Joanne Dobson - Karen Pelletier 05 - The Maltese Manuscript (29 page)

My heart must have stopped, because the blood ceased flowing through my veins. With chilled lips, I retorted defensively, “What kind of woman is that? A saint? Mother Teresa?”

“Nobody’s a saint.” He leaned forward and ran a finger across my lips. “I’m crazy for you. You know that. I don’t want to hurt you. But if I have to worry all the time….”

I swallowed. “I’m sorry, Charlie. Don’t pay any attention to my smart mouth. Just listen to what I’m saying now. I love you. I need you.”

His brown eyes were full of pain. “Do you?” He sat back, to distance himself from me. “Listen, when this case is resolved, we’ll talk about us. We’ll see where we are. Does that make sense to you? Can we do it that way?”

“Yes,” I breathed, “we can do it that way.”

“Until then it’ll just be hands off. Got it?”

“Hands off? Okay. Got it. Hands off.”

Chapter Twenty-four

Sunnye Hardcastle came to my house for dinner that evening. The police insisted that she remain in the area, and her big-time L.A. lawyer had advised her to cooperate. That marvelous mountain aerie in Colorado, I mused, and here she was, stuck with a suite at the Springfield Marriott. She seemed to prefer my little house in the woods to the hotel, and since Amanda was at loose ends and beginning to get restless, they were killing time with a mini film festival. My daughter and the novelist seemed to have become great pals. I’d become chief cook and bottle washer. My visit with Sunnye to Peggy Briggs’ house had revived our appetites for childhood foods. I was cooking a modified retro meal: no condensed tomato soup in the meatloaf, the mashed potatoes were real, the peas were frozen, not canned, and I’d purchased the chocolate cream pie at Bread & Roses rather than make one from pudding mix and graham cracker crumbs. For a few moments I even forgot my worries about Charlie.

The phone rang as I closed the oven door. Sunnye and Amanda were watching
The Thin Man
and had
The Thirty-Nine Steps
scheduled for later. I was planning to spend the evening grading papers for my Freshman Humanities course. Eighteen five-page essays on Emerson’s “Self-Reliance.” I’d rather be watching movies with Sunnye and Amanda.

The phone gave its second shrill. Must be a telemarketer, I thought; after all, it’s dinnertime.

“Hello.” I still had the oven mitts on, and the receiver slid out of my hands.

A man’s deep voice said, “Karen, I’m on my way. Just passed through Enfield.”

Huh? Oh, shit! Dennis O’Hanlon! I’d forgotten to cancel with him.

“Oh, Denny, I—” I juggled the receiver to keep from dropping it.

“See you in fifteen minutes.” He ended the call.

“Oh, shit. Oh,
shit!”
The phone hit the floor. I took off the mitts and retrieved it.

Sunnye came into the kitchen carrying two empty beer bottles. “What’s wrong, Karen?”

I slammed the receiver down. “Nothing. I’m just so stupid.”

“What?” She dumped the bottles in the recycling bin and plucked another from the refrigerator.

“Oh, this guy said he was coming over. I meant to brush him off, but I forgot. Now he’s on his way, and it’s too late to—”

“Leave it to me. I’ll get rid of him.”

For a split second I entertained the thought of Sunnye giving Dennis O’Hanlon the old heave-ho, but then I said, “No, thanks. He came all the way from Lowell.” I might as well take advantage of Dennis being here. On the phone Monday I’d asked him if he knew anything about Peggy, and he didn’t. By now he might.

“Lowell? That’s north of Boston, right? On a rainy Wednesday night? Whatever it is you’re cooking with there, Karen, it’s hot stuff. You ought to bottle and sell it.”

“It’s not like that, Sunnye.”

“It’s always like that.” She ran a slow finger around the sweating beer bottle, then carried it into the living room.

***

Dennis was wearing black denim and leather, and his ginger hair had been freshly cropped. I met the P.I. at the door, coat on, ready to go, but he slipped past me into the living room. “So this is where you live, Karen?” His cat’s gaze darted over the modest room with its Naughahyde recliner, faded green couch, rag rug, and my one good possession, a glowing Scandinavian cast-iron wood stove. “Comfy.” The comment was uninflected.

“Yes,” I replied. “We like it.”

Dennis’s pale eyes scrutinized Amanda recumbent on the couch, took in the black-and-white film on the TV. Just then, Sunnye came in from the kitchen with a second helping of meatloaf. Trouble eyeballed the newcomer.

He jerked to attention. “You’re Sunnye Hardcastle!” Dennis usually flaunted the Alpha-male attitude of being surprised by nothing, but the novelist’s presence here tonight took him aback. His eyes appraised her—silver earrings, old jeans, sweater: nothing much. But the boots: yes. His eyes lingered on the boots. They were alligator, hand-tooled in a traditional western pattern. He approved of the boots.

“That’s right,” Sunnye said. How else was she going to respond: “I am?”

Dennis strode over to the novelist, ignoring Amanda’s presence. It was a small room; two strides did the job. He thrust his hand out. “I heard you speak at the conference last week. Impressive.”

“Thank you.” Her handshake appeared as unenthusiastic as had Dennis’s response to my home. Was it simply that she knew I didn’t want him there?

“It’s an honor to meet you, Ms. Hardcastle. We’re in the same business, you know.”

She raised her thin dark eyebrows. “You’re a crime writer?”

“I’m a crime
fighter
.” Every muscle in his body was suddenly on steroids. “Investigator. Private.”

A long, cool stare. “’Zat so?” Nope. It had nothing to do with me. She’d taken against Dennis all on her own. She turned back to the screen. William Powell lit a cigarette. A moment of silence ensued. Trouble shifted on his haunches.

Dennis wanted more from Sunnye, but she wasn’t giving. William Powell claimed her full attention.

“See you guys later,” I said. He had no choice but to follow me out the door.

***

My companion wanted “serious” food, so we drove to Rudolph’s in his big black Dodge Ram. The restaurant was crowded. We sat at the horseshoe bar, waiting for a table. Across from us, Claudia Nestor nursed something amber in a rocks glass. As we’d entered, her eyes snagged on Dennis the way his had snagged on Sunnye Hardcastle. He was a babe magnet, dressed to attract any woman’s eyes in black jeans and a soft black leather blazer, a close-fitting plum-colored shirt. Unlike most men, Dennis knew how to put his clothes together. Charlie just wore guy clothes, disappearing into his guyness as if he were permanently undercover, but Dennis
dressed
, and the effect was all shoulders and muscle and strength and height. I did enjoy showing off this tall, blond, mysterious stranger in Rudolph’s, but, oddly enough, I’d rather have been at home eating meatloaf with Sunnye and Amanda.

The bartender was a former student of mine, so skinny she had no breasts. She wore a red sweater, and her hair was cut like a little boy’s. She looked poignantly like the French cartoon character Tin Tin, and seemed barely old enough to drink liquor, let alone serve it. Dennis ordered Chivas, straight up. I asked for an Absolut martini with an olive, also straight up. I really prefer the drink on ice, but then you don’t get the debonair stemmed glass.

“That Hardcastle broad’s a cold bitch, isn’t she?” Dennis said. “What’s she doing at your place, anyhow? I heard the cops fingered her for the library murder.”

“Where’d you hear that? Nobody’s ‘fingered’ her for anything.” I gave him a wide stare, then picked up my glass. The martini was cold and smooth. I drank it slowly.

“Hey, take it easy, Sweetheart.” He held up an elegant hand. No rings, but the fingernails were manicured. Just like a funeral director, I thought.

I drained the martini and stared at him for a long minute. “Look, buddy. You’re starting to piss me off. First you insist on this get-together, even when I make it clear I’m not interested, and now you insult my friend. And what are you doing here, anyhow? What do you want from me?”

“Karen, honey, I don’t ‘want’ anything from you. We’re old pals, aren’t we? This is just a get-together for old time’s sake.” He sat back and smiled. “And, besides, you’re one hell of an attractive woman. Why wouldn’t I want to spend an evening with you?”

Tapping my fingers on the golden-oak bar, I thought back to the phone conversation where he’d made the date, tried to reconstruct the dialogue. “You know, you showed very little interest in me until…until I said I was acquainted with the police officers working on the Elwood Munro case.” I snapped my fingers. “That’s it! Then you started to press it. You want to pump me for what I know about the…” His eyes went still, but I plowed on. “About the…the book thefts! Damn it, Denny! You’re still working on the stolen-books case, aren’t you?”

He let his breath out in a huff, sat back and gave me a rueful Irish-boy grin, little Denny O’Hanlon again. “It’s not every lady college professor hangs out with cops. That’s intriguing all by itself. You’re still one tough cookie, aren’t you? And then they turn out to be homicide cops investigating the death of a book thief I’ve been hunting down. Oh, yeah, I’m interested. On a couple of levels. So, shoot me. Here,” he gestured to the bartender, “let me buy you another drink.”

“No.” I waved the young barkeep away, and took a deep breath. Restraint, girl, restraint. If Dennis was still on the library case, it was all the more possible he knew where Peggy was. If he had learned anything about her, I wanted to find out before I bad-assed him. I rubbed the back of my neck to ease the tension, and tried to relax on the high chrome-and-wicker barstool.

“Listen, Kar,” he said, “you’ve gotta see my point of view. I told you before, this is a big case. Mitchell’s paying serious money. I know the Feds are involved…” he was talking fast, “…but the college still needs to know where its security failed. That’s what I’m working on, security. And that manuscript’s still missing. So, don’t get uptight. We’re all on the same side here.”

“Are we? Looks to me like you’re working
your
side.” I plucked the olive out of my beautiful, empty glass and nibbled on it.

“Karen, you know where I come from, how hard it was. Sure, I’ll admit I’m in it for the bucks. But, hey, what better motivation? There isn’t a lot I wouldn’t do for money. And why not? Look at you, for instance.” He paused, then spoke super-casually. “All that education, Ph.D., prestigious job, and, really, you’re no better off than your old man was, rented house, five-year-old car, secondhand furniture. And on top of that, you’ve got all those education loans.”

I choked on the olive. “How do you know that?”

“Know what?” It was warm in the bar. My companion reached up and loosened his silk necktie. Its purple-on-grey zigzag design suddenly resolved itself into a stylized pattern of squared-off hand guns.

“About my house and car. And the loans.”

He sat back complacently. “You have to ask? It’s what I do. What I can’t get on the Internet, I find out over coffee or drinks. People like to talk.” Another casual pause. “That’s how I found out that you and Mitchell got it on a couple of years ago. It’s my business to learn what I need to know about people.”

I recoiled from him. “Avery and me! That never happened!” I was suddenly aware that Claudia was staring at us across the bar. How loudly had Dennis and I been talking? And, oh, God, if gossip about Avery and me hadn’t been flying around before, it surely would be now. Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God: my tenure petition! It was only a single kiss in a country driveway, and three or four years earlier, but rumors of a romantic involvement with Enfield’s president, no matter how misguided, could lose me my job.

Rachel Thompson and Paul Henshaw entered the bar hand in hand. At any other time I would have been goggle-eyed at the pairing, but now I was too embarrassed to pay any attention. And too angry.

“Whatever you heard, it was nothing but rumors. And, damn it, you investigated my finances? You creep!” I gathered up my bag and slid off the stool. “You’ve turned out to be a total sleezeball, Denny O’Hanlon.” I turned away from him, then snapped back over my shoulder, “Don’t call me again.”

“Suit yourself,” he replied, raising his voice. “But, remember,
you
got in touch with
me
. And, by the way, Karen, how do you think you’re going to get home?”

“No. Trouble.” And where was that dog when I really needed him? The door closed behind me with a pneumatic hiss, but not before I noticed Rachel nudge Paul and raise her eyebrows. Then I took in the fascinated eyes of students, colleagues and townspeople. Everyone in the whole damn bar had been listening in on the nasty spat with my former childhood pal. Had they all heard what he’d said about Avery and me? I was doomed. I was truly doomed.

***

I called home from my office, betting that Sunnye was still there with her big rented Lincoln. Fifteen minutes later she and Amanda picked me up outside Dickinson Hall. I didn’t want to think about how they’d gotten to the college that fast. I opened the passenger door of the Town Car. My daughter didn’t even wait until I’d gotten my butt on the seat before she started hassling me from the back. “Mom, the minute he walked in the door, I wanted to tell you to watch out. That Dennis O’Hangman has trouble written all over him. How could you not have seen it?”