Two Tall Tails (3 page)

“Seriously?” Abigail said.

“Absolutely.” Ruby wiggled her eyebrows. “I think a green or navy streak in the front would look good on you.”

Abigail smiled back at her. “I may just take you up on that.”

“Is Susan upstairs?” I asked.

Abigail shook her head. “She's over in nonfiction shelving books.”

“I just need to talk to her for a minute and I'll be back to relieve you.”

“Take your time,” she said. “I'm just going to sit here and try to imagine myself with the Incredible Hulk's hair.”

“Better his hair than his skin,” I said.

Ruby and I found Susan in the 590s sitting on the floor, rearranging a shelf of books, a shrimp cocktail fork and what looked to be a paper-wrapped straw stuck in her updo. I wondered where the straw came from. It hadn't been poked in her hair when I'd left the library to head for Riverarts.

She smiled at me over her black cat's eye glasses. “Hey, Kathleen,” she said. “This shelf let go again. I think it was the clips so I got some new ones from the workroom.”

“Thanks,” I said.

It had to be a mistake, I thought. I couldn't come up with any rational explanation for Susan stealing a couple of scarves and some placemats from the co-op store. It was just too out of character.

Susan reached up and pulled the straw out of her hair. “Weirdest bookmark yet.”

“Where did you find it?” I asked.

“In a book about hyenas,” she said, indicating the stack of books beside her on the floor.

“Someone used a straw for a bookmark?” Ruby said. “Seriously?”

“That doesn't even make my top ten list of strangest things I've seen people use to mark their place in a book,” I said with a grin.

Ruby tipped her head to one side and regarded me with a skeptical look. “No, no, no. You can't say that and then not give me the details.”

I laughed. “Okay. There's the usual stuff, napkins, squares of toilet paper, ribbons, paper clips, et cetera. I guess the weirdest thing I've ever seen used as a bookmark was a snakeskin.”

“You're making that up,” Ruby said.

I shook my head. “I swear I'm not.”

“She isn't,” Susan said, waving the straw for emphasis. “I remember the snakeskin. It was between the pages of a book on vegetarian cooking.”

Ruby laughed. “Okay, now I know you're messing with me.”

I put my hand over my heart. “I'm not. Librarian's honor.”

Susan got to her feet and poked the straw back in her hair. “What's up?” she asked.

“Susan, were you at the co-op store on Tuesday?” I tried to keep my tone light and nonaccusatory.

She nodded. “Uh-huh. That was the day those two buses of tourists stopped in town for lunch.” She pushed her glasses up her nose. “I walked a bunch of them over to the store, and then since I had a bit of time before I had to be back here, I stayed to look around for a few minutes.”

“What did you look at?” Ruby asked.

Susan reached over and straightened a couple of books on the shelf closest to her. “What's going on?” she said.

“Do you remember what you were looking at?” I said. “It's important.” From the corner of my eye I saw Ruby looking at me, but I kept my focus on Susan.

She looked puzzled, two frown lines pulling her eyebrows together. “Sure, I remember. I was checking out those scarves that Ella made, the multicolor knitted ones that look like they were done on some kind of loom. They're beautiful.”

She stopped and the color rose in her cheeks. “Wait a second. Did you think I was trying to steal one of them?” She looked at Ruby, eyes wide, a mix of surprise and embarrassment on her face. Before Ruby could answer, Susan had turned to me. “That's it, isn't it, Kathleen? I was in the store three or four times in less than a week looking at those scarves.”

“Why?” I said.

Susan didn't answer. She'd already turned back to Ruby again. “Ruby, I'm sorry,” she said, twisting the hem of her lime green cardigan in her fingers. “I didn't think how it would look to someone else. I swear I didn't take anything.”

“Why were you so interested in those scarves?” I asked gently. “You're not really a scarf person. Why did you keep going back to look at them?”

“Kathleen, do you remember when Abigail tried to teach me to crochet?” she said.

Ruby's eyes narrowed, and I gave an almost imperceptible head shake, hoping she'd take that as a cue to stay quiet.

“I remember,” I said.

Susan had tried to teach herself how to crochet, and when her efforts had quickly gone downhill, Abigail had stepped in to teach her. That hadn't worked so well, either. Everything Susan had tried to make had ended in a tangled ball of yarn, a lot of frustration and a few words that weren't usually in a librarian's vocabulary.

Susan shifted from one foot to the other. “I'm trying to learn to knit,” she offered, her cheeks turning pink.

“Oh,” I said. “Ummm, how's it going?”

She rolled her eyes. “How do you think it's going, Kathleen? I was a disaster with one crochet needle. It's twice as bad trying to knit with two.”

“Crochet hook,” Ruby said.

We both looked at her.

“You crochet with a hook, not needles.”

“See?” Susan exclaimed, holding out both hands. “I don't even know what the stuff is called.”

“So why do you want to learn to knit?” I said.

She gave me a wry smile. “For Eric. Did you know he makes my breakfast every morning?”

I shook my head. “I didn't.” Eric Cullen, who owned and ran Eric's Place, was a great cook and an all-round good human being. His breakfast sandwiches were one of
my
favorite ways to start the day.

“He makes all our bread and granola and salad dressing.”

“You think he'd adopt me?” Ruby asked.

Susan laughed. “I want to make something special for him. Something with my own two hands.” She looked at me. “You're right that I'm not a scarf person but Eric is. I wanted to knit one for him but the truth is I suck at knitting. I kept going back to look at Ella's scarves because I was trying to figure out what I was doing wrong. But that's all.” She shook her head. “And for the record. I still don't know.”

“I can teach you,” Ruby said.

Susan sighed. “I appreciate the offer but I can't do it. It doesn't matter if it's crocheting or knitting. Whatever I start ends up in a mess.” She inclined her head in the direction of the checkout desk. “Just ask Abigail.”

“I can teach you,” Ruby said again. “All you need is big needles and bulky yarn and you can make a scarf. I promise.”

Susan looked skeptical.

“I didn't know you could knit,” I said.

Ruby grinned. “Hey, just because I'm a pierced, rainbow-haired artist doesn't mean I don't have traditional skills, too. I can knit, sew and make my own ketchup. My grandmother taught me.” The eyebrows went up again. “My grandfather taught me a few things, too, but I don't usually talk about those.”

Ruby's grandfather, Idris Blackthorne, had been the town bootlegger. I could only imagine what skills he'd taught his favorite grandchild. “Probably a road best not traveled,” I said lightly.

“Are you working tomorrow morning?” Ruby said to Susan. “We could go to the yarn store. What color were you thinking of?”

Susan made a face. “I'm not certain but I did think gray would go with his eyes.”

I put a hand on Ruby's arm. “I'm going to go give Abigail a break,” I said. “Everything's okay here?”

Ruby nodded. “It is. Thank you.”

“I'll keep going,” I said quietly.

Ruby nodded again and turned back to Susan. As I headed for the circulation desk, she was pulling out her phone to show Susan a scarf that might work for Eric.

The thief wasn't Susan. But the knot in my stomach hadn't completely untied itself. I still had two more people to talk to.

Owen and Hercules were waiting in the kitchen when I got home. Over a bowl of chicken stew with dumplings for me and a little plain shredded chicken breast for them, I explained about the missing items at the artists' store.

I talked to the cats all the time. They were good listeners, especially if chicken or sardine crackers were involved. They didn't interrupt for the most part unless it was to try to mooch (unsuccessfully) part of a dumpling, and there were times when they wordlessly seemed to take part in the conversation. I didn't generally share that last part with people.

When I was down to the last couple of bites of my dumpling, I leaned back in my chair and curled one leg underneath me. Owen was peering at his dish as though he was trying to figure out whether there could be one last morsel of chicken hidden behind it. Hercules had started his face-washing routine, spending more time that usual on the left side of his furry black and white mug.

“I need to talk to Rebecca,” I said, ticking things off on my fingers. “And I have no idea how to bring up the thefts at the store.”

Owen gave up nosing around his bowl and walked over to sit in front of the back door. He looked back over his shoulder at me and then meowed loudly.

Meanwhile, Hercules took one last pass at his face before moving across the kitchen to sit by the cupboards and stare at the one where I kept the tea.

“You two are not at all subtle,” I said.

They exchanged a look and Owen meowed again.

“Okay, I'm going,” I said. I scooped up the last bit of dumpling, then got up and headed for the living room and the telephone. I sat on the footstool and pulled the phone down beside me. As I was punching in Rebecca's number, I looked over to see Hercules watching me, head poked around the living room doorway.

Rebecca agreed to come for tea in the morning to hear all about the new books for the Reading Buddies program. She had served on the library board for years and had a soft spot for the literacy project.

Hercules followed me around while I threw in a load of laundry and did the dishes. I told him about the rest of my day and he made little murping noises that at least made it seem as though he was interested.

Later I curled up in the big chair in the bedroom and called Marcus. This was the longest we'd been apart since we'd become a couple, and I missed him like crazy. Owen stretched out across my lap while Hercules sprawled on his back on the floor, moving his paws in the air as though he were doing a halfhearted yoga routine.

If Marcus had been in town, I would have pushed Maggie to talk to him about the thefts. Not only was he a detective with the Mayville Heights Police Department, but he also knew Susan, Rebecca and Nic. The two of us had met when I'd gotten caught up in one of his cases and it had taken a long time for us to work through our differences. Marcus was the kind of person who looked at the facts and I tended to pay more attention to feelings. It had taken a case involving his sister, Hannah, for each of us to be able to see things from the other's perspective.

But Marcus was out of town at a hockey skills clinic. There wasn't anything he could do so I didn't say anything. If I couldn't figure out who had taken the missing items from the co-op store, I would nudge Mags to get him involved when he got back. So I talked about Reading Buddies and how good Maggie's pizza had been, and when I hung up, Owen's narrowed golden eyes were fixed on my face.

“Don't give me that look,” I said, scratching behind his left ear. “I didn't tell Marcus because there's nothing he can do.”

Owen continued to stare at me. I leaned forward and stared pointedly back at him. “Was there anything you did today that maybe you'd just as soon not share with me?” I said. To my amusement, Owen suddenly became very engrossed in his feet.

Rebecca arrived for tea about nine thirty the next morning. She was tiny, barely five foot three in her sock feet, with blue eyes and silver hair in a pixie cut that showed off her gorgeous cheekbones. Abigail was working for me in return for a shift I'd taken for her the week before so I didn't have to be at the library until noon.

Copies of the new books we'd received were on the table. After she'd hugged me and talked to Owen and Hercules, Rebecca sat at the table to look at the books while I made the tea.

“Wonderful choices,” she said. She held up one of the picture books. “I especially like this one with the dancing cows.”

I smiled. “We all agreed on that one. Even Susan's twins gave it a resounding yes.”

Rebecca smiled back at me. “It's always good to get the approval of your target audience.”

I set a cup of tea in front of her. “Thank you, dear,” she said. She took a sip and nodded her approval. “I'm glad you called me. I wanted to talk to you about Reading Buddies. Everett and I would like to throw an end-of-school party for the children next month. I'm sorry, I know it's short notice.”

“I don't know what to say,” I said, smiling across the table at her.

I'd put a plate of cut-up fruit on the table because I knew Rebecca had been instructed by her doctor to restrain her sweet tooth a little. “Well, that's easy,” she said, reaching for some apple slices. “You say ‘yes.'”

“Okay. Yes.” I gave her arm a squeeze and she beamed at me.

I was touched by the generous offer, which I suspected had originated with Rebecca. Everett was just as kindhearted as his wife, but Rebecca had an extra soft spot when it came to anything involving kids.

She leaned down for a moment to speak to Hercules, and I realized I couldn't do it. I couldn't ask her about the missing items from the co-op store because I was certain she'd had nothing to do with the thefts. It made no sense. Looking at Rebecca smiling down at Hercules, I found it hard to imagine her looking furtive while she browsed in the shop and stuffed a couple of placemats in her tote bag. There had to be some other explanation for what had happened.