Melody for Murder: A Bertie Bigelow Mystery

by Carolyn Marie Wilkins

  “As long as it’s not too much trouble,” Bertie said. “I’ll fill you in on the rest of the story when I see you.”

  As Bertie hung up the phone, she felt a shiver move up her spine. Theophilous had been telling Delroy to “hear from the other side.” What on earth had he meant by this remark? Did it even matter anymore? Nine months ago, Delroy Bigelow and Theophilous had been making big plans for the future. Now, all that remained of their hopes and dreams were a few pages of cryptic notes. Both men were dead, and one of them had been murdered.

  Chapter Seven

  THURSDAY, JANUARY 10, 2013—10:00 A.M.

  Ten days after the murder, Judge Green’s funeral was held with due pomp and circumstance at Trinity Episcopal Church. Built in 1893, the stately gothic cathedral on the edge of Chicago’s Historic Bronzeville District had been ministering to upwardly mobile black folks for over sixty years. As Bertie, Ellen, and a well-dressed collection of Chicago’s African American elite looked on, Mayor Davis gave a moving tribute, dusting off his Latin to end with a quote from the Roman historian, Pliny.

  “Judge Theophilus Green left this world full of years and full of honors. Plennus annis ablit, plenus honoribus.”

  After the Mayor’s speech, the Reverend Bryant J. McCall launched into what promised to be a lengthy eulogy. In the second pew, Alderman Fred Clark, his lanky frame draped in a black suit hand-tailored from raw silk, crossed one leg over the other and stole a glance at his Rolex. His black, cashmere overcoat hung casually over the back of the pew in front of him. That coat must have set him back at least five hundred dollars, Bertie thought to herself. It would certainly qualify in anyone’s book as a “fancy coat.” Was Alderman Clark the angry man who had waited for LaShawn Thomas at Mrs. Petty’s house? If so, why?

  The more Bertie thought about her wayward student, the more conflicted she became. She still had no idea what had possessed the boy to attack the alderman at the Christmas concert. Nor did she have a clue what LaShawn had been doing at Jackson Towers the night of Judge Green’s murder. Had she done the right thing in not telling Detective Kulicki she’d seen him there?

  Dr. Momolu Taylor sat two rows back, his arm draped casually over Patrice Soule’s shoulder. Regally attired in a long African robe embroidered with gold, the doctor’s expression ranged between boredom and irritation as the minister droned on. From what Bertie could tell, Taylor and the judge had not been the best of friends. Could the fact that Judge Green was head over heels in lust with Patrice Soule have had anything to do with their enmity?

  Charley Howard, the Hot Sauce King, sat with his wife on the other side of the church. Next to Howard’s massive bulk, Mabel Howard seemed insubstantial, almost wraithlike. As the minister continued to speak, Bertie peeked surreptitiously at Howard’s face. Was Howard glad the judge was dead? With Theophilous out of the way, his application for membership in the Octagon Society was sure to be accepted. With the notable exception of Mrs. Leflore, the Society’s membership committee was made up of younger, less conservative types who’d be eager to welcome the Hot Sauce King—and his money—into the fold. According to Delroy’s manuscript, Howard had been arrested for assault and battery, although his victim had refused to press charges. Could Howard have been angry enough with the judge to kill him?

  The sound of shuffling feet as the congregation stood for the final hymn snapped Bertie from her reverie. Stop this idle speculation this instant, she said to herself. For all she knew, the police were closing in on Judge Green’s killer this very minute.

  At precisely seven fifteen the following evening, Bertie walked up the three cement stairs that led to David Mackenzie’s townhouse. The Mackenzies lived in South Commons, a warren of townhouses located minutes from the heart of the Loop. It had been snowing all afternoon, and with all the traffic on Lake Shore Drive, Bertie had been afraid she would be late. Other than her disastrous evening with Theophilous Green, it was the first time Bertie had been out to a social occasion in months. In one hand, she carried a bottle of French Bordeaux and in the other, a foil-wrapped plate of homemade brownies. Hopefully, if the Mackenzies didn’t like French wine they would at least enjoy the brownies. She took a deep breath and rang the buzzer.

  Seconds later, the door flew open and Big Mac, dressed for comfort in a University of Illinois sweatshirt and a pair of well-worn jeans, enveloped her in a bear hug.

  “Welcome, stranger,” he boomed. “Come in out of the cold.”

  “I’ll be out in a minute to say hello,” Angelique called out from the kitchen. “Mac’s got me sweating over a hot stove back here.”

  “I brought you guys wine and chocolate,” Bertie said. “Need any help?”

  Angelique laughed. “Nah. I’ve been making gumbo since I was ten. I’m sipping on some Wild Turkey and catching up on old Scandal reruns. I’ll be out in a bit. Just make yourself at home.”

  The house smelled of onions, peppers, and tomatoes simmering in olive oil. Miles Davis’s trumpet shimmered softly from the Bose speakers recessed into the ceiling, and signed prints by Jacob Lawrence, Romare Bearden, and Elizabeth Catlett lined the walls. A small gas fireplace burning in the corner gave their dining room a cozy elegance.

  As she and Mac exchanged pleasantries, Bertie recalled the many times she and Delroy had visited here. It sure felt different being there alone. Resolutely, she pushed aside the grief that threatened to overwhelm her. Much as she missed Delroy, she had to get out and socialize. Otherwise, she was likely to turn into one of those people one saw on reality TV—the hermits who stayed indoors for years at a time and hoarded things.

  Angelique’s gumbo was delicious—mild, but with just enough red pepper to highlight the tomato, okra, and shrimp that gave the dish its flavor. As they ate, Bertie and the Mackenzies worked their way through two bottles of crisp German Riesling as they discussed old times and mutual friends—people Bertie and Delroy had socialized with before her husband’s sudden death. No one brought up Judge Theophilous Green’s murder until after the dinner dishes had been cleared away nearly two hours later.

  “You must have been one of the last people to see Theophilous alive,” Angelique said, giving Bertie a speculative glance. “I didn’t know the two of you were so close.”

  “We weren’t close,” Bertie said. Perhaps because she did not wish to speak ill of the dead, or more likely because she just didn’t feel like reliving the incident, she omitted the harrowing details of her visit to Judge Green’s apartment. “I couldn’t go to the Octagon Ball without a date. I wanted to hear the Count Basie Orchestra, and Theophilous offered to be my escort. It was that simple.”

  “Nothing simple about it,” Angelique said. “The man is dead.” Carefully, she lifted the antique decanter from the sideboard next to the table and splashed a healthy dose of bourbon into her glass. “Don’t suppose you shot him, did you?”

  “No,” Bertie said calmly. “Sorry to disappoint you.” Mackenzie’s wife was apparently trying to rattle her, but Bertie was determined to maintain her dignity. With a chilly smile, she changed the subject. “When I went to the judge’s apartment that night, I learned my husband had been working on a memoir. He’d left it with Judge Green for safekeeping. You could have knocked me over with a feather when Theophilous showed it to me. I didn’t know a thing about it.”

  “Delroy definitely had a secretive side,” Mac said. “What was he writing about?”

  “Some of it is about the cases he won—who did what to whom and when. Some of it is his life story. And some of it is about the movers and shakers he knew on the South Side.”

  “I’ve been President of the Jack and Jill Charity Fund Drive for the past three years,” Angelique said. “Am I in it?”

  Bertie shook her head.

  “Well, what about David then?” Angelique tossed off the remaining bourbon in her glass and poured herself another. “A former Cook County prosecutor, now in private practice. That should count for something, right?”

  While Bert
ie cast about in her mind for a tactful response, Big Mac shook his head in irritation.

  “Who cares, Angie? That’s not even the point.”

  “I care, that’s who!” Mackenzie’s wife shouted. By this point in the evening, she’d consumed a fair amount of liquor. But far from being a mellowing influence, the alcohol seemed to make Angelique even more irritable. “That’s just like you, Mac. You don’t stick up for yourself. You’re so oblivious you don’t even know when you’re being dissed.”

  “I’m sure Delroy meant no disrespect,” Bertie said mildly. “There are only a few people in this section. Politicians and entrepreneurs, mostly. Alderman Clark, Silas Blackstone, the president of Unity Bank, Charley Howard. People like that.”

  “Charley Howard? The Hot Sauce King?” Angelique sniffed derisively. “That man’s nothing but a cheap hoodlum. Everybody knows he’s a front man for the Roselli mob.”

  “Maybe he is, and maybe he isn’t,” Mac said. “You shouldn’t say things like that about people you don’t know.”

  Angelique ignored him. “Did you say Freddy Clark was in the manuscript, Bertie?”

  Bertie nodded reluctantly. As the hostility level in the room rose, she realized that Mac and his wife probably argued like this on a regular basis. The last thing she wanted to do was to add fuel to the fire.

  “Like I said, the manuscript was unfinished. More like a rough sketch, really. Perhaps if Delroy had lived, he would have added more chapters,” Bertie said in what she hoped was a placating tone.

  “Give me a break,” Angelique snapped. “Steady Freddy’s got to be as crooked as a dog’s hind leg.”

  “How do you know he’s crooked?” Big Mac said. “You’ve never even met the man.”

  “Come off it, David. How the hell else did he get elected? Those politicians are all the same, especially on the South Side. I’ll bet you Freddy’s taking bribes from every gangbanger in Englewood. If you took your nose out of those stupid law books once in a while, you’d know that.”

  Although the lawyer was trying to keep his cool, Bertie could see that his wife’s needling was beginning to get to him.

  “You can’t just go around saying things like that about people,” Mac said. “You don’t have a scintilla of evidence to support that statement.”

  “David Mackenzie, legal eagle,” Angelique said. As she waved her glass in the air, her voice dripped with sarcasm. “The patron saint of losers the world over.”

  “I’m warning you,” Mackenzie said. “Give it a rest. Now.”

  “Or what?” Angelique fixed her husband with a challenging glare. “What exactly do you plan to do about it, David? Tell me!”

  “Please, Angie,” Mackenzie said softly. “Now is not the time or place.”

  “It’s never the time or place for you,” Angelique said bitterly. “We haven’t had a real conversation in ten years.” Wobbling unsteadily, she pushed back from the table and stood up. “Sorry to break up this little gathering, but I’m feeling a bit under the weather.”

  “I ought to go,” Bertie said. “Let you get some rest.”

  “No need to rush off,” Angelique said. Mac looked daggers in her direction as she staggered to the sideboard and poured herself another shot of bourbon. “We both know you’ve been waiting all night to get my husband alone.”

  David Mackenzie slammed his fist onto the table. “That’s enough!” he shouted. “I will not have you behaving like this in front of our guest.”

  “Bastard!” Angelique hissed. As Bertie stared, open-mouthed, Angelique Mackenzie drained the rest of the brandy in her glass and stumbled out of the room.

  In the pause that followed, Mac shook his head like a fighter who’d just absorbed a hard right to the head.

  “Jesus, Bertie. I don’t know what gets into Angie sometimes,” he said slowly. “She didn’t mean it, really she didn’t. It’s just the liquor talking.”

  Bertie wasn’t too sure about that. But now was certainly not the time to discuss it.

  “Don’t worry about it,” she said, giving Mackenzie a sympathetic pat on the shoulder. “Go take care of your wife. I can see myself out.”

  Lake Shore Drive was virtually deserted on the way home. As she made her way along the dark and snowy streets, Bertie couldn’t help but ask herself why it was that a good man like David Mackenzie was burdened with a drunken shrew like Angelique. If Delroy were alive, she would have asked him. Perhaps another man would be able to understand such a thing. It sure seemed a shame, though, she thought to herself. Mac is far too good for Angelique. Always was and always would be.

  Chapter Eight

  FRIDAY, JANUARY 18, 2013—7:00 A.M.

  One week later, Detective Michael Kulicki rang Bertie’s doorbell at seven in the morning. As seemed to be his custom, the detective was unshaven and looked like he hadn’t slept in a week. As Bertie opened her front door, he took one last drag on a cigarette before flicking the butt into the street.

  “Your Smith & Wesson has checked out clean,” he said, handing Bertie the shoebox that contained her gun.

  Though she wanted to keep her demeanor crisp and professional, Bertie couldn’t resist a smile.

  “Does this mean I’m no longer a suspect?”

  Kulicki’s eyes narrowed, and he studied Bertie for a full beat before answering.

  “This is an ongoing investigation, Mrs. Bigelow. We are continuing to look into everyone who was with the judge the night he died. Do not leave the city without letting me know.”

  As the detective drove away, Bertie felt a chill work its way up her spine. Surely the cops didn’t really think she was a murderer? She’d read somewhere that ten thousand people in the US were wrongly convicted of crimes every year. Was she about to become one of them? It would have been nice if Kulicki could have offered some kind of reassurance, let her know she was not going to be dragged out of her house in handcuffs. Instead, he’d told her not to leave town.

  As she climbed up the stairs to the kitchen and put a kettle of water on for tea, Bertie tried her best to push these unpleasant thoughts from her mind. It didn’t help her mood that LaShawn Thomas was not returning her calls and had apparently gone into hiding. Worse still, she could only assume that her longstanding friendship with David and Angelique Mackenzie was now on shaky ground. It was never advisable to get in the middle of a fight between two married people. Now that she had witnessed the seamy underbelly of their relationship, Angie and Mac might very well close ranks and banish her from their lives entirely. Mackenzie had always been a valued friend, the only man she felt she could confide in. How she would manage if he were to disappear from her life was something Bertie did not want to contemplate.

  All in all, the past three weeks had been a continuous nightmare. Christmas vacation had come and gone in a blur of nonstop stress, and now Metro College was back in session. Sadly, it was not possible to hop the next plane to a remote and preferably uninhabited tropical island. But at the very least she could put her worries aside for the rest of the day.

  After devouring a sinfully delicious breakfast of hash browns, sausage, and scrambled eggs, Bertie took a long bubble bath, steaming up the bathroom mirrors and topping off the tub until the hot water ran out. One hour later, dressed in a warm down coat, work boots, a Metro College sweatshirt, and her favorite pair of jeans, Bertie got in her car and drove to the Near North Side.

  Along Southport Avenue, an assortment of Chicago’s rising young professionals, apparently oblivious to the brisk winter wind blowing in from Lake Michigan, strolled, jogged, walked their dogs, and browsed in trendy little shops. It was still early in the day, and Bertie was able to snag a parking spot on the street. Her destination, an old movie theater that had been lovingly restored to its original Baroque splendor, was just around the corner. Once inside, she took off her coat, set her cell phone to vibrate, and settled comfortably in her seat. For the rest of the afternoon nothing would be allowed to distract her from the spectacle of Humphrey Bogar
t and Lauren Bacall flickering larger than life across the silver screen.

  It was almost dark when Bertie emerged from the theater. Tiny snow crystals glistened in the glow of the street lamps on Waveland Avenue and crunched under her feet on the sidewalk. Her cell phone, still set to vibrate, buzzed like an angry bee in her pocket. Bertie ignored the call. As she brushed the snow off her windshield, the phone buzzed again. Again, she ignored it. When the device went off two minutes later, Bertie heaved a sigh, extracted it from her pocket, and peered at the caller ID. When she saw her boss’s Metro College extension flash across the screen, Bertie’s heart rate quickened.

  “I was beginning to think you’d been arrested,” Dr. Grant’s executive assistant said in her well-modulated voice. A gray-haired dynamo in her mid-forties, Hedda Eberhardt was the power behind the throne at Metro College. Among the faculty, she was referred to as the Dragon of Doom. “The chancellor wants to see you the minute he comes back from his vacation.”

  “Do you have any idea why?” Bertie’s words tumbled out in a rush of anxiety. “Is it about the concert?”

  “You know I’m not at liberty to discuss that,” Eberhardt said crisply. “The college will be closed Monday for the Martin Luther King holiday. Be in his office Tuesday morning at nine sharp. Don’t be late.”

  For the rest of the weekend, Bertie worried about her upcoming meeting with Chancellor Grant. Recalling the near-apoplectic expression on his face on the night of the concert, it was easy to surmise that the meeting would not be pleasant. The only real question was the degree of unpleasantness she would have to endure. Although she tried her best to stay cheerful, visions of the chancellor, looking a lot like Ebeneezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol, haunted her dreams.

  Fortunately, Monday was Martin Luther King Day—a day to put aside the mundane and focus on the big picture. If it wasn’t for Martin and the thousands of anonymous Civil Rights warriors who had sacrificed their lives for equal rights, Bertie was well aware she would never have been hired to teach at a college. Instead, she’d have been relegated to the same kind of jobs her grandmother had to perform—cleaning homes and washing white folks’ dirty clothes. Bertie celebrated King Day every year by attending a black history breakfast at St. Mark Methodist Church. Despite the tragic events of the past three weeks, she was determined to maintain the tradition.