Petty Crimes & Head Cases

by Lola Beatlebrox

  “Why do those men always wear shorts?” she asked.

  “What men?”

  “Those delivery men. Always wearing brown shorts. Even in winter.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “And why did she kill herself?”

  “Kill herself?”

  “The beautiful girl,” Mrs. Hernandez said. “The beautiful, unhoppy girl. Do you think she did it on purpose?”

  “Surely it wasn’t suicide!”

  “Then why did she stop on tracks? You tell me that, huh?”

  I gazed into Mrs. Hernandez’ eyes. Her brows had knitted together.

  We didn’t say any more as Mrs. Hernandez made her next appointment but her question was sitting on the computer keyboard as she handed me her credit card. Her question was standing on my bamboo flooring as we crossed to the front door.

  Why did she stop on the tracks?

  “Tracy!” said a voice at my front door.

  Oh no. It’s Candy Fiber. I just put up with Candy Fiber at book club the other night. I don’t want to talk to her now.

  “Candy! How nice to see you!” I said.

  “You doing good, Tracy? Love your hair color! How do you get that particular shade? Just that one little patch on the right-hand side. You’re so clever. Not everyone’s as good a colorist as you are. And green. Only you can pull it off.”

  “It’s chartreuse, Candy. To match my nail polish. But I didn’t expect you until next week.”

  “A new product came in and I wanted to share. Your clients will love it and so will you. In six days you’ll feel like new. ‘Zoom Away’ is guaranteed to make you lose weight and work magic on your complexion, or your money back.”

  I should be calling her Candy Bilk-U-of-Your-Money. She’s signed onto as many pyramid schemes as I’ve given haircuts—the kind where a person buys inventory and must sell it to make her money back.

  Without taking a breath, Candy continued her spiel. “There are no preservatives, no chemicals, and no GMOs in this product, so it’s healthy for you. And gluten-free! You don’t have to spend too much at first. A fifty-five dollar starter kit will have your clients seeing results by the beginning of next week.” Candy pulled out a brochure with before-and-after photos and an order-form on the back. “How many would you like?”

  She was poised with her pen on the door sill, so no one could get in or out of my salon. I marveled at this girl’s balls. But then, of course, she doesn’t have any. Only little tits that she would like to have enlarged at the earliest opportunity so she could snag some guy before he knew what hit him. Conveniently, she was dating a plastic surgeon.

  “How’s the cosmetologist?” I asked.

  “Cosmetic surgeon,” she said. “Fabulous. His office bought fifty starter kits!”

  “What a score! Then you don’t need business from me.” I advanced on her, propelling her out of the doorway toward the street. “Let’s not block the door, Candy.”

  “On the contrary,” she said, batting her eyelashes. “I need your business, Tracy. You see more people who need these products in one week than the doctor sees in a month.”

  “Are you trying to say my clients are fat?”

  She smirked. “They’re a bit overweight, aren’t they?”

  “Candy, give me a break. I’m not interested in carrying any new products, okay?” I caught sight of the clock. “I have a client coming in five minutes and I have to get ready.”

  “Well, if you’ll try at least one starter kit, I’ll tell you what I heard about the big accident this morning!”

  I looked at her smug little face. She wasn’t kidding. She knew something and she wouldn’t give it up without a bribe.

  “Candy, you don’t know anything.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “What is it?”

  “Na uh.” She shook her blonde curls.

  I wanted to slap her. Instead I said, “I’m not interested. I’m too sad. That poor girl and her baby. Crushed to death by two hundred tons of metal going five miles an hour. What could you possibly tell me that I haven’t heard already?”

  “She wasn’t alone in the car.”

  “She had her baby.”

  “She wasn’t the only adult in the car.”

  “Who says?”

  “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

  “Candy, if you know something, you should tell the police.”

  “Nonsense. I’m only repeating what somebody told me who was told by somebody else.”

  “Then it’s not good information.”

  “There was a man in the car. A stocky man with black and silver hair. He was in the car with her and jumped out before the train hit!”

  “I don’t believe it.”

  “Choose what you want to believe. Or ask your husband. You’ll see I’m right.”

  I remembered the phone call to Carl I should have made hours ago.

  “Candy Samuels!” yelled a voice from a car careening into a parking space in front of my shop.

  “Oh, boy, I’m outa here!” Candy scuttled down the sidewalk.

  Katherine Putnam leaped out of her car and set off after Candy who disappeared around the corner.

  When Katherine returned, I took one look at her florid, pudgy face and knew what was going on. “You didn’t try one of her elixirs, did you?”

  “Guaranteed to melt pounds off in five days.”

  “Yikes.”

  “If I catch that sorry—”

  “Didn’t get your money back?”

  “No.”

  “Still trying to get it?”

  “Yes.”

  We went into the salon and I checked my Client Notebook. “Last time we talked about an auburn color to enhance your complexion,” I said to Katherine. “Did you think that one over?”

  Katherine reached into her purse, which contained more stuff than the local thrift store, and pawed around for a few minutes. She finally pulled out a picture of a beautiful model with bright red hair. “I want this color,” she said.

  “Ahhh,” escaped my lips. How should I react to this? I settled on: “A truly vibrant shade.”

  “I saw it on a singer in a band at the festival last week. It’s totally radical. Don’t you think it will look super?”

  On her, yes.

  “Very distinctive,” I said. “Shades of red. Violet. A little of the auburn we talked about. Auburn would really suit your complexion.”

  “I want to be different. I want to be—sensational.”

  “It will be that.”

  We cruised into the color salon where I opened my book of color swatches. As we discussed the choices, I suggested a weave. Red, auburn and blonde. “Not exactly like the picture but I guarantee it will enhance your complexion. Then if you want to go brighter red next time, we can ease into it.”

  “Okay. If you think so. But I want to look like that singer. You know she’s going to be the next Ms. Cowgirl.”

  “Oh really?” I mixed the colors and notated the formula in my Client Notebook.

  “Yeah, she’s a shoo-in now that Angelica Diego is dead.”

  I looked up from my mixing bowl. “Is that the girl who was killed by the train this morning?”

  “Yeah. An absolutely gorgeous girl.”

  “You knew her?”

  “Yeah.”

  “How?”

  “We went to high school together.”

  I began to section off Katherine’s hair. “Why would she do such a thing?” I asked.

  “Go to high school with me?”

  “Stop on a train track.”

  “Accidents happen.”

  I applied color to a chunk of hair and wrapped it in tin foil. “Some people are saying it was suicide.”

  “Suicide!”

  “You don’t think so?”

  “No way. She had everything to live for. A great husband. A beautiful kid. Not such a great job, but a chance at being Ms. Cowgirl? No way.”

  “Then what do you think happened
?”

  “Car trouble?”

  “But why would a car pick that spot to stall out? Most train accidents seem so ridiculous. You can hear the train coming. You can see the train coming. Crossings have lights and barriers. Anybody who gets stuck on the tracks is a dope.”

  Katherine absorbed this information. Then she said, “Some people say someone else was there.”

  “Who?”

  “Someone who stepped on the brake or stalled out the car.”

  “And forced her to stay?”

  “Had a big argument.”

  “A big stocky white guy with silver and black hair?” I asked, dreading the answer.

  Katherine laughed. “No! Where’d you hear that? People are saying it was a woman. Someone saw a woman running away from the train into the shadows.”

  “Who was the someone?”

  “The train engineer.”

  Now it was definitely time to call Carl. I wished there hadn’t been so many interruptions.

  “You’re done.” I put down my painting brush. “Where would you like to process?”

  “How long do I have?”

  “Thirty minutes.”

  She thought for a moment. “How about in the spa with the footbath and the massage chair?”

  “You got it.”

  I ran the tub and sprinkled lavender essential oil in the warm water. Then I placed a pillow on the seat of the chair, so vertically-challenged Katherine would be tall enough to enjoy the full range of my automatic deep cushion-rest back kneader.

  Katherine eased into the chair and dangled her feet over the tub while I removed her Reeboks and socks. She dipped her feet in with a chortle of delight.

  “Enjoy,” I said and turned down the lights. Katherine closed her eyes, a little smile on her face.

  I strode to my desk and grabbed the phone.

  Carl answered on the first ring. “Hello, Miss Headstrong.”

  “Hello, Officer-In-the-Know.”

  He laughed.

  “I’m worried about the accident this morning,” I said.

  “Why am I not surprised?”

  “There was a man in here. My first customer. He said he saw it happen. Well, I mean, he said he saw the dead baby.”

  “The baby’s not dead.”

  “Not dead?”

  “The baby was saved by a squirrel’s nest. You know those things you see in trees? This one was in a shrub, big and wide and soft inside. The baby fell into it and survived.”

  I bit my lip which was quivering. I put my hand over my mouth to make it stop. My son Jamie. Her baby. Alive.

  “But he said it died in the bushes,” I whispered.

  “Not so. The nest was above some brambles and it lived.”

  “So this man who was here this morning—”

  “Stocky? Working man? Black hair shot with gray?”

  “Yes.”

  “He came in and gave a statement. You should have seen his face when he found out the child was alive. Blubbered like a baby.”

  Thank God.

  “So what happened, Carl? What happened to that poor girl?”

  “Active investigation, sweetheart. I can’t talk about it. Goodbye, Miss Ears.”

  “See you, Officer Sexy.”

  He laughed.

  I hung up.

  Katherine was gone and Martha Farqhuar had arrived—Martha with the big chest, hefty shoulders, and stocky frame. I have always marveled at her girth and her grit. Martha is a presence no matter where she shows up, whether City Council or the Rotary Club. Martha is Vice President of Operations at our town’s main claim to fame—the Resort where the rich and famous go for rehab. Martha’s in charge of the culinary, maintenance, and housekeeping staff.

  I consulted my Client Notebook. Basic bowl cut on her steel wire head with no color touch-ups. Likes her eyebrows waxed to get rid of stray white hairs that tend to give her a pale, insipid appearance—her word, not mine. Likes her mustache waxed, too. No five o’clock shadow for her.

  My Client Notebook told me that she had no husband, boyfriends, or love interests of any kind. She was working on a memoir about her life with the rich and famous that she planned to publish posthumously, which was her fancy word for “after death.” Whose? Hers or the rich and famous? I was never quite sure.

  “I would like the usual,” she said, after I took her brown coat and hung it in the closet.

  “Of course.” I brought her an assortment—Hershey’s, Belgian, Godiva. She selected Godiva. I draped her in a burgundy cape which hid her lumpy body. After tucking a royal blue terry cloth towel around her neck, I began to trim the hair all over her black and silver head. My snips sounded quite staccato as I marshaled her layers into shape. She eyed me in the mirror.

  “You’re looking happy today,” she said.

  I was surprised. Usually she didn’t pay any attention to me. “I’ve just learned that the baby who was hit by the train is still alive.”

  A flicker crossed her face. “Oh?”

  “Yes, he was thrown clear and came down into some kind of nest—a soft landing. Isn’t that a miracle?”

  “My, my.”

  “But you should know about him. Wasn’t Angelica Diego one of your housekeepers?”

  “Was she?”

  “That’s what I heard.”

  “She could have been.”

  “Didn’t you know her?”

  “I don’t know all the people on my staff. There are so many.”

  “A beautiful girl, they say. She was going to compete for Ms. Cowgirl.”

  “Oh. That one.” The way she said it, I felt she was talking about a leather glove. Oh, that one. As if there were two and one had been lost but now found.

  “Yes,” I said. “Apparently she was a front runner, but her husband didn’t want her to compete. Said she wouldn’t win and shouldn’t even try.”

  “Playing the race card, was he?” she said.

  How crass! But was she right? Was that his real objection—that Angelica couldn’t win because she was Hispanic?

  “These macho Hispanic men,” Martha said with some venom. “They think they can run their women’s lives. She was a pretty thing, as I recall. And she did have a baby. But – Not so close!”

  “Sorry!”

  “You nearly took my ear off!”

  I wasn’t anywhere near her ear. Why was Martha so touchy? “I’ll be more careful,” I said.

  “These girls should be more mindful who they marry,” she said. “He hurt her.”

  I pulled back and caught a glimpse of my horrified expression in the mirror. Luckily, Martha was looking elsewhere. “How do you know that?” I asked.

  “Came to work with bruises. On several occasions.”

  “Really!”

  “We reached out to her, tried to help. She would have none of it.”

  “So you do remember her.”

  Her silence spoke volumes. What had made Martha hide her knowledge at first?

  “Of course, you have so many employees to worry about,” I said, “but this one sounds like she was in trouble.”

  Martha expelled more air from her lungs than a beached whale. “She was terrified of her husband and what he might do to her. I tried to make her leave him. Gave her the number for the battered women’s shelter.”

  “But she wouldn’t use it?”

  “No.” Martha was silent for a while.

  Don’t dry up now.

  I changed tactics. “You are so persuasive, councilor. I’ve seen you in city hall meetings. I know how you make things happen.” I poured it on. “Surely she would have listened to someone as wise as you.”

  “I took her home with me.”

  My eyebrows were raised, but I hid behind her head so she couldn’t see me in the mirror. I shaved the hairs around her collar. Her head emerged from the chair at about the same height as my first customer of the day. I stared at the back of her head. Her thick neck matched the brown of the coat I had hung in the closet. Was
that a coincidence? Candy said the engineer saw a woman running away from the tracks—a woman with salt and pepper hair.

  “How did she fare at your house?” I asked, pushing my alarm bells down near my ankles. “Were you able to talk some sense into her?”

  “She didn’t stay long.”

  I took out the soft plush cosmetic brush I use to dust off hair snippets resting inside ears and on delicate neck muscles. Martha didn’t have any—delicate neck muscles, I mean. I had never contemplated what a formidable, muscular body she possessed and suddenly I thought I knew why Angelica refused to stay at Martha’s house for very long.

  “All set,” I said, putting a lilt of gaiety in my voice.

  I took off the burgundy cape and removed the royal blue towel. I gave her a hand mirror. “How’s the back?”

  She took the mirror and moved on muddy, booted feet to observe the back of her head. Then she said with a bitter tone, “Good enough for city hall but not good enough for Ms. Cowgirl.”

  I gulped.

  How did Angelica reject your advances—with polite good nature or noisy screams and a terrified retreat?

  “You want to keep your standing appointment next month?” I asked, leading her toward my desk.

  “I don’t know. I might be busy,” she said, not looking at me. “I’ll call you.”

  I took her cash.

  She dropped five bucks near the computer and lumbered through the front door.

  After I saw Martha Farquhar out, I plucked the hand mirror off the counter with a tissue and dropped it in a plastic bag. Then I locked up the salon and drove to the police station.

  The place was bedlam. Strange men in suits huddled in sweaty groups beside our uniforms. Half the men were on cell phones. Our local admins bustled around with print-outs and coffee pots. Chief Fort Dukes stood in the middle of it all looking stunned, but then he looks that way every day.

  I found Carl at a computer terminal and waved my plastic bag. “I think I have the fingerprints of the murderer in here,” I said.

  “Murderer,” Carl said. “What murderer?”

  “The woman who was with Angelica Diego when she was killed.” My words tumbled out. “The woman who ran away from the train tracks right before the engine hit. The woman who parked Angela’s car on the tracks!”