Double Booked For Death

Then it struck her.

Hamlet could easily leap to the uppermost shelf, and he had already demonstrated that he could pull books out of a bookcase. But even a cat as clever as he lacked the facility to stack those volumes into such carefully arranged towers. So if he hadn’t been playing architect with the collected works of Austen, Brontë, and Dickens, then who had?

“Hamlet?” she repeated, far more softly this time. With a small shiver, she gazed about the room. Someone had been in her apartment while she was gone, and for some reason had searched her bookcase. The question was, why? And, more important, was that person still in the apartment with her?

A prudent woman would have left the place posthaste. Jake had a gun and would know how to search a house for a possible intruder. But Darla remembered the way the ex-cop had surreptitiously coddled her bad leg after her impromptu sprint. While the other woman would not hesitate to make the roundtrip up and down two narrow flights of stairs to guarantee Darla’s safety, Darla was loath to put her through the pain. Besides, Hamlet had now abandoned the books for the back of the sofa, which meant whoever might have broken in was probably long since gone.

Probably.

Cell phone in one hand and a clublike wooden rain stick that Great-Aunt Dee had brought back from a Chilean vacation in the other, Darla checked out the rest of the apartment. Her first thought was for her laptop and television. Both were in their usual places, as was her jewelry and the small stash of cash she kept in a mug in an upper kitchen cabinet. Her aunt’s valuable nineteenth-century glassware and a lesser-known example of Jackson Pollock’s early work were untouched as well.

The bedroom appeared equally intact. No drawers were dumped onto the floor, no mattress was flipped, and no crazed book stackers leaped out of any closets at her. She ended the hunt back in the living room a few minutes later, feeling relieved yet somewhat foolish. After all, what kind of thief limited his ransacking to overstuffed shelves of highly uncollectible volumes? Just to be certain, she checked the windows. All were locked, so that even if the intruder had scaled the front of the building or somehow had managed to crawl onto the fire escape in the back, he’d not come in that way. The deadbolt on the apartment door had been locked, as had the ground-level door. As for extra keys, Jake had the only other one. Unless Hamlet had opened the door to a stranger, there was no way someone had entered from the outside.

Setting the rain stick back in its spot in one corner, Darla flipped open her cell phone and dialed Mary Ann’s number. Something still didn’t seem right about the situation. She’d run it past Jake and Reese at supper. In the meantime, it didn’t hurt to find out if Mary Ann or her brother had seen someone lurking around the building.

“Why, Darla, it’s been so long since we’ve spoken,” the old woman answered her call on the first ring, chuckling at her mild joke. “What can I do for you?”

Mary Ann sounded frailer and a bit more breathless over the phone than she did in person, and Darla hesitated. She didn’t want to upset the woman unnecessarily by carrying on about a possible intruder. On the other hand, Mary Ann might have noticed someone hanging about the place, and, at the very least, she should be aware if something untoward was going on in her neighborhood.

“I don’t want to worry you, but something odd just happened. I went out for a few hours with Jake and Detective Reese, and when I got back, I found half the books in my bookcase lying on my living room floor.”

“Oh dear, was Hamlet misbehaving?” Not surprisingly, Mary Ann sounded puzzled, but she gamely went on, “He’s usually such a civilized cat, but he’s probably upset with everything that’s happened since yesterday. I’m sure he won’t do it again.”

“No, it’s more than that. Don’t be alarmed, but I think someone broke into my apartment while I was out.”

When she heard a gasp from the old woman, she hurried to add, “Like I said, no need to worry. Nothing’s been taken that I can see, and Hamlet’s fine. It’s just some books that got scattered around. But I was wondering if maybe you saw someone who didn’t belong hanging out by my door this afternoon.”

“Oh my gracious, let me think. No, no one in particular, my dear, though all those young people have been wandering down the sidewalk all day bringing their flowers. Oh, but wait.”

Darla heard a pause and shuffle of footsteps before Mary Ann went on, “I almost forgot, there was a woman out chatting with some of the young people a bit earlier—a pretty young thing, and in such a respectable suit. She was there for about an hour and then left, but I’m looking out my window and she’s back again.”

A woman? A bad feeling swept her, and Darla promptly headed for her own window to take a look. Since the Lone Protester had only just been released from custody from what Jake had said, then it had to be . . .