The Real Macaw: A Meg Langslow Mystery

maybe it’s just jealousy that made Louise put something in Vivian’s purse,” I went on.
    “What?” Louise and Vivian exclaimed in unison.
    “Did you see what it was?” the chief asked.
    “No,” I said. “It was small enough to wrap in a tiny scrap of white paper or cloth that she still has in her pocket. And if you search her, you’ll also find the gloves she used to handle the purse.”
    “What was it?” Vivian demanded. She took a step toward Louise, and reached out as if to shake her, but I stepped between them.
    “Sammy,” the chief was saying into his phone. “Get up here. And have Debbie Anne send Horace Hollingsworth over.”
    “We’ll see about this,” Vivian said. She strode over to the nurses’ station.
    “Ms. Forrest,” the chief said. “Don’t touch that.”
    Vivian ignored him. She yanked open the drawer, pulled out her purse, opened it, and poured the contents onto the counter.
    “Leave that alone,” the chief snapped.
    “I didn’t plant anything,” Louise said. “She’s making it up.”
    “Oh, my God!” Vivian said. She was pointing to something.
    “What is it?” the chief asked.
    “Parker’s earring,” Vivian whispered. “What’s it doing in my purse?”
    “Don’t touch anything,” the chief said.
    This time it looked as if Vivian would follow his orders. She was backing away from the clutter on the counter, both hands covering her mouth.
    Just then the elevator dinged. Louise turned toward the doors. The chief and I both moved toward them. If Louise tried to make a run for it …
    The doors opened. Sammy stepped out and almost bumped into Louise.
    “Detain her, Sammy,” the chief said. “Detain both of them.”
    Sammy looked around in confusion. Counting me there were three possible detainees.
    “Ms. Dietz and Ms. Forrest,” the chief added. “Ms. Langslow is assisting me.”
    Sammy looked relieved. He crossed his arms, frowned at his two detainees, and stood in front of the elevator doors.
    The chief walked over to look at the clutter Vivian had spilled onto the counter. I followed and peered over his shoulder. The interior of Vivian’s purse was probably the one less-than-chic part of her life. She had a slender, elegant wallet and a sleek black cosmetic bag, but around them the counter was littered with bits of cotton and tissue, loose change, pens, individually wrapped mints, empty gum wrappers, and any number of indistinguishable bits of paper and plastic junk. Glittering in the midst of the clutter, like an ill-omened red star, was the ruby earring. I wasn’t an expert on gems, but I had a feeling it would turn out to be a ruby, not a red spinel or a garnet. Surely nothing but a real ruby could burn with such a poisonous red fire.
    “This does appear to resemble the missing earring,” the chief said. He had drawn a pair of gloves out of his pocket and was pulling them on, his eyes fixed on the ruby.
    “Complication,” I said. I grabbed a pencil from the selection in a plastic cup on the counter and used it to lift up one of the shreds of tissue. The chief glared at me, then glanced down and raised one eyebrow at what I’d uncovered. A second ruby earring gleamed back at us. For a few seconds, the scattered contents of Vivian’s purse seemed to form a wizened gnome face, peering up at us from the counter with glowing red eyes.
    Then the spell broke, and it just looked like a pile of junk around two glittering red earrings.
    Vivian was the first to react.
    “Why you … you … AAAHHH!” She sprang toward Louise, fingernails extended. Louise tried to run, but Vivian caught her, and the two of them began a vicious tussle, complete with hair-pulling, shin-kicking, and fingernail-clawing. Vivian was shouting abuse at Louise in language so blue it would probably have astonished Parker’s parrot, while Louise contented herself with shrieking nonstop.
    After a brief moment of surprise, both Sammy and I leaped to part the combatants. I didn’t have much trouble shoving Louise to the floor and sitting on her, probably because, unlike Sammy, I had no qualms about hitting a woman. And I’d tackled her because she was the smaller of the two. Maybe I should have gone for Vivian. Sammy took quite a lot of damage from her nails before he managed to follow my example.
    The chief started around the counter when the fight began, but Sammy and I had things under control by the time he reached the field of combat.
    “Good job,” he said, glancing