“You’re right, as always,” I said into the phone. “It is more personal. Thank you.” Then I hung up without waiting for a response, my head clear again. I knew exactly what it was I had to do. I even knew why.
CHAPTER 27
I Rotated the Knob and Gave a Push
I put the phone down, lay my head on the carpet, right behind Blanche’s, and with the comforting smell of dog filling my senses, finally fell asleep. At two-thirty, the afternoon sun coming in the open door, the damn birds, their recent conflict a thing of the past, singing so loud they could wake the dead, I woke up, my heart pounding until I could feel that Blanche was still breathing. I didn’t realize until it rang again that it was the phone that had awakened me. Blanche opened her eyes as I eased my arm out from under her head. Her tail thumped against the rug and then she got up, taking her time, and walked slowly over to the open door.
The phone rang again.
“Alexander.”
“Ms. Alexander? This is Preston Wexford, returning your call. You’re calling at a great time, a perfect time, the ideal time to buy in upstate New York. The real estate boom hasn’t hit us yet, but it will—”
“Hello,” I said, wondering if I was hearing a person or a computer-generated message.
“It’s still possible to buy property here very reasonably and I can almost guarantee you that your investment will—”
I spoke a little louder this time.
“MR. WEXFORD?”
Okay, I shouted. But it worked.
“Ma’am?”
“That’s not why I called you.”
“Oh. I apologize, but since you called my business number—”
“I’m calling about your cousin Sophie.”
“Sophie? She’s still alive?”
“Actually, she’s not. She was killed a few days ago. That’s why I’m calling…”
“I don’t understand. How did you get this number?”
“From Sophie’s doctor. She had you down as next of kin.”
I could hear a dog barking on his end, a siren passing on mine. I waited, but nothing happened for a while.
“Mr. Wexford?”
“I haven’t seen Sophie since we were kids, since a year or so after…”
“You weren’t in touch recently, birthdays, Christmas?”
“I thought she was dead. I thought she died. My mother said she wrote her and the letter came back, oh, years ago. We assumed…”
I got up and walked over to the open door, stood next to Blanche, saw Dashiell and Bianca asleep on the warm flagstones that led to the tunnel.
“You know, because of her condition.”
“I’m sorry to—”
“Yeah,” he said. “And she had my number in her book?”
“Yes, but I got it from her doctor. She had you down as—”
“Right,” he said. “Next of kin. You’re sure there’s no one else?”
“She didn’t seem to think so.”
“I don’t know how to feel about this.”
“That might take some time,” I said.
Blanche walked down the stairs, squatted right on the flagstones, then came back inside, lying down on the floor near where I stood.
“Well, Mr. Wexford, as far as I can tell, you are next of kin. I’m sorry to be the one to give you this bad news, and to be so abrupt about everything, but, you see, I’m running out of time here. I’m trying to clean up Sophie’s affairs before her apartment…the thing is, Mr. Wexford, Preston, I was wondering if you’d be willing to make arrangements for her.”
I moved the phone away from my ear and swiped at my eyes. I didn’t think Preston Wexford was going to be in any rush to respond.
“I could give you the number of the precinct.”
“The precinct?”
“She was murdered, Preston.”
“Murdered? You mean, like in a mugging?”
This time I took my time.
“Ask for Detective Burke,” I said, giving him the number of the Sixth. “It’s probably better if he explains it, gives you the official, uh, details.”
“Okay,” he said, overwhelmed.
“And that way, you can take some time. You can think about what you want to do, about your cousin. Look, it doesn’t have to be real complicated. Something simple would—”
“I thought she died a long time ago,” he said.
This wasn’t going as well as I’d hoped. I was beginning to think I shouldn’t bother to ask about the dogs. But if he was next of kin, I didn’t really have a choice.
“She has two dogs that are going to need homes really soon,” I said. “Although I’m pretty sure I can place the younger one with Sophie’s best friend. If that’s okay with you.”
“Yes. Yes, of course. That would help,” he said.
I heard a dog bark again.
“Do you have a—”
“Three of them. It’s the country up here, you know. What kind is it, the other dog?”
“A bull terrier. She’s old, Preston. It’d be swell for her to live in the country, have someone in the family to—”
“I don’t know,” he said. “Like I told you, I already have three. The last one, Roberta, she just found me. I woke up one morning, she was on the porch, no intention of leaving. So what could I do? I put out a bowl of food, then I took her to the vet and we went on from there.”
He was starting to sound like a very nice man, startled by what I’d dropped on him, but very nice. Kind, too.
“Perhaps I should tell you that Blanche, the old dog, was a seizure-alert dog. She wasn’t just a pet, Preston. She was a service dog and she made a radical, positive change in your cousin’s…”
And then I just stopped, because Blanche had rolled over and put her head on my foot. I crouched down and stroked her cheek.
“If you don’t mind, I’ll keep her here. She’s on a special diet. It takes about half an hour to get her food ready and it costs an arm and a leg. Anyway, we’re used to each other.”
“Were you and Sophie close?”
I watched as two tears landed on Blanche, leaving small gray spots on her fur.
“Yes,” I said. “Very.”
“Well, that would be fine,” he said.
“What would?”
“What you said about her dogs.”
“And her things?”
“Her things?”
“You see, this is New York City real estate we’re dealing with here, Preston, so the landlord will want this place ASAP, so that he can raise the rent and get himself a brand-new tenant. But you talk this over with Detective Burke, okay? He’ll help you figure it all out.”
“Okay,” he said, sounding seven.
“She was a wonderful woman, your cousin. It’s sad she never called you. I know she thought about it, about calling you,” I said, thinking about the white lies she’d told Lydia, something to make herself feel less alone. “You would have liked each other a whole lot.”
I dropped the phone on the marble table and got some raw, chopped turkey for Blanche. She ate it from my hand, but before I had the chance to offer her a medley of vegetables and yogurt, she was back asleep. I showered and changed, then sat upstairs in my office and made a list of what I knew. And more important, what I didn’t know.
When I was still training dogs and I had a tough problem, one in which the solution wasn’t immediately obvious to me, I would let everything I thought I knew go, as if what I believed about the dog and what I’d been told were so many leaves I was tossing into the wind. Then I’d start from scratch, looking at the dog as if for the first time, making room for him and what he knew and what, if I paid careful attention, he would tell me about himself, about the world, and about me. And that, I knew, was exactly what I had to do now.
I took out the list of inoculations that Bianca had been given, wondering who had written it. Then, with the list in my pocket, Dash and I headed over to Hudson Street to find Mel’s mailbox. I tried several places
that had mailboxes for rent, including the post office, and fifteen minutes later found a box that had the same number as Mel’s key. Then I headed for Horatio Street with his spare key ring in my pocket, hoping the pocket could hold all that weight without tearing.
It was one of those perfect September days, the sky a bright middle blue, the clouds puffy, like the ones you see on picture postcards. It was cool enough that we could walk quickly, and the air seemed charged with energy. Or perhaps that was just me, my determination and anger propelling me forward. Dashiell stayed at my side, looking up at me every so often. Whatever it was, he felt it, too. We didn’t know where we were going, but we were heading there at top speed.
I stopped outside the building on the corner of Horatio and Washington, the place where cells and blood had been taken from Blanche, someone not taking any chances, someone who wanted to make doubly sure he had what he needed. But I didn’t go in this time, to look for an office I’d never find, one, I now thought, that had been set up for that one use, like a movie set. Instead, I stopped outside the building and read the plaque that was there, taking out a small pad and pen and writing down all the information. Perhaps someone at JSB Properties would be able to tell me who had rented an office on the ground floor for so short a time that no one could remember their ever being there.
Of course no one would remember them. It had been a Sunday. There wouldn’t have been anyone else in the building.
Next we headed a block north, to Gansevoort Street, to the place where Mel had seemed to vanish the night I met him back where the vet’s office was supposed to be. Unless he’d started to run, the only way he could have disappeared was if he lived right there, in one of the lofts above street level. Standing on the corner, I looked at the other side of the street, a meat market on the corner, the little French bistro Florent a quarter of the way up the block, then an architect’s office, and farther down the street, a bar named Hell. On the second story, on those buildings where there was one, there were apartments, and even more on the south side of the street, where Dash and I stood.
I went into the little deli on the corner first, describing Mel in great detail, the hair that looked as if he’d touched a live wire, the gangly, dangling arms, the too long legs, the smile that worked on one side of his face but not the other, saying he had a dog, maybe they remembered her, a mixed breed named Margaret. Or perhaps Judy.
But the guy shook his head and pointed at the door I’d just come in through.
“We don’t allow dogs in the store,” he said. “It’s against the law. If you want to shop here, you’ll have to tie him up outside.”
“Oh, this one’s okay,” I told him, but not explaining, picking up some gum, a candy bar, and a small packet of Kleenex instead, thinking that spending a little money might make him friendlier. “Maybe you saw the guy without the dog.”
But all he could think about was that I was spending less than two bucks and if someone from the Department of Health waltzed in to check the premises, he’d be the proud possessor of a three-hundred-dollar fine.
So once again, he shook his head and pointed. “I tol’ you, lady. I never seen no one like that. Now”—he pointed to Dashiell—“you get me in trouble, lady, I lose my job.”
So I paid for the tissues, candy, and gum and left, turning right onto Gansevoort, trying the gallery where I’d gone to meet another client, some weeks back, describing Mel again, mentioning that he had a dog, waiting and hoping. I tried the new restaurant on the corner, Le Gans, though I couldn’t picture Mel sitting in such an upscale restaurant, white tablecloths, flowers on the tables. So I crossed the street and tried Florent, because anyone might show up at Florent, a movie star, or a skinny guy whose arms and legs flailed around like a marionette’s. But no one knew a Mel Sugarman and no one remembered a dog named Margaret or Judy, a dog who might be waiting for her master even now, thirsty, hungry, and in need of a walk.
I even stopped a couple of people on the street, a young girl carrying a painting wrapped in brown paper and a short heavyset man in a bloody white apron heading back to one of the wholesale markets with his take-out coffee. A lot of people shook their heads when I asked about Mel. Maybe he hadn’t lived here. Maybe there was more time than I remembered between when he left me on the corner of Horatio and when he seemed to disappear on Gansevoort. The truth was, I still didn’t know anything. He could have lived anywhere.
I went back into Florent and checked the phone book, but somehow I didn’t expect to find a Mel Sugarman and I didn’t. Why would anything in this peculiar case be that easy?
But I wasn’t giving up yet. I stuck my hand into my jacket pocket and pulled out that enormous key ring. A man who’d worried he’d leave someone else’s dog without a walk if he lost his keys might also worry about his own dog. You lose your work keys, you might lose your house keys as well. Was that why he’d kept the key to his rented box separate from the rest of his keys?
I started at the east end of the block I was on, figuring I’d check the names on the bells, then try every key on the ring on the downstairs door, see if any of them worked. But halfway around the ring, I noticed something odd. A mail key. That meant that the set of keys on either side of that key could be Mel’s, and if so, that I’d been right about one thing, that he’d left a duplicate of his own house keys at the mailbox, just in case.
I tried the keys to the left and to the right of the mail key, but they didn’t work. And neither did any of the names—McSweeney, Zeichner, Polsky. Someone was coming out. I watched him check his mailbox. It was Zeichner. He stopped there, in the tiny hallway, eyeing me while he snipped off the end of a cigar and lit it. The smell of smoke filled the small area. Dashiell sneezed.
“Can I help you?”
“Maybe. I know this is going to sound stupid, but I’m supposed to walk a dog who lives on this block.” I lifted the set of keys, to prove I wasn’t lying. “But it’s my first time here, and I’m not exactly sure of the address.”
“You don’t know the address?”
“The owner’s name is Sugarman. I know it’s not here, on the bells, but if he lives with someone else, I thought maybe the key would fit…”
He took another puff on that cigar and smoothed his scalp.
“Her name’s Judy, the dog. She’s a mix. Or Margaret,” I added, feeling like a fool.
“You don’t know the dog’s name?”
I lifted the key ring again. “I have a lot of clients. And she’s new.”
Zeichner was shaking his head.
“No dogs in this building. Cats. We have three. My neighbors,” he gestured with the cigar, “have one each. Maybe another building?”
I opened the door to the street and let Dash out, then turned back. Zeichner locked his mailbox and walked out past Dashiell. I followed him, describing what Mel looked like.
Zeichner shook his head. “I’d like to help you, but I don’t know,” he said.
“Well, thanks anyway.” I headed for the next building.
“Wait a minute,” he called after me. “There’s a skinny guy I see a lot across the street.” He pointed with the cigar. “But his dog doesn’t look like a mix. I mean, not that I’m any expert. Are they usually solid colors, mixed breeds?”
“Some are, sure.”
“Well, then maybe this one I saw is Margaret. Or Judy.”
“Where did he come from?”
“The guy?”
“Yeah.”
“There.” He gestured with his head this time. “Only I still think the dog is a purebred.”
“A bull terrier?” I asked, thinking he might have seen Mel with Bianca.
But he just shrugged. “Ask me if it’s an Abyssinian or a Burmese, I can help you out. More than that—” He shrugged again.
I started to cross the street.
“What do they look like?” he asked. “Bull terriers.”
“Medium size, white, Roman nose, shortish tail.” I left out the part about the tear.
He shook his head, took a puff of his cigar. “Medium size? I don’t think so. This one looked much bigger than medium size.”
I thanked him and Dashiell and I crossed the street, but when I checked the name on the upper bell, it wasn’t Sugarman. It was Madison. I turned to leave, but then turned back. The plaque on this building said it was managed by JSB Properties, just like the building where some vet had taken cells from Blanche. For half a second, I wondered about that. But then I’d always been told that half the buildings in the West Village were owned by Bill Gottlieb. Maybe JSB Properties owned and managed a sizeable chunk of the other half. Because the brass plate on Zeichner’s building had the same name on it, too, as building manager. The third key I tried unlocked the outer door. Then I stood in front of Madison’s mailbox and hesitated. But not for long. A moment later, I was holding his phone bill in my hand.
Still, I reminded myself, Mel could easily have been taking care of cats, plants, and mail for someone who was away on vacation. Maybe this was where he’d gone the night I’d lost him, not because he lived here, but because he had an Egyptian hairless to feed, a litter box to clean, a coleus to water, and some bills to drop on Madison’s desk. On C. Madison III’s desk.
Hoo-hah, my grandmother Sonya would have said.
I had to agree. It didn’t look like the kind of place a III would live. Still, you never know.
I looked down at Dashiell, who was looking back at me, his tail wagging, well, boss, are we going to see some action or not? written all over his face.
So I rang the bell. And heard barking.
The key to the left of the mailbox key opened the door to the stairway. Then mightn’t the next one unlock Madison’s door?
The stairs were worn down to almost nothing, uneven enough that I had to watch where I put my feet. I held on to the railing, listening to the sound of barking getting louder as I neared the apartment.
The Wrong Dog Page 18