For I Have Sinned a Cate Harlow Private Investigation

by Kristen Houghton

  The delicious hazelnut chocolate tart coupled with the cappuccino and shot of Benedictine has left me pleasantly full. A little too full I think, feeling my stomach press tightly against the bodice of my dress. I check Melissa’s watch and see that it is almost twelve-thirty. We’ve been sitting, eating and talking, for over four hours. There are only two other tables still filled with diners. The staff doesn’t seem to mind even though the server brought our check a half hour ago. No one rushes you at Regina Margherita.

  As the evening is winding down, I tell Francesca about my cold case and even take Joshua’s key out of my bag to show her. She examines it and hands it to Will.

  “This is a key to a type of strongbox,” he says. “It looks like one that I had when I was in my teens.”

  “You had a strongbox?” Both Francesca and I look amused by this admittance of personal boyhood information.

  “Oh, yeah,” he laughs. “I had to hide my Playboy pictures from Francesca. So, remembering the skills I learned in woodshop, I made an opening and a hinge in the wooden shingles right outside my bathroom window, hollowing out a nice little niche. Inside that I put a small locked, metal box. The shingles closed right over it. That's where I kept all my treasures, money, baseball cards, porn.”

  Francesca shakes her head and raises an eyebrow but she’s smiling.

  “You had easy access to them when you needed them. It was practically in your room.”

  “Easy access and no one was the wiser.”

  “So it could be in the house; I just haven’t found it yet.” I say mostly to myself.

  Will looks at me. “You’re talking about the McElroy place, aren’t you? But you looked all over that house. You were pretty sure there was no hiding place that you could see.”

  Francesca looks at me questioningly. Will fills her in on what I’ve told him about the McElroy cold case. She acknowledges the sadness of the case with a small nod.

  “But you know, about that key? Children are pretty good at hiding things from their parents,” says Francesca. “The fact that Will had his own hiding place doesn’t surprise me at all. Some things need to be hidden because the child feels that they are personal and private.”

  I know she means Will hiding his porn but her words are true for other reasons. I think that Joshua McElroy had something he felt needed to be hidden and he hid it near where he could get at it when he needed it. Just like Will with his treasures, it had to be accessible. I look at Will and I know what he’s thinking. If I’m able to find the locked box, the key I hold in my hand will lead me to the reason Joshua McElroy went missing.

  My mind goes back over the house and the yard. It can’t be the yard because it’s too open. If Joshua came back to get something it would have had to been in the house or on the house itself. I think of shutters, windowsills, shingles.. Suddenly I’m wide-awake and the relaxed feeling from wine and Benedictine have disappeared from my head. I have to go back to the McElroy house as soon as possible.

  A small argument erupts as Will places his credit card on the bill. Francesca insists on paying for dinner for all of us and I hand Will three twenties.

  “No, Mom, I am paying for this. Let me do it. How often do I get to take you to dinner? Cate, take this money back.”

  Francesca continues to refuse to let him pay for a few more minutes, then gives in. I think she realizes that it’s a male ego thing. As for me, I’m happy to get my money back.

  The bill paid, we go outside and walk Francesca to Will’s car. Because he’s a detective he always parks his own car in case he gets a call, off-duty or not, to a crime scene. He doesn’t need other cars blocking him. I hug Francesca and she tells me that she hopes she’ll see me soon, really soon. I let the implications slide and just say that I enjoyed having dinner with her.

  “I’ll be right back. I'm just going to talk to Cate for a second,” Will says as the valet brings my car up.

  “Take your time, Will,” says his mother happily and ever hopeful.

  At my car he thanks me for coming tonight. “I couldn’t have done it alone. She makes me a little crazy sometimes. Anyway, thanks Cate.”

  “That’s okay. Dinner was good and your deception played out well. Thanks for thinking of that, otherwise I would have had to leave early.”

  He opens the door and helps me in looking obviously at my legs and the way my dress rides up.

  “Blue ones to match the dress, huh? Nice touch. I didn’t notice them during our encounter earlier. Blue bra too?”

  Oh he is exasperating! “I’m not wearing a bra,” I say a little too loudly. The valet glances our way and muffles a laugh with a discreet cough. “Good night Will. Pleasant dreams.”

  “You too.”

  ****

  No pleasant dreams for me. Once I have a possible lead on a case, it gnaws at me until I can act on it. I lie awake looking around my bedroom. My dress is draped over a chair and the silky blue panties that Will admired were removed by Giles a half hour after I came home. No questions asked about my night, no talking at all; just hot passion coupled with guilt on my part. Giles sleeps easily. He once told me that the trick to sleeping well is to love the day you had. To do that you had to create a life filled with satisfaction. Giles has a job with meaning, makes good money, and enjoys his life. But for me, some of my days are not so lovable. Maybe in my line of work with so many ifs and unknown dangers, loving my days is not so easy.

  The key that is still in my crystal purse is on my mind. Mentally I go over the rooms in Marie McElroy’s family house. I dismiss the downstairs ones and concentrate on the upstairs. Josh’s bedroom, Marie’s bedroom, the one that had belonged to their parents, and the tiny bathroom situated next to it. Where would Joshua McElroy be most likely to hide something?

  Will had said that he had hidden his treasures behind a set of shingles. The McElroy house has no shingles, just flat pieces of siding. I didn’t think there was a hiding place behind that. I need to see the house again otherwise I can’t make a correct decision. I make a mental note to call Marie in the morning and ask her to leave me the house key again with her neighbor, Mr. O’Leary.

  Giles mumbles something in his sleep and turns over towards the window. I close my eyes, drift into a restless sleep, and dream of Peter Pan holding a key. His face looks remarkably like Joshua McElroy with his haunted eyes.

  ****

  “Where are we going, Joey.”

  “Someplace special, Father, a very special place.”

  Chapter 17

  Kristen: This opening drags and isn’t very interesting. I’d like to start with Cate at her office. Early the next morning Giles and I leave the brownstone together. As we’re about to go in separate directions, he surprises me by saying he’ll see me later in the week. “You’re busy with this cold case. I know what it’s like to get caught up in your work, Catherine. It’s all consuming. The last thing you need is distraction.Work on what you need to do and I’ll call you in a couple of days.” Seriously he is way too nice a person for me but he’s right; I need my time completely undivided right now.

  My office smells musty after a weekend with no open windows or air movement. Even though the place has what passes for central air, each office has its own controls. Air-conditioning doesn’t do it for me and I am lucky that the old building still has windows that can be manually open. Even the smell of the streets is better than the funky odor that is a staple of old buildings. Sometimes Myrtle is here before I roll in and she has turned on the air and sprayed air-freshener all over the place. Me, I prefer the smells of the city to canned fragrance. I also feel too closed in when the windows aren’t open.

  I check my voice mail messages. There’s a request for donations to the state police fund, something Will once told me they never do by phone so I know that’s a scam, a woman calling to tell me a credit card I don’t even have is overdrawn, and a man who is interested in retaining me to check on the activities of his teenage daughter and her boyfriend. Except for the o
ne from the father of the teen girl, I delete them one by one and wait to listen to the last message. It clicks on and a slightly familiar voice comes from the machine.

  “Hi, this is a message for Ms. Cate Harlow. We briefly spoke by phone a short while ago when you called the Paterson Diocese office. I don’t know if you remember me. My name is Father Richard Boyd. I’d prefer that you, uh, that you… do not call the diocese office and ask for me. This is confidential. I’ll call back during the week. Thank you. Goodbye.” His voice sounds urgent and disappointed that he hadn’t been able to speak with me.

  The call came in at four-twelve Friday afternoon. On Fridays Myrtle leaves at four.

  Every other day she’s here well past five but Friday is her hair and nails day and she has an unbreakable, standing appointment for four-thirty.

  Richard Boyd. I remember the name; he was the priest who had the boyish voice, the one who referred me to the older priest whose whole jocular demeanor changed when I mentioned the name of the murdered clergyman.

  Father Richard Boyd doesn’t want me to call the diocese office. That, in itself, is interesting, as is the fact that he said he would call back. It has to be important. He must have remembered my name and got my number online. It’s too bad that I can’t speak with him now. Damn! I debate whether I should call him anyway, but decide against it. Sometimes you have to wait for information to come your way.

  I sit at my desk and pull out my laptop. Keying in murdered priests and the words “New York area” a whole bunch of news sites come up immediately. I click on the most reliable one and read what their updates are. There aren’t any; the original news is just being repeated, sensationalized ad nauseam. Then I click a news video that shows the spot in Central Park where the body was found. A reporter talks about the fact that there are no leads and that this is the second body found within a few weeks. She doesn’t know about the one found last year in upstate New York, no one in the media does. That’s good; there’s enough of a feeding frenzy as it is with two priests mutilated, murdered, and no suspects.

  The names of the victims have not been disclosed. There is a tacit agreement between the media and the police on all murder cases not to reveal names until family members have been notified. Though their respective dioceses have been informed of the murders, it has been difficult to locate any family members for the priests. It isn’t surprising. This is usually the case when an elderly, unmarried person dies or is the victim of murder. Mostonly have nieces and nephews who truthfully don’t want to be bothered. This is especially true if there’s no inheritance. No one wants to put themselves out for funeral arrangements and expenses. So far no relative, or even friends, have come forward to claim the bodies. The burials will have to be handled by their respective dioceses after the bodies are released.

  “Well, look who is here before me,” says Myrtle as she’s walking in the door carrying a Timothy’s bag that I know is filled with coffee and another bag with Harry’s pastries.

  “I thought I saw your car two blocks down when Harry was driving me here. That’s why I made a stop at Timothy’s.” She puts her bag down. “Did you check the messages?”

  “Yes, I did, and listen, Myrtle, there’s something I want you to do for me. It is really important.”

  “Alright. Tell me what it is and I’ll make sure it gets done.”

  “I’m going out to Marie’s house early this afternoon and I doubt that I will make it back here before five. I’m expecting a very important phone call this week. It will be from a Father Richard Boyd. I don’t know if he’ll call today, but he will call sometime this week. Whenever the call comes in you need to send it to my cell phone immediately. Just tell him to hang on and patch it through to me. Tell him that I do remember him and that I am anxious to speak with him. Oh, and Myrtle? Change the outgoing message to let clients know the office closes at four on Fridays, okay?”

  Myrtle is writing all this down and nodding her head. She rarely asks questions about my cases knowing full well she’ll get all the details eventually.

  “What’s up at Marie’s?” she asks. “Everything okay with her?” She hands me a large coffee and a pastry concoction called a bow tie.

  “Yes, I guess it is,” I answer, sipping the coffee and biting into the sugared icing of the bow tie. “This is simply a routine visit, just need to check something there.”

  Myrtle gets up to put on tea for herself and asks me when she can turn on the air. The unexpected spring humidity is frizzing her hair.

  “In a few minutes, Myrtle,” I say standing near the windows looking out at nothing in particular, just the traffic on the street. A soft sound gets my attention and I glance down at the nest of doves. The babies are getting bigger and they can be left alone for short periods. I don’t see the parents.

  “Myrtle? Can you bring me the bag of bird seed with the scooper that’s by the coffee-maker?”

  She brings everything over and smiles at the baby birds.

  As I scoop out a small portion and place it in a feeder on the fire escape step, I heard a distant cooing sound.

  “Feeding the birds; it’s supposed to be good luck, you know,” muses Myrtle. “Look Cate! There are the parents, across the street on that other building. Probably were searching for food; bugs and such. The place under the overhanging roof is a great place for termites to hide. Those birds fly back and forth across the street quite often during the day. You’re not here a lot so you don’t always see them. Those babies need food. Can you see the adult birds on that building?”

  “Where?” I say looking to where she’s pointing. “I can’t see them.”

  “There, honey. You can just spot their tails under the roof’s edge. See?”

  “Oh, right, now I see them.” As I look I see the birds emerge from under the edge of the roof of the building across the street. The edge…

  I put my coffee down and stare. The edge of the roof also known in architectural terms as eaves. The eaves! Of course great hiding place for termites and…anything else. I grab my phone and bag and run out of the office.

  Hello Peter Pan.

  ****

  Ringing Mr. O’Leary’s bell I have time to look around at the houses and check out the architecture. I especially look at the eaves on several houses, the McElroy house included. I’ve always loved old homes and had at one time actually dreamed about becoming an architect. There’s such beauty and grace in old buildings. Even modern ones have their own beauty in their energy and fluid lines. But I was so much better at solving problems, following elusive clues, and finding something that others disregarded; even as a child I could figure out who-done-it in a movie or story before other people had any hint of a clue. As frustrating as it can sometimes be, I love what I do; I’m in the right profession.

  Mr. O’Leary opens his door and I can tell he’s happy to see me standing there. My appearance is a break in an otherwise mostly solitary day for him.

  “Well, lady detective! How are you? Just got back from the store a half hour ago. I bought you that nice fresh-baked raisin bread. Been waitin’ for you since.”

  He hands me a small envelope. I open it and there’s the house key as well as a note from Marie.

  “Hi Cate,

  Here’s the key. I’m sorry about not returning your call but I didn’t get home until late. David took me to a movie and then we had dinner out. He’s seems nice and understanding of my feelings. I know you’ll like him when you meet him. He might be painting the porch railings today if he can get out of work early so you might see him later. I think he said he’s working until one; he’s a vet’s assistant. ~ Marie”

  “She givin’ you the details on that young man she’s seein’?” says Mr. O’Leary. “Took her out a few times and came over for dinner two days ago she told me. Hope he’s a good one. Don’t know if I like him; only met him once. Still, Marie never did have a steady fella after her brother went missin’. She took care of her mother and then the dad. Tried real hard to hold th
ings together. Doin’ that…well…that leaves no time for a steady beau.”

  I agree with him. Marie hasn’t had it easy at all and made no time for herself. Mr. O’Leary tells me that when I’m done he’ll have his coffee with a kick waiting for me along with that delicious bread. I tell him to give me a couple of hours and he has a date.

  “A date? Ha! I’m flattered. But you’re too pretty for an old geezer like me, lady detective. You need a young fella like my great-nephew Hal.”

  I laugh at the thought that another young fella is what I need. It’s enough for me to juggle the two I have now. I smile and ask Mr. O’Leary if he has a ladder I could borrow.

  “Sure, lady detective. I’ve got one, friend of mine made it for me years ago. Not goin’ to ask why you need it, just goin’ to remind you of your tree-climbin’ episode.”

  Yup, lost dignity and bruised tail-bone. No reminder needed.

  I follow him to a shed at the back of his house and haul out an old wooden ladder. It looks as old as Mr. O’Leary and I hope it’s still okay to climb it. It’s just a plain ladder that doesn’t close, made in a straight up and down line. It looks and feels as if it was made a hundred years ago.

  “Goin’ to finish up my laundry now. See you later, Cate,” says Mr. O’Leary as he ambles slowly towards his back door.

  The McElroy house looks quiet and peaceful. There are eaves up near the bedrooms. A twittering from the trees tells me there are birds nearby. Trying to judge from the outside where Josh’s bedroom is I put the ladder up against the left side of the house near the eaves. Josh’s bedroom was on the left and towards the back. Taking a breath, I test the first few steps and they hold my weight. It feels a little rickety but I climb up slow and steady.

  “Do you know why swallows build in the eaves of houses?” Peter asks Wendy Darling.

  I think about the words of Peter Pan as I steady myself on the third most top rung of the ladder.