Elaine Orr - Jolie Gentil 07 - Vague Images (13 page)

My eyes went to her face
. She literally beamed happiness. I could imagine a transplanted Elizabeth realizing she could find happiness in her new identity and anticipating a summer of planting flowers and maybe harvesting vegetables. None of that came to fruition.

I wondered if the newsletter had contributed to the Finch family’s discovery and quick removal from Ocean Alley
. But it appeared after they left. No one would have seen it before then.

Daphne looked over my shoulder
. “I don’t think I know her.”

I kept from jumping in surprise
. “I used to babysit for her kids. They moved even before eleventh grade ended.”

“She’s really pretty,” Daphne said
. “So are her flowers.”

“Hard to really see in this photo,” I said, trying to pretend I knew what I was talking about.

“Master Gardeners and Lions were the first two local groups to have websites. Maybe the newsletters are there.”

I turned to look fully at Daphne, who was standing just behind my right shoulder
. “Great idea. Thanks.”

“Sure.”  She walked toward the stacks with a few books she was probably reshelving.

I put the large folder back in the vertical file and signed onto one of the computers with Internet access. There was no line of patrons waiting for one, so I’d be able to look as long as I wanted.

After a couple of quick searches I came to the local group’s website
. The Master Gardeners were colorful in every sense. There was every kind of flower, and a man who figured prominently in several photos from ten years ago had on a tee shirt with a huge peace sign. A woman wore a Support Our Troops shirt.
Not mutually exclusive.
Even so, I bet their meetings had talk about more than flowers.

Finally I figured out the link to past newsletters
. Elizabeth Finch was in two newsletters. One in late fall had her demonstrating how to condition the soil so bulbs would do well in the partially sandy soil. That explained why her garden was featured so prominently after she moved.

Elizabeth Finch did not keep a low profile in her garden club
. I wondered if the fall picture had helped lead the bad guys, as Lucas called them, to her family. It seemed far-fetched. However, if whoever they were had people who read obituaries, why not web pages?  If they knew the Finches’ hobbies, maybe they did some targeted searching.

Daphne was right about the Lions being the only other Ocean Alley club with a strong web presence when the Finch family lived here
. No Nicholas Finch that I could find. Even if he did belong to a group, my guess was that he would have been much more circumspect about his participation.

I picked up my purse to leave, and then remembered that Mr. Finch sold cars in his life before Ocean Alley
. I didn’t know what he did when they lived in Ocean Alley. He wouldn’t have been in the same profession, but maybe he did something with cars. I had a vague memory of antique cars being displayed at some local dealerships, and maybe the county fair.
Surely he wouldn’t have been that dumb?

An Internet search found the Ocean Alley Old Time Car Club, but the only other car-related organization was Triple A
. In a spurt of rational thought, I decided to be satisfied with what I had found. For a while, anyway.

THAT EVENING, LUCAS told me about his walk through the hospital with Sergeant Morehouse, complete with several comments about how it had been a waste of time. “He kept asking me to think about whom I saw when I was in different parts of the hospital. I know it’s important, and I get why. But I was totally focused on Kim. I wish I hadn’t noticed that woman’s cape.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“He thinks because I noticed the cape that I paid attention to a lot of other stuff.”

I smiled
. “The sergeant is persistent.” 

“That’s mild.”

“It’s a trait you should recognize. While you are so persistently looking for Kim, do you check with your dad to see if he’s heard from her?”

“He promised he’d call if he did.”  Lucas’ tone said to not discuss the topic further.

I didn’t want to talk about Kim. I wanted to hear more about Douglas Householder, and looked for a way to bring the conversation to him. “You said you worked in a hospital, but I don’t think you said what your dad does now.”

Lucas looked as if he didn’t see why I cared, but he answered anyway
. “He had to do something really different than selling cars, of course.”

“Oh, sure.”

“He got trained to be a plumber before we came to Ocean Alley. Mom hated that because his clothes got dirty. When we went to Atlanta, he kept track of inventory in a department store. Mom liked that.”  Lucas shrugged. “We got discounts.”

“Sounds like a good deal
. You know, it occurred to me, I wouldn’t know how to contact your father.”

Scoobie’s voice came from his bedroom, where he was studying
. “Why would you need to?”

Lucas grinned at me
. “Yeah, why?”

I feigned total surprise that they questioned my motive
. “You’re healthy, but if…your appendix burst or something, I don’t know who to call.”

Scoobie grunted, still staying in his room.

I looked at Lucas. “You can leave it in a sealed envelope in the kitchen if you want.”

“I’ll put it in a safe deposit box and give Scoobie the key.”

HE DIDN’T, OF COURSE
. Thursday morning I found Douglas Householder’s name, address, and home phone number on a card on the kitchen table. I copied it into my address book, but called the name Douglas Sandman.

I had showered and was getting an apple from the fridge to take with me, when I saw someone had added a note to the card
. “You forgot his blood type.”  Scoobie’s handwriting, of course.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

I DROVE to Harry’s home office to work on a report and check for new requests for appraisals
. My mind would not concentrate on work. What did I really know about the murder?  Nothing, except that Tanya Weiss was still dead and Lucas had been in the hospital at the time but still couldn’t find Kim.

I had begun to think that there was not a likely connection between Kim coming to Ocean Alley and irate mobsters – or whomever – looking for her father
. So they knew her mom died, and maybe even knew that she had more or less run away from home. So what? 

Once they had seen the obit, whoever was mad at Douglas Householder could probably have gotten at him anytime they wanted to. And if they wanted to use Kim as some kind of leverage, her behavior had been so erratic it would almost make it easier to find her
.

That doesn’t make sense
. Yes it does. No routine, so no one to notice if she doesn’t make it home, or wherever.
In a way, Kim had made it easier to find her. And Lucas made no secret of his search for her. Bad guys sophisticated enough to find the Householders because of the mom’s obituary would have more resources to search for Kim than Lucas had.

I let myself into Harry’s house and was greeted by its now usual cold silence
. Within a few seconds, the fax machine rang and started to spit out paper. The person most likely to send a fax about a potential appraisal, rather than an email, was Ramona’s Uncle Lester. He’d finally graduated to a smart phone, but I’d seen him in Java Jolt trying to respond to a text and figured he’d stick with fax machines for a while.

The words were pure Lester
. “Harry, you old fart. The Watkins’ place is worth seven grand more than your dim glasses could see. You need to send Jolie back over there.” 

Lester knew I had done the appraisal, but he doesn’t like to criticize me directly
. Scoobie says it’s because Lester wants me to say yes if he gets up the courage to ask me out. I think he simply doesn’t want to argue with me. Harry is more polite.

I took the fax and wrote on it, “Are you guaranteeing the mortgage for the bank?” and faxed the page back to him.

The microwave hadn’t finished warming the water for my instant coffee when the office phone rang. Without looking at caller ID I picked up the receiver and said, “Hello, Lester.”

Ramona laughed
. “My dear uncle called me to see if you’re mad at him. If you tell him you are, he might quit sending those faxes.” 

Someone near Ramona said, “Excuse me, Miss?”  She said she was at work and had to help a customer.

I let Lester stew for a few minutes and then called him on his cell. He’s rarely in his office. It’s a small space on the second floor of a two-story building with no elevator. He meets most customers at Burger King, or occasionally Java Jolt. Owner Joe Regan discourages the latter because Lester buys one cup of coffee and sits there for hours.

“I’m not mad, Lester, but I can’t say the house is worth more than the comps will support
. Unless you know of some recent sales that I didn’t find.” 

“What about the Riordan place?” he asked.

“You have to be kidding. That was more than two years ago, and it has one thousand more square feet.”

“Yeah, but the bank don’t know that.”

“Lester, they do. Plus, neither Harry nor I want to lose our appraisal credentials for overestimating a house’s value by so much. You’re just going to have to earn less of a commission.”

After a couple more wildly off-base suggestions, Lester hung up
. I sent Harry an email and told him he was lucky to miss Lester’s fax, and suggested that Harry look again at my conclusions in case there was a chance Lester was right. Two minutes later Harry sent back an email that was a comic book-style skunk laughing hysterically. Didn’t sound as if he planned to look at the appraisal for himself.

I finished entering data into the appraisal software and studied the floor plans it created for me
. I love that graph paper and pencil erasures are no longer part of an appraisal.

When I was satisfied that the drawing was accurate and I had selected pictures to put in the appraisal package, I turned my attention to that night’s Harvest for All Committee meeting.

I have learned to develop a detailed agenda or Scoobie, who drafted himself onto the committee a year or so ago, will hijack the meeting with some crazy fundraising idea. The varied personalities mean meetings are enough of a balancing act as it is.

Sylvia Parrett and Monica Martin are in their mid-sixties
. Sylvia is a very rigid person, but she’s also a hard worker. With her buttoned-up cardigans and low voice, Monica can only be described as mousy. Though they work as hard as anyone for the food pantry, they are the two least likely to get Scoobie’s humor. Monica does not try to put down Scoobie’s ideas though, which Sylvia occasionally does.

I know I shouldn’t have favorites, but Lance Wilson, our treasurer, has become a dear friend.
Who knew I would have a friend more than sixty years older than I am?
 

Aretha Brown used to be our only black member, and I asked her to help me find someone else of her complexion, as she translated my request
. I know who’s black and who isn’t, but I also know people are more likely to join a group if they see a friend is in it. I have lots of black friends, but the close ones are in Lakewood. I was almost embarrassed that the person Aretha asked was Daphne, whom I’d known since high school. I figured that as the librarian, Daphne was asked to be on lots of committees and would say no.

Megan Ortiz was our most recent member before Daphne
. It took me a couple of tries to convince her that what she knew as our most regular pantry volunteer was invaluable. Her daughter Alicia doesn’t come to meetings, but she helps at every event and in a pinch can be counted on for a shift at the pantry. More important, she gets her friends to help at fundraisers.

All of us respect the retired Dr. Welby, who at times acts like our de facto chair
. He speaks in a kind of formal baritone, whether he’s telling someone not to make fun of his name or cajoling money from a business. He’s really good at asking busy people to help us.

I went over fundraising ideas again
. I meant it when I told Mr. Markle that we’d try to help his store get more customers. I was also trying to think of an idea that wasn’t so, well, silly. Our spring liquid string contest was not the kind of event everyone will attend.

Plus, we would have the unusual angle of a joint fundraiser with the Shop with a Cop group
. Lance said he would back me up on my deal with Sergeant Morehouse. We’d probably do most of the work, since police officers are busier than most of our members, and then we’d have to split the funds. My plan was to say we’d have a lot more publicity because the cops know everyone.

BY THE TIME OF our six o’clock meeting, I’d worked myself into a worry that a couple of members might quit the committee because I’d make the unilateral decision to work with Morehouse and his crew.

We were squeezed into the smaller of two meeting rooms in the basement of First Prez
. Thankfully, it wasn’t hot outside, and we hadn’t had to slug through snow or rain to get to the meeting. People might be in a better mood all the way around.

“Thanks for coming, everybody,” I began
. No one said anything. “Um, I know it was kind of short notice, but we need to pull in more money than usual this Thanksgiving.”

“Or Christmas,” Dr. Welby said, in a serious tone.

Damn. He knows, and he doesn’t like the idea.

“That, too, of course,” I continued
. “I was focusing on the first big event.”

“Maybe we can patrol the town and come up with ideas,” Sylvia said.

After another second of silence they all started to laugh.

“We got you,” Monica said.

I leaned back in my chair and let out a breath. “Did Scoobie arrange this?”

“He did not,” Sylvia said, as Scoobie walked in.

“No, but I said I’d stay in the hall until they finished giving you grief. I’d never have kept a straight face.”

“It was Monica’s idea,” Lance said.

“Oh, dear.”  She looked stricken.

“Don’t worry, Monica, I don’t believe it.”

“It was mine,” Aretha said. “I like the idea of working with Shop with a Cop. I try to get a couple kids at the community center to participate in that, but they say it isn’t cool. If we have an interesting fundraiser, maybe they’ll come to that and get to know a couple of cops.”

“Now, what ideas do we have?” boomed Dr. Welby.

“We’ll do the treasurer’s report first,” Lance said, and began his recitation.

I glanced at Scoobie and he silently mouthed, “Not me this time.”  I rolled my eyes at him.

I took the chair role back from Dr. Welby. “It would be a good idea if whatever we do places some kind of spotlight on Mr. Markle’s store. He said business is down after that robbery.”

“Does he still give a discount if people say they are buying food to donate to us?” Sylvia asked.

“At designated times,” I said.

“My sorority raffles off big baskets of goodies, even if it’s not the main part of one of our fundraisers.”  Daphne thought for a second
. “We could give a raffle a lot of publicity and get a few prizes from local businesses. And say Mr. Markle will give people a discount if they donate a food basket and buy the contents at the In-Town Market.”

“And they can get all their ingredients for the bake sale there,” Monica threw in.

“Those would work,” Scoobie said, “but Alicia and I had an idea that would get a lot of free publicity.”

The group was too polite to do a collective groan, but Lance did ask, “Is there any risk of falling at this one?”

“You’d have to try pretty hard,” Scoobie said.

“I’ll have my orthopedist friends on stand-by,” Dr. Welby said, dryly.

“Have you guys heard about the big craze for bean bag game contests?  Only the bags are filled with corn, and they have to be an exact size.”

“You mean like at the Saint Anthony’s carnival, a clown with holes where the eyes and mouth go?” Sylvia asked.

“Not hardly,” Aretha said, and she gave Scoobie a grim smile. “The boxes they throw into are made to exact measurements, and slanted off the ground, not upright. A couple corporate groups I know have competitions, paint their boxes in company colors, things like that.”

“Do we have to make the boxes?” Lance asked.

“You can buy them plain, and paint them, or use them plain,” Aretha said.

Daphne said, “Maybe we can generate publicity by having a day to paint them.”

From the looks Aretha and Scoobie exchanged, I felt as if I wasn’t getting something. Plus, I had a lot of questions. “Where do you get the corn, and are there patterns to make the bags?”

“Seed corn,” Megan said
. “And they have to be six inches by six inches and weigh the same. We’ll have to be the ones to supply the bags.”

“And Alicia and her friends would help?” Dr. Welby asked.

“Oh yes,” Megan said. “She and Scoobie had the idea. Alicia and her friends are looking forward to it.”

We set the date, which was earlier than I was comfortable with, but the time that was best-suited to everyone’s schedules
. Before we left, Sylvia agreed to contact local media with the initial information and Aretha said she would take the lead on getting and coordinating volunteers. Dr. Welby was to try to get a few donations to fund what we needed to buy before the event, and I would work with Mr. Markle on making his market a visible part of the event.
What could possibly go wrong?

“I DON’T GET it,” I said. I was driving Scoobie and me back to the bungalow,
our bungalow
. “People seemed to be kind of dancing around a point they didn’t want to make.”

“I can’t imagine what it would be.”

“I know your innocent act.”

“When it comes to Harvest for All, I’m all business,” Scoobie said.

George was sitting on my repainted porch swing when we pulled into my tiny parking area. He walked down the steps. “Where were you guys?”

“Food pantry meeting,” Scoobie said
. “Come on in. What’s up?”

What if I wanted to go to bed early?

We went in and I said, “You want water, there are bottles in the fridge.”

I sat on the couch with Scoobie
while George grabbed a bottle and then sat in the rocker. He pulled out his thin reporter’s notebook. “Okay. I heard there was a second set of proposals for budget cuts at the hospital, and this time it gave names of people to get rid of.”

“It says that?” I asked.

“No, Nancy Drew, I haven’t seen it, but it would say stuff like
redundant positions and opportunities to economize.”

“When did you learn words like that?” Scoobie asked.