The Fan Letter

by Nancy Temple Rodrigue

  The boutique was on the first floor of a Victorian mansion that once belonged to the founding family of Amherst. Located in what was now the Old Downtown District, the entire ground floor had been refurbished to accommodate the shop, but Mona kept with the Victorian theme. A beautiful copper and crystal chandelier that had always hung in the entryway of the mansion now held light bulbs instead of flickering candles. The original dark walnut hardwood floors were covered here and there with pastel Oriental rugs in elaborate floral patterns. Victorian Queen Anne chairs that sat waiting for customers had lovely tapestry seats. Four large dressing rooms were draped with velvet panels held back with gold braided cords. Gourmet coffee in an antique silver decanter sat waiting on an etched tray with delicate Petit Fours on lace doilies to spoil the best of customers. Highly polished mahogany display cases showed off the jewelry, as well as the purses. An open armoire held scarves, hankies, and linen. Dresses, wraps, and lingerie hung in recessed, lighted nooks. Then there were the beveled, etched, and leaded Italian mirrors: the accent lights hung with prisms or tassels. The pastel oil paintings on the walls of the boutique were copies of Monet and Renoir in floral-edged gold leaf frames.

  The second and third floors were the private living areas of Mona Green and her family. Her husband, Patrick, owned and operated a small local dealership, and their two pre-teen children, Mike and Mary, attended school nearby.

  It was in this surrounding that Wayne Fields first met the Evil One of Amherst. Within the first two days of his moving into the conveniently empty apartment directly below hers, he had learned much of her schedule and some of her habits. He had followed her to work the first day and entered her apartment the second. Now he was curious.

  He entered the boutique and was momentarily taken aback. The size of the city with its two hundred thousand residents had already surprised him, but this shop was incredible. He could hear the soft strains of classical music playing lightly in the background and almost expected a maid to ask for his calling card! Instead, four well-dressed women glanced up from their various tasks of rearranging, dusting and ordering garments. He recognized Leslie immediately from the pictures he had seen with her curly brown hair, trim figure and friendly smile. After her first glance at the newcomer, however, she went back to organizing the armoire she had already dusted.

  A tall, attractive redhead dressed in a fashionable white suit approached as he now self-consciously advanced further into the shop. He had been expecting the usual racks of dresses behind which he could stall and observe.

  “May I be of assistance?” Janice asked, silently wondering why in the world this man was in their shop looking as if he wanted to disappear into a crack.

  “Yes, I was…I mean…,” he stammered as he searched for the excuse he had planned on using. The redhead was very pretty. “I wanted to find a present for my mother. I'm new in town and wasn't sure where to find something for her.” Yeah, that sounded good, he thought, refraining from wiping his forehead. Steady, man, you know what you're doing.

  Janice was now sorry she had rushed forward. She had liked the way his hair fell messily over his forehead. Her first reaction was to want to push it back with her fingertips. But, his eyes seemed to be returning to Leslie…. “All right. Did you have anything particular in mind?” she hoped, backing off and getting down to business.

  “No. Maybe a nice dress,” was the vague reply. That should allow me plenty of time to observe.

  “Do you know what size she wears?”

  Wayne looked her over and then Leslie. “Somewhere around the size of you two.”

  Leslie, a petite size six, bit her lip as she glanced at Mona who hurried to her office. Janice, a tall size ten, tried another approach.

  “Well, maybe a nice scarf or some jewelry would do as well. That way we wouldn't have to worry about sizes.”

  That was fine with Wayne as it took him over to where Leslie was busy working. He saw the amusement in her eyes as she stood back. He pretended to study her face which immediately made her blush and become nervous.

  “I've seen you somewhere before,” he stated before she could bolt and retreat.

  “I'm sorry. I don't recall.” She was torn between being polite to this customer and getting away from his intense, rude stare.

  Wayne looked like he was thinking hard. “I know! Don't you live in the Brighton Apartments? That's where I've seen you. I'm your new neighbor, Wayne Fields. I just moved in below you.”

  Leslie looked relieved. She didn't like conversations that started that way. “Oh, really? I didn't even know someone had moved in. Shows how much I pay attention,” she replied, giving a small self-conscious laugh and then falling silent.

  “I'm Wayne Fields,” he repeated, making it obvious he wanted formal introductions.

  When her friend remained silent and blushed again, Janice turned to the armoire and pretended to look through the scarves, intentionally bumping Leslie in the process. She got the point. “I…I'm Leslie. This is my friend Janice.”

  “Good to meet both of you. I hate being the new one in town!” Wayne said with a self-deprecating grin that, on a handsome man, would have been charming. It just made him look self-conscious. He added as if an afterthought, “You know, you're pretty quiet yourself. It's like I don't even have neighbors in that complex.”

  Now that they had talked a little longer, Leslie felt more at ease and her eyes gave a mischievous twinkle. “That's because I haven't given my weekly mambo party!” Her attention was suddenly drawn to the front door, her smile froze on her face, and an almost inaudible, “Oh, goody,” was heard.

  Three giggly high school girls armed with notebooks and pink feathered pens entered. They attempted to straighten their faces and become sophisticated, but failed in a chorus of nervous giggles.

  Leslie muttered to Janice, “Muffy, Buffy and Fluffy are here. No. No. Let me get them. I insist,” as she left to do her inflicted duty.

  Janice hid her mouth with her hand and saw Mona grinning off to the side. Wayne was forgotten for the moment as they all watched and listened. He didn't mind because buying a scarf wouldn't have taken very long and he wanted to stay and observe his target in her natural surroundings.

  Leslie fixed her smile. “Ladies?” she said in a way that would cut butter. “May I help you?”

  The one pushed forward first became the spokesperson for the trio. “Um, like, see? We didn't want to buy anything. Like, we're from Amherst High, you know? And, see, we're doing this project, like, in retailing, you know, and wondered if we could, umm, ask a few questions. ‘Kay?” she finished brightly as the other nodded in agreement.

  “‘Kay,” Leslie responded just as brightly. “Like, what did you, like, want to know?”

  “Okay, like, okay. What's your most expensive item?” Buffy asked looking around eagerly as the other two held their pens ready to write.

  That was always the first question. “If you'll come here, like, I'll show you.” Leslie shot a glance back to Mona who, in turn, pulled the corners of her mouth into a smile. Leslie batted her eyes at her boss and gave a rather silly smile. She dropped it before turning back to the girls.

  Janice's shoulders were shaking at her friend's antics and she had to turn away. She then remembered the customer, Wayne Something. “Oh! I'm sorry. You wanted a scarf or some other thing?”

  Wayne's eyes still followed Leslie. “What's the show about?” he quietly asked, indicating the girls with his chin.

  “Every semester the seniors in the retail management classes are sent out to talk to shop owners about their businesses. It's like a term paper,” she explained and then shook her head with a smile. “The ones who come here usually just want to see the ‘neat stuff’ as they call it.”

  Wayne indicated Leslie. “She's the owner, then?”

  “Oh, no. That would be Mona Green, back there by the piano. Leslie is the senior clerk. We all know how much she enjoys these interviews,” Janice grinned wickedly.

  �
�I can tell…. I'll take this scarf,” he said, picking up the closest one. “Do you have gift wrap?”

  They moved over to the cash register which brought them closer to Leslie. She was holding up a beautiful black velvet evening dress appliquéd with gold and silver beads.

  “This lovely creation is $4,500,” she told the gaping girls.

  They all wrote down $4,500 in their notebooks and added three exclamation points.

  Muffy asked, “So, like, how much would it have cost wholesale?”

  “A little less,” was her reply as they wrote down ‘a little less.’ “The beadwork is hand sewn and the velvet is imported from France. We captured some runaway grandmothers to sew the beads on. We keep them in the cellar.”

  “Can we see them?” Fluffy asked eagerly.

  “No.”

  ““Kay, like, what do you call these little, you know, these little buttons that you can't get off?” Buffy took over the interview again, indicating the security tag attached to the label inside the gown.

  Leslie fought to keep her face straight. “That would be a Detonating Untheft Monitoring Instrument, or a D. U. M. I,” she spelled, “as it is known in the business.”

  “How do you spell that?”

  Leslie slowly repeated, “D. U. M. I.”

  Paula and Mona were nowhere to be seen.

  “Like, where do you get all this neat stuff?”

  “We have wholesalers in San Francisco, and contacts in New York and Paris.”

  Buffy wrote that under her D. U. M. I. and wondered if this place ever had clearance sales.

  The others could see Leslie visibly cringe at the thought. She answered slowly, “No. You see, nothing here really goes out of style. That's one of the keys to good buying.”

  The girls wrote down “No” and asked what the cheapest thing in the store was.

  Probably your earrings, Leslie thought, but answered, “Some of the lingerie begins around twenty dollars.”

  “Oooh!” Fluffy squealed. “Twenty dollars just for underwear?”

  “We don't carry underwear. That would be a satin camisole.” Leslie gave the returning Mona a glazed look that the owner knew meant “Get me out of this now!”

  The girls closed their notebooks and headed back to the dresses. As one of the girls reached for a shimmering pink gown, Leslie warned, “No, no. Don't touch. Hand oil on silk doesn't come off.”

  “You touched them,” Muffy obstinately pointed out.

  Leslie held up her hands for them to see. “My hands are specially treated.”

  “Oooh! Cool!”

  “Any other questions, answers, comments, observations, queries, statements?” as Leslie herded them towards the door.

  “No, like, that's all, I'm sure,” Buffy replied, still cheerful. “Thanks ever so much. Do you carry prom dresses?”

  Leslie's smile froze again. “Oh, sorry, no. We don't have the room. Nuts.”

  “Bummer! Maybe, if, like, you got rid of that old piano you could in a neat circle rack,” Muffy offered, pointing at the baby grand.

  “I'll mention it to the owner. Thanks for coming. Bye, bye,” as she closed the door and turned to face her co-workers. “Not one word,” she warned as she walked past them and into the lounge where she put her head on the table.

  All of the other women stood outside the door and shrilly shrieked, “Oooooooooh!” before they returned to their duties.

  Wayne had sat unnoticed by the armoire throughout all this. He had already paid for the silk scarf he had no use for and had it wrapped. Now he arose and left, likewise unnoticed. He tossed the carefully wrapped package into his trunk and decided he wanted another look at Leslie's apartment tomorrow. It was too close to closing time to carry this out tonight.

  He sat there, just for a moment, behind the wheel of his car. He had conflicting information and was trying to sort it all out in his mind. She had been both gushy teenager-like and all business in her letters to Phillip Beck. She had blushed and gotten nervous when a stranger got overly familiar with her. Then she had sweetly made a group of silly girls look like, well, silly girls without their knowing what she was doing to them.

  The investigator chuckled to himself. “I'd like to see her get good and mad at someone! Wow!”

  He headed back to his apartment to make some notes for his first report to Sarah Beck.

  At ten minutes after six, he rolled his newspaper back into a bundle and put it outside on his door mat. At six fifteen, from the corner of his front window, he watched Leslie walk past their building to the mailboxes. At six eighteen, he opened his door to retrieve the paper he had just set there and startled the disappointed look off Leslie's face as she headed for the stairs leading up to her apartment.

  “Hello, again,” he said cheerfully. “That was some performance you gave.”

  Leslie was looking at him as if he were a green Martian and had suddenly sprouted wings.

  “At your store…earlier today…three high school girls? We met right before that,” he hurriedly explained.

  Remembrance flooded back and she blushed at her forgetfulness. “I'm sorry. I…I'm a little preoccupied.”

  She didn't hear from the publisher or from Phillip Beck, Wayne told himself. “Those girls were really something.”

  Leslie shifted uncomfortably and glanced up the stairs to the sanctuary of her front door. “Sometimes we get students who really are interested in retailing or sometimes designing. Most of the time we get Fifi and Scooter who go to every store in the mall and then come to us.” She shook her head as if to rid it of the thought and started for the stairs leading up to her apartment.

  “Say,” Wayne called, stopping her. As she reluctantly turned back, he indicated inside his apartment with his head. “I have enough Chinese food in there to choke a horse. I didn't know how generous the chefs are here. I have egg fu yong.”

  “Appealing as you make it, no, thank you,” as she started up the stairs.

  “There's plenty.”

  “Then it looks like you'll be having egg fu breakfast,” she called back without turning. She let out a silent breath of air when she heard his chuckle and the door close. “I don't need this now,” she muttered as her own door closed and was quietly locked.

  Ten-fifteen a.m. Thursday. Most of the residents of the Brighton Apartments had left for work or had gone out for the day. The gardeners were busy at another section and it was the manager's day off. Wayne Fields had left his apartment at nine-thirty dressed in a dark suit and hat. At ten, he had returned to the complex, parked in the visitor's section in the back, and left the jacket and hat in the car. Under the slacks that he removed was a pair of tennis shorts. The loafers were switched with athletic shoes and a white visor was pulled low over his eyes. Grabbing up a gym bag, he walked unhurriedly past his own door and up the stairs. Using a pick, he entered Leslie's apartment and noiselessly closed the door.

  Pausing just inside the door, Wayne set down the gym bag and looked around her living room. He was using different eyes, as it were, than he had used the first time he had broken in. Now he looked for evidence of the two distinct personalities of which he had gotten glimpses. The quiet, almost shy individual was most prominently displayed. Her rooms carried the same Victorian atmosphere as the boutique in which she worked, only not as plush and expensive. The off-white sofa and loveseat had tapestry borders that were highlighted by floral throw pillows. The dark accent tables were cluttered with filigree picture frames, cut-glass vases, porcelain flowers, dried arrangements and crocheted white doilies. The pictures on the walls were inexpensive oils of landscapes and flowers. The largest picture over the sofa was a copy of a pastel garden party done by one of the more-popular Impressionists.

  Her one bedroom was more of the same. The queen-sized brass bed was covered with a floral comforter and had lacy pastel pillows at the head. Two old-fashioned prismed chimney lamps hung from the ceiling and were poised over the nightstands. Intricate glass perfume bottles, a gold sat
in jewelry box, more doilies, stuffed animals, and a Venetian glass cockatoo sculpture were on the top of a triple dresser. The French cradle phone, clock radio, and a small television set seemed out of place in this feminine, old-fashioned setting.

  It was in the shadowbox and in the collage picture frames that one began to see another side of Leslie. Here the whimsy was evident, the humor. The shadowbox, at first glance, continued the feminine ambiance. But a more careful scrutiny caused one to see items that didn't seem to belong. A large silver sheriff's badge, a brass sailing ship, a wind-up kangaroo that did flips, and a “Time Police” badge all fit neatly into the wooden spaces but didn't exactly blend in with the miniature white ducks, Tiffany-style lamp, small antique music boxes trimmed in gold, and porcelain thimbles.

  On one of the walls he noticed two picture frames that held a total of thirty-five snapshots. They appeared to be of family and friends and vacations. But, mixed in were pictures of a popular singer in concert, the cast members of “The Time Police,” and a close-up of Phillip Beck in costume. What made Wayne stop and reconsider was that these were not pictures cut out of magazines. They were not publicity photos signed at conventions—they were taken by a personal camera. Since the quality of the pictures was the same as those of the family pictures, Wayne had to assume that Leslie had taken them herself. But how? It seemed obvious that the parties involved had never met. Had Leslie somehow gotten onto the set to take pictures? How could she sneak through security? Or did she follow Beck somewhere and take his picture without his knowledge?

  With a quiet, “Hmm,” Wayne turned his attention to Leslie's roll-top desk. Here he found the ivory-colored stationery she seemed to favor—the same paper Sarah Beck had shown him when she interviewed him. In the bottom drawer he found her “Time Police” collection of magazines, newspaper articles, Phillip's letter, an answering machine tape labeled “Phillip Beck— Keep,” copies of all the letters she had mailed to him, and a collection of more pictures like the ones in the collage on the wall.