“How do we know the killer hasn’t gotten to them, too?” Thaddeous asked.
“We don’t,” I said, “but you can be darned sure that I’m going to find out.”
Chapter 36
I’d told Thaddeous that I didn’t know Colleen well enough to go see her. But I must have been thinking like a Northerner that day. Look at how Thaddeous had gone to talk to Dave and how much Dave had told him. Besides, I had the perfect excuse. She’d lost her husband, hadn’t she? Friends are supposed to drop by at a time like that. Of course, friends don’t usually check out your hard drive, but somehow I was going to have to come up with a way to look for those files.
Thaddeous and Michelle both wanted to come with me, but I talked them out of it. “I don’t know Colleen well, but I do know her. She’s more likely to talk to me if I’m alone.”
Michelle said, “Are you sure that’s a good idea? She’s still a suspect, isn’t she?”
“Not really,” I said. “Maybe she could have killed Philip, but I don’t think she’d have been able to get to Murray so easily. And how would she have known about Murray walking down the stairs every day? Or that he’d been looking at the StatSys code?” Neither Michelle nor Thaddeous said anything, meaning that they weren’t convinced, so I added, “Besides, I’ll be sure and mention that y’all know I’m visiting her. That should make her think twice about trying anything.”
Of course, I couldn’t go empty-handed. I spent the rest of the afternoon in the kitchen. By the time I got ready to go, found the listing for Philip and Colleen in the Cambridge phone book, and figured out how to get from the subway to her house, it was after six o’clock, so I was pretty sure she’d be home from work.
I looked up at the house after I rang the bell. It was an enormous white Victorian, with a tower and everything. It would have been glorious if half the shutters hadn’t been missing and the paint hadn’t been peeling. Knowing Philip, I suspected that he’d had big plans for the place when he bought it. But once again, reality hadn’t cooperated with him.
Colleen opened the door, looking surprised to see me. “Laura?”
“Hi, Colleen. I brought you something,” I said, holding out the pie I was carrying.
“Thank you,” she said, and opened the door wide enough for me to come in. There were boxes stacked in the living room, and she led me past them and down a hall to the kitchen. “This is the only place where there’s room left to sit,” she said.
“I know most people bring food over right after a family misfortune,” I said, using the excuse I had made up on the way over, “but my Aunt Nora always brings something a while later, when you’ve already eaten the other stuff.” Though that was a out-and-out lie, it was the kind of idea that might occur to Aunt Nora.
“That’s sweet. I didn’t think people brought food for things like this anymore.”
“My folks do,” I said, looking around the kitchen. There was nothing on the counter, and an open cabinet door showed empty shelves. “Colleen, are you moving?”
She nodded. “This place is too big, and I can’t really afford the payments on my own. And there are too many memories.”
“I hadn’t heard.”
“I haven’t told anybody. Nobody at SSI, anyway. Not that they’d care.”
“Of course they’d care, Colleen. I know there was some awkwardness at Philip’s visitation, but they’re your friends.”
“No, they were Philip’s friends, not mine. They were nice enough to my face, but Philip used to tell me what they’d say about me behind my back.”
This sounded an awful lot like what Dave had said. Once again, Philip had gone out of his way to cause problems between people.
Colleen went on. “I don’t think they ever forgave me for not coming to SSI.”
“I always wondered why you didn’t work there.”
“What kind of work did they have for me? Answering the phone? Running the mailroom? I’m a chemist, not a programmer. You know that crew. If you don’t know computers, you don’t know shit.”
The SSI folks did have a heavy bias toward programming, which is probably why the business end of the company had suffered so. I wasn’t immune from that bias myself—I had completely forgotten what Colleen’s major had been. “I didn’t realize.”
“They just put up with me being around because of Philip. I haven’t heard from any of them since the funeral.”
“I’m sorry, Colleen, I didn’t know.” Then I thought of something. “Oh, Lord, did somebody call you about Murray?”
“No, but I saw the obituary in the paper. I would have gone to the funeral, but I’ve missed a lot of work lately. Because of Philip, of course. And I wasn’t all that close to Murray anyway.”
“Still, somebody should have called. I apologize, Colleen. I was expecting Jessie to take care of it—I’m really embarrassed.” Actually, I hadn’t even thought about Colleen, which was even more embarrassing.
“It’s all right. I don’t expect you and me to be friendly. Not after Philip dumped you to date me.”
That wasn’t the way I remembered it, but I guess that’s what Philip had told her. “It wasn’t just that,” I said. “When Philip and I broke up, the group cut me out pretty thoroughly. I always assumed that you took my place, both with Philip and with the others in the group.”
I suddenly felt angry at the whole group, for cutting me out, and for cutting Colleen out, and maybe even for cutting Philip out. “What is it with groups of people, anyway?” I said, asking myself as much as I was asking her. “Who gets to decide who’s In’ and who’s ‘out’? It’s like the group has a mind of its own. Everybody always fussed about it, worrying about how the rest of the group felt about something, and worrying about inviting one person out if you didn’t invite everybody, and worrying about how it was running our lives, and worrying that it might break up. Nobody ran that group—it ran us.”
At first Colleen looked taken aback by my vehemence, but then she started to nod. “You’re right. Look at Inez and Vincent. No way should they be working together, but neither one dares to break away from that damned group. I don’t think most of them even like each other anymore. It’s like it’s got a stranglehold on them. There are families that don’t hold on to each other that tightly.”
I nodded, feeling oddly relieved. For so long I had nursed pain at having been dropped from the group, but now I was just as glad I had been. “Maybe they did us a favor by cutting us out.”
“Maybe they did. If it weren’t for Philip, I’d never have hung around any of them, anyway.”
“Same here.” I’d never thought of it that way before, but she was right. “One thing you have to say about Philip: he had great taste in women.”
“Damned straight. Tell you what. I’ll make some coffee, and we’ll cut into this pie of yours.”
She rummaged around and found two mismatched mugs, paper plates, plastic forks, and a half-empty jar of instant coffee. Then she filled the cups with water and put them in the microwave.
While we waited, I asked, “Where are you moving to?”
“An apartment in Somerville.”
“We’ll have to get together sometime.”
“I’d like that.”
The microwave timer went off, so Colleen added coffee crystals to the hot water and cut generous slices of pie for both of us.
I let her take a bite first, and was pleased when she said, “This is great.”
“Thank you,” I said. “It’s my mother’s recipe.” I don’t cook much, but I make a good egg custard pie, if I do say so myself. I wouldn’t have felt right bringing something store-bought on a bereavement call. Which reminded me that I was there to do something other than work out old grievances and eat pie.
“I know you’re not a programmer,” I said, hoping it sounded more casual to her than it did to me, “but I suppose you use computers a lot in the lab these days.”
“Quite a bit,” she said, “but I never got into them the way Philip
did. When I get home, the last thing I want to do is to stare at a computer. I don’t even play computer games. And now I’ve got all of Philip’s equipment.”
“What are you going to do with it?”
“Pack it up and store it, I guess. In fact, that’s what I was about to pack when you got here.”
“You know, I’ve been looking around for some decent used equipment,” I said, again hoping that I sounded nonchalant. “Do you want to sell any of it?”
“I’d much rather sell it then store it,” she said. “Have you got time to look at it now?”
“Why not? I’ve got a few minutes.” In fact, I’d been hoping she’d say just that.
She took me to what had been intended as a large bedroom but instead was filled with unfinished pine bookcases, a old-style metal office desk, a couple of tables with wood-grain formica tops, and a ramshackle desk chair. The top of the desk and the tables were covered with a motley collection of computer equipment: monitors, CPUs, floppy drives, hard drives, and modems. I recognized some of it from when I was dating Philip, which meant it was long past its prime, but other pieces were newer. All were connected with an alarming array of wire and cords duct-taped to the walls and floor.
“Good Lord,” I said. “What on earth did he do with all this stuff?” I was a computer nut myself, but I knew I’d have no use for that much.
“You got me. All I know is that he said he needed the big bedroom, and that I wasn’t to move anything.”
“I’m surprised it didn’t short out your fusebox.”
“It did—several times. Probably a fire hazard, too. Are you interested in any of it?”
I walked in and looked around. If the StatSys files were there, they were mostly likely stored on a hard drive. “I could really use more hard disk space. Mine is nigh onto full.” That was true enough, though I hadn’t considered buying more until just that minute.
“Just tell me what you want.”
There were three hard drives of different vintage but all showing signs of wear. Any of them could have the StatSys files, so I resigned myself to buying all three. But first I had to make sure Colleen hadn’t already deleted what I needed. “Are any of these empty?”
“No, they’re all pretty full. Philip had been wanting something new so he’d have more room. A Zip drive or something. I tried to tell him that if he’d just clean out some of the files on one of these drives he’d have plenty of room, but he said I didn’t know what I was talking about.” She looked indignant. “I may not know computers, but I know he hadn’t touched some of these files in years.”
That was what I wanted to hear. “That’s no problem, I can clean them off. How about all three of them? They’re pretty small by today’s standards, but put together, I think they’d be enough for me to back up my files.” That last part wasn’t just trying to drive the price down—they were pretty dinky. One could hold twenty megabytes of data, one fifty, and the third a hundred. These days, most people won’t consider buying anything less than half a gigabyte.
“That would be fine.”
“How much do you want for them?”
She shrugged. “You tell me what they’re worth—I haven’t got a clue.”
“How about a hundred and twenty-five?” I thought that was what I could buy them for from an newspaper ad, and though my Aunt Maggie would have been appalled at my offering full market value, it just didn’t seem right to bargain with a widow.
“Okay.”
I wrote her a check, and we unraveled the trail of wires connecting the drives with the system. Then Colleen found a box big enough for me to carry my purchases in.
“What are you going to do with the rest of it?” I asked.
“I’m not sure. I hate to just throw it away, but it seems dumb to store it.”
“There’s a few places around that specialize in used equipment. You might could get a few bucks.”
“Yeah? That would be great.”
“Call me with your new address,” I said, “and I’ll send you a list.”
“Thanks.” Then she added, “I appreciate the pie and your taking the hard drives off my hands, and I hate to rush you off, but I’ve got a lot to do.”
“Do you need help packing?” I felt like I had to offer, even though I was itching to get the hard drives home so I could look at them.
“No, thanks,” she said. “Most of it’s done. But I still need to sort some stuff and I’ve got a lot of Philip’s things to send to his parents.” She paused. “I wonder if I shouldn’t give them Philip’s piece of SSI after all.”
Even though I knew from what Thaddeous had found out that Philip’s family could use the money, I didn’t want to push Colleen into anything she’d regret later. “That’s a nice thought, but where would it leave you money-wise?”
“Not too well off,” she admitted.
“Maybe you could compromise. If you and Philip had gone through with the divorce, you and he would have split things fifty-fifty, right?”
“Right.”
“Why don’t you give them half of that piece of SSI? He had a one-seventh share, so if SSI goes public, that would be a fair number of shares of stock for both of you.”
“That’s not a bad idea.”
Then, to make sure that she knew what she was potentially giving away, I said, “I’ve got a hunch that this new release is really going to turn the company around. One-fourteenth could be a lot.”
She shrugged. “If it is, then I’ll be that much better off. If not, I haven’t lost anything, and it might make them feel better.”
“It would be a very generous thing for you to do.”
“Like you said, if Philip had lived, it would have gone to him, so I’m not really out anything. Thanks for the idea.”
“Don’t thank me—it’s your money.”
“Yeah, but they should get something. I mean, he wasn’t much of a son to them. Or much of a husband to me. You know, that’s what makes me the sorriest.”
“What?”
“That nobody’s going to miss him. I’ve tried to cry for him. I’ve really tried. I just don’t have it in me.”
I knew a little of how she had to feel. My feelings about Philip were pretty mixed, too. “Don’t blame yourself, Colleen. Philip didn’t make it easy to love him. He was easy to fall in love with, but not easy to stay in love with.”
“Yeah, that was Philip.” She held out her hand. “Thanks for coming by, Laura.”
“I’m glad I did,” I said, and meant it. Not just because of the hard drives, but because she had helped me clear up some of my own unfinished business. I didn’t take her hand, though. Instead, I gave her a hug, Byerly-style. Philip was right about one thing: you can take the girl out of the country, but you can’t take the country out of the girl.
Chapter 37
The box of hard drives was a little big for me to lug onto the subway, so I took a cab from Harvard Square to my place. Thaddeous and Michelle must have been watching for me, because they had the door opened before I could reach my keys.
“Did you get the files?” Michelle wanted to know.
“I don’t know yet,” I said. “Let me get my coat off and I’ll tell you what happened.” As I was talking, I was moving my portable PC to the coffee table. By the time I finished explaining how I’d ended up with the hard drives, I was ready to hook up the first of them. “Cross your fingers,” I said.
Michelle and Thaddeous were sitting on either side of me, staring at the screen as I took a look at the directory.
“Are the files there?” Michelle asked. “Do they have any information?”
“Hold your horses,” I said. “It’s going to take me a little while to check.” As it turned out, it took me quite some time because the hard drive was a virtual pigsty. Philip never had been very organized, and it showed in the way files were scattered hither and yon on that hard drive. Files that had nothing to do with one another were shoved into the same directory for no reason I could figure
out. So instead of a quick look, it took me half an hour to be fairly sure that the StatSys files weren’t there.
“One down and two to go,” I said, and unplugged the first drive to plug in the second.
Michelle said, “I can’t stand just sitting here watching,” and started pacing. “What if the files aren’t there?”
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” Thaddeous said soothingly.
The second drive was just like the first. Well, the files themselves were different, but the condition they were in was just as bad. I spent another half an hour sorting through it all before shaking my head and saying, “Not in here, either.”
“We’re getting closer to that bridge, Thaddeous,” Michelle said.
“But we ain’t there yet,” he said, as I plugged in the third drive.
I’d saved the twenty-megabyte drive for last. Since it was the smallest, the oldest, and the slowest, I didn’t think Philip would have been as likely to use it for anything important. I was just hoping I was wrong, because like Michelle, I was worried about what we’d do if the files weren’t there.
It didn’t take me any time to see that the files on this drive were put together very differently. Files were much better organized—in fact, it was neater than I keep my own hard drive. It took me no more than five minutes to find a set of files labeled STATS, and maybe five more to be sure that they really were the StatSys files.
“They’re here!” I said.
“Hooray!” Michelle said, and gave Thaddeous a big hug. He didn’t seem to mind.
“And for once, Philip did the right thing and saved both the compiled and the decompiled files,” I said.
“You’ve been talking about compiled files, and decompiled files, and source files, and I don’t know what-all kinds of files. What’s all that mean?” Thaddeous asked.
“You remember how I said that a computer program is a set of instructions? Well, the instructions have to be in a language the computer can understand. Computer languages are so wildly different from English that they’re called code, which is why I talk about ‘coding a program’ or ‘writing code.’ ”
Toni L.P. Kelner - Laura Fleming 04 - Country Comes to Town Page 21
