A Secondhand Murder Read Free

was taken from there.” I nodded my head toward the display counter where the knife holder still sat.
    â€œ Knife?” Mavis had maneuvered herself away from the other customers and was standing near the dressing room hallway. “Someone was stabbed?” Her voice echoed throughout the store, occasioning looks of horror and murmurs of concern. One woman sighed and fainted into the arms of a police officer. Another pushed several customers out of her way and ran for the door.
    â€œ This is not good,” Frida said, as she waded into the fray to reestablish order.
    â€œ Poor Mrs. Sanders.” Madeleine reached into her pocket and extracted a tissue.
    â€œ Poor us. We’re done for.” I shook my head.
    â€œ Eve!” Madeleine might be a klutz, but she had manners and enough emotional sensitivity not to be crass. Graceful as a Lipizzaner but socially a stumblebum, I handled my horror at finding the body by envisioning the going-out-of-business sale we’d have to run after losing our clientele to murder.

Chapter 2
    I was wrong about the sensibilities of the women shopping in our store. The next morning a line of ten or so stood in front of the place waiting for us to open. Once they got inside, they fought each other for the dressing room where “it” had happened. When Frida arrived to ask us more questions, everyone got on their cells to tell their friends about the newest “in” place in town.
    By the end of the day, our inventory was down. Even those items tagged as our most recent acquisitions sold well. Our policy was to reduce the prices of anything left on the racks for over a month by ten or fifteen percent.
    â€œ If this keeps up,” said Madeleine, “we won’t have anything to sell by the end of the week.”
    Word of what happened here might not have reached the coast yet,” I said. “When it does, if today is any indication, we’ll soon have the West Palm society ladies in here drowning us in their worn tennis whites, golf togs and cocktail dresses.” I leaned back against the counter for a breather. I hadn’t taken a break since the doors opened and the crowd poured in.
    â€œ Is this one of her dresses by any chance?” came a voice from behind me.
    â€œ Her?” Madeleine looked puzzled.
    â€œ You know, the woman who … yesterday?” The customer nodded her head toward the dressing rooms.
    At a loss for words, Madeleine looked to me for help.
    â€œ We keep our donors’ names and the items they give us private.”
    â€œ Oh, you can tell me. I won’t say a thing.” The woman, wearing a pants suit printed with fuchsia flamingos running through emerald green ponds, leaned over the counter as if she expected me to reveal the secret of the dress’ former owner only to her.
    Madeleine pulled on my sleeve and whispered, “Tell her the dress belonged to Mrs. Sanders. What can it hurt?”
    â€œ Madeleine Boudreau, shame on you. A deal is a deal, and we vowed to keep our donors’ identities secret.” I turned back to the woman, who appeared to be on the verge of salivating on the dress in her eagerness to know its provenance. “I can’t tell you.”
    â€œ Well, I never.” She flung the dress on the counter and strode toward the front door.
    â€œ Lost that sale, didn’t you?” A man’s voice. A man! In a women’s consignment boutique? I grabbed the counter for support and looked up into a pair of azure eyes. Up. Get it? He was taller than me. That wasn’t his only virtue. He had brown hair, sun-streaked and worn long. It curled over his shirt collar. I tried to catch a whiff of his aftershave. None. Just the clean smell of Dial soap coupled with a strong whiff of sexiness.
    I leaned forward farther and would have fallen onto the floor, but a bronze arm handed me a business card. I took it.
    â€œ You’re a private dick?” I asked,