Free Mourning In Miniature by Margaret Grace Page A

markets and shops, there was medium-to-heavy traffic this Saturday afternoon. Not usually an impatient driver, right now I couldn’t wait to see how Maddie was faring.
    Skip had been as forthcoming as he was going to be. It was neither surprising nor unusual that he’d gotten more from me than I’d gotten from him. After all, he was highly trained in investigative and interviewing techniques. I didn’t know whether to be ashamed or proud of myself for getting away with the hotel key card.
    I’d given Skip a watered-down version of Rosie’s behavior of late, trying to make her out to be less a stalker than she was. It couldn’t hurt to act as a character witness to balance out her miniature crime scene. I told him the truth about my temporary roommate, that I’d seen her leave David’s doorway about ten thirty last night and then saw her again in her bed when I woke up this morning.
    “If you could tell me the time of David’s death . . . ?” I’d asked, to no avail.
    Skip had brushed off the fact that David had been beaten, not poisoned. That his body hadn’t been left in the old locker hallway, as might be indicated by Rosie’s little amended scene. That there must have been many other people from David’s current life with a better motive to kill him than one who hadn’t seen him in thirty years. (How about Ben, that unhappy employee in the jumpsuit, for example? Or the son he hadn’t seen in years.) That Rosie was one of the last people I’d expect to have the will or the strength to beat someone to death, especially a large man like David Bridges.
    I wondered where the locker scene had been found, where Rosie was now, and where she had been between ten thirty last night and seven o’clock this morning. I couldn’t be at all sure how long she’d been in bed when I woke up. She might have been fully dressed under the covers, having sailed in only a moment before.
    I wished I knew where and when David was killed.
    I wished all I had to think about was what fun it would be to see Henry Baker’s woodworking.
     
     
    I barely had my car in Park when Maddie ran up to me. She and Taylor, trailing behind her, were soaking wet. I caught a glimpse of the backyard swimming pool and marveled at her hearing, or some other sense that told her I was approaching the house.
    “I’m sorry I skipped out like that, sweetheart,” I told Maddie, bracing myself for a wet hug and a barrage of whining.
    I got both.
    “I know what you were doing, Grandma.”
    I tickled her bare midriff, always an effective distraction, then addressed Taylor. “So, what have you two been up to?”
    Henry came out of the garage as the girls gave alternating reports of their hour and a half of fun. A little television, a little computer work, and more swimming.
    I allowed myself to enter the world of Henry’s workshop, physically and mentally, and forget the stress of the day. Thanks to Ken, I recognized a good-quality new band saw in the corner and an old table saw next to it.
    Henry showed us a rocking chair he had just finished, a beautiful cherrywood creation with the longest, most graceful rockers I’d ever seen.
    “It’s in the style of Sam Maloof,” he said, as if I might know who that was.
    “I’m afraid I don’t know much about life-size furniture,” I said. “Ken knew every style of architecture backward and forward and he taught me a lot, but he wasn’t interested when it came to interiors. And, as for me, I’ve always stuck to dollhouse-size furniture.”
    “I didn’t mean to name-drop. The Maloof style’s very well known in the circle of furniture designers. His work is in museums and in the White House.” Henry pointed to a photograph of Jimmy Carter in a woodworking shop. “He had a lot of fans.”
    I stepped back to admire the chair again. “It’s like a piece of sculpture,” I said.
    “‘Art at the service of utility’ is Maloof’s trademark. But you might relate better to these chairs.” He steered