by Lee Harris
“OK, I admit that’s not very good.”
The lobsters came at that point, and we put our bibs on and got to work, but I couldn’t stop thinking about it. The woman had been angry. She thought I was playing a nasty joke on her. In her mind, her son was dead. “How about this?” I said, setting my nutcracker aside for a moment. “Two boys are in an old shack and it burns to the ground. One of them is burned to death; the other escapes. The Krasskys believe the body is that of their son.”
She thought about it, her face deep in concentration. “Don’t they use dental records in cases like that?”
“Maybe only one boy was thought to be in the building, and that was Val. Maybe the boys were young, eight or ten years old, and they hadn’t had dental work yet.”
“Val has good teeth,” she said slowly. “He goes for checkups, but he rarely has a cavity. I’m not sure, but he may even have all his wisdom teeth.” I could see she was on the verge of accepting my new theory. “But why didn’t he go home after the fire or the accident or whatever it was?”
I was ready for that one. “Two possibilities: one, he set the fire; two, he didn’t get along with his parents. This was his opportunity to run away. For all we know, he created the opportunity.”
She shuddered. “How did he survive in the adult world? Eight or ten years old—you have to be pretty streetwise to make it.”
“Twelve,” I suggested, “fourteen, sixteen.”
“Yes.”
“A boy who has good teeth and rarely sees a dentist, and a boy who’s homeless and has never seen one.”
“My God. Chris, we have to see these people.” She looked at her watch. “I can probably get us on a plane tomorrow if I call tonight.”
“Carlotta, this is just a theory. Let’s not dash out to Connecticut. Let’s call tonight and then decide what to do.”
“Isn’t it better to talk to people face-to-face? We’re two very nonthreatening women. If they look at us, they’ll feel at ease.”
She was right about that. I admit to feeling frequently uneasy on the phone, not knowing whom I’m talking to or what they look like. But to assume with no hard evidence that my little scenario was the right one was too much of a stretch. “Let’s call. We can always fly out there afterwards if we decide we have to. We’ll still look nonthreatening when they open the door.”
“All right. But I think you’ve put your finger on what happened. I think there was some kind of accident, and then he ran away and fabricated the story of his parents’ going back to Europe. In a way, it’s a combination of two of your theories.” She was quietly excited, hardly eating now. “I sensed there was something strange, something different about his early life. He was never clear about his parents, about why they went back. He never talked about his childhood. I talked about mine. I had good parents, a good family, a nice house to live in, a great school, wonderful friends.” She looked at me. “Val didn’t. I knew that, but I only knew it in a general way because he never talked about it. I wonder what these people are like.”
“We’ll find out, Carlotta. Let me put together some questions for Mr. Krassky. Do you have a speakerphone in the house?”
“The one in Val’s study has one. We can call from there.” She put her fork down. “I don’t think I can eat any more.”
“Calm down. This is so good, it’s a shame to waste it.”
She gave me a small smile. “You’re right. It’s just that I’m starting to feel that we’re getting somewhere. I know we haven’t found him, but a veil has lifted. Do you think—is it possible that the bullet in Matty is somehow connected to Val’s childhood?”
“I have no idea. Maybe after you talk to Gregory Krassky tonight, we’ll know a little more.”
She closed her eyes. “I hope I don’t blow it.”
We got home about eight and sat in the study looking over the questions I had scribbled during my lobster dinner. I had no idea, of course, if Gregory Krassky was alive, but I thought it would be better for Carlotta to try to speak to him rather than to his wife, who was already upset at my call this afternoon. The one thing I was now pretty certain of was that their son, whoever he was, had not died in the recent past. He had died or disappeared or gone away some time ago, so that telling this woman that I was a friend had struck a dissonant chord.
“I don’t know if I can do this,” Carlotta said, sitting next to the phone with the sheet of questions on the desk in front of her.
“Whatever happens, try to stay very calm and sound very pleasant. If we decide to go there, I don’t want them to throw us out at the door.”
“Here goes.” She pressed the speaker button and a loud dial tone filled the room. Then she dialed, each beep piercing the silence. The connection was made and the distant phone began to ring, all the sounds magnified as though under some kind of tonal microscope.
“Hello?” It was the woman.
“May I speak to Mr. Krassky, please?”
“Just a minute.” The woman laid the phone down and we heard her call, “Greg? Can you pick up?”
“Hello?” It was a man’s voice.
Carlotta turned and looked at me. Her face had lost its usual self-assurance, and for a moment I thought she might really come apart. But she turned to the desk, glanced at my hand-written lines, and said, “Mr. Krassky, I live near Buffalo, New York. I found your name and address recently, and I think you can help me with a problem.”
“Who did you say you were?”
“My name is Carlotta French. I believe you had a son named Valentine.”
“Are you the woman who called this afternoon and spoke with my wife?”
“No, I’m not, sir. I understand your son died some time ago.”
“It’s almost thirty years. What is your interest in his death?”
Thirty years would make him about five or six, I thought. And there went my beautiful theory up in smoke.
“I have known a man with your son’s name,” Carlotta said, being careful not to disclose the relationship.
“Then it’s a coincidence. My son is dead. I don’t see what this has to do with me.”
“Can you tell me how your son died?”
We heard his breath in the room we were sitting in. “He died in a hospital,” he said wearily, as though the death had occurred so recently that he had not had time to get over the newness of it.
“In a hospital? Was he in an accident?”
“It wasn’t an accident. He got sick and we brought him in. We thought he was getting better, but he died in the middle of the night. What does this have to do with you?”
“Maybe it is a coincidence,” Carlotta said with an echo of defeat. “Can you tell me the name of the hospital he died in?”
“This is absurd. If you have questions, write me a letter and identify yourself. I don’t know what you’re after, but I’m not saying anything else over the phone. And please don’t call my wife. It’s too upsetting for her. We lost our beautiful little son and our lives haven’t been the same since. Good night, Miss French.”
The hang-up crackled in our room, and Carlotta pressed the speaker button again. “I didn’t get much,” she said.
“You got plenty. You know when and where he died—or when he is supposed to have died. If a child’s sick, you take it to the nearest hospital. I think we could look at a map and find the right one. I have another idea. Maybe another Krassky lived in that town, Gregory’s brother. Maybe both men had sons with the same name.”
“Two boys born on Valentine’s Day?”
“Valentin is a Slavic name. It could be a family name. Maybe Val got the wrong birth certificate and never noticed it. Or maybe he just didn’t want to bother writing for the right one. Accidents happen. Did he send for it or did you?”
“He did. I got mine from my mother. She had a copy at home.”
“Did Val open his?”
“Yes. I never open his mail unless it’s addressed to both of us.”
“I’m going to ta
lk to Jack tonight. He can find someone in the Trumbull police station to check a phone book. It’s probably the phone book for the whole area, and we’ll see how many Krasskys they come up with. I’ll also ask if he can find out the name of the local hospital. This may be worth a trip, Carlotta, but let’s not go too soon. Let’s see what Jack can dig up for us.”
Carlotta got up and walked to the bookcase across the room, leaving behind the questions I had prepared, most of which she had not had the opportunity to ask. Personally, I thought she had done very well. He hadn’t hung up on her, which was my greatest fear. He had told us where the child died, and we knew now the boy hadn’t been burned beyond recognition or hit by a car or drowned. I stopped my thoughts on the last word. That would have been some coincidence, to be drowned twice. But it hadn’t happened.
“All I wanted was to find my husband alive,” Carlotta said. “Now I find he died twenty-five years before I met him.”
“We’ll find out,” I said. “The fact that there are strange things going on tells us to keep looking. I have no intention of giving up.”
10
“Hey, good to hear your voice, Chris,” Jack said in my ear.
“Same here. You just get home?”
“Just walked in. Haven’t even looked at the mail yet. How’re you feeling?”
“Great.”
“Drinking your milk?”
“Carlotta got a gallon of skim, and I’m making my way through it.”
“Sounds awful.”
“It is. I have things to tell you.”
“Let me pull up a chair.”
I went through it all, from the insurance policy to the Krasskys in Connecticut, dictating names and addresses, and spelling out my requests. Nothing I asked was impossible, but nothing was certain. Still, when I said good night, I had the feeling I would know a lot more by this time tomorrow.
When I got up in the morning, my first thought was that I was glad I didn’t have to catch a plane. I felt awful. I regretted immediately the delicious lobster I had devoured the night before. Flu, I thought miserably. Four hundred miles from home and I have to get sick.
I sat up and became aware that I didn’t feel feverish. I pulled on my robe and went to my private bathroom where I looked at myself in the mirror. It wasn’t the most pleasing sight I’d ever seen. I washed and brushed my teeth, then brushed my hair, all the while hoping my stomach would calm down.
I went downstairs and found Carlotta putting breakfast together. “I’m afraid I’m not feeling well,” I said, pulling a chair out from the breakfast table. “I think the lobster didn’t sit well.”
“Maybe it’s morning sickness,” she said.
“Morning sickness.” I felt a sense of relief and, I must admit, a bit of pride. “Morning sickness.” I was pregnant. This is what happened to other women, and it was happening to me. “I bet that’s it. I’m sure I’m not running a temperature.”
“What’s the antidote? Do you take pills?”
“No, not unless it gets severe. She said dry toast or crackers or something like that. I wish I could drink some tea. It’s so soothing.”
Carlotta brought a box of long, narrow, crisp toasts to the table, and I broke one and started to eat it. On the stove, a handsome tea kettle was already over a flame.
“I feel like an idiot,” I said. “I insulted that lobster wrongfully.”
She laughed. “You’re forgiven. Is this the first time you’ve had it?”
“The absolute first. I really thought I was ill. I think I’m feeling better already. Just knowing what it is is a help.”
“I’ve got some English Breakfast. How does that sound?”
“I guess I’d better not. Dr. Campbell frowns on caffeine in any form. I’ll just pour myself a glass of milk. As long as I know I’m not dying, I think I’ll feel better on my feet.”
She looked approvingly at me. “How are the crackers?”
“Very tasty.” I stood and munched another, feeling a little giddy. A new experience in my life. I was on my way to being a mother.
“Jake said to drop in anytime,” Carlotta said, as we finished our breakfast.
I was feeling much better, the crackers and milk having done their work. “Then I’ll dress and drive over.”
“When will you hear from Jack?”
“It’s hard to say. If he has time, he’ll probably call as soon as he has something. If you’re here, I’m sure he’ll tell you whatever he knows.”
“I’ll be here. You and Jake don’t need me.”
I went upstairs, dressed, and made the bed.
Val’s daily drive to work was a scant twenty minutes. It struck me as a nice way to live. Jack drives a very long distance now that we’re married. His old drive or subway ride from one part of Brooklyn to another has been replaced by a trip from our Westchester suburb southwest into the big city. But here was a man who could get up in the morning, have a leisurely breakfast, and be at work by eight-thirty without trying very hard.
The building that Val’s and Jake’s business was in was a small, square, three-story construction of red brick. The directory inside the front door showed only one other business on the first floor. Whatever the other offices held, there couldn’t have been many employees. Except for mine, there were no cars at the curb, and the small lot behind the building was mostly empty.
When I knocked at the inside door, standing at a glass window so I could be seen, the man inside looked my way and buzzed me in.
“Ms. Bennett?”
“Yes. I’m Chris.”
“Jake Halpern.” He held out his hand. “Glad to meet you.” He opened a door, called someone, and said to me, “We can sit in back and talk. Otherwise I’ll be interrupted all morning.”
A younger man appeared, and we went back to a cluttered office with cartons piled, strange-looking components scattered, and a desk under siege. Jake emptied a chair for me and took the one at his desk.
“Carlotta said you wanted to talk about Val.”
“She thinks he’s alive.”
“Carlotta would think Val was alive if they found his body in the lake. She can’t face the truth. I’m having a damn hard time facing it myself.”
“But she has reasons. She thinks he wasn’t the kind of man who would do something so stupid.”
“I’d like to think she’s right. It doesn’t look that way.”
“Did you know Val’s two friends, Matty and Clark?”
“Sure. They’d drop in sometimes. I went out with them once in awhile.”
“The impression I get is that Matty exerted a lot of pressure on Clark. If Matty dared Clark to do something, he’d do it.”
“That’s pretty accurate. Matty was that kind of guy. Clark was more malleable.”
“And Val?”
“Different from both, more of his own man. He didn’t have an ego like Matty’s, and nobody except Carlotta could twist him around their finger. We were in business for a long time together. We got along and we were good friends. I’ve seen him under fire. He was a guy who could hold his own.”
“Then you’re saying what Carlotta says: Matty couldn’t embarrass him into doing something stupid.”
“Right. But he might’ve done it because he wanted to, because these two guys were his friends, they were in a good mood, crossing the lake to Canada was a challenge, and he was always up for a challenge. There’re a lot of reasons why he might have gone with them.”
“And you think he did.”
“Is there any indication that he didn’t?”
I decided not to get into that. “Carlotta and I have done some digging in the last two days, and we’ve found some interesting things about Val. You knew him for a long time, didn’t you?”
“Fifteen years, anyway.”
“Did you go to college together?”
“We met there.”
“What do you know about his family?”
He smiled for the first time since we had sat down. “
OK, you hit the one crazy part of Val’s life. I admit it. There was something damn weird about his family.”
“Like what?”
“Like whether they existed.”
“You mean his parents?”
“Like I’m not sure he even had parents. If he did, he never talked about them. I come from a family that’s very close and very outgoing. My father does his thing, my mother does hers, my grandmother would drop in during the day when I was a kid. I have a sister and a brother, and we never stood still, always doing something, always going somewhere. I would say to Val, ‘You should see this girl my brother brought home over Christmas. Wow!’ or ‘My sister’s playing the lead in the high school play, and I’m going home to see it.’ And we would talk about my family. But in all the years I knew that man, I never once heard him say the words ‘my mom’ or ‘my dad.’ If he had brothers and sisters, it’s news to me. He would leave college for vacation and drop into a void.”
“You mean you don’t know where he went?”
“I mean I don’t know what planet he went to.”
“Did he ever talk about Connecticut?”
“Not that I remember. Hey, can I get you some coffee?”
I was feeling pretty good and I would have loved a cup, but I thought I’d better not. “No thanks,” I said. “How did the two of you happen to open your business here?”
“OK, that’s a link. He knew western New York. He was the first person I ever met who told me about the Erie Canal. I’m from New York, and the only canal I’d ever heard of was Canal Street in downtown Manhattan. I kicked around a little after school and he did, too. When we got together to think about making our fortune, Val suggested the Buffalo area.”
“So he had a connection here.”
“Yeah, but don’t ask me what it was. Maybe it was Matty and Clark.”
“They were here when you opened up?”
“Oh, yeah. I met them right away.”
“Do you know their wives?”
