“Okay,” said Milo, “I’ve been there, Don. So I know getting the words out is like passing a kidney stone. Don’t talk— just blink. Once for yes, twice for no. Is Noel Drucker McCloskey’s kid or not?”
Nothing. Then dry lips formed the word yes, and a sibilant whisper followed.
“Does Noel know?” I said.
Ramp shook his head and lowered it to the table. Boils had broken out on the back of his neck and he smelled like the bear cage at the zoo.
Milo said, “Noel and Joel. Bethel have a flair for light verse or something?”
Ramp looked up. His facial skin had the texture and color of old custard, and his mustache was clogged with skin flakes.
He said, “Noel because . . . she couldn’t.” Shaking his head and starting to droop again.
Milo propped him up. “She couldn’t what, Don?”
Ramp stared at him, wet-eyed. “She can’t . . . She knew Joel . . . the way the word . . . looked . . . so Noel . . . three letters the same . . . remember.”
He eyed the bourbon bottle, sighed, closed his eyes.
I said, “She couldn’t read? She named him Noel because it looked like Joel and she wanted something she could visualize?”
Nod.
“Is she still illiterate?”
Faint nod. “Tried to . . . She couldn’t . . .”
“How’d she manage to do her job?” I said. “Taking orders, totaling the check?”
Unintelligible sounds from Ramp.
Milo said, “C’mon, dammit, stop blubbering.”
Ramp lifted his head slightly. “Memory. She knew everything . . . the whole menu . . . by heart. When there’s . . . a special . . . she . . . we rehearse it.”
“And filling out the check?” said Milo.
“I . . .” Look of exhaustion.
“You take care of it,” I said. “You take care of her. Just like the old days back at the studio. What was she, a country girl, came out west to be a star?”
“Appalachia,” he said. “Hill . . . billy.”
“Poor girl from the sticks,” I said. “You knew she’d never make it in pictures, especially not being able to read lines. Did you help her keep it secret for a while?”
Nod. “Joel . . .”
“Joel blew her cover?”
He nodded. Belched and let his head loll. “Pictures for him.”
“He caused her to lose her contract at the studio and then hired her as a model?”
Nod.
Milo said, “How’d she get a driver’s license?”
“Written tests . . . memorized all of them.”
“Must have taken a long time.”
Ramp nodded and wiped his nose with the back of his hand. He lowered his head to the table again. This time Milo let him remain there.
“Have she and McCloskey maintained contact all these years?” I said.
Ramp’s head shot up with surprising speed. “No— she hated . . . it . . . not what she wanted.”
“What wasn’t?”
“The baby. Noel . . .” Wince. “Loved him, but . . .”
“But what, Don?”
Beseeching look.
“What, Don?”
“Rape.”
“McCloskey got her pregnant by raping her?”
Nod. “All the time.”
“All the time what, Don?” said Milo.
“Rape.”
“He raped her all the time?”
Nod.
“Why didn’t you protect her from that?” said Milo.
Ramp began to sob. The tears landed in his mustache and beaded in the greasy hairs.
He tried to say something, choked.
Milo put his finger under Ramp’s chin. Used a napkin to dab the weeping man’s face.
“What, Don?” he said gently.
“Everyone,” said Ramp, tears flowing.
“Everyone raped her?”
Sob. Gulp. “Had her . . . She’s not . . .” Struggling to lift his hand, he tapped his head.
“She’s not bright,” said Milo. “Everyone took advantage of her.”
Nod. Tears.
“Everyone, Don?”
Ramp’s head lolled and dipped. His eyes closed. Saliva trickled down one side of his mouth.
Milo said, “Okay, Don,” and lowered Ramp’s face to the table once more.
I followed Milo back to the bar. The two of us sat and watched Ramp for a while. He began to snore.
“The studio wild bunch,” I said. “The dumb, illiterate girl everyone passed around.”
“How’d you know?”
“From the way Noel acted just before. We were talking about his mother. He mentioned she said that working anywhere else wouldn’t be the same, started to elaborate, and stopped. When I pressed him on it, he got mad and left. That struck me as unusual. He’s a kid who controls his emotions— needs to be in control. Typical for someone growing up with a druggie or alkie parent. So I knew whatever it was that made him blow up had to be important. Then when Ramp started talking, it all fit.”
“Illiterate,” said Milo. “Living that way, all these years, never knowing when someone was going to blow her cover. Ramp taking care of her and the kid out of guilt.”
“Or compassion, or both. Guess he is a genuine soft guy.”
“Yeah,” he said again, glancing over at Ramp and shaking his head.
I said, “It explains Bethel’s willingness to wait tables while Ramp and Gina lived like royalty. She was used to being the doormat. Failed at acting and got into heavy dope and God knows what else. Topped it off by getting pregnant by the guy everyone hated. Posed for pictures that probably weren’t high fashion. The way she’s built isn’t exactly suited to Vogue. It adds up to subterranean self-esteem, Milo. She probably figures what Ramp gave her is more than she deserves. And now she’s in danger of losing even that.”
He ran his hand over his face.
“What?” I said.
“If McCloskey exposed Bethel, then raped her, why would she freak out when she found out he was dead?”
“Maybe it was still a loss to her. Maybe she harbored some small bit of good feeling toward him. For giving her Noel.”
Milo spun on the stool. Ramp snored louder.
“Or,” said Milo, “what if it was more than some little bit of good feeling? What if she and McCloskey have been in contact with each other? Misery loving company. A common enemy.”
I said, “Gina?”
“They both could’ve hated her. McCloskey for whatever reason he had in the first place, Bethel out of jealousy— the haves against the have-nots. What if she wasn’t quite so happy playing the underdog? And what if there was another ingredient sweetening the relationship— money? Blackmail.”
“Over what?”
“Who knows? But Gina was a member of the wild group.”
“You said you didn’t uncover any dirt on her.”
“So she was better than the others at keeping it quiet— making her secret worth even more. Weren’t you the one who told me secrets were coin of the realm out here? So what if McCloskey and Bethel took that literally? If McCloskey had been Bethel’s partner in something nasty, it would make sense for her to bolt after hearing he was dead.”
“Joel and Bethel, Noel and Melissa,” I said. “Too goddam ugly. I hope you’re wrong.”
“I know,” he said. “I keep coming up with them. But we didn’t write the movie— we’re just reviewing it.”
He continued to look pained.
I said, “What if Noel ran down McCloskey? He’s the first one I thought of when I heard a car had been the weapon. Cars are his thing— he has access to all of Gina’s. Think we should open all those garages, see if any of the classics have front-end damage?”
“Waste of time,” he said. “He wouldn’t have used one of those. Too conspicuous.”
“No one in Azusa saw Gina’s Rolls drive up to the dam.”
“Not true. We don’t know that. Sheriff filed it as an
accident— no one ever did a door-to-door.”
“Okay,” I said. “So Noel used some kind of utility vehicle. They used to have one— back when I was treating Melissa. Old Caddy—’62 Fleetwood. She called it a Cadillac Knockabout. They’ve probably got one like that today— can’t use a Duesenberg to pick up the groceries. It’s stashed somewhere on those seven acres, or in one of those garages. Or maybe McCloskey was run down with stolen wheels— Noel could know how to hot-wire.”
“From too-good-to-be-true to juvenile delinquent?”
“Like you said, things change.”
He swung toward the bar.
“Oedipus wrecks,” he said. “The all-American kid runs over his old man. How much therapy will it take to patch that one up?”
I didn’t answer.
Across the room, Ramp snorted and gasped for air. His head lifted, sank, rolled to the side.
Milo said, “Be a good idea to get him lucid, see what else we can squeeze out of him. Also be a good idea to wait around and see if old Bethel comes back.”
He looked at his watch. “Got to be getting over to the airport. You feel like sticking around? I’ll check in with you when I’m settled— let’s say before nine.”
“What about your surveillance guy? Can’t he take over here?”
“Nope. He doesn’t come out into the open. Part of the deal.”
“Antisocial?”
“Something like that.”
“All right,” I said. “I was planning to play with the phone for a while— check out a few more Boston things. What do I do if Bethel comes back?”
“Keep her here. Try to get whatever you can out of her.”
“Using what technique?”
He came around from behind the bar, hitched his trousers, buttoned his jacket, and slapped me on the back.
“Your charm, your Ph.D., bald-faced lies— whichever feels best.”
34
Ramp slipped into a deep sleep. I cleared the bottle, glass, and cup from the table, put them in the bar sink, and dimmed the lights until they were no longer cruel. A phone-in to my service yielded no messages from Boston, just a few business calls that I handled for half an hour.
At four-thirty the phone rang: someone wanting to know when the Tankard would be open again. I said as soon as possible and hung up feeling like a bureaucrat. Over the next hour I disappointed lots of people wanting to make dinner reservations.
At five-thirty I felt cold and adjusted the air-conditioning thermostat. Pulling a cloth off one of the other tables, I draped it over Ramp’s shoulders. He continued to doze. The great escape. More in common with Melissa than either of them would ever know.
At five-forty, I went into the restaurant’s kitchen and fixed myself a roast beef sandwich and cole slaw. The coffee urn was cold, so I settled for a Coke. Bringing all of it back to the bar, I ate and watched Ramp continue to sleep, then phoned the house he’d once called home.
Madeleine answered. I asked if Susan LaFamiglia was still there.
“Oui. One momen’.”
A second later the attorney came on. “Hello, Dr. Delaware. What’s up?”
“How’s Melissa?”
“That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”
“How’s she doing right now?”
“I got her to eat, so I suppose that’s a good sign. What can you tell me about her psychological status?”
“In terms of what?”
“Mental stability. These kinds of cases can get nasty. Do you see her as someone who can deal with court without cracking up?”
“It’s not a matter of cracking up,” I said. “It’s the cumulative stress level. Her moods tend to go up and down. She alternates between fatigue and withdrawal, and bursts of anger. She’s not stabilized yet. I’d watch her for a while, wouldn’t get right into litigation until I was sure she’d settled down.”
“Up and down,” she said. “Kind of a manic-depressive thing?”
“No, there’s nothing psychotic about it. It’s actually pretty logical, considering the emotional roller coaster she’s been on.”
“How long do you think it’ll take for her to settle down?”
“It’s hard to say. You can work with her on strategy— the intellectual part of it. But avoid anything confrontational for the time being.”
“Confrontational is mostly what I’ve seen from her. That surprised me. What with her mother being dead only a few days— I expected more grief.”
“That may relate to something she learned in therapy years ago. Channeling anxiety to anger in order to feel more in control.”
“I see,” she said. “So you’re giving her a clean bill of health?”
“As I said, I wouldn’t want to see her go through any major upheaval right now, but in the long run I expect her to do okay. And she’s certainly not psychotic.”
“Okay. Good. Would you be willing to say that in court? Because the case may end up hinging on mental competence.”
“Even if the other side has engaged in illegal activities?”
“If that turns out to be the case, we’ll be in luck. And I’m looking into that angle, as I’m sure Milo told you. Jim Douse just went through a very expensive divorce and I know for a fact that he bought too many junk bonds for his personal portfolio. There’s talk of some funny business up at the State Bar, but it may turn out to be nothing more than dirt thrown around by his ex-wife’s attorneys. So I’ve got to cover all bases, assume Douse and the banker acted like saints. Even if they didn’t, with the way books can be juggled, major skullduggery can be hard to uncover. I deal with movie studios all the time— their accountants specialize in that. This case is sure to get nasty, because it’s a sizable estate. It could drag on for years. I need to know my client’s solid.”
“Solid enough,” I said. “For someone her age. But that doesn’t mean invulnerable.”
“Solid’s good enough, Doctor. Ah, she’s coming back now. Do you want to speak to her?”
“Sure.”
A beat, then: “Hi, Dr. Delaware.”
“Hi. How’re things going?”
“Fine . . . Actually, I thought maybe you and I could talk?”
“Sure. When?”
“Um . . . I’m working with Susan now and I’m getting kind of tired. How about tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow it is. Ten in the morning okay?”
“Sure. Thanks, Dr. Delaware. And I’m sorry if I’ve been . . . difficult.”
“You haven’t been, Melissa.”
“I’m just— I wasn’t thinking about . . . Mother. I guess I was . . . denying it— I don’t know— doing all that sleeping. Now, I keep thinking about her. Can’t stop. Never seeing her again— her face . . . knowing she never will . . . again.”
Tears. Long silence.
“I’m here, Melissa.”
“Things will never be the same,” she said. Then she hung up.
• • •
Six-twenty, still no sign of Bethel or Noel. I phoned my service and was told Professor “Sam Ficker” had called and left a Boston number.
I phoned it and got a young child on the line.
“Hello?”
“Professor Fiacre, please.”
“My daddy’s not home.”
“Do you know where he is?”
An adult female voice broke in: “Fiacre residence. Who’s calling?”
“This is Dr. Alex Delaware returning Professor Fiacre’s call.”
“This is the babysitter, Doctor. Seth said you might be calling. Here’s the number where you can reach him.”
She read off the number and I copied it down. Thanking her, I gave her the Tankard’s number for callback, hung up, and dialed the one she’d given me.
A male voice said, “Legal Seafoods, Kendall Square.”
“I’m trying to reach Professor Fiacre. He’s having dinner there.”
“Spell that, please.”
I did.
“Hold on.”
A minute passed. Three more. Ramp appeared to be rousing. Sitting up with great effort, he wiped his face with a grimy sleeve, blinked, looked around, and stared at me.
Private Eyes Page 50