All in all, the richest tidbits from the morning had to do with Hill and Keefe.
Hill had known Draper well enough to mention something about the dead man’s past. He was digging his heels in awfully hard against the idea there could be a partner. He definitely didn’t like Vern. And having previously told me nothing unless I asked him directly, he’d volunteered information he had no reason to think I’d find elsewhere about Rogers serving time.
Frank Keefe, underneath his blarney and charm, had been curious, maybe even suspicious. He’d given me a name I hadn’t had before, Lucinda Graham – a woman who conveniently was now in another city. Since he was the same one who’d told me about Draper talking to wives in the first place, the whole thing could be an attempt to send me after a wild goose.
Puffing out frustration, I paced around my office a couple of times. Why had Hill told me about Rogers being in prison? Should I attribute that to conscientious, albeit unwilling, cooperation, or to Hill’s love of superiority? And why would Keefe spin me a tale of bored wives entertained by the late Hal Draper.
I went out for some soup. Afterward I made phone calls to the previous places of employment listed by everyone working at Wildman’s place. They all panned out. There was no previous address or recent work information for Rogers, but I knew why.
Somewhere along the way I remembered Draper’s secretary mentioning calls and visits from angry men after he’d gone missing. I’d told her I’d stop in to see her again. This seemed like the perfect time for another chat.
Twenty
People loosen up over tea, particularly when they need to lick something sweet off their fingers. On the way to Draper’s office, I stopped and picked up a couple of elephant ears. They were big as a man’s outspread hand, crispy and fragrant with cinnamon. I’d never known what it was to be hungry enough to eat garbage like the woman in the alley, but smelling the pastries set my mouth watering.
Four men got off the elevator when I got on. I didn’t know any of them. The hallway on Draper’s floor was quiet. As I neared his office, I heard a toneless, scarcely varying hum from inside. Pausing for a minute, I listened. If it was Cecilia Perkins, I hoped she didn’t sing in a church choir.
“Oh, hello,” she said in surprise when I’d knocked and she’d called to come in.
The hum had stopped. The edge of my eye caught someone else in the room. I looked around.
“That’s Donnie,” his mother said. “The woman I leave him with needed to see her eye doctor this afternoon, so he came to help me at work, didn’t you, Donnie?”
He stared without answering. Based on his size he was nine or ten, his face flattened out with small features all in the middle.
“Hi,” I said. My skills with kids could probably use a little work.
“Hello,” answered the boy. The sound was distorted like he had a bad cold.
“I’m Maggie,” I said.
He gave me a flickering smile. One hand clutched a pair of snub-nosed scissors. Strewn around him on the floor, where he sat with knees together and legs turned out, were pictures cut from an open Sears and Roebuck catalog.
“Donnie’s working on his collection, aren’t you, Donnie?” his mother explained.
He nodded vigorously.
His work was uneven at best, mostly haphazard shapes. Sometimes he’d managed to clip complete images. Other times, parts had been left behind. I swallowed a lump in my throat, thinking how hard it must be for Cecilia Perkins to sound that cheerful when her heart must ache.
“I thought you might be ready to have some tea,” I said. “I brought treats to go with it. Okay if he has one? We can share.” I showed her the contents of my sack.
“How awfully nice of you. He’ll love it. Let me put the kettle on.”
While she was turning the hotplate on, I went and knelt down by Donnie.
“Want one?” I asked offering him the elephant ears.
He looked from them to me.
“You’ll need to hand it to him,” his mother said over her shoulder.
When I did, his flat face beamed.
“Dank you.”
He took it with the same hand that still held the scissors. As he began to maneuver the oversize pastry toward his mouth, he turned it awkwardly. The scissors tilted toward his eyes.
“Hey, it’ll go easier without the scissors.” I reached for them quickly. “Here, I’ll take them.”
Cecilia, who had started toward us with face going white, halted and sighed.
“Thanks,” she said. “No matter how hard I try to think ahead, something always pops up.”
“Looks like you and Donnie were both busy when I came in.” I nodded at a stack of what looked like more than a dozen typed letters, interlaced with envelopes to accompany each, to the right of her typewriter. On the other side, the Dayton Daily News lay open to the job offerings. Beneath it I could see what looked like two other papers.
“After we talked yesterday, I decided I might as well use up all the stamps,” she said wryly. “Today I’ve been applying everywhere – even a couple of places in Xenia. We have no family, so there’s really no point in trying to remain in Dayton, I guess, apart from Mrs. Graves being so good with Donnie and my not wanting to move him out of the only place he’s familiar with.”
Her shoulders lifted in resignation. She turned away to get our tea.
On the other side of the room her son was taking small, careful bites of his elephant ear. His tongue made a circle around his lips after each one, collecting the crumbs. Occasionally he licked the top of the pastry as well.
I waited until Cecilia and I had sipped some tea and just about finished the elephant ear we were sharing.
“I got to thinking about something you told me yesterday.”
She nodded, dusting her fingers over the torn piece of newspaper we’d used as plates. She waited expectantly.
“You said after Mr. Draper had been missing a couple of days, men began coming in and acting upset because they couldn’t reach him.”
“Yes.”
“And some called as well? Ones you thought seemed irritated?”
“Yes. It’s not that you don’t get an occasional call from someone who’s impatient, or curt, or even downright rude – a secretary does, I mean. But these were... different.”
“Different how?”
She frowned. “Like they suspected something,” she said slowly. “Or thought I was hiding something. The ones who came in hunting him especially.”
“Any chance you might remember who some of them were?”
“Oh, yes. Of course.” Her manner changed to that of a woman dealing matter-of-factly with things she understood. She opened a desk drawer and took out a leather bound notebook. “I keep – kept – a daily record. The phone calls are here.” She opened another drawer.
“Not so nicely filed, I’m afraid,” she apologized as she removed a cardboard box. “Since these would have gone on Mr. Draper’s desk and been thrown away as he looked at them.”
Placing one hand on the contents to keep them from shifting, she turned the box carefully upside down. Starting with the day Draper had disappeared, she read off the names of people who’d telephoned. I scribbled notes. Behind us, Donnie had resumed his toneless humming, punctuated by the slow snips of his scissors. We worked our way through two weeks worth, after which, Cecilia Perkins said, the people who called for her boss seemed more surprised at his sudden absence than upset.
“There was a little code I’d used for years,” she said with a self-conscious laugh. “I put a little tick in the corner so Mr. Draper would be forewarned someone’s feathers were ruffled.”
I thought what a peach of a secretary she was. It brought to mind the one Rachel Minsky had, who seemed the exact opposite.
After that we went through the list of people who’d actually come in upset and looking for Draper. It wasn’t as long. Cecilia had moved the newspapers with the job listings so she could put the book with their name
s where we could both see it.
Of the names she’d marked as being upset, only one was unfamiliar to me. A woman named Ingrid had called twice, scolding that Draper had missed his weekly sauna and massage.
“She called again later, too,” Cecilia said with a laugh. “She said to tell Mr. Draper she was taking him off her regular schedule. Goodness! I’d hate to have her out of sorts and slamming me around on a massage table!”
Ulysses Smith, Charles Preston, Frank Keefe and the other two men who’d invested in Draper’s phoney scheme all had telephoned. So had James C. Hill. Smith and one of the others had called a second time. Preston and Keefe had both called three times. There had been a few other upset callers who’d been noted on slips, but hadn’t left names.
“All men?” I inquired.
“Yes, I think so. Ingrid has a somewhat low voice for a woman, but she also has quite a thick accent. And as you can see by the other messages, she’s not shy about leaving her name.”
I patted my finger up and down the edge of people who’d come in. Charles Preston, who had subsequently committed suicide. Frank Keefe ... then Keefe again.
“Keefe came in twice?” It fit the suggestion of scrappiness in his manner.
“He didn’t give his name the second time – just in and out looking ready to spit nails. But I remembered him. He’s very nice-looking.” Her cheeks turned pink.
“And the one you listed as ‘Scary’?”
“He wouldn’t give his name – and he was scary. Oh, he didn’t threaten or anything, but....” She shook her head wordlessly.
My interest quickened. “What did he look like?”
Small furrows appeared at the bridge of her nose as she thought.
“Do you know, I’m not sure I even noticed what color his hair was. Dark, I think. He wasn’t particularly big or tall, and there was nothing rough about his clothes or the way he spoke. Only....” She shook her head again. “I can’t explain. There was something about him. The way he just stood there, looking at me – looking through me – when I told him Mr. Draper appeared to have gone off without telling anyone where he was going.”
She shivered.
I tried to fit the description to someone I’d met, but I couldn’t. The name beneath it appeared to be a separate listing. I pointed.
“Vern Tarkington? Is that who you’re talking about?”
“Oh no.” Cecilia’s mouth tightened. “That one was rude and obnoxious, but he wasn’t scary. Demanded to see Mr. Draper. Yelled. Accused me of lying – all the time shaking his finger and ignoring me three times when I asked for his name.”
“Then how did you know–?”
“He threw his matchbook on my desk. Right after he ripped a match out to light a cigarette. He said tell my boss ‘if he tries to dodge Vern he’ll be sorry.’ Then he stormed out. The name on the matchbook was Vern Tarkington Autos. I was down in the dumps and it made me laugh seeing he sold cars since he’d used the word ‘dodge’.”
Twenty-one
I don’t care much for babies or kids either one, although plenty of people think I ought to settle down and have a passel. Kids are smelly and sticky and not very interesting. But today I’d met two who were just about opposites. I found myself thinking about them as I walked toward Finn’s at the end of the day.
Little Stuart Wildman had everything a kid could want, except maybe enough love. The poor kid was scared something bad might happen to his father. Donnie Perkins, with his clumsily cut out collection of pictures, didn’t have much except love. He and his mother would likely end up on the street if she couldn’t find work.
Draper’s con had done more than fleece rich people who mostly could afford it. He’d hurt innocent people too. If he’d had a partner, that partner was just as guilty, and I meant to find whoever it was.
“Maggie, sweet Maggie. Come and give us a kiss,” crooned Wee Willie Ryan patting the barstool beside him as the door to Finn’s closed behind me and I shook off rain.
“I only see one of you, and I wouldn’t kiss it on a bet.” I slid onto the offered barstool. “If you buy me a pint, though, I might be persuaded not to tell your oldest why you had to wear a frilly apron for two weeks in Sister Mary-Patrick’s class.”
Finn and a couple of others along the bar pricked their ears with hopeful interest and started to chuckle.
“I wouldn’t insult your standing as a successful businesswoman by buying,” Willie responded, unruffled. We’d know each other forever.
“I would,” someone else volunteered.
Behind the bar, Finn’s wife shared a look with me and rolled her eyes. Finn grinned, flashing a front tooth that was mostly silver. He already was putting a perfect head on a Guinness which he knew very well I’d want on my own tab. I yakked with Willie while he finished his stout. He walked a mail route and had a wife he was crazy about, so he never stayed long. A stranger took his place, freeing me to turn my back to the bar and retreat into thought while the pub’s familiar sounds coddled me like reading in bed on a Sunday morning.
The most interesting finding from my chat with Cecilia Perkins was that Vern had lied to me. Not that I was surprised. I’d suspected it yesterday when he barged in on my confab with Dorothy. Now, though, I had proof. Not only had he known Harold Draper, he’d gone to Draper’s office. He’d been hot under the collar, too, by the sounds of it. Despite what Hill thought, Vern was looking better and better as a candidate for being Draper’s partner.
Before I confronted him with the lie I wanted to think about it some more, see where it might lead me. When I’d returned to my office after my talk with Cecilia, I’d let it simmer. I’d busied myself making notes, running down information for a regular client, making a couple of calls to people I knew in hopes they might have or know of openings for a first-rate secretary. They didn’t.
Now, as I watched tables fill up at Finn’s, I found myself thinking of Vern again. Much as I wanted him to be Draper’s partner, something didn’t feel right. For one thing, he was too hot tempered. Too much of a loud-mouth, too. Based on the one time I’d met him, he seemed as much of a freeloader as Wildman and Hill both regarded him.
I was thinking about it when Seamus and Connelly burst through the door. They were shaking off rain and chattering like schoolboys, so caught up in conversation the rest of the world had ceased to exist.
“You look like a happy man, Seamus. Getting married, are you?” Finn teased.
Sixty, taciturn and afflicted with a bad knee, Seamus positively swaggered. His chest was puffed out and his shovel-shaped jaw gave a thrust that imparted a cocky air.
“Got me a Victrola,” he announced proudly. “Mick and me like to stayed up ’til sunrise the last two nights listening to music, haven’t we, Mick?”
Connelly wasn’t floating as high in the clouds, but his nod was more than a little besotted. “Makes a man’s spirits soar, I’ll tell you that.”
“Michael Coleman fiddling and a couple of lads playing jigs – those ones came with it, ’cause that was the deal we struck.” Seamus’ head bobbed, affirming his bargaining skills. “And I bought Patsy Tuohey doing some fine reels. Then last night, Mick made me a gift of a record – by a concertina player if you will.”
I listened in fascination. I’d never heard Seamus string so many sentences together at one time.”
“Patsy Tuohey, that old piper from Galway?” asked one of the listeners. “My cousin in New York wrote about hearing him play. Said it was the grandest thing he’d ever heard.”
“First rate. I’ll tell you, though, those jigs is awful nice too. How did that one go?” Closing his eyes in thought, he started to didle a tune: “DI-de-de di-de-de, DI-dl-de, di-did-dl....” His bony hands lifted and stiff leg and all he started to dance as Connelly chimed in on the wordless lilting.
The room had grown silent. A quiet old fellow they thought they knew had changed colors before them. Connelly’s hand darted under his jacket and brought out a pennywhistle. He started t
o play the tune in question, each note sweet and precise. A few of the old-timers started to clap out the beat. Seamus grinned, but after a few more measures he gave out, heading toward the bar and a pint. He grinned sheepishly as he received congratulatory slaps on the back.
“Look there. Mick plays,” Finn’s wife said nudging her husband.
“Learns fast, too,” Seamus bragged as Connelly put the whistle away. “Has two of those tunes we’ve been listening to down already.”
“You should get out that fiddle of yours and play with him, Finn.” Rose picked some glasses out of soapy water and started to rinse them.
Tough Cookie (Maggie Sullivan mysteries) Page 11
