by Joanne Pence
Suddenly, all Angie’s instincts went on red alert.
First, she went back to the marriage records and looked up Eric and Natalie. Their wedding took place in November 1979. Eight months later, both were dead.
She then got into her car and drove back to the Chronicle, and hurried back to its morgue to see if she could find anything about Edward Steed’s death, since he supposedly died in an accident of some sort.
She found an article written one day after he died. Edward Steed had been scrambling on the cliff above China Beach and slipped on the rocks. Reports were that he must have hit his head on a rock or boulder as he fell because one side of his head, near the temple, had been struck hard enough to kill him.
Angie knew a person could die in a fall along some sections of the cliff over China Beach, but for the most part, the way the hill sloped, the fall would be more painful and “scrape-inducing” than a break-your-neck kind of drop unless a person was truly unlucky.
The report quoted Carol Steed as saying her husband climbed on the cliffs for fun because it was a beautiful, sunny October day, and he slipped.
Angie did a quick calculation…Carol’s daughter Enid was born in April, so the prior October when Edward died, Carol would have been only a couple of months pregnant—far enough along that she would know—but not so far that the pregnancy would show. Carol was 41 when Enid was born. She and Edward had been married for thirteen years with no children when Carol found herself pregnant.
The very next month Carol moved out of the big house and let Eric Fleming move into it. He was 28 years old at the time, handsome, single…and if his parents were correct, a womanizer, and according to his brother, enjoyed drugs and alcohol.
So, Angie thought, what if Eric met a lonely wife who lived in a beautiful home, got her pregnant…and poof! the husband was suddenly out of the picture?
Angie had her suspicions about what had happened, but how could she prove any of it?
Why in the world didn’t the police investigators at the time have the kind of mind she did?
Maybe because they were there; they saw Natalie and knew about her money and beauty. They also saw the landlady. For all Angie knew, she was gorgeous, but if so, the police might have suspected something. Most likely, she wasn’t much to look at, a dozen years older than Eric, and that was why thoughts of anything going on between Eric and his landlady never even crossed their minds.
She went back to the online genealogical program she had used earlier to find Eric Fleming’s relatives. In it, she learned that Carol Steed’s daughter’s married name was Enid Norbel and she still lived in San Francisco.
She then phoned her sister, Cat. “The person who wants to sell the Clover Lane house, the owner’s daughter, is named Enid Norbel, right?”
Cat didn’t answer right away. “How do you know that?”
Angie smiled. “Ve haf our vays! Thank you!”
She quickly hung up. She didn’t want Cat quizzing her, and she didn’t want to lie to her sister.
Chapter 22
ANGIE TORE HERSELF away from her discoveries and dashed across town for an appointment. She was both glad and surprised to find a nervous Paavo already there.
She led him to the office area of St. Peter and Paul’s church. They were there to talk to the priest about being married in the church.
“Father John, this is my fiancé, Paavo Smith,” Angie said as she introduced the two men. “Paavo, Father John.”
“Hello, Father,” Paavo said shaking hands with the priest. Father John was in his forties, of medium height and build, with short graying hair that was quite thin on top.
“I know Angie and her family well,” Father John said, “although I don’t see her as often as I should.”
“I know; I’m sorry,” Angie murmured. She had warned Paavo that Father John was an old enough priest to enjoy inflicting a little old-fashioned Catholic guilt on his parishioners. Paavo would have preferred a new-style, anything-goes priest, but he knew that wasn’t Angie’s way or her family’s.
The priest turned to Paavo. “Paavo—that’s a Finnish name, isn’t it? Are you Finnish?”
“My father was,” he said. “He died. My guardian was also Finnish.”
“I suspect you were raised Lutheran,” Father John said with a smile. “Most Finns are.”
“I’ve been told I was baptized in a Lutheran Church, and when I was young I went to a Lutheran church with my step-father,” Paavo said. “But once away from my guardian, I pretty much stopped going.”
“A common situation with many young people these days, I’m afraid. Tell me, do you still consider yourself a Christian?” Father John asked.
Paavo moved uncomfortably in his seat. “As much as I have any religious belief, it is the Christian way of thinking that I most follow.”
“What about children? Would you want them to be raised as Catholics?”
“I would raise children as Catholic, and I would attend church with them and Angie.” He looked at her. “I would like to do that.”
Father John nodded and then studied the couple a long moment. “I’m sure there will be no problem with the two of you getting married in the church. We’ll be glad to have you here. Who knows, someday you might decide to join us and become a convert.”
“Angie can be persuasive,” Paavo said.
“I know the Amalfi women. And you’re right,” the priest said with a chuckle. Angie had convinced the priest to let her break the news to Paavo that they would also be attending the church’s pre-marital classes.
Father John ended the visit with a few words about the sanctity of marriage and the life-long commitment the two were entering with each other. He then gave a brief prayer for their future happiness, and made a sign of the cross with Angie. He placed his hand on Paavo’s shoulder as he made a sign of the cross over him, praying that one day he would find solace in his marriage, and in his life.
Paavo found himself surprisingly shaken by the encounter. How had the priest known he had no solace in his life? Was it that obvious? He felt as if he had been on a hot seat in there. He was so used to the modern way of looking at marriage and divorce, and how easily people moved from one state to the other, that he forgot that in a great part of the world marriage wasn’t a whim of the moment. And to Angie and church-going Catholics, it was a sacrament. He didn’t know much about the Catholic church, but he knew that there were only seven sacraments, so it was a big deal.
He was glad to leave, but at the same time, both the priest’s blessing and his words about the sanctity and seriousness of what they were about to undertake had moved him deeply.
o0o
After meeting with the priest, Paavo was more than happy to go with Angie to dinner at the Russian Renaissance Restaurant. He immediately ordered vodka. He rarely touched hard liquor and it rather amused and moved Angie to see the effect meeting the priest and talking about their marriage had had on him. Maybe he wasn’t as immune to religion as he thought.
By the time their dinner of borsch, stroganoff, and potato vareniki was delivered, the conversation turned to Paavo’s intertwined cases.
“I’ve got two people who worked together,” he said. “The man, Taylor, was married and having an affair with the identical twin sister of Gaia, the woman who was killed.”
“The obvious question is how jealous was Taylor’s wife?” Angie asked.
“She doesn’t seem jealous at all. I have the impression the two lived together but didn’t much like each other. The wife is beautiful, movie star good looks.”
“Did the wife know Gaia had an identical twin?”
“I doubt it. Few people knew, not even her co-workers. To hear them, she had no one in her life, no friends, relatives, had never been in love, and so on. Also, she and her twin didn’t get along. Most people said they thought Gaia lived for TV shows and her cats. Period. She had no interest in the news, politics, movies, or music.”
“So she basically had nothing going
on in her life, and then she was murdered?” Angie asked.
“One other thing, Taylor’s secretary, an older man, gave every indication that Taylor might have had a tryst or two with him as well.”
“Really? The wife had to suspect something was wrong with her marriage, or she’s an idiot. Women know, even if they don’t want to admit to anyone.”
“You think so?” he asked.
“Absolutely. She knew he was a cheat, and finally decided to do something about it. The beautiful wife probably found out that her husband had thrown her over for those two and felt so insulted that she killed him. I suspect she didn’t realize the woman who worked in his office was the wrong sister. Poor Gaia!”
“It doesn’t quite ring true,” Paavo said. “If she murdered them, she had to have paid someone to do it since Taylor was stabbed to death with a powerful thrust I doubt she could had inflicted. Gaia was killed after Taylor—or so we assume because she called her boss to say she was sick and couldn’t come in to work. Now that I think about it, though, it could easily have been Marilee who phoned the office, pretending to be Gaia.”
Thoughts swirled in his mind.
“The medical examiner is still trying to determine the time and date of Gaia’s death in the face of some strange findings. Usually, when people are killed because of a jealous rage, both are killed at the same time—and the most likely place would have been their beach cabin.”
“Except that would have pointed straight at the wife,” Angie said. “And everyone would know Taylor had been cheating on her. The wife wouldn’t want that.”
“Good point, Angie. I knew I kept you around for some reason.”
“Something more is out there. Some missing piece. Once you find what it is, it’ll all fall together,” she said, then added. “The same thing is going on with my murder case.”
“Your murder case?”
“The Flemings.” She smugly nodded, leaned closer and lowered her voice. “It was no murder-suicide. Someone killed them both. But I don’t yet know why. I’ve got an idea, though. I’m looking at the landlady.”
“The landlady? That’s a pretty harsh penalty for being late with the rent.”
“Very funny! I think she might have been in love with Eric Fleming.”
Just then, Paavo’s phone began to vibrate. He normally would have shut it off, but he saw the call was from Katie Kowalski. “I better take this.”
He got up and stepped into the hallway that led to the restrooms, away from the diners. “Hello.”
“Uncle Paavo?” the young voice asked.
“Micky, how nice to hear you,” Paavo said, worried that the child would be phoning him. “Is everything all right?”
“Yes. I wanted to tell you I’m on the Panthers T-ball team now,” Micky said. “I hit every ball!”
“Hey, great job! I’m proud of you!”
“I wish you could have seen me,” Micky said softly.
Something about the way he said it, made Paavo’s heart catch. “I do, too, Micky. But your Mom was there, wasn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“And her new friend?” Paavo asked.
Angie stood in front of him now. She’d been watching his face and knew something was wrong.
“What friend?” Micky asked.
Paavo wasn’t sure what to say, but Katie had told him… “Maybe I misunderstood,” he began carefully. “I thought your Mom had a friend, a man named Daniel or Dan, who liked to watch you play ball.”
“No. She comes by herself. She looked a little sad. I think she wished you were there, too.”
Paavo shut his eyes a moment. “When is your next game, Mick?”
“Tuesday, five o’clock, at Funston.”
“I don’t know for sure if I can be there, okay? I can’t make promises because of my job. You understand that, right Micky?”
“Yes. But will you try?”
“I’ll try.”
“Good. I miss you, Uncle Paavo.”
“I miss you, too, son. I’ll see you soon, okay?”
“Okay.”
“Bye, now.”
Paavo hung up and looked at Angie. “There’s no man in Katie’s life according to Micky.”
Angie nodded. “And there won’t be as long as you’re there as someone for her to lean on and to keep the past alive. You understand that, don’t you?”
“I do. But Micky doesn’t. It’s hard on the boy.”
“On you, too,” she said, and put her arm around his waist. He didn’t have many people in his life that he loved. Micky was one of them, and now he’d been asked to stay away. No words would help, and this was a situation with which she dare not interfere.
Chapter 23
ANGIE RANG THE doorbell at Enid Norbel’s house.
A tall, attractive woman with brown hair and eyes opened the door. “I’m looking for Enid Norbel. My name is Angelina Amalfi, and—”
“Oh, yes.” Enid immediately warmed up to the visit. “You’re the person who keeps going to see my house! I hope you aren’t here to negotiate on the price.”
“No, not at all—”
“But you still like it?” Enid asked.
“Definitely,” Angie said. “Very much. I’m sorry to bother you, and I know this isn’t the way things are usually done, but I’d like to talk to you about it, if I may?”
“Certainly. Come on in.” As they walked to the living room, Enid said, “A friend recommended that I offer whichever realtor sold the house a $20,000 bonus over and above any commissions they might receive. I told your sister that when she called, and that’s all I’ll say on that score!”
“I’m not here to talk money,” Angie said. She now understood Cat’s sudden interest in selling the place, and her generosity in turning over the commission as a wedding present!
Angie sat on the sofa, and Enid on the love seat facing her. “My grandfather built the house,” Enid said. “What did you want to know about it?”
“Did you ever live there?”
“No. My mother moved to the smaller house across the street after my father died, before I was born.”
“I assume she rented out the big house because she could get more money from it than from the little place,” Angie said.
“Not really. My father left her well off. She never said why she moved. The small house was roomy enough for the two of us. I assumed the bigger house reminded her of my father. She was desperately in love with him, and never got over his death.”
“I see. That would make sense,” Angie said.
“To tell the truth, I think she both loved and hated the 51 Clover Lane house. My father died while they lived there, and later, some tenants who were living there also died—not in the house, of course. A murder-suicide, apparently. My mom said the ordeal was a nightmare with the police and newsmen tramping all over and asking everyone questions. I think she decided she didn’t want to bother with any more tenants. Oh, dear! Perhaps I shouldn’t be saying all this. It might make the house seem undesirable to you. But no one died in the house. Not even all that close to it!”
“No, it’s all right,” Angie said. “I already knew about all that.”
“Good.” Enid sounded relieved. “Actually, my mom often said that if she found someone she could love, she would want to live in the big house with him, so she never held anything against the house as you can see! Unfortunately for her, she never fell in love again. Now it’s too late.”
Angie found this conversation terribly sad. “Too late? Is she sick?”
Enid fidgeted. “Well, if you buy the house, it’ll come out so I may as well explain now. My mother has a mental illness. It’s not something easy to put a name to. She’s borderline paranoid schizophrenic. Not dangerous since her medication stabilizes her, but she tends to live in her own little world that has nothing to do with reality. It’s easy to hold a conversation with her on the simplest level. ‘What would you like for dinner?’ ‘Do you want to watch television?’ But if you
try to talk to her about anything complex, she can’t follow it. People say she had some sort of a nervous breakdown after my father died. She was always troubled, and she’s gotten worse over the years. Recently, I was granted conservatorship over her finances.”
“I’m so sorry about your mother,” Angie said. “Does she live with you?”
“She spends most days at a care facility, Restful Gardens in the Richmond district. It’s nice, but terribly expensive. That’s why I’d like to sell 51 Clover Lane. Unlike my mother, I have no reason to keep it.”
“I see.”
“On good days, they allow her to go home, which is nice for her.”
“Home? To 60 Clover?”
“Yes. When she’s there, a nurse’s aide stays overnight with her. But I doubt she’ll be able to go home much longer. I haven’t decided yet, when that time comes, if I want to sell that house as well, or simply rent it. It’s not as special as 51 Clover, but still a beautiful piece of property.”
“Yes, it is,” Angie said, then after a slight pause, asked, “I’m wondering if it would be possible for me to speak to your mother?”
“She doesn’t talk to strangers. She’s easily frightened.”
“You think she’d be scared of me?”
“When she sees someone she doesn’t know, she often thinks the person is a ghost.”
Angie was taken aback. “She thinks she sees ghosts?”
“Yes, it’s crazy.”
“Was she institutionalized because she thinks she sees ghosts?” Angie asked.
“She not only sees them, but she believes they’re after her and want to kill her.”
Angie’s left eye began to twitch. “I see. Um…did she ever say who haunted her?”
“Not directly,” Enid answered. “But from things she said, I think she believes she’s being haunted by her renter, the woman who was murdered. Oops…maybe I shouldn’t have said that. But you did say you know about the renters.”
“Yes, Natalie and Eric Fleming.”
“My goodness, you have done your homework, haven’t you? I scarcely remembered their names myself! But she once said a little thing that made me think she referred to the dead woman.”