“It’s not like Ellie to be so messy,” one woman said.
“I think the overall service here has gone down in the last years,” a second woman said.
“Do you think Ellie’s in financial trouble?”
“For heaven’s sake!” the tallest woman said. “Some clerk left a box behind. It isn’t Ellie’s fault. Let’s just move the thing.”
Gemma stepped around the box to put herself in front of the women. “I think it covers up something that spilled. You’d better not get your shoes near it,” she said quickly.
“I hope it’s not toxic,” a woman said.
Gemma feared she was single-handedly destroying Ellie’s reputation. “Actually, I think it’s a broken bottle of maple syrup.”
“I bet that Hausinger boy did it,” a woman in a pink dress said. “I just saw him with his mother. That child is never disciplined.”
“Where is someone to help us?” one of the women asked. “I need some sliced ham.” She pounded on the bell on top of the case.
Gemma stepped between the women and the counter. Now all she had to do was keep the store workers from lifting the box and taking it away.
When Ellie came out of the back, Gemma wasn’t sure how to tell her to play along. The women all started talking at once, very upset about the big box in front of the glass case. Gemma used the noise to slip to the back of the women and began waving her arms and vigorously shaking her head at Ellie. She pointed at the box and mouthed, “No!”
When one of the women looked back at Gemma, she dropped her hands.
Ellie doesn’t miss a beat. “What can I get for you ladies today? The red snapper just came in.” She had to listen to the women’s complaints about the aisle being blocked, all of it presented in a way that was meant to sound constructive, even caring, but wasn’t. When Ellie encouraged them to give their orders, one of the women looked at Gemma as though wondering who she was and said she was there first.
Gemma put her hand on top of the box, leaning on it in a proprietary way, and said that she hadn’t made up her mind yet.
Ellie filled the orders of the women and dispatched them in record time. When one of them dawdled over the price, Ellie said she’d forgotten that for today only it was on sale at half price.
The second the women turned to leave, Ellie ran to the front of the counter. She told a clerk to follow the women to make sure they didn’t double back, then she looked at Gemma. “What have you trapped? Please tell me it’s not a rat.”
Gemma couldn’t help grinning mischievously as the two women lifted the big box straight up. Sitting on the floor, his legs crossed and looking perfectly content, was Mr. Lang.
“That’s recycling at its finest,” Ellie said, making Gemma laugh.
With the agility of a much younger person, Mr. Lang stood up and stared at Gemma for a moment. He started to leave, but then he turned back and said, “Thank you.” He disappeared down an aisle.
“I’m not sure I’ve ever heard him say those words before,” Ellie said as she nodded to a clerk to take the box away.
“You mind telling me what that was all about?” Gemma asked.
“Was Lang afraid the women would see him?”
“He acted like they had rifles and he was their prey.”
Ellie chuckled. “If anyone did that it would be me. I’d go after him for overcharging me for his produce. Anyway, Lang knows about people in Edilean back to the 1930s, and he’s become much sought after to answer people’s questions about their ancestors.”
“He’s a genealogist?”
“Ha! Lang is a snoop, has been all his life. He likes to listen in on people and spy on them.”
“That’s not nice,” Gemma said.
“Lang never tries to be ‘nice.’”
“So who are the women?”