Killer Pancake

Dusty plunked a shiny box down on the counter. “Shaman Krill? Never heard of him. What does he look like?”

I handed her the hundred-dollar bill. “He’s an animal rights’ activist with a dark ponytail, gold earring, short stature, and big attitude. Sound familiar?”

She wrinkled her nose. “Are you kidding? He sounds disgusting. I never saw anybody like that. And Claire would never have gone out with some weirdo.” She pressed buttons on the cash-register terminal to ring up my purchase, lifted the jar and the receipt—for the cameras, I guessed—and gave me the bag.

“Thanks, Dusty.”

She tilted her head and gave me a sweet smile. “Come back soon. It’s fun to have somebody to talk to.”

Time to leave the store, time to find Julian, time to go see Marla. Time to see if I could get my friend-who’d-just-had-a-heart-attack to smile at my freshly minted face. And yet something was holding me back. I couldn’t go just yet, and besides, Julian was still doing the chamber brunch. The paper bag crackled in my hand as I surveyed the store, the store that twinkled with bright lights and glittering décor and mirrors I hated to look in. Mirrors. I looked up to the second story. Not an hour ago I had seen Babs Braithwaite leaning half-dressed over the escalator and claiming somebody was back there, Nick had talked about surveillance from the blinds-that-were-like-duck-blinds. Claire had been helping Nick; Claire thought she was being watched. Now Babs thought she was being watched. I dashed up the moving steps. Back where? Behind the dressing room mirrors? Was there somebody back there?

On the second floor, I knew better than to look up to locate the camera or glance back and forth to check on the presence of security people, called “hawking” by Nick Gentileschi. That would alert them to my attentions, and I certainly didn’t want to have them watching me again. Even a paranoid has real enemies, Henry Kissinger was reputed to have said. I lifted a hanger with a hot-pink and yellow bikini and headed confidently in the direction of the dressing room.

In the recessed entry, a short hallway to the right led to the mirrored rooms. I walked along the row of dressing rooms. One was occupied by a woman trying on a suit while attempting to calm her recalcitrant toddler. The rest were empty. Was this just more evidence of Babs acting hysterical? She’d seemed so convinced that someone was watching her. And not just a camera either. But where could you watch someone from?

At the end of the hallway of dressing rooms was one of those expensive imitation rubber plants and a rack of bathing suits apparently waiting to be returned to the sales floor. Behind the rack and almost invisible because it was painted the same color as the walls was a door. Without hesitation I dropped the suit, pulled the rack out of the way, and tried the door handle: locked. Now, where would Nick Gentileschi, that cliché of a dime-store cop, put the spare key, if there was such a thing?

I thought back to my visit to his office. He had been wearing a keyring. But there had to be more than one key. Where would the department store keep a key to an area behind the ladies’ dressing room?

Wait. I had seen something the day before, when I was trying to find the right person with my check. There had been a key box on the aquamarine office wall belonging to Lisa, the lady perplexed by the notion of accounts payable. I veered off toward the offices. What would Tom say if he knew I intended to filch a key? Well, I would see if I could get the key and find out what Babs was talking about with somebody back there. Then I would worry about Tom.

The store offices were virtually deserted, probably because of the food fair. To the one young woman in accounts receivable, I asked knowledgeably, “Is Lisa here? I talked to her yesterday about accounts payable.” I touched my Food Fair badge, as if that made me official. “She told me to come back today.”

The young woman shrugged. “You can check her office.”

Well, now, I would just do that. I knocked and walked into Lisa’s office. She was gone. Hallelujah. I stuck my head out and announced to the young woman, “She’s not here. I’m just going to leave her a note.”

The woman shrugged. Instead of writing a note, of course, I stepped over the pile of computer print-outs, crossed to the key box, and pulled on it. It wasn’t locked, but one corner was painted closed. I needed something like a blade to cut through the aquamarine muck. Lisa’s desk yielded a nail file and I levered it in. My next tug brought the cabinet open and I stared at what must have been forty keys, of which only about half were labeled with ancient, corroded masking tape. I scanned them. In barely visible ball-point pen, one scrap of tape said, SECOND FLOOR—LADIES’ DRESSING ROOM. My fingers closed around the key and I slipped it into my shirt pocket. Thanks, Lisa.