The Cold Blue Blood: A Berger and Mitry Mystery

by David Handler

  “My great-granddaddy built it,” the old woman explained as they stood on her front porch watching the white water race over the polished rocks and directly under them. “I’ve lived here since I was a little girl. Back then, we generated our own electricity—for this place and a dozen others down river. There were no paved roads here. We raised most of our own food. And I went to a one-room schoolhouse, grades one through eight. But those days are gone. Too damned bad, you ask me. People were happier back then. Look around you, Mr. Berger. No one’s happy now. Got too little time and too damned many credit cards.”

  Sheila Enman was the kind of hard-nosed character who was known around the village as a cranky Yankee. Mitch liked her right away. She was feisty. She was opinionated. She was totally no-bull. Her blue eyes were clear and alert, her hair a snowy white. She wore a ragged old yellow cardigan, dark blue slacks, ventilated orthopedic shoes and reading glasses on a chain around her neck. Her age didn’t seem to have slowed her mind down one bit. Just her stooped, big-boned body—she needed a cane to get around.

  “It’s my bad hip,” she sniffed. “Doctors keep saying they want to give me a new one, but that just seems so wasteful, don’t you think? I’ll be ninety years old next month. Someone younger would get a lot more mileage out of it. But enough about that—it’s really not a very interesting story. Now how can I help you? You said on the phone you’re living in Dolly’s old caretaker cottage … ?”

  “That’s right,” said Mitch, pulling his eyes away from the waterfall, which he found positively hypnotic. “And I’m writing an article about what happened. I’d like to know more about Tal Bliss. I understand you two were close.”

  “Knew him his whole life,” she confirmed, her eyes misting over.

  “What sort of a kid was he? Can you describe him for me?”

  “I can do you one better than that, Mr. Berger. I can show you.”

  “Do you mind if I tape our conversation?” Mitch had brought along the microcassette recorder that he used for the interviews he occasionally did with directors and stars.

  “Hell, no. I got nothing to be ashamed of. Take a seat, stay awhile.”

  There were two rockers out on the porch. He sat in one while she hobbled inside, her cane thumping on the wooden flooring. He set the recorder on the table between the two rockers and flicked it on. She came thumping back a moment later, balancing a tray on one arm. There was a plate of homemade oatmeal cookies on it, two glasses of milk and an old, slim high school yearbook.

  “Can I help you with that?” Mitch offered, climbing to his feet.

  “You stay right where you are,” she commanded him. “I don’t keep doing things for myself I’ll end up in a wheelchair over at Essex Meadows, sitting in a puddle of my own urine and not even minding.” She managed to set the tray down without spilling any of the milk. She sat in the rocker next to him with a heavy grunt. She opened the yearbook.

  Mitch sampled a cookie. It was chewy. It was good. It was very good.

  “Don’t be bashful, son,” Sheila said, urging another one on him.

  The front page of the yearbook proudly noted that the Dorset Fighting Pilgrims were the 1967 Shoreline Champs, although it did not say of what. “There is pleasure in doing,” was the senior class motto. Sheila began leafing her way through page after page of group photographs, her hands knobby and misshapen. They were photos of neat, well-groomed teenaged girls and sturdy, shorthaired boys, all of them smiling, all of them white. It was a Wonder Bread world that bore no resemblance whatsoever to the roiling, multicultural city that Mitch had grown up in. It was a world as alien to him as Sheila’s rural childhood of dirt roads and one-room schoolhouses.

  “That whole bunch is in here somewhere,” the old woman murmured absently. “All except for Redfield, who graduated two years ahead of Dolly. The ambassador and Mrs. Peck tried to enroll her at Miss Porter’s up in Farmington. She didn’t care for it, though. Came back home after one year. Girl’s not happy if she strays too far from the nest. Neither is Bud. They’re two of a kind that way … Ahhh, here they are,” she exclaimed, handing the open book over to Mitch.

  There they were, all right, frozen in time for their senior class pictures. There was Dolly Peck, just as Mitch had imagined her—a slender, pretty girl with a nice smile. There was Bud Havenhurst, with his thrusting jaw and air of WASP superiority. And broad-shouldered Tal Bliss, wearing the same crewcut he went to his grave with. And Tuck Weems, who sported slicked-back hair and a somewhat mocking grin. They were all there, alongside thumbnail profiles of their campus accomplishments, complete with inside jokes:

  Dolores Sedgewick Peck (Dolly) … “Oh sure!” Prom Queen. Senior class vice president. Varsity field hockey. Civics club. “You’re not going to beleeeve this … !” Most Gullible. Peanuttiest. Pet Peeve: Dislikes grouchy people.

  Kinsley Twining Havenhurst (Bud) … “Hey, boy!” Prom King. Senior class president. “Guys, who put the mouse in my briefcase?” Chess club. Debating society. Varsity tennis. Most Likely To Succeed. “Seriously, guys …” Yale bound.

  Talmadge Huffman Bliss (Tal) … “Help you across the street, ma’am?” Dudley Do-Right. Never seen without Tuck. Co-captain, basketball varsity. All Shoreline, junior and senior years. Most Courteous. Eagle scout. Vietnam bound.

  Tucker Adair Weems (Tuck) … “What are YOU looking at?” Dudley Do-Wrong. Never seen without Tal. Captain, baseball varsity. Co-captain, basketball varsity. All Shoreline, junior and senior years. Best Excuse Maker. “Who said you could sit on my GTO?” Vietnam bound.

  Mitch helped himself to another cookie and a sip of milk. “I hadn’t realized that Tal Bliss and Tuck Weems were such close friends,” he observed, leafing his way through the yearbook to the varsity basketball team. There they stood, shoulder to shoulder with their teammates in their Pilgrims jerseys, looking strapping and confident.

  “Oh, sure, those two were like Mutt and Jeff when they were growing up,” Sheila recalled, rocking back and forth in her chair. “Two sides of the same coin—one good, one bad. Although Tuck wasn’t really, truly bad. Just wild. Had a troubled home life. Alcoholic mother, abusive father. He hated them both. Loved his fast cars and his nasty reputation.” She gazed out at the waterfall for a moment. “The girls went crazy over Tuck. Why, he could charm them right out of their knickers without so much as a wink. Poor Tal, he was always the shy one.”

  “Did the two of them stay good friends through the years?”

  “Yessir, they did,” Sheila replied, nodding. “Never did let Dolly come between them.”

  Mitch gazed at the old woman intently. “What about Dolly?”

  “Now that one is an interesting story,” she replied, munching on a cookie. “You see, from day one Dolly’s socially correct beau was always Bud Havenhurst.” Sheila’s voice dripped with scorn at the mention of his name. “Her folks liked Bud. Bud was the ‘right’ sort. Decent and upstanding. You ask me, he was about as thrilling as a bowl of my warm tapioca pudding—”

  “Wait, you make your own tapioca pudding?”

  “Been known to,” she said, her eyes twinkling at him with amusement. “Why, do you like tapioca, Mr. Berger?”

  “Like isn’t a strong enough word for it,” replied Mitch, who was drooling just at the thought of it. “But I interrupted you. You were telling me about Bud.”

  “A weasel from the word go,” she stated firmly. “I never have trusted him with my personal affairs—and I don’t care where he went to law school. Young Dolly, she liked him well enough. But she was mad for Tuck Weems. Crazy in love. Tuck was everything Bud wasn’t. He was the son of hired help. He was rude. He was greasy. He was Dolly’s walk on the wild side.”

  “And how did Tuck feel about her?”

  “Couldn’t be bothered with her,” Sheila replied. “Not when most every other girl in town would do whatever he asked, if you understand what I’m saying. A few married women, too, or so it was said. Dolly just wasn’t his type. Too proper. But Doll
y would not take no for an answer. This was a girl who was used to getting her way. She chased after him shamelessly. And made Bud insane with jealousy. Some said Tuck went to Vietnam just to get away from that girl. Not me, though. It was to get away from his folks.” Sheila broke off, her face darkening. “After they died, he became much more sullen and withdrawn. The war may have had a little something to do with that, too. And the drugs. He used them heavily, I’m told. Lived up at the lake. Went his own way. Dolly, she settled down with Bud. And eventually she talked Tuck into coming back to work out on Big Sister, which folks in town thought was real kind of her. And maybe Tuck did have some feelings for her after all. Tal did mention to me that Tuck was none too happy about the way Niles Seymour was treating her.”

  “I wouldn’t expect Tal was too pleased about it either.”

  Sheila eyed Mitch shrewdly. “You’re right, of course. A crying shame if you ask me. That poor man could have made some nice girl a good husband. He would have been a fine father. He just loved kids to death. But no, he just hung on and waited for Dolly. And waited and waited.”

  “She’s a pretty special lady.”

  Sheila glanced at him in surprise. “Do you really think so?”

  “Don’t you?”

  “Don’t take my word for anything, Mr. Berger. I’m just a buggy old woman. But do take a good look at the evil that has happened around that woman. Look at how many lives have been ruined. Ask yourself how that happens. Ask yourself why.”

  “I’ve been asking myself a lot of things lately,” Mitch confessed. “What I don’t seem to have are many answers.”

  Mitch did have a theory of sorts—that the resident trooper had flown into a jealous rage when he found out that Niles Seymour was two-timing his beloved Dolly with Torry. Possibly, he had confronted Seymour over it. Possibly, a fight had broken out that led to Bliss using a gun on him. Possibly, Bliss had then eliminated Torry so she wouldn’t start asking questions around town. This would explain why Seymour was buried on Big Sister Island while she was murdered at the Laurel Brook Reservoir in Meriden. Bliss may have lured her there with the promise of a message from Seymour. Then, to cover his tracks, he had made it look like the two of them had run away together—the Dear John letter, airline reservations and so on. That much added up.

  But the murder of Tuck Weems did not. Mitch hadn’t the slightest idea why Tal Bliss had lured his best friend down to the beach in the rain and shot him. No one did.

  “I still can’t believe Tal did it,” Sheila spoke up suddenly. “I guess I can’t accept it either, because he was such a good, caring man. He drove me to church every Sunday. Picked up my groceries for me. Fixed things around the place. Never asked if they needed doing. Just did them. He was also, and I don’t mean this in a negative way, not very imaginative. He was more what you’d a call a point A to point B sort of a fellow. I think that’s why he enjoyed spending so much time in the kitchen. He had his instructions all laid out in front of him and as long as he followed them, step by step, something good would come out of it. Something that would make other people happy. What I mean to say is …” Sheila paused, considering her next words carefully. “I don’t believe Tal could have dreamt this whole scheme up all by himself.”

  “Are you suggesting that he and Tuck might have been in on it together”

  Sheila beat a hasty retreat. “Oh, I wouldn’t know about that. And I am not one to speculate about the dead. It’s just that Tal got to be like family to me. I like to think I knew him. And one thing he would never do was court trouble. Or run from it, either. If he did wrong, he’d take his punishment like a man.”

  Mitch leaned forward in his rocker now, studying her. “You don’t believe he committed suicide either. You think someone shot him and made it look like a suicide.”

  Sheila Enman didn’t respond to this. Just let it slide on by, rocking back and forth on her porch in front of the waterfall.

  “Mrs. Enman, Tuck Weems was already dead and gone when Tal Bliss shot himself. If it wasn’t suicide, if Tal was murdered, then that means a third person was in on it with them. Someone who’s still walking around. Who, Mrs. Enman?”

  She didn’t seem to be hearing Mitch anymore. She was lost in her grief.

  “Mrs. Enman?!”

  “Mercy,” she finally said in a reedy, faraway voice. “Who will shovel my driveway for me now?”

  CHAPTER 16

  “TAL BLISS WAS MY first,” Des announced as they rocketed down Rimmon Road in Bella’s Jeep Wrangler, empty pet cages rattling around in back. It was dusk—dinner hour at the A & P Dumpsters on Amity Road. “I never killed someone before.”

  “You didn’t kill this one,” insisted Bella, her round double chin practically resting on top of the steering wheel as she drove. “It was his own doing.”

  “If I hadn’t gone to see that man, he’d still be alive today.”

  “You don’t know that, Desiree.”

  “Yes, I do,” Des said somberly. “I do know that.”

  “Sweetheart, you must not hold yourself responsible for what he did,” Bella said scoldingly. “You’ll make yourself meshugah.”

  “What’s meshugah mean?”

  “Crazy.”

  “I heard that.” Des nodded to herself. “Yes, indeed—in Dolby Sound.”

  She had spent an entire day and night in the Internal Affairs building next door to Major Crimes being grilled by a lieutenant from Hartford who she did not know. The man was not hostile. The man was not sympathetic. The man simply wanted the facts. He had already spoken with Soave who, in spite of the unwritten code, had made virtually no attempt to help cover Des’s bootay. Not that she had expected him to. Not after the way he’d sold her out once already … “Why did you keep your sergeant out of the loop?” the I.A. lieutenant wanted to know. “There was time pressure,” she replied, leaving it at that. She was not going to whine to I.A. that she didn’t trust him. “These things happen in the heat of an investigation.” But the man clearly did not feel right about this. Nor did he like that she had failed to go through I.A. channels before looking into the personal medical history of a fellow officer. “But I didn’t search his medical file,” Des objected. “And I didn’t know before the fact that I’d find his name on that pharmacist’s list. How could I know that? I simply asked him about it, that’s all. I asked him about a lot of things. How was I supposed to know he’d blow his brains out? Man, I was just doing my damned job.”

  Except they were not going to let her do that job anymore. Not for a while, anyway. She was on the shelf, pending the findings of an official Department of Public Safety review panel. Or at least that was the formal way of putting it. Here was how the Deacon put it when he gave her the news, his voice low and solemn: “This case has generated too much heat, Desiree. The superintendent doesn’t want you within ten miles of it until it’s good and cooled down.”

  Translation: They were paying her to go away.

  Soave could not quite manage to look her in the eye when she came back to the Jungle to gather up her things. No one could. Not big brother Angelo, not Captain Polito, not Gianfrido, Polito’s hand-picked boy from Waterbury. No one had a comforting or encouraging word to say to her. No one had a thing to say to her. It was as if she had ceased to exist.

  The last thing Des did before she cleared out was take down the CATGIRL FROM HELL sign from her cubicle.

  There had been television reporters waiting outside her house. She had brushed past them without a word, locked her door, closed her shutters. Thwarted, they had tried interviewing her neighbors. A huge mistake, because Bella had been only too glad to hold forth for them: “Why don’t you goddamned vultures cover the news for a change?” she demanded at the top of her lungs. “Our public schools are crumbling. Affordable health care is a fantasy. And all you’re interested in is destroying decent people’s lives!”

  They cleared out right after that.

  God, Des wished she had that woman’s chutzpah.

/>   She had spent this, her first full day of forced leave, getting physical. She ran three miles. Did two circuits with twenty-pound dumbbells on the pressing bench in her guest room. Mowed the lawn, pruned bushes, weeded beds, raked. She vacuumed the entire house. Cat hair, mostly. She got down on her hands and knees and scrubbed the kitchen floor. But it was no use—she remained profoundly shaken. Counseling had been offered to her. She had declined it. She had her own form of therapy.

  “What did your father have to say about all of this?” Bella honked at the slow-going Toyota in front of them. The traffic on Rimmon was sluggish, folks heading out for the evening.

  “Almost nothing.”

  “You don’t sound surprised.”

  “Only because I’m not.” In the world according to the Deacon, no special allowances were made for family. He would not intercede. He would not play favorites. “All he wanted to know was whether I went by the book.”

  “Did you?”

  “Bella, they can spin it any damned way they want. They have the benefit of twenty-twenty rearview vision.” She would get her job back, she felt sure. They couldn’t fire her over this. But from now on, there would be an asterisk next to her name. The fast track would be muddy. She was tainted now. Damaged goods.

  “Screw ’em,” Bella fumed. “If I were you, I’d quit.”

  “And do what?”

  “Whatever makes you happy. You’re young, you’re bright, you’re gorgeous—what do you need those bastards for?”

  “And do what?” Des repeated, even though she knew perfectly well what. Except that it was simply not in her nature to walk away from a fight. She was not a quitter. Never had been. “Do you know what I’m saying?”