Cannoli to Die For

by Peg Cochran

  She handed them to Theresa. “Here. Can you put these on the dining table, please?”

  Lucille got out her biggest pot and filled it with water. She would get it started heating up so that it would be boiling by the time the family arrived.

  “Lucille.” Theresa walked back into the kitchen. “You didn’t set a plate for cousin Louis. I’m sure he’ll be coming. He never missed Sunday dinner.”

  Cousin Louis never missed a free meal as far as she could tell, Lucille thought. Even if he was now a ghost, they could count on him showing up.

  She handed her mother a plate and set of silverware.

  “Here. Put him next to Father Brennan.”

  “That will make him happy,” Theresa said.

  Lucille sighed again and brushed some crumbs off the front of her sweatshirt. People should be arriving any minute.

  The water on the stove was just beginning to bubble when the doorbell rang. Lucille wiped her hands on a dish towel and ran to the foyer.

  She opened the door and Flo and Richie walked in.

  “Here are the cannoli,” Flo said, handing Lucille a bakery box.

  Lucille turned to Richie. “I was afraid you wouldn’t be able to come on account of you were out looking for the killer.”

  Sambucco patted his stomach. “A man’s got to eat, right?”

  “Sure, sure.”

  Lucille scurried back toward the kitchen, but before she got there the bell rang again.

  She held the door and stood aside as her sister and her husband, Gabe and cousin Millie walked in with Father Brennan bringing up the rear.

  “Go sit down. Dinner is almost ready.”

  Lucille was pouring the box of rigatoni into the boiling water when the doorbell rang again.

  Who could it be? She wasn’t expecting nobody else. She hurried back to the front door and flung it open.

  Bernadette was standing on the doorstep with Lucy in her arms.

  Lucille’s mouth opened and closed but no words came out.

  “I’ve left Tony,” Bernadette said as she swept into the foyer.

  “For the time being?” Lucille asked. “I’m sure yous two can work things out,” she said. “The Church don’t like people getting divorced.”

  “I don’t care what the church thinks,” Bernadette said.

  “Shhhh.” Lucille put a finger to her lips and glanced toward the dining room. She hoped Father Brennan hadn’t heard that.

  “Why are you leaving Tony? You two just bought a house and all.” She pointed to Lucy. “You have a family.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” Bernadette said. “Can we just eat, okay?”

  • • •

  Lucille thought of that phrase she’d read once—be careful what you wish for. She’d been wishing and praying to have Bernadette and Tony come around so the family would be all together around the table again, and look what happened. She got part of her wish—Bernadette and Lucy were back with the family again—but now Bernadette wanted to divorce Tony. She’d finally come around to Frankie’s way of thinking and it was ruining her marriage.

  Lucille sighed as she pulled on a pair of slacks and a sweater and fished her shoes out from under the bed. It was her morning at the Clip and Curl for her weekly set.

  The Olds was cold when she got in it—the temperature had dropped overnight and she’d had to get up to close the window. She figured that was why she couldn’t sleep, but she knew she was fooling herself—it was because of Bernadette leaving Tony.

  Bernadette and Lucy had spent the night in the basement bedroom she and Frankie had created for cousin Millie and cousin Louis back when they were living with them. She wondered if the ghost of cousin Louis would visit Bernadette during the night.

  She shook her head. Ma almost had her convinced the ghost was real. Next thing they’d be holding séances and asking questions of a Ouija board.

  Lucille got a space right by the back door to the Clip and Curl, but even so, she shivered as she scurried the few feet from her car to the door. The black leather jacket Frankie had given her back when they was in high school didn’t zip no more, and she had to hold it closed with both hands.

  Carmen was standing in front of the open dryer folding towels. Lucille waved to her as she went past.

  “Hey, Lucille. How are you?”

  “Can’t complain. Can’t complain,” Lucille said, although she felt like complaining plenty.

  Usually when people said they couldn’t complain they would then immediately go on to tell you everything that was bothering them. Lucille could never make no sense of that.

  Rita was waiting at her station when Lucille walked in and waved her over to her chair.

  “Lucille, how have you been?”

  “Fine,” Lucille said as Rita swirled a plastic cape around her and tied the strings in back of Lucille’s neck.

  “Let’s go over to the wash basins.”

  Lucille followed Rita over to the sinks and eased herself into a chair. Her back hadn’t felt the same since she’d taken that aerial yoga class with Flo.

  Her hair washed and wrapped in a towel, Lucille followed Rita back to her station.

  “Ouf,” Lucille said as she plopped into the revolving-style chair.

  “Back hurt?” Rita spun Lucille around.

  “Yeah. Getting old, I guess.”

  “You should try acupuncture. Cured my sciatica right up.”

  “Isn’t that where they stick needles in you?”

  “Yes, but they don’t hurt.”

  Lucille shivered. “No, thanks. I don’t need nobody sticking needles in me. I’m sure some liniment and a heating pad will fix me right up.”

  “Looks like you could do with a trim,” Rita said, reaching for a pair of scissors.

  She was snipping Lucille’s bangs when a woman slid into the chair next to Rita’s station.

  Lucille glanced over. It was Mary Garrity. Lucille knew her from the Altar Guild. Her son had been in Bernadette’s class back when they were in high school.

  Mary glanced over at Lucille.

  “I didn’t realize that was you, Lucille. How have you been?”

  “Fine. Fine.”

  “And Bernadette?”

  “She’s doing well. She’s got a little girl now—Lucy.”

  “Does she now? Lucky you—a grandmother. Seth shows no interest in settling down.”

  “Give him time,” Lucille said. “The right one will come along eventually.”

  “I hope you’re right.” Mary leaned closer. “I had lunch with Janice Karpinsky the other day. She works at that real estate office on Springfield Avenue down by the senior citizen apartments.”

  “I know Janice.”

  “She’s my brother’s wife’s sister, you know. Anyway, she was telling me about how her colleague, Dotty Garibaldi, got herself murdered.”

  Lucille wasn’t sure it was fair to say that Dotty got herself murdered. It wasn’t like she’d gone looking for it. As a matter of fact, she was pretty sure Dotty would have run in the opposite direction if she’d known.

  Lucille didn’t want to admit she’d found Dotty’s body. She was getting enough of a reputation as it was.

  “The police still don’t have any idea who did it,” Lucille said. “I was sure it was that husband of hers. You know they call him Jack the Ripper? I heard he’s been involved with some of them au pairs they have.”

  Mary nodded. “That’s what I thought, too. But then he turns up dead himself.” She shook her head. “That latest au pair of theirs must be very disappointed.”

  “Oh?” Lucille’s ears perked up. “Why?”

  Rita was reaching for the blow dryer and Lucille prayed she wouldn’t turn it on.

  Mary leaned over the arm of her chair toward Lucille while her stylist waited patiently, her scissors poised in the air.

  “You probably don’t know that I work in the New Providence Borough clerk’s office.”

  She paused dramatically. Luc
ille couldn’t imagine what was coming next.

  “Well. One day this girl walked into the office. I noticed her right away. She was very pretty but also looked . . . different somehow. Not anything I could put my finger on.”

  Rita was about to turn on the blow dryer and Lucille waved it away.

  “As soon as she came up to the counter and opened her mouth, I knew what it was. She wasn’t American. I could tell that right away.”

  By now Lucille was hanging on Mary’s every word.

  “She came in to ask about getting a marriage license. You know—how to go about it and what kind of paperwork she needed to fill out.”

  Mary paused again. Lucille was beginning to find it irritating.

  “And?” she prompted Mary.

  “Her name was Alva. Alva Lundgren. She said she’s from Sweden.”

  “She’s the girl who was working for—”

  “The Garibaldis,” Mary finished with a smug look on her face.

  Chapter 17

  Lucille had just enough time to run home for lunch. Since she could only have one slice of bread a day and she planned on making meatball subs for dinner, she fixed herself a salad.

  Theresa walked into the kitchen as Lucille was opening a bottle of salad dressing.

  “Another salad? Are you becoming a rabbit or something? Let me see if your nose is twitching.”

  Lucille ignored her. Wait till her mother saw how much weight she was going to lose. She’d be singing a different tune then.

  “It’s awful quiet. Where’s Bernadette and Lucy? Are they taking a nap?”

  Bernadette had taken to napping whenever the baby slept. Lucille was worried about her—she was afraid Bernadette was coming down with one of them depressions. Lucille thought she ought to see the doctor—she knew they had pills for that now.

  “She’s taken Lucy to some play group.” Theresa snorted. “Back when I had you there was no such thing. You sat the baby on the floor, gave them some toys, and they played with those. Now they’ve got to play with other babies. It don’t make sense.”

  “I don’t know about that, but it’s good for Bernadette to get out.”

  Lucille opened the refrigerator. She knew she had a hunk of pepperoni in there somewhere. She was supposed to have protein with every meal, and lettuce, cucumbers and tomatoes didn’t have no protein. She’d didn’t need Weigh to Lose to tell her that.

  “Ma. Did you finish off that pepperoni that was in the fridge?”

  Theresa shook her head. “No—pepperoni repeats on me. You know that, Lucille.”

  “You’ve got to take some Brioschi after. Then it won’t bother you.” Lucille stuck her head in the refrigerator. “If you didn’t eat it, then it must be in here somewhere.”

  “Cousin Louis ate it,” Theresa said. “He stopped by, and he was hungry so I made him a little snack.”

  “Ma, that’s not possible. Cousin Louis is—” Lucille snapped her mouth shut. There was no use upsetting her mother.

  “I had my nails done at that new place over on Springfield Avenue this morning. Madge Sobeleski took me since she still drives.”

  Theresa waggled her fingers at Lucille.

  Lucille shuddered. Madge was in her eighties and had to close one eye when she drove on account of she had some kind of double vision. When people saw her coming they pulled over to the side of the road until she’d gone by.

  “All the gals was talking about the murders,” Theresa said as she got herself a glass of water. “They couldn’t believe it was my daughter who found the body. I felt like a celebrity.”

  Lucille rolled her eyes. She didn’t consider it no privilege to be tripping over dead bodies.

  “Do the police know anything more?” Theresa sipped her water. “Richie wouldn’t talk about it at dinner on Sunday.”

  “That’s probably on account of he’s got to keep it secret like.”

  Theresa stared at Lucille. “Do you know anything?”

  Lucille thought for a minute. Maybe if she talked to her mother about the murder, she’d stop going on about cousin Louis being a ghost. Take her mind off it, so to speak.

  “After I heard about Jack, Dotty’s husband, being a sort of ladies man, I kinda figured he’d done it,” Lucille said as she carried her salad to the table. “So he’d be free to find himself a new girlfriend. But then bam, he turned up dead, too.”

  Theresa sat opposite Lucille, her eyes wide. She nodded her head. “Could there be two killers?”

  Lucille shrugged. “Maybe. But how likely is that?” She picked at the lettuce in her bowl. “Besides, me and Flo caught Jack in a clutch with another woman.”

  Theresa gasped. “Who?”

  “That’s the thing. We don’t know. We couldn’t see her face. But . . .” Lucille paused to take a bite of her salad.

  “Go on. Don’t leave me in suspense.”

  “Flo and I saw Jack with some woman on the golf course.”

  “I didn’t know yous two played golf. When did you start playing golf?”

  Lucille sighed. “We didn’t. We don’t. We followed Jack to the course.”

  “Oh. Because I can’t picture yous playing golf, that’s all.” Theresa wiped a smudge on the table with the edge of her blouse. “So who was the woman? Don’t tell me you didn’t see who it was or I’m going to think you need to go to Dr. Amato to get your eyes checked.”

  “It was Alva Lundgren, the Garibaldis’ au pair.”

  “Oh pear? What on earth’s an oh pear? It’s not enough to have a cleaning lady these days? Fancy people have to have oh pears?”

  “An au pair is a sort of babysitter. Only they live in with the family and they come from foreign countries.”

  Theresa rolled her eyes. “What will they think of next?”

  “Don’t ask me,” Lucille said as she chased the last piece of lettuce around her plate.

  “So was Jack Garibaldi stepping out with this oh pear Alva? Is that what you think?”

  “Yeah. And get this—” Lucille pointed her fork at her mother. “I ran into Mary Garrity at the beauty parlor—”

  “Isn’t she Val Polsky’s daughter? Val was in our bowling league back when your father was still alive and we was playing every Friday night. I sure miss that.”

  “Yeah. I can imagine. Anyway, Mary works at the Borough Hall. She said this Alva came in asking about getting a marriage license.”

  Theresa drew in her breath sharply. “So Jack must have wanted his wife out of the way so he could marry this oh pear person.” Theresa looked puzzled. “But then who killed Jack?”

  “When Flo and I saw Jack on the golf course with Alva, it was obvious they was having some kind of argument. And when we saw Jack in that clutch with that woman? Like I said, we couldn’t see who it was, but we could tell it wasn’t this Alva.”

  “So do you think . . . ?”

  “I think Alva killed Dotty so she could get herself a husband. But then maybe Jack was only fooling around with Alva—you know—taking advantage of the fact that Alva was right under his own roof. But maybe he was really planning to marry that other woman.”

  “And Alva found out,” Theresa said.

  “Yeah. And she got mad. Mad enough to kill Jack.”

  • • •

  A couple was sitting with Janice when Lucille got to the real estate office. She put her jacket in the closet, took a seat at the reception desk and waited for the telephone to ring.

  Lucille drummed her fingers on the desk and thought about Dotty and Jack’s murders. She had so many suspects her head was spinning. There was Felicity—she had a good reason to dislike Dotty, who had embarrassed her at the Weigh to Lose meetings. Lucille had wanted to slug Dotty—she could only imagine how Felicity had felt. Then Jack goes and loses a bunch of money for Felicity, who was already going to lose money since she was getting divorced.

  And there was no reason Joe couldn’t have done it. He owed money to some bad men by the sound of things. With Dotty out of the way
he would be the one to score that big commission on that house sale. That didn’t give him a reason to kill Jack, of course, but it was quite possible that Jack gave Joe bad investment advice like he’d given Felicity. That would make anybody mad.

  Mad enough to kill? Lucille didn’t know. She couldn’t imagine taking someone’s life. She still felt guilty eating meat on Fridays even though the Church had changed its mind and now said it was okay. How would she be able to handle the guilt of knowing she’d murdered someone? Not to mention having to hide from the police. She shook her head. No, murder wasn’t for her.

  And now they had Alva to consider. She and Jack had been fooling around. Maybe he promised to marry her in order to have his way with her. But like her mother always said, why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free? A sudden image of a very pregnant unmarried Bernadette crossed Lucille’s mind. Well, she had a ring on her finger now, didn’t she? So it wasn’t exactly the same.

  So Jack promises to marry Alva but meantime he’s also fooling around with that other woman she and Flo saw him with. Alva finds out, gets mad and kills Jack. She’s already killed Dotty so what’s the big deal about killing again? Lucille had read that people sometimes developed a taste for it.

  “Are you coming?”

  Janice’s voice cut through Lucille’s reverie.

  “Coming?”

  “To Dotty’s funeral. The boss wants us all there to show our respect.”

  Good thing she’d worn dark pants, Lucille thought. Not that that mattered much anymore. People went to funerals in all sorts of clothes these days.

  “Let me get my coat and handbag.”

  Lucille put on her coat and left. As she was walking toward the parking lot, Janice was turning the key in the lock to Dingledyne, Mingledorff, Hoogerwerf and Rumble.

  • • •

  The organist was playing “Jesus Christ Our Sovereign King” when Lucille got to the church. Flo was seated on the end of the second-to-last pew. Lucille was surprised to see her there.

  She was wearing a short zebra print dress with a plunging neckline and over-the-knee high-heeled suede boots.