by Dorien Grey
When the waiter came with our order, Marty and I got down to the purpose for our meeting—Carlene’s hit-and-run death and the murder of the private investigator who, coincidentally or not…and I had the distinct feeling it was not—had been following her.
“What do you know about Frank Santorini?” Marty asked before taking a healthy bite out of his B.L.T.
“Not much, and what little I’ve heard about him hasn’t been too flattering.”
Marty grinned, wiping the corner of his mouth with his napkin. “That’s putting it mildly. Santorini was pretty much a bottom feeder. Cheating spouses, messy divorces, anything that involved digging up dirt were his specialty. I gather this would cover your client, Ms. DeNuncio?”
I shook my head. “I really don’t know.”
I told him what Carlene had said about her relationship and breakup with Jan Houston and the note Carlene subsequently found in her mailbox.
“Jan was possessively attached to Kelly, and I can understand her being upset when Carlene moved out, but what she might have been trying to do I have no idea. She has no legal rights to Kelly.”
“How about the ex-husband?”
“There isn’t any. The guy who got her pregnant thinks she had an abortion. He didn’t want anything at all to do with a kid, and he doesn’t sound like the kind of guy who would change his mind after four years even if he knew about Kelly. Carlene hadn’t seen or talked to him since she told him she’d had the abortion.”
“Hmm.” Marty drained his cup and looked around for the waiter.
“Well, if you have any information on the girlfriend, we can check her out, but given the kind of people Santorini had as clients, I’d pretty much imagine his killer would be somebody he got dirt on rather than a client who hired him to find it.”
He had a good point. If Jan Houston, Carlene’s ex-lover, had hired Santorini, what reason would she have had to kill him? Maybe Santorini’s death was a coincidence after all.
I gave Marty Jan Houston’s name, phone number—in case it had been reconnected—and the name and number of her employer. I also mentioned Carlene’s sister, Beth—though I had no idea of her last name—in case she might know something.
The waiter returned to refill our coffee and remove our plates. He asked if we wanted dessert, but we declined and asked for the check, which I intended to pay, but Marty grabbed for it when it arrived.
“You’ve got another mouth to feed at home,” as he put it.
But I wouldn’t let him (“And you’ve got one on the way,” I countered), so we ended up going Dutch.
We shook hands outside the restaurant, and I said, “Let me know how all this turns out, will you?”
“Sure will,” he replied with a grin. “And you let me know if you come up with anything more.”
“OK. We’ll have to do this lunch thing again sometime soon. And give my best to Lieutenant Richman.”
With that, we headed on our separate ways.
*
I returned to the office to find the light on the answering machine flashing, but there was no message. About ten minutes later, the phone rang.
“Hardesty Investigations.” I wish I had a nickel for every time I’d said it.
“Mr. Hardesty, this is Estelle Bronson from Happy Day day care.”
Oh-oh! “Is anything wrong with Joshua?” I asked, rather surprised by how on edge I instantly was.
“No, no, the children are having rest time, and Joshua is just fine. I didn’t mean to upset you. I would like to talk with you, if I could, about…another matter entirely.”
“Carlene DeNuncio?” I really didn’t need the question mark.
“Yes.”
“Of course. How can I help you?”
“It’s a rather personal matter,” she said, which immediately piqued my interest, “and I was hoping we could meet privately to discuss it.”
“Certainly. Would you like to come to my office, or…”
“Could you possibly come out to Happy Day…this afternoon, perhaps?”
My curiosity was building rapidly. “Yes, I can do that. And I can pick up Joshua at the same time, if that’s convenient. I’ll call Jonathan and let him know.”
“Wonderful! About four fifteen, then?”
“Four fifteen will be fine. I’ll see you then.”
I called Evergreens, hoping Jonathan was working the yard rather than out on a job somewhere. Luck was with me again and he was able to come to the phone. I told him I had to go out to Happy Day to talk with Estelle Bronson about Carlene, and that I could pick up Joshua while I was there.
“That’s okay, I can meet you there. It’s not much out of the way, and I’ve got Bunny and G.I. Joe in the back seat—I told Joshua that was his playroom on the way to and from school so he won’t insist on getting into the front seat where he can get into trouble. But he can ride home with you, if you want—we can just transfer the toys.”
“Well, we can work that out later. I’ll see you at Happy Day, then.”
*
Estelle Bronson met me at the front door. She turned out to be tall, rather thin, with a nice face and a friendly but somewhat sad smile. Probably older than she looked—mid-thirties—her long brown hair was pulled back, held in place by what appeared to be a large rubber band.
“Come in, please.” She let me pass, then closed and latched the folding children’s gate across the door. We were in a formal foyer, with a polished wood staircase to the left, the base of which was blocked by another children’s gate.
Directly to my right was what obviously had been the living room of the house, now set up as a combination playroom-classroom with children’s desks and a large TV at one end of the room, and toys of all descriptions cluttering the other end. The walls were lined with low padded benches and bookcases, above which were several drawings in crayon and watercolor. To the left, partly open sliding doors showed a row of padded plastic floor mats with pillows and neatly folded blankets—probably the original dining room.
“Let’s go into the kitchen,” she suggested, leading the way down a short hall to the back of the house. I could hear kids laughing and shouting, apparently from the back yard, which I could see through a screen door at the end of the hall. A Dutch door to the left showed the kitchen, and to the right a room set with two children’s-sized picnic tables and a couple of highchairs.
I looked through the back door to a large porch and the fenced yard beyond, where several kids were playing. There was a sandbox, a swing set, a teeter-totter, and small slide, all of which seemed to be in use. I spotted Joshua racing around the yard chasing another little boy, all under the watchful eye of a woman slightly older than Estelle Bronson, who stood by the swings, and a much younger girl/woman in her late teens, sitting on the grass with a toddler in her lap.
Estelle leaned through the open top of the Dutch doors to unlock it, and we entered the kitchen, which was notable largely because of having two large refrigerators.
“Would you like some coffee?” She motioned me to a seat at the round kitchen table by the window.
“Not for me, thanks.” She merely nodded and sat down across the table from me.
“Carlene told me about you,” she said, getting right to the point, “and how kind you were to offer to help her.”
“I’m very sorry I couldn’t have done more.” I wondered exactly what Estelle Bronson’s interest/involvement in all this might be.
I think she sensed my question.
“I’d never met Carlene until about a month ago, when she contacted us about taking care of Kelly. I’ve never had this happen before, but there was an instant rapport between us.”
“And you and she became involved?” She gave me that same smile, only sadder.
She shook her head, slowly. “The differences between gay men and lesbians have always fascinated me,” she said. “Gay men…probably because they are men…tend to move much more quickly with their relationships than lesbians do. So no, Carlene
and I were not ‘involved’ in the sense you might mean it. We were getting to know one another, and growing closer. I hoped—and believe she hoped as well—that something might develop, but it was much too early to tell, especially in light of her recent breakup.”
“I’m very sorry you never had a chance to find out where it might lead,” I said sincerely. “Carlene, from what little I really knew of her, seemed to be a really sweet person.”
A small sigh and the smile. “So I was discovering,” she said wistfully.
“So is there anything I can do for you?”
She looked at me carefully for several seconds. “I’d like to hire you to find out exactly what happened to Carlene, and why.”
“Apparently it was an accident. The police are looking for the driver.”
“I don’t believe it was an accident.”
So I wasn’t the only one to think so. “Why do you think it wasn’t?”
She had been sitting with her hands folded on the table, the thumb of her top hand stroking the wrist under it.
“Carlene was frightened. She wouldn’t say of what or of whom, and I at first assumed she was just reacting to her general anxiety over her breakup. But then I sensed it was something else. I didn’t want to pry, but I could feel it.”
The back door opened and she quickly said, “I’ll call you tomorrow,” as the woman I’d seen by the swings appeared at the Dutch door.
“Oh,” the woman said pleasantly, “there you are, Estelle. I didn’t know anyone was here.”
“Bonnie, this is Dick Hardesty, Jonathan Quinlan’s partner. He came to pick up Joshua, and we were just getting acquainted.”
Bonnie nodded and smiled and I debated on whether I should get up and cross the room to shake her hand. I decided against it and merely nodded and smiled in return.
“I’m quite impressed by your facility,” I said. “And Joshua looks like he’s having a good time.”
“I’m sure he is. He’s a charming little boy and we’re glad to have him.” She then turned her eyes to Estelle. “The other parents will be here soon. I think we should start getting the children ready.”
“Of course,” Estelle said, getting up quickly. I followed and the three of us went out onto the back porch. The third woman got up from the grass, still holding the baby, and extended her hand to another toddler, who rather obviously wasn’t too steady on her feet yet.
The three of them herded the children toward the porch. As Joshua was coming up the steps he spotted me.
“Hi, Uncle Dick!” he said brightly. “Is my mommy here?”
“No,” I said, walking beside him into the house, “but Uncle Jonathan will be here in just a few minutes.”
“Why isn’t mommy here?”
“Because she and your dad are still in Hawaii. Remember?”
He didn’t respond but ran ahead of me into the playroom with the same little boy he’d been chasing in the yard.
I stood in the doorway to the playroom as the first mother arrived to pick up her kid, followed almost immediately by another mother, and then a very hot-looking dad, who’d come for the baby. It was sort of organized chaos, and the sisters and their assistant took it all in stride.
“Come on, Joshua,” I said. “Let’s go wait for Uncle Jonathan outside.”
“Okay,” he said, coming over to me with a toy tank.
“Is it okay for you to take toys home with you?”
“Sure!” he said, but Estelle came over to him.
“Let’s put this away until tomorrow, Joshua, okay?”
He didn’t look at me as he handed it to her without a word.
“Thank you, Joshua,” she said, smiling, then looked at me and repeated her last words to me in the kitchen. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
I took Joshua’s hand and led him out of the house just as Jonathan drove up.
*
When we got home—Joshua rode with Jonathan rather than switch toys from car to car—I fixed my Manhattan and opened a Coke for Jonathan, pouring a small amount into one of the little jelly jars we normally used for juice in the morning. I brought the drinks into the living room, where Jonathan and Joshua were sitting side by side going through a magazine, playing “What’s that?” with the ads and pictures. I set my Manhattan on the coffee table and handed Jonathan and Joshua their drinks, then sat down on the other side of Joshua to relax.
Well, “relax” isn’t exactly the word. The first thing I realized was you don’t hand a small boy a glass of something unless he has some place to put it, and the coffee table was too far for him to reach. So he’d take a sip and Jonathan would take the glass from him and hold it while Joshua turned the pages of the magazine, which he moved to his lap so all three of us could play.
“What’s that?” Joshua asked me, pointing to a car.
“That’s an elephant,” I said, which he apparently thought was the funniest thing he ever heard and sent him off into peals of laughter. Well, it’s nice to have an appreciative audience.
I’d volunteered to help Jonathan fix dinner, but he said one of us should keep an eye on Joshua who had tired of the “What’s that?” game and climbed down from the couch to sit on the floor in order to carry on an animated conversation with Bunny and G.I. Joe.
At dinner, Joshua told us a long, somewhat rambling story—wide eyed and serious as an owl—about how a monster had come into the playroom and started eating up the other boys and girls and how he had chased it out into the back yard and made it go to bed under the sandbox.
“Wow,” Jonathan said admiringly. “You’re a brave little boy!”
“I’m a brave big boy!” Joshua corrected.
After dinner, Joshua wanted Jonathan to go upstairs and ask if Kelly could come down and play. Jonathan explained that Kelly wasn’t home, which led to a series of questions as to where he had gone and when he’d be back, which Jonathan managed to deftly sidestep with the grace of a matador.
A few minutes after eight I brought out the book I’d bought him and showed it to him—I knew if I actually handed it to him, he’d drag out looking at the pictures as long as possible to delay the inevitable bedtime. I didn’t give him a chance to ask for it before saying, “Now, as soon as you get ready for bed, Uncle Jonathan and I will come in and read it to you.”
To my considerable surprise, he got up and started running for the bathroom. He was about halfway there when Jonathan stopped him in his tracks. “Toys,” Jonathan said, getting up from the couch.
Joshua turned around and looked at him, but didn’t make a move. There followed a brief stare-down contest until Jonathan said, “Come on, I’ll help you.” It was apparently what Joshua had been waiting to hear, for he came across the room and started picking up various toys and transferring them to the cardboard box.
He’s getting us trained already, I thought as Jonathan bent over to pick up G.I. Joe and Bunny.
*
As Jonathan and I were sitting in the living room talking after Joshua had gone to sleep—he’d started nodding off about two-thirds through the reading, but wouldn’t let us leave until we’d finished—the phone rang, and Jonathan nearly tripped over himself getting to it before it might wake Joshua. It was Tim and Phil, inviting us over for dinner Friday evening. They were looking forward to meeting Joshua, and we accepted their offer with thanks and the caution that they might want to consider moving any really fragile items within easy reach of a four-year-old to higher ground.
At three thirty in the morning, we were awakened by Joshua calling, Mommy! Mommy!” from his room. Jonathan was out of bed like a shot, grabbing his robe from its hanger behind the door, and dashing down the hall. I debated whether to get up, too, but decided Jonathan could probably handle whatever the problem might be, and drifted back to sleep. I woke up half an hour later after rolling over and trying to put my arm around Jonathan only to find he wasn’t there. I got up and started for the door to check on him, when he came in.
“Nightmare,” Jon
athan explained as we crawled back into bed. “I stayed with him until I was sure he was fully asleep.”
As a result, we were all running late in the morning, and I held off my shower, helping Joshua get dressed while Jonathan showered. After a quick breakfast, they left and I proceeded to get myself ready.
*
As I was leaving the apartment, I saw a woman I did not recognize in front of the mailboxes in the foyer, fumbling with several keys. The box she was trying to open was Carlene’s.
“Excuse me,” I said, never one to mind my own business when something got my attention, “Can I help you?”
She’d been concentrating so heavily on finding the right key that I must have startled her.
“Oh!” she said, then added quickly, “No, thank you. I’m just trying to pick up my sister’s mail.”
“Ah. You must be…Beth, isn’t it? I’m Dick Hardesty. We live directly below Carlene’s apartment. I can’t tell you how sorry we are for your loss.”
She tried for a smile, but didn’t quite make it. “Thank you, Mr.…Thank you, Dick. Carlene told me about you and…Jonathan and…Joshua and how kind you were to her and Kelly.”
“How is Kelly? Is he with you?”
“He’s at our home in Carrington, yes. I have two daughters, twelve and fifteen, and the fifteen-year-old stayed home today to look after Kelly while I came into town to start to straighten out some of Carlene’s affairs.”
“When and where is the funeral?”
“It will be Thursday at two o’clock, at Evans’ Mortuary in Carrington.”
I made a note of the name of the mortuary so that we could send flowers.
“Jonathan has been very concerned about Kelly. How is he doing?”
She almost made it with the smile this time.
“He’s a four-year-old boy. He’s old enough to know his mother is gone, but doesn’t quite understand fully, of course. It’s difficult for him, but he’ll be fine in time.”
“Well, if there’s anything at all Jonathan and I can do to help, please give us a call.” I took out one of my business cards, wrote our home phone number on the back, and gave it to her.
