There was an Old Woman

by Howard Engel

  “Oh, Benny! It’s been like the old days around here!”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Takes me back to my time with the Star. They’ve pulled out all the stops on this murder. We haven’t had a week like this since Red Hill went over the falls in a barrel.”

  “What makes this so special?”

  “Temperley? Hell, he was a prince of a financial institution, a cardinal of the counting house, a …” He ground to a stop. “I’m all written out. You finish it.” When the coffee came, he didn’t so much drink it as absorb it directly. A wink and it was gone.

  “I’ve read all about it. Great stuff, but you do look done in, Bill. Have you been working double shifts?”

  “I’ve been up to my knees in that Victoria Lawn gumbo, Benny. And it’s cold out there! Those yellow plastic ribbons the cops put around the scene of the crime don’t keep the cold out. This is my second pair of boots I’ve dragged through the muck. Ruined my dress shoes the first night. Damn it all!”

  “Are there any leads? Do they have a clue who did it?”

  “If they have, they’re wary of spilling it to the media. I can’t get Chris Savas to answer his phone. And him owing me from last Monday’s poker game!”

  “Was Temperley dead when he went into the grave or was he killed in the cemetery, Bill? Did the coroner say anything about lividity?”

  “Hell, he wouldn’t tell me anything. He just grinned at me with those phoney new teeth of his.”

  “Bill, remember when you were telling me about McKenzie Stewart the other day?” Bill nodded suspiciously. “Well, do you remember telling me whether he was married or not?”

  “McStu’s an estranged man, Benny. His happy home is no more.”

  “So, a divorce is in the wind?”

  “That’s what I hear. But hell, Benny, I don’t hear all that often from that quarter. They could both be back together again for all I know. But remember to be careful of that wife of his. She can be a dangerous woman.”

  “Good! That’s just what I wanted to hear.” I got up and found my way out into the weather again.

  I sympathized with Bill and the working press. At least he was working on a big story. My talents were totally absorbed in another direction. Mendlesham couldn’t have been clearer: nothing fancy is wanted from Mrs. Cooperman’s younger son, just the facts, please. If McStu’s wife wanted to share in the riches to be had from writing crime fiction, that was her business. My job was to furnish the information. That was what I was good at, after all. That’s what I did in the divorce trade. Why did I now start feeling like a hired gun, a mercenary? I used to be proud of what I did. Suddenly I felt like a heel. Maybe I was getting senile, taking on a bad case of that disease I can never remember the name of.

  I stopped at the sight of my office door and turned around. I was not in the mood to be serenaded by the sound of running water—not after spending so much time in the library. I didn’t want to run into Kogan again. He’d probably want a progress report too. Just like Mendlesham. When I stopped chewing my lower lip and noticed where my feet were taking me, I found that I was heading in the direction of the TV station. I was just passing the park with the cenotaph in it. There were a few bruised wreaths leaning against the white stone, spilling faded ribbon on the steps, left over from November eleventh. Across the street stood another monument, the one to the builder of the canal that still ran along behind St. Andrew Street. Today the canal was a horrible example of what unchecked pollution can produce; back then it was a symbol of trade, commerce and progress. The smile on William Hamilton Merritt’s face was fixed in the past.

  The receptionist at CXAN didn’t quiz me about my business with Orv Wishart. It was enough that I wanted to see him. She said, “Top of the stairs and to your right,” so I did that. The door was standing open.

  The room had probably been a bedroom in the original mansion, which went back to the 1860s, when it was built as the home of the man who built the canal. Now the radio station occupied the ground floor of the building and the TV studios were set up in an extension added to the back in the 1950s. All the changes had failed to erase the charm and beauty of this high-ceilinged, white, old house. Take the long, curving staircase I’d just climbed, for example. You could still see ghostly figures from the last century in dark suits and long dresses sweeping up to the ballroom. I’m sure the original house had a ballroom. It was that sort of place.

  Wishart was rapidly coming around his big desk and I stood in the entrance.

  “Mr. Cooperman!” he said. I was always flattered when somebody remembered my name after a casual introduction. We’d shaken hands less than a week ago when I’d been pumping Robin O’Neil about Cath Bracken’s routine, Of course, I wasn’t giving Wishart credit for remembering who saw him briefly in the Kingsway Hall last Tuesday. Once again I had my finger bones rattled, and the rest of me was directed to one of the comfortable-looking chairs that gazed up at the big judge’s chair behind his desk. “Since I met you, Mr. Cooperman, I’ve been hearing your name around town. Funny the way that happens, isn’t it?”

  Orv Wishart was well built, heavy, athletic-looking. His jacket was well cut, but the necktie had been loosened and pulled to one side, like this was the middle of a dog-day heatwave in August and the air-conditioner was on the blink. His face was large and round. The beard looked like an afterthought and not a good one, Like his other hair, it was brown and curly. From his appearance I could see he looked after himself. Besides a simple digital wrist watch and wedding ring, he wasn’t showing any jewellery. “What’s on your mind, Mr. Cooperman? Or is this a social call?”

  “I wish it was, Mr. Wishart, but I’m afraid it’s simply business. Strictly business.” Wishart relaxed back into his chair, let it tilt towards the window, through which I could see the bronze form of William Hamilton Merritt holding out his hand to the pigeons in his little park across the street. “As you may know,” I went on, trying for routine blandness, “a private investigator is often asked to make credit checks on people. It’s just routine; nothing to get excited about. As a matter of fact, I usually do them by phone. A couple of the banks send a little of this work my way and it makes a comfortable filler between assignments.”

  “I see. How did I rate a personal visit?”

  “Frankly, I was curious to see you again. You’re a powerful man in this community, Mr. Wishart. But, if you like, I could go through the Credit Bureau and the Department of Transport.”

  “You’ve been asked to check on somebody who works here, is that right?”

  “That’s it. Strictly confidential, of course. But I don’t have to tell you that. It must happen all the time in your position.”

  “It can be a headache. These young announcers are here today and gone tomorrow. If I don’t help them get a credit rating, they won’t ever put down roots.” He took out a pack of cigarettes and then put it back into his top drawer without taking one. Another reformed character in the making. “Who is it this time?”

  I reached into my inside breast pocket and brought out my electric bill. I pretended to read a name scribbled on the back. “Catherine Bracken,” I said without expression. Orv’s chair ratcheted him a notch or two in my direction, but his face didn’t change.

  “She’s been here well over a year. She’s steady, dependable, honest, trustworthy—”

  “—reliable, friendly, resourceful, talented. I get the picture. Unfortunately, I have to give them all that spelled out in detail. It takes longer, I know, but it’s the insurance companies. They want all the i’s dotted and the t’s crossed, if you know what I mean. Do you have her employment file handy? It’d help if you could refer to it. Notice, I’m not asking to see it myself.”

  “Only take a minute,” he said, getting up and leaving the room. For a horrible moment, I thought that when he returned it would be with Cath Bracken herself. I didn’t have a plan of action to cover that. I’d have to brazen it out.

  The woodwork in the offi
ce was white, the walls were a light blue with stripes like you see in shirting material. The effect was blue and restful. There was plenty of light coming in through the window and the big brass light on Orv’s desk was turned off. Wishart silently came back into the room.

  “Here it is, Mr. Cooperman.”

  “Ben, please. Call me Ben. Let’s get the personal statistics first.” Wishart returned to his chair which welcomed him back with a resounding poooof! of pleasure. “Is ‘Catherine Bracken’ a stage name?”

  “Not according to this. Born 12 January 1965, in Toronto’s Wellington Memorial Hospital.” I made a note. He went on giving me details of education and past employment. If I’d wanted baptismal records, vaccination, or high-school marks, he was all for passing the information along.

  “Now we come to the hard part,” I said. “I don’t know why they have to know this, but they want to. What is her marital status?”

  “Unmarried.”

  “Okay. ‘Unmarried.’ Does she have what they used to call a ‘common-law’ relationship with anyone?”

  “Hey! What is this, Ben? What kind of bank wants that kind of information?”

  “Just one of the routine questions they gave me. If you don’t know, I’ll leave it blank. Look,” I said, smiling, “like I said, if there’s a problem, I can go through the usual channels. It all comes out the same.”

  Orv thought a moment, then spread his hands on the desk. I read this as an invitation to continue. “Does she own her house or is she renting?”

  “Renting, as far as I know, Ben.” Orv was noticeably tiring of this interrogation. I was going to have to cut it short.

  “Next of kin?” I asked.

  “None. She’s an orphan. No relatives at all.”

  “I see,” I said, making a note. Orv looked worried, as though he had just given her a less than passing grade. I began putting my notes away in my pocket. “Well,” I said, “that just about covers it. I don’t think she’ll have any trouble. I shouldn’t think so anyway.”

  “Do you know if this is for a loan or a mortgage?”

  “Sorry. They don’t tell me these things. Any more than they tell a bird dog the recipe for roast duck, eh?”

  Orv laughed and got up. I extended my wounded hand to him again and he added insult to injury, but with less vehemence. I got up and allowed him to show me the way to the stairs.

  “I’m glad you could help me out like this, Mr. Wishart,” I said, getting a start on the stairs.

  “‘Orv,’ please, Ben.” He hit the steps just behind me. I felt a little awkward being a step or two ahead of him. They were his stairs, after all. At the bottom of the staircase, the receptionist was not at her desk. If fact, she was busy trying to hold up the fainting form of an old woman in a black coat with a silver fox collar.

  “Mother!” Orv called, before he had quite reached the bottom step. “What a nice surprise to see you here.” He moved around the woman and took some of the weight and responsibility from the receptionist. I recognized the redoubtable Mrs. Gladys Ravenswood. From the look of her, she was on a tear of some kind.

  “Orville, I think that you are about to preach to me and I won’t have it. I don’t need a reason for coming into my own office.”

  “But, Mother, I said how nice it was to see you.”

  “Yes, but I know what you meant. You want me to sit like Patience at home, and I’ll not have it.” She didn’t look up. “Jenny’s just helping me. I felt faint for a moment, but I’m quite recovered.” She was exaggerating her recovery from where I stood.

  “But what brings you downtown?” Orv asked, trying to soften the question.

  “Does there have to be a reason, Orville? I don’t like the line you’re taking with me. I’m not an invalid and I’m not mentally incompetent. Don’t crowd me, please.”

  “But, Mother. I worry about you.”

  “Don’t ‘But, Mother!’ me, Orville. I’m not ready for Webster and Powell yet, you know.” Webster and Powell were a firm of undertakers with an establishment on Ontario Street within easy reach of most of the big churches.

  “At least come and sit down,” Orv said as he began to lead his mother-in-law away from the counter. He got her halfway to a chair in the waiting area, when she began to fall again. I caught an elbow on the other side of her along with a whiff of what her problem was, and helped Orv settle her into a chrome-rimmed black leather chair. When she lifted her head, she was looking at me. I couldn’t tell whether it was brandy or rye on her breath, but there was a lot of it.

  “Thank you, young man. What have you done with Orville and Jenny?”

  “I’m right here, Mother,” said Orville through thin lips. “Would you like me to bring the car around?”

  “And why would I want that? I just arrived.” She began to struggle with the arms of the chair. She was trying to get up.

  “Mother, is there something I can help you with?”

  “I have to urinate, Orville. I doubt if you would be of much use where I’m going. Come along, Jenny!” she called and, almost unassisted, walked until the receptionist caught her under one arm. Together they disappeared into the ladies’. For a moment, Orv and I watched the closed white door with the skirted silhouette on it.

  “She’s getting on,” he said, as much to himself as to me. There lingered behind her the perfume of strong drink. Neither of us commented on it.

  “Apart from the Ravenswoods, Orv, do you have a lot of relatives around town?” I was trying hard to fill the silence and not doing a very good job of it.

  “I have a brother in Oxford, Mississippi, and a few cousins on the North Shore, above Boston.”

  “I didn’t know you were an American.

  “I’m not. I’m one hundred percent Canadian. I say ‘eh?’ and everything.”

  “Sorry. What I meant was—”

  “Don’t let it bother you, Benny. I was one of those draft-dodgers you used to read about. Only, I put down roots. You want to see my papers?”

  “Orv, who put you on trial? I was just asking.” Was he nervous about me, I wondered, or was it the old woman. Maybe he was thinking, as I was, about our near meeting at Kingsway Hall a few days ago. The presence of Gladys Ravenswood, even behind a door, made it difficult to talk about. It was one of those mysteries that would have to be solved another day.

  FOURTEEN

  Once again I was at my post when Catherine Bracken came off duty after reading the evening news. She came carrying a large totebag, which she had been dragging around with her since I picked up her trail in Papertown just before noon. She’d led me the same merry chase she always did from the Wool Shoppe to the butcher, from the library to the Beacon, from lunch at the seafood restaurant Martha Tracy was talking about to her parking spot next to the CXAN mobile TV van. This was the point I usually had my dinner, so I’d gone to the Di for a snack and to reread a few chapters of a book by Bracken’s literary friend, McStu. It sustained me through four courses. I’d only meant to eat two, but I got immersed, caught up, and I knew Catherine Bracken wasn’t going anyplace as long as my watch was ticking properly. . I’d phoned my mother to tell her that I was working and wouldn’t be there for my regular Friday dinner. I explained about all the work Julian Newby could throw in my direction. She sounded doubtful.

  Bracken got into her car and started it up. I let her creep out of the lot and pull ahead. Yates Street is always quiet, so I let her get a few car-lengths ahead of me. I kept a healthy distance between us for a long block, even though I had a good idea where she was going. In the next block she pulled ahead. I could live with that. I could even let her get out of sight and pick her up again on Welland Avenue. But when I came out on Ontario Street, she was nowhere in sight. Maybe I wasn’t committed to the idea that what Bracken did with her free time was any business of Julian Newby or his client. But that kind of thinking is bad for business. Once I start getting soft-headed ideas, it’s time to hang up my skates.

  I was mentally trying to
balance Bracken against Newby, while waiting for the light to change, when I heard a car horn honking at my back. I got mad and made a rude gesture without even turning around. The honking continued and the light was still as red as ever. If the driver wanted to make a left turn at this intersection he was going to have to wait until I made mine. There was plenty of room to turn right. Turning right on a red light is one of the four freedoms that Ontario pioneers had fought for. The horn kept honking.

  I got out of the Olds and walked back to the honker. “What the hell is this all about?” I asked as the driver rolled down the window.

  “Suppose you tell me!” an angry Catherine Bracken shouted.

  “Now wait a minute!” I blustered. “You’re doing the honking. And if you noticed the light just changed.”

  “To hell with the light, you know why I’m leaning on my horn. Why are you following me? You’ve been behind me for weeks!”

  “What are you smoking, lady? Give me a break. If you’ve got head problems, see a shrink. But get off my case!” I was trying to sound both stupid and outraged.

  “Deny! Deny! Deny! Sure, I know the policy. Don’t ask me to buy it, though!”

  “Look there’s a car behind you and he’s going to start honking himself. Goodbye!” I turned around and got back behind my wheel, trying to remember if I’d given anything away. How could she have seen me behind her? I’m a good shadow. Nobody’s ever seen me. What was going on?

  I started the motor again. (The car had stalled.) And soon I was headed north on Ontario Street. She was right behind me. I took three right-hand turns around Montecello Park. She was still in my rear-view mirror. I pulled over near the corner of Lake and Ontario. We got out of our cars at the same time. There were globes of mist glowing around the light standards in the park. There was a bite to the night air.

  “Okay, what’s this all about?” I thought that I’d try the aggressive, aggrieved approach.