something that has been thrown out.”

  “They’re very hard to come by. Vintage car collectors and sculptors fight for them.”

  “Sophie, I believe you’ll have to come up with another ingenious idea.” Natasha clasped her hands. “This bed! I love it. Don’t you want this, Sophie? Imagine it filled with plants. It would be a—flower bed!”

  Wanted was the wrong word by a mile, but I moseyed over. She had her eye on an old wooden bed that had clearly been dragged out of a junkyard. Mangled was the only word that came to mind. It probably hadn’t been much to speak of when it was new. I was not having that thing in my garden. Not!

  “Couldn’t we do something with a broken stained-glass window?” Or anything else!

  “Stained glass.” Natasha said it under her breath like it was a novel new concept.

  She took off and I followed, passing a stack of yellow gingham napkins displayed in a fan. I backpedaled, and I swear my heart skipped a beat.

  I picked up one of the napkins. Someone had embroidered a ladybug on a daisy.

  “Those are hand-embroidered,” said the saleswoman.

  I opened one, searching for a name or brand. “Are they vintage?” I held my breath. They didn’t look vintage to me.

  “No, I’m afraid not. I have some lovely vintage linens over here.”

  My heart was pounding. I would have to compare it to Wolf’s pillow to know for sure, but the embroidery on the napkins looked just like the embroidery on Anne’s yellow gingham pillow to me. Unlike the one I had seen in the children’s store, this looked hand-embroidered. The stitches were skilled, but they didn’t have that machine-stitched tightness. I tried to speak calmly. “Where do you get these?”

  “From a supplier out in the country. He brings those wonderful baskets, too. They’re all woven by hand, not too far from here.”

  “Do you have anything else like this? With embroidered ladybugs?”

  She dipped into a large pile of cloths. “Here we are. A matching tablecloth. You know, I really should put this on display—”

  “I’ll take it.”

  “Wonderful. The napkins, too?”

  “Yes. I’d like to locate the woman who does the embroidery. Could you call your supplier, perhaps?”

  Her smile and cheery tone vanished. “No.” Her voice had turned hard and huffy. “I’m sorry. If you want to buy more, I can place an order for you.”

  I waved my hands nervously. “I’m not trying to cheat you out of your cut. You don’t understand. I think I recognize the work. I’ve been looking for this person.”

  She tucked her chin in. “And you think you can recognize the stitches?” Her voice dripped with sarcasm.

  “No, it’s the motif.”

  “Because ladybugs and daisies are so original?”

  “Could you cut me a little slack here? I might be very wrong about this, but there’s a lot at stake.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Anne Fleishman.”

  She pulled out her cell phone and made a call. “Bobby, I have someone here who wants to know if the lady who embroiders the daisies is an Anne Fleishman.”

  As soon as she uttered Anne’s name I realized I had made a huge mistake. If the guy called Anne and told her someone was making inquiries, she might take off.

  The saleswoman hung up. “Sorry, it’s not her.”

  My hope deflated like a pricked balloon. “What is the name? Maybe she’s using an alias.”

  “If she’s using a different name, then maybe she doesn’t want to be found.”

  “Please? This is a matter of life and death.” Well, it was—sort of—Anne’s life or death in a weird way.

  “I suppose you need a kidney from her?”

  At that moment, I wished I was tall and macho and could grab her by the throat and make her choke out the information like they would on TV. But I was neither tall nor macho, and she would have me arrested if I did that.

  Natasha chugged up, dragging along three industrial garbage bins, a piece of the bed, a small bookshelf, and a stained-glass window. “Do you deliver?”

  The saleslady, clearly eager to be done with me, turned her back to me and apologized to Natasha for not having a delivery service. Natasha chattered about sending Leon and someone from the production crew over to pick up the items she was buying.

  Holding the napkins and tablecloth, I pawed in my purse for my wallet and promptly dropped it. I bent to pick it up and saw a corner of a picture propped up on the floor behind the counter, a picture of… a duck? Still hunched over, so they wouldn’t notice me, I shuffled forward for a better look. No doubt about it—I had located Roscoe’s mallard print.

  Grinning ear to ear, I placed the linens on the counter and handed cash to Natasha. “Ring those up, too, please.”

  “What are we going to do with these?”

  “I think they’re cute.”

  “Oh.” Her tone indicated her disagreement on that subject.

  When she finished paying, I stepped behind the counter and lifted the mallard print.

  The saleswoman glared at me. “That’s quite expensive. Please be careful.”

  In a hushed voice, I said, “I happen to know the value because this print was stolen from the home of my friend earlier this week.”

  “Put that down this minute and leave my shop. I don’t carry hot merchandise.”

  I calmly took out my cell phone. “No problem. I can call the police from your parking lot.”

  “Maria Delgado.”

  “In… ?”

  “Durbin.”

  “Thank you.” I motioned to Natasha, who looked on, appalled. “Let’s go.”

  The saleswoman hustled around the counter and latched onto the print in my arms.r />
  I raised my eyebrows. “I don’t think so.” I kept going, waiting for her to tackle me from behind. But she didn’t. I had a hunch it wasn’t a coincidence that Heath knew about this place.

  Natasha demanded explanations on the way home, but I was so engrossed in finding Durbin and Maria Delgado on my phone that she didn’t get much information from me. Durbin turned out to be a tiny town in West Virginia with a population of less than five hundred people. Unfortunately, although there were tons of Maria Delgados on the Internet, I wasn’t finding any in Durbin. I was excited, nevertheless. In a town of fewer than five hundred residents, they all probably knew each other.

  I asked Natasha to stop in front of my house. I unloaded the print and thanked her for the ride.

  “Wait! Soooophie,” she whined, “we have to get to work repurping now. I’m going to send the fellows over in the pickup to get everything.”

  “Okay. Call me when you have the stuff.”

  Natasha called an hour later, complaining that nothing had been delivered. I had to tell her I’d been called away the next day. I supposed it wasn’t nice of me, but I felt compelled to follow up on the possible lead to Anne. Nina agreed to leave at the crack of dawn the next day.

  It was ten in the morning when we rolled into Durbin, West Virginia. It turned out to be an adorable little town with a railroad theme in the mountains near a state park. Not all that far from Old Town, yet a world apart. We passed a feed and hardware store, a dress shop, and a diner. At the end of the block, we spied a coffee shop.

  “What’s our best bet?” I parallel parked Wolf’s car. “The coffee shop?”

  “You go there, and I’ll work the feed store.”

  I lowered my sunglasses to look at Nina. “You? In a feed store?”

  “You don’t think I can flirt?”

  “I’m sure you can. Have at it.”

  She jumped out of the car. “We should have brought Daisy, she would have helped us break the ice. Wait here.”

  Instead of waiting, I visited the coffee shop. The sole employee, a middle-aged woman with kind eyes, recommended the homemade ham biscuits. I bought two, along with two iced coffees, though it did seem considerably cooler and less humid than Old Town.