I opened Izabelle’s book and showed him the picture. “You want me to age-progress a doll?” he said, giving me a weird look. Not a big surprise; it was an odd request. I thought of explaining why I wanted the altered photo, but I couldn’t come up with an easy explanation that didn’t make me seem even weirder.
“I think I can do it with Photo Shop. How about next week?”
“I was thinking of something more along the lines of in an hour or so.”
He swallowed hard. “Okay. I’m always up for a challenge.” He took the book and said something about scanning the photo, followed by a lot of computer mumbo jumbo. With that settled, I rushed back to Adele’s car.
I returned to Asilomar just as lunch was ending. The driveway was clogged with people from our retreat on their way to the afternoon sessions as I parked the car in one of the few spots near the administration building. Adele had made me promise to drop off the keys the moment I got back. She was already in the crochet workshop room. When she saw me, she put down the purple pouch bag she was finishing and got up, insisting on inspecting her car.
She walked all the way around it, checking for damage. I rolled my eyes in disbelief as she opened the back door and rearranged the yarn, bag of craft supplies and box of bubble gum packets in the backseat and complained that everything had gotten jostled around, no doubt because of my harsh driving.
She held out her hand for the keys. “Ah, there’s one more thing,” I said, giving them to her.
“What now, Pink? My people are waiting.” She began walking, and I followed.
I broke the news that I had to go back. You’d think I’d just asked Adele for a seat on a rocket to the moon.
“What, exactly, is all this about?” she asked, putting her hand on her cloud-colored encased hip. She wasn’t going to give back the keys without the whole story. She stopped in the middle of the path and waited while I told her about the doll in Izabelle’s book and how I thought if I got it age-progressed, I’d know what she looked like as an adult.
“But we know what she looked like, Pink. I think you’re losing your detective touch.”
I reminded Adele how she’d brought up that Izabelle’s perfect looks weren’t natural.
“Right,” she said. “My eagle eye did pick out the fake cheekbones and redone nose. And the puffy lips, ha!” I threw in the eye and hair color. Then I dropped the bombshell and told her Izabelle had an identical twin and that she might be among us.
Adele took a moment to process the information and then got it. “And I bet if someone was on the beach with Izabelle, it was her,” Adele said, handing back the keys. “Okay, you didn’t wreck my car the first time, so you won’t this time, right?”
In all our negotiations, I hadn’t noticed that there were people around us until Jym called out a greeting. Jeen’s acknowledgment came out like a combination groan and sigh as her eyes locked on Adele. I looked past Bennett, who appeared deep in thought, to a dark blue uniform that immediately grabbed my attention.
“There you are,” Sergeant French said in a studied friendly voice. He stopped next to Adele. “Ms. Abrams, I just want to talk to you again about the afternoon Ms. Landers died.”
Adele grabbed the fabric of my corduroy blazer. “Here, Pink has some information for you. I really have nothing more to add. Like I said all those times before, I didn’t talk to Izabelle after the incident in the crochet workshop. I didn’t follow her to the beach. I didn’t have any of the s’mores. I went to my room alone, where I could concentrate, and tried to re-create the stitch she had stolen from me.”
The police officer shifted his weight and sighed. He obviously hadn’t given up on Adele being the person with Izabelle on the beach.
“Ms. Abrams, you know you’ll feel better if you tell me the real story.”
“That is the real story,” she protested. “Talk to Pink. She’s got it all figured out. I’ve got a workshop to run.”
She marched off, and Sergeant French turned his attention to me. “More amateur sleuthing, Ms. Pink?” he said with another sigh.
“I’m going to have something this afternoon that’s going to rock your investigation.”
“Right,” he said without looking at me, probably because he was rolling his eyes. Commander came by, carrying a grocery bag. He stopped to remind me that his group was making a special appetizer for the evening get-together. Sergeant French nodded at him.
“Anything else you want to add to your statement?” the police officer asked.
Commander merely shook his head as an answer. So, Sergeant French had talked to him, too.
When Commander was out of earshot, I asked the sergeant if Commander had mentioned that he’d picked up marshmallow forks on the beach. I was expecting a big gasp of surprise before he asked me for details, but he gave me his blank cop face.
“I don’t have to discuss this with you. We’re not working together, remember? At first Mr. Blaine didn’t mention it, but it came back to him, and he called me. He said he’d picked them up along with a partially burned bag. He claimed it was his natural tendency to pick up his things others had left. He didn’t remember exactly, but was pretty sure he’d thrown the bag away and cleaned up the forks and put them back with the others.”
“Well, there goes any forensic evidence,” I said. I think Sergeant French was back to rolling his eyes as he prepared to leave.
“You should talk to Spenser Futterman,” I said quickly.
“Who?” Sergeant French asked. His cop face was all gone as I described Spenser and his female companion and said that Spenser was the crow.
“The what?” he asked. He was trying to keep a serious look, but his mouth wanted to grin. I reminded him that someone was in Izabelle’s room when Dinah and I had first used the key. “There were papers missing and we saw a shadow go out the window. You said it was a crow, remember?” He gave me a condescending nod and I explained how Spenser and his lady friend had come into Izabelle’s room and I’d heard Spenser admit that he’d been in there before and had exited through the window. “So you see, he’s the crow.” It was a little tricky explaining why I was in the closet.
“I guess that’s part of your amateur sleuthing,” Sergeant French said. He couldn’t hide the grin anymore. He took out his notebook and wrote something down. “See, I’m making a note of it. You said they didn’t take anything other than pictures, right? I’ll have my men check this guy out.”
Right. I knew when someone was humoring me.
The call that my photo was ready came as the workshops took their break. I walked through the throng of people quickly, not wanting to be stopped by anyone, and made a direct line to Adele’s car.
I struggled with the lock, not remembering what special move I was supposed to use, and finally jiggled it enough that it moved and the button popped up. A few moments later, I zipped back out through the gate, elated at the prospect of seeing the altered photo. In a few minutes I’d know for sure if Izabelle’s twin was among us and, more important, who she was. I barely noticed the ride and pulled into the large parking lot of the Del Monte Mall.
Rather than deal with Adele’s weird lock, I just left the car open. How long would I be, anyway, and who in their right mind would want to steal her car? The layout of the mall confused me, and I didn’t realize until I was walking into it that I had parked at the wrong end. By then it seemed longer to walk back and move the car than to go the extra distance. I felt a surge of excitement as I reached the walkway between the stores and headed toward the photo studio. I was priding myself on my creativity at age- progressing the doll. Amateur sleuth, hah!