I held a pair of enormous black stone earrings up to Morrie. He shook his head. “Those are totally wrong for your coloring. They’re perfect for Heathcliff, though. They’d bring out the rage in his eyes.”
I shoved them closer to Morrie’s face. “Look closer. They’re the same as the earring we found in the shop.”
“Croak?” Quoth tapped the earrings with his beak.
Elizabeth stared at us, her smile frozen, not sure how to react. “Did you want those hematite earrings, Mina?”
“No thanks. I noticed them because we found an earring on the floor of the shop that’s identical to these. They’re so beautiful, I’d love to be able to return it to its owner.” I flashed a sweet smile as I pulled the earring out of my pocket. “Can you help us find the owner? If you keep a record of who buys from you—”
Elizabeth shook her head. “I’m afraid I’m not as sophisticated as all that. Although I’m sure Bertie will get his way eventually and I’ll have my whole business online. He’s always going on about the power of cloud computing for small business—”
“I think Bertie’s going to bring this whole village kicking and screaming into the 21st century,” I laughed. “But back to these earrings. Do you sell many of this particular design?”
“Not really. They’s a little large and dark for most people. Most ladies prefer the daintier styles they can wear every day.”
As Elizabeth turned, I noticed a few sparkly beads sticking out of the back of her sweater. “It looks like you’re using yourself as a display stand.” I pointed to the rogue craft supplies.
“Oh, silly me. I must’ve leaned back over my craft table again.” Elizabeth laughed, pulling off the beads. “It’s these winter woollies – everything sticks to them, especially jewelry. Why, often my husband will leave the house with one of my earrings stuck to his suit and he won’t even notice!”
A thought occurred to me. “You haven’t noticed any of your own supplies of these earrings gone missing?”
“Why, yes, actually.” Elizabeth frowned. “It was those black earrings you’re holding. I had two pairs on my craft table, and this morning when I packed up for the market one earring was missing. I bet Bertie snagged it on his sweater and dropped it when he visited last night. I always tell him to check himself before he goes outside, but he never listens. If it’s not numbers or spreadsheets, he’s completely hopeless.”
“Bertie came over to the shop… last night?” Morrie leaned forward, his eyes twinkling with the scent of an important clue.
“Yes. It was probably around 11:30PM. He left an important piece of paper in Heathcliff’s office, and he wanted it so he could finish the accounts last night. I said you’d all be asleep and he needed to wait for morning, but he swore he’d just pop in and out, all quiet-like.” She lowered her voice. “Between you and me, he’s been under a lot of stress lately, what with me losing my job and Princess’ new puppies. He was going to give you the accounts today so he could get paid and we’d have a bit of money over Christmas, but then we heard about the terrible robbery, and he didn’t want to bother you all.”
I bet he didn’t.If Bertie had accidentally snagged the earring on his coat, and he’d been in the shop last night after Heathcliff got home, he could be the Christmas thief.
“It’s just horrible,” Elizabeth continued. “I can’t imagine who would commit such a heinous crime. It must’ve been someone who truly hates Christmas…”
Her voice trailed off as Heathcliff’s eyes bore into her. She straightened up. He’d come to the same conclusion as I had about Bertie, but Elizabeth had also just realized who would be the likely suspect, and she mistook Heathcliff’s suspicion for guilt. She straightened up and her voice took on a businesslike tone. “Well, anyway, I hope they catch the bastard who did it. I’ll wrap up the necklace for you and you can be on your way.”
While Heathcliff paid for my necklace, Morrie and I exchanged a look. We needed to find Bertie and wrestle the truth from him somehow.
As I accepted my wrapped necklace, Tabitha bustled over. “Hi, Mina. Hi, boys. Elizabeth, I’m so pleased to see you. I wondered if you might be able to help me. I’ve lost one of your lovely hematite earrings.”
“You have?” Elizabeth turned to me. “Mina, isn’t this fortuitous? I remember now that Tabitha purchased a set of those exact earrings from me six months ago. So maybe the one you found in the bookshop wasn’t mine after all.”
Tabitha lost an earring? Interesting.
“You found an earring in the bookshop?” Tabitha backed away, her eyes darting from me to Heathcliff. “Er… it can’t possibly be mine. I lost my earring a week ago, so I definitely wasn’t wearing them yesterday when I visited the shop. I’ve got to go – I need to get my beauty sleep if I’m to be up bright and early for the shoot tomorrow.”
Oh, she must not have heard.“Actually, Tabitha, the tree was—”
But Tabitha cut me off before I could finish. She backed away, her eyes darting toward the pub. “Elizabeth, I can see you’re busy, so I… I’ll talk to you later.”
Watching Tabitha dash across the green, a nagging feeling prickled behind my eyes. I remembered why those earrings looked familiar to me. Tabithahadbeen wearing them when she came to talk to me in the shop yesterday. Normally, I’d be too blind to notice, but those stones were so big they stuck out.
Which meant Tabitha was lying. And she was acting very cagey. But why?
Bertie or Tabitha? We still had two potential suspects. But how to figure out which one of them had taken the gifts?
Chapter Seven
“It’s got to be the accountant.” Morrie frowned at the wine swirling in the bottom of his glass. “I never did trust him. He always looked far too happy about spreadsheets.”
“Of course you don’t trust him. You run a criminal empire out of Nevermore Bookshop and you don’t want to get caught. I’m not sure your opinion counts for much in this case.”
