Deb Baker - Goodbye Dolly

Shouldn't she be home right this minute, answering business calls and repairing dolls? Piles of unfinished broken dolls didn't put food on the table, or give her the income necessary to get her own place. You're still living with your mother, she reminded herself. Time to grow up and move out. Gretchen entered the Biltmore Fashion Park with Nimrod riding in her purse and walked briskly through the exclusive mall until she found what she was looking for. Ricardo's Fine Jewelry.

Young, fashionably bejeweled women helped customers from behind resplendent display cases.

"Nimrod, hide," she commanded as she entered the store. Nimrod ducked down.

She strode past the glistening cases and toothy sales staff to the back of the store, where an elderly man with coke-bottle eyeglasses sat stooped over a cluttered worktable. "Can I help you?" he said, reluctantly glancing up from a Rolex watch he was repairing.

"I have a hypothetical question," Gretchen said, wondering how best to approach the subject. The truth would take too long to explain, and besides, he would write her off as a kook. She almost didn't believe what she was thinking. Okay, so a small fib was the best tactic. "A bet I have going with a friend."

He looked at her questioningly.

"If a little doll, a hollow doll, about this big," said Gretchen, holding her forefinger and thumb apart to approximate three inches, "was filled with diamonds, would it be heavy enough to alert anyone who handled it that something was inside?"

The jeweler frowned. At first, Gretchen thought he might dismiss her as crazy or-worse-a potential thief.

Maybe he had an alarm button under the table like a bank teller and was alerting the police at this very moment. After a long pause to size her up, the jeweler said, "Not necessarily. It would be relatively light, hard to detect by a casual observer. Even one who might hold it. That is, as long as the diamonds were secured so they weren't rattling around inside." He rose from the table. "Not a likely scenario though."

"Why not?" She felt Nimrod stirring in the bottom of the purse. He liked the game of hide, but he was easily distracted. Gretchen dug a liver snap out of one of her pockets and casually dropped it into the purse.

The jeweler looked through his magnification glasses at the purse, then over the top of them at her.

"Why isn't it likely?" she asked again.

"A doll filled with diamonds would be worth an immense fortune. Who would own that many diamonds?"

"How many diamonds could a doll that size hold? Hypothetically."

"Ten or twelve fine diamonds could fit easily into a doll that size and could be worth a million dollars or more, depending on their size, brilliancy, and clarity."

"So a doll filled with diamonds could be worth multimillions."

"Correct. Hypothetically, as you say."

"Thank you, you've been a big help."

Gretchen smiled at him broadly to express her gratitude.

"Well?" he said.

"Well, what?"

"Who won?"

For a moment, Gretchen didn't understand his question. Then she remembered the imaginary bet.

"I did," she said. "I won."

A million dollars or more. A fine, sparkling jewel of a motive. A million plausible reasons for murder.

Like winning the lottery.

Gretchen thought back on all the things that had happened to her in the last few days: the scorpion, the killer's use of her hobby knife, the messages that continued to arrive addressed to her. She sincerely hoped she would win. It was apparent that the killer thought she was close to either the diamonds or the truth-or both-and he was taking steps to stop her. She had to win. Or at the very least, come out of this unharmed. As she stepped out into the warm desert night, Gretchen opened the poodle-embroidered purse and praised Nimrod for remaining out of sight. His furry body bounced to the top of the purse, and Gretchen fed him another treat. All she wanted to do was walk away. But how? She hadn't asked for any part of this, but she was into it up to her neck, like quicksand, and she was sinking fast. The truth, and that alone, would save her.

"I don't know what you're doing here," Nina said through clenched teeth. "Can't you see this is a private dining room? And look at the way you're dressed."

"I'm not staying long," Gretchen said, extremely conscious of her wrinkled shorts and inappropriate footwear. Flip-flops were acceptable nearly everywhere these days, but as Gretchen looked around her at the opulence of the Praying Monk, the Phoenician's finest private dining room, she could think of one exception. She sat down and buried her feet under the table, sliding the tapestry-covered chair Eric provided closer to the table.

Nina gasped when she noticed Gretchen's purse. "Please don't tell me Nimrod's in there." She clutched her heart.

"All right, Nina, I won't. You look lovely."

Nina shot her a look. "You could have left him at home with Daisy."

The entree dishes had been quickly removed, and coffee and creme brulee arrived with an extra spoon for Gretchen. Eric pointed up at the barrel-vaulted ceiling. "Wonderful design, isn't it?" he said.

"I don't mean to interrupt your evening," Gretchen said, after agreeing with him, "but I hope you don't mind answering a few questions."

Nina snorted. "Couldn't you wait until tomorrow?"

"I don't mind." Eric patted Nina's hand comfortingly.

"Tell me about Percy's history," Gretchen said. "Where did his family's fortune come from?"

"Ah, you've heard the rumors."

Gretchen nodded.

"The story goes that his father made his fortune as a profiteer during the war. That part of the O'Connor past has been confirmed by local historians, an indisputable fact, and was the main reason why Percy could never be accepted in certain Boston social circles. Black marketeering was an unsavory profession, at best, when the country was working together to ration scarce supplies. Whether his father really converted his wealth into diamonds is strictly hearsay, and a bit unrealistic, I imagine."

"One report suggested that the O'Connors hid diamonds inside of Kewpie dolls." Gretchen dipped into the creme brulee that Eric offered her, recalling that she hadn't eaten anything for hours.

Eric laughed. "Nonsense. What report was that?"

"She doesn't remember offhand," Nina said. "Do you, Gretchen?"

Gretchen felt a sharp heel grinding into the top of her foot, warning her that Nina had reached the end of her patience. Gretchen felt a stab of shame that she was about to bring Nina's evening to an abrupt closure.

"Pretty quiet in that purse," Nina observed. "If he wakes up and causes a ruckus, I'll never live down the embarrassment."

"You could never embarrass me," Eric said to her with a warm smile. "You are the epitome of grace and charm."

Gretchen took a sip of coffee.

"You know," Eric said, rubbing his plump chin in thought, "I recall hearing once of documents hidden in dolls. A United States citizen spying for the Japanese sent damaging information regarding our ships at Pearl Harbor via messages inside of dolls. The FBI finally caught on, and she was arrested."

"How does Percy fit into that?" Nina said.

"He doesn't." Eric sipped his coffee. "I'm simply saying it's been done, and there's a certain fascination among the general populace regarding that whole subject of dolls and hidden secrets. Your suggestion might not be as farfetched as I originally thought." His eyes widened. "Oh. I see where this is going. A smashed Kewpie doll was found in the study along with Percy's body. Do you suppose the doll contained diamonds? The police didn't find anything missing. Perhaps that was the motive."

"That's my best guess," Gretchen said. "Only the killer didn't actually find any diamonds."