Bad Reputation, A by Jane Tesh Page B

“Let’s head on to Billie’s, then. You might be able to use your powers for good.”
    ***
    Billie’s house was at the end of Pumpkin Lane in a neighborhood only a few streets over from my mother’s. Knowing Billie’s early taste for all things gaudy, I expected the house to be different. It was a brick Colonial with a circular drive and boxwoods. Billie’s appearance, however, more than made up for her bland surroundings. She had put on a little more than fifty pounds, but she was still the loud, flashy girl I remembered. Her sequined top had a butterfly design that spread its wings over her ample chest, and she had a ring on every finger. Billie’s mother had always insisted her daughter’s hair be the poofiest in the pageant. Now Billie’s hair was closely cropped to her head with a fringe of bangs. Huge earrings dangled from her ears, and in honor of my visit, she was wearing one of her many crowns.
    Her laugh bounced off the walls. “There she is! Madeline Maclin! The moment we’ve all been waiting for! Grand Supreme Pixie Dust Winner!”
    I gave her a hug. “Good grief, how do you remember that?”
    â€œBecause that crown should have been mine, of course! My singing was better than your awful violin playing any day.” She turned to greet Jerry. “And this must be Jerry, con man extraordinaire, or you’d better be, to help solve this mystery.”
    He shook her hand. “Pleasure to meet you, Billie. So what happened?”
    â€œCome inside and I’ll tell you all about it.”
    The living room, like Billie, was extravagant and bedazzled, with zebra-patterned furniture and huge china cabinets filled with her crowns, ribbons, and sashes.
    I peered in one cabinet at a photograph of Billie as Little Miss Acme Carpets. “Why in the world did you keep all this stuff?”
    â€œOh, I think it’s hilarious. Don’t you have yours?”
    â€œMy mother has a shrine.”
    Billie took off her crown and placed it on a side table. “Let me get you a drink. You want iced tea or something stronger?”
    â€œTea would be fine, thanks.”
    While she was gone, Jerry looked in the cabinets. “Here’s one of you, Mac.”
    There was eight-year-old me standing in my rigid pageant pose. I had on my best fixed smile, a pink dress that probably cost my mother twelve thousand dollars, and a hairstyle that could withstand hurricane-force winds.
    â€œI don’t know why you didn’t like doing this,” Jerry said. “You look so happy.”
    â€œHa, ha.”
    â€œBillie looks happy, too.”
    Billie, standing beside me, had an equally glazed expression. “She’s annoyed because I placed higher than she did in that pageant, but she has to keep smiling. We all did.”
    Billie returned with a tray and glasses of tea. She set the tray on the zebra-striped coffee table and handed us each a glass. “Now, let me tell you my tale of woe. Last week, my husband and I got a letter in the mail saying we’d won a night out to the Parkland Dinner Theater’s gala. Of course, we were skeptical, so I called the number on the letter and was assured there was no catch. We’d been chosen from a mailing list, and we assumed it was the theater’s list, because we’re theater supporters. Gala night, a limo came to the house, and the driver told us not to worry, everything had been paid for. We went to the gala and had a fabulous time.”
    â€œLet me guess,” Jerry said. “When you got home, a few things were missing.”
    â€œA few! Practically everything! Our wide-screen TV, our computers, my jewelry box, Harold’s golf clubs, and all of our best wine. You tell me what happened.”
    â€œA week or so before the letter came, did someone come to your house, maybe asking you to take part in a survey, or someone asking about a house for sale on your street, anything like