Lucky Stiff

by Elizabeth Sims

  Do I ever.

  "And," she added, "it's probable that greed was involved. We have to figure out who betrayed whom."

  How come I didn't hear about this Tillie before? This wonderful goddamn Tillie?

  "Right," I said.

  "Now," said Minerva, "Trix is the key."

  I bet Tillie has perfectly formed tits and a high round butt and—

  I said, "We find Trix and we're home free, then?"

  "Oh, well, no, don't make any assumptions about that. It's too early to say that."

  —and a little snicky-smile and a closet full of those cutesy pajama uniforms nurses wear these days—and oh, NO! I won't make any fucking assumptions, far be it from me!

  "OK, you're right," I said.

  "It'd be a good idea to make contact with Robert Hawley, her quote-unquote widower. We don't know how much he knows. Did Trix have life insurance? Does he know it was a setup? Was he involved? Or an innocent party here? Just somebody who got fucked over?"

  Fucked over! Yes! Fucked over!

  "I can start looking for him right away," I said.

  "Lillian, do you know you're really biting off your words?"

  "Oh! Am I?"

  "Lillian. Dear. Please. You don't have the right to be angry with me."

  "I'm not angry."

  "You are too. You're furious."

  I stopped, got ahold of myself, and let out a long sigh. "All right. You're right, Minerva. I—everything's fine. I'm fine."

  "You need to focus on what's important right now. Lillian, I'm working with you on this."

  "Yes—God, I—thank you. Thank you, Minerva. Man. I really suck sometimes."

  "You do not suck." She went on, "OK, this Robert Hawley, if he was involved, is obviously not going to tell you anything. But you can get a sense. If after you've talked to him you feel there's something there, I can get somebody to look into the insurance angle for us. That could be interesting."

  "Yeah. What do you mean, you'd have somebody look into it? Couldn't I just—"

  "I want a licensed PI to represent us in any contacts with an insurance company."

  "Oh."

  It was disconcerting to talk with someone with the vocal cadence Minerva LeBlanc now had. Her speech was just a shade slower than normal, so that I had to give her time to finish her sentences—extra time so as not to inadvertently interrupt. Yet she was free to interrupt me at will. This did not, however, bother me a damn compared to the idea of that little fucking Tillie hanging around Minerva's apartment. Tillie. I'd never heard a stupider name. I bet she's a great cook too. And wait, let me guess, she's the greatest lay on the eastern seaboard. I bet she's won tongue-kissing contests in every back room from Key West to Provincetown. God! Damn! It!

  Minerva said, "I think this is a good start."

  "Yeah. Uh…"

  "Why don't you call me in a couple of days?"

  "OK."

  "Lillian?"

  "Yeah?"

  "One thing at a time, OK?"

  "OK."

  I began my search for Robert Hawley that day at the public library. I scored a PC carrel and settled in. Actually, I had a PC at home, I composed my freelance work on it, but I'd been too broke to keep paying for connectivity. I had a love-hate relationship with the Internet anyway. I'd been way behind the American public's stampede toward its wonders, only dragging myself to it when I thought it would be a good resource—a reference desk right in my home. But after the first ten times my PC crashed for no apparent reason, I had to force myself not to hammer it to pieces.

  I felt unenthusiastic about finding Robert Hawley. I wanted to get right going on the trail of Trix. Duane's guess that she went to Las Vegas was probably a good one. But was she still there, and if so, how the hell to find her?

  "Trust me," Minerva had said when I spoke my doubts. "Just see what you can learn from this guy."

  Giving thanks that I had a middle initial for him, N., from the death notice for Patricia Lynn Hawley, I did a people search and got two Robert N. Hawleys in Michigan. I knew, of course, that not everybody gets nabbed by these Web databases. But it was a better and quicker start than if I'd begun with a stack of phone books. Reporters and investigators hate unlisted phone numbers.

  One of the Robert N. Hawleys lived in inner-city Detroit, an apartment number on Forest Ave. I knew the neighborhood, a scuzzy one, from my days at Wayne State. The other lived with a missus in Novi, one of the milk-run suburbs on the route from Detroit to Lansing. I mapped both addresses, noted the phone numbers, and went out to the public phone.

  I punched up the Detroit number and got a recording of a very young dude trying to sound hip and ironic. "This is the number for Bob and the band. If you're a record producer, leave a detailed message. Otherwise I don't give a shit."

  I took a breath and gathered myself before ringing the Novi number, because I had a sudden feeling about it.

  "Hello?" said a mature female voice.

  "Hi," I said brightly, "is this the home of the Robert N. Hawley?"

  "Uh…well…" A short laugh came over the line. "Which Robert N. Hawley do you mean?"

  "The one who ran track for Mumford High School in Detroit, ma'am, class of '89?"

  "Oh, no. No. My husband—ha-ha, my husband's much older than that, in fact I think he graduated from high school in 1964 or '65. I think. And he went to Chadsey, as a matter of fact."

  "Oh."

  "And he played football there. At least he claimed to be a football hero…"

  "Oh."

  "Well, I'm sorry I can't help you."

  "Ma'am, thank you very much anyway. You have a good day now."

  The name was right, the age was right, the Detroit background was consistent. My feeling was right. It was worth a jaunt out to Novi.

  I fired up the Caprice and pointed the nose westward. The suburban landscape spooled by, then Northwestern Highway with its edge-cityscape of office high-rises and greenbelts. Its TGI Friday'ses, its Bennigan'ses, its Lexus dealershipses.

  Then came the last clinging farmers' fields, the pint-size cowherds, and then came the shopping centers and condominiums of Novi.

  Number six on the railroad's run between Lansing and Detroit, Novi had been named in the purest postwar utilitarian fashion, right off the sign at the railroad stop: "No.-vi." Novi. Rhymes with "go-high." Emphasis on neither syllable.

  The Hawley home was shoebox-style tract house in one of the cheaper parts of town. It was built of that dismal blond brick that was considered sophisticated in the Ed Sullivan era. But the scrawny saplings that had been planted fifty years ago—ancient history—had grown into tall maturity, maples and catalpas and oaks, lovely in every season.

  I drove past the house, parked beyond it, and walked back.

  The current Mrs. Robert N. Hawley was a pretty woman in the pejorative sense of the phrase: tall fluffy hair, dyed to match the harvest-gold kitchen appliances, waist cinched tight into a pair of what I swear were Cheryl Tiegs jeans, nail job, swingy earrings, bangles, and a bit of eye shadow at 11 A.M. She was the same age I imagined Robert Hawley to be, late fifties. No, on second look somewhat younger, actually. She might have been just fifty.

  I introduced myself, having backed off from my idea to impersonate a March of Dimes walkathon recruiter. Yes, I used my real name, wanting to play this one straight. I felt it was the right thing to do, and moreover, something told me I'd get further that way.

  Be careful, I reminded myself. I felt concern for Robert Hawley, who had, in remarrying, put the ugly past of Trix's death (he thought) behind him. I knew the conspiracy involved Trix and Bill Sechrist. It was possible Hawley had been involved, as Minerva suggested, but how likely was that? Not too. Even my credulousness would be strained by that.

  No, I had to be careful not to shock a regular family guy into an aneurysm. My focus was on Trix. Maybe he could tell me something that could help me find her.

  I made Mrs. Hawley laugh at the door by confessing I had played
a trick on her by telephone.

  "So what's up, then?" she asked. She wasn't the slightest bit suspicious or guarded, the way most people are these days when a stranger comes to the door. She reminded me of the neighborhood moms of my childhood: bored out of their skulls, eager to talk, interested in anything new.

  "Well," I said, "I think your husband really is the Robert Hawley I'm looking for. I need his help. Not money," I hurried to say. "Not anything like that. It's his memory of someone I want to know about. Someone I used to know. It's that—I'd just like to sit down and do some remembering with him. I take it he's not home."

  She shook her head, fascinated. "But oh, I'm sorry! Won't you come in? I can get your phone number or something…"

  "Thank you, Mrs. Hawley."

  "Oh! I didn't even tell you my name," she said. "It's Adele."

  "Adele, thank you. In fact, it might be better if you talked to him about this first…" I followed her inside.

  She showed me to the kitchen. "Won't you sit down? Like I say, Bob's not here, he's at work."

  I noted that she spoke of her husband in a somewhat contemptuous tone. It wasn't pronounced, but it was there. I'd heard it first when on the telephone she'd said, "…at least he claimed to be a football hero…"

  The furnishings were consistent with the exterior of the house, humble and tired. Too much of it, too: tables and stuffed chairs and side chairs and recliners and lamps, lamps, lamps. The kitchen was beat-up Early American and smelled greasy. The stove and refrigerator were Kenmore. The tabletop was clean, but there was a feeling of covered-up despair in the place. A definite patina of forlornness.

  I sensed that Adele Hawley, though, was dealing with it pretty well. She had her routines. She had her customs. "Would you like some coffee?"

  "I sure would, thank you. Just black. Adele, maybe you can help me decide how to bring this up with your husband." The coffee was supermarket roast, acidic and thin, plus the pot was three hours old if it was a minute. "Mm, good coffee," I said.

  A happy smile. "Thank you! Thank you, uh, oh, I'm sorry?"

  "Lillian," I reminded her.

  "Lillian! That's such a nice name!"

  "Well, thank you. Listen, Adele, I guess I'll just plunge in here."

  Her eyes searched my face alertly.

  "OK, well, first I need to know one thing. Was Bob married before you to a woman named Trix?"

  Adele's face went suddenly blank. I watched her. I said a moment ago that she was pretty—that is, she worked at making the most of her looks, within the parameters of the working-class suburban culture of the American Midwest. Her features were softening with age. The chin line had gone long ago. Her nose appeared to have been violently flattened: the result of one or two breaks, I guessed.

  It'd taken me time to notice the nose, to begin to wonder why it looked the way it did. It was the kind of nose you'd expect to see on a guy, or a really jocky woman. Or, I thought, looking again into the face of Adele Hawley, a battered wife.

  Chapter 11

  I watched her eyes roaming, searching the middle distance. She closed them, tilted her chin toward the ceiling, and said, "Heh. A-heh. A-hah!" She rolled her lower lip in a pretend pout, then chomped on it. Her lipstick was a dark maroon that didn't go with her bronzy, fluffy hair. She opened her eyes and gave me a sharp little smile.

  I realized that somehow I'd just turned her into a woman with a secret.

  "Well," she said slowly, "Bob was married to a woman before me, but her name wasn't Trix. It was, I believe—" And here I beheld the classic second wife choking ever so slightly on the name of the first: "—Patricia."

  "Ah," I said.

  "Is this about—Patricia?" She rubbed her hands in an unconscious gesture of relish.

  "Yes."

  "Would Trix have been a nickname, then?"

  "Yes."

  "Well," said Adele, feigning casualness, "I myself don't know much about Patricia. She—I guess—I don't know whether to be grateful to her or furious at her. I've been both, actually."

  "Yeah? How so?"

  "May I ask you what your interest is? How come you want to ask Bob about this person?"

  "Well," I said, "I used to know Patricia when I was a kid. And—uh, do you know that Patricia—well, that Bob was a widower there for a while?"

  "I did."

  "OK, well, Patricia died in an incident that also took the lives of my parents. Like I say, I was a kid then. And—I know this sounds very strange, but, well—I'm looking into the possibility that it might not've been an accident."

  Adele Hawley's small smile broadened.

  I continued, "And I've never met Bob, and it occurred to me that he and I should talk. I'd like to tell him some information I've got, and ask him a few things in turn. I don't want to upset him, though, so I'm glad to be talking to you first…Maybe you can give me some idea of—"

  "Well, well, well," interrupted my hostess. "Excuse me for a moment." She left the room, and I sat there surveying the decor. There's only one way to really give you the feel of what it was like sitting in that kitchen with the view to the living room beyond, and that is to summon the ghost of Joshua Doore.

  If you spent time in Detroit in the 1970s you may remember an intense television advertising campaign for a chain of furniture stores called Joshua Doore. The jingle was sung with great playfulness and verve, and it went,

  You've got an uncle in the furniture business: Joshua Doore.

  Joshua Doore!

  He's a remarkable guy with a remarkable way

  to give you bargains on your furniture every day!

  So pick it out in the showroom, pick it up at the warehouse—

  take it home in the crate!

  Yeah.

  You've got an uncle in the furniture business: Joshua Doore!

  Yeah!

  If that tells you more than you needed to know about the Hawley home, I'm sorry. You may also feel that that tells you more than you need to know about my mind. What can I say? I would prefer not to be the kind of person who would remember such a carcinogenic jingle word for word. I am, though.

  My hostess returned. She placed a few envelopes facedown on the table, near her place. They appeared to be saved letters.

  Pointing to a grouping of photos in a wall nook, I asked, "Are those your kids?" The word grouping would have been used by a Joshua Doore sales associate.

  "Yes, that's Bob Junior and Kelly." Her gaze lingered on them. "They got out," she sighed.

  I made no comment.

  Adele said, "Kelly's about to have our first grandbaby."

  "Oh, how nice."

  She reached into the refrigerator and pulled out a quart bottle of Budweiser. She twisted off the cap and took a slug. "Ah," she said. "Want one?"

  "Gee, no thank you. I gotta drive. Otherwise, you know."

  She pulled up her chair again and leaned over the table toward me. "I met Bob before Patricia died."

  That was interesting.

  Adele responded to my expression and continued, "When he was with Patricia he didn't have dime one. He was hot for me."

  "Where did you know him from?"

  "We both worked at BG."

  "What's that?"

  "BG Construction, you know."

  "Was that a firm in Detroit or out here?"

  "Oh, in Detroit. Redford, really, which was Detroit. We moved to Novi—well, I'll get to that. I got a summer job typing and filing, in the office, and Bob drove a truck. Dump truck."

  "I see."

  "Once he laid eyes on me, he made up every excuse under the sun to come into the office! Hah! All the guys did."

  "You liked him."

  "I thought he was King Kong and Paul Newman rolled into one."

  "Yeah," I said, "Good-looking young guy?"

  "You got it. And I was pretty. Oh, pretty-pretty-pretty. I'm not bragging, just trying to be honest. Huh, look at me now!" She glanced at me sideways, and I took my cue.

  "Oh, you're a lovely
lady still! Very charming."

  "You think so, Lillian?" She sucked on her beer.

  "I know so!"

  She appreciated my enthusiasm. "We saw each other in secret. It was so thrilling! All that hot passion. I was stupid. I was just a kid myself, just eighteen. I wished Patricia dead so often, to myself. I never spoke it out loud. And then it happened."

  "Wow," I said. "Must've been spooky."

  "I was scared for awhile, that's how dumb I was. I thought maybe I had special powers."

  I smiled indulgently.

  Adele went on, "After Patricia died, Bob had money all of a sudden. I wanted to go to cosmetology school. He offered to pay for it." She shook her head. "'N' I did it, I married him. My parents were glad. They thought driving a dump truck was a good job!"

  "Well," I said mildly, "any honest work is a good job in my book."

  Adele paused. "If we were talking about a better man, driving a dump truck would be a good job."

  I listened, catching on. But what's with the envelopes?

  "Like I say," she went on, "I was a kid. I didn't know squat. He told me he won the money in Las Vegas. Fifty thousand dollars, he got. I believed him then. I didn't care. I had goals. It wasn't like I wanted him to buy me diamonds, blow all his money on me. I had goals. Cosmetology school—the one I wanted to go to—cost $4,900. I married Bob, and he paid it, and I went. But by the time I graduated, the rest of the money was gone. I wanted to set up a salon, but no way at that point. No way."

  "What happened to the money?"

  "He pissed it away, one thing 'n' another. He did buy me some nice jewelry, all of which went too. I was too dumb to see where the money had come from, but later when I thought about it, it was obvious. Life insurance on Patricia."

  "Well, what would be unusual about that?"

  "Not unusual, Lillian, you're absolutely right. But he lied to me about it, said he'd won it. Why not tell the truth? He was always too cheap to gamble, I knew that."

  "Hmm," I said. "Well, I could see a guy telling a lie like that. Not wanting you to perceive anything creepy about the money. You know, buying you gifts with the first wife's insurance money—that might creep out a young girl."

  Adele checked her wristwatch. She said, "I don't usually have a drink in the middle of the day, you know?"