Photo Finished

“Thank you, Charles Joseph,” said Carmela, suddenly feeling as though she were in a stage play where everyone was terribly well mannered and polite.

“Nothing broken?” asked Carmela.

“They’re absolutely perfect,” smiled Baby, her blue eyes gleaming. “In more ways than one.” She put an arm around Carmela. “Thanks for being such a dear friend.”

Charles Joseph helped repack the boxes and gathered them up once again. “I shall place these in the pantry, ma’am, if that is agreeable to you.”

“Wonderful,” cooed Baby, who turned to face Carmela. “Now, about those two pumpkins I have left…”

“I’ve got just the design for you,” said Carmela as she grabbed a crayon and a sheet of paper, then sat herself down at the library table and began to sketch.

“Look at that,” marveled Baby as Carmela’s fingers flew across the page. “A pumpkin face that has a moon for one eye and a star for the other. Where ever do you find your inspiration?”

CARMELA ZOOMED DOWN THE BACK ALLEY, POINTED her car into the parking space behind Menagerie Antiques, and cut the engine.

Quarter to five. Had she really been gone almost all afternoon? Yes, she had. But, she told herself, I got a whole lot done, too.

And there’s lots more to do, a little voice echoed inside her head as Carmela stuck her key in the lock and pushed her way inside the shop.

“I’m back,” she called, throwing her leather bag down atop the clutter of her desk.

Out front, two customers were sifting through a basket filled with colorful stickers while Gabby stood at the front counter, ringing up a purchase for a third customer. Carmela thought Gabby looked absolutely frazzled.

“You’ve been busy,” Carmela remarked after the last customer had finally departed.

Gabby stared at her. “Busy? Au contraire, my dear, we’ve been absolutely frantic. I do believe we did more business today than in all of last week.” Gabby blew out a puff of air that lifted her bangs off her forehead, then plunked herself down on one of the stools that had been brought around from the back of the counter. “Halloween,” she said. “Amazing. It’s been almost as crazy as Mardi Gras.”

“Gabby,” said Carmela, immediately feeling guilty, “I’m awfully sorry. I had no idea the shop would be so busy today.”

Gabby waved a hand. “Not to worry. In a weird way it was kind of fun. Challenging, you know?”

Carmela nodded as she glanced about the shop. Something was missing. Or rather, someone was missing. Boo was still there, curled up in the corner, but… “Where’s Sweetmomma Pam?” Carmela asked suddenly.

“Gone home,” said Gabby, gathering up a handful of hair and pulling it into a ponytail. “Ava stopped by about twenty minutes ago to pick her up. Ava also inquired about your-and I quote-hot date last night.” Gabby paused, curious now. “Did you have a hot date last night?”

“Not really,” said Carmela. “It was more of a business thing. I’m going to do a scrapbook for Bon Tiempe Restaurant.”

“Oh,” said Gabby, suddenly switching to her disinterested mode. Gabby’s forte was helping customers put together family scrapbooks and she was quite content to let Carmela deal with the commercial projects.

Carmela glanced at her watch, a sporty little Tag Heuer that Shamus had given her when they were first married. “Listen, could you stick around for five more minutes? I have to bring some stuff in from my car.”

“No problem,” said Gabby, beginning to sort through a basket of stickers that had gotten all messed up.

“I stopped by Patterson’s Paper Supply and got three more packages of that floral-patterned paper,” Carmela called to her as she headed toward the back door.

“Good,” said Gabby. “Mrs. Gardette was in a few days ago asking about it.”

Carmela had the packs of paper balanced on one knee, and that knee jammed up against the rear bumper of her car, when a truck lumbered down the alley. It was a large, nondescript-looking vehicle with a white cab and a wooden box with a tarp thrown over its contents. Easing up to the back door of Menagerie Antiques, the truck rumbled to a stop, its tailpipes belching diesel fumes.

What’s this? Carmela wondered as she wrinkled her nose. A delivery for Bartholomew Hayward? Doesn’t this guy know that Barty is dead? Has been for some five days now?

Resting her packages on the hood of her car, Carmela walked toward the truck. If memory served her correctly, Barty had been expecting a shipment the night he was murdered. She wondered if this was the shipment, arriving late. Or if this same fellow had delivered a different shipment on Saturday night. If so, he might know something.

“Got a delivery,” said the trucker, jumping from his cab. He was ample-bellied and jowly, wearing a gray shirt that barely tucked into baggy khaki pants. The name DWAYNE was stitched in red over his shirt pocket. No doubt, Carmela decided, his family and friends pronounced it Doo-wayne.

“The owner is away,” said Carmela, unsure as to how to proceed. Yeah, he’s away. For good.

“No problem,” said Dwayne. “As long as somebody can let me in.”

Carmela thought of the keys Billy Cobb had passed on to her a few days before. Should she go get those keys and let Dwayne in? Why not? No harm done.

Carmela was back with the ring of keys in two minutes, unlocking the back door and then ducking inside the back room of Menagerie Antiques. She pressed a dusty red button and the large garage door creaked and groaned its way upward.

“You were just here last Saturday?” she asked.

“Nope,” said Dwayne. “Haven’t been here for a couple weeks.”

That might have been so, but Dwayne certainly knew his way around. He flipped on a few more lights, then shoved a couple wooden crates off to one side to make room for the new shipment. Then he muscled the half-dozen pieces of furniture off his truck, slid them onto a dolly, and wheeled the furniture inside. Once he’d dispatched with the furniture, he disappeared into the bathroom for a few minutes to do his business.

Carmela stood off to the side the whole time, a somewhat reluctant participant, still wondering if she’d done the right thing.

And, pray tell, what is the right thing? Tell Dwayne to get lost? Call the oh-so-strange Jade Ella and tell her to get down here to her dead husband’s shop? Ring up Reed Bigelow, Bartholomew Hayward’s insurance agent?

None of the choices seemed terribly appealing. Or all that appropriate. So, in the end, Carmela just wandered about Bartholomew Hayward’s workroom, gazing at spare chair parts, a peeling fireplace mantel, a small painting on an easel, and waited patiently for Dwayne to emerge from the rest room.

Dwayne came out, zipping his pants. “You got anything for the return trip?” he asked nonchalantly.

“What?” asked Carmela, slightly discombobulated by Dwayne’s casual zip-up.

The trucker inhaled deeply. Then he picked up his clipboard and tapped a metal pen against it, as though he really didn’t have time for this. “Mr. Hayward’s usually got a pickup for me,” he told her.

“Where do you take it?” Carmela asked, wishing Dwayne would stop his annoying tapping.

Dwayne gave an exasperated shrug. “Storage. Where else?”

Carmela rolled her eyes. “I know that.”

With that the trucker seemed to drop his hard-ass attitude. “The usual place,” he told her. “Place over in Westwego, just off River Road.”

“Yeah,” said Carmela. “Okay.” She gave an appraising look around, then flashed Dwayne what she hoped was one of her sweetest smiles. “No, we don’t seem to have anything to haul out there today.”

“Okay then,” he said, passing her the pen and clipboard. “Just put your John Hancock right there.”

“Not a problem,” said Carmela. She thought about signing a false name, then figured, the heck with it. On the bottom line of the form she carefully penned Carmela Bertrand accepting shipment for Billy Cobb.

“Thanks,” said Dwayne as he disappeared out the door. “You-all have a good one.”

Carmela stood in the back of Bartholomew Hayward’s shop and looked around. The shipment Dwayne had left was relatively small. A highboy chest of drawers, a banister-back rocking chair, plus a round dining table with four so-so chairs. Nothing to write home about. Probably the same caliber of stuff Dove Duval had been summarily stuck with.

But that storage place over in Westwego. Now that sounded interesting. Carmela wondered if that could be the place where Billy Cobb was hiding out.

She turned the idea over and over in her head, wondering if Billy was, in fact, hunkered down in Barty Hayward’s storage space. Finally, she decided there was only one way to find out. Take a drive out there.

Yeah, but that means I have to go into Barty’s office and snoop through his records to locate the exact address.

Was that a smart thing to do?

Good question.

And, of course, the next issue was what to do if she actually found Billy Cobb hiding out there. Then what? Did she try to reason with him? Get him to turn himself in so the whole mess could be sorted out? Lieutenant Babcock seemed like a decent man. Could she convince Billy to turn himself in to him? And then convince the lieutenant that Billy was innocent?

But there was something else bothering Carmela. In the back of her mind hung the unanswered question: What if Billy Cobb really is a murderer? What if I’m walking into what could end up being a trap?

Carmela decided she wouldn’t dwell on that right now.

The address. First I gotta find the address.

Carmela eased through the swinging doors that led into the shop, decided it probably wasn’t a good idea to switch on the lights. If she did, customers walking by would for sure see her rummaging around and knock on the door, seeking admittance.

Moving carefully through narrow aisles of etageres and tea tables crammed with antique silver teapots, pewter pitchers, colorful glass vases, and fanciful lamps with fringed shades, Carmela made her way to Bartholomew Hayward’s desk in the center of the room. Hesitantly, she turned on a single Tiffany-style lamp. As it cast its golden light across the top of the desk, Carmela hoped she could locate a Rolodex or address book. If she could, she was fairly certain she’d also find the address.

Unlike Barty Hayward’s neatly organized shop, his desktop and business records were a mess. Business cards were heaped in three different Chinese blue and white bowls, messages were written on tiny scraps of paper and scattered seemingly everywhere, files were nonexistent. After twenty minutes of random pawing through office drawers and stacks of papers, Carmela found a small stack of unpaid bills sitting beneath an antique bronze frog that sported large, bugged-out eyes.