Coming Unclued

by Judith Jackson

  I reluctantly handed Rose the piece of construction paper. She took a little bite of her cookie and carefully wiped off her fingers before taking it from me. “Pass me my reading glasses would you honey?” she asked. “I’m getting to the point I can’t read a street sign without them.”

  “You’ll probably be able to read that,” I said as I passed her the glasses. “It’s just a kind of cursory outline. I haven’t cemented all the details yet.”

  Rose put on her glasses and pulled them down on her nose so she could peer at me over the top. “Well you’d better get cementing. There’s no time to dilly dally. The police could come barging through that door any minute. If they do I want you to go jump in my laundry basket. They won’t want to go digging around in an old lady’s unmentionables.” Rose gave a little cackle and took another bite of her cookie as she adjusted her glasses and looked at the paper. She stared at it for a long moment as she chewed, and then took her glasses off, folded them carefully and put them on the table beside her.

  “Your freedom is on the line and this is all you could come up with?” she asked, waving the construction paper at me. “Well this is just brilliant. A child, a two year old, could have written this. I’m surprised you didn’t use a crayon.”

  “As I said, it’s only a preliminary stab at getting things going.”

  “So while you’re sitting on your thumb, without a thought in your head, the entire Toronto police force is going to be out looking for you?”

  Sitting on my thumb? “I’ve hardly been sitting on my thumb. I’ve been strategizing this whole thing and I haven’t had a chance to get it down on paper. Right now, as we speak, Julie is talking to the cab companies to find out if someone else was with me. That is real progress.”

  Rose pursed her lips and glared at me. “Well that’s good, but what else are you doing? You can’t waste a minute. Tick tick tick, that is the sound of your freedom ticking away. Got it? Pass me a pen.”

  God, she was a bit of a cow. A bitter old cow. Heather was right about her. “Did you put up that tree in the lobby?” I asked as I passed her a pen.

  “Yes I did. Here it is five days before Christmas and except for my Poinsettia there wasn’t a thing in that lobby to signify it,” said Rose. “I bought it on Craigslist for twenty-five dollars and the nicest fella delivered it and set it up for me. All for twenty-five dollars. I offered him a tip but he wouldn’t take it. Just the friendliest man. A wee bit simple if you know what I mean but nice as can be. Single.” She gave me a look. A significant look.

  “I’m not looking for a wee simple man. Not just now.”

  “I don’t know that you’re in the position to be so fussy,” said Rose. “Cheers up the lobby don’t you think?”

  “Very festive. Are you allowed to do that? Just put up a tree?”

  “I am the chairman of the condo board. I can do as I please. Oh I’m sure it’s got Bambi’s knickers in a twist. Too low class for Miss High Falutin. Little Miss thinks she’s the abattoir of good taste.” Rose pointed the pen at me. “You tell her if she knows what’s good for her she’ll keep her scrawny claws away from my tree.” She picked up her glasses and started writing on the piece of paper.

  “What are you writing there?” I asked.

  “I am writing a plan of action for you,” said Rose. “What evidence do the police have? Why are they arresting you?”

  “You mean apart from the body?”

  “There’s nothing definitive about a dead body,” said Rose. “Doesn’t mean a thing. It could happen to anybody. Have you talked to your lawyer? If they’re arresting you they must have some hard evidence. Forensics, that kind of thing.”

  “Well my fingerprints were on the murder weapon, the kitchen knife, from when I had a slice of that banana bread I made because you like it so much and I was going to bring you some” — not that I was blaming Rose for my troubles — “And there was no sign of forced entry. They seem to think that means something.”

  Rose chewed on the end of the pen for a moment, deep in thought and then grimaced and pulled her upper plate out, dipped it in a glass of water on the end table and stuck it back in. “Take it from me Val. Don’t take your teeth for granted. I just got a new plate and I might as well have a hockey puck in my mouth, that’s how comfortable it is. Now I get why folks walk around without any teeth.”

  “I floss pretty regularly.”

  “Good girl. You won’t regret it. Who else had keys to your place?”

  “Just Evan, but he lost them a while ago. So nobody, really.”

  Rose started fiddling with her plate, using her tongue to move it around. I hoped she wasn’t going to do that every time she needed to think. It was making me queasy watching her teeth pop in and out of her mouth.

  “I’m just going to take this out for a while,” said Rose, popping her plate into the water glass. “You don’t mind do you?”

  “No, that’s fine.” It wasn’t fine. Gerontology obviously wasn’t the field for me. I could cross that off my list of potential professions. “I really can’t stay Rose. I just wanted to drop by and see if you had any suggestions to get me started.”

  Rose wiggled her jaw around and opened her mouth in a huge yawn. Her tonsils looked healthy. “That feels better. Bit of oxygen to the brain. Look honey, I don’t want to be cruel, but you investigating a murder is like that little simple Christmas tree fella going to Harvard. You’re in over your head.”

  I was hardly in over my head. “Nobody says simple anymore. Not in reference to someone’s intelligence.”

  “What do they say?”

  “Mentally challenged. Developmentally delayed.”

  “Well I don’t know that that’s any better, but if it makes you happy. You investigating this murder is like a mentally challenged developmentally delayed woman who if brains were lard wouldn’t have enough to grease a pan, doing brain surgery. That better? You have no clue. Do you even have any idea how much danger you’re in? If the police think you’re a cold-blooded murderer they’re not going to be asking you a whole lot of polite questions if they see you on the street. They’re going to be drawing their guns and you’d better hope no one gets trigger happy.”

  The getting killed by the cops thing again. I could be shot in the back while I was peaceably going about my business.

  “It’s so unfair,” I whimpered.

  “Oh grow up. Life isn’t fair. Deal with it. I’ve buried six dogs and two husbands. Cremated the last one actually. His ashes are around here somewhere and for the life of me I can’t find ‘em. I should have sprung for that overpriced urn. Is your fella being buried or cremated?”

  “How would I know?” Really. “What do you think? You think his wife is keeping me apprised of the funeral plans?”

  “No need to get snippy with me Missy,” Rose said. She gummed the pen for a little longer, wrote something else down on the paper and then settled back on the couch with another half Oreo. She was going to eat it without her teeth in. How much more was I expected to take?

  “Love or money,” said Rose as she used her upper gum to break off a piece of the cookie. “That’s pretty much it. You get your occasional random crazy or serial killer but nine times out of ten it’s love or money. You’ve got to go back to the source, the deceased, and figure out who would want to slaughter him in his sleep. You gotta figure it was either someone he was having sex with or someone who would gain financially from his death. Now given that he was a somewhat wizened fella of questionable appeal, I’d be devoting more time to the money angle.” Rose popped the rest of the Oreo in her mouth and looked at me for a response.

  “There’s his wife,” I said. “There must be life insurance. And I don’t know, maybe somebody at work might benefit.”

  “Good, good,” said Rose. “Can’t imagine that the police have looked at either his wife or his business partners.”

  “Are you being sarcastic?” I asked her.

  “Yes I’m being sarcastic. You’ve got
to dig deeper. Someone knew he was with you; this person managed to get into your condo without any sign of forced entry and they — could be a him, could be a her — hated him enough that they used a knife.” Rose took a dainty sip of her tea and picked up a cookie and mulled it over before putting it back on the plate. “Now the way I see it a knife is personal. It’s someone with a personal relationship. A gun — a stranger would use a gun — but someone who uses a knife that’s different. That’s more a crime of passion. The killer wants to watch that blood gushing and see the agony in the victim’s eyes as he takes his last breath.”

  “Mr. Potter was stabbed in his back in the dark.”

  “Whatever. Trust me, this was personal.”

  “When I was at the office the other day, Angie, the receptionist, said she knew where all the bodies were buried. I thought at the time that was kind of an intriguing statement but I didn’t have time to pursue it. Actually, I’m just remembering it again.”

  “That is interesting,” said Rose. “Very interesting. Unless you worked at a cemetery.” She gave a little snort. Nothing amused Rose more than her own witticisms. “Where did the deceased live?”

  I wished she would stop referring to Mr. Potter as the deceased. “Forest Hill.”

  Rose put her pen down. “Well why didn’t you tell me? Forest Hill? For sure he’s a crook. They’re all crooks up there.”

  “I don’t think living in Forest Hill automatically means you’re a crook. That’s a little prejudiced don’t you think?”

  “Crooks. Every one of them. And you can get down off your high horse. It’s not prejudiced, it’s the truth. No one spends three mill on a house without being a crook. Now we just have to find out who wanted the old crook dead. Okay. Try this. Who is the second person you think of if you’re trying to figure who knifed him? Not the first. The first is his wife and it isn’t always the first. Quite often it’s the second person, just to kind of throw you off. You think it’s them and then they do something so you think maybe it isn’t them, but guess what? Turns out you were right in the first place. So who’s the second person you’d think of if you’re trying to figure who’d want to off the little guy? … what’s his name … Breath?”

  It made me very uncomfortable, her disrespect for the dead. “There’s Douglas. He’s the VP at the office. I’ve never trusted him.”

  “Why?”

  “There’s just something about him. Well he doesn’t like me for starters. He’s kind of slimy. He always has a tan and in the summer he wears white linen pants and those espadrille shoes. There’s something not right about him.”

  “I’ll put him down,” said Rose. “He’s got motive. Where’s he live?”

  “Rose the police must be looking for me and for sure they’re going to check out this building. I should get out of here.”

  “Don’t worry honey. They won’t get past me. I know how to deal with the likes of them. Anyways, you need to get to work investigating this Douglas fella. I don’t like the sounds of him. He seems just the type. Is he married?”

  “Divorced.”

  “I figured. Find out if Mr. Fancy Pants is getting biblical with the deceased’s wife. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised. That’d be your motive in a nutshell. Love and money all wrapped up in one slimy, white trousered parcel. What’s the widow like? Attractive?”

  “Very. I mean for someone who was with Mr. Potter she was extremely attractive.”

  “Well there you have it.” Rose put down her pen, picked up an Oreo and dunked it in her cold tea to soften it up. She then gummed off a chunk and gave me a tight-lipped smile of satisfaction. “There’s your answer Val. I always say, nine times out of ten the obvious killer is the killer. Now, of course, you’re the obvious killer so you have to look somewhere else and you get the wife and then a little further and you’ve got Fancy Pants. You just have to set to it and pin it on him. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if the widow wasn’t involved too. I know her type. Gets her lover to do the dirty work. I’ll bet you she dumps him as soon as all the fuss dies down. She’s not going to settle for a two-bit grifter like him.”

  Yeah, it probably was Douglas. Rose was right. He was just the type. Slipping into my condo, killing Mr. Potter and pinning it on me. It’d be just like him. “How do I catch him?”

  “He’ll slip up. They always do.” She tapped her chin. “Plus time of death. That’s important.”

  That’s right. Time of death was important. But why exactly?

  “Was he killed right away when you got back from that party, or was it closer to when you woke up? That might tell us if it was someone who came home with you, or someone who showed up later.”

  Exactly! Rose was brilliant.

  From deep in my pocket Andrew’s cell phone rang. It was Julie. “Where are you?” she demanded. “Why aren’t you picking up Diane’s phone?”

  “On the toilet,” I said. “I turned on the cell phone in case you called while I was on the toilet.”

  “Call me when you finish,” said Julie.

  “No. I’m good to talk. How are you progressing? What did the cab companies say? Have you found anything out?”

  “I left messages with all of the big ones,” she said. “I said I had a reward for the driver who picked up a passenger from 948 Kingston Rd. in the wee hours of Sunday morning. A reward if he gave me a call.”

  “You didn’t say it like that did you?” I asked. “The wee hours of Sunday morning?”

  Julie ignored the comment. “I’m on my way to the funeral. Taking the subway. It’s easier to ditch the cops that way. I’ve been researching, looking at Who Dun Its, trying to get my head around all this. Why did he come home with you? That’s the question. You couldn’t have been that drunk. Now we both know you would pass out face down in a pool of your own vomit before you’d bring your skeevey boss home for a quickie. Not to speak ill of the dead.”

  She was right. Even when I was young and fun and firm of thighs, I’d never been so drunk that I’d sleep with just anyone. And the late Mr. Potter definitely fell into the category of just anyone.

  “And time of death?” I told her. “That is imperative to know.”

  “I’m going to ask some questions when I’m at the funeral. Make a real pest of myself. Someone has to know something. Clearly we have to find out why he was at your place and in your bed. And we need to know who knew he was there. And time of death. I’ll call you after the funeral. Stay put. I’m heading downtown. St. James Cathedral.” With that she hung up. The new Julie, detective with a mission.

  I tossed the phone back in my pocket. “Who was that?” asked Rose.

  “Julie,” I said. “She’s the only one who knows where I am. Well she doesn’t exactly know where I am. She thinks I’m still hiding out in a house on her street. She’s on her way to the funeral.”

  “The funeral is today?” said Rose in surprise. “Well doesn’t that just tell you something? The Adulteress can’t get that body in the ground fast enough.”

  “Julie is going to see what she can souse out.”

  “Good idea,” said Rose. “We’re not going to solve anything sitting around here.” She gave me a good looking over. “The orange hair is kind of a disguise, but it’s not enough. You still look like you. An older, sallower you, but folks will still be able to recognize you. I guess I’ll have to go alone. You might be safe, hide in plain sight and all, but we better not risk it.”

  Rose gave a little grunt and hauled herself off the couch, then rolled her eyes and sat back down again. “Whew. Felt a little dizzy there. Low blood pressure.” She propelled herself forward again, picked up her cane and started thumping toward her bedroom. “Where exactly are you going?” I asked.

  “I told you. The funeral. Julie’s a nice girl but she doesn’t know anything about solving a murder. You mark my word, the killer’s going to be at that funeral, all satisfied, saying The Lord’s Prayer, thinking he got away with it. Where they having it anyway? Some fancy Forest Hill church
?”

  “St. James. Downtown.”

  “Hmmm,” snorted Rose. “His local church wasn’t good enough for him?”

  This was ridiculous. “You’re not going to the funeral Rose. How are you going to get there? And what’s the point?”

  “Saving your sorry butt is the point. I have experience. I know what to look for.”

  “Reading mysteries is not exactly the same as experience.”

  “I am an astute observer of human nature. Not much gets past me.” Rose turned around and gave me a quizzical gaze. “I’m not as spry as I could be. I’m thinking I could fix you up a little. Disguise you, so to speak, and bring you along. You can be my legs. You’re a sturdy thing. With my brain and your brawn we could be quite a team. I’ve got some old wigs from the seventies. We have to cover up that new hair of yours. Makes you stick out too much. A wig and some dark glasses and maybe a nice pantsuit and no one will be the wiser.”

  She gave a cheerful little laugh — more of a cackle really — “Oh this is going to be a bit of fun.”

  CHAPTER 16

  Twenty minutes later there I was, the brawny fugitive heading out the door, wearing a grey wig styled into a limp bouffant, sunglasses with a dark green cat’s eye frame, a pale blue 100% polyester pant suit, and a mink coat that seemed to be molting. “Keep the glasses on,” advised Rose. “Even when we’re in the church. Everyone will think you’re trying to hide your tears.”

  “I’m not sure about this mink coat. I don’t wear fur.”

  “Oh cry me a river,” said Rose. “That minks been dead for fifty years.”

  “And it smells a bit off.”

  Rose sniffed the air. “It smells fine. Don’t be such a princess.”

  We made our way down to Kingston Rd. and managed to hail a cab almost immediately. “A good omen,” said Rose. “I can feel it.”

  I waited on the street, keeping my back to pedestrians on the sidewalk, while Rose loaded herself into the backseat. “Lordy, why do they make cars so low?” she said as she heaved herself down on the seat and I climbed in after her. “I’m going to need a crane to get me out of here.” She tapped the driver on the shoulder. “St. James’s Cathedral on Church St. Church and King. And don’t take Queen. Up Main to Mortimer and then over to Bayview and down.”