“Are you working?” he asked.
“Kind of,” I said, looking over my shoulder for Glenda Whalen. “I’m trying to lie low, but I wouldn’t be doing my job if I weren’t here.”
“I had a long meeting with Frank Olney today,” said Don, nodding to a constituent across the room. “He wants a murder-one warrant for the Puerto Rican kid.”
“Are you going to get it for him?”
“Not yet. We’re treating him as a material witness for now. We issued a warrant, but I’m a bit more cautious than Frank. I like to go slow and see how things play out.”
“What about the prints they took last night? Any luck?”
“Tomorrow morning,” said Don. “And if his prints turn out to be on that X-acto knife, I’ll have to go along with Frank on the murder-one charge.”
“Do you even have his prints?” I asked.
“In spades. Apparently he painted a fence two days ago and left perfect prints all over the brush. Dried into the paint.”
“Even if the prints match, what’s that prove? His prints are bound to be on that knife just as they were on the paintbrush; he’s Jean Trent’s handyman.”
“That’s a question for a jury. I’m not saying we couldn’t drop the charges later on, but you have to admit, it doesn’t look good for the kid.”
I concurred.
“What happened to your lip?”
“Fell off a barstool.”
“You should take it easy, Ellie,” he said. “I know you can hold your drink, but that doesn’t mean you have to prove it every night.”
“Listen to the pot calling the kettle black.”
The crowd began to dwindle after eight, and I was thinking about leaving myself, when a girl of about twenty-one approached me. Short, with dark hair cut in a bob, she identified herself as Fran Bartolo, formerly Jordan Shaw’s best friend.
“I’ve seen your stories in the paper,” she said. “And I heard them talk about you on the radio. You might be interested in what I know about Jordan.”
“I might,” I said, unsure what to make of this girl. “Try me.”
“Not here,” she said, looking around the room. “I don’t want her friends to see me talking to you.”
So now I was a pariah. I made a quick visual inspection of the room and saw no Glenda Whalen. “Let’s talk here,” I said.
“No; meet me in Gem Cleaners’ parking lot in twenty minutes,” she said and disappeared.
I was in the cloakroom, retrieving my overcoat, when the funeral director’s son, Tim O’Connor, asked me if I was Eleonora Stone. Judge Shaw wanted a word with me. O’Connor escorted me through two doors to a private room, where the judge and his wife were seated on a divan. Mrs. Shaw still looked remote, chin high, back straight, knees together. The judge rose when I came in, offering me no handshake but motioning for me to take a seat instead. O’Connor withdrew. Once we were alone, Judge Shaw mumbled an introduction to his wife, and I offered my condolences. She nodded coolly but said nothing.
“I’ve asked you here, Miss Stone, to share some information that has come to my attention,” he began. “My wife, Audrey, suspects Jordan was involved with a professor from Tufts.”
“What gives her that idea?” I asked.
“Phone calls, letters, bits of conversations overheard . . . Women seem to be more attuned to these signs.”
“Do you know his name?” I asked Mrs. Shaw.
She shook her head and spoke for the first time. “Jordan never told me anything of this relationship,” she said, her voice even and dry. “But last August I noticed Jordan was receiving letters posted in Medford, Massachusetts. The handwriting on the envelopes was always the same, and it was written by a man.”
“No return address?”
“No, but the postage was metered. Tufts.”
“Do you know where these letters are now?”
She shook her head. I stood up and crossed the room to the window. Cars were still pulling out of O’Connor’s lot, but the one that caught my eye was parked on the street: a maroon Hudson Hornet.
“Jordan took an educational tour of India and Nepal in August of last year,” said the judge. “We believe that this man accompanied her.”
India? I thought of the man at the Dew Drop Inn the night Jordan died. I had put him out of my mind, but this was a coincidence. Or was it? A school trip to India a year and half earlier, and an out-of-place foreigner in a bar a quarter mile from her shallow grave.
“Is India where the kids are going these days?” I asked. “I thought coeds dreamt of visiting France or Italy.”
“She’d already been to Europe,” said the judge. “This was one of those organized tours, sponsored by Tufts alumni, a month with lectures and special speakers.”
“Still, India. Not exactly a run-of-the-mill choice for a summer vacation.”
“Jordan was not a run-of-the-mill girl,” said Audrey Shaw, and I felt reproof in her tone. She didn’t like me.
“And you think this man went along to India?” I asked, returning to the professor in question. “Why?”
“When Jordan returned from her trip, I noticed one fellow in particular in many of her snapshots,” said Mrs. Shaw. “Nothing scandalous, of course. It just seemed he was always there next to her. There was a familiarity. And he was always smiling.”
“What did he look like?”
“Judge for yourself, Miss Stone,” she said, extending a four-by-five, black-and-white print to me. “You’re a clever young woman. I’m sure you recognize handsome when you see it.”
I took the photo from her. Three tourists in a bazaar somewhere in India, long garlands of marigolds hanging in a stall behind them. Jordan was in the middle—beautiful, I must say—flanked by two men: one in his twenties, thin with thick glasses and waxy skin; the other fortyish, handsome and tanned, with sandy hair blowing in a light breeze. They all wore big smiles, though the younger man seemed extraneous to the happiness of the other two. The older man looked like one of those easy globetrotters, equally at home on a camel in the Sahara or in a rickshaw in Peking. He was flat stomached, with taut skin and wiry muscles, and I could see how a young coed might find him terrifically romantic.
“I’ll look into this,” I said. “May I keep the photograph? Not for the paper, of course.”
The judge nodded.
“I’d like to ask you about some of Jordan’s friends,” I said, feeling awkward. “Do you know a girl named Fran Bartolo?”
“Of course,” said Mrs. Shaw. “What does Franny have to do with this?”
“She cornered me a few minutes ago and said she wanted to talk to me about Jordan. She said I’d be interested to know what she knows about her.”
Audrey Shaw fidgeted and produced a cigarette.
“I doubt Franny Bartolo will have anything nice to say about Jordan,” she said, inhaling deeply. “They were friendly a few years ago, but you know how teenage girls are. Franny was always jealous of Jordan because of boys.”
“What about Glenda Whalen?”
“A devoted friend of Jordan’s,” said the judge. “I told you that the other night.”
“A little too devoted, if you ask me,” said Mrs. Shaw.
“Why do you ask about Glenda?” asked the judge.
“She knocked me unconscious at Tedesco’s Grill about two hours ago,” I said. “In case you hadn’t noticed, she’s the one who gave me the fat lip and the bump on my head.”
“What a horrible story, Miss Stone,” said Audrey Shaw, eyes well hidden behind the black veil. “You should see a doctor.”
“I’ll be all right, thanks. But I was wondering about Glenda. Why would she attack me?”
“Perhaps she didn’t approve of what you wrote about Jordan,” said Mrs. Shaw, arching a perfectly plucked and penciled eyebrow as she regarded me.
“The judge knew what I was going to write. I didn’t betray any trust or print any surprises.”
“Indeed, you did not,” he said.
“Enough, Audrey,” said the judge, cutting her off.
“Who’s Greg?” I asked, wondering if he was the same hungry young man I’d seen with Glenda. The one who’d unsettled me with his leer.
The name triggered a reaction from both, that much was clear. Their eyes met briefly, and some kind of silent communication took place. Judge Shaw squirmed in his seat, crossed and uncrossed his legs. Mrs. Shaw, ever more subtle, tightened the grip on her cigarette just enough to dislodge the ash, which fell into her lap. She brushed it away and recomposed herself before the ash had hit the floor.
“Greg Hewert,” said the judge as the silence grew ponderous.
“Wasn’t he once the quarterback?” I asked.
Again the look between them.
“Yes, that’s him,” said the judge. “Greg was a friend,” he added simply, as if he wanted to close the subject. “But Jordan and he were not fast friends. As a matter of fact, Greg was more a friend of Tom Quint’s.”
“And Greg and Franny were going steady, of course,” added Audrey Shaw.
I was beginning to reconsider the wisdom of meeting Fran Bartolo in a dark, empty parking lot.
“Anything else I should know about Greg Hewert?” I asked.
Both shook their heads.
Despite my sympathy for their loss, I couldn’t quite shake the suspicion that they were holding out on me.
“What do you plan to do next, Miss Stone?” asked Mrs. Shaw.
“I need to talk to Jordan’s roommate, Ginny,” I said. “And I’m going to meet Fran Bartolo right now, along with Greg Hewert, I suspect. Or Glenda Whalen.”
“Aren’t you afraid for your safety?” she asked.
“Yes, I am.”
Mrs. Shaw stubbed out her cigarette in the crystal ashtray on the end table. She rose, tall and slim.
“If Glenda gives you any trouble,” she said, “tell her the judge and I disapprove of her bullying tactics.”
“I’d rather have a restraining order and a bodyguard, but thanks.”
Judge Shaw and his wife left the funeral parlor through a private door and were escorted home in O’Connor’s black Cadillac limousine. I returned to the cloakroom for my coat, passing through the viewing room to get there. Three of O’Connor’s sons were preparing to close the coffin and asked if I wanted to have a look before they did. I was taken aback at first but then realized that, indeed, I wanted to see her. I wanted to remember Jordan Shaw as something other than a muddied corpse. The O’Connor brothers retreated in deference and left the room.
Jordan Shaw, twenty-one, dead before my eyes. Just the two of us. Shrouded by a diaphanous chiffon, Jordan lay frozen in a white lace gown, head resting on a pearl silk pillow, blonde hair lustrous as if burnished by long strokes from caring hands. A bouquet of lilacs had been threaded through her willowy fingers. Where had they found lilacs in November? Her face was starchy white, matte through the sheer fabric with a hint of pink brushed over her lips. I was moved by the tranquility and beauty of the deceased, and never would have recognized her as the same body I’d photographed in the mud a few nights before. That body was human, if dead, while the one before me looked not of this world. Hers was an ethereal beauty, good and clean. Without realizing, I found my hand grazing the gauzy material draped over her body, as if I could communicate with the touch of my hand, and, for the first time, I was moved by her death. I felt sorry for her and wanted to find her killer for more than selfish reasons of my own.
Tim O’Connor cleared his throat and broke the spell. I didn’t know how long I’d been standing there. I watched the three men arrange Jordan Shaw’s finery, lower her head, and gently close the casket.
I trudged out into the gloom of the parking lot, my eyes cast downward in search of oil spots. Nothing. My lip throbbed in the cold as I walked away back to my car.
Gem’s was New Holland’s biggest dry cleaner, located in the heart of the city at the bottom of Market Hill. A recent demolition next door had provided a huge parking lot, and it was there that I was to meet Fran Bartolo. I arrived on time and noticed a solitary car, parked near the rear of the lot where Gem’s and the back of the New Holland Savings Bank came together on either side of a dark alley. A subtle trap, I thought, and I was walking into it anyway.
Summoning the last shred of my common sense, I swung my car around and approached the alley in reverse; if things got bad, I’d gun the engine and make a run for it. I stopped about thirty feet in front of the other car, a dark-green sedan, and doused my lights. I left the engine running and stepped out onto the pavement.
“Fran?” I called. “Are you there?”
The door on the driver’s side popped open, but no dome light went on inside. Fran Bartolo stepped out.
“Come over here,” she said. “I’m afraid someone will see us.”
“Where is he?” I asked.
She squinted at me through the dark. “What?”
“Where’s Greg?”
She shrank, and I could see her apprehension grow. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Tell Greg to come out,” I said. “I want to talk to him.”
“Are you crazy?”
“I came to ask Greg some questions,” I said, my heart thumping.
Fran’s eyes darted around the parking lot and back to me. She ran a hand over her hair, then inched closer to the car’s open door.
“Look, I came alone. Greg isn’t here.”
I didn’t speak or move during the tense silence that ensued. I was scared, at least as scared as Fran, but she seemed sincere.
“If he’s not here, where is he?”
“How should I know?” she asked, very convincingly.
“He’s your boyfriend, isn’t he?”
She frowned; I’d touched a nerve. “Thanks, why don’t you rub some salt in the wound? Greg dumped me. Who told you he was my boyfriend?”
“Audrey Shaw.”
Fran threw her head back in frustration, and when she looked at me again, I could see the sparkle of tears in her eyes. “She probably told you that because she didn’t want to say her precious Jordan stole him away from me.”
I paused to consider her account. It was possible. I had sensed Judge and Mrs. Shaw were hiding something from me, why not that?
“Let’s go somewhere private to talk,” I suggested, and Fran agreed.
I took her to my apartment and gave her a bottle of beer. At another time and place in my life, I would have offered her a cocktail, but this was New Holland, and young people drank beer or nothing at all. Halfway through her second Genesee, she began to relax.
“It was our senior year in high school,” she said, sitting cross-legged on my couch, the bottle of beer resting on her lap. “Greg was my steady, gave me his letterman’s jacket, and pinned me. He’d always been the big man on campus, but as soon as Colgate offered him that scholarship, he changed, got real stuck on himself. I could tell things were changing between us, but you know how people try to hang on. I thought it was my fault, that I was doing something wrong. He wouldn’t call for a week, and I’d apologize. He’d stand me up, and I’d call him. He’d flirt with other girls, and I’d take him back. He did that a lot. Kind of became obsessed with scoring. He even got into trouble once for not taking no for an answer from a girl who shot him down. Shot him down like Francis Gary Powers. Judge Shaw had to vouch for him, and the cops let him go. But that was long after we broke up. Long after I found out about him and Jordan.”
“What happened?” I asked from my position on the other end of the couch.
“Jordan’s parents had gone away for a week; I think it was when Judge Shaw’s father was sick in New York, just a while before he died. Anyway, Jordan was home alone. She
and Greg were seeing each other on the sly, but I never found out how long it had been going on.”
“How did you figure they were seeing each other?”
She snickered. “By accident. Glenda Whalen was always stopping by unannounced to see Jordan. I used to call her ‘Latch’ for the way she latched onto her. Anyway, she was on her way to drop in on Jordan when she saw Greg’s car in the driveway. It was pretty late. After ten, anyway. And then she ran to Tommy to tattle and phoned me too. I think she just liked to watch us suffer.”
“I thought Tommy and Greg were friends,” I said.
“They were. Before that happened. They’re civil to each other now, but they haven’t been close since. Greg still denies everything. He says nothing happened between them, that they were just talking about college. Jordan denied that he had ever even been there. But Tommy and I both know Greg. He’s a liar. And Jordan was too.”
“And you haven’t dated Greg since?”
“No way. I may have been crazy in love with him in high school, but I got over it. Especially when I saw what a jerk he turned out to be. He bombed out as a football star at Colgate and enrolled at Mohawk Valley Community College. Couldn’t make it there, either. Now he’s just another ex-jock wishing he could relive his high school glory. It’s sad.”
“Was Tommy at the viewing tonight?” I asked, switching gears.
“Didn’t you see him? He broke down over the casket when he went to view the body. It broke my heart. Poor fellow. She didn’t deserve a boy like him.”
I remembered my emotions upon viewing the exquisite girl, and I had never even spoken to her. For a moment, I lost my train of thought, forgot Fran was there.
“You said you knew things about Jordan that would interest me,” I said finally, remembering how she had approached me at the funeral parlor. “Like what?”
“Well, you’ve probably guessed that boys really liked her. But not just boys her own age. Older men, too.”
“Like professors, maybe?”
She looked at me dumbly. “How’d you know?”
“Her parents told me.”
“Did they tell you she went to India with one of them?”
“I knew she had gone to India with a professor from Tufts, but what do you mean one of them? Are you saying there were others?”
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