Dolly Departed

'We finished up yesterday. It's all yours.' Matt handed her the key. 'You first.'

'After you.'

'I'm being polite. Ladies first.'

'Yoo-hoo,' someone called from down the street. Gretchen turned to see Nina hustling down the street from the north, Tutu in the lead. The dog wore a large ruffled pink collar and matching bows clipped to her ears. When Nina drew closer, Gretchen could hear Enrico, the ornery Chihuahua, snarling from a Mexican tapestry purse slung across her aunt's shoulder.

'Yoo-hoo,' she heard from the opposite direction. April thundered at her from the south.

They all converged in front of Mini Maize as Gretchen unlocked the door.

5

Room boxes offer an excellent way to create a scene that is smaller than the traditional dollhouse. Art in miniature has been around since ancient Greece and still has an avid following today. Use your imagination to create your very own. Either purchase a room box or build one out of cardboard, plywood, or fiberboard. Then let the fun begin. For enhanced realism, you can build false walls with windows or doors and display scenic photographs behind them. Make window treatments from shelf edging, shades from mailing tape, or Venetian blinds from wooden coffee stirrers. Paper napkins make excellent bedding, after dunking them in a mix- ture of glue and water. Gift wrap becomes wallpaper, and refrigerator magnets turn into wall hangings. Common household objects will take on new significance as the hunt begins for new and creative ways to furnish your very special room box.

– From World of Dolls by Caroline Birch

'Why is that hunky detective still outside?' April said, waving at Matt from inside Mini Maize. 'I thought he was over his doll problem.'

'Apparently not,' Nina said, roaming through the shop and picking up one item after another. She glanced at the floor. 'What a mess. This place looks like Gretchen's workshop.'

Gretchen slid Nina a look before finding several empty containers in the back room and distributing them to her crew. She picked up a five-inch porcelain ballerina doll from the countertop, encircled it with bubble wrap, and put it inside one of the containers. 'Help me pack these up,' she said to the two women. 'He won't come into the shop until the dolls are out of sight.'

'Why didn't you say so earlier?' April said, rushing to help. 'Let's not keep him waiting any longer than we have to.'

Enrico watched slyly from his purse hanging on a doorknob, waiting for just the right opportunity to escape. Nina held up a finger in warning as if she could read his thoughts.

'Stay,' she said in her dog-training, authoritarian voice. Then she turned to Gretchen. 'You don't really think you can put away the entire room of dolls, do you?' she said.

'Just these on the counter and nearest the door.'

April was really moving.

'Okay,' Gretchen called out the door a few minutes later. 'Coast is clear. Just don't look inside the display cases around the counter. I don't have time to put away every one of them. After all, this is a doll shop.'

Matt's head popped around the corner, his even tan a few shades lighter. He had a cheesy grin on his face. 'I've been called away,' he stammered. 'I'll check back later and see how it's going.'

Gretchen watched him scramble for his unmarked car.

'Coward,' she muttered under her breath.

April was on her hands and knees, examining miniature furniture pieces. Nina, casting around for something to do other than actual physical labor, chose to entertain the canines with a walk around the block. She came back with new and improved managerial skills.

'April,' she said, 'You need to sort the pieces and do groupings based on the type of furnishings.'

'I know that.'

'Gretchen,' Nina said, 'where are the mini dolls that go into the room boxes?'

'Haven't found any yet.'

'April-' Nina began.

'Stop,' April said, raising her arm to Nina, palm out like a cop stopping traffic. 'You don't have to manage me. I'm capable of handling this without supervision.'

'Some sort of order would help. And we know Gretchen can't do it.'

A direct shot at Gretchen's lack of organization skills. Wait until Nina found out that Gretchen had locked her keys in her car. She'd discovered the lockout when she tried to get in to retrieve her toolbox. Peering through the tinted window, she had seen her keys hanging in the ignition. If there was any way of keeping Gretchen's mistake from her aunt, she'd try it. At least they had all arrived in separate cars. She'd call for help later.

'Why don't you take the dogs for another walk?' April suggested to Nina from the floor.

'I just got back. Why would I. . Wait a minute. . Is that sarcasm I hear in your voice?'

'If you can't find anything to do, go outside and practice your hocus-pocus,' April retorted. 'Why stick around if you aren't going to help?'

'I'm giving valuable advice.'

'Will you two quit crabbing at each other?' Gretchen said, taking Nina by the arm and leading her to the counter.

'See all these accessories and accents?'

Nina looked at the things Gretchen had scooped from the floor: tiny lamps, pictures, and knickknacks.

'You're our interior decorator,' Gretchen said. 'Your job is to help figure out which ones go together in the same room boxes.'

'How am I supposed to do that?'

'We're partners, remember? Your skill, you said, was in decorating and deciding where all the pieces should go.'

'I don't remember saying that.'

'I recall it as though it just sprang from your perky lips.'

'I thought I'd take care of the dogs while you worked.'

Gretchen frowned at her aunt. Why did Nina offer to come if she wasn't going to pitch in? Ah. . she got it. Gretchen's cunning, calculating aunt didn't want her spending time alone with April. Gretchen had to find a way to stop this childish rivalry. 'See what you can do,' she said, leaving Nina alone at the counter.

'There are some creepy miniatures scatter-' April began to say.

'Here comes Caroline,' Nina announced, cutting her off. Gretchen's mother walked in wearing sunglasses. When she didn't remove them, Gretchen guessed that she was hiding red-rimmed eyes behind the shades. Throughout the night, Gretchen had heard her mother crying over the loss of her friend.

'Just in time,' Gretchen said, giving her a hug. 'You're the expert. We await your orders.'

'First, we'll pick up all the scattered pieces.' Caroline said, digging right in by walking to one corner of the shop and searching the floor.

Gretchen retrieved an empty room box, admiring its tiny painted walls. A rendition of a church loomed in the background. Charlie had captured the essence of it in her painting: the stonework, stained glass, and a slender tower with a cross at the top.

Gretchen slid the room box into a display case partition along with the one she had placed there when she met Britt Gleeland. This one must be a bedroom, she guessed, based on the floral pattern of the wallpaper.

Gretchen's practiced eye scanned the boxes. A standard one-inch scale equaled one real foot, so she estimated the room it represented at about fourteen feet by twelve feet. She bent down to pick up another box that had landed facedown. Gretchen turned it over and gasped.

'What happened?' April sprang from the floor.

'I'm not sure what this scene is supposed to represent, but that looks like blood all over the ground,'