Don't Cry Over Killed Milk (5 page)

“What did he do with the $1.6 million?”

“We don’t know yet.”

“I wonder if his mother will be entitled to the remaining money now that Jeremiah’s dead,” Damon said.

“We’ll check to see if he had a will or not, but I suspect the remaining money will go to Dottie either way.”

“Did you ask Jeremiah’s new girlfriend, Veronica, about the money?”

“In a roundabout way. I didn’t let on that Jeremiah had $400,000 left in the bank or that he either spent or moved another $1.6 million. But I danced around the issue of his money in general.”

Damon waited for more.

“She didn’t think Jeremiah was well-off,” Gerry said after a moment. “When they went out, it was to a chain restaurant or a diner. Either he kept her in the dark about his wealth, or she’s a very good liar.”

“It would be interesting to know whether Dottie Milk knows about it,” Damon said. “It sounds like he came into the money after she moved from Hollydale.”

“I plan to ask her tomorrow morning.”

Chapter 5

 
    
Damon spent the following morning helping his mother prune the rosebushes abutting the steps to her townhouse.

“Terrible news about Jeremiah Milk,” Lynne said as she snipped thorny stalks.

“I didn’t realize word already made its way around town,” Damon replied, collecting the refuse.

“You know how fast information travels around here. Have you spoken with Gerry about it?” Lynne Lassard-Brown knew how close Damon was with the detective.

“A little,” Damon said sheepishly.

Mother and son looked up at the sound of a high pitched shrieking. Mrs. Chenworth’s sizable girth was hurtling down the sidewalk after a mammoth yellow Labrador retriever at the end of a flimsy leash. “Help!” she shouted as the leash broke free from her hand.

Damon sprang forward and corralled the beast into a hug on the grass beside the sidewalk. The Labrador responded with a series of sandpaper licks to Damon’s face. He scratched the dog’s underbelly in return.

Mrs. Chenworth caught up and bent over panting. “Thank you, Damon,” she said between breaths.

Before Damon could respond, Mrs. Chenworth caught a second wind and began to prattle. “It’s my niece’s dog. She lives in Alexandria and had the nerve to ask me to watch him while she’s on vacation. In Greece! A twelve-day trip. It’s only my first day with this creature. I don’t know how I’m going to handle him if he jets off every time I try to walk him.”

“There’s the dog park on the ridge,” Lynne said, joining them. “You could let him exercise there.”

“I suppose,” Mrs. Chenworth replied. “But I have to get him there first!”

“I can take him out a few times this week,” Damon volunteered.

“That’s very kind of you, Damon. Now, what’s happening in your murder case?”

“My murder case?” Damon asked.

“I know how you like to get involved in these things. As well you should. You’re the Hollydale citizens association president. And Jeremiah lived in Hollydale his whole life. It’s only fitting that you solve the mystery.”

Damon thought the police would have been the more obvious choice to catch a murderer. He let Mrs. Chenworth continue on the subject of Jeremiah Milk while he played with the Labrador.

“He completely closed himself off from the world after his wife and son died,” she said. “But I suppose for the last couple of years he’s been a little more social. Over the summer, I even saw him playing catch or some nonsense at the town’s picnic area.”

Damon looked up with interest. “Who was he playing with?”

“I don’t know,” Mrs. Chenworth said. “A boy—he looked like he was a teenager. But he’s not from Hollydale. I know everyone here, and I’d never seen him before.”

“What did he look like?” Damon asked.

“I don’t recall. I was paying more attention to Jeremiah. I was surprised he could throw the ball so nicely given how short his fingers were.”

Damon reattached the Labrador’s leash and handed it to Mrs. Chenworth. After chattering for another five minutes, Mrs. Chenworth marched away with a much calmer pet.

* * *

Damon went home and washed up from the yard work, then walked a half mile to the True Capital Bank branch just outside of Hollydale. Gray clouds darkened the sky. Damon had a check to deposit. He was also determined to ask the bank manager, whom he’d known for more than two years, about Jeremiah Milk.

A wave of air conditioning cooled Damon’s face as he entered the unremarkable bank building. Cynthia Trumbell stood at the end of a line that Damon joined. His citizens association vice president’s brow was wrinkled—she looked anxious.

“Is everything all right, Cynthia?” Damon asked with concern.

She took in his relaxed posture. “I don’t know, Damon,” Cynthia said. “I think I witnessed a crime this morning, but I’m not certain.” She pulled strands of unkempt hair from her face and bound them into a ponytail.

“What did you see?” Damon asked, his voice lowered to a whisper.

“I didn’t sleep well last night, so I was up particularly early this morning. I saw a man poking around in the Rothsteins’ trees. They live next door.”

“Crepe myrtles?”

“Yes. How did you know?”

Damon outlined the story about mysterious tree infestations in Hollydale. “Could you see what the person was doing?” he asked.

“No. It was just before dawn. In the light from the streetlamp outside, I saw a man dressed in a black shirt and black pants with a knapsack near the crepe myrtles. But his back was to me, so I couldn’t make out what he was up to.”

“Did you call the police?”

Cynthia blanched. “I didn’t. By the time I thought about calling, he was gone. He wasn’t there long, and I never saw his face.”

“Too bad.”

“I know. I spoke with Lydia Rothstein and told her what I saw.”

“How did she react?”

“She was pretty terrified. Lydia said that her crepe myrtles have been dying, so there’s probably a connection.”

“I’m sure there is. I’ll have a word with Gerry Sloman about it,” Damon said. “He’s a detective with the Arlington police. They may want to interview you and Lydia.”

After parting with Cynthia and taking care of his deposits, Damon poked his head through the open door of the bank manager’s office. Cameron Williams had lost weight since the last time Damon saw him. But he hadn’t updated his wardrobe, and his suit hung about his shoulders like loose skin.

“Cameron, do you have a minute?” Damon asked.

The bank manager looked up from his computer monitor and gave Damon a toothy smile.

“Damon Lassard,” Cameron said heartily. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

Damon shut the door to the office and sat in the tight space in front of the manager’s desk.

Cameron eyed him questioningly.

“I was down at Tripping Falls yesterday talking with Detective Sloman,” Damon said.

“And you want to know about Jeremiah Milk’s finances,” Cameron interrupted. Damon’s reputation as an amateur sleuth had travelled beyond the confines of Hollydale to the surrounding neighborhoods.

Damon held up his hands. “Gerry Sloman gave me the details last night,” he said. “Two million dollars came in to Jeremiah and $1.6 million went out.”

“If you already know the details, I don’t know what else I can tell you, Damon.”

“Did he have any strange spending habits?”

“Not at all. He had $400,000 left in his account but treated it as if he only had a couple of thousand. He didn’t invest it. He spent about as much as he brought in from the park’s direct deposit system. It was almost as if he’d forgotten it was there.”

“Can you tell me where the $2 million came in from, or what he did with the $1.6 million?”

“Sorry Damon, that would be against bank policy. Even the police need a warrant for information that detailed. They’re putting one together, and once a judge signs it, we’ll be happy to help them out. They should have the information in a matter of days.”

* * *

After lunch, Damon headed off to offer his condolences to Dottie Milk. Even though Damon had moved to Hollydale after Dottie left for Arizona, as the local citizens association president, he felt obligated. Of course, his insatiable curiosity also pushed him along.

Damon climbed a set of creaky wooden steps to the lifeless porch of the Milk house. With his right hand, he rapped lightly on the door. His left elbow cradled a turkey casserole from The Cookery—he didn’t want to show up empty-handed.

The door swung open quickly, and a wide-eyed woman stared at him with a look of confusion. She wore a loose dress that resembled a hospital gown. But Damon knew she wasn’t much older than sixty.

“Mrs. Milk? I’m Damon Lassard, with the Hollydale citizens association. I knew your son. I’m so sorry for your loss.” He pushed the casserole toward her.

Dottie’s eyes flashed with understanding. “Come in, young man.” She moved at a pace that belied her appearance.

At Dottie’s direction, he placed the casserole dish in the refrigerator beside an oversized head of lettuce that looked remarkably like the shape of Mrs. Chenworth’s bulbous dome.

They moved to the living room. Damon settled into an easy chair near a dormant fireplace. A picture window dominated the room and provided ample light. Cheaply-framed replica maps lined the walls—Siberia, Antarctica, and the Canadian Arctic. Dottie Milk sat on a hard-backed chair that appeared to be part of a dining room set.

“Did you know Jeremiah well, Mr. Lassard?” Dottie asked. “He’s never had many friends.”

“Actually, I didn’t, Mrs. Milk. I’ve been in Hollydale for less than three years.” He crossed his legs.

“Well, it is nice to have a visitor. Most of my friends from the old days have left Hollydale. And after the morning I had with the police, I could use some better company.”

Damon straightened up. “The police were hard on you?”

“The male detective, Mr. Sloman, wasn’t. But the female lieutenant was merciless.”

“Margaret Hobbes,” Damon said.

“That’s the one. I just lost my only child and she started grilling me about what I was doing two nights ago. How could she act like that? I live in Arizona for goodness’ sake.”

Margaret must know about the deaths of Jeremiah’s wife and daughter
, Damon thought. He spent several minutes placating Dottie Milk to gain her trust.

“Hearing that Jeremiah was murdered was so distressing,” Dottie said.

“I can’t imagine what you must be going through, Mrs. Milk.”

“The only other time I had a shock like that was on the day Jeremiah was born.” Dottie fixed her eyes squarely on Damon.

He noticed that she left out the night her daughter-in-law and grandson died.

“Obstetricians back then didn’t have the fancy testing equipment they have now,” Dottie continued. Her voice was melancholy. “I had no idea Jeremiah would be born with abnormalities. He had four surgeries before he was a month old. And another six by the time he turned sixteen.”

“That must have been incredibly hard on you and your husband,” Damon said.

“My poor husband never got to see Jeremiah,” Dottie whimpered. “Roger was in the military. He died in a training exercise accident three months before Jeremiah was born.”

Damon considered the woman facing him. She had lost her husband, daughter-in-law, grandson, and now her only child, each in a tragic event.

Dottie said, “Thankfully the government paid Jeremiah’s medical expenses. But he had such a hard life growing up.”

“Was it difficult for him to do the same things that other children did?” Damon asked with interest.

“Well, that part wasn’t too bad. He learned to make do with the curveball God threw him.” She crossed herself.

Damon nodded.

“I meant he was teased incessantly,” Dottie said. “Kids can be downright mean.”

Damon thought about his own childhood. A group of girls in his middle school had so badly bullied a girl who wore a back brace to treat her scoliosis that her parents transferred her to a private school.

“When Jeremiah was in kindergarten, the other children were curious,” Dottie said. “Why were his fingers so short? Why didn’t he have any fingernails? The questions bothered Jeremiah, but they were innocent. Jeremiah cried a few times, though I could still soothe him with a trip to Baskin Robbins. Then, around the time he started second grade, the other boys lost their inhibitions.”

She coughed and inhaled several quick breaths. “Mr. Lassard, would you be a dear and get my asthma inhaler? It’s next to the sink in the upstairs bathroom.”

Damon bounded up the narrow flight of steps two at a time. He could see four closed doors from the landing. He tried the closest door first. It opened into a makeshift office stocked with a desk, a metal two-drawer filing cabinet, and more maps on the wall. The next door led to a bathroom, where Damon quickly located a yellow and white inhaler. He picked it up with a tissue and brought it downstairs.

Dottie greedily sucked in the elixir, and her breathing recovered.