Jim and Beth both nodded.
“I want you to think before you answer. Is there anything to what Potter’s wife is saying?”
“Hell, no!” Jim shouted.
“I need you to calm down, Jim. Sit back and take a few breaths for me. I’m on your side. Better from me than the cops, right?”
“Yeah, OK.”
Dupree directed his next question to Beth. She was far calmer than her husband. “Beth, you said he’s been missing for a week. How do you mean, missing?”
“She means he’s gone. We work together. He never misses work. He hasn’t shown up in the last week. Something’s wrong. He never misses work.”
“Have you spoken to his wife?”
“She won’t take my calls. She blocked the number or something. I even tried calling on my boss’s phone. She answered, then hung up when she heard my voice and blocked the number without talking.”
“Do you know where he is?”
“No.” Jim looked straight into Dupree’s eyes, there was no question he was telling the truth.
“We’ll look into it.” Dupree asked for clarification, “His legal name is Michael? Middle name?”
“Allan, I think.”
“Michael Allan Potter. I will see if a missing person’s report has been filed. If not, we’ll get one started. What if Dara and I go and talk to Mrs. Potter?”
“You can do that?”
“Anybody can talk, right? We are a group of concerned friends. What can it hurt?”
“Nothing, I guess. Why would you do that?”
“Most of all because something just doesn’t seem right. Let’s see what his missus says.”
“Thanks. I really appreciate it. Especially from…” Jim reached across the table and shook hands with Dupree.
“A stranger?”
“Yeah.”
Dupree smiled broadly. “I’ve probably played hooky about long enough. I need to get back to my office.”
“What do you do?” Beth realized she knew nothing about Dupree.”
“I’m an attorney.”
“I should have known.” Beth smiled. “Nice suit.”
“Nice to meet you, folks. Let’s agree to stay positive.” Dupree stood. “There is an explanation to all this, and I bet we’ll all be surprised how simple it is.”
Dupree made his way back to the counter. “Can I have this to go, please?”
CHAPTER 13
The chill in the air hit Dupree and sent a shudder through him as he left the Quarter Moon. His pace back to his office was quicker than it was on the way there. The temperature dropped several degrees while he was in the café. He looked up at the darkening clouds. He was learning the signs of approaching storms and the difference between rain and snow clouds. This angry gathering of clouds would bring snow and lots of it.
“Whew. It’s going to be a doozy.” Dupree shook the snow from his shoulders. “You might want to think about leaving early.” He suggested to Tomi.
Dupree dove right back into work. The Peggy Grimes case was demanding his full attention. Tomi did some filing, so he could work in peace. Time seemed to suspend when he was working. He was surprised to hear his office door click.
“Your 3:00 appointment is here,” Tomi announced standing at the open door.
Dupree, being deep in thought, didn’t hear the first time she spoke. His finger was tracing the words of the counteroffer slowly and carefully.
“Sir?” Tomi said slightly louder. “Your 3:00?”
“Sorry, what?”
“Your next appointment is here.”
“Already? Please show them in.”
“This is Lenore Francine. She has a…” Tomi hesitated. “I think I’ll let her tell you why she’s here.” She smiled mischievously at Dupree.
Dupree rose from his seat and met Lenore in the middle of the room. She wore a dark dress, had stylish silver hair and a serious expression on her face. In her arms, she clutched a brass urn.
“Please, have a seat.” Dupree indicated the chair in front of his desk. “Would you like to set that on the desk?”
“No,” she retorted indicating there was no room for discussion.
“That’s fine,” Dupree replied moving to his chair.
Lenore glanced around the room. Her eyes landed on the painting of the buffalo that hung above a side table. Then she looked back at Dupree’s desk.
“Well, Mrs. Francine, what brings you in today?”
“Where’s the clock?”
“Sorry?”
“The clock. The timer, whatever it is you use to count your time to bill me. I understand you folks charge by the hour and every minute counts. I’ve never been to a lawyer before so I want to make sure I don’t get overcharged.”
“There is no clock, Mrs. Francine. This is the first consultation. There is no charge. Now, how can I help?” Dupree smiled reassuringly.
“It is Marvin, or more precisely, what has become of Marvin.” She lifted the urn slightly from her lap. “He’s not in here.”
“I see.”
“No, I don’t think you do.” Her stern facade cracked and tears ran down her cheeks.
“You’re right, I’m sorry. Did someone take Marvin’s ashes? Was Marvin your husband?”
“Yes, we were married for seventy-two years. High school sweethearts. And now he’s gone and I have nothing left.”
“So…” Dupree looked at the urn for a long moment. “When did you discover your husband’s remains were missing?”
Lenore wiped her cheek with the back of her hand. “Sorry.”
“Not at all.” Dupree offered softly.
“They’re not gone, gone. Let me explain. Since Marvin’s been gone, I have been so lonely. I miss his voice, small things, like his leaving the newspaper strewn all over the sofa. Most of all I miss the smell of him, the sweet scent when he left the room. One evening I was sitting alone on the sofa and I was losing the memory of his scent. I went to the mantel and took this down.” She once again lifted the urn from her lap. “I broke the seal, lifted the lid and smelled the remains of my dear Marvin.” She removed the lid from the urn and held it up and sniffed at its contents. “Nothing! He is not in there!” She said angrily.
Dupree thought for a long moment before he spoke. This was a sensitive situation and he must approach it with great delicacy.
“There are ashes, but not your husband’s? And you know this because…”
“It doesn’t smell like Old Spice. Marvin wore Old Spice Cologne every day for nearly seventy years. It was in his blood you might say, like an old handkerchief. Perfume doesn’t just go away, there is always a faint lingering of the scent. He practically bathed in the stuff. It had to be in his pores, in his skin, do you understand? There isn’t the slightest lingering of Marvin to these ashes. They have switched my husband for someone else!”
Lenore dramatically dropped the urn onto the desk with a thud. “I want you to sue the funeral parlor, the crematorium, and anyone else you can think of to get my Marvin back!”
“These are serious allegations. Let me do some digging, sorry, investigating, and see what I can find. Can you leave this with me for a while?”
“I can’t see that it will make any difference now. It’s not Marvin.”
“That’s good. Please leave all your contact information, the name of the funeral parlor, crematorium, and anything else pertinent to the case and I will get started right away.”
“How long will this take?”
“I will make some calls this afternoon.”
“How much will it cost do you think?”
“We bill at two hundred dollars an hour. I hope we can get this done quickly.” Dupree stood. “Tomi, can you get all of Mrs. Francine’s information for me?”
“Yes, sir.”
“She will take real good care of you. We will be in touch as soon as I find something out. Give me a couple of days though, will you?”
“Thank you, Mr. Dupree. Just get my Marv
in back.”
“We will do our best.”
The two women went back to the outer office and Dupree returned to his chair. The sound of the women’s voices murmuring from the other room combined with the sight of the urn was a bit unsettling. It was odd, he thought, how a simple brass vase could seem so ominous sitting on the edge of his desk.
Dupree shook his head and grinned. There was no way the smell of cologne could survive the flames of the cremation fire. Convincing the lonely widow was another challenge altogether.
When the door closed on the outer office a few moments later, Tomi came into Dupree’s office.
“Here’s the name and number of the funeral parlor. She didn’t know who did the actual cremation. I looked up their number for you. My impression from their webpage is they do the cremations.”
“Thanks. I might as well get this over with before we go home.” Dupree took the slip of paper and dialed the number. “Good afternoon to you as well. My name is Dupree. Yes, that’s me. Nice to meet you too, Robert. Tell me, do you folks handle cremations in-house or do you send the bodies elsewhere? You do.” Dupree chuckled. “That many. Here’s why I’m calling. My client, Lenore Francine. Yes, she is, very nice. She seems to think her husband’s ashes got mixed up with someone else’s.” He smiled up at Tomi. “OK, OK, let me make sure I got this straight. No one was cremated the month before Mr. Francine and no one was created the week after. No, it doesn’t sound like you do many cremations. Thank you, Robert! Mystery solved. No, I didn’t think it was possible. No, there is nothing to worry about.” Dupree listened for a few seconds. “I certainly will tell her. She’ll be thrilled. Yes, she is very proud of her nut bread. You too. Thanks.” Dupree set down the phone.
“Didn’t happen?” Tomi asked.
“Couldn’t have. They hardly ever do cremations. “Hey, what do you say we close this case before we knock off for the day.” Dupree reached in his pocket and pulled out a twenty-dollar bill. “Do me a favor, will you?”
* * *
About twenty minutes later Tomi came through his office door and set a small white bag on his desk. “Here you go. Shari at the pharmacy says hello.”
“Ah, thank you very much.”
Dupree took a pencil off his desk and stood.
“What are you going to do?” Tomi asked.
“I, my dear, am going to bring the spirit of Marvin Francine back to us. Or rather, his wife.”
“How?” Tomi said looking at the pencil.”
Without saying a word Dupree lifted the lid on the urn and set it gently on his desk. With a movement that looked like he performed the task regularly, he shoved the pencil down the center of the urn into the ashes.
Tomi gasped and watched wide-eyed as Dupree began to move the pencil in small circles. As the pencil moved around, he firmly pressed the sides of the hole outward.
“Bag please.”
Tomi handed Dupree the small white paper bag from the pharmacy. Leaving the pencil in place, Dupree took the red box from the bag and flipped open the lid. He removed the white bottle of Old Spice cologne and pulled out the small gray stopper.
With the bottle in his right hand, he took the pencil and gave three more turns around the ashes. Satisfied with the small hole he created, he carefully tipped the bottle and began streaming the cologne to the bottom of the hole. First, a few drops, then glancing up at Tomi, poured a healthy tablespoon into the ashes.
“There, that should do it.” Dupree smiled, quite pleased with his work. He placed the lid back on the urn, placed his hand firmly on top, and gave the urn a good hard shake.
“What’s it smell like to you?” Dupree took off the lid and held the urn out for Tomi to smell.
“Pretty strong.” Tomi winced a bit.
“Too much?”
She shrugged.
Dupree took his pencil and vigorously stirred Marvin. A small cloud of ashes rose above the urn. Dupree paused and then gave the ashes a robust twirl in the opposite direction.
“Better?” Dupree asked holding the urn out to Tomi again.
She smiled. “Much better,” she giggled. “That was pretty smart.”
“Remember, my co-conspirator and accessory, nobody will ever know of our baptizing Marvin’s ashes.” Dupree placed the lid back on the bottle, placed it in its carton, and rolled the top of the bag down. “Take this to out to the dumpster. If captured, admit nothing, deny everything and…”
“Destroy the evidence,” Tomi said beaming.
“We are becoming a dangerous pair!” Dupree chuckled at what a quick study Tomi was. “Now put it in the closet and leave the lid off. We don’t want to be too, you know…”
“Obvious?”
“Rule number three, ‘Never use a club when a feather will do.’”
“I’m going to have to start writing these pearls of wisdom down. I might want to use them someday.” Tomi whirled around and returned to her desk.
Dupree picked up the phone and dialed the Quarter Moon. Luck was with him and Dara picked up.
“Can you get off early?”
“I suppose so. Why?”
“I thought we might go see Mrs. Potter before the storm hits. See you in five?”
“I’ll be ready.”
“Tomi! Let’s call it a day. Can you lock up?”
“Yes, sir.”
“No sticking around either. I want you home before the storm hits.”
* * *
Dupree made a humph noise as he left the car. The snow was starting to fall heavier. He slipped making his way to the front porch. Thankfully there was a wrought iron rail up the steps. Dara thought ahead and wore her snow boots, a fact she made sure she drew to Dupree’s attention.
Hanging on the front door of the Potter house was a dream catcher as big as a family-size pizza pan. The circle was made from a sort of yard trimming Dupree guessed was from Wisteria vines. The huge door ornament was a misguided hybrid of Macramé and a wanna-be spider web. Dangling from several thick pieces of yarn were little bunches of duck feathers.
The porch was a catch-all of junk that either didn’t make it into the house or landed there on the way to the trash: a cracked Styrofoam ice chest, a threadbare comfy chair, and a pet cage with no door, neglected and decaying. Before he knocked on the door, Dupree turned to look at Dara. Dara looked like she just stepped in something nasty.
“That is really ugly.” For the first time today, Dupree smiled. He gave the door three quick raps and took a step back. They could hear muffled music coming from inside the house but were unable to identify the song. After at least a minute’s wait, Dara stepped forward and pushed the doorbell four or five times. The music inside stopped. A few moments later the door unlocked and opened just a sliver.
“Who are you? What do you want?”
Dupree, being the closest to the door spoke first, “My name’s Dupree, this my wife Dara. We’d like to have a few words with you, Mrs. Potter. We are friends of Mike’s.”
The door opened and the voice said, “I know who you are. You own the café downtown.”
“That’s me.” Dara gave her a non-threatening smile.
Standing in front of them was quite possibly the skinniest woman that Dupree ever saw. She wore a pair of pink, hip-hugger shorts and a yellow tube top. Dara stepped back a little further from the door, a blast of hot air exited the house.
“What’s this about?”
“There are a lot of folks worried about your husband. They kind of sent us to talk to you to see if you needed any help, or have any idea where he is.” Dara voiced such genuine concern it took Mrs. Potter by surprise. “I don’t think I know your first name?” Dara tried to be friendly to the woman who was bristling at their presence.
“My legal name is Roxanne, but everybody calls me Roxxy.”
“Nice to meet you, Roxxy.”
“Can we ask you a couple of questions?” Dupree, not thrilled to be there in the first place, just wanted to cut to the chase.
&n
bsp; “What? Are you a lawyer or something?”
“As a matter of fact, yes. But that doesn’t have anything to do with why we’re here.”
“As Dara said, we’d like to ask you a few questions about your husband’s disappearance.”
“Who told you that? I ain’t said nothin’ about nothin’.”
“Can we come in for a minute? It’s kind of cold don’t you think?”
“Why?”
“I think we’d all be more comfortable.” Dupree offered his hand, but she ignored it.
Roxxy stepped aside. “Whatever.”
Dara and Dupree entered the house. As Dupree passed the woman in the doorway, he could see the bones of her face on either side of her nose nearly cutting through her over-tanned skin. To the right of the front door, there was a small living room with two chairs and a love seat covered with a patchwork quilt.
“Is in here okay?”
“I guess.” Roxxy Potter seemed to be a woman of few words. Dara took a seat in the chair on the right side of the window and Dupree took the one across from her to the left. As Roxxy sat on the loveseat Dupree couldn’t help but stare at the thinness of her legs. It was almost as if you could see her tendons holding on her kneecap.
“You haven’t reported your husband missing?” Dupree knew she didn’t but it was a start.
Roxxy shook her head.
“Is there a reason for that?”
“I don’t know for sure he is missing. What I do know is he ain’t here, and I don’t have to clean up after him or cook for him, and it’s been a real nice vacation.”
“Is it normal for him to just go away, or not show up for work, or let you know where he’s going?” Dara was trying to wrap her head around this woman’s attitude.
“He likes to hunt and fish, but I know he hasn’t done either one because the boat is still here.”
“Excuse me Mrs. Potter, but you don’t seem the least bit concerned.”
“Well, if he doesn’t show up pretty soon, I guess he won’t be getting paid.”
“Have you and Mr. Potter been having any trouble lately? Any reason he’d take off?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know if you’ve been having problems?”
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