Red Herrings Can't Swim (Nod Blake Mysteries Book 2)

by Doug Lamoreux

  “Of course.” She rose in one smooth move, cat-like as ever, and stepped from her circular pedestal offering a hand. I hesitated only an instant, remembering the last time we'd touched, then told myself I was being stupid. What, after all, were the odds of triggering another flash? I took the hand. All went well, even better. Most of the women in my life had cold hands (and hearts). As before, this one was warm with a firm pleasing grip. You don't get that every day among the debutantes. “Danita Callicoat,” she said. “You probably don't remember me.”

  “Certainly, I remember,” I said, noting her friendly greeting came with a glare from the hired help. “Yesterday morning in the Navy Pier dormitory–”

  “Oh, come, Mr. Blake. Neither of us did anything memorable yesterday.” She smiled, enjoying herself. “I was speaking of the evening in Master Criswell's parlor.”

  “Ah, yes. Only a select few have heard my trumpet solo.”

  She laughed. It was a nice laugh. “It lives in infamy,” Mrs. Callicoat said. “My mother-in-law is still in shock. And desperately looking for a new medium to replace the one you despoiled.”

  “My talents are endless. Offer your mother-in-law my apologies, will you?”

  She turned to the sweating chauffeur. “That's all, Rudy.”

  He didn't look a 'Rudy' to me. But, as I no longer take my shirt off in public, I admit my prejudice. Rudy, the chauffeur, released the trigger on his spray nozzle killing the water flow. He swept the two of us with his eyes; not a happy camper. Mrs. Callicoat seemed okay with that. Still smiling, she told him, “You can finish that later. I'd like to talk with Mr. Blake alone.” She gave him a moment to respond and, when he didn't, still smiling, raised the volume and lowered the tone. “You can go.”

  Rudy didn't like it. But he dragged his hose past the wagons to the near wall, tossed it in a pile, and turned off the tap. He grabbed his shirt, bowed slightly to his mistress, and went without giving me another look.

  “Rudy Ace, my chauffeur and valet,” Mrs. Callicoat said. “He's rather protective.” I nodded my understanding and that took care of Rudy. She returned to her concrete stage and her silver breakfast set up. “Would you care for some coffee?”

  “Thank you. Black.”

  She poured and brought it to me on a saucer. I took it awkwardly, proving what we both already knew, that socially I was out of my league. Then she stated a simple undeniable fact. “You lied to my circus manager yesterday. You told him you were an author.”

  “A writer, actually, for 'Little Folks' Magazine.”

  “It was a lie?” she asked. I nodded. “Then do the details matter?”

  “Certainly; especially with a lie. In my business, it's vital to keep your lies straight.”

  “So… you are a liar?”

  “Absolutely. I already said, it goes with the business.”

  “That night in his salon Master Criswell said you were a detective. But he made it stronger. He called you a snooper, I think?”

  “We started so nicely,” I said with a smile. “Coffee and all. Then it went downhill fast. That's your second nasty crack. Maybe I should call your chauffeur back to protect me?”

  The rich widow frowned.

  “Don't get me wrong. I'm sure I'd benefit from a discussion of my character – or lack thereof – but coffee won't cut it. We'd need cocktails, a meal, and after dinner cigars. And we'd only scratch the surface.”

  “I didn't mean to offend you.”

  “Yes, you did. If only as a test. But it was a waste because I'm not offended. I'd love to have the conversation. After, we could do you. Without knowing a thing about you, Mrs. Callicoat, I'm already convinced still waters run deep. I wouldn't mind taking a peek at all. Let's schedule it for when our current affair is wrapped up. In the meantime, let's save time. We'll agree, I'm a cad. I wouldn't trust me any further than I could throw me. Now… Why did you want to see me? Or should we skip to why I agreed to see you?”

  “You have been… detecting… around my circus. I want to know why. That's reasonable, isn't it, to know what it is you're after? Why you're there pretending to be someone you are not? What is it you're looking for? I want to know what your game is?”

  “Don't you know?”

  “I do not.”

  “If that's true… Then, yes, you have a right to know why I'm sticking my nose into your affairs.”

  “Oh?” She looked shocked. It could have been baloney but one gets a feel for these things. Her reaction seemed real enough.

  “If it's true,” I repeated. I took a sip of my coffee. It was good coffee. “Are you aware a number of your employees have gone missing?”

  “I know one of the Sideshow performers left suddenly. The Bearded Lady. The Major told me that yesterday.”

  “Left for where?”

  “I don't know. He didn't say. I don't think he knew. He was annoyed, that's all. I don't blame him. I doubt bearded ladies grow on trees. But he didn't seem surprised. There's nothing notable in circus performers appearing or disappearing without notice. As I understand it many are, by nature, gypsies. They come and go like the tide.” She sipped her coffee. “You said a number of employees? The Major didn't mention others. What others?”

  She seemed taken aback. That took me aback. Was I being played? Or was it really news to her? That in itself would have been informative. But the interview was going backwards. I was either slipping or the head injuries were catching up with me. A good detective never gave more information than he got. I was giving away the farm. But I needed some place to start so I continued cautiously forward.

  “Do you know Michael Gronchi?” I asked, watching for a reaction.

  “No.” She shook her head. “The name means nothing to me. Was he–”

  “Employed by you? Yes.”

  “And he's gone missing?”

  “For a short time. Actually, he's gone dead.”

  “Dead? How did he die?”

  “He was attacked two nights ago at your circus and given a hand off the Pier into Lake Michigan.”

  “That's horrible.”

  “He thought so too.”

  Unsure what to do with that, she decided to ignore it. “He drowned?”

  “No. Do you know anything about him?”

  “No, of course not. I already said I didn't know the man. He was an employee? Doing what?”

  “Sweeping up spilled popcorn and horse poop.”

  “I don't know the maintenance workers. I'm sorry.”

  “In the old days he was a performer, a circus geek, but that was long ago and far away.”

  “This may sound cold or distant but my connection with the circus is tenuous at best. I inherited one. That's all. I have little to do with it. I'd love to sell it. But people aren't buying circuses these days.”

  “No one has mentioned Gronchi's name or his absence in the last two days?”

  “Are you asking if anyone has confessed to killing him? Not to me. I repeat, Mr. Blake, until this moment I've never heard the name. Besides, who could have mentioned it? I don't know anyone at the circus but The Major. My only contact with the show is to occasionally discuss needed business with him, as on yesterday morning when you saw us.”

  “Where we you two nights ago?”

  Mrs. Callicoat paused. Then she gasped. I thought she might spill her coffee but she got it under control. Anger flared in her eyes. She opened her mouth, closed it again, then she took a deep breath and the fire disappeared. It was quite a show and I saw it to the credits. “When you're born rich,” she finally said, reddening. “People go out of their way to avoid annoying you. On the rare occasion they do, it's unforgivable. When you're born poor and fall into riches, as in my case, people who used to annoy you stop. You forget what it was like to be annoyed. When you finally remember, you also recall you can handle it.” She smiled and the blush faded from her cheeks. “Where was I two nights ago? I was fighting desperately not to yawn at a charity gala in downtown Chicago; a dinner and silent auc
tion that lasted just short of forever. I'm certain all of the cringe-worthy details can be found, with pictures, in the Society pages of the World's Greatest Newspaper.”

  “Thank you. Just to tie all of the bows, where were you yesterday? Late afternoon and into the evening?”

  “Yesterday? Why?”

  “Humor me.”

  “I was…” She put her brain on it. “Here.” She reconsidered, then nodded her agreement. “Here. I didn't go anywhere at all yesterday.”

  “Rudy can vouch for you?”

  “My chauffeur?”

  “And valet,” I added.

  She gave me a twisted look, frowned, apparently decided I wasn't worth the argument, and turned her thoughts to the question. “No, Rudy can't vouch for me. He was off. My maid was here. If necessary she can, what's the phrase, 'Give me an alibi'. Why do I need one for yesterday?”

  I considered again my rule about not handing out information. If she was innocent of the diabolical doings at her circus, and it was certainly possible she was, she had a right to know what I wanted and why. She might even help me to figure the mess out. If she was innocent, that is. But was she acting? If so, she should have been a performer instead of an owner. Because I was buying it. I might have been wrong, but I didn't think she had killed Mickey. I didn't think she had killed Sybil either. I didn't know if I trusted her, but I trusted me. Feeling the way I did, it made sense to, not necessarily dump the bag, but to give her a peek inside.

  “There's been a second murder.”

  I was still watching her reactions. And still saw only what I read as real shock.

  “Another employee of the circus?” she asked. I nodded. “But The Major has said nothing–”

  “It's the missing employee you and he discussed.”

  “The Bearded Lady?”

  I nodded again. “Killed yesterday afternoon at the circus museum in Wisconsin.”

  “Our Bearded Lady?”

  “Sybil. Yes.” I decided to really test the waters. “Her real name, his real name, was Gerald Lapinski.”

  For an instant, I thought she'd drop her cup and saucer to shatter on the concrete like they do in the movies. She didn't. Again she got a hold on herself but, shaken badly by the news, set the coffee down not to drop it. She was still ringing true. “Our Bearded Lady was a man?”

  “All three hundred pounds of him,” I said. “But every ounce a lady.”

  The widowed circus owner didn't laugh. Nor did she meet my stare. In truth, she looked a bit green about the gills. The revelation of Sybil's gender, and the fraud her circus had been perpetrating upon the paying public, seemed a greater shock than the revelations of the murders had been. I didn't deduct points for it; human minds processed information differently. What mattered was I was more convinced than ever the shenanigans at the circus had occurred without her knowledge.

  “Are you all right, Mrs. Callicoat?”

  “Yes, I'm… It's all so…” She finally managed to look up. “Please, call me Danita.”

  “All right, Danita.”

  “You were Mr. Blake last week at the séance. And, yesterday you were, if I remember right, 'just Blake'. Have you a first name?”

  “Yes. But Blake will do.” I handed her my cup and saucer and strode away. It was time to change the game up and push. “What do you know of the acts working for you?”

  “Very little. I–”

  “Tommy Dagger?” I pointed to the poster.

  “The knife thrower?”

  “It's a reasonable question.”

  “Yes. I suppose it is. I wish I could give you a reasonable answer. But I don't know the acts in the circus; not in any personal way. My husband was the circus fanatic. It was his toy. You're aware I recently lost my husband?”

  “I am. My condolences.”

  She nodded, accepting them, without thanks. Then she looked past me to take in the wagons, wheeled cages, banners and posters surrounding us. She set down my cup, paced a bit, then laid a hand on the sculpted molding at the corner of the nearest wagon. “Reginald came here to escape the world.”

  “Would seem to do the trick,” I said, following her lead and looking around. “A fantasy world of make believe. The artwork, the wagons, fun and exotic but hardly functional.”

  “You have a good eye, Blake,” Danita said. “And a reasoning mind. The real circus wagons, the everyday functional wagons, were that; work wagons. A few of those exist as collectors' items. Most were dismantled, ages ago, stripped of their steel for war.”

  “Which war?”

  “Name one,” Danita said with a sad smile. She returned to rubbing the gold painted surface. “Most of these were street models, built for show. Their only function was to roll slowly in parade, to make the crowds gasp, and make the people follow them to the Big Top. Beyond that,” Danita said, turning. “I don't really know much about it. As I said, it was Reginald's world.”

  “Yet you take your coffee in this gallery?”

  She stared trying, it seemed, to decide how to take the question. I waited with a curious, but innocent, expression. Let her take it how she would. She softened and looked away. “When I want to be near my husband, I come here.”

  Uh huh, I thought. Thinking of hubby with morning coffee and chauffeur cheesecake. I know, I'm a cynic. Hoping for something on Reginald and Danita a bit closer to reality, I dove back in. “Kindred spirits, your husband and you?”

  “Nothing of the kind. As a matter of fact, we were virtually opposites. My husband was a dignified middle-aged prude. I was fighting to hold on to my youth. He feared and agonized over the future like an anxious child. I dwelled in – and ran from – the past like a tired and depressed old woman. We weren't kindred spirits at all. We were a mess. But we were in love… once upon a time. That's how fairy tales begin, don't they, Blake? And fairy tales are filled with ornate coaches.”

  “I'll take your word for it. I'm no expert.”

  “Nor am I.” Danita returned to her 'center ring' patio and reclaimed her chair and cup. “I have my own pass times. But when I want to be near Reginald, I come here.”

  She shook away her reverie, showing ire, whether at me or herself, I wasn't sure. “What are you, Blake? A second-rate detective who's let me steer you off the subject to garner your sympathy? Or are you better at what you do than I gave you credit for? Have I bared my soul to a heartless cop?” She smiled her patented amused smile and sipped her coffee.

  “Back to the present,” I said.

  “Yes. When it comes to the circus, Blake; the circus operating on Navy Pier… If you have questions, you'll need to ask The Major. I was aware our Bearded Lady had left us. I knew of no other missing employees. I knew, I know, nothing about any murders. I know only what he tells me. He tells me only what I need to know for the show to go on. I own the circus. I sign checks.” She paused. “Speaking of which… who hired you?”

  “A client's name, if there was one, wouldn't come into it. Confidentiality. But this time around the question doesn't apply. I haven't got a client nor have I been hired. I'm snooping for me.” To show her how at ease I was in snooping for me, I raised a hand to one of the wagons intending to lean like the confident private eye I was. When I made contact with the wagon, the psychic flash came so quick I had no time to formulate my regret. The Callicoat pavilion disappeared.

  You know the story from there, sisters and brothers, the pain, the heat, the ringing in my ears, the colored lights, the temporary blindness. The oh-so-familiar feelings that were absolutely impossible to get used to. Finally, the blackness as I arrived wherever the vision had taken me.

  That too was familiar. I heard splashing water, coughing, sputtering, and… Over there, though I had no inkling of distance or direction, I made out the head and shoulders of the drowning man. Still he had no face. But he had a voice and, weakly, struggling for breath, he used it – this time to call me by name.

  “Blake. Blake. Help! Help… me! Down… here…”

  T
hen the world, at least the world I was in, stood on its head – while I took a blow to mine.

  I was lost, completely disconcerted. I don't know if, in the telling, I can make it make sense. I was in the same place, the same dark water but, suddenly, the drowning man was gone. He was gone and I, as suddenly, was choking, gagging, and could not catch my breath. I heard an explosion and, an instant later, felt a sharp blow above my left temple. I disappeared into oblivion.

  I have no notion how long the unconsciousness lasted. When I came to there was no doubt – I had taken the place of the drowning man. My forehead ached, but that was the least of my troubles. I had a mouth full of filthy water. I spit it out, choking. I gasped. I gagged. I bobbed to my chin in foaming freezing water. It was dark as pitch and I strained but saw nothing; nothing but the dirty black water and churning white foam flooding over me, dragging me to my doom. I fought it. I splashed. I kicked trying to hold the surface. I ached all over, the injury (whatever it was) split my skull, and I was dead exhausted.

  “Help!” I cried weakly, in another man's voice. Then I choked and gagged and swallowed more filthy water. “Help… me! Down… here…”

  The vision passed. Still gasping, I got a breath. I took one, then another, filling my lungs. I flailed my arms, trying to stay afloat, but soon saw it wasn't necessary. I was kneeling on gravel on solid ground. I grabbed the wooden spokes of the painted wagon wheel beside me and leaned heavily until I had my balance. No longer dying the death of the drowned man, I saw the hallucination was gone and I was back in the Callicoat wagon pavilion.

  But the embarrassing truth was I had never left. I found immediate proof when I looked up to see Danita Callicoat standing nearby, mixed horror and shock on her face, staring down at me as if I were a mad man. “Blake? Are you… Are you all right?”

  “Do you know Michael Gronchi?” I shouted.

  “I… I… I've already told you. I don't.”

  I'd scared her. I didn't care and demanded again. “Think! Michael Gronchi? Mickey? Do you know him?”