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“Nice to meet you, Lucy.” He put down the spoon and extended his hand to Lucy. Shrugging off her sense of umbrage, she took it and found it pleasantly firm and warm. “Hope you don’t mind the oatmeal—actually, where’s my manners? Would you like some? I cook it in a slow cooker overnight and it’s really good, I put in nuts and stuff for protein. I’m vegan, you see. Gotta take care of the corpus, right?”
This was surprising news, thought Lucy. “No, thanks, I ate at home.”
He cocked his head, looking at her suspiciously. “The slow cooker is just between you and me,” he told her. “For all I know it’s against one of this GD town’s stupid regulations. No this, no that. They’re after me about the smoke machine, y’know, but I’ll take them to court. I’ve got rights.”
“Completely off the record. I am also a fan of the slow cooker,” said Lucy, aiming for some common ground. “But I’m covering the egg theft and I’d love to get a quote from you for my article.” She paused. “A bit of free publicity for your store.”
Zach scooped up the last of his oatmeal and shoved the bowl aside. “Personally, and you can quote me on this, I think this whole Easter basket promo sucks! Who wants a dumb egg anyway?”
“A lot of people, apparently. Karl Klaus is famous and his sculptures, even the little ones, go for thousands of dollars.”
“Well, I wouldn’t take it if you gave it to me,” declared Zach, picking up his bowl and carrying it into the store’s back room. “If you ask me,” he continued, returning, “it looked like those eggs that ladies’ stockings used to come in.”
Lucy found herself chuckling. “That’s what I thought, too.”
Zach grinned, revealing a couple of gold teeth.
Oh, my, thought Lucy. “Some people are saying the egg was taken to embarrass the Chamber, to make the whole promo look foolish.”
“The promo was stupid before the egg was stolen, nobody had to risk going to jail for grand larceny to show how dumb it is. I mean, stickers? Who collects stickers? Apart from little kids, you know, in kindergarten. Good for you, kid, you colored within the lines, you get a pretty little sticker.”
“It’s kind of fun,” said Lucy, who had quite enjoyed collecting a few stickers and was hoping to complete her card. “A little reward. A sort of thank you plus the chance of winning the basket. Even without the egg, it’s a very nice prize.”
Zach cocked his head, amused. “I got some, do you want one?”
“Well, I’m not planning on buying anything,” confessed Lucy.
“So what? Trust me, most of my clientele don’t want ’em. They’re going to waste.” He pulled out the sheet, which was only missing a couple of stickers. “Here. Take two.” He peeled them off and held them out to her, stuck on his fingers.
“Okay, thanks,” said Lucy, producing her card and applying the stickers. “So what sort of promos would you prefer? What do you think would bring customers to town, and to your store?”
“Okay, this is what I told them at the last meeting. I’d like to see a rock music festival, we could set up a tent in the harbor parking lot, get a bunch of bands. It’d be great. Bring in some food trucks, and beer, wouldn’t it be nice? Listening to the music and lookin’ out over the water, the lighthouse blinking in the distance? Now that would really attract a lot of folks.”
“But where would they park?” asked Lucy.
“That’s what Corney said, and the bank guy. It’s not an insurmountable problem, we could figure it out. There are other parking lots in town. At Marzetti’s grocery, for one. And the schools. The schools are out in summer, right. And the churches, if the festival isn’t on Sunday, those lots are empty. We could use the school busses for shuttles, it could work.” He shook his head. “Small minds, that’s the problem. And unwillingness to try something new.”
“You’ve definitely got a point,” said Lucy, who had produced her reporter’s notebook and was writing it all down.
“You could just record me on your phone,” advised Zach.
“I’m used to doing it this way,” confessed Lucy.
“Whatever floats your boat,” he said, with a grin.
“Any other ideas for promos?”
“Well, this would never fly, but I’ve been to some motorcycle rallies, and those things are dope. Parking not so much of a problem, for one thing, and there’s great comradery. Gathering of the clans, so to speak, town humming, practically vibrating from all the motors. It’s incredible.”
“You’re right,” said Lucy. “It would never fly.”
“That’s the problem, this town needs shaking up!” he declared, pounding a very large fist onto the counter and making the display of breath mints jump. “You know, they won’t even let me sell pot, even though it’s legal. The state puts you through a lot of hoops, but it’s worth it in the end ’cause you can make a lot of money. But it does require local permission and the minute I proposed my business plan to that board of selectmen they passed a law banning the sale of recreational marijuana. Can you believe it?”
“Actually, I can,” said Lucy.
He shook his head mournfully. “You woulda thought I was pushing heroin, the way they reacted. That lady in charge, the boss of the board, she actually clutched her pearls.” He threw his head back and roared in laughter. “It was a scene.”
Lucy pictured Franny Small, now retired from a successful career in which she built a million-dollar jewelry company from the bottom up, reacting to Zach’s proposal. She was tiny, always perfectly coiffed and dressed, usually sporting a lovely scarf and a gleaming strand of pearls. Lucy had never seen her clutch those pearls, but she figured Zach was telling the truth in this instance.
