At Wick's End (Book 1 in the Candlemaking Mysteries) (16 page)

“
No blood, no foul,” I
said. “I’m just sorry I couldn’t help you.”

“
I’d like to do more as a
way of apologizing,” he said. “Let me think. Is there any legal
representation I can handle for you?”

“
Nobody’s suing me that I
know of,” I said, trying to take some of the somber tone out of the
conversation. “At least not yet.”

He thought a moment, then said, “I know, I
can draft your new will for you. Now that you’re a man of some
substance, you’ll want to make certain things are taken care of if
something should happen to you. I’d be honored to tender my
services free of charge.”

“
I appreciate the offer,
but to be honest with you, I don’t know who I’d leave my things to.
I’m the last Black left, at least from my particular branch of the
family tree.”

The attorney nodded. “If you should change
your mind, I’d be delighted to help. The offer has no expiration
date.”

I offered my hand. “I appreciate the
gesture.”

He nodded and left as I added a little more
cream to my coffee.

As I did, I looked up to see Millie smiling
at me. “What’s so amusing?” I asked.

“
I feel like the Red Queen.
I’ve seen two things today I never thought possible, and it’s not
even 9 am yet.”

“
Okay, I’ll bite. What are
they?”

“
A lawyer offering
something for free, and a lunatic turning him down.”

I grinned at her. “You never know, I might
just need him if anybody ever sues me.”

“
Let’s hope it doesn’t come
to that. I hear you’re cat-sitting,” she added as I was nearly to
the door.

“
Mrs. Quimby came by, I
take it.”

She laughed. “Come on, Harrison, you’re
spoiling my reputation as a psychic.”

I said, “I won’t tell a soul,” as I left to
open At Wick’s End.

To my surprise, Eve was already there, a
good hour before we were due to open.

Now what in the world was she up to?

I unlocked the door, intent on seeing what
Eve was doing, when I heard the chime go off above my head. In all
honesty, I’d forgotten all about it when I’d decided to slip
inside.

Eve looked up at the sound, and was
flustered a moment before she could speak.

“
Good morning, Harrison,”
she said.

“
You’re in awfully early,”
I replied, trying to keep my voice casual. “Are you trying to show
me up?”

She frowned slightly, then said, “I wanted
to check on our inventories so I could order before we opened. I
hope you don’t mind.”

“
No, it’s a great idea. In
fact, I’ll give you a hand. I made a preliminary list
yesterday.”

“
It’s not necessary,” she
said, a little more forcefully than was required. “I’m nearly
finished, and I’m sure your list will just duplicate parts of mine.
I can handle this myself.”

“
I insist. I’ve got to
learn how to run my own candle shop.”

She started to cloud up, and I quickly
added, “If I’m ever going to be able to operate this place without
calling you every two minutes, I need to learn how to do everything
myself.”

I walked back to the storage room before she
could stop me and found a dozen boxes on the floor, all moved off
the top shelves.

“
It looks like a hurricane
went through here.”

Eve said, “That’s another reason I came in
early. Items are always falling behind the boxes. We find them
later, after we’ve ordered duplicates we don’t need. Belle and I
started pulling the top inventories once a month to make sure we
weren’t missing anything.”

I shook my head. “There’s got to be a better
way to do inventory than that.”

“
I’m just an employee,” she
said with a slight nod. “It’s your store.”

“
I’ll look into it,” I
said, making the hundredth mental note since I’d taken over the
shop. “In the meantime, let me give you a hand getting this back
into some kind of order.”

We had things straightened out again soon
enough, with everything back in its rightful place. There were
three packs of wicks, one expensive rubber mold, a few scraps of
paper and a handful of votive candle forms lodged behind the
boxes.

“
This won’t take long to
place, it’s hardly big enough for you to bother with,” Eve said as
she studied the list.

“
I’d still like to do it
myself, if you don’t mind. The quicker I learn, the better off I’ll
be.”

She handed me the list and said, “You’re
welcome to it.”

“
Hey, I could use a
walk-through first,” I said, sorry I’d offended her yet again. “I
don’t even know who to call.”

“
I’m sure you’ll have no
problem at all, there’s a list of our vendors by the telephone. Now
if you’ll excuse me, I have other work to do before we
open.”

As Eve started straightening the shelves out
front, I stared after her. Most likely Belle had let her place the
orders herself, but if I was going to get a handle on running the
business, I had to know how to do everything in the store. I
probably should have handled it more diplomatically, but I couldn’t
do anything about that at the moment. When things settled down, I’d
try to make things right with Eve.

I dialed the number of our supplier and was
waiting for someone to pick up when there was a knock at the office
door. Good, it appeared that Eve had reconsidered and had decided
to give me a hand.

Pearly stuck his head in and said, “We need
to talk, Harrison.”

“
I’m kind of busy right
now, Pearly.”

“
I can see that, but it
would still be in your best interests to make that call
later.”

I hung up the phone and asked, “What’s
up?”

“
Harrison, you don’t know
me all that well, but I’m not one to overreact to situations.
Still, there’s something going on here that requires your
attention.” He paused a moment, then added, “I’m beginning to
suspect this new tenant Markum is up to something.”

“
What makes you think
that?” I asked, suddenly forgetting all about the supply
order.

“
Last night I was upstairs
adding a new dead-bolt lock to Cragg’s office when I saw the oddest
thing. Markum didn’t notice me, I was on the inside of Cragg’s
office with the door cracked. He walked up the stairs with a bag
slung over one shoulder, and from the strain on his face, I’ll
wager there was a heavy load in that duffel.”

“
He’s into salvage, Pearly.
It could have been anything.”

“
I might concur if that
were all.  However, I needed a different tool from my truck
for the installation, and as I walked by his office, I heard him on
the telephone.” Pearly colored slightly. “Now I wasn’t
eavesdropping, but he’d neglected to close his door, and the man’s
voice does have a way of carrying.”

“
What did you hear?” I
asked, in spite of the invasion of privacy If Markum had anything
to do with Belle’s death, I wanted to know about it. Courtesies,
even legalities, didn’t bother me much if they stood in the way of
me finding the truth.

“
There was quite a bit of
shouting.  I caught references to payments being late, and
then there were some questions about glass for sale.”

“
Glass?” That got my
attention. “What else did he say about that?”

“
Just that some of it had
to be cut first. I assumed that part had something to do with a
broken window, but the rest of the argument was quite
forceful.”

“
I’ll talk to him tonight,”
I promised.

“
Fair enough, that would
ease my mind.” Pearly paused, then added, “I’m as level a man as
you’ll most likely find, Harrison, but there’s something in the air
around River’s Edge lately, and I can’t for the life of me figure
out what it is.”

It was murder, I thought, but I kept it to
myself. Pearly was absolutely one of my least likely suspects in
the search for my great-aunt’s killer, but I couldn’t let the fact
that I liked him impede my judgment. I liked just about everyone at
River’s Edge, with the possible exception of Gary Cragg. Markum
seemed like a straightforward fellow with a good disposition, but
that didn’t exclude him either. It would be hard to imagine Millie
or Heather or Eve doing anything to Belle, but that didn’t take
them off my list. Until I could prove otherwise, every last one of
them was a legitimate suspect.

The only problem was that my list kept
growing with suspects as I added new people, but I never managed to
eliminate anyone. If I couldn’t discover who was involved in
Belle’s death, maybe I could start from the other end and try to
eliminate some of the suspects I had.

It was bound to be better than my current
approach.

By nightfall I hoped to speak with Markum
about that glass. I’d read enough mysteries to know that it was
also a term used as slang for diamonds, and I had a sneaking
suspicion I knew what that might be connected with.

I still had a little time before we opened
the candle shop, so I told Eve I’d be back before we opened and
returned to The Crocked Pot. Millie was just finishing up with a
customer when I decided it was time to try to strike her off my
list.

“
What’s the matter,
Harrison, did you forget something?”

“
Do you have a second?” I
asked her.

“
For you? I’ve got all the
time in the world.” As Millie said it, she polished the top of the
counter with her rag.

“
If you don’t mind, I’d
like to ask you a question.”

Her ever-present smile dimmed as she nodded.
“Okay by me. Fire away.”

“
Were you around River’s
Edge the night Belle died?”

She looked shocked by the question. “What an
odd question. Why do you want to know that?”

“
Honestly? I was hoping
maybe you noticed something, or saw someone hanging around who
shouldn’t have been here that night.” If she gave me a positive
answer, I’d know whether Millie had been there herself without
asking her for an alibi directly.

Millie pondered a moment, then said, “I
know, I was with George at the baseball game. He’s a fanatic for
the Ridge Runners, and it was their first home playoff game. Their
last one too, I might add, the dear boys didn’t do well.”

So Millie was out with a crowd of three
thousand other folks at our local single A baseball team’s
game.

I said, “Was there anyone in Belle’s life
most folks around here wouldn’t have known about?”

Millie shook her head, then said, “I don’t
think so.”

“
If you come up with any
names outside of River’s Edge, let me know, okay?”

“
I’ll do it.”

“
Thanks.” If I did as
Pearly had suggested and went with my gut, Millie had to be ruled
out as a suspect. It would be easy enough to check to see if she’d
really been to the game, but I wasn’t about to do it unless she
gave me the slightest reason to suspect her.

It was time for me to get to work. I headed
back to the candle shop and dove into the day, even venturing out
from behind the cash register now and then to actually help a few
customers myself. Eve was never more than a few steps away, but she
showed remarkable restraint by letting me handle things myself.

By that afternoon, I was starting to get the
hang of running At Wick’s End. We were nearly ready to close for
the day when Eve asked, “Did they say when our order would
ship?”

“
Order?” I asked as I went
through the stack of credit card receipts.

“
Don’t tell me you’ve
forgotten already. I’m talking about the order you placed for the
store this morning. You did call it in, didn’t you?”

“
Blast it all, I got
distracted. I’ll go do it right now.”

Eve looked at the clock and said, “They’re
already closed for the day.” She looked pointedly at me as she
added, “That’s because they open so early in the morning, before
the stores get busy and don’t have time to call.”

“
I’ll phone them first
thing tomorrow,” I said, feeling my face burn.

Eve didn’t answer, and I knew I’d earned her
disapproval yet again. That was just too bad. I was about to throw
another log on the fire.

When I asked Eve where she’d been the night
Belle died, giving the same reason I had to Millie, she said, “I
was home alone. How terrible that Belle had to die that way,
without another soul around her.”

That was exactly what I was trying to find
out. “Did you get any calls or visitors that night?”

Eve shook her head. “My evenings are
solitary, Harrison. Honestly, that’s the way I like it after
dealing with our customers all day. There are times when I turn the
telephone ringer off and ignore my doorbell.”

So far nobody was willing to admit they’d
been within ten miles of River’s Edge, but I still didn’t believe
Belle fell off that ladder on her own.

Eve and I were nearly ready to lock up for
the night when Mrs. Jorgenson came in. She looked around the empty
store, then said, “Mr. Black, would you mind walking me out to my
car? There’s something I’d like to discuss with you.”

“
Was there a problem with
your bill?” I asked, worried that I had indeed overcharged her for
the lessons. Eve looked like she was going to pass out.

“
No, it’s nothing like
that. This is a personal matter.”