The Cold Blue Blood

by David Handler

  He started to respond but instead shook his head at her, unwilling to spill it.

  She wondered what it was. And why he’d clammed up. But she did not press him, convinced that she would get no more out of Mitch Berger, New York film critic, at the present time. She merely thanked him for his time and started for the door.

  “Do you think one of the islanders killed him, Lieutenant?” he asked her.

  “I don’t do that.”

  “You don’t do what?”

  “Spitball.”

  “But you must have a gut feeling.”

  “I must. I do. Only I don’t share my gut feelings with members of the working press.”

  “But I told you—I’m not a reporter. I’m just curious.”

  Des paused at the door, gazing at him intently. “Mr. Berger, what we have here is a situation where someone has lost control, okay? It has been my experience that when an individual loses control once he or she may very likely lose control again. Consequently, my advice to you is this …”

  “Yes, Lieutenant … ?”

  “Don’t be curious.”

  He didn’t react. Just stared gloomily into the fire. God, he was a mournful specimen. She couldn’t be positive, having only known him for twenty minutes, but there was a distinct possibility that Des had just met the loneliest man on earth.

  “Mind if I ask you something personal?” she asked, treating him to her maximum-wattage smile.

  “No, not at all,” he replied, glancing at her curiously.

  “Have you ever thought about sharing your home and your heart with a nice warm cuddly individual of the feline persuasion?”

  “What can you tell me about your husband’s departure last month, Mrs. Seymour?”

  “I can … tell you next to nothing, Lieutenant,” Dolly Seymour replied in a soft, halting voice. “I-I found his letter on the kitchen table when I came downstairs that morning. And … And …”

  “And … ?” Des pressed her gently.

  “And he was gone.”

  Niles Seymour’s widow lay limply on her bed under an Afghan throw, a moist tissue clenched in her small fist, her blue eyes red and swollen from crying. She had been given a strong sedative to help her cope with the shock. It had made her a bit dreamy and slow on the uptake. But she was able to respond to questions. She was a slender, frail-looking woman with a child’s delicate face and translucent skin.

  Her bedroom was not especially elegant. It was small and the ceiling was quite low. The furniture was of the ordinary department store variety. Bud Havenhurst, her patrician lawyer and ex-husband, hovered attentively in a chair next to the bed. Tal Bliss loomed just inside the doorway, hat in hands. Des sat at the foot of the bed.

  Downstairs, Soave was parked at the breakfast nook taking statements from the son and the sister-in-law.

  “What did this letter say, Mrs. Seymour?”

  “That he was … not worthy of me. That he was leaving.”

  “You still have the letter?”

  “Possibly. I can’t remember.” After a long moment, she added, “No one knew.”

  “No one knew what, Mrs. Seymour?”

  “How kind and gentle he could be. How he could make me laugh.”

  Des instinctively disliked this woman. Dolly Seymour was rich, white, privileged and weak—a mewling little porcelain figurine. Des resented such women. But she was also aware that there might be more to her than met the eye. Could be Dolly Seymour was not as helpless as she seemed. Maybe she was a cold, calculating schemer who got what she wanted by acting that way. Maybe she was a manipulator, a user. Maybe she was even a murderer. “Did your husband ever attack you, Mrs. Seymour?”

  Bud Havenhurst stirred slightly in his chair at the mention of this.

  “Attack me?” Dolly repeated.

  “Strike you. Physically abuse you.”

  “Why, no. Never.”

  “You sure about that?”

  “She’s quite sure,” Havenhurst answered for her, his voice icy.

  “He arrived here from Atlantic City?”

  “Yes,” she replied. “We met at the country club.”

  “And before that? Where was he born and raised?”

  “He was a Southie,” Dolly replied fondly. “He came from South Boston. His father was a construction worker, his mother a beautician. He developed his love of fine things from her. And his grooming. He always took such wonderful care of his hands. He came from nothing, you see. Never even went to college. But he understood people. He understood style. Style meant the world to him.” She glanced around at her bedroom. “He always wanted to redecorate this room. He loathed it.”

  “I’ll need to see your credit card records, Mrs. Seymour,” Des said. “Bank statements. Any and all account information, please.”

  She didn’t respond. Did not, in fact, seem to hear her. She was still gazing around at the bedroom decor. Her lips were moving, but no sound was coming out.

  “I think I can help you with that, Lieutenant,” Bud Havenhurst cut in discreetly. “Perhaps if we moved downstairs? Dolly’s really got to get some rest.”

  “Very well,” Des allowed.

  He closed the curtains and turned off the bedside lamp, pausing to stroke his ex-wife’s forehead gently. Then they left the room and went down to the study. Havenhurst seated himself at the desk. Des took a chair, watching him skeptically. He was a lawyer. Therefore, she assumed that every word out of his mouth was a lie. Bliss parked himself in the doorway once again, stolid and silent.

  The Dear John letter that Niles Seymour had left Dolly was in the top drawer of the desk. It was on a sheet of common copier paper, folded neatly in half. Des cautioned Havenhurst not to touch it—it might contain latent fingerprints. She sent Bliss out for tweezers. She used these to lift it from the drawer. It was a short letter. It read:

  Dearest Dolly—I should never have come into your life. You are too fine. And I am too greedy. I must leave you for another now, my darling. Try to remember me fondly. All my love, Niles.

  The letter was not handwritten. It had been computer-generated and printed out.

  “He didn’t sign it,” Des observed.

  “Why, no. Is that so important?” Havenhurst’s eyes widened. “My God, what am I saying? Of course, it is. That never occurred to me before—when I thought he had run off on her, I mean. I just chalked it up to his utter rudeness. But now that we know he never … Niles didn’t write this at all, did he?”

  “Whoever killed him did it, most likely. Chances are, Seymour was already dead.”

  “Anyone could have written it. Anyone with access to their computer.” Havenhurst glanced at it there on the desk, his shoulders slumping. “Assuming it was done here.”

  “We’ll try to match it up,” she said. “Dust it for prints. Maybe we’ll even find it on the hard drive. Although I’m doubting that whoever did this was stupid enough not to delete it.”

  Bliss went back out to notify a crime scene technician.

  Havenhurst remained seated at the desk. “She never locks her doors. It could have been anyone on the island.”

  “Um, okay, about those credit card and bank statements … ?”

  Dolly Seymour’s ex-husband seemed very far away for a moment. Des found herself wondering where he was. Then he shook himself and opened another drawer. “You’ll find their receipts and records here. Seymour’s own things are out in the barn—old papers, letters. There isn’t much, but …”

  “Thank you. We’ll look at those, too.” She sat back in her chair, crossing her long legs. “Why did you try to talk Mitch Berger out of moving in, Mr. Havenhurst?”

  “He was a stranger,” the lawyer responded mildly. “I knew nothing about him. Still don’t, for that matter.”

  “You sure it wasn’t something else?”

  He raised his chin at her. “Such as?”

  “Such as that you knew what was buried in that garden.”

  “Absolutely not,” he said, bristli
ng at her. “And I would advise you not to throw around such reckless and slanderous accusations, Lieutenant. You are not handling a drive-by shooting in Hartford’s North End. You are not dealing with the disenfranchised, the disempowered or the destitute. You are dealing here with individuals of great influence. The cream of our society. And you will behave accordingly, or suffer the consequences. Is that understood?”

  No two ways about it, Des reflected unhappily. She would be feeling Captain Polito’s hot breath very soon indeed. “I am well aware of where I am, Mr. Havenhurst,” she evenly. “I am also aware that a murder has taken place here among your fine, rich cream. I have a job to do. I intend to do it. And I expect you to cooperate. Is that understood?”

  “Proceed,” he snapped.

  “Mr. Berger alluded to certain events that have taken place since his arrival. He seems to feel someone was trying to scare him away.”

  Havenhurst sighed glumly. “He told you about Dolly’s episode, I take it.”

  Des kept her face a blank. “As a matter of fact, he didn’t.”

  Havenhurst got up and went over to the window. He was obviously annoyed with himself for volunteering this.

  “Perhaps you would like to,” she suggested.

  “Very well,” he said heatedly. “Dolly occasionally … She wanders in the night. She’s not a well woman, Lieutenant. It’s important for you to understand that. It goes back to an incident that happened here quite a number of years ago.”

  “The Weems shootings?”

  He glanced at her sharply. “I suppose Tal Bliss told you.”

  “He said Mrs. Seymour found them.”

  “Hell of a thing for her to experience,” Havenhurst recalled. “She went into a serious clinical depression directly after that. There were suicide attempts, several of them. She had to be hospitalized. We almost lost her, Lieutenant. She remains, to this day, an extremely vulnerable creature. If I seem perhaps a bit overly protective toward her, that is why.”

  “I understand, Mr. Havenhurst.”

  “No, you don’t understand,” he insisted vehemently. “Because there’s more to it than the simple fact that she found the bodies. Certain details were not included in the newspaper accounts. It was possible to keep such things from the public in those days. But as I’ve no doubt you will soon dig up the official report for yourself, I’ll tell you right now what you will find in it.”

  “And what is that, Mr. Havenhurst?”

  “She was raped, Lieutenant,” the lawyer answered bitterly. “Roy Weems, the Peck family’s own caretaker, forcibly and savagely raped my Dolly. She was a virgin. A carefree, sunny, lovely seventeen-year-old virgin. And that bastard took that away from her forever. He—” Havenhurst broke off, pausing a moment to compose himself. “We believe that his wife walked in on it … happening. And that she threatened to have him arrested. So he shot her. And then turned the gun on himself. And that poor Dolly witnessed the entire thing.”

  Des frowned. “You say that you believe she witnessed it …”

  “That’s correct,” Havenhurst affirmed, nodding. “We have never known for sure. Not really. You see, Lieutenant, Dolly retains no memory of the incident. To this day, she remembers nothing about it whatsoever.”

  It was a small convoy of cruisers that headed up the Old Boston Post Road toward Uncas Lake. Resident Trooper Bliss, who knew where they were going, took the lead. Des followed in her car. A third state trooper brought up the rear as precautionary backup.

  Soave remained behind on Big Sister to attend to the Seymours’ computer and business records. He had, he informed Des, learned very little from the victim’s stepson, Evan Havenhurst. As for the sister-in-law, Bitsy Peck, Soave reported, “Loot, I never heard someone talk so much and say so little in my whole life.” He still had to take a statement from Jamie Devers. And the island was still being searched for weapons. Two of the islanders remained at large. Redfield Peck, who was still en route to Tokyo, and Mandy Havenhurst, who had not yet returned any of the calls placed to the Havenhursts’ New York apartment. According to her husband, she had intended to spend the day at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

  In reality, there were two Dorsets, Des reflected as she drove. One was the Dorset of the Pecks and the Havenhursts, the old money WASP gentry who’d long ago claimed the lush meadows and pastures, the precious Long Island Sound frontage, the village’s power structure and its upper social rung. The other Dorset was made up of the people who plowed that gentry’s driveways and mowed their lawns and pumped out their septic tanks. Some of them held low-end factory jobs at the Electric Boat submarine plant in Groton. Or toiled as chambermaids at the mammoth Indian reservation casinos in Uncas. Most of these lower-rung people were crowded into the mildewed cabins and cinder-block ranchettes that were squeezed, shoulder to shoulder, around Uncas Lake. The fetid, sulphurous lake was situated five miles inland from the shore. The soil was rocky here, the roads narrow and dark. Kids in dirty diapers rolled around unattended on scraggly front lawns. Dogs roamed loose, sometimes in packs. Idle men sat on their front porches drinking beer in the middle of the day.

  There was a name for white people such as these. They were called swamp yankees.

  Bliss slowed his cruiser way down when he turned off of the Post Road and started his way through their squalid enclave. The resident trooper knew the territory well. He knew it because he lived here himself.

  He pulled up in front of a seedy cottage where a rusty pickup with no tires rested up on blocks in the driveway. An ancient sofa was set out in the weeds out front, surrounded by empty beer cans. He parked and got out. Des did the same. She heard music blaring from somewhere, a dog barking, a baby crying. She could smell spaghetti sauce. And feel a million eyes watching them through windows up and down the street. As always she felt the same mix of anger and intolerance that smoldered within her whenever she was in such a neighborhood, whatever its racial or ethnic make-up. She simply could not understand how people could sit around all day doing nothing with their lives.

  The third trooper remained back at the corner of the Post Road, a shotgun mounted to his dashboard.

  She and Bliss strode up to the front porch together. The sound of a television blared through the screen door. Bliss knocked on it. A girl’s voice called, “It’s open—come on in!”

  The room was stuffy and reeked of cigarette smoke and soiled diapers. A slovenly, rather bovine-looking girl of no more than eighteen lay sprawled lazily on the sofa, drinking a diet soda and watching one of those trashy daytime talk shows. A naked baby, a boy, dozed peacefully next to her on a blanket. The girl wore a tank top and cut-offs. She had red hair and fair skin and a small, mean face. Her bare arms and legs were soft and sprinkled with freckles. Her feet were pudgy and dirty. She painted her toenails black and wore rings around two of her toes. Also one in her right nostril. She exuded a certain ripe concupiscence in spite of her chubbiness. By age thirty, Des reflected, she would be jowly and jiggly, a pig. By forty she would be an old woman, her tits hanging down like a pair of accordians. Right now, she was just about the same age Dolly Seymour had been when Tuck Weems’s father had raped her.

  The girl eyed them warily as they stood there in the room with her. But she did not stir from the sofa. Or turn down the volume on the TV “Whoa, it’s the resident trooper man,” she said in a mocking voice.

  On the sofa next to her, the baby continued to sleep peacefully.

  “Darleen, isn’t it?” Bliss said pleasantly.

  “Yeah, so what?” she shot back defiantly. “Who’s she?”

  Des told her.

  “You can think of her as my boss,” Bliss added, by way of explanation.

  “No way,” Darleen exclaimed. “That is so weird. No offense or nothing. I mean, it just is, isn’t it?”

  “We’re looking for your father, girl,” Des said.

  The girl’s eyes went back to the TV “My father’s been dead for fifteen years, ma’am,” she said sullenly. “If yo
u’re looking for Tuck he’s not around. And I haven’t seen him since …” She trailed off into silence for a moment. “Why, what did he do?”

  “Where is he, Darleen?” Bliss asked.

  “How should I know? God, can you believe these people?” She meant the ones on the TV—two women who had wrestled each other to the floor and were throwing punches. The show’s host was egging them on. “Can you believe somebody would go on TV and actually do that over some man? I mean, why would they do that?”

  Because cows like you actually sit here all day and watch it, Des said to herself. This was the truly remarkable part. “Darleen, Tuck may be in a lot of trouble. I’m not saying he is. I’m saying he may be. He’s wanted for questioning in connection with a murder, okay?”

  Darleen’s eyes widened. “Murder? No way …”

  “If we don’t find him, and talk to him, then I’ll have to alert every trooper in the state to be on the lookout for him,” Des told her. “Believe me, that will not be a good thing. He will be considered a dangerous person. And I cannot promise that he will not be hurt. All we want to do is ask him some questions. If you care about him, you’ll help us.”

  Darleen took a long drink of her soda, considering this. “What makes you think I care?”

  “You had his baby, didn’t you?” Des asked.

  “What’s that got to do with anything?” She reached for a cigarette and lit it.

  Des stared at her intently. At the way her soft, childlike hands shook. And her knee jiggled. She was talking plenty hard and tough, but was clearly frightened. She had a baby to take care of. She had no job, no education, and no skills—other than the obvious one. Tuck was her meal ticket, her comfort zone, her home. And now she could see that disappearing right before her eyes.

  “Look, I don’t know where he is, okay?” Darleen said finally. “I haven’t seen him since yesterday.”

  “He didn’t come home last night?” Bliss asked.

  Darleen shrugged.

  “Does he stay out on you regularly?” Des pressed her.

  The girl shrugged again, although this time her nostrils flared slightly. Evidently, Tuck Weems was not a one-teenager man.