Dead in D Minor

by David Crossman

  “Well, you wouldn’t,” said Cindy, “if it’s still in cloves you know?”

  No, he didn’t. “Cloves,” he said. Cloves were the little black sticks his mother used to stick in ham. So that’s where garlic came from.

  You never stop learning.

  “Look in a dark, dry place,” Cindy suggested. “A closet off the kitchen, the cellar stairs, under the sink – somewhere like that.”

  “Under the sink,” Albert repeated. He often repeated things when the bread of his brain had sopped up all the mental soup it could accommodate. He closed the door quietly behind him and, striking another match, went back to the kitchen.

  “They look like little onions,” said Cindy from the bushes.

  Little onions. Sothat’s where cloves come from.

  There were a lot of dark, dry places. The room was practically constructed of them. Closets. Drawers. Cupboards, and even more in a little room off the kitchen. The pantry. There a little sliding door above the shelf opened into the dining room. There was one at his mother’s house in Maine. His Uncle Albert had called it the ‘pass-through.’ His mother called it the butler’s door.

  They hadn’t had a butler, so it was never used. Things that were never used in Maine, tend to get painted shut.

  This one wasn’t. It moved easily and noiselessly all the way, so a medium-sized butler could still be passed through if he didn’t take too deep a breath.

  Still, no garlic.

  Nothing that looked like onions in the pantry.

  The match burned his fingers. He shook it out, stuck it in his pocket, and lit another.

  Back into the kitchen. One door remained. He opened it revealing a darkness that seemed hesitant to yield to the light from the match, the bright yellow of which faded quickly to gray on the threshold and dragged a threadbare train down the first few steps where it quickly faded to black.

  “Cellar,” Albert said to himself. The word was synonymous with bugs and rats. He hated bugs and rats. Ergo, he hated cellars. His heart apparently concurred. It began tumping out “don’t go down there! Don’t go down there!” in aboriginal rhythms.

  By the time his feet got the message, however, it was too late. He was already halfway down the stairs. Dark. Dry. If ever there was a place created for habitation by garlics, this was it.

  A string was threaded through hooks along the wall. He pulled on it. A light came on somewhere below. The door closed silently behind him.

  The cellar had a very low ceiling, but its similarities to other cellars of Albert’s experience ended there. This was clean, with a concrete floor. A neat work bench with rows of unused tools lined the wall to his left. Beside this were a washer and dryer and a deep sink in the middle of a wide counter. In the corner was a single heating element.

  Set into the wall to the right was a closet with a screen door through which he could see, hanging in a display of concentric wire mesh nets, potatoes and something that looked like tiny onions.

  He tried the door.

  It was locked.

  Why?

  He pressed his nose against the screen, cupped his hands around his eyes, and stared into the dim recesses of the closet. A rank of empty shelves lined the back wall. Jars of preserves together with a bottle of cooking cherry and vanilla occupied the shelves on the right. And the walls to the left were stacked with bottles. Wine, probably.

  Two smoked hams hung in off-white bags from hooks in the ceiling.

  Nothing else.

  Yet, the door was locked.

  “Strange,” said Albert, to whom it was.

  Three seconds later yet another lock had succumbed to Albert’s felonious talents. He plucked a clove of garlic from its stem and held it to his nose.

  There was no smell at all.

  He peeled the dry, papery skin away, revealing the shiny, soft pod beneath. Now he could smell it. Then he made one of the biggest mistakes of his life . . . thus far; he bit into it . . . just to be sure.

  Instantly, his corporeal being was flooded with a tsunami of raw, aggressive, unadulterated garlic.

  There is a time to plan, and a time to spit. Albert instantly recognized this as the latter. Having located a paint bucket in the corner, he spat and he spat, and as he spat, he looked for something else to bite into. Anything would do. Anything but potatoes. He seemed to remember that uncooked potato skins were poisonous. Then again . . . if it were a quick, painless death ...

  He grabbed one of the glass jars from a shelf, opened it, and stuffed some of whatever was in it into his mouth.

  It was soft and squishy and sweet. Jam. Or Jelly. Or pudding. It was hard to distinguish through the garlic.

  Six ounces of whatever it was later, the effect was sufficiently diminished so his brain began to function again. He screwed the lid on the jar and placed it back on the shelf. He noticed the label: ‘Blackberry Preserves.”

  Blackberry and garlic don’t mix.

  He licked the remaining jam from his fingers and wiped them on his pants.

  So, this is where the garlic smell was coming from.

  But how?

  He was just closing the closet door, when Cindy’s whistle raced down the stairs to find him. More frantic this time, though. More wind and less sound. It stopped and was followed immediately by the sound of the front door opening. Footsteps came down the hall toward the back door.

  Chapter Nineteen

  “My word,” said a woman’s voice. It was Maudanne. “How on earth did this get left open?” She was referring to the back door, which she closed. ‘Marchant!?” she called. “Are you home?” There was no reply. “March!” Pause. “Honestly, I don’t know what comes over that boy, leaving the house wide open like that . . . these days!” she said to herself.

  Albert was amazed how clearly the sound carried through the floor.

  As she spoke, she crossed the hall and went into the kitchen. “Now, why do you suppose he’s been lighting matches?” she said.

  She had a highly developed sense of smell. What if she smelled the garlic?

  “Is that garlic I smell?”

  For some reason Albert’s imagination appended ‘fe, fi, fo, fum,’ to the sentence. He didn’t have to wonder where her investigation would take her.

  Jeb, who had accompanied Albert on his inspection, chose that moment to check out the closet, squeezing himself through the crack just as Albert, using all the speed and stealth he could muster, departed, shutting the door behind him.

  The corner under the stairs afforded the only hiding place, and there was no time to spare for feline retrieval. The cellar door opened. “Marchant?” said Maudanne, a little tentatively. “Are you down there?”

  Albert, fumbling frantically, locked the closet door and bolted across the room just as Maudanne began to descend the stairs.

  ‘Now, how did this light get left on? I declare!”

  Her left foot gently came to a rest on the step directly in front of Albert’s face and she hesitated. Maybe she felt the same way about cellars that Albert did.

  “Marchant?” she quizzed, almost whispering. She bent as low as she could and peeked beneath the floor joists.

  Emboldened by what she didn’t see, she descended the stairs and went directly to the closet. “No mistaking that smell,” she said.

  She pressed her nose against the screen and sniffed loudly. This is when Jed chose to announce his predicament, with the result that Maudanne nearly levitated out of her tiny shoes and floated aloft on eyes the size of hot air balloons. “Jeb!” she said breathlessly, as she drifted back to earth. “What are you doing in there?” She tugged at the handle, but to no avail. “How on earth . . . ?”

  She stepped back and surveyed the situation from a distance with her hands on her hips. Suddenly her entire tiny body relaxed. She had realized something. “He’s been into the wine,” she said. She licked her lips and tugged at the door again. Still locked.

  Albert found the running monologue helpful. He wondered, though, w
hy Maudanne didn’t open the door and let Jeb out. He was just about to ask when he remembered he was in hiding.

  “I mustn’t think about it,” she said.

  Albert thought that a little hard on Jeb. He stepped back into the shadows just as Maudanne turned. “Well, you’ll have to wait ‘til young Marchant gets home,” she said. “I’ll have a word or two for him!”

  She went up the stairs, turned off the light, and shut the door.

  Albert began breathing again. He heard the phone ring and Maudanne’s footfalls went off to answer it.

  Jeb meowed softly, self-incriminatingly from the closet as if finally realizing he’d gotten himself into this mess. But it was too late. Maudanne had seen the door shut and locked.

  “Sorry, Jeb,” said Albert, as he felt his way up the stairs.

  He was.

  Doors in most old houses creaked loudly when they were opened and closed. Fortunately, the cellar door refused to be axiomatic. Albert closed it quietly behind him as he stepped into the dark kitchen.

  The phone was in the hall, just outside the kitchen door.

  The only kitchen door.

  Maudanne was on the phone.

  Albert was in trouble.

  “Well, Mother,” Maudanne was saying, “if you don’t want the shrimp, ask them to make you something else.”

  Pause, listen.

  “I said ask them to make you something else,” she said more loudly. Then, lowering her voice so only Albert could hear, she added, “Lord knows we’re paying them enough.”

  Pause. Listen. Listen. Listen. “Yes. Yes, I’m sure they will. What? No. I didn’t notice it was hot.” Pause. “Well, it’s July, Mother . . . I’m sure the air conditioning is working just fine . . . It was when I was there.” Pause. Listen. “I said it was working fine when I was there.” Pause.

  Albert didn’t like eavesdropping, but there was nothing else to do there in the dark with only the thrumming of his pulse in the inner precincts of his temples to measure the time. He could put his fingers in his ears, but that wouldn’t help. Human flesh is too good a conductor of sound. Besides, he might miss something important, like ‘ready or not, here I come.’

  A sudden motion caught the corner of Albert’s eye and dragged his attention to the window.

  Cindy had emerged from the bushes and was peering in his direction, careful to keep an eye on Maudanne in the hallway.

  Albert waved. She didn’t respond. She must not see him. He stepped to the window and waved again. Now she saw him. She began gesturing wildly in a kind of sign language Albert couldn’t attach any particular meaning to, but her sincerity was evident.

  He gestured back that he didn’t understand what she was gesturing, but that only made things worse.

  “Mother, I was just there for four weeks!” Maudanne said. She hadn’t spoken in so long Albert had almost forgotten she was there. “You’d never guess what all happened while I was gone! I can’t leave young Marchant alone again.

  “He’s been more than kind to us already.” Pause. “Well, he has! He needs me, Mother. This house . . . and now he’s gone off and left the doors unlocked, and the cat locked in the wine cellar and . . .”

  Pause. “No, Mother. I haven’t touched a drop. He keeps it locked like he promised.”

  The ensuing silence was orchestrated by an indecipherable yet highly animated exchange between Cindy in the bushes and Albert in the window.

  “Well, don’t you worry about that. Once burned is twice shy,” said Maudanne. Some kind of female code. “I’ll be up again Labor Day.” Pause. “Labor Day. That’s right.” Beat. “No. No, Mother. The doctor said it would tingle like that for a while, but the feeling will come back. It will. You’ve had a stroke, you know. It takes time. You have to do those exercises. Come Labor Day . . . ”

  Albert stopped listening at this point, because Cindy and the bushes and the side of the house were suddenly splashed with light. A car had pulled into the driveway.

  Cindy disappeared into the foliage.

  Albert ducked in the darkness.

  There would have been any number of places to hide had this been Sarah’s kitchen. Or Kitty Odum’s. But here there was nothing but a vast, unobstructed ocean of linoleum in all directions as far as the eye could see, or would have been, had there been a light on, which there wasn’t.

  The pantry. It was the only sanctuary, and Albert hied him hence with alacrity.

  “He’s back early,” said Maudanne. Albert could hear the chair slide back as she stood up. “I said young Marchant’s back early. He’ll be wanting his decaf. I’ve got to go. God bless, Mom.” Pause. “Yes, I’ll call tomorrow.” Encore pause. “Yes.” The front door opened to admit DuShane, the kitchen door opened to admit Maudanne.

  “Mim?” said DuShane from the distance.

  “I’m in the kitchen!” Maudanne replied from opposite the refrigerator, which separated her from a clear view of Albert, who had assumed a fetal position on a counter along the inside wall of the pantry. “You want your coffee in the library?”

  “No, I’ll have it in here,” said DuShane. Albert was startled to find that ‘here’ was in the kitchen. Somehow, he’d gotten all the way down the hall without Albert hearing his footsteps. He must have Hush Puppies, too. Or a carpeted floor. If only he could say the same for the walls of his heart.

  “If I’d known you were coming back early, I’d have had it ready.”

  DuShane’s shadow stretched across the pantry doorway, standing watch over Albert while the rest of him leaned against the refrigerator. Albert was sealed in.

  “If forgot my wallet,” DuShane replied sheepishly.

  “Honestly, March, it’s a good thing you’re head’s bolted on. I sometimes wonder if I should have your name sewn into all your clothing – especially after tonight.”

  “What do you mean? Forgetting my wallet?”

  The shadow shifted somewhat. Presumably DuShane had, too.

  “No. You left the back door wide open.”

  “The back door? What are you talking about?”

  The shadow stood bolt upright.

  “And the cellar light on.”

  The shadow abandoned its sentry duties and slid across the floor toward the cellar door, which opened with a bang. Heavy feet bounded down the stairs.

  Heavy feet might also have been treading on Albert’s cardiovascular system. He watched in pregnant desperation as Maudanne positioned herself at the top of the cellar stairs, directly between him and escape. His eyes ransacked the little room for another hiding place.

  The butler’s door! Even better.

  “You locked Jebby in the wine closet. Do you have the key?”

  A fusillade of angry bangs and slams and epithets proceeded from the cellar, providing ample cover for Albert to slide the little door open and pass himself into the dining room. He fit.

  Maybe he should have been a butler.

  He let the door slip gently into place, but not before it allowed a glimpse of DuShane’s shadow preceding him up the stairs, brushing Maudanne aside.

  A substantial shadow.

  “I locked the back door,” said DuShane, as Albert decanted himself onto the floor and crouched beneath the sideboard, waiting to hear what DuShane would do next.

  No more than seven or eight of the now-familiar footsteps separated DuShane from the back door. These were accomplished in haste to the accompaniment of the lighter, contrapuntal tattoo of Maudanne in hard-soled shoes. The disjointed rhythm was punctuated by the door slamming as Maudanne, DuShane, and their respective shadows chased one another into the yard.

  Simultaneously, Albert was out the front door, down the steps ,and on the safe side of a huge old oak tree that had kept its share of secrets over the years. Hopefully, it had room for one more.

  DuShane trucked down the driveway siphoning Maudanne along in his slipstream. Albert sidled around the tree, juxtaposing himself with their progress to the sidewalk at the head of the drive, where they
stood for a moment. DuShane surveyed the neighborhood. Maudanne surveyed DuShane. “You think someone broke in?” she said with her whole body. “Should I call the police?”

  Eventually, convinced the neighborhood held no immediate answers, DuShane returned to the house where he mounted the porch in what sounded like a single bound. He turned and, silhouetted in the rectangle of light from the front door with his fists on his hips, said to Maudanne and anyone else who might be listening: “I don’t like this. I don’t like this at all. Go ahead . . . call Matt Harvey.”

  Chapter Twenty

  “Well, I don’t know if there’s money in the trunk, Professor,” said Standish, as he joined Albert on the granite steps of the yellow house across the street. He sat down and lit a cigarette. He smoked too much. Albert wished he could smoke too much, too. “But there’s definitely a car there. I couldn’t tell what kind, though.”

  It didn’t matter if he could.

  “I’d say fifty, sixty feet deep, at least. There’s a sheer drop off at about twenty feet. I think Trelawney’s friend just miscalculated by a few feet. It’s safe from prying eyes, though,” he considered. “Maybe he didn’t.”

  That didn’t matter either. It never occurred to Albert that Tanjore might have lied, so it didn’t surprise him that he hadn’t.

  “All three of those houses were on the underground railroad,” he remarked.

  “So you said.”

  Albert had been speaking to himself. He’d forgotten someone was listening. “What? Oh . . . yes,” he said, replaying the preceding exchange in his mind. “Yes. I know. I was just . . .

  “Those two houses,” he continued, indicating the Antrim’s and Sarah’s, “have rooms that smell like garlic. But neither of them use it.” He looked at Standish. “It gives the Commander stomach problems.” Pause. “Does it do that to you?”

  “What? Garlic?” Standish wrinkled his chin and shook his head. “Nah. I’m an ex cop, remember. We have cast iron stomachs.”

  “Me either,” said Albert, but he wasn’t sure. He was thinking about having bitten into the garlic. He had heard someone once refer to a near-death experience. That must be what they meant. He’d have noticed it in a doughnut or Twinkie, so they probably didn’t use it in those recipes.