Shades of Grey

by Clea Simon

  ‘What do you mean, “a person of interest”?’ Dulcie sat up.

  ‘Well, think about it. The cops brought her in. She was involved with the deceased, probably sneaking around with him, and it sounds like maybe she wanted more. Wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to think she had something to do with Tim’s murder.’

  Dulcie paused. She had wanted to ask Luisa about the police, but she’d looked so innocent and stricken. She kicked the pillow. ‘They let her go.’ She was playing devil’s advocate. But Suze was a real advocate in training.

  ‘Come on, kiddo.’ She could hear Suze sitting up, getting serious. ‘That only means they haven’t charged her. But Tim was just playing around with her, right? Wouldn’t that be motive?’

  ‘If she knew about it. She seemed to think that Tim really cared for her. I was thinking that Alana had more reason to be jealous. A woman scorned, and all that.’ In Dulcie’s mind, the younger girl was way more attractive, her story more romantic. Maybe she’d have won out in the end. Not that Tim was much of a prize.

  ‘You’re forgetting about the ring. If you were a young girl, wined, dined and seduced, and then you found out your knight in shining armor was about to propose to someone else, wouldn’t that make you mad?’

  ‘Yeah, but . . .’ Dulcie couldn’t really see either woman resorting to anything stronger than a good slap. Suze had a good case, in theory. But Suze hadn’t seen the blood. ‘Well, I don’t see it. She seems . . . innocent. Like a young novice who had the bad luck to be seduced by a caddish lordling.’ She heard Suze snort. Suze was not a fan of Gothic lit. ‘I like her.’

  ‘You feel protective of her.’

  Suze had a point.

  ‘And you spend much of your time reading books in which innocent women are preyed upon by evil men. But you’re not her lawyer, and this isn’t a storybook. If you want to help this girl, next time you see her, don’t buy her coffee. Send her to legal aid.’

  ‘I didn’t buy her coffee.’ It was iced tea. ‘But I didn’t get a bad vibe off her, either.’

  ‘No, the fish did.’

  Only after they hung up did Dulcie realize she hadn’t told Suze about the biggest potential break in the case: Tim’s dealing. With a stab of conscience, she realized why. Between Alana and her buddy coming by and Dulcie’s own desire to get out of the house, she hadn’t told anyone – not even the cops. And if her legal-minded friend would have said anything about Luke’s revelation, it would be that Dulcie should immediately inform the police. Well, it was Sunday night. Tomorrow, during her lunch break, she’d call the detective who had given her his card.

  With a slight stab of guilt – she knew Suze was right – she settled in again. What was Sunday night for, if not a good book?

  Two suitors, despite her poverty, laid claim upon her hand. One, a noble lord of great pastoral lands, gay with the song of running water, and fragrant groves of lemon trees and olives, stretching beyond sight. The other, a young knight, who had travel’d far, of haunted visage . . .

  Six

  What if the chill were the wind? A cold, mountain gale sweeping up into the mountains, where she, Dulcie, was held captive? What if the wind presaged the ghost of the heroine’s long-dead fiancé, Rabinovitz?

  It was no good. The chill was the air-conditioning vent, blowing straight down on her cubicle, presaging nothing more than goosebumps. Dulcie shivered in her thin cotton dress. Three days away from her desk, and somebody had nicked her office sweater. It had been one of Lucy’s better efforts, too, only slightly lumpy, knitted from unbleached wool that she’d carded and spun herself. Best of all, it had been warm.

  To add to Dulcie’s troubles, the temp agency hadn’t bothered to inform her supervisor at the insurance company about why she hadn’t been at work since last Tuesday, with the result that everybody seemed to regard her as a slacker. The agency would probably find her another mindless drone job if this one canned her. But it seemed that the powers-that-be at Priority Insurance were so desperate for help that instead they’d been piling up folders since Wednesday morning, only nobody could understand why she was so far behind.

  Rabinovitz, Jacob R. Backspacing over a typo, she tried once more to concentrate on what she was doing. Accident reports, all of which came in scrawled in nearly illegible handwriting, and most of which, she suspected, would never amount to anything for the poor claimants.

  Date of accident: March third. The day Jonah had told her about Summer, his new camera-toting love. She shook that memory off and looked at the claimant code. It was a 342, a motor vehicle accident. And the poor guy had been waiting more than four months already. With a twinge of guilt, Dulcie picked up another form.

  Rabinovitz, Jacob S. Also a 342, as were the next five forms. The guilt was fading. The company could have assigned these forms to a regular employee or brought in temp help earlier. She’d only been out since last week.

  Rabinovitz, Jacopo. That opened her eyes but, hey, she was Dulcie Schwartz, full name Dulcinea, thanks to Lucy’s half-remembered role in a college production of Man of La Mancha. And who was Dulcinea Schwartz to question Jacopo Rabinovitz? Another code 342. Dulcie shivered, both from the arctic air and the eerie sense of déjà vu that kept creeping up on her. Maybe it was that date, with its personal memories, but she feared code 342 would haunt her dreams. She stood up and stretched, trying to see into the other cubicles. Maybe whoever had ‘borrowed’ her sweater still had it here. She looked over to where the office manager, Lily, sat. Something about her nubbly beige top looked familiar. Of course, Lily was a nubbly beige woman. But still . . .

  Then it hit her. Jacopo Rabinovitz? March third? Not a date or a name she was likely to forget. Hadn’t she typed his form in last Monday? Could there really be two Jacopo Rabinovitzes who’d had fender benders during the last ice storm of the spring, the night Summer had eclipsed Dulcie?

  Dulcie raised her voice slightly. ‘Hey, Joanie?’

  The kohl-rimmed eyes of the other temp poked around the grey cubicle wall. ‘She speaks!’ Black lips broke into a smile. ‘Hey, you wanna take a break? I’m dying for a ciggie.’

  From the way she was bobbing, Dulcie could see that the modern-day Goth girl was jonesing. ‘In five. But first, what’s with these claim forms? I swear I’ve typed some of these in before.’

  ‘Shh! C’mere.’ Joanie beckoned with nails polished to match her lips. Dulcie slid her chair closer to the partition. ‘We are retyping them, a whole bunch. I don’t know the whole story, but last week, during one of those thunderstorms, I was in the smoking room with Ricky. You know, the cute redhead with the freckles, over in Accounting?’

  Dulcie couldn’t imagine anyone here being cute, but nodded anyway.

  ‘Anyway, he said something about a bug.’

  Without thinking, Dulcie lifted her feet off the grimy carpet.

  ‘A computer bug, silly. But he said it’s all hush-hush for some reason. Anyway, I’m happy; I wasn’t supposed to be here this week. Though, I guess with you out – hey!’ Her grey eyes lit up, wide and innocent despite all the warpaint. ‘Did you really, you know, find a body?’

  ‘Yeah, my room-mate.’ Dulcie was heartily sick of talking about it. But Joanie was as close to a friend as she had here. ‘He’d been stabbed.’

  ‘Gross!’ Joanie beamed. ‘I mean, I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be. He was an ass.’ It felt good to say it. ‘A total preppie creep.’

  ‘I know the type.’ Joanie was nodding. ‘I went to Milton. So, wanna take a break?’

  Fifteen minutes later, Dulcie was sweating and ready to return to the chilled office. Besides, she really shouldn’t push her supervisor. Joanie, however, had other plans.

  ‘Let me finish this butt, then I’ve gotta go to the corner for another pack and a Red Bull. I was at this party last night—’

  ‘I’ll catch you inside.’ Dulcie waved off her raven-haired colleague and leaned into the glass revolving doors. The cool was lovely here in the lobby, not
blasting, just the perfect corporate chill.

  ‘Excuse me.’ It sounded like a command, and Dulcie stumbled forward as a woman brushed past, her heels clicking on the polished lobby floor.

  ‘Hey!’ Dulcie had paused right inside the doors, but that was no reason for such rudeness.

  ‘Yes?’ It was Mrs Putnam, the human resources manager – Sally Ann Putnam, if Joanie was to be believed. It was a name that belonged on a farm girl, although the tart-tongued Goth girl preferred to call her ‘the Snake’. And as was true every time she appeared, since that morning she’d first given Dulcie the once-over and then a company log-on, the HR boss was a vision in perfectly polished and undoubtedly expensive neutrals. Maybe it was the coloring, the way her frosted bob was just a shade lighter than her deeply tanned skin, or maybe it was her cold, flat eyes, but something about her did in fact remind Dulcie of a copperhead snake she’d seen once, sunning on a rock. Maybe it was the job; thinking of people as ‘resources’ could not be good for the soul.

  ‘Um, excuse me? Mrs Putnam?’ Whatever she thought of the HR head, Dulcie needed the gig and made herself blink away the image of the reptile. The opportunity, however, was too good to waste. ‘I was wondering about the data we’re working on now? A lot of the forms have been entered before. I’m sure of it.’ A perfectly manicured eyebrow arched, and Dulcie remembered Joanie’s warning. ‘I mean, maybe there was an announcement while I was out?’

  ‘There was no announcement to any of the clerical staff. Not even to our regular staff,’ sniffed the older woman, tossing back her head. Her hair didn’t move, and Dulcie half expected a slim dark tongue to flash out. Instead, the older woman kept on hissing. ‘You’re being well paid for your labors. I’d advise you to concentrate more on the quality of your work, and less on details that don’t concern you.’

  With that Mrs Putnam spun on one slick leather toe and click-clacked off to the elevators, her posture, like her unbleached linen suit, perfect. It was only as she paused for the small crowd at the elevator to part for her that Dulcie noticed what was on her arm. Over the leather strap of a simple fawn handbag was a neatly folded sweater. It looked like raw wool, it was nubbly, and it was hers.

  Not until Joanie slammed her desk drawer shut did Dulcie realize it was five p.m. Another day gone. Joanie was already shoving her iPod into her bag as Dulcie stood and stretched.

  ‘I don’t know how you can work and listen to music.’ She shook her head to clear it and realized how long her curls were getting. ‘I’d end up typing lyrics.’

  ‘I don’t know how you keep your sanity without it.’ Joanie shouldered her black and green messenger bag, and stood, waiting for Dulcie. ‘I mean, I know you’re quiet and all.’

  ‘I just sort of drift. I daydream, I guess.’ She’d been trying to think about her reading, about Hermetria locked in her forlorn castle with only Demetria, who, to be honest, seemed a bit of a drip. But as the day had dragged on, she’d found herself thinking of Luke instead.

  ‘Not Ricky over in Accounting?’ Joanie must have seen something in her face.

  ‘Don’t worry.’ Dulcie grabbed her own bag and followed the black-clad girl toward the elevators. ‘My room-mate’s brother, actually.’

  ‘The dead guy’s brother?’ Joanie looked at her with new respect as they squeezed into the crowded elevator. ‘Cool!’

  ‘Oh!’ That’s when it hit her. She’d been so annoyed about the sweater and then so caught up in work and, to be honest, thoughts of Luke, that she’d never called the cops.

  ‘What?’ Joanie was bouncing with eagerness, but Dulcie waited till they were down in the lobby.

  ‘I’ve got to call the cops,’ she whispered. ‘The detective in charge gave me his card and I found out something.’

  ‘You found out something?’ Sally Putnam was behind her. She must have been further back in the elevator, or coiled under a nearby rock. ‘Have you been prying into the system?’ Next to her stood two men in suits that looked out of place on their block-like bodies.

  ‘Mrs Putnam!’ Dulcie took a step back. ‘I was meaning to talk to you.’ She’d been trying to get up her nerve to ask about the sweater all day.

  ‘I see, and now you think you’ll just sidestep the corporate chain of command? Go directly to the police?’

  None of this made sense. ‘But the detectives said—’

  ‘If Priority has had a breach of protocol, Priority executives will handle it themselves. Securely.’ The sibilant hissed between her thin lips. ‘So if you have any desire to continue working here, you will respect our rules.’ She stared down at Dulcie without blinking.

  Dulcie stood there, mouth open, while for the second time that day the executive spun on her toe and marched away.

  ‘Hey, Dulce.’

  She’d forgotten Joanie standing beside her.

  ‘Isn’t that your sweater?’

  It wasn’t until she was about to descend into the Government Center T that Dulcie got through to someone at the Cambridge Police.

  ‘No, it’s not an emergency,’ she repeated for the tenth time and expected to be put on hold again.

  ‘I gather,’ said an amused voice on the other end. ‘But you were calling for Detective Scavetti?’

  Feeling a little foolish, Dulcie explained what had happened. Standing on a busy sidewalk, surrounded by tired office workers, it sounded weak. Yes, her room-mate had been murdered. And, yes, the detective had told her to call if she remembered anything else. But was a high school memory from the dead room-mate’s brother really anything? Well, she was on the phone now, trying to explain.

  ‘So, the victim’s brother told you that the victim had sold a little pot while he was in high school?’

  ‘Yes, while he was at prep school at Andover.’ She could almost feel the detective sigh. So, Tim wasn’t a major league drug lord. He was a spoiled rich kid. Maybe that would have made him more vulnerable. ‘His brother said he could usually figure out where Tim had hidden his stash, and he’d looked. So maybe he was in over his head, you know, dealing here in the city, and he got killed for it?’ It was a weak theory, but someone had killed her room-mate. ‘Isn’t that a possibility?’

  The voice on the other end of the phone sounded tired. ‘Yes, it is a possibility, and I will pass along your theory to Detective Scavetti. But I wouldn’t lose any sleep over it. This doesn’t look like a gang killing, and frankly, gangs control the drug traffic in this town.’

  ‘But that’s just it.’ She couldn’t let go. ‘I mean, what if this one upstart was—’

  ‘Selling a little pot to his friends? Frankly, they wouldn’t care.’

  But what if he hadn’t paid his wholesaler? What if he’d tried to rip someone off? It was too late. ‘Thank you very much for calling in, Ms Schwartz.’ The line went dead – and then immediately hummed back to life.

  ‘Yes?’ She clicked on without looking. Her idea had made sense!

  ‘Dulcie?’ The female voice on the other end was familiar, but she couldn’t place it. ‘Dulcie Schwartz?’

  ‘Speaking.’ If this was a telemarketer, she’d just shut the phone. She was still being jostled by brain-dead commuters seeking the T, and the late afternoon had baked the city like a casserole.

  ‘This is Alana – you know, Tim’s fiancée?’

  Dulcie noted the elevation in status and toyed with the idea of descending into the cool shadow of the subway stop. Maybe Alana wouldn’t even notice that she’d lost the signal.

  ‘Anyway, I’m calling because I’m having a little get-together on Thursday,’ Alana continued. ‘It’s just been such a horrible, horrible week, and Stacia and I thought it would do everyone good.’

  Dulcie couldn’t tell which thought was making her speechless: that Alana would have a party a week after her boyfriend’s murder, or that she’d think to invite Dulcie. ‘A party?’ She managed not to stutter.

  ‘Just drinks. Just to cheer everyone up.’

  Dulcie found herself staring at a T
map like a lost tourist, noticing for the first time how the lines of color spread out like trickles of blood and bile against the white. What was Alana thinking of? She closed her eyes and once again saw the hand, the puddle. Alana was still talking, and Dulcie made herself focus. Alana hadn’t seen Tim the way she had – so bloody, so still. Nobody had, except for the police. To Alana and her friends, Tim was just gone – his absence rather like an inconvenient holiday, as if he’d gone off-trail skiing in Aspen. She swallowed hard and felt her stomach begin to settle.

  Alana hadn’t missed a beat. ‘I mean, Tim would be the first one to tell us that life goes on. Especially in summer! My folks have a shade up over most of the roof deck, and they’re going away for the weekend.’

  Aha, thought Dulcie, the truth was out.

  ‘So, would you care to drop by?’

  Would I care to swim with sharks? Even well-dressed sharks? Dulcie paused before answering. It couldn’t be simple kindness that had prompted Alana to invite her. Stupid as she seemed, the willowy blonde had to have an ulterior motive. And, Dulcie had to admit to herself, she was a bit curious. Curious enough to give up a night of reading?

  ‘Um, well, thank you, Alana. I’ll have to check my calendar.’ Dulcie was rather proud of her stalling technique. ‘But why don’t I take down your info?’

  Alana didn’t seem to notice her bluff and gave her the address of a Beacon Hill town house. The invitation was for cocktails at seven. ‘We really would love for you to come.’

  Dulcie was touched, despite her misgivings. ‘Thanks, Alana. And, hey—’ She could throw the girl a bone. ‘Thought I’d let you know. I talked to the cops about what Luke said and they didn’t buy it.’ She heard a puzzled noise. ‘They don’t think that Tim was a dealer.’

  ‘Well, of course not!’ Dulcie could hear the refined sniff of disapproval, as if Alana had smelled something distasteful. Maybe this party wouldn’t be such a good idea after all.