Following Polly

by Karen Bergreen

  “That must have been a good feeling.”

  “It was. In fact, since that time, I did three busy years in the DA’s Office and even made it to partner in one of the best firms in the country, and it still tops my list of my most satisfying career moments. Too bad it happened before I even passed the bar.”

  “Some people never have those moments,” I say, thinking of myself.

  “Some people don’t look for them,” Charlie tells me.

  “Do you look for them or do they just come to you?”

  “I think I keep myself open.”

  “Yeah, I remember in college when they wrote that article that profiled you in The Crimson as the man who saved Francisco Pena.”

  “You remember that?” Charlie asks me.

  I could practically recite the article word for word. When Charlie was a senior, he exposed the mistreatment of a freshman named Francisco Pena by the university police. Pena was among the many undergrads who rode his bicycle on university paths that were, according to the school, exclusively set aside for pedestrian traffic. Although hundreds of students violated this rule, Pena was repeatedly singled out. The police never stopped any other students. One day they had enough of his insubordination. They asked Pena to step off his bicycle. They impounded the bicycle and detained Pena for two hours. It turns out that Pena had his organic chemistry final that day. He was over an hour late. He received a failing grade.

  Charlie filed a complaint with the university, exposing the differential treatment Pena received. Pena was targeted, according to Charlie, because he was Hispanic. The school made sure that Pena was permitted to retake his exam. And more significantly, he received a public apology from the university police and Harvard’s president.

  “I can’t believe you remember that,” Charlie says.

  I have a fantastic memory. Besides, it is a pretty incredible story.

  I keep having the same dream. I’m walking in the dark with my father. I think we’re in a church. Mother and Paul are half a block ahead of me. Paul looks as he did at his tenth birthday party, wearing perfectly pressed khaki pants, a light blue button-down shirt, and shiny new brown loafers. Mother is in an airy gown. I look over at my father; he is wearing a new tuxedo, and smiling his big smile. I look down. I’m in a bridal gown. It is big and princessy, but I love it. I look up and I see Charlie, standing next to my brother. He’s wearing the same tux as my father. It is my wedding day.

  Suddenly, my father’s hand lets go of mine and my brother disappears from the scene altogether. Mother is still ahead of me, and, as I walk toward her, Barnes appears, wearing a velvet dinner jacket and an ascot. We are still walking forward, but there is no altar. In the middle of the church are two caskets. I don’t look inside, but I recognize the mahogany from the funeral twenty-four years ago. Barnes is tending to Mother as she cries violently. I look around for Charlie and he has disappeared. I am alone.

  I’ve had this exact dream four times.

  I am trying not to be too hopeful about Charlie’s meeting with Kovitz today. First, I may still be their only viable suspect. My excitement is also tempered by what I’m pretty certain is going on between William Redwin and LaDonna. But I can’t go to Charlie with this information until I’m absolutely sure.

  The only way to be sure is to follow William.

  It’s funny. Charlie hasn’t given me a folder on his dad: where his dad lives, his phone number, his car make and license plate. He wants me to clear his dad without even looking at him.

  Does this mean that on some level Charlie thinks he’s guilty?

  Then again, Charlie isn’t investigating me, either.

  But Charlie didn’t see what I saw. He didn’t see his father driving around Harlem with a prostitute.

  I don’t even know where Charlie’s father lives. He didn’t tell me. I look him up in the phone book, and I realize that he’s on Eighty-ninth and Park, not much more than a mile from here. I just have to see if he’s home. I call his number. Realizing I am probably the only person on the planet that doesn’t have caller ID, I press *87 to privatize Charlie’s number. (It’s a trick Jean showed me when she was obsessively calling an aloof boyfriend three years ago.)

  It’s ringing.

  Ringing.

  Ringing.

  “Hello.”

  “Oh, ummm, hi.” I don’t really have a game plan. “May I speak with Nicole?” I disguise my voice just in case he recognizes it.

  “I’m sorry. What number are you calling?”

  I tell him a number. Unfortunately, I panic and I give him his number.

  “You’ve got the right number but there’s no Nicole here.”

  I want to die, I’m so embarrassed. Charlie would kill me.

  “I’m so sorry. I thought this was the number the phone company gave me, but sometimes I transpose the numbers wrong.”

  I hang up the phone and grab my coat.

  I get on the express train to Eighty-sixth Street. When I get out, I walk one block over to Park Avenue and then just a few blocks to Eighty-ninth Street. Charlie’s father lives four blocks from Mother. I suddenly long to take a detour and knock on her door, but Barnes will most certainly turn me in.

  It’s hard knowing that Mother and I are so close—geographically.

  I wait outside his building for a while. It’s difficult to be on Park Avenue because there are no stores or restaurants to provide a legitimate justification for loitering. I didn’t bring anything to read, either. I hope I don’t look too creepy. I’m wearing oversized corduroys and a ski jacket. I run down to Lexington Avenue. I go into an old drugstore and search for a prop. I find it: a crappy sketch pad and a box of pencils. The sketch pad has been sitting on the shelf so long that even though it advertises white paper, the sheets are a pale yellow. But the price is right: $1.19 for the pad, and the guy tells me I can have the box of pencils if I throw in eighty-one cents. I give him two dollars in change, and then run back, crossing my fingers in hopes that William Redwin hasn’t left his house in the last thirteen minutes.

  I glance at the front door of William Redwin’s building. The doormen are changing shifts. The stout older guy is replaced by another stout older guy and the young buck is also replaced by a nearly identical colleague. I think of the doormen at Mother’s. It has been the same group now for as long as I remember. They always give me that look that says, How come you keep coming back here by yourself? All of this building’s other graduates have families or, at the very least, a life. I always feel as if I should offer to take the service elevator.

  I’m sitting on the edge of the sometimes-grassy area on the island that divides Park Avenue from itself. I’m drawing with one hand and covering the page with the other. I hope this will be interpreted by all who see me as modesty.

  I’m a terrible draftsman.

  I draw for just over three hours before William Redwin exits the building. He’s wearing a long dark overcoat and a cap. He makes a left and walks downtown on Park. I’m relieved. I thought for sure that we’d be taking a cab up to the Metro North station in Harlem.

  Redwin walks.

  And walks.

  And walks.

  He turns left on Seventieth Street and walks east. He must have a destination; we’ve been going for almost half an hour now. Maybe he sees me tailing him. No. He would recognize me. And then, even if it would draw attention to himself—negative attention—he would turn me in. Despite my being “delightful” and “beautiful.”

  Okay. We’re on York Avenue now. We must be near our destination. We can’t go any farther east because we will end up in the river. We make a right. We are on Sixty-eighth Street now—just a few blocks from Charlie’s house. William abruptly goes into a building. I know this building. It is Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.

  Does William Redwin have cancer?

  I can’t follow him any farther. I’ve already invaded his privacy enough.

  I hear the security guard talking to him.

  “Nice
to see you, Mr. Redwin. You’re a little late today.”

  It seems odd that the security guard is so involved in Redwin’s cancer treatment.

  “I know, but I’m here.”

  “Oh, sir. It is very nice, sir. I can take you there now, sir. Let me just get someone to watch the desk for a sec.” The security guard picks up the phone. “Karl. It’s Zona. Mr. Redwin is here. I’m going to take him to the Falls. Can you come over here?”

  I wait on the other side of the desk, careful not to catch anyone’s eye. They always ask for identification in places like this, and I’m not going to risk producing a document with a picture of me on it.

  Karl shows up within two minutes.

  “Hello, sir.”

  He extends his hand to Charlie’s dad, who grasps it warmly.

  “Let me show you up,” Zona says as she leads Redwin up the escalator into the front lobby. I scurry in after them as Karl gets himself settled.

  We walk into the upstairs lobby and there is a beautiful waterfall in the middle of the floor. Bright purple orchids punctuate the streams of water that continually pour down the huge rock formation. Next to the waterfall is a plaque:

  IN MEMORY OF EMILY REDWIN

  Redwin stares at the plaque for some time. After a few minutes, he turns to Zona.

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome, Mr. Redwin. Do you need me for anything else?”

  “No, Zona. Thank you.”

  “My pleasure, Mr. Redwin. We’ll see you tomorrow?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay then.”

  Okay then. And off we go. Mr. Redwin and I. He hurries out of the hospital and waves his hand anxiously for a taxi. He gets in. For a moment, I forget my discretion and I stand too close to the door.

  I could swear William Redwin is staring right into my eyes.

  I’m lucky to get another taxi right away.

  “Follow them,” I say to the cab driver, hoping that he’s not an undercover cop.

  We make a right on Sixty-eighth Street and sit in traffic for about ten minutes. I think about William Redwin and how much pain he’s in.

  “My father hasn’t been this way since my mother died,” Charlie had said. And William told me himself in his note that finding romance was “unimaginable.”

  William, it appears, makes daily trips to the hospital where his wife died.

  As the taxi heads up First Avenue, I’m hit with the rage that’s been fueling Charlie. These people are pushing him out of the company, his company, months after losing his wife. This is outrageous. Of course I’ll help Charlie. I’ll follow all of those girls on that list to see what kind of payoffs they are getting. That man I saw the other day with LaDonna could not have been William Redwin. It was some other WASPy white guy getting his rocks off under the 125th Street station.

  It was probably some jerk from Kelt Pharmaceuticals doing just what Charlie has been thinking all along: paying the hooker off in some sort of conspiracy.

  We’re making our way slowly up First Avenue. I guess I’m going to have to walk from Park and Eighty-ninth back to Charlie’s house. I don’t want to spend all of his money on cabs. We head up First Avenue past Eighty-ninth Street.

  “I think he missed the turn,” I tell my driver.

  The driver doesn’t say anything, but he does something with his shoulder that appears to be a shrug.

  We go by Ninety-first Street. Nothing.

  We keep going. The traffic has thinned out some.

  We keep going.

  I know when we’ll turn. But I don’t tell the driver because I don’t want it to be true.

  It is true.

  We turn at 125th Street and head west.

  To the Metro North station.

  William Redwin gets out of his taxi.

  “Sixty-fifth between Park and Lexington,” I tell the driver.

  I’m no longer worried about how much this will cost me. I have other problems now.

  It’s just after six when I return to Charlie’s house. I have no idea what to tell him about his father. You were wrong about him, but please don’t give up on me. And that’s just the selfish part. I don’t want to hurt Charlie. I love him. Not just in the crushy way. I love him in a way that I know it will hurt me to hurt him.

  I decide to be angry with William. He has put me in this position. If he had just been honest with Charlie from the get-go, I wouldn’t be dealing with this unpleasantness. What was he thinking? Going to prostitutes. I look at Charlie’s files. Descriptions of back alleys and underpasses. William Redwin doesn’t need to go to prostitutes. He certainly doesn’t need to go to cheap ones. He’s an attractive, rich, successful man in a city filled with women looking for attractive, rich, single men. And it didn’t need to be sordid. The man wasn’t cheating on anybody. According to the files, William went to these women only after Emily’s death.

  He chooses prostitutes when he can have anybody.

  I think of Mother. She chose Barnes when she could have had anybody. He wasn’t such a plum choice, either.

  But their liaisons were legal.

  When I get home, Charlie isn’t here. Good on two fronts. First, I don’t really feel like telling him about his father right now. And second, I can use the computer without his timing me.

  I’ve made significant headway with respect to Doris, and I’ve all but ruled her out as a suspect. On the one hand this does not bode well for me. If I could just find the real killer, I could give all of the information to Kovitz, turn myself in, and then join Charlie in holy matrimony.

  I figure if I’m going to dream, I’m going to dream big.

  I don’t really want the killer to be Doris. I like her. I am Doris—without the extra weight and the success. But the way Polly treated her reminds me of the way Mona Hawkins treated me. And now Polly is dead, and Doris is free. I want her to get her life back as I’m trying to with mine. I log on to Charlie’s computer to step up my research.

  Oh my. Doris and I are nothing alike.

  Doris is a chess freak.

  I have happened upon an obscure dating Web site, Chessmates: If the only King in your life is two inches tall, or if your romance is in a stalemate, don’t despair. Come to Chessmates: For chess enthusiasts who are looking for real-life Kings and Queens.

  There she is, sitting at a table with a chessboard, looking up at the camera. She is listed as Doris Meisel, 47, businesswoman (lingerie).

  From what I can tell, Chessmates is a dating service for chess enthusiasts. I click on Events. There’s a chess retreat scheduled for next weekend. There are chess cocktail parties every week. I click on Event Archives. Oh my. There was a Chess Christmas Cruise. I click it. There is a gallery. And there she is: Doris. Still middle-aged, still overweight, but there’s something different about her.

  She’s happy.

  There’s no Polly harping at her side. She looks interesting and interested. She’s in almost every photograph. The Chessmate photographer obviously loved her. And the cruise looked beautiful. Where was it? I look at the dates.

  It looks as if Doris is innocent after all. She was sailing through the Panama Canal on the day Polly Dawson was murdered. I’m happy for her. Elated even. Now that Polly’s dead, she can enjoy the rest of her life. And she has an alibi.

  But where does that leave me?

  Charlie walks into the room beaming. He has just returned from his meeting with Kovitz.

  “What?” I tuck the William Redwin files under my bottom so he doesn’t ask me about them.

  “Polly Dawson was pregnant when she was murdered.”

  So now I’m looking at one of those double homicide charges.

  “That’s not the great part,” Charlie says.

  “I figured.”

  “Humphrey Dawson’s infertile.”

  “So he is… was… not the father?”

  “Very good, Dr. Ruth.”

  “So the cops know Polly Dawson wasn’t faithful to him.”

 
“Better. Humphrey knows Polly wasn’t faithful to him. He has taken his reward for your head off the market.”

  “That’s great news.”

  “I guess Preston Hayes isn’t such a reliable source after all.”

  “I guess not.”

  “I have more.” More. Charlie has more. I take a moment to praise myself for loving him all of these years.

  “According to Kovitz, something didn’t seem right at the memorial service.”

  “That’s crack detective work.” I can’t help myself. “Why don’t we start with the fact that it was at Barneys?”

  Charlie ignores me.

  “It seems that they have added to their list of suspects.”

  “Added? As in I’m not the only one?”

  “Yes, Alice. You’re still holding first place. Your position is strong due to the fact that you haven’t turned yourself in.”

  “I might have been more cooperative if they hadn’t been so eager to convict me within thirty seconds of questioning.”

  Charlie ignores me again. I become concerned.

  “Are you trying to get rid of me, Walter?” I say, trying to be coy to cover my desperation.

  “Kovitz has some others in mind.” Charlie doesn’t address my question. “Now that it’s clear that Polly wasn’t a faithful wife, the list of suspects and motives is growing. According to witnesses, Polly was continually cheating on Humphrey. It was as if she wanted him to find out.”

  “Maybe he was withholding, and she just wanted to make him think she was sleeping around so that he could be more attentive,” I offer. My friend Debbie Gold had done this exact thing with a boyfriend so that she could get him to propose to her. And it worked.

  “Well then, how would that explain her pregnancy?” Charlie says in a Miss Marple moment.

  “I’m just covering all the bases,” I say, but Charlie’s detective skills are improving.

  “Kovitz had a huge emergency and had to cut our meeting short, but he assured me that we could meet tomorrow and he would have some really good information for me.”