Jo had figured Saturday was likely to be busier than Friday, and she was quickly proven right. Building ten was soon invaded by throngs of shoppers, exclaiming, touching, asking questions, and all thoughts of Linda disappeared from Jo’s mind as she repeated several versions of:
“Yes, ma’am, those are indeed Swarovski crystals.”
“No, these earrings are made with yellow sapphire, not amber.”
“This choker? Only fifty-six dollars, and the beads in it are sterling silver. Something cheaper? How about…” and occasionally --
“Thank you, ma’am,” as she rang up a sale. “Do come back if you decide you want the matching bracelet.”
Jo was kept so busy that the time flew by. She could hardly believe it when a very familiar voice behind her commented: “Looks like business is brisk.”
Jo glanced over her shoulder to see Ina Mae Kepner, white hair shining in the sunlight that beamed through the plastic doorway, the sleeves of her peach-colored warm-up pushed to the elbows, ready for action.
“Brisk enough,” Jo answered, “that I haven’t sat down since I arrived.”
“Then for heaven’s sake take a break now! I’ll watch things.”
Jo finished a transaction with the teen who had just bought a pair of Jo’s silver earrings, then turned back to Ina Mae.
“I’ll be glad to run out for a minute, but I don’t like leaving you on your own for too long.” Jo looked over toward Linda’s booth and Ina Mae nodded.
“I got the story from Carrie this morning. Don’t worry, I didn’t teach in the elementary schools for close to forty years without growing that necessary second pair of eyes in the back of my head. Nobody plays any tricks while I’m in charge.” Ina Mae’s face took on the stern look of a general preparing for battle - a Viking general – which made Jo laugh.
“Yes, ma’am, I believe that’s true. Even so, I think I’ll bring back lunch to eat here. Things have been busy enough that having two people back here won’t hurt.”
“All you need to pick up are drinks. Loralee sent along her famous pasta salad with shrimp and snow peas,” Ina Mae held up the bag Jo hadn’t noticed until then – “including, I believe, homemade bread. Better than hot dogs, or whatever you’ll get here.”
“Actually, the food’s been pretty good. But nothing could be as good as what comes from Loralee’s kitchen.” Jo promised to bring back two large coffees, grabbed her pocketbook and set off, happy to get her first full look at the sky in four hours.
When she got back, Ina Mae was helping a customer choose between a turquoise and silver necklace and an elaborately beaded one in shades of blue. “From what you’ve told me,” Ina Mae said in a tone that told Jo she had come close to the end of her patience, “I’d highly recommend the turquoise.” She then gently but firmly withdrew the beaded necklace from the woman’s fingers and set it out of reach.
“Yes, I think you’re right,” the woman said, and before she could add another qualifying thought Ina Mae was wrapping it up and totaling up the cost.
As the customer left the booth, pleased but blinking in a ‘what just happened there’ way, Jo came around the counter with the tightly covered coffee cups.
“I think I just learned a new method in the art of salesmanship,” she said.
Ina Mae smiled. “Some people need to be told what they want. I could see she’d be here for the next three hours if I’d let her.” She took her coffee, and reached back to get Loralee’s plastic lunch dish.
As Jo helped scoop out the hearty salad onto two paper plates Loralee had sent along, Linda’s voice sailed across the aisle, announcing to whom Jo had no idea, that after such an extremely busy morning she finally had a chance to open up the box of chocolates from Jack Guilfoil, and how wonderful he had remembered that she loved vanilla creams!
Ina Mae rolled her eyes at Jo. “She’s also been letting me know about each and every significant sale she’s made. Tried to steal one of my customers once, but I wouldn’t let her.”
“You slapped on a pair of sterling silver handcuffs?”
“Didn’t need to use force.” Ina Mae unwrapped two of Loralee’s forks. “Ah, she sent along real ones. I can’t abide those plastic utensils, can you? No, I simply conveyed to the customer with a firm look and one or two choice words, that her best course of action was to remain right here.”
Jo could only imagine the trepidation inspired in that hapless customer who must have felt transported back to third grade – on test day - and might have bought almost anything at that point just to be allowed to leave.
Well, Jo thought with a grin, whatever worked.
Ina Mae opened Jo’s two folding chairs, and sat down on one to enjoy her lunch. Jo was carefully prying the lid off her coffee cup when she glanced over to see Linda standing beside her own counter. Something about her didn’t look right. The pink wrapping that had been torn off the candy box lay on the counter top along with the box cover. Linda held the opened box in one hand, but her other hand clutched at her neck. Her face began to take on the color of the wrapping.
“Linda,” Jo called, “are you okay?”
Linda turned toward Jo, her eyes bugging by this time. “I – can’t – ” she gasped, then sank downwards, the chocolate candies spilling about her from their fluted paper cups.
A nearby shopper screamed. “She’s having a heart attack!”
Others began shouting:
“Call an ambulance!”
“Call security!”
“She needs CPR! Can anyone do CPR?”
“No, it’s a stroke! She needs aspirin. Who has aspirin!”
Everyone seemed to be shouting at once as people rushed to Linda’s booth, crowding around her. “Give her space!” “We need a doctor!” “I think she’s dying! Oh my God!”
The shock of it all had frozen Jo for an instant, but she snapped out of it and grabbed for her pocketbook. By the time she’d dug out her cell phone to call 9-1-1, though, she heard Ina Mae’s voice already giving the information on her own phone.
Ina Mae closed her phone and told Jo, “They’re on their way.”
“Thank goodness.” Jo looked back to the scene across the aisle. She couldn’t see Linda anymore with so many others crowded about her, all shouting conflicting orders at once. After an agonizing length of time she heard, to her great relief, sirens in the distance. She realized the ambulance crew would need final direction and said, “I’ll go show them where to come,” and ran out and down the alleyway, glad to be doing something active. She saw the ambulance inching its way up the main thoroughfare through the parting crowd, and waved, calling, “This way! Over here!”
When they had pulled to a stop, a team of paramedics jumped out with their gear, and Jo led them back the way she had come, explaining over her shoulder, “I don’t know what’s wrong with her. She just suddenly collapsed.”
The rescue team took over, sending people out of their way, and Jo, too, stayed back, out of the building but still able to glimpse some of what was going on, most of it a blur of activity and confusion. Gabe Stubbins appeared at her side, his shoulders hunched and hands in his pockets, as he too watched with concern.
“Your friend is taking care of your booth,” he said. “I saw her moving things off the counter so nothing would get knocked off.”
Jo nodded, feeling grateful to Ina Mae but at the same time guilty for caring about mere things when someone’s life might be in danger. Much as Jo disliked Linda, she felt that simply as a human being she deserved total attention.
A stretcher was rolled in, and Jo heard pieces of radio communication as the rescue team prepared to transport Linda to the hospital. When they wheeled her out, oxygen mask in place and IV tubes attached, Linda’s face looked pale against the dark blanket partially covering her.
What could have happened, Jo wondered as she stepped back along with the gathered crowd of curious onlookers. How could someone seem healthy and active one minute and collapse to the ground th
e next?
As these questions ran through her head, Jo saw one of the people who had first rushed to aid Linda step out of the building behind the rescue crew – a thin, middle-aged woman whom Jo remembered from the leather bags and wallets booth. The woman watched as the stretcher disappeared down the alleyway, her face screwed up tightly with concern. As she turned back toward the building her eyes suddenly locked on Jo, and her expression morphed into one of fury. Jo was dumbfounded, the anger projected from that look actually causing her to recoil until she bumped Gabe’s shoulder.
Their gazes held for a few seconds until the woman continued on into the building. Jo remained in place, wondering what could have brought that on. She began to rub at her arms, surprised to realize she felt a slight chill. After being on the receiving end of such heat it seemed more reasonable that instead of goose bumps she should be rubbing at singed hairs.
CHAPTER 5
Feeling in need of TLC, Jo called Russ then she got home that evening. The craft show had gradually recovered from the crisis caused by Linda, with most of the vendors in building ten returning to their business, though in somber moods. Ina Mae had lingered, claiming she had nothing whatsoever to do the rest of the day, and Jo, though sure that was a huge exaggeration, had been grateful.
The distraction of newly-arrived customers who had no idea of what had occurred earlier and therefore were in full, carefree, fair mode, had helped. But during her quiet drive home, all the distressing thoughts Jo had pushed aside came creeping back, making her long for a few soothing words.
Russ, she knew, was on duty that night, and Jo hoped she’d catch him at a slow time. She was delighted, therefore, when, after waiting on hold for several minutes, she heard his voice, brisk and businesslike though it was.
“Morgan here.”
“Hi, Morgan. McAllister here.”
“Ah.” His tone immediately softened. “That new guy at the desk is going to have to cue me in a lot better. How’d it go today?”
Jo sighed. “Got a minute?” When Russ acknowledged that he did, she spilled out the whole, disturbing story.
Russ, after offering a few consolatory phrases, zeroed in with his usual perceptiveness on the one thing that was bothering Jo the most, though she’d tried to minimize it – to herself as well as to him.
“The woman who gave you the evil eye, did she say anything to you?”
“No. We all simply went back to work. I didn’t see her the rest of the day. Now that I think of it, I probably should have, since her booth is only two down from mine. I can’t say for sure if she was there afterwards or not.”
“What about that candy? What happened to it?”
Jo had to think. “Most of it, I think, was spilled from the box, and probably got trampled from everyone that rushed to help. I remember a security guard showing up at Linda’s booth later on. He seemed to be packing her jewelry away and locking it up. I suppose he might have cleaned up the candy. I don’t remember seeing the box or the pink wrapping anymore.”
“Hmm.”
“Why?”
“Nothing. Just wondered about it. So, did this very unfortunate event have an impact on sales the rest of the day?”
“Not terribly,” Jo admitted, aware of her torn feelings about that. Why did she feel the need to somehow suffer because of Linda’s illness? Would she be happier if in fact business had been awful? “Things eventually returned to normal, and Ina Mae and I made several very good sales.”
“Great. Word must be spreading about the fantastic McAllister designs.”
Jo smiled. “I don’t know about that.” She really didn’t, but she liked hearing Russ say it.
“One of my officers said his wife bought something of yours yesterday. He seemed impressed enough with it to not even grumble about the cost.”
Jo laughed. “She must have bought something with gold. Tell him if it makes him feel any better that the value will only go up.”
“I will. But not when he’s unwrapping his PB&J, the only lunch he can afford for a while.”
“Oh, come now!” Jo said, still smiling. “I couldn’t have made that big of a dent in their budget.”
“Well, put it this way --,” Russ stopped, then asked Jo to hold on. When he came back on the line he said, “Sorry, gotta go. Something’s come up.”
Jo hung up, disappointed to have their conversation end, but happy she at least had the few moments to talk with Russ that she did. She went to bed that night feeling better than when she’d come home, and looking forward to her final day at Michicomi.
The next day, Sunday, Jo pulled up to the craft fair and was climbing out of her Toyota, when Gabe Stubbins came up to her.
“I’ve been watching for you,” he explained. “I wanted to tell you myself. There’s been some bad news.”
“What?” Jo closed her car door behind her. The look on Gabe’s face told her this was serious.
“Linda Weeks died last night.”
“Died! Oh, gosh,” Jo leaned back against her car, staggered by the unexpected turn. She looked up at Gabe. “What was it? Her heart? A stroke?”
“I don’t know. No one seems to have any details. I just thought you’d want to know before you came in.”
Jo thought of the leather-works woman who seemed to want to blame Jo for everything. But why? Could an argument like the one she and Linda had, cause a fatal reaction? Jo couldn’t believe it. But that didn’t mean others might not.
“How are people taking it?” she asked Gabe.
“Stunned, mostly. Still coping with the news. You know how it goes, though. Scoundrels turn into saints on passing, so there’s a lot of grief being expressed by people who could barely spare two words for her before.”
Jo nodded. She’d have to deal with her own mixed feelings. She felt shocked and sad for Linda, but at the same time hypocritical for the sadness.
“Ready to go in?”
“Yes. I assume the festival continues as usual?”
Gabe nodded. “The show, as they say, must go on.”
Gabe walked beside her through building ten and Jo realized this respected, long-time Michicomi regular was in effect giving her his stamp of approval. Jo appreciated that, especially when they came to the leather-goods booth where the woman who had glared so fervently at her the day before, worked busily at straightening handbags on a wall shelf.
“ ’Morning, Amy,” Gabe called, and she turned around with a smile which faded as she spotted Jo beside Gabe. But Amy pulled herself together and returned his greeting cordially. Gabe escorted Jo to her booth, then said, “Don’t worry. Everyone just needs a little time to get their heads together.”
He turned back to his own booth, and Jo got down to work getting ready for business. She checked her clock: nine-forty-five. The gates would open in fifteen minutes. She and Ina Mae had sold quite a few of the larger pieces the day before, and Jo needed to unpack replacements for them. She was crouching over her boxes on the floor when a man leaned over her counter and asked, “Mrs. McAllister?”
Jo looked up to see a mustached, pinstripe-suited man standing somewhat uneasily next to a taller, square-jawed man in a brown and tan uniform.
“Mrs. McAllister, I’m Julian Honeycutt, and this is Sheriff Franklin. He’d like to speak with you. Would you please come to my office?”
“Oh! Right now?” Jo asked. “The festival is on the verge of opening up.”
“I just have a few questions,” the sheriff said, adding, “if you don’t mind.”
“No, of course not,” Jo said, understanding the need but feeling, at the same time, pulled in two directions. She quickly relocked her cases and stepped out of the booth to walk silently between the two men to the Michicomi main offices, two buildings down. Julian Honeycutt ushered Jo and Sheriff Franklin into a small room with a metal desk and two chairs, offered coffee which they both declined, then excused himself.
“Mrs. McAllister,” the sheriff began, pulling out a small notebook from his tan
shirt pocket and slipping on a pair of half-moon reading glasses. He had very dark, thick eyebrows, Jo noticed, much darker than his hair, which had considerable gray running through it. His dark eyebrows furrowed together, either in concentration or displeasure, Jo couldn’t tell which. “You are aware,” he asked, “that Linda Weeks, the woman who had the booth directly across from yours, has died?”
“Yes, I heard it this morning. Just a few minutes ago. I’m still quite shocked. She was much too young, and, as far as I could tell anyway, perfectly healthy.”
Franklin looked at her over his glasses, an action that always made Jo feel uneasy from the air of skepticism it projected, though what there was to be skeptical about she had no idea.
“I understand you were acquainted with the deceased, before this craft fair. Can you tell me how?”
So the sheriff had been talking to others already, people who had probably reported on the acrimonious exchange between them. Not that it could have had anything to do with her death, Jo was convinced, but obviously he was leading up to that.
“Linda and I knew each other a couple years ago in New York, where we both placed our jewelry with many of the same consigners.”
“You were friends?”
“We were friendly, at one time. That changed.”
“Into enemies?”
“Enemies? No, I wouldn’t use that strong of a word, sheriff. We simply didn’t get along. Look, I know you’re probably aware that Linda and I had a big blow-up, but it was hours before she fell ill. I really can’t see that it had anything to do with her death.”
“Mrs. McAllister, yesterday morning you gave Ms. Weeks a box of candy, is that correct?”
“I didn’t give it to her. The box was on my counter, but was addressed to her. I simply carried it over.”
“Is that right?” Another over-the-glasses look. “You didn’t buy the candy and bring it with you?”
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