Death of a Wandering Wolf

by Julia Buckley

  Erik bent to hold my face in his warm hands. “I’m sorry, Hana. I know you can feel—vibrations and things. And that you met him and talked to him. I know it’s hard.”

  “It is. I’m sad, and I’m angry.”

  “We’ll deal with this. We’ll find this person,” he assured me.

  “But that doesn’t matter!” I said. “What matters is that poor William can’t come back.”

  Detective Wolf didn’t have an answer to that one; he patted my hand and kissed my cheek, but his eyes soon returned to the door, and to the stretcher that had just been carried into the house. A young officer was wrapping police tape all around the lawn, and neighbors were starting to gather on the sidewalk.

  “Hey, I’ll have Officer Tate there drive you back to your car, okay?”

  “Okay. Hey, Erik—who was that lady?”

  “She was here for the garage sale. She saw the sign on the door that said ‘Come on Down,’ so she went down and found him dead. She ran back up and we were there. She said she was there less than a minute. I have her information.”

  “You’d better go,” I said. “And I suppose you need this.” I lifted my purse and, with some reluctance, removed the bubble-wrapped wolf figurine.

  Erik took it, handling it with care. “Sorry, Hana. You know I’ll give it back to you.”

  He touched my cheek, then walked over to Officer Tate and spoke to him. The young man nodded at him, clearly pleased to have a job beyond putting up police tape.

  Moments later, I climbed into the back of Tate’s squad car and told him where to find my vehicle. We drove down the street and I saw a man emerging from a car that had just tucked into a spot at the curb; I realized at the last moment that it was my friend Falken Trisch, and that he had come, on my recommendation, to find treasures at a garage sale. His wide eyes met mine as I glided past in the police car. I pointed at my phone.

  Tate sped up and turned at the intersection, and I sent Falken a text: The man I told you about was murdered. It’s a long and terrible story. When I’ve recovered emotionally, you and I can have lunch.

  I put away my phone and managed to smile at the young officer in the front seat. “Thank you for the ride,” I said.

  “Of course. It sounds like you had a rough morning.” His eyes were sympathetic in the rearview mirror.

  “No, it was fine. It’s just hard to accept what happened. I don’t know how you police officers handle such—darkness. The rest of us, well . . . I guess we would just rather not see.”

  His look of sympathy remained. “It’s not always dark. Sometimes we make real connections with the people we serve. But days like today, yeah, those are tough. Is this the lot? This little diner here?”

  “Yes. My car is the blue one on the left. Thank you for the ride.”

  He parked, then turned to look at me. “Are you sure you’re okay to drive?”

  I took a deep breath and realized that I was. “Yes, thank you. I’ll be fine.” I stepped out of the car and waved as Officer Tate drove away. Then I returned to my vehicle and climbed inside. I called Katie on her cell phone, and she picked up after two rings.

  “Hey! What’s up? Don’t tell me: you went back and bought more stuff.”

  “No. But, Katie—I have bad news.”

  “What?” Her tone was sharper now, and nervous.

  “The man—the artist that we spoke to, the garage sale man—”

  “Yeah?”

  “He’s dead.”

  “What? We just left there! He was fine!”

  “Someone killed him, Katie.”

  “Oh my God! Is your boyfriend there?”

  “Yeah. The place is swarming with vehicles.”

  “Oh, wow. I’m sorry. For him, and for us. This sucks.”

  “Treasure those paintings. You were the last person to speak to the artist, to experience his warmth.”

  “Don’t cry, Hana.”

  “I’m not.” I wiped my eyes and glared out the windshield. “I’m angry now, not sad. I want Erik to find this guy and put him away forever.”

  “Yeah. It’s unbelievable. But wait—how did you happen to find out? I mean, why did you go back there?”

  I sighed. “Erik found a tracker on that Herend wolf. The one you discovered for me.”

  “A tracker?”

  “Like a GPS kind of thing. Really tiny.”

  “That’s crazy!”

  “So he drove us over there, furious, thinking the guy was trying to follow me. It turns out someone might have been tracking him. Anyway, I just wanted you to know. Because you and I were—you know. We spoke to him last, I think.”

  A silence on the other end, while Katie thought about this. “I’ll say a prayer. The good thing is, we were nice to him. We complimented him and exchanged positive words. It was like a sort of—blessing.”

  “I suppose so. I hope so. I’ll talk to you later,” I said.

  “Yeah,” Katie said. “Boy, I really feel like calling Eduardo now.”

  “Do it.”

  She didn’t say anything.

  “Katie, call him.”

  “I’ll probably hold off. Gotta go,” she said. “Hang in there. Talk to you soon.”

  She ended the call, and I started my engine. The icy rain had stopped falling, but the wind still buffeted my car, rocking it slightly, reminding me that the universe was a force outside human control.

  * * *

  At the tea house, despite the work that waited, my family pampered me. My mother gave me a hug and tucked me into a chair at one of our tables with starched white cloths. My grandmother brought me a glass of Pálinka, assuring me that it would make me feel better. I sniffed my amusement; Grandma thought Pálinka made everything better, although I’d never been a fan of the strong plum brandy. Grandma pushed it toward me. “Try,” she said. “Is different from usual. Normally we drink szatmári szilvapálinka, the plum from Szatmár, but this is a gift from Laszlo, you remember him? Is újfehértói meggypálinka, the sour cherry, made in Újfehértó.”

  I blinked at her. Sometimes I picked up on bits and pieces of meaning, but today nothing was penetrating. “What? That’s all just a bunch of Hungarian words to me, Grandma. It’s Greek to me, as they say.”

  She shook her head. “Hungarians don’t say that. Right, Magda?” She turned to my mother, who nodded.

  “Yes, that’s true. In Hungary they say Ez nekem kínai—‘It’s Chinese for me.’”

  “Whatever. The point is, it’s a foreign language. And also, the point is that I can’t understand a word Grandma says sometimes.”

  My mother and grandmother exchanged a regretful glance. “We should have taught you Hungarian,” my grandmother said with a sigh. “We thought it was better to let you and Domonkos be a part of your country, America. Our little Americans.” She sighed again, with her special blend of melodrama and melancholy, and I laughed.

  My mother sat down next to me and patted my hand. “I’m sorry you had to go through that this morning. And so soon after poor Ava died right here in the tea house.” I didn’t like to think of that event, although it had been not even two months since it happened.

  I covered her hand with my other one. “At least I didn’t—you know—find him. But just to know that he was there, alive and vibrant, and he had a future, and all this talent. Oh, I didn’t tell you—he was an artist. And he was Hungarian!”

  My grandmother, standing beside me and reading her Pálinka bottle, suddenly clutched my shoulder. “Vat?”

  “Yes, he was a Hungarian. He said he knew you—he mentioned meeting Mom at some Hungarian event, so he probably knew you both.”

  Their eyes locked over my head; a look of pure dread. “Do you know his name?” my mother asked in an odd voice.

  “Kodaly,” I said. “William Kodaly.”

  “Oh,
no!” my mother said. She pulled her hand from between mine and sat up straight. Then she clenched her hands in her lap. “Will Kodaly. Oh, Mama.”

  My grandmother nodded grimly. “Oh, the wolf, Magda. The wolf pays the price.”

  I frowned at them. “Now you’re speaking English and I still don’t know what the heck you’re saying. Why is he a wolf?”

  My mother shook her head. “He just had a reputation among the ladies. A sort of ‘love ’em and leave ’em’ kind of thing. I actually know several women who had relationships with him. He was a great boyfriend in many respects, but he didn’t tend to stick around long.”

  I turned to my grandma, who still clutched her brandy bottle and stood stiffly at my side, like a statue of herself. “What’s wrong? Did you date him?”

  She shook her head. “Bad luck, bad luck. Another Hungarian, dying on a day of ice and cold.” She muttered to herself in her native tongue for a while; I got goose bumps again.

  “Mom, make her stop,” I said. But a glance at my mother’s forearm revealed that she had goose bumps, too. “Oh, great,” I said, pointing. “You’re as psychic as she is, apparently.”

  My mother shrugged. “It’s nothing. We’re all just shocked because a man is dead, and he was a man we knew, if only peripherally. I wonder how those women are taking the news, though—the ones he dated. If they even know yet.” Her blue eyes met mine, holding a mixture of casualness and curiosity. “I suppose your boyfriend is there now?”

  “You mean Detective Wolf?”

  My mother smiled. “I mean Erik. Don’t put on your formal air with us, Hana. The boy has had dinner at our house.”

  “He’s not a boy, mother,” I said, sounding like a girl. “And, yes, he’s there. We—he—got there just minutes after it happened, I think. Maybe half an hour.”

  “How did you know to go back, if you had already left?” my mother asked. “You didn’t have a—psychic moment, did you?”

  My grandmother brightened at the thought and studied me with her canny eyes.

  “No, no. It’s a weird story. Sorry, Grandma, but it has the word ‘wolf’ in it.”

  She shrugged, dramatic again. “What doesn’t, these days?” She plopped down in the chair on the other side of me. Grandma hated wolves with a superstition that probably went back to her childhood, but she had encouraged me to date Erik, despite his unfortunate name.

  Our pastry chef, François, walked swiftly out of the kitchen at the back of the tea house, bearing a china plate with three little sandwiches and three little cakes, all of them like tiny works of art. He set it before us with a flourish and bent to look in my eyes. François was a handsome twenty-three-year-old man, and it was always a treat to receive his focused attention. I’m sure my mother and grandmother felt the same way—women of all ages responded to François’s charms. “I am sorry to hear of your trauma,” he said. “Please eat. Food heals the soul, so. Mangez bien.”

  I smiled at him. “Thank you, François. That is really sweet of you. And these sandwiches look amazing, as always.” I selected a sliced egg sandwich with red pepper shavings and a dot of paprika-sprinkled sour cream on top and popped it into my mouth. “Mmm. So good,” I said. “Mom and Grandma, join me.”

  My mother shook her head. “I know it’s been a rough morning, but we have a group arriving in two hours, and I have to make the tea. Hana, are you okay to do the table arrangements?”

  “Of course. It will calm me down.” It always soothed me, working with our decorations, trying to create the most artistic tableaus on both the buffet table and in the centerpieces. Today, despite the almost wintry weather, we were decorating with a European garden theme—a popular choice with our clients. I had created centerpieces for each table: baskets full of silk roses, along with real-looking violets, daisies, gerbera, and trailing ivy. I set this splash of color in the center of each crisp white tablecloth. Then I laid out pale blue place mats and selected one of our favorite tea sets: a Wedgewood Blue Hibiscus set that we had purchased from a restaurant that was going out of business. The cups, white with gold rims and blue and gold hibiscus flowers adorning the sides, looked striking on the tables and added elegance and old-world charm to the room.

  Once the dining tables were finished, I turned my attention to the side table. This served sometimes as a gift table (for weddings and showers); other times as a buffet table; and, in the past, as a place where my grandmother could entertain guests by reading their tea leaves. Since a tragic death in our tea house in early September, Grandma had not chosen to read leaves, and she did not plan to do it today, either.

  I scattered some loose silk flowers around the table, where I set up a variety of colorful teacups and various laminated maps of European cities. At one end I put a discreet pile of business cards—green and pink with a scalloped edge—which read “Maggie’s Tea House—Celebrate Your Event in Grand European Style!”

  My phone buzzed in my pocket. I lifted it to see a text from Erik Wolf: You okay?

  I texted back that I was fine, then saw another text, this time from Falken: Are you all right? When can we meet? I’ll treat you to some afternoon pastry at Eleanor’s.

  My mother hurried past and I said, “Mom, can I take off after I clean up the tables today? Falken wants to meet with me, I guess to ask about Mr. Kodaly.”

  She walked back toward me and touched my hair. As ever, she looked like a European doll in her tea house uniform: white blouse, black skirt, colorful embroidered apron. Her blonde hair was swept up in the elegant twist she wore to work. Only in the evening did she let it hang loose, probably because she knew that my father couldn’t resist playing with it. Her blue eyes held affection and sadness. “Are you ready to talk about it? Why not tell him maybe another time?”

  “No, it’s okay. I feel bad because I told him to come out and see what Mr. Kodaly was selling. He got there in time to find all the police cars.”

  “Oh, my.”

  I studied her face. “Kodaly was your friend, wasn’t he?”

  She shrugged. “Not exactly. I liked him, though. We always got along, when we chatted at one event or another. I should have resented him, because he hurt more than one female friend of mine, but it was hard to feel angry with him. He had a sort of—whimsical quality. So it was like trying to be angry at the wind, or at a bird, or something.”

  “I bought two of his paintings. I’ll show them to you.”

  “Oh, my. It’s still so hard to believe.”

  “Who are the friends that he dated?”

  She sighed, then pointed at me. “One was your teacher. Remember Ms. Derrien?”

  “My high school English teacher?” I gaped at her.

  “Yes. He was with her for more than a year. And then Cassandra Stone from the library.”

  “The lady who hosted that book-a-thon? She’s sort of ethereal. I could see why he’d fall for her.”

  “Yes. And I believe he was linked to more than one woman in the local Hungarian crowd. Sofia Kálmar, for one. She’s an artist, too.”

  “Oh wow. She’s a friend of yours, isn’t she? And gorgeous. He sure went for the good-looking women.”

  “Yes, well. He had an artist’s eye. I’m sure he did portraits of them all.” She paused and cleared her throat. “He painted me once.”

  “What?”

  “Our heritage group was raising money for a local food pantry. They wanted him to provide a painting for auction, and he asked if I would pose.”

  “I’ll bet it was beautiful. Did Dad bid on it?”

  She shook her head. “The bidding started at five hundred dollars. His paintings are in demand in the U.S. and even in Europe. He’s quite famous.”

  My grandmother joined us at the table. “Looks good,” she said, studying my carefully careless display.

  I pointed at my mother but spoke to Grandma. “Did you know that Will
iam Kodaly painted her for some charity thing? And that some stranger bought the painting?” I turned back to my mother. “What did it sell for, anyway?”

  She blushed slightly. “Six thousand dollars.”

  “Wow! Who bought it?”

  “I don’t know. It was an anonymous bid; they received it online. Alida Szabó was on the committee. She told me that someone’s assistant came to pick it up.”

  “When was this?”

  She shrugged. “About two years ago.”

  My grandmother looked up and nodded. “I remember. He was coming to their house every day, seating her in the backyard. Your daddy was always making excuses to go out. He had to weed the garden, he had to water the hedge, he had to spread mulch.” Both women started laughing.

  “He was jealous,” my mother said. “But William was very professional. He never did anything inappropriate. It was actually quite fun sitting for the painting, and he completed it within a week.”

  “Did you like the finished product?” I asked.

  Her face grew wistful; for a moment she looked eighteen years old. “It was lovely. Your father wanted it, but he wouldn’t say so. And when he heard how much it earned, he realized we never could have afforded it.”

  “Luckily he has the real you,” I joked.

  “That’s what I told him. He got over it quickly enough. But it was funny—your father is not the jealous type, but Will Kodaly brought that out in him. I think Will had that effect on a lot of men.”

  My grandmother stiffened slightly, then said, “I check on François.” She moved away on her flat shoes, her skirt swishing as she walked.

  My mother was still wistful. She touched my sleeve. “I would have liked to see a portrait of you, painted by Will. He was a genius, really.”

  “He told me I’d make a good subject.”

  Her eyebrows rose. “Did he?”

  “Yes. He said something about my hair. He said—it was like fire at twilight.” My eyes grew unexpectedly wet when I said these words.

  “That is poetic.” She took a lock of my hair in her hand and sifted it through her fingers. “And true.”