A Fine Line

by William G. Tapply

Julie shook her head. “First Mr. Duffy has that accident,” she said, “and now . . .”

  I nodded.

  “Detective Mendoza is with homicide,” she said after a minute.

  “Yes. They were both unattended deaths. They have to be investigated.”

  Julie smiled. “Meaning you can’t talk about it, right?”

  I nodded.

  “And you’re in the middle of it, of course.”

  “I guess I am.”

  “So what are you going to do?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. I wish Ethan would show up. He might know something. I just hope . . .”

  “You hope what?”

  “I hope nothing’s happened to him.”

  I had office appointments with clients in the afternoon. Henry behaved himself while we conferred.

  When the last one left around four, I called Ellen Bramhall, Walt Duffy’s ex-wife and Ethan’s mother, at her home in Sudbury.

  She answered on the first ring. “Yes?”

  “Mrs. Bramhall,” I said, “it’s Brady Coyne again.”

  “Oh, Mr. Coyne. Have you heard anything from Ethan?”

  “I’m sorry, no,” I said. “I was wondering if you had.”

  “No,” she said. “I’ve talked with our police. They’ve been very kind. But . . .” She sighed. “I’m out here in my garden. Weeding, pruning, watering, mulching, tending my dear little plants, trying not to think about Ethan and what happened to Walter. I’ve got my telephone right here with me so I won’t miss any calls. I was hoping . . .”

  “I’m sorry,” I repeated. “I was wondering if you and I might talk?”

  “Talk?”

  “About Ethan. About how we might find him. I guess we’re both worried about him. And I think he might be able to help us understand what happened to Walt.”

  “Well,” she said, “I’ve wracked my brain to no avail ever since I talked with you on Thursday. I don’t know what good I can do. I feel so useless. Maybe talking with you will make me feel less useless. Do you want to come over to the house?”

  “How about after supper tonight?”

  “That would be lovely,” she said.

  She gave me directions and insisted I call her Ellen. She sounded like a frantic mother trying desperately to hold herself together.

  Julie and Henry and I left the office together. I had Henry’s leash in one hand and my briefcase in the other. I’d stuck Walt Duffy’s file, including copies of his will and his divorce decree, into it with the intention of glancing at it before I met with Ellen Bramhall. I wanted to double-check my memory that she was not mentioned in it. Anyway, it made Julie happy to think I might spend some time at home catching up on my paperwork.

  We stopped outside the parking garage across the street where Julie always left her car, and I held out Henry’s leash to her. “Last chance,” I said.

  “Not today, Brady.”

  “Another time, then?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know. I’m not sure it’s a good idea. It was, to tell the truth, really fun having Henry around over the weekend. Megan loved every minute of it. But I don’t want her to become attached to him. He’s not our dog. He’s not even yours.”

  “Getting attached to pets is part of growing up.”

  She nodded. “Then they’re gone. They run away. They get old and die.”

  “That’s part of growing up, too. Kids can take it better than we give them credit for.”

  She cocked her head and looked up at me. “So maybe it’s me, then.” She bent down and gave Henry a pat, then straightened up. “See you guys tomorrow.”

  Henry and I cut over to Commonwealth Avenue, where the sidewalks were wide and less congested than those on Boylston or Newbury at five o’clock in the afternoon, and we’d gone less than a block when a dark unmarked sedan pulled over to the curb in front of us. Lieutenant Matthew Keeler stepped out from the passenger door and stood there on the sidewalk.

  Henry went up to him and sniffed his cuffs. Keeler bent down and patted his rump.

  “You following me?” I said.

  He smiled. “Mind if I walk with you?”

  “What’s up?”

  He fell in beside me. “We parted kind of abruptly this morning. I thought you deserved an explanation.”

  “Detective Mendoza was the abrupt one,” I said.

  Keeler nodded. “Sandy Mendoza’s got some things on her mind. I apologize for her. She tends to be rude with lawyers in the best of times.”

  “She was a lot friendlier when I saw her the other day,” I said. “I was a lawyer then.”

  He smiled. “You shouldn’t take it personally.”

  “It’s okay. Lots of people don’t like lawyers. Especially cops. I don’t take it personally except when they’re asking for my help.”

  “It’s not really that,” he said. “She’d probably kill me for telling you, but I figured after the way she acted, you’ve got a right to know.” He hesitated. “See, Sandy just found out this morning that her sister’s got a brain tumor. They don’t know if it’s operable. It hit Sandy pretty hard. Her sister’s just a college kid. They live together. Both of their parents are dead. Sandy pretty much raised her.”

  I shook my head. “That’s a rough one.”

  Keeler shrugged. “I feel for her. I lost my little girl two years ago.”

  “Your daughter?”

  Keeler nodded. “Becky. Leukemia. She was nine.” He smiled quickly. “Becky had a dog she called Bo-Bo. Seeing your dog there . . .” He blew out a breath. “Anyway, Sandy Mendoza is a good cop. She’s just angry now. Kinda mad at the world, you know?”

  “Sure,” I said. “Hard to blame her. I’m sorry about your daughter. That’s an awful thing.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “You’re never the same after something like that.”

  Henry seemed to have lost interest in the trees and fire hydrants and sign posts along Commonwealth Avenue. Apparently he’d finally emptied his bladder, and he was trotting along sedately between Keeler and me.

  We walked in silence. The sedan was creeping along a discreet distance ahead of us. After a few minutes, Keeler said, “We didn’t really finish our conversation this morning.”

  “What else is there?” I said.

  “What we mainly wanted to know was if Benjamin Frye gave you any hint that might help us understand what he did between the time he was with you Friday evening and when we pulled him out of that warehouse on Sunday.”

  “He didn’t say anything about his weekend plans. Like I said, he told me he had an appointment right after we ate. He didn’t even stay for dessert.”

  “But he didn’t say who the appointment was with?”

  “No.”

  “Or what it was about?”

  “Business was all he said.”

  “That was it?”

  “Well, he pretended to be pissed off at me for giving Detective Mendoza his name. Ben didn’t like cops.”

  “Pretended?”

  I shrugged. “It was sort of a reflex with Ben. He practiced a lot of civil disobedience back in the sixties.”

  Keeler smiled. “So he didn’t mention anything about East Boston or that warehouse or Beau Marc Industries?”

  “No. I think I’d remember that.”

  “And nothing about Walter Duffy?”

  I shrugged. “Just what I told you. He was upset that Walt had died. They’d known each other for a long time. We talked about the letters. That was about it.”

  Keeler stopped walking and touched my arm. “It wasn’t the fire that killed Mr. Frye.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “There was no smoke in his lungs. He was already dead when that warehouse went up.” He hesitated. “The ME determined that he had a fractured skull.”

  “Fractured skull?”

  Keeler patted the back of his head.

  “Like Walt Duffy?” I said.

  He nodded.

  I stared at him. “So your
arsonist is also a double murderer.”

  “Apparently.”

  “And he’s the one who called me on the phone.”

  “Can’t think of any other explanation,” Keeler said.

  “What’s he want with me?”

  “We’d like to figure that out,” he said.

  “Shit,” I said. “Me, too.”

  The dark sedan had stopped at the corner where Commonwealth Avenue butted onto Arlington Street. When we got to it, Keeler stopped and handed me a business card. “My cell phone’s on there,” he said. “Call anytime.”

  I put the card in my shirt pocket.

  “Look,” he said. “The media are asking questions. We’re not telling them everything.”

  “That’s a bit unusual, isn’t it?”

  “This is an unusual situation.”

  “You can’t expect them not to find out.”

  Keeler smiled. “If they do, Mr. Coyne, we better not learn it was from you.”

  TWELVE

  After Keeler drove off in the dark sedan, Henry and I crossed Arlington Street and strolled through the Public Gardens. When we got to Charles Street, Henry veered off to the left. I gave his leash a tug, but he dug in his heels. He was aiming for Mt. Vernon street, I figured. He wanted to go home.

  I had intended to continue diagonally across the Common to Boylston Street, my usual route to my apartment from my office. But this was a better idea. Maybe Ethan would be there.

  So I told Henry what a smart dog he was, and we crossed Beacon Street to Charles, then went up Mt. Vernon. Henry led me into the alley behind Walt’s townhouse and pressed his nose against the door in the brick wall that opened into the bird garden.

  My note to Ethan was still wedged under the latch, and the big X of yellow crime-scene tape was still plastered over the door. That tape was a stark reminder that Walt had died on the other side of the door. It had happened less than a week ago.

  Correction. Walt had been murdered.

  “Come on,” I said to Henry. “We can’t go in there.”

  We retraced our route back to Mt. Vernon Street. When we turned to continue up the hill, I saw a tall, elegant-looking white-haired woman with two greyhounds on leashes coming down the sidewalk toward us.

  Henry tugged at his leash and whined. The greyhounds approached us. They were whining, too. They all seemed happy to see each other.

  “Now, boys,” the woman was saying. “It’s just Henry. You be nice to Henry.”

  The greyhounds sniffed Henry fore and aft, and Henry sniffed them. All three tails were wagging furiously.

  “You must be a friend of Mr. Duffy,” said the woman. She appeared to be in her late seventies or early eighties. She wore sneakers, baggy blue jeans, a short-sleeved white shirt with the tails flapping, and a Red Sox baseball cap.

  I smiled at her. “Yes, I am.”

  “Taking care of Henry, then?” She had sharp blue eyes and a sun-creased face. Her white hair hung in a braid halfway down her back.

  I nodded.

  “Terrible thing,” she said. “Poor man. First that awful fall that left him all crippled, and now this. We used to walk with Mr. Duffy and Henry all the time. Spite and Malice think Henry’s about the nicest little doggie on the Hill. We’d let them off their leashes on the Common, and the three of them would have the grandest time chasing each other.”

  I smiled. “Spite and Malice?”

  “This,” she said, pointing to one of her greyhounds, “is Spite. And this saucy fellow is Malice. Spite and Malice is a card game I used to play with my husband. I rescued these boys from Wonderland after Win passed away. They were racers. My name is Gladys. Gladys Whyte. Whyte with a y.”

  “I’m Brady Coyne,” I said. “Coyne with a y.” I put down my briefcase and held out my hand, and she shook it.

  The greyhounds were circling Henry, who had decided to lie down on the sidewalk. The three leashes had become hopelessly tangled.

  Gladys Whyte jerked her head at Walt’s front door. “That tape. Was there some kind of crime? I heard Mr. Duffy fell down and hit his head.”

  “He was alone,” I said. “Unattended death, the police have to investigate.”

  “Ethan wasn’t there when it happened, then?”

  “I guess not,” I said.

  She nodded. “I would’ve expected Ethan to be walking Henry today.”

  I pointed at Walt’s front door. “They won’t let anyone in there for a few days. Henry’s staying with me until Ethan can move back in.”

  “That poor boy must be devastated. Such a shock, losing his father that way.”

  I nodded.

  “I thought it odd,” she continued, “not running into Ethan and Henry since . . . since Mr. Duffy’s accident. Is Ethan staying with his friend, then?”

  “Which friend do you mean?”

  “The big fellow. What was his name?” She frowned, then nodded. “Connie. That’s what Ethan called him. Connie. Very well-mannered gentleman. Somewhat older than Ethan. They often walked Henry together, Ethan and Connie.”

  “I don’t think I’ve met Connie,” I said. “What’s his last name?”

  She shrugged. “I’m not sure I ever heard.” She smiled. “They made quite a pair, Ethan and Connie. That Connie fellow is always dressed nicely. Well groomed. Conservative, you might say. And Ethan with his shaved head and his earrings and all.” She smiled. “Quite a pair.”

  “You said Connie is older than Ethan?”

  “Oh, my, yes.” She narrowed her eyes at me. “You are in your mid-forties, am I right?”

  I nodded. I hated it when people did that. I still thought of myself as a young man.

  Gladys smiled. “Connie would be, oh, five or six years younger than you, if I’m any judge. Around forty. I’m surprised you’ve never met him.”

  “Maybe I have,” I said. “Is his actual name Conrad? Does he own the record store where Ethan works?”

  “I wouldn’t know anything about that. I try not to pry, you know.”

  “Of course,” I said. “Do you know any of Ethan’s other friends?”

  She shrugged. “It’s my impression that Ethan does not have a lot of friends. He was very devoted to his father, you know.”

  I nodded. “What about Walt’s friends?”

  “Mr. Duffy had a lot of visitors,” she said, “especially after his accident. I always thought it was lovely that his friends came to spend time with him.”

  “Do you remember any of them?”

  She shook her head. “I never paid that much attention. They always used the garden entrance. I’d glimpse them heading down the alley.” She smiled. “I do remember you in your expensive suits. You visited him quite often.”

  “The others didn’t wear suits?”

  “Ethan’s friend Connie, he often did. The others?” She shook her head. “I guess not. I notice nice clothes.” She looked at me and frowned. “Why are you asking me these questions?”

  “Gladys,” I said, “the truth is, I haven’t been able to get in touch with Ethan in the past few days. In the, um, confusion when Walt died, I neglected to ask him where he’d be staying. You don’t recall any mention of where his friend Connie lives, do you?”

  “No,” she said, “I’m afraid I don’t. I would surmise it’s not within walking distance.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Well, the two of them were always driving off in Connie’s car. Connie would park it up on the curb when he came calling. Sometimes they’d take Henry with them.”

  “What kind of car is it?”

  “Oh, lord,” she said. “I don’t know one thing from another when it comes to vehicles.” She narrowed her eyes and looked up at the sky. “It’s a nice car. Dark blue? Maybe green.” She shrugged. “Could be black, I suppose. Expensive-looking. Big. Quite new, I’d say. That’s about all I can tell you.”

  Now all three dogs were lying down. The greyhounds, Spite and Malice, lay on their sides. They appeared to be sleeping. Henr
y had his chin on his paws and was watching the other two warily.

  “They’ve made a mess,” said Gladys. “Perhaps they’ll lie still so we can disentangle them.”

  After we got the dogs’ leashes straightened out, she said, “Well, we’re headed for the Common so my boys can visit with their friends. Are you going our way?”

  “No,” I said. “I live in the other direction.” I rummaged around in my briefcase, found one of my business cards, and handed it to her. “If you think of anything that might help me catch up with Ethan, I’d appreciate it if you’d give me a call.”

  She looked at my card. “You’re a lawyer?”

  I nodded.

  “Of course,” she said. “The briefcase, the nice suit. Mr. Duffy’s lawyer?”

  “Yes. And his friend.”

  “Well,” she said, “I’d be happy to call you, of course. But I don’t believe I’ll think of anything I haven’t told you already.”

  “You might notice Connie’s car in the neighborhood or something like that. Maybe somebody else coming to visit.” I smiled at her. “If you run into Ethan, please ask him to call me. Henry misses him.”

  She reached down and patted Henry’s head. “Of course he does,” she said. “Let’s go, boys,” she said to her dogs. She waved and smiled at me, then started down the hill toward Charles Street.

  Henry and I went in the other direction. We continued up Mt. Vernon, turned right on Joy Street, down the hill and across Beacon and diagonally through the Common to Boylston, and we ended up at Skeeter’s, where Henry and I both ordered medium-rare cheeseburgers. A slice of Bermuda onion for me, no onion for Henry. Onions make dogs sick. Skeeter gave Henry a bowl of water. I had coffee.

  At Henry’s request, we visited the park on Commercial Street on the way home. I let him off the leash, and it turned out to be a productive visit. I used a stick to scrape his production into a paper bag I found in a trash barrel and dutifully took it home with me.

  The first thing I did when we got up to my apartment was flush Henry’s production down the toilet. Then I checked the answering machine. No messages, ominous or otherwise. No hangups, even.

  I changed out of my suit and into a pair of Dockers, cotton shirt, and moccasins, grabbed my briefcase, leashed up Henry, and ten minutes later we were in my car heading for Sudbury.