Читать книгу Ladies Courting Trouble - Dolores Stewart Riccio - Страница 13

Deidre was in the upstairs sewing room of her brick-fronted garrison Colonial, making costumes for Jenny and Willie to wear at the school Thanksgiving pageant. Bobby was pedaling a red car up and down the hall. The toy poodles, Salty and Peppy, skidded along after him, yapping, while Baby Anne revved up her own little motor from the playpen nearby. The scene brought me back to when my own three, also close in age, had been a full-time concern. I sighed a grateful sigh. Getting older has its compensations.

“So I wondered if you might go with me to the pageant,” Deidre said. “I’d like to take these two to see their brother and sister on stage, but Will’s on duty and M&Ms is off to Atlantic City with her gambling pals.”

“Sure. There’s nothing I like better than a six-hour elementary school Thanksgiving pageant. It’s the thing I’ve missed most since my children grew up.”

Deidre stitched a fake-leather fringe onto a little brown cotton shirt. “Remember when you needed me and the kids to be your cover while you scouted around that serial murderer’s homestead in Carver? And his two crazed Dobermans attacked my station wagon?”

“Okay, okay. I owe, and I’ll go. I’d love to. Same old plot, is it? The Pilgrims invite the Indians to share a meal and sign over North America?”

“Yep, same lousy deal. Jenny’s a Pilgrim lass, and Willie’s an Indian brave. I’m making an Indian costume for Bobby, too. Even though he’s not in the pageant, he doesn’t want to feel left out.”

“And Anne?”

“Papoose. You wouldn’t mind carrying her on your back, would you? I’d like to be able to move around freely with the video camcorder, in case anything unexpectedly delightful occurs.”

“Sure. Good for the posture, I bet. How do you find time for all this?”

“No problem. Time stretches to fit the things you have to do, I always say.”

Deidre had the knack all right. Watching her busy hands, I marveled at the way the costumes seemed to appear out of nowhere and were remarkably well-made. When I used to whip up costumes, my stock-in-trade for fast effects had been safety pins and Scotch tape. “I think you must have those little brownies out of Grimm’s fairy tales coming in at night to help you. Made them tiny shoes and shirts, did you?”

“Funny you should say that, Cass.” Deidre reached into a copious workbag hanging on the back of her chair and fished out a stuffed elf wearing a cobbler’s apron with a tiny awl sticking out of its pocket. “It’s a new product I’m introducing into Deidre’s Faeryland. This one is Bobbikins the Brownie Shoemaker. Wait a minute…yes, here’s his wife, Bettikins.”

Bettikins wore a kerchief and an apron; she was holding a little sewing basket.. “Adorable. You’ll sell a million of ’em. And seeing it’s you, I believe those million orders will be filled on time. Who needs sleep?”

“I have you to thank, Cass, for getting me started selling on the Internet. I do sometimes miss the stimulation of running that vitamin place at Massasoit Mall, but when Baby Anne arrived, it was just too much.” She propped the two dolls on the windowsill and went back to her sewing machine. I couldn’t resist opening Bettikins’s miniature sewing basket. Tiny spools of thread, a strawberry pincushion, some postage stamp–sized scraps of cloth. While I was playing, Deidre continued dispensing folklore. “Those legends of the brownies may have been inspired by the history of the ancient Picts, you know—small, dark pixie people who had a way of disappearing into earthen tunnels when the Romans began to hunt and kill them for sport. Only came out at night to collect the food left for them by kindhearted Celts.”

“I’ve heard something about that from Fiona.”

“Yeah, I guess I did, too. She’s like a walking Golden Bough. The unabridged edition, of course.”

“Speaking of Fiona and pixie food handouts, did you dowse the kids’ Halloween candy?”

“Huh! I did better than that. I dumped it out in the trash and substituted good stuff. I don’t think they ever knew the difference. This poison thing has me freaked.”

“You can’t be too careful,” I agreed. “You’ve heard about the Peacedale windfall? What’s your take on it?”

“It could be that old Mrs. Craig was a target, but, then, the poisonings just keep right on happening. That woman at the senior center had a close call.”

“Patty’s the one who saved the seniors. Took one look at those brownies and smelled a rat.”

“Bizarre coincidence, isn’t it. Here I am making brownie dolls and someone else in town is making poisoned brownies.”

“But not necessarily someone who lives in town. When did you begin this new project?”

“Just before Halloween. I got to thinking about trick-or-treating, which reminded me of the Picts, or brownies, in their nightly foraging expeditions. Hey, do you think that was a clairvoyant thing?”

“Very likely. Because your particular magic is so often expressed by handicrafts. So, my dear, if you get any new inspirations, we ought to give them serious attention.”

Deidre looked at her hands and smiled. “Well, what do you know. Clairvoyant fingers—there ought to be a special name for that.”

“If there isn’t, we’ll make one up. Maybe it’s a form of psychometry, though. That’s, like, when you put your hand on an old brooch and suddenly ‘see’ the history of the person who wore it.”

“I’ll stay out of the antique business, then. Might be overwhelming.”

“Oh, yes, the Picts,” Fiona said. Intrigued for reasons I couldn’t quite fathom, I’d stopped in the Black Hill Branch Library to inquire after books referencing the Picts. “Supposedly they went to earth, literally, when the Romans invaded, hiding in burrows like prairie dogs. Not only were they smaller in stature, with darker skins, than the Celts, they probably emerged covered with dirt—hence the name ‘brownies.’ Some scholars insist that the Picts and Celts were one and the same, but I favor the theory that the Picts predated the Celts in Briton and were a truly aboriginal people. There’s some evidence that they spoke a different language. It was said that the Irish saint Columba needed an interpreter when he spoke to the king of the Picts on the banks of Loch Ness.”

“Loch Ness?” I was getting confused.

“The Picts were the original inhabitants of Scotland—I’ve always thought my tiny Aunt Gwenny MacDonald must have been a Pict throwback. Sharp little bird eyes, never missed a trick. Stood no higher than my shoulder. A true pixie. Taught me just about everything I know.”

“Which is just about everything there is to know,” I commented, still looking through the disappointing history section. Branch libraries are pretty poor pickings. I’d have done better at Fiona’s cottage, which was crammed with esoteric references that rivaled the collection at the New England Center for Physical Research.

While I grumbled over the shelves, Fiona busied herself making tea for the two of us. This was her kingdom, a minimalist library housed on the first floor of a cozy twenties’ bungalow. It was owned by the Plymouth Women’s Cooperative for Folk Arts, who still had a quilting room in the cellar. Furnished with warm, aged oak, it would have seemed like a step back in time except for the computer buzzing and gurgling on Fiona’s desk.

“Strange coincidences,” I said, giving up on the Black Hill reference books. “Someone is poisoning people with homemade brownies. I make an offhand comment about brownies sneaking in at night to help Deidre finish her dolls, and I find out she’s creating prototypes for a line of brownie dolls to sell on the Internet. What do you make of all these ‘brownies’ popping up?”

Fiona poured fragrant ginger tea into two thistle-decorated mugs, handed one to me, and opened a tin of shortbread. Immediately, Omar Khayyám wafted in from mouse patrol in the stacks and jumped gracefully onto her desk. “Never be surprised that synchronicity is woven into our lives. Everything is interconnected in spirit, my dear. The ultimate oneness of the universe is the basis of all magic. And healing.” She gave Omar a shortbread crumb and passed me the tin. “So when you perceive the pattern underlying these ideas and events that seem weird coincidences to you now, you’ll solve the mysterious poisonings.” She turned to the computer, punched a few keys, and clicked on a search item. After starting the printer, she turned back to her tea.

“I expected to do that with a vision. You mean I’m going to have to puzzle this out?” I wondered what she was printing.

“A little of one, a little of the other is my guess. I’m printing out a little essay on the Picts and the pixie-brownie connection for you to take home with you. That’s what you were looking for, wasn’t it? I have some things at home, too, that I’ll set aside for you to read. Maybe something there will strike a spark in your psyche. That’s all it will take, my dear. But I wonder, don’t you, who the next target will be?”