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“Well, I haven’t got any ideas. Do you have ideas?”
“No.”
“Maybe if I went home and took a nap,” Lula said. “To tellyou the truth, I could hardly get that egg salad sandwich down, and that’s saying something, because your mom makes kick-ass egg salad.”
“I’m checking on Beedle, Benji, and Sparks again. I don’t know what else to do.”
“I hear you. I’ll ride along. Maybe we could stop at the bakery and get some cannoli to settle my stomach. Those cookies Grandma put out didn’t do it for me.”
I drove to Hamilton and stopped at Tasty Pastry Bakery. Lula ran in and got a dozen cannoli and hopped back in the car.
“There were two women in there, and they were talking about the Mori viewing tonight. They were all excited to see if Bella was going to be there. I guess there’s a rumor that she’s on house arrest.”
I hoped that was true because I really didn’t want to have to handcuff her again. I swung by the Beedle house first. Still no Sentra in the driveway. I left Lula in the car with the cannoli, and I went to the door and knocked. Mrs. Beedle answered.
“Stephanie,” she said, “I have good news! Carpenter stopped in about an hour ago. He looked wonderful. He was shaved and he was wearing nice clothes and he had a new car. He said things have really turned around for him.”
“What kind of car?”
“A Mercedes,” she said. “It was black, and it looked brand-new.”
New clothes and an expensive car. That required a fast infusion of cash. Like selling something very valuable. Something like a Knights Templar coin. And not just any Knights Templarcoin. One in particular. What the heck was so special about that one coin?
“Wow, he must have won the lottery,” I said to Mrs. Beedle, fishing for information.
“I didn’t think about that,” she said. “It sounded more like he was back in finance somehow. It was a short visit. He stopped in to pick up a few of his things.”
“So, he’s in the area. Did he say where he was staying?”
“No, not exactly, just that he had to get back on the road.”
“That’s great,” I said. “I’m glad he’s doing well. Next time you talk to him, remind him that he has a court date coming up. Even better, you could put me in touch with him and I’ll make sure he gets to court.”
“That would be wonderful,” she said. “I’ll give him the message.”
“So, how’d that go?” Lula asked.
“I don’t know. I can’t tell if Carpenter’s mom is naïve or devious. She said Carpenter stopped by to pick up a few things and he was driving a new Mercedes.”
“He must have picked a good pocket,” Lula said.
“You can’t buy a new Mercedes with someone else’s credit card. And it’s difficult to believe someone was carrying that much cash.”
“Drugs?” Lula said. “Maybe he’s dealing.”
“I don’t see him dealing drugs. This has something to do with the coin.”
“You got a feeling, right?” Lula said. “It’s like when I get nipple radar if there’s rabid rats or man-eating spiders coming atme. How are your nipples doing? Are they feeling all shriveled up and tingly?”
I looked down at myself. I didn’t see any evidence of shrivel, so I continued driving to the comic book store. It was still closed. No new Mercedes in sight. I cut across town and parked in front of the Ivy. Lula had worked her way through half of the cannoli and felt like she could take a break, so she came up to the fifth floor with me. I knocked and there was no answer. The door wasn’t locked since Lula had damaged the lock when she bumped it with her screwdriver on the earlier visit. I stepped inside and yelled for Sparks. No answer. We walked through the apartment, looking for signs that Sparks had returned. We didn’t see any signs. I checked his closet and pawed through his costumes.
“Sir Lancelot is missing,” I said to Lula.
“Say what?”
“It’s his favorite costume. And it’s missing.”
“Maybe he wore it when he rode out of town on his big white horse,” Lula said. “Those guys always had big white horses.”
