Клео Коул - On What Grounds

He stepped up to me, emphasizing his height in that towering way again. “Another time,” he said flatly.

“On the house,” I offered, craning my neck backward. God, I thought, if his wife is as short as me, she must need neck traction every night.

“No sign of forced entry here,” he said to the young officers. “Let’s go.” He led us back into the service staircase, pausing at the second door on the landing. “Where does this go?”

“My duplex. It’s one flight up. There’s an entrance to the private stairway here. There’s also a separate entrance on an outside stairway leading up from the back garden.”

“Do you keep this door locked?”

“Of course.”

The detective reached into his pocket, put a latex glove on his right hand, and tried the door. It didn’t budge. He examined the frame. “Locked. Okay, let’s go back down.”

We descended the service stairs and returned to the main room.

“I’m going to check the back alley,” Quinn said and went out the front door and toward the back. I watched his lanky form disappear around the corner and turned to the young officers.

“Quinn’s a pretty serious detective, isn’t he?”

Langley laughed. Demetrios grunted.

“What’s so funny?” I asked.

“If you only knew,” said Demetrios.

“Knew what?”

“It’s like this,” said Langley. “Quinn’s the guy who put a Proverbs saying up in the Sixth’s detective squad room. He wrote it out in that real ornate kind of writing—it’s like his hobby—what’s it called? You know—”

“Calligraphy,” said Demetrios.

“I don’t understand,” I said.

“You would if you read the saying,” said Langley.

“Well, what does it say exactly?” I asked.

Langley glanced at Demetrios, whose black eyes glanced down and then back up with the sort of deadly serious look reserved for city morgues.

“‘If a man is burdened with the blood of another, let him be a fugitive until death. Let no one help him.’”

The front door opened again; Quinn was back.

“See anything?” I asked.

“No sign of attempted forced entry or anything else out of the ordinary in the alley—just this.”

Quinn’s long legs reached me in a few strides across the wood-plank floor. With a latex-gloved hand, he held out a torn piece of thick paper printed with heavy black ink.

“JFK,” I read aloud.

Langley took a look. “It’s one of those airport luggage tags.”

“Not a smudge or footprint on it,” said Quinn. “Clean. And in your alley. So it was very recently dropped, I’d say. Could it be yours, Ms. Cosi?”

“No. And I can’t think of anyone on my staff who’s come back from a trip in the last few weeks.”

“Could be nothing,” Quinn said to me as he placed it in a small plastic bag and set it carefully on one of the marble-topped tables. “But listen, I have something to ask you. Officer Langley informed me that the shop’s front door was open when he arrived. Was it open when you arrived?”

“No,” I said. “It was locked. I mentioned that already, didn’t I? I had to use my key.”

The detective glanced at Langley and Demetrios standing behind me, but I couldn’t read his expression. “Thank you, I just needed to confirm that. It’s very important. And was there anything missing from the shop? Anything valuable?”

A robbery. The thought slapped me as obvious. I’d been so flustered by the morning’s events, I hadn’t considered the most obvious explanation. A robbery? My God, a robbery. I raced to the register, my hand digging into my jeans pocket for the thick ring of keys. I separated out the short one and was about to slap it into the register lock to open the drawer when one word boomed across the shop—

“FREEZE!”

The perfectly measured burr of a dispassionate detective had suddenly changed into the explosive boom of a take-no-shit street cop.

Suffice it to say, I froze.

“What’s wrong?” I asked as Quinn came barreling up behind me.

“You were about to disturb evidence.”

“Evidence?”

“Within a crime scene, Ms. Cosi, everything is evidence.”

“Oh. Right.” I suppose it seemed elemental to him, but this was my place, my world, and I couldn’t just automatically start thinking of it as a crime scene.

Besides, Demetrios and Langley had already let me make Greek coffee back here, hadn’t they? I glanced over at them, and they suddenly seemed more than a little uncomfortable with this whole area of conversation. I decided I wouldn’t mention it if they wouldn’t.

The detective examined the register, again with hands behind his back. “Looks untouched,” he said. “Can you open it?”

“Yes, of course. Why do you think I was racing over here and fumbling with my—”

“Open it.”

I slipped the small key into the register lock and turned it. I pressed the NO SALE button and the drawer, full of twenties, tens, fives, and ones, slid open. “Looks like a typical evening’s take.”

“Where do you keep the store’s cash?”

“Safe. Upstairs office.”

“Let’s go take another look.”

But the contents of the safe hadn’t been disturbed. Neither had anything in the office. We returned to the first floor.

“Anything else that could be missing?” pressed the detective. “ Really look.”

I quickly surveyed the room, which displayed an eclectic array of coffee antiques gathered over the last century: from a cast-iron, two-wheeled grinding mill (used in the late 1800s, when the Blend was primarily a wholesale shop) to copper English coffeepots, and Turkish side-handled ibriks made of brass.

Behind the coffee bar hung a row of colorful demitasse cups collected from a variety of European cafés and a three-foot-tall bullet-shaped La Victoria Aruino espresso machine. Imported from Italy in the 1920s, and strewn with dials and valves, the machine was for show only and had since been supplanted by a much more efficient, low-slung espresso maker.

Antique tin signs from the early twenties advertising various coffee brands were all accounted for on the walls. And the shelf above the fireplace still held the Russian samovar and French lacquered coffee urn Madame had placed there years ago. Nothing seemed to be disturbed or missing.

Then I remembered. The plaque! I rushed to the front window.

“No. It’s there.”

“What?”

“The famous Village Blend plaque. It’s over one hundred years old, probably the most valuable antique in the store. It had been stolen by the previous manager. I believe your precinct took care of the arrest.”

“Moffat Flaste,” said Demetrios. “I remember. It was us, Ms. Cosi. We were the ones who booked him.”

“You? And Officer Langley?”

“Yeah.”

“You never stopped by for your Kona, did you? At least I haven’t seen you here before.”

The officers shrugged.

“Well, you be sure to. You don’t want to insult Madame. She never speaks idly about free coffee, especially when it comes to Kona—”

“Excuse me.” The detective looked a tad exasperated. “That’s the sign in the window, right? It’s there, right?”

“Yes.”

“What about Anabelle’s possessions? Was her purse on her when you found her?”

“No. She usually keeps it in the office upstairs, hanging on the coat rack. I didn’t see it up there. Or her jacket, for that matter—”

“Okay,” said Quinn, “we might have a lead here. Missing purse and jacket—”

“But if she was getting ready to close up,” I broke in, “she may have moved it down here.”