Caroline beamed. “I had to work through the attorney,” she said. “He had to carry the request and subsequent questions and answers back and forth.”
“Any luck getting the name of our generous benefactor while you were being so clever?”
“None. We’ll have to tie the attorney down and torture it out of him.”
Gretchen couldn’t imagine a worse idea than being trapped with the little man who had approached them with the offer. She’d be the one under torture. “Let’s see what’s happening inside,” she said, opening the museum door and stepping into the World of Dolls.
No one was working in the front of the museum, but Gretchen could hear singing coming from the back of the house.
Caroline set her purse on a counter. “April and I have been working nonstop the last two days. What you see here is all we’ve managed to organize so far.”
“I love it already,” Gretchen said.
Fabulous displays began at the entryway. The minute she entered Gretchen felt as though she were on an exciting Disney ride. Smiling dolls with colorful clothing were placed in settings that would draw visitors farther into the museum. The displays were like scrumptious appetizers, a promise to the diner that every course would be as flavorful as the first.
“I have a few calls to make,” Caroline said. “Look around. You have such a good eye for design, Nina. Come back in, oh, about fifteen minutes and tell me what you think would be the best layout.”
Gretchen and Nina followed the melody down the hall and into a room on the left where fellow club member and good friend, April, was humming away while she arranged dolls. She had a rich, well-projected voice.
April was the doll club’s appraiser. She had a keen eye for detail and a natural talent that Gretchen envied. April could touch a piece of doll clothing and tell you exactly where it came from and when. She was also Gretchen’s best friend along with Nina. April was about Gretchen’s own age but looked older than Nina (who, at twelve years younger than Caroline, was almost closer to Gretchen’s age than her own sister’s). April was a big-boned woman who wore muumuus and colored socks with her sandals, and she absolutely adored a tiny Chihuahua named Enrico, another of Nina’s successful adoption placements.
Gretchen and her aunt stood in the doorway and listened to the melody until April noticed them.
“Hey, what are you doing here? Aren’t you supposed to be directing?” she asked.
“We gave the cast the day off,” Nina said as if it had been her idea.
“Oh good. Julie offered to help us after rehearsal,” April said. “That means she might come early.”
“Look at this!” Gretchen exclaimed, stunned by the wonderful collectibles spread out on a metal worktable. “Wow!”
“I’m going to do a walk-through,” Nina said. “My expertise is needed elsewhere.”
“Go and create,” April said.
April was thrilled to show Gretchen the display she was working on. She had almost completed a collection of Robert Tonner dolls-sixteen-inch Tyler Wentworth dolls with their ultramodern hair fashions and up-to-date casual wear. Fleece, peasant tops, jean jackets, accessories. Gretchen also admired a collection of Seventeen dolls by Ashton-Drake, wearing hip teenage fashions.
“But some of these are new dolls,” Gretchen said, dazzled but puzzled. “They aren’t old enough to be part of the original collection, are they?”
April smiled. “One of the ladies who is coming to our luncheon donated them after I solicited for a contribution. Can you believe it?”
Gretchen shook her head in wonder, feeling very emotional. The doll collectors of Phoenix were some of the most generous, loving people she had ever met. This collection went far beyond her wildest expectations. If this, Gretchen’s first room of dolls, could make her tear up, what else was in store for her?
“I’ve been so busy trying to shape the play and the players that I forgot about our actual cause, this museum.” Gretchen wiped away a tear of joy.
“And this is only the beginning.” April stood back from the display with a critical eye. “Wait until after the fundraiser, when we have more money. Eventually we’ll open the upstairs rooms, too.” She picked up one of the dolls from the table and smoothed the hair. “This is one of the original owner’s dolls. Remember Starr?”
How could Gretchen forget the teenager dolls? “And Starr’s friends, Tracy and Kelley,” she said.
April held up two more 1980s dolls. “We don’t have a Shaun doll, but I’m on the lookout. He’s my favorite. He was the guy everybody wanted to date.”
“He’s a doll, April,” Gretchen said, laughing. “Not a real guy.”
“Not like your hunk,” April said. “If Matt were a doll, he’d be Shaun. Hot, sexy, smart, fun.”
“He is all that.”
“Starr and her doll friends went to Springfield High,” April said. “They came with schoolbooks, tambourines for their band, yearbooks, and all the latest fashions from the eighties.”
“Those were the days,” Gretchen said. “Roller-skating, pep rallies, wholesome fun.”
April snorted. “Wholesome fun! We watched all those teenage slaughter movies. Remember those? Remember Friday the 13th with Adrienne King and Kevin Bacon? What a hunk that Kevin was. We’d be glued to the screen, chomping on popcorn, watching those poor camp counselor kids get chased around and killed by a psychopath.” She snorted again. “I wouldn’t exactly call it a wholesome time, but it sure was fun.”
“Where’s Enrico?” Gretchen asked.
April motioned to a Mexican tapestry purse hanging on the back of a chair. “Sleeping.”
“What are you-”
Gretchen’s next question was interrupted by a glass-shattering scream coming from above, someplace on the second floor of the massive house.
She knew that voice.
“Nina!” she shouted, rushing down the hall.
Another scream.
She reached the circular staircase and ran up them, taking them two at a time.
Nina screamed for the third time.
7
Gretchen reached the top of the stairs with her mother right behind her. They stopped at the landing and listened. Caroline, her breath ragged, grasped the dark wood banister on the landing for support.
“Are you okay?” Gretchen asked her mother, worried.
Caroline nodded. “I’ll be all right. Where do you think she is? Nina!”
There was no response.
“You go that way,” Gretchen said, pointing to a hall on the left before turning to the one to the right.
She listened to her mother’s footsteps on the tile floor, then heard her open a door and call out her sister’s name.
Gretchen did the same. As she approached the second room, she heard a tiny, muffled voice. “I’m in here.”
Gretchen followed Nina’s voice into a room that had been converted into a large storage closet. Every bit of space was filled with boxes of dolls that hadn’t been catalogued yet. Stacks and stacks of them with little room to enter.
“Where are you?”
“Here.”
“I found her,” Gretchen called loud enough for her mother to hear. Then she squeezed down a narrow aisle between the boxes until she found her aunt on the floor.
Nina was a sight to behold. All that was visible were two red high heels and bare calves sticking out from underneath a display case piled high with boxes. “Help,” Nina croaked, her voice muffled under the case.
“What are you doing down there?” Wasn’t this exactly in character for her aunt? Nina wasn’t happy unless she was the center of attention. What better way than to worm under a piece of furniture and start screaming.
