by John Lutz
She got an answering machine informing her in stilted language that there was no one available to take her call right now, but if she would please leave a message���
Pearl waited patiently for the drivel to end, then left her name and number for Ella Oaklie and cut the connection.
Since it was almost lunchtime, she drove over to Third Avenue and Fifty-fourth, where she knew a street vendor sold tasty and reliable food. Pearl generally lightened up for lunch, so she bought a knish and bottled water from the vendor, then wandered over to sit on a warm stone wall and people-watch while she ate.
After her second bite, her cell phone vibrated in her pocket. Setting knish and bottled water aside, Pearl picked up.
Ella Oaklie had called home and checked her messages and wanted to get in touch with Pearl as soon as possible, since it was so horrible what had happened to Marilyn Nelson. When Pearl offered to meet Ella at her office, Ella was reluctant, but might they meet for lunch? Pearl said sure, and suggested the Pepper Tree near Marilyn Nelson’s apartment. She’d found that putting the witness as close as possible to the scene of the crime sometimes did wonders for the memory.
Ella agreed at once. While Pearl had Ella going, she suggested they meet in half an hour. Forty-five minutes would work, Ella said, and Pearl said she’d meet her just inside the door, where there was a small waiting area with a bench. Ella asked if she’d be in uniform, and Pearl, irritated, told her no, she’d be wearing gray slacks and a blue blazer, not to mention sensible black shoes.
Kind of a uniform, Pearl thought, as she broke the connection and slid her phone back in her pocket.
It buzzed again almost immediately.
This time it was Jeb. He wanted to meet her for lunch.
“If you can get away,” he added, when he sensed Pearl’s hesitancy.
“I’m going to meet someone at a restaurant for a brief interview, then we can have a bite ourselves if you want, and maybe go somewhere.”
“Sure it’s okay? I mean, I don’t want to mess you up in your work.”
“It’s more than okay,” Pearl assured him. “The restaurant’s the Pepper Tree.”
“Great. We were planning on going there anyway.”
She told him approximately what time the interview would be over.
“Go ahead and eat hearty,” he said. “I’ll have some lunch before I turn up at the restaurant, then we can have a drink or two and leave.”
And go to your room at the Waverton?
Pearl didn’t have to ask him. She knew it was what they both wanted.
She said good-bye to Jeb, then again slid the phone into her pocket, hoping the damned thing would stay there for a while and be quiet.
That was when she glanced across the street and saw Lauri Quinn.
Lauri, in patched and faded jeans and a baggy red pullover shirt, was standing near the doorway of an office supply store, pretending to look at something in the display window. Pearl figured she might be watching her in the window’s reflection and averted her gaze.
She was more annoyed than surprised at seeing Lauri, because it wasn’t the first time. Twice before Pearl had caught a glimpse of someone she thought might have been Lauri, but it had been so brief she couldn’t be sure. Now she was sure. Apparently Lauri hadn’t taken her insistence that she not accompany Pearl on the job seriously, but had decided to follow Pearl without Pearl’s knowledge.
Lauri not giving up on what she wanted.
Lauri being like her father.
Pearl wasn’t sure what to do about this, but decided not to do anything now. She had to meet Ella Oaklie soon, anyway, and didn’t feel like confronting Lauri about being inexpertly and annoyingly tailed. And of course there was the danger of an amateur-a kid, at that-dogging a homicide detective on the trail of a serial killer. It might be a good idea to tell Quinn what was going on, find out how he wanted to handle the situation. After all, Lauri was his daughter.
On the other hand, Pearl did feel a certain protectiveness toward Lauri, and Quinn seemed completely at sea when it came to dealing with a teenage girl who wasn’t a murder suspect.
Pearl glanced at her watch. Forty minutes until her meeting with Ella Oaklie. She had the unmarked and could get to the Pepper Tree in a hurry, so she was okay on time.
Being careful not to glance again in Lauri’s direction, Pearl ate her knish.
37
Another one.
Quinn had expected it. The Butcher was going to continue taunting the police with his puzzle notes.
Renz had just faxed the newest one to Quinn, along with the expected useless results of lab tests on the note itself and the envelope it arrived in. No prints on envelope or stamp, no DNA on the envelope flap, the usual common and virtually untraceable paper stock, a midtown New York postmark, and almost mechanically neat printing in number-two pencil. Like the first note, this one was addressed to Quinn.
Pearl and Fedderman were in the field, leaving Quinn alone in the office. He carried the just-faxed note to his desk to give it some thought. It was cool in the office and quiet except for an occasional thump or muffled voice from the dental clinic on the other side of the wall. Quinn leaned back in his swivel chair and rested the note on his knee, squinting at it and trying to parse its brief and cryptic message:
A rose is a rose is a rose by any other name.
Take care,
The Butcher
Fedderman came in from helping to canvass the buildings surrounding Anna Bragg’s apartment. He looked hot, his suit coat hooked over his shoulder with a forefinger as he often carried it, his shirt sweat-stained and wrinkled. His right cuff was flapping unbuttoned, as it often was. Fedderman was the only person Quinn knew whose cuff persistently came unbuttoned while he was writing with pen or pencil. Maybe it was the brand of shirts he wore. His rep-striped tie was loosened and looked as if it had been used in a tug-of-war.
He sighed, and his desk chair sighed as he sat down in it.
“Any progress to report?” Quinn asked.
Fedderman rolled his weary eyes in Quinn’s direction. “How can you even ask that?”
“I wanted to get it in before you passed out.”
“None of Anna’s neighbors remembered anything they hadn’t recalled or made up last time they talked to us. There are a few inconsistencies, but I think that’s because the heat is addling their brains. I know it’s addling mine.”
“Maybe you oughta have a hot coffee,” Quinn said. “There’s a theory that if you drink something warmer than your body temperature it will feel cool on a hot day. Worth a try.”
“Sadist,” Fedderman said. “Lab give us anything from the paper or envelope?”
“Not a thing. We got zilch. Except for this other note he sent us.”
Fedderman stopped feeling sorry for himself and sat forward, interested.
“Renz just faxed it over.” Since Fedderman still looked too exhausted to stand, Quinn got up from behind his desk and walked over to the opposite desk and handed him Renz’s fax.
Fedderman studied the brief printout for almost a minute, as if waiting for inspiration.
It never came.
“Woman named Rose?” he said finally.
“Kind of obvious.”
“Kind of rose,” Fedderman said. “We look for roses named after women, maybe we come up with the next victim’s name.”
“I thought you said your brain was addled.”
“If I said that, I forgot it,” Fedderman said. “The composer, what’s his name, Cole Porter. Didn’t he name a kind of rose after his wife?”
“He did,” Quinn said, but I can’t think of it.”
“Internet,” Fedderman said.
As Quinn was returning to his desk, Fedderman was already booting up his computer.
Within half an hour they had more than twenty species of roses that were named after women, including the Linda Porter, namesake of Cole Porter’s wife. There were also among the multitude the Betty Boop rose, th
e Helen Traubel, and the Charlotte Armstrong.
And Quinn came across another possibility as he was roaming the Internet-Shakespeare: “That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” A quote from Romeo and Juliet.
Would the next Butcher victim be a Juliet?
When he asked Fedderman what he thought, he agreed that Juliets were in danger.
“Should we warn them all?” Fedderman asked. “The Juliets and all the other rose women?”
Quinn stared at the lengthy list of rose names and thought about all the Lindas, Bettys, Charlottes, Annabels, Sonias, Michelles���He saw that there was indeed a Juliet rose listed. Not only that, it was the Sweet Juliet. He informed Fedderman.
“I dunno,” Fedderman said, perusing the same list. “It seems like every woman’s got a rose named after her. I still kinda like Starina. Sounds like a stripper.”
“We need to make the note public as soon as possible, and it wouldn’t be a bad idea to see if we can get the media to print all of the names.”
“My guess is that’s what the Butcher wants us to do,” Fedderman said. “That way he can terrorize more women.”
Quinn thought he was probably right. Still, it was the thing to do.
“I’ll call Renz,” he said. “He likes to hold press conferences, especially the part where you refuse to take any more questions and strut away.”
“She might already be dead,” Fedderman said sadly, looking at his list. “Starina, Elle, Carla, Dainty Bess���”
“Christ!” Quinn said. “Dainty Bess.”
He pecked out Renz’s phone number, hearing Fedderman say, “I wonder if there really is a Starina out there.”
38
“Gertrude Stein,” Pearl said, when she’d checked in by cell phone and Quinn told her about the Butcher’s latest note. She was driving fast, trying to make up for heavy traffic due to construction on Lexington Avenue.
Now Quinn remembered. “Jesus, Pearl! It was right in front of us.”
“She’s the one who said, ‘A rose is a rose is a rose.”
“I know. Our sicko’s going to kill a Gertrude.” He wondered if there was a Gertrude rose. Something to check.
Steering one-handed, Pearl swerved around a furniture van. “I wouldn’t be too sure. There are plenty of other possibilities, including some we haven’t thought of.”
“But I sure like this one, Pearl. It’s oblique, which seems to be our guy’s approach in his little puzzle notes. I’m glad you thought of it.”
She couldn’t help feeling a flush of pride. Also, she had to admit, affection. Despite her present relationship with Jeb, Quinn could still get to her. You didn’t live with someone, sleep with him, without a part of that staying with you.
Maybe it wasn’t just Quinn. She wondered if it somehow had anything to do with Lauri. For a moment she considered telling him about his daughter following her around after being forbidden to do so, then decided this wasn’t the time or place. The way was a problem, too.
“I’m pulling up in front of the Pepper Tree to meet Ella Oaklie,” she said. “Gotta go.”
She replaced the cell phone in her blazer pocket and double-parked, then got out of the car and used her shield to chase away some joker who was waiting for someone while parked illegally in a loading zone. When he was gone, Pearl parked there. She placed the NYPD placard on the dash, just in case some civilian couldn’t read the invisible letters on the unmarked that screamed police, and climbed out of the car into the brilliant heat.
When she entered the comparatively cool and dim restaurant, Pearl saw a thirtyish, rather plain-looking dishwater-blond woman seated on the gaily decorated deacon’s bench just inside the Pepper Tree’s door. The woman seemed anxious and looked up at her inquisitively, as if she’d been sitting forever in a doctor’s waiting room and Pearl might at last usher her into a tiny room and poke a thermometer in her mouth. Pearl smiled, and the obviously greatly relieved Ella Oaklie rose and introduced herself.
Here is someone, Pearl thought, who’s been often stood up.
They were led to a table toward the rear of the restaurant, near a corner. Pearl was glad. There weren’t any diners so close that they might overhear and conversation would be inhibited.
Ella ordered a vodka martini before lunch, and Pearl a Pellegrino. This was going well; alcohol might help to loosen Ella’s tongue.
“So you and Marilyn were college chums?” Pearl asked.
“We were roommates throughout our freshman year, so I guess you could call us that. We hadn’t seen each other in years. I don’t think I can be much help to you, but I’d sure like to do anything to help catch the bastard who killed her.” Her voice didn’t convey anger, but she did sound sincere.
“Conversations like this help us to get as accurate an idea as possible about a murder victim,” Pearl explained. “Sometimes it leads us to the sort of people they associate with. Sometimes even to a particular person who turns out to be the one we’re looking for.”
Ella smiled with straight but prominent teeth. Her dentist had done everything possible but it hadn’t been quite enough. “You might have some difficulty there. The Marilyn Nelson I knew liked all kinds of people. She was outgoing and friendly, and I guess what you’d call democratic. I couldn’t name anyone who disliked her. I always thought she’d go into sales or public relations, but she stuck to her designing.”
“Good student?”
“Dean’s list. Beauty and brains. If we hadn’t been roommates and friends, I’d have been jealous of her.”
Ha! Pearl thought. She knew jealousy when she heard it. “Do you recall her using drugs?”
Pearl saw a sudden and familiar wariness in Ella’s eyes at the mention of drugs, as the woman reminded herself she was talking to a cop.
“Not in any way meaningful,” she said, obviously choosing her words carefully.
“The statutes of limitation have expired,” Pearl assured her with a grin. Then she winked. “Not to mention we were all young once.” Become a coconspirator; an interrogation technique she’d learned from Quinn.
It worked. Ella seemed to relax. “Okay. We smoked a little weed, took some uppers when we had to cram for exams. But when I knew her, Marilyn wasn’t at all what anyone would describe as a drug addict.”
“When you had lunch with her here, not long before she died, did she make any reference to drugs?”
“None whatsoever. She didn’t even drink alcohol, just Pellegrino water, like you are.”
“So what was your lunchtime conversation about?”
“What you’d expect. What time had done to us. What’s happened to old friends. Then clothes. Or her job. Same thing in this case. She was really enthusiastic about her job designing some new store here, and the Rough Country line of clothing that was gonna be sold there. She was even wearing jeans and a Western-looking shirt and jacket to impress me.”
“Did it?”
“Yeah.”
“Trying to sell you?”
“I guess. That’s what I’d have been trying to do in her place.”
Their drinks came, and they each ordered a salad, Ella because she was on what she called her endless diet, and Pearl because she’d already scarfed down a knish.
“You sound a bit defensive about her,” Pearl said, when the server was gone.
Ella sampled her martini and shrugged. “I liked her. And my God, she’s been murdered. I mean, I wouldn’t trample all over her memory even if I hadn’t liked her.”
“But you did like her.”
“Of course! Unless she changed a lot, you’d have to turn over a lot of rocks to find somebody who didn’t like Marilyn.”
“Did she talk much about her job? The people she worked with?”
“Quite a bit about the job, but not about the people. I think she was pretty much on her own here in New York, except for the one other store over in Queens or someplace. And she hadn’t been in town long enough to make any enemies.”
“Yeah, but the way Marilyn was killed���” Ella took another sip of martini. “Jesus! That was so awful!” She stared across the table at Pearl. “You actually saw it, what that ghoul did to her. Doesn’t that haunt you?”
“Forever,” Pearl said, being honest to evoke honesty. Another Quinn technique.
“And it happened just a few blocks from here,” Ella said, “in the everyday world.”
“That’s the horror of it,” Pearl said. “Everything happens in the everyday world.”
“But you’re a cop, so you should be used to it.”
“Well, I see more of it than most people. But no matter how much or how little any of us sees, it’s still happening. What goes on behind all those walls and windows out there sometimes isn’t what we imagine or would like it to be. But it happens every day.”
Ella seemed to think about that most of the time while they ate their salads.
They’d both virtuously decided against dessert when Pearl noticed a change in Ella’s eyes, a kind of double take, as she looked over Pearl’s shoulder.
Pearl turned and saw Jeb Jones approaching the table.
He smiled and said hello to Pearl, then nodded at Ella.
“Spotted you when I walked in,” he said to Pearl, resting a hand lightly on her shoulder. “I just wanted to let you know I was here.”
He backed away. “You’re working. I’ll grab a table up near the front and we can talk when you’re done.”
“Haven’t we met?” Ella said.
Jeb studied her. “I don’t think so. I’m Jeb Jones.”
“Ella Oaklie.”
“Sorry, doesn’t ring a bell.” He gave her his incandescent grin. “But now we know each other.” To Pearl: “Take your time.”
Pearl said that she would and watched him cross the restaurant. Watched the way Ella was looking at him.
“I thought that was the same guy I saw with Marilyn about two weeks before she was killed.” She frowned. “But now that I look at him, I suppose he’s just the same type.”