by Tom Corcoran
“Maybe she should’ve been a cop instead of a news liaison.”
We both quit talking, and thought about what we’d been saying. An idea came to mind. “Marnie, who found Naomi?”
“I asked that question, too. The police weren’t sure. The call came from Naomi’s home. The officer I talked to figured that a neighbor found her. He said that a lot of people didn’t want to get caught up in legalities. Maybe she had a housekeeper.”
I shook my head. “No woman as active as Naomi Douglas would need a housekeeper.”
Marnie shrugged and stood to leave. “She was always on the go, maybe she didn’t want to spend time cleaning. Knowing Naomi, we also could guess that she employed someone who needed the money.”
“Was it a woman’s voice or a man’s that called?”
“You’re not going to believe this. The call came through on a line that wasn’t recorded. The dispatcher who took it couldn’t recall if the voice was male or female.”
* * *
I was unlocking my bike when I heard the phone ring. If I waited three more rings my answering service would pick up. I had eighteen seconds to decide: win big or lose big. I got it just in time.
Jack Spottswood, attorney-at-law. “Alex, have you ever been executor of an estate?”
“I’ve been called some bad-ass things, but never that.”
“Guess what. You’re up to bat. Naomi Douglas named you in her will.”
“Why would she leave me money?”
“That’s a minor part of it. What I’m getting to is that she asked that you handle her estate, the financial details. As executor, you’ll get a set fee. But don’t go ordering a new car.”
“Don’t executors get asked or warned in advance?”
“Most of the time, yes. Not this time.”
“When do I execute?”
He asked if I still lived on Dredgers Lane.
I told him I did.
“Can you come down to the office about three o’clock? We can go over the papers.”
I said, “Tell me about the time factor.”
“You got a conflict?”
“I leave tomorrow for a seven-day job in the Caymans.”
“Come down here and sign papers, I can put this in motion. Some of this can take weeks and months. The sooner I start it, the better. The rest, we’ll do it when you get back.”
She had planned it, and I had to laugh. Naomi would be part of my life, and I would stay part of hers. Amazing woman.
7
I RECALLED THE WORK crew in 1998, tossing chunks of drywall and flooring into a Dumpster at the Fleming Street curb near Duval. The West Key Bar had been one of the classic wood-floor saloons on the island, but there is a huge difference between classic and classy. It’s amazing what plans, paint, glass and cement will do. The first level is now a glitzy clothing store. The Spottswood law offices are upstairs. A lot of old woodwork remains in salute to the structure’s history. Today’s pale walls, mahogany furniture, and office art would baffle the old bar crowd.
I sat in Jack Spottswood’s office while he finished two calls and rejected a third. He asked a woman named Robin not to interrupt unless his daughter called. He sat back in his leather chair and took a deep breath.
“There won’t be a funeral, Alex.”
“We could pack a church,” I said.
“That was Naomi’s decision. She left a directive letter with her will. The only thing she wanted was a gathering on Louie’s Afterdeck. There’ll be a jazz group, champagne, and six tables of hors d’oeuvres. Anyone who cries has to donate a hundred bucks to AIDS Help and leave the party.”
Perfect, I thought. “Her sense of style plays on.”
“It does. She had fun on this island. She put a lot into it, too, but I don’t have to tell you that.” He checked a file. “Her body’s at the funeral home on Simonton. They’ll cremate. We didn’t want to taint the directive, so she gave me verbal instructions. She wanted her ashes scattered at Woman Key.”
“This is a case where we don’t ask permission?”
Jack cracked a smile. “I can’t advise you on that.”
I smiled, too. “Ah, but you did.”
“Anyway,” said Jack, “our first problem is finding her older brother, one Ernest Bramblett. He’ll get the bulk of the estate. Ever met him?”
“Never heard of him,” I said. Odd that she’d never mentioned his name.
“The will is only three years old, but the guy’s address is history. Robin went looking on the Internet but found nothing. I remember Naomi saying recently that she had been in touch with him. He’s out there somewhere.”
“Can I look through her papers?”
“Or maybe go on her computer. I was hoping you’d take care of that.”
“Where did they grow up?”
Jack flipped through some pages. “Akron, Iowa. She’s leaving money to the Akron-Westfield School. I never knew there was more than one Akron.”
“There’s one in New York State, too.”
“You get to all the hot spots, Alex. Anyway, we contacted the Akron Register and Northwestern Bell. Mr. Bramblett had previous accounts, but he left no forwarding info. If you don’t have one, I’ve got a house key here.”
“I never had a key.”
Jack told me I was free to enter Naomi’s home. Her household items could be given to friends or charity. I would make those decisions. She had specified sums for the Red Cross and a half-dozen local causes. I would determine sources for that money, from the sale of stocks and bonds, cashing certificates of deposit, or tapping bank and brokerage accounts. Jack agreed to help me set up an escrow account for handling estate costs. He wished me luck, told me to call anytime.
“When I asked why she would leave me money, you said it was a minor part of it. How minor?”
“I will be the trustee of a small amount to, quote, ‘further the fine-art career of Alex Rutledge.’ It’s twenty grand, for camera gear, film supplies, printing, framing, and so on.”
“Not too damned minor,” I said.
“She must have believed in you.”
Our meeting had been quick. I sensed that Jack had other business on his desk, so I stood to leave. “Shame about Steve Gomez.”
“Crazy, what he did.” Jack tilted his chair, inhaled, looked away. “Steve was another one. He put a lot of himself into this town. Some people live for today. He could see the future. His last margin of victory was a landslide, a fine job review from the voters. Today’s front page did him right. They got a positive quote from every important person in the Lower Keys. I guess, if he killed himself, Steve didn’t agree with the mandate.”
Jack thought for a moment then said, “You watch. There’s going to be a mad scramble at the city. Steve left some real estate deals blowing in the wind. The commission’s voting could go haywire. There’s no telling what they’ll pass or reject.”
“Dexter Hayes got me out to photograph the scene.”
“I’m glad you saw it rather than me.”
“Nothing to see,” I said. “They took him away as I got there.”
“Why’d you have to take pictures?”
“Only Dex Hayes knows that. I got garden shots. Botany one-oh-one.”
Jack sneered. “The almost-ex-wife won’t keep it up. I know her people. They buy everything they see. Boats, pickup trucks, cars, vacant lots, you name it. They let it all go to hell. Six months from now that garden will look like any overgrown yard. Shame about that.” Jack gazed through his oak blinds. “Bigger than that, it’s a damned shame about Steve. I once saw him snipping dead leaves off a peace lily in city hall. He liked his plants.”
I walked outside to blustery weather. A thin comfort line splits the rough northeast wind from the island’s prevailing southeast breeze. You didn’t see salt mist unless you gazed a few blocks down a street, and you might mistake it for dust blown from Key West’s nonstop sewer digs and road repairs. You felt it on your skin, in your eyes, on anything
you touched, then you tasted salt on your lips.
Grand Cayman’s weather pattern was separate from the southern Gulf of Mexico’s. I would be gone in twenty-four hours.
I stared at Fleming and Duval. The Holiday Inn, Fast Buck Freddie’s, two fancy clothing shops. There once had been the La Concha Hotel, B.O.’s Fish Wagon, Kress, and a pharmacy. Nothing is as sure as change, especially in the tropics. The death of Naomi Douglas was large in my life but had little impact on the island and its history. I would think about Naomi long after I had forgotten buildings and businesses. And the more I heard about Steve Gomez, the more I wished I had known him better.
Plastic bags and dead sea grape leaves skittered down Fleming. I fought the wind east to Grinnell. I began to lock my bike in front of Naomi’s house, then changed my mind. I rode two more blocks to my house to get a camera and my mini-cassette recorder.
A phone message greeted me, from Teresa. “I’m paying for my lack of sleep, like riding a roller-coaster. I’ve been doing office things, filing that I’ve put off for weeks. Alex, if I tell you I’m horny, will you please believe I’m thinking of you and no one else? Call me if you get a chance.”
The phone rang as I switched off the answering machine.
Sam Wheeler: “Glad I caught you, so we could talk one-to-one.”
“How you making out?”
“Bad. I drove through Islamorada this morning, which I hate. The locals are militant slowpokes. I stopped for gas in Tavernier, that Circle K between the north- and southbound lanes at mile marker ninety-three. I’m in such a snarl over this shit, I pulled out of the place, went ripping up the road. I was back in Islamorada before I knew that I had fucking U-turned.”
“You’re a distracted man.”
“Then I get behind some drizzle-dick in a beater Falcon wagon covered with decals, with painted coconuts hanging from what’s left of the bumpers. It’s his civic duty to do twenty, so everyone lives a safer life at his turtle pace. I about went nuts before I got to Florida City.”
“Get anything done?”
“Marnie advised me to research Detective Marlow in the library up here. It took me an hour to find the right branch and another half hour to find the right desk. Then the clerks gave me a runaround. Something about microfiche files sent out for scanning. They told me that media credentials might improve my luck. I’ll have to bounce that one back to Marnie. Tell her, if you see her, but I’ll leave a message, too.”
“So that’s it?”
“I bagged the post office box and checked into a hotel so my sisters can FedEx me stuff. I ate a chicken Philly cheesesteak, whatever the fuck that is. Then, get this, I went to buy beer in a 7-Eleven, and I ran into our cab driver, Goodnight Irene Jones. She wanted to meet me for a drink later tonight, told me she hung out in a joint called Cheers.”
“And you said…”
“I told her not to count on me. Meanwhile, I can’t figure out how to tune the rental car’s radio, and I wish I’d bought two six-packs instead of one. That about sums me up.”
Sam gave me a Hampton Inn’s address and phone number, told me the room he was in. He advised me to buy stock in Amstel Beer.
Ten minutes later I chained my bike inside Naomi’s picket fence. I let myself into her house, then locked the door behind me. Someone had shut down the air-conditioning. I was hit with musty smells from drains and air baked by attic heat. The house looked clean, though, with mahogany tables waxed, rugs vacuumed, wood flooring swept. I opened the four living room windows, a first-floor bathroom window, and the back door. Then I flipped on a ceiling paddle fan. The breeze began to blow papers off the tables. I closed three of the windows, sat a moment, and observed.
Naomi had filled her main room with tropical and nautical artifacts. Two old solid rattan rockers and a rattan love seat. Crab-trap tables, driftwood posts in a corner, under a hanging plant. A framed 1940s-era postcard packet with eight images of “quaint” Key West connected vertically. A table made of two antique louvered window shutters under thick glass. Four small prints of hundred-year-old Winslow Homer ocean scenes hung on the rear wall.
I spent twenty minutes taking photos of furnishings, framed art, and the contents of cupboards. I wanted a visual record for her brother and proof of value for the tax people. I made audio notes to myself about what I had done, things I needed to do. I felt a traitor to my grief, going about my task, my manner so similar to procedures at crime scenes. I consoled myself with grand cliché: It was what she had wanted me to do. She had named me in her directive, wanted me in her home, dealing with her possessions, closing out her life, her accounts. I still felt unease as if something was wrong, missing, misplaced.
I thought about Spottswood’s words. “She must have believed in you.”
I entered the small pine-paneled room that Naomi used as her office. With my arms extended, swung in an arc, I could almost touch all four walls. The room was a perfect hideout for someone privately proud but modest in public. Above me was an old Hunter ceiling fan with oak blades. An antique table served as her desk, an antique chest her filing cabinet. She’d placed a cotton print-covered pillow on her oak office tilt-chair on rollers. A white Bose Wave Radio/CD sat on top of the chest. The room was a compact statement of elegance and function. Pure Naomi.
I sat in her chair and studied items hung on the north wall. An Honorary Conch declaration signed by Wilhelmina Harvey in 1996. A pilot’s license issued in 1967. A diploma and a Master of Fine Arts certificate, both from the University of Wisconsin. A citation from the Illinois chapter of the American Red Cross. A signed Jeff MacNelly print called Personal Trainer, in which a dog riding a bicycle leads a woman in jogging clothes down a street in Old Town. A valuable collection of framed signed letters and notes from Twain, Hawthorne, Welty, and Faulkner. There was no room in the office to use my flash. I would have to photograph each item elsewhere.
Next to the window was a photo of Arthur Douglas, Naomi’s late husband. Barrel-chested, a crewcut, not much of a smile. She had told me about going with him to business social functions. She’d said that his fellow executives’ wives all had too much jewelry, too many homes, cars, memberships, pets, and vacations. They had been wealthy so long that they’d run out of ways to spend their husbands’ money. So the women had gone to the knife for retrofits. Naomi guessed that many of them had been trying to compete with their daughters’ youth. The oddest result of the face-lifts and tucks was smiles. All permanent and identical. When she told me of this, Naomi had folded her arms across her belly and said, “I don’t care if my jowls droop to my waist like my boobs. I will never join the Smile Club for Women.”
I opened the chest’s top drawer and caught her scent. The faint smell took me to an image of Naomi’s face, laughing, looking me in the eye. She changed her expression to speak softly, to tell me something important. I wished I could have heard her voice, known her mind at that moment. Her purse and a small pouch were in the drawer. The pouch held three watches, eight or ten jeweled pins, several gold necklaces, earrings, and bracelets. I pocketed the pouch. It needed safer storage, elsewhere.
I looked through a stack of utility bills, bank statements, ATM receipts, and coupons. A recent bill from Dr. Lysak’s office, a basic visit. I had met Lysak at a charity party several years ago. Young, buffed-out, pleasant guy. Under the stack was an old photo of Naomi. She stood with three other women in a large yard. Red and yellow maple leaves filled trees and covered the ground. By the date on the back, she had been thirty, give or take a few. Her smile was identical to the one I knew.
I tilted back in the chair and started her computer. As the hard drive spun up to speed I checked my watch. I thought about all the things I needed to do before flying out at noon the next day. I hadn’t packed, hadn’t withdrawn cash from the bank. I decided to take Jack Spottswood at his word, to postpone my executor duties until I had returned from Grand Cayman. I shut down her computer and returned to the living room.
I had found nothing of
Iowa. Naomi had adopted Key West and divorced her past. I wondered again what had bothered me about the decor. The easiest answer was no fresh flowers. She always kept blossoms in a tall vase on the large table. Some had come from her yard, most from the grocery store.
Then it struck me. My photographs, the two that Naomi had considered “fine art” and had bought from me, were not above the sofa. The wall was empty. I looked into the bedroom. A navigational chart was on one wall, a vintage Caribbean watercolor on the other. The room looked exactly as I had seen it when Naomi had asked me to help hang the watercolor. She had died in her bed, and I found it odd that the bed wasn’t stripped of its blankets and sheets. The bed looked enticing, as if waiting in the day’s dimming sunlight for Naomi to slide in for another night’s rest.
I shut off the fan, closed the window, went to lock the back door. Just outside were two garbage cans in a wood rack. Trash pickup was twelve hours off. The first one I opened was empty. Inside the second can was the sucker punch. In a crush of broken glass, bent frames, and curled mat paper were the two photos that I had sold to Naomi years ago.
8
I WALKED OUT OF Fausto’s with a six-pack and two bottles of wine. I downed a beer as I rode home, finished one while I locked my bike to the mango tree, started another while I peed the neighbor’s hedge. I was going to do a righteous job of packing my duffel bag. I would forget sun lotion, underwear, and extra ball caps.
Four beers plus a snifter of Merlot sent me to bed without my supper. Teresa woke me around ten-thirty and tried to snuggle. I later learned that I fell back asleep. She rubbed my back at six-thirty, a sign that specific attention was desired. That time she had better luck, as did I. I tried to keep my face averted so I wouldn’t vaporize her eyelashes with halitosis. At one point, with her on top and flushed and lovely, we took a break.
