The Claudia Hershey Mysteries - Box Set: Three Claudia Hershey Mysteries

by Laura Belgrave

  Somehow, Mrs. Becker’s tone made it sound like Aaron was just an overgrown high school boy. Claudia put him in his mid-thirties and calculated his height at six-five or six-six. She hoped he wasn’t already angling for a piece of the widow’s pie.

  “I’ll be all right now,” Mrs. Becker reassured him. “Really. You don’t need to stick around any longer.” They stepped to the side and spoke quietly for a minute, then Aaron nodded coolly at Claudia and left.

  “I hope he didn’t sound too abrupt,” Mrs. Becker said. “He’s so protective of me. And he absolutely dotes on Henry.” She paused, catching herself. “He did,” she added softly.

  “I’m sorry, Mrs. Becker,” Claudia said.

  “That’s all right, dear, though I appreciate your expression of concern.” She turned to Booey. “Would you like to see my husband’s model trains? If I’m not mistaken, I promised to show them to you last night.”

  Booey yipped his enthusiasm before Claudia could tell her that a tour of Henry Becker’s model railways wouldn’t be necessary. She frowned at his back while Mrs. Becker led them out of the foyer and into what once must have been regarded as the “grand room.” Claudia heard Booey gasp. She was pretty sure she did, too.

  An elaborate web of camouflaged scaffolding and plywood throughout the room supported hundreds of toy trains in painstakingly detailed settings that mimicked real life. There were farm towns and bustling cities, beachfronts and rocky shores, flat lands and mountain regions. The support structure ran from one end of the room to the other and crisscrossed diagonally at various points, with dips and curves that put some layouts above Claudia’s shoulders and others nearly at her feet. Everything had been carefully arranged to depict the topographical realities of each scene.

  She stared, momentarily speechless. Not a thing had been left to chance. From the tiniest shrub to the most majestic summit, the display evidenced a meticulous attention that suggested both a labor of love and an obsession. Even the walls boasted canvases painted to reflect the scenes they were nearest to.

  “It’s incredible, Mrs. Becker,” Claudia said.

  “You should see it when the lights are out and the trains are running,” she said softly. “Henry used some sort of projection system to put a twinkle of stars on the ceiling. It’s astonishing. He was astonishing. Right up until the end, he was working on this, though obviously less and less as the disease took hold of him.”

  Booey had not yet found his voice. He stood rooted in place, as spellbound as a toddler seeing snow for the first time.

  “What will you do with it?” Claudia asked.

  “I’m not sure. I haven’t thought that far. There’s another display out in the garden, only with much larger model trains. When Henry had all of this set up back home, he’d open it to the public once a year, right around the holiday time. Museums clamored for it. But I don’t know, now that he’s gone . . . well, I suppose I might sell it. As much as I respected his passion for model railroading, it’s not a hobby we shared.” She smiled. “Tennis was my passion, at least until my arthritis began kicking up in a serious way, mostly in my hip.”

  “I wish I’d brought my camera in,” Booey said wistfully. “Mr. Becker must have every HO-scale train ever made by Lionel and American Flyer, or just about. The whole thing, it’s just, it’s just . . . I don’t even have a word for it.”

  “Well, young man, if you have a camera in the car, by all means feel free to go get it. Henry would’ve insisted.”

  Claudia firmly shook her head. “Thank you, Mrs. Becker, but this isn’t the time or place for—”

  “Nonsense! Henry would’ve been very flattered by the young man’s interest. Besides, while he’s snapping pictures you and I will have a chance to talk. Please. Indulge an old lady.”

  “All right,” Claudia said politely. She would kill Booey later, and he must have sensed it. When she gestured for him to retrieve the camera from the car, he sidled out without looking at her. “Mrs. Becker, would you like to sit down while we talk? You’ve been on your feet quite a while now.”

  “Actually, I would. When your young man gets back, I’ll take you into the kitchen. We’ll have some coffee.”

  When Booey returned, Claudia whispered stern instructions for him join them in the kitchen when he was finishing taking pictures. She hissed at him to hurry up, and for God’s sake to not knock anything over. She knew nothing about model trains, but suspected that any one of the displays could rival a year of her salary.

  “Boys and their toys,” Mrs. Becker clucked as she led Claudia across an acre of tile and toward the kitchen. “Henry would have liked your Booey.”

  “Someone needs to,” she murmured too low for the woman to hear. And then she put Booey and the trains out of her mind. She needed to get down to business.

  * * *

  While Mrs. Becker made coffee over her protest, Claudia idly examined the kitchen. Stainless steel everything, and all of it gleaming and spotless. She couldn’t help but contrast it to the kitchenettes in Farr and Raynor’s trailers. There were the haves and the have-nots. Mrs. Becker was a have, and when eventually her husband’s will was probated, she would glide into a have-even-more category. Claudia didn’t resent the woman’s good fortune, but hoped that instead of selling the model railways she would donate them to a museum or charity, maybe make some kids happy.

  Finally Mrs. Becker set their coffee at the table and gingerly eased herself into a chair. She rested her cane against the table and folded her hands in her lap, making idle chitchat while she got settled. Claudia pulled discreetly at her jacket. Although the house was clearly air-conditioned, she guessed it was set to eighty; hotter than hell, at any event. She didn’t know how Mrs. Becker could stand to wear a sweater, although she supposed that being chronically chilled was just one more concession people had to make when they aged.

  “Mrs. Becker,” she began, “the officer who originally talked to you when you reported your husband missing said there’d been some sort of communication mix-up between you and a caregiver. Can you tell me what that was about? It’ll really help me close the file on this.”

  Mrs. Becker shook her head. “Stupid, stupid, stupid. Not the caregiver—me.” She shuddered briefly. “Henry and I have lived down here almost eight months. We moved here from Chicago because the doctors advised us that a quiet town and more temperate weather could be beneficial for Henry. You see, he wasn’t bad off yet—most days you’d never even know anything was wrong with him—but Alzheimer’s is a progressive disease and we were quick to take advantage of every possibility that might forestall it, even a little.”

  “Go on,” Claudia encouraged.

  “Well, prior to moving I met with a lovely young woman who was trained in caring for Alzheimer’s patients. Henry needed virtually no help at the time, but I knew that one day he would, so I hired her to be with him on a part-time basis. Actually, I’m not even sure you could call it part-time. I probably only had her in six or seven hours a week, just long enough for Henry to get used to the idea of having someone besides me around.”

  Mrs. Becker grew silent, and her eyes misted over. She pulled a tissue from the sleeve of her sweater and dabbed at them. “I’m sorry, Detective.”

  “Take your time, Mrs. Becker,” Claudia said. “I know this is hard.”

  “Thank you.” She pushed the tissue back up her sleeve and put her hands in her lap again. “Anyway, Henry took to the woman instantly. She was gentle. She was kind. She didn’t seem to mind listening to his endless stories about railroading.”

  “What’s her name, this woman?”

  “Oh, I’m sorry. Her name is Barbara Kensington. We simply called her ‘Babs’, though, mostly so Henry wouldn’t get confused with two Barbaras in the same house.”

  “Makes sense,” Claudia said. She wrote it down, wondering whether Barbara Kensington minded the nickname, which to her ears sounded almost as childish as “Booey.”

  “Henry quickly grew to love Babs al
most as if she were his own daughter.” Mrs. Becker laughed lightly. “In fact, she looks like she could be. No one would confuse our ages or our energy levels, but she has the same build that I do and similar features. At least I think she does, though that might be the wishful thinking of an old lady who never had her own children.” Mrs. Becker sighed, and said softly, “But that’s another story.”

  Claudia stole a look at her watch. “This . . . Miss Kensington, she moved down with you?”

  “Not right away. She had other obligations and frankly, I thought I could handle Henry on my own for a while longer. What I didn’t count on was how . . . restrictive our new lifestyle would be. Henry, well, he was content to putter with his trains. He was content to take walks. Indeed, there were times I thought he really might rally here.” She shook her head. “It’s a vicious, heartless disease, Detective. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.”

  “So it got worse and you asked Miss Kensington to come down?”

  “Well, as I said, I didn’t right away. But when I realized that if I were to be any good for Henry, then I needed a break now and then. I longed for my friends. I longed for conversation that had nothing to do with disease and treatments.”

  “So . . . ?”

  “I’m rambling. Forgive me.”

  Claudia told her it was all right, though she yearned to get through the interview and be on her way.

  “To make a long story short, I invited Babs down to live with us. I’ll be honest; as much as I know she sincerely loved us both, I’m not sure she would’ve come if I hadn’t induced her with a great deal of money and the assurance that Henry didn’t need a full-time babysitter. Even to the end, he could still be left alone for hours—at least that’s what I thought, though in retrospect I obviously underestimated the stage he was in. Or perhaps I was in denial. I don’t know, and for that matter, Henry himself mightily resisted being treated like an infant who needed someone at his side all the time. I knew that day would come, but I genuinely didn’t think it was here yet.” Mrs. Becker shuddered and pulled her sweater more tightly around her neck. “I told Babs she would largely be free to come and go here as she pleased.”

  “So what happened?”

  “Everything worked out beautifully. Henry had his Barbara and he had his Babs. I continued to take care of him, of course—doctor visits and so—but now I had someone who could pinch-hit for me on those occasions when I just had to get away. Now and then I’d take a two- or three-day visit to Chicago to visit friends and check on our house there. I haven’t gotten around to selling it yet, so of course I have to see that it’s maintained. At any event, Babs was always here in my absence. And it worked in reverse as well. She had freedom to come and go, to make her own visits back up north. One way or another, we were looking after Henry.”

  Claudia flexed her fingers, trying to shake off writer’s cramp. She’d filled three pages with tightly scripted notes.

  “More coffee, Detective? I’m going to refill my own cup, anyway.” She braced her hands on the edge of the table, beginning to rise.

  “I . . . sure. Why not?” Claudia reached to hand over her cup, inadvertently knocking the woman’s cane toward the floor. She fumbled for it, but Mrs. Becker pivoted and snagged it in the second before it landed. She pooh-poohed Claudia’s apology and made her way to the sink.

  While she refilled their cups, Claudia thought about Booey, hoped like hell he wasn’t fooling around in the train room. She’d have to kill him twice.

  Mrs. Becker picked up her narrative the moment she settled back into her chair. Claudia blew on her coffee and sipped as quickly as the steaming brew would allow. The woman had to be getting tired. They both needed to move this interview along.

  “This communication ‘mix-up’ that we had, I . . . well, I blame myself. I’d gone back to Chicago for a visit. My intention was to be gone just two days, but then I decided to stay longer. I called the house. No one answered, so I left a message on the answering machine. I’d delayed a return one time before and on that occasion I’d also left a message, assuming that Babs would call me if my change in plans presented a problem. It didn’t then, and it didn’t this time—or at least that’s what I thought.”

  “So you didn’t talk to her again?”

  Mrs. Becker shook her head, looked down at the table. “I didn’t, no. And it was . . . a fatal mistake.”

  “What happened?”

  “Babs didn’t get the message. She didn’t check for it, and the next morning, she left.”

  Claudia straightened in her chair. “Wait a minute. She didn’t check the machine? And she just—”

  “I know, I know. It sounds terribly irresponsible. But Babs was tremendously excited about a trip she was planning on making herself. In a short period of time she’d saved a great deal of money and she had plans to close on a pleasant little house just outside Chicago. It would be her first. And, though she didn’t specifically say as much, I got the impression she was getting back together with an old boyfriend. Perhaps they were making a commitment to each other.”

  “Still.”

  “Yes. Well, Babs knew—or thought she knew—that I’d be returning the next morning.” Mrs. Becker choked back a sob. “She left. She wrote a note to me and left just a few hours before she expected I would be walking back in the door.”

  Claudia seethed. Outrageous. Deal or no deal, boyfriend or no boyfriend, for a caregiver to abandon an old man in Henry Becker’s condition screamed of a thoughtlessness so complete, so arrogant that it needed a whole new vocabulary.

  Mrs. Becker put a hand on Claudia’s. “I can see what you’re thinking. If I didn’t know Babs as well as I did, I would think it myself. But you have to remember that it seemed to me a minimal risk to leave Henry unattended for a few hours here and there. Nothing ever happened and—”

  “But Mrs. Becker,” said Claudia, “you yourself had reported him missing on a few occasions. You must have known the risk was greater than minimal. You must have expressed that to Ms. Kensington.”

  “On those occasions, I overreacted. I thought I was overreacting and truthfully, your own officers seemed just as convinced. As you must know, Henry would inevitably show up almost as soon as I’d put in a call. He wasn’t lost. He was merely . . . dawdling. He—you don’t know much about Alzheimer’s, do you?”

  “I . . . no.”

  “Well, as much as the disease gets progressively worse, it’s very difficult to predict behavior with any accuracy. Henry could go days without exhibiting symptoms, or at least not serious symptoms. He was certainly far from being at the point where he didn’t know my name—or his own. And oh, he loved his walks! To deny him that small pleasure or cling to him would be to deprive him of a dignity that he already understood he was slowly having to surrender. Don’t you see how painful it would be to have that kind of knowledge about yourself?” Mrs. Becker pursed her lips, her eyes steady on Claudia. “There’s a balancing act, Detective, and I would challenge anyone who claimed they had it down perfectly.”

  Claudia tried to put herself in the same situation, tried to imagine how she might react. She couldn’t, and waited out an uncomfortable silence that she suspected Mrs. Becker thought she should fill with an apology.

  Mrs. Becker sighed. “If Babs had checked the answering machine, this wouldn’t have happened. I’ve thought about that, of course. Certainly Babs has too. I told her it wasn’t her fault, a least not—”

  “She’s back? You’ve talked to her?”

  “Just this morning, early. She’s still in the Chicago area, but she called to say hello and see how Henry was doing. Telling her what had happened was probably the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. We cried together for twenty minutes.” Mrs. Becker repositioned herself in the chair, groaning lightly. “I hope she gets . . . I don’t know, maybe some counseling. She’s too young to feel the weight of this kind of guilt.”

  “So she’s not coming back?”

  “What? Oh, sure. She�
��ll be returning, probably in time for Henry’s funeral. But truthfully? I told her not to rush the closing, or whatever other personal matters she’s seeing to. What would be the point? Henry is . . . dead. Recriminations won’t bring him back.”

  Claudia shook her head. “I’m not sure I could have such a generous spirit about this. Do you have a number for Miss Kensington?”

  “I’m sorry, no. I didn’t even think to ask. We were both rattled.” She leaned forward. “You know, Detective, what you have to remember is that this isn’t just about Babs—what Babs did or failed to do. Henry was my husband and yet . . . I didn’t even think to call back. I failed to make sure my message had been received. I was so concerned with myself that I didn’t give Henry or Babs another thought.”

  Claudia scribbled a note, then looked up. “In the end, you thought Miss Kensington would be here. She thought you would be here. It’s as simple as that?”

  Mrs. Becker nodded. “It’s as tragic as that,” she said so quietly that Claudia had to strain to hear. “It’s a mistake I will live with for the rest of my life.”

  * * *

  On the ride back to the station, Booey was as animated as Claudia was depressed. He had found her in the kitchen just as she was standing to leave, the camera dangling from a cord wrapped around his wrist and his face radiant with excitement. Even now, oblivious to her mood, he chattered about Henry Becker’s model railways and about the digital photos he’d taken. He couldn’t wait to load them into the computer. He wanted to print some out on photo-quality paper. Did she know how important it was to have the right kind of paper for digital pictures? Because he could show her, if she wanted. He could teach her how to crop photos right on the screen, how to bring out highlights.

  Claudia tuned him out. She had the note that “Babs” Kensington scrawled for Mrs. Becker. She had the answering machine tape with Mrs. Becker’s message. The widow gave both up freely, and why not? They were what they were: A fatal mistake. A tragic miscommunication.

  The light that Claudia always seemed to catch at Hoop Road turned red. She braked and silently cursed. If she told the chief she wanted to close the books on the Becker drowning now, he’d be fine with it. More than fine. And it was tempting. It was also tempting to simply comply with Mrs. Becker’s renewed request to forego the autopsy and just let Henry Becker rest in peace.