02 _ Maltese Goddess, The (11 page)

Then, thinking how more than anything, I just wanted to go home, I said, “Is she coming over? To claim the body and make arrangements for… you know?”

“I expect she might, if we could find her to tell her. Gone missing, it seems. Hasn’t been seen since sometime yesterday.

Cherchez la femme,
as I said. Anyway, why don’t we call it a day? It’s nearly midnight, and there isn’t much more we can do until we get the coroner’s report. If we get the coroner’s report, that is.“ He sighed loudly again.

I wondered what that meant. I didn’t want to ask.

“You wouldn’t be thinking of leaving Malta in the next day or two, would you? No? Then I’ll get someone to drive you back to the house. I think it’ll be good to have you staying there. Who knows, maybe the mystery guests will show up, one of them with a sign saying ‘I’m the murderer.” Or someone who confesses to killing Galea because he wasn’t considered important enough to be invited to the party. You never know!“ As he spoke, he watched my face, and evidently thought better of his attempts at humor. ”I’ll get someone to watch the house at night, if it would make you feel better,“ he offered. I told him it would.

After checking every door and window in the place, and peering intently into the backyard to see if the hooded creature was there, I sat in the dark in the living room of Martin Galea’s nearly perfect house, and thought about the day. Had it not been for the fact that this was all the result of a murder, it would have seemed rather funny, in a Monty Python kind of way.

After my initial screaming fit, my northern temperament reasserted itself, and I got a grip, admittedly tenuous, on myself. This could not be said for the others. I have never heard such a din. Everyone was screaming and yelling. Marissa took it all particularly badly, overcome by a really serious attack of hysteria, which ended only when she fainted dead away. The cousins, the truck driver, everyone was crying and waving their arms around.

I headed for the telephone. I had no idea how to reach the police, of course, so I tried to get an operator.

I got a recording of some sort, which in my shaken state I tried to engage in conversation. I assumed it was telling me in Maltese that all the lines were busy, that my call was important to them, and that I should stay on the line. Then there came extremely loud and raucous music, disco style, seemingly everyone’s favorite in Malta. On this occasion it was disconcerting, to say the least.

Finally, after what seemed an eternity, an operator, a man, literally shouted something in Malti.

“There’s been a terrible accident,” I said, rather inanely.

The operator switched to English and yelled, “What do you want?”

“The police,” I yelled back.

“Where?” he shouted.

Where what? I thought. “How should I know?” I yelled.

“Malta or Gozo?” he yelled again.

“Malta.” Another round of rock music. I thought he had cut me off. Finally I was connected to the police and told them as best I could that there was a body in a piece of furniture. You can imagine how this was received. I was asked where I was, and couldn’t describe my location. “Wait a minute,” I yelled.

“You don’t have to shout,” the policeman said peevishly.

I went to fetch the calmest, or perhaps I should say least hysterical, of the cousins, and got him to talk to the police. Finally they arrived. A doctor was called for Marissa, and I was escorted to police headquarters in Floriana, where I was treated as a major nuisance, until at last I was taken to Vincent Tabone. All of this, including Tabone’s interrogation, had taken many hours and I was feeling more than a little sorry for myself when I got back to the house.

It was nearly one in the morning, so my first thought was that it was way too late to call anyone. But then I remembered the time difference and realized it was dinnertime back home. But there was the question of who to call. It is one of life’s revealing moments when one considers who, out of perhaps dozens of acquaintances and friends, one knows well enough to call when one has found a corpse, a murdered corpse, stuffed in a piece of furniture.

Calling Lucas was out of the question. As much as I might need him right now, he was out of reach, probably sitting in a tent eating astronaut food from a plastic bag, oblivious to my situation.

I considered calling Clive, my ex, on the theory that a heated argument, even over the telephone, would be therapeutic. Even talking to his new wife, the rather fatuous but extremely rich Celeste, might do the trick.

In the end, I called my neighbor, Alex. I first met Alex when I moved into the neighborhood after my rather acrimonious separation and divorce. He adopted me somewhat in the way he takes in various stray cats and dogs from time to time. I credit his avuncular concern and friendship with getting me through a bad patch in my life. In turn, I have fended off more than one foray by his other neighbors who feel his rather ramshackle house and jungle-like garden are not in keeping with the image they have of our part of town. They’re right, of course. His place is a bit of an eyesore, but who cares? Alex is a genuine eccentric, and I don’t know what I’d do without him now, nor how Sarah and I could manage the store without his help.

When I told him what had happened, he clucked over me in a soothing and satisfying way.

“Haven’t heard a word of this here yet, although I’m sure we will soon enough. I’ll expect police enquiries, shall I? You tell me Mrs. Galea—Marilyn, is that right?—has gone missing, and is the prime suspect?”

“Yes. Did Dave mention whether or not she was at the house when his men got there?”

“No. I waited for his team to pick up the furniture last night but didn’t talk to him personally. They came around eight or eight-thirty, I’d say. We were open late last night anyway, and they came before we closed. Dave left a message on the answering machine at the shop. Said the furniture was on its way to you, it was late and he was going to bed. Bad cold or flu, by the sound of him. We didn’t bother him at all today. We figured we’d hear from you if there was a problem.”

“No doubt he’ll be bothered soon enough, if he hasn’t been already.”

“No doubt. Maybe I should call and warn him he can expect a call from the police.”

“You know what, Alex? I think I’ll call him myself. Something went very wrong with that shipment, and maybe Dave can enlighten me in some way.”

“Okay. But you take care. Leave the detective work to the police this time, will you?”

“I will, Alex. And thanks for being there!” I said.

I called Dave at his home. His wife answered.

“Hi, Sandy, it’s Lara. How’s Dave? Is it possible for him to come to the phone?”

“Hi, Lara. How’s Malta? Warmer than here, I hope. Did the shipment get there all right?”

“It got here,” was all I could think to say. “Dave’s got a cold. It’s settling in nicely. The way he’s carrying on you’d think he had dengue fever, mind you. You know how men revert to babyhood the moment they get even the most minor of ailments! He’s asked me to screen all his calls. You are, in fact, the only person he said he’d talk to. Hold on a minute, I’ll get him.”

Dave came on the line, and I gave him a short version of events and told him to expect a call from the police. “Good Lord!” he exclaimed.

“Can you tell me anything about the shipment, Dave? Did you notice the switch in the piece of furniture? Was the chest particularly heavy? Who was there when your men got to the house? Anything strike you as unusual, anything at all?”

“We did everything in such a hurry, Lara. I don’t know… I’ll have to ask my team who let them into the house. I didn’t think to ask at the time. I did notice that one piece wasn’t measured with your normal military precision. But the yellow sticker with your initials was on it. I checked every piece for that. And you know, the description—chest, sideboard—not much difference really.

“I think I thought that maybe Galea had changed his mind about which piece to send, although it did cross my mind that maybe you’d come under the legendary Galea spell and lost it for a minute or two. You wouldn’t be the first woman that happened to.” His laugh turned into a coughing spasm.

“Very funny, Dave. The guy is dead. Stabbed.”

“You’re right. I’m sorry. It’s not funny. I should have known something was wrong. I guess I screwed up. Big time,” he said morosely.

“I don’t think you screwed up, Dave. Presumably the murderer switched them. The police here think it was Marilyn Galea.”

“That little mouse? Tired of all his philandering, no doubt. Still I wouldn’t have put her down for it, would you? And you’d think divorce, while it might take longer, would be a more socially acceptable alternative, wouldn’t you? Most of the money’s hers, from what I hear. Isn’t it just as likely to be a jealous husband, or a colleague whom Galea beat out for a big commission? There must be a few of those. He got a lot of commissions.

“Come to think of it, I do recall a couple of the guys complaining that some of the furniture must be filled with bricks, or something. But they were all heavy wood pieces, and we didn’t open anything. I just amended the waybill accordingly. We were really rushing to make the flight. I… hold on a sec, Lara, Sandy’s waving at me.”

He put his hand over the mouthpiece for a second or two. “Gotta go,” he said. “Police at the door, as you predicted. Thanks for the warning. We’ll talk soon.”

“Just one more question, Dave. Was the furniture always in your sight from the time it left the Galea house? I mean, could he have been killed somewhere other than at his house?”

“Doubt it. The guys took it directly from the house and loaded it on the truck. They came straight to the airport. There was no time for a coffee stop, or anything, and they told me they came direct. I don’t think there was a time when at least one or two of us weren’t there during the loading. And anyway, why would anyone come all the way out to the airport to stab somebody? And what would Galea be doing out on the tarmac or in the hangar?”

What indeed? It was looking more and more as if Tabone was right. Galea was probably killed in his own home. And yet… I couldn’t imagine Marilyn Galea stabbing anyone, much less her own husband. She had seemed very nice to me. But what did I know? Perhaps I just felt guilty because I’d once contemplated having an affair with her husband. A middle-class Presbyterian upbringing stays with you forever.

It was not until the next day that I figured out what all the loud sighing was about when Tabone talked about the autopsy. I was back in Floriana the next morning, going over the same old stuff one more time. Marissa, looking very pale and sad, was leaving the office when I arrived. She gave me a wan little smile as we passed in the corridor. I’d seen Anthony and Sophia in the waiting room as I came in. He was utterly crushed, I could tell, by the death of his idol and mentor, she in her own quiet way, was a pillar of strength. It occurred to me that Anthony, an only child, and a very much adored one, was seeing life in the raw for the first time. Sophia on the other hand possessed a maturity that far exceeded her young life.

In any event, as I was reading the typed version of my statement, prepared for my signature, the telephone rang.

“What have you got?” Tabone grunted upon answering it. There was a pause.

“That’s it?” he asked incredulously. Then a few seconds later, he slammed the phone down and spoke to no one in particular.

“It appears Martin Galea was stabbed. With something sharp. Brilliant, wouldn’t you say? But perhaps you figured that out for yourself just looking at him,” he said, turning his attention to me and glaring in my general direction. I said nothing.

“Well, what would you expect from a loaner?”

“A loaner?” I asked hesitantly.

“Our former coroner, Dr. Caruana, has retired. He’s a prince. Really knew his stuff. We’re hoping to hire another one, Maltese, but in the meantime, we have a Frenchman, on loan. One of their rejects, if you ask me. He complains constantly about the primitive conditions under which he has to work here, and of course, he’s right. We have a long way to go in that area. Can’t do all the fancy tests other labs can. True in the medical area too. When Rosa, our eldest, was badly hurt in a car accident, my wife and I flew her to Italy for tests and treatment. Took every cent we had. No, more than that. We borrowed from several relatives, and we’ll be paying them back forever. But it was worth it, let me tell you.

“Caruana wasn’t bothered by it, though. He did his autopsies the old fashioned way, and he was always right. This French fellow obviously relied on fancy equipment in the past, and he’s definitely not so good at the basics. Complains about everything, including, and maybe especially, the food here. I hate spending any time with the man, but obviously I’m going to have to.

“We’re having a devil of a time getting a permanent coroner. But what can you expect? Coroners, like policemen, are civil servants. Very badly paid. You get what you pay for, except of course in my case, where my contribution far exceeds the paltry sum I’m paid, wouldn’t you say?”

“Absolutely,” I agreed. He smiled at me.

“Sorry. Totally lost it there, didn’t I?”