by Eva Shaw
He looked me up and down, focused on the five-carat diamond that I had kept to impress people and it worked. He snorted again, but motioned me into the grand foyer. “I believe she was about to leave for the day.” He glanced at his watch and trotted off in a direction, I assumed, that housed the kitchen quarters.
I could see from his face that he was confused. I was certain he’d grill Inez at the first opportunity, too. In his world, upper and lower classes didn’t mix in his book and I’d stepped over the line, from the huffing I’d heard after the snort.
I studied the Gauguin prominently featured on a foyer wall and then the kindly gray-haired woman appeared. A dark cotton raincoat covered her uniform, and the middle buttons holding on for dear life as they strained across her plump bosom.
“Mr. Everett said you’d like to see me?” she asked in that same tiny, non-intrusive voice I’d had heard during my first visit to the mansion.
“May I walk you to your car? I’m harmless, really,” I asked and handed her a business card from the Bureau.
She looked at the card and then at me. She nodded, so we walked through the huge industrialized kitchen to the back of the home. It was sprinkling and in the distance clouds grew darker, intending to dump plenty of rain. “The bus will be here in five minutes. I usually leave in the evenings, about nine, but I came in early today. Mr. Everett gave me time off since there’s a housekeeper who can serve tea and the madam will be out until this evening.” She sighed and then smiled. “My oldest boy is coming home on a military leave and it’s his birthday tomorrow.” I’d seen it, that sweetness, on other moms and it was something I knew would never be mine.
Yes, we all have our private spots where unfulfilled dreams are stuffed. That was one of mine that I hid from the world, and most of the time from myself. But it was there.
“I still have a present to buy.” There was a nervous rambling in her flowing Latin-accented voice, then she stopped smiling and turned to me. I think this time she really saw me. “Excuse me, but do you know me?”
The sky crackled. In with distance thunder vibrated and the palms trees shivered. I had heard heavy rains were heading toward the city and it was weird weather for spring in Honolulu, everyone said, including the gal on the Weather Channel.
I took a few more steps toward the street, sensed that Inez was following. There was no doubt in my mind that she would be discrete. Mr. Everett, I was sure was watching from a window and would interrogate Inez the next day. If I was wrong about Inez keeping mum on what I was about to discuss, so be it.
“I was here for tea with Miss Victoria and Miss Diamond Dupris. My car is just over here,” I motioned. “I’ll take you home,” I offered and was met with a skeptical glance. “Really, I don’t mind. I’m trying to help Diamond find out about her parentage. I’d like to talk with you and it doesn’t make sense for us both to stand on that corner in rain that’s headed this way. I’m afraid I don’t know your last name, Ms.—”
“Gonzales. Mrs. Inez Gonzales, but everyone just calls me Inez. I don’t mind waiting for the bus.”
“Please, let me drive you home, Inez.”
She looked at my business card again. “Okay, yes, Miss Diamond told me about you and what you are trying to do. She’s sweet, and I loved her mama; even with that wild streak in her, she had a good heart. Frightful business for Miss Diamond. Miss Victoria asked me specifically not to talk about the past, so I’ve kept my distance. Every time I see Miss Diamond, I see her mama’s eyes shining through, hopeful and alive and giving. I’ve tried not to say anything that could upset the family. Miss Victoria isn’t well, you know.” Inez whispered as if the palms might report back to the Madam that she’d been conversing with me. Or perhaps, I was just imaging it. Nope, I definitely felt like the palm trees heard our conversation. Maybe the bump on the head did do some damage.
“Please. My car is this way.” Inez looked in the direction that I pointed and when we got to the car the first sprinkles plummeted to the windshield.
As we left the mansion’s grounds, Inez sat taller and even looked younger. She became more animated, chuckling about the weather, the cake she’d made for her son. “A captain in the Navy, my little boy is now a captain, a child who never learned his right from his left. Oh la la, but he’s a big man now. He tells me so all the time.” It didn’t take a psychotherapist or trained profiler, even of my low standard, to see Inez was relieved to leave the restrictions of the Dupris estate.
“When did you come to work for the Dupris family?”
“So long ago. I’ve been with the family since I was a girl. I was tiny when my parents and I escaped from Cuba on a boat. It was a terrible time for my country, but America welcomed us. There were no jobs in Miami back then, so Mama and I came here to Hawaii to live with a cousin. She was in the Navy, but she’s gone now many years. She had children at home and I took care of the babies and stayed. When the children no longer needed me, I started to work.”
“Always with the Dupris?”
“My life is full. My children are grown. All college graduates. My oldest Pedro, a pediatrician, works at the free clinic in San Francisco. Deanna is a congresswoman. She lives in Kapalua and travels to Washington all the time. Gordon, well you know about him, the big captain man. And then there’s my baby Rosa, grown up now, of course. She was a surprise baby. My husband and I were finished with babies, but God had better ideas. I was too old to be a mama again, but she is a true gift. She’s a news reporter, but working other jobs too. All have their father’s features and his hair. He was a handsome man. Yes, all are smart, too smart to be servants.”
What was it with me and traffic? The sea of gridlock seemed to stretch for a zillion miles. It was slow-go through the cushy neighborhoods that surrounded the Dupris mansion, but it gave me time to keep Inez kept talking. This was the way it was done in the mysteries I’d read and in the ones shown on TV. Besides I was safe in the car and there was a witness, too, should I have needed one if that black Suburban was out to get me again.
At the longest traffic signal on the planet, I asked, “So you’ve seen lots of changes in the family?”
She chuckled and there was something in her laugh that made me miss my adopted mama. “When old Mr. Dupris was alive, he set up a trust fund for me and the others so that after the first of the year, when I retire, I will have plenty of money to travel and visit all my children whenever I want. Of course, I can’t go in softball season.”
“You play softball?” She was fit, but softball?
“Everyone played back in Cuba, so even when we were in Miami my brothers insisted I play, too. I’ve loved it since I was a girl. Still play a bit, but mostly I coach at the Honolulu Boys and Girls Club. Got a cracker-jack team this year.”
“Hmm.” The signal was still red, and I doubled the thanks knowing that He had everything to do with this, since Inez was chatting away. “Did you get on well with Mr. Dupris?”
“Oh, yes. Mr. Dupris taught me how to make investments and offered the staff shares in his company, as well as our salary. Most of the staff shunned his offers. I have always been a good listener. Mr. Dupris had old-fashioned ideas about woman’s work and the place women should have in society, but I was a maid, and he believed in hard work, so he treated me well.
“My girls, oh they hate it when I talk about how I was treated when I was just a kitchen girl, but Mr. Dupris was never mean, never spiteful like some rich men are.”
It didn’t take the IQ of a Mensa member to read between those lines, as if what had not been said was printed in bold. Victoria Dupris was mean and spiteful, I thought turning on the car’s headlights. The thick layers of fat black clouds made everything feel gray and cold but the sprinkles weren’t any heavier than when we left the house. The light turned green, and we got caught at the next intersection.
I turned to Inez. “I know it happ
ened a long time ago, but could you possibly think back to when Lanie was a girl, before Diamond was born. Did Lanie ever sneak out of the house, runaway, get strange packages? Have odd visitors? Was she, um, wild?”
“I only remember once when Miss Lanie didn’t come home for two days. The first afternoon, everyone in the kitchen said she was at the beach with the gardener, a young man from the mainland who watched her every move. I caught him watching through a window once. Mr. Everett stopped that. But when he showed up for work the next morning and didn’t know a thing about Miss Lanie, rumors took other directions.”
“What was the man’s name?”
“It’s been a long time. Staff comes and goes. Does it matter? He was full of mischief, that man, and quite the flirt.” Inez laughed, remembering another time, and the smooth-Latin sound was good to hear.
“Go on. Do you know more? About Lanie?”
“Her disappearance was foolish, but sure did get the family in a tizzy. Seems she had taken the bus out to the family ranch and was alone there with the housekeepers.” She looked at me, the light was still red, and then continued. “The Dupris owned several ranches; this one was on the North Shore, near Turtle Bay. When the rumors started the day she disappeared, I thought at first they were talking about someone else. I thought she’d run off with the man who delivered the milk and cream. You’re too young, but at one time and to the rich folks, dairy products were delivered to the back door of everyone’s home. Our Lanie was sweet on him, too, when she was a child—we all liked him—he would sit down with the girls, Miss Victoria and Lanie, on the running board of the milk truck and tell them grand stories. He was a husky man from Chicago, strong and sang as he dropped off the milk each day. Sang old Gospel music. He flirted with me, too, and said that in World War II, he’d been around the globe on a merchant marine ship. That man could spin some tales. Lanie loved to hear them especially the stories of Europe. After he left for the day, Lanie would run to the kitchen and tell me everything.”
“Were there other men or boys you suspected when she disappeared?” The light finally changed but the traffic was so congested I didn’t move more than five feet. There must have been an accident or construction ahead, or He wanted to give me more time to talk with Inez.
“Then Lanie fell in love with one of the men working on the marble porch around the house. He was a white man this time. Had a southern drawl and mud under his fingernails. She was sixteen and in love. I’m no expert like Dr. Phil, Miss, but I think she was seeking affection because she didn’t have it at home. From a mother. Mrs. Dupris died just after Lanie was born. It happened in those days. Mrs. Dupris was a traditional Hawaiian woman, but something went wrong. I didn’t ask for details. It wouldn’t have been my place,” Inez said and continued. “After the thing with the marble cutter and another episode with a boy the family had known through the country club, Mr. Dupris sent Lanie to a boarding school on the mainland. It was all the way to Tennessee, a fancy finishing school in Memphis.
“I saw Mr. Dupris cry, oh, how he loved that girl. He slammed the door to his study after he put her in the car for the airport and didn’t come out for hours. She had argued that she would do what she wanted and see whomever she decided to see. She yelled that she didn’t need her father’s blessing.”
We inched in the traffic. “Any problems at school?”
“The girl had a tutor. She never attended public or private schools. I’m sure there were problems, but I never heard about them. I was just a kitchen girl. But when she left and wrote to me from the boarding school everything seemed fine.”
“She wrote to you, from Memphis?”
Inez nodded. “The following Christmas, she came home for holiday break; she was quieter and took long walks. She kept cosmetics and dime store jewelry beneath her bed. She had lacy underthings, too. Please don’t tell Miss Dupris this. She’s more difficult now that I’m about to leave. Oh, please be careful, please don’t say anything.” She grabbed my forearm. “I am certain she would find a way to take away my retirement. She’s always looking for loopholes and never forgets anything anyone says or does, especially when she’s upset. Most things upset her these days.”
“You have my word.” We looked at each other and her eyes accepted my promise. “Tell me, Inez, do you remember if the man who came with the work crew to build the porch was named Jimmy?”
She stared straight ahead. “Had I known, I would have warned her. My own husband thought he should be in show business. He was an actor; not a good one but with a certain flair. Before he escaped from Cuba, he’d had some success there. I know what that life can be with folks in the entertainment world. I have known people like that man Lanie was in love with. My husband came home one night, packed a suitcase, and told me he was going to be a star. Going to Hollywood to make it big, he said. We never saw him again.” She opened the car door, but held the handle even as the sprinkles dotted the shoulders of her serviceable coat. “Yes, Miss Lanie’s beau was named Jimmy. Jimmy March.” She watched my face and I’ve never been good a poker, so you know she could tell I’d just gotten the answer I was fishing for. “Yes, I know he’s that same musician I read about that just suddenly disappeared.”
“Anything you can remember about them as a couple could help Diamond.” I turned off the motor and waited.
She took a ring of keys from of her purse. “A week or so before I read how the performance had to be cancelled, I had seen a picture of her Jimmy. I remember one day Lanie dashing through the kitchen door, saying she was going out for a long walk. She always came to tell me and knew I worried. Her father hated how she paraded around in the baggy clothes, but she refused to wear maternity things. Or stay in the house.”
“You knew she was pregnant?”
Inez nodded and looked at her lap. “Mr. Dupris thought if no one said anything and she stayed home and didn’t go to parties and so on, it would all go away. Like an unplanned pregnancy would just go away. Oh, he was old fashioned.”
As if she were torn with telling me the truth or rushing away to escape, she looked toward her condo and then me. Finally, she got back into my car and closed the door. Her cheeks sagged and she fiddled for a tissue from her pocket, she touched the corners of her eyes, and sighed. Deeply.
“I saw her. I should have run after her. I could have stopped her somehow before she got into that car. This Jimmy was driving. I’ve carried this burden too long. I should have stopped her.” She inhaled and straightened her spine. “I hope whatever I’ve said can help you. I hope that Miss Diamond can gather courage and live a better life than her mother. We can’t change people. We can only change our attitudes. Bless you for taking time to listen. Vaya con Dios.”
“Vaya con Dios, mi amiga,” I replied. Praying that God would be with her always.
The woman’s smile felt sad as she gently shut the car door and headed for the condos. Everyone knew of the pregnancy and connection with Jimmy March, including her rich and powerful father. Then why wouldn’t Victoria Dupris help Diamond find out the truth? What in the world could she be hiding? Why in the world was she being so darned mean?
Chapter 16
The rain had stopped by the time I pulled into a parking spot at the Ala Moana Shopping Center and it had turned into a Chamber of Commerce day. The temps were in the low seventies and the ocean glittered with silver waves as far as the eye could see. I stood for the longest time looking out at the ocean, feeling the trade winds caress my soul, the winds I didn’t even know how much I had yearned for while working in Washington and then Las Vegas. I’d been so caught up in overachieving and pushing myself for some unattainable perfection, I didn’t see I was unhappy inside.
Standing there, I felt closer to God than at any other time in my life, closer to Him than in the churches and holy places I’d visited around the world. I whispered a prayer for forgiveness, “Oh, Father. Thank you for lovin
g me when I couldn’t love myself. I see now how I tried to be better than everyone at everything and still down deep believing I was worthless. I didn’t need to prove myself. You’ve loved me all this time.” I held the railing, breathed in my words. A calm came over me and for the first time in my nutty, hyper-motivated and super-charged emotional and intellectual life, I felt at peace. I whispered a string of thank yous. Maybe this serenity happens to the Christians who have been in the church forever. But as a neophyte, I floundered and worried and fretted. I also knew more than ever that only I could help Diamond Dupris find the truth.
I walked into the mall, sat at a café, and ordered passion fruit ice tea. I sipped it and thought of the revelations of the last hour.
What did I know? Lanie Dupris was a willful teenager. Even in my sheltered, geeky teenage world, I’d heard rumors of bad little rich girls and their escapades. I took out my notebook and wrote: Lanie was sent to boarding school in Memphis—the hometown of her lover, possibly why she didn’t protest too much.
Did it really matter that Lanie had kept makeup, bright flashy stuff, and lacy underwear hidden away? When Lanie was sent off to boarding school, did she and Jimmy reunite there in Tennessee? And was it Jimmy in the car with Lanie just before his death, like Inez said? There was no doubt now that Lanie and Jimmy were romantically involved. Even if no one saw them doing anything more intimate than sharing the same front seat of a car. Also Lanie was pregnant and from what she’d told Diamond, she was certain that Jimmy March was her father. So did Jimmy just drop off the planet, fall into a black hole, or run for the hills? If so, why? Lanie had money and position and that’s how he probably got the new duds that Pinkie had told me about. Or was he shot to death in the theater that night? Or even more of a conundrum, did he lose at Russian roulette? Or, was he even dead? Were any of those sightings that Payton told me about true?