The Rita Farmer Mystery series Box Set

by Elizabeth Sims

  Polen turned his back and went to the house. Rowe followed him in.

  Polen poured more wine for himself and said, “I’m going to win the Pan Pacific.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I just know. One of my dogs will earn best in show. Beagles are being taken much more seriously in the top shows these days.”

  “No more for me,” said Rowe, when Polen looked at him questioningly. “Is the story of the duel true?”

  Polen shut the cupboard and looked at Rowe. “Yes. What do you know of it?”

  “He got you in the chest.”

  “That’s so.”

  “And you survived because you’d hidden a medical unit nearby.” Polen said nothing. Rowe said, “You challenged him to a duel over a woman, but you behaved like a sneak.”

  “I’d have instructed them to help him if he’d lost.”

  “Where did you get that scar on your face?”

  “Another duel.”

  “My ass.”

  Polen belonged to a category of non-handkerchief-carrying men who were too plentiful in the world, Rowe thought. Never meaning harm, but their fear leads them into slyness.

  “One more thing,” he asked. “Who’s going to handle your dogs at the Pan Pacific?”

  “Oh, my longtime man, his name is Gold. He’s gotten into breeding rough collies now—doing well, very well.” He gave an oddball, inappropriately hilarious laugh. “I think he could take breed at the Pan Pacific. Go ahead and look him up, he’ll show you my Copernicus Jumper and Mary Lullaby.”

  “Won’t you be there?”

  “Oh, of course, I’m flying in on Friday. But I’ll be in the stands; I get too nervous to be anywhere near the dogs on show day.”

  “I see. Thank you, Mr. Polen. I’ll be going now.”

  Rowe turned to the kitchen table and looked at the Strügen Cycle Beagle. Polen did not deserve to have this prize toy, but Rowe left it anyway, out of pity.

  He walked out, shook himself, and returned to the airport.

  Chapter 20 – Inside the House in Bakersfield

  I felt slightly forsaken by George when he went out of town on whatever other case he was working on. “The bad guys,” I whined on the phone, “right here in L.A. are trying to annihilate you. Us. Why do you have to go?”

  “Besides that it’s business, I’ve committed to this particular client, and he’s paying me? I’m starting to tunnel on this Vargas-Cubitt situation. I’ll get a message to the Whale, but before I do, I want to be away from it for a day or two. You said you wanted to do more. Well, I’ve got an assignment for you, and I think you can guess what it is.”

  “Bakersfield.”

  “I think it’s safe enough for you to stick your head in there, so long as you’re cautious. Don’t reveal yourself, you understand what I’m saying?”

  “Yes. And then I’m going to poke around the ABC Mission again, because I’ve just got to learn—”

  “Rita, no. Don’t go near there without me.”

  “But—”

  “I’m asking you. Please.”

  “But—”

  “Look, isn’t Bakersfield enough for now? See how it goes. But promise me—just for now!—you won’t go to the mission.”

  “Well, OK.”

  He’d gotten on his red-eye going “somewhere in North America”—so discreet!—and the next morning, Wednesday, I drove up to Bakersfield.

  I passed the exit to the farmhouse and went on into town. I found the main senior citizens’ rec center and picked up a bunch of literature, including the business card of the activities director.

  Then I asked directions to a pharmacy, where I bought a jar of Digest-All, a bottle of Vitamax Silver, a pair of support hose (medium), a seven-day plastic pillbox, a tube of hand cream, a tube of face cream, a thing of gel sanitizer, a bar of olive oil soap, a packet of rose hip tea, and a mug with a picture of a barefoot farm boy asleep on a haystack. All for only $18.78.

  At the open trunk of my car I arranged the stuff in a wicker basket I’d been using for bathroom towels. I tied a yellow grosgrain bow on it and headed out to the farmhouse. It was eleven o’clock.

  Typical dog-day weather in the San Joaquin Valley: ovenlike heat. The land lay flat as if the sun had hammered it that way. The tumbleweeds blew, and the long irrigation channels flowed siltily.

  In the distance the worn gray house, a couple of hundred feet back from the road, stuck up from its weedy patch like a tombstone. My pulse quickened at once again taking a matter into my own hands. I pulled all the way up to the house.

  The whole way there, the whole morning, the weight of this errand had grown. It’s one thing to imagine yourself walking into what might turn out to be a scorpion jar, and another to actually do it.

  But long before all this began, I’d gone hunting for a dark place inside myself. I’d found it, used it, and now I knew where it was. As an actress, I had a leg up when it came to pretending not to be afraid. And I knew that the key thing, when the chips go down, is to get fierce, stay fierce, and fight with everything you’ve got.

  Nothing stirred in the house as I mounted the board steps, though as soon as I’d stepped out of the car, I’d sensed a sudden alertness behind the weathered walls. The sky-blue sedan was parked there as before. It was a dusty Impala.

  Red-winged blackbirds trilled from the swaying tips of willows growing in the drainage ditch across the road.

  I felt a flash of anger at Harper Lee for making me think of Boo Radley at this moment.

  I saw the mail slot in the door, although of course there was the rural mailbox on a post at the road.

  From a distance 17 Thistle Route looked merely forlorn; up close it was almost malevolently decrepit, its sun-baked planks showing only the ghost of a paint job. Where I’m from, when a house begins to decay, the paint starts to flake, then it blisters off in the summer humidity. At this house it appeared that the paint had simply desiccated in place and fallen away in granules. A piece of board trim veered away from the doorway at the top, its rusted nailheads extruded by decades of slamming.

  I rapped, and after a full minute, I heard someone approach stealthily. The door creaked inward, and a stout Asian woman stood staring at me, hands on hips.

  Smiling blandly, my purse dangling beneath the brimming basket, I exclaimed, “Good morning! I’m Sharon Pressley from the senior center!” I held out my card. “Somebody’s got a birthday this month! May I bring this in?”

  The woman’s face did not change one molecule, but her posture softened just perceptibly. She wore a blue service dress, black leather sneakers, and a silver crucifix the size of a pair of scissors around her neck. Crow-black bun hairdo, with two tendrils hanging down from the temples. This part gave her a slightly Spanish look. The Philippines, then.

  “Wait,” she said, and shut the door firmly in my face.

  “Great!” I responded.

  I heard muffled voices, then a minute later she returned and reached for the basket.

  “I take it.”

  “Oh, but no!” I got in her face like a jolly fistful of firecrackers. “It’s my job to deliver this Friends of Bakersfield assortment personally. They’ll have my head if I don’t report that I actually came in and personally—”

  “OK, OK.”

  She stepped backward and I went in, my shoes all but sliding out from under me on the slick board floor. It was lusterless, just worn smooth from years of cleaning.

  A bone-thin woman sat in the front room, her hands gripping the padded arms of a wheelchair.

  “Diane!” I exclaimed, striding to her, in one smooth move setting the basket within her reach on a low table and drawing a straight chair near. “Happy birthday. Look. Presents!” George had advised me to tumble right in, no hesitation. Although Diane Keever’s natural impulse was to recoil—hell, anybody’s would be—the force of my do-gooderism overcame her. She smiled suspiciously.

  I went on, “It’s so wonderful to meet you. I’m Shar
on Pressley, from the senior center.”

  “How do you do?” said Diane Keever. “What is all this?”

  Blue Dress watched.

  “We have a new director,” I explained, toning down my volume and pace, segueing into pure warmth and sympathy, channeling a relentlessly compassionate Greer Garson or Florence Henderson or some such. “Do you know Kevin John Wilson? He’s the new director, and he made a decree! A decree went out from him that the BSC would locate every citizen over—well, let’s between us girls say a certain age!—and check the public census records for birthdays. ‘No homebound senior is going to celebrate their birthday without some senior cheer, not while I’m in the driver’s seat!’ That’s what Kevin John Wilson said.”

  “Neneng invited you in?”

  “You need this things,” said Neneng, poking in the basket.

  Her boss said, “My birthday is in March.”

  “Oh! Oh! Oh, my goodness.” I sat there helpless. “Oh, my goodness.”

  Mrs. Keever took the opportunity to be magnanimous. “It’s all right, dear.”

  “Well, mistakes do happen, don’t they?” I trembled on the verge of embarrassed tears. “I’m so sorry to have barged in here like this—what must you be thinking? My goodness. Well, I know one thing: the basket stays!”

  “It’s all right,” she repeated. Then, as if from an unused portion of her brain, a hospitality reflex awakened. “Well, ah…would you like some tea, before you go, Mrs. Pressley? Some iced tea?”

  “Oh, yes, please!” I fanned myself delicately. “I’d love to visit with you for just a minute or two, Mrs. Keever.” I decided to switch to that after having used her first name just once, to achieve initial disarmament.

  “Neneng, bring us some tea and cookies. The good ones.”

  I was tremendously pleased that the old delivery trick had worked.

  The house wasn’t as bad on the inside as out: once fine, now frayed, but clean and tidy nevertheless. Basic cleaning, I realized, can go a long way. The furniture, the wallpaper, which was a charming old pattern of green vines against a rosy beige ground, all were holding up more or less OK. The Keevers had had good taste.

  Mrs. Keever was well turned out for the day. Her pure-white hair was nicely waved and combed back from her large ears, she wore a peach silk (or perhaps easy-care polyester) blouse and a soft knit skirt. Her skinny legs were encased in white-person’s-flesh-color support hose, and she wore Minnetonka-type little shoes. A battered aluminum walker was stationed near the hall.

  One gnarled hand sported a fairly whopping diamond. Silver button earrings. She cared about the way she looked, and in fact, her face was quite fine; she even wore a little lipstick. This was a woman who carried on the routine.

  She sat straight and studied me with wary clarity. She was plainly thirsty for company, yet there was an antisocial vibe about her.

  I oriented my chair so as not to face her directly, more like side-by-side. But I kept myself in front of her so she wouldn’t get the feeling that any part of me was out of view. A subliminal thing. “Someone at the center said your late husband was a lawyer in town.” I made my body language open, nothing crossed, open relaxed hands, slightly forward-leaning posture. “I do remember the name.”

  “Yes,” she said.

  I showed her everything I’d brought, with narration. “And the lavender in this lotion makes it double as cologne!”

  When George and I had talked this over, we’d tried to think of a foolproof pretext for me, but it was hard.

  “Well,” he’d said at last, “you’ll just have to figure something out.”

  “What am I supposed to do once I get inside?”

  “Observe. And if it feels OK, mention Amaryllis and see what happens.”

  Of course, Mrs. Keever might not be living there, but we also felt it was a pretty good bet, especially as George could find no alternate address for her.

  So right now, step one was good. Either Mrs. Keever or this Neneng was receiving the ten thousand a month from Amaryllis.

  It was very hot inside that house, but a few windows were open, allowing a stifling breeze to push through the screens. Like all old people, Diane Keever barely sweated.

  What was the money for, what was it for? Did Neneng take it to the bank for her mistress? Was there a gigantically fat mattress upstairs? Did the envelope go from here to somewhere else?

  Well, my goal was to simply make friends. As I talked about the lotions and so forth, I glanced about the room carefully for evidence. Of something, anything. Bricks of heroin, slave manacles? It was an ordinary living room, not very big.

  Diane Keever was suspicious, and Neneng was a cold-eyed one. My impression was she lived in. Neneng looked late-fortyish, maybe as old as fifty. Realistically, Mrs. Keever was no drug dealer. But Neneng was a person to figure out.

  “You haven’t been over to the senior center yet, have you?” I asked my hostess.

  She paused. “I still don’t think of myself as ‘senior.’ Isn’t that funny?”

  “Not at all! We’re all just kids, really. All our lives.”

  “You’re very young.”

  There was no television in the room. A baby grand piano had been wedged into a corner. Mrs. Keever saw me look at it, then at her crabbed hands.

  “I don’t play much anymore,” she said.

  A book, Grieg Lyric Pieces, perched on the music stand.

  Heavy on her feet, Neneng carried in a wide silver tray with the tea and cookies. She seemed respectful enough of Mrs. Keever.

  As she served us, I gestured to Mrs. Keever’s wheelchair. “Is it arthritis?”

  “Yes. Just osteo, but it’s really got me, as you can see.” She said it tight-mouthed and bitter. Perhaps a drop of self-pity in there too. But I wondered: If her mind is sharp and she’s got this evidently faithful servant, doesn’t she at least get out a little?

  Neneng said, “It rheumatoid.”

  “These aren’t the good cookies,” Mrs. Keever said.

  Neneng said, “More in oven.”

  Mrs. Keever’s hands did seem to have that tight redness of rheumatoid, just like Gramma Gladys’s. Her knees too.

  “I used to play, quite a lot,” she said. “Now Neneng plays, don’t you, Neneng?”

  I found that hard to believe; Neneng seemed as musical as a crocodile.

  “Shit itch me,” said Neneng.

  She teach me.

  There was a pause.

  “Well,” I said, “I brought all this information on the wonderful activities we do at the center.”

  “I should have volunteered there, when I was younger,” Mrs. Keever mused.

  “Well, we’d love to see you now.” I shuffled through the flyers. She said, “I don’t…interact…much.”

  “I would think an intelligent, attractive woman like you would have lots of friends!”

  “Oh,” she said, brushing away the compliment. “No.”

  “I it,” said Neneng.

  “Neneng takes care of me. I couldn’t do without her.”

  Neneng nodded possessively. “I drive.” She left the room.

  The tea was good. The shortbread-type cookies tasted rancid. “They are terrible,” said Mrs. Keever, grimly amused at my attempt to hide my reaction. “I’ve never gotten used to them. She puts duck fat or something in the dough.”

  “Plus oregano,” I guessed. “How long have you lived in Bakersfield?”

  “Oh, a long time,” she said vaguely.

  I took her hand gently and said quietly, “Please consider me a new friend.” She squeezed my hand rigidly and stared at the floor.

  Then I got her vibe. It wasn’t antisocial, it was angry. Beneath that fine-lady facade was a crust of anger and resentment.

  Why?

  “You know,” I ventured, “senior activities today aren’t what they used to be. In the old days it was cutting paper dolls and watching television, but now we’ve got dance classes—even for wheelchair folks!—we’ve g
ot ice cream Thursdays, and sometimes Harold does Elvis. Our handyman.”

  “Oh.”

  Neneng returned to check our glasses.

  “Neneng, please play something,” asked Mrs. Keever.

  The sullen Filipina said, “I have to?”

  “No,” said her boss. “No, of course not. But I’d like to hear some of the Grieg. Just a little something. You pick.”

  Neneng looked at me hatefully, heaved a bone-rattling sigh, and stomped over to the piano. She yanked the heavy tufted bench; it made a hideous screech on the wooden floor.

  Neneng laid her buttocks over the bench. The blue fabric of her dress smoothed and strained against her back as she opened the keyboard and reached to turn pages in the Grieg book.

  She touched a few chords to warm up, then, peering at the complicated-looking music, began to play.

  BALDWIN, said the logo above the keyboard. The instrument, of polished walnut, gave forth several pure notes.

  The room instantly became lighter, brighter, cooler.

  At first Neneng played a small melody, high on the keyboard. Then the sound deepened into full, ringing chords.

  The air came alive. God stepped in.

  Mrs. Keever tipped her head back, to open her ears to the wider room—the sound came to us from every direction as it poured from the piano and swelled against ceiling, walls, floor.

  I’m not a classical musician, but I felt Neneng’s playing was extraordinary.

  The music lightened and returned to the original melody, only this time the melody was prettier—somehow—I don’t know.

  Then it diminished to a few wistful droplets.

  Silence.

  Neneng dropped her hands into her lap and bowed her head for two seconds. Then abruptly she rose, the bench screeching out from under her.

  Mrs. Keever came back from wherever she’d been transported to. “Thank you, Neneng. That was very good.”

  I could only stare, smiling.

  Neneng, stone-faced, stood at the piano. “Tuner man come yesterday.” As if that explained it.

  I made a sound of amused bafflement.

  Neneng returned my gaze. “I have knack,” she muttered.

  “I don’t know what I’d do without her,” said Mrs. Keever. “She comes from a terrible place in the Philippines. A lot of family depend on her.”