by Dorien Grey
The phone interrupted my thoughts.
“Hardesty Investigations.”
Silence, then a click and a dial tone.
I hate people who don’t at least have the decency, when they get a wrong number, to say “Sorry, wrong number” before hanging up.
At eleven thirty, as I was thinking about lunch, there was a knock on my door. I wasn’t expecting anyone, and prospective clients seldom dropped in without calling first.
“Come,” I said.
The door opened, and Eric stepped in. “I’d love to,” he said with a big grin.
“Well, this is a surprise,” I said truthfully.
“I should have called first,” he said, coming over to my desk, “but I wasn’t near a phone. I had to deliver a special order to our store down the street, and when I realized how close I was to your office, I thought I’d see if I could buy you lunch.”
“That’s nice of you, Eric, but…”
He looked mildly chagrined. “Oh, I’m sorry. You’ve probably got plans.”
“No, not at all,” I said, “but you certainly don’t have to buy me lunch.”
“Sure I do. You guys have been really nice to me, and this is the least I can do.”
“Well, okay,” I said. “I guess it is time for lunch. Where would you like to go? There aren’t all that many places right around here, other than the diner off the lobby.”
“That’s fine with me.”
“Okay,” I said, getting up from my chair. “You want to go now? I imagine you have to get back to work soon.”
“I’ve got time,” he said. “But now’s as good as ever.”
*
Neither of us said much as we rode down on the elevator, which I found mildly uncomfortable. I really didn’t know what to say, which made me even more uncomfortable, and Eric was uncharacteristically quiet.
Finally, seated at one of the diner’s red plastic-upholstered booths, I said, “So, what do you think of Crandall Booth’s death?”
He looked up from his menu and directly into my eyes. “Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.”
“I’m sorry?” I said and, he grinned.
“Crandall was a prick, pulling the rug out from under the chorus like he did.”
“Aren’t you being a little unfair?” I was a little surprised by the intensity of his reaction. “He did a lot for the chorus.”
Eric shrugged. “That he did. But I think we’d have been better off if he’d never gotten involved with it in the first place. Teasing us along, promising us things, getting us to depend on him—not because he gave a damn for the chorus, but so he could throw his weight around. Roger would have kicked Grant out of the chorus the very first time he started pulling his shit if it wasn’t for Crandall. Roger knew exactly what Crandall was doing, but he wasn’t able to do anything about it for fear Crandall would do exactly what he ended up doing anyway.”
The waitress came to take our orders.
“What do you recommend?” Eric asked.
“I usually get the B.L.T., it’s pretty good.”
“Sold.” He smiled at the waitress and said, “I’ll have a B.L.T. and a Coke.”
“Same for me,” I said, “but make it milk.” When she’d gone, I said, “So, any ideas on who might have killed Crandall?”
He looked at me carefully before saying, “Yeah, I do. Word is he was killed because he owed more in gambling debts than he could pay. And I’ll bet Grant was killed as a warning to Crandall to pay up. When it didn’t work, they killed him, too.”
Well, that was an interesting theory, and one that had never occurred to me but should have. I was mildly ticked at myself that it hadn’t. It made some sense, except for the basic fact that while killing Grant might have been meant as a warning to Booth it still didn’t make sense to kill Booth.
“Interesting idea,” I said. “And at least it would take all the pressure off the chorus.”
“Right!” Eric said. “And I never believed for one minute that anyone from the chorus could have done it.”
I decided not to pursue the subject any further, but I didn’t have to. Out of thin air, Eric asked, “So, how are you and Jonathan getting along?”
That one caught me totally by surprise. “Fine,” I said. “What made you ask?”
The waitress appeared with our food. Nothing was said until she left, but I certainly was curious.
“Oh, nothing,” he said. “Jonathan mentioned that you’d had a fight last week.”
A fight? What the hell was he talking about? I searched my memory for a clue.
“We had an argument,” I said, remembering what he must be referring to—Joshua’s still being up when Jonathan got home from chorus practice. “I certainly wouldn’t call it a fight. We argue all the time. It never means anything.”
Eric raised an eyebrow. “Sorry,” he said. “Guess I misunderstood. So, no problems?”
I had no idea why he was asking all this and was definitely uncomfortable with it.
“No problems.”
“Good,” he said, and took a large bite out of his B.L.T.
However, since he’d opened the door to personal lives, I thought I’d put my foot in the door of his.
“You’ve never had a relationship?” I asked.
He wiped the corner of his mouth with his napkin and smiled. “Nobody wants me.”
“Bullshit!” I recognized a bid for sympathy when I heard one. “Not anybody?”
“I’ve had a string of disasters,” he said, “but only one I’d really qualify as a relationship. He died.”
Died? Was that what Rothenberger had meant by Eric’s “tragedies”? I wanted to know more, but didn’t think it was proper of me to ask.
Oh, what the hell.
“I’m really sorry to hear that,” I said. “Can I ask what happened?”
“He killed himself. Is Jonathan your first?”
Non sequitur, anyone? Still, I knew a keep-out sign when I saw one.
“One other,” I said, heeding the sign and taking a sip of milk. “Chris. Seven years. He lives in New York now. We’re still friends.”
“Is Jonathan jealous?”
I laughed. “Jonathan is not the jealous type, thank God. He and Chris are great friends.”
“Well, I’d be jealous.”
Hey, I’m the last person on earth who should criticize anyone for being the jealous type, but dense though I may occasionally be, it was pretty clear by this point that Eric was coming on to me. While my crotch was flattered, the rest of me was definitely uncomfortable.
We’d been playing this little game of badminton for quite a while now. He had never come out and directly expressed his interest, and I had tried as subtly as I could to field his every serve as gently as possible. The whole thing was compounded by his friendship with Jonathan. I couldn’t imagine Eric would want to jeopardize it, and while Jonathan had teased me about Eric’s interest, I found it equally hard to imagine he thought Eric was serious.
Eric was one of the first friends of his own that Jonathan had made outside of his work. I knew it meant a great deal to him, and I hated the thought that I might be the cause of a rift between them. But there was no way in hell I was going to jeopardize my relationship with Jonathan for anyone or anything. How could I get that point across to Eric without hurting his feelings?
Nobody likes rejection—I’ve been on the wrong end of that stick more than once myself, and it ain’t pretty. But sometimes there simply is no alternative.
I hadn’t quite reached that point with Eric, and hoped it wouldn’t come to that, but it was drawing uncomfortably close.
We finished our lunch, and Eric insisted on getting both the bill and the tip.
As we walked out into the lobby, I said, “Thanks, Eric, I really appreciate it.”
I extended my hand. He stared at it intently for a second, then grinned and took it.
“My pleasure,” he said. “See ya around.” And with that he turned and st
rolled through the revolving doors and out into the street.
Chapter 13
“I had lunch with Eric today,” I told Jonathan at dinner.
“Ah, that’s nice,” he said. “He told me Tuesday he was going to try to do it this week if he could. How did it go?”
Uh, okay, Hardesty, your move, a mind-voice said.
“Fine,” I said. “Did he ever mention having had a lover in his past?”
“No.” He was looking at me curiously. “Why?”
“Just wondered. He had an interesting theory on Crandall Booth’s death.”
Jonathan shot a significant sideways glance at Joshua, who was busily building a dam of mashed potatoes to keep the gravy from running into his peas and apparently not paying attention to our conversation.
I took the hint and dropped the subject. But later, after he had returned from class and Joshua was asleep, I felt I had to say something and hoped I could find the words to say it right.
“You know, babe,” I said, “how you’re always teasing me about Eric’s being interested in me?”
He nodded. “Yes?”
“Well…is there any possibility he might be serious?”
Jonathan jerked his head back and stared at me. “Are you serious?” he asked. “No way. Eric’s my friend, and he’d never do anything like that. He just likes pulling your leg!”
Maybe, I thought, but I hope it isn’t the middle one.
“Yeah. Okay,” I said, “but could you maybe let him know it makes me a little uncomfortable?”
He shook his head, grinning. “If I did that, he’d only come on ten times as strong.”
“I’m serious. I really wish he wouldn’t do it.”
“Has he ever come out and asked you to go to bed with him?”
“Of course not!”
“Well, then, lighten up a little. He’s just got a strange sense of humor.”
“Yeah. Strange.” I was not convinced.
*
I got a call first thing Thursday morning from one of the lawyers for whom I did occasional legwork, asking me if I could drive up to Neeleyville immediately to pick up some papers from the courthouse and get them to his office by two that afternoon. There had been some major snafu in getting them to him, and he had no one else who could do it. I agreed—it’s not like I was up to my ears in pending leads on Grant/Booth needing instant follow-up.
I was out the door the minute I hung up the phone.
It was a pleasant drive, the weather crisp and clear, and I always enjoyed the drive through the hills north of the city. I was tempted to take a little side trip to my favorite scenic overlook—the one from which Jonathan had scattered the ashes of his friend Randy (another story)—but the time factor wouldn’t allow it.
Returning to the city, I went directly to the lawyer’s office, arriving there at one thirty after spending ten minutes looking for a parking place. By the time I’d had lunch and got back to my office, it was almost two thirty.
There were two calls waiting on my machine: a prospective client and Marty. I tried Marty first but was told he was out of the office, so I left a message. Then I talked with the prospective client who, it appeared, needed a good lawyer more than he did a P.I., and I referred him to a couple. I always hate passing up the chance for a new client, but I really couldn’t see wasting his money by taking a case just to take it.
It was nearly four when Marty returned my call.
“Seems like your tip on Stapleton paid off,” he said. “They don’t have all the facts yet, but it seems that Booth was about to lose a couple of his major dealership franchises. Stapleton says it was only his dad’s adept financial maneuvering that had kept Booth in business this long.
“Apparently, Booth has had a serious gambling addiction for years, but he kept it hidden. Since he was sole owner of all his businesses, he didn’t have to report to anyone, and nobody—except maybe for Irving Stapleton—knew what was really going on.”
“Interesting,” I said. “I wonder what’s going to happen to his dealerships now. I know that’s not our problem, but a lot of people’s jobs are at stake.”
“Yeah, it is a shame,” Marty said. “But when you build a house of cards—literally, in Booth’s case—it’s bound to fall down.”
“Sad but true,” I said. “But I still question how anybody he might have owed gambling money to stood to gain by having him dead.”
“Unless they realized he was never going to be able to repay a cent and decided to swat him like a mosquito as an object lesson to other potential deadbeats.”
“I wonder why they kept lending him money when they knew he could never get out of the hole?”
“Hey, credit card companies do it all the time,” Marty pointed out. “But with Booth, they might not have known just how bad off he was. All those luxury car dealerships, the big house—he put up a pretty dazzling front.”
I sighed. “I suppose. Well, keep me posted, if you will.”
“I will.”
I remembered Eric’s theory about Grant’s possibly having been killed as a warning to Booth and relayed it to Marty for what it might be worth.
“Yeah, that is a thought,” he said. “I don’t know if Earl and Ben have looked into that angle, since Jefferson wasn’t their case, but I’ll definitely mention it to them. Maybe Dan and I should be working more closely with them in case the two murders are related. Thanks again for the tip.”
We exchanged good-byes and hung up, leaving me with a definite sense of frustration.
*
So, exactly where did all this leave me? If Booth was killed for his gambling debts, and if Eric’s theory was right that Grant was killed as a warning to Booth, that meant nobody in the chorus was involved and I probably should send the chorus board a bill for my time and get on with my life. On the one hand, I didn’t want to jump the gun and step away too soon, though everything did seem to be pointing in that direction; but on the other, I didn’t want to drag it out any longer than necessary.
Since it was nearly quitting time, I decided to let things ride until the next day. There was no great rush, after all, and I could use the time to think things over again for the twenty-third time. Still, I couldn’t escape the sneaking suspicion that I was a pretty piss-poor detective for not having everything figured out by this time.
*
“So, how was school today, Joshua?” I asked at dinner.
“I’ve got a girlfriend,” he announced, causing me to glance quickly at Jonathan, who merely rolled his eyes to the ceiling. I gathered he’d been told earlier.
“A girlfriend, huh?” I asked. “What’s her name?”
“Susie,” he said. “She’s new.”
“When did you decide she was your girlfriend?”
“She told me.”
I grinned. “She told you?”
He nodded solemnly.
“And what do you think about all this?”
He shrugged. “It’s okay.”
“Well,” I said, “I’m happy for you.” And I was really surprised to realize I wasn’t sure whether I was happy or not.
After Joshua was securely bathed, pajama-ed, bedded, Story-Timed and asleep, Jonathan and I returned to the living room.
“What did you make of Joshua’s news?” I asked.
He looked at me and smiled. “Susie, you mean?”
I nodded. “Isn’t it a little early to have a girlfriend?”
“Well, I really don’t think we have to worry about him and Susie eloping to Las Vegas just yet.”
We had talked before about how we might feel if Joshua turned out straight—and the odds were nine-to-one that he would. I could now understand how straight parents might react to their child being gay. We all want our children to be like we are, and for the child to have a different sexual orientation than the parents is disconcerting at best.
“Would it really matter to you?” Jonathan asked.
I sighed. “No, not really. We’ll love hi
m no matter what. But I sort of pictured him meeting some nice guy—a doctor, maybe…”
Jonathan punched me in the arm. “Oh, puh-leez!” he said, and we started laughing.
*
The first thing Friday morning, I called Glen O’Banyon’s office. I knew from the start of this case that, though I was hired by the chorus’ board of directors, it was Glen who undoubtedly would be footing most of the bill for my services. He and Booth were the only board members with considerable amounts of money, and the chorus operated on a shoestring except for Booth’s not-altogether-altruistic largesse.
I knew, too, that Booth had opposed my being hired, so that would leave Glen with the primary financial burden. I’d decided to talk directly with him as to whether I should bow out now or leave the books open in case the gambling angle did not pay off. I was only charging for the time when I was actually doing something; but leaving the door to the case open meant I wouldn’t have anything to put in the bank until the door was closed, and at this point I had no idea when that might be.
Glen wasn’t in, but I left a message with Donna asking to have him call me.
With nothing really to do until I heard from either Marty or Glen—and it galled me to realize I’d spent far too much time on this case doing exactly that, waiting for someone else to do something—I decided to tackle the long-delayed (by a couple of years, actually) reorganizing/cleaning out of my file cabinet. As so often happens, I was about ten minutes into it when I wondered why in hell I’d ever started. But by that time, with papers and envelopes and folders stacked around on every exposed surface, it was too late to stop.
I looked on cleaning out file cabinets rather like being on an archaeological dig; I found things I hadn’t seen or even thought of in years, and hadn’t a clue as to why I’d kept most of them in the first place.
I was returning from dumping the second full wastebasket of things down the garbage chute when the phone rang.
“Mr. Hardesty,” Donna’s always-professional-but-friendly voice said, “Mr. O’Banyon wonders if you would like to join him for lunch at Etheridge’s at the usual time.”
“I’ll be there,” I said. “Thank you for calling.”
Glancing at my watch, I saw it was coming up on eleven thirty, so I picked up the papers and folders still sitting around, dropped them in the now-empty top drawer of the file cabinet and closed it. I’d get back to it soon. Maybe next year.