Dirty Harriet Rides Again

by Miriam Auerbach

  “Get him off me!” Howard screamed.

  Hollings smiled. “As soon as we have the whole story.” He stroked Monty’s head, and the creature relaxed.

  I was still holding up my gun. That sucker is not light. My arm was starting to hurt. I wanted the story wrapped and Monty unwrapped.

  “That must have made you really mad,” I said to Howard.

  “Hell, yes! I left her office. But on the way out, I saw the room next door with the clothes draped over the chairs. So right then I got an idea. I could change, kill the greedy bitch, then change back into my own clothes and dump the bloody ones nearby. I’d be in the clear.”

  Yeah. And an innocent man would be framed. Real nice.

  “So you just grabbed the nearest set of clothes?” Hollings asked.

  Howard looked offended. “Of course not. Proper fit is important, my man. I found the clothing that fit best.”

  Of course. Howard was a natty dresser. And the clothes that fit him best were Trey’s. The two of them were about the same size. The other Holy Rollers were taller, shorter, heavier, thinner.

  “So you got dressed to kill,” I said. “We know the rest.”

  “What about the rabbi and the priest?” Hollings asked.

  “I read the paper, so I knew the donation to the bitch’s church came from Dennis Pearlman. He’s a filthy rich Boca resident, if you don’t know.”

  “Aren’t they all?” Hollings asked.

  Howard ignored him. “Then, of course, I realized that Pearlman was behind EternaLife,” he continued. “Later I saw on the news that Pearlman had donated the same amounts to the Temple Beth Boca and Our Lady of the Fairways. Of course, I recognized those donations as bribes. So I killed the others, too. I just hid in the temple and the church and waited for them to arrive. Just like I hid here, waiting for you, my dear pastor. I knew you would come sooner or later, whether tonight or in the morning. But Harriet here screwed up my plans.”

  Obviously, the man had gone nuts. Having seemingly gotten away with the first murder, he felt omnipotent and kept on killing.

  I’d heard enough. And my arm was real tired.

  “Call the cops, for God’s sake,” I told Hollings.

  He may have had God and Monty, but I had the gun. He did as I said. The cops came, took statements from all of us, then hauled Howard off in cuffs. Hollings and I were left looking at each other.

  “Young lady, you saved my life,” he said. “For that you have my respect.”

  “The feeling isn’t mutual,” I assured him and got the hell out of that snake pit.

  Chapter 23

  TWO DAYS LATER, the entire wedding party and guests reconvened at the Hog Heaven biker bar. Chuck and Enrique, all five Holy Rollers, Mom and Leonard, the contessa and Coco, Lupe and I all sat at a couple of tables that had been pushed together. Also there were Lior and Pierre Laboisse, the Haitian maintenance man, both of whom had been released, their charges dropped, after Howard had confessed to the police. The rest of the place was filled with the remaining guests, including Chuck’s biker customers and the gay matchmaker and his clients. And S. Lee Dailey had shown up as well.

  Immediately after Howard’s arrest, I’d called Cherise Jubilee, then Chuck and Enrique. I briefly filled them in, then told them that I wasn’t going to repeat the story over and over to all the interested parties, so a group gathering was called for. Chuck and Enrique had already booked and paid for the Hog Heaven for their reception, so they’d called the owner, who graciously changed the date. And the agenda was changed from a marriage reception to a murder recitation.

  The party menu remained unchanged, so everyone, even Mom and the contessa, was guzzling beer and downing buffalo wings, onion rings, and fried mozzarella sticks. The jukebox was playing a collection of country songs that someone had evidently deemed appropriate in view of the vocations of the murder victims: “Drop Kick Me Jesus Through the Goalposts of Life”; “I Been Roped and Throwed by Jesus in the Holy Ghost Corral”; and “Thank God and Greyhound She’s Gone”.

  My favorite bartender, Marla, came over with a tray full of beer bottles. As usual, she wore a black leather halter, and her long gray hair hung down her back in a braid. Her face was lined and wrinkled from years of the hard life. But something about her looked different. Some kind of light shined out from her usually dull eyes.

  “Hey, Marla, what’s up?” I asked. “You’re looking . . . good. Uh, I mean, more relaxed, happier.”

  “I finally kicked out my ol’ man,” she said in her gravelly smoker’s voice.

  “Get out of town!” I said. Her ol’ man was a habitually unemployed, verbally abusive, lying drunk. I’d urged—okay, told her—to dump his useless ass, but she’d refused, saying he did have one use—in bed.

  “No, honey, I’m serious as a heart attack,” she said.

  “So what was the last straw?”

  “The booze finally poisoned him so much that he got . . . whaddya call it? Oh, yeah, erectile dysfunction.”

  “Oh.” I wasn’t sure I wanted that much information. “So not only was he a pathological liar, he was a pathological lover.”

  “Yep, you got it. So I told him, ‘Hey, you can’t get it up, there’s no hard feelings. Just zip up, shut up, pack up, and clear out.”’

  “What’d he say?”

  “He goes, ‘But, baby, I can get me some Viagra.’ So I said, ‘Go ahead. I hope it gets stuck in your throat and gives you a stiff neck.’”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “And you know what? I really am happier. Right now all I want is a meaningful overnight relationship.”

  “Uh, yeah, right,” I said. “Well, I’m really happy for you.”

  “Thanks, hon,” she said, and left to serve another table.

  Marla’s newfound independence reminded me that you can’t force anyone to see the light. Marla had found her own truth and a new strength within herself. Whether my unsolicited advice to her had had anything to do with that, I didn’t know. Maybe I’d planted the seed, maybe not.

  I thought back to Brigitta Larsen O’Malley. She’d actually asked for my advice, then ignored it. But maybe one day, like Marla and like me, she would find that seed of strength inside herself and cultivate it, until a whole new life broke through the soil of fear and blossomed in the fresh air of freedom.

  As the meal wound down, Lior rose and nodded at Marla, who turned off the jukebox. Suddenly the room was silent and all eyes were on Lior. To my horror, he started to make a toast in my honor.

  “Friends, let us raise our glasses—um, that is, bottles—to the incomparable Harriet Horowitz. A woman whose brains, courage, heart, and devotion to the pursuit of justice are unsurpassed. And I want all of you to know that while she pursues justice, I will pursue her with the same devotion.”

  How embarrassing was this? I put on a tight smile.

  Enrique elbowed Chuck. “What do we say? What’s that Jewish thing they say?”

  Chuck shrugged.

  “I know what it is, I know what it is,” Enrique muttered. “Ma . . . Matzo . . . Maz . . . Yeah, I got it! Mazel tov!” he yelled. Everyone cheered.

  Then, to my further horror, some of the guests lifted up my chair, with me in it, and passed me around the room above their heads. Some of these people weren’t exactly sober. I didn’t exactly trust them not to drop me. But I could hardly let my fear show after what Lior had just said about my courage. So I grinned and bore it as they bore me to the front of the room.

  Finally they set the chair down. On top of the bar. Somebody handed me a microphone.

  Great, just great. Here I was, like the pontiff on his balcony preaching to the masses below. Well, maybe this wasn’t so bad. When would I get another chance to pontificate like this?

  “Dearly beloved,” I began. “I’ve gathe
red you here today to explicate the murders of our cherished spiritual leaders, the Reverend LaVerne Botay, Rabbi Lev Zelnik, and Father Patrick Murphy.”

  Okay, so maybe the rabbi wasn’t cherished quite by all, but it certainly wasn’t my place to reveal his widow’s feelings. I proceeded to explain the hows and whys of the killings.

  “So this wasn’t about the gay marriage ordinance at all?” someone asked when I’d finished.

  “Right. This wasn’t about marital legislation, it was about market competition. The market being the dead. And that’s all, folks.”

  I got up, hopped off the bar, and went back to my table. Marla started the jukebox again, and the guests resumed partying.

  “That was a very good presentation, Harriet,” the contessa said. “But we know that’s not all there is. I can understand that you did not want to share all the details with everyone. But now that you’re among family and friends, give us the full, unabridged version.”

  “Like what?” I asked.

  “Like, how did you figure out Howard was the killer?” Cherise Jubilee asked.

  I turned to Leonard. “It was you who finally put me on the right track,” I told him.

  “Really? How?” Leonard asked as Mom patted his knee and gazed at him adoringly.

  “Remember the other night at dinner, when you were talking about the technique of disinformation?”

  “Yeah, sure.”

  “Well, I realized Howard was feeding me disinformation. Through Mom. Sorry,” I said to her.

  “What do you mean?” she asked. “I’m already in such disbelief that my dear friend has turned out to be a killer. I feel so deceived. And you mean there’s more to it?”

  “I’m afraid so. There were a couple times during my investigation when you suggested possible leads to follow. The first was when you said that the reverend’s killer might be someone who had a beef with Trey over a court case. That led me to Lucas Morse and the Loyal Brotherhood of Ass—uh, Aryans. The second time was when you suggested I check out the rabbi’s wife as a potential suspect. Both of those turned out to be false leads. They derailed me off the track. After Leonard talked about disinformation, I realized that both of the times you suggested those leads were after you’d spoken with Howard. He got you involved in the iguana protests just to have the opportunity to feed you false information. He was using you as a stooge. I’m sorry, Mom.”

  She looked crestfallen. Leonard squeezed her hand.

  “You’re right, Harriet,” she said. “Howard did give me those ideas. I’d told him there was some friction between you and me, and he suggested that I might improve my relationship with you if I was helpful to your investigation. I only meant well. I had no idea he was using me.”

  “It’s all right, Mom. He played on your vulnerability. He was a smooth operator. You can’t blame yourself for not seeing what was really going on. After all, I didn’t see it myself. And maybe I still wouldn’t if Leonard hadn’t brought up the disinformation thing. I didn’t catch on to Howard’s lies even from the start, when I ran into him at the city council meeting. He told me he was there regarding the iguana-bridge issue. That was a lie. He wasn’t there about the iguanas. He was really there about EternaLife. He wanted to throw me off track. And he did, because I left the meeting before EternaLife came up. I didn’t learn about it until much later.”

  “That’s okay, darlin’,” Chuck said.

  “Yeah, you still rock,” Enrique added.

  That was nice of them to say. But I still felt guilty. If I’d just stayed at that meeting longer, maybe I would have gotten on the right track sooner and prevented the two subsequent killings. I guess I’d carry that regret with me to my grave—or urn, or suspended state, or whatever.

  “There’s one more thing, Harriet,” Virginia Hamm said. “When you briefed us, you mentioned offhandedly that you’d been endangered a couple times during the investigation. What’s up with that?”

  “What?” Mom exclaimed. “Why didn’t you tell me about this, Harriet?”

  “I think the reason is obvious. I didn’t want to upset you, just like you are now. Anyway, it’s over. I’m safe, so you can chill.”

  “Well, I never . . .” Mom started, but Leonard clutched her hand, and she sat back in silence and pouted.

  I recounted how I’d been shoved into and then rescued from the casket in Howard’s funeral home. Everyone at the table was aghast.

  “Naturally, I thought that whoever shoved me in there wanted me dead, and they didn’t know that that casket wasn’t going into the cremation oven. But now I realize that it was Howard who shoved me in there in the first place. He knew that casket wasn’t going in. He didn’t want to kill me, just scare me. I guess he had some shred of conscience since his partner Mort was my stepfather and Howard has known me since I was in high school. And by ‘rescuing’ me he also set himself up as a good guy, so I wouldn’t suspect him of anything later.”

  Mom started sniffling. “I just cannot believe that our family friend, whom Mort loved like a brother, could do such things.”

  “I know, Mom. Being betrayed by someone you trust is a stab right in the heart.”

  Mom nodded.

  “What about the other attack?” Lupe asked.

  “That was a similar scenario. Except this time it wasn’t Howard. It was Dennis Pearlman. I’d gone to interview him at his vitamin company. So immediately he knew I posed a threat to his bribery scheme. He wanted to keep track of me. He got my image from the security cameras in his building. Then he transmitted it over to Preserve-A-Pet and instructed his minion over there, Barnes, to keep close watch on their security cameras to see if I came in. If I did, he was supposed to scare me off some way. So sure enough, I came in and he recognized me, even though I was undercover.”

  I described my slip off the platform of the liquid nitrogen vat.

  “Barnes had put this oily substance on the platform. The thing is, he was supposed to be walking around there with me, and when I slipped he was supposed to rescue me. Then he was supposed to issue a warning for me to back off from EternaLife. So Pearlman, like Howard, just wanted to scare me, not kill me. But the plan went awry when Barnes was unexpectedly called away and I walked around the platform myself. So I nearly was killed, but I was able to save myself.”

  I looked at Lior. “Thanks to your fitness training,” I told him.

  “That’s my girl!” he said.

  I glared at him. “Girl? Yours? No. I am a woman, and I’m no one’s possession.”

  Lior rolled his eyes heavenward. “Nothing I say to her is right. Why, Lord, am I tortured like this? Why do I want her like no other woman?”

  “Kids, kids, please,” Enrique said. “The road to romance can be rocky. Sometimes that makes it all the more exciting.”

  Chuck grunted. Lior and I both bit our tongues.

  Keisha LaReigne broke the silence. “How did you figure out Pearlman was only trying to scare you?” she asked.

  “I didn’t. The cops had a chat with Barnes, and when they mentioned an attempted-murder charge, he squealed on Pearlman. And by the way, I think Pearlman figured out what Howard was up to and had one of his goons push Howard off the bridge to scare him off. But that’s something we’ll never know for sure. With all the people on that bridge that night, there’s no way to prove it wasn’t just an accident.”

  “So none of this had anything to do with homophobia, or racism, or anti-Semitism, or anything like that,” Honey du Mellon summed up.

  “That’s right,” I said. “Obviously, those kinds of bigotry are in no short supply around here. But in the end, there’s really only one thing that moves Boca, which we all should have known from the start.”

  “Money,” everyone said simultaneously.

  Epilogue

  IT WAS A COUPLE weeks later. I wa
s sitting in my rocking chair on my porch, sipping my Hennessy and waiting for Lana to come home so I could tell her about my day.

  She finally floated into view.

  “It’s about time,” I said. “I’ve got some big news to tell you.”

  “Give it up, girl!” she said.

  “Today the city council voted on EternaLife and the same-sex marriage ordinance. I attended the meeting.”

  “And?”

  “First of all, the council had appointed a new Ethics Committee. In accordance with that committee’s recommendations, EternaLife is out and same-sex marriage is in.”

  Lana flipped her tail back and forth in delight.

  “So Chuck and Enrique can get married now. Legally. And, the Church of the Gender-Free God has a new minister, the high priestess of Lupe’s coven. So the wedding is rescheduled for next month.”

  “Yesss!” If Lana could have pumped a fist in the air, she would have. “Speaking of romance,” she went on, “what’s the latest on Lior?”

  “Lior? Um . . . We’re still stumbling down the perilous path of . . . passion.”

  “Well, now that you’ve proven he’s not a killer—not in this case, anyway—you have my permission to keep stumbling.”

  “Gee, thanks.”

  We were silent for a while as I reflected on my relationship with Lior. Okay, so we’d become closer. And not just physically. Maybe I did sort of, well, care for him. I’d gone to jail after him. Hell, isn’t that how all meaningful relationships start out? And as for our age gap, I seemed to be thinking about it less and less as I knew him more and more.

  The case had affected my other relationships, too. Howard’s exploitation of the tensions between Mom and me had brought us a little closer—neither of us wanted to be vulnerable to outside forces like that again. So it seemed that lately, we kind of agreed to disagree on some things, instead of blowing up at each other.

  And I’d made a whole new set of friends in the Holy Rollers. I had to face it: my post-Babe life was evolving in ways I’d never expected. When I’d retreated to my Glades hideaway following my abusive marriage, it wasn’t loneliness I’d feared. It was relationships. Now I was entangled in them. The fear was still there, but now I was facing it.