Rubbed Out

by Barbara Block

  Stephanie bit her lip and turned her head away. “I don’t believe you. I won’t believe you,” she said.

  Alima gave her a pitying look. “So much the worse for you,” she told her before turning to me. “It’s your turn,” she said to me. “You try and explain the realities of life to her,” she said. “I’ve got other things to do with my time. And by the way,” she said to Stephanie, “you should do something about the way you dress. You look like a crow.”

  “Fuck you.”

  I grabbed Stephanie’s arm just as she was bringing her hand up to punch Alima in the face and dragged her back to the sofa. It took me a half an hour to settle Stephanie down and another half an hour to convince her that Alima was telling her the truth. From the expression on Stephanie’s face, I had the feeling it would have been kinder if I’d taken out a gun and shot her.

  “My mother never said anything to me about money. She really didn’t.” I watched Stephanie’s eyes well up and the tears begin to fall. They dripped down her cheeks and fell on her sweater. “She told me she had a little money saved up. I thought she was using that.

  “I tried to be a good daughter,” Stephanie continued, her fingers plucking spasmodically at her pants legs. “I really did. But everything I did was wrong. I never knew what she wanted, and after a while I gave up trying.”

  Alima paused at the entrance to the living room on her way up the stairs. She took one look at Stephanie and rolled her eyes.

  “Grow up,” she said to her. “So your family life stunk. So what? Suck it up and move on.”

  Stephanie didn’t give any sign of hearing her.

  “My father was worse, though,” she continued. “One day, when I broke a dish, he told me adopting me was my mother’s idea and he’d only done it to shut her up. I’ve never forgotten that.”

  “He was probably angry,” I said.

  Stephanie shook her head. “It was more than that. He meant it. I never remember him hugging me. Not even once.” She closed her eyes for a few seconds, then opened them. Her cheeks were speckled with little dots of mascara that had fallen off her eyelashes. “I should have stayed in the City,” she whispered. “I should never have come back here.”

  “Why did you?”

  Stephanie wiped her cheeks with the back of her right hand, smearing the dots into larger splotches. Her skin glistened with the moisture from her tears.

  “I just . . . I didn’t . . . I couldn’t believe.” She took a deep, shuddering breath. “I don’t know. I guess I thought coming here would make it real. It would have been better the other way.” Her face collapsed and she started to sob.

  I couldn’t get her to stop, and I couldn’t leave her the way she was. After about an hour of trying to get someone to sit with her, I was desperate. I finally dialed Peter Simmone, the psychologist her mother had gone to, and explained the situation. Despite our past meeting, he told me to bring Stephanie over. A point for him.

  I managed to coax her into my car. He was waiting for us when I got there. The last I saw of Stephanie, he’d put his arm around her and was guiding her into his office. She was leaning into him, as if she’d fall down without his support.

  I turned around and went back to the Wilcox house. I had a question for Alima, but she’d already gone. Luckily for me, there were no locks on the bottom windows. I pushed one open and went inside. I spent the next hour and a half going over the house from top to bottom, just to make sure the money wasn’t there.

  It wasn’t.

  Or if it was, I couldn’t find it.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  George and I met at the pizza shop near Nottingham Plaza. He was ten minutes late, and I was starting on my second slice when he walked through the door. I waved to him and he nodded to me before giving his order to the girl behind the counter. A moment later he put his plate containing three slices topped with pineapple and ham down on the table and slid into the booth opposite me.

  “How can you eat that?” I asked.

  “This from a woman who lives on chocolate doughnuts and coffee?” he said as he took off his jacket and carefully laid it next to him on the seat.

  “Chocolate is good for you, or haven’t you heard?”

  “Really?” I watched George peel off the top of a small container of blue cheese dressing and dip his pizza in it. “So what’s going on?” he asked.

  “I just talked to Stephanie. I don’t think she knows anything.”

  “She could be lying,” he said as he took a bite. A line of red-colored oil slid down his chin. He wiped it away with his napkin.

  I thought about the expression on her face when Alima mentioned the money. “I don’t think so.”

  “Why?”

  I recounted the conversation between Stephanie and Alima.

  “Plus I went through the house. The money’s not there.”

  “No reason it should be. If it were me, I’d have it in a bank in the Bahamas by now.”

  “If it were me, I’d be in the Bahamas by now.”

  “This is true,” George said. He took another bite. “This Stephanie, she could be a really good liar. I’ve known people that could convince their own mothers they were somebody else’s child.”

  “If what you say is true, why would she be up here?”

  George shrugged. “People do illogical things all the time.”

  “That’s helpful.”

  “But true.”

  “Maybe. My gut feeling is she doesn’t know.”

  “Your gut feeling? That’s what you’re going on here?”

  “What else do I have?”

  George considered that for a moment. “Nothing else, I suppose, when you get right down to it. So what now?”

  “I’m going to fly down to New York City and talk to Quintillo.”

  He took another bite, then reached over for my soda. “You mind?” he asked.

  I shook my head and he took a sip.

  “And if you come up dry, what then?”

  “I’ll worry about that when it happens. So what about you? Did you find anything out?”

  “Some dibs and dabs. But not a whole hell of a lot, unfortunately. I think I can put names to two of the guys at the bar, but that’s it. No addresses, no vehicles, no nothing. They’ve both got warrants out on felony assault, fraud, and extortion. One of them is a possible ex-KGB.”

  “Wonderful.”

  “Phil says he thinks they got in beef with some of their brethren in Brooklyn and decided to set up shop here until things cooled down.”

  “They probably couldn’t resist the climate.”

  “Pining away for all that snow and ice.”

  “Reminds them of home.”

  George finished off his first slice and started in on the second. He was a neat, methodical eater. Which is hard to do with pizza.

  “And that’s it?”

  “I’m hoping to have the names of the other guys for you by tonight.”

  “It would be nice if you could turn up an address.”

  “I’m working on it.”

  “I mean they have to live somewhere.”

  “How about under a trash can?”

  “My money would be in a Dumpster.”

  George drizzled some more blue cheese dressing on top of his second slice, folded it, and took a bite.

  “Don’t worry,” he told me. “Phil and I are going out later. We’ll shake something loose.”

  “Why’s he doing this?”

  “He owes me.”

  “And?”

  “He’s hoping to pick up some information he can use.”

  “Anything else?”

  “He was a friend of Paul’s.”

  “Makes sense.” I glanced at my watch.

  “What time’s your plane?”

  “I still have an hour before I have to be out at Hancock.”

  “Good. I’ll drive you,” George said

  It almost felt like old times, I thought as I watched George polish off the rema
ins of his last slice.

  It was cold in New York City, the kind of raw cold that bites through your bones and makes you want to stay inside, turn on the TV, and order in Chinese. I was waiting for a cab outside the terminal at LaGuardia and wishing I’d brought along another sweater when my cell rang. It was Bethany. She sounded hysterical, but then, that wasn’t unusual these days.

  “You just got a dozen gladioli delivered to the house,” she said. “The note said, Thinking about you, Manuel. Gladioli are what people send to funerals.”

  “Not necessarily,” I told her even though that was my association with them as well.

  “He’s going to die.”

  “Bethany, he’s going to come out of this. These people are just playing with our minds.”

  “Well, they’re doing a good job. I threw them in the trash.”

  “Okay. Leave them there, but don’t throw them out.”

  “I shouldn’t have done that, should I?” And she started to sob. So much for being tactful.

  “No harm done.” I took a deep breath.

  Bethany cried louder. I moved the cell away from my ear.

  “Bethany, where’s the girl that’s staying with you?”

  She stopped crying long enough to answer me. “She went off to class. I was just going to go to school when these came. I don’t know what to do.”

  “Don’t do anything. I’m calling George. He’ll be over.”

  Bethany sniffed. “He doesn’t have to. Really.”

  “I can see that. He’ll be glad to.” And I hung up and phoned George.

  “I’m not a baby-sitter,” he said.

  “She shouldn’t be by herself now, and there’s something else as well.” And I told him about the note and the flowers.

  “It probably won’t lead to anything, but I’ll see if I can trace them. Maybe someone got stupid and used a credit card.”

  “Maybe,” I said although I didn’t think so.

  “It would be a nice change.”

  He hung up and I called Bethany back. “George will be over in about twenty minutes.”

  “Okay.” Her voice was very small.

  “How’s Zsa Zsa?”

  “She’s fine.”

  “Good. I’ll call you later.”

  “Promise?”

  “Promise.”

  I wanted to say something else, but I couldn’t think of anything except, “Don’t worry.”

  Sometimes words really are inadequate. Or maybe it’s that I can’t think of the right ones when I need them. As I slipped my cell into my coat pocket, the two people standing in front of me got into a cab. A few seconds later, another cab pulled up in front of me and I slipped inside. In the best-case scenario, the trip into the City from LaGuardia takes twenty minutes, but we were in rush-hour traffic, and that wasn’t going to happen this time around unless we sprouted wings.

  Traffic had congealed around us and we advanced in fits and starts. I spent the next hour watching the numbers on the meter grow and wondering how Manuel was and thinking about what the flowers and the message meant. Like Bethany, I didn’t think the choice of flowers was accidental.

  Listening to the wailing of the music coming from the radio of my Pakistani driver mixed in with cars honking their horns didn’t improve my mood. I’d just asked the driver to turn his music down when we hit a two-car pile-up before the tolls, and that slowed us down even more.

  Finally, we inched our way through and got onto the FDR. But that wasn’t much better. It must have been pouring in the City earlier in the day because there were large puddles on the road that the cars were slogging through, and I finally told the cabbie to get off at the 96th Street exit and take Third Avenue down to Quintillo’s apartment.

  I didn’t know if he’d be there or not, but aside from the gallery it was the only address I had for him. As it turned out, he wasn’t. At first I was upset, but his absence turned out to be a good thing. By dint of a good story and three hundred dollars, I managed to convince the super that I was Quintillo’s long-lost sister, and he unlocked the door of Quintillo’s apartment and let me in to wait. It would be a pity, we both agreed, for me to have to wait outside in weather like this. Especially since it had taken me so long to find him.

  The place was hot and stuffy, the way apartments get in New York City when the heat comes on in the winter. Looking around, I’d forgotten how small apartments in the City could be. Even though it was a one-bedroom, the entire place could fit in my living room with space left over to spare. I took off my jacket, stashed it on the sofa, and got to work looking for Janet Wilcox’s money. Unfortunately, something that small could be anywhere.

  I decided to start in Quintillo’s bedroom and then go through his living room, kitchen, and bathroom—in that order. I worked as quickly as I could, but I could see it was going to take a while because Quintillo’s place was jam-packed with drawings, canvases, and pieces of sculpture. Evidently he was using it as a storeroom for the artworks he was selling out of the gallery.

  I wondered how the hell Quintillo managed to get dressed in the morning, as I edged my way around five bronzes, one of which looked like a Rodin. I looked through his drawers, which were filled with drawings, and tried his closet, which contained sporting equipment, an ironing board, five cases of books, two suits, and three pairs of jeans. Welcome to City living. I checked under the mattress as well, found nothing except some old socks, and moved on to the living room.

  I glanced at my watch as I came out. It had taken me half an hour to go through Quintillo’s bedroom, and the only thing I knew now that I didn’t know before was that he had an awful lot of unsold stock on his hands. As I walked into the living room, I heard footsteps out in the hall. A second later I heard a key turning in the latch. The master of the house had returned.

  “Hi,” I said when he came through the door. “You wanna do Chinese or Mexican tonight for dinner?”

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Quintillo’s mouth dropped open. His eyes widened. He clutched his chest. For a moment, I thought I was going to have to call the EMTs because he was having a heart attack.

  “How the fuck did you get in here?” he demanded when he’d recovered enough to talk.

  “Oh. I’m your long-lost sister, didn’t you know?”

  He threw the mail he’d been clutching down on the table and reached in his pocket and pulled out his cell.

  “I’m calling the management company right now.”

  “Don’t be mad at the super. He really thought I was your sister.”

  “You’re full of shit. How much did you give that little spic to let you in?”

  “That’s so un-PC.”

  “Shut up.”

  “You know your forehead gets red when you get angry? It’s kind of cute.” And I gave him my most winning smile. For some reason Quintillo didn’t fall down at my feet.

  “I’ll tell you one thing,” he said. “I’m getting my locks changed tomorrow. Let that little spic just try and get a spare key from me. And he can say good-bye to his Christmas bonus.”

  “I take this to mean we’re not dining together?”

  Quintillo took a step toward me and shook a finger in my direction.

  “I could have you arrested. In fact, I’m going to.”

  “For what? Breaking and entering? Stealing?”

  “How about unlawful entry?”

  “Okay,” I conceded. “There is that. You could call the police—that’s true. Only then you wouldn’t know how much trouble you’re in.”

  Quintillo rubbed his chin with the knuckles of his right hand. “Trouble? I’m not in any trouble. You’re the one that’s in trouble.”

  “Yes, you are. You’re in the Janet Wilcox kind of trouble.”

  He snorted. “We’ve been over this already. I told you everything I know about Janet. You have any more questions, go ask her.”

  “I’d love to, only I can’t.”

  “And why is that?”

  �
�Because it’s hard to talk to dead people. Mediums are so unreliable these days.”

  “She’s not dead,” Quintillo sneered. “You’re trying to con me.”

  “Am I?” I pointed to his phone. “Call her daughter and find out.” And I gave him Stephanie’s number in Syracuse.

  Quintillo punched in the numbers and waited. “No one’s home,” he announced.

  “So leave a message and she’ll call back.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Why would I lie?”

  His eyes moved around the room inventorying the contents as he mulled the question over.

  “I didn’t take anything,” I said.

  “I didn’t say you did.” He pulled the beige cashmere scarf he was wearing around his neck off and folded it in two. “All right,” he conceded when he was done. “What happened to her?”

  “She walked into the path of an oncoming bus on 42nd Street.”

  Quintillo gave all his attention to laying the scarf on the back of a green leather armchair. Then took off his coat, carefully folded it in two, and placed it over the scarf. When he was through, he looked at me.

  “You know, now that you mention it, I remember hearing something about something like that on the radio, but I wasn’t really paying attention.”

  “Neither was she. That was the problem.”

  “Poor Janet,” Quintillo mused. “She was one of those people that nothing ever worked out for.”

  He walked into his kitchen, got a glass off the sideboard, and opened the freezer. I heard the click of ice cubes going into the glass. Then he came back out, took a bottle of Stolichnaya off the desk in the living room, poured himself a couple of fingers, and drank half of it down.

  “Want one?” he asked.

  “I’ll pass. Too much to do.”

  “Suit yourself,” Quintillo said and took another sip. “It’s unbelievable when I think about it,” he said to me. “This woman whom I haven’t seen in—I don’t want to tell you in how many years—calls me up out of the blue and asks me if she can stay with me and out of the kindness of my heart . . .”

  “And fifteen hundred dollars,” I interjected.

  Quintillo continued as if I hadn’t said anything, “. . . I say yes, and since then all I’ve gotten is trouble. She was like Typhoid Mary, trailing misfortune in her wake.”