In Plain Sight

by Barbara Block

  We chatted for another couple of minutes about how to take care of a salt water tank and then she left.

  “Who are you going to get to help carry the stuff in?” Tim said after she’d left.

  “I don’t know. Maybe Manuel.”

  Tim rolled his eyes.

  “You have any better suggestions?”

  “No,” Tim admitted. “I don’t.”

  It took seven phone calls and the promise of thirty bucks, but I finally got Manuel up and functioning. He was at the store three-quarters of an hour later, and we loaded up the cab and drove over to Garriques’s house.

  “Nice place,” Manuel commented as we pulled into the driveway.

  I nodded my head in agreement. The house was a large, well-kept Tudor. In a another community it might have cost two hundred and fifty thousand or more. Here it would go for one hundred and eighty. One of the advantages of living in Syracuse is the cheap price of housing.

  “I wouldn’t mind camping out here,” Manuel told me as I unlocked the door.

  “Me either.” We stepped inside. The hall floor gleamed so brightly I almost felt guilty stepping on it.

  The living room was furnished with good English antiques and Oriental rugs. Enid had told me that the study was across the hall. It proved to be equally tasteful. A large desk took place of pride in the center of the room. The walls were covered with Garriques’s collection of antique maps while the mantel was lined with photographs. Most seemed to consist of two youngish women now sitting, now standing, in front of a house. Something about them and the house looked very familiar, but I couldn’t think what it was. I was still trying to figure it out when Manuel tugged at my sleeve.

  “Are we going to get going or not?” he said.

  I turned away reluctantly and studied the site Enid had proposed for the aquarium. Everything seemed to be fine. There was no reason the fish tank couldn’t go in there.

  “All right,” I told Manuel. “Let’s do it.”

  By the time we were done we were both hot, sweaty, and irritable.

  “God, I didn’t think it would be this much work,” Manuel said as we walked out the door. “I don’t suppose you could add another ten to the thirty you’re giving me.”

  “Not a chance.” I put Enid’s key in the mailbox. “As it is I’m already giving you too much.”

  Manuel shrugged. “Oh, well. It was worth trying.”

  I paid Manuel, dropped him off at his house, and went back to the store.

  “I hope Garriques likes it,” I told Tim as I bent down to pet Zsa Zsa. “I’d sure hate to have to take it back.”

  “He will once the fish are in,” Tim promised. “How could he not? They’re gorgeous.”

  “True.” I looked through the day’s mail. “Did George call?”

  Tim shook his head. I tried George again. No one was home. I left a message telling him to call and hung up. It looked as if George and I were playing telephone tag.

  Chapter 32

  I’d planned on taking an hour and dashing back out to where I’d followed Ray and having a look around, but things didn’t work out that way. First the store got busy, then Tim had a dentist appointment, and then when he got back I got a call from Hancock. A shipment of lizards I’d ordered three weeks ago had just come in. Somebody had to pick them up. That someone was me. By the time I got done with that and Tim and I housed the skinks, it was time to close up. My little trip would have to wait till tomorrow. It was too dark and I was too tired to go. Instead Zsa Zsa and I went home.

  James was waiting for me. I let him in and opened a can of tuna for him. While he was eating I called George. Still no answer. I was now beginning to feel annoyed. The least he could do was call me back, I decided as I poured some Cocoa Krispies and milk into a bowl. I took it into the living room, turned on the TV, and sat down on the sofa. Zsa Zsa jumped up beside me. We sat there together as I ate my dinner and watched reruns of 1950s sitcoms. I have to get a life, I thought as I put the bowl down on the coffee table. A moment later I was sound asleep. I awoke at four with a stiff neck. I took a couple of Tylenol and stumbled upstairs and went to bed.

  I must have been making up for all the sleep I’d been missing recently because I slept through my alarm. I awoke at eight-forty-five took one look at the time, pulled some clothes on, called to Zsa Zsa and ran out the door. The rest of the morning was equally annoying. One of the new lizards escaped and it took forever to find it. Then some guy I’d never seen walked in and wanted his money back for a sick fish he claimed he’d bought in the store. I knew he hadn’t because we don’t carry fancy goldfish, but when I explained he’d made a mistake he started yelling and screaming. I had to call the police and have him thrown out. And to top everything off Tim was late.

  By the time two o’clock rolled around all I wanted to do was get the hell out of Noah’s Ark. Finding out where Ray had gone seemed like the perfect excuse. I told Tim to mind the store and took off. The drive back out to where I’d followed Ray took longer the second time around, mostly because I had trouble finding the last turnoff. I drove up two dead ends before I located it. Or at least I thought I had. The road looked familiar, but it was hard to tell since everything always looks different at night. I kept going anyway. The worst that could happen was that I’d made a mistake and would have to turn around. After about fifteen feet the paving gave out and turned to gravel, and then a little later the gravel turned to dirt. As the cab jounced along I began wondering if this was such a good idea after all—my shocks were in bad enough shape as it was—but I managed to make it without a damaged spring or a flat tire.

  Here and there I saw signs of civilization—a discarded soda bottle, a white porcelain sink, a pair of torn underpants—but mostly I saw sumac and honey locust. The afternoon sun slanting in through the trees gave the scene a nice bucolic quality. Normally I would have enjoyed it, but I was too keyed up about what I was going to find to pay much attention. After about seven minutes of driving the trees gave way to an open field. A house stood a little ways away. When I saw it I jammed on the brakes.

  I couldn’t believe it.

  I was looking at the house Estrella’s mother was supposed to have been living in.

  I must have come up the back way.

  What the hell had Ray been doing here?

  This didn’t make sense.

  I drove up to the farmhouse and got out.

  It was still deserted.

  No one was here.

  I knocked just in case. When there was no answer I tried the door. It was open. I went inside.

  The place felt damp and chilly—as if the house didn’t know that spring had come. Strips of wallpaper dangled from the hall walls. It looked as if someone had started stripping the walls and then gotten tired of the job and walked away. I went into the living room. A sagging sofa sat in the middle of the room. Some old newspapers were spread out on the floor along one wall. The wall itself had brown water stains on it. The plaster was beginning to buckle along the intersection of the wall and the ceiling—the bathroom upstairs must have overflowed. I turned and walked into the kitchen. The counter was bare. I opened the cupboards. Except for a few boxes of Kraft’s macaroni and cheese, they were empty. So was the inside of the refrigerator. I was turning to leave when I spied a bag of garbage over by the door that led to the outside. I went over and sniffed. It didn’t smell. Someone had bagged the trash fairly recently. I didn’t know whether that meant anything or not.

  I climbed the stairs to the second floor, but didn’t get any more answers up there. There were four small bedrooms, each of them filled with three or four sagging, dirty mattresses. From the look of them whoever had slept on them hadn’t slept well. I opened each of the room’s closets. Except for a baseball hat hanging on a hook in one, they were all empty. I turned and went down the stairs. Garriques had said he thought that Estrella’s mother was working as a migrant laborer. Well, if she was and she’d been here, she’d moved on. I closed the house
door behind me and went to check the barn. Even though I knew I wasn’t going to find anything, I wanted to be able to tell myself I’d done a thorough job.

  As I walked along I was aware of the silence surrounding me. The only noise I heard was the crunch of my footsteps on the gravel path that led to the barn. When I got to the entrance I stopped and looked. My impression was one of desolation. I stepped inside. The place smelled of lost hopes. Orb spinners’ cobwebs decorated the walls. Bird droppings lay splattered on the hay-strewn dusty floor, though when I looked up I couldn’t see any nests on the eaves overhead. I went through the stalls. They were all empty except for the last one. It contained several large yellow and blue metal drums. They were the kind chemicals were stored in. Some stood upright; others had fallen over on their sides. As I drew closer I saw the caution signs scrawled along their tops. Something told me I didn’t want to get too near to whatever was inside them, and I backed away.

  When I’d gone a little ways I stopped and stood there hoping that enlightenment would strike; but it didn’t, and after a few minutes I left. I was almost at the main door when a glint of gold on the floor caught my eye. I stooped to get a better look. A pen lay half-hidden beneath a fallen metal rake. I picked it up. It was a Mark Cross, an expensive one from the look of it, the kind that belonged on Fifth Avenue, not in this kind of place. I turned it over in my hand and wondered who owned it and what its owner had been doing here. I’d ask Ray, I decided as I slipped it in my pocket. Dollars to doughnuts he’d know the answer.

  I was still thinking about the pen as I got in my car and drove off the property. This time, though, I went out the front way. As I passed the gravestones standing on the slope of the hill I thought that soon, with no one to care for them, they’d be completely covered over with weeds. It seemed sad to be neglected like that, and then I reminded myself that I hadn’t been back to Murphy’s grave since he died. I lit a cigarette and looked at the flame on my lighter. Maybe cremation had a lot going for it after all. Especially if you had your ashes scattered to the winds. You couldn’t be neglected if you weren’t there.

  “Tell me, how do you want to dispose of your body when you die?” I asked Tim when I stepped inside the door.

  He looked up from the hamster food he was shelving. “It’s not a question I’ve given a lot of thought to. Why? Are you planning on dying soon?”

  Pickles rubbed herself around my ankles. “Not as far as I know,” I replied.

  “Good.” Tim went back to rearranging the shelf.

  I picked up the cat and rubbed under her chin. She began to purr. “Would you feel bad if you were dead and no one came to visit your grave?”

  Tim snorted. “At that point I don’t think I’m going to care. If I were you, I’d be giving more thought to increasing the sales in here and less to this kind of stuff.”

  “Maybe you’re right.” I banished the gravestones from my mind, walked out back and poured myself a cup of coffee. Then I came back in and looked over the mail. It was all bills and circulars. The usual. I dropped the circulars in the garbage can.

  “Where’s Zsa Zsa?”

  “She went for a walk with Lucy. She’ll be back soon.”

  I grunted. Lucy was eight going on twenty-five. Once in a while when things got rough at home, which was usually once a week, she came over and took Zsa Zsa out.

  “Anything else?”

  “Yeah. A guy named Eddison phoned. He said he wanted to speak to you.”

  “Did he say about what?” As if I couldn’t guess. I should have been more careful replacing things when I’d gone through his office. What had Grandma always said? Neatness counts.

  “He didn’t leave a message,” Tim replied. “You want to do the rabbits or should I?”

  “I will after I call this guy.” I was curious to hear what Eddison had to say.

  What he said was, “You were in my office, weren’t you?”

  “Are you accusing me of breaking and entering?” I countered. Over the years I’ve learned the best thing to do when you’re challenged is to throw the challenge back.

  “Yes, I am,” Eddison replied.

  Tim stopped dusting the shelf behind the counter and listened.

  “Now, why would I want to do a thing like that?” I demanded, even though I knew what Eddison was going to say.

  “To look at my files.” He took a deep breath, then exhaled. “I know what you’re thinking, but Marsha wasn’t using my files to blackmail anyone. I was the only person she was doing that to.”

  “So you say,” I observed, even though I suspected he was telling the truth.

  “You’ll have to take my word.”

  “What if I don’t want to?”

  “I’m not giving you my files,” Eddison reiterated.

  I lit a scrap of paper and put it in the ashtray. As I watched the edges curling in on themselves I tried to decide how badly I wanted to see what was in them. I knew I could get Eddison’s client list if I pushed a little, but I had a feeling getting the contents of their files might take more pushing than I was willing to do right now. It might make more sense to look at the list first and go from there.

  Eddison coughed. “Don’t you understand I can’t betray people’s confidences like that?” he cried.

  “I think I’d be more sympathetic if you hadn’t done it the first time around,” I told him. Eddison didn’t reply. I guess he couldn’t think of anything to say. “Listen,” I continued. “I want that list over at my store in half an hour. Otherwise I’m calling Fast Eddie.” I hung up.

  “Would you really do that?” Tim asked.

  “I don’t know,” I replied.

  Fortunately I didn’t have to make the decision.

  Eddison slunk in the store with five minutes to spare. I scanned the list as he was leaving.

  I don’t know what I’d been expecting, but none of the names leaped out at me.

  I thought about them on and off during the day with a mounting sense of frustration.

  But no matter how many times I looked at the list I didn’t recognize any of the names. I finally decided that I’d check them out if nothing else panned out, but for the time being it made more sense to concentrate on Merlin and Shirley and Ray and Eddison. I lit a cigarette and spent the next couple of minutes watching the smoke rise toward the ceiling.

  Around eight-thirty I called George. I wanted to fill him in on the latest.

  I got his answering machine instead. Even though I didn’t have any right to be, I was annoyed and I hung up without leaving a message.

  I spent the next half hour mopping the floor. At nine I closed up the store and did some paperwork. When I was done Zsa Zsa and I had a couple of Big Macs and I dropped her off at my house. Then I headed over to Ray’s. I had a few questions I wanted answered. A slight breeze was blowing and the air smelled as if spring was here and meant to stay. As I got near Ray’s house I could see that he was home. His car was in the driveway and one of Merlin’s vans was parked on the street. I pulled up behind it and got out. The van’s back doors were open.

  The interior light was on. It silhouetted Ray.

  His back was to me. He was hunched over a low table.

  Whatever he was occupied with must have involved him completely because he didn’t turn when I stepped inside.

  “Ray,” I said, tapping him on the shoulder.

  He whirled around.

  I gasped when I saw what he was holding.

  Chapter 33

  A brown bat lay cupped in Ray’s hand.

  It looked exactly the same as the ones Tim and I had been taking out of people’s houses for the past couple of weeks. Something told me I’d stumbled on their source.

  “That’s a rather odd pet,” I said, aiming for wry.

  Ray didn’t answer. I guess he wasn’t doing banter—not that he ever had.

  As I walked over for a closer look I became aware of a cacophony of high-pitched squeakings coming from a cardboard box in the far corner
of the van.

  “I bet you didn’t know that it’s illegal to kill bats in England,” I observed pleasantly. “If there’s a colony in your attic, you have to apply to the council for permission to move them.” I knew this because I’d researched an article several years ago on rental rights in the United States and England and the fact had stayed in my mind.

  Ray glowered. “Who gives a fuck about England?”

  “Obviously not you, but it’s illegal to kill them in New York State, too.” It wasn’t true, but it seemed like a good thing to say.

  “No, it’s not.”

  “Yes, it is,” I insisted.

  Ray got a mulish expression on his face. “I ain’t killing them.”

  “That’s good.” I pointed to the bat in his hand. Some people said they were cute, just small cuddly mice with wings, but I couldn’t see it. It was probably their teeth that made me feel that way. They were little and jagged and reminded me of the kind of teeth gremlins would have—if gremlins existed. “Would you mind telling me exactly what you are doing with them?”

  Ray took two steps back. I took two steps forward. The bat stayed still.

  “This wasn’t my idea,” he whined.

  “Let me guess, you were just following orders.”

  Ray touched his upper lip with the tip of his tongue. “I got bills to pay.”

  “Don’t we all.” I took out a cigarette and lit it. For some reason the smoke made the smell of chemicals coming from the canisters stored along either side of the van worse. I sighed and scotched the Camel on the floor with my heel. I guess I’d have to wait till later. “You know,” I continued, “when I followed you ...”

  The corners of Ray’s mouth quivered in suppressed alarm. “You followed me?” he cried.

  “Last night.” By now I was close enough to smell his breath. He’d eaten something with garlic and onions not too long ago. I glanced at the bat in Ray’s hand again. It looked forlorn. Then suddenly something occurred to me; the droppings I’d seen in the barn earlier in the day were from bats not birds. That was the reason I hadn’t spotted any nests in the rafters. “You got that in the barn, didn’t you?”