The Same Mistake Twice

by Albert Tucher

  Everything she had planned to ask him fled her mind.

  “I’m Don Prendergast. I’m forty-eight and I have my own business, called Prendergast Associates. If you’d like to check me out, you can ask Tiffany, Lulu, or Jennifer. They’re all local.”

  “You mean, like references?”

  The thought had never occurred to her.

  “You really are new at this, aren’t you.”

  “Pretty much.”

  “Don’t worry. It’s charming.”

  At least she knew where to suggest meeting him. Everyone in Sussex County knew what the Savoy Motel was for. He would get the room, but when he asked how he could tell her where to go, she was stuck.

  “You should get a pager,” he said.

  “That’s a good idea.”

  “It’s how most of the girls do it.”

  He sounded amused again. He told her to look for his Volvo and said he would try to park in front of the right room. In any case, he would watch for someone who seemed to be looking for something.

  The parking scheme worked, and her envelope lay on the counter just inside the room. She probably could have grabbed it and run, but that was no way to build a business.

  And it wasn’t her style.

  The sex went. The new man was a good fifteen years older than Dick Leavitt, who was fifteen years older than Diana, but she found that his age didn’t bother her. Don had a paunch that threatened to squash her, but he didn’t last long enough for her to get really worried.

  I can do this, she thought.

  She stayed the full hour, because that was what he had bought. Still naked, he handed her a business card. She took it while wondering what he meant by it.

  “I’m a tax accountant. You need someone like me.”

  “I do?”

  “Definitely. Suppose you get busted for prostitution. It’s just a misdemeanor. But tax evasion, that’s years of federal time. I can find you deductions until you hardly owe anything, but you’ll be covered.”

  His seriousness impressed her.

  “I’ll think about it,” she said, but she knew she would call.

  A few weeks later she sat at the kitchen table counting twenty-dollar bills.

  “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

  Diana closed her eyes until her heartbeat returned to normal.

  “I didn’t know you were here,” she said.

  “You haven’t been around much,” said Mrs. Wynn. “Somebody needs to be here for her.”

  “And somebody needs to bring the money in.”

  “You have a job. You had one, anyway.”

  “Yeah, Denny’s would support us in style.”

  “You could do it for longer.”

  “And I‘d have to.”

  “You could have gotten a scholarship. The guidance counselors all said so.”

  “And who would be here then?”

  “I would, if you did something with a future.”

  “How did you know, anyway?”

  “Oh, please. You haven’t gone to work in weeks, and you’ve always got these piles of twenties in front of you.”

  Mrs. Wynn studied her.

  “Did you think about this at all?”

  “What’s to think about? There’s one thing men want from me. I can give it away, or I can get paid for it.”

  “You’re probably ruling out getting married.”

  “Talk about something with no future.”

  “Okay, your parents didn’t make it, but I still don’t think they’d go for this.”

  “If you see them, ask them about it.”

  “I guess you’re going to do what you want to do,” said Mrs. Wynn.

  “And pay the bills while I do it.”

  “Until something happens.”

  Something happened, but not to Diana. On a late August morning she opened the Newark Star-Ledger and read about the murder of a local high school teacher. Dick Leavitt had been shot in his home. Police were “following several promising leads.”

  In other words, Diana thought, they don’t have a clue.

  Dick Leavitt’s house in Lakeview sat on one of the main routes to the south, where Diana had several regular clients. She passed the house frequently. She tried to summon a little grief, but nothing came.

  A week after his death she saw a black Honda Civic parked in front of the house. The hatchback gaped. As Diana drove by, a woman carrying a cardboard box came out of the front door.

  Diana swerved to the shoulder and stopped. She climbed out of her Taurus and crossed the highway. The traffic was light. As she approached the Civic, the woman dropped the box into the cargo space and turned toward her with an unwelcoming look.

  Diana didn’t smile.

  “Are you Mr. Leavitt’s wife?”

  “I’m Deborah Leavitt. Who are you?”

  “I’m Diana Andrews. I graduated in June.”

  “Oh, you’re his little bit on the side.”

  “Very little. Once, as a matter of fact. How did you know?”

  “I lived with him for ten years. I heard your name way too many times.”

  “He never touched me as long as I was in school.”

  “What difference does that make?”

  “If you’re divorced, he can do what he wants.”

  Could, she corrected herself.

  “We were separated. And it’s definitely my business if I gave that much of my life to a pedophile.”

  “Nothing happened until I was eighteen.”

  The woman studied her from head to foot. Diana had already become used to clients who stared. They had bought the right to look, but this woman came close to making her uncomfortable.

  “I knew I was losing his attention. I just didn’t know he had you.”

  “He didn’t have me. He bought an hour.”

  Diana wondered why she had confessed.

  The woman stared for another long moment.

  “This may sound weird, but that makes me feel better, sort of. Like he turned into some kind of loser without me.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Well, that’s what you do, isn’t it? Make a living off losers?”

  Diana opened her mouth to defend her clients, but she stopped herself. It didn’t matter what this woman thought.

  “Why did you stop here, anyway?” said Deborah. “Did you think I’d want to meet you for some reason?”

  “I’m asking myself the same thing.”

  “Since you’re obviously new at this, let me give you some advice. Don’t get involved. I doubt the losers will appreciate it, and their loved ones definitely won’t.”

  “Loved ones,” said Diana.

  “That was irony. He was supposed to be an English teacher. I guess he didn’t do that very well, either.”

  Deborah glared. Diana looked back.

  “Didn’t you just hear me? Do I need to spell it out? Go. Get lost.”

  “Thanks for the advice,” said Diana. “Not that you know much about it, but it’s the thought that counts. That’s what they say, anyway.”

  She turned and almost forgot to check for traffic before crossing the highway.

  That’s one way to spoil a good exit line, she thought. Get flattened by a truck.

  She was ten minutes late for her date, and of course the client was one of those men who did everything by the clock.

  That same evening Keith Hernandez hit a hard liner, but right at Ozzie Smith.

  “Shit,” Grandmom yelled.

  She had never cursed or shouted before her mind started to fail. As Diana wondered whether to say something, the doorbell rang. She went to the front door and looked through spy hole. Two men stood on the top step, one forty-something, the other about ten years younger. She pulled the door open.

  “Yes, officers.”

  “Detectives,” said the older man.

  He gave her the impression that she could spend an hour trying to memorize his face and still not recognize him the next time she saw
him.

  “I’m Rostow, Driscoll police. This is Detective Tillotson from Lakeview.”

  She thought about it and decided that she had no choice. A law-abiding citizen wouldn’t slam the door on them. She stepped back, and they took it for an invitation. She led them to the kitchen. Grandmom should be okay for a while.

  The three of them took seats around the kitchen table.

  “Were you thinking they were going to repeat this season?” said Tillotson. “I was.”

  “Who?”

  “The Mets.”

  The sound of the television set carried easily to them. Grandmom’s hearing had also declined. Diana shrugged.

  “I gave up on them, but my grandmother is still into it.”

  “Not your average grandmother.”

  She studied him for signs of mockery but saw none. Tillotson’s graying hair went well with his youthful face. She liked that look on men.

  “She never was.”

  “You knew Richard Leavitt, am I right?”

  “He was my English teacher.”

  “That’s all?”

  “That’s all.”

  As soon as the words came out, she knew they were a mistake.

  “That’s not what Mrs. Leavitt told us.”

  Diana decided that the best thing to say was nothing.

  “She told us about your little deal with her husband. She thinks you killed him.”

  Again she didn’t answer.

  “You want to tell us what happened? Did you go to see him again and he got rough?”

  “I only saw him the once. And he didn’t get rough, and I don’t have a gun.”

  “I believe you don’t have one now.”

  Diana sat perfectly still and looked at the ruins of her life. She had considered the possibility of an arrest for prostitution, but this could put her in prison until she was forty.

  Then she looked at Tillotson’s face. Something about his expression didn’t match his words. He didn’t want her.

  “She didn’t do it,” she said.

  “Who?”

  “The widow. That’s what you want, isn’t it? You want me to tell you she did it.”

  “Only if she did.”

  He waited She waited longer. Finally he nodded.

  “You’re right. The plan was to scare you or piss you off enough to dish dirt about the widow. But never mind that. We want to pick your brain in general.”

  “You could have just asked me.”

  “We didn’t know you well enough for that. We still don’t. So prove it to us.”

  “Or I’m out of business? I need to write that bitch wife of his a thank-you note for outing me to the cops.”

  “Give us some credit,” said Rostow. “We knew about you the second time a uniform saw your car at the Savoy Motel.”

  “Oh.”

  “So what you need to do,” said Tillotson, “is follow a few rules. You use drugs?”

  “No.”

  “That’s a good start. Rule number one, don’t make us look bad. Drugs make us look bad. Neighbors who complain about you make us look bad.”

  She nodded.

  “But bear in mind,” he said, “that’s most jurisdictions. There are exceptions. Witherspoon cops, for instance. They’ve got it bad for hookers. You might want to stay out of there.”

  She didn’t tell him that she had some lucrative clients in nearby Witherspoon Township.

  Tillotson studied her.

  “Your parents know what you’re doing?”

  “If you see them, ask.”

  “They’re not in the picture?”

  “Not since I was five. They both disappeared a couple of weeks apart.”

  “So it’s you and your grandmother?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Can you handle it alone?”

  “I’m going to have to find a place for her pretty soon. And probably sell the house to pay for her care.”

  She wondered why she was telling them. She decided that Tillotson had the knack for getting people to talk, and she would have to be careful with him.

  The two detectives started to get up.

  “I’ll need you to come to Lakeview,” said Tillotson. “We’ll take your fingerprints for elimination.”

  “I was in his house once, weeks ago. Why do you need my prints?”

  “Prints can last a long time. They could still be there.”

  She definitely didn’t need her fingerprints on file.

  “Don’t you want to know who did kill him?”

  They settled back in their chairs. For the first time Tillotson looked annoyed.

  “What have we been talking about all this time?”

  “Me, I thought. Do you want to know, or don’t you?”

  “I guess I should have mentioned rule number two—tell us when you know something. Don’t make us wait for it.”

  “Okay. It was his girlfriend.”

  Tillotson shook his head. “He didn’t have one.”

  “Yeah, he did. Have you asked around?”

  Rostow looked angry with her, but Tillotson smiled and said, “That did occur to us.”

  “Ask some more,” she said.

  “Okay, who is she?”

  She told him about her hour with Dick.

  “I was sure I would get a regular client out of it, but it was strictly a one-time thing, like he was crossing something off his list of things to do. He was starting to get another hard-on when I left, but he didn’t want another date. What does that say to you?”

  “Tell me.”

  “To me it says he took a big chance seeing me even once, and he didn’t want to push his luck with somebody. He didn’t care what his wife thought, so it had to be a girlfriend. And what kind of girlfriend would nobody know about?”

  Tillotson nodded. “Somebody underage.”

  “And still in high school.”

  “I thought he never made a move while you were in school.”

  “He never crossed the line with me until I let him. Men generally behave themselves with me.”

  “I’ll bet they do.”

  She decided to ignore his grin.

  “But you can bet some other girl did let him,” she said.

  Tillotson nodded. “And if she’s the possessive type, he’s got a problem. He’s her trophy man, and she’s going to keep him.”

  He and Rostow stood.

  “We’ll look into it.”

  Two days later the bell rang again. Mrs. Wynn never used the bell. Diana’s high school friends had left dead-end Driscoll for jobs and a chance at real lives. Who else could it be but those cops? She turned the volume of the Mets game down a little and went to the door. As she pulled it open, she turned to make sure that Grandmom looked settled for a few minutes. Diana turned back and met a fist coming in the opposite direction.

  She felt more shock than pain. It wasn’t much of a punch, and she was already throwing one of her own. But she stopped her fist in mid-flight when she saw the gun.

  “Surprised you, didn’t I?”

  Behind the gun stood a teenage girl. She looked familiar, but Diana couldn’t come up with a name.

  “You could say that,” said Diana. “What’s this about?”

  “Don’t try that shit on me.”

  The girl started forward. Diana backed away from the gun. She kept backing up all the way to the kitchen. The girl pursued her, leading with the gun. Diana felt something meet the backs of her thighs. It was the kitchen table. She edged around it. Finally she ran out of room to retreat. She stopped against the counter, with the sink to her right.

  “What shit is that?” she said.

  “Don’t pretend you don’t know me.”

  “Okay, high school,” said Diana. “I’ve got that much.”

  “You made my life hell for three years.”

  “So you’re a senior now?”

  “I said, don’t try it!”

  Diana still couldn’t think of a name, but a mental pic
ture had come to her. She saw this girl sitting alone in the cafeteria. It could have been any day, because the girl always sat alone.

  “Anything I wanted to do, you got there first,” said the girl. “Any boy I liked, you had to have him.”

  “Wait a minute. That’s just too weird. I had exactly one boyfriend. And I wasn’t a cheerleader or class president or anything like that.”

  “All the boys wanted you.”

  “News to me.”

  “And you still can’t leave me alone. You sent the cops after me.”

  “You’re Dick Leavitt’s girlfriend.”

  “Mr. Leavitt to you. I get to call him Dick.”

  “Why did you kill him?”

  “Because he was a creep. He never brought me to his house, but he let you just waltz right in.”

  “You were watching?”

  “His ex told me.”

  “Why would she tell you anything?”

  “I helped her clean the house out,” said the girl.

  “Did you kill her, too? If you didn’t, I will.”

  “You won’t get the chance.”

  For a moment Diana ran out of words. She groped for something to say before the girl remembered to shoot her.

  “What makes you think I sent the cops after you?”

  “They came to my house. They talked to my parents.”

  “They must be talking to everybody.”

  “Oh, now you’re saying Dick couldn’t possibly want me.”

  There was no way to win with this girl. The gun in her hand seemed to grow until it filled the room.

  Diana didn’t dare turn her head to look, but she remembered her small cast iron skillet sitting in the sink, out of the girl’s line of sight. Mrs. Wynn sometimes scolded Diana for not washing up promptly, but tonight her laziness might save her life.

  “Say goodbye, bitch.”

  “Shit!” Grandmom yelled.

  The girl whirled toward the sudden noise. Diana lunged for the sink. She grabbed the skillet and sidearmed it toward the girl, who was already turning back toward her. The pan spun like a lopsided discus and struck the girl in the face. Her nose gushed blood. Diana rushed around the table. She grabbed the girl’s wrist and twisted it. She twisted again, harder, and the girl screamed and dropped the gun.

  The girl wouldn’t stop fighting. With her left hand she jabbed her fingers at Diana’s eyes. Diana jerked her head away and then forward in a head-butt. Her forehead mashed the girl’s already bloody nose. The girl clutched her face with both hands. Diana punched her hard in the abdomen, once, twice, three times. The girl slid down the wall and sat on the floor, hugging her knees.