Gillian paced out the front door and slammed it so hard I feared the glass would break. Luckily, it stayed intact, along with my resolve.
I congratulated Sarah on calling the woman’s bluff.
“She doesn’t scare me,” my assistant said, “but you see why I called you out here. What on earth is her problem?”
“Whatever it is, I’m really glad her husband stashed Leya here and paid us in the way that he did. I’d hate to hand any animal over to someone with that kind of temper!”
Gillian’s visit left us both rattled, so after some thought I decided to report it to Bonelli. When I called her office phone I got a recording, then left a message. Just in case Gillian did try to sue, or cause us some other kind of trouble, it might help to have my side of the story on record with the Chadwick PD.
* * *
We closed the shop at noon, as per our usual Saturday schedule. That gave me a chance to take my list of missing items over to Towne Antiques.
Philip Russell flattened the sheet of paper on the glass top of his sales counter. A tall floor fan whirring a few feet from us dispelled some of the musty smell that pervaded the antiques shop on warm days like this one. Still, I enjoyed a sense of traveling back through time, while surrounded by beautiful ceramics, amateur oil paintings, UFO-shaped chandeliers and colorful, 1960s Pop Art furniture.
“Yes, I do recognize some of these Nintendo games,” he told me. “I may even still have a few of them in stock.”
“Did you get them from Bob Smiley?” I asked.
“Nooo, I don’t think so. Bob tried to sell me a few earlier this month, but they weren’t especially rare. He seemed disappointed at the prices I offered him, and he took them all with him when he left.”
So I had part of my answer—Smiley had been peddling some electronic games. “Does he bring things to your shop often?”
“Now and then. He’s sold me some toys that were worth a bit more—vintage Star Wars and Star Trek stuff.”
“Any of it on this list?”
Philip narrowed his eyes and went over the items again. “Maybe this model kit. I sold that earlier this spring. Can’t remember whether it came from Bob, but it’s the kind of thing he tended to bring me.”
Early spring . . . months before Bernice’s death.
Supposedly he had been visiting Chester often, at that time, and chatting about the older man’s experiences as a sports writer and announcer. Had Bob been smuggling things out of the Tillmans’ house even then?
“Smiley never offered you any of these LPs, autographed pictures or baseball cards?” I pointed to one particular item. “This is the doll Chester lost, the one you said was probably an American Girl design. Did Bob bring that in?”
The antiques dealer shook his head sadly. “If I ever had anything like that I would have told you, back when you first described it to me.”
I still held out a slim hope that I could recover some of the pieces that meant the most to Chester. “How about a baseball signed by Roger Maris? Chester said it was under a protective dome.”
Philip smiled. “I’d sure remember seeing that! I’d be keeping it under a dome, too, and under lock and key. But no, sorry.”
Discouraged, I took the list back, folded it and stuck it in my purse again.
“Don’t give up, though,” he told me. “Search online and see if those things show up for sale anywhere else. Look on eBay, Etsy, and any specialty sites you can find. If Bob took them, or someone else did, he could be trying for the best possible price by putting them out on the web. Even if you do find something, though, I don’t know how easy it will be to trace the seller. Maybe someone would have to pose as a collector to flush him out.”
That sounded like a job for the actual cops, although probably not the blasé Dalton force. “Thanks for your time, anyway. Even what you told me could be helpful.”
At least I knew now that Smiley had been trying to sell old toys and games, and could easily have picked them up at Chester’s home.
* * *
Later that afternoon, Bonelli called me.
“In it up to your neck again, aren’t you, McGlone.” It wasn’t a question.
“Don’t tell me Gillian Foster went crying to you? I just expected her to sue me, not try to have me arrested.” I explained that Donald had brought me the family cat and strongly implied Leya might be safer with me, at the moment, than in their home. “To give her back to Gillian would have been to go against the wishes of a paying customer.”
“You may be within your rights,” Bonelli conceded, “but putting yourself in the middle of their marital spat might not be the wisest move, either.”
“There’s only one person who can make me return Leya, and that’s Donald. Technically he hired me, and brought her here for a reason. If he’s found another way to keep her safe, or honestly feels there’s no more danger, I’m perfectly willing to give the cat back to him.”
“That sounds fair. I’ll have a word with him about it.” The detective paused, switching tracks. “You’ve gotten yourself on the radar of Chief Hill, too, and he’s not pleased.”
“The Dalton guy? How come? I’ve never even met him.”
“Maybe not, but he said you were up at the Tillman house yesterday encouraging Chester to make wild accusations—his words, not mine—and insisting someone dust the back doorknob for fingerprints.”
I also gave her an accurate account of that incident. “Sure, Chester’s stunt with the rice on the floor was dumb, but it does look as if someone came in his house. Officer Brewer wasn’t taking it seriously at all.”
“Well, Hill was already ticked off because I had a chat with the guy from Superior Home Renovations, the one who’s flipping houses in that neighborhood. The chief insisted Dan Pressley is doing a service to the town, and we shouldn’t go making trouble for him.”
I smiled to myself. “Hill’s going to regret his invitation to let you investigate the case.”
“Yeah, I’m like a vampire,” Bonelli agreed in a rare moment of whimsy. “Once you let me in, it’s hard to get rid of me. I was only asking Pressley if he or his workers had seen anyone strange hanging around Tillman’s house, but I didn’t really expect that they would have, since they only work during the daytime.”
“You said you also talked to Bob Smiley, right? He lives in back of Chester, past that little patch of woods?” I told her about the collectibles Bob had tried to sell to the antiques shop.
“Interesting,” the detective said. “Sounds like he might be worth another visit.”
“Try around five thirty or six. That’s when I saw him getting out of his truck yesterday.”
“Will do.” I heard a pause on the line. “The Dalton cop who came out to check on Chester’s story . . . did you say his name was Brewer?”
“That’s right, why?”
“Same guy who beat the rap, a couple of years back, for stealing the iPod during that traffic stop.”
Chapter 19
FOCA already maintained a designated room where the volunteers did light grooming of their rescues, so on Sunday Becky and I used that space to tidy up Autumn. I commented that the tortoiseshell’s coat actually seemed to have grown healthier and bushier over her two weeks at the shelter.
“We’ve got her on a low-protein diet for her kidneys,” Becky told me, “so she’s not as dehydrated. The downside is, she’s more prone to matting now.”
I noticed that, too. The tortoiseshell tolerated my initial brushing well enough, but objected when I tried to work out the more stubborn knots in her long coat. I misted the air around the table with my herbal calming spray, and Becky used several gentle but firm holds that I had taught her to keep the cat from squirming free.
“It’s great that you found a potential adopter so soon,” I said.
“Yeah, she saw Autumn on our website and read the sad story—that her elderly owner had died and she needed a home to live out her last years comfortably. This woman is older, herself,
and one of those big-hearted folks who’s actually looking for a cat with special needs.”
“Sounds like a match made in heaven.”
The mention of special diets pulled my thoughts back to Mango’s ailment. His blood work had revealed, as Mark expected, that my aging tabby suffered from hyperthyroidism. Unfortunately, controlling that took more than just a change of food. I’d begun giving him tablets embedded in pill pockets, but already he was getting wise to that, eating the pockets and spitting out the pills. The evening before, I’d tried giving him the pill by hand; I succeeded after several attempts, but came close to getting bitten. I worried that my luck might not hold up over the long haul.
“Winky should be easy to place, too, since he’s very cute and lively,” Becky went on. “Sugarman could be more of a challenge—he’s more ordinary-looking and on the shy side.”
“He’d also be well suited, though, to a mature person who just wants a quiet companion,” I said.
“Actually, Chris and I have an idea along that line. Once or twice, we’ve visited nursing homes, or geriatric wards in hospitals, and brought along kittens. The seniors always brighten up and want to pet them. Of course, kittens are easy, because they’re always friendly, and can’t bite or scratch hard enough to do anyone much harm. But we’ve been wondering if we should bring some older cats, too.”
“Sugarman might be a good candidate for that,” I suggested. “I’ve also heard of nursing homes that keep a couple of cats on the premises, and they wander around visiting the residents. You might be able to place a couple that way.”
And FOCA might need to make some room in their shelter, I thought, if Chester moved to assisted living and needed to send them his last two cats. The whole situation was very sad, and once again made me angry that his grown children weren’t doing more to help.
Finally, we’d completed Autumn’s transformation from grungy to glamorous, and returned her to her stainless steel cage. Although FOCA tried to provide their animals with all the necessary comforts, Autumn was used to a house to roam around and a loving owner. I wished both her and Becky success in their meeting with the prospective adopter the next day.
I’d walked to the shelter, because it was only about five blocks from my shop and the weather was clear. Eleven a.m.—just enough time to clean up a bit before Mark came by. He’d proposed a picnic in Riverside Park, and I wasn’t about to turn that down!
* * *
As I’ve mentioned already, cooking is not my strong suit, but I at least made the sandwiches for our park excursion—deli-sliced chicken, organic and free range, with mayo on whole wheat bread. Mark probably put more effort and finesse into the salad of dark greens and tomato chunks that he brought along. Both in shorts, we spread out a blanket under a shade tree, not far from the river bank, to eat our picnic. Plenty of other people had already done the same.
Mark also brought along his guitar, figuring he’d use the leisure time to practice some new pieces he’d been working on with Stan. After lunch, he surprised me with a lively version of “Stray Cat Strut,” which I’d playfully challenged him to learn. Mark didn’t really know the words, though, so while he concentrated on his fingerwork I sang along.
The singer was supposed to be a tomcat, but I had fun with the lyrics, anyway.
I slink down the alleyway looking for a fight . . .
A family of four, passing by, actually stopped to listen to us. When we finished, they grinned and applauded our efforts. We probably should have handed out our business cards; they might have been amused by our professions.
After they moved on, Mark confided, “I pretty much taught myself that one.”
“Really? It sounded great. You’re getting better all the time.”
“Thanks. You weren’t bad, either. I never heard you sing before! You could give Tracy a run for her money.”
“Hold that thought,” I purred.
He laughed self-consciously. “Speaking of which, Stan thinks I might be able to sit in with Quintessence for a real gig later on this summer.”
“That would be terrific.”
Mark might have heard a note of caution in my voice, because he added, “I mentioned my problems with Tracy to him. I made light of it, at first, just to see how he’d react. He got the message, though. I guess it isn’t the first time she’s made some guy in the band uncomfortable.”
“Oh, yeah?” I wondered again what the woman’s issue was. She was attractive enough not to need to chase after everything in pants.
“Herb, her uncle, told Stan that she just went through a bad breakup, so I guess she’s rebounding pretty hard. Anyway, Stan said I shouldn’t worry, he’d deal with it. I just hope he’s subtle—I don’t need Tracy as an enemy, either!”
“No, you don’t. I have a feeling she can fight dirty.” And I’m sure she’s already not too crazy about me.
A tinnier version of the Stray Cats hit drifted from the pocket of my shorts, and I checked my cell phone. I didn’t recognize the number, but it was local, so I answered.
Donald Foster’s voice sounded weary and apologetic. “Cassie, I know Gillian went to your shop yesterday and raised a stink about the cat, and I’m sorry. I guess it wasn’t fair of me to put you in this position. Can you bring Leya back to us?”
His defeated tone concerned me. “Are you sure she’ll be okay at your house?” It would be awkward to also ask if he and Whitney would be okay, though I wanted to.
“Yes, she’ll be fine. I think that will be the best solution, to keep the peace. Things have settled down a bit—we’ve put the basement work on hold for a while.”
Okay, he was sticking with his story that the cat was disturbed by the noise. “I don’t want to cause any problems with Gillian, of course. But if the construction starts up again, feel free to park Leya here with me anytime.”
“For sure. And keep the check I gave you. With all this drama, you’ve certainly earned it.”
I’d been dodging concerned looks from Mark, and I didn’t want to interrupt our time together on a customer’s whim. “Did you want me to bring her back today? I’m not at the shop right now.”
“No, no, it’s your day off, and I’m sure you made other plans. But can you swing by tomorrow morning, say, around ten? I won’t be here, but Whitney and Herta should, and Gillian definitely will be.”
Great, I might have to face Gillian by myself. Oh, well, why should she give me a hard time? She’ll be getting what she wanted.
“Okay, I’ll do that,” I said.
Donald hesitated before adding, “Gillian gets wrought up sometimes, but she’s had kind of a tough life. She grew up an only child, and I guess her parents were the same as she is now, maybe worse. Both very high achievers, and pressured her to be the same. To get top grades, take on all kinds of extracurriculars, get a high-paying job. It was almost literally, ‘Unless you’re perfect, we won’t love you.’”
I said nothing, but thought of the inspirational slogans on Gillian’s website, and even the samplers in her guest room—as if she had to have the perfect home, too.
“I saw through all that,” Donald went on, “and told her she didn’t have to try so hard all of the time. When we were first married, she did seem to relax a little more. Maybe getting older has revived those anxieties for her. She was taking some medication for a while that I think helped her, and so did this hobby of renovating houses. But our latest restoration project seems to be making things worse instead of better.”
It was my first hint that Gillian’s obsessiveness might be more than just a personality defect, but a real mental illness. “That must be very hard on you and your daughter.”
Donald sighed. “Yes, she does tend to nag Whitney sometimes. Usually about her weight, though the poor girl certainly isn’t fat! But by now Whitney’s mounted some heavy defenses of her own against Gillian.” He chuckled dryly. “She probably can take care of herself!”
It was quite a confession on Donald’s part, and I hardly k
new how to respond. “I just hope things settle down for all of you soon. I’ll bring the cat back tomorrow, then. If you’re sure it’ll be all right.”
“Yeah, Cassie, everything’s going to be okay,” he assured me. “I’ll make certain of that.”
His vow lingered in my mind as I tucked the phone back into my pocket. I met Mark’s curious eyes and sighed deeply. “You won’t believe this!”
Chapter 20
“As you requested, Ms. Foster, I’m returning Leya to you. You’ll notice that the balding area on her tail has started to grow back, so it seems that she was over grooming herself from stress. After you spoke to Detective Bonelli, I also asked her advice; she agreed that, since your husband paid Leya’s board, I was within my rights to wait until I had his okay to bring her back home. Donald has assured me that the most disruptive renovations in your house are over now. If that situation changes, though, I’ll be happy to accommodate Leya again.”
I guess I am my mother’s daughter, because when necessary I can craft a prim, rather legalistic speech, and I rehearsed this one on my way to the Foster house. If I had to hand the cat back to Gillian, I wanted to put her on notice that even the local PD knew I had misgivings about doing so, and if anything bad happened, we’d all hold her responsible. In reality, our local cops don’t deal directly with animal cruelty cases, but I also have clout with the county SPCA.
When I pulled into the driveway of the historic Ramsford-Cooper house, now better known as the Fosters’ fortress, I tried to determine who was home by the other vehicles parked there.
No sign of Donald’s silver BMW, so he must be at work. Whitney’s bike was absent, too. I saw only a glossy cream-colored Acura that, because of the fracas over the faulty brakes, I knew must be Gillian’s.
Odd . . . Donald had said that at least Herta would also be around. Maybe she commuted to their house by bus, or even lived near enough to walk? At any rate, the quiet, conscientious maid probably wouldn’t be much of a buffer—she seemed unlikely to take my side against her strong-willed employer.
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