Brain Trust

by A W Hartoin

  Spidermonkey made a subtle displeased sound, the first I’d ever heard from him.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I know this is a pain.”

  He chuckled. “They’re a pain, not you. I’m happy to help. I need you safe and sound.”

  “Why?” asked Fats, tearing her gaze from Blackie.

  “Mercy has brought a certain mystery into my life,” said Spidermonkey. “She’s essential to solving it and I like her.”

  “This would be the thing with The Klinefeld Group?”

  He didn’t reply.

  “She got ahold of Dr. Bloom’s file,” I said. “And she told me something you might find interesting.”

  “What would that be?” Spidermonkey sounded stiff and guarded.

  “Don’t worry. I think our secret’s safe with Fats.”

  “Based on what?”

  “Well…based on we don’t have any choice,” I said. “Go ahead, Fats. Tell him about the board.”

  Fats told Spidermonkey how The Klinefeld Group got control of the art museum board, getting his attention fast. He hadn’t come across anything to do with the board, but he hadn’t been looking.

  “They’re getting more dangerous by the minute,” he said. “If we don’t find something soon, perhaps we should consider backing off.”

  “You make it sound like they’ll back off if we do,” I said. “They’ve shown no signs of it.”

  “When this is all over, we need to sit down and map out a strategy. Right now, I have nowhere to go,” he said.

  “There was information in the Bloom papers,” said Fats. “Something about DH8. I don’t know what it means.”

  “That’s something, at least.”

  “Don’t get down in the dumps,” I said. “I did get a tidbit from Myrtle and Millicent.”

  “Really?”

  I told him about Agatha and Daniel’s memorial being in St. Sebastian.

  “I can’t believe it,” he exclaimed. “I assumed the crash was near Jeff City.”

  “Me, too, but it wasn’t. Maybe I should go out there and talk to the local cops. They might know something.”

  “They might. Let me get my source on it. I’ll see if she can get access to the evidence, but first, I’ll find the wayward Detective Keely,” he said. “Is there anything else?”

  I glanced up at Blackie, who continued to stare at me. I could tell him about the cat, but it would only upset him. As far as I could tell, the cat warned of impending doom, but nobody ever managed to avoid what was about to happen, which was just plain obnoxious. I mean, what was the point? “No, nothing.”

  “Are you going back to the hospital?” asked Spidermonkey.

  I stood up and shook off the weight Blackie had put on my shoulders. There was no use worrying about something you couldn’t change. “We’re going to see a man about a lie.”

  “That doesn’t narrow it down.”

  I laughed and hung up.

  “Where are we going?” asked Fats.

  “To see Palfry, but I guess I’d better call my beloved first.” I called Chuck, who was in a snit about Spidermonkey choosing me. He crabbed for a minute before I filled him in. He’d only found out that Keely moved to Columbia and that pissed him off further. The news about Scott Frame’s wife wasn’t impressive, but he said he’d drive over to Belleville and have a talk with Scott to see how upset the detective was about her death. I asked about Palfry and they hadn’t had time to re-interview yet, but Chuck had a uniform go over to interview Johnny and Jim. They said Palfry was in Ode to Caffeine on Saturday afternoon some time around four. More interesting was Palfry’s topic of conversation. He did his normal gossip with the add-on that the Watts family was always mucking up the peace of the avenue. Jim asked if my parents were having a barbecue, something Palfry considered very low-class, and he said ‘Who knows’ with a snotty harrumph. Johnny and Jim knew my parents and liked them. They thought Palfry was, in their words, an amusing old prig and made a mental note to tease Mom about her out-of-control afternoon barbecues when they next saw her.

  “So that old buzzard did see or hear something,” I said with a thumbs-up. She just gave me an odd look and glanced back at Blackie.

  “Yeah. I’ll get it out of him one way or another,” said Chuck.

  “Leave Palfry to us,” I said.

  “Mercy, what are you going to do?”

  “Let’s just say a little Licata goes a long way.”

  “I can’t let you assault a witness,” he said, sounding a bit panicked.

  I chuckled. “We won’t assault him. Unless, of course, he doesn’t cooperate.”

  “I’ll deal with Palfry. You go to the hospital. Do not—”

  “Oh, no. My battery’s dying. What did you say?”

  “Don’t even—”

  I hung up, giving Chuck plausible deniability or something like it, if we did happen to beat the snot out of Palfry the weasel. He couldn’t stop us if he didn’t know what we were about to do. I must admit I wanted to beat Palfry senseless myself.

  “Ready?” I asked Fats.

  “There’s something wrong with that cat,” she replied.

  “Noticed that, did you?”

  “I don’t think it’s breathing and it definitely hasn’t blinked.”

  “Yeah, well, ya know,” I said.

  “I don’t know. What is up with that cat?”

  “I’ll tell you on the way to Palfry. I don’t suppose you have any brass knuckles?”

  She crossed her arms. “As if I’d need them.”

  “I meant for me.”

  “You continue to surprise me. So what do we do about the cat?”

  “There’s nothing we can do about him.” I trotted out of the room and down the stairs with Fats hard on my heels, protesting the whole way. I wasn’t going to fob her off with some tale that Blackie was just weird. Not Fats Licata. Like me, she was nosy by nature.

  By the time we’d walked down to the McCallister mansion, Fats had gone silent. We went around to the servants’ entrance and I rang the bell next to the narrow security door.

  “You expect me to believe that your family has a two-hundred-year-old ghost cat that warns you of impending doom?” she asked.

  I shrugged. “Believe what you want.”

  “You do have that bruise on your forehead. Do you have a concussion?”

  “Probably.” I rang the bell again and a maid in an actual French maid-type uniform answered. “Miss Watts,” she exclaimed. “How is your mother? We were so sorry to hear what happened.”

  “She’s better. Thanks.”

  “Why did you come to this door? You’re supposed to use the front.”

  “Because I want to talk to Palfry,” I said. “Is he here?”

  Her nose twitched ever so slightly. “I wouldn’t bother. The police already talked to him.”

  “I think I’m a little more persuasive than the average cop.”

  Doubt was written all over her pretty face until Fats stepped into view and gave her a finger wave. “And I’m not half bad at persuading people either.”

  “I imagine you’d be quite good at it,” she said, stepping back. “Would you like to come in?”

  “I think we’ll stay out here.” I wanted Palfry out of his element. He was an indoors kind of guy. Plus, there was less to break outside.

  The maid went to get Palfry and Fats said, “I don’t believe that cat means anything.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  “It’s just a cat.”

  “That doesn’t breathe. Got it.”

  The door opened and Palfry stuck his nose out. “What do you want, Watts?”

  Fats didn’t hesitate. She grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and dragged him outside before tossing him against the wall. “That’s Miss Watts to you.”

  When I imagined beating the crap out of Palfry, I imagined him taking it like a man or at least like a five-year-old girl. Palfry peed. All it took was a light slap to the jowls and Fats yelling, “Wh
at did you see Saturday?”

  He flooded his pants and begged, “Please don’t hurt me.”

  Fats stepped back in utter disgust. “I don’t even want to touch you.”

  “I’ll touch him,” I said.

  My bodyguard couldn’t believe it, but heck, I touched Blankenship on the lips. This was just a pissy butler. He wasn’t nearly so disgusting.

  “Go for it,” she said with cringe.

  I kept my feet from the puddle and stuck a finger in his quivering face. “I know you were out walking at the time my mom was attacked and from what you said in Ode to Caffeine, you heard something.”

  “I…I…”

  I flicked his jowl and he may have let loose again. I didn’t care. “Palfry, I’m losing patience with you. Maybe me and my parents aren’t your style. Maybe we aren’t good enough for the avenue, but that’s not the question. The first question is do you want to be charged as an accessory in a rape and murder?”

  “But I didn’t do anything,” Palfry whined.

  “Oh yeah? Then why are you helping the guy who did to get away with it?” I asked.

  “I don’t know who did it.”

  Fats came in close. She was so big, her breath ruffled the thin hair on the top of his head. “The second question is where do you want me to hit you first, the face or the stomach? I, myself, favor the face. You have a chance of being knocked out and missing what’s coming to you. Until you wake up in intensive care, that is.”

  “Nice,” I said.

  “You like that?” she asked.

  “Very well put.”

  “Thank you.” Fats popped him on the cheek, just hard enough to make the flubber shake. “Head or stomach? The choice is yours.”

  Palfry put his shaking hands over his face. “I thought your mother was…”

  I stepped back and put my hands on my hips. “What?”

  “You don’t want me to say.”

  “I assure you, I do.”

  “She’ll hit me,” he said, peeking through his sweaty fingers.

  Fats shrugged. “Likely, but you can still save yourself.”

  “I thought she was having sex outside.” He shielded his face with his arms.

  “What the what?” I pulled his arms down. “Why in the world would you think that?”

  Palfry heard something when he walked by my parent’s house at four on Saturday. Having a low opinion of my mother, he automatically thought the muffled groans and thumping noise was her, outside, in broad daylight, having sex with someone other than my father. He knew Dad was gone because the maid we’d just talked to had told him he was.

  The butler walked on by, went to Ode to Caffeine, complained, and returned about four thirty and this is where he felt guilty. He avoided my eyes and began sweating more, which was saying something, considering that he was already soaked. Palfry saw a man walking down the cross street away from Hawthorne wearing a wrinkled suit and pulling, of all things, a wheeled trash can. It struck him as odd for many reasons, most notably who drags a trash can down Beecher Stowe Boulevard? Where was he going? All trash got picked up in the alleys. The closest business was Ode to Caffeine and that was several blocks away. Also, the can was heavy like it was full to the brim and trash day was Friday.

  My chest got tight. “What did he look like?”

  A bead of sweat ran down from his sideburn and dripped off his jowl. “I didn’t look.”

  “You were afraid,” said Fats.

  His chin trembled. “I don’t know why. I just felt nervous and it was very odd, a man with a trash can like that.”

  “What did you see? Anything will help,” I said.

  “He was a good-sized man, not skinny like your father. He had on some kind of hat, but like I said I didn’t look.”

  “White or Hispanic?”

  “White,” he said, automatically, then more slowly, “I don’t know why. It was just what I thought. He was definitely out of place.”

  “Aside from the trash can?”

  “Yes, he wasn’t our sort.”

  I gritted my teeth. “Like how my parents aren’t your sort.”

  Palfry put his hands down finally and clasped them under his chin. “Is she going to hit me?”

  “No,” I said quickly. “Just tell me.”

  Like the feeling that the guy was white, the feeling that he didn’t belong was just as instinctual. Palfry was an unbearable snob, but he had a nose for social rank. Oddly, he placed that man below us. He admitted that while my parents didn’t have the social graces that came with being born with money—I called it entitlement, he called it breeding—they had a certain style to them. The blue suit the man wore was cheap and heavily wrinkled. Mom and Dad were always acceptably turned out, even when we really didn’t have money and Mom drove a 1987 Honda with tremendous hail damage. We had that car until it died on the highway and had to be towed away when I was in high school. My parents had something that said they weren’t Palfry’s sort but better than most people and that guy didn’t have it. Notice that I wasn’t included in the better than most or acceptably turned out, just the parents. I was dirt and getting worse, with the leather bikini poster and whatnot.

  “Did you smell anything?” I asked.

  “Like what?” asked Palfrey, for the first time curious.

  “I don’t know. Mothballs, for instance.”

  He shrugged. “I was across the street, but the suit did look like it’d been in storage.”

  “What happened then?” I asked.

  “Nothing,” he said, once again avoiding my eyes.

  “Come on. You know you want to tell us.”

  “It might be nothing.”

  “Spill it.”

  “The alley gate was ajar. I saw it and pushed it closed. That’s it, I swear to you,” said Palfry.

  Fats patted him on the cheek. “Now, don’t you feel better?”

  He appeared puzzled for a moment and then said, “I think I do.”

  “Why didn’t you just tell the cops when they interviewed you?” I asked.

  “I thought Mr. McCallister might blame me for what happened to your mother. He has a soft spot for her. I didn’t want to lose my job and if he thought I should’ve saved her…”

  “To be clear, you didn’t hear a gunshot?” I asked.

  “No, but I was inside before my walk with the dogs. I don’t think anyone else was home that Saturday. All our maids were off. The street was really quiet.” He had the good sense to look ashamed. “Are we done?”

  “We are, but bring out that maid we were talking to earlier,” I said.

  He vanished inside the house and the maid came out, looking nervous herself. “I don’t know anything about what happened.”

  “I don’t think you do, but I’d like to know how you knew my father was out of town.”

  She relaxed. “Oh, that’s easy. Your mother told me. I took my little sister by. She was selling candy bars for her soccer fundraiser. Mrs. Watts is always so good about that. She bought a whole box and said your father was out of town for a while.”

  “Did anyone ask you about my parents?” I asked.

  “No, why would they?”

  “Just checking. So you told Palfry that my father was gone and nobody else?”

  She shrugged. “It was common knowledge. Nancy down at Mrs. Huff’s knew.”

  “Do you talk about my parents a lot?”

  The maid blushed and lowered her voice. “You’re a celebrity, singing with DBD, and your father’s a world-famous detective. Your mother’s so nice and classy. Your family’s fun to have around and something’s always happening. Palfry hates that, but I think it’s exciting.”

  Exciting was one word for it. I thanked her and we left, heading back for my parents’ house, both silent until we reached the truck. Neither of us went for it. Instead, we went up the brick walk, around through the side yard.

  “Garage?” asked Fats.

  “Yep,” I replied.

  Just as we both
expected, my parents’ garbage can was missing. That’s how he hauled Denny’s body away. He rolled him right out in front of the whole world, but the world, except for Palfry, wasn’t paying much attention.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  FATS INSISTED WE stop by my apartment, saying I needed fresh clothes, but I think she was really sick of my mangy hair. Before I knew what was happening, I was draped in a towel and having it snipped. I suppose I could’ve protested, but I was too tired to fight it. My whole face hurt and I looked like I had a purple slug in place of a lower lip. Of course, I still had the nasty egg from Sturgis on my forehead to match. I’d like to say I’d looked worse, but I hadn’t. It was a new low, complete with mangy hair.

  My bodyguard/hair stylist stepped back. “Not bad. You look almost normal. From the back, that is.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Don’t mention it,” she said, ponytailing her hair and then sockbunning it with amazing speed. “How about you put something comfortable on, baggy jeans or sweats?”

  “My mother hates jeans. She doesn’t even own a pair.”

  “Do you really care? Your day sucked.”

  “I think I do. She’s hurt and she likes it when I look appropriate.”

  Fats heaved a sigh and dug into my closet. “Holy crap! You’ve got Valentino in here.”

  “It was a gift from Millicent and Myrtle for funerals.” I collapsed on my bed. It felt so good I could’ve gone to sleep for twenty-four hours.

  Fats poked me. “How about this?” She held up a pair of Ponte pants that were sort of a cross between yoga pants and regular pants.

  “Perfect,” I said, throwing them on with a super-soft fitted button-up. “I have to go back to the hospital.”

  “You don’t sound convinced.”

  “I just want to sleep.”

  Sleep wasn’t in the cards. Fats dragged me out of the apartment, snagging Dr. Bloom’s packet as we went.

  “What are you doing with that?” I asked.

  “You can read it at the hospital and get back to Spidermonkey,” said Fats.

  “It can wait.”

  She gave me a glare. “Can it? They kill people.”

  “So do you,” I said.

  “Not lately.”

  “That doesn’t make it better.”