Mixed Messages (A Malone Mystery)

by Gligor, Patricia

  “No. No. I … . It’s been a bad morning. Would you like a cup of coffee?”

  “That would be nice,” Louise replied, following Ann into the kitchen where the remains of breakfast littered the table and stovetop.

  “I haven’t had a chance to clean up yet,” Ann said. As she cleared a place at the table for Louise, tears began streaming down her face and her hands trembled as she carried dirty dishes to the sink.

  “What’s wrong?” her mother-in-law asked. “What’s the matter with you?”

  “Nothing. I … . I don’t know how much more I can take,” she said, her voice cracking. “David didn’t come home last night.”

  “Where is he? Is he all right?” Louise asked in a shrill voice.

  “He’s fine. He called this morning from the office.”

  Louise sighed. “Well, then, there’s nothing to be upset about, is there?”

  “Nothing to be upset about? How can you say that? Didn’t you hear me? David stayed out all night!”

  “Oh, for goodness sakes, Ann. Grow up. Boys will be boys. You should know that by now. You should be thankful he’s safe and sound.”

  “Wait a minute. I should ‘grow up’ but David’s allowed to be totally irresponsible because ‘boys will be boys’? He’s a married man! A married man with children! He should be home at night with his family, not hanging out in bars doing God knows what with God knows who!”

  “What are you saying? What are you accusing my son of?” Louise shouted.

  “I’m not accusing him of anything. I’m telling you like it is. He goes to the bar almost every night. He comes home in the wee hours, so drunk he can barely walk. He’s hung over almost every day. It keeps getting worse and worse. Now he’s stayed out all night! Your son has a problem with alcohol and you’re too blind to see it!”

  “Are you calling David an alcoholic? How dare you call him an alcoholic? He works hard. He supports you and the children, doesn’t he? Did it ever occur to you that maybe he doesn’t want to come home? That, maybe, if you kept a cleaner house and paid a little more attention to your appearance he might not have to stay away?”

  Ann felt like slapping her. Instead, she said, “I think you’d better go now.”

  “Well, I didn’t come here to argue with you. You’d better give some thought to how good you’ve got it, Missy. It wouldn’t be so easy raising two kids on your own, you know. I did it and it wasn’t easy. At least I had a job. How would you even live? You don’t even have a job.”

  Ann glanced up at the wall clock above the stove. “Oh, my God!” she exclaimed. “The job! I’ve got an appointment with Father Andrew in exactly one hour! I have to get ready. Look, Louise, let’s just forget it. We both got carried away. I’m sure everything will be fine. But, I really do have to get ready.”

  “I put in a good word for you, you know, with Father Andrew,” Louise said.

  “And I appreciate that. Thank you. I’ll let you know what happens,” Ann said as she ushered Louise out the door of the apartment. “We’ll talk soon.”

  She followed her mother-in-law into the hallway and out the front door. Olivia was sitting on the front porch in her wheelchair. “Liv, I didn’t hear you come down,” Ann said.

  “It’s a wonder,” Olivia said, “with the noise that darn lift makes.”

  “Actually, David asked me to talk to you about that. Is there any way you could have that noise fixed? It’s been waking him up in the morning. Sometimes, he goes back to bed for an hour or two after the kids go to school. If he had mentioned it to me sooner, I could’ve asked you about it before now. Then maybe you could’ve had Charlie look at it Monday when he was here.”

  Olivia frowned. “Charlie was here Monday? I don’t remember seeing his van,” she said, looking perplexed. “He usually parks right in front of the house. Oh well, no matter. Consider it done. I’ll call him today and see if he can do it right away. He’s a wonderful handyman, been fixing things around the neighborhood for years. Anything broken or not working properly, he can fix it.”

  “Thank you. Oh, I’m forgetting my manners. You know David’s mother, Louise, don’t you?” Ann asked, turning toward Louise.

  Olivia smiled pleasantly. “Of course. Hello. How are you?”

  Louise didn’t reply. She simply nodded toward Olivia and started down the steps. When she’d reached the walkway, she turned around. “Good luck, today, Ann,” she said.

  As soon as she was gone, Ann looked down at Olivia and said, “I’d love to sit and talk with you awhile but I’m late! I’ve got a job interview with Father Andrew at the church in an hour for a part-time secretarial position.” She took a deep breath and exhaled. “To tell you the truth, I’m kind of nervous. Cross your fingers for me that I get this job.”

  “I will,” Olivia said, holding up her hand and crossing her fingers. “I know you’ll do just fine but you’d better get going.”

  “If you want, I’ll come up and tell you all about it when I get back.”

  “Well, you’d better. I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Olivia replied, smiling up at her.

  * * * *

  As the door closed behind Ann, Olivia mumbled to herself, “That darn Louise Kern. What a meddlesome, old biddy!” It seems like, every time I turn around, I see her sour face, she thought. Why can’t she leave those poor kids alone? And what was that business about Charlie being here Monday? I didn’t call him. I know I’m getting old but I’m not senile yet.

  Chapter 12

  BERNIE KOCH FROWNED AS HE LISTENED to the busy signal. Disappointed, he hung up the receiver and placed the scrap of paper with Ann’s phone number on the table beside him. He’d tried calling her several times over the past few months but he couldn’t seem to get in touch with her. He was sure he had the correct number because he knew that the Kerns had kept their old phone number when they moved but, each time he called, he either got a busy signal or the phone rang and rang. Whatever happened to her answering machine? he wondered.

  Ever since Ann and her family moved out of his apartment building at the beginning of the year, he’d hoped she would call him but he knew how it was with young people these days. The world was so hectic anymore, everything moved at such a fast pace, not like back in the days when he was a young man, when life was much simpler. At least, that’s how he remembered it.

  He turned the volume back up on his police radio scanner, pushed the lever down on his La-z-boy recliner and struggled to get to his feet. He grabbed his cane, which he always kept at his fingertips, and hobbled to the kitchen. His leg, the result of a gunshot wound when he was on the force, was really acting up today. That always happened when it rained; the dampness seemed to seep into his bones for days.

  He opened the refrigerator and took out a can of Diet Coke. He waited until he was back in his recliner before popping the tab on the can. He’d learned the hard way that, if he opened it before he sat down, sure as anything he’d spill a lot of it on the way to his chair. There were several faint stains on the light beige carpet to prove it. No matter how hard he scrubbed, he couldn’t totally erase them.

  He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, thinking about his many conversations with Ann. She was such a sweet girl. When she lived across the hall from him, she used to come over almost every day and they’d spent hours talking. He’d begun to think of her as the daughter he never had. He hoped that she was okay. He knew that her husband, David, was on his way to developing a drinking problem. Bernie had seen all the signs and he recognized them because he too had once had a problem with alcohol.

  It started when he was in boot camp. At first, it was a social thing but, little by little, for him, it had escalated. In Korea, it became a way to escape temporarily from the horrors of war. He didn’t like to think about the war. There was so much death and destruction in what was truly a beautiful country. He could still see the bloodied bodies of his friends and the terrified expressions on the faces of the little children, many of whom had
fathers and mothers who were soldiers because Korean women fought as soldiers too.

  Worst of all, was the time he’d spent as a prisoner of war. Somehow, he’d made it through the months of captivity but he’d seen so many men die. Some died of malnutrition and disease because they received no medical treatment whatsoever, some froze to death, some were beaten to death and some simply couldn’t take it anymore and died from what was later called Give-up-itis. He’d watched two of his closest friends being executed by the KPA forces, one bullet behind each of their ears.

  He opened his eyes. It didn’t pay to think about that time; it only depressed him. The war was what had started him drinking in the first place but, miraculously, because a lot of men developed drinking problems on the job, joining the Cincinnati police force after the war, had somehow saved him. He had his old sergeant to thank for that.

  He’d started out on the force drinking with the other cops a few evenings a week after work. It wasn’t long though before even he knew that he was using any and every excuse to have a drink, actually several drinks, and he realized that, long after his buddies went home, he still sat in the bar ordering one after the other. Some nights, no one else wanted to go out but he went anyway. He didn’t think about quitting because hey, a guy worked hard, risked his life every day to protect the public, he deserved a break.

  Then, one night his sergeant came into the bar and sat down on a stool next to him.

  “How’s it going, Bernie?” he’d asked.

  “Doin’ okay,” he replied. “You wanna drink? I’ll buy ya one.”

  “No. No thanks. I gave that up a few years ago.”

  “How come?” Bernie asked.

  “I had a problem with the booze. I lost everything because of it. My wife left me, took my three kids. It was a bad time. Then, one night, my partner and I were on a stakeout over-the-Rhine, supposed to watch for any illegal activity at this warehouse and I was, let’s just say, not at my best; actually, I had the hangover from hell. We were sitting there and, all of a sudden, this guy comes running out with a gun. My partner jumps out of the car and, of course, I should’ve been right behind him, watching his back, but I wasn’t. I was too slow responding, thanks to the hangover. My partner got shot and almost died. I don’t know. After that, I kind of took it as a sign that maybe I’d better lay off the sauce. I started seeing a counselor who, by the way, is available to any cop, and I kicked it. I haven’t had a drink since and, you know what, I don’t even want one.”

  That night changed Bernie’s life. He got to thinking about the Korean soldiers he’d shot in the war and the fact that, as a police officer, some day, he might have to kill in the line of duty. Those were unavoidable; he had protected and served his country and, now, he was protecting and serving the citizens of his city. However, if someone were shot or, God forbid, died because of his negligence, he didn’t think he could deal with that. He decided that the drinking had to stop. He’d been thankful every day of his life since then.

  Thanks to the decision to quit drinking, he’d had a long and distinguished career, first as a patrol officer and, several years later, he received a well deserved promotion to detective. The department sent him to Washington, DC to study fingerprinting and he worked in the fingerprint division until he retired from the force. Shortly after he began collecting his pension, the department created a civilian position in fingerprinting and he’d spent many years doing the exact same job and being paid handsomely for it. Now, he collected two pensions.

  He’d never married. He wasn’t a saint; he’d been with other women through the years but no one had ever touched his heart the way his one true love had many, many years ago. Sadly, that hadn’t worked out. Anyway, he’d always considered himself married to the job.

  He had lived in the same second floor apartment for the past thirty some years simply because, whenever he considered looking for a first floor apartment somewhere, which would be a lot easier for him with his bad leg, he looked around at all the stuff he’d accumulated over the years and the idea of moving seemed overwhelming. Besides, he liked being able to see what was going on up and down the street and, from a security standpoint, the second floor was much safer, he told himself.

  This place could use a little sprucing up though, he decided. He looked around the room at the drab walls and discolored venetian blinds. A new coat of paint on the walls might do wonders and maybe some new blinds, he thought. I’m sure these are original to the building. This carpet could stand to be replaced too or, at the least, professionally cleaned.

  Yeah, but good luck trying to get the owner to spend a dime; the man was as cheap as they came. It took an act of Congress to get him to fix something that was broken in the apartment and, even then, he always tried to do the work himself. “After all,” he made a point of saying every time, “it costs money to bring in a professional.” You’d think he’d take a little more pride in his building, Bernie thought, but that seems to be the way of the world today: do as little as you can and make as much money as you can. Oh well, I’ve lived with it this long; I guess I can live with it a little longer.

  He glanced down at the scrap of paper with Ann’s phone number written on it. I’ll just have to keep trying to get in touch with her, he thought. It would be so good to see them all again. I hope David has already realized that he has a drinking problem and has gotten help. He looked out the window and watched the wind whipping through the treetops. David has such a nice family; I’d hate to see him throw it all away. I hope he realizes how fortunate he is. It’s not much fun, being all alone.

  He didn’t want to interfere in something that was really none of his business but, he decided, if he ever saw signs that David was still in trouble, he’d have a little man to man talk with him. He still had his Big Book, the “Bible” from Alcoholics Anonymous, which he’d picked up years ago at his first AA meeting. It might come in handy, he thought. Maybe, like his sergeant, he could help to make a difference in someone’s life.

  He picked up the remote control from the table next to him and flipped through the stations, looking for the local news. He believed that it was important for a person to stay informed of what was going on in the world, even if the news was depressing. Mostly, though, he wanted to see if there were any updates on the Westwood Strangler, the monster who was murdering women in their own homes.

  He thought about Ann and hoped she was being careful, the way he’d always cautioned her to be. In today’s world, it didn’t pay to be careless. He took a sip of his Diet Coke and sighed. Yes, he thought, for the second time that day, life was a lot simpler when I was young.

  Chapter 13

  FATHER ANDREW SAT AT HIS DESK, flipping through the pages of his appointment book. There was only one appointment penciled in for today, an eleven o’clock with Ann Kern, the daughter-in-law of his housekeeper, Louise. He hoped the interview with her went well because he wanted to fill the part-time position as quickly as possible. The ad had been running in the Western Hills Press for over a month and he’d had several responses. Unfortunately, none of them was even worth considering.

  He couldn’t believe some of the people who had applied for the job. Didn’t anyone have common sense anymore? he wondered. What part of ‘this is a job at a church’ didn’t they get? He recalled one young woman in particular who had come to see him, a bleached blonde wearing a tight, purple dress so short that it barely covered the necessities. When she’d sat down across from him and crossed her legs, it was a good thing the desk blocked his view. However, when she’d removed her jacket and leaned forward, he’d gotten an unrestricted look at the upper half of her body. How inappropriate!

  Looks like a tornado hit this desk, he thought, looking down at the sheets of paper that were scattered all across the top of his desk. I need to straighten this mess up. He gathered several sheets together and separated them into neat stacks. That’s good enough for now, he decided. I detest paperwork! That’s why I need a secretary, he thought, som
eone to handle all the minor details that will free me to do what I need to do.

  He glanced at the wall clock directly across from his desk and saw that it was ten till eleven. Time enough to glance at the paper, he decided. He picked up the Cincinnati Enquirer, quickly scanning the pages. On page six, an article caught his eye: another priest in the news for sexually abusing a young boy. He refused to read the article; the thought sickened him. He wadded up the newspaper and tossed it in the trashcan.

  To abuse a child is an atrocity! he thought. Everyone has sexual urges and impure thoughts. Only the naïve believe otherwise. Wouldn’t his parishioners be surprised if they knew the thoughts he sometimes had? But there are other ways of dealing with those urges, those impulses that, at times, could be relentless and almost overpowering.

  For some, strenuous exercise or a cold shower got them through; others needed to take more drastic measures. Many people believe that the way priests live is unnatural; that man was not meant to be celibate. Quite possibly, they were right. It didn’t matter though because unless or until The Church changed its views, that was just the way things were.

  He barely heard the sound as Ann knocked timidly on the door to his office. He pushed his desk chair back, stood up and went to the door. “Come in, Ann,” he said, reaching out to shake her hand. She’s nervous, he thought, feeling the dampness on the palm of her hand.

  As she entered the room, Ann looked up at the priest. “Thank you for taking the time to see me today, Father.”

  The priest smiled. “It’s nice to see you. Have a seat.” He motioned for her to sit in a straight back chair across from his desk. He sat back down and folded his hands in his lap, examining the woman across from him. She was dressed conservatively in an ivory turtleneck and a pair of brown dress slacks. Her hair was a natural shade of brown and she didn’t appear to be wearing much, if any, makeup. He watched as she fidgeted in her chair. “So, you’re interested in the secretarial job,” he said.