Dyeing Wishes (32 page)

I was about to spit when Ardis put her hand on my shoulder and squeezed. “Thank you for your concern, Coleridge.”

He touched the brim of his hat and opened the door
to leave. I should have taken that squeezed hint from Ardis and let it go, let him go, but I couldn’t help myself.

“Why?” I called after him.

He turned. “Why what?”

“Why did you interrupt your busy, professional-criminal-investigation-type day to drop by our hobby business?”

He stopped with his hand on the door and a smirk on his face. “Because I love a good cautionary tale. But let me be completely clear about its moral. You”—he aimed a finger at me for emphasis—“are no longer involved in this investigation.” He turned the finger to Ardis. “And neither are you.”

“Oh, goody,” Geneva said. “That leaves me.”

A
fter Clod’s warning, Ardis was unhappy all over again that I’d gone out to the cabin without her and without telling her. Geneva was unhappy I didn’t have an immediate assignment for her, our only operative not reprimanded or grounded by the authorities. I was unhappy I’d forgotten to get my sunglasses back from Clod. I was willing to bet he couldn’t keep them for evidence, anyway, having found them on private property without a search warrant.

Ardis accepted my apology for scaring her after the fact and we rebonded over insults to Clod and his disparaging description of the shop as a “hobby business.”

“He’s a flat-footed Philistine,” Ardis said.

“A career klutz,” I agreed.

“And most of us in TGIF are hampered by the fact we have these day jobs,” she said, “which Mr. High-and-Mighty Deputy Dunbar doesn’t. He can spend all his time investigating. I call that unfair advantage.”

Clod would probably argue that point, but I didn’t see any particular need to defend him.

“So what’s our next move?” Ardis asked.

“I’m not hampered by anything but your lack of imagination,” Geneva said. “Why don’t you assign me to tail someone? That would be a good move.”

“Speaking of tailing, I never found out from the
Spiveys if they learned anything useful when they tailed Sylvia and Pen that first day,” I said. Apropos of nothing as far as Ardis was concerned.

She looked at me, sucked a tooth, and said, “Uh-huh.”

“Just thinking out loud,” I said. “You know, kind of jumping in midstream.”

“Uh-huh.”

“It keeps my brain nimble. Here’s another example. Speaking of things that come in twos—”

“Which we weren’t,” Ardis said.

“Exactly. See how well it works?”

“Kath be nimble,” said Geneva.

“Yeah, that’s good.” I paused, realizing I was getting confused about who was part of the conversation. “Um. Anyway, things that come in twos. Have you noticed we’re missing two cars? Eric’s and Sylvia’s. We’ve known Eric’s car was missing, but now he’s been found and the place he was probably hiding has been found, but his car is still missing. And where is Sylvia’s car? Maybe she’s with it somewhere far from here, the way Pen is.”

“The shame of it is we haven’t really got the wherewithal to trace cars,” Ardis said. “I wonder if we can work on that.”

“Here’s another set of two to consider. We have two competing stories of Shannon’s love life. Bonny claims Shannon was engaged to Eric and having his baby. Debbie said in her notes that Will told her
he
was engaged to Shannon and he was the baby’s father. Two versions, both secondhand.”

“Hearsay,” Geneva said. “Inadmissible in a court in
Law and Order
.”

“And which version do we believe?” Ardis asked. “And why? And how do we prove it’s true?”

“Or how do we prove the other one isn’t?” I said.

Proving anything that day proved difficult, hampered as we were by our hobby business day job. In between customers we toyed with the idea of contacting Debbie’s cousin, the still-green Deputy Darla, and offering her a free knitting class, plus materials, if she would give us access to certain official files. Ardis might have toyed more seriously than I did. Geneva, of course, was all for it.

“I would enjoy corrupting a policeman,” she said. “I would also enjoy being a corrupt policeman.”

Ernestine stopped by and John Berry called. Neither of them had anything to add to the tale of their adventure in Pulaski. I asked John to let me pay his speeding ticket, but he just hooted.

“It was good for me,” he said. “Got my old heart pumping the way it used to when I’d try to outsail a squall. It was good for the car, too. It belongs to my brother and it probably hasn’t gone over twenty in the last twenty years.”

And speaking of things that came in twos, I did finally make myself call Mercy Spivey, after tossing a coin to decide between calling her and calling Shirley. A purely imaginary waft of her scent came through the phone when she said hello, followed by an annoying conversation. The gist of it was that they stood by their confidential source, who had told them that although Shannon was being stalked, she was not being stalked by Will; they would not give up that confidential source; they had followed Sylvia and Pen to the library, to a bed-and-breakfast on Depot Street, and then they’d remembered a sale at the Western Auto and broken off the tail; they’d written down the make, model, color, and tag number of the car Sylvia and Pen were driving, but Shirley had used the other side for a grocery list and then thrown it out;
they were ready to give further assistance anytime they were needed.

I took a chance at that point and asked a question. “Will you ask if your confidential source knew Eric Lyle or knew who Eric Lyle hung out with?”

“With whom,” Mercy said. “I’ll ask her and get back to you.”

Geneva was unhappy, again, when I told her I wasn’t going to spend the evening playing audiobooks for her.

“Oh, fine, you run along,” she moaned when I went up to the study to say good-bye to her and the cat. “And don’t even worry about me and Nero.”

“He hasn’t gained nearly enough weight to be called Nero Wolfe,” I said.

“Yes, that’s it. Find fault and then leave. I’ll just disappear into my room and maybe you’ll see me again and maybe you won’t but you won’t care and you’ll just leave Nero to pine away to nothing so that he never suits his name.”

“You don’t have to be like that, you know.”

“Then what are you doing that’s so much more important than spending time with us?”

“Do you remember the fishing trip I took with Joe that might or might not have been a date? I think we’re trying another one. We’re meeting for a picnic in the park behind the courthouse at six.”

“Considering how well the first one turned out, maybe I
should
come with you as chaperone this time,” she said.

“Mm, no, probably not.”

She came anyway.

Joe brought wedges of a new sandwich Mel was experimenting with.

“She told me how she made it,” he said. “It’s roasted
vegetables layered in a hollowed-out round bread loaf. Then she pressed it overnight under a gallon jar of pickled jalapeños and this afternoon flash-baked it for ten minutes at five hundred degrees. We’re part of her test group. What do you think?”

The single bite I had was fabulous. Eggplant, zucchini, red bell pepper, sweet potato, with a caramelized balsamic red onion sauce…

Before I could take a second heavenly bite, before I had a chance to try the handmade cracked-black-pepper potato chips he brought, or the whole-wheat chocolate chip cookies, Geneva appeared on the picnic bench next to Joe. He looked around, shivered, and moved over.

“How’s it going?” she asked.

“The sandwich is fantastic,” I said to Joe.

“If I can’t taste it, I’m not interested,” Geneva said. She looked at Joe’s profile. “He has a kiss of gray at his temple, just like you. I always think a touch of gray is attractive. On a man.”

“Oh darn, there’s my phone vibrating,” I said, sounding completely wooden due to being completely torqued. “I should have
left it at home
.”

“You could ignore it,” Joe pointed out.

“You’re right. Whoever it is will call back or leave a message if it’s important,
which I seriously doubt
.” I sounded ridiculous.

“Oh,” Geneva said. “That reminds me. I nearly forgot why I came. It
is
important and you have my very excellent memory to thank for remembering it.”

I didn’t know whether to believe her or not.

“You look worried,” Joe said. “Go ahead and answer it or call back if you want. No big deal.”

“That’s okay. I’m sure I’ll hear all about it soon enough.”

“It might not be soon enough,” Geneva said, “if
Bonny realizes where she left that book she wanted to show you this morning. I saw it next to a newspaper article about that man Ardis was so rude about. You know, the Smoky Carlin. I saw them both—the book and the article, not Mr. Carlin—in the not-so-darling cabin in the wood.”

I put my sandwich down and stared at her. That would mean Bonny had gone to the cabin recently. She couldn’t have forgotten, but why lie? Did it mean she knew Eric Lyle was there…

“Are you sure?” I asked Geneva. Oops.

Joe shrugged. “Go ahead.”

I gave him a quick “thanks” and a “sorry” and yanked my phone out to make the pretend call. I needed a way to “know” what Geneva had just told me. She enjoyed the charade and, wonder of wonders, she repeated the details exactly.

“Aren’t you glad I have such an excellent memory?” she asked.

“Yes. Will you do me a favor?”

“Rouse the villagers and bring the pitchforks?”

“No. Please don’t get carried away. Please keep quiet for now and I’ll talk to you back at the shop, okay?”

She gave me a hideous wink. I disconnected and told Joe about the book.

“If your brother or another deputy got a search warrant and even noticed the book there, he wouldn’t have known what it meant.”

Joe chewed a bite of sandwich and nodded at the phone still in my hand. “Who’s your friend with ‘inside’ information?”

“Um, I don’t think you’ve met.”

He looked at me, head cocked. “You should call Cole.”

“He isn’t real keen on what he calls Nancy Drew–ish
clues, and the Mystery of the Mislaid Library Book is about as Drew-ish as they come.” Although it was better than the Disclosure of the Dispirited Spirit, which he’d really hate.

“So what are you going to do?” he asked.

“Call the posse.”

“You should call Cole.” This from Blue Plum’s premier part-time burglar.

If we were having a second date, then it didn’t end well, either.