The Lanvin Murders (Vintage Clothing Mysteries) (2 page)

No reply.

“Right? Marnie?”

She’d hung up.

“That's it, you've almost got it,” Joanna said to the teenage girl wobbling across the carpet in a pair of black patent stilettos. “Step on the ball of your feet and loosen your hips. Right. Like that. See, it's not so hard.”

“These shoes are awesome.” The girl stopped in front of the gilt mirror in the back of the store. She posed, hips turned to the side, one leg bent, and examined herself. Mid-thigh down she was Betty Grable, but the rest was straight from the mall.
 

Joanna never ceased to be amazed at how a flattering dress, or, in this case, a sculpted shoe, could transform a person. Without knowing it, the wearer stood straighter and a new seductiveness emerged. The girl in the stilettos was just discovering her power. “Ten minutes of practice a night, and you'll walk like you were born in them.”

As she rang up the shoes, the bell at the door jangled. Joanna glanced up. Not Marnie. “Hi, Apple,” she said. “Hey, why don't you leave the door open? Maybe it will cool it down in here a little.”
 

Rain drummed steadily on the aluminum awning, a rare late-summer shower that filled the air with the scent of humid ozone. Apple’s bangles clinked as she lodged the doorstop, a rock-filled Beatles boot, in front of the door.
 

Joanna handed the stilettos, now wrapped in pink tissue and tucked into a zebra-print bag, to the girl. “Goodbye, and remember, walk from your hips.”

Apple dropped her fringed leather tote behind the cash register and went straight for the front window. “Where did you get that coat?” She lifted the mannequin from the window platform to the ground. “This is fabulous. A little worn, kind of smelly, but outrageous. No wonder—a Lanvin.” She peeled the coat off the mannequin. “Hmm. Weird energy.”

“You always say that.” She had been having “feelings” about things since they were girls together and Apple’s name was Daphne.

“Not like this. Not good.” She draped the coat over her shoulders for only a moment before shrugging it off. “Definitely weird energy.”

Joanna took the coat from Apple. “Marnie brought it yesterday. Said it belonged to an old beau. It was too good not to put in the window, even with the heat.” She ran her fingers through the sleeve's fox cuff. “A moujik-style—that’s Russian peasant—coat. I found a photo in one of my old
Harper’s Bazaars
. See the red patches? Practically Courrèges. Or Fendi.”
 

Apple shook her head. “There’s something off about this coat, gorgeous as it is.”

Joanna wasn't going to let Apple's intuition mar the glory of vintage Lanvin. She put the coat back on the mannequin and posed it in the window. “Her beau must have come from money.” She rested her hands on her hips and admired the coat from its rear. “Listen to this—she called me yesterday afternoon and demanded the coat back. Wanted me to bring it to her right away. I told her it would have to wait until this morning, but she hasn’t shown up.”

“She sold it to you then demanded it back? Strange.”

“Oh, I don’t blame her. I’d have a hard time giving up the coat, too. But she insisted that she get it back stat, that I bring it to her. And now she doesn’t even care enough to show up for it or the money I owe her.”
 

“It’s only been a day.”

“I know. But you should have heard her. I’ve tried calling, and she doesn't answer.”
 

“Give her a week and keep trying to call. Who knows? Maybe she's out of town or on a bender or something.”

“I worry about her. You should see her. Skin and bones.” Joanna returned to the tiki bar and filed the receipt for the stilettos in a cigar box. “Anyway, what brings you in? Your shift isn’t until Friday.”

“Gavin has a friend with a band playing at the Doug Fir at nine. Come with me?”

“Standing in a crowded room for three hours listening to some skinny, bearded guy whining about his love life?” A good dinner, hot bath, and early to bed sounded so much better. Besides, she had just started reading a biography of Cleopatra, and her
Gilda
rental was due back at the video store tomorrow.

“I knew you’d say that.” She folded her arms. “Come on, Jo. What are you going to do? Sit home alone all your life? You’re such a hermit.”
 

“Listen, I’m with people all day at the store, and I like some time to myself in the evenings.” Apple had touched a nerve. Joanna knew some people might say she was in a rut, but if so it was a contented rut with good food, engrossing novels, and the occasional icy Martini.
 

“Fine. No need to get so defensive.”

“I’m not.” Joanna changed tactics. “I would go, but I think I’d better check on Marnie.”

“Really?” Apple looked her straight in the eyes. “Do you even know where she lives?”
 

Strangely, she didn’t. All their interactions had happened at the store. Come to think of it, there wasn’t a lot she did know about Marnie. “Maybe she fell and can’t get to the phone. I should look in on her.” Although if her address wasn’t in the phone book, she didn’t know how she’d track her down.
 

As she spoke, Joanna fidgeted with the worn pearl ring on her middle finger. Tiny rubies flanked the pearl. Her grandmother’s ring. It wasn’t worth much, but Joanna wouldn’t leave the house without it.

The doorbell rang again and what looked to be a mother and daughter came in, probably planning ahead for a homecoming dance. The mother lagged back, clutching her sensible handbag, while the daughter strode confidently toward a rack of tulle-skirted prom dresses.

Apple smiled at the customers, then turned toward Joanna. “All right. Can’t blame me for trying. If you change your mind, give me a call. Don't worry too much about Marnie. I'm sure she's fine.”

As Joanna pulled a lemon-yellow Emma Domb crinolined gown from the rack, her thoughts stayed with Marnie. She had been so determined to get the coat back, and Joanna had never known her to wait around when someone owed her cash.
 

“What size shoes do you wear?” Joanna asked the daughter. “You really should try the dress with heels, see where the hem hits your calf.”

“An eight,” said the daughter.

“Not too high, though,” the mother said.

Joanna grabbed a pair of silver evening sandals by their ankle straps. Maybe Apple was right. Marnie was probably fine, and Joanna was making too big a deal about it. She helped the daughter zip up her dress. Yellow was a trying color, but it suited the girl’s porcelain complexion and crow-black hair.
 

She’d try calling Marnie again tonight, from home. Yes, that’s what she’d do. Maybe this time she’d answer.

***

The next morning, Joanna prepared for work. When exactly four minutes were up, she plunged the handle on the French press and poured her morning coffee into a thermos. She wrapped a Spode teacup in a linen napkin embroidered with bees and tucked both the cup and thermos into a tote bag. The opera length black gloves from
Gilda
stuck in her mind. If she could get her hands on a few pairs, they’d sell like hotcakes.

The tote bounced gently against her hips as Joanna walked the scant five minutes to Tallulah’s Closet. She needed the extra boost of caffeine. After watching the movie, she’d stayed up past midnight reading. Marnie hadn’t answered her calls. Joanna had toyed with the idea of somehow finding her house and visiting her in person, but Marnie was a private person and wouldn’t appreciate an unannounced drop in, anyway. Or so Joanna had convinced herself.

The morning was dim, and it was still raining off and on. People ducked in and out of the corner café, but the other businesses along Clinton Street wouldn’t open for another hour, when the lunch trade began. Joanna rounded the corner, raised her head to take in the view of Tallulah’s Closet’s front window, and halted in her tracks.
 

Where was the Lanvin coat?
 

The front window’s mannequin stood slightly turned, the bottom half of its silk slip reflecting light from the street. Surely she’d left the coat on the mannequin at the end of the day. She was a stickler for making sure the window always looked good. But maybe a customer had tried it on and left it near the dressing rooms. Maybe.

Frowning, Joanna unlocked the door and flicked on the front light switches. She set her tote on the store’s center bench and glanced toward the dressing rooms at the rear. No coat there. Panic rose. Could it have been stolen? She rushed to the tiki bar to look for the cash box and let out a sigh of relief. The Lanvin coat lay heaped on the floor. She must have forgotten that she’d put it on the rack behind the counter, and at some point during the night it slipped off its hanger. She grasped the heavy coat by its shoulders to fold over her arm then instantly let it fall to the ground behind her.

Under the coat lay Marnie, face up, eyes open. Dead.

Joanna grabbed the edge of the jewelry counter for support. Breathe deeply, she told herself. Stay calm. She took a shuddering breath and stepped again behind the tiki bar. Her heart clutched. Yes, definitely Marnie.
 

The skin on the older woman’s face was clean and translucent white, and her open eyes, glassy, stared to the left. Thin wisps of hair clung to her scalp. She hadn't ever seen Marnie without a wig or makeup. She looked so small, vulnerable. Hands trembling, Joanna stepped away. She didn't have a lot of experience with death. Once on a high school choir trip the school bus passed an accident, and she had seen a man's body hanging out the driver's side of a car. Then, of course, there was her grandmother. Naturally, they didn't have an open casket. Couldn't.
 

Joanna couldn’t force herself to reach across Marnie’s body for the phone under the tiki bar. She ran next door to Dot’s Cafe and banged on the door. Maybe someone was setting up for lunch. The prep cook greeted her with a smile, but Joanna shoved past him and ran towards the phone. She returned to Tallulah’s Closet a few minutes later and sank on the bench, gaze firmly averted from Marnie’s body.
 

A rapping on the door jolted her to her feet. A uniformed policeman and policewoman stood outside the door. “Back there.” Joanna gestured toward the tiki bar. They pushed past her.

An unmarked Crown Victoria pulled up behind the cruiser. A tall man wearing a bolo tie and cowboy boots got out. He dropped his cell phone in his pocket and slammed the car door behind him.
 

In the store, he extended a hand. “Detective Foster Crisp.” He approached the tiki bar and stopped short of the Lanvin coat, a pile of fur and wool now pushed to the side. “What’s that?”

“A coat. It was covering her.” Joanna reached to pick it up, but the detective stepped in front of her.
 

“Please, don’t touch it. We’ll need to check it for evidence.” The police behind the tiki bar parted as the detective knelt beside the body. After a few minutes, he rose. He placed a hand in the small of Joanna’s back and directed her back to the red velvet bench.
 

“You know the victim?” he asked.
 

“Yes, Marnie. Marnie Evans.” Joanna didn’t want to leave her, but at the same time she was glad to be distracted. “How did she die?”

“Crowley?” Crisp asked one of the policemen.

“Can’t say until the autopsy. Nothing obvious.”

“Sit,” the detective said and patted the bench. A chunk of turquoise anchored his bolo tie. Its silver-tipped ends dangled as he leaned forward. “This is your store, is it?”

She nodded, still casting anxious glances behind the tiki bar.
 

“Tell me what happened. Start from the beginning.”

Joanna recounted the last quarter hour, from noticing the Lanvin coat missing to trembling over the phone at Dot’s.
 

“Did—” Detective Crisp looked at his notebook “—Ms. Evans have a key to the store?”

“No. I don’t know how she got in. The door was locked when I got here.”

“Only a handle lock. Easy enough to pick. I’m surprised you don’t have better security, actually. But there’s no reason she would be at the store?”

“Closed? No.” She bit her lip. “That coat, the one that covered her. She sold it to me the day before yesterday. That same day she called to say she wanted it back. I told her she could come by yesterday morning to get it, but she never did.” She wouldn’t have come back to get it by herself, would she?
 

The detective made a few notes. “Tell me about Ms. Evans.”
 

While a policeman stepped away from Marnie and punched numbers in his cell phone, Detective Crisp kept his attention on Joanna. From where Joanna sat she could only see one of Marnie’s slipper-clad feet.

“I've known her not quite a year. She sells—sold me—some of her old clothes.”
 

“Tell me about it,” the detective said.

The day Marnie first appeared the fall before, the store had been quiet. Joanna had looked up from a skirt she was mending to find Marnie standing at the door with a cardboard box at her feet.
 

“Do you buy old clothes?” she'd asked.

“Yes, I do.” Although Marnie's appearance—baggy pants, waterproof jacket—didn't suggest a glamour puss, Joanna had enough experience to know the box could contain anything from 1930s silk nighties to an old wedding gown to a stack of batik hippie skirts.
 

“Got a few things I don't need anymore.” Marnie had pulled a dress from the box and held it up by its shoulders. It was Nile green and covered with an intricate pattern of bugle beads that gleamed in the dim morning light. From its length and strong nylon lining, Joanna guessed it was from the mid-1960s. She could imagine a guest wearing it on the Merv Griffin Show. Maybe Nancy Sinatra.
 

While Joanna was trying to figure out how to flush the cigarette smoke out of the dress, Marnie had commented on her grandmother’s ring. She took Joanna’s hand in her dry palm and touched the ring’s pearl. Then she mentioned she had a few other things she could bring in, as well.