Molded 4 Murder (Sophie Kimball Mystery Book 5) by J.C. Eaton

Author:J.C. Eaton [Eaton, J.C.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kensington Books
Published: 2019-08-27T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 21

“Stop fussing and meet me at the clay club room when you get out of work today. It should only take you ten or fifteen minutes to see what I’ve done. Lucinda wants to show you her pieces, too. Right now, they’re greenware. That means they’re unfired, but we’re putting them in the kiln for their first firing tonight. When they come out, they’ll be bisque and we can glaze them.”

That was the gist of the phone conversation I had with my mother during my afternoon break. I made the mistake of calling her to find out if she thought Cecilia would be willing to share any information she had about Mario Aquilino, especially since she knew him from her church. My mother said she’d ask and then immediately tried to rope me into rendering an opinion about her clay artwork.

“I decided to do hand-building for my first piece rather than use a mold. You’ll have to tell me what you think.”

It was a trap and there was no way out. The closest I’d come to seeing my mother’s art was when we played a game of Pictionary. “A stalk of celery?” “No, Phee! It’s a monk praying. Can’t you see that?”

The thought of having to say something about her first creation in clay was giving me a case of mild indigestion. “Fine. Fine. Ten minutes. I want to get home in order to take a quick swim. The weather’s perfect this time of year.”

“Good. By the way, tonight’s clean-out night.”

I am not going to allow myself to get coerced into cleaning out anything. “Huh? Clean-out night?”

“Yes. A few times a year, club members clean out the old pieces that have been gathering dust on the shelves or, worse yet, cobwebs in those storage cabinets. They’re pieces that were made by members who are no longer active. That’s a nice way of saying dead. Well, not all of them have died. Some have moved, others decided not to stay in the club. . . .”

“I get it. I get it. So, do you just throw them out? The pieces, I mean.”

“No. If they’re greenware, we fire them. If they’re bisque, we glaze them. Then we donate them to the Empty Bowls in Phoenix for their annual fund-raiser.”

“Empty Bowls. I seem to have heard of that.”

“It’s a national thing now. The bowls are either sold as is or sometimes the organization holds a dinner and fills them with soup. People eat a meal and take the bowls home with them. The proceeds go to feeding the homeless.”

“Hmm. Sounds like a neat charitable thing but, like I said, I’m only staying for a few minutes.”

So much for that. I should’ve known better.

At five forty-six, I walked into the clay club room. It was the second time I’d been there. The first was a week and a half ago when I had the tour from Diane, the monitor on duty. This time there was a different monitor on duty, a heavyset man who appeared to be in his sixties.

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