The Mournful Teddy (8 page)

“How does three o’clock work for you?”

“Three o’clock is fine. Where do you want to meet?”

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John J. Lamb

“Since you live nearby, how about your home? I’d like to see where you work and it’ll give me the chance to look at some more of your bears without you having to pack them up again and bring them to the hotel.”

“Thanks. We appreciate that.”

“Look, I’d love to chat, but I want to get a seat before they’re all gone.” Cleland pointed in the direction of the auction enclosure. “Could you write your address down for me?”

“Absolutely.” I took one of her business cards. “So, you’re here for the Mourning Bear auction too?”

“Actually, it’s the main reason I came down here. Finding your wife’s work was an unexpected bonus.”

“Thanks and good luck.”

I finished writing down our address and handed the card back to Cleland. A moment later, she was slicing her way through the crowd toward the auction enclosure, which was rapidly filling with people. However, I noticed that although the scheduled start of bidding was only a few minutes away, there was still no sign of the Mourning Bear.

I turned to Ash and stroked her golden hair. “Mrs.

Lyon, I’m damned proud of you.”

“I can’t believe it. Brad, I won first prize! This kind of thing only happens on sappy Hallmark Channel shows.”

Ash was glowing with happiness.

“I’m not surprised one bit. And I’ll tell you something else: She’ll make an offer on the licensing rights for Susannah tomorrow afternoon. Otherwise, she wouldn’t be coming out to our house.”

“If you’d told me that an hour ago, I’d have said,

‘Brad, honey, you’ve completely lost your marbles,’ but I think you’re probably right.” Ash paused to exchange pleasantries with a woman who’d stopped to congratulate her. Once the lady moved on, Ash said, “From what some The Mournful Teddy

59

of the other designers have told me, we shouldn’t expect her to offer much money.”

“Which is no problem because you don’t look at the teddy bears as a business.”

“But God, wouldn’t it be amazing to walk in and see Susannah in a gift shop?”

“Yeah, but it still might not be a bad idea to give Scotty a call when we get home, just to run it past him.” Scott Shueford was a former neighbor from San Francisco and a very skilled corporate attorney.

“That’s a good idea. Well, I guess Susannah and I’d better get back to the table.”

“Yeah, what with the award, we’ve probably got some customers.” I held up the camera. “I’ll be with you in a minute, but I want to go out in front and get a picture of the tent and the teddy bear show sign for the photo album.”

Ash leaned over to give me a warm kiss on the cheek.

“Thank you for having faith in me, Brad.”

“My pleasure, honey.”

As I went outside, I saw the young man from the auction company who’d given me the brochure. He was getting out of an Acura sedan and wore a preoccupied expression. I said, “Hi, there. It doesn’t look like your day’s improved.”

He blinked, recognized me, and replied, “Not by a long shot.”

“What’s wrong? Didn’t the bear ever arrive?”

“No, so my boss sent me to Miss Ewell’s house over there by the mountains.” He pointed vaguely to the east.

“What did she say?”

“Well, I didn’t actually get to talk to her. She has this live-in nurse or something and she said that Miss Ewell was asleep and couldn’t be disturbed. But the nurse told me that Miss Ewell’s nephew picked up the bear last night around nine-thirty and was supposed to deliver it to our motel here in Harrisonburg.”

60

John J. Lamb

“And that’s the last anyone saw of him?”

“Basically.”

“Didn’t the nurse think that was strange?”

“Oh yeah. She was getting all frantic and wanted me to go and wake up the old lady and tell her that her nephew ripped her off.” The young man laughed nervously. “So, I’m like: ‘No way.
You
break the bad news to her. I’m outta here.’ ”

“But you do have to break the bad news to your boss.

That won’t be pretty.”

“No, it won’t.”

“Hey, just to satisfy my curiosity, what is the nephew’s name?”

“I think she said it was Robert Thayer.”

“Thanks, man, and best of luck dealing with your boss.”

I took a couple of photos of the sign that would forever commemorate the location of Ash’s first teddy bear competition victory and then heard an announcement over the public address system that due to unforeseen circumstances, the Mourning Bear auction was being postponed.

The speaker added that everyone would be notified by mail when a new auction date was set.

And don’t hold your breath waiting for that letter,
I thought, because I was suddenly and irrationally certain that the Mourning Bear was long gone.

A moment later, Cleland blasted out of the tent like a Minuteman ICBM being launched from its missile silo and headed for what obviously was the VIP parking area.

She didn’t see me, but I watched her get into a tobacco brown Jaguar XJ-8 that bore red, white, and blue Massachusetts license plates. The engine roared to life and she flew from the lot, sending loose gravel flying.

I watched the departing vehicle and thought:
In a day
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61

already chock full of riddles, here’s another real puzzler.

Unless she was in the market for a hot DVD player
—

which seemed real unlikely
—
what possible reason could
there be for Lorraine Cleland to have been at Pastor
Poole’s flea market earlier this morning?

Chapter 6

Two hours later, we loaded up the truck and headed home. Exhausted from being up all night tinkering with the bears and the long emotionally fulfilling yet draining day, Ash reclined the Xterra’s passenger seat. However, she couldn’t relax because she was still trying to make some sense of the news that I’d seen Cleland’s Jaguar at the Remmelkemp Mill Apostolic Assembly that morning. “You’re absolutely sure it was the same car?”

“Not a doubt in my mind. And even though I didn’t see her behind the wheel at the church, I still know it was her in the Jag.”

“How?”

“Because she’s got a lead foot—accelerates like she’s at a drag strip.”

“Unlike you.”

“That goes without saying.”

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Ash snorted and I did my best to look surprised and offended. We were driving eastward on Pleasant Valley Road headed home and I want to make it absolutely clear that I wasn’t speeding. However, I will admit that the only reason for this was because we were behind a slow farm tractor pulling a large trailer loaded with hay bales and there was no safe place to pass.

“Maybe it was just a coincidence. She could have been doing some sightseeing, got lost, and turned around in the church parking lot. Think of how many times we had lost tourists come down our driveway this past summer,” Ash said.

“I hadn’t thought about that. You’re probably right,” I said, wanting to accept Ash’s very plausible explanation.

Aside from the fact that it really wasn’t any of my business why Cleland was at the church, I’m trying to break this awful habit of always expecting deceit from everyone but my wife and a few close and proven friends.

“But you aren’t buying that.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“No, but you were thinking it.”

Remember what I said a little earlier about being an accomplished liar? That’s true except when it comes to Ash. She unfailingly knows when I’m withholding the truth. I said, “Do you have any idea of how spooky it is to be married to a mind-reader? Okay, I don’t think she was sightseeing.”

“I can think of lots of times when you’ve positively enjoyed the fact I could read your mind.” Ash gave me a coquettish smile. “So, why would she be at the church?”

“To pick up background information on you.”

“How do you mean?”

“There was a picture of Susannah on the Teddy Bear Extravaganza web site along with the other finalists, right?”

“Yes.”

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John J. Lamb

“And we can assume Cleland saw that picture. What if she knew before coming down from Boston that she was interested in buying licensing rights?”

“That doesn’t explain why she went to the church.”

“It does if she wanted to collect some background information on you before the show. That’s what I did before interviewing a possible suspect—I talked to his friends and neighbors.”

“What kind of background information?”

“Something as simple as our income. If we were poor, she could drive a harder bargain because we would need the money.”

“But I can’t imagine Pastor Marc telling her anything and I’m certain he’d have called us.”

I thought for a second and recognized that—despite my dislike for Poole—Ash was correct. Poole would have told us, if only to score points with Ash. “You’re right, which shoots my cunning theory down in flames. Okay, she was sightseeing and I promise that tomorrow I’ll be a little less paranoid.”

We turned left onto Cross Keys Road, finally losing the lumbering tractor, but I didn’t speed up because there was a spot just ahead where the Rockingham County Sheriff ’s deputies ran radar. A few minutes later we turned onto Highway 33 and headed eastward.

“Hungry?” I asked.

“Starved.”

“How about we celebrate your victory by picking up some ribs and chicken from Pinckney’s Brick Pit?”

“Ooh, and some cole slaw too?”

“Absolutely.”

As we approached the intersection with Coggins Spring Road, I was startled to see bright blue lights and wigwagging headlights flashing in my rearview mirror.

We were being pulled over by a Massanutten County The Mournful Teddy

65

Sheriff ’s cruiser. Now, I swear to God, I wasn’t speeding—

traffic was too heavy and I was slowing down to make the right-hand turn onto Coggins Spring Road.

“We’re being pulled over?”

“Yeah, and I can’t think of why.”

Not wanting to stop in the intersection, I completed the right turn, pulled over to the side of the road, and shut the engine off. Watching in the side mirror, I saw a large deputy get out of the patrol car and make a slow, swaggering approach to my window. The cop was built like Hercules, with the sort of massive chiseled muscles that can only be created by diligent daily work with free weights and the occasional injection of anabolic steroids.

If I had any doubts about that they vanished when I got a closer look at the deputy’s face. Although he appeared to be only in his late twenties, he was suffering from acne and was also beginning to lose his hair—classic symptoms of long-term steroid use. With all the fanatical bodybuilders in San Francisco, I saw this sort of thing all the time.

“I want your driver’s license, vehicle registration, and proof of insurance.” The cop leaned over to look in the window

“Certainly, Deputy,” I said, trying not to inhale. His breath was bad enough to asphyxiate trash barge seagulls.

Severe halitosis is one of the other wonderful side effects of steroids.

“Sergeant.” He flexed his brawny left shoulder to signal the fact he wore three gold chevrons on his shirtsleeve.

“My apologies,
Sergeant
. Do you mind telling me why I’ve been stopped?”

“You ran the red light and I’m gonna issue you a citation.” He pointed back to the intersection of Highway 33

and Coggins Spring Road.

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John J. Lamb

I struggled to keep my voice serene. “I don’t understand how that’s possible. You turned your emergency lights on to stop me about fifty yards
before
we got to the intersection and, besides, the light was green.”

“Why don’t you shut up—or I might just decide that you’re interfering with my duties. Now, gimme your license, registration, and insurance card and don’t make me tell you again.”

Then I noticed the cop’s nametag above the pocket on his uniform shirt. Removing my license and car insurance card from my wallet, I said to Ash, “Honey, I’d like you to meet one of Massanutten County’s finest, Sergeant Trent Holcombe.”

Ash, who was already simmering, leaned over to look out the driver’s window. “Imagine trash like that wearing a badge.”

“I’d watch my mouth if I were you, ma’am.”

“I’ve always believed that you can tell how brave a man is by the way he threatens an unarmed woman.” I handed Trent the license and insurance card. “My vehicle registration is in the glove box. Can I reach for it or are you going to claim you thought I was reaching for a weapon so you can stick your gun in my ear?”

“If I wanted to point a gun at you, I wouldn’t need any excuses.”

I grabbed the registration form and gave it to Trent. “So just to satisfy my curiosity, did your daddy send you out on this errand or is this just a routine psychotic episode caused by your steroid addiction?”

For a moment I thought I’d gone too far. Trent’s jaw got so tight you could actually hear his teeth gritting and his hands balled up into enormous fists. Then he seemed to regain some control over his emotions.

Taking a deep breath, he said, “Shut up, you goddamn cripple.”

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Trent went back to his car and I watched in the mirror as he stood and wrote out the ticket. He came back a couple of minutes later and stuck the leather-bound ticket book under my nose. I took the book and examined the citation, amazed at Trent’s awful penmanship. Not only had he charged me with running the light, he’d also cited me for having a brake light out. Of course, my brake lights were in perfect working condition, but I knew that if I said anything to Trent, he’d break out a taillight with his nightstick. I’d occasionally run into badge-heavy thugs like Trent back in San Francisco and knew how they operated.

“Sign here.”

I took the pen and signed the ticket—there was no point in disputing the false charges here because all that would do was land me in jail. Handing the citation book back to Trent, I asked, “So, what did I do to annoy your dad? I thought I was properly respectful earlier this morning.”