Dolly Departed - By Deb Baker Page 0,27

seems a little strong. I gently suggested it."

"Gently suggested it?" Men really were impossible to deal with.

"You're right. I don't want you anywhere near Charlie Maize's shop. But since you refuse to listen, please tell me that you're almost done."

"We're sorting through the pieces, deciding which room box each of them goes into. It wouldn't take long if my mother and I were the only ones working on it. Instead, the shop is filled with small animals and several people who are in the way more than they are helping."

"Well, there's more safety in numbers. Keep it that way. All I'm asking is that you remain alert."

"You're making too much of it."

"That's my job. To expect the worst."

The food came, temporarily distracting them.

"Anyway," Gretchen said between mouthfuls, "none of us knows what the room boxes represent. Based on the detail pieces that go into them, they're all from different time periods. There doesn't seem to be a common theme."

"Are you trying to read too much into them? I heard that Charlie was a bit odd toward the end. It might just be a hodgepodge."

Gretchen remembered the miniature street signs. She had shoved them into her purse, thinking she would ask around or check a phone directory later. Now she drew them out.

"We found these on the floor. I was meaning to ask mom if she recognized any of them, but then I became distracted." By him!

She handed over the tiny green street signs. "At least the signs are all the same, green with yellow lettering. They're the only things in the group that are consistent."

"Twenty-nine Hanbury Street." Matt read each one aloud.

"De Russey's Lane, Seventeen seventeen Elm Street, Number Ninety-two Second Street. Four room boxes?" His eyes pierced hers. "Each with a street sign?"

"Five room boxes, actually. But we aren't sure the fifth one is part of the display."

Matt handed the tiny signs back. "I know every corner of this city. None of those addresses are familiar to me."

"Any suspects yet?"

"We're working on it. Nobody claims to have seen Charlie on Saturday morning. Britt Gleeland had dinner with her the night before and saw nothing unusual in Charlie's manner. Britt's daughter went by the shop to drop off some miniature flower arrangements, but it was locked up. She looked through the window and saw nothing unusual."

Gretchen watched Matt carefully. She saw concern etched on his face.

"Wrap it up soon," she said.

"That's the plan."

"I could hardly wait for the two gigglers to leave," April said from a stool at the Mini Maize checkout counter.

"They went out for a late lunch, and I don't expect them back anytime soon."

Gretchen released Nimrod from her purse, and he trotted off, sniffing around the edges of Charlie's display cabinets.

"What a pair," Caroline said from a seat at a card table that Gretchen had set up after finding it folded in the corner of the storage room. Piles of room box furnishings covered the square table.

Nina's friendship with Britt Gleeland certainly had come on fast and furious. Gretchen hoped her aunt wouldn't share any confidential information with Britt. She regretted opening her own big mouth. Now the secret about Charlie's poisoning threatened to spread like valley fever. The two sisters had both died in agony. It gave Gretchen the creeps just thinking about what they went through. She was glad that April and her mother were still at the shop to keep her company.

"April and I decided to take pictures of the room boxes," Caroline said. "Before and after photographs."

"But neither of us can figure out how to use the camera part of our phones." April chuckled. "You're the only one of us that isn't technology challenged."

Gretchen pulled her cell phone from her purse. "Smile."

She took April's picture, then showed it to her friend. April sighed. "I've lost five pounds, but you'd never know it. I have another hundred to go."

"One day at a time. Smile, Mom."

Caroline turned away from the camera's eye. "Not me!

The room boxes."

Gretchen took pictures of the empty room boxes. After each snapshot, she checked it for clarity on the small phone screen.

"Joseph Reiner stopped by while you were gone," April said, wiping grime and footprints from a little mahogany bed frame. "He was extremely upset by Charlie's death. He broke down and cried twice in the short time he was here."

"I'm sorry I missed him." Gretchen had lost a convenient opportunity to ask the Joseph's Dream Doll shop owner about his presence at the parade. She still wondered why he hadn't