It was 1965 and we'd received a shoplifting complaint from a dress shoppe in the 3rd Street South shopping area. It was, of course, The Season because, at the time, the exclusive area was only open then. Closed all summer. Most all the other shops in town could've, too, since they made the majority of their profits from the Snowbirds. The other stores did close, during the summer, on Wednesday afternoons.
Howsumever, I went to the shoppe (shoppe meaning expensive) that we'll call Snob's, owned by a lady I called Zazu. Zazu was torqued because a fat woman had walked out with one of her cocktail dresses and had given Zazu a menacing look when she tried to follow her. The thief'd left in a black Cadillac. This wasn't much help since most of the shoppers on 3rd Street South were from Port Royal and in Port Royal there were a lotta fat ladies in Cadillacs.
While filling out my report, I asked Zazu how much the dress cost. "Three-hundred-dollars," she said. I said, "Was that what you paid for it? That's what your loss really is."
Zazu mumbled and grumbled for a while and told me she'd have to look it up and get back with me. She didn't. Not even after a couple weeks, so I dropped by Snob's to give her some inspiration.
I explained to her that I had to have the number or her insurance wouldn't pay. She said it wasn't worth turning into insurance, anyway. She hadn't paid that much for it.
I told her there must be a helluva profit in dresses but I still needed a number so I could determine if the theft was a misdemeanor or a felony--fifty-dollars was the dividing line. I finally squeezed it out of her.
"Truth is, these Zazu Originals aren't quite that. I go over to Miami to Jackson-Byron's Bargain Basement and buy them there. Then I bring them back and sew a Zazu Originals label in them."
"So how much money did you have in it?" I asked.
With downcast eyes she whispered, "About fifteen-dollars." Then, trying to legitimize this dubious commerce, she said, "They don't care anyway. They're only going to wear it to a cocktail party one time, tell everyone they paid $300 dollars for it, then donate it to one of those charity re-sell stores, over on 10th Street, and claim a $400 tax deduction."
That pretty much solved the case for me. I wouldn't be busting my arse on this one. Couldn't determine, in this whole moral dung pile, who was the bigger damn thief.
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