The Helium Murder

by Minichino, Camille

  “I don’t want to hear this now,” he said. “I have a meeting this afternoon, and there’s no time to really talk.”

  He looked at his watch and signaled for the check. I thought about making a move to pay my share, but felt I’d done enough damage to Peter for one holiday season. He left bills on the table and stood up. Without my noticing, he’d managed to rewrap his book with no detectable wrinkles. He tucked it under his arm and leaned over to kiss me on the forehead.

  “Sorry I have to run,” he said. “I’ll see you on Monday.”

  I ordered another coffee and sat at the table for a while, wondering what made people like Peter tick. We certainly had different responses to rejection. Whenever anyone expressed the slightest displeasure with me, I backed away immediately, apologizing for being in the way. Josephine’s training, I realized, and couldn’t fault it.

  I got home about two o’clock and did something rare for me—I started to lay out my clothes for the evening. Rose would be proud of me, I thought; I’m practicing dating behavior. I was smoothing out the folds of my new dress when I stopped to answer my telephone, hoping it wasn’t Peter.

  I heard a muffled voice against a background of traffic.

  “This is Vincent Cavallo,” he said. “I have some information you might want on the Hurley murder investigation.”

  “What is it?” I asked, clutching the phone, as if that would keep my informant on the line.

  “Not now. I’m calling from a pay phone near City Hall. Can you meet me somewhere?”

  I didn’t relish the thought of going all the way back down Broadway again, but I couldn’t pass up a chance for information. And I certainly would be safe out in public, even if Cavallo were setting me up. I looked at the clock. Matt was to pick me up at six. As long as I was back by five-fifteen, I’d have plenty of time to get into my new dress and shoes.

  “I’ll meet you at Luberto’s in twenty minutes,” I said, seeing nothing wrong with combining a Deep Throat meeting with a pastry run. I’d wanted to have something to go with coffee after the concert anyway.

  I drove to Luberto’s, arriving about three o’clock, and took a seat at a small table near the back of the shop. I ordered a cappuccino and gave the clerk a list of sweets to package for me.

  More than an hour later, I was still waiting for Cavallo. It had already turned dark, and I’d finished my Scientific American. I couldn’t imagine what had gone wrong. The worst thing I could think of was that he was the third victim in the Hurley case.

  I picked up my box of pastry and left the shop. As I unlocked my car, something in the window of a store near where I was parked caught my eye. Luggage sale, the sign said, and under it was a garment bag.

  How could I have been so dumb? I asked myself. As I drove home, I saw how the clues added up. Number one, Mrs. Whitestone had complained to me that the police still had Margaret’s garment bag, but the police had told no one about the luggage. She couldn’t have known about the bag unless she drove the car herself, or learned about it later from Rocky, probably while she was forcing him to write his confession to the murder.

  Number two, I finally realized, was that Margaret had not been calling for Mrs. Whitestone, as the paramedic thought. She had been naming her killer, since she recognized the license plate. No wonder Mrs. Whitestone insisted on talking to everyone who had access to Margaret before she died.

  Number three, Mrs. Whitestone had the money to be Cavallo’s “partner,” and therefore also the motive to kill to protect her interests.

  I planned to report to Matt as soon as I got to my apartment, skipping the part where I went on a wild goose chase to meet Cavallo.

  My only question was whether Mrs. Whitestone was so ruthless that she would have her friend and protégé murdered for the sake of her investments.

  I pulled into the mortuary garage, entered the foyer, and came face-to-face with Frances Whitestone. One look at her, gun in hand, and I had my answer.

  Chapter Nineteen

  I stood in my foyer, holding my box of Italian desserts. Mrs. Whitestone seemed to tower over me more than ever.

  “How did you get in?” I asked, as if logistics were all that mattered. She was wearing a long, dark brown coat with a high fur collar, and for a moment I convinced myself that the gun in her hand was merely an extension of her tasteful brown leather gloves.

  “It’s astounding what people will do for a helpless old lady,” she said, standing straight as ever, not a hair out of place. “A man in overalls let me in earlier so I could pick up more of my dear departed friend’s holy cards. For all he knows, I left the building before he did.”

  Guido, I said to myself. E dove sta? Where are you now?

  “Cavallo set me up,” I said, to myself and my intruder, unable to turn off my brain and face the danger my body was in.

  “You went out to do an errand and were unfortunate enough to meet a prowler in the foyer.”

  “You can’t do this,” I heard myself say, as if I were talking to the schoolyard bully. “I have a date with a homicide detective. He’ll be here any minute.”

  “Your detective has been called out unexpectedly, to trace a lead he can’t refuse. On the Hurley case,” she said, with a thin smile.

  “The police know about your out-of-state license plate.” True to form, I told myself, you think you can argue your way through life.

  “Poor Margaret loved that license plate. She noticed the significance right away and was so proud of herself. Anyway, that’s already been taken care of. How difficult do you think it was to wipe out one little record—especially since I own that little New Hampshire town?”

  I searched around my brain for more reasons why she shouldn’t add me to her list of victims. I was ridiculously embarrassed to be intimidated by a woman old enough to be my mother, but she was taller and she had a gun. My only advantage was that she seemed to want to chat before she shot me, and I had the feeling that she wanted to tell me something I didn’t know yet.

  “Guido will remember you,” I said, “and the police will figure it out.”

  “The police give up easily, unlike you. I told Al years ago that you would be trouble.”

  My eyes must have widened considerably, and I finally dropped the box of pastries I’d been holding. Mrs. Whitestone smiled, and I knew she was pleased at the effect her words had on me.

  “Al? You knew Al Gravese?”

  “Al and Margaret were a lot alike. First, they were too idealistic for the real world, then they took what they could get. But they were weak. They had qualms of conscience. They didn’t understand you can’t go back.”

  “You had Al killed, too,” I said, my voice weak and hoarse at the stunning revelation of how far back into my youth this woman’s power reached.

  “You’re a lot like me,” Mrs. Whitestone said. “An intelligent woman. Strong-minded. Not easily intimidated. Under different circumstances, we could have been great friends.”

  Mrs. Whitestone must have been insulted by my wide-eyed, skeptical response to her compliment, because her eyes narrowed and she tightened her grip on the gun. I knew if I were going to act at all, this was the time.

  I made a quick calculation of the length of the strap on my purse, hanging from my right shoulder, and flung the purse at Mrs. Whitestone with all my strength. She reeled backward, banging into the stairway banister, the gun falling from her hand, but it was still too far away for me to reach.

  For once, carrying the huge leather sack around had given me an advantage, I thought. Even in the midst of panic, I wished I could call Elaine, whose purse was a small, classy fashion statement, and tell her she was right—my purse was a weapon, heavy enough to ward off an attacker.

  I doubted that I could get past Mrs. Whitestone to the outside door. She was closer to the gun than I was, even if she was a little off-balance. I ran to the nearest inside door, which lead to the stairs to the basement.

  My worst moments at Galigani’s seemed to be at the e
xtremes of the building—first in the attic, where I was shot at, and now in the basement. I wished I’d spent more time here so I’d know my options better.

  The laundry room had a window to the outside, but it was so small only a child could fit through it. The prep room, a “dead end” one might say, had no windows. I thought of the tour Frank had given me when I first moved into the mortuary, and remembered a host of potential weapons in the form of embalming tools. I shuddered as I pictured the trocar, three feet long, with a razor-sharp point, used to remove excess fluid from his deceased clients. I wondered if I had the courage to use it on a live person, even if my own life depended on it.

  I went into the prep room and locked the door behind me, grateful that there were no clients on this Saturday afternoon. I thought about hiding—climbing onto a table and covering myself with a cloth, crawling into a cabinet under the sink. None of the options seemed feasible.

  I was even more disheartened when I noticed the elevator, which I’d forgotten about. Galigani’s rickety old elevator ran through the middle of the building, from the second floor to the basement, opening onto the landing at the top end, and directly into the prep room at the bottom end.

  I had no idea what Mrs. Whitestone’s condition was upstairs, or whether she’d noticed the elevator doors. If I could be sure she wasn’t on it, I could call the elevator down, and hold it open in the basement. Then I’d just have to spend the rest of the weekend in the prep room until someone came in on Monday. Unless, of course, someone died in the meantime.

  I looked above the elevator door at the old-fashioned semicircular brass plate, and saw its arrow pointing to 2. If I called the car down, Mrs. Whitestone would hear it, and I couldn’t be sure the car wouldn’t stop for her if she pushed the button. So far, I’d heard no noise in the elevator shaft.

  A moment later, I did hear a noise, but it was the doorknob rattling and I felt a shiver of panic, even though I knew the door to the stairway was locked. There was no window on the door, so I could only imagine an angry Mrs. Whitestone standing there, having recovered her balance and her gun.

  This would make a good problem in a physics book, I thought, as if I knew no fear. Will the elevator car, now on the second floor, pass the first floor before Mrs. Whitestone, now in the basement, can get back to the first floor and push the button? Impossible to figure without knowing the speed of the elevator car, I concluded. I’d only been on it once before, without a stopwatch. And who could estimate the speed of a woman who was already responsible for three deaths that I knew of?

  I pulled myself together. Redundancy, that was it. Years of lab work taught me the importance of backup systems and plan B arrangements: Call the elevator, I decided, pushing the button at that very moment, and also be prepared for attack if Mrs. Whitestone arrives in the basement.

  Keeping my eye on the arrow, making its way slowly to the first floor, I looked around the prep room, more impressed than ever at its cleanliness and neatness. I wished I’d paid more attention to Frank when he showed me around. Where were the knives, scissors, and saws when I needed them?

  I opened the drawers under the counters, two at a time. Nothing sharp, nothing heavy, certainly no gun. Was everything in the shop for repairs? I wondered. I looked up at the wall above the elevator; the arrow had stopped at 1.

  Moving as quickly as I could, feeling my rapid heart beat in the vicinity of my throat, I pulled open the cabinets and found one filled with clear bottles of liquid. I invoked the memory of my high-school chemistry teacher and chose one labeled DRYENE. It had the biggest skull-and-crossbones symbol of them all, and a special orange wrapper that read For Cauterizing Wounds.

  I carried the bottle back to the elevator, unscrewing the black plastic top. The arrow was rotating slowly clockwise, coming close to its rest position, B. I pressed myself against the wall, flush with the elevator doors, so that I’d be on Mrs. Whitestone’s right when she exited the car. I’d figured that would give her the least effective angle for shooting with her right hand.

  I heard the car hit bottom. An old lady or an empty car? I wondered, as I practiced flicking my wrist, hoping I could manage exactly the angle for Mrs. Whitestone’s face. Except that I couldn’t think of it as Mrs. Whitestone’s face. I couldn’t think at all; I just had to do it.

  The elevator doors opened and I smelled Mrs. Whitestone’s expensive perfume. If you’re on a mission to kill someone, I thought, shouldn’t you be fragrance-free? Either because I was lucky, or because I wasn’t wearing any telltale scent, Mrs. Whitestone turned first to her left as she entered the prep room.

  I had my arm in position for a wide swing. I gave the bottle of acid a large rotational momentum upward, allowing for Mrs. Whitestone’s height, then tipped it so that a stream of clear, caustic liquid hit her forehead and streamed down her face. I was nearly sick at the sight of it, and at the idea of it.

  She screamed, dropping the gun and pressing the palms of her hands to her face. I kicked the gun as far across the room as I could, then ran out the door to the stairs and outside.

  I ran along Tuttle Street, not looking back. There were no phone booths in my immediate neighborhood and I didn’t think of stopping at any of the homes on the street. I didn’t think of stopping at all, not knowing where Mrs. Whitestone was, and not wanting to find out. I ran for several blocks, a personal best.

  In one of the universe’s marvelous displays of symmetry, a cruiser was parked at the edge of Oxford Park. I ran to it, cheered by the red, white, and blue of Revere’s Pride.

  “I just attacked someone,” I said, falling onto the hood of the police car as if I’d been busted and told to spread my legs.

  Later I remembered seeing Matt, not knowing how either of us got there, to the corner of Revere Street and Oxford Park, not understanding why he was so dressed up. I didn’t recognize the suit he was wearing, a striking navy blue, nor the scarf, which was a dazzling blue-and-beige paisley.

  When it came to me that this was my date for the evening, who’d come to pick me up, I sobbed.

  “I’m so sorry,” I said. “Are we missing the concert?”

  “We’ll catch it next year,” Matt said, cradling my head as we sat in the back of the cruiser, “and the next, and the next after that.”

  Chapter Twenty

  We were at the end of the first and very successful party in my apartment—Christmas brunch for the extended Galigani family, Matt, and me. I’d accepted help all around, remaining responsible only for decorations and one main dish—a frittata—in spite of Josephine’s reproachful voice. I couldn’t remember any guests ever bringing food or drink into Josephine’s house.

  The present exchange between Matt and me went much better than I’d hoped for. We were on the same wavelength, each giving the other a gift of time. I’d found a roundabout way, through a California friend, to get coveted tickets for a January concert in Harvard Square by one of Matt’s favorite jazz artists. He presented me with tickets for a series of four all-Beethoven concerts at Symphony Hall. I’d folded his tickets inside a new blue scarf, to replace the one I’d been slightly sick on two weeks before. He’d tucked mine into a small black satin evening purse with a note that said Not for use as a weapon.

  The Galigani children, spouses, and grandson had gone on to other celebrations, and the four of us who were left sat listening to soft Christmas piano music, suitable for full stomachs. Parts of the newspaper were handed around and we chatted and read together.

  “I still can’t believe Frances Whitestone,” Rose said, finishing an article in the newspaper. “How can anyone have a close friend murdered?”

  “I guess ‘close’ means something different to the rich and powerful,” Frank said.

  “She had a lot of money and power tied up in helium,” I said, “going all the way back to the Sixties.” I pushed back images of Frances Whitestone, ambushing me in my foyer, aiming a gun at me, and screaming in the prep room.

  “I hear she’s regained the
sight in one eye,” Matt said, with a glance at me that said, “so don’t feel guilty.”

  “Plus, she has a few scars and some bad press that she deserves,” Frank said.

  Although I hadn’t yet expressed it, I was distressed that a physicist had also been involved in illegal dealings—Vincent Cavallo was to be indicted for fraud. In my mind scientists ranked next to little old ladies for purity of heart.

  Rose walked over to me and put her arms around me. “I can’t stand these close calls, Gloria. I can’t imagine what I’d do without you.”

  “I don’t have a scratch this time,” I said, holding out my arms for inspection, as if she could see through my new green velvet dress.

  “And we’re going to keep it that way,” Matt said.

  “I hope that doesn’t mean I’m fired.”

  “It means we’re going to meet less often at my office and more often at parties.”

  We raised our various glasses and mugs to cheer Matt’s pronouncement. Moments later Rose had retrieved two coats from the closet and tugged at Frank’s arm. She made “let’s leave them alone” gestures which Frank seemed to understand immediately.

  Matt and I were due on the Cape around four o’clock for dinner with his sister’s family. I’d never met them, and I was a bit anxious as I packed up the presents and food we were taking with us.

  At the last minute, I dug my camera out of my dresser drawer.

  “Do you think they’d mind if I take photos?” I asked.

  “Not at all. The kids love to show off.”

  I opened the back of the camera to insert new film.

  “This camera is so old,” I said. “I’m dying to get a new one, with lithium batteries.”

  “Oh, no,” Matt said, giving me a menacing grin as he moved closer.

  It’s a good thing I hadn’t misinterpreted his move to kiss me, because I met him more than halfway.