by Brian Meeks
Henry walked the four blocks to his friend’s combination office and apartment. In truth, it was more a combination pig sty and junk yard.
Henry knocked.
Alan Finnegan peered through the peephole, and said, “Henry Wood, my old friend," and started to undo the numerous locks.
The door opened, and Henry extended a hand. Alan grabbed it and pulled him into a bear hug.
Alan led him past boxes of wires, transistors, and tubes. There was a single bed on one side of the room and a desk next to it. Several floor lamps bathed the desk in light. A giant magnifying glass on an arm hovered over a transistor waiting to be soldered. There were piles of papers, letters, and magazine articles lying about. Henry picked up a letter and asked, “Alan, what is all of this? You get madder by the day.”
Alan made a noise resembling laughter and said, “I know, but the world gets crazier every minute. It's hard to keep up. You see that letter there? The one you're holding.”
“It has three coffee cup stains on it. It must be important.”
“See the name at the bottom.”
Henry read aloud, “It’s from Jack Kirby."
"He has some ideas about creating miniature components and connecting them to one another. It's cutting edge stuff. Currently, it's just theoretical but looks promising.”
“Once connected, what would they do?”
“All sorts of exciting things…” He paused, not being able to explain it in such a way that he thought Henry would understand.
“It's okay. We can leave the explanation for another day. I'm in a bit of a hurry anyway. I need your help.”
“Sure thing, Henry, what do you need?”
“What does it mean when you hear a clicking sound on the phone?”
“It sounds like your line has been tapped. Or maybe it's the line of the person you called. How obvious is the clicking?”
“I can barely hear it, but it's there. I noticed it twice today.”
“Hmm, it's hard to say. It could also be a bad line. How old is the building you're in? I heard about your other place getting torched.”
“Yeah, I moved. I'm in the Flatiron, now.”
“That place is fifty-three years old...could be the wiring. You want me to check it out?”
“Could you come by in the morning? There’s twenty bucks in it for you.”
“What time?”
“Say 8:00?”
“I’ll be there. Which office is yours?”
“I'm on the third floor, end of the hall, near the point. It's number 309.”
Henry found his own way out and grabbed a cab to the restaurant. He would be early, but that was fine. He wanted to sit and jot down some notes from the day. There was a lot to think about, and, if he didn’t get it down, he might forget it. He also wanted to be there when she arrived to watch her enter and to see how she carried herself. He was expecting a diva.
He wasn’t disappointed.
CHAPTER 16
Henry sat at the far end of the bar. He could see the door and everyone who had come through had been with someone. She seemed confident on the phone that he would be able to know it was her. Was she just vain? Or spoiled? Or…
She walked in, head held high, wearing a long coat. As she crossed the threshold, she removed the coat and laid it over her arm. A wave of attention swept across the restaurant. Heads turned, wives became offended, and Henry noticed himself sucking in his stomach. The black dress, silk stockings, and hour glass figure moved effortlessly through the crowd. When she saw Henry, her eyes locked on his. She smiled. How had she known it was me who was waiting for her? he thought and then realized he was the only person sitting alone.
When she stood next to him, Henry’s throat became dry. “Mr. Wood, I presume?” She reached out her hand, expecting him to kiss it. Henry gathered his wits and shook it instead.
“Yes, it’s a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Pollard.”
They moved to a table, and Henry spent a few minutes listening to her talk about herself. For all her beauty, her self-involvement was enough to remove the luster. When it became unbearable, he said, “I was wondering if I might ask you a few questions about Daniel Kupton.”
“What sort of questions?”
“You were close to him?”
“Yes, so?”
“No need to get defensive. I'm trying to understand what happened.”
“He jumped out of a building. That’s what happened.” She lit a cigarette, took a drag, and let out a puff of smoke.
“You and Mr. Kupton ever fight?”
“You sound like a cop. What is this about?”
“I was hired to look into his death.”
Tapping her cigarette against the ashtray she said, “By that chubby wife of his, no doubt. She wasn’t good enough for him.”
“And you were…good enough.”
“Honey, I’m great.”
“The night it happened, did you see Daniel?”
“Is that bitch trying to cut me out of the will?”
“I don’t know anything about the will. Were you in it?”
“Daniel said he would take care of me. What do you think?”
“I bet a lot of men say that to you.”
She wanted to be offended, but it was true. She took another drag from her cigarette.
Henry could see how Cynthia had gotten Daniel wrapped around her little finger. She had the looks, sure, but it was her confidence, her attitude, that was really intoxicating.
Henry said, “I’m not telling you who hired me, but I'll tell you this. I don’t think he jumped.”
This seemed to take a while to register. She had a look of confusion at first; it changed to sadness, then realization. “He said something about two men following him.”
“What men?”
“Daniel talked about his business a lot. Most of it was boring, so I would just listen and nod. For the last few weeks, he had been coming around less often. I asked him why, and all he said was he thought some men were following him. He didn’t want me to be in danger.”
“Did he say what sort of danger?”
“No, and I didn’t ask. Who would want to hurt me? Everyone loves me.”
“Did he say anything else about the men, who they worked for or how they dressed?”
“Just that they wore dark suits. I told him everyone wore dark suits.” Another drag from the cigarette and then continued, “So you don’t know anything about the will?”
“Sorry, no. Did he ever mention any business associates or anyone who might have a grudge?”
“I met a business friend once. Strange fellow, though.”
“You remember his name?”
“Sure, it was Martin Van Sythe. He kept looking at my chest and then pretending he wasn’t all while talking about some boat or something. I think he was investing with Daniel. He was a very strange man.”
“You said that twice. What made him strange?”
“He talked quickly and kept changing subjects. He seemed nervous. I told Daniel he should find new friends because this guy was weird.”
Henry wrote down the name. The waiter arrived to take their order. The food was great, and Henry enjoyed the looks of envy from the other guys in the restaurant. When he asked Cynthia what she did, she looked at him like he was crazy. She was a kept woman and her look said, "work was for the ugly." When she started to ramble on about her childhood, Henry tuned her out and started to think about tomorrow’s lineup for the Dodgers.
What Henry hadn’t noticed were the two gentlemen at the corner table by the kitchen. They had slipped in after Cynthia arrived and taken a seat at the back. They noted everything; what Henry and Cynthia had ordered for dinner, their mannerisms and the pieces of the conversation they could hear over the crowd noise. The man facing Cynthia could read lips and wrote down what she said. Neither man looked happy.
CHAPTER 17
“So was she beautiful?” Luna asked.
“Define beautiful.” Henr
y answered as he plugged in the strange little device.
Luna sat across the kitchen table from Henry and gave him a look. She was adorable and Henry’s fondness for her seemed to be growing daily.
Luna opened the box and read the cover aloud, "Billy Joel, The Stranger 30th Anniversary Edition. Look at this…” She pointed to the date, ‘Live at Carnegie Hall, June 3, 1977,' and looked at Henry. Henry shook his head, still unsure of what it meant that he had a closet with a fondness for the future. The obvious questions, ‘How did it work?’, ‘Why him?’, and ‘Who sent the stuff?’ were ones he rarely asked as he couldn’t even begin to wrap his mind around any possible answers.
“Twenty seven years from now. Let’s give it a listen and see what they are up to in the seventies.”
Luna took out the contents as Henry grabbed a bottle of wine. “Look, there is a journal sort of thing and a picture book…oh, and another record.”
“I think they are called DVDs.”
“What does DVD mean?”
“I don’t know.”
“These two say CD on them, but they look the same.”
Henry took the first disk, a CD, and put it in the little player. He hesitated before hitting the button to start it. “You have your paper ready?”
Luna flipped open her notebook. It was just like Henry’s. When he had given it to her earlier, she had squealed with delight. Now she was acting professional and picked up her pencil. “I’m ready.”
“Anything you find interesting, jot it down. We have no idea why the closet sends me this stuff, but there is always a reason.”
He hit the play button, and a list of titles appeared on the screen. They both started writing them down, starting with “Movin’ Out (Anthony’s Song)”.
Luna said, “Music from the future. It’s nice. He just mentioned Hackensack; maybe it's a clue?”
Henry wrote, "Sutherland street down," then hit pause. A chill ran down his spine. “I didn’t tell you about this morning.”
Henry recounted the trip to the Woolworth building and their surprise at the twenty-third floor being empty.
She looked excited and pushed the button. The song continued. They listened to one after another: “The Stranger”, “Just the Way You Are”, and when "Scenes from an Italian Restaurant” started, Luna said, “I really like music from the future. Hey, look, we have a bottle of red.” It was half empty, and she was taking fewer notes. “Dance with me.”
She pulled him up from the kitchen table. They started to sway together until the change in tempo and then Luna let go and bopped around the room. She didn’t know where the song was going nor did she care. Henry liked her easy way with life.
“It's a story. Fun.” Luna said.
Henry sat back down and wrote, "Brenda and Eddie" in his notebook.
She stopped dancing and said, “Oh, it has a sad ending; they got a divorce. But it's still fun to dance to.” She started bopping around again. Luna waved "Brenda and Eddie Goodbye." The tempo changed again, and she grabbed Henry and said, “He is quite the piano player.” She looked into his eyes, then rested her head on his chest. They swayed for a while, right into "Vienna". The notes could wait; Henry could listen for clues later.
Henry turned off the player after "Vienna" finished. Luna looked up at Henry with tired eyes and said, “I should probably be getting home.”
Henry gave her a long slow kiss. She wrapped her arms around him and gave him a tight hug. “Detective work is nice.”
Henry said, “I think I'm going to go back to the city and do a bit more work.”
“Don’t stay up too late...Opening Day tomorrow. I’ve never been to an Opening Day.”
“Don’t worry about me. I hear Carl Erskine is getting the start.”
Luna smiled. She had no idea who Carl Erskine was, but she liked how excited Henry got when talking baseball.
Henry snuck in one more kiss before he said goodbye. It was about 11:00, and Henry had too much on his mind to pack it in for the evening. He brought the player and box with him and drove to his apartment.
It was an easy drive into the city.
The hallway outside his apartment was quiet. Henry opened the door. He walked in, set the player on the table, and went to grab a beer from the fridge. The phone rang before he got there. “Hello?”
“Henry, this is Mike, I tried a little while ago, but you didn’t answer.”
“I was out with Luna and just got back.”
“I know it’s late, but I need you to come down to a crime scene.”
“Sure, who is it?”
“I wouldn’t have bothered you, but, after the Woolworth building today, well, it was too much of a coincidence.”
“What was?”
“The victim has a picture of Daniel Kupton on her bedside table.”
“The victim, is it Cynthia Pollard?”
“Yeah, how’d you know?”
“I had dinner with her, tonight. She was his mistress.”
“I’ll send a car.”
* * *
Henry walked onto Cynthia's floor. Mike was standing in the hall talking to another officer. “This way,” Mike said.
They stopped at the door. The chain had been broken. In her hallway, a vase had been knocked off the table, and they carefully stepped over the puddle of water and lilies. Cynthia Pollard was lying on the floor next to her couch. She was wearing only a silk robe. Henry could see the red marks of a rope burn around her neck. He felt sick. More than that, he was angry.
“What time did you get the call?”
“The lady upstairs heard a scuffle and called at 9:27 pm. The first officer on the scene arrived less than five minutes later.”
“Any witnesses see someone leaving?”
“No, which is strange, as it's a secure building. The doorman reports that she got out of a cab at 9:10. He said there was a guy with her.”
“That would have been me.”
“Oh, yeah…right…sorry.”
Henry gave them a rundown of his evening. After a look around the apartment, he went with Mike down to the station to fill out an official report. The song "The Stranger", or at least the whistling, ran through his head.
CHAPTER 18
It didn’t matter that he barely knew her; they had broken bread. Henry sat alone at Mike’s desk. He filled out an official report. Mike had called Luna, just to check the alibi and make it official. Henry didn’t mind.
Henry looked at the stack of file folders next to the name plate "Mike McDermott Detective." It was a strange collection of names on the tabs. Henry didn’t give it much thought as he cared little about Mike’s other cases. It was hard to imagine who might have killed Cynthia beyond a jealous Mrs. Kupton. He considered his client Amy Silverton, but dismissed her without any reason other than he didn’t want it to be her. She had seemed less than friendly towards Cynthia when she mentioned her as the mistress. Still, Henry thought that to hire a detective, then go out and kill someone without leaving any proof, seemed unlikely.
He knew Mike would be obligated to check out Mrs. Kupton, so he didn’t add it to his list. Seeing Amy was now tops on Henry's list. Obviously, there were more people in Daniel’s life, and he needed to know who they were. One of them must have killed Cynthia, but why? What could she have known or done to deserve it?
Mike returned with two cups of black coffee. “I called the captain and told him what was going on. I hated to wake his wife, but with Cynthia's connection to Kupton, I knew he would want to know.”
“What did he say?”
“Not much, just took it in.”
“Did you tell him about the disappearing tenants from the twenty-third floor?” asked Henry.
Mike said, “Yep, I told him when I got back to the station after dropping you off. He agreed that it seemed strange, but he isn’t convinced we have a murder on our hands. He said that people must move out of office buildings all the time.”
“I'm sure they do but an entire floor without
anyone noticing?”
“Maybe they were magicians?”
Mike wasn’t known for his sense of humor, but Henry gave him a courtesy laugh anyway.
“I would like to know where they vanished to,” Henry said.
“I wonder how many buildings in town could accommodate that size of tenant on short notice.”
“Who would know something like that?”
The wheels in both their heads were turning but quickly ground to a halt. “I'm beat. I think I’ll head home if you no longer think I'm a suspect.”
Mike said, “You're free to go, my friend. It has been a long day, and I think I’ll head home, too. The case will be here, tomorrow. I'm sure someone in the precinct can figure out where they moved to or, at the very least, knows a real estate person who would. I’ll even check with city hall. Maybe there are permits or something.”
“Permits for what?”
“Sneakiness maybe?”
Henry looked at his watch and smiled. “It’s Opening Day.”
CHAPTER 19
Henry hadn’t slept much, maybe three hours. He had to be back to the office by 7:30 a.m. since Alan was going to be there to check for bugs. At 7:20 he passed Bobby’s office. The door popped open. Normally, the thought of getting roped into a lengthy conversation with Bobby would start the "excuse machine" running.
The strangest thing about Bobby was his office. Henry had only been through the door once. Usually, Bobby sort of slid through into the hall, barely giving a glimpse of what was inside. The one time he was inside, it was filled with mountains of newspapers, magazines, and books. There was a back room, too, which Henry imagined was about the size of Delaware.
