Fragrant wood smoke downdrafted from a chimney on one end of the barn. I knocked on a normal-sized door on the side of the barn. "Dawn?" I called. "It's Willow."

She opened the door a crack. Her gray hair stood out in wisps around her head as if she'd run out to the barn the second she got out of bed. "Oh, it is you," she gasped like someone calming down from an enormous fright. "Come in and bring the puppies with you." She bent to let them sniff her fingers. "Hello there, you two darlings." She wasn't afraid of everything, then.

I gave her the check I'd written. "All of your placemats and napkins sold." Several looms were behind her in the toasty warm barn-turned-studio.

"That's odd."

"No it's not. Your work is very attractive."

She waved one hand in front of her face. "No, I mean someone called me, a woman with a low, hoarse voice like she was talking through burlap. She offered to buy everything I made. She wouldn't tell me who she was, so I turned her down."

"It wasn't me," I said quickly. "Mona DeGlazier is opening a home decor shop in that store next to The Ironmonger. Maybe she called you."

She looked perplexed. "Mona DeGlazier?"

"Pete DeGlazier's wife."

With a little gasp, she staggered backward. I hoped she wasn't about to swoon again. "Pete DeGlazier?" She shook her head as if clearing cobwebs. "He must have remarried. Into money, sounds like, if his wife has the wherewithal to open a store." Dawn probably hadn't talked to anyone since Wednesday morning, when she'd told me about Mike's gang, and now she was making up for her silence. "Years ago, Pete lost his farm and moved away. Not surprising he lost it, either. He was the laziest farmer around. Left crops to rot on the ground while he . . . I don't know. Drank, I guess."

"I hear they bought a Victorian mansion upriver from the village."

Judging from her bug-eyed expression, that astounded her.

On a loom beside me, a bedspread in a colonial pattern and shades of indigo and ivory was almost finished. I stroked the homey cloth. "Beautiful. Do you have a buyer for this?"

"A museum shop. I sell most of my work through mail order."

A smaller loom was set up for placemats and napkins, while a gorgeous chenille scarf in spring greens and pastels reminding me of daffodils, hyacinths, and lilacs was materializing on an even narrower loom.

She handed me a bag of placemats and napkins she'd finished. I suggested, "You might want to sell your things through Mona's new store, Country Chic, instead."

"No, not to a DeGlazier. Never." Her hands shook.

Time for a new subject. "Has Herb always lived across the road?"

"Only since his injury. That place is always being rented to someone new. A man named Foster inherited it. His great-great-granddaddy was one of the first settlers around Elderberry Bay. Everyone calls it the old Foster place, but no Foster's lived there for years."

"And Foster owns that field and woods immediately east of the house Herb rents?" The woods where I'd seen a man the morning Mike died.

"I own that. My farm straddles the road. The old Foster place is smack dab in middle of my farm. I've offered good prices for it. Foster refuses to sell."

Had she been planning to buy the land with the proceeds of weaving that she seemed to undervalue?

She tilted her head toward Herb's place. "Uncle Allen asked me where I was Tuesday night and Wednesday morning. I was here. I don't sleep well. Every time I looked outside that night, Herb's truck was in his driveway. Uncle Allen seemed pleased that I provided Herb with an alibi. He said that Herb told him my lights went on and off all night. Then he acted like that proved I'd been coming and going all night. He can't have it both ways. Either I was here all night, providing Herb with an alibi, or I wasn't here, and Herb doesn't have an alibi. That ornery policeman twists everything to suit himself." Her face paled to gray. She backed to her largest loom and plunked down onto the bench.

I decided to stop agitating her or she'd never weave another row. As I turned away with her linens and my dogs, I heard her throw the shuttle, then smack the beater against the bedspread. Maybe I could come back some time and learn more about weaving. Threadville tourists would probably love to add the skill to their many ways of creating textiles. Could Dawn come out of her shell enough to teach them?

Driving back to the village, I wondered what it had been like for her, living all alone on those bluffs above the lake where bullies like Mike Krawbach made frightening her a sport.

Mike and some of the other people around here.

Including Irv, Herb, and perhaps Smythe and Clay.

27.

BACK IN MY APARTMENT, I OPENED MY closet and stared at the clothes hanging in it. How dressy would Mona's party be? I finally chose black silk slacks and a black top I'd embroidered with colorful butterflies. Not owning a mink coat, I had to make do with my wool jacket.

Mona met me at the door. The velvet of her crystalbedecked gown was stretched to its limits, riding up in unflattering ripples. She showed me where to hang my coat. "So glad you could make it." She shook her head. "Your friend is here."

Apparently, Mona meant Opal. In the short time since I had joked with Opal about whipping up an outfit for tonight, she had knit a long caftan from the fuzzy tangerine yarn. Wearing it over red hand-knit slacks and a pale yellow sweater, she resembled a sunset. She beckoned me to a buffet table. "Look at these hors d'oeuvres!"

"Tempting," I agreed. "Let's explore the store and put ourselves as far as possible from them."

A man turned around and bumped into me. "Hi!" He nodded encouragingly. "I'm Pete DeGlazier. Welcome to Mona's and my boutique, the latest on the Threadville tour."

I carefully kept my jaw from dropping. The latest on the Threadville tour? Would our usual Threadville tourists agree? Nearly everything in Country Chic was finished and decorated, with no scope for the creative touches that Threadville tourists loved to add. What would draw them to this store more than once? I asked, "Will you teach courses?"

"My wife will offer tips on interior decorating." Nod, nod. "You'll be glad to know and to tell your customers"-nod, nod, smile-"that we also provide custom upholstery and window treatments. White wine?"

I nodded back at him. White appeared to be the only choice, which was probably just as well in a store stocked with furniture upholstered in pale fabrics.

As soon as my wine was safely in my glass, I gravitated toward the fabrics in the back of the store. They were stylish and upscale, with prices to match. Who would actually do the upholstery and create the window treatments? Not, I guessed, the famously lazy Pete. Mona? Or would the work be done offsite by someone else?

Haylee found me contemplating amazingly realistic faux suede that we could sew-and embroider-if we used needles made specifically for leather. Like me, she couldn't help touching the material. She wore a tailored black suit and high-necked white blouse. Her blond hair was pinned up. Near the front door, Edna and Naomi accepted wine from Pete. Edna's hair was brown tonight, a color I'd never seen on her before, and her outfit was quite tame, although I suspected that what looked like a plain brown jacket from across the room was not plain at all. Beside her, Naomi wore a long skirt and matching jacket, both quilted in patches of black and white in a pattern resembling flying geese. Mona could learn a few things about how clothes should fit from the other Threadville boutique owners.

Hatless again, Smythe arrived and made a beeline for Haylee.

Herb brushed past the other two and zeroed in on me. "What was Petal saying about me in the post office today?"

What a strange greeting.

Pondering an answer, I sipped at my wine. "That you work very hard. But, of course, I already knew that." I tried to give him a charming smile that wouldn't signal my suspicion that he might have murdered Mike. "I couldn't have saved my cottage without your help." I felt myself flush. Whoever killed Mike Krawbach had been very instrumental in saving my cottage, either from being burned down that night, or from being bulldozed later if it survived the fire.

The store became crowded and noisy. Herb stepped closer. "I saw you visiting my neighbor today." He showed his teeth in what was probably supposed to be a grin. "The old bit . . . witch."

So Mike's gang members were every bit as fond of Dawn as she was of them. Shouldn't they have outgrown their childish animosities? Herb was Dawn's neighbor. Maybe she'd done something recently to bring about his caustic reaction. I answered his implied question. "I sell her weavings in my shop. Don't you like her?"

Herb put his face almost in mine. Maybe he didn't want to shout to make himself heard in that crowd, but his invasion of my personal space felt threatening. "All my life, she's blamed my friends and me for things we didn't do. Whenever anything happened, she was on the phone to the police."

Pursuing that line of questioning might make it dangerously clear to him that, alibi or no alibi, he was among my lists of suspects. I asked, "Where's Karen?"

He shrugged. "I don't know. Was she supposed to be here?" He kept moving closer to me, and I kept edging backward. If I was going to be cornered in one part of the store, I should have stationed myself closer to the buffet table.

A huge hand fell on my shoulder and a familiar voice bellowed, "Hello there, young lady! I see you're feeling better."

Dr. Wrinklesides.

Certain I couldn't yell loudly enough to make him hear me, I smiled.

He pushed a huge plate overflowing with food toward me. "You could use some fattening up. Help yourself."

Choosing a cube of cheddar, I looked for Herb. He was gone. Avoiding the good doctor? Maybe I should, too, if he wanted to fatten me up. "Are you singing tonight?" I shouted at Dr. Wrinklesides.

His blue eyes sparkled. "If enough people ask me to."

I pointed a finger to my chest, then held it up. "Here's one."

"It's not over until the fat man sings." Laughing, he pushed away through the crowd, giving hearty greetings and snacks to everyone.

Someone tugged at my sleeve. "Willow," Edna squeaked. "Come see what I found." I'd guessed correctly that her brown jacket wasn't plain. She'd woven it from brown satin ribbons, and had sewn tiny dark red, gold, and amber beads at each intersection of the ribbons.

I followed her past vases of silk flowers to a table of linens. "These look like Dawn's," I began. I touched a placemat. "They are Dawn's, the very ones I had in my store." I checked the prices. Twice what I'd been asking.

Aunt Betty had bought the lot from me and resold them to Mona and Pete. No wonder Aunt Betty told Rhonda she was making an investment. If the weavings sold at these prices, Rhonda could earn a lot.

From now on, I would charge only a little less than Mona and Pete were asking for Dawn's linens, and Dawn could have the extra profit.

Speak of the devil, I thought, catching sight of Aunt Betty. For once, she wasn't covered by an oversized snowmobile suit. Her shapeless denim dress showed off impressive biceps. She had combed her hair and smeared lipstick near her mouth. Where was Rhonda?

Edging around the crowded room, I stumbled over a love seat upholstered in tapestry featuring roosters and hens. Fowl furniture, I said to myself, rubbing my bruised shin and wishing I could have shared the dopey pun with someone.

A coat was thrown over the loveseat. Not thrown, actually, neatly tucked inside out so that any spills would fall on the satin lining instead of on the fur.

The only mark on the lining, so far, was a monogram, the type woven into ribbon squares, with a large initial in the middle and two smaller initials flanking the large one. The first initial was M, for Mona. The large initial was an F, not a D, and the third initial was a B. Mona must have bought-or been given-the coat before she married Pete DeGlazier, which gave credence to Dawn's theory that Pete, too lazy to farm, had married money. Too lazy to retrieve his fishing hut from the lake, too, no doubt.

I made it to the buffet and filled a plate. Herb, Haylee, and Smythe joined me. We made small talk about food until Haylee glanced toward the door. Opal and Edna were leaving, and Naomi wasn't far behind. Haylee and I made our excuses, too.

"See you tomorrow morning at my place," Smythe said, sending Haylee a smile that should have warmed her to the toes.

"I'll be there, too," Herb reminded us.

Great. But I would heed Clay's warning and not be alone. Haylee and her guardian mothers were coming, too. We would protect each other.

"Stop in often," Mona said with a phony smile and a shake of her head when Haylee and I put on our coats.

It was dark outside. Haylee ran across the street toward The Stash. I hurried to my side yard, reached over my gate, unlocked it, and made my way down the hill to the back door. The wheelbarrows the men had used yesterday to transport sandbags had made grooves that were, for now, immortalized in frozen mud.

Not bothering to change out of my dressy outfit, I let the dogs race around while I checked on the river. It had definitely gone down, depositing debris on the trail outside my fence. But one of those branches was too boxy. I unlocked the gate, made certain the dogs stayed in the yard, tiptoed onto the icy trail, and grabbed the rectangular thing.

It was a small wooden chest, banded in brass and in excellent condition as far as I could tell. I coaxed the dogs inside and gave the box a shower to wash off some of the mud it had gained on its voyage down the river. The wood grain varied from very dark to very light, exactly like the black walnut of the floor in my shop. I turned the chest over. On the bottom, someone had carved a message, very neatly.

TO SKIPPY WITH ALL MY LOVE MK.

Rhonda and her friend had sighed over the beautiful jewelry boxes that Mike had made. MK had to be Mike Krawbach, but who was Skippy?

"Do you know?" I asked my dogs. They barely opened their eyes.

The box wasn't hard to open. It was empty. If I scrubbed the rest of the mud from it, I would probably discover it was new. It wasn't banged-up or dented.

How had it ended up in the river?

Leaving it to dry, I filled a tin with cookies and went upstairs through In Stitches and out to the street.

Apparently, the gala was winding down. A group of men had migrated from Country Chic to the sidewalk in front of The Ironmonger.

I stopped walking with one foot on the curb and the other on the street.

Irv, Smythe, and Herb, all possibly members of Mike's gang when they were teenagers, were among the large group of men outside Sam's. Mike's old buddies. Had Mike threatened to expose one of them for something they did years ago?

The men's laughter grated, like they were having a laugh at someone's expense. They turned and stared at me.

Smythe was the only one smiling.

28.

DR. WRINKLESIDES DROVE PAST IN A black SUV. Apparently, he recognized me underneath the streetlight. He tooted his horn, lowered his window, and called out, "The fat man sang!"

I made an exaggeratedly sad face to show I was sorry I'd missed it, then ran across the street to Buttons and Bows. Haylee met me at the door. The lights inside Edna's notions boutique had been dimmed, but ribbons and buttons glimmered in stray beams from Mona's brightly lit shop kitty-corner across the street. Haylee preceded me through Edna's back room and up the stairs. At the top, Haylee turned around, obviously to see my face. Her eyes danced with mischief.

My tin of cookies nearly slid out of my hands. Entering Edna's living room was like walking into a lemon. Pale yellow was everywhere. Floors, walls, furniture, and window coverings. And Edna had been creative with her notions. Cording, braid, and fringes embellished upholstery and cushions. Grommets and tiny silver medallions decorated blinds and matching drapes. The rug was bound with tape in shades of lemon and lime. Even the picture frames were covered in crystals, gilt, and sequins. As I took it all in, I realized I shouldn't have termed them picture frames. There was no artwork, only mirrors in the frames. Beveled mirrors, convex mirrors, small mirrors, huge mirrors. Blinding mirrors.

Naomi, Edna, and Opal rushed into the living room. Opal hugged me. I couldn't see the stitches in the caftan she'd knit because the yarn was so fuzzy, but my fingers accidentally poked through holes. She must have used very large needles. "You look like you've solved Mike's murder, Willow," she said.

Actually, I was in awe of my surroundings, so maybe it was just as well that she misread my expression. I told them about the jewelry box I'd found and the inscription carved on it. They were disappointed that it hadn't been filled with jewels. On the other hand, if it had, it might have sunk and I never would have found it.

Haylee laughed. "Mike made furniture for his dog?"

Naomi asked, "Did he have a dog?"

Haylee shook her head. "I don't think so."

"Who lives upriver from you, Willow?" Opal asked.