“That congresswoman?”
“Yes.”
And once again, Peter’s tone changed my mood in a matter of seconds. I no longer wanted to sound disappointed that I was busy, or even vaguely interested in a visit from him.
“I read that the police are considering foul play. Don’t tell me you’re involved in the investigation.”
“I won’t if you don’t want me to, Peter.”
“Why are you like that, Gloria? I’m just worried, after what happened last time.”
“Last time worked out fine,” I said, glad there was no video link to show Peter that I had automatically rubbed my wounded arm at the mention of “last time.”
“Well, are you at least able to have lunch with me on Monday? I won’t see you before Christmas otherwise. I’m going on the senior trip to Washington.”
“How nice,” I said. “I love Washington. The National Gallery, the Smithsonian.”
“It’s not the same with a hotel full of eighteen-year-olds that you’re responsible for.”
“I guess not.” I removed the receiver from my ear and looked at it momentarily, as if to ask it why it was bothering me with these petty issues. I wasn’t proud of my reaction to Peter, but the alternative of leading him to think I was still his girlfriend was out of the question. The fact that I’d been engaged to another man and then lived three thousand miles away since our last date didn’t seem to faze him.
“So, lunch on Monday?”
“I’ll let you know,” I said. “I’m pretty busy with this case.”
“Good night, Gloria. I can tell you’re distracted right now.”
“Good night, Peter.” The growling sound I made came after I’d hung up.
I let out a big sigh and walked to my window to calm down. I could always count on a snowy street scene to soothe my nerves. Later, I decided, I’d have to think of a more permanent way to resolve my relationship with Peter.
I searched through my CDs for some technical-reading music. I still hadn’t gone through Vincent Cavallo’s report and hoped it would contain some physics that I could enjoy. Just picturing the helium atom, with its two lovely electrons, relaxed me.
To the tune of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, I read another person’s view of the helium operation. Since Cavallo was a physicist, I wasn’t surprised to find that he took the strong position of the American Physical Society. “Profoundly concerned about the potential loss of the nation’s accumulated helium reserves,” were the words they used.
The body of the report listed several actions that Cavallo felt would improve the helium program. Among his recommendations were the elimination of smaller activities, like testing, that weren’t cost effective, and charging higher fees to private industry for services. Cavallo estimated that the program would see an increase in income of four to eight million dollars, with a loss of only thirty jobs if his plan were followed.
I couldn’t see anything suspicious in Cavallo’s report. Even though his view was very biased in favor of upgrading instead of discontinuing the operation, it was hardly a motive for murder. Or maybe I was still suffering under the illusion that people dedicated to science were incapable of violence, especially murder.
The thought of murder brought me up short again, and I realized I hadn’t taken any time to grieve over the death of a young woman. Is this how homicide detectives get through their careers, I wondered, thinking of murder as a puzzle to be solved as opposed to a human death to be mourned?
Whatever uncivil behavior she may have exhibited toward her family and friends, whatever her political leanings, Congresswoman Hurley didn’t deserve to be murdered.
I cringed at the idea that my only concern about the comings and goings of the Galigani hearse might be whether it would wake me in the middle of the night. A dead woman had been brought to a basement laboratory three floors below me, and it had taken me all this time to feel sorry for her and her family.
I packed up my notes and lay down on the couch as the “Song of Joy” came to an end.
Chapter Seven
My solemn mood persisted as I left my apartment and walked down Galigani’s main stairway to the parlor where Congresswoman Margaret Hurley lay in her brown walnut casket. I remembered a line from a Jane Austen novel that had particular significance for me since I’d been dwelling in a funeral home—“The living ever feel unease, when the dead are in residence.”
The fragrance of gladioli and mums, and the slow organ music piped through the rooms, didn’t help my spirits. I loved cut flowers, but much to Frank’s chagrin, I swore that they smelled different when arranged around a dead body.
I’d fallen asleep on my couch, and had to iron the telltale wrinkles from my skirt, thus missing my self-imposed starting time of six-thirty. Great first impression if this were a real job, I thought.
It was close to seven and several dozen people were already in the parlor when I made my entrance. For the tenth time, I checked my little black Galigani ribbon, as if I’d just won first prize at a morbid science fair.
Rose’s assistant, Martha, greeted me and pointed out Frances Whitestone.
“As long as you’re here, I’ll get back upstairs,” Martha said in a normal tone. And then, in a whisper, “I know you’re on this case. Good luck.”
Martha had always overestimated my police involvement, once introducing me to her eight-year-old twin boys as “a policeperson.” Usually I corrected her, but this time I simply thanked her, and gave her a smile and a wink that said “I’m on it.”
Frances Whitestone would have been hard to pick out of a lineup as a senior citizen. Standing tall and straight, with her hair more red than gray, she wore her money well, from her simple sheath dress in dark green silk, to her rich-looking purse and shoes.
I had to adjust my old-woman image to accommodate this perfect picture of a wealthy widow of one of Boston’s financial geniuses. My previous images came from my grandmother and older aunts—hair all gray, their short, wide bodies ensheathed in flowered housedresses and terry-cloth slippers.
A quick calculation told me that Frances Whitestone had to be close to eighty, given the number of years she and her late husband had dominated local politics from behind the scenes, funding winners almost every time. I sighed as I walked over to her, trying to formulate a word of sympathy that wouldn’t sound hollow. I resolved to listen more closely to Frank in a situation like this, the next time I had the opportunity.
“Good evening, Mrs. Whitestone,” I said, extending my hand. “I’m so sorry for your loss. I know how close you were to Margaret.”
“Thank you,” she said. She gave me an appraising look, up and down quickly, without moving her head, and then trained her eyes on my ribbon. “Are you aware that there are only two boxes of votive candles in this room?” she said. “Hardly enough. Can you see to it?”
“Right away,” I said, feeling like I’d flunked a blood test, and guessing that I wouldn’t be delivering any tissues to her chair.
Not that I was judging her grief. People mourn in different ways, I knew, and I had the feeling that all of Frances Whitestone’s would be done in the privacy of her boudoir. My own relatives had preferred to express their suffering by throwing themselves, wailing, onto the casket of the departed loved one.
I desperately wanted to ask Mrs. Whitestone some questions, and had to clench my jaws and fists to keep from reading her my mental list. Had she heard the hit-and-run car drive away? Had she seen any suspicious-looking cars in the neighborhood that day? Who else knew what time Margaret would be arriving? How soon had she gone out to investigate the noise? I was aggravated that Matt hadn’t even told me the basics yet, like who found the body.
The sight of Robert Galigani across the room reminded me that I was supposed to be working. I tried to figure out who was responsible for the votive lights and decided to take it to the top, or next to the top, to Robert himself. In the precomputer days, when people knew what carbon copies were, that’s what we
would have called Robert, so like his father in manner and looks. Unlike his journalist brother, Robert wore his hair in a neat, short cut, and except for minor glitches in vocabulary, like “cool,” had a professional manner at all times.
I noted with dismay that Robert was already starting to bald, and I had a moment of regret that I’d missed the childhood of Rose and Frank’s children. I’d managed to keep a special connection with Mary Catherine, my godchild, but mostly through presents and phone calls. The longest time I’d ever spent with her was one summer when she stayed with me in California, during her antimother teen years.
These reflections were a small lapse in the otherwise great progress I’d been making since my return to Revere, controlling twinge-of-regret moments, replacing them with moments of excitement at new adventures, like dating and police work.
“Mrs. Whitestone would like to have more votive candles at the ready,” I told Robert. “If you tell me where they are, I’d be glad to get them.”
“Thanks, Gloria,” he said. “They’re in the storage closet in the basement, next to the prep room.”
“Oh,” I said, with a grimace that Robert seemed to recognize immediately. The whole family must know, I thought, that I was inordinately squeamish about going into the basement where the embalming process was carried out. I’d even started to take my dirty clothes to an outside Laundromat rather than use the washer and dryer in the room next to the prep room. It’s a testimony to my fear that I preferred the spectacle of pulling up to a coin-operated facility and dragging my dirty laundry out of a new Cadillac.
“I’ll send Tony,” Robert said. “The boxes are heavy anyway.”
So far, I thought, I’ve arrived at work late and reneged on my first chore. It’s a good thing I retired from my old job with a healthy pension.
“Thanks,” I said to Robert, and looked around for a less intimidating duty.
To my disappointment, there was not much action to this role of mortuary staff person. Although there were more guests than chairs, and the overflow spilled into the lobby, all of the visitors seemed self-sufficient and not very interesting, as far as what I’d come to call The Hurley Case.
I still hadn’t laid eyes on Brendan Hurley, Margaret’s brother. I thought it strange that he wasn’t in charge of his sister’s funeral services.
Although I kept checking the guest register, pretending to be tidying up the table, I’d seen no record of a visit by Vincent Cavallo from the Charger Street lab, or Patrick Gallagher, Margaret’s ex-fiancé. Thanks to Rose, who sneaked looks at the tabloids in the supermarket, I was up-to-date on their headlines: Dead Congresswoman Dumped Boyfriend for Job in D.C., and Woman Rep Mocked Brother in Public.
I didn’t even have the pleasure of seeing Matt again that evening, since his partner showed up instead. Berger came over to me and I was at least grateful that we now seemed to be friends.
“I thought this would be a good chance to see the family,” he said, “since I’m a little behind on this case. Haven’t been getting much rest.”
“Cynthia?” I asked.
Berger grinned his new-father grin again, and told me a few stories about Cynthia’s cute sounds and movements.
I wanted to question Berger about the case—what was everyone’s alibi, for example, and who were the leading suspects? Matt as much as admitted to me that they were thinking in terms of deliberate homicide and not random hit-and-run anymore. I decided not to disturb the delicate truce Berger and I had reached. I was relieved when he moved away to work the crowd, afraid that I might either inadvertently reveal how bored I was with his baby stories, or blurt out something intelligent like, “Do you think her spurned fiancé was angry enough to kill her?”
When Father Tucci, the pastor of St. Anthony’s, finished the rosary, I made a fuss over him, because there wasn’t much else to do. I served him coffee in the small downstairs office Frank and Robert used for seeing clients. The main offices on the second floor, where Rose and Martha carried out the bookkeeping and management operations, were off-limits during wake hours, as, of course, was the third floor, which housed only my apartment. I listened to the old priest’s reports on the Christmas cake sale and the funding drive for the new rectory.
I was beginning to think that funeral-home employees spend most of their time standing around, listening to dull tales, when a general stirring of the population occurred. After the rosary, deliberately or not, Margaret Hurley’s brother, Brendan, finally arrived, with a group of four men who made Tony and Sal look like kindergarten teachers.
“Hey, Buddy,” I heard often as he walked into the parlor, shaking hands and bestowing small hand-waves on the crowd, his men around him like the Secret Service around the President. You’d think he was the politician, I thought, rather than his sister.
Buddy looked “dark Irish,” as we on the Italian side of town used to call them. Unlike his fair-skinned sister, Buddy had almost-olive skin and dark brown hair. Only his green eyes and the enormous shamrock tie pin he wore gave away his ethnic background.
Buddy was made much of by everyone except Mrs. Whitestone. I remembered the casual remark Frank made about the bad feeling between Buddy and Frances Whitestone, and I felt I was seeing it firsthand. I wished I knew more, and plotted a way to find out. After all, he was on my list of duties, caring for immediate family. What care I could give Buddy, strutting boldly and powerfully toward his deceased sister, I couldn’t imagine.
I zigzagged my way to Buddy and his group, now assembled around the casket, lighting candles and making sweeping signs of the cross in the vicinity of their enormous foreheads and chests.
When they’d turned back to the crowd, there I was, a head shorter than the shortest of them, ready to care for them.
“I’m Gloria Lamerino, Mr. Hurley,” I said, my fingers brushing the Galigani ribbon, my heart beating a little more loudly than usual, I thought. “I’m sorry about your sister. If there’s anything I can do ...”
“Thanks,” he said. I thought I heard “danks,” but chalked it up to my imagination and my stereotyping of men in dark shirts and white ties, which was what Buddy and his crew were wearing.
Berger, on the job, I noticed, came over to the group, and introduced himself to Buddy. I wondered if Berger had read Buddy’s statement, assuming he’d given one. I was getting more and more annoyed at how little I knew, and had to hold myself back from stomping to a phone to call Matt and demand some answers.
Next to Buddy was a man who looked at me a moment longer than he needed to, I thought. As we chatted about the tragic accident, and then about the weather, the man made nervous twitching motions, practically hopping from one foot to the other, like a seventh-grader who needed to use the boys’ room. Buddy introduced him to me and Berger.
“This here’s my friend Rocky Busso,” he said, and the soundtrack of The Godfather played in my head.
Rocky seemed to have no neck, and I thought I could see rippling muscles about to break through the sleeves of his dark jacket.
“Hello, Dr. Lamerino,” he said.
“Rocky,” I said, bravely offering my hand, and vaguely aware of a shiver that had started down my spine.
“I bet you’re not used to this weather, huh? California’s always seventy degrees, right?”
“Right,” I said, as a second shiver made its way all through my body, so strong that I felt my skirt and vest must be showing visible signs of a wave as large as those at high tide on Revere Beach.
“Excuse me, please, I need to see if Father Tucci needs anything,” I said, and walked away in what seemed like slow motion. I felt as I did often in dreams, when I’d keep running and running but stayed in the same spot.
I made my way to Tony, who was standing by the door to the foyer.
“I’m glad you’re here, Tony,” I said, touching his arm, feeling his muscle, as if to reassure myself that someone strong was on my side.
Chapter Eight
I climbed the two flights of s
tairs to my apartment, looking over my shoulder the whole way. Every time a step creaked under my foot, a tiny shiver went through me. It was only eight-thirty, but I completely abandoned the idea of staying at my post until the wake ended at nine.
I locked my door, then leaned against it, putting all my weight on its dark wood panels, as if that would help keep it locked. I breathed deeply and remembered that after my break-in two months ago, Matt had a police security expert install the latest in locks—a deadbolt with hardened steel inserts, and a specially designed strike plate anchored into the building frame. I felt better thinking of that, but only marginally. For all I knew, Rocky had a key.
I walked to my window and looked down on Tuttle Street. Thanks to the celebrity of the deceased, Frank had arranged for around-the-clock police presence, and the sight of a white-and-red Revere Police car and two uniformed officers brought my breathing to a normal level. I inhaled as hard as I could, as if to suction their strength and protection up through the wintry air and into my living room. At a certain angle, I could see my reflection in the window. My hair looked grayer and my jowls more droopy, and I seemed to have aged a decade since meeting Rocky. My “staff” ribbon was slightly askew, as if it, too, had suffered a blow.
Following a curious habit of mine whenever I entered a hotel room for the first time, I walked through my apartment, checking under my bed and in my closets, and even under the sink. I’d carried out this procedure once when sharing a suite with Elaine at a conference in San Jose.
“I thought physicists were supposed to be logical,” Elaine had said. “What are you going to do if you find someone?”
I had no sensible defense, but that never kept me from completing my search, then or now. Maybe it was just to eliminate the element of surprise, I’d decided. If you’re here, I want to know now.
In another display of faulty logic, I put on a CD of light Christmas music, to ward off pending evil. Surely, I reasoned, no harm could come to someone in her own living room listening to “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus.” I resolved to put up a Christmas tree, too, for further protection, although I’d been resisting the effort that would take.
The Helium Murder Page 5