“BOARD, page 19
“Well now, if you’re looking to buy costly jewelry at a discount price and don’t see what you want in the–shall we say–underground market, you just might think about looking in real jewelry stores. Too bad that all sorts of stolen items, including archeological treasures looted from sites around the world, are now offered for sale on the Internet. If you’re already searching there for jewelry, what better place for a store to post an ad? But you’re right, it could be an invitation to thieves.”
“I sure saw pictures of some fabulous stuff, beautiful almost beyond what this simple female could grasp.” She looked at Rose. “I saw a pair of cuff bracelets so loaded with emeralds, rubies, sapphires, and diamonds that there was no metal showing. And they were each over an inch wide! Stolen two years ago, never found.”
“I’d be scared to go out of the house wearing something like that,” Rose said, “and I’d feel embarrassed and almost sinful over all that show.”
“Me, too. So, Ray, do you want me to keep looking?”
“Wait until our guys have a chance to check your pendant.”
“Rose’s pendant now.”
Ray slid over in the booth and put an arm around his wife. “Carrie, I have a strong feeling neither your nor Rose will ever get to wear that necklace. You two had better shop for something more in the price range your poor husbands can afford.”
Henry said, “I hate to bring this evening to a close, but Carrie and I plan to be on the road fairly early in the morning. Ray, will you keep in touch about the pendant? We took a picture of it before we brought it to you tonight, in case that might be of use to us, but would you e-mail me an official photo when you have one? Carrie and I will probably make a trip to Van Buren to consult with Sgt. Burke in the near future. I’d like to know more about the necklace before we go there, and also know what’s pending between the sergeant and Ms. Lively.”
“You’ve got it. Hey buddy, thanks for the wonderful evening. I echo Rose’s request that you come back for a visit soon. Until I retire, it’ll be easier for you to travel than for us.”
“We do expect you at Blackberry Hollow whenever you can make it,” Carrie said, “though it’s nothing like Kansas City.”
“And that’s not all bad,” Ray said. “We look forward to a visit.”
* * *
“I’ll be glad to get home,” Carrie said as they crossed the border from Missouri into Arkansas, “but I sure did like staying at that bed and breakfast. I wonder what they charge for regular guests?”
“I asked,” Henry told her. “Rounds off to $350 a night and up, plus extras, of course.”
“Ouch.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Wonder if we could manage to need police protection on our next trip to Kansas City?”
“Don’t even think it. You want a potty stop yet?”
“Nope, I’m good ‘til we get home.”
Henry pulled into their garage an hour later and, after they finished unloading the car, he said, “I’m going to fix a Pepsi; you want something to drink?”
“Thanks, I’ll join you as soon as I hang these things in the closet.”
He was back almost immediately. “Cara, could you come to the kitchen for a minute?”
“Coming. What’s up?”
When she joined him, he pointed to a few tiny brown flecks in the sink. “That’s coffee. Could you have spilled it there before we went to Kansas City?”
“No, I wasn’t in the can of coffee then. Remember, we used one-cup coffee bags that morning.”
“Oh, yeah, we did. Then how about this?” He pointed to the counter.
“How about what?”
“Here... a bit of spilled sugar. Hard to see, but you can feel it.”
“Henry, I don’t put sugar in my coffee, as you know. Why do you ask?”
“I just wanted to be sure before… well, I wonder if someone was in the house while we were gone. Were Shirley or Eleanor coming in to check on things?”
“No. Could it have been a mouse or something? FatCat wasn’t here.”
“Not that kind of mess. I think we’d better give the house a good search, including a look in all the drawers and storage boxes. You’d best check your own stuff. I can’t be sure how normal would look. See if everything is just like you left it.”
“Well okay, but why survey the whole house over a bit of spilled sugar and coffee?”
“Because, my love, thieves as well as law-enforcement people know that homeowners often hide jewelry and other small, expensive items in ice cube trays, cans of coffee, and kitchen canisters. Unexplained spilled sugar and a few scattered coffee grounds say to me someone with that knowledge searched through our kitchen, and it’s easy to assume they were looking for the pendant. When that person or persons didn’t find it in the kitchen, they would have gone through the rest of the house. They didn’t intend for us to know they’d been here, that’s why we didn’t catch on right away.”
“How could they get in the house? The windows and doors are okay. Everything was closed and locked when we got home.”
“I know. But my key ring was on the desk by our computer when we left the room during that fake fire alarm. Someone in the know could have made an impression of our house key and had it duplicated. Very easy in and out. Leaving the keys there didn’t worry me earlier because I couldn’t see why anyone would notice or care. But now....”
“I’ll call a locksmith right away.”
“Person who did this won’t be back, but that’s a good idea anyway.”
She knew she sounded calm–simply taking a wise step in the face of what had happened. The weeping and wailing were all inside her head. Someone had been inside her home and probably went through most of her possessions. Where had this person searched, what did he touch?
She wondered if Henry would understand when she threw out the contents of all her canisters.
Calmly she asked, “How about fingerprints?”
“I’d bet there aren’t any. This thief was most certainly too smart for that. Okay, let’s search the house.”
Thirty minutes later Carrie reported the only things she noticed awry were tangled necklace chains in her jewelry chest and a scattered stack of once neatly folded panties in her underwear drawer. “But both of those could be my fault. I was in the chest and my underwear drawer when I packed for the trip. As you know, all my good jewelry is in my safe deposit box. I’m glad about that now.”
Henry said, “I don’t think the object of this search was general burglary, and I couldn’t find anything disturbed at all in my stuff. Carrie, someone sure wants that necklace back.”
“Should we phone the sheriff’s office?”
“I don’t think they’d take kindly to being called out for nothing more than a kitchen spill. But I am going to call Ray.” He went to the phone.
* * *
As soon as Ray Duncan heard Henry’s voice he said, “I was just getting ready to call you. What’s up?”
Henry explained about the search.
“Huh. This gets stickier and stickier, and your gut feeling about that pendant was right. It’s a good quality emerald, possible value at least $25,000. Came from a jewelry store in the Plaza, not a house burglary. Stolen two years ago. Most of the stuff was recovered after an anonymous tip saying where the thieves had stashed it, but the necklace and a couple more high dollar items were never found. Insurance company paid off.”
“Who worked the case?”
“Carter and his partner then, Louie Drum. Why?”
“I guess Drum’s another one I don’t remember.”
“He was in the reserves. Called up shortly after that. Died in Afghanistan.”
“Sorry to hear it. Did you catch the thieves?”
“No, not for that particular case. It dried up shortly after Carter and Drum found the stash. A lot of fairly recent jewelry thefts around here have seemed similar enough that I would have thought we were dealing with a single gang. In each of those cases we’ve ended up recovering a good portion of the stolen items but never all of them. Frustrating.”
“And you’ve caught no one?”
“I didn’t say that. Carter did get a few two-bit guys, most working singly. All of them insisted they were operating independently, and none of them admitted to being responsible for more than two of the burglaries. Some even had alibis to prove it. Each must have had inside knowledge of the places they hit, and Carter never figured out where they got that.”
“Could there be a boss over all of them? Like, say, Graham Hawkins?”
“Yeah, maybe he’s a possible. I think there’s gotta be someone over all this. It seems too slick for the guys we’ve caught. Carter disagrees with me–and with Doug Boinevich, by the way. Doug sees a mastermind over the thefts, same as I do.
“Does this apply to the museum thefts, too?”
“I don’t know. Whoever pulled those off had to be pretty darn cool since they operated in broad daylight. Lots of research there, just like the home and jewelry store burglaries here in Kansas City.”
“Have there been any recent burglaries of this type reported?”
“No, though there were a couple right after Graham’s murder.”
“Ah. A lot to think about.” After a moment’s silence, Henry said, “Have you called Sgt. Burke about Lively and the necklace yet?”
“Left that to Carter.”
“Carrie and I will go down there, probably tomorrow. I just wanted to be sure Burke knew the latest before we talked to him about coming. I don’t want to get in the way of the Van Buren PD. So, could you let me know for sure when Carter has contacted him? Then we can follow up.”
“I’ll get back to you about that ASAP, and I’m sending you a picture of the pendant.”
“Thanks. Anything else I should know?”
“Yes. Danielle never found that key and we questioned Gordon pretty closely. Put a bit of pressure on him. He denies having ever seen it. We got the museum tags from her, though, and I assume they’ll tie to one of the museum burglaries we spoke about.”
“Hm. Maybe there’s still a duplicate key somewhere in Van Buren.”
“Possible. Okay, buddy. Be careful down there. Wouldn’t hurt to carry some protection for a while. Is your retired officer’s carry permit up-to-date?”
“Yes, but....”
“Doesn’t mean you’ll have to use a gun. I just want you and Carrie to be safe, okay?”
Henry didn’t answer.
After an awkward pause, Ray Duncan closed the conversation. “Well then, I’ll sign off for now. Boinevich or I will get back to you later this afternoon about Carter’s contact with Burke.”
Henry repeated the new information to Carrie, leaving out Ray’s question about his carry permit. Following her brief “whew” over the value of the pendant, they sat in silence on their couch. Finally she said, “Uh, about Detective Carter… am I the only one with a funny feeling? Y’know, during that fire scare I saw a fireman who had a strut like Carter. Couldn’t have told who it was though, because of the helmet, face gear, and all. He did have on athletic shoes rather than boots.”
“You never mentioned that.”
“I didn’t really think about it until now.”
“I see. Yes, I see.” He frowned, leaned back on the couch, and shut his eyes.
SUSPICIOUS MINDS
Carrie, her own forehead wrinkled in perturbed contemplation, watched her husband frown for a few minutes before she decided thinking about Detective Art Carter wasn’t proving all that productive.
When she could stand the silence no longer, she said, “I think I’ll call Ms. Lively and tell her I gave the pretty cut glass pendant to a friend. I might even tell her the friend’s husband is a police chief. Or should I wait until we visit her tomorrow? What do you think?”
Henry opened his eyes and sat up straighter on the couch, still frowning. Finally he said, “I’d like to see her reaction when you tell her the pendant is out of reach. I’m sure she’s unhappy, possibly even in trouble, because she sold it for a tiny fraction of its true worth.”
“Henry, I feel sorry for her. I don’t know how she got the emerald, but obviously she had no more idea than I about the value.”
“I’m sure she didn’t, and she won’t know yet that we are aware it’s not costume jewelry. But tracing the necklace back to its source would certainly give the guys in Kansas City valuable information, and I’m hoping we can do that through her. Maybe saying you gave it away will startle her enough that, before she has time to think things through, she’ll drop her estate sale story and tell us where the emerald really came from, or at least identify who sold it to her. She may want to impress on us the importance of returning it. I’m sure whoever supplied her with the piece is saying she needs to get it back from you.”
Carrie stared at Henry, searching for hope behind his words and not finding it. “She’s not in danger is she?”
“I wouldn’t think so, but someone else has gotten involved quite recently since she didn’t know the value of the pendant when she sold it to you. I think our mastermind learned she’d sold it and what the selling price was. He must have told her to get it back, even though it could have been his mistake–or Graham Hawkins’s–that she had it in the first place. I’m guessing it was mixed in with a lot of costume jewelry, perhaps as a clever way to hide it.”
“You’re talking recent time. Does that mean you’ve ruled out Cousin Graham?”
“A living mastermind is still very much in evidence.”
“Gordon doesn’t fit the mastermind image, does he?”
“No. Danielle is smart enough and ambitious enough to fit the part, but from what you’ve said, I’m leaving her out of consideration, at least for now.”
“Carter?”
“I just don’t know, Carrie. I hate thinking about that, but there are... peculiarities.”
She changed the subject.” We still don’t know whether or not Jenni Lively is providing a willing outlet for stolen merchandise.”
“True, but remember, somehow she knew or learned that Gordon’s cousin was the dead man on the riverbank. How? And why didn’t she tell the police rather than calling Gordon?
“I’d like to find out how Carter and Burke plan to proceed before we get too nosy with her or anyone else. We’ll see what Ray can tell us when he calls. But, no matter what, I see nothing wrong in going to Van Buren in response to Lively’s call asking for the return of the pendant. That’s our personal business.
“Are either the Booths or Stacks available tomorrow? I think appearing in a group might be more daunting to Ms. Lively than just the two of us walking in her store. She can’t keep her eyes on everyone while you or I talk with her and the rest fan out to look over her stock. If she knows what’s been going on, she might think we’re searching for stolen items.”
“Not to mention there’s safety in numbers?”
“That, too. But I don’t anticipate trouble or I wouldn’t invite others to go along. After all, we haven’t the power to arrest anyone.”
“Does Mastermind know that?”
“Of course.”
“Will Mastermind consider us a threat?”
And that was the problem jabbing at Henry, though he said nothing.
She looked at him, brow furrowed, then said. “When I phoned to tell Eleanor we were home, she was almost too busy to talk. She said they were preparing for a big wedding and reception on Saturday. Jason is helping her start the set-up tomorrow. I don’t know about the Booths, but we need to drive down there anyway, give them our gifts, and pick up FatCat.”
“Good. I’m looking forward to seeing Roger’s reaction to the steamboat book.”
As soon as they started down the hill toward Walden Creek and the Booth’s farm, Carrie said, “Look! Color is beginning to show on top of the bluffs. Some yellow, and there’s orange and red in the tupelo-gum.
Henry didn’t answer. He was still thinking about Mastermind.
Roger came out of the dairy barn and waved while Carrie was shooing a couple of cows away from the Booth’s front gate. He walked toward the house as Henry pulled the car through and Carrie fastened the gate. As soon as they were parked and out of the car, Roger said, “Sorry about the reception committee. Lulu has just been bred for the first time, and Mary Belle is here to keep her company. Dang bull chased Lulu all over the barnyard and she didn’t take kindly to his attentions.”
“Did he—?” Henry began.
“Oh, yeah. Got her cornered, but right now she’s mad at all of us. I brought Mary Belle in to help calm her down. We’ll see how things went in a few weeks.”
He sat in a chair on the wide porch and pulled off his boots, replacing them with worn leather house slippers. “Y’all come on in. Smells like Shirley’s baking cookies.”
In a couple of minutes the four of them were seated at the Booth’s kitchen table enjoying the spicy-sweet fragrance of oatmeal cookies Shirley deemed “too hot to eat yet.” While they were waiting, Carrie opened her tote bag, handed a box with the button pin in it to Shirley, put two steamboat mugs on the scrubbed oak table, and gave Henry’s purchase, Steamboats on the Western Rivers by Louis C. Hunter, to Roger.
“Well now, this is great,” Roger said. “These here steamboats on the cover have smokestacks that look about the size of the pipe we saw in the middle of that island. But, why ‘western rivers?’”
“Seems odd to us now,” Henry said, “but Hunter is referring to the west as people living in the east defined it in the mid-19th century. It wasn’t just Montana and Wyoming, buffalo and American Indians. The Mississippi Valley was ‘west’ to many people. Look in the index under ‘Arkansas.’”
