Murder in Miniature (17 page)

I did have one easy-to-fill request. “Can you come to the bookstore for five minutes and say hi to Maddie?” I asked him.

He opened his drawer and pulled out a blue-and-gold Lincoln Point Police Department patch. “I’ll do better than that. I’ve been wanting to do this anyway.”

A few minutes later, a crowd was assembled in Rosie’s bookstore. Skip had recruited one of his fellow officers (actually, an attractive female policewoman to whom he gave the second cookie) to join us. Rosie gathered her customers, mostly mothers and children, for the ceremony.

Skip cleared his throat and assumed his best posture. “This Lincoln Point Police Department patch is awarded to Ms. Madison Porter, for cracking the case of the white truck.”

The small but enthusiastic audience clapped, not knowing (I was fairly sure) a thing about a white truck case.

Maddie beamed (so did I), and I knew we’d been forgiven for excluding her.

I was so grateful, I added my own tribute.

“You’re all invited to Sadie’s,” I said to more applause. “Free ice cream cones all around. Sprinkles included.”

Maddie’s farewell party back at the house that evening
was in full force. Although she visited several times a year, it was our tradition to make a big family fuss at the end of every trip. We did it up right, with
BON VOYAGE
balloons and matching plates and napkins.

“We don’t need hats this year,” Maddie had announced while we shopped in the party store. Fine with me—it meant fewer opportunities for Skip to catch his mother and aunt on film (or was it on bits? or bytes?) in a silly pose.

A cool evening breeze made it perfect for dining on the patio. At this time of the day, by the light of the setting sun, the Bay Area’s dry, brown hills took on a golden color. (When she was six, Maddie informed me that the red streaks at sunset meant there was a lot of pollution in the air, but I refused to let science spoil my enjoyment.) Add to the scene the smell of hamburgers on the grill, expertly flipped by Skip, and the flutter of the hummingbirds drinking sugar water at my feeders, and every sense was satisfied.

As far as police talk went, Beverly was much more willing to share than Skip.

She’d put in a long day at her volunteer tagging job. I never would have guessed there would be that many abandoned vehicles on the streets of Lincoln Point.

“Another idiot today,” she said. “This guy comes up to me while I’m tagging his beat-up old car and says I can’t do that. ‘Yes, I can,’ I say, and he lashes out to hit me. Fortunately, the guy is way out of shape and I grab his arm on the way to my face. I was ready to call for backup, but I realized he was never going to connect. So I let him flail around and shout verbal abuse and went on my way.”

“You should have called it in,” Skip said. (Every family has a rule follower.)

His mother hardly gave him a glance, and went on to a story about a man who approached her with an open bottle of wine and asked if she could test it to see if he was being poisoned by his wife.

“I guess it’s the uniform,” Beverly said. “It attracts the oddballs among us.”

Skip, on the other hand, kept his police business to himself (the nerve), using Maddie as a shield. He bestowed on Maddie her second award of the day, naming her Assistant Chef. This meant she got to do Skip’s bidding, running back and forth from the grill to the kitchen to the outdoor table to the trash and, once, to retrieve Skip’s cell phone from his car.

She loved it.

Maddie told more Los Angeles stories than usual, her way of easing back home, I guessed.

“You know what stinks?” she asked, a forkful of salad (a required course tonight) in her mouth. “In my school, the boys have the best locker room. We have to share ours with the janitor. And he puts these smelly mops in there just because he knows we don’t like it, and because he just doesn’t want to share.”

Something about the juxtaposition of the words
janitor
and
just
stirred my brain. Just Eddie, the janitor, that was it. One of those strange neuron firings, or free-association trips I often went on.

“I’m surprised your mother isn’t on a committee to correct the locker situation,” Beverly said.

“She is,” Maddie said. We all laughed, and from her reaction, I imagined Beverly, like me, was picturing petite Mary Lou Porter storming the PTA meetings with petitions for girls’ rights. To be followed probably by leaflets on the nutritional value of the food in the cafeteria and a campaign for new girls’ volleyball uniforms.

Between dinner and dessert, Maddie announced that she had presents for everyone. I didn’t remember her ever doing this before, and took it as a sign of further maturity. I was amazed that, in spite of her snit at being left out, she’d spent part of her time in Rosie’s store buying each of us a bookmark, the kind with a lovely photograph and a tassel at the end for ease of handling. I felt a surge of pride. I couldn’t wait to tell Richard and Mary Lou what an outstanding job they were doing.

Skip’s bookmark had a photo of a bright yellow sports car rounding a bend on a curvy road; the pattern on Beverly’s was a Native American design that looked similar to a quilt that had been in the Porter family for years.

She’d also found a book of famous doctors for Richard.

“Mrs. Norman helped me with Dad’s,” she said.

And for me, a teary moment:
THE WORLD’S GREATEST GRANDMA
, printed in gold against a background of yellow roses.

For the second time that day, I offered ice cream all around.

Skip timed his leave-taking to coincide with Maddie’s
going to bed.

“Gotta run,” he said, as soon as Maddie said her long good nights, with hugs that went on and on.

Coincidence? I thought not. He knew I had many questions about the murders of Tippi Wyatt and Dudley Crane. He knew I had a strong interest in finding the killer lest my friend be accused. He knew all this, and worked the evening perfectly, to avoid talk of the cases.

But tomorrow I would put Maddie on a plane, and then pay him a visit. Age and aunthood had its privileges.

And thanks to Maddie, and a slip of the tongue by Just Eddie, I had a new idea.

We arrived at the San Jose airport early to fill out the
forms required for a child traveling alone. Maddie was past the age when she enjoyed getting little silver wings from a gushing flight attendant, but airline policy still called her an Unaccompanied Minor (UM, in airlines’ literature).

“Only a few more times, Grandma.”

That was Maddie trying to rush to adulthood. She’d be eleven next January; after that she’d no longer be a UM. How could she know how quickly life passes—how, a couple of decades from now, she’d want to slow it down?

“I promise to check out the rules for eleven-year-olds in plenty of time.”

“Thanks, Grandma.” She straightened her shoulders, bringing herself to her full height of four feet three inches, a little below average for her age (she had her mother’s short genes, Richard said, not the tall Porter genes). “I love my bookmark,” I told her. “That was so thoughtful of you.”

Maddie smiled. “I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll miss you more.”

We laughed and hugged and continued our “more” game for several rounds.

“Don’t finish the historic apartment without me, okay?”

Strangely, I found my granddaughter’s grammatical errors charming. “Okay.”

“I know you’ll be busy anyway. Are you going home first after I board, or straight to the police station?”

Maddie slid one palm past the other, in a motion meant to emulate my path to the civic center, I was sure. Where did that come from? Did I have a little psychic on my hands?

“What are you talking about?”

“I know you’re going to investigate all the stuff going on in town. You’re just waiting so you won’t have me to worry about anymore.”

It sounded remarkably like a former president who said we wouldn’t have him to kick around anymore, but Maddie was too young to know that.

On the other hand, she was quite advanced for her age.

The appearance of a flight attendant bearing gifts saved me from having to respond to Maddie. Dotty was on the dumpy side and a lot heavier and older than the “girls” in my college class who aspired to coveted careers as “stewardesses” and struggled to fit themselves into the weight and measurement requirements that ruled in the early days of air travel.

San Jose airport was bustling with a surprising number of children, their UM cards slipped into cases and hanging from navy blue lanyards with the airline logo.

“Hey, little girl,” Dotty said to Maddie, who grimaced. “How would you like to wear the same wings our pilots wear? Huh?” Lucky for her, she didn’t try to pinch Maddie’s cheek.

Maddie looked at me and rolled her eyes. I made a note to give her non-pink luggage for Christmas, which might help upgrade her image. I gave her a “be nice” look.

“Thanks,” Maddie said, taking the wings from Dotty with her thumb and index finger, as if they were from a dead insect. Come to think of it, she would have preferred to be holding the wings of a dead insect.

The airport PA system was at its best, with an unintelligible command that apparently Dotty understood. She gathered the families and led the children toward the gate for early boarding.

This was it. “Call me when you get home,” I said, holding on to Maddie for one more second.

“I will. And if you need any help catching the bad guys”—she held her hand to her ear, thumb and pinkie extended, telephone style—“call me.”

As I noted, my granddaughter was advanced for her age.

My excitement over the “just” and “janitor” juxtaposition
that I picked up from Maddie seemed unwarranted in the light of day. Especially as I got closer to the civic center and the LPPD.

I had two things to back up my theory, both a little shaky. I couldn’t barge into Skip’s felt-walled cubby, shouting, “Just Eddie is Jason’s father!” I needed to review my reasoning.

I pulled into a parking space in the police department lot. I rolled down the windows and took down the small notepad and pencil I kept clipped to my visor. Not that I would write anything comprehensible, but doodling would help me sort things out.

First, Tippi had named her son Edward. That was a matter of record. Yes, it was a leap from that to a father named Edward, who called himself Just Eddie. But it was possible. I couldn’t let go of the scenario: Tippi Wyatt and Just Eddie have a son in Brooklyn, whom they name Edward Louis. Both parents are in and out of jail (I knew this about Tippi, and had no trouble believing it of Just Eddie), and eventually Tippi moves to the Midwest to get away from Just Eddie. When she has a relapse into drugs, she gives little Edward up for adoption (enter Linda and Chuck Reed). Just Eddie somehow (a miniature weakness in the theory here) finds out that his son is now Jason Reed, living in Lincoln Point, California, and comes out to be with him. Possibly he was waiting to make a move and kidnap Jason from the Reed home. (But I digress.)

My second clue, if it could be dignified as such, was Just Eddie’s comment to me at the crafts fair (which seemed ages ago). When I asked him if he’d seen Jason, he’d said not to worry, and then something about a kid from Brooklyn’s having lots of street smarts. At the time, I thought he was making a wild-card dig against my own New York roots. Now it seemed he was giving himself away. He knew where Jason was born because he was there.

What did these startling conclusions amount to? I didn’t know exactly. A possible motive for Just Eddie to want to be rid of Tippi? That would make sense if Tippi had custody and could keep Just Eddie from his son. Since Jason belonged to the Reeds, however, that was moot. Maybe Just Eddie just hated his former wife, or lover, from undreamed-of issues in their past.

For symmetry, I wanted to fit the murder of Dudley Crane into the picture, but there was no reason to think the two murders were connected.

Unless the same gun was used. I had to talk to Skip. By now he knew the answer to that, plus who was the rightful owner of the sapphire, plus all kinds of information that I was sorely missing. I had to find a way to get him to share, the way a family is supposed to.

I told myself I was here—about to enter the LPPD building and ask my cop nephew if I could be his partner—for Linda’s sake, but if I was honest with myself, I’d have to admit that part of me needed to be involved in getting these cases solved, and quickly, for myself. I’d unwittingly driven my granddaughter within a few yards of a murder scene, which might account for the twinge I felt every time Skip mentioned that no one seemed to care about finding the killer of this stranger. And Dudley Crane—he wasn’t a close friend, but he was an important part of my little community. A community I wanted to feel safe in again.

A familiar tune interrupted my thoughts. I couldn’t quite place it, although it was coming from my own oversized purse. It took a couple of seconds for me to recognize the melody and figure out the mystery. Maddie had programmed my cell phone to ring with, “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.” She knew I had no idea how to change it back to a simple bell sound. I smiled. She was probably planning to call me on this number as soon as she could.

I answered the frivolous ring.

“Is the UM in the air?” Beverly’s voice.

“She is.”

“Where are you now?”

Busted. “I’m sitting in my car, parked in the police department lot.”

“Of course you are. How about an adults-only lunch at Sheridan’s first? We can discuss the case.”

This was standard for Beverly and me—not discussing murder cases, but getting together the day Maddie left for home. It was my sister-in-law’s way of easing me into being alone again, a practice for which I was usually very grateful. This time the hole didn’t seem so big. Maddie was right, that I did have the murders to distract me, but there was another reason that I couldn’t express yet, even to myself.

Sheridan’s restaurant was actually about six tables at
the back of a ceramics shop where customers could paint their own designs on naked pottery. A few days later, they’d come back and their pieces would be fired and glazed, looking quite professional. Recently the two sisters who owned the studio had turned some extra space into a café. The fare was definitely adult, with salads, sprouts, avocados, fresh basil, and right-from-the-garden veggies—nothing that Maddie would like.

Today there were fewer people than usual at the high tables and stools available for painting. No big holiday was looming, like Mother’s or Father’s Day, when the studio was packed with children, dipping their hands in paint and preserving their pawlike designs on china.

I told Beverly about my call from Linda and briefed her on my current theory of Jason Reed’s origin.

She blew out a low whistle. “And I thought I had a scoop. Just Eddie is Jason’s father?”

I hoped Skip would be so accepting. “Maybe. I wonder if Linda will allow DNA testing. I don’t imagine they can take a swab, or whatever they do, from Jason without her permission. Tippi has no known relatives, so getting a sample from Tippi shouldn’t be a problem.”

Beverly, still wide-eyed, was definitely on board with my theory. “Then we’ll need a sample from Just Eddie, too. It’s anybody’s guess if he’ll submit to a paternity test. If he thinks about it, he might not, because it reveals a motive for killing Tippi Wyatt.”

“Jason isn’t theirs to fight over, though.”

“Doesn’t matter. They always look at spouses and significant others first.” Beverly’s voice had the ring of authority.

“Good point,” was all I could add. We were at a standstill. Understandably, since our scenarios suffered from a distinct lack of facts.

A little late, I flashed back to Beverly’s comment. “Wait. Did you say you had a scoop?”

“Nothing like yours. There is buzz around the station, however, about the sapphire.” She shook her head. “Good thing I don’t have to depend on my son for information.”

“And?”

“It’s the real thing, apparently. The gem’s easily worth fifty or sixty thousand dollars, as Linda thought. It was faceted in India, which I guess makes it even more special.” Like mine, Beverly’s jewelry collection consisted mostly of costume pieces, and one or two items that were more expensive, like the pearls Ken had given me. Nothing on the order of that sapphire, however. “And you had it in your possession for a while, Gerry.”

I smiled. “If only I’d known. So whose is it?”

“It belongs to”—Beverly mimicked a drumroll with slender arms—“Ta da…Jack Wilson.”

The would-be councilman, Gail Musgrave’s brother, running against the now-deceased Dudley Crane. My turn for a low whistle. I barely said, “Thank you,” to Alysson, our waitress—who looked only a couple of years older than Maddie—when she brought our heaping salads.

“So it’s Gail’s sapphire also?”

“Not. Their father was in the foreign service. He brought it back from Ceylon for their mother.”

“Who died about three months ago,” I said.

“And who left it to Jack.”

“Not to Gail?”

Beverly shook her head. “Gail didn’t even know about it. The father wanted the son to have it. Sound familiar? Good old boys, with old ladies following their wishes. Gail found out it existed when the will was read, and then, guess what? It was stolen about a month later.”

“In the Crane robbery?” Now I was really confused. This was more complicated than I could handle over lunch.

“No, no, long before last week’s robbery at Crane’s.”

“But between the time the mother died and the time Crane took over the estate handling. And before Gail and Jack relieved Crane of his estate duties.”

Beverly finished chewing a healthy forkful of lettuce, cranberries, and nuts. She pointed her fork at me. “You got it.”

“So someone stole the sapphire from Jack Wilson as long ago as three or four months?”

“Apparently.”

“Jason?” I had a hard time picturing Jason climbing in a window of the Wilson home.

Beverly shrugged. “You can never get the ‘whos’ out of them, just the ‘whats.’”

By “them,” I assumed she meant the officers of the LPPD, including her son.

“Still, it’s another piece of the puzzle.”

And it made me a little better prepared to talk to Skip, though I couldn’t connect all the dots immediately. I mulled this over while Beverly did the math for the check.

“Don’t look now,” Beverly said.

But of course, I did, and gazed straight into Chuck Reed’s belt buckle. Quite a surprise. This didn’t seem like his kind of establishment. For one thing, Sheridan’s did not serve alcohol; plus, the idea of Chuck’s biting into a cucumber-and-hummus sandwich was laughable. Skinny as he was, I pictured him eating from a Styrofoam box at any of the fast-food places along the boulevard.

“Afternoon, ladies,” he said.

I gave him a slight, unsmiling nod. The last time I’d seen Chuck was at the fair, after his fight with Linda, when he bellowed some threat at me, about my keeping out of his family business. As if he were even close to being a family man.

Beverly was more friendly. “Hi, Chuck. What brings you into a pottery shop?”