He dropped his coffee cup. “Oh, Christ!” Shaking his head, he rolled back his chair and stared at the mess at his feet in disbelief. Then he grabbed a handful of tissues from a dusty box and threw them onto the floor. “Did he kill himself?”
Now it was my turn to be surprised. Suicide was not a possibility I’d even contemplated. And Helen Keith certainly hadn’t mentioned it.
“Heart attack, I think,” I stammered. “But… I guess I was hoping to find out about his background. I’m thinking maybe there’s something in it that could help our friend in jail.”
“I’ll bet it was suicide. No-toe was just so damned depressed,” Victor continued gloomily, as if he were thinking of offing himself, to end his own remorse about everything. “One day, he just said, ‘I quit.’” He shook his head in disgust. “Some guys just can’t take the pressure of construction.”
“I need to ask you about the time before Holden quit. About a month ago. Was Holden the one who pushed Barry down, so that he landed in a ditch out here on the construction site? Or did he see who pushed Barry?”
Victor’s thin eyebrows rose. “No. It wasn’t No-toe. But how did you hear about that?”
“Oh, you know, some gossip was reported in the paper…”
His voice turned cautious. “Well, Barry told us to keep our mouths shut about that incident. If it got out, he said, things would get worse for him. That’s what he said. They’re putting pipes and cables in that ditch now, but it was about seven feet deep before.”
“Did you see who pushed him?”
“Yeah. I did.” He lowered his voice. My skin crawled, and I imagined the dreaded Rhonda with one of her large ears pressed against the thin door.
“So did No-toe,” Victor added, just above a whisper. I waited, heart hammering. “Dean had had a real bad fight with his girlfriend,” he continued. “One of ’em, anyway. Dean was two-timing, see. But if you heard about the ditch thing, you probably heard that, too.” I nodded. Victor squirmed, then finally whispered, “That girlfriend was here the day of the truck thing. Anyway, she didn’t push him down so that he fell into a ditch, she pushed him into the ditch. Right then, Dean screamed, ‘Don’t! Ellie, don’t!’” Victor’s bloodshot eyes squinted at me. “So. Do you know this Ellie?”
CHAPTER 17
At the mention of my friend’s name, I made my face blank and, shivering, tugged my coat around me. The office’s little space heater suddenly seemed woefully inadequate.
“I sort of know her,” I evaded.
“I found out her last name when her car got crashed into Dean’s Mercedes,” Victor told me. “It was in the newspaper. McNeely. Wealthy woman who swears she wasn’t driving.” He grinned in mock defeat. “The rich never have to pay. You and I work our butts off and we get what? Hot kitchens, freezing offices, and no appreciation.” He stopped to pull out a tissue. “Ever notice?”
While he blew his nose, I cleared my throat, and looked around the room again. Plans, charts, and notes were pinned to every bit of wall space. Victor was right about one thing: I’d already decided I wouldn’t want to work in this frigid, disorganized environment.
I asked, “Did anyone besides you and Holden see Ellie McNeely push Barry into the ditch?”
“It was early in the morning,” Victor replied. “Couple of guys might have been around. We were discussing delays on the project, when this woman comes running up and starts screaming at Dean about how he had a commitment to her.” The phone rang and he answered it. “They are?” he said, with a glance at the clock. “OK. Just a coupla minutes more, I swear.” He grinned. “Yeah, thanks. I took ’em.” Clearly, the omniscient and nosy Rhonda was trying to throw her weight around.
As he hung up the phone, I stood. “Victor, I appreciate your seeing me. Did you tell the police the details of this ditch incident?”
He shook his head. “No. They asked me if Dean had any enemies, and I said I didn’t know of any. He had a coupla people he didn’t get along with, I told ‘em, like his two girlfriends and No-toe. But I didn’t want to get one girlfriend over another in trouble. Anyway, Rhonda just called to say the cops are on their way over. They’ve got a coupla more questions, apparently. Do you think I should tell them this McNeely lady pushed Barry?”
“That’s up to you.” I thanked him again, picked up the foam cup, and backed out of the tiny, icy office.
“Real sorry about your friend in jail,” Victor called after me.
I ignored Rhonda’s vicious glare, clomped out of the trailer, and poured the dark liquid into the ditch. Could Ellie really have pushed Barry in there, when it was seven feet deep? Was it possible she could have set up the whole portable toilet incident, just to look innocent in my eyes? I simply could not fathom it.
A sudden icy wind blasted my nostrils with a horrid stench. I gagged and stared at the stinking turquoise portable toilets. They were scribbled with racist graffiti. Wetbacks Go Home!! was scrawled beneath a Spanish retort that I translated, more politely than it was written, as We can’t wait to go back to Mexico, and good luck having an incestuous relationship with your mother. So much for racial harmony on the job site.
Near the plastic fence, a Hispanic man was hovering between my car and the Porsche. He was dressed in the garb of a construction worker, and was putting one of those bright orange ads under my windshield. Just what I needed, an encouragement to do yet more shopping. Before he could put an ad under the Porsche’s windshield, a Furman County prowler pulled up. The ad-placer vanished as the prowler disgorged two men. They were detectives, no doubt… and maybe they would give a ticket to someone illegally distributing ads to parked cars.
The workmen hacking at the ice stopped to stare at the cop car. Bucking the wind, I ignored the detectives, and made my way toward the mall. On the way, I tossed my cup into the overflowing Dumpster with such fury that it bounced up, was caught by the wind, and sailed away.
Tampering with evidence, disobeying my lawyer, and now littering. Pretty soon my charge sheet was going to have more scribbling on it than those toilets.
Inside the mall, I ducked into a women’s room and examined myself. My lips, nose, and cheeks were crimson from the cold. I reached into my bag and pulled out the crocheted cap, a small compact, and a pair of sunglasses. After doing a bit of damage control on my face, I put on the hat and glasses and emerged into the mall. I didn’t know if I was incognito or not, but the sunglasses made everything awfully dark. I headed toward the Shopaholics Anonymous meeting, where I sincerely hoped I’d hear something useful, especially from Page Stockham, such as I’d kill to be able to keep shopping. In fact, that’s exactly what I’ve done!
A handwritten sign was taped beside the entrance to the shoppers’ lounge: Private Meeting in Session. By the time I pushed through the lounge’s massive doors, the group was reciting a posted list of the Twelve Steps. As I skirted the furniture—all put back in place since the jewelry-leasing party—I focused hard through my sunglasses on the attendees, who were clustered on three long couches around a pastry-laden coffee table. No Page. At least, not that I could tell.
One member started reading aloud what sounded like a preamble. We are not so much concerned with debt, as are our colleagues in Debtors Anonymous, as we are with shopping itself, which we use as a drug to avoid dealing with our feelings of inadequacy….
The reader droned on as I looked around the room, where the atmosphere was palpably tense. To my surprise, the nine attendees were comprised of five men and four women. Five men! And here we women were always wondering what men were up to in those long trips to the hardware store. By inserting myself into the group, I created an even division between the sexes. I sat down as unobtrusively as possible and nodded at two welcoming smiles.
“I’m George, and I’m a compulsive spender,” one balding man began, as he lofted an éclair. Before the woman seated beside George could introduce herself, he added, mouth full, “I got a eating problem, too.”
Everyone laughed, and
the edgy atmosphere vanished. At my turn, I said I was Gertrude—no lie, as this is my real name—and that I was visiting. A packet of pamphlets was pressed into my hands by George, who left chocolate smears on the top sheet. It began: If you do nothing but shop, you WILL drop. DEAD! Now there was a cheery thought.
“My name is Page, and I’m a compulsive shopper,” someone said.
I sat up so quickly my crocheted hat wobbled and threatened to topple. Through the sunglasses, I hadn’t spotted her. I slid off the sunglasses, put on my patented blank expression, then looked around. Page, who looked as if she, too, had come in disguise, was seated almost out of my range of view, at the far end of the couch. Her long blond hair was tied back in a bun that was concealed by an elaborately tied scarf. She, too, wore sunglasses—hers were of the aviator variety, and boasted pink lenses. Most atypically, she was clad in black tights and a black T-shirt, as if she’d just dropped in after ballet class. I did notice that despite the outfit, she wore a strand of large pearls—diamond clasp in front, so we’d know they were real—and a sparkly bracelet that (with my glasses off) looked like half a dozen strands of pink, yellow, and white diamonds. Why did wealthy women go out looking as if they’d just been to exercise class for hookers? Another unanswered question of the universe.
Clearly, I was losing my perspective. I reminded myself to focus, then glanced at the tray of pastries. One of the women who’d smiled at me offered me a paper plate and plastic fork.
“They’re for everybody,” she urged. “Food eases the pain.”
Well, I couldn’t disagree with that. And I do love Linzer torte, I thought as I chewed into a big bite laden with spice, ground nuts, and raspberry preserves.
A tiny woman with bobbed brown hair announced in a high voice, “My name is Carole and I’m a compulsive shopper.”
Everyone murmured a greeting to Carole. Her fingers nervously pleated her skirt. “My boyfriend left at Easter last year. For a while, I didn’t feel anything. I was just numb. Then a friend insisted on getting me out of the house. She took me shopping.”
There was a chorus of groans.
“It was weird,” Carole went on. “I felt better once I bought a new sweater. It was a cabled pink mohair, and buying it and wearing it made me feel loved again. So my friend insisted on taking me to the mall again the next weekend. With new gray slacks, plus a matching belt and purse, my feelings improved even more. I mean, I felt alive again! Problem was, I had to spend more money each time I went. One new sweater became two new sweaters. Then four new sweaters. Then ten—all on one trip!”
Carole began to sob. The group waited while one member handed her several tissues, and another put a plate with a cream puff in front of her.
“Now,” Carole continued between gulps, “I’m sixteen thousand dollars in debt on four credit cards. I have, uh… Last week, I finally did a count. Six hundred and thirty-two sweaters, most of them still with the price tags on them. The worst part is that on some trips, I must have had a memory loss or blackout. Almost a dozen times, I bought the same sweater twice.” She stopped to blow her nose. “OK, but I do have some good news. I didn’t buy a single sweater this week!” The group made supportive noises. Carole snuffled and managed a shy, red-nosed smile. “It was so hard! It’s cold outside! And… oh, God, Talbot’s just put their winter stuff on sale. I can barely walk by their window!”
The group burst out laughing. Carole, recognizing the laughter was affectionate, not mocking, dug into her cream puff. Murmurs of “Oh, Carole” and “You should see the stuff on sale at Saks” accompanied big grins and hands reaching for babas au rhum. I glanced around for some coffee or tea to go with the pastries, but saw only a table lined with bottles of water. Maybe caffeine stimulated shopping, blast it. When Page stood and strode over to snag a water, I quickly turned back to the group.
“So,” Carole was saying, as she delicately wiped her mouth with a paper napkin, “now, instead of shopping, I’m looking forward to seeing you all, because you make me feel better. Not quite the way Rob my ex did, but close. And get this! On the way over here, I stopped at Goodwill, and left them two hundred and fifty-nine sweaters!”
The group clapped wildly. Carole, blushing and triumphant, reached for another cream puff.
“I’m Jack and I’m an image spender,” a lanky fellow with gray hair offered. “Can’t say I’m doing as well as Carole, sorry. Last week my ex-wife wanted to have a lunch meeting with our attorneys. This should have raised a red flag, but it didn’t. I suggested we make it easygoing, you know, something modest, both lawyers and the two of us. At Duccio’s.” This time I gasped along with the group. Minimum tab at Duccio’s on the Sixteenth Street Mall in downtown Denver, for one person having lunch, without liquor, would run about forty dollars. Add a single glass of wine, coffee, dessert, and tip, and you were looking at twice that. I had the feeling that Jack, in his gray pin-striped silk suit, Italian leather shoes, and imported tie, didn’t know the concept of a modest lunch.
“Of course,” Jack went on, “it turned out to be a terrible meeting, full of wrangling over child support and visitation issues. Oysters and two bottles of Château Lafitte didn’t help make things jovial, either.” He sighed. “I’m twenty-two thousand dollars in debt, which Gail knows but pretends not to.” He gave the group a rueful grin. “Still, when the check came? I grabbed for it. I mean, I had to! It was like an unseen force pushed my hand to reach out for that slip of paper!” He paused. “Now I’m twenty-two thousand, four hundred and ten dollars in debt. Yesterday I went to the grocery store and bought a case of peanut butter. On sale.” The group sighed. “But you all are here,” Jack concluded with a wide grin. “And at least I can have free pastries on Thursdays!”
“See, that’s what bothers me!” Page Stockham burst out savagely, as the group murmured encouragement to Jack. There was a collective gasp. “People always angling to get free stuff,” she added, her tone hostile. An uncomfortable silence ensued, interrupted only by the sounds of pastry-eating.
“Uh, my name is George, and, Page, remember that we have a format—”
“My name is Page and I have a sister problem. I’m here because my therapist said it might help.” The members squirmed. I peeked over at Page, who tilted up her chin and gazed defiantly down her nose at the group.
“My sister has always been a taker,” Page told us bitterly. “She gets into relationships with people by adoring them. These people are never low-income types, I should add. As soon as they start spending money on her, she adores them even more!” Page examined her manicured fingernails. “So rich folks, mostly guys, get addicted to being loved by my sister. Then she starts freeloading. First she gives them some sob story, of course. ‘I just need to borrow your car because mine’s not working.’ Two weeks later she’s all ‘Your stepson wants this car back? What am I supposed to drive? Besides, you have five cars, can’t he drive one of those? Don’t you care about me?’ Then she cries and withdraws affection from the rich guy, who feels guilty and finally gives her his damn car. She’s a horrible flirt, of course. And a slut, I should say.”
For the first time in the meeting, no one was reaching for pastries. The members sat without moving, concentrating on appearing neutral, although frowns and pursed lips indicated creeping discomfort. You need help, girl, their expressions said. Jack, for his part, looked downright disgusted. Maybe he’d been seduced by Pam, too, and had bought her lunch at Duccio’s.
“OK,” Page snarled, “I probably do shop too much. But I need to. My husband used to buy me nice things, and now he takes me for granted. I have to buy stuff for myself. Meanwhile, my slutty sister has a new boyfriend, or she had one, anyway, and she got him to give her discounts, big ones, on all kinds of stuff.” Her voice turned shrill. “Another one of her boyfriends sweet-talked the dean at… his former college, so my sister could get into a special scholarship program to go to night school for her degree. Free! This new guy gave her furs and jewelry from… vendors or reps o
r whatever they’re called. And then he bought her a round-trip ticket to Hawaii for next Christmas, because he knew the travel agent here in the… well, here.” Her voice ramped up a few more notches. “This boyfriend even got Pam a fifty percent discount on… a piece of jewelry. Not to buy, but… to rent. And he leased it for her!” Page screamed, “And then this same guy…fired my husband, so we suddenly had no income! I was so furious I couldn’t sleep! Couldn’t eat! Couldn’t drive!” She leaped to her feet. “That son of a bitch ruined our lives!”
Page ran out of the room.
Silence fell over the group.
George said, “Next?”
I wanted to follow Page, but my inner voice warned me to stay put. At this juncture, she’d be in no mood to chat. So I listened sympathetically to two more people talk, or as they called it, “share.” One man was a bargain-hunter with six storage sheds full of stuff he never used. He said the seller always represented his mother, who’d withheld love from him as a child. By ruthlessly bargaining, he tried to outsmart the seller, so he could “get love for free.” Except he never got the affection he needed, just lots of fishing rods and motorcycle parts. The final speaker, a very large woman with a pointed chin, announced that she was a codependent spender. She fingered her plastic dark glasses and tried to straighten her very crooked curly-haired wig. She said she had a compulsion to spend money on others. By giving people huge gifts, she was hoping they would love her. The previous year, she’d won fifty thousand dollars in the lottery, now all gone on presents for which she had not received a single thank-you note. Now she had to work a crummy job that caused her no end of stress.
I squinted at her thoughtfully as the group broke up. “Why, Rhonda!” I whispered to myself, then hightailed it out of there.
In the mall, shoppers scurried or moseyed past, many of them with that hungry, pinched look that said they were rushing for a bite to eat. Monday morning, I’d bemoaned the fact that I never had time for lunch out with Marla; now I was so stuffed with pastries and water that the idea of a midday meal made my very full stomach holler in protest.
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