Sell Low, Sweet Harriet

by Sherry Harris

  “Could it be the person who left the footprints in the snow outside of Jeannette’s house?” I asked.

  “No idea,” Pellner said.

  That wasn’t very helpful. “What if Fake Troy just slipped on all those papers and files that were on the floor? Maybe it was an accident. The other guy heard me call to Troy and left him there to fend for himself.” I hesitated, feeling foolish. “Will you stay on the phone with me while I walk through my apartment? I didn’t leave any lights on and I feel a little freaked out.”

  “Sure. Do you want me to come over?”

  “No. But thank you.” I walked from room to room, turning on lights, looking behind the shower curtain, under the bed, and in the closets. It didn’t take long since there was only a bedroom, bathroom, living room, and kitchen. I even checked the attic space off my living room. “Okay. No one is here.”

  “Just keep an eye out,” Pellner said.

  “Trust me, I’ll keep two eyes out.”

  * * *

  I could have gone to Seth’s house, but I’d be alone there too. He had flown down to a meeting for district attorneys in Washington, D.C., until tomorrow night. I’d stayed at his house for a few days last summer when he was out of town, and it had been awkward to say the least. Things wouldn’t be as awkward now, but staying here seemed better. The apartment next to mine had been empty for several months and the couple who lived across from Stella were wintering in Florida as usual. However, Stella was downstairs. I could hear her singing an aria from Madame Butterfly.

  She’d toured Europe when she was young, but now taught voice at Berklee College of Music in Boston. Last fall she’d been in a production of The Phantom of the Opera in Boston. The evening I attended she had filled in for the lead. She was amazing, like Tony-award-winning amazing. It made me wonder why she wasn’t touring. Maybe it was because of Awesome.

  And now that I thought about it, most likely Awesome would be spending the night. He usually did these days, although I worried about them ever since Stella and I had talked the other night. All in all I felt fairly safe here.

  I had no way to search for Fake Troy, but desperately needed a distraction. Since it was only 9:10, I decided to call Becky Cane, who was the president of the Spouses’ Club. Her husband was a colonel and second-in-command on base. She might know someone who was looking for part-time work. Even better, she was in a position to know a lot of gossip and may have heard something about Alicia or Alicia’s husband. Calling her was part of what I’d promised Special Agent Bristow I would do. Sort of.

  I plunged in after we said our hellos. “I’m looking for a couple of assistants to help me with a big sale. I thought you might know someone who would be interested.” I was never quite sure how Becky would take things. She’d had an issue with a woman in the Spouses’ Club last fall. I’d heard both sides of the story and thought a bit of blame lay with each of them. Becky, who came off as a bit snooty, had confessed how shy she was. What a toll her role as wife to the second-in-command had taken on her because she had so many unofficial duties that kept her in the public—well, base—eye.

  “I’m not an employment agency,” Becky said.

  Not the reaction I was hoping for. “Of course you aren’t. You just know everyone. No worries. I can ask someone else.” A little flattery along with a hint that someone else might also be in the know often worked with Becky. Even though doing it made me feel sneaky and not very kind.

  “Let me think about it. I may be able to come up with someone.”

  Whew. “How are things going?” I asked. “It must be stressful with all that is going on with Alicia’s death.”

  “Sarah, you have no idea. We’ve all taken her death so personally.” Becky’s voice choked up. “She was such a dynamo and everyone loved her.”

  “I heard that at the gender reveal party tonight,” I said.

  “Oh. How was it? I couldn’t make the party because we had to entertain some dignitaries who were visiting base. I hope there was a good turnout.”

  That was one of the parts of the military I missed. People came to visit the base for all kinds of reasons. Meeting them was fascinating. I’d met an ambassador or two over the time CJ had been active duty and people from all over the world. “The party was packed. Lots of fun.”

  “I’m sorry to have missed it then.”

  I couldn’t think of anything else to ask about Alicia that wouldn’t sound overly inquisitive. Becky promised to call me soon with some names and we said our goodbyes.

  Chapter Ten

  I was still full of nervous energy so I decided to try making the marsala. It was better than sitting around worrying about Fake Troy showing up. I read the recipe twice, got out all the ingredients, and did all the prep work like washing the mushrooms and chopping the shallots and garlic. After I managed all that without injuring myself, I measured out the chicken broth and wine, setting them aside for later. Because I was still a bit unsure of what was next, I watched a video of an Italian nonna making it. She chatted and smiled and tasted the sauce as she cooked. Really, it looked easy.

  But as I dredged (I’d looked the term up) the chicken in the flour, the flour kept falling off. When I put it in the pan, I dumped some more flour on each piece and packed it down. There. At last it stayed on. I set the timer and sautéed the first side for four minutes like the recipe said. When I flipped it some of the flour fell off, so I added more again to the other side. Was there some kind of flour glue that made flour stick on chicken? If there wasn’t maybe I could invent it. Cooks everywhere would thank me.

  After cooking the chicken on the other side I added the mushrooms, shallots, garlic, broth, and wine. I put a lid on the whole thing and turned the heat down. As I settled in my living room my phone buzzed. A text from Pellner with a picture of his wife’s cobalt glass collection. I saved the picture and then swiped it to make it larger. I counted fifteen pieces, mostly bottles like an Evening in Paris perfume bottle and what looked to be old medicine bottles of some sort. There was a vintage child’s mug with a fading image of Shirley Temple’s face with her mop of curly hair. They were hard to find and it could be the most valuable piece of her collection. Although it wouldn’t be worth more than forty dollars or so.

  I turned on the TV and ten minutes later the timer went off. It smelled delicious in here. Cooking wasn’t as awful as I remembered. I lifted the lid of the skillet and stared down. The sauce was a thick, gelatinous substance with small islands of hardened flour dotting it. The chicken had curled a bit, but maybe the marsala just looked a little funny. After all, it smelled good. I got a spoon out of the drawer and dipped it in, avoiding the flour islands. I tasted, swallowed, and almost gagged. I ran to the faucet, turned it on, shoved my head under, and drank straight from it.

  How could food that smelled so good, taste so awful, like some kind of flour gelatin? I looked into the pan. “You will not defeat me.” Yes, I’d like to collapse into a heap and swear off cooking forever, but not this time. I shook my fist at the stove. “Not this time.” Some of the ingredients would have to be replenished before I could try again. After I cleaned the kitchen and took out the trash, I read up on cooking with flour and found out too much wasn’t a good thing. I’d also missed a step. I should have taken the chicken out of the pan when I made the sauce. Oh, well.

  * * *

  My phone rang at seven for the second morning in a row. This time I was up, dressed, showered, and drinking coffee. It was Bristow. Again.

  “We’ve got to stop talking like this,” I said cheerfully since I’d already consumed some coffee.

  “I wanted to thank you for volunteering to help with the case, but we’ve made an arrest.”

  I set my coffee down, sloshing a little on the trunk I used as a coffee table. I got up and headed to the kitchen to find a towel to mop up with. “Really? Who?” That was fast.

  “I can’t say.”

  “Come on. You know as soon as we hang up I can call someone on base and fin
d out. You might as well save me the trouble.” I grabbed a blue and white dish towel off a hook and headed back to the living room. Everyone would be so relieved knowing there wasn’t a murderer running around among them.

  Bristow sighed, but didn’t say anything right away. I mopped up the coffee while it seemed like he silently debated the truth of what I’d said. “It’s why you asked me to listen anyway,” I pointed out.

  “Walter Arbas. Alicia’s husband,” he finally said. “I’ve got to go.”

  “But—” Bristow disconnected before I could say more. I pictured Alicia’s husband at the funeral. He had looked so torn up. Was he really that good of an actor, or did Bristow get it wrong?

  * * *

  After tapping my fingers against the arm of my white, slip-covered couch for a few minutes, I decided to go to base, curious to hear what was being said about Alicia’s husband. I still had the thirty-day pass and guessed that Special Agent Bristow had more on his mind than taking the time to revoke it. I’d use it while I could.

  I stopped and bought a box of donuts from Dunkin’s and a large coffee for me. After my talk with Pellner last night, I had jumped at every little sound. Old houses creaked a lot, so an extra dose of caffeine seemed imperative this morning. The line to get on base was almost a half mile long. We inched forward as each driver had to pause at the gate and show their ID before they could continue on. If the driver was military and outranked the guard, the guard had to salute the driver. Even that few extra seconds added up. I pulled into the parking lot behind the thrift shop forty-five minutes after I’d left my house.

  When I entered the back room of the thrift shop carrying the donuts, I ran into a beautiful woman who looked like a Nigerian princess—a real one, not the internet-scamming kind. She had a graceful long neck and her posture made it look like she’d been schooled somewhere where they made you walk around with books on your head. She had a bright yellow headband wrapped around her head and a smile as wide as the Niger River.

  “Hello. Can I help you?” The woman’s hips swayed as she glided toward me. Watching her made me stand up straighter, wishing I moved half as gracefully.

  I clutched the box of donuts, introduced myself, and told her I’d come to volunteer.

  “Ah, yes. I’ve heard of you.” She had a beautiful British accent. Maybe she did go to some posh school where they taught posture.

  Hearing of me might not be a good thing, considering some of the things I’d ended up being unwillingly involved with.

  She must have noticed my concern because she laughed. “I’ve heard what a hard worker you are and about your garage sale business.” Her eyes sparkled. “And a few other things too. I’m Nasha.”

  “That’s a beautiful name.”

  “My mum is originally from Nigeria. She says it means ‘arrived in the rainy season.’”

  “And did you?” I asked.

  “I did.”

  I set the box of donuts on a scarred table in the break room. We both grabbed blue bib aprons that would let shoppers know we were volunteers and put them on. The store wouldn’t open for another hour, so I went to work in the sorting room. Nasha came with me. We did that whole thing talking about where we had been stationed and did you know so and so, as military spouses always do. But we didn’t have very many bases or people in common. It happened. Our husbands had had different career fields. Her husband was a program manager and CJ had been with the security forces.

  I sorted a box of clothing as we talked, relieved to see that someone had taken the time to wash everything in this one. A few of the pieces were name brands and would go quickly. Since Nasha and I hadn’t found a connection from other bases, I started talking about people we both knew here. Hoping she’d mention Alicia. We both knew Eleanor, of course, since she volunteered here so often.

  I hesitated to bring up Alicia directly, since Special Agent Bristow had warned me to only listen. But she had to be fresh on everyone’s mind. Besides, as of this morning he’d told me not to bother investigating, I mean listening, so talking about Alicia one way or the other shouldn’t matter to Bristow or anyone else. In my gut I was sure he was wrong about Alicia’s husband. The grief I’d seen etched on his face—I just didn’t believe you could fake that.

  “Did you know Alicia?” I asked. I might as well be blunt.

  Nasha sorted a bag of toys. Most of them were sticky and dusty, so I wetted some rags and helped clean them.

  “I did. She was lovely,” Nasha said. “She’d been stationed at Mildenhall too. We met several years ago.”

  Mildenhall was one of the bases in England. “I love England.” I said it with a sigh. It would be a long time before I could afford to go back.

  Nasha gave a gentle laugh. “I think you Yanks all have these romantic notions about what it’s like to live there.”

  I laughed too. “Maybe. But I loved it.”

  “You’ve been there then?” Nasha asked.

  “For two glorious years at Mildenhall. Almost ten years ago.”

  “Alicia’s one of the few people I know who couldn’t wait to get out of there,” Nasha said.

  “Really?” I asked.

  “She said it was too cold and too gray.”

  I nodded. “It was both of those things, but that didn’t, uh, dampen my pleasure.”

  Nasha smiled her beautiful smile at me. I needed to find out what else she knew about Alicia.

  “Her husband seemed so broken up at the funeral.” Just putting it out there seemed smartest. I didn’t know if news of his arrest had spread or not.

  “He was. We live near them. Our husbands are friends.” She shook her head. Tears swarmed her eyes. “It’s amazing how everyone is suddenly best friends with a person who passes.”

  “Yes.” It made me think of Angelo’s comment about eulogies and people being thought of as saints after they died. “I didn’t know her well, but we worked the same shift here every once in a while,” I said. It was impossible to think that would never happen again. Her poor family.

  “She made people laugh but wasn’t one to get her hands dirty, if you know what I mean,” Nasha said.

  We looked from the dirty toys to our hands. I laughed. “I know exactly what you mean.” Most people would rather run the register or help customers. Even dusting was more fun than digging through bags of who knew what. But to me sorting through donations was almost as much fun as going to a garage sale. I liked finding the treasures that hid among the trash. Last time I was here I found a pair of designer jeans that retailed for over two hundred dollars. They were almost like new. Working back here had its advantages.

  It seemed like Nasha was going to say something else, but we were interrupted by a bunch of volunteers showing up, including Eleanor. The new arrivals brought with them the news of Walter Arbas’ arrest. Nasha left as soon as she heard. Chatter seemed more subdued than normal although there was still plenty of it and most of it was about Walter.

  I went into the retail side of the shop since no one else was in the back room and there was no way to overhear anything. A group of three women huddled over by the glassware, gossiping. I edged over that way to see what I could find out. I grabbed a dust rag and started dusting a set of china that had been in the store for several months. It was a good brand and when I’d first started volunteering at base thrift shops right after CJ and I were married twenty years ago, this would have flown off the shelf. Now you could barely give it away. Times change, and people like to entertain differently than they did in the past. I certainly didn’t have room for it in my tiny kitchen.

  But I’d been thinking about having my own garage sale next spring. I’d accumulated some stuff that I couldn’t resist and stuck it all in the attic space off my living room. Maybe I should buy this for a garage sale too. I could make cake stands out of the plates, with a turned over cup from the set as the base for tiered serving trays, or even a fountain if I felt really ambitious. Lately, I noticed people were using pieces of old china
in bracelets and necklaces. It was pretty, but I was no jewelry maker. I decided I would buy the china, and then realized I’d totally lost my focus.

  Yeesh, I’d come over here to try and see what the women were talking about, hoping it was Alicia. I felt compelled to find out what was going on. I kept my back to them and started moving glasses around on the shelf.

  “I guess he bashed her over the head and just left her there to die,” one woman said.

  “I never did like him. Something about his eyes.”

  “I agree. They seem small. Kind of feral. And that poor puppy. Can you imagine leaving that poor thing out in the cold? He’d have to be cruel to do that.”

  “That and murdering his wife.”

  “How come you’re so quiet?” the woman who’d spoken first asked someone.

  I wanted to look over my shoulder to see who, but didn’t want to draw attention to myself.

  “You know something, don’t you?” the woman continued.

  “What is it?” someone else asked.

  “I heard it wasn’t the ice that killed her. She was poisoned.”

  Chapter Eleven

  I almost dropped the wineglass I was holding. Poisoned? I peeked over my shoulder to see who’d said it. The women surrounded a younger girl whose back was to me. Her thin hair hung below her equally thin shoulders.

  “You all can’t say anything. My husband would kill me.”

  They all flinched at that. She refused to say anything more about the kind of poison or what else she’d heard. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe she just wanted attention. Stories got jumbled. Rumors could run rampant when things happened on base. And the death of a spouse by her husband’s hand wasn’t just any little thing. When the group turned to walk off, I got a glimpse of a sharply sloped nose, and cheeks burning bright from the unwanted attention. If it was unwanted.

  After they left, I found a box and put all the china in it, wondering if I was being stupid. But for this price it was hard to resist. It was marked down to twenty dollars for the set of eight place settings. I carried it up to the register where Eleanor was working.