Deb Baker - Dolly Departed

"She's really nice. Don't be mad, but I started out being friendly with her to make you jealous."

Gretchen knew exactly what to say next. "Well, it worked. I thought you'd abandoned me."

"Never, dear. We're adults, and I like Britt. You and I should be able to handle other people in other lives without letting it affect our friendship."

Gretchen nodded. Finally! Great words of wisdom.

"There you are." Caroline led Britt into the kitchen and offered her a seat and a cup of coffee. Britt held the box of dolls in her hands. "We were talking about the dolls," Caroline said, pouring coffee, "and thought you'd like to be part of the conversation."

Britt's face was flushed when she said, "I don't understand who would do this to my dolls. Surely not Charlie."

"She created the room boxes," Gretchen replied. "And at least two of them are murder scenes, the one we've identified as Lizzie Borden's home and another one of a backyard where there's blood on the ground and on the steps leading into the building."

"Tell Gretchen what you told me," Caroline said. Britt inhaled, a ragged breath, and blew it out. "Charlie was very specific about the dolls she wanted. I remember her instructions to the letter. One male: tall, thin, white-haired, middle-aged; one female: same age, short, slightly obese."

Gretchen and Caroline exchanged looks. "The Bordens," Caroline said.

"And the other dolls?" Gretchen asked.

"She gave me more leeway. A male with the dignity of the clergy, a woman who would pass as a woman of the street, a choir girl, and the last one."

She glanced up at her waiting audience. "The last one would be male, well-heeled, powerful. And he must, she insisted, have a look of extreme anguish on his face. Other than that, I could sculpt him however I wished."

"A look of anguish?" Nina said, perplexed. "Why?"

"I asked her that. She said it was a surprise." Britt's fingers skimmed across the damage to her dolls. "I wanted to get these back as mementos of my last work for Charlie. But why would I want them like this? This is the only one that is still intact, and look at him!"

Britt held up the male doll she had created for her friend. The excruciating pain on his face was unmistakable.

Britt and Nina went off together, leaving Gretchen and her mother alone in the workshop. "I have an idea," Gretchen said, arranging the street signs in a row next to the computer they used for their doll repair business. "Let's search the other signs and see what comes up."

She keyed in one of the addresses. "Twenty-nine Hanbury Street. A London address." The search engine gave her a list of possibilities. She clicked on the first one, while Caroline looked over her shoulder.

"Jack the Ripper's second victim was killed at that address," Gretchen said, not sure whether to be proud of her sleuthing abilities or saddened by Charlie's obsession.

"Look! The dilapidated backyard."

Without a word of explanation, Caroline hurried from the room. Gretchen was about to go after her to see if she had broken down in tears and needed comforting, but she returned as quickly as she left. And she had Britt's dolls in her hands. "This must be the one." She selected the slashed woman. "And the bloody knife must be part of that display."

Gretchen keyed in another address, the one on Elm Street. "Arsenic Anna."

"I'm not familiar with that murder," Caroline said. "Although I've heard the name."

Gretchen read aloud. "In the 1930s, a woman named Anna Marie Hahn posed as a nurse as a way to care for wealthy, elderly men, who had no living relatives. Each of them died from arsenic poisoning. Four in all before she was captured and convicted."

"That's horrible," Caroline said. "And explains the facial features on the male doll. Death by poison."

Again Gretchen entered a street name. De Russey's Lane.

"The Hall-Mills murders," Caroline read over Gretchen's shoulder. "An Episcopal priest and a choir girl were found dead under a crab apple tree. Both had been shot in the head. Torn-up letters were found between them."

"The ripped pieces of paper we put in the unknown pile," Gretchen said.

Caroline held up two more dolls while she read the victims' descriptions. "Eleanor Mills wore a blue dress with red polka dots and black stockings."

The doll was dressed exactly as the description of the poor murdered girl.

"A blue velvet hat lay beside her."

"Another unknown piece placed." Gretchen remembered the little hat. Charlie created four room boxes to represent famous murder scenes. Why would she do that? What did she hope to accomplish by inviting guests to view such horror?

"What do these murders have in common?" Caroline asked, puzzled. "How did she pick her settings? Jack the Ripper and Lizzie Borden are very famous murders. Arsenic Anna not quite as well known, and I've never heard of the Hall-Mills murders."

"Let me check each one again." Gretchen did additional searches to read the cases more thoroughly. Caroline worked on a cracked bisque doll at the worktable. Nimrod dozed on the floor, while Wobbles graced them with his presence for a few minutes, licking his coat.

"I've got it!" Gretchen shouted, startling both animals.

"Charlie chose unsolved murders-Lizzie Borden was acquitted, Jack the Ripper was never identified, and the priest and choir girl's murderer was never found."

"And Arsenic Anna?" Caroline asked.

"Was electrocuted for her crimes. But she was the only one who used poison. Maybe Nina's right," Gretchen said.

"She thought the kitchen was very important."

It was time to take a peek at a few kitchens. But Gretchen didn't say it out loud.

Bernard Waites lived on Twelfth Street in a brick ranch with white wood trim.

"That's his truck in the carport," Gretchen said. "He was driving it the day he came to return my checkbook."

She noted that the sun was rapidly setting and checked her watch. A little after five o'clock.

Nina stopped the car across the street. "Why did he steal a check, then cash it and return the checkbook? Wouldn't he have been better off just keeping your checkbook or throwing it away?"

"He claimed he was borrowing the money and was going to return it to my account before I noticed."

"He decided to take out a loan?" Nina shook her head.

"Is the entire world crazy?"

"Looks that way."

"What if he's home from the hospital?"

"He isn't. I called the hospital. He's still there."

Nina swung her head toward the house. "What's the plan?"

"I thought you might have one."

"Search his house and take a look at the kitchen."

"Let's go."

Nina tipped her head toward the backseat. "I'm the puppy sitter. You're the investigator."

"You're making this up as you go."

"You bet."

"Mom will kill me if she finds out what we're doing."

"I'm not going to tell her."

There wasn't any sign of activity at the house. Bernard had taken an ambulance ride after the bug juice blew up, which accounted for the parked truck. All Gretchen had to do was slip around to the back of the house and peek through the kitchen window. How hard could that be?

"Okay," she said. "I'm not breaking and entering, but I'll look in the window. That's all."

Nina nodded in approval. "How hard can it be?" she said, echoing what Gretchen was thinking. Her aunt was starting to scare her. Maybe there really was something to all her quirky psychic beliefs. No. Impossible. Gretchen opened the car door, eased it closed, and trotted across the street. She had forgotten about Phoenix's passion for privacy walls. No one in the enormous desert community wanted snoopy neighbors spying on them, so they built walls to keep them out. Walls also kept snakes and wild animals from appearing on doorsteps.