Alien Blues (3 page)

“I'm Ron Pressman.” He opened the door. “Come on in. We're sitting out back. Peeping over the gate at you fellas. Hey, you see that Elaki? What's he up to?”

“Mr. Puzzle is assisting in the investigation.”

“Puzzle, huh? Those people got funny names.”

Pressman led him down a dark hallway. David saw a formal living room off to the right—dusty and unused. Pressman led him through a den where the TV played. The computer terminal was dark. Newspapers were scattered on the floor, and there was a bowl of soggy cereal on the coffee table.

The house smelled musty, but it was cool, and David was sorry to follow Pressman out the back door. The yard was small, enclosed by a six-foot privacy fence. Sunflowers, yellow-brown and heavy, lined the back and sides of the fence. The yard was tiny, but David counted eight trees and four flower beds, in addition to a huge vegetable garden. The tomato plants were tall. David spotted the deep red of ripe tomatoes. He wished his looked that good.

Two women sat in metal rocking chairs. The chairs were green and had heart-shaped backs. One of the women was dumpy, fiftyish, with unlikely blond hair and a worn pink complexion. She had on shorts and a loose overblouse. Her feet were bare, the toenails painted a deep violet. Her legs were flabby, lined with blue varicose veins.

She held up a glass of beer. “Hi there. Get you something?”

“No thanks.”

The other woman was old, and she watched David warily. This must be Millicent Darnell. The victim. Her eyes were soft brown and alert, and she wore a pink belted house robe that had cotton knobbles on it. Her arms rested on the rails of her chair. Her fingers were shaking.

David took off his coat and tie.

“Beautiful,” he said mildly, waving his hand at the backyard. In all honesty, the profuse greenery pressed him—like standing in a crowded floral shop with no elbow room. Stainless-steel shears and a heavy pair of cotton gloves rested on a table by the chairs. Pressman had been gardening through the worst heat of the afternoon.

“Those are wonderful tomatoes,” David said. “Mine aren't near that big, and I'm just now getting some ripe ones.”

Pressman beamed. “Here, sit. I'll tell you my secret.” His chair creaked as he leaned forward. “
Grass clippings
. Put them right 'round the base, makes wonderful compost. And always keep them pruned. Make 'em stay in the cage.”

David nodded.

The old woman started to rise. “I guess it's me you want.”

“Mrs. Darnell? How do you do, I'm Detective Silver. Please, don't get up.”

The woman sank back down. Her hair was white and tangled in the back. She wore heavy stockings, rolled down below her knees. The skin of her arms was loose and thick, freckled with age.

“They tried to get me a doctor. But I'm not hurt.”

“I'm very glad to hear that.”

“I s'pose some pretty bad things could of happened. They said you'd want to talk to me at home. At the scene, they called it.” Her lower lip trembled. “Darn shame, isn't it? When an old woman's afraid to go home. I've lived in that house for forty years.”

“Forty years?”

“Forty years. I'm ready, though, you want to go over there. Been worrying over it all day, but Ron says, you got to cooperate, so the … the police can find this fella. So I'm ready.”

“Please, relax, Mrs. Darnell. We need to talk, but you should be comfortable.”

“She had a rough night,” Sybil Pressman said.

“You want us to leave?” Ron Pressman stood up.

“Don't let me run you out of your garden.” David studied the old woman. Still rattled. “Would you be more comfortable inside?” His shirt stuck to his back. He smiled at her hopefully.

“I just as soon be out here, if it's okay, then. I don't have to go back to the house?”

“Not now, no. Why don't you tell me everything, from the beginning. Assume I don't know a thing.”

“She loses her train of thought,” Mrs. Pressman said. “If you interrupt. Those others, last night. They kept interrupting and never did get the story straight.”

Millicent Darnell looked annoyed. “That's just police business, Sybil. That's how they work.” She looked kindly at David. “I see that notebook behind your leg. Don't dangle it down in the dirt. Go on and take your notes.”

David smiled and waited.

Her eyes narrowed and she stared at her toes. “Well, now, I was asleep. Sound asleep. And I woke up, and looked at my clock. It said three forty-two. I got my aids off the table.” She pointed to her ears. “Don't hear too good without them, and I ain't a good risk for surgery.” She patted her chest. “Heart. I take the aids off at night because they rub. Anyway, as soon as I put them on, I hear something funny … A kind of squeak and crack. And then I remember, that's the noise that old kitchen window makes when it opens.

“Boy, that scared me! Oh, I can't tell you how scared. It hit all a sudden, and I go out of my bedroom … I can't run. My legs don't work so good when I first get up. And I bumped into my dresser, and it made an awful noise, all my knickknacks rattling.

“I figured he'd be on me in a minute, but he must of stopped to listen too. And I go through the hall—dark, you know. I didn't turn on no lights. And I go into the living room to the door, when I hear footsteps. He's coming to get me.” She took a breath, her eyes full of tears.

“I used to have a hard lock to open on that door, but a while ago my grandson—Lord bless his heart—he put in that voice-activator thing.

“I told the door to open, and it opens. And I heard him. I know he was in the hall, but I was afraid to turn and look. I went down those steps and … I ran. Across that grass in my gown and nothing else, but I ran, and I don't think I done that since I was fifty, and my grandson fell in the pond.”

David pictured it—the dark night, the killer in the house, the old woman running in her nightgown.

“I banged on their door something awful,” she nodded at the Pressmans. “Confused hell out of the sensor, but Ron let me right in. Sybil tucked me up in her robe, and held my hand till the police come.”

“Who called the police?”

“I did,” Ron Pressman said.

“Did you see anything?”

“Well, I came out here in the garden, to watch for the cops. And I watched the house to see if he'd come out.”

Lucky he didn't see you, David thought.

“I didn't see him, but I saw a light go on in Millie's bedroom.”

“Oh my,” said Mrs. Darnell.

David looked at her. “What woke you up?”

Millicent Darnell twisted her hands in her lap. “What?”

“In the middle of the night. What woke you up?”

“I don't know. I guess maybe I heard something.”

“But you weren't wearing your hearing aids, Mrs. Darnell.”

Sybil Pressman sighed. “Go ahead, Millie. Tell him what you told me.”

This, thought David, would be it. The stray piece of information that helped break the case.

“Earl got me up.”

David blinked. “Earl?”

“My husband.”

“Where is Mr. Darnell?”

“I … he … I'm a widow, Mr. Silver. My husband's been dead for three years. Hard to believe—three years without Earl. We were married a long time.”

David scratched his head, and Ron Pressman shifted in his seat.

“Earl didn't sleep so good.” Millicent Darnell smiled faintly. “He liked to sit up late and read. Sat in that old brown recliner in the living room, and read military history books.

“But he was always up making biscuits at six every morning, no matter how late he went to bed. And he'd come in after breakfast was fixed, and lean down, and kiss my cheek and pat my back. I'd wake up, put in my hearing aids, and go in for some coffee while he scrambled the eggs.”

David peeled the cuticle back on his left thumb.

“Anyway, it was
Earl
got me up last night.” She looked defiantly at David.

“It's okay. Tell me.”

“I was sound asleep. I felt Earl kiss my cheek and pat my back. It was just like every morning before he died. I put in my aids and tried to smell the coffee. Then I remembered Earl was dead. I looked at the clock, and it was the middle of the night. That's when I heard the noise in the kitchen.”

David felt the hair stir on the back of his neck.

Tears rolled down the old woman's cheeks. “I wish it had been Earl. I wish it had been Earl, and coffee, and biscuits, and eggs. I wish Earl were here.” She pointed to her house and her hand shook. “They say … they say that man did awful things in my bedroom. Me and Earl's bedroom. I want to go over there. I want to see what that fella did.”

Sybil stood up and patted her shoulder. “Now, Millie, we agreed that after the police were done, I'd go over and clean up first. You can stay with us tonight, and Dennis will come get you tomorrow.”

Millicent Darnell stood up. “I want to go home.”

David studied her. What would be best? For her—he was not sure. But she might remember something if they went over it again.

“I'll take you. Just one minute.” He stood up. “Mr. Pressman, can I use your phone?”

He called and told Mel to clear the house. Dyer, the Elaki, and Mel should wait out front—he and Mrs. Darnell would go in through the kitchen.

He took Mrs. Darnell's arm, and they made their way slowly out of the backyard, while Ron and Sybil Pressman watched them go.

The Darnell yard seemed bigger, though it probably wasn't. The grass was dry and heat-scorched, and there was a shade tree by the side of the house. They walked along a path of hexagonal concrete steps. David searched the grass for footprints or a stray wallet. No such luck.

“Who put that on the door?” Mrs. Darnell pointed.

“That's a seal—we put it on all crime scenes. Keeps everything secure.”

“Maybe so, but it's turned that panel of glass green. Will it come off?”

“Yes ma'am, it sure will.”

The back door opened into the kitchen—a small dingy room, the floor tile a battered reddish-maroon. The countertops had yellowed with age and were crammed with greasy appliances. The refrigerator hummed. There were snapshots on the door—babies, and men and women, many of them tending to fat. A family, David thought, that would benefit from Elaki research on eating disorders.

The kitchen window was shut. David opened it. It squeaked and groaned.

“That what you heard last night?”

The old woman nodded. “Yep. It's a noisy window. Been trying to get someone in to fix it. Good thing I didn't.”

“Mrs. Darnell, do you notice anything different about the kitchen? Anything missing?”

She folded her arms. “He seems to have left a mess.”

He wondered how she would know, then squelched the thought. His house didn't look much better. He remembered his mother's kitchens—the blank, gleaming counters, meticulously organized cabinets, garbage stashed out of sight. Lavinia Silver would do without food, rather than have it on the counters. In Little Saigo, they'd had to scrape together every leftover, but once they got out, she'd said eat it now or toss it. It wasn't till he met Rose that he discovered the peculiar improvement of meatloaf after a night in the fridge.

“Where exactly, Mrs. Darnell?”

She pointed. A knot of cups from Burger Bazaar were strewn across the worn wood table.

“I think those were left by my colleagues.” David scooped up the trash and stuffed it into the recycle compacter. “Anything else?”

She shook her head. She peeped out the kitchen door.

“Would you like to look through the living room first?”

“Yes.” She frowned. “No. I want to see.”

She led him down the dark hallway. The bare floorboards creaked. David could smell the faint acrid odor of the nano machines that had been run through the house to collect minute evidence. A lot of effort for a B and E. What had gotten them to put on the heat?

Sunlight poured in the bedroom window. Mrs. Darnell paused in the doorway, shoulders rigid.

“Oh my.”

She turned a white face to David. He leaned forward and caught her before she hit the floor.

THREE

David surveyed the bedroom. He shouldn't have brought Mrs. Darnell here. But at least he knew why the uniforms hadn't treated this like a typical B and E.

A drawer full of panties and old cotton bras had been dumped on the bed, then hacked to pieces. The blade of the machete had bitten deep into the mattress. The semen-stained bedspread had been removed by the lab tech.

CATCH YOU LATER
was scribbled on the wall in bright pink lipstick. Who was the guy talking to—cops or Darnell?

The closet door had been yanked so hard it wobbled off the hinges. Mrs. Darnell's floral dresses lay in shreds over her shoes. David squatted down and looked at them. Shoes not touched—no foot fetish. Men's clothes hung undisturbed at the back of the closet. Earl's? Probably. Machete Man hadn't been interested.

David wondered why the clothes were still hanging there three years after Earl's death. He thought of his mother's apartment—still locked up and unattended to. He hadn't been particularly close to his mother. It would be hard for Millicent Darnell to dispose of a husband she had loved for so many years.

He checked his watch—seven P.M. The kids needed to eat, poor babies, he hoped they'd had a late lunch. They'd been sitting out front in a priority car when he went out to see Rescue off. Mrs. Darnell had been conscious and complaining, but the EMT hadn't liked her vitals, and had taken her to a clinic for observation. She had cried a little. David felt bad about sicking the meds on her, but she definitely looked shocky.

Della Martinas and Pete Ridel would start tomorrow morning, going through Mrs. Darnell's things, getting the make on the victim. Somewhere must be a connection. David thought about the window. Small—hard to get through. Guy was slender, or agile anyway. He'd hit his head. He was professional enough to get around the sensor alert, but he'd missed his victim. Must have made him mad. He was cool or crazy, taking the time to chop up the bedroom and jack off with the police on the way. The uniforms must have come close to getting him.