Mike Befeler Paul Jacobson Geezer-lit Mystery Series E-Book Box Set: Retirement Homes Are Murder, Living with Your Kids Is Murder, Senior Moments Are Murder, Cruising in Your Eighties Is Murder

by Mike Befeler

  I scanned the building—an institutional structure with three shades of brick: gray, gray-white and gray-brown. A steel beam (gray) connected three gray pillars to the left of the door, and to the right of the lobby stood another pillar attached to a gray beam. The United States and state of Colorado flags hung limply on tall gray poles. Above the flat roof of the building appeared a jumble of antennas. That must have been for the communications.

  We pulled into a parking lot on the side of the building, waited for a guard bar to rise and proceeded to the back of the building. My companion police officer escorted me to my own private waiting room that was the size of a closet and consisted of a table, two chairs and a camera mounted in one corner. Ah, the wonders of crime investigation.

  I thought how nice it would be to take a nap, but reconsidered, knowing my memory would reset and then I’d be in deep trouble.

  Closing my eyes, I tried to imagine beautiful places I had visited, but instead my mind dredged up the image of the stockroom in the store I’d run in Los Angeles many years ago where a prankster had locked me in.

  My musings were interrupted by the arrival of Detective Lavino.

  “Mr. Jacobson. We meet again.”

  “You never know who you’re going to run into.”

  “Would you care to tell me about the bag of money you had in your hand in the parking lot of the Boulder Central Bank?”

  “It’s simple, Detective. When I left the bank, I noticed this guy charging across the parking lot. He leaped up on a retaining wall and, before he disappeared on the other side, something fell into the bushes. I went over to investigate, being a duty-minded citizen. Voila. I found a bag. You can imagine my surprise when I opened it up and saw twenty-dollar bills. I started back to return it to the bank when one of your officers intercepted me.”

  “You certainly have a way of being right nearby when crimes are committed. One of the bank officers, Mr. Kraus, had something interesting to say concerning you.”

  “Oh, and I have something interesting to say about him, Detective. He wasn’t very helpful. If you’re looking for a bank, I’d suggest you try elsewhere.”

  Lavino thumbed through his notepad. “He states you caused considerable commotion in the bank. Yelling and calling attention to yourself.”

  “I merely voiced my displeasure over the stupidity of the banking system.”

  Lavino smiled. “I know what you mean. I’ve run into some strange banking rules a few times myself. But you should know that Mr. Kraus thinks you caused a disturbance to distract the bank personnel while the robbery took place. He even suspected you were working with the robber.”

  I flinched. “An old coot like me? There was nothing planned on my part, just a spontaneous reaction to Mr. Kraus and his silly regulations.”

  Lavino nodded. “Okay. Did you recognize the bank robber?”

  “I have no idea who he is. I saw the back of a man running, that’s all.”

  “Describe what you saw.”

  “A man in jeans, a dark sweatshirt and tennis shoes, who seemed athletic. Caucasian with brown hair, poking out from under a black baseball cap. I didn’t see his face.”

  “Pretty good description for someone with memory problems.”

  “My memory blanks out when I go to sleep, but I have a darn good memory when I’m awake. I could repeat our conversation word for word if you like.”

  “Go ahead. Show me.”

  I proceeded to do so.

  I detected a hint of surprise in his eyes.

  “I could also do the same for when we spoke earlier today. But I remember nothing regarding yesterday.”

  “You have quite a selective memory, Mr. Jacobson.”

  “Just the way my defective brain works, Detective. I have to live with the hand I’ve been dealt.

  Unless you have any more questions for me, I’d like to return to my family.”

  He shook his head and moved to the door. “Come on. I’ll escort you up front.”

  Denny, Allison and Jennifer were sitting in the lobby, and they all jumped up when I appeared.

  Jennifer raced up to Detective Lavino and wagged her finger at him. “You let my Grandpa go. He’s innocent.”

  Lavino looked down at her and laughed. “You’re as feisty as the old man. He’s not accused of anything today. He’s just a witness to a bank robbery.”

  She put her hands on her hips. “I’m going to be a lawyer when I grow up.”

  He nodded his head. “I’m sure you will.” He turned toward me. “You’re free to go home, Mr. Jacobson. With all the things you’ve witnessed lately, just don’t leave the state.”

  “Okay. I’ll put off my trip to Bogotá.”

  Lavino looked at me askance. “Get out of here.”

  “Yes, sir,” I said and saluted.

  As we headed out of the building, Jennifer said, “A man from a bank came to speak at our school this year. Do you know what happens when bags of money are stolen?”

  “Other than a robber jumping over a wall to escape?”

  “Not that, Grandpa. They have red dye that explodes in some of the bags of stolen money.”

  I looked at my hands. “Obviously not the bag I found.”

  Jennifer bounced along the parking lot. “That was so cool, Grandpa. The police questioned you again.”

  “Again?” I said.

  “Yes, when we visited you in Hawaii, the police took you in for questioning.”

  “What are you referring to?” Denny asked.

  “You remember,” Jennifer said. “Grandpa was sitting in a reported stolen car.”

  Denny looked as blank as me.

  “Uh-oh,” I said. “Denny, I think your memory may be starting to act like mine.”

  Denny’s brow furrowed. “Do you notice me forgetting things, Allison?”

  “No worse than any of us at our age,” Allison said, patting Denny on the arm.

  “But he may have inherited my memory,” I said, helpfully.

  Now Denny looked worried. “That would be terrible.”

  “Although to be honest,” I said, “I can’t remember for sure if we adopted you or not. If adopted, there would be no risk, unless it’s contagious.”

  Denny cracked a faint smile to acknowledge my joshing him.

  “Don’t worry, Dad,” Jennifer said. “I have a good memory. I’ll remind you if you start forgetting like I do with Grandpa. Besides, you can always keep a journal.” She gave Denny a big hug, and he seemed to relax. “And Grandpa remembers fine from the past. I’m even going to have him help me with a school project tonight.”

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “I’m supposed to give a report covering something during World War II. I thought I’d base it on your experiences.”

  “I should be able to dredge up something of value from this soggy old brain of mine. Thank you all for rescuing me from the inquisition. And me such a law-abiding citizen.”

  Allison smiled at me. “Some men are chick magnets. I guess you’re a crime magnet.”

  “Anything I can do to bring a little excitement into your lives,” I said.

  “Why not simply avoid these little incidents?” Denny said.

  “Nah. You’d be too bored.”

  * * * * *

  Back at the old homestead before dinner, Allison reminded me to take my pills.

  “Your mom is a slave driver,” I told Jennifer.

  “She wants you to stay healthy.” Jennifer crossed her arms. “Now take your medicine.”

  “You’re both turning against me,” I said. “Denny, protect me from these overzealous women.”

  “I’m on their side,” he said. “Take your pills.”

  “Three against one,” I said. “I don’t like those odds.” I managed to gulp down the three rocks disguised as pills without choking to death.

  Allison retrieved the mail and handed me two letters. “Some people from your fan club, Paul?”

  “Who’d be writing to me?”
I read the return address on the first letter out loud. “Meyer Ohana from Kaneohe, Hawaii.”

  “It’s your friend who you ate meals with at the retirement home,” Jennifer said, jumping up and down. “Open it so we can find out how he’s doing.”

  “The letter is addressed to me, young lady.”

  “Meyer’s my friend too,” Jennifer said. “He described being a judge in Hawaii. That’s why I want to be a lawyer when I grow up.”

  “I’ll disinherit you if you go over to the dark side and become a flesh-eating attorney.”

  “Oh, Grandpa. You say the funniest things.” She gave me a hug. How could you argue with that? She’d probably be a good lawyer and win cases by giving the judge and jury hugs.

  I read the letter out loud to Jennifer. Meyer described living in a care home and said that his macular degeneration had stabilized. He had taken up watercolor painting and could see shapes well enough to do abstract pictures. The letter ended with: “But, Paul, without you here things are definitely too calm.” He included his address and phone number.

  The second letter had a return address in California. I opened it to find the name Marion Aumiller.

  “It’s your girlfriend who used to live in Hawaii,” Jennifer said.

  “How do you know so much about me?”

  She clucked at me. “Grandpa, I met all your friends in Hawaii last year.”

  I adjourned to my room to read this letter in private. Marion said she missed me and had obtained my address from Meyer. She indicated she would be passing through Colorado with her daughter next week and wanted to let me know so we could get together. It included a phone number.

  I called Jennifer into my room.

  “Marion says she might be coming to visit,” I said. “I don’t even remember what she looks like.”

  “You used to have a picture of her on your dresser in Hawaii. Maybe you brought it with you.”

  I still had one bag I hadn’t unpacked. We rummaged through it, and Jennifer extracted a framed picture.

  “Here it is,” she said, bouncing up and down.

  I placed it on my new dresser. Not a bad-looking old broad.

  “What’s Marion like?” I asked Jennifer.

  “She’s really nice. She’s the one who helped pick out the Hawaiian stuffed animals you gave me.”

  “From her letters it seems we were . . . uh . . . pretty intimate.”

  “That’s right, Grandpa. You were lovers.”

  “What! You shouldn’t know these things.”

  “Well, I am twelve. But I also read the diary you kept when you lived in Hawaii. But don’t worry. I promised to keep it a secret between just you and me . . . Grandpa, what happened to the journal you kept in Hawaii?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “I’m sure you would have brought it with you. Let’s check some more in the bag where we found Marion’s picture.”

  We both sorted through everything. No journal.

  “Grandpa, when you arrived at the Denver airport, you didn’t have any carry-on bag with you. You may have left it on the plane. That could be where your Hawaiian diary is.”

  “It’s probably long gone if that’s the case.”

  “You never know, Grandpa. Maybe someone found it and turned it in to the lost and found. You should call them.”

  So at Jennifer’s assistance, I called the airline. After listening to music for ten minutes, being placed on hold twice, and listening to the damn music again, a human being answered.

  “I may have left a bag on a flight from Honolulu a few days ago.”

  “Flight number and date?”

  “Hell, I don’t remember. Just a minute.”

  Jennifer,” I bellowed. “What date did I arrive?”

  She shouted the information back to me.

  “And the flight number?”

  Allison walked up to me and handed me a folder that had my ticket receipt. I thumbed through it and gave the man on the phone the flight number.

  “Your name and a phone number where you can be reached?” the man asked in a clipped tone.

  “Paul Jacobson and here’s the phone number.” I read it to him.

  “Description of the lost item.”

  “Crap, I don’t know.”

  “Sir, how can we be expected to find a lost item if you can’t describe it?”

  “That’s a damn good question. See if you can find some sort of carry-on bag.”

  “Sir, we handle thousands of misplaced items a day.”

  “Don’t take very good care of people’s stuff, do you?”

  “Sir, I wasn’t the one who left something on the plane.”

  “Just see if you can find a bag with my name on it.”

  I hung up, then decided to call the phone number in Marion’s letter.

  “Paul, it’s so nice to hear your voice.”

  “I received your letter and wanted to call to say hi.”

  “I’ll be passing through Boulder next Tuesday.”

  “Then I’ll plan something for us to do.” I gave her Denny’s phone number.

  We chitchatted and then parted.

  I returned to my room and admired the picture on my dresser. I’ll be damned. She seemed to like me. I pressed my palms against my forehead, trying to squeeze out some memory of Marion. I could remember squat concerning her.

  After dinner I called Gary Previn’s number and listened to the recorded message again, but no human answered. Jennifer left for her room to start her homework, and Denny departed for the garage to tinker with an end table. I looked over Allison’s shoulder as she sat at the dining room table. “What are you working on?” I asked.

  “A Sudoku puzzle, Paul. Do you want to try one?”

  “Never heard of it,” I said.

  “Sit in the chair.”

  I obeyed and she handed me a booklet that had a bunch of squares with a random mix of numbers spread around.

  “Looks like an incomplete set of social security numbers,” I said.

  “No, it’s the latest craze and a good way to keep your brain in shape.”

  “A little late for me, but you may want Denny to give his gray matter a workout.”

  “As long as he stays active with his woodworking projects, he’ll be fine. Now here’s a pencil and some scratch paper, and I’ll point out an easy puzzle to start with. You need to fill each square of nine boxes with the digits one through nine in such a way that every complete row and every complete column also have the digits one through nine. No duplications in either the boxes or the complete rows and columns.”

  “Looks complicated,” I said.

  “The puzzles can be easy to extremely difficult. Let me give you a hint. Work each square first. With the pencil fill in the possibilities in each individual box. By looking at what digits are already in the square, the row and the column you can eliminate digits. You have to be diligent not to make mistakes or you have to start over.”

  “Kind of like my brain every morning.”

  She smiled and patted me on the arm. “You have a good brain during the day. Give the puzzle a try.”

  I felt like I was back in school again. I licked the pencil, flexed my arms and dove in. At first nothing seemed to get eliminated. Every box had multiple alternatives penciled in. Then in one little square the alternatives dwindled to being only one digit. I circled it. A minor victory. Whenever I circled one, it eliminated other alternatives in other boxes. By a slow process of elimination, I began to fill in the puzzle. Then suddenly, like winning at solitaire, the digits cascaded into a completed puzzle. Damn. I had done it!

  I felt like a kid who had managed to navigate his two-wheeler for the first time.

  “You can try a harder one now, Paul, if you like.”

  “I think I’ll quit while I’m ahead. And just think, I can redo that same puzzle tomorrow because it’ll be all new to me.”

  Allison laughed. “No need to invest in more puzzle booklets for you.”

  �
�I’m supposed to talk to Jennifer regarding World War II for her school project. I’ll mosey into her room and see if she’s ready.”

  I sauntered upstairs and entered Jennifer’s room. On the walls she had pictures of Perry Mason, F. Lee Bailey, the Justices of the Supreme Court, and Bart Simpson. Seemed like birds of a feather to me.

  “Hi, Grandpa.” Jennifer stopped pounding away on the keyboard of her computer. “You ready to help me with my report?”

  “I sure am. What have you found so far?”

  “I’ve done some reading on the European Theater of World War II and checked some web sites. There’s so much material.”

  “It was a big war. You need to pick one part of it.”

  “Tell me what you did.”

  “I participated in Operation Overlord. My job was logistics—getting supplies from England to the troops who landed in Normandy.”

  “Wow, you were right there.”

  “But not in the fighting itself.” I related my experiences and Jennifer typed into her computer.

  “That’s good, Grandpa. How’d you like to come to class with me tomorrow? History’s right at the end of the day. You could meet me at school. That way when I give my report, you can be my expert witness.”

  “You’re starting to sound like one of those blood-sucking attorneys.”

  She scrunched up her face. “Oh, don’t be so down on lawyers. Your friend Meyer was one.”

  “Yeah, but most of them are useless or worse than useless.”

  “You’ll like lawyers more when I become one.”

  “You can defend me if I ever need it. Did you know that the bank officer I met with made a comment to the police that he thinks I was in cahoots with the bank robber?”

  Jennifer regarded me thoughtfully. “Once they catch the bank robber they’ll find you had nothing to do with it, Grandpa. I have an idea.”

  “I can always use good ideas.”

  “There is probably red dye on some of the stolen money. If we can find some of that, it should lead to the robber.”

  “I’m sure the police are looking.”

  Jennifer’s eyes lit up. “But we can help. I’ll tell a bunch of my friends to look around for money with red on it.”

  I shrugged. “What ever you can do to keep detectives and bank managers from breathing down my neck.”