“Are you hungry?”
A silent nod.
Sean set him on a chair. “You stay right there and I’ll be back in a second to fix you something.” He picked up the knife and deposited it in the sink before heading into the living room where he gently nudged Mrs. Buchanan awake.
Flustered, she blinked her eyes and patted her hair but offered no apologies. “Henry can’t pick me up tonight so I’m walking,” she said after she’d stood and retrieved her coat. Sean helped her into it.
“I’m sorry I can’t take you.”
“No problem, Mr. Reilly. The fresh air will do me good.”
He couldn’t have agreed more.
After she left, he fixed Danny a bowl of soup, tried to coax a few spoonfuls down Robby’s throat by pretending they were airplanes coming into a hangar, and changed the sheets on Danny’s bed. He gave Danny a sponge bath in the bathroom, not wanting to risk chilling the boy when he was still recovering. He bundled sheets, pajamas and other dirty clothes together and took them to the basement washing machine where he threw them in with some Borax detergent. When he turned the machine on, however, nothing happened. He tinkered with the old equipment for a few minutes, but nothing would get it running again. Shit. He hauled the wet clothes upstairs to the bathtub where he soaked and cleaned them as best he could, hanging them over the shower rod, towel racks and in the kitchen to dry.
He read a bedtime story to the boys about a father who steals money for his daughter only to have her perish from a fall when she tries to prevent his misdeeds, and then had to answer frightened questions about whether he’d ever do anything like that. Finally, he kissed them good night and retreated to the living room.
After opening a beer, he sat on the sofa with Lowenstein’s papers spread before him.
But he couldn’t bear to pick up a page, let alone read it. Everything blurred together. He was too damned tired. He just wanted to rest.
No, not rest. Be…companionable. Talk with someone. Someone who’d make him smile, cheer him up. The lack of that—that was what kept his mind a muddle.
On the table by his side was the slip of paper with Brigitta’s number on it. She’d said to call again. He got up and went to the kitchen where he dialed her number. Sitting in a chair at the table, he cradled the phone and his chin in one hand while the other stroked the beer bottle. On the fourth ring she answered, sounding bleary as if he’d awakened her.
“Brigitta, I’m sorry….this is Sean. I can call back another time if you’re busy….”
“No, no. It’s a good time. Really. I was just thinking of you.”
They talked, and it felt good. Just small stuff—about the weather, a little local politics, places they knew around town. She asked where he lived and seemed interested in his house when he started bragging on it. She said she wouldn’t mind seeing it.
He made plans to pick her up the next day.
His phone rang almost as soon as he put it down.
“She’s gone missing and it smells funny to me,” Sal said over the line. No need to explain. Sean knew he was talking about the Schlager woman. He listened while his partner described the interview with Susan’s husband.
“I might follow him tomorrow,” Sal offered. “If she doesn’t turn up.”
A heavy sigh escaped Sean’s lips. “I’ll start checking morgues then, too.”
Chapter Twelve
SEAN DREAMT MARY WAS ALIVE. Just a soft ordinary dream, maybe more memory than dream itself, where he saw her laughing in the kitchen after burning his toast, sitting on his lap and kissing his face. And then, warm, joyous lovemaking.
It wasn’t the first time he’d had that dream. He always awakened from it feeling light and happy. A few seconds later—despair. He’d rather not have the dreams when all they did was lead to a raw pit of longing.
Maybe it was the dream. Maybe it was just the light of day. But as he fixed the boys’ breakfasts and shaved for work, Sean became vaguely uneasy about having asked Brigitta Lorenzo to his house that night. First, the boys were still recovering. Not a good time for a guest to arrive. Second, what in hell would he do with her once she was here? He hadn’t thought of cooking dinner for her or entertaining her in any way. And how would she get back home if he had the boys to watch? Not only that, but it was Friday, and on Fridays he liked to treat the boys to an ice cream, or a game, or even just a ride.
Not a good plan, Reilly. He peered at his face in the fogged mirror, stretching his neck to see if he’d wiped off all the lather. Not a plan at all, in fact. He’d only asked her because he was lonely. He stood up straight and stared at himself. From now on, Reilly, no decisions when you’re bushed and feeling blue.
It wasn’t that he didn’t like Brigitta. He’d enjoyed talking with her last night. She’d lifted him from his low mood. And she certainly was one good-looking broad. He just felt she was in a different league than he was. A little more sure of herself. A little more…whole.
He swiped his face one more time with a towel and walked to his bedroom.
“You boys finishing your cereal?” he called out to Danny and Robby.
“Yes, Daddy,” they said together and then giggled.
He grabbed a shirt from his closet, making a mental note to take the rest of his shirts to the cleaners that day. He scooped them out of the basket by his bed and put them in a pile on the edge of his dresser.
Brigitta has had time to adjust to losing her husband. He knotted a green striped tie, hoping it went with his brown suit. I haven’t adjusted yet. That caused a twinge of panic, that there might be a time when he would be just like Brigitta—over it. He needed this longing for Mary to remember her. When it went away, it would be another death.
He tugged at the tie, pulling the long ends free so he could try it again, more neatly this time.
Brigitta seemed to have done okay after her husband’s death, maybe even better. If not for his death… she’d not have found her job, her life.
There was no “other side” to his loss. If not for her death, he’d be a happy husband and father today. He was defined by what he used to be.
Like the secretary, Julia. He remembered her irritation yesterday.
He and Julia were both missing something. He had no call to pity Julia. He was just as bad. His life without Mary had left him severed from part of life, distant, unable to feel everything—except the fear that things could get worse. He fooled himself if he thought it would get better, that eventually it wouldn’t hurt so much, this missing Mary, wanting her, thinking it had been a nightmare from which he’d awaken. Just as Julia was made “whole” with her crutch, so, too, would he cobble together some kind of completeness. But in the end, it would be just a crutch—another woman, drink, work, or just the goddammed march of time. It would prop him up, but it wouldn’t make him who he was before. Never could be that again.
“Daddy, can we play outside today?” Danny stood at the door, dragging his worn stuffed teddy bear. Robby came up behind him, looking pale and sweaty.
Sean quickly slid into his suit jacket and rubbed both their heads. Robby was still warm.
“Not today. Too cool outside for you two invalids.” He heard a soft knock at the front door. Mrs. Buchanan was there. “I’ll move the chairs out of the way in the living room and you can play racing cars there.”
***
Two hours later, Sean rubbed his eyes. He and Sal had been poring through Lowenstein’s papers for half the morning, and he was already tired and bored. Nothing had popped out at them. Nothing had indicated anything out of the ordinary.
He’d started the day on a grimmer task, calling local hospitals looking for someone who fit Susan Schlager’s description after determining she once again hadn’t shown up at work. Sal had started even earlier, camping out at the Schlager house after dawn, tailing Stephen Schlager to Bethlehem Steel for the seven to three shift.
“Seems odd,” Sean said at last, thinking back to what Wellstone had told them of a fell
ow going into the victim’s house. It hadn’t been the Schlager man—he didn’t fit the description. Jansen was the match there. “If Jansen had killed Lowenstein, he’d be a little more careful about showing up to loot the guy’s house, don’t you think? Probably would have broken in somehow instead of letting a neighbor know he was there.”
Sal shrugged. “Look—all these doctors think their shit don’t stink. Jansen might figure we’re too stupid to put two and two together.”
“It might help to know what Jansen was looking for—or what he took,” Sean said, remembering the empty file drawer and Julia’s account of Jansen rummaging through Lowenstein’s papers at the lab. It would be nice to know what Susan Schlager had been looking for as well, but she was nowhere to be found herself. “Let’s talk to him again.”
Sal looked at his watch and stood. “I’m going to see Lowenstein’s cleaning lady. I’ve tracked her down through another maid.” He picked up a sheaf of bank statements and dropped them on Sean’s desk. “Here—payment for leaving me with Mrs. Wellstone the other day.”
Cleaning lady. Damn. Sean had forgotten to bring his shirts to the drycleaner. At least he could call about a repair to his washing machine.
As Sal left the stationhouse, Sean found a repairman’s number and put in a request for the fix. He then phoned Mrs. Buchanan to let her know the man would be by. His phoning put him in mind of another task he needed to perform—calling the real estate agent who’d handled the cabin rental for Dr. Lowenstein. He pawed through his notebook and found the number Adelaide Wilcox had given him, then quickly had the operator get the line for him.
A man with a distinct upstate New York twang answered. “Ethan Pendleton here.” After Sean introduced himself, Pendleton quickly offered assistance.
“I’m investigating something for Dr.Lowenstein and need some information,” Sean began. “Could you tell me a little about any friends, visitors, family he had come to the cabin?”
“He was a loner, that one,” Pendleton said. “Never saw a soul come with him or visit him neither. Came every year at the same time. Said he liked the solitude. Far as I could tell he spent the week reading and listening to music. You can hear a gramophone for miles in this neck of the woods. Nice music, too. Symphonies and such.”
“He never had any visitors?”
“None that I ever saw. I live at the crossroads to his place and I’d have known if folks were traipsing down that way.”
“Did you talk to him much yourself, Mr. Pendleton?”
“Off and on. I’d chat a bit when he picked up the key. And then I’d make sure he had firewood—no central heating in those cabins, you see, and he used the fire for burning up old papers and such he didn’t need any more. And once I had to see to a repair on the back porch when some boards rotted through.”
“What did he talk about?”
“Oh, the usual. The weather. The woods. He was a real nature lover. Knew this area real well, it seemed. Knew about lots of plants and animals. Why, he even fixed up a neighbor’s dog once. That’s right—I remember it now. A collie it was, beautiful thing with a dark coat. Twisted its leg somehow every which way. Dr. Lowenstein put a splint on it so it wouldn’t hurt the creature. Vet’s a good fifty miles away, you see.”
Sean noticed that Pendleton called him Lowenstein.
“Anyone ever call him Mike Lowe?”
Pendleton laughed. “No, sir.”
So Lowenstein didn’t bother to change his name at the cabin.
“He always said coming up here was like coming home,” Pendleton added. “Was not too pleased to hear I was selling the place.”
Sean sat up straight.
“When did you do that?”
“Told him last summer a year ago I was putting it on the market. I’m getting too old to keep it up. He wanted to buy it, of course. But I already had a fellow who’d put down ready cash. But that ended up falling through.”
“Did you let Dr. Lowenstein know?”
“Oh yes. I wrote to him. Told him it was available as always. Hadn’t heard.”
Sean asked a few more questions of the man before getting off the line.
Nothing. Sean sighed heavily. He had nothing more about Lowenstein than what he already knew. The man was a loner. The man loved solitude. That went with being a loner. Okay, he did learn the fellow loved all god’s creatures, great and small. Had a soft spot for something that was hurting. Well, he was a doctor, wasn’t he?
He looked back at the papers in front of him and ruffled through them. There was Pendleton’s letter to Lowenstein, still in the envelope, the top neatly slit. Sean put it aside and picked up the bank statements instead. All right, he’d finish this bit of reading and go through his notes again.
Nothing in the pile of papers had yet yielded a spark, so Sean almost didn’t notice the pattern at first. But it was so regular, so neat and constant, only a fool would miss it. Sean might be tired and pulled in a dozen different directions, but he was no fool.
Over the past year, Lowenstein had been withdrawing regular sums of money every month. Five thousand dollars each time.
Sean’s breath quickened At last, something. He thumbed through past statements until he found when the withdrawals had begun. September. So Lowenstein’d taken out a total of thirty-thousand dollars since the fall. All around the middle of the month.
He’d been murdered around the middle of the month. Sean got on the phone and called the bank, explaining who he was and what he wanted. No, Dr. Lowenstein’s account didn’t show a withdrawal for five thousand dollars this month.
Someone had been blackmailing Lowenstein. And the good doctor had decided to make it stop.
***
Sal’s interview of Angie Hamilton was long and sad. A young Negro girl who still lived with her parents in a dilapidated row house near the Orleans Street Bridge, Angie didn’t even know about her employer’s death until Sal told her. She didn’t read the paper much, she tearfully told Sal when she heard the news, and the radio had broken a month ago. She hadn’t been due to clean the doctor’s house until that very afternoon.
She’d invited him into her home and he sat with her on a nubbly green sofa, the only piece of furniture in the living room. Net curtains let in milky sunlight from the front bay window. He heard a baby crying upstairs.
“I was just going to ask him if he needed me more than once a week,” she said, rocking back and forth. “I was headed there this afternoon for my regular hours.” She blew her nose into a neatly folded handkerchief, and the tears rolled again. “He was such a nice man. I don’t have any other bosses like him. I mostly works for women. Dr. Mike, he even let me bring Kenny to work with me sometimes.”
Another wave of grief overcame her, and Sal found himself patting her gently on the back.
“He even took a look at Kenny one time for me. You know, like a real doctor. Said he looked real healthy. A strong boy.” At this memory, she smiled with pride.
“Did Dr. Mike ever have any visitors?”
“No. Not while I was there.”
Sal described Jansen and asked if she’d ever seen him. No, not once. She knew what work Dr. Mike was involved in because he told her about it. That was one of the things she liked about him, how he treated her like they were the same. Not servant and boss, but equals. She recounted for Sal all she could remember of the conversations they’d had over the five years she’d worked for him. He wasn’t always home when she cleaned (Mrs. Wellstone provided a key to the house), but when he was there, he played records for her sometimes and talked about the music—he liked German composers, she said seriously as if she herself were a music lover. When she was done her cleaning for the day, he’d ask her to put on a cup of tea, and he’d sit in the kitchen drinking it and talking to her while she washed dishes or finished some other chore.
“Sometimes I made up things to do while he sat there just so’s I could listen to him talking.” He encouraged her to go to night school—she was enrolled
now—to get her high school diploma, and insisted she even think about college, giving her some materials about Morgan, the city’s Negro college. From her account of his kindness, Sal wouldn’t have been surprised if the doctor had planned to help pay for her schooling.
She was bereft at the news of his passing and not just because it meant the end of some economic security for her. She’d genuinely liked the man, maybe even hopelessly loved him a little.
When Sal left her, he felt shaken for the first time by the victim’s death. Here at last was one person who would miss him in all the world.
***
This is what happens when you allow yourself to be carried away, Brigitta Lorenzo thought.
She sat in a lavender kimono at the skirted vanity in her tiny apartment bedroom, smoothing on Revlon Rosy Pink lipstick with the confidence and skill of a master painter. The radio played the soft sounds of a Perry Como hit, and she occasionally joined in the words. And yet they say it’s not unusual/For people to feel this way./The way I do….
It was midday and she’d only awakened an hour ago. Her head throbbed from a mild hangover. Too much wine, too late in the evening. She was glad Sean had awakened her from an early doze last night. After their phone conversation, she’d taken some aspirin and gone to bed. She’d have felt much worse had it not been for that preventative action.
She picked up the cigarette—her second that morning—and inhaled a long drag. Then she walked to her closet and pulled out several outfits. The navy blue suit and polka-dot blouse—it accented her looks and was still very professional. A cream-colored straight-skirt dress with wide belt and turned-up collar—could be considered provocative because of its open neck. A full-skirted bottle-green suit with short cropped jacket. Hmm…that was fashionable but subdued. The color wasn’t the best for her, though. It made her skin look a little sallow.
Nonetheless, she put the others away, leaving the green outfit on her bed. Female office managers wouldn’t feel threatened if they found something obscure to criticize about her appearance. Men, on the other hand, didn’t notice things like color and hue as much. They’d only see her small waist and the way the jacket hugged her chest. Perfect.
LOST TO THE WORLD Page 13