Another Word for Murder (18 page)

Sonny barked out a big laugh. “Oh, yeah, that was a real howl. Now that's something you should put on
Back Bay D.A
. That heist was really slick.”

Rosco watched as Sonny continued to laugh. He was either completely innocent of wrong-doing or he was one of the best actors in the world. Rosco couldn't figure out which. “From what I heard, the crooks got away with twenty-plus cars? Wouldn't the shop need to be at least as big as yours to handle an operation like that?”

“Oh, yeah, easy.” Sonny stopped laughing abruptly. “What? You think I pinched those vehicles? Hey, Rick, come on, this is a legit deal I'm running here.”

“And the place would have to be fairly close to the restaurant, right? I mean, you can't be driving a convoy of BMWs and Porsches up Route 140 toward Boston. Plus, you'd need to have a bunch of drivers in on it.”

“Hey, what is this?” Sonny demanded. “You accusing me of running a chop-shop? Is that it?”

Rosco held up his hands and chuckled. “No, no, hold on.
Back Bay D.A
. is a detective show, right? Well, it's got lawyers, too, but this is the kind of detail they're going to ask me about as soon as I get back to Boston. I've gotta have some answers for them.”

“Why don't they shoot it in Boston, then? There's gotta be body shops up there they can use.”

“It's a union thing,” Rosco said, knowing that the relationship between television networks and their unions was a subject that no one fully understood. Sonny nodded knowingly, so Rosco added, “Who do you think did snap up all those cars last March? Local guy?”

“No telling.”

“It'd be great if the
Back Bay D.A
. research team could have a sit-down with the perpetrators. Talk about realism! You didn't hear any rumors? It'd be a feather in my cap to go back to Boston with that kind of stuff. There must be chat that goes around—”

“Even if I did hear something, I wouldn't be dumb enough to talk about it. A job that big? Had to have mobsters mixed up with it…. Nobody I'm gonna fool with.”

Rosco nodded while he continued to study Sonny, trying to determine if he was being truthful or not, but the man's face remained remarkably unreadable.

“Sonny!” a female voice shouted out from the front of the shop.

Sonny sighed and said, “My mom…. I'll be right back.” He trotted toward the office.

Rosco also ambled back to the front of the building, stopping every now and then to chat with an employee. None were remotely talkative. Instead, they seemed unusually tight-lipped, apparently unwilling to discuss anything: the cars they were working on, the Red Sox, the Pats, even the weather. Rosco reached the front of the shop just as Sonny was emerging from the office.

“Listen, Rick,” he said. “My mom doesn't think it's a good idea for your show to use the shop as a location. Sorry, I shoulda cleared it with her first, I guess. Like I said, she's really the boss. Like the gal-behind-the-throne kind of thing.”

“What's the problem?”

“She just thinks it wouldn't look good, you know, for the business.” Sonny shrugged; he appeared genuinely disappointed.

“We'd cover up all your signs. We'd rename the business. We're not going to splash ‘Sonny's Autobody' all over national TV if that's what she's worried about.”

“Nope.” Sonny reached out his hand. “When my mom says no, she means no. I'll see ya around. Sorry about this.”

“Do you still want me to get you one of these ABC hats?”

“Nah, that's okay.”

Rosco shook Sonny's hand and took five or six steps toward his car. He then turned back and said, “You know, Sonny, we have an episode coming up later on in the season … It's about a hit-and-run accident…. A young kid gets killed, and the driver finds a body shop that repairs the dent produced by the collision, and then keeps quiet about it…. Everything'll be interior shots, so there's no way anyone's going to recognize your place…. In fact,” Rosco paused. “In fact, there's a part in the script you might be perfect for. Would you like me to mention you to my producer?”

Sonny perked up. “Yeah. That'd be cool. I'll check with my mom and let you know.”

“Have you ever heard of a situation like that? Someone asking you to do that kinda work on the sly?”

Sonny gave Rosco another toothy laugh. “What? A guy bringing in a car with blood all over it? And he doesn't know us from Adam?”

“I see your point…. He'd need to clean off the vehicle first, right?”

“Sure. Then he'd tell us he hit a deer or a tree or a road barrier or something. He'd even report it to his insurance company in order to collect the dough. And who's gonna question an owner who describes what sounds like a legit accident? Not us. We're not in that business; we leave it to the private detectives. As long as our customers pay their bills, we're happy. And don't think that every other body shop in the country doesn't operate in the exact same way.”

Rosco nodded slowly and walked over to his car. “What are you asking for the red Explorer here?” he called back.

“Ninteen five.”

“Ouch.”

CHAPTER 22

“We're not discussing the case with Sara,” Belle announced as she and her husband drove to that august lady's noble home for dinner. “I just don't think it's professional. Al Lever wouldn't, Abe wouldn't.” Belle's tone had taken on a finicky, some might even say “bossy,” ring. “What I mean is, we've been given information that's highly sensitive, and we shouldn't allow ourselves to indulge in idle conjecture or gossip…. ”

Rosco didn't respond; from long experience he knew it best not to interrupt when his wife embarked upon one of her more serious monologues. Besides, nine times out of ten, she would amend her statement long before she finished it.

“… Not that Sara's a gossip, mind you. In fact, she's the farthest thing from such a person. But I don't like the notion of talking out of school…. Of course, Sara would never stoop to prying, so we don't have to worry about deflecting a lot of indelicate questions …”

It took all of Rosco's concentration not to disagree with what Belle was saying. If there was someone on this earth with as much mule-headed curiosity as his wife, it was Sara Crane Briephs, Newcastle's octogenarian dowager empress.

“… I don't mean that she's
in
curious, because someone as quick-witted and bright as Sara is naturally full of intellectual inquisitiveness …”

By now the car was climbing Patriot Hill, the habitat of the city's old money and even older lineages. The driveway leading to White Caps, which was Sara's ancestral home, would be on their left in less than two minutes.

“… Well, I guess what I'm saying, Rosco, is that we should try to keep the evening on a strictly social level—”

“What do you mean ‘try'?” Rosco finally asked as the drive appeared between two magnificent stands of rhododendron, whose blossoms lit the dusky twilight with a dazzling display of mauve and white.

“Attempt … strive … endeavor … undertake … essay—”

“I know what the word means, Belle.” Rosco laughed.

“Both of us should,” was her airy reply as White Caps' former carriage house came into view. Parked in front, as if just returning from a spin, was Sara's ancient black Cadillac, its surface shiny with polish, its chrome as glossy as silver. Standing a few feet from the spotless vehicle, her walking stick in hand, was the owner in person. Ramrod-straight, her white coiffure impeccable, and her lilac linen dinner suit a stirring reminder of a more genteel era, Sara appeared as out of sync with the hustle and bustle of the twenty-first century as did her 1956 Cadillac. Looking at the scene, Belle had the feeling of being transported back to a golden age of courteousness and ease when the universe was at peace with itself.

Then she opened her door, calling out a joyous “Sara!” which was immediately followed by “Guess what? You're not going to believe this, but Dan Tacete was murdered! Al has officially classified the death as a homicide.”

“So much for ‘our' professional discretion,” Rosco murmured as he gave his wife a sidelong smile.

“You know Sara would never forgive us if we kept her out of the loop.”

“She might ‘try' though,” Rosco said, but the gibe was lost on his wife.

Dinner over, the hostess and her guests sat in White Caps' Victorian-era conservatory, where Emma, Sara's equally elderly maid, had laid out the silver coffee service and the gilt-edged porcelain cups. Over the many years of their joint occupation of the house, the two women had developed a symbiotic relationship that permitted Sara to maintain an appearance of authority while Emma's role remained one of helpmeet and confidant. In culinary matters, however, the tables were turned; the maid became the de facto ruler of the roost, and Sara's position fell to that of an apprentice admiring the expert's considerable skills.

“Thank you, Emma,” the ostensible mistress of White Caps now said.

“Will you be needing anything else, madam?” was the habitual reply.

“If we do, we'll rustle it up ourselves. You've had a long day.”

“Very good, madam.”

“Lovely dinner, too, Emma. I don't know how you do it.”

“I'm glad you were pleased, madam.”

“I always am. You're a positive wizard. All our guests say so.”

At this point in the familiar exchange, Belle expected Emma to forsake her formal demeanor, plop herself down in a chair, take out a bag of knitting, and join the general chat. Instead, her old knees bent in a kind of bob that in earlier years would have been a curtsy. Then she turned and began to trundle off toward her kitchen castle.

“Thanks again, Emma!” Belle called to her retreating figure.

“It cheers up the house when you and Mr. Rosco visit. And we like a cheerful home, don't we madam? And I certainly enjoy cooking for more than two people.”

Then Emma was gone, and the tall glass room with its potted palms and flowing plants settled into stillness. Sipping her coffee in silence, Belle smelled the earthy scent of growing things, of humus and orchid bark and damp clay pots. It was a place of such tranquility that it was difficult to remember that criminals roved the same terrain.

“I worry about my Emma,” Sara mused aloud. “She's getting old.”

Belle and Rosco held their tongues. Mistress and maid had been born within a few months of one another.

“We all grow feeble eventually, I suppose,” Sara continued. “Still, one doesn't appreciate witnessing the effects of time on a person one is fond of. I was fortunate in not having to watch my dear husband cope with the depredations of the passing years—or my son.”

Again, Rosco and Belle kept silent. It was the murder of Sara's middle-aged son, Thompson, that had initially established their friendship.

“Ah, well,” Sara mused. “
Les temps perdus
, as the poets say…. Although time is never quite ‘lost' is it? Just as the dead are never fully gone if they live in memory.” The indomitable old lady replaced her cup on the silver tray and raised her patrician chin.
The past is the past
, her expression seemed to say.
We must forgive even if we cannot forget
—
especially if we cannot forget
.

At length, she released a small and melancholy sigh and returned her concentration to her guests. Her astonishingly blue eyes were now focused on the present. “So … Albert has classified Dan Tacete's death as a homicide.” It was a statement rather than a question, since the threesome—or rather, Belle and Sara—had discussed the case in detail over dinner. Rosco, alone, had tried to maintain a “professional” stance. “It's too bad the FBI won't be brought in, because something seems highly irregular in everything you've described. Not that I don't believe darling Albert is more than capable of divining the perpetrator—or perpetrators.”

“There's no evidence that anyone crossed state lines,” was Belle's response.

“A shame. One would imagine that with Dan Tacete's two automobiles zipping here and there, some border would have been crossed.”

“A ‘border,' as in the line dividing Massachusetts and New Hampshire?” It was Rosco who asked this question. He was smiling as he did so. “I gather you'd feel better if there were checkpoints?”

“Don't you get flippant with me, young man,” Sara chuckled in return. “If the people of Keane and Concord wish to espouse ‘Live free or die' as their motto, they obviously don't care a whit about their neighbors' well-being—”

“I don't believe the expression was intended as an insult to their fellow colonists,” Rosco rejoined.

“
Humph
,” Sara answered with a quick and mischievous grin. Then she turned back to Belle. “And those nursery-rhyme-themed crosswords you received … there's no possibility of tracking their authorship?”

Belle shrugged. “Post office boxes can be registered under false names, and the email address on the one puzzle was through one of those huge Web servers, which anyone can sign up for by presenting fraudulent information…. So, no, Sara, in answer to your question: The author—or authors—is anonymous.”

“I don't like it,” Sara said. “It makes me worry about the safety of the little Tacete girl … although you haven't been able to connect anything to her father except the name Jack.”

“No,” Belle admitted.

“Not much of a lead, other than the obvious: the partner.”

“No, it isn't.”

“I wish you'd brought those crosswords with you, dear child. We could have pored over them together.”

“Belle didn't intend to discuss the case with you,” Rosco said with his own small chortle. “She told me so during the drive over. ‘Mum's the word,' she insisted.”