‘‘Listen, it’ll take a little while for me to explain. Why don’t we get together later? I could meet you for lunch down by St. Catherine’s.’’
‘‘No, please. I’d like to hear now.’’
So for the next ten minutes I proceeded to give Peter an
abbreviated version of the circumstances I’d laid out for Ellen the night before.
‘‘Damn him to hell!’’ he growled when I was through. He had some questions after that, which he interspersed with a variety of impassioned, but minor-league, curses. Then we both fell silent. And when he spoke again, Peter’s entire manner was changed. ‘‘Listen,’’ he told me brightly,
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‘‘you haven’t heard my news yet. Mary Ann’s doctors say she could have her first operation in maybe a couple of weeks.’’
‘‘That’s wonderful!’’ I responded.
He immediately proceeded to elaborate a bit on how pleased everyone was with the girl’s progress. So, in spite of everything, the conversation ended on an upbeat note. But I was only too conscious of the fact that my job wasn’t done yet.
At a quarter of nine, and with almost zero optimism, I tried Charlotte Bromley. The recording still claimed she’d be back the day before. Then, on an impulse, I decided to stop off at her building before going to work that morning. As soon as the taxi pulled up in front of the familiar yellow brick facade, I was reminded of my last visit here and my throat promptly closed up on me. And when I went
to open the cab door, I was disgusted to note that my hand was shaking.
By the time I entered the vestibule, though, I’d suc
ceeded in composing myself a little. Checking the directory, I found a listing that said R. SCHMIDT, SUPER and pressed the buzzer. There was no answer. I was trying to decide what to do next when I heard a slight commotion coming from the direction of the lobby. I turned to see a woman with a baby carriage struggling with the door. She was fighting to keep it from closing in her face, so I grabbed it while she maneuvered the carriage through. Then I let my
self into the lobby.
If the super wasn’t around, I could at least try talking to Bromley’s neighbors.
Walking to the elevators, I had to pass the very spot where I’d so eloquently demonstrated the kind of mush I’m made of. And it came to me then that Sunday night was only the second time in my life I’d passed out like that, my first dead faint occurring during that earlier murder investi
gation of mine. And under not too dissimilar circumstances, too. Well, it looked like I was one of those women who swoon whenever things get really hairy. And so what! I thought defiantly.
The first thing I did when I got off on the seventh floor was to ring the bell to 7H—just in case. After satisfying myself that Bromley still wasn’t home, I tried 7G, the apart
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239
ment directly on the left. I had no luck there, either. So I pressed the buzzer to 7I.
‘‘Who is it?’’ someone demanded even before I had a chance to take my finger from the bell. The voice sounded like it was coming from at least a million miles away.
‘‘I’d like to ask you a couple of questions about your neighbor!’’ I shouted through the closed door.
‘‘What?’’
‘‘I want to talk to you about Ms. Bromley!’’
‘‘Speak up!’’ The voice seemed a little closer.
‘‘I’m Charlotte Bromley’s cousin!’’ I yelled.
‘‘Can’t hear a damn thing through these damn doors,’’
the voice muttered, and it was obvious that whoever it be
longed to was now just on the other side of the door. I heard five locks being turned then. A second or two later, the door opened a crack, and a man no taller than I am—most of him hidden from view—was peering out at me from behind a chain. ‘‘Oh, a redhead,’’ he said in this frail, high-pitched voice, and I could feel him eying me up and down. ‘‘Always had a weakness for redheads. When they’re natural, anyways. You natural?’’
‘‘Of course,’’ I answered with a straight face.
‘‘Yeah. Like I’m Ronald Colman,’’ the man shot back, cackling. ‘‘Don’t even mind if my redheads got a few extra pounds on ’em,’’ he informed me magnanimously, removing
the chain from the door and opening it wide.
Framed in the doorway was this wizened little fellow who
must have been close to eighty and who was so thin that his bones jutted out. But he had a handsome thatch of pure white hair and the most mischievous gray-green eyes you’ve ever seen. ‘‘Now, who’d you say you was?’’ he asked. As soon as he spoke, I noticed he didn’t have a tooth in his head.
‘‘I’m Charlotte’s cousin—Charlotte Bromley, your neigh
bor. She expected to be back from vacation yesterday, but she’s still not home. I don’t suppose you’d know anything about that.’’
He gave me this gummy, elfin grin. ‘‘Izzatso? Well, you don’t suppose wrong, little girl.’’ Little girl?
‘‘Then you do know where she is?’’
‘‘Betcher life, I do. The super was up here fixin’ my damn sink the other day, and he tells me she’s gonna be stayin’
at her sister’s a little longer. She had to have her gallblad
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der taken out real sudden over there, and the doctors don’t want her doin’ no travelin’ yet.’’
‘‘Do you happen to have her sister’s address?’’
‘‘Don’t you have it? You’re the one’s the cousin; not me.’’
‘‘Europe is all Charlotte told me,’’ I answered, taking a clue from his using the words ‘‘over there.’’ But the little man was looking at me skeptically. ‘‘I just got into town; I’m from the Midwest,’’ I put in quickly. ‘‘And Charlotte didn’t say too much to me on the phone—just that she was
going to visit her sister.’’ He still didn’t appear to be satis
fied, so I finished up with: ‘‘Uh . . . Myra moves around a lot.’’ The name seemed to go pretty well with ‘‘Charlotte.’’
‘‘Myra?’’
‘‘Her sister.’’
‘‘Paris, France; that’s where she is,’’ he told me then,
‘‘but that’s as much as I know.’’
‘‘I don’t imagine you’d have any idea when she’s due home.’’
Another gleeful cackle. ‘‘Wrong again,’’ the little man announced. ‘‘Super says she’ll be comin’ home next Mon
day—the twenty-third—if all’s well. That’s the day before my wife’s birthday, may she rest in peace. She woulda been seventy-seven.’’
‘‘Well, ummm, thank you very much, sir,’’ I said, already moving away from the door. ‘‘I’ll get in touch with her then.’’
‘‘Leo,’’ he said, stopping me in my tracks. ‘‘Name’s Leo. What’s yours, little girl?’’
‘‘Mary,’’ I told him for no reason I can think of.
‘‘Say, you got a husband, Mary?’’
‘‘I’m a widow.’’
‘‘Listen, you like steak?’’ He didn’t bother waiting for an answer. ‘‘My son—he’s a butcher, see?—he brings me the best tenderloin you ever ate in your life. It’s even worth puttin’ in my damn dentures for; that’s how good it is. You come up here one night, and I’ll fix you a dinner’ll bring tears to your eyes.’’
‘‘I can’t tell you how tempting that sounds, Leo. Only I’m afraid I just wouldn’t be able to trust myself with you.’’
Moments later, when I was getting into the elevator, I could still hear Leo’s merry cackle reverberating through the hall.
Chapter 40
‘‘We nailed the bastard,’’ the message from Fielding read.
‘‘All right!’’ I exclaimed.
‘‘Does that mean what I think it does?’’ Jackie asked, catching some of
my excitement.
‘‘You bet.’’ I was grinning from ear to ear.
She jumped up from the chair and ran around her desk to give me a congratulatory hug. Like Ellen, Jackie turned out to be a hearty hugger. And since she’s a pretty fairsized woman, my nose ended up smashed against her shoul
der somewhere, so I had a little trouble breathing. ‘‘I want to hear all about everything!’’ she informed me when she was (mercifully) done with displaying her enthusiasm.
‘‘You will,’’ I promised. ‘‘Just let me make a few phone calls.’’
I left Jackie and hurried down the hall, shrugging out of my coat along the way. As soon as I walked into my office, I dialed Fielding.
He was exuberant. ‘‘It’s the same thirty-eight that was used on the twins, and it’s got Foster’s prints all over it!’’
‘‘Hallelujah! Has he been arraigned yet?’’
‘‘He certainly has. And he’s being held without bail.’’
I was so hyped up by these latest developments, I couldn’t wait to share them with Peter’s machine, which took things in stride. After that, I phoned Ellen at Macy’s, and she, of course, squealed in all the right places. When I finally managed to calm down a little, I tried R. Schmidt, Charlotte Bromley’s super. He was home now—
and barely civil.
After quickly explaining who I was, I said how much I’d appreciate it if he could supply me with Bromley’s Paris address.
‘‘Listen, the police were here about the same thing yes
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terday. And I’ll tell you what I tole them: I don’t have no idea where she’s stayin’.’’
‘‘Wait!’’ I put in, just as he was—I know—about to hang
up. ‘‘How did you hear she was operated on?’’
‘‘This friend a hers who dropped off the rent for her a coupla weeks ago—four days late, a course—tole me about
it. Not that it’s any a your business.’’ I was primed to ask another question, but R. Schmidt anticipated it. ‘‘And I don’t know who this here friend is, how to get in touch with her, or even why I’m spendin’ all this time yakkin’
with you when I got so much work to do.’’
It was a little before five that afternoon when another piece of the puzzle fell into place.
I’d just been to the ladies’ room prior to leaving for home, and when I got back to my desk, the message was sitting there. All that was written on it were the name Helen Ward and a phone number. For a minute or so, I drew a blank. Then I remembered: This was the girl Claire Josephs had suggested I get in touch with—that actress friend of Meredith’s who’d been off shooting a movie in some jungle. I returned the call right away.
Helen Ward sounded very bright. And very concerned. She explained that she’d arrived home from Africa that day, and her roommate told her how anxious I was to talk to her. Ward, it seems, was every bit as anxious to talk to me. She’d just heard about the shootings, and she wanted to know how the survivor was and whether she’d been identified yet. I said the victim seemed to be improving but that so far we hadn’t made any headway in establishing who she was.
‘‘Well, I’m relieved that she’s doing all right. My room
mate saved yesterday’s paper for me, but it didn’t say too much about her condition.’’
‘‘Yesterday’s paper?’’ I hadn’t looked at a newspaper in days.
‘‘The Post had the story about the police picking Eric up at the airport Sunday night. I’m not surprised, you know—
about Eric.’’
‘‘You’re not?’’
‘‘Not after what he pulled on Meredith’s husband.’’
‘‘Oh, you mean trying to buy him off.’’
‘‘Who told you that?’’ Ward scoffed. ‘‘It was just the
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opposite. Eric was after Gene, Meredith’s husband—al
though he wasn’t her husband at the time—to pay him off. Blackmail. Eric told Gene that if he didn’t come across with twenty thousand pounds, he’d see to it he never married his sister.’’
I was completely thrown. ‘‘Are you positive?’’
‘‘Absolutely. Eric had some kind of connections with the
police, and he found out Gene had been arrested for drug trafficking years back. Well, when Gene refused to fork over the money, Eric went ahead and tattled to the Fos
ters—which is what he’d been threatening to do—and the parents put Meredith under a lot of pressure to break off with the guy. It was really a terrible time for Meredith. Things were never the same between her and her parents after that, either. And then, of course, they died.’’
‘‘That Eric is some piece of work, isn’t he? You heard all this from Meredith herself?’’
‘‘That’s right. It’s not something she’d normally talk about, I’m sure, but one night I was crying to her about all this trouble I was having with my sister, who’s the bitch of the Western world. Well, Meredith started commiserating with me about how awful it is when a sister or brother lets you down like that, and then she just opened up to me about Eric. I guess, in a way, my problems gave her an excuse for getting it off her chest.’’
Thanks to Helen Ward, things had suddenly become a lot clearer to me. I could certainly understand now why, even after all this time, Meredith would have nothing to do with her brother. But it did make me wonder about Mary Ann. After all, she’d given everyone—including her own fiance´—Eric’s version of things.
It was almost as though Ward had been reading my thoughts. ‘‘From what Meredith told me,’’ she said, ‘‘Mary Ann always refused to believe—on a conscious level, at any rate—that Eric could do anything like that. At first she tried convincing Meredith that Gene had lied to her about the blackmail, that drug addicts always lie. Then, after a while, she started insisting that it must have been some kind of misunderstanding, and she’d talk about how Eric was their only brother and how Meredith should at least let him have a chance to explain.
‘‘But Meredith always felt that, deep down, Mary Ann had to realize there was no reason for Gene to make up a
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story like that. And besides, Eric’s demanding money wasn’t exactly out of character for him. When Meredith and Mary Ann were growing up, he used to hit their parents up for loans all the time. Loans that, of course, he never paid back. She—Meredith—was worried about how traumatized
Mary Ann would be when one day she was forced to admit
to herself what her brother was really like.’’
‘‘Talk about misplaced loyalty, huh?’’ I remarked then.
‘‘You said it. But tell me, what made him try to kill them, anyway?’’
‘‘It’s sort of complicated, but he stood to come into a pretty nice inheritance if both his sisters died.’’
‘‘ Naturally it would be money. The man’s a compulsive gambler—the horses, I think. Also, he’s been living with some woman who has very expensive tastes.’’
This girl was full of information! It occurred to me at this point that there might be one more little piece where the rest had come from. I crossed my fingers. ‘‘Did you, by any chance, ever notice Meredith wearing a ring of some sort?’’
‘‘Uh-uh. Not that I can recall.’’
Well, I couldn’t expect her to clear up everything for me, could I? Uncrossing my fingers, I thanked her for all her help.
‘‘Shakira—my roommate—thought you’d probably want
to see me.’’
‘‘It won’t be necessary,’’ I responded, thanking her again.
‘‘You’ve already answered more questions than I’d ever have thought to ask.’’
Chapter 41
On the way home that night, I got to thinking about Mere
dith and Mary Ann—about everything, really. And all at once it dawned on
me where the rest of Meredith’s millions might be!
It was something that should have occurred to me long before, of course. And I tried to take some consolation from the fact that Fielding had been just as big a blockhead as I was. But it didn’t help much.
Well, anyway, we were getting together tomorrow for that lunch he’d been promising me. I’d talk to him about my idea then.
Knowing that I love French food, Fielding had picked out this lovely—and quite pricey—French restaurant not far from my office. We’d both heard wonderful things about the place, and I was looking forward to a very special meal. Which, I guess you could say, is just what I got. For starters, Tim ordered a bottle of cabernet sauvignon, and as soon as the waiter poured the wine and we made a little toast to ourselves, he leaned across the table. ‘‘I have some news for you, Dez.’’
‘‘Good or bad?’’
‘‘I’d call it ‘interesting.’ I’ve been saving it for when I saw you.’’
‘‘I have something to tell you, too,’’ I informed him.
‘‘Ladies first,’’ he said with mock gallantry.
‘‘Oh, no, after you; you’re older.’’
‘‘That’s debatable,’’ Fielding retorted. ‘‘But okay, I just thought you’d like to know that we’ve located Meredith’s assets.’’
Well, how do you like that! I took a very large gulp of wine. ‘‘Where?’’
‘‘Of course, we were pretty slow-witted about this, I
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admit,’’ he digressed—and I could tell that he was going to milk this thing for all it was worth. ‘‘And by the way, when I say ‘we,’ Shapiro, you can feel free to include yourself.’’
A protracted break in this little monologue to allow me to fully appreciate my own failings. ‘‘But anyway,’’ he finally went on, ‘‘as soon as we found out Meredith was the only one with an inheritance, we started approaching the prob
lem differently—concentrating on where she might have put the money instead of where they might have put it. Under
stand?’’ He sat back in his chair then, a smile on his face, and looked at me expectantly.
‘‘I understand,’’ I responded impatiently. ‘‘Go ahead.’’
‘‘Garibaldi!’’ he proclaimed. ‘‘Meredith’s married name was Garibaldi.’’
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