“How do you know they stole your mail?”I asked.“Was the mailbox damaged?”
“Well, no,” Mr.Cheek said.“But it’s my birthday, and the cards from my very best friends aren’t there.It’s obvious that they were stolen.”
Deputy Bobby was silent for another few moments.And then he said, “Happy birthday, Mr.Cheek.”
“Well, thank you, dear.”
“If your cards are missing, we’ll need to refer that to a postal inspector.”
“Oh no, I really don’t think that’s necessary.I’d hate to be a bother.”
“You know what?”Deputy Bobby asked.“I was going to mail mine, but maybe I’ll drop it off this afternoon instead.”
A smile lit up Mr.Cheek’s face.“Well, Bobby, that would be lovely.Just lovely.”
He followed us to the door, and as we made our way to the cruiser, Mr.Cheek called after us, “Oh, Bobby, there’s a strange man who’s been watching my shop from across the street!”
“Keep walking,” Deputy Bobby told me in an undertone.
“He’s really very handsome.Breathtaking, really.And he seems to be quite taken with me.But I thought maybe you could check it out and report back, and then we’d have time for tea—”
By then, we were at the cruiser.Deputy Bobby glanced at the comic book store across the street, looked back at Mr.Cheek, and said, “That’s a cardboard cut-out of The Rock, sir.”
“Is that his name?”There was a little thrill in his voice.“Quite the specimen.”
When we got into the car, Deputy Bobby gave me a look that I realized, after a moment, was unexpectedly defensive.
I managed—barely—to keep my grin under wraps as I said, “He seems nice.”
“Heisnice,” Deputy Bobby said, and the same defensiveness was in his voice, too.“He’s lonely.And a little silly.But he doesn’t mean anything by it.”
“You were very sweet to him.”
Deputy Bobby seemed to be picking that apart in his head.Finally, he shifted into drive, and we pulled away from the curb.
“Isn’t that a problem, though?”I asked.“Like, calling in false reports, that kind of thing?Waste of official resources?”
“He sends donuts to the station every morning,” Deputy Bobby said, voice dry.“My first month on the beat, I was out there every day.I finally told him if it was more than once a week, I’d arrest him.”
“You know, I think he might like that.”
3
Our next callout was to Ancient Mariner Antiques.The old building, with its Disneyland-style facade that made it look like a pirate ship, sat where Main Street met the boardwalk.Prime tourist real estate, in other words.A handful of people—retired types, mostly, including not one, not two, but three elderly gentlemen in matching beachcomber hats—shuffled up and down the sidewalks, enjoying what had to be one of the last beautiful days of the season.Out to sea, the water rose and fell, edges sharp like a tumble of sun-bright glass.
“I don’t suppose—” Deputy Bobby tried.
I was already getting out of the cruiser.“Not a chance.”
When we stepped inside, a voice came from a speaker above our heads: “Ahoy, mateys!”
I’m not going to lie: I jumped.
Deputy Bobby, of course, was much too polite to smile, but he did give off some seriously satisfied vibes.
Deeper in the shop, I could hear a murmuring voice, but I couldn’t see anything except the junk.So.Much.Junk.Shelves of it.Bins of it.Every inch of available floor space had been commandeered to squeeze in as many, uh, antiques as possible: mid-century stools with hairpin legs, an enormous Chinese vase, a hickory-wood monster that I conceptualized as “pioneer kitchen thingy.”One aisle seemed devoted entirely to The Three Stooges—if you ever need a porcelain set of the Three Stooges dressed as golfing buddies, I can hook you up.Unlike some stores that sold “antiques,” the Ancient Mariner didn’t smell like grandma’s attic.A little dusty, maybe.A hint of dry wood and an inoffensive, all-purpose cleaner.
I also feel obligated to pause here and mention, seen in a different section of the store, theI Love Lucymusic box.It was from the episode when Lucy stomps grapes.
