The kid gave the old woman a glance. “She’s your mother?”
“Oh, yes, sir.”
“Sure she is.”
“I have proof!” I pulled a ten dollar bill out of my pocket. “See?”
The cop looked around, took the bill and slipped it into his pocket. “All right, you can go on in. Just to her house, though. Got it?”
“Yeah, I got it.” I started around the barricade with Norman in tow, but the cop slapped his hand on Norman’s chest.
“Hey! Where do you think you’re going, buddy?”
Norman’s eyes bulged. “With her.”
He looked Norman up and down. “Oh yeah? Who are you?”
I took Norman by the hand. “He’s my husband.”
Norman stood a little taller and a grin split his face. “Yeah, I’m her husband.”
The cop rolled his eyes. “Of course, you are.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Just get out of here.”
“Sure thing.” I tugged Norman into motion, and we marched up the street. My ‘mother’ lived in a house across the street from Shultz’s, and two houses closer to Beachmont. I tried to shake off Norman’s sweaty grip, but he held on for all he was worth. He just kept grinning at me.
When we got to the old woman’s house I strode straight up to her porch. “Good afternoon, ma’am. I was hoping to ask you a few questions.”
She studied me up and down with a cloudy squint. “You with the paper?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Post or Enquirer?”
“Columbus Dispatch.”
The old woman’s eyebrows creased her forehead. “No foolin’?”
I chuckled and finally disentangled my hand from Norman’s death grip. “No foolin’.” I took my grimy notebook from my pocket. “May I have your name?”
“Mrs. McKnight.”
“How well did you know the deceased?”
“The who?”
“The dead guy across the street.”
“Oh! Well, he’d lived there since wintertime. I ‘member there was snow on the ground when he moved in. He weren't none too friendly, never spoke or waved or nothin’.”
I scribbled that down. “Did he have many visitors?”
She coughed and something rattled itself loose, which she spat over the railing into the weeds. “He was always a-comin’ and a-going with someone. Sometimes in a big black car, sometimes in a big white car. They weren’t his cars, yuh see, someone was always a-coming to pick him up.”
“Pick him up for what?”
She shrugged. “How should I know? ‘Bout April or May though, he got himself a girl that moved in there. Old Georgia, she talked to him, and found out that the girl an’ him weren’t married yet, but they was a-plannin’ to get hitched sooner or later.” She coughed and spat again. “It’s a sin, that is. A sin for a man and a woman to live in the same house afore they’re proper wedded. It’s a sin.” She shook her head sadly. “Nuthin’ but sin left in this worn out world.”
I took the photograph of Heloise Kendall out of my pocket. “This the girl?”
Mrs. McKnight took it in her talon and held a few miles away from her eyeballs. “Could be. Looks like her. I didn’t see her as close as Georgia did.” She handed me the picture with a shrug.
“Where does Georgia live? I might need to speak to her too.”
A strange, toothless grin brightened Mrs. McKnight’s face. “Can’t speak to her.”
“Why not?”
She pointed to the burned down house I’d seen last night. “She’s burned to ashes.”
Norman looked right at me. “Just like your husband at Pearl Harbor, eh?”
I shot him a frown then turned back to Mrs. McKnight. “Do you know why anybody would want to kill Shultz?”
“Shultz? Was that his name?” She scratched at something that crawled around in her hair. “Nah, I can’t say why anyone would want to kill him, unless it was his girl.”
“Why do you say that?”
She leaned closer and spoke in a low, excited whisper. “They been a-fightin’ sumthin’ fierce, him and her.”
“Oh my.” I jotted that down. “Did you hear what they were fighting about?”
“Oh yes!” She rocked back and forth on the milk can. “I sure did, whole neighborhood heard ‘em at it. Weren’t a secret they was a-fightin’.”
“What was it about?”
“She was a-wantin’ to leave town! They was a-fightin’ about leavin’ town. I ‘spect her people didn’t like him none, and they was a-tryin’ to stop her from marryin’ him. She was a-sayin’ that she wanted to leave right then, but he wasn’t ready to go just yet.”
“I heard he was a kraut.” I watched Mrs. McKnight closely, but she only shrugged.
“He was German, you could hear that when he talked. Does that make him a kraut?”
Norman spoke up, using his loud voice again. “No! He’s only a kraut if he supports Hitler!”
“Oh, well then, I wouldn’t know about that. Maybe he was a kraut, maybe he wasn’t.” Something rumbled in her chest and it was a minute before she could breathe again.
“Who found Shultz’s body?”
“I reckon it was the girl. I seen her this morning, early like, before the sun was up proper. She went in and come out a few minutes later with her suitcase. ‘Bout an hour later the law come screaming up the street in an awful hurry.”
A voice boomed behind us. A voice I knew. “Hey! Who are you? Are you with the press?” I closed my eyes, but didn’t turn around. The voice thundered again. “You two, I’m talking to you!”
I heard his footfall on the sidewalk behind me, but I still didn’t turn around.
“You’d better not be with the press. I mean it.” I knew he stood right behind me, only a matter of inches away, but I still didn’t turn around.
He grasped my elbow and spun me around. I kept my eyes closed and forgot how to breathe.
I heard a sharp intake of breath, then he spoke. “Cassy? My God, Cassandra? Is it really you?” I finally opened my eyes, and for a moment time folded over itself, and I saw him as he was five years ago, and also as he was now, two images superimposed one over the other. Something tore loose inside my chest, in my brain, and the world wobbled for a second.
Only for a second. A cigarette leapt to my lips, and I breathed again, a deep blast of tobacco. “Hello Paolo. Been a while.”
He didn’t say anything for a century or two. He just watched me with those bottomless blue pools, unchanged in all the years apart. I felt a pulse in my arm, the one he still held. I couldn’t tell if it was his or my own.
“You arresting me?” I drew a deep breath through my cigarette. When he didn’t move, I gestured to his hand. “If not, stop handling the goods.” He still didn’t make a move. “Am I gonna have to scream?”
He blinked and that smile of his crept across his face as he released my arm. The thing in my chest gave another lurch and I suddenly felt like I might collapse. Instead, I took another drag and took a step away from him.
Norman swung his head toward Paolo, and then back toward me. “You know this guy, Kissy?”
“Oh yeah. Paolo and I go way back.”
Paolo didn’t even look at Norman. “Kissy? You don’t go by Cassy anymore?”
“Guess not. You must have missed the memo.”
“I must have. Why Kissy?”
“Why not?”
His smile broadened. “Cassy or Kissy, other than your taste in clothes, you haven’t changed at all.”
“Haven’t I? Well, that’s a damned shame.” I flung my used smoke at his feet. “If we’re not under arrest, my friend and I have things to do.”
He hitched out a long sigh. “Cassandra. It’s been five years.”
“Has it been that long? My, how time flies when you hate someone’s guts.”
He winced. “So, I guess you’re still upset.”
I moved closer to him, close enough that I could smell his aftershave.
He still used the same brand. “Upset? Is that what I am Paolo? Am I upset?”
He held his hands up. “All right, I’m sorry.”
I turned toward Norman and Mrs. McKnight and jerked a thumb at Paolo. “Hear that? He’s sorry.” My voice began to rise in pitch and volume. “Guess everything’s fine now. No more worries, nothing to fret about at all!”
“Cassy ...”
I stabbed a finger toward his face, and I let contempt ice up my voice. “That’s not my name. ‘Cassy’ is dead. She died the same day Mary did. She died with Mary’s blood on her face. Don’t ever call me Cassy again.”
He watched me light another cigarette but said nothing. I spat a jet of smoke in his direction. Our mutual silence clearly made Norman uncomfortable; he fidgeted like a toddler in a candy store, but he didn’t break the silence either.
Behind me a telephone bell clanged away, and Mrs. McKnight excused herself to answer it. Paolo watched the old woman enter the house, then looked at me again. “Why are you here, Kissy?”
“Why shouldn’t I be here? Maybe I’m visiting Mrs. McKnight.”
His face disapproved of my answer. “No. Why are you really here?” He aimed his glare at Norman. “How about you? Care to tell me what you’re doing thirty yards from a murder scene?”
I answered for Norman. “Not really.”
Paolo’s brow knit. “You don’t have anything to do with the business across the street, do you?”
“Absolutely. We butchered the whole gang over there. With dull knives.” I stared into the azure depths of Paolo’s eyes. “What gave us away?”
He sighed. “Fine. I can’t help you if you won’t let me.”
“I asked for your help once, Paolo, remember?”
He waited a long time to answer, and when he did his voice was low and husky. “I remember.”
“You told me to go to hell.”
“I never said that!”
I dropped my cigarette to the ground and mashed it with my foot. “Didn’t you? Funny, that’s how I remember it.”
“I couldn’t do what you asked me to do. I’m a cop, for God’s sake!” He ran his fingers through the blond curls on his head. “There are ways to do things, Cassandra, procedures that must be followed. I can’t take the law into my own hands, and neither can you!”
“Watch me.”
I started to walk past him, but he grasped my arm again. “Look, it’s been five years. Haven’t I done my penance?”
I shook my head. “If you believe you have, we have nothing more to say to each other.”
His head drooped. “How long will you hate me?”
“How long will Mary be dead?”
“That’s not fair. I didn’t kill her!”
“Nope, you didn’t. But you didn’t kill the man who did. You’re good at not killing people, aren’t you? Mary bled out on the filthy street, Paolo, so don’t talk to me about what’s not fair. Go do your cop things and leave me alone.” I stepped close to him again and looked up at his face. “Leave me alone.”
I gave Norman a shove, and we stalked away from Paolo. My heartbeat finally slowed down an hour or two later.
Chapter Eight
“Where are we going, Kissy?” Norman whined in that nasally petulant voice that always put me in my worst mood. Unfortunately for him, I’d already slipped into my worst mood.
“Shut up, Norman.”
“But where are we going?”
I spun around and gave him a savage shove in the chest. “Shut up means shut up. I don’t want to listen to your ignorance right now!” I steamed forward, no destination in mind, but a powerful need to move. Anyone who saw me would think I had to be somewhere in a desperate hurry. Honestly, I simply wanted to get away from Mount Washington. To get myself far away from Paolo.
I stepped on the first streetcar I found, not even caring where it went. Norman sat next to me, thankfully silent. I yanked him to his feet, and we disembarked at a random stop downtown, and I resumed my frenetic footrace to nowhere. Finally, a diner caught my eye and I aimed for it. I sat down and ordered coffee for myself and Norman.
I smoked three cigarettes and drank two mugs of coffee before I felt numb enough to live again. I noticed the window was clean enough to look through, so I did, and realized I didn’t know where I was. I chuckled through my cigarette. “Where are we, Norman?”
He shrugged but didn’t say anything.
“Come on, you really don’t know?”
He shook his head and tipped back the last of his coffee.
“Not talking to me?”
He shrugged.
“Aw, did I hurt your little feelings, Normie?”
His brows fell toward his prominent nose. “Sometimes I wonder why I stick around, you know that? You’re really hard to put up with, Kissy. Or is it Cassy?”
“Don’t call me Cassy.”
“Fine.” He leaned back and stared out the window, shaking his head.
“What do you want? An apology? Is that it?”
He didn’t look at me. “I don’t want anything.”
I picked up the menu. “Well, I do. I want something to eat. It feels like it’s high time for some meal or other. Care to join me?”
He stared out the window for another minute before he opened his menu. He ordered the steak and potatoes, and I had the vegetable soup. The waitress, a pretty young thing of blonde curls and coltish legs, freshened up our coffee. Watching her walk away reminded me of Heloise Kendall.
I watched Norman ignoring me until our food came. He salted his meal with such vigor that it looked like a blizzard above his plate. “How’s your salt? Get any meat in it by accident?”
He dropped the salt shaker onto the table with a thump. He glared at me in a way I’d never seen him glare at anybody, and looked for a moment as if he might say something. Instead, he snatched up his silverware and started sawing at the snow-coved beef. He chewed slowly, deliberately, and kept up his glaring.
My mouth quirked into a crooked smile. I fell to my soup, not really tasting it, but wincing when it started up the burning in the pit of my stomach. I only ate half of it before giving it up as a bad job. Instead of eating, I fired up a cigarette.
Norman frowned at my soup bowl. “Is that all you’re going to eat?”
I nodded and exhaled a blast of smoke toward the window.
“Kissy, you need to eat more than that.”
I sucked in another lungful of tobacco. “Nah, I’m done. It’s not all that good.”
“Then order something else. You have to eat.”
I chuckled. “Says who? And aren’t you supposed to be giving me the silent treatment?”
“I’m not giving you the silent treatment; it’s just that you really treat me bad. I’m getting kind of tired of it.” He carved off another chunk of his steak.
“Are you?” I smirked again.
“Yeah. I’m especially tired of never knowing what’s going on.”
“Norman, I could write it all down for you, and you’d still not know what’s going on. That’s not my fault.” I dropped my smoke into the ashtray to wither. “What do you want to know?”
“Who is Paolo?”
“A cop.”
“I know that. Who is he to you?”
I spat out a long expressive sigh. “His name is Paolo Constantin Belvedere, and he once asked me to be Mrs. Belvedere.”
His mouth hung open. “What did you say?”
“That, Norman, is a long story, and not one I’m going to tell you right now.” I watched his brows knit. “That all happened a long time ago.”
“Okay, who’s Mary?”
My jaw clenched and my coffee cup froze mid-flight, and I plopped it onto the table, almost spilling it. “Look Norman, I don’t want to talk about her. Got it? She’s dead. That’s all you need to know, and that’s all I’m going to tell you.”
He spread his hands and scowled. “See, that’s what I mean! You keep me shut out! We’re supposed to be friends,
for Christ’s sake!”
I pawed through my jacket looking for another cigarette but found none. He didn’t miss that I remained silent.
“Right? We are friends, aren’t we? Kissy?”
By now every eye in the diner had turned to our table, waiting for my answer. I just sat there, watching his stupid moon-face as he watched mine. “We’re partners, Norman, and we have a job to do.”
“What job?”
“Finding the girl.”
He waved that away with a dismissive hiss. “Come on, Kissy. We’re done with all that.”
“Are we? I don’t remember deciding that.”
He leaned forward and, for once, lowered his voice. “We’re not detectives, neither of us. The Kendall girl got herself tangled up with a bunch of krauts. Her kraut boyfriend got himself shot, and she’s probably dead in a ditch somewhere. Or maybe she’s floating in the river. It doesn’t matter because it’s not our problem! We’re in this mess deep enough, it’s time to get out while our hides are still in one piece.”
“Impressive.” I put two-dollar bills on the table. “That’s the most coherent thing I’ve ever heard you say.” I put on my hat and we left the diner. Heads turned to watch us through the window as we scuttled up the street. “However coherent it is, though, I disagree. Mrs. Kendall paid us in good faith to find her daughter, and that’s what we’re gonna do.”
“Will you listen to yourself? Kissy, you’re not making any sense! Are you really talking about ‘good faith’? How much ‘good faith’ were you showing that guy who owned the deli last winter? You weaseled fifty bucks out of him! Is that what you mean by ‘good faith’?”
I shook my head. “I don’t want to do that sort of thing anymore. I think those days are over.”
“Like the days with Mary and Paolo?”
I slapped him then, hard across the chops, and handed him a handkerchief when his nose inevitably started to bleed.
“Why’d you hit me for?” He pinched his nostrils together with my handkerchief.
I shoved him into the brick façade of a bank. “I told you I didn’t want to talk about Mary. Do you understand me now, or do I have to repeat myself?”
Big Shots and Bullet Holes Page 6