Boric Acid Murder, The

by Camille Minichino

  Michelle patted my shoulder on her way out. “I can hardly wait for retirement, Gloria. Your life is more exciting than mine.”

  COMFORTABLE AND SAFE in my air-conditioned Cadillac the next morning, I talked myself out of worrying about the alarm incident. I’d spent my last waking moments planning my outfit for the trip to the library, starting with a costume jewelry pin Elaine had given me—a colorful ceramic stack of books she’d earned by tutoring in an ESL program in Berkeley.

  As I drove, I reviewed the details of my eventful evening. Zone four, the one that was breached, was an inside door—a second wall of safeguard. Since there was no sign of break-in through any outside door or window, I reasoned, it was certainly a false alarm. I focused on how lucky I was to have so many police officers at my disposal.

  One especially, I thought. Then reality kicked in and I realized it might be time for the first we-have-to-talk session for Matt and me. A session about our future. If we had one.

  I approached the library for the third time in two days, surely a record for a noncardholder, and parked on Beach Street. My mission was to introduce myself to Yolanda’s last-known boyfriend, Assistant Director Derek Byrne.

  I could hear the arguing as I walked to the circulation desk. A meeting seemed to be breaking up on the mezzanine above me, at the doorway of Director Dorothy Leonard’s office. I altered my strategic plan, deciding to remain anonymous for a few minutes.

  A table in the adult reading section was close enough for me to eavesdrop. Only one other table was occupied, by teenagers who seemed more interested in each other than the library holdings. A nearby pamphlet on the history of Revere provided cover as I pretended to read it. Over the edges of the colorful tri-fold, I watched two men and a woman come down the stairs to the first floor.

  The first comment I heard, right after Dorothy Leonard slammed her door, was from the woman. Tall, navy-blue power suit, bulging Italian leather briefcase. A lawyer, I decided. “This is not a battle you want to fight, Derek. The expansion proposal is dead,” she said to the younger man. Derek Byrne, Yolanda’s boyfriend—tall and lean, with light brown hair. “You should listen to your father.”

  “He never does,” the older man said. Councilman Brendan Byrne, according to Rose’s tutorial.

  “Not since I was two.” Derek’s laugh came out more like a snort.

  “You’re out of your league here,” the lawyerlike woman said. “I don’t care what documents you claim to have.”

  Derek ignored her. “I’ll talk to you later, Dad.”

  The repartee turned to whispering as the three entered the public area, but even without audible words, I sensed a heavy undercurrent of hostility in the banter. I lowered my eyes and skimmed a paragraph on the 1871 celebration when the town of North Chelsea became officially known as Revere.

  Councilman Brendan Byrne stood a few inches over his son, and nearly a head over the woman, the slight round-shouldered bent to his posture the only sign of his age. Around seventy-five, Rose had guessed. It seemed the father-son disagreement I’d witnessed had to do with something more serious than a missed curfew. Something like the library expansion program, a major city project.

  Derek returned to the circulation desk alone, after the other two left, and I made my move.

  “Good morning,” I said, extending my hand. Derek glanced at me, then scanned the area, as if to locate a clerk to take care of me. “I’m Gloria Lamerino, Mr. Byrne. I’d like to talk to you if you have a few minutes.”

  He gave me a distracted smile. “Oh, yes. I’ve heard about you.”

  Hasn’t everybody? I said to myself.

  “I’m so sorry about the loss of your friend.”

  Derek ran his hand through thick hair, set back from a high forehead. His eyes wandered toward the stairway where Yolanda had been shoved to her death. “Thanks. It’s been tense around here.”

  Derek’s smooth, fair skin and sad blue eyes made him look much younger than I knew him to be—like John Galigani, closing in on forty years old. “Would you like me to come back another time?”

  “It’s OK. Sorry to appear rude. And please call me Derek.” He tilted his head in the direction of the front steps, as if his father and the woman I’d endowed with a law degree were still standing there, pointing fingers at him. “Sorry about that, too,” he said. “We’re in the middle of a small war.”

  I nodded, surprised at my sympathetic feelings toward him. I was prepared not to like Derek Byrne, hoping to find in him a viable alternative to John Galigani, currently the principal murder suspect. My experience with the Revere Police Department to the contrary, part of my mind held on to the idea that murderers should look the part and evoke negative vibes.

  I pointed to the model of the planned renovation and expansion. “Is the war over this?”

  “Uh huh. The woman is Frances Worthen, an attorney for the Archdiocese.” I gave myself a point for a correct guess. That she had an ecclesiastical boss never crossed my mind, however. “The Church claims it owns the land surrounding the library. They say it’s sacred historical ground and we shouldn’t dig it up.”

  “But that’s where the high school used to be. Immaculate Conception Church was across the street.” I hurried to verify the little bit of Revere history I knew. “And the Rumney Marsh cemetery is much farther down the street.”

  “That’s right. After the high school burned, the city built a park that lasted sixteen or seventeen years. Then the parish and the city did a land swap. The city got the old church site and the rectory, and the Church got some of the land surrounding this building. I’m sure you noticed that new church on the corner of Winthrop and Beach.”

  “If they got the land that recently, how is it sacred and historically significant already?”

  By now, two middle-aged women had taken over the business at the circulation desk and Derek and I had moved to the table from which I’d done my spying. He seemed eager to explain himself to someone who’d listen. I wondered if he’d be as forthcoming if he realized I was scrutinizing his smooth face for signs of malice, ready to turn him in at the least provocation.

  “It’s not one particular congregation that’s opposed to the construction. There were a lot of churches along Beach Street in the old days. The Catholic Archdiocese is spearheading the resistance for all of them. They’re saying at one time the land could have held a number of cemeteries of many different denominations.”

  “They want to stop the construction because it might be the sacred ground of some possible early churches?”

  Derek nodded and raised his eyebrows, creating a pleasant pattern of wavy lines across his high forehead. He seemed to say he was equally confused by the logic. He stood and motioned me to the model of the library-to-be, moving a pen along the miniature landscape as he talked. “We’re only going out sixty feet from the back of our building. The chances of hitting graves are very slim. About as likely as digging anywhere in the city.” With every sentence, Derek became more animated. “Not only that, but this building was erected in 1902, so we know there haven’t been bodies buried out there at least since then.”

  “And your father is on their side?”

  “He is.” Derek sounded sad, as if he’d give anything not to have to go against his father. “He’s Catholic. But I never realized he was that Catholic, if you know what I mean.”

  Naive as I was about political dealings, I’d have thought something like expanding the public library would be welcomed by all. Who can be against literacy? Of course, if it came down to allocation of limited funds—more library space versus a new laboratory wing—I might think differently.

  “Is there competition for the funds?” I asked, still seeking a logical explanation for the controversy.

  “Technically, no. But all the old city buildings are in bad shape. The people at the police station are making the biggest fuss—the chief and the administrators. Their building’s in a state of decay, too. But our money’s coming through a sta
te grant specifically designated for libraries. The cops can’t have the grant even if we don’t accept it.”

  Interesting, and worth asking Matt about. I realized I’d gone astray of my motive for being in the library in the first place.

  “I hate to bother you with this, Derek, but did Yolanda feel strongly about this issue, one way or the other?”

  He shook his head. “She knew about it, but she had other things on her mind. She was caught up in causes at the lab.” His voice choked slightly and he turned away. I tended to believe him, but just in case, I made a mental note to put the Church/State dispute on my list of motives for Yolanda’s murder. Giving me all of two besides John’s.

  Derek Byrne seemed to be what my father would have called “a nice young man.” I had to remind myself he was one of my murder suspects. It was to his advantage not to tell me if he and Yolanda had argued about the expansion proposal. I planned to check it out.

  “I know you’ve only recently returned to Revere. Would you like a little tour of the building?” Derek asked, recovering his equilibrium.

  I appreciated his allowing me a full year back to find the library again. I accepted and followed him up and down the stairs to the two unconnected mezzanines off the main floor. I’d already been, with Matt, to the one that held his office and Dorothy Leonard’s. Her door was still closed.

  The second mezzanine was more like an abandoned loft, filled with sealed cartons and rusty trunks and a collection of dusty artifacts that didn’t seem to belong in a library. Its walls were uncovered brick, like the outside of the building. The slanted beams that formed the ceiling forced Derek to walk with his head hunched between his shoulders. I worried about dirt and snags in his expensive-looking suit, light brown, almost the color of his hair. I had no such problem with either my height or my washable cotton jacket.

  “From the Historical Society,” Derek explained as we passed two spinning wheels and stacks of old photographs in elaborate frames.

  A long glass-covered case contained antique knives and guns and what looked like the precursor to the modern crowbar. Handwritten labels with a temporary look identified a colonial musket, a Civil War cannonball, a wooden gavel made from the keel of the U.S.S. Constitution. I grimaced as I calculated the number of years since my fourth-grade field trip to Old Ironsides. A bigger number than Derek’s age, I was sure.

  “I’m impressed,” I said, checking out a thank you letter sent to a Revere resident by Jackie Kennedy a few weeks after the assassination of her husband.

  “We’re storing all this while they complete a new history wing in the City Hall.”

  Derek seemed proud to show me a special bookcase with original editions of stories by Horatio Alger, a Revere native. “Alger wrote more than a hundred books with ‘rags-to-riches, onward and upward’ themes right after the Civil War. Very inspiring message—if you do your best and always try to do the right thing, you’ll succeed.”

  I let Derek go on about Alger, the poet, journalist, and eventually a minister on Cape Cod. I couldn’t bring myself to admit I’d never read him and if I were on a quiz show, I would have guessed he was a spy during World War II.

  A strange-looking contraption next to a musty dressmaker’s dummy caught my eye.

  “That’s part of a still,” Derek said, apparently noticing the direction of my gaze.

  “From Prohibition days. When they made wood alcohol in backyards.”

  He nodded. “That’s right. Moonshine. It gets its name from being made and transported at night, by moonlight. It was also called bathtub gin, because it was often stored in bathtubs so the user could just pull the plug if a raid was imminent.”

  Derek’s tone was neutral, as if he were lecturing fifth-graders on a tour of the library. I remembered Rose’s account and wondered how much he knew about how wood alcohol/moonshine /bathtub gin had ruined his grandparents’ lives.

  “Fascinating,” I said.

  My trip to the library was proving more interesting than boron.

  Could that be?

  NINE

  WHEN I LEFT Derek Byrne, it was still too early for a one o’clock appointment I’d made with Matt. Since it was hot and muggy outside, I sat in my comfortable car and made some notes about my interaction with Derek.

  A dispute over sacred burial grounds, the history of Revere, Horatio Alger lore, the etymology of “moonshine” liquor. I felt I’d learned a great deal, even if none of it seemed relevant to my investigation of Yolanda Fiore’s murder. Maybe that’s what libraries were all about—a collection of data and facts, with the responsibility for synthesis on the shoulders of the cardholder.

  The more I thought about it, the more I realized it had been Derek’s agenda, not mine, that we’d followed. Could he really have been simply exercising good PR skills, unaware that I was engaging him in an unofficial police interview? Had he skillfully steered me past anything that would help my inquiry? Or was Derek what he seemed—a nice guy distracted by the loss of his girlfriend and his involvement in a conflict with his father and the Catholic Church?

  He hadn’t offered to include the basement area on our tour, where the computer center was, and where Yolanda’s body had been found, and I hadn’t had the heart to ask. I figured it would be too difficult for him. Either because he missed his girlfriend, or because he killed her.

  Although I didn’t think it was pertinent to the murder case, I jotted down the salient points about the “war” over the library expansion project.

  Pro: Dorothy Leonard and Byrne the younger.

  Con: the Church (Attorney Frances Worthen) and Byrne the elder.

  Unknown position: Yolanda Fiore, John Galigani.

  I tapped my pen on the pad. Skimpy information, but I didn’t rule anything out.

  When you have nothing, everything matters.

  AT ONE O’CLOCK, a smiling and efficient Michelle Chan walked me to Matt’s office in the Revere Police Station. I estimated her weight at about the same as mine when I was eleven years old. I was more than usually aware of the cramped quarters, walls badly in need of paint, torn-up furniture, out-of-date office equipment, water stains on the ceiling. I was sorry for every time I’d declined to buy tickets for policemen’s balls. I wondered if the police station staff was envious of the state grant to upgrade the library facility.

  “Matt’s always excited to see you,” Michelle told me. I gave her a nervous smile. Was that before or after I refused his invitation to …to what? I wondered. “Finally get some sleep last night?” she asked.

  “Yes. I hope you did, too.”

  “Not yet, but I’m leaving soon.” She looked at her watch and smiled. “Hot date.” She took off her hat and loosened her thick black hair, shiny as new filament wire.

  “I have things to read while I wait,” I told Michelle when we found Matt’s office empty. “Don’t be late for your date.”

  Michelle winked and left.

  The last time I’d visited the office Matt shared with George Berger there had been only one picture on Matt’s side of the room—a photo of his parents at their fiftieth wedding anniversary celebration, surrounded by him and his sister Jean and her family.

  I was glad Matt wasn’t present to see my double take when I glanced at his credenza today. He’d added a new photo. Me, in a blond wood frame, windblown and smiling for the camera, wearing a red fleece jacket Rose had pressed on me. I recognized the background as Jean’s home at the Cape. I was thrilled to see the photo, though the event it recalled hadn’t been as pleasant as I’d hoped.

  When I began my dating life with Matt a year ago, in my mid fifties, I’d expected to be able to skip a lot of the usual problems—zits on prom night, grounding for a missed curfew, begging for an advance in allowance to buy a new dress.

  Matt’s sister, Jean Gennaro Mottolo, a real-estate agent ten years younger than Matt, proved an unexpected stumbling block, substituting for a strict mom and dad. The one time I’d been at her home in Falmouth was the previou
s Christmas. She was cordial, but not overly welcoming. I’d run through a list of possible ways I’d offended her—my mother, Josephine Lamerino, had trained me to blame myself first if anyone didn’t take to me immediately.

  Perhaps I’d chosen inappropriate gifts for her children. I’d given a valuable old biography of Marie Curie to her fifteen-year-old daughter, and one of Einstein to her thirteen-year-old son. I’d wrapped colorful posters of the periodic table for both of them.

  Or maybe she was cherishing the memory of Matt’s wife, Teresa, who’d died of heart disease ten years ago. Jean’s husband had been killed in a boating accident a year later. I recognized she’d not had an easy life, raising two small children by herself. On the other hand, she was doing it in a beautiful beachfront home on Cape Cod.

  I’d written Jean a note after the holidays, thanking her for the wonderful dinner and pink silk scarf. I hadn’t heard from her since. Maybe she knew I never wore scarves, except for warmth. No need for more layers on my already ample chest. And I never wore pink anything.

  A gentle hand ran across my shoulders. “That wasn’t your favorite afternoon, I know,” Matt said. “But it’s the only decent picture I have of you.” Matt kissed my cheek in between sentences—I was back in his good graces. Had I ever left them? He squeezed past me to sit on his desk, crossed his arms, and smiled, seeming pleased with himself for having caught me in a daydream, staring at the photo.

  I was more dismayed that he’d picked up the tension between his sister and me. “Has Jean complained to you?”