by Alice Duncan
“Let me think. Maybe How the Elephant Got His Trunk. Or…I know! How the Rhinoceros Got His Skin! I love the part where the Parsi says, ‘Them that takes cakes which the Parsi man bakes, makes dreadful mistakes’. Although I do love the great green greasy Limpopo River, too.”
“I’ll be happy to read both of them to you,” said Regina, rummaging around in the inglenook, searching. “Here it is!”
She brought our family’s old, battered copy of Kipling’s Just So Stories over to the sofa and sat in the chair Pa had vacated.
Before she began reading, she said musingly, “I wonder if you’d enjoy Robert’s collection of dime novels. Some of them are quite cunning. Then again, some of them are downright ridiculous.”
“Oh. Is that the collection he was talking about?”
“Yes. They’re…Well, they’re kind of fun. Pure fantasy, of course. I’m sure the old west wasn’t really like that.”
“Dime novels, eh? You know, I don’t think I’ve ever even seen a dime novel, much less read one.”
“That’s because you grew up in Pasadena. I’m sure no one in Pasadena, except Robert, would allow a yellow-back novel into his house.”
“Stuffy lot, aren’t we Pasadenans?” I said, wishing she’d start reading. At last she did.
We were alone there in the living room, Regina Petrie and me, for several minutes, Regina reading, and I resting. I had very nearly drifted off to sleep when the men returned rather precipitately, jarring me out of my almost-slumber and making every muscle in my body screech and twang. I muttered a curse under my breath. Regina, startled, looked up at the gang of three who’d invaded our privacy.
“Good heavens, what’s the matter?” she asked, standing and closing the book, but keeping a finger in it to hold her place.
“Sam just said the car that hit you is owned by Bernard Randford.”
“Oh?” I swiveled my eyeballs and managed to see Robert Browning, who’d made the comment. I didn’t quite dare turn my head. “So what?” That wasn’t very polite, was it?
“He’s an executive at Underhill,” said Robert. “I know him quite well.” Robert Browning worked, also in an executive capacity, at the Underhill Chemical Company in Pasadena. Another of their big muckety-mucks had been a louse and a criminal, and had been murdered a year or so before. No great loss.
Wow, I was cranky as that grizzly bear who tore up Mr. Randford’s car, wasn’t I?
“Oh.” Robert’s information was kind of interesting, although I didn’t think it was interesting enough for the men to have busted in on my nap. “I’m sorry his car was stolen. I’m even more sorry somebody used it to hit me.”
“I am, too,” said Robert, coming closer and with a worried frown on his face. “I’ll give him a ring. I’m kind of surprised he hasn’t telephoned me before this, since we work closely together.”
“Maybe he didn’t want to spread bad news in the new year,” I suggested feebly.
“Maybe,” said Robert. “But it looks as if you were trying to take a nap. I’m sorry, Daisy. But Sam, Joe and I got the radio to broadcast without a person having to wear the head phones. Here. I’ll put it on the piano bench or a table and plug it into an electrical socket…Um…” He glanced around, evidently looking for an electrical socket. I decided to let Pa help him, since I was irked at having had my nap interrupted before it had even begun.
“I’d better be going, Daisy,” said Sam, coming over to sit next to me where Regina had sat earlier. “I’ll have to interview Mr. Randford. Maybe we can find out something if we look into his life.”
“Sounds grim,” I said. “I also don’t like the Underhill connection. How come everyone who works there except Robert and the younger Mr. Underhill are louses?”
Robert laughed as he bent over to plug in the radio set. “There was only one louse working there, Daisy. Well, two, if you count that fellow, Kingston—or whatever his name was.”
“Does Miss Betsy Powell still work in the stenographic pool there?” I asked. Miss Powell attended our church, the First Methodist-Episcopal Church on Marengo and Colorado. She screamed a lot.
Maybe that isn’t a fair statement. Yes, she had screamed, but only when a couple of people had died during communion services at church. Perhaps watching people die is reason enough for a person to scream, although I’m personally not a screamer and would be embarrassed to death to produce the noises Miss Powell had produced during communion services those two times.
On the other hand, I guess people don’t get murdered during communion services as a rule, so perhaps she should be forgiven.
Oh, dear. Maybe Sam had a point when he told me I was like the Typhoid Mary of murder in Pasadena. I didn’t like to think so.
“Yes, she does. In fact, I do believe she and Bernard had been keeping company lately.”
Aha! A connection, and one I didn’t like. Suspicious, by golly. Very suspicious. “Oh. Is he the fellow who’s come to church with her the past few weeks?”
“How would Browning know that?” asked Sam, sounding a trifle cross.
“Yes,” said Robert, chuckling. “I don’t know. Reggie and I go to First Presbyterian.”
“Oh.”
“You attend the Methodist Church, don’t you?” asked Regina.
“Yes. Anyhow, the man who’s been accompanying Miss Powell is sort of middle-sized with salt-and-pepper hair and one of those skinny little pencil moustaches that look really stupid,” I told everyone.
“Daisy,” said Pa. Usually it was Ma who reprimanded me for speaking ill of people, but Ma was at work, so I guess Pa was taking up the cudgels of propriety on her behalf.
“It’s true,” I said, whining slightly. I was also ashamed of myself.
“That sounds like him, all right,” said Robert. “Would you like me to turn on the radio for you? I’m not sure what’s broadcasting at the moment, but maybe I can find some music or something.”
“No thanks, Robert. I do thank you for fixing the radio, though. That was kind of you. Now we can all listen to the radio of an evening.”
Laughing again, Robert said, “Or something. But we’d best be off. Reggie has to be at the library at noon today, and I should get to the office. Good to see you, again, Daisy. I hope you recover quickly and completely.”
“Yes,” said Regina, rising and smiling sweetly at me. Everything she did was sweet. She was an exceptionally nice person. “Get better soon, Daisy. I’m going to miss seeing you at the library.”
“I’m going to miss going,” I said, feeling like crying again. For once I controlled myself.
“I’d better get going, too, love,” said Sam, leaning over to give me a kiss on an undamaged part of my forehead. For the record, he had a hard time finding one. “I’ll be back later, and I’ll tell you if we discover anything interesting about the stolen car.”
He’d called me love! Sam never called me love in front of other people. I darned near started crying again. “Thanks, Sam.” I didn’t want him to go. But there was no reason for him to stay, except that I was a puling, pathetic, sniveling human being. “Come to dinner.”
“You bet,” said he.
“I’ll save any good books for you,” said Regina. “And I’ll bring them to you until you’re on your feet again.”
“Thanks, Regina.”
“Spike and I will see everyone to the door,” said Pa, probably figuring I needed rest more than I needed company. He was right.
“Please do look into Mr. Randford,” I called to Sam as he strode off. “I don’t trust anyone who works at that place. Well, except for Barrett Underhill and Robert.”
Everybody laughed. Except me.
“Well, I don’t,” I said crabbily.
“Oh, Daisy!” cried Regina, giggling. “You’re such a cut-up.”
Whatever a cut-up was.
“Good God,” said Sam.
“Daisy, Daisy, Daisy,” said Pa, clearly unhappy with his second daughter for not saying anything nice about anyone
. If you have nothing nice to say, you’re not supposed to say anything at all. That’s what my mother, father, aunt and other assorted relatives had always taught me. As you can tell, the lesson hadn’t stuck.
“You’re a caution, Daisy!” said Robert, laughing harder.
Whatever a caution was.
The rest of that day was mostly spent in slumber, if you were me. A few people came to the door, but Pa fended them off, except for Harold Kincaid, who made good on his promise to bring me lobster Newburg. He brought some for Pa, too. Pa had to help me eat it since I couldn’t lift a fork. Then he helped me to the bathroom when I needed to go.
And then I took another spoonful of morphine syrup after the ordeal of visiting the bathroom, conked out shortly thereafter, and stayed conked until it was time for bed.
Six
The following day was even worse than the day after New Year’s Day. I hadn’t believed my body could hurt any worse than it already did, but I was, unhappily, mistaken. I didn’t attend church on Sunday, the fourth of January, but the rest of the family did. At the time they all left for church, I’d been parked on the living-room sofa again, the radio-signal receiving set within what would have been easy reach, if I could have moved an arm or two. Sam opted to stay with me.
I objected. “But you should go to church to see if Miss Betsy Powell brings Mr. Randford with her,” I told him.
“We already know he’s the man she’s seeing. We did interview him, you know, because he owns the car that hit you.”
“Oh,” I said, having forgot that pertinent fact. “That’s right, you did.”
“May I bring you something to eat or drink, Daisy? Did you have breakfast?”
Sam sounded so solicitous, I wanted to hug him. But I couldn’t. Even if my right arm didn’t twinge every time I even thought about moving it, my left arm was still strapped to my body. It had only been going on three days since that villain, whoever he was, had struck me with that motorcar, and I was already so resentful, my temper threatened to erupt. I’d have to wait until I felt better to release my fury, however, because Sam deserved better from me. Which made me even more resentful. I was sure in a terrible bind, wasn’t I?
“Thank you, Sam,” I said, sniffling only slightly. “Ma fed me a piece of French toast, and I had a cup of tea. Sort of. She cut it up for me. The toast, not the tea.”
Sam shook his head. “I’m so sorry, sweetheart.”
“Thanks, Sam.” Then, because I couldn’t seem to help myself, I blurted out, “But you’re going to take a closer look at that Randford person, aren’t you? I don’t trust anyone who works at Underhill except the two men I mentioned before. Not only that, but Miss Betsy Powell has an abysmal track record when it comes to men, so I wouldn’t trust any man she’s seeing.” I paused for breath, and added, “And she screams like a banshee every time anything happens to anyone.”
With a grin, Sam said, “I think you need to stop worrying about Randford, love. The poor man’s car was stolen, and he was outraged that anyone had used it to try to kill you.”
His words sobered me. Not that I was riotously happy before he spoke them. “You really think someone was trying to kill me?”
Sam shrugged. “Looks that way, doesn’t it? I mean, you were shoved out into the street, and then conveniently hit by a car. There was no other automobile traffic on the road at the time, because the area had been cleared for the parade.”
“Oh, dear. Does this mean I need to hire a food-taster, like those old kings used to do?”
With a laugh, Sam said, “I don’t think so. But I’ll be sure to take any candy you receive to the lab for testing before you eat it.”
“I have candy?”
“You haven’t seen all the stuff people have sent to you yet?”
“Um…No. I mean, I’ve seen lots of vases of flowers and some of the packages stacked around the house, but I’ve been too miserable even to look at anything closely, much less eat any candy if anyone sent some.”
“You’re in for a treat when you’re able to sit up and study your surroundings. It looks like a funeral parlor in here. Can’t you smell all the flowers?”
I took a tentative sniff of the air and discovered Sam was right. “By golly!” I said, surprised. “It does smell like a funeral parlor!” I sobered instantly. “I guess that isn’t funny, is it?”
He shrugged. “I think it is, but I imagine your perspective is warped at the moment.”
“Warped?”
“Maybe warped isn’t the correct word.”
“If someone tried to kill me, I should say it isn’t.”
A knock came at the door, and Sam rose from the chair he’d pulled up to the sofa. “I’ll see who it is.”
“If whoever it is has a gun, bring him in and let him shoot me,” I muttered.
“Not on your life,” said Sam. “Maybe after we’ve been married for a couple of years.”
I couldn’t help myself. I laughed. That hurt, so I stopped.
“Kincaid,” said Sam when he’d opened the door. Spike had already announced the visitor to be a friend, so I wasn’t overly surprised.
“Good morning, Detective Rotondo,” Harold said in a jolly voice. He knew why Sam didn’t care for him, thought it was funny, and always behaved with humor and tolerance toward Sam.
That’s more than I’d have done if I were Harold. He’d told me once that so-called “real” men didn’t care for men like him because they feared men like him might seduce “manly” men. I’d told him he was full of beans, but Harold had only laughed. I hadn’t yet asked Sam if Harold’s assumption was correct.
“Come on in,” said Sam, sounding friendlier than he usually did when Harold was around.
“Thanks. I see the flower garden continues to grow.” I guess Harold had glanced around the house when he’d brought me the lobster Newburg.
“It does. And Daisy hasn’t opened any of her presents yet, either. Maybe you can help her with them.”
“I’ll be happy to.”
A questioning note in Harold’s voice evidently pushed Sam to say, “I want to examine the packages to see if there might be anything…dangerous in them.”
“Dangerous? Do you really think someone deliberately set out to hurt Daisy?”
“Yes,” said Sam. His tone brooked no equivocation.
“Oh,” said Harold.
“After Sam told me what happened to me, I think he’s right, Harold.”
Harold walked over to the sofa, upon which I lay. He frowned as he gazed down upon me. “You look absolutely terrible, Daisy.”
“You’re such a sweetheart, Harold. I had no idea I looked so bad.”
His nose wrinkling, Harold switched his gaze from me to Sam. “She’s kidding, right? I mean, she’s seen herself in the mirror, hasn’t she?”
Sam said, “Yeah.”
“Yes, I have,” I said tartly. “I expect I’ll heal, but right now I hurt all over and don’t appreciate people telling me how awful I look.”
“Sorry, sweetie,” said Harold, taking a seat in the chair Sam had vacated. Spike instantly jumped on his lap, so Harold had to placate the hound. I was beyond placating, but I’m sure you’ve figured that out by this time.
“Why don’t I bring all the packages to the couch, Daisy,” offered Sam. “Then you, Harold and I can go through them together.”
Wow, he’d called Harold Harold! I couldn’t remember another time he’d done that. Therefore, instead of scolding some more, I said, “Thanks, Sam,” and felt better for it.
So Sam dragged up another chair and then went away. I don’t know where all the packages were, and I couldn’t sit up to look, but he came back with an enormous one first.
“Ah,” said Harold. “I remember that. It’s from my mother.”
“It’s huge,” I said, gazing at it and wishing I didn’t have to open it. Harold’s mother, Mrs. Pinkerton, was a generous woman, but totally impractical. I couldn’t imagine what she might have sent me that was so
large. And I really hoped the big box didn’t contain dozens of little boxes.
“Want me to untie the ribbon and open the box?” asked Harold. He carefully set Spike on the living room floor. Spike’s feelings were hurt; I could tell. I managed to pat the sofa with my right hand, and Spike jumped up to join me, soothing his rumpled feathers. Fur. Whatever.
“Yes, please,” I said.
So he did, while Sam trotted off to collect more presents.
“Good God,” said Harold as he peered into the box.
“What is it?”
“You won’t believe it.”
“If you show it to me, I might,” I said brusquely.
“All right, all right. Don’t get snippy.”
“Sorry, Harold. It’s just that I feel so ghastly.”
“I know, sweetie.” Harold sounded as if he felt sorry for me. As well he might. Heck, I felt sorry for me.
Sam had just walked up to the sofa carrying three or four more wrapped boxes—I couldn’t turn to see precisely how many he held—when Harold reached into the box and pulled out its contents.
“Good God,” said Sam, stopping in his tracks.
“Yeah,” said Harold.
And he lifted out a porcelain figure of a dachshund. The thing was gigantic. About as big as Spike himself, actually. I mean, that’s not as big as a great Dane or an Irish wolf hound, but it was big for a porcelain figurine. It was also painted with colorful flowers on a white background. No respectable dachshund would ever allow himself to be clad thus.
As Harold settled the porcelain hound on his lap, I stared at it. Then I looked at Spike, who had tilted his head as if he, too, were inspecting the fake dog. I think his upper lip curled.
I wasn’t sure what to say.
Fortunately, Sam didn’t suffer from my muteness. “What the hell is Daisy supposed to do with that?”
With a shrug, Harold said, “Beats me.”
“Her heart’s in the right place,” I said weakly.
“She’s a nitwit,” said Mrs. Pinkerton’s dutiful son.
“Maybe you can put it on the side porch,” Sam suggested. “Among the flower pots.”
