Sleuthing Women

by Lois Winston

  Opie cleared his throat. “Um, ma’am, if you’re feeling up to it, we have a few questions we need to ask you about the events that occurred tonight.”

  “Okay.” I shivered a little and sank back into the pillows. Someone had jacked up the air conditioning and the cubicle was as cold as Montauk in December. Mom hurried to cover me with a white blanket that was as thin as tissue paper. “But first, I want to hear about Pugsley,” I said stubbornly. “How did you get him past security? And where are we, by the way?”

  “Cypress Grove Memorial. The emergency room. We didn’t have to sneak Pugsley in here,” Mom said confidentially. “I said he was a helper dog. They have to allow them in public places, you know. It’s a federal law. I said we’d left his harness and identification back in the apartment in all the confusion.”

  Twenty-two pound Pugsley a helper dog?

  “But he’s not a helper dog.” I glanced over Mom’s shoulder and saw Opie rolling his eyes, obviously eager to get on with the Q and A.

  “Yes, dear, but he’s not going to tell them that, is he?”

  “What exactly do you remember about the events that transpired?” Opie whipped out his notebook, ballpoint poised. I remember Rafe introducing him as Officer Duane Brown, but he’d always be Opie to me.

  “Not very much.” I reached up and touched a sore spot on the back of my head and winced. “I hit my head,” I said slowly, “because it was so dark in the apartment.”

  I saw Lark and Mom exchange a look. Wrong answer. Funny how fuzzy my mind had become. My brain felt like it was stuffed with wet Kleenex and my thoughts were skittering in all directions. It was hard to focus. Maybe I really did have a concussion.

  “You’re saying you tripped in the dark?” Opie raised his sandy eyebrows.

  “No, wait, I remember now!” I said, sitting up straight in bed. “The door was open, and the apartment was very dark. I was trying to figure it all out when somebody came barreling out of my bedroom. He was dressed in black, I think, and he pushed me against the wall and clobbered me.” My heart beat a little faster, just remembering the scene.

  Opie was dutifully writing this all down when a nurse came in to take my vitals. A cell phone jangled and out of the corner of my eye, I saw Rafe slip out into the hall.

  “Can we bring her home now?” Mom asked the nurse. “It’s been a long night.”

  “We’re waiting for the results of the CAT scan, the doctor will be in soon.” The nurse stifled a yawn before vanishing through the curtain.

  Opie was chafing at the bit, eager to get back to his questioning. “So the intruder in your apartment was definitely a male?”

  “I couldn’t tell.” I squinted my eyes and tried to recall the menacing figure. I had no idea if it was a man or a woman. My heart was in my throat at the time.

  “You said ‘he,’’ Opie pointed out. He looked pleased with himself as if he had made a deduction worthy of Hercule Poirot.

  “I guess I just assumed it was a guy,” I said, trying to focus. “He was about five ten or eleven, and really strong. I remember that because he sort of picked me up and slammed me against the wall. And then he hit me with something, I don’t know what.”

  “Oh my poor baby,” Mom moaned.

  “What happened next?”

  I shook my head. “That’s all I remember. Until now.” I paused and looked over at Mom and Lark. “You put me in the ambulance,” I said smiling, “we were talking about Rinaldo shooting Marco in the head.”

  “A shooting?” Opie asked, puzzled. “When did that happen?”

  Mom quickly explained the complex plots points of Stolen Passions and Opie listened politely, eyes glazed. I looked over at Lark and grinned. We both knew that once Mom got started talking about her soap career, she would be good for hours. I sighed and put my head back on the pillow. Maybe there was time for a quick nap before Rafe came back.

  ~*~

  “I can’t believe they don’t have any suspects,” Mom said a couple of hours later. It was after midnight, and I’d been discharged from the hospital in record time, with a few Ibuprofen and a copy of my CAT scan. My instructions were to relax, drink plenty of fluids and call my own doctor later that day. I thought longingly about slipping into bed, but Mom insisted on making me a cup of herbal tea, a vile concoction laced with sassafras root.

  “They think it’s just a break-in,” Lark said, “maybe neighborhood kids looking for money or something to pawn.”

  I thought of the powerful figure in black. This was no neighborhood teen. Whoever was in the apartment wanted something, but what?

  “Was anything taken?” I looked around the living room. Everything looked fine.

  “The silver candlesticks are gone.” Lark gestured to the distressed oak mantelpiece over the fireplace. It was completely bare except for a wilting fern in a ceramic pot.

  Oops, somehow I’d missed that. I’d picked up a pair of candlesticks at an estate auction a couple of months ago. They were British and very nice, but they had a few dents and weren’t really that expensive. Which made me doubt the theory on it being just a botched robbery.

  “Why would anyone break in and just take a pair of candlesticks? There are a few other things here that are more valuable,” I said. “Cameras, jewelry...”

  I suddenly remembered my jewelry box in the bedroom. I’m not into baubles but I do have a nice set of pearls and an antique cameo that I’d hate to lose.

  Lark must have read my mind, because she said, “Relax, he didn’t take anything from the bedroom. Maybe he just ran in there to hide when you opened the door.” She paused. “He did knock over a few files, though. Did you have anything important in there? There was a whole stack of papers lying on the floor by your briefcase. It looked like he might have been going through them, or he maybe he just tripped over them when he ran out. The cops aren’t sure.”

  “Any fingerprints?”

  Lark shook her head. “They didn’t say anything. I know they dusted for them.” She thought for a moment. “You’re sure there wasn’t anything important inside your briefcase?”

  “I’m positive. Just some show ideas. Certainly nothing worth stealing.” My head was throbbing and I popped a couple more ibuprofen, but I might as well have scarfed down some M & M’s. I was already regretting my trip to the hospital. It would have made more sense to go to the local drugstore and buy a bottle of Advil.

  Plus Rafe had never re-appeared and Opie had finished his questions just as the doctor turned up to sign my discharge papers. All in all, it had been a wasted evening. I could only hope that my health insurance covered the cost of the ambulance ride and the ER visit.

  I decided to call it a night, ignored the open briefcase and the tangle of papers fanned out on the floor and fell into bed. Everything could wait till morning. Just before drifting off to sleep, I remembered that I’d never called Professor Abramson, my prospective show guest. I’d have to make my apologies in a few hours.

  SEVENTEEN

  “Land sakes, you look a mess, girl,” Vera Mae greeted me when I zipped into WYME that afternoon. “You’re so pale you could be one of those Goth chicks, you know, the ones with the black lipstick and the body piercings? It looks like you’ve already got the black eye shadow thingy goin’ on.” She leaned over to peer at me. “Upper and lower, I’d say.”

  “Thanks,” I said drily. I glanced in the mirror. I was dead white, with the same ghostly pallor Helena Bonham Carter sported in Sweeney Todd. Except on her it looked sexy.

  “How’re you feeling?”

  “Like I’ve gone three rounds with Mike Tyson,” I moaned. A wave of dizziness came over me and I sat down abruptly in the reception area, wishing I could bag the show and go back to bed. I felt like my head was stuck in a vise. “So what’s on the agenda for today?”

  “You are sweetie, you’re the big news,” Vera Mae said, showing me the call book. “There’s a lot of buzz about the break-in and your fans want to make sure you’re okay. The phones
have been ringing off the hook, and I thought Irina was going to have a psychotic break.”

  Then she handed me the spot log, which lists all the commercials scheduled for my time slot that day. “I asked Big Jim to tape the live ones for you, and the rest are already in the can. I didn’t think you’d feel like messin’ around reading cemetery ads or plugs for Dora’s House of Beauty.”

  “Thanks, Vera Mae, you are so right. I don’t know what I’d do without you. Don’t ever leave this place, okay?” I stifled a low moan. My head felt like a trick cigar, it was threatening to explode at any moment.

  Vera Mae grinned. “Don’t worry, honey. I’d never leave WYME. I’m a lifer.”

  I’d already called in my apologies to Professor Abramson, who wasn’t the least miffed with me about the missed phone interview. Tossing around the words “blunt force head trauma” garners one a lot of sympathy, I’d discovered. We decided to go ahead with the show on Jungian archetypes without any preparation. I could only hope that he’d be mildly entertaining in person and that we’d get some interesting questions and comments from the listeners.

  “So did they get him?” Vera Mae asked a few minutes later in the break room. She poured me a cup of hazelnut coffee, and we decided to go over a print-out of some of some of the listener e-mails. She pushed a box of Dunkin’ Donuts at me and I ate half a powdered old-fashioned.

  And then I ate the other half. Plus a jelly donut. A bear claw was calling to me, but I managed to ignore its sugary little voice. Who says I have no self-control?

  “Afraid not. I couldn’t give much of a description and one of my neighbors saw a car parked outside, but who knows? They may never figure out who did it.” I went for a sugar cube and then poured a packet of Splenda into my coffee instead. Two donuts versus a packet of Splenda. If you do the math, it doesn’t make any sense at all. “And the more interesting question is not who, but why? God knows there’s nothing in my condo worth stealing.”

  “But maybe he didn’t know that,” Vera Mae said, resting her chin on her hands. “It was a he, right?”

  I nodded. “I think so. Or it might have been a very strong woman. Someone tall with a powerful body build.” I shuddering, remembering how the intruder had picked me up like a rag doll and tossed me against the wall.

  “Well, the station is going to follow this closely. They’re doing hourly updates.”

  “But there’s nothing new to report. I haven’t even talked to the police today.” I’d been idly thinking about calling Rafe Martino and decided to wait another day. If he had any news he would have gotten in touch with me. And I didn’t want to get stuck shooting the breeze with Opie who was probably better at hooking marlins than solving neighborhood robberies.

  “This is Cypress Grove, honey. The break-in will be the talk of the town, trust me.”

  I’d called Vera Mae earlier that morning to fill her in on most of the details of the break-in. She’d told me the latest buzz. Cyrus wanted to feature the break-in as a Crime Watch Exclusive, “Talk Show Host Mugged and Robbed in Her Own Apartment!” I thought it was over the top, but he thought that my loyal viewers would be fascinated by the case and it would boost the ratings.

  The reaction among the rest of the staff had been mixed. Big Jim Wilcox had given me a speculative look as I checked my mailbox, probably wondering if I had master-minded the break-in as a publicity stunt.

  Twyla in Human Resources told me that if the break-in was related to my work at WYME, the station would consider picking up my medical bills. Since I had no idea who had hit me on the head, or why, I didn’t expect to collect on her offer.

  Irina shyly handed me a bunch of violets and a card when I walked past her desk. It read: “I was deluged to hear you were hit on head. Your faithful friend, Irina.”

  “Deluged? What do you think she means?” I asked Vera Mae, who read the note and giggled.

  “Devastated? Or desolated? Something like that. Her heart’s in the right place even if her English isn’t up to par.”

  I picked through the phone messages. Nick Harrison, my reporter pal at the Cypress Grove Gazette, had called a few times. I zipped into my cubby-hole/office to call him back and he told me he was already writing a front page piece about the story.

  I scrambled in my briefcase while we chatted, trying to find my Day Planner. No luck. It was probably buried under the mountain of papers on the desk and stacked up against the wall. The office was a mess, but here’s my defense.

  Being a radio talk show host—even in a small town like Cypress Grove–puts you on the radar screen of every publicist in south Florida. I get a ton of press kits and promotional materials every single day. I gave up on the day planner and tuned my attention back in to Nick.

  “And it’s going to appear above the fold,” he was saying excitedly. Above the fold? Apparently getting thwacked on the head was big news in my small Florida town. Nick said he’d already talked to Rafe Martino and was told there weren’t any hot leads in the case. I guess the cops hadn’t found fingerprints and or any other “trace evidence” as Mom would say.

  The cops had sent Lark’s bottle of “calming essence” to a testing lab, but the results were inconclusive. They decided to send it to another lab in Miami for analysis. The cause of death was also inconclusive. Did Sanjay die of a head injury? Or did he die from ingesting something?

  A lot of uncertainties, but one thing was sure. The bottom line is that Lark was still the key suspect. The only suspect.

  Nick mentioned AP was interested in doing a piece on the break-in, but only if it was done by a “crazed former patient” or a “crazed listener.” Hmmm. That limited the field, somewhat. He insisted I scribble down the contact number for AP.

  A few minutes later, I left a message with the AP stringer explaining that I had no idea if the intruder was crazed or not, and I never heard back from him. Apparently, the story didn’t have the legs to hit the national media without a psycho element attached to it.

  The afternoon went rolling along. Vera Mae had announced a last minute schedule change. At Cyrus’s insistence, we were doing a surprise show on “It’s a Jungle Out There: Hanging Tough in a Dangerous World.” It was obvious Cyrus wanted to capitalize on the break-in any way he could. As Cyrus says, “It’s all about the numbers, baby.”

  So Vera Mae had run promos throughout the morning, inviting my listeners to call in with safety tips and home security products. It turned out to be a popular topic and a lot of women asked me why I didn’t carry pepper spray or a Taser gun.

  “You could have Tased him, sistah!” the first caller told me.

  “Um, right,” I agreed weakly. Except I don’t own a Taser gun and I doubt I’d have the guts to actually zap someone with one.

  The next caller said I should have used something more lethal, like a Beretta. And someone else swore by a Glock.

  I had the sneaky feeling that my listeners thought I’d been way too passive in the attack on my home and property. Maybe they’ve never been thwacked over the head in the dark, completely taken by surprise. At the end of the first hour, I was beginning to feel like a wuss.

  “You should have gotten one of those cell-phone stun guns,” Wanda from Boca said.

  “Never heard of them,” I admitted.

  “Honey, you just whip out your cell phone, pretend you’re making a call and zap a guy like a bug. Nine hundred thousand volts and wham! He’ll be crying like a baby.”

  “It has a built-in flashlight, and it comes in pink,” Vera Mae offered helpfully. “It fits nicely in a fanny pack.”

  “You have a cell-phone stun gun?” I asked her at the break.

  “I saw one in Soldier of Fortune.” There was a touch of defensiveness in her tone. “Not that I wouldn’t hesitate to buy one. I’m a sucker for gadgets.”

  I sipped my coffee as we went live again. It was obvious I was way behind the curve on the hottest trends in weapons.

  Marlene from north Hollywood explained the concept of �
��pistol purses” to me. Pistol purses are leather shoulder bags with compartments for sunglasses, cell phone and oh yeah, your trusty .9 mm Glock. It’s the latest in “don’t-leave-home-without-it” personal safety devices.

  The hour was winding down when Gina, who refused to give her city, described a Stinger .22 one-shot handgun that folds in the middle to create a revolver. It’s practically the size of a pocket comb when it’s folded up. Yowsers.

  Who knew? Even Vera Mae’s eyes widened at that one.

  “They’ve all been watching too many Bronson movies,” I said, slipping off my headphones at the end of my shift. “It sounds like half of Cypress Grove is packing heat. And the other half would like to.”

  “Well, I really enjoyed the show, except I have my doubts about that one-shot gun,” she said idly. “What if you don’t get him on the first try? Then you’d have created a real problem for yourself.” She scooped up the afternoon logs and headed for the billing department where the logs would be recorded and the sponsors would be billed for their spots. “When the chips are down, give me a .38 anytime,” she added over her shoulder.

  “A .38?”

  She nodded. “You bet. No mess, no fuss. Two in the head and you know he’s dead.”

  ~*~

  I spent the rest of the afternoon finishing up some paperwork at the station, and it was nearly six-thirty when I decided to call it a day. The sun was low in the sky, but the warm air was still rising off the blacktop, and the whole scene seemed to shimmer in the summer heat.

  I opened the door to my red Honda Civic, wincing as my fingers touched the white-hot metal handle. I tossed my briefcase on the front seat and hesitated as a blast of hot air rushed out. It was like a broiler-oven in there.

  I waited a couple of minutes, then groped around under the seats to see if the Day Planner had ended up there. No luck. It had to be back at the apartment or the office, those were the only two possibilities. Finally, I gave up the search and drove to Charlie Chan’s for take-out with the AC cranked up as far as it would go.