A Wee Murder in My Shop (A ScotShop Mystery)

by Fran Stewart

  “This sure did take a long time,” Gilda said around a yawn.

  I looked at my watch. Dirk cleared his throat before I could swear. “Yikes! We have to open in two hours.”

  We replaced the door, threw out the broken Sheetrock, and vacuumed up all the dust—moving considerably faster than the ache in my muscles called for—and pushed the bookcase back into place moments before nine o’clock. I looked carefully. There was no sign of Sheetrock, damaged wallpaper, or a hidden safe. Gilda and Sam arranged the display items as I opened curtains and unlocked the front door right on time, all three of us harried and dragging our tails but putting on a good show for the tourists.

  I called the station at ten. Moira answered, her southern drawl stronger than usual. “Hamelin Po-lice Station. What kin I do fer yeuw?”

  “Good morning, Moira. It’s Peggy. I need to talk with Harper.”

  “He’s not in right now, Peg.” Raht naow. “He’s gone to the funeral.” Feeoon-ruhl.

  “What funeral? Who died?”

  There was a long silence. I could hear male voices in the background. “That would be the funeral of your former boyfriend, remember?”

  “No, I didn’t re-mem-buh.” Good grief, why was I being so sarcastic? “I’m sorry, Moira. Shouldn’t have grumped at you.”

  Damn. I’d honestly forgotten about the funeral. I hadn’t wanted to go anyway. I’d have to watch Andrea crying, although she might not be too devastated, since she’d thrown him out. That’s what Harper had said. “Harper didn’t even know Mason,” I said. “So what’s he doing at the funeral?”

  Another silence. “Honestly, Peg. I should think you’d be able to figure that out.” She lowered her voice, and the background sounds diminished. She must have cupped her hand around the receiver. “Your boyfriend—”

  “Ex,” I said. “Very much ex.”

  “Don’t get your britches twisted. Your ex-boyfriend . . . was . . . murdered.”

  I thought about it. Oh. Sometimes the murderer attends the funeral. Fine. I’d tell Harper about the safe later.

  “Shall I take a message, sweetie?”

  “No. It’s nothing much.” Just a major surprise in an already muddled case.

  16

  A Wee Puzzle of My Own

  The shop was busy, and I spent most of the morning surreptitiously moving daddy longlegs outside. I’d scoop one up, carry it through the back door, and deposit it on the fence across the alley. As soon as I returned to the ScotShop, I’d have to field questions about finding Mason’s body. There were enough purchases to make the morning worthwhile, but I got awfully tired of the ghouls who came in to absorb the aura of murder without buying anything. At least Robert—the wee fiend, as Dirk would say—didn’t show up again. Maybe his mother got smart and disowned him.

  Gilda asked me if I’d tried Harper again. “Not yet, but I will as soon as we get a break.” An hour later, Sam reminded me to call him. “Yeah, yeah,” I told him. “I’ll do it.” But visions of the shop closed clouded my judgment, and I kept putting off the call.

  I was still so tired, it took me a while to see what was happening, but just before noon I noticed that wherever Dirk stood, not only did spiders spring out of nowhere, but customers seemed to avoid him. They couldn’t possibly be doing it consciously. No one ever gave any indication that they saw anything, but I’d see someone start toward him, stop, turn around, and head the other way. When he wandered toward the tartan ties, some of the best-selling items in the shop, I hurried over to divert him.

  Pretending to straighten the display, I spoke as quietly as I could. “You’ve got to go into the back room and stay there.”

  “Why?”

  It’s hard to talk without moving your lips. “You’re scaring my customers away. They don’t want to get near you.”

  “They dinna know I’m here.”

  “Yes, they do. They don’t know it, but they know it, if you get what I mean.”

  “Ye are making no sense whatsoever.”

  “Were you talking to me, young lady?” I looked to my right. A white-haired woman peered anxiously at me.

  “Not at all, ma’am. I tend to talk to myself whenever I straighten the ties.” And whenever my ghost is around. “It passes the time.”

  She gave me a befuddled smile. I motioned Dirk out of the way. “Just what were you looking for, ma’am?”

  “I’d like a Graham plaid tie for my son-in-law.”

  Dirk hadn’t gone as far away as I wanted him to. “Would she be wanting Graham of Monteith or Graham of Montrose? They’re verra distinct, ye ken.”

  “How would I know?”

  “Well, don’t you work here, young lady?”

  “I’m sorry, ma’am. I meant, would you happen to know if he’s Graham of Montrose or Graham of . . . uh . . .”

  “Monteith. Can ye no remember the twa?”

  “Yes, Monteith. Which one?”

  “Oh dear, I’m not sure. Does it make a difference?”

  “Well,” I said, “Graham is Graham, after all. . . .”

  Dirk snorted. “Try telling that to Bonar Graham of Clan Monteith and Macgilvernock Graham of Clan Montrose. They wouldna thank ye.”

  I cleared my throat. “Let’s move along, right down here to the Gs. The ties are in alphabetical order, see?” I helped her find a lovely green plaid tie and a matching tartan scarf for her daughter.

  Dirk pounced as soon as she walked away from the register. “She purchased a Monteith. Let us hope he is not of Montrose. Ye had a Montrose right next to the Monteith. Could ye not have sold her both so he could have a choice?”

  “You’re turning into quite a marketing expert, aren’t you?” Dirk gave me a long, level look. Guess I hadn’t kept the sarcasm out of my voice. “They were both green,” I said. “She didn’t know the difference.”

  “Aye, but he might.”

  He was right, damn his hide, but I was too tired to think about it.

  As soon as I could, I ushered Dirk into the stock room and draped the shawl over the back of the desk chair. “Stay,” I said, as if I were talking to my brother’s dog. “If Gilda or Sam come back here, keep out of their way.”

  “Ye could at least have brought me a book.”

  I rummaged in the desk, pulled out a dog-eared paperback, and propped it open. “Read slowly. I’ll come back when I can to turn the page.” And remove spiders, too, most likely.

  “Talking to your ghost again?”

  I spun around. Harper stood just inside the door, notebook in hand.

  Dirk moved in front of me as if to protect me, although I couldn’t imagine from what, except maybe Harper’s ridicule for my habit of talking out loud to the thin air. I glimpsed Harper’s face through Dirk’s shoulder for just a moment and quickly stepped to one side. That was just too bizarre for words, the two of them melded together like that.

  “I tried to call you,” I told him, “but you were at the funeral. We found something last night.”

  “I know.” He crossed his arms. “Gilda called and said you had a surprise for me.”

  “Gilda? That little—” I took a deep breath. “Yes. I’m glad she did.”

  Was that a smirk on his face? Whatever it was, he wiped it clean immediately. “So, what do you have to show me?”

  “Can it possibly wait until after closing time? Business is fairly good, and I don’t want to have to close early.”

  “Why would you have to close early?”

  “There was something behind the bookcase, and you’re not going to want to look at it when there are customers around.”

  “We missed something?” He looked incredulous.

  “Aye, ye did.” Dirk positively gloated. I wanted to kick him.

  “It wasn’t that obvious,” I said. Probably the understatement of the year.


  Harper looked at his watch. “Is it something that will hold a few hours?”

  “Och, aye. It will that, and mayhap another hundred years or so.”

  “I think so,” I said. “It seems to have been there for quite some time.”

  “Are you always this enigmatic?”

  Dirk’s hand flew to his dagger. “He insults you?”

  I thought back to Chaucer. Maybe enigmatic wasn’t a word back then. “I do tend to be mysterious at times,” I said, and flicked my fingers at Dirk.

  Harper watched my hand. He cleared his throat, entirely unnecessarily. “I’m interested in seeing this mystery behind the bookcase, but there’s something else. Something I’d like to talk over with you.” His eyes had gone a deeper gray. Maybe it was just a shadow cast by the light from the high window over the desk.

  “Fine. What’s up?”

  “I want to show you something.”

  You can show me whatever you’d like. I put an instant—well, almost instant—brake on that thought. “What is it?”

  He glanced around the workroom and right through Dirk. The shawl was, thank goodness, invisible to others when Dirk held it. Apparently satisfied that we were alone, Harper opened his notebook and extracted what must have been an evidence bag. I’d seen enough of those on TV and in the movies. He laid it on the desk, carefully avoiding the daddy longlegs strolling across the surface. I bent to look. Dirk stepped closer. The bag held a wrinkled piece of paper with scratchy old writing on it. “What is this?”

  “Do you recognize it?”

  “No.” I glanced at the handwritten column of words and numbers. “The ink looks old-fashioned,” I said, “but the words are nothing but nonsense.”

  L side 18 to wl

  ,000 dentists

  L

  4

  _& 10

  _ _ stars

  /100 %

  1 R

  brother against brother

  ended just in time

  I read it aloud again. “Dentists?” I said. “Stars? What on earth is this?”

  He took it back and returned it to his pocket. “I hoped you could tell me. We found it in Mason’s sporran.”

  The last time I’d seen that sporran . . .

  I felt woozy and reached for a nearby table. Harper grabbed my arm just as the bell over the front door jingled. I straightened quickly and looked out into the showroom. A busload of middle-aged women fanned out among the displays, and I heard Gilda and Sam greet them. I sure hoped they’d find lots to buy. Maybe good sales would take my mind off Mason’s bloody face.

  * * *

  Harper came back half an hour before closing time and wandered around the store, fingering a tartan here, a knickknack there. My ghostie, carrying the shawl—he would not stay put—stalked after Harper, until I caught Dirk’s eye and motioned him away. “He’s not doing anything wrong,” I hissed. “Leave him alone.”

  “I dinna trust him.”

  “You said that about old Mr. Pitcairn, too, and look how harmless he is.”

  “He’s nae so aulde as all that.”

  “Don’t argue with me. Just leave Harper alone, okay?” I looked past Dirk’s shoulder. Harper stood there, watching me. I hummed a little tune and broke out into a song. The only song I could think of at the moment. Straight out of that scary scene in Jaws.

  “What are ye doing for aye?”

  “Show me the way to go home, dum, dum, I’m tired and I wanna go to bed, doop-de-doo.” I certainly was tired, if that was the best I could do. I moved away from both of them, hoping neither one would follow me. It was all I could do to keep from looking back to see if three yellow barrels popped out of the water behind me. Peggy, you’re being ridiculous.

  A few minutes later, right before closing time, I helped a young woman find a weathered Keith tartan tie for her fiancé. “The brown matches his eyes,” she told me with a fair amount of moon dust in her own. I wrapped it in the ScotShop signature paper, placed it in a tie box, and sent her on her way, thanking her, and locking the door behind her.

  When I turned around, Gilda straightened up quickly but not fast enough. She looked decidedly off-kilter. “You,” I pointed at her, “are going home now.”

  “But I want to watch.”

  “Not a chance. You look like you’re asleep on your feet, and your hands are shaking.” I patted her shoulder, surprised at how bony it felt. Had she been losing weight? “Get a good rest, and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  Sam stepped up beside her. “I’ll take you home.”

  “You will not,” I snapped. “I need you here.”

  Gilda pressed her cheek against Sam’s chest, narrowly avoiding poking her eye out on his kilt pin. His arms went around her. “I’ll be fine,” she said. “I’ll just go to bed.” I saw his arms stiffen. “That’s all.”

  I must have missed something. She sounded like she was trying to convince him of something unspoken but thoroughly understood between the two of them. I looked at Harper, wondering if he’d caught whatever was happening. He stared at Gilda and a line formed between his eyebrows.

  She stepped away from Sam and opened the door. “I promise,” she said, looking directly at Sam.

  I locked the door behind her. “What was that about?”

  Sam shrugged but wouldn’t say anything. I made a mental note to grill Gilda tomorrow.

  I glanced at Harper again, but his arms were crossed on his broad chest. I couldn’t help but notice the ripple of muscle down his forearm. “So,” he said, “what do you have to show me?”

  I motioned to Sam to close the blinds and shut the curtains—we needed all the privacy we could get—and led Harper to the bookcase. “We have to move it one more time.” Sam let out a loud groan, but it was just for show.

  Harper looked from Sam to me but didn’t say anything.

  “After you and Karaline left the other night, we got to wondering why those holes had been drilled in the wall.”

  Sam let out his breath audibly. “You mean you got to wondering. I wanted to call the cops.”

  Self-righteous twit. “Right. Sure you did. And all Gilda had to do was bat her lashes at you once or twice to convince you otherwise.”

  He grumbled but had no way to contradict me—I was right, doggone it.

  “We thought—I mean I thought—the murderer might be looking for something behind the wall.”

  Harper tilted his head to one side. He looked awfully intent. “Go on.”

  “So we tried to break through the Sheetrock, but there was solid wood behind it.” Harper frowned at me, but I kept going. “Behind the Sheetrock,” I explained. “You’ll just have to see for yourself.”

  “You do know there’s a penalty for destroying a crime scene?”

  “What right do you have to grump at me? It’s not a crime scene.” My indignation was about as strong as my sense of guilt. “I mean, it was a crime scene, but the yellow tape is gone and you released it.” I really should have called him first, but I wasn’t about to admit it.

  “That’s splitting hairs, and you know it.”

  “I do not. I mean, it isn’t. I mean . . . damn it, do you want to see this thing or not?”

  “I don’t think I’m going to like what I see.”

  “Mistress Peigi, I would be most happy to rip his heart out and hand it to ye on the tip of my dagger.”

  I growled at Dirk. He was entirely too protective. I don’t think he liked Harper at all.

  “What’s wrong with you, cuz?” Sam slapped me on the shoulder and practically sent me sprawling. I rounded on him, ready to fire him or at least clop him upside the head, but Dirk jumped in between us. His plaid swept through me and I staggered sideways.

  Harper’s notebook clattered to the floor. He grabbed me, and I was surrounded with the subtle scent of citrus
and a whiff of soap—the kind my mother always bought when I was growing up. I looked up at him. What kind of guy used little-kid soap? I had a brief vision of me in a bathtub when I was about five, holding down the bar of Ivory. Every time I let go, it would shoot up out of the water, like a dolphin at SeaWorld. Pure Ivory. It floats. Still, the smell felt ordinary and comforting, with not a hint of a ghostly presence anywhere, as I stood there with Harper’s arms around me.

  I heard the ominous whoosh of Dirk’s knife sliding out of the scabbard. “I’m okay. Nothing to worry about.” I pushed myself away from Harper’s chest, wishing I could stay but not wanting to see what might happen if my ghost tried to impale my cop. My cop? Where had that idea come from?

  Harper gazed at me steadily for a long moment. I straightened my shoulders to show him how good I felt. “You’re not going to fall again, are you?”

  “No. I just stumbled, that’s all.”

  His eyes darkened, as if he didn’t quite believe me. “Let’s see what you have to show me.”

  Anything you want, I thought. Stop it, Peggy. Stop it right now.

  Harper’s lips twitched. I sure hoped he couldn’t read minds.

  Between the three of us, with Dirk hovering protectively in the background, making suggestions and threatening to skewer both my helpers, we shifted the thing away from the wall. Harper whistled when he saw the gaping hole in the Sheetrock.

  Sam had been quieter than usual for a few minutes, but now he spoke up. “Why would anybody build a solid wooden wall as nice as this one is and then put Sheetrock on top of it?”

  Harper stepped back a ways and scanned the wall. “You said the building was a hundred years old?”

  “Right around there,” I said. “It says 1915 over the front door. It’s been divided into three separate stores, but originally it was just one business, and this”—I swept my arm around in an arc—“was the front office.”

  “The wooden dividing wall was the original,” he mused.

  “But why the Sheetrock, too?” Sam sounded more aggrieved than curious.

  “The Sheetrock was put in later,” Harper said. “Sheetrock wasn’t in use a hundred years ago.”