Sleuthing Women II

by Lois Winston

  Turning to Mike, he barked, “For a few days, there will be a uniform on the premises night and day, with access to the interior as needed.”

  There went privacy! And peace of mind. But Mike was part of the system and he simply nodded.

  Conroy went on, “After that we’ll have a plainclothesman for a couple days. That’s all the budget will stand. In fact, it’s stretching it just because it’s you.” He stared at Mike, as though in a challenge.

  “Meantime, we’ll be sure someone somewhere has put out an APB on Hollister and do some research, enlist the people in San Antonio and Alamo Heights. They should have reports from the Feds. You folks keep your eyes and ears out, report anything suspicious, like noises in the night. Anything.”

  He talked like he was lecturing the public, not speaking to an experienced officer. All Mike would hear in the night was that policeman on duty.

  Well, I didn’t report to Buck Conroy, and I certainly didn’t owe him anything. I spoke up. “Wait a minute, y’all. Has anyone considered that it might not be Bruce Hollister? There’s other possibilities, like that wicked Mrs. Buxton, used to be Kelly’s doctor’s nurse, and she’s the one who kidnapped me. And, Mike, you’ve surely made some enemies, though I grant you most probably aren’t the kind to be interested in a baby.”

  Conroy sputtered. I think he was indignant that I’d spoken without being called on. “Hollister is the most likely candidate.” He was it with such a positive air that I was almost convinced.

  “Yeah, but….”

  “Keisha’s right,” Mike said. “Mrs. Buxton went to jail for a long time too, but who knows why they let people out these days. And I’ll review my cases.”

  Bless him, he didn’t mention my sixth sense. Conroy would really have scoffed them.

  After what seemed like hours but wasn’t, Conroy and his minions departed, with him still blustering and issuing orders. When all was quiet in the house, Maggie and Em crept back into the living room. They wanted to know what went on, of course, but they were just in time to see their mom, still clutching Gracie, come into the room and announce,

  “I think Don Kennemer is right. The best thing is for me to take Gracie and vanish.”

  The girls stared at her in horror. Mike’s expression was less clear…until he spoke. “You’d go without me to protect you? And the girls and their schooling? Your mother? This house? I don’t think you’ve thought this through, Kelly. In fact, it’s one of the worst ideas you’ve ever had. And as a postscript, people who run spend their lives scared, hiding and moving on to be sure they aren’t found. No, we aren’t acting on fear.”

  It was time for me to leave them to what would be a cheerless and strained supper. Em ran over and hugged me like she would never let go.

  ~*~

  I had some thinking to do. How could I help them? And who did I really think was the kidnapper-in-waiting. Unusual for me, but I poured a glass of wine when I got home. José had gone on his shift, without hearing my story, so I texted him that there would be an officer at the Shandy house when he made his rounds. Then I sat in the gathering dusk and stared into space.

  A vision of Mrs. Buxton came to me. She was a stocky lady, trained nurse and probably good at it when she wanted to be. But she hadn’t wanted to be caring with Kelly and me, and when she had me in that creepy, abandoned house, she was downright cruel. And ready to kill me to make her escape. Only trouble she had was that I was smarter than she was…and I knew Kelly would be coming to get me. Even though I was the one who suggested her, I was sure she hadn’t done it and was probably still in prison. Conroy could check that easily enough.

  And someone Mike had locked up? All people who openly broke the law—a few murderers, some robbers and burglars, not the kind of people who’d think of kidnapping if they wanted revenge. I could remember one or two white-collar criminals, but I suspected they’d be so glad to get out they wouldn’t come after revenge. They’d seek vengeance the same way they went amuck—by swindling, forgery, and the like.

  Then there was Ralphie. Ralphie was the deranged serial killer that Kelly’s mom almost married. Long story, but he’d been under his mother’s thumb all his life, one of his duties being to serve tea to the ladies of her church circle. He’d killed his mother, smothered her and made it look like a natural death; then, years later, he snapped and went after the ladies he’d served all that tea to. But at the same time, he courted Kelly’s mother, Miss Cynthia, and she thought he was a fine fellow, would have married him except he realized Kelly was on to him. He tricked Kelly into going to her mom’s house by having Miss Cynthia call and say she was sick. Almost killed the both of them, but I got there in time. Ralphie was in an institution for the criminally insane, and I could check, but he was almost surely still locked up.

  All this led me to two conclusions: Bruce Hollister was our man, and I needed to do something about Miss Cynthia. We hadn’t seen her or her current companion, Otto, for the two weeks since the arrival of Clyde. She’d be worrying that she hadn’t seen her grandchildren…and she freak out when she heard about the second note. Maybe we didn’t have to tell her that part.

  FOUR

  Ah, Miss Cynthia. Where do I begin that story? She’s a case, that woman is. She moved to Texas from Chicago—you know, that place where they shoot people all the time. But she believed she was moving from safety to frightening danger. Of course, it was when the serial killer was targeting older women in our neighborhood, so I had to move in with her. I could keep anyone safe from anything—or so Kelly and Mike thought. And no one knew the killer was Ralph, the rather meek and mild man who eventually tried to start a vigilante movement.

  But the moving-in-together didn’t go well either. Things got better when I called her Miss Cynthia instead of just plain Cynthia. She worried that all my canned goods and pots and pans took up space meant for hers. I assured her I wanted to taste northern cooking, though the only thing from up north I could think of was sweet beans. Once she fried some mush for dinner and expected me to be thrilled. How did I tell her I’d been eating that all my life?

  On the other hand, I cooked grits and greens for her, and she ate like she was famished. We gradually got to be buddies, and these days I manage Miss Cynthia a lot better than her own daughter did.

  That’s probably why she called me, not Kelly, a few days after that second ransom note. She hadn’t seen Kelly, Mike or her granddaughters in two weeks, and when she called, she felt like she was getting put off. When she visited that once and unfortunately met Clyde nobody told her about the kidnapping threat, so I could see she thought it passing strange she didn’t hear from Kelly or the girls.

  “Is my daughter’s second marriage falling apart?” she asked, with emphasis on the “second.” Miss Cynthia thought Kelly should have worked harder to preserve her first marriage, no matter how many times I told her that Tim Spencer, the first husband, was a scumbag and not worth any effort. And then she disapproved mightily of Kelly and Mike living together, with the girls, before marriage. A right good Baptist she was, even if she went to the Methodist church.

  “No, no, the marriage isn’t falling apart,” I assured her, but my fingers were crossed. If someone didn’t do something pretty quick—like find Bruce Hollister—and this tension went on in that household, I wasn’t making any guarantees about what would or wouldn’t happen.

  “They’ve just got some things on their minds right now. Girls been sick, that kind of stuff. You know.” Fingers crossed again.

  “My granddaughters sick! I’ll start a pot of chicken soup this evening and take it in the morning. I wonder what else I can do?”

  I felt like I was in the soup myself. Having started this train rolling with my white lie I couldn’t see how to stop it. Best I could do was call Kelly with a soup alert and hope the on-duty policeman didn’t try to frisk Miss Cynthia. I giggled at the thought.

  Instead of going over there, I took the coward’s way and called Kelly. She’s been almost in a
trance, kind of sleep-walking, since this whole business started. When I called with the soup news, I got the first loud cussing I’d heard from her in two weeks.

  “Damn! I can’t have my mom over here wringing her hands. She’ll demand to take the girls home, which is the last thing we need.”

  “She may not,” I comforted. “She thinks you’ve all been sick, and she wouldn’t want Otto to get any germs.” We weren’t sure but we had our suspicions that Otto lived at Ms. Cynthia’s these days, for all she disproved of cohabitation before marriage.

  The Kelly I knew and loved would have laughed at that. Now, she just said, “Yeah. I got to go feed Gracie. Talk to you later.” She clicked off in my ear.

  Sure enough, Miss Cynthia arrived at just the wrong moment next morning, trailed by Otto who labored under a pot of soup. The officer on duty had just found a cigarette butt under the bushes in the back yard. Swearing it hadn’t been there the day before, he called for reinforcements to search the entire place again, as if they hadn’t jut done that.

  So Miss Cynthia found a small army of police at her daughter’s house, one of who had the nerve to stop her and demand to know who she was. All the while, he was eyeing Otto with high suspicion.

  “Chicken soup,” the lady said indignantly. “Smell it if you don’t believe me.” She lifted the lid, while Otto clutched the pot with both hands. It was probably getting heavy. I was watching out the window and saw the officer breathe deeply, go back for a second whiff, and then escort Miss Cynthia to the door where he gave some sort of secret knock they’d all developed.

  Cynthia stormed into the living room, Otto behind her, haplessly holding the pot. “Fine welcome to my daughter’s house,” she complained, her voice rising in indignation. “Tell me what’s going on, Kelly. Now!”

  Sometimes a girl cannot lie to her mother, and this was one of those times in my estimation. Bless her, Kelly stood tall, looked her mom in the eye, and said, “We’ve had two kidnapping threats against Gracie. We didn’t want you to worry. We’re handling it.”

  Miss Cynthia’s voice dropped to a low register. “Nobody’s sick?”

  Kelly shook her head. “Nobody’s sick. Except with worry.”

  “Cynthia! What do I do with the soup?” Otto was understandably tired of holding that pot. I led him into the kitchen and we set it on the stove. Then I scuttled back to the scene, leaving him to do as he wanted. He followed me, only to plop down in his favorite chair and prop his feet on the ottoman. I swear, if he’d asked for a beer, I’d have brained him.

  “Now what?” Cynthia asked, sinking down on the couch. “Who would want to harm that precious baby?”

  “We think it’s someone who wants to hurt me, He doesn’t care what happens to Gracie.” Kelly had somehow regained a lot of steel.

  Cynthia stared at her daughter a long time and then said the absolutely worst thing. “I told you, you shouldn’t get involved with all these murders.”

  Kelly bit her tongue, probably hard. At long last, she said, “What I should have done or shouldn’t doesn’t matter now. We’ve got to protect Gracie. That’s why there are all those officers outside. They’ve found evidence that maybe someone was spying on the house.”

  Cynthia hid her face in her hands. “What good does that evidence do? Clearly the person is gone.”

  Kelly sighed, and I could see she wasn’t going to explain evidence and investigation and police ways to her mom. “Will you and Otto join me and Keisha for some soup?”

  Cynthia looked at me, startled. “Oh, you’re still here.”

  “Yes, ma’am. I spend a good lot of time here these days. I got to protect my family.” She had demoted me to hired help again, but I was used to Miss Cynthia and didn’t pay no mind.

  She sniffed, clearly making me the outsider I was when she first came to town. “The police are taking care of things, as far as I can see.”

  I decided to get smug. “But they don’t have the sixth sense. I do.”

  She looked puzzled, and Kelly threw me one of those looks that said, “Now? You had to bring that up now?”

  Lunch was strained. If I wanted to make a pun, I’d say but the soup wasn’t. It was rich with potatoes and carrots and celery and onion, and the broth was so flavorful and full of chunks of wonderful chicken. I suspected the cook of putting bouillon cubes in the broth for extra flavor. One of my mom’s tricks, so I knew it well.

  Miss Cynthia did not want to let go of the kidnapping question, and I couldn’t blame her. It was all that was on anybody’s mind these days. “How long has this been going on?”

  “Two weeks,” Kelly offered no more explanation.

  “And you didn’t call your mother? I could have ... well, I could have kept Maggie and Em so you wouldn’t have to worry about them.”

  Kelly wasn’t mincing words now. “I’d have worried about them more. They could be used as hostages to get to Gracie. They understand that, and they wait inside their schools to be picked up, don’t go anywhere except school. It’s been hard on them, but they’re troupers.”

  “Terrible to put those poor dears through that.” Cynthia shook her head and made that tsk-tsk-tsk noise that only mothers can do perfectly

  Otto said nothing except to ask for another bowl of soup and a beer.

  When they finally left, and I closed the door behind them, Kelly pulled Gracie out of her crib, almost roughly, sat on the couch, her head buried in the baby’s blanket, and sobbed. Finally she looked up and asked, “Keisha? Would you be my mom? I don’t seem to be doing well with the one I have.”

  ~*~

  Conroy appeared in the late afternoon—I had stayed to work from Kelly’s house because I thought she needed me, and I guess I knew Conroy was coming.

  “We contacted the ex-wife to ask what brand of cigarette he smoked, and she said he didn’t smoke. Maybe he took it up in prison. Anyway, we did get some DNA from things she had—she sure didn’t keep much. Wanted to be rid of that dude, she really did.”

  I listened to this rant quietly. Otherwise, I’d have jammed a fist down his throat.

  “Now I need DNA from the baby.” He leaned down like he’d pick up Gracie, but Kelly swooped in.

  “Why? This baby is not related to him.”

  “She’s not?” He clearly didn’t believe her.

  Kelly gave him her icebox look. “She got her DNA from me and Mike. What did you think? His baby belongs to Sheila and Don Kennemer.” She was scornful.

  And he was flustered. “Then why would you think this guy wants to kidnap her? Why doesn’t he threaten the Kennebunks or whoever?”

  “Ask them. While you get Little Lorna’s DNA.” With that, she began to nurse Gracie.

  If I weren’t a lady, I’d tell you what he said under his breath. I was standing close enough to hear. If Kelly heard she too ignored him.

  “Jeesh!” Conroy exclaimed more loudly, staring at Kelly and Gracie. “I’m leavin’. Could you just wait a minute?”

  She didn’t say anything, He might as well have not existed as far as Kelly O’Connell was concerned. In fact, I bet that was a secret wish of hers.

  ~*~

  Most of my attention was focused on keeping Kelly and Mike and the girls on an even keel, preserving their household. I was careful not to ignore José. Most of the time when I was at Kelly’s house, he was sleeping, storing up for his night shift as Neighborhood Police Officer. He usually didn’t get home until midnight, and I’d wake up to greet him and love on him in the middle of the night. I had to give him a reason to come home instead of hanging around the station. And we’d go to breakfast together at the Grill, like always.

  Once when José and I were making love, I suddenly thought of Mike and Kelly. I bet they didn’t make love these days, and it was such a comforting act. I felt sorry for them.

  “Keisha? Everything okay?” José sat straight up.

  “With you and me? Couldn’t be better.”

  News of the kidnapping threat was definitely no
t public. In fact, it was a well-guarded secret. But Peter, owner of the Grill and our good friend, knew something was wrong. Mike, Kelly and the girls hadn’t been in there, except for a furtive dinner visit or two when Peter was gone for the day.

  He’d ask after them, and I’d say they were just busy. Everything was fine. And then Peter would give me a long look. He knew better.

  I had to make sure I wasn’t ignoring José, but I was responsible for Spencer and O’Connell Realtors. I couldn’t ignore the business. We had the phone wired to Kelly’s house, so I was really in the office very little. A sign on the office door asked folks to please call for an appointment.

  One incident upset all of us. When I opened the back door to the office building, I noticed the door had some dings and scratches I’d never seen before, but I passed it off. But the inner door to our office appeared to have been jimmied. It stood open. I squelched the urge to charge into the office shouting, and made myself back away and calmly check the doors to the other two office suites in the building. They were unscathed. I called 911, retraced my steps out the door, into the parking lot, and around the building to wait by the front door. It looked untouched, but I put my face to the glass and saw files everywhere, drawers pulled out, wastebaskets upturned.

  Two officers responded, middle-aged and a bit bored. “Lady, whoever did this is long gone.” A gruff man, bearded and bald, surveyed the chaos. “Computers are here. Anything else taken? Cash?”

  “We don’t keep any,” I said.

  “No need to call 911. No rush. Regular patrol officer could have handled this.”

  “You gonna dust for fingerprints?” I didn’t like being blown off, which was essentially what was happening.

  “Nope. Wouldn’t do any good. Like looking for a needle in a haystack. Probably some homeless guy looking for drugs or cash to buy them or booze.”

  “I don’t think you get the whole picture,” I said. Just to be deferential, I added, “Sir.” Then, “This is Kelly O’Connell’s office.”