by Mary Daheim
“Joe…” Judith sighed. Basically, her husband was a gentleman. But he was also a cop, and occasionally his language violated good taste. Suddenly Judith’s uneasiness spiraled upward. “Are you talking about this stuff with Mrs. Bauer?”
“Sure, I have to. I told you, we need to establish motive. Shortages in the till are hard to figure, especially if Lapchick was doctoring the bar tabs. It’s his word against Diana’s. She told me tonight that her husband, Les, knew about the pilfering, but Phil was a longtime pal running out a string of tough luck. Les was trying to get him through the latest bad patch and see if he could get his act together. At first, Diana said Phil skimmed small amounts—ten, twenty bucks a night. Then he got greedy. Last week he—”
“Joe?” There was a plaintive note in Judith’s voice. “Joe, where did you go tonight?”
“Oh. I stopped by the Bauers’ apartment. Diana hadn’t had time to clean the place, so we went out for a drink. And dinner.” Joe’s voice had dropped a notch.
“You and Woody and Diana, huh?” Judith tried to keep her tone light.
“Uh…no, Woody had to get home. Sondra had invited their neighbors over for a barbecue. I told him to go ahead, no big deal, I’d ask Diana a few questions, and we’d brainstorm tomorrow morning, first thing.”
Judith calculated. If Woody had gotten home in time to help host the Price family barbecue, he’d probably left Joe no later than six-thirty. It was now almost eleven. Joe had just arrived at Hillside Manor. It appeared that he had spent almost four hours drinking and dining with Diana Bauer.
“My,” Judith remarked through stiff lips, “you must have had quite a lengthy session with Diana.”
“Oh, you know how it is—she’s in a pretty bad place right now. Her husband’s been killed, running the business is left to her, she’s short a bartender, and the tavern is shut down indefinitely, anyway. It’s not as if she’s had an easy life.” Joe paused, and Judith heard two faint successive thuds. She imagined that he was taking off his shoes. “I’ve heard it all, but Diana’s story is a classic. Abusive father, alcoholic mother, a warped brother who got sent up for child molesting. She quit school at sixteen and married a worthless kid who wouldn’t work. Husband Number Two did drugs and beat the crap out of her. She finally settled down with Les, who gets himself killed. Not that he was any great shakes—jealous bastard, the kind who blew his stack if a customer winked at her. But all the same, she loved him.”
Joe’s voice had grown melancholy, and Judith could almost hear a piano somewhere playing an accompaniment to a husky-voiced torch singer. She thought of Joe’s first wife, Herself, who had earned a living between marriages by singing a few bars in a few bars.
“Does Diana sing?” Judith asked, her voice suddenly sharp.
“As a matter of fact, she does. Every Saturday night, she leads the customers in a sing-along.” Joe succumbed to a delayed reaction to his wife’s tone. “Hey, Jude-girl, what’s wrong? You sound pissed.”
Renie was coming down the hall, her homely hairdo damp and her face plastered with thick white cream. She arched her eyebrows at Judith, then picked up a magazine and sat in her favorite armchair. Renie pretended she wasn’t eavesdropping, but Judith knew better.
“I simply don’t understand why you’re lavishing all this attention on the Widow Bauer,” Judith said in a low voice between clenched teeth. “Lapchick killed Bauer. There’s no doubt about that. He’s been charged, right? When he gets out of the hospital, you go to the arraignment with Woody and give your testimony. What’s so complicated? Let the prosecutor make the case. I don’t see why it matters if the motive was a love triangle or offensive egg yolk on Les Bauer’s tie. The guy’s dead, and his bartender killed him. Don’t you have some other cases to solve?”
Judith’s voice—and perhaps her blood pressure—had risen. Renie grimaced as she tried to keep her nose in her magazine. At the other end of the line, Joe expressed dismay.
“Hey, I think you’re jealous! I’m too beat to be flattered. Besides, Diana is—”
“Don’t be silly,” Judith broke in, trying to lower her voice. “But you know darn well you don’t usually go around holding hands with homicide survivors.”
There was a sharp intake of breath at Joe’s end before he spoke again. “Knock it off, Jude-girl. I’m just a civil servant, trying to do my job. If you can’t find a murder of your own to solve, why not bust some old farts smuggling chess pies into the States?”
Joe had it all wrong. Judith pursed her lips and snarled into the receiver, “I’m not competing with you! I’d never do that! I don’t give a damn about solving crimes! I’m talking about you and—”
“Save it!” Joe’s usually mellow voice was savage in Judith’s ear. It was, she realized, the tone he used with hardened criminals and mass murderers. “I’m bushed, you’re unreasonable, and it’s late. I’ll talk to you when you get your ass back home.”
Joe hung up.
Judith was in a state of shock. Immobilized, she sat on the dining room chair that Renie had vacated and stared at the kitchen cupboards. Finally, she replaced the receiver, slowly and deliberately.
“Joe’s a jerk,” she declared, more in wonder than in anger. “A complete, total jerk.” As if in a daze, she walked toward Renie.
“Right, he’s a jerk. So’s Bill, every now and then. Did you see this article about how to rag your walls? It gives that textured look.” Renie shoved the magazine in front of Judith.
With an impatient hand, Judith slapped at the magazine. “Rag, schmag. Don’t try to distract me. I’m really upset.” She sat down on the edge of the sofa. “First he accuses me of trying to compete with him on a professional level. Then he chews me out for being jealous! And hangs up on me! What kind of a husband is that?”
Renie returned to perusing the article on rag-painting. “The usual kind. The occasional jerk. Remember Dan? The Jerk for All Seasons? Whither trust? Whither self-confidence? You and Joe have traveled too long on lonely roads to let some woman with a sob story upset you.” Renie smiled kindly over the top of her magazine.
But Judith refused to be soothed. Getting up, she began to pace the living room. Her bathrobe got caught on Renie’s foot. She stumbled just as the doorbell chimed.
“Who’s that at this time of night?” she breathed, regaining her balance and momentarily forgetting her wrath.
Renie remained calm. “Go find out. Do you need backup?”
Judith didn’t think so, at least not until she’d checked through the spy-hole. To her astonishment, she saw Dagmar Delacroix Chatsworth standing on the small porch. Judith opened the door.
Dagmar scooted inside, as if Gertrude’s Hounds of Hell were on her heels. “It’s that awful Lusatian!” she gasped, leaning against the wall as Judith quickly closed the door. “He’s trying to kill me!”
Judith peered again through the peephole. She saw nothing. “Was he following you?” she asked Dagmar.
Breathing heavily, Dagmar nodded, then shook her head. “I’m not sure,” she said at last. “He threatened me. Oh! I must sit down!”
Taking Dagmar’s arm, Judith led her to the sofa. “Would you like something to drink?”
Dagmar nodded again. “Brandy, please.”
But the cousins had no brandy. They could offer only scotch, rye, or soda pop. Dagmar reluctantly agreed to a bit of scotch, neat. Renie put down her magazine and strolled to the kitchen.
“What happened?” Judith asked, noting Dagmar’s pallor and trembling hands.
Dagmar had thrown a lavender summer-weight coat over her peignoir and negligee. She wore beige mules decorated with feathers. Her dyed red hair was in disarray, and without makeup, she looked old and extremely tired.
“I should never have let him in.” Dagmar sighed. “I’d been sleeping, and someone rang the chimes, repeatedly. I woke up and realized I was alone. It took a moment to…grasp reality. I’m so used to having Agnes there.” Her manner was pathetic. “I went to the front door, a
nd it was Nat Linski. He seemed humble, so I let him in. But he exploded into a rage, accusing me of ruining Mia and Ice Dreams! I denied his charges, we argued, we yelled and screamed, which brought the Kreagers on the run!” Dagmar stopped to catch her breath and accept a drink from Renie.
“Take your time,” Judith urged in a quiet voice. Her indignation had abated with Dagmar’s unexpected arrival. She would worry about Joe later, perhaps far into the night. “Coz,” she said in a small voice, “how about a teeny bit for me?”
Renie looked askance, but surrendered. “Why not?” she muttered. “Let’s all get stupid and pass out. I haven’t had the whirlies since I was twenty-two.”
Ignoring Renie, Judith turned back to Dagmar. “Why did Nat think you were ruining Mia and her ice show?”
Dagmar’s small, plump body shuddered under the layers of poplin, silk, and lace. “About a month ago, I got a lead that Mia had calcium deposits in her knees. Such a condition could end her skating career. But I hadn’t used the information in my column. I wanted to get it checked out with various medical experts first. I was considering it for my next book, in a chapter on athletes who retire early. The whole thrust of the second volume is celebrities as victims, the downside of fame. Very sympathetic stuff. But I told Nat Linski that I planned to include Mia—and he blew up! That’s when the argument started, and the next thing I knew, he was threatening me, and then Karl and Kirk and Tessa came rushing in. They all began to argue, and Nat and Kirk actually came to blows! I couldn’t stand it, and I ran away. Here.” Distractedly, she kneaded the sofa cushions. “Where else could I go at this time of night?”
Renie returned, carrying three glasses. “You mean they may still be across the courtyard, beating each other black-and-blue?”
Gratefully, Dagmar sipped her scotch. “They may be. But Nat might have followed me. He’s very big and very strong.”
“So is Karl,” Judith noted. “And Kirk’s no small thing. The Kreagers are formidable.”
Dagmar gave Judith a dark look. “Aren’t they, though? I hate them!” Her voice shivered with malice.
“But you work for them,” Renie pointed out, settling back into her armchair and sipping her rye.
“I have to work for somebody,” Dagmar retorted. “Publishers! They’re all a bunch of crooks! If I told half of what I know…” Her voice trailed off as she took another gulp of straight scotch.
“So,” Judith said in a musing tone, “the terrible thing that Nat and Mia said you knew about them was calcium deposits?” Her voice held a note of incredulity.
“Hmm-mmm.” Dagmar sagged next to Judith on the sofa. She took another drink. “Mm-mmm. That’s right. Ruinous, if colorless. Mm-mmm…”
The cousins exchanged glances. Apparently, the scotch wasn’t meshing well with the doctor’s sedatives. Or maybe it was, too well. Dagmar looked as if she were about to pass out.
“Dagmar…” Judith began, then gave up. Dagmar’s eyes were closed and the glass tumbled out of her hand. Renie caught it on the first bounce.
“Great,” Judith muttered in annoyance. “Now we’ve got a sleep-over.”
Renie stood up. “Let’s cart her off to my room. I’ve got the other twin bed. It’ll be easier than taking her downstairs.”
Judith tugged at her black-and-silver curls. “Damn. What if Karl and Tessa come looking for her?”
Renie shrugged. “We’re asleep. We’re innocent. We’re simple tourists from the States.”
Judith took a swig of scotch, then tried to prop up Dagmar. Renie came to her aid. Together, they carted their unconscious guest off to Renie’s bedroom and settled her on the extra bed.
“I hope she doesn’t snore,” Renie said, watching the irregular rise and fall of Dagmar’s coat-covered breast.
“Does Bill?” Judith inquired with a wry look.
“Not much. What about Joe?” Renie asked innocently.
Judith turned away and stomped out of the bedroom.
FOURTEEN
DAGMAR SLEPT IN. At least she was still asleep by the time the cousins had finished their homemade breakfast at eight-forty-five. The groceries they’d purchased would cover them through the morning meals before their leave-taking on Thursday. Judith and Renie managed to save just enough Canadian bacon, eggs, and bread to feed Dagmar, should she desire to eat Chez Cousines.
“Should we wake her up?” Judith asked, pouring a second cup of coffee.
Renie was in a merciful mood. “No. She’s been through a bad time. Plus, she’s had a sedative—and some straight scotch. Let her sleep. She was breathing normally when I got up.”
“Good for her.” For once, Judith’s frame of mind wasn’t as benevolent as her cousin’s. “I had a lousy night.”
“Oh? How come?” Renie was clearing the table.
But Judith still wasn’t ready to confide in Renie. “The mattress isn’t right,” she muttered.
Renie knew Judith far too well to accept a facile explanation. “Wrong, coz.” She leaned on the dining room table. “You’re out of sorts because of Joe. I’m not exactly sure why, but he ticked you off last night. You can tell me now, or you can tell me later. Either way, by the time we get home, you’ll be over it. He’ll look at you with those magic eyes, as you call them, and you’ll dissolve like jelly. You always do, just the way I melt when I see Bill’s chin. They can act like jackasses, make you swear you’ll kill them or at least consider divorce, but when it comes right down to it, whatever hooked you in the first place is still there, and it works, every time. The good part is that it’s reversible—it works with them, too, which is why we stay married.” Renie gave Judith an off-center smile.
“Stick it,” said Judith.
“Okay, for now. What about Dagmar?”
Before Judith could answer, Dagmar staggered out into the kitchen. She was holding her head and clutching her summer coat around her body.
“I feel terrible!” she exclaimed. “Do you have tea?”
Again the larder was inadequate. “Only coffee,” Judith replied. “And orange juice.”
“Juice.” Dagmar collapsed into a chair. “Why am I here? Did Nat show up?”
Renie was at the refrigerator, pouring a glass of orange juice. “Not that we know of. We went to bed right after you did.”
Dagmar shuddered. “Karl must have killed him.” She accepted the glass from Renie and drank warily. “I wish I were back in Minneapolis, writing about waiters from North Dakota!”
Judith offered to make toast, but Dagmar declined. She couldn’t eat, she insisted. Her life was a shambles. If the police would permit it, she would leave Bugler as soon as possible, fly Agnes’s body to the Twin Cities, and make funeral arrangements.
“Does Agnes have family in Minnesota?” Judith asked.
Dagmar seemed uncertain. “She wasn’t close to anyone. Except me. Agnes didn’t socialize much.” Suddenly Dagmar tensed. “Where’s Rover? Where’s my precious poopy-doo?”
“Rover?” Judith glanced at Renie, whose face was a blank. “He wasn’t with you last night. Did you leave him at the condo?”
On unsteady legs, Dagmar got up from the table. “Oh! I must find him! He ran out when I did! Rover would never abandon me in my time of need!”
“Relax,” Renie urged, putting a hand on Dagmar’s trembling arm. “I’ll look for him. I’ll start with the Kreagers.”
But Dagmar wouldn’t relinquish the task completely. “I’ll call to him. He’ll come when he hears my voice.” She leaned on Renie, who led the way to the front door.
Despite Dagmar’s shrill cries, Rover didn’t show up. Renie steered Dagmar back inside, spun her in the direction of the dining room, and headed out across the courtyard to the Kreager complex.
Dagmar sat down with a plop. “I can’t bear this!” She covered her face with her hands. “What if that awful Lusatian did something to my poor Pomeranian?”
“I thought you said Karl had killed Nat,” Judith remarked in a reasonable tone.
“What?” Dagmar peeked through her fingers. “Maybe he did. But the police would have come, wouldn’t they?”
“Probably.” Judith spoke dryly, then took pity on her guest. “Don’t upset yourself, Dagmar. Rover will show up. Where could he go?”
Dagmar’s hands fell into her lap and her eyes grew enormous. “The woods! There must be wolves and bears and mountain lions! They’ll tear my poor precious lambie-pie to pieces!”
Since Rover had almost bested Sweetums, Judith thought that the dog’s chances against wild animals would be quite good. She also doubted that there was much danger in the nearby wilds.
“It’s summer, Dagmar. The big animals are far away. They probably cleared out years ago, at the first sound of a bank card charge being approved. What with helicopters, private planes, and everybody tromping around the mountains, a couple of deer would be a novelty.”
The horror in Dagmar’s eyes abated. “Still,” she argued feebly, “it’s not like him. He never leaves my side.”
Judith offered more juice, but Dagmar shook her head in a dull fashion. “Where will you stay in Minneapolis?” Judith asked, trying to pull Dagmar out of her depression.
“Oh—I don’t know. In Edina, with Kirk Kreager, maybe. I haven’t thought about it.” Her agitated fingers traced loopy circles on the teal place mat.
“You lived in Minneapolis a long time before moving to New York,” Judith remarked. “I suppose the area has changed, like most places.”
“I suppose.” Dagmar had swiveled in the chair, leaning to one side in an attempt to see the front door. She showed no interest in her old hometown.
“It’ll be hot,” Judith said.
“What?” Dagmar didn’t turn around. “Oh, yes, certainly. Mosquitoes, too.”
“You don’t have mosquitoes in Manhattan?”
“Yes, but not like Minnesota. The lakes, you know.”