Make Quilts Not War by Arlene Sachitano Page B

then pocketed her phone. “He’s in Annie’s,” she said to Connie and Harriet.
    “Let’s go,” Harriet said and they gathered up their purses and coats and headed to the parking lot.

    “What’s the plan, Kemo sabe?” Lauren asked as Harriet pulled to the curb and parked a block away from Annie’s coffee shop on Ship Street.
    “I thought we could go in and get drinks.”
    “Well, that’s brilliant.”
    “Oh, hush, and let me finish. We get drinks, and then on the way to our table, we ‘notice’ the guy then pull out some of the money Jenny dropped and say we thought we saw him drop it in the parking lot.”
    “And if he demands the rest of the money?”
    “I’m not giving him all of Jenny’s money.”
    “Are you going to tell him we know Jenny?”
    “Not if I don’t have to. We don’t know who he is or what their relationship is. Our goal is to find out without revealing any more than we have to.”
    “Okay, let’s get this over with.” Lauren unbuckled her seatbelt and got out of the car.
    Annie was a retired county librarian who had spent years making people toss their drinks before they came into her building. The day after her last day of work, she bought her coffee shop, lining the walls with books so people could drink coffee and read to their hearts’ content.
    Harriet and Lauren entered the shop and casually dropped their coats on chairs at a table near the tattooed stranger. Lauren made a show of choosing a book while Harriet walked up to the library table that had been converted into a counter. She ordered two mocha drinks and joined Lauren at their table. Annie herself delivered the drinks, asking about the festival before returning to the coffee bar.
    “I thought she’d never leave,” Lauren whispered. “By the way, see that guy in the gray cardigan sweater and black-framed glasses?”
    Harriet looked across the room at a young man bent over a large book that lay open on the table in front of him.
    “He’s one of mine.”
    “Good to know,” Harriet said and took a deep breath. “Show time. I guess.”
    “Don’t blow it,” Lauren cautioned.
    “Thanks for the vote of confidence,” Harriet replied in a low tone then stood up, pulling two bills from her pocket as she went. “Excuse me,” she said when she’d reached tattoo man’s table.
    He jumped like he’d been shocked.
    Close up, Harriet could see that not only did he have a lot of ink on one side of his face but he had a bar sticking through the top of one ear, metal barbells through the eyebrow on the tattooed side, and a large hole in the earlobe on that same side was held open with a black ring. His foot tapped a silent rhythm on the floor.
    “I was at the sixties festival this morning, in the parking lot,” she said, clearing her throat. She could feel sweat forming at her hairline.
    The man stared at the surface of his table without saying anything. His clothes gave off the sweet-smoky odor of marijuana, leaving little doubt about what he’d been doing since she’d seen him.
    Harriet held the money out to him.
    “I found this on the ground. I thought I saw you talking to a woman there. I thought maybe you dropped it.”
    The man looked up at her for the first time. Harriet nearly did a double-take, but forced her face to remain still. He was much older than his wiry frame, tattooed face and straggly hair had made him appear at first glance.
    “Do I know you?” he finally said. “What makes you think this would be mine?”
    It was her turn to stare.
    “This is a small town,” she finally said. “We don’t get many people with facial tattoos on just one side of their face. I guess I was mistaken. Sorry I bothered you.” She started to draw the hand with the bills toward her, but he reached out like a snake striking and snatched them from her before she could put them back in her pocket.
    “Maybe it was me,” he said.
    Harriet didn’t move.
    “Thank you,” he said finally and went back to staring,