Carrot Cake Murder (Hannah Swensen, #10)(86)

“Hi, Mother,” Hannah took the empty chair next to her mother and turned to Carrie. “Hello, Carrie. I’ve got a question I need to ask both of you.”

“First I’ve got some information for you,” Delores said, leaning closer, even though there was no one close enough to hear. “Carrie and I drove out to the Inn this morning, and we asked Sally about that credit card Gus used for the brunch.”

“The charges went through just fine,” Carrie picked up the story. “Sally said she always runs it through right away when it’s a credit card from someone out of state.”

“I’m glad Sally was so prompt,” Hannah said. “If she’d waited a few days, she would have been out of luck.”

“The credit card’s been canceled?” Delores guessed.

“Right. You two watch the Antiques Show on television, don’t you?”

Delores nodded. “Every week. Stan says we can deduct it as a legitimate business expense so we watch it live, and then we order the whole season through our Granny’s Attic account. Since we own an antique store, it’s research for us.”

“Makes sense,” Hannah said. “Did you watch it last week?”

Carrie laughed. “Of course we did. We haven’t missed an episode yet.”

“That was the one with the black Steiff bear, wasn’t it, Carrie?” Delores asked.

“Yes. And the heart-shaped jewelry box with real diamonds and rubies on the top. There was a signed Ansel Adams, too.”

“Maybe I’d better tell why I’m asking,” Hannah said. And she proceeded to tell them part of what Norman had uncovered in Atlantic City. Naturally, she didn’t mention Mood Indigo’s true character. She just said that it wasn’t a fancy nightclub the way Gus had described it to them. In her version of events, Mood Indigo was merely a cheap bar, and Alison was Gus’s manager.

“So that’s why I need to know what was on the show,” Hannah wound up her story. “Gus’s manager said they watched the show together, and then he told her that he had to go back to Lake Eden because he’d left something there that was worth a whole lot of money.”

“And Norman uncovered all that?” Carrie asked, looking very proud of her son.

“Yes, he did,” Hannah told her.

“Maybe he should have gone into the detective business. He certainly seems to be good at it.”

“Don’t even say something like that!” Delores warned her. “Just think of how you’d worry if Norman had to chase around after dangerous criminals.”

“You’re right,” Carrie said, giving a little nod. “I didn’t even think of that part of it.”

Hannah decided it was time to get off that train of thought before Delores remembered that her own daughter had come into contact with the very same criminals she was warning Carrie against. “Anyway, we’re sure that Gus came back here to get something valuable he left behind. I know he went through some of his old things. That night at the dance, he was talking about going through the trunk in Lisa’s attic and looking for keepsakes from his childhood. He said he took a teddy bear and the baseball bat he used in high school.”

“Maybe the bear was a Steiff,” Carrie suggested. “A genuine nineteen-oh-seven black alpaca Steiff was worth a fortune, and it wasn’t even in mint condition.”

Delores agreed. “There’s the bat, too. It could have been signed by a famous baseball player.”

“But there weren’t any baseball bats on that episode,” Carrie reminded her. “There was the young boy with the baseball cards, but no bats.”

Hannah realized that they were getting nowhere fast. “Let’s go find Marge and Patsy,” she said. “You can tell them what items were on the show, and they can tell us if they think Gus might have had something like that in his old room.”

They sat around the kitchen table in the cottage where Marge and Jack were staying, sipping fresh coffee that Marge had just made. A plate of the Red Velvet Cookies Hannah had baked for Jack sat in the center of the table, contributed by Jack before Tim had come to take him off to the softball game.

“A Steiff bear?” Marge exchanged glances with Patsy and they both burst out laughing.

“Believe me, it wasn’t an antique Steiff!” Patsy said, still chuckling. “The bear Gus took was from Uncle Carl’s Five and Dime. Aunt Minnie and Uncle Carl gave every one of us a teddy bear when we were born.”

Hannah listened while her mother and Carrie described the items on the show. She was amazed at how much they remembered, but Marge and Patsy kept shaking their heads.

“And then there were the baseball cards the little boy brought in,” Delores said.

“They were appraised at eight hundred dollars for insurance purposes, but you wouldn’t get more than half of that if you sold them at auction,” Carrie said. “That wouldn’t be enough to bring Gus back to Lake Eden, would it?”

Marge shook her head. “He spent more than that while he was here. Gus treated over twenty relatives to champagne brunch, and that didn’t come cheap.”

“Gus did have Grandpa’s baseball cards, though,” Patsy reminded her. “Dad gave them to him when he made the team at Jordan High.”

“He didn’t happen to have…I mean…it’s not possible that there was actually a…um…do you remember if he had…”