Acts of Murder

by L. R. Wright

  She filled a pail with hot water and added a cleaning fluid. She began in the bedroom, stroking a yellow sponge over the walls, as high as she could reach; removing framed prints and two small oil paintings Ivan had bought from artist friends; wiping; rehanging the paintings; rinsing the sponge in water that was almost too hot for her hands to bear, squeezing away excess water; and wiping again: the top of Ivan’s bureau; the surface of her dressing table, pushing cosmetics and silverbacked brush, comb, and mirror first to one side and then to the other. Denise made her systematic way around the bedroom, concentrating, missing nothing. She cleaned the desk, tidied now, unlittered, financial records filed neatly away in drawers. She cleaned Ivan’s nightstand, the headboard, then her own nightstand, wiping the lamp, lifting the clock radio and cleaning beneath it, running the sponge around the edges and down the sides. She needed to rinse the sponge again. She pulled back from the nightstand, glanced at the sponge—and a small puff of air was expelled from her lungs, as if she had been rapped, softly, once, on the chest.

  Denise sat back on her heels and swallowed several times. She looked again at the sponge, at the red smear on it.

  Her skin contracted as she thought about how much cleaning there was still to do.

  ***

  “We’ll get the autopsy results tomorrow probably,” said Eddie, “but the preliminary findings indicate there was no sexual assault.” She referred to her notebook. “Just like Rebecca Granger.”

  Alberg was sitting at his desk. Eddie occupied the black leather chair he kept for visitors, and Ralph Mondini had dragged in a folding metal chair from the interview room.

  “Assuming there’s a connection,” said Alberg, “—and you’re right, Sergeant, two homicide victims deposited in the same clearing virtually guarantees a connection between them—what do we know?”

  “Rebecca Granger was struck on the head, then strangled,” said Eddie, leafing through a file folder.

  “Right,” said Alberg.

  “We don’t know about Janet Maine for sure yet,” said Mondini, “but if she was killed in the same way, well, it might suggest—” He stopped, flushing.

  Eddie felt immediate sympathy. She had endured this affliction ever since she was a teenager with sexual urges that were crucial to conceal. She had been betrayed by her own blood—every time she felt lustful, her face got red. Eventually she learned to feign anger or outrage whenever she felt a blush coming on. This had proven amazingly successful. She thought it was at least partially responsible for her reputation as an aggressive officer.

  “It might suggest what?” asked Alberg.

  Eddie couldn’t tell whether he was impatient with Mondini. In fact, she couldn’t ever tell what was going on in Alberg’s head. He was not a person who needed to worry about blushing—about revealing himself in any way at all. His face was smooth, his eyes were hooded. He hid himself, skillfully, retreating behind the flat, guileless planes of his face.

  “Well, it occurred to me,” said Mondini, “that—well, a couple of things occurred to me.”

  “Give me one of them,” said Alberg.

  “It could be that the perpetrator isn’t particularly strong.”

  “Uh huh,” said Alberg.

  “Because it looks like he had to knock them unconscious before he smothered them,” said the constable. “Like he didn’t have the strength to just, you know, strangle them to death.”

  “Or else he didn’t want it to be that intimate an experience,” said Eddie.

  “What do you mean, Sergeant?” asked Alberg.

  “If they’re unconscious, it may be like he’s killing somebody who’s already dead.”

  “Maybe,” said Alberg. “They’re conscious, though, when he hits them, of course.”

  He was pulling apart paperclips and bending them into stick people. Although Eddie knew he was paying attention to the conversation, she nevertheless found this irritating.

  Now he arranged his stick people into a circle, feet together. “Anything else?” He glanced up at them over his reading glasses.

  “Well, the fact that they weren’t buried deep,” said Mondini, “that might mean he didn’t really care when the bodies would be found.”

  “Why bury them at all, then?” said Alberg.

  “To give himself time to get away from the scene,” said Eddie. “To get home. Or onto a ferry.”

  “You’re probably right.” Alberg studied Mondini, who reminded him of a constable who had been at the detachment when Alberg took over. Sanducci was Italian, too. But he’d been extremely good-looking, unlike Mondini, who possessed a sallow complexion, thinning hair, and a tall but scrawny physique. Alberg had recently heard that Sanducci, an inveterate womanizer, had actually gotten married, settled down, and become a father. Alberg found this hard to believe.

  “Okay,” he said. “I want the autopsy report as soon as it gets here. And the scene of the crime report. And officers’ reports on interviews.”

  Mondini’s chair scraped against the floor as the two of them stood up to leave.

  “You realize,” said Alberg softly, “that if we’d found this son of a bitch last summer, Janet Maine would still be alive.”

  Mondini and Henderson hovered awkwardly in the doorway.

  “Neither of you was here then,” Alberg went on. “But I was here.”

  “It was—the body—six months had gone by, Staff,” said Eddie hesitantly, clutching the file folder to her chest.

  “I know that, Sergeant.” Alberg took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “Nevertheless.” He folded the glasses and put them aside. “But we’ve got a second chance at him now.”

  “Right,” said Mondini.

  They shuffled out into the hall, closing the door behind them.

  ***

  “So what kinda stuff do you report on?” asked Naomi. She banged her empty beer glass on the bar and signaled that she wanted another. “Besides people and their jobs, I mean.”

  Cindi figured that Naomi was bringing the interview to an end. “I’m a general reporter,” she said, closing her notebook, “so I do whatever comes along.” She stashed the notebook in her immense shoulder bag, which rested against the legs of the bar stool she was sitting on.

  “Like that murder?” said Naomi. She turned avidly to Cindi, displaying more interest than she had all evening. “How about that, eh? Two bodies, dumped in the same spot.” She gave a low whistle, shaking her head.

  “No,” said Cindi. “There’s a guy who covers police and courts. He’s handling it.”

  “Thanks, Paul,” said Naomi to the bartender, as he put another beer in front of her.

  “What about you, Miss?” asked Paul, but Cindi smiled and shook her head.

  “Makes you wonder,” said Naomi, “just how safe anybody is.” She glanced at her watch. “Jesus. I got to get home pretty soon. Tuck in the kids.” She brushed some ferociously black hair away from her forehead.

  It was still early, and the bar was far from crowded. Cindi let herself gaze around the room, appraising, assessing.

  “Shit,” Naomi mumbled. “I’m bushed.” She had her back to the bar, hands loose in her lap, and her eyes were closed. “That son of a bitch Earl, he’s gotta get another waitress in there. Waiter. Whatever.” She began humming to herself, a country and western tune that Cindi recognized but couldn’t identify. Naomi’s heels drummed against the bar-stool railing in time to the music.

  “What happened to the last one?” asked Cindi. Naomi’s skin was extremely pale, which made her black hair look even blacker. She would be attractive, Cindi decided, if she weren’t so combative.

  “I don’t know,” said Naomi with a shrug, her eyes still closed. “One day she’s there, next day she’s gone. Didn’t even pick up what was owed her.”

  Cindi watched as an out-of-uniform Mountie entered the bar with three male friends. Not bad looking.

  “She wasn’t a happy person,” said Naomi. She opened her eyes and reached behind her for th
e beer, which she drank straight from the bottle this time.

  “What, you mean—she was depressed?” asked Cindi.

  “Guilty.”

  “What about?”

  “Put her mom in a home. Or maybe it was her dad.” Naomi took another swig. “Or a grandparent. Shit, I can’t remember. Anyway, she stashed some old relative or other in some kind of a home, and so she felt guilty.” She looked again at her watch. “Shit. I really do gotta go. They’re gonna already be in bed if I don’t.” She swung herself off the bar stool. “Coming? Or are you gonna stay and flirt with that cop over there?”

  Cindi reached quickly for her shoulder bag, grateful for the dim light in the bar that might hide her expression. She dug out some money and dropped it on the bar. “Coming. I’m coming.”

  Chapter 14 Thursday, March 28

  THE NEXT DAY the weather had changed. Gray clouds were piled against the mountains and had spread across the sky. Rain fell in fitful showers, then in downpours. Susan, drinking coffee on the ferry, had forced herself to make the trip to the mainland and was already regretting it, for calmness and certainty had possessed her, unexpectedly, here in the cafeteria, and she had remembered with reassuring clarity his leave-taking late last Monday night.

  “I’ll call you,” he had said. “We’ll find a way to spend a couple of days together, out of town.”

  This rang in her head, now, and she heard unmistakable affection in his voice, obvious attachment, and saw the light tremble in his eyes as he bent to brush his lips across her cheek in what had become a ritual goodbye.

  Susan felt a sudden urgent uneasiness. Maybe something was wrong. Maybe somebody had died. Or he had gotten sick, had had a heart attack or something, even though he was only forty-two and supposedly healthy.

  She hurried from the cafeteria and out on deck, where the wind felt strong enough to knock her off the ship and into the frigid waters of Howe Sound. Anything could happen to anybody at any moment, she thought, wrapping her arms protectively around her body. He might be lying in a hospital bed with an oxygen mask over his face, hooked up to an IV bag.

  When the ferry docked, Susan drove off through Horseshoe Bay and back up to the freeway, where she turned left and joined the lineup for the return trip to Langdale.

  An hour later she was home.

  ***

  Mrs. O’Hara had breakfast at Earl’s again that Thursday morning, but encountered nothing and nobody of interest there.

  As she ate her soft-boiled egg, she remembered a day years ago when she had decided to poach a chicken. She had placed the bird in a large pot and held the pot under the kitchen tap. And as she watched the water level rise, covering the chicken, she realized that the chicken wasn’t a chicken at all. It wasn’t a creature that had lived and squawked and feared and fluttered. It was merely food.

  And so it was, she had thought, that her sinners weren’t people. Not once they had sinned.

  The first one, after Tom and Raylene, was a man who owned a hardware store that Mrs. O’Hara frequented. He treated his employees badly, with rudeness and contempt. Mrs. O’Hara had several times sent conspicuous disapproving frowns his way but this had had no effect and so one day she rebuked him, sharply. He turned small, black, porcine eyes upon her and Mrs. O’Hara began to stammer and was gripped by a full-body shudder. The storekeeper slapped her purchases into a paper bag with unnecessary force, turned to one of his feckless employees and ordered the man to do something. Mrs. O’Hara couldn’t remember, later, what his directive had been: the tremor of apprehension, or fear, or aversion, or whatever it was, had mutated into rage, and she was too angry to hear. All sound had clotted into a solid, pulsating din. She blundered out of the store and slid open the side door of her van with shaking hands.

  That night in the fragrant dark, gasoline slurped from her red plastic gas can: Mrs. O’Hara listened to it splash against the side of the hardware store, then heard the flames bawl as they consumed the building.

  He had insurance, of course. And soon there was another hardware store, on the same lot. But Mrs. O’Hara burned that one to the ground, too, and this time he gave up and moved away.

  Mrs. O’Hara hoped that he had suspected one of his employees, and that this would result in his treating future staff members with more respect.

  Mrs. O’Hara finished her breakfast and pushed the plate aside. Before she left Earl’s she used the toilet, because it was very clean. She knew that Earl scrubbed it himself at the close of business hours, and also made regular checks throughout the day. Mrs. O’Hara didn’t like using the facilities at the places she cleaned—it felt inappropriate. But it was sometimes necessary, of course.

  She climbed into her van, which had no windows in the sides, and as she slid behind the wheel Mrs. O’Hara realized that her energy had returned, and she felt her spirits start to rise. She sat in peace for a moment, looking out through the windshield.

  None of the businesses on the street were open yet, only Earl’s Cafe and the sandwich place down the block. Hardly anybody frequented the sandwich place anymore. Mrs. O’Hara reflected on this, marveling. How on earth had Earl’s become the cafe of choice? The sandwich place was a lot spiffier. And although the food wasn’t as good as Earl’s food, it had been, once; it had in fact been a lot better than Earl’s. Yet people went to Earl’s. They didn’t talk about this. They hadn’t made a community decision. They just went there, regularly, day after day.

  It was only March. She had—not lots of time, not plenty of time. But time.

  Soon there would be hanging baskets of summer flowers up and down the street, and tourist traffic would clog the roads again. Mrs. O’Hara turned on the engine, put the van into gear, and set off for the first house on her list.

  She did the Newmans’ place, and then the Mackenzies’.

  It was almost noon when she pulled up in front of the Dyakowskis’ house, stuffed her keys into the knapsack she used as a handbag, and got out of the van. She hauled back the side door and started to unload her supplies: a metal pail, a plastic pail, a scrub brush, containers of liquid cleanser, gritty cleanser, glass cleanser. She reached for the paste wax, and then reminded herself of where she was—there was nothing in the Dyakowskis’ house that needed waxing. The van’s door rumbled loudly as Mrs. O’Hara shoved it closed. She picked up the pails full of her supplies and headed through the broken gate across the unmown grass to the back door.

  She reached for the key on the window ledge, but before she could insert it in the lock the door opened a crack and Denise looked out, her hair disheveled, her eyes squinted. “Mrs. O’Hara,” she said dully.

  Mrs. O’Hara was startled: she hadn’t expected anyone to be home.

  “Mrs. O’Hara,” said Denise again.

  Mrs. O’Hara found her tongue. “Right. It’s me. I’ve come to clean, like usual.”

  Denise continued to peer out at her, blinking.

  It began to rain. Mrs. O’Hara heard it scattering itself on the roof of the overhang under which she stood, waiting, a pail in each hand, her knapsack hanging around her neck. “You’ve forgotten,” she said. “Okay, then. Do you want me to come back another day?”

  “Oh,” said Denise, dazed.

  “Are you sick?” Mrs. O’Hara asked suddenly. She thought Denise might be looking a little pale. Although it was hard to tell, seeing only a small strip of her face.

  “No,” said Denise, but she didn’t sound completely certain. “Oh well,” she said, and pulled the door fully open. “I’m sorry. Come in.”

  Once Mrs. O’Hara was inside, Denise began chattering, which was uncharacteristic. Mrs. O’Hara watched and listened in amazement.

  Tying her robe tight around her waist, Denise said, “Yes, I have been sick, I’ve had the flu all week. And I didn’t stay in bed like I should have, either. Ivan would be so mad.” She scuttled into the kitchen and filled the drip coffee maker. “Do you want some coffee, Mrs. O’Hara? And perhaps a cinnamon bun? I think I’ve got some
cinnamon buns,” she said, hunting through cupboards. “Oh dear. I’m wrong.”

  “I don’t want anything, thanks,” said Mrs. O’Hara, opening the living room curtains.

  “It’s Thursday, isn’t it?” said Denise, rubbing her hands vigorously. “Ivan will be back on Sunday, from Penticton, he’s there on some sort of course, I think. I have to be better by the time he gets home,” she said seriously.

  “Your face is flushed, it’s true,” said Mrs. O’Hara. “Have you been to the doctor?”

  “I mean—can you imagine? A whole week. I’ve missed almost an entire week of work. But I’ve kept myself busy,” said Denise, running her hands through her hair, which Mrs. O’Hara noticed needed washing. “Cleaning, cleaning, cleaning, you wouldn’t believe how I’ve scrubbed and scrubbed.”

  Mrs. O’Hara looked slowly around. “What am I doing here, then?”

  Denise stopped talking and looked intently into her face.

  “I mean, if you’ve cleaned the place yourself, you don’t need me. Right?”

  “Oh no,” said Denise. “I do need you, Mrs. O’Hara. Really I do.” She nodded her head in affirmation. “I haven’t done all that wonderful a job, I’m afraid.” She scraped her hands through her hair again. “Please.”

  Looking at Denise, Mrs. O’Hara was somehow reminded of Raylene, although they didn’t look at all alike.

  What was going on here? she wondered.

  ***

  Susan picked up the portable phone and dialed his number, standing at the glass doors, watching the rain batter the waters of Trail Bay.

  The phone rang several times. She had resigned herself to getting an answering machine, and was trying to decide whether or not to leave a message when the phone was picked up and a soft, breathless voice said, “Hello?”

  “Hello,” said Susan. “May I speak to Ivan, please?” She sounded calm and controlled, even to herself.

  “Oh, I’m afraid he isn’t here. Can I take a message?”

  “When do you expect him?”

  “Oh, not until Sunday, I’m afraid. Shall I get him to call you?”