Murder in Pastel

by Josh Lanyon

  “Why was Brett blackmailing you?”

  “Blackmailing me?”

  If only she had sounded more indignant and less alarmed. My heart sank.

  I leaned back against the wall, watching her. “He was blackmailing you then?”

  “Do you think I’d put up with blackmail for five minutes?” She looked dangerous. The kind of dame Philip Marlowe might have encountered on one of his mean streets.

  “No.” I didn’t have to think it over.

  “Damn straight. I told the little prick to go right ahead and I’d sue his ass—or Adam’s ass, if it came to that.”

  My head snapped up. “Adam? Did Adam know?”

  She took an agitated puff of her cigarette. “I have no idea what Adam knew or didn’t know. He brought that little snake here; it was his responsibility to keep tabs on him.” Exhaling, she reminded me of a small fire-breathing dragon.

  I nodded. Stared at my foot in its scuffed sneaker. This wasn’t easy. I raised my head. “Brett was your son, wasn’t he?”

  She opened her mouth for instant denial, then shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “You…don’t?”

  Reluctantly she admitted, “He said he was. He could have been I guess, although…”

  “Although what?”

  “They told me the baby died. It could have been a lie.”

  If I said the wrong thing she was liable to clam up, but I was totally confused by now. Cautiously I tried, “The orphanage people told you your baby died?”

  Micky’s nose wrinkled. “Orphanage? Child Services informed me the baby died with the parents—the couple who adopted it.”

  It. Not exactly the maternal type, our Micky. Joel had provided most of the mothering in my life. But Micky had always been there for me, tough and tender in her own idiosyncratic way.

  “You gave your baby up for adoption?”

  “Bingo.” She stubbed out her cigarette.

  “And Brett claimed that he was your son?”

  She snorted, still not meeting my gaze. “Now I know why cats eat their young.”

  “Yeech. They don’t, do they?” She shrugged her slim shoulders. “Was Brett—was the baby—” I half swallowed the name, “Cosmo’s?”

  For a moment there was a sparkle in Micky’s eyes that could have been anger or tears. “Yes.”

  My throat knotted. It was hard to get the words out. “Did he know?”

  She shook her head. “I was a big girl. I dealt with it. Cos already had a kid; he wasn’t in love with me. And, let’s face it, I’m not exactly Brady Bunch material.”

  I pushed off the wall and tried to put my arm around her slim shoulders. “You were great to me, Micky. Always.” After a moment she let me hug her.

  “That’s because I could hand you over to Cosmo when I got tired of playing with you.”

  Yeah, that was the funny part. Imagining Cosmo taking care of a kid. I couldn’t picture him bathing, feeding, dressing a small child—tucking a little kid into bed at night. I couldn’t picture it and I had been the little kid.

  How long had it been since I let myself remember?

  I said, “So you told Brett to publish and be damned?”

  “Something like that.”

  “And Brett?”

  “Exit stage left.”

  I blinked. “You didn’t—?”

  An unpleasant smile flickered across Micky’s features.

  “No, I didn’t. But I could have.”

  When I left Micky’s, I went home and went to bed. Three hours of sleep a night was definitely not what the doctor ordered. And even without the sleep deprivation, I’d had an emotionally exhausting morning. If I had bad dreams I slept too deeply to know it.

  When I woke it was four o’clock in the afternoon. I lay there staring up at the shadows of wisteria on the ceiling, listening to the music floating across the meadow from Adam’s cottage. I felt drained, empty. Like you do when you’ve been sick with a fever and the fever finally breaks.

  I ran a quick internal audit. My heart thumped steadily along. Maybe a little fast, but it was a hot afternoon. Maybe the new dosage would do the trick. After all, it wasn’t like the strain of the last few weeks was normal for me. Maybe…

  Too soon to get my hopes up. All the same, I needed to start making plans for my future. Maybe two sets of plans depending on what my future was going to be, but somehow I didn’t feel like I could move forward when the past seemed to be converging—and the intersecting point seemed to be right where I was standing.

  I showered, ate a peanut butter sandwich, and sat down at the kitchen table to do a bit of mind mapping as set down by Leonardo de Vinci in his Treatise on Painting.

  On a large sketchpad I drew a globe containing the word COSMO in the center of the page. With a different colored pencil I jotted down key words as they occurred to me in a circle around the globe. Words like Art, Lover, Father, Mystery. I connected these words to the central image.

  It was a long time since I’d tried this creative approach to logic; I remembered Cosmo showing me how to map that last summer. I wondered what problems I’d thought I had back then. Or what problems Cosmo thought I’d had: the kind of trouble that could be worked out with colored pencils, a sketch pad and a few minutes to myself? A bit optimistic on his part.

  Focusing on the key words I’d sketched, I started to free associate. Under “Lover” I wrote: Micky. Joel? Adam? Virgin? Not that I was certain the mystery model had been Cosmo’s lover, but if she wasn’t, she’d have been unique.

  Under “Painting” I wrote: intellect, exhibition, Virgin. Under “Mystery” I came up with murder, disappearance, Virgin.

  I drew for about thirty minutes. As I wrote “Virgin” for the third time, I examined my mind map, and I recognized a theme. In red pencil I wrote the word “Virgin.” I drew connecting lines. Red lines seemed to connect the word “Virgin” to every other key word. Yet under the word “Virgin,” I had to draw a big red question mark.

  The summer breeze was stirring the lace curtains and I could hear the distant notes of “Bebop in Pastel.” I never wanted to hear that tune again as long as I lived.

  I got up and slammed shut the window.

  * * * * *

  It was almost closing time when I reached Cobb House. As usual the museum was nearly deserted. I found Jen in the concession shop selling postcard copies of Cosmo Bari’s paintings.

  I waited till she finished with her customer of the day.

  “Kyle, I’ve been meaning to call you,” she said, before I had a chance to get started, “Vince and I are getting back together.”

  “Congratulations.”

  “I know you think it’s a mistake, but we do love each other.”

  “It’s none of my business, Jen. Just because he poisoned me…”

  “That was a mistake, Kyle. Vince would never deliberately hurt anyone.”

  “A couple of days ago you told me you thought he had killed Brett.”

  Jenny flinched and looked around as though the walls had ears. “Vince explained everything to me.”

  “Like?”

  “He was in L.A. the day Brett was killed. He went for a job interview at an ad agency. He was embarrassed so he didn’t want me to know. Kyle, we’ve put the cottage up for sale. Vince took the job in L.A. We’re getting away from here.” She made it sound like an escape from Alcatraz.

  “Isn’t this sudden?”

  “We should have done it a year ago. But sometimes it takes something like this to bring people together.”

  “Jenny, a couple of days ago you were saying you were frightened of Vince. Now—”

  She rushed in, “Because I was hurt. I didn’t understand. Now I understand.”

  “What do you understand?”

  “The thing that Brett did to Vince.”

  “What thing? Taking the painting?”

  She shook her head.

  “What thing?”

  Out on the patio two matronly ladies were
having soft drinks. Jenny looked at them and lowered her voice.

  “You have to swear you’ll never tell anyone. Not even Adam. Especially not Adam.”

  “Fine. Scout’s honor.”

  “Were you a Boy Scout?”

  “No. Spill it, Jenny.”

  “It’s…horrible.”

  “For God’s sake!”

  She took a deep breath and plunged. “Vince was—curious, you know. He thought—well, he was questioning his own—his own orientation. He thought he had feelings for Brett.”

  “I know all that.”

  “Well he thought—he thought, Brett that is, thought, that they should—”

  “They should what?”

  “They went to a motel in Kelsburgh and they were, you know—”

  I gestured like a traffic cop to try and speed her onwards.

  “And Vince didn’t want to. He changed his mind. It hurt and it was disgusting. He wanted to stop but Brett wouldn’t let him. Brett forced him. Brett—Brett raped him.” Her cheeks were scarlet, her eyes bright and indignant.

  After a moment or two I closed my mouth.

  “That’s Vince’s story,” I said at last.

  “It’s true, Kyle. Vince cried when he told me.”

  I didn’t know what to say. It was so far off the track from everything I’d imagined. I thought of that night of the bonfire; of tussling with Brett on the rocks. It sunk in on me that he had known we were half brothers even then.

  “Have you told the sheriff?”

  “No! Of course not! It’s no one’s business but ours. And you can’t either. You promised!”

  “Jen, don’t you realize that this might give Vince a motive for killing Brett?”

  She gasped. Clearly she had not realized it. “No it doesn’t! That’s ridiculous. Besides Vince has an alibi, and the sheriff checked it out.”

  One of the other volunteers came downstairs. Jenny and I guiltily moved apart. I strolled over to the far wall and studied framed black-and-white photos of Steeple Hill’s glory days. A number of them were of Steeple Hill’s most famous (or infamous, according to who you asked) citizen, Cosmo Bari.

  I studied these relics of the ’60s curiously. My father seemed to stand out in every photo, tall, dark and dramatic; the center of every crowd. There he stood accepting the keys to the city from the town fathers-past (and looking mighty satirical). There he was with Joel and other people I didn’t recognize at some kind of picnic. Cosmo was not much of a picnic-er. I leaned in to better examine the picture—especially the very pretty blonde girl laughing gaily up at him.

  “Who’s this?” I asked Jenny as she came up behind me.

  “Who?” She peered around my shoulder. She chuckled. “She was pretty wasn’t she? That’s Miss Irene.”

  “Irene Cobb?”

  “Is there another Miss Irene?”

  I stared at the photograph of Irene Cobb twenty-odd years before. Tall, slim with a veil of blonde hair that fell nearly to her waist. Yes, she had been pretty once, young once, and no doubt a virgin once.

  Chapter Sixteen

  My grandfather’s house stood dark and silent in the moonlight. Though technically mine, for now I was obliged to creep in like a thief, slipping under the police tape and shinnying up the tree in the front yard. It had been several years since I’d climbed a tree—tree climbing not being recommended for heart patients.

  I reached the open window on the second story and slipped inside the house.

  It was hot and stuffy and dark. I pulled my flashlight out. The beam played around the room, lighting the crucifix over the bed, the photos of my grandparents on their wedding day and my mother on ponies of various shapes and sizes. I began sifting through my grandfather’s dresser. As Adam had said, everything was in apple pie order.

  I wasn’t sure what I was looking for; finding the Virgin tucked between his boxers would have been convenient. Not that I wanted to believe there was a link between my grandfather and Brett’s death, but to me the connection seemed inescapable. I found my grandfather’s keys on the lace doily, gleaming dully in the street lamplight. I tucked them in my jeans.

  Quietly, I crept downstairs.

  It was an old house. Floorboards creaked beneath phantom footfalls. The beams, which had expanded in the heat of the day, now contracted in the cool night with unnerving little groans.

  I tiptoed into my grandfather’s study and sat down at his desk. The drawers were closed. Locked. I pulled out the key ring and slid the keys aside looking for something small enough to fit in a desk drawer.

  It was not there.

  I searched the desktop and found a letter opener. It was too fat for the key slot. I pulled out my Swiss army knife and went through the blades, one by one, till I found one thin enough. I used this to pry at the lock. It was so easy in books and movies. Not so easy sweating in the darkness. There was clearly some trick to it. I closed my eyes and tried to picture the locking mechanism, flipping through the memories of pages of diagrams and templates from my research.

  After what seemed an eternity of blind poking there was a gratifying click and the drawer sprang open.

  I sat up, shining my flashlight inside the drawer’s contents. The drawer was as neat as a pin, everything in its proper tray compartment. Next to the tray was a leather journal—also locked.

  I lifted the journal out and glanced up as a floorboard cracked by the door. Because I expected to see nothing it took my eyes a moment to separate the dark figure standing motionless from the other shadows.

  When at last I realized what I was staring at, my heart seemed to stop. The stillness in my body matched the stillness beside the hall. I snapped off my flashlight, rising and slowly edging toward the door at the opposite end of the room.

  The silent figure moved away from the doorway.

  “Who are you?” I asked. “What do you want?”

  It was not so much that I expected an answer as I wanted my apparition to speak. That purposeful silence was terrifying.

  The figure took another step forward and tripped over one of those small tapestry footstools my unknown grandmother had been so fond of.

  As he went sprawling, I bolted for the door which led into the kitchen.

  The kitchen was long and narrow, the door leading to the backyard was at the opposite end. I ran for the door, unbolted it, yanked it open but there was a chain at the top and it held.

  My pursuer crashed through the doorway as I scrabbled at the chain. The part of my brain that could think, noted that he was tall, and that the reason I could not see his face was because he wore a black ski mask.

  Picking up one of the kitchen table chairs, he advanced on me, raising it high. There was no time to think; I had no experience, and I knew I couldn’t hold up long in a fight. I grabbed the teakettle off the stove and threw it at him.

  He ducked and struck at the kettle which hit the floor, spilling water. As he threw the chair at me he slipped on the water, his aim spoiled. I scrambled toward the entrance to the dining room.

  The chair hit my side and I fell half on top of it, which hurt enough to galvanize me into new action. I continued anteater fashion toward the doorway, pulling out and emptying drawers as I regained my feet.

  Silverware, candles, pot holders, tools clattered down on the hardwood floor. My pursuer paused, feeling among the forks and boxes of matches, to rise up, hammer in hand.

  I became aware that someone was breathlessly swearing and praying, and that it was me. My assailant swung the hammer at me, and some instinct or forgotten movie memory guided me. I yanked open the dry goods cupboard door, and the hammer smashed into it with such force it wedged in the wood.

  Astonishment held my attacker still for a split-second. I dived for his legs. He crashed down like a felled redwood, his head striking the edge of the table with a sickening cracking sound. He slid to the floor, and lay still, practically lined up with the chalk outline of where my grandfather’s body had lain.

  Put
ting my hand to my chest, I worked to get my breath. After a moment’s struggle I could breathe again. My heart was galloping away but was relatively steady.

  I got over to the phone and called the Sheriff’s Department. Then I grabbed one of those long white dishcloths, and headed back to my fallen foe whose weak gurgles signified returning consciousness.

  I pulled the ski mask off. Blonde hair shone brightly in the moonlight streaming through the window over the sink. For a shocked moment I thought I was seeing Brett. Then I recognized Jack Cobb.

  * * * * *

  “He says he didn’t murder anyone,” Sheriff Rankin told me over a cup of bitter coffee. “Not Hansen and not your grandpappy.”

  I tore my gaze away from the wanted posters on the bulletin board. We were sitting in the sheriff’s station. Jack had been booked and was now sitting in a jail cell while Mayor Cobb, his gray hair sticking up like a rooster’s comb, pajama shirt hanging out beneath his jacket, was signing his life away at the front desk.

  “You don’t believe him?”

  The sheriff noncommittally slurped his coffee.

  “He tried to kill me.”

  “He says no. Says he wanted what you found at Aaron’s house.”

  “I didn’t find anything.”

  “Uh huh.” The sheriff eyed me with an uncomfortably keen gaze.

  Getting the conversation back on track, I reminded him, “He tried to cave my head in with a hammer.”

  “He says he just wanted to frighten you.”

  “He succeeded. Does he have an alibi for Brett’s murder, or for my grandfather’s?”

  “We’re checking on that.”

  I thought back to the moonlit house, to his silent purposefulness, and I said, “He would have killed me if he could have.”

  But Rankin looked unconvinced. “You were right about one thing anyway.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Cobb admits he stole that painting of your father’s. Like to tell me how you knew that?”

  “A lucky guess. He was the first person to leave the party. No one could positively remember seeing the painting after the argument between Vince and myself. By then Jack had split.”