“I don’t know what I’m going to do about a manager for Artisans Alley,” Katie said. “I don’t know anyone else who’s qualified to take over, or even who I can trust. I guess I’ll have to call an employment agency.” She took a bite of the warm, crumbly confection, savored it, and swallowed. Good as it was, it couldn’t hold a candle to the scones her beloved Aunt Lizzie had made.
“Why don’t you take charge yourself?” Mary asked, adding a dollop of clotted cream to her scone.
“Me? There’s no way. I have a real job.”
“A job you don’t really like,” Tracy added. “And it sounds like you’re vastly overqualified for it, as well. You ought to make use of that marketing degree of yours.”
“I tried getting jobs in the field, but all the big Rochester firms keep downsizing and firing—not hiring—workers. Besides, I have no practical experience in marketing. At least at Kimper Insurance I have health care and other benefits.”
“Like what?” Mary asked.
“Vacation, for one.”
“Which your boss gives you a hard time about using,” Tracy reminded her.
“Working for Josh Kimper isn’t the best job in the world,” Katie admitted, “but it’s stability. I can’t possibly give it up for Artisans Alley. Especially when I don’t even know if I can keep the place afloat until Christmas—let alone beyond.”
Mary put a hand on Katie’s shoulder. “You don’t have to make up your mind today, dear. Think about it tomorrow when Artisans Alley is closed.” She glanced at the clock. “Oops. I’ve got some mocha chocolate chip cookies in the oven. They’re due to come out right about now.” As if on cue, a bell rang in the kitchen. Mary rose from her seat and hurried off.
“Did you see Ezra’s death notice in the paper this morning?” Katie asked, referring to the announcement notice Seth had placed in the Democrat and Chronicle.
Tracy nodded. “In case you didn’t know, Mother and Ezra were . . . friends.”
“Good friends?” Katie asked.
“Close friends,” Tracy clarified, and Katie remembered Mary’s sobs upon finding Ezra—her lover?—dead.
“If she’d like some private time with Ezra before the burial, I’d be happy to arrange it.”
Tracy’s gaze darted to the kitchen, then back to Katie. “I’ll let you know. Thank you.”
“Artisans Alley closes in about an hour. I’d better get back.” Katie stood and started for the door, but then she turned. “Thanks for the tea—and the sympathy.”
“I’ll see you at the funeral home tomorrow night,” Tracy said.
Katie headed for the door, and then stopped abruptly, her throat suddenly dry. The memory of Ezra’s still body stretched out on Artisans Alley’s floor filled her mind. “Oh my God,” she breathed. “Ezra’s really dead.” She turned her tear-filled eyes toward Tracy.
Without hesitation, Tracy stepped forward and embraced her, patting her back sympathetically.
“I don’t know why it hit me like this,” Katie said, wiping at her eyes. “But suddenly I just feel so alone.”
“You can handle this. It’s not the end of your world. It’s a new beginning,” Tracy suggested.
“It’s a beginning all right, but of what?”
Tracy didn’t answer, just patted Katie’s back some more.
“I’m sorry,” Katie apologized and pulled away. “I didn’t mean to dump on you like this.”
Tracy smiled with a look of distant pain in her own eyes. “It’s okay. What’re friends for?”
Plywood covered Ezra’s—now Katie’s—broken office window, darkening the room and making Katie feel claustrophobic. She sat at her desk once more, sifting through yet more file folders from the mound on the floor. Once more she came across the key to “Chad’s pad.” Like it or not, one of these days she was going to have to deal with disposing of the items in there. Maybe in a couple of weeks. It might take her that long to work up the courage to read the rest of the journal, too.
Yeah, maybe in a couple of weeks.
Katie reached for another stack of folders and uncovered a framed picture, its broken glass long gone. A young man with curly blond hair and a blithe smile looked back at her.
“Who are you?” she asked, and naturally received no answer. The frame was dime-store etched metal—nothing spectacular—the picture a high school graduation photo.
Shrugging, she set the picture on the desk next to Chad’s and wondered what she should do about her regular job the next day. Artisans Alley was closed on Mondays, so that gave her an extra twenty-four hours to make up her mind about the business’s future. She’d have to tell Josh she had other responsibilities and would need more time off—to attend Ezra’s funeral on Tuesday, and to hire a manager. She’d have to bust her buns trying to catch up with Kimper Insurance’s Friday and Saturday work. That still left the rest of the week to worry about.
Should she open Artisans Alley on Wednesday, or shut down and keep the place open only on the weekends for the time being? Maybe that was the best—her only—option. The artists were paying rent for a six-day week; to cut them back to two . . . they’d expect a rent reduction, and she couldn’t afford that either. Would they leave in droves if she announced a cutback in hours? But what was her alternative? Maybe she could work part-time at both jobs—at least for a couple of weeks . . .
Katie realized she’d been sorting papers into piles, but she hadn’t really looked at any of them. She set the hanging file folder aside and went through the closest pile once again.
One sheet in particular drew her attention: a simple loan agreement for five thousand dollars, typed on standard eight-and-a-half-by-eleven-inch white paper. Though properly dated and signed, the signature on the agreement was illegible. Ezra probably hadn’t thought it important enough to type in the borrower’s name. He knew who he was giving the money to. Katie studied the squiggly line—the handwriting was totally illegible. Did the signer think he or she was a movie star, or maybe a doctor? One thing was clear. The loan was due to be paid in full on October twenty-third.
The day Ezra died.
Katie read through the simple document once more. Ezra had taken it seriously enough to write it all down, but he was damnably vague about who owed him the money. The loan was dated four months before Chad’s death, and definitely did not contain the borrower’s name beneath the signature. Would Chad have known about it? Had the money come from the Alley’s funds, or was it a personal loan? Could the killer have ransacked the office looking for this one piece of paper?
Katie pulled out the rent checks Vance had given her the evening before, comparing the signatures. No, whoever signed the loan was not one of these artists. Who was to say it was an artist who’d asked Ezra for the loan? Did Ezra’s bank send statements showing miniature versions of each Alley check or were they available as JPG pictures online? She’d have to check. Comparing them to the signature on the loan might be the best way to eliminate any artists as suspects. She’d have to make a trip to Ezra’s house, since she hadn’t seen any evidence of bank statements in the vast sea of dumped Alley files.
Katie glanced at the blue-ink signature on the loan. It bothered her that Ezra died the day he was to collect. Had the person confronted Ezra, asking for more time, been denied, and then murdered him for a lousy five thousand dollars? As Deputy Schuler had said, people were killed for a lot less. Either way, whoever borrowed the money owed it to the estate. And five thousand dollars would help keep the creditors from Artisans Alley’s door.
No matter what, she ought to at least let Detective Davenport know about the loan. It could be a motive for murder.
She dialed the number on the card Davenport had given her on the day Ezra’s body had been found, and listened to it ring four times before voice mail picked up. “You have reached the office of Detective Ray Davenport. Leave your name and number at the tone and I’ll get back to you.”
Swell, Katie thought. He was probably watching the football game on
TV. Okay, so she didn’t like the man. Still, she did as instructed, figuring Davenport would no doubt get back to her on Monday morning. She told him she had something important to tell him concerning Ezra, left her name and number, and hung up the phone. As Katie sat back in her chair, a flash of movement caused her to look up.
Vance stood in the doorway. “I owe you an apology,” he said, and took a step forward.
Katie leaned forward and laid a file folder over the loan agreement. No need to advertise it. “What for?”
“I didn’t give you an explanation of why I can’t manage Artisans Alley. It was . . .” He trailed off, and then said, “Rude of me.”
She waited for him to continue.
Vance didn’t meet her gaze. “See, my wife. She’s sick. She’s got MS. I need to take care of her. And, well, I can’t promise I’d be available to be at Artisans Alley every day.”
A logical explanation she didn’t for a moment believe. Her great-aunt Lizzie always said a man who wouldn’t look you in the eye had something to hide. Vance was definitely hiding something.
“Thanks for telling me,” Katie said, knowing her voice sounded cold. It wasn’t Vance’s fault she was in this mess. She ought to blame Ezra as much as anyone, but she knew he’d much prefer to be sitting here worrying about unpaid loans and the mass of bills than embalmed at the funeral home.
“Do you know if any of the other vendors has business experience and might be able to step in?”
Vance shook his head. “Most of us are retired and do this as a hobby. We all depended on Ezra to handle the paperwork, the advertising—everything. Chad set up the computer so that we would get weekly printouts. Ezra liked to hand-write the checks, although the computer can do it. They go out on Tuesdays, you know.”
Not this week, Katie thought. “It’s going to take me a while to figure out how to do all that.”
“I can help,” he offered. “I just can’t do it on a regular basis.”
“Could you be available this week?”
“I’ve ...” He hesitated. “I’ve got things to do tomorrow. And Ezra’s funeral is Tuesday. You weren’t planning on opening that day, were you?”
“I haven’t decided. Probably not. With no one to manage the place, I may not reopen until Saturday.”
Vance’s eyes widened angrily. “You’ll piss off a lot of the artists if you do that.”
“Maybe it’ll motivate someone to find us a manager,” she said, making sure to keep her voice level.
Vance seemed to squirm within his clothes. “I’ve got to get going. I’ve written out a list of instructions,” he said and handed her a folded piece of paper. “Can you close by yourself?”
The last person who’d closed by himself was dead, Katie reminded herself. She glanced at her watch: four twenty-nine.
“Sure,” she said, with more conviction than she felt.
“I’m sorry, Katie,” Vance said again.
“Don’t worry about it. You must put your family first.”
Vance swallowed and looked like he wanted to say something—then thought better of it—and turned to leave her office.
Katie sighed, uncovered the loan agreement, and stared at the Courier typeface. Ezra had probably written up the agreement on the old portable typewriter that sat in the corner. Was that so there was no record in the computer, or had the computer only been there for Chad and Vance’s use?
Katie bit her lip. She should put the document somewhere safe. But first she’d make two photocopies on the tabletop copier behind her. Placing the original on the platen, she did just that. Folding one of the copies, she put it in her purse, then made a new file folder tab and put the other copy and original away in the cabinet.
Next, she read through the paper Vance had given her. Neatly printed block letters guided her through every step needed to close the place. Step one, warn the customers that Artisans Alley closed in twenty minutes, and then after they were all gone, lock the doors and do a walk-through to make sure the place was secure. Empty the cash registers and lock the day’s receipts in the safe. Only she didn’t have the combination to the safe. Did Vance? Maybe she could lock them in the file cabinet. It wasn’t the best solution, but she didn’t want to take that kind of money home and make herself a target for a mugging either.
Katie looked up at the ugly plywood covering the hole where her window had been and sighed. “Oh, Chad, why did you have to die and leave me in this mess? You, too, Ezra.”
She read through Vance’s list a couple more times, memorizing it, before heading for the cash desk. She picked up the phone and pressed the public address button. “Artisans Alley will be closing in twenty minutes. Please bring your purchases to the front desk. Closing in twenty minutes.”
Rose Nash, manning Cash Desk 1, with a string of five customers in line, gave her a thumbs-up and a smile. She had no wrapper, so Katie stepped in to help. Katie recognized one of the women as having been standing behind the door at opening. Could she have been shopping at Artisans Alley for nearly seven hours?
“Oh, isn’t this cute,” Rose proclaimed, examining a small, handmade greeting card in a clear protective sleeve. She removed the gummy price tag from the plastic. “Someone’s birthday coming up?”
“My sister’s,” the woman said proudly.
“Tell her ‘Happy Birthday’ from Artisans Alley,” Rose said. “That’ll be three dollars plus tax.”
The woman handed over a fistful of dollars and change. Katie eased the card into a small brown paper bag before handing giving it to the customer.
“Will we see you tomorrow?” Rose asked.
“Maybe,” the blond-wigged older woman said with a shrug. “Have a nice evening.”
“You, too!”
The customer walked away.
Rose turned to Katie. “She’s our best customer. Comes in every day. Now if we could just get her to buy something over five dollars, we’d all get rich.”
Katie smiled, but it quickly turned to a frown. Artisans Alley’s income came from renting vendor space to the artists, but if their sales were so lackluster, it was no wonder they found it hard to pay their rents.
Within minutes Artisans Alley emptied out, and Katie followed the last customer to the door and locked up for the night.
The tag room was just to the left of the main double doors. Clad in her raincoat and scarf, Ida exited the little room and turned off the light. “Hi, Katie. All but the last batch of tags have been sorted and taped down,” she reported. When Katie had last ducked into what she had begun to think of as “Ida territory,” she’d seen the older woman bent over the table, carefully lining up the price tags that had been removed from merchandise.
“See you on Tuesday,” Ida chirped and headed for the side—vendor—exit.
“We won’t be open on Tuesday,” Katie called. “Tuesday is Ezra’s funeral.”
Ida stopped short. “Oh, dear. But I’m used to coming in here on Tuesdays. What will I do if I can’t come here?”
Was her routine that engrained? “Stay home?” Katie suggested.
“Why would I do that?”
“Because Artisans Alley will be locked up. We won’t be open.”
Ida seemed to need time to think about that. “Oh.”
“Perhaps you’ll consider attending Ezra’s funeral service on Tuesday morning.”
Ida frowned. “Maybe.” She started off toward the vendor exit once more, her steps slower.
Katie waited until the woman was out of earshot before she turned to Rose. “Does Ida have some kind of emotional or mental problem?”
“I’d say so. She calls that big ugly wart on her cheek a beauty mark, which is certainly not what I’d call it.”
Nor would Katie.
Rose giggled. “I told you she had more than one screw loose.” She changed the subject. “I’ll do the walk-through with you if you’d like,” Rose volunteered, and she stayed until Katie had completed every task on Vance’s list before she retrieved h
er coat from the tag room.
“You did great today, Katie,” Rose said, her good cheer giving Katie a much-needed boost of confidence.
“Thanks, Rose.”
“Are you leaving now? We could walk out together.”
Katie shook her head. “I have a few more things to do in the office, then I’ll be off.”
“Do you want me to wait with you?” Rose asked, sounding anxious.
“Oh, no. You’ve been on your feet all day at that register. I’ll be fine here alone.”
Rose pulled out a silk kerchief from her coat pocket and tied it around her tight blond curls. “Then I’ll see you tomorrow night at the funeral home,” she said, her voice cracking. She swallowed hard, and Katie gently patted her shoulder. Then Rose cleared her throat and straightened. “I’ll say good night, then.”
Katie walked her to the door and locked it behind Rose before heading back for her office. Artisans Alley felt cavernous and empty without another living soul within it, and she found the silence unnerved her. Katie took the paper sack full of cash, checks, and credit card receipts from the two registers and locked them in the back of one of the file cabinets, crossing her fingers that the burglar wouldn’t make a return visit.
She tidied up the desk and remembered the lack of dinner opportunities in her refrigerator at home. About the only things in her cupboard were bags of flour and sugar, a couple of cans of cat food, and a bag of kitty kibble for her cat, Mason. Her wallet was empty, thanks to the pizza and soda she’d paid for the previous night, and she didn’t feel up to a trip to the grocery store and the ATM machine. Maybe kitty kibble would make a good snack, after all. In the meantime, she plucked a butterscotch sweet from her pocket, unwrapped it, popped it into her mouth, and crunched it—letting the chunks of sweetness begin to dissolve on her tongue.
Pocketing her keys, she shrugged into her jacket, collected her purse, and headed for the side exit, turning out lights as she went. Finally, only the light from the exit sign over the door to the showroom pierced the gloom. The darkness pressed in around her, sending a shiver of unease down her neck.
A Crafty Killing Page 8