The Dead Letter

by Finley Martin

  “I thought you hated those walking dead movies.”

  “I do, but at three in the morning, there’s little choice. Anyway, after a bit, I began to wonder who moved faster, the zombies or me on crutches, and eventually I figured it out. If I was in a foot race with Scottish zombies, I’d probably become their ham and cheese special.”

  “And how did you arrive at that depressing conclusion?”

  “I used a metronome.”

  “That’s the silliest thing I’ve ever heard,” she said with a laugh.

  “Blame it on insomnia. Anyway, I could hobble around the room no faster than forty-five beats per minute, but they clipped right along in the mid-fifties. An adagio beats a lentissimo any day. Remembered that from high school music classes. Played trombone.”

  “That’s really pitiful. You know that, don’t ya?”

  “You got an issue with trombonists?”

  “No, just your absurd use of the metronome.”

  “It’s scientific methodology.”

  “It’s demented.”

  “I think of it as cross-media experimentation. Musical free-thinking.”

  “And now you’ve taken music to a place where no note has gone before. Wait a minute! Are you putting me on?”

  “Hell no!…except maybe the part about the metronome…though I have to admit that I did think about using one. Great to see you, Anne. What are you busy at?”

  “Oh, this and that. You know.”

  Dit looked at his watch and said, “Do you ordinarily run out of this-and-that by mid-afternoon? The private eye biz must be goin’ t’ hell.”

  “I had to clear my head. That’s what I meant.”

  “Do you want to talk about it?” he asked. This time his voice was serious.

  Anne opened her mouth to say something just as Dit’s wall phone rang. He picked it up and gave Anne a silent indication that he’d just be a minute. “Malone Electronics,” he said, and a large smile crossed his face. “Hey, babe. Where are you?… I’m glad…you made good time…yeah…yeah…plenty of room… I would think so…later…sure…not a problem…”

  Anne got up and motioned that she had to go. Dit pulled the receiver from his ear and muffled the phone.

  “Stick around. I’ll just be a minute.”

  “Gotta go. More this-and-that.”

  “Are you heading to Mary Anne’s later?”

  She shrugged.

  “Be there…around nine…someone I want you to meet,” he said. Then he returned to his telephone conversation and turned toward the wall.

  Anne waved noncommittally and vanished out the door.

  The walk had done her no good at all. The sun still shone, but her mind was a muddle again. Bits of thought and twinges of emotion whirled in her head like the scraps of debris whipped by wind in an alleyway.

  11.

  “It was the damnedest thing,” said Anne. She sat next to Ben Solomon in the large round booth at The Blue Peter.

  Ben Solomon grunted. He read the letter again. Then he pushed it across the table to Anne with the back of his hand.

  “Interesting,” he said. Ben could be an engaging storyteller at a party but, when it came to uttering a professional opinion, he was as talkative as a Himalayan mystic in a mountainside cave.

  Ben had been Bill Darby’s best friend. Like Bill, he was a big man. He had short, sparse, greying hair and a stout, firm build. He wore rumpled suits, white shirts, and unremarkable ties. They made him look like a none-too-prosperous sales rep, but all of that belied eighteen years’ experience with the Ottawa and the Charlottetown police departments. As detective sergeant he had planned to retire in two years, but those plans changed when the last major case he closed launched him into a top cop position with the Provincial government.

  “Interesting? What do you mean ‘interesting’? It’s more than that. A lot more,” said Anne.

  “It was written eleven years ago. Three years before I joined the Charlottetown Police. It seems a shame, but it’s ancient history.”

  “It doesn’t feel that way to me, Ben. It’s been nagging at me all day. When I opened that letter, it was like hearing a scream that had been choked back for eleven years. It brought tears to my eyes. It really did.”

  Anne fingered the wedding ring that hung from the gold chain around her neck.

  “You’re reading too much into it, is what I’m saying. You’re thinking too much.”

  “It’s not what I think. It’s how I feel.”

  “I think you’re spinning wheels over nothing. Take a step back. Look at the facts.”

  “How is this nothing, Ben?” Anne wagged the letter in his face. She was feeling angry now.

  Ben caught the edge in her voice. He leaned back against the leathery cushion of the booth, raised his glass of beer, and sipped, and thought. Then he leaned forward again.

  “Okay, let’s take a look. What facts do you have?”

  “An undelivered old letter to Uncle Bill from a woman who witnessed a murder.”

  “Now, do we know that it was a homicide…and not the death of someone’s family pet…or her imaginary friend?”

  “No, but…”

  “Is it possible that the woman couldn’t go to the police because she was a known pain-in-the-ass? A local kook?”

  “Maybe, but…”

  “Is it possible that she followed up her unanswered letter with a phone call after no one got back to her?”

  “I guess.”

  “Maybe Bill did handle it or referred her to another agency.”

  “Okay.”

  “And, even though she may be a kook, she sounds like an intelligent one. So there’s every reason to think she would have followed up in some other way.”

  “Okay.”

  “And notice that the woman used the word believes. She said she believes that she knows the killer and she believes somebody else is taking the fall for it. That’s pretty fuzzy language. Maybe she heard a rumour from a friend of a friend of a friend.”

  “Okay, okay, enough. I got it. You’re right. But, Ben, I just can’t forget about it.”

  “I never said you should. Turn the letter over to the police. It’s their job. Let them handle it. They’ll get paid for it. You won’t. It’s not like it’s a real case. Oh…before I forget…one more thing…maybe…if it was a real murder…maybe the killer was caught and convicted. There aren’t any open murder cases from that time period. So maybe right now he’s kicking back and enjoying the ambience of one of those fine cabanas they got over at sunny Dorchester Penitentiary.”

  “I love it when you get all optimistic like that, Ben.”

  12.

  Anne returned to The Blue Peter that evening. She had left Jacqui at her desk, analyzing the humour of Stephen Leacock stories for an English project. Anne had suggested that topic after a satirical line from Nonsense Novels popped into her head.

  “It goes something like this,” she had said. “‘Lord Ronald said nothing; he flung himself from the room, flung himself upon his horse, and rode madly off in all directions.’”

  After Anne left the house, Jacqui was still giggling at the theatrical manner with which her mother delivered that line but, by the time Anne arrived at The Blue Peter, the humour of it all had vanished from her mind and, strangely, she felt like a twelve-year-old sitting with the “big people,” even though all of those who gathered around the large, round-tabled booth were friends or long-time acquaintances.

  Ben Solomon and his wife Sarah had been first to arrive. Brenda Malone and her husband, Dashiell, Dit’s brother, came in with Urban Nolan and Eli Seares, two eccentric bachelors who made up what Anne called the “geek squad” at Malone Electronics. Mary Anne MacAdam hovered over the group and popped in and out of conversations between her restaurant duties and staff crises.
Anne just curled up in the midst of them all, feet drawn up beneath her on the leather upholstery and a half-empty glass of Cabernet in front of her.

  Laughter and chatter swelled and fell away and, during a subdued moment, Mary Anne nudged Anne.

  “You seem out of sorts,” she said. “Not feeling well?”

  “It’s been one of those days,” Anne said, “and I’m not convinced it’s over yet.” Then she added quietly, “Why are we here anyway? What’s going on?”

  “Dit wanted us to meet.”

  “But why? What’s up?”

  “Well, if I had to guess, I’d say that he has a new friend and wants to show her off. At least, that’s what I hope we’re here for. He needs a serious upgrade to his social life. All work and no play, if you know what I mean.”

  “Hmmph,” said Anne.

  “Speaking of which…,” Mary Anne said and bent her thumb toward the door.

  Dit pushed through the foyer doors. He had strong, kind features, a muscular build, and brown curly hair. He wore dark trousers with a sharp crease and a cream-coloured sweater that showed off his lingering summer tan. A woman walked next to him, her arm linked loosely under his. She wore high heels and a low-cut, peacock blue dress with one shoulder strap. It shimmered under the dim overhead lights. She carried a white knit shawl.

  She’s beautiful, Anne thought and straightened up. The sneakers on her feet dangled near the floor. She glanced at Dit. She gave her over-stretched sweater a few subtle tugs to imply some shape, but it had no effect whatsoever.

  “She’s gorgeous,” said Ben.

  “She’s kinda cute,” said Anne. “I guess,” she added.

  Sarah jabbed Ben in the ribs. “You look like an owl,” she said. “Stop staring.” Then Sarah turned to Anne. “Let me know if he starts drooling, and I’ll take him home and lock him in the basement until the next lunar cycle.”

  “Of course, you must realize that it’s against the law to lock up a cop,” he said, “…unless it’s Saturday night…and bondage gets your motor running…” Ben quickly shifted into the lyrics of a Steppenwolf song and began to sing softly to Sarah, “head out on that highway…lookin’ for adventure…in whatever comes our way…yeah darlin’ gonna make it happen…take the world in a love embrace…”

  Sarah’s face turned red.

  “Stop it! Stop it!” she growled under her breath. She forced a smile and at the same time poked Ben sharply under the table.

  “What? What!” protested Ben.

  Anne laughed. Tears came to her eyes.

  “Everyone, this is Gwen Fowler. Gwen, this is Ben ‘Easy Rider’ Solomon and his long, long-suffering wife, Sarah. You know Brenda and Dash. Urban and Eli are my electronics gurus. Mary Anne owns and operates this wonderful establishment and keeps our favourite table reserved, and, next to her, is Anne Brown, fondly named Wilhelmina A. Darby by her parents…”

  “The detective?” she asked.

  “Yes,” said Anne.

  “…but as a detective, she now goes by the name of Billy Darby.”

  “You work under a pseudonym?” asked Gwen.

  “I do.”

  “But why? Wil… Anne’s such a lovely name.”

  “I guess the simple answer…if there is one…is I inherited my uncle’s agency after he died last year. His name was Bill Darby. He had a heart attack. It was unexpected. It became awkward to explain to new clients who asked for him that Bill Darby was dead, and that I was taking care of business. Then I’d have to explain who I was and so on. It just became too…awkward…like now.”

  “I’m sorry…didn’t mean to pry. I was just curious.”

  “It doesn’t matter. Anyway, some people think my name change is as odd as a top-hat on a dinosaur. I won’t name names, but it rhymes with Dit.”

  “Rings a bell,” said Dit. “I probably know the guy.”

  Anne ignored the comment and went on.

  “My birth name was Wilhelmina Anne Darby. It became the endless source of torment in middle school. Later I shortened it to Willy…then Billy. So Billy Darby, the woman detective, was born. End of story.”

  “Sorry again.”

  “What’s in a name? A rose by any…,” Dit mused.

  “You’re no rose, and you’re not Romeo and, as long as you’ve brought up the subject of odd names, let’s look at yours. What kind of name is ‘Dit’ anyway? It doesn’t even have enough letters for a real name.”

  “The Malones may be an economical gang, for all that, but they’ve managed to provide me with half the entire Morse code in my good name.”

  “Actually,” interrupted Gwen, “‘Dit’ isn’t his real name.”

  Anne looked blank. So did Sam and Sarah and Mary Anne.

  “I knew that,” said Dashiell with a smirk.

  “It’s ‘Diarmuid,’” she said, pronouncing it again more slowly, “DEEar-mut.”

  “That’s even more pathetic than Wil-hel-MEE-na,” said Anne. “My condolences. And how did Diarmuid become Dit?” she asked.

  An embarrassed grin swept across his face.

  “I couldn’t pronounce ‘Diarmuid’ when I was young. “‘Dit’ came out, and ‘Dit’ stuck.”

  “And Gwen,” asked Sarah, “how did you uncover this delightful family secret?”

  “It was on his wrist bracelet in the hospital. I was one of his caregivers on the spinal trauma ward.”

  “So you’re a nurse?”

  “I’m a nurse practitioner.” Gwen noticed some blank looks again and added, “It’s two steps above an RN and a giant step below doctor.”

  “Impressive. And how long are you visiting?”

  Gwen looked questioningly at Dit. He nodded back in return. Then he pulled himself up on his crutches, stood, and smiled.

  “The short answer is…forever. Gwen and I are getting married.”

  13.

  This shouldn’t take long, thought Anne, hunched over the desk in her office. She was determined to the set the record straight and set her own mind at ease by locating Carolyn Jollimore.

  And maybe Ben was right. Even though the letter pre-dated Ben’s time here, he was certain that Charlottetown had no unsolved murder cases, nor did any of the other jurisdictions on PEI. Maybe the Jollimore woman is just some local screwball. An inveterate gossip with an imagination that runs amok. No point jumping to embarrassing conclusions, though. A quick interview with Carolyn would reveal a lot, give her the opportunity to explain her letter, and give Anne the opportunity to explain why no one from Darby Investigations had come to help her if there had been no follow-up after the lost letter.

  Anne picked up the receiver and dialled the number Carolyn Jollimore had included in her letter, but a recorded message said the number was no longer in service. So she flipped through the phone directories for a Carolyn Jollimore listing. No luck. Carolyn Jollimore was listed nowhere.

  Okay, then, I guess it’ll have to be the hard way.

  Anne picked up the phone again and methodically called every Jollimore listed. After an hour of dialling, none of those who answered admitted knowing a Carolyn Jollimore. As a last resort, she turned to the computer and opened an online directory for Halifax. A couple of keystrokes brought her a list of Jollimores, a hundred or more.

  This is going to take forever, she thought. Then her mind wandered to Dit and Gwen.

  Why is he talking marriage? It’s so soon. He scarcely knows her. What’s the matter with him, she wondered. That’s not like Dit. He’s practical and down-to-earth and smart…and she’s…she’s just not right.

  She pushed both of them out of her mind, stared at the enormous list of Jollimores as if she suddenly had been confronted by a flash mob of evangelists. Then she dove into it.

  Three hours later, she had talked her way from Aaron Jollimore, a musicologist, to Zephyr Jollymore,
a Barrington Street stripper. She had made telephone contact with dozens of others and left phone messages for the rest, but, in the end, her efforts seemed futile.

  A pang of hunger reminded her that it was past one o’clock. She grabbed a file folder on her desk and headed downstairs to The Blue Peter.

  “Club sandwich, dill pickle, water no ice,” she told the waitress and sank back into the soft leather seat. Mary Anne approached and slid into the bench across from her.

  “Hey,” she said, “You’re late. What’s up?”

  “Well,” she said and thought for a moment and smiled, “The CEO of Brown Technologies approached me this morning and offered me a contract to do annual background checks on his entire staff. Isn’t that wonderful?”

  Mary Anne nodded.

  “A hundred and thirty-five employees, all males, all professionals, all handsome, all single, all…”

  “…fictional?” added Mary Anne.

  “You’re spoiling a wonderful illusion.”

  “Real women don’t need illusions. I read that in Cosmo.”

  “Oh, yeah? So why do you put on lipstick and blush every morning, huh?”

  “So I can look my age, of course.”

  “And how old are you, Mary Anne? The truth.”

  “The truth is that real women have real secrets, and I’m old enough to keep mine.”

  “Aren’t some secrets better shared with friends?” asked Anne.

  “Some better than others. You have one you want to share?”

  “As a matter of fact, I do, but I’m not so sure you want to hear it.”

  “There’s nothing that makes my mouth water more than a secret I haven’t been told. Out with it.”

  “How about the secret of your vanishing money?”

  “I’m all ears, hon.”

  Anne pushed a brown manila envelope toward Mary Anne.

  “The details are here…a few surprises, too. First, the waitress you thought was ripping you off? The new one? Genevieve?”