The Cluttered Corpse

by Mary Jane Maffini

  “They were running like crazy. They’re not afraid of cars. They could be hit! Truffle! Sweet Marie! Come home!”

  Mona Pringle raised her voice. “Charlotte? Please get in your car.”

  I was hunting for the dogs when the first police car swung onto the street, red and white roof lights flashing. It was joined by a second one coming from the other direction. That was reassuring. The police officers got out of the cars, and at almost the same moment two small dogs scampered recklessly across the street half a block away and raced off in the opposite direction.

  “Mona? Tell them I’ll be right back!”

  Five minutes later, two panicked dogs continued to shake as I carried them under my arms. With Schopenhauer as a guard by my side, I joined the cops. Naturally, one of them had to be Nick. It was nearly midnight. Was he working overtime?

  “Nice place, Charlie,” he said.

  “It was,” I said.

  The other cop stepped over the devastation that was my tiny perfect apartment. Cushions lay on the floor; the sofa was upended. The wooden legs of my pretty occasional chair were broken. The upholstery was slashed. The contents of my closet lay scattered across the floor: skirts, jackets, even my new white shirt that I hadn’t even worn once.

  “Please don’t step on that,” I said to the new officer.

  My dresser drawers had been dumped. Nick regarded my underwear with interest before I hastily swept it out of his sight. Someone had pulled the sheets and comforter off my bed and dumped them in a heap. My supplies had been tossed from their shelves, along with out-of-season clothing. It was a measure of how much they’d been traumatized that Truffle and Sweet Marie didn’t each grab a roll of toilet paper and play Make Some Clouds. Luckily the burglars hadn’t emptied my jewelry box.

  In the kitchen, things were worse: the doors of my perfectly organized cupboards were open. Pans, cans, strainers, cleaners, dry goods littered the floor. My spices were no longer in alphabetical order. My last container of Ben & Jerry’s sat melting sadly on the counter. A broken jar of Dijon mustard was splattered everywhere, yellow streaks staining my pretty cream-colored cabinets. I picked up the dogs so they didn’t cut their paws.

  Next I checked my small office area, which is nothing more than a section of my bedroom hidden by a screen. I was followed by the officer I didn’t know and even more closely by Nick. The first thing I noticed was the upturned trash can and the paper recycle bin that seemed to have been flung at the wall, denting the drywall.

  “I guess they took your computer,” the other cop said.

  I shook my head, feeling a bit overwhelmed. “At least I had my laptop with me. I worked on some projects while I was waiting at the hospital today.”

  I wondered. Could Nick have done this as an excuse to get into my apartment? He knew I was at the hospital…No. Too much like a plan for Nick.

  I turned my attention to my poor, still-cowering little dogs. I covered them up with a blanket, gave them a reassuring pat, and told Schopenhauer to watch over them. It was time to check out Jack’s place. Sure enough, it had been turned over too. But there was less to trash, since his parents’ furniture was in storage, he had absolutely no food, and what burglar is desperate enough to steal a collection of Hawaiian shirts? I explained that I wasn’t sure whether Jack had money or bike parts in his apartment. His books lay sprawled from wall to wall. Nick bent over and picked one up. “Can’t see anyone ripping off this stuff.”

  Jack’s prized CD collection had been dumped out of the holders. There was a crunch as Nick stepped on a couple of the jewel cases.

  “Why would anyone do this?” I sniveled.

  The cop I didn’t know gave me a strange look. “Burglary, ma’am. Theft.”

  “But of what? They didn’t take my jewelry. Some of it’s valuable. And they didn’t take Jack’s CDs.”

  Nick said, “I dunno, there’s a lot of jazz. And way too much classical and opera. Weird and screechy in languages no one can understand. No fence is going to touch them. You can’t give that crap away. Now if he had tools or something, that’d be different. You think he did?”

  “We’ll have to ask him. He’ll be back from Troy later.” As the words flowed out of my mouth, I wanted to claw them back.

  Nick cleared his throat. “If you don’t mind me saying, Charlie, you shouldn’t stay here tonight.”

  “I’m staying. I have to clean up! I can’t leave my home like this.”

  “It might not be safe.”

  “Why not? The so-called burglar’s gone. Why would he come back? And how would he get in if I’m here?”

  “With a key. The same way he did before.”

  “What?”

  Nick said, “With a—”

  “I heard you. But how would he get a key? The only people who have a key to the front door and my door are me and Jack.”

  Nick smirked.

  “Well, I didn’t do it.”

  Nick said, “Maybe Jack flipped. And trashed the place. Insane jealousy or something.”

  I stared at him. “Are you smoking dope, Nick?”

  “Hell no. I’m on duty.”

  “Okay. I have my keys, so someone must have Jack’s. He’s gone to Troy.” A hellish world of possibilities unfolded in my brain. I babbled in a panic, “What if Jack picked up a crazed hitchhiker? What if he was robbed? What if he’s been tied up and left to die?”

  Nick and the other cop gawked at me as if I’d started speaking in tongues. I pulled out my cell phone with shaking hands and keyed in Jack’s number. To my surprise, he answered.

  “Where are you?” I shouted.

  “Be home in half an hour,” he said. “Why do you sound like that?”

  “Where are your damned keys?”

  Long pause.

  I tried again, “Well?”

  “Last time I looked they were in the ignition. The car is moving.”

  “Oh.”

  If Jack’s keys were in his ignition and mine were in my purse, what keys had been used to break in?

  Nick looked at me with pity. “Somebody probably copied them. Have you left your handbag out of your sight recently? It doesn’t take long for a pro to take an imprint. If they know your name, they can find your house. Of course, usually, they steal your credit cards too. Or they get the numbers and make copies. Any unusual activity on yours lately?”

  I spent the next half hour on the phone with my two credit card companies. No one had done anything with mine. To be sure, they put a hold on both cards. Jack doesn’t even have one, so I guessed we didn’t have to worry about that.

  “That’s good,” Nick said. “But weird. It’s a lot easier to make purchases with forged cards than it is to break into houses.”

  “That’s the problem,” I said. “I don’t think this a break-and-enter. This person was searching for something.”

  “I can understand that,” Nick leered.

  “But what?” I said, ignoring him.

  Nick finally took my statement and waited until the twenty-four-hour locksmith arrived. I spent the waiting time picking up the mess. I worked fast and kept a jump ahead of Nick. “Nothing is missing. Is that usual?”

  “It’s sort of weird.” He edged a bit closer.

  It helped to mention Pepper’s name once every second sentence. Sort of like hosing down a dog that’s out of control. When the locksmith arrived, Nick gave up and went back to work.

  By the time Jack got home, the locks had been changed on both our doors and I’d made a big dent in the disorder. I handed him his new set of keys as he reached the top of the stairs. “My treat.”

  He stood in my doorway, staring. “Temper, temper, Charlotte,” he said. “I wasn’t that late.”

  “Let me guess. Your trip to Troy? Was it a wild-goose chase?”

  “Honk honk,” he said.

  It would have been the perfect night to sleep through. But my subconscious sounded a gong at the preferred time of three in the morning and told me why two of Emmy
Lou’s classmates looked familiar. They were no longer teenagers with bad haircuts; they were women in their forties with jobs around Woodbridge. Not that it mattered, because now I knew that Emmy Lou had indeed lived at number 7, that the man who denied being her father was indeed her father, and that she’d known and cared about Tony Starkman since he was a small damaged boy. Not that I understood what any of this signified, but you can’t have everything. The same subconscious didn’t offer insights about who might have hit Lilith. It was equally silent on my break-in. But it did remind me that I hadn’t made a to-do list the night before and suggested that I add the following items to that list:

  Visit hospital to see Lilith

  Double-check to see if anything is missing after break-in

  Get LeMans back to North Elm Street for Rose

  Talk to Gary about progress with shelves

  Bring Dwayne up-to-date on shelving

  Pick up dry cleaning

  Call Sally

  I was blasted from a deep sleep by the first shrill ring. Luckily my cell phone was by the bed.

  Ramona said, “You sound groggy. Did I wake you?”

  “It’s okay,” I yawned.

  “I know the old joke: you had to get up anyway to answer the phone. Of course, it is ten in the morning, not that it’s any of my business. Can’t talk long, we’re up to our patooties in pesky patrons here. But I checked with the city system and the properties at 9 and 11 Bell Street, for your information, are owned by a T. Wright. Same name as the person you were looking for. Hope that helps. Gotta go.”

  Rose called from the hospital as soon as Ramona hung up.

  “I slept in, but I’ll be there as soon as I can,” I said.

  “No rush, they’ve wheeled her off for tests,” she whispered. “She won’t be back for an hour and a half at the earliest. I’m going to get some shut-eye.”

  I was halfway through my very late cup of coffee when my brain clicked in and I realized that the man who denied being Emmy Lou’s father was probably the person who slashed my tires. But slashing tires was a big step up from ignoring my questions. So why would he want to frighten me off?

  Jack was passed out when I knocked on his door. I heard a muffled groan from inside and then the door opened. “Please tell me it’s the middle of the night,” he said.

  “It’s the middle of something.” Of course, I had the advantage. I’d walked the three dogs, showered, done my hair, and put on a pair of slim brown dress pants and my yellow leather jacket. All in top speed so I could get going fast and make up for lost time.

  I’d had breakfast and three cups of coffee. I was ready to run rings around him.

  “I’d like to get over to the hospital to see how Lilith’s doing this morning. Maybe we should get the LeMans. One of us can take Rose home afterward.”

  “Boy.” He had the wide-eyed look he gets without his glasses. “You’re talking awfully fast. I can take Rose home. And I’ll be happy to spend time with Lilith. Do you want me to come with you now?”

  “Thanks, Jack.” I felt my chin wobble.

  “And Charlotte?”

  “Hmm?”

  “I can close the store for the day. Whatever it takes.”

  I had time to swing by Klean and Brite on my way to the hospital. As I walked through the door, I felt a tiny tickle from my subconscious. Of course. The pleasant blowsy woman behind the counter had been one of Emmy Lou’s classmates, clearly recognizable despite the fifty pounds she’d added. Her hair seemed stuck in the eighties style, but maybe that was the humidity. It was a long shot, but after all, high school is such an intense experience, some people have every person in every class etched in their brains.

  I slid my claim slip across the counter and said, “This might be a weird question, but do you remember Emmy Lou Wright?”

  “I remember everyone from high school,” she replied. “It’s taking tonight’s dinner from the freezer that I forget. She was a beautiful girl.”

  I leaned forward and said in a conspiratorial whisper, “I heard she had a breakdown.”

  “Who wouldn’t?”

  “What?”

  “Wouldn’t you have a breakdown if you were forced to give up your baby?”

  “I’m sorry. Did you say give up her…?”

  “That was the rumor going around. I know she was in bad shape after Roger Starkman died, but I always wondered if the real breakdown didn’t happen after they snatched that kid from her. Hang on, I’ll get your cleaning for you.”

  “Wait! Did everyone know about Emmy Lou’s baby?”

  “Her family tried to hush it up. That was crazy. So many girls had babies back then. Anyway, you can’t keep something like that a secret.” She paused and frowned. “I don’t think it was a story. Emmy Lou left town, and she didn’t come back for years. Can’t say I blame her. It was a real surprise to hear she moved back to Bell Street. I’ll tell you one thing: I would never want to see the people who did that to me. I’d never forget and I’d never forgive.”

  Keep a simple project in your briefcase or handbag

  in case you find yourself with a long wait.

  20

  When I found Rose in the relatives’ lounge, she looked as drawn and gaunt as any patient in the trauma unit.

  She said, “Don’t try to talk me into going home. I can catnap here and be good as new. Lilith’s off having tests for the next while.”

  “Fine. Let’s go to the cafeteria. At least you can have some food and coffee, and we’ll have a chat. I can swing by your place later and get you a change of clothing.”

  Rose didn’t put up any resistance. Over what the hospital optimistically called “food” and “coffee,” I filled her in on Emmy Lou and the baby she may have been forced to give up.

  “That’s a terribly sad story,” she said.

  “Yes, it is. Now I have to figure out what it means. It answers some questions but raises just as many.” I’d thanked my subconscious, of course, for the connection. I could hear little pieces ringing deep in my brain, like a wind chime. The only problem was that when the pieces fell into place, they didn’t make sense.

  “So, Rose, you know Myrna Dingwall. You said she was your age.”

  Rose managed a weak chuckle. “Yep. Just another kid into her seventies.”

  “But Kevin is only twenty-three.”

  “These things happen.”

  “But did it happen in this case, Rose?”

  She bit her lip. “I wondered about that too. When the other baby died, Myrna went into a real depression. Didn’t come out of the house, didn’t get out of bed. It lasted an awful long time. Fred still worked with my late husband then. He was beside himself. Then after a while, he sent Myrna away to visit family somewhere out of state for a while. When she came back, she had her beautiful new baby boy. That’s all I know.”

  “Emmy Lou Wright was forced to give up her child at about that time.”

  Rose twisted her hands. “People gossiped, of course. I never liked that kind of talk. I was happy for her. It’s not the kind of thing you question.”

  “There’s no question that Mrs. Dingwall loves Kevin. And so does Emmy Lou. Here’s what I think might have happened. I think Emmy Lou never got over losing Roger Starkman, her boyfriend, and then having her baby taken away. I think she came back, not to aggravate her horrible father, but in spite of him. She wanted to be near to her son. I think being so close to Kevin was driving her to the brink. And Tony Starkman was her boyfriend Roger’s nephew, a reminder. They played stupid stunts, but she would have been on edge all the time anyway. Imagining things, having trouble concentrating, forgetting things.”

  “That might send anyone up the wall,” Rose muttered. “Especially if it was a secret. These are more open times, Charlotte. It used to be that every family had secrets; every neighborhood was full of them. Babies born and whisked away, girls who left suddenly and came back sad, if at all, affairs, double lives, battered wives, abused children, so many things w
e pretended didn’t exist.”

  I said, “Perhaps some of those old secrets are causing grief.”

  Rose said sadly, “If Kevin was Emmy Lou’s child and she was estranged from her family, it must have been horrible for her. Especially keeping that secret from Kevin himself.” Rose glanced over sharply. “Do you think her husband knew?”

  “He’s a smart man. He has his own daughter. But I doubt that he’d have a problem with Kevin.”

  “And who is she protecting?”

  “It must be Kevin. Perhaps he and Tony were clowning around and Tony fell. But Kevin was away with his mother, visiting the grandmother. He couldn’t have done it. Unless…”

  Rose’s gnarled hand shot to her bloodless lips.

  I said, “Unless Myrna Dingwall is lying about when they drove away.”

  “To protect him. Same as Emmy Lou.”

  I met her gaze. “Or to protect herself.”

  “You think she killed Tony, accidentally or even deliberately?”

  “She wasn’t too fond of him, and she didn’t believe he was good for Kevin. Afterward, she would have made sure that Kevin was out of the way. I doubt if he’d have been aware of the time. She was the one who told me when they returned.”

  I watched Rose’s kindly face crumble. “But she would be setting Emmy Lou up in that case. That’s a very wicked thing to do.”

  “She had no way of knowing that Emmy Lou would scream out a confession in front of everyone. And if she hadn’t, Tony’s death would have probably looked like an accident.”

  Rose said, “And where is Lilith in all this?”

  “I don’t know. But if it’s a coincidence, it’s a huge one. Lilith was asking questions on Bell Street when she was hit. Even though the questions were about Bryony Stevens, maybe someone didn’t realize that.”

  Rose shook her head slowly. “I don’t believe that Myrna would run down an innocent girl like Lilith because she was asking questions. I think you’re wrong about that, Charlotte.”

  “Let’s hope so. There are delivery vans speeding up and down there all the time. Maybe one of them hit her. But even so, I feel responsible for what’s happened.”