Black Cat Weekly #50

Chapter 6

byAbby Arlington always figured Cappy’s Tailor Shop had been designed by Pavlov. Every time she entered through front door, a bell rang, and Cappy, standing in his open back door, tossed a lit cigarette into the alley and ran to the counter.

“I called you yesterday,” he said angrily. “Didn’t you say your jacket was a rush job?”

“I apologize, Cappy. I got called out of town to train this rich person up in Lexington, so I came this morning as soon as you opened at 8:00.”

“So you chose this man over Cappy,” he said.

“I’ve been told the client is always right.”

The tailor handed Abby the high school letter jacket she hadn’t worn in twenty years and asked, “Why is this jacket so important?”

“My mother received it in the 70s when girls’ high school basketball first started up, and I wore it when we won the girls’ Sweet 16.”

“I see now,” Cappy said as they settled the bill. “Good thing you didn’t come yesterday. The sheriff and his men were all over town like ants on a fallen ice cream cone.”

“Woodhole’s too small for a traffic jam. What happened?”

“You didn’t hear? Just before closing time, Hooper’s Jewelry just down the street was robbed. Thieves got away with many diamonds.” He shut his register and smiled. “Maybe some time you and Cappy can play a game of H-O-R-S-E.”

Outside, Abby folded the jacket into her backpack and hopped on the Honda 65 that had been her dad’s motorcycle in grad school. She turned off Main and onto Three-Mile Road, taking the backroad to Gymtastic. The shortcut would get her to her gym in plenty of time for the eight-thirty session with her client, Barry.

Abby hadn’t gone two blocks before a black pickup passed so closely she could smell the pot in the cab, but then the truck swerved in front of her bike, blocking the road.

Abby leaned back on the cycle, turned right, and lifted up on the front wheels so as to jump the curb. She wheeled through someone’s front yard, cut through their side, and exited into the parking lot of some apartments. There, she pulled into the fenced-off area containing the trash bin and hid between it and the fence.

Somebody was after her. Abby’s best guess was Elton’s ex-wife. Elton, her boyfriend all through high school, had called the day before and asked her to come up to talk about his crazy ex-wife, Lily. The ex must have been camped outside Elton’s Lexington condo the night before and seen her go in. Elton claimed Lily was quite possessive, but Abby hadn’t believed him until now. Through the fence slats she watched the pickup cruise through the parking lot, then disappear.

Abby was still kicking herself for getting involved in an old friend’s love life when she arrived at Gymtastic. As she dismounted her cycle, a familiar voice called, “First time I’ve ever known you to be late for a training session, Abs.”

“Sorry, Barry,” Abby apologized with words and a smile to the lawman. “After that big robbery yesterday, I wasn’t sure the sheriff of Woodhole would even make it in this morning.”

Barry opened the gym’s door for her. “This sheriff has a long history of being able to do two things at once.”

An idea dawning on her as she came through the door, Abby put her backpack on the counter. “So you haven’t solved the jewel robbery yet?”

“Strangest thing. Mr. Hooper positively identified the Bowser brothers as the thieves, but when we caught up with them yesterday, they were diamond-free. They must have ditched the stones somewhere.”

“Barry,” said Abby, “today is your lucky day. You’re going to get both your ten thousand steps in and your diamonds back. The Bowsers still drive a pickup?”

Coming through the gym door, Abby remembered Cappy standing in his open back door, and his tailor’s shop was just down the street from Hooper’s Jewelry. The Bowser brothers must have stolen into the tailor’s through the always-open back door and hidden the jewels in a garment hanging there, her letter jacket. That morning, when Cappy reopened, the Bowsers had come to fetch the jacket and, seeing her leaving with it, pursued her in their pickup truck. After his morning workout, Barry arrested them, and they confessed.