Six Pack of Sleuths: Comedy Mysteries

by Barbara Silkstone

  “April 5

  “I hate snow. It's April and we had a stupid snowstorm and this is a horrible place and my mother is the stupidest thing of all. I'm going to run away from home. As soon as the snow melts, I'm getting on my bike and riding to Springfield. They must have an orphanage there or a YWCA or someplace I can live. I have to get away from my hateful, hateful mother.

  “Tonight she hit me. Right across the face. My own mother. After dinner she wanted me to practice piano instead of watching TV and I said no, I was never going back to Mr. Finkelstein. I meant to tell her anyway because he is getting more and more gross and disgusting all the time, and sometimes he puts his hand up my dress and between my legs, even though I squeeze them together as hard as I can and ask him to please not do it, but he breathes real hard through his big ugly nose like he's going to have asthma or something and won't stop.

  “When Mother asked me why I didn't want to go back to piano lessons, I was scared to tell the whole thing because she might think I want Mr. Finkelstein to do those things, like he says, so I just said he was ugly and had a big nose.

  “So she slapped me real hard across the face and said I was talking like a little Nazi and I shouldn't hate people for the way they look. So I'm going to run away from home. As soon as the snow melts.”

  Fatima stopped reading. “Jeez! What was the matter with this girl's mama?”

  Cady felt frozen, unable to speak, stuck in time somewhere between 1961 and now.

  “That poor, poor child,” she said finally. “I don't think she ever told anyone about that piano teacher molesting her—not me, anyway, and not her mother. No wonder she was such a moody kid. All that darkness she kept inside.”

  “If that had been me,” Fatima said, “My mama would have cut that guy. I mean she would have cut it right off. You should have seen her keeping the guys off me.”

  “Mine, too.” Cady smiled, remembering how her mother had tried to protect her virtue even after she was engaged to be married.

  But Astrid had been so different. Sex didn't seem to be part of her world, from what Cady had seen. Astrid dated pale, strange George Peabody for years, but after he dumped her to marry a graduate student, she never seemed to think about dating again. In fact, even Regina's father wasn't somebody she talked about in a romantic way, although from his pictures, he looked like he'd been a drop-dead gorgeous man.

  The only real passion Cady had ever seen Astrid show was when she played her cello. Music must have been like sex for her. Actual sex, on the other hand, was something unsanitary you did to make a baby. And she did hate anything that was unsanitary. Cleanliness wasn't next to godliness for Astrid Ingram. It was godliness. Thoughts about something as dark and dirty as pedophilia probably never even entered her tidy brain.

  Fatima went back to reading again:

  “June 22

  “Remember me? School's out and I have nothing to do so I guess I'll write in here, even though I have nothing to say except I finally got a bra. Professor Peabody told Mother that in America it's not considered nice for girls to go without bras. Professor Peabody comes around a lot and he says I'm going to be a real beauty when I grow up.

  “I hope so. Pretty girls get married, but beauties get to have adventures. Like Adam Troy's girlfriends. I'd like that—to have great clothes and sail around on a boat with beautiful sails.

  “Artie and I are friends again, and he's taking me to a July 4th party at his parent's club. There's a polished cotton print sundress at Mrs. Levine's store that Mother says she'll buy me for the party if I lose five pounds, so I didn't eat anything all day yesterday. But today I snuck money from Mother's purse and bought a devil dog. Mr. Finkelstein still won't stop and yesterday he put his fingers in my shorts and right inside me where you get your period.

  “I wish he'd get run over by a truck.

  “July 4

  “Well, I'm not at the party, am I?

  “I HATE, HATE, HATE my mother. I am never going to talk to her again. She found out I was taking money to buy snacks, and now she won't let me go to the party with Artie. She's at a picnic with stupid Professor Peabody who has a bald head and a neck like Ichabod Crane and I hope he chokes on a piece of fried chicken and dies like Stu Conway's skinny dog did. I hope they all die.

  “Especially Mr. Finkelstein. I stopped going to piano and I've been hanging out at the drugstore reading Seventeen magazine instead and she found that out, too. She says I can't go anywhere for the whole summer, and I can't watch TV.

  “Fine. TV's all reruns, and Linda's gone to Girl Scout camp. Besides, I'm drawing a dress for Katy Keene that has about a million roses on it so it will take all summer.”

  Agitated knocking at the door interrupted Fatima's reading.

  “Reverend Stanton,” Lupe said. “It is your secretary again. She is worried about Denmark. Something is rotten there, she says.”

  “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark? Flo said that?”

  Not good news. Flo only used that quote from Hamlet when things were bad and going to get worse.

  Cady picked up the phone. “Okay, Flo, what's wrong?”

  Chapter 24—Cady: Colored Girls

  Cady listened to Flo's voice—clipped and overly formal. Whatever was going on, Flo was not happy.

  “Your new secretary, or whoever she is, said you're still not seeing properly; is that right, Cady?”

  Cady hesitated. “Not properly, no.”

  So Flo didn't know about her blindness. Tyrone must have been playing down the eye problem to the media. He probably knew nothing could kill a political career faster than a victim image. Flo was going to be in for a shock when she learned the truth, but there was no point in alarming her now. She sounded alarmed enough already, and in need of reassurance.

  “Lupe is Tyrone's cook. Don't worry. You haven't been replaced. How's your house? Did the burglars take anything?”

  “I wouldn't know. I'm still in San Montinaro.”

  “But yesterday I thought you were on your way to the airport.”

  “I was. But there was a storm. We've been grounded here for over twelve hours. Not my favorite way to spend my time, but I'm all right. That's not why I'm calling.”

  “Is it about the box?”

  “No. This is more important. I've been playing cards with a young woman, to pass the time,” Flo said. “She's a girl who came for the funeral—what was your name, dear?”

  She seemed to be shouting at someone, but the voices were impossible to make out over the background noise.

  “I'm sorry, this place is so noisy. Tina Davis, her name is; a white girl. She's an actress. She was on one of those 1970's family television programs—you know, the kind that made your teeth hurt.”

  Cady couldn't imagine why Flo was calling with such urgency tell her this.

  “She thinks someone murdered Princess Regina. She says all sorts of funny accidents were going on. Apparently she and the princess were patients at the same alcohol rehabilitation clinic in Southern California last week. She says an oven fell on Princess Regina's foot, and then a toilet tank fell on her head, or some such improbable thing. She says the princess was trying to be brave, but seemed to be afraid of something. So I thought…”

  “What are you saying? Regina was here last week? In Los Angeles?”

  So that was a real flesh and blood Regina who sent the Caterpillar note. Regina had been here, reaching out for help. And Cady had been so busy flirting with Hollywood and Tyrone Power Magee that she hadn't even noticed.

  “This connection's terrible, isn't it?” Flo said. “It's probably the storm. That's the problem. There's another one coming in, and I'm not sure when I'm going to get home, but I thought you ought to know. You might make some inquiries.”

  The phone crackled and popped.

  “…Miss Davis here is awfully concerned. I guess she broke out of rehab and risked a good deal to come here when Regina disappeared from the clinic. Nobody will listen to her. The palace claims
Regina was never in California; that she hasn't left San Montinaro for months.”

  Cady felt as if she'd been punched in the solar plexus. How awful. How painfully, unbearably awful. Murder. Could it have been? Could she have prevented it if she'd got the message in time?

  “I'll look into it,” she said into the static. “Thanks for letting me know.” And now for the important part. She needed her secretary more than ever. “Flo, when you get back, how soon can you get back to Los Angeles…?”

  But the line crackled again and went dead.

  Cady wondered if she should dial the operator and try to get through to the San Montinaro airport, but decided she'd be better off waiting for Flo to call back.

  What should she do with Flo's news? Who should she call? The LAPD? The FBI? Her lawyer back in Boston? She'd better be sure.

  Any call would produce an instant media circus.

  She heard the doorbell ring downstairs. Fatima shouted at someone. The person shouted back. There was a laugh—warm and full of joy at its own amusement…and familiar—a laugh Cady never thought she'd hear again in this life.

  It sounded like Sinclair Jr.'s laugh, the one he used to have before he started to poison his soul with the heroin. Her ears must be playing tricks on her.

  Her bedroom door opened.

  “Hello, Reverend Cady! I'm Athena.” The laugh again. Not Sinclair's. A woman's. Maybe her ears were going too. “LadyFat tells me you need you some first aid on your poor old hairdo.”

  Cady felt big, sure hands massage her scalp and warm fingers combing through her unstyled relaxed curls.

  “And girlfriend, she was not lying. Not one little bit.”

  Cady's hand went instinctively to her head.

  “Oh, no. Is it awful?”

  “Not that awful,” Fatima said in a soothing tone. “Athena, show some respect. You didn't even let me introduce you.”

  “Okay, so introduce me,” Athena pulled her fingers through Cady's hair again. “Better yet, I'll do it for you.” She cleared her throat. “Reverend Cady, this is Athena Roberts, my girlfriend, who is also the best hairdresser in all of Los Angeles. Athena, this is Congresswoman Reverend Cady Stanton, probably the most important black woman in the universe, after God and Miss Oprah. Did I do okay?”

  The hands produced a comb and went to work.

  “Reverend Cady, I'm sorry,” Fatima said. “But I told her you needed—well, we thought maybe you'd like your hair braided—you know, so you don't have to worry about fixing it when you can't see.”

  “Obviously I haven't been worrying enough.” Cady laughed. The girls' good spirits were infectious, in spite of the glib remark about God.

  She decided to put her worries about what Flo told her on hold. Acting prematurely on some third party's wild accusation could be disastrous. This Tina Davis person probably made the whole thing up.

  Letting these girls work on her hair might be a good distraction.

  “I'd love to have you fix my hair, Athena, but I don't know about braids. Cornrows are a little radical for an old lady like me. My hair's too short, anyway.”

  “Reverend girlfriend, that's why God invented hair extensions.” Athena dangled something hairy near Cady's hand.

  Fatima bounced on the bed.

  “Hey, Reverend, did you really own a Stradivarius violin? It says so in this diary.”

  “No, no. The violin—it wasn't the real thing. My daddy won it in a crap game and my mother was—well, she was good at telling stories.”

  “Sounds like the princess was, too,” Athena said. “So you gonna read us some of that diary, or keep it all to yourself, LadyFat?”

  “If it's okay with Reverend Cady. We could listen to music or watch TV if you'd rather, Reverend.”

  “No way!” Athena said. “You promised me we were gonna hear some of these stories. You have the one where the princess gets saved from the aliens by Elvis?”

  “That was a dream, Athena. I told you,” Fatima said. “You know, after I heard that thing on the news.”

  “Right. Half of California is seeing flying saucers. You know, it's true what we say back in New Jersey. California is the granola state. What ain't nuts is flakes.”

  “Are you going to shut up and let me read or what?”

  “Read,” Athena said.

  “August 1

  “Today Mother took me to a doctor who had a big nose and reminded me of Mr. Finkelstein so I hated him. He asked me why I didn't like the piano anymore. Was it because I didn't like my mother keeping company with Professor Peabody?

  “What a moron. I said I don't hate the piano. I hate Mr. Finkelstein. I didn't say why, of course, because I didn't want to give this guy any ideas. Then he said was I lonely for my papa? I said duh. Of course. How stupid can you get?

  “August 7

  “I guess that doctor wasn't such a moron because I'm getting a new piano teacher—Mrs. Banacek who teaches at the school with Mother. She's really strict, but I can stay with her if I promise to practice hard every day. So I'm getting to play Fur Elise again and the Moonlight Sonata, which is my favorite.

  “And you know what else I'm going to get? A sister. The doctor told Mother I'm lonely for my Papa so I need a companion. And Mr. Peabody has a friend in Boston that's a social worker who knows a poor girl my age who plays the violin and needs a family to live with. I guess I'm supposed to be all excited, but I don't know if I want somebody in my room reading my comics and eating my devil dogs. I hope she's not one of those trashy girls who rat their hair and will get me a bad reputation.”

  Athena gave a hoot, but Fatima went on:

  “August 20

  “I can't believe it. She's really coming. This stupid girl who's supposed to be my sister. Her name is Caterpillar. That's right. And she's a Negro. She calls it Colored. She sent a letter with a picture of herself and she's got brown skin and fuzzy hair. And she signed her name Caterpillar Deville Stanton.

  “Now, all of a sudden, Mother says I have to move all my things to one half of the room and throw away a bunch of stuff so there will be room for a new bed and a bureau for her and I guess I'm supposed to shrivel up and die so this wonderful Negro girl can move in before school starts next week. Also she gets to take music lessons from Mother because she plays the violin so wonderfully. I don't even get to go to Boston to pick her up because I have to be here when the furniture men come with the new bed and bureau. I bet they're nicer than mine.”

  “Whoa,” Athena said. “Is that you Reverend—the little Caterpillar girl? You had to move in with that?”

  “Hey, girl, you want to listen, or what?” Fatima kept reading:

  “September 10

  “My new sister is here, and she's neat. She has only two dresses, but she has a real Stradivarius violin that her Daddy left her when the Communists killed him in Korea. She showed me inside where it says in real old, old writing, 'Antonius Stradivarius Cremonensis Fecit Anno Domini 1695'. That's Latin. Not only that, but she can do the Mashed Potato better than anybody else at Berkshire Jr. High, and she's teaching me how to do it, too. We're going to be the coolest girls at the sock hop on Saturday Night.

  “Her name isn't Caterpillar. She just has bad handwriting. But Mother thought her up a new name. It's Cady Stanton. Like Kay-dee. Because somebody named Elizabeth Cady Stanton was a famous American History lady and it's an easier name to have than Cadillac DeVille.

  “October 2

  “Today is my birthday but we're having a party for Cady, too. We both got new dresses. Hers is a pale yellow Villager shirtwaist and it makes her look really grown up. Mine is purple.

  “Everybody loves Cady because she's so friendly and smart and they even put her in ninth grade instead of eighth because she has a twelfth grade reading level.

  “Sometimes I get mad at her, though. She found my peanut butter cup I had hidden in the closet and she made me give her half and a half a peanut butter cup is practically nothing. She also says Katy Keene is childish and she re
ads books like 'A Tale of Two Cities'. And she is always practicing her stupid violin. But still, she's the best friend I ever had, and last night at dinner, which was spaghetti—the real kind, not the Chef Boy-ar-dee, I said I wished I was Colored, too. At first I thought I'd said something wrong, because Cady laughed too loud and Mother looked at me like I'd farted or something, but then she laughed, and asked me if I could be colored, what color would I be?

  “I didn't get what she meant right away, but then she said she'd be blue; Delft blue like the china her mother had for best when she was a little girl in Holland. I said I'd have to be purple, because that's my favorite color. Cady said she'd be red; not spaghetti sauce red, but a classy red like her Stradivarius violin. But I said that wasn't fair because the violin is really brown, and that's the color she is already, but she said, no, kind of like she is now, but more glowy.

  “Mother said she thought Cady was pretty glowy already, and I agree.”

  Cady felt tears running down her cheeks, as memories of that night flooded back; the smell of the Hunt's tomato sauce, the bright turquoise Formica of the kitchen table; the flowered Melmac dishes, the high polish of the yellow linoleum floor—such a foreign, white-people place when she first arrived, but beginning that evening, a clean, safe refuge—a place she felt loved—home.

  Someone handed her a tissue. She wiped her eyes and for one quick moment, thought she saw light and something above her: a face, smiling. A familiar face. She wiped her eyes again. No, she had to be hallucinating. What she saw looked like her dead brother Leroy in a bright green flowered hat.

  She tried to laugh, but for some reason, this made her tears gush uncontrollably.

  “It's okay, Reverend Cady,” Fatima said. “You're supposed to be grieving, right?”

  Grieving. Yes. She was grieving for all her dead; for Leroy, for Regina, for Astrid, for her own mother, and for Sinclair Jr.

  All the stored up grief seemed to be pouring out of her at one moment. A deep, wordless wail escaped from somewhere deep inside her.

  The door slammed open. Someone entered the room with brisk, efficient footsteps.