Sleuthing Women

by Lois Winston

  What I could do was to cheer myself up and get my hair done. And wait for Jim to come home and tell me what happened.

  I realized I’d better take advantage of this opportunity with Deanna. If Jim really did lose his job, this might be the last time I could afford to come to the hair salon for a long time.

  NINE

  Q: Why does a retiree often say he doesn’t miss his job, but he misses the people he used to work with?

  A: He’s too polite to tell the whole truth.

  Deanna really performed a miracle on me that day. When I left Crimpers, not only were my highlights a little blonder—always guaranteed to lift my spirits—but Deanna had a new brand of cosmetics that she tried out on me, and when she was through, my eyes looked bluer, my skin looked rosier, and all that, combined with my newly blonde shiny hair, made me look pretty damn good. The ego boost, plus the support of good friends, had done wonders to lift my spirits.

  But when I got home and let the dogs out, I checked the home voice mail and there was no message from Jim. The afternoon wore on and he still hadn’t called.

  By five thirty, I was going a little crazy. Jenny had left a note that she would be home by six thirty, so I decided to start dinner. I needed something to do with my hands, and cooking would keep my eyes from constantly straying to the clock. And worrying about what was happening with Jim and Rhodes. I had the phone in my pocket so there was no way I would miss a call.

  I remember I had just started to wash greens for a salad when the phone finally rang.

  “Carol!” Jim said. His voice was very high, a sure sign that he was upset.

  “Where are you? What’s going on? I’ve been so worried.”

  “Carol,” Jim repeated. “Please, don’t talk. Just listen to me.There’s been a terrible accident.”

  “Accident! Jim, are you hurt?”

  “It’s not me,” Jim said. “It’s Dave. He’s dead.”

  “Dead!” I screamed into the phone. “How could he be dead?”

  “He’s dead because he’s not alive, Carol,” Jim snapped back. “How could you ask such a stupid question?”

  I forced myself not to react. Jim is upset. Shut up. Let him talk. It’s not important that he’s taking things out on you.

  I waited a beat, and then Jim continued. “When I got to the Center late this afternoon, the front door was locked and the only car in the parking lot was Dave’s. So I went around to the kitchen door and let myself in that way. At the time, I wasn’t thinking clearly, but I should have realized it was strange that the front door was locked.”

  Jim’s voice quavered. “I found Dave slumped in a chair at the kitchen table. I touched him to see if he was sick or something, and he fell onto the floor. I felt for a pulse, but there wasn’t any. It was pretty horrible.”

  “Oh, God! What did you do then?”

  “I called nine-one-one immediately. Thank God the police and the emergency squad came right away. The police are still here. They’ve been taking my statement.”

  Jim choked back a little sob. “The way they’ve been questioning me, it sounds like they think I had something to do with Dave’s death.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” I started to say. “You’d never…”

  But Jim interrupted me. “I think I need a lawyer here with me. Please, call Larry right away.” Then, for the second time that day, he hung up on me.

  I stared at the phone, willing myself not to cry. This was a nightmare. Then, I started to giggle. I just couldn’t help myself. All I could think of was, do the producers at Wake Up New England know they’re going to be minus one guest for tomorrow morning’s show?

  I forced myself to calm down and call Larry at home. Fortunately, Larry, not Claire, answered the phone and I managed to give him a fairly coherent account of what had happened. He asked me a few questions, very gently. I guess he was used to dealing with clients who don’t make a whole lot of sense.

  Larry assured me that the police’s questioning of Jim was standard procedure, since Jim was the one who had found Rhodes’s body and reported it. He also assured me that Jim was unlikely to be arrested, but that he was smart to ask for a lawyer to be present during the questioning. I gave him Jim’s cell phone number, and Larry, after repeatedly assuring me that everything would be fine, said he would contact Jim immediately. And that one of them would get back to me as soon as they knew something more.

  I felt a little better. But not much.

  I was still hanging onto the phone when Jenny came home about a half hour later. She was in a very good mood, almost like her old self. I, of course, was about to ruin that.

  “Hi, Mom,” she said, planting a kiss on my cheek. “Let me just drop my stuff upstairs and I’ll be right back to help you with supper.” Then she looked at me more closely. “Mom? Why are you holding the phone like that? Is something wrong? Did you get bad news? Is someone sick? Mom! Talk to me!”

  I moistened my lips. Deep breaths, Carol. Try not to get her upset, too.

  “Jenny, honey,” I said, “there’s been an accident. Well, actually, it’s a misunderstanding. Your father…”

  “Mom, was Daddy in an accident? Is he all right?”

  I rushed to reassure her. “No, honey. It’s not your father. Davis Rhodes has had a terrible accident. Your father called me from Rhodes’s office about half an hour ago. When Dad got to the Center for a meeting,he found Rhodes dead at his kitchen table.”

  “Poor man,” said Jenny. I wasn’t sure if she meant her father or Rhodes, not that it mattered. “He probably had a heart attack. How awful for Dad, finding him.”

  A heart attack. Of course, that must have been what happened. Why didn’t I think of that?

  “You know, you’re probably right,” I said. “But when your father found Rhodes, he called the police, and they came right away. They started questioning him, and Dad got very upset. He called and asked me to get a lawyer for him. He sounded like he thought he was going to be arrested.”

  “I’m sure Dad freaked, Mom,” Jenny said. “No wonder. Imagine going to an innocent business meeting with a client and finding him dead. Anyone would freak. Did you call Larry McGee?”

  I decided not to clarify the fact that Jim’s appointment with Rhodes was not the innocent business meeting Jenny had described. The less she knew about that, the better.

  “I called Larry right away. He said not to worry, and that questioning Dad was just standard police procedure because he found Rhodes. I hope he’s right.”

  Jenny gave me a big bear hug.

  “Mom, I know you must be worried sick, but I really think the best thing we can both do right now is to put something together for supper, so Dad will have something to eat when he gets home.”

  “Honestly, Jenny,” I said, “sometimes you remind me of my mother, thinking food can solve almost anything.” I laughed to take any sting out of my words, and then we set to work.

  About a million hours later—though it was only an hour and a half since Jim’s frantic phone call—he finally arrived home. I handed him a glass of merlot and said, “Take off your coat, sit down, and sip. Try to relax.”

  To say that Jim looked terrible would be an understatement. The man must have aged ten years since he’d left for work this morning. “This has been the worst day of my life,” he said.

  I tried not to rush him, but part of me wanted to just shake Jim and scream, “Tell me what happened! Tell me what happened!” I’ve never been a patient person. When I get a new mystery to read, I always peek at the end first. Just can’t stand the suspense. I know, I know. That’s what mysteries are supposed to be about—suspense. But this was real life and the suspense was killing me.

  “I told you on the phone how I found Dave. It was horrible. I’ve never touched a dead body before.” Jim shuddered. “Of course, at the time, I didn’t know he was dead. I thought he was just sick. But when I put my hand on his shoulder, he rolled off the chair onto the floor. I felt for a pulse, but there wasn�
��t any.” He covered his face with his hands. “Oh, God, what a day.”

  “Dad, it was a worse day for Rhodes, after all,” Jenny pointed out sensibly. “I mean, you just found him. Rhodes is the one who’s dead.”

  At first I thought Jim would snap at Jenny for her remark. But instead, he smiled for the first time since he got home. “You know, honey, you’re absolutely right. But the police kept asking me more and more questions, so I felt I needed to have a lawyer with me. They eased up when Larry got there. Both Larry and the police assured me that, in the case of a sudden death, they always question the person who finds the deceased pretty thoroughly. Oh, Jenny, you’ll get a kick out of this. One of the police who questioned me was Mark Anderson, remember him?”

  “Dad, no kidding!” Jenny exclaimed. “Of course I remember Mark. When we were in grammar school, the teachers always sat us next to each other. Guess it was easier for them to keep track of us kids if we were all in alphabetical order. He’s a policeman now? I’d completely lost track of him.”

  Before they both started going too far down memory lane, I interrupted them. I still had lots of questions that I wanted answered, and, as I have already admitted, I am not a patient person. “Jim, what kind of questions did the police ask you? Did they want to know why you were at Rhodes’s office? Did they ask what your relationship was with him?”

  “I told the police that Rhodes and I had a client relationship, Carol,” Jim answered. “He was a retirement coach, after all.”

  “But Jim,” I persisted, “did you clarify that Rhodes was your client, not the other way around?”

  “I didn’t feel it was necessary to go into details,” Jim said impatiently. “The police didn’t ask me for any clarification, and I didn’t give them any.”

  “That amounts to lying to police,” I screamed at him. “Are you crazy?”

  “Now who’s overreacting?” Jim shot back at me. Some of his old bravado was coming back. I think I liked him better when he was less sure of himself.

  “Larry says the police have to do an autopsy on Rhodes because no doctor was present to certify cause of death, but it was probably a heart attack or stroke or something like that,” Jim continued, ignoring my out- burst. “He told me to come home and not worry. Good advice for all of us, Carol.”

  I swear, I wanted to grab him by his shoulders and shake him until his teeth rattled. How can men be so stupid?

  TEN

  Q: What do you call an intelligent, good-looking, sensitive man?

  A: A rumor.

  Jim lay next to me in our dark bedroom, snoring away without a care in the world. Between his snoring and that damn retirement clock, ticking away like a time bomb, I lay there so wired and wide awake I felt like I’d drunk an entire pot of black coffee. Maybe two pots.

  I tried counting sheep. No dice.

  For some obscure reason, I remembered an old Bing Crosby song, when he promised you’d fall asleep if you counted your blessings. Bing was wrong this time. I counted a lot of blessings, and I still couldn’t fall asleep.

  I knew I was going to be bleary-eyed and the bags under my eyes were going to be suitcases in the morning if I didn’t get to sleep soon. After you reach a certain age, no amount of cover-up can mask those dark circles or puffiness.

  What I finally ended up doing to get to sleep was to count our problems. I had enough of those to choose from, God knows.

  Hmm, let’s see. In the past 12 hours Jim had been betrayed by a “client” he never really had. The “client” was set to go on a major television show and do a live interview which would probably make him a household name. Jim had no idea the interview was scheduled until I told him. It was a pretty safe bet that his boss would find out Jim had lied about his relationship with said “client.” Jim could lose his job. At the very least, Jim would lose a huge amount of credibility at the agency. So, in a desperate attempt to save his bogus “client relationship” and his job, as well as his ego, Jim went to the “client’s” office. And found his “client” dead. The police were called, and Jim lied to them.

  Did I leave anything out? Could things get worse?

  Sure, I felt sorry for Jim. But he was handling the situation all wrong, damn him. The more I thought about that, the madder I got.

  I imagined Jim coming home tomorrow night, a broken man, and confessing that he’d lost his job. Oh, that’s harsh, Carol. But, fantasies are harmless, right?

  Let’s continue. How about Jim coming home, a broken man, confessing he’s lost his job, and the police arrive on our doorstep wanting to talk to him again. Ooh, even better.

  The snoring beside me continued mercilessly. As did the ticking of that blasted clock. But so did my fantasizing.

  How about this one? Jim is questioned again and again by the police because they are suspicious of his story. It turns out that—oh, yes!— Rhodes was murdered! Oh, boy, this was getting really good now.

  Jim breaks down and confesses he’s lied. Against his lawyer’s advice, he tells the police the whole ugly story. And promptly gets himself arrested for murder, the big jerk!

  When I visit him in his jail cell, he begs me through his tears to help him. “Carol, you’re the only one who can save me now! Please, honey, help me!”

  God, I was so loving this fantasy!

  I was deciding what to wear to Jim’s arraignment when I must have fallen asleep.

  ~*~

  Jim left for the office the next morning before I had a chance to talk to him again. He was probably afraid I was going to try and talk some sense into him, and didn’t want to deal with me.

  Jenny left for school early, too. But at least we had time for a quick mother-daughter bonding session over cups of coffee and bowls of cold cereal, where we assured each other that there was really nothing to worry about, blah blah blah.

  I don’t think she believed me any more than I believed her, but at least we were there for each other. And for Jim, of course. Needless to say, I didn’t share my late-night fantasy with Jenny. She probably would have a pretty low opinion of her mother if she knew I was fantasizing about her father going to jail. And the fun of having him beg me to save him.

  I tried very hard to avoid turning on the television. I was afraid of what I might hear on the news. But finally, I couldn’t stand the suspense any longer and I clicked on the television remote. I just couldn’t help myself.

  I surfed through channels, trying to control my curiosity. Then, I gave in—well, I hadn’t really tried so hard to resist, to be honest—and there they were: Dan Smith and his co-host, Marni Barker, outside the Wake Up New England studio with hundreds of screaming fans jumping up and down behind them.

  I checked my watch. It was ten of eight. Almost time for them to cut away for the regional weather, then to local stations for a brief update. But this was also the time to give viewers a little teaser about what was coming up in the next hour on the show, to entice folks to stay tuned. Had they acknowledged Rhodes’s death? Had I missed it?

  Then I heard Marni say, “Before we get to the weather, I want to tell viewers about an exclusive story we’re following.”

  She gazed solemnly into the camera.

  “You may remember that Dr. Davis Rhodes, pioneering retirement guru for the baby boomer generation, was scheduled to be a guest on this broadcast this morning. Dr. Rhodes was going to discuss his revolutionary approach for making the best out of the third portion of life.”

  She paused dramatically.

  Dan stepped in to assist. “That’s right, Marni, and we were all looking forward to his appearance. But tragically, last night Dr. Rhodes died, under mysterious circumstances, at his office in Westfield, Connecticut. Police are investigating.”

  A picture of Rhodes, taken from the dust jacket of his book, flashed onto the screen.

  “However,” Dan continued, “we are very grateful that Sheila Carney, Dr. Rhodes’s trusted associate, has graciously agreed to be interviewed. We’ll be talking to Sheila live from he
r office at the Re-tirement Survival Center, and getting her unique perspective, both on the great Dr. Rhodes as a person and as a pioneer in his field, coming at fifteen minutes past the hour. Don’t miss it. Now, here’s the weather.”

  I pressed the mute button. I had hoped that the media would ignore Davis Rhodes’s death. Now I realized how ridiculous that idea was. In death, Rhodes was being transformed by the media into a legend. No, more than that, an icon. The New Elvis!

  I took a sip of coffee and grimaced. Ugh. Cold. Time to replenish the cup, or better yet, throw out the old stuff, which tasted like paint remover now, and make a fresh pot. Activity always soothes me and this was certainly mindless enough.

  Have I mentioned how much I love throwing out things like ketchup or shampoo bottles that have just a little bit left in the bottom? It may sound silly, but it’s one of the guilty pleasures I give myself when Jim isn’t around. He’s forever going into the recycling bin and saying, “Carol, why did you throw away this bottle of shampoo? There’s plenty left in the bottom. I’ll use it up. I’m not made of money, you know.” I just had to be sure I rinsed the bottles thoroughly when I got rid of them, so he wouldn’t catch on. Oh, how I missed those weeklong business junkets he used to take back in the eighties. It was the only time I got to clean out the refrigerator.

  I didn’t want to miss a single word of Sheila Carney’s interview, so I set the timer on the microwave for five minutes, then tossed out the old coffee and put together a fresh pot to brew. Half decaf, half regular coffee. I’ve read some studies that say decaf is healthier, and seen others which claim regular coffee and all that caffeine won’t hurt you. I figured I’d cover myself either way.

  While I was at it, I let Lucy and Ethel out for a quick run so they wouldn’t interrupt me with doggie needs, and filled their bowls with fresh water. Then, I poured steaming coffee into my favorite mug, the one that shows an elderly couple in wedding attire with a caption that reads, “Daddy always said the first fifty years are the hardest.”