Dolled Up for Murder (18 page)

Nina remained rigid in front of her.

“What’s wrong?” Gretchen asked.

Nina, moving woodenly, took her hand and led her to the workshop doorway. “Martha’s bag is gone,” she said, her voice leaden. “Someone must have been here when we went to see Bonnie.”

“We should have hurried right home,” Gretchen said in shock. “What were we thinking when we stopped to eat? Are you sure it’s gone?”

“It’s gone, all right. And there’s more.”

Nina flipped a switch by the door, and a fluorescent light hanging over the worktable illuminated the room.

Gretchen saw it hanging over the padded table and moved closer. She drew in her breath, sharp and quick.

Someone had hung one of her mother’s Shirley Temple dolls from the overhead light with a piece of restringing elastic. Blood dripped from its face and pooled on the floor. The doll swayed gently from the noose around its neck, eyes wide and sightless.

The screen glowed, casting an eerie light over Caroline’s intent features. She quickly registered as a member and hesitated briefly at the password prompt. She keyed in an appropriate password: counterattack. If this were a game of chess, she would be planning multiple moves into the future, but she hadn’t studied openings for this particular game. Besides, she couldn’t have anticipated her opponent’s deadly first move.

All that mattered now was the endgame. A draw wasn’t an acceptable finish. There could be only one winner.

Caroline’s hands trembled in anticipation as she worked her way through the red tape associated with Internet bidding. She clicked on the French Jumeau Bébé listing and frowned. The seller had set up a private auction, effectively cloaking his or her identity until after the final accepted bid. Only the highest bidder would be allowed full contact information about the seller.

She entered her first bid, determined to win.

Someone else’s bid immediately canceled hers out.

She keyed in a higher amount, determined to avoid the other bidder’s strategy of proxy bidding. Allowing the online service to bid for her until her maximum dollar amount was reached would have stripped Caroline of her feeling of power. She wouldn’t relinquish control.

Besides, she had no maximum level at which she would withdraw.

She had to win, and she had to win her way.

21

The operative word when discussing the value of a doll is original. Just as real estate depends on location, location, location, doll collectors insist on original, original, original.

An antique doll is in excellent condition if the following qualifications are met: the doll has all its original parts, no marks or blemishes mar the skin, original eyes are intact, the wig has not been soiled or restyled, and it is wearing the original clothing, including the original dress, underclothing, shoes, and socks. Mint in box (MIB) means the doll has all of the above and is in its original box, preferably with original tags and labels.

—From World of Dolls by Caroline Birch

Gretchen stared at the hanging doll, cold fear jettisoning through her body. Was the intruder still in the house? She quickly closed the workshop door and locked it. She picked up a pair of scissors lying on the table, and, with Nina as backup, she opened the closet door and peered in. Nothing inside but more bins. She sighed with relief. “It’s empty,” she said.

Nina dropped the repair hook she had grabbed as a weapon, and it clattered to the floor. “I almost died of fright.”

Gretchen retrieved the hook and placed it on the workbench with the scissors. “I’m calling the police. Let’s stay in here until they arrive.”

“What about the animals?” Nina asked shrilly.

“I’m sure whoever did this is gone by now,” Gretchen said, dialing 911. “But let’s stay smart. If it was me, if I was the bad guy, all I’d care about would be a safe way out of the house.”

“What if we came home while he was here,” Nina said, “and he’s trapped inside with us?”

“Then staying in the workshop will give him time to escape.” Gretchen wasn’t sure she liked the idea of hiding, but after another glance at the swinging doll, she decided not to risk a confrontation.

She gave the dispatcher the necessary information, alerting him to the remote possibility that the intruder might still be in the house, and hung up.

“Red paint,” she said after touching the pooled liquid on the floor and noting an open jar of paint on the table.

“Don’t contaminate the crime scene,” Nina advised. “I hope they dust for prints.”

“How many people knew Martha’s bag was here?” Gretchen asked.

“Bonnie, April, Rita, Larry and Julia, Karen Fitz.” Nina ticked them off on her fingers. “And anyone they might have told. We weren’t trying to keep it a secret.”

“We really botched this one,” Gretchen said, thinking,
What else is new?
“Who had a key to the house?”

Nina shrugged. “I don’t know.” Then she widened her eyes. “We gave the key to Larry at the hospital when we thought Daisy was Caroline. He checked on the animals, and I suppose he could have had a copy made.”

Gretchen shook her head. “The sliding door was unlocked before I gave Larry the key. I think whoever did this was also in the house earlier. Who else?”

“Clients and friends were in and out of here all the time, but I never knew Caroline to give out her keys.”

Gretchen heard sirens in the distance, growing louder and stopping outside. With all the noise only a bungling fool would still be inside the house.

After a thorough search, a police officer with a perky ponytail and a cautious stance discovered the point of entry. “Jimmied the lock,” she said, studying the patio doors leading to the pool. “Probably came over the fence and forced the lock.”

“Anything else gone?” another officer said, holding a notepad and pen. “Other than the bag?”

“I don’t see anything else missing,” Gretchen said.

“Me either,” Nina said, plopping on the living room sofa surrounded by canines, a firm hand on Enrico, his incisors bared. “I should take him home. He isn’t handling all the excitement very well,” she said to Gretchen. “I’ll come right back.”

“You have to fill out this report first,” the woman said handing a clipboard to Nina, a wary eye on Enrico. “Why would anyone break in to steal a bag of old clothes?”

“Someone wanted the key,” Gretchen said. “Someone knew what the key would open.”

“And what does it open?”

“We don’t know.”

The officers observed Gretchen and Nina with steady stares. “And you don’t know why anyone would hang the doll and smear red paint all over it,” the officer with the notepad said.

“Right,” Gretchen and Nina said simultaneously.

“Looks like a warning to me,” perky ponytail said. “Or a threat. There’s a warrant out for Caroline Birch. Could she have done this?”

Gretchen gaped at the police officer. “Why would my mother break into her own home? Wouldn’t she let herself in through the front door?”

“That’s right,” Nina said, the pen in her hand poised midair, jabbing at the officers. “She wouldn’t try to scare her own sister and daughter.” She shook her head, and Gretchen smiled. She could hear the wheels turning in Nina’s head, berating the cops for what she considered total ineptness.

Their eyes met.
We’ll have to take care of this on our own, won’t we?
Gretchen thought.

Nina nodded slowly, and Gretchen blinked. Nina’s psychic thing was getting scary.

* * *

“Most of it is simply intuition,” Nina said, explaining what Gretchen referred to as her psychic abilities. The police officers had departed, and Nina had returned the cheeky Chihuahua to his owner. “Nothing magical about it. And it usually runs in families, so you probably have it, too, but you haven’t figured out how to channel your powers.”

“Did you hear what I was thinking when that officer suggested that my mother had broken into her own house?” Gretchen asked, dishing up food concoctions for Tutu, Nimrod, and Wobbles. All thoughts of finding a flight to Boston vanished from her mind.

“Not exactly. I caught the gist of it, though.”

“Well that isn’t so hard. You probably could tell from my expression that I didn’t have any faith in their ability to solve the burglary.”

“That could be true.” Nina placed two bowls on the floor and watched Wobbles jump onto the counter to eat his.

“Cats on the countertop are disgusting,” she said, making a face.

“Wobbles knows he can only go on this section,” Gretchen said, gesturing to the countertop farthest from the food preparation area. “Right here on the corner.”

“Anyway, you should work on your own psychic abilities.”

“If you’re so good, why haven’t you solved Martha’s murder and found my mother?”

“It doesn’t work like that.” Nina watched Tutu lick every last crumb from her bowl. “Sometimes I have a clear mental image of fragments of the past or future, but mostly I analyze my feelings through auras. An image of Martha’s murderer won’t pop into my head, but I might see an evil aura emanating from the killer if I encounter him.”

“And have you seen any malevolent auras lately?” Gretchen picked up the canine’s bowls and soaped them in the sink. Wobbles jumped to the ground, challenging the two dogs to rush him. They kept their distance, although Nimrod wagged his short tail ferociously.

“To tell you the truth, my energy connection seems to be on the fritz lately,” Nina said. “To make it work I have to clear my mind and concentrate, and there’s too much turmoil right now to see through the haze. That hanging doll, for example.” Nina shivered visibly. “I don’t have to be a psychic to read that message.”

“I agree,” Gretchen said. “Steve’s going to be away from Boston for a few days, and it doesn’t make sense for me to go home now. I can’t leave you here alone with some psychopath running loose.”

She hoped Nina wouldn’t pursue a discussion of Steve. She wasn’t anxious to share her confused feelings with her aunt. Her emotions were too close to the surface, and she needed time to think about what she wanted to do next.

Nina was too delighted when she learned of Gretchen’s change of plans to follow up with any comments about Steve. “Let’s get started then. The key, obviously, is important. Important enough to risk breaking and entering.”

“But the thief wants us to know he’s angry.”

“Or she,” Nina said. “I still think we need to watch April more carefully. My aura might be off, but every time I’m around her, I get mixed signals and a confusing blend of colors.”

“And how about Bonnie?” Gretchen said. “She was lying about the Rescue Mission.”

Nina held up her copy of Martha’s hidden key. “Let’s start with April and Bonnie and see if this fits in either one of their door locks.”

A flash of lightning struck nearby, and Nimrod’s ears flattened to his head. His tiny poodle body shook violently, and Gretchen picked him up. “It’s storming outside. Can’t we wait until it passes?”

“During monsoon season in Phoenix?” Nina said. “It’ll continue to storm at least until midnight. Besides, we can use the rain and darkness as cover.”

“Great. Just what I want to do. Stand in the rain.”

“Slink around in the rain,” Nina corrected her, ignoring the sarcasm. “We are going to slink like an Arizona rattlesnake.”

They drove toward Tempe, taking one detour after another to escape entrapment in flooded washes. On the left side of the road, coyotes appeared in the Impala’s headlights, gaunt, running loosely in a pack, eyes red and glaring. Their heads swung in unison to look at the car, but they continued moving on through the spears of rain.

The windshield wipers slapped against the window in high gear. Occasionally, Nina pulled over to the side of the road until visibility returned. At times, all they could see ahead of them were taillights and streams of water rushing down the windshield.

April’s modest home came into view through the descending gloom. Nina parked across the street and killed the lights, and Gretchen saw April’s car parked in the carport. Through the rapidly fogging windshield of the Impala they watched an undulating glow behind April’s front curtain.

“She’s watching television in the dark,” Nina said, rubbing her palm in a circle on the driver’s window to clear her view. “This isn’t going to be as easy as I thought.”

Gretchen clutched the key. “Only one of us needs to go,” she said, watching April’s window for movement.

“You can,” Nina said, looking away.

“Who’s idea was this in the first place?”

Rain hammered on the roof of the car, reminding Gretchen of one Boston hailstorm so intense that it pounded circular dents into the hood of Steve’s Porche.

“I have an umbrella,” Nina said, reaching onto the backseat floor and pulling out a long white umbrella with pink polka dots. She handed it to Gretchen.

“Pink and white? How can I hide with this?” Gretchen cast a dubious expression Nina’s way. She tossed the umbrella into the backseat and quickly jumped out into the rain.
Sometimes,
she thought,
you have to take a deep breath and plunge in, like a dive into frigid water. The longer you wait, the harder it is to go through with it.

Her flip-flops splashed through sheets of water, and her hair hung from her face in dripping strands even before she made it to the first porch step. She clomped under an overhang and flattened against the brick wall, wiping water from her face and listening to the sound of the television, muted by the pounding rain. The light through the window flickered.

She edged over and risked a peak between the curtains. April’s enormous frame covered her sagging sofa, and in the glow from the screen, Gretchen could tell that she was fast asleep, eyes closed, mouth hanging wide open.

She wiggled back to the front door, careful to stay under the protection of the eave, although she wasn’t sure why she bothered, since she was soaked to the skin. She tried to slide the key into the lock.

It didn’t fit.

In one mad rush, she lunged back to the car. Nina, encased in fogged windows, searched Gretchen’s face. “Well?” she said.

“It isn’t April’s key.”

“You didn’t try the back door.”

“The back door?”

“We have to be thorough,” Nina said.

“We?” Gretchen was annoyed by Nina’s use of a plural noun to describe a singular act. It wasn’t as though Nina was making a significant contribution. “We?” she said again. “Remember what you said? We are going to slink around in the rain like a rattlesnake. Your turn.”

“Don’t be silly,” Nina said, crossing her arms in protest. “You’re already wet. And rattlesnakes know better than to slink around in the rain.”

Gretchen climbed up on the seat and reached into the back for the umbrella. “April’s sleeping. I’m through slinking.”

She made her way carefully over the AstroTurf in April’s yard and circled around the back. Lightning struck nearby, too close for comfort, and Gretchen hoped her umbrella wasn’t the tallest structure in the vicinity. Not a single tree or large shrub grew near April’s yard. Aside from an antenna on top of the house, she held the only other lightning rod around. With her recent streak of bad luck, electrocution was a distinct possibility.

She hurried to the back door and transferred the umbrella to her left hand, hooking it with her thumb, which protruded from the cast. The umbrella swayed and tipped out of her hand, falling to the ground. Abandoning it, she fumbled in her pocket for the key, retrieved it, and tried it in the lock. It didn’t fit.

As she bent in the rain to pick up the umbrella and make a speedy exit, she heard the back door squeak open. She straightened. April’s face loomed in front of her.

“Thought I heard something out here,” April said. “What you coming to the back door for when the front’s so much closer? And look at you, you’re soaked through. Come on in.” April held the door open.

“I’m too wet,” Gretchen said. “I’ll come back later.”

“Nonsense, girl, I’ll get you a towel. Well, come on.”

While April went for the towel, Gretchen stood in front of the window, hoping Nina was paying attention and had spotted her. She turned and swept her eyes over the clutter in the room. Miniature dolls scattered over the tables, empty bags of chips, a collection of soda cans on the coffee table.

Overnight bag still on the floor with its contents thrown carelessly on top.

Gretchen realized that the overnight bag could have been on the floor a long time. Judging from April’s nonexistent housekeeping skills, her earlier assumption that the bag had been used recently could have been wrong.