Trap Door

by Sarah Graves

  Now jouncing a baby on her plump shoulder she stood frumpily barefoot in the gleaming kitchen of Fred Mudge’s place warming a bottle of formula on the gas stove.

  “I didn’t know what else to do,” she added plaintively, brushing back a strand of brown hair. “I came here because I had nowhere else to go, and now Fred wants me to stay.”

  Her expression hardened. “But I still want my own place. And besides, he won’t like having a kid around once the novelty wears off. He thinks he will, but Fred likes things kept neat.”

  Neat wasn’t the word for it. Back in the city I’d seen fancy apartments; heck, I’d lived in one. But this place took the cake: high ceilings, plaster smooth as that baby’s bottom, and paint so fresh it made me look around for an open bucket.

  And all that was just the beginning in Mudge’s unexpectedly plush digs. “The ring and bracelets belonged to your mother?” I asked Trish.

  Mudge had stopped on the steps to tell us so before bringing us in here, as if now that we knew he hadn’t stolen the jewelry we might decide Trish had. After all, unwed young mothers didn’t often own the kind of bling that would have looked just right on Zsa Zsa Gabor.

  Trish nodded agreement while in the next room Ellie kept Fred Mudge busy by letting him show her around some more. I’d already seen plenty; the oaken woodwork, maple floors, and cherry staircase banister all glowed with decades of polish, and the marble fireplace mantels shone mirror-bright.

  “Yes,” Trish said sadly. “The bracelets and ring are all I have of my mom’s. But now I’m going to have to get rid of them.”

  Soft rugs in a variety of neutral shades complemented the furniture upholstered in nubbly wheat, each sitting area with a brass lamp, velvet or needlepoint throw pillows, and an ottoman covered in tapestry or leather.

  Trish tested the bottle on her arm, then cradled the baby, who took it eagerly. “See, as soon as I found out Cory was dead I knew I had to get out of St. Stephen…”

  Her voice broke, blue eyes filling with tears. So she had known. “Who told you?”

  At least it hadn’t had to be me. “Fred,” she replied. “He’d go over there sometimes, to check up on what Cory was doing. Spy on him, really, so he could report all the bad stuff to me.”

  Sure, smear his rival; that made sense. Trish went on: “And the next day of course it was all over Eastport. That’s how Fred heard about it.”

  She bit back a sob, then stubbornly regained her composure. “I tried to tell Cory that girl he was seeing would only get him in trouble. He just thought I was jealous.”

  “Were you? And how did you know about her, anyway? Did Fred tell you that, too?”

  She shook her head. “Cory told me, after I smelled perfume on him. He would’ve gotten over her,” she added.

  Yeah, maybe. “And after he got convicted of stalking her?” I asked. “What was his attitude then?”

  She sat at the tile-topped kitchen island, her listless wave inviting me to do the same. “Typical Cory. It just made him mad. Nobody was going to tell him what to do, you know?”

  “Ever meet her?” And when she shook her head no: “Trish. Think hard, now. Was there anything Cory knew about Jen or about her father that either of them might’ve wanted kept secret?”

  Because with the fire in St. Stephen, things had changed. Getting rid of Cory was one thing but going after Trish implied considerably more of a motive than just eliminating a daughter-pestering punk.

  And if Jen’s only link to Trish Bogan was via Cory telling Trish about her…“No,” Trish answered sadly. “I didn’t want to know about her.”

  The dozing baby woke with a sudden shriek; startled, Trish dropped her cup. It hit the expensively tiled counter and took a chip out of it. “Oh, God,” she whispered, appalled.

  From the next room Mudge’s and Ellie’s voices still mingled. Trish looked up, stricken. “When he sees that, he’s going to…”

  My eyebrows must’ve lifted. “Oh, no, wait a minute,” she said hastily. “Fred’s not…a problem. Not like that. He’s a good guy. It’s just that he cares so much about this place. He’s so kind to me, but…”

  In the dish drainer by the immaculate sink lay a grinder, the kind of low-tech, hand-cranked food processor you clamp to a counter. For making baby food, perhaps; pureed spinach or mushed-up chicken. I pulled the bottle of white glue from my bag.

  “Gimme that,” I said, indicating the device.

  By the time Trish had settled the baby in a portable crib and returned with the grinder, I’d searched the floor and located the chip of tile her cup had removed.

  The grinder’s clamp consisted of two flat rubber-padded surfaces, plus a turn screw to hold them together. “Okay, now.” From the other room, Ellie’s and Mudge’s voices approached, so I had to work fast.

  “First you coat the hole and the chip with white glue.” I demonstrated. “Next, you position the chip in the hole, precisely where it belongs, and I mean precisely.”

  That was the tricky part. “Now get me a wet paper towel.” I wouldn’t have a second shot at wiping off the glue squeeze-out, so I pushed the chip in with my finger, then wiped all around it without moving the chip.

  I hoped. Inevitably there would still be more white glue to ooze out once the clamp was applied, and I sure didn’t want the grinder to end up glued to the counter. “Waxed paper?” I asked.

  That would keep the glue from sticking to the grinder, and the paper itself wouldn’t adhere. Swiftly she retrieved some from a roller under the cabinets; I placed a patch of it over the repair and carefully clamped the grinder to the counter, directly on top of the paper.

  “There,” I said. “Leave it clamped for an hour, more if you can. Then gently scrub off any oozed glue with one of those soft sponges you use to clean Teflon pans. Have you got one of those?”

  Trish nodded; of course she did. In this house Mudge likely had all the tools and solutions they use to sterilize operating rooms; distantly I wondered if he might be related to Bella.

  “You have to understand about Fred,” she said once the fix was complete. The baby was asleep again. “He’s loved me since we were in high school together. I mean like crazy love.”

  I must have shown my surprise. “Fred’s way younger than he looks,” she explained. “We’re only three years apart. But with him going bald so early, and that mustache…”

  Right. It gave him a mature appearance. That, anyway, was a kind way of putting it. “How’d he get this place?” I asked.

  She shrugged. “Inherited it. His mom and dad were in a car accident the year before mine died, left him on his own with the house and buckets of cash. So he can just do the puppet thing if he wants…”

  That business card, I recalled: Puppeteer. And what was up with that? “But he thinks that’s socially irresponsible,” Trish went on, “so he got a job with Canada Transport.”

  Of course; that’s where I’d seen the uniform, in the tollbooth as Ellie and I were driving from the main highway over the bridge into the city.

  “He wants me to marry him, adopt the baby.” She sounded like somebody who’s just heard she’s going to be sold into slavery.

  “He really loves me,” she repeated in tones of despair. “I mean don’t get me wrong, I love Fred, too. I’ve known him forever, our parents were friends…he’s good to me. Really good, and he always has been. It’s just that…”

  Her eyes implored me to understand why she couldn’t make the safe choice: a secure home, money for the baby’s needs, the kind of predictable future a mother needs.

  “I don’t love him the way he loves me,” she finished. “And that’s why I can’t stay here with him. He wants to protect me but no matter what’s happened, I have to have my own home, some kind of…I don’t know. Am I making any sense at all?”

  “Maybe,” I said, unsure suddenly what I might have done in her place. The baby whimpered, half waking.

  “Fred’s hopeless with Raj,” she added. “Can’t figure ou
t how to warm up a bottle to save his life, and as for diapers…”

  She made a face, and we laughed comfortably together for an instant. “Raj?” I asked.

  “Short for Rajah.”

  I reminded myself that she was young, and that when the kid grew up he’d be perfectly free to pretend his name was Roger if he wanted to.

  “With Cory, it was the other way,” Trish went on. “He never loved me at all. I met him at a dance in Calais, the baby was just an accident, and when he finally decided he wanted to marry me, it was only another scheme of his, that’s all.”

  She smiled wanly. “See, he thought us Canadians have it so much easier. Medical, subsidized college, benefits for the baby. You know—social support stuff. He said being a Canadian citizen was like living on easy street.”

  If only it were true. But it sounded like Cory, all right. “Did you know he’d bought a life insurance policy?”

  “No. You mean he…no. He never said anything about it. Are you sure?”

  “Mm-hmm. So you don’t know that you and the baby, along with his mother, are beneficiaries.” That’s what it said on the policy his mother had showed me.

  “No, I…” She went on shaking her head. But not believably.

  “Don’t get your hopes up. Suicide voids the policy.”

  “Oh,” she said, stricken. “Well. I guess it was too much to hope for. That there might be a…”

  Silver lining. “What about Fred, do you think he might’ve known anything about it?”

  More head shaking. “No. He’d have told me.”

  “Okay. Seriously, though, can you think of anything that Cory might’ve known or found out, that someone might want to shut him up about? Something about Jen, maybe?”

  “I don’t…”

  “Something he said?” I prompted. “Something he might’ve told you?”

  “No,” she repeated. “He’d tell me how skinny Jen was, how fat I was getting. Why couldn’t I fix my hair, stuff like that.” She paused, remembering. “This was when I was so sick with being pregnant, I was puking just about nonstop.”

  Nice guy. “What else did he tell you about her?”

  Trish sighed tiredly. “Oh, that she was so cool, and about her friends, especially this one girl. Said Jen bought stuff for this girl, always paid her way, and the girl was real jealous of him.”

  Ann Radham, I realized Cory must’ve meant: Jen Henderson’s long-suffering musical pal.

  “But that was just Cory, too,” Trish went on. “Of course he would think that about her. Because it’s the way he always felt,” she added with unexpected insight.

  Ellie’s and Fred’s voices moved toward the kitchen. Trish looked embarrassed. “Listen, I lied about the insurance policy before. I was in on it. He had a plan, how he was going to fake his death. Then I would get the money, and he’d come back, and…”

  Her voice faltered, because surely she knew by now how that part of the plan would end: he’d take the money. End of story.

  “It sounds so awful now. That’s why I didn’t want to tell you. But the thing is, Cory would never have killed himself,” she insisted. “Why would he? The money was going to be his big score. It’s why he kept coming around, to make sure I paid the premium. Fred,” she added shamefacedly, “was giving me cash.”

  But I still thought the part about the suicide clause had come as a surprise; she’d looked so disappointed. “Did Fred know about the scheme?”

  “Oh, no! He’d…he’s very law-abiding.” Shaking her head sadly, she continued, “Anyway, when I heard Cory was dead, I got scared, that’s all. For me and Raj. I didn’t know what might be going on…”

  “And that’s why you left St. Stephen? Because Cory was looking forward to the money from this scheme, so you didn’t believe he’d kill himself?”

  She nodded. “He’d been in a real good mood, actually. Even when Jen’s father started the stalking case against him, Cory just said screw it. If he did go to jail there’d be a nice payoff from this other thing someday, he said. And then he even started insisting that he wasn’t going to jail.”

  I asked her about the why of that, of course, but she didn’t know, puzzlement filling her face again. Seeing it, sympathy for her overcame me suddenly; maybe the girl was no Rhodes Scholar, but…

  “Trish, I’m sorry all this has happened to you.”

  “Thanks. But I kind of bought that trip, didn’t I? Little late to be figuring it out,” she added in a wry tone that gave me hope for her. “Anyway, like I said, I didn’t know what was going on. So I ran.”

  By now Ellie and Fred Mudge were almost in the doorway. “I told Fred if I did stay here, though, I had to have my own money. He could sell the bracelets and ring for me or I’d do it myself.”

  She looked at me, suddenly realizing something else. “Um, if you don’t believe me I can show you all the papers that came with them. From the lawyer and so on, when I inherited them.”

  “No,” I told Trish gently. “I appreciate it, but it won’t be necessary.” The offer was plenty. “So,” I shifted gears, as Mudge and Ellie came in, “how was the house tour?”

  Meanwhile I found Mudge’s card, brought it out and wrote my own phone number on the back of it, and slipped it to Trish.

  Just in case. Ellie already had her own copy of his business card in her hand. “Fabulous,” she replied. “You should see it. Especially his collection of puppets.”

  Mudge corrected her fussily. “Marionettes. Only the business card says puppets, because people don’t understand.”

  “Right,” she amended. “Okay if I show Jake?”

  He hadn’t seemed to notice the food grinder still clamped to the tile repair. “Sure,” he said, his attention returned to the the young woman he loved.

  And who didn’t love him. We left them there, Ellie guiding me through the living room and down a hall past a sparkling bath, finally to a closed door. “Prepare yourself,” she said.

  But I couldn’t have. Behind the door was a roomful of little people with faces like shriveled apples, their tiny fingers possessing veins, nails, even creases at the knuckle joints and in the scarily lifelike palms of their cloth hands.

  Ranged out on shelves, windowsills, and chairs, each wore a different costume: a minister’s suit, Bo Peep’s blue dress, the embroidered cropped jacket and baggy trousers of an Alpine villager in traditional costume.

  “Goodness,” I said inadequately, half expecting them all to start preaching, sheepherding, and yodeling at me.

  “But that’s not all,” Ellie said. “I wasn’t supposed to see this, but when he left ahead of me, I peeked.”

  She opened a closet door. Inside, more puppets sat on shelves, with strings and sticks tucked neatly behind them, legs dangling. There were a dozen of them and at the sight of them my heart nearly stopped.

  Soft brown hair, curled lashes, pert nose…the mouths were red and bitten looking, recognizably full-lipped. Each costume—evening gown, swimsuit, a sweater-and-skirt set that contrasted sharply with the next one’s hot pants, midriff bandeau, and boots—was perfectly sewn. My own clothes should’ve fit so well.

  The bride’s dress, a confection of white lace that must’ve cost a fortune to create, was the loveliest. “He makes these,” Ellie told me. “Bodies, outfits…”

  And faces, each doll carefully stored where it could come to no harm. I shut the door on the motionless bodies and closed eyes, returning them to the silence of their closet.

  “Oh,” I breathed, still seeing them in my head. Alone in the dark…

  “Yes,” Ellie agreed, not needing to say more. Because the faces on the hidden-away marionettes all belonged to Trish Bogan, and from them it was clear Fred Mudge didn’t just love the girl.

  He was obsessed with her.

  Outside, I put my arms on the steering wheel and my face on my arms. “Oh, man,” I exhaled. “If I were Walter Henderson’s defense attorney, Fred Mudge would be my new best friend.”

  “Bu
t, Jake,” Ellie objected, “do you really think Fred’s got the physical ability to do something violent to Cory Trow?”

  “Doesn’t matter. He’s weird, he’s in love, and he was in Eastport around the time when Cory died. It might not be enough to convict him, but it’s plenty of reasonable doubt for someone else. Any jury in the world would think that where there’s a will, maybe there’s a way.”

  I sat up. “He could even have torched Trish’s building, to make it look like somebody else was after her. Knowing himself that she was out already.”

  Ellie frowned. “I don’t know about that. Weird, yes, but he doesn’t seem like the type who would risk a lot of other people’s lives, just to…”

  Wordlessly, I passed the morning’s Maritime Sentinel to her; I’d been reading it while Ellie lingered inside oohing and aahing over the infant Raj.

  He was indeed an adorable little peanut, just as she said. But the baby bore too much resemblance to his father for me to take any pleasure in inspecting him: blue eyes, pale curly hair. In the paper was an article about the fire in St. Stephen, complete with pictures the surly photographer had been taking the day before.

  “Trish’s building was slated for demolition,” I said. “There were no near-escapes after all. The other tenants moved out even before she did.” I started the truck.

  “Henderson’s still our guy, don’t get me wrong. He had the best reason, he’s a career killer, and it happened at his place. It’s just that he’s so good at it, it’s hard to nail him down.” We pulled away from the curb. “And I’ll tell you something else. If he went after Trish he had a reason for that. I just wish I could figure out what.”

  Mudge had given us directions back to the main highway. I took the turn he’d advised, onto Truro Street toward downtown. “I’m hungry,” Ellie said.

  Me too, so after some discussion we decided to go to the trendy Harborside District for a meal that would inevitably, I supposed, include arugula. Probably it would also feature that other chic but inedible impediment to happy lunching, the sun-dried tomato.