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Authors: Tamar Myers

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BOOK: Larceny and Old Lace
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“Open that door or I'm telling Buford everything,” I said.

The line works with Tweetie every time. One of these days I'm going to find out what it is she's trying to hide. At any rate, the door opened wide, leaving me face to point with Bob. Or maybe No-Bob. You get the point.

“I'm here to see my son. Is he here?”

“Maybe, maybe not. Buford said I don't have to let you in but once a week. You were already here this week.”

“I was here Friday, and today is Tuesday. Anyway, I was awarded unlimited visiting privileges. Besides, Charlie is seventeen now. He can see me whenever he wants.”

“I was talking about how many times I have to let you in the house. I don't care how many times you see your son. He's in the kitchen, still eating. That's all he ever does.”

“That's what seventeen-year-old boys are supposed to do,” I said calmly.

“And this damn dog sheds over everything. Have you ever tried getting dog hair off of white suede?”

“Not since my divorce, dear.”

She lost interest in me and wandered off, the door still open. She turned around a corner, and I could see Bob bobbing and No-Bob not.

I am better behaved than most things the cat drags home, and closed the door. It was strange to be alone in my own house again—well, you know what I mean. Tweetie either had no interest in decorating or else was forbidden to do so by Buford (the man must have a little taste: he married me, didn't he?), because the only change I could see was the velvet Elvis painting above the grand piano. Even it was of better quality than most.

I gave Scruffles a big hug and let him lick my face a few times. “Next time trying chewing that white suede,” I whispered.

Charlie was indeed in the kitchen, chowing down on the remains of an extra-large pizza. Tweetie undoubtedly cooked like she decorated. And what else did she expect a seventeen-year-old boy to do besides eat? Besides
that
, for pete's sake?

“Mama!”

I hugged Charlie and tousled his hair. Thank God the gene for baldness doesn't pass through the father. Even a cue ball has more fuzz clinging to it than Buford.

“What's up, Mama? You want some pizza? The bitch wouldn't let me order extra cheese. Says she's trying to watch her weight.”

I accepted dinner from my son. After supper I tousled his hair again. Charlie doesn't mind pizza grease in his hair.

“Honey, Aunt Eulonia died last night. Did you hear?”

He shook his head, tears welling up immediately. “I was at school all day, then football practice. I just got home.”

“Look Charlie, I'll tell it to you straight. Anyway, you're going to read about it in the paper. She was murdered.”

He sat bolt upright. “No way!”

“Yes, dear, last night. I would have called you then, but I wanted to tell you in person.”

He nodded, a far-off look in his eye. Undoubtedly he was remembering some of the good times he had known with his great-aunt. When he was little he used to spend the night at
her house, and the two of them would stay up until dawn, playing canasta and making peanut brittle.

“She was one of a kind,” I said. “Why would anyone want to kill an old lady like that?”

He looked me in the eyes.

“I know why she was killed, Mama. I know why they killed Aunt Eulonia.”

“Y
ou know who killed Aunt Eulonia?”

“No, but I know
why
she was killed.”

Like all teenagers, Charlie lies through his teeth, but he is not given to dramatic statements. He has never felt the need for a spotlight.

“Why?”

He looked me in the eye. “Because of her lace.”

Perhaps I had misjudged my son. “Her lace?”

He nodded. “Yeah. Aunt Eulonia had this lace thing—I forget what you call it—that she said was very valuable. That's why she was killed.”

I smiled. A full day of school and then football practice. The boy was undoubtedly exhausted.

“Lace isn't that valuable, dear. Sure, if you get some really old stuff, and it's clean and not stained, it's worth something. But not enough to kill for. I mean, who would kill somebody for twenty-five dollars?”

He shook his head. “This was really special. She was going to sell it, you know. At an auction. In New York.”

“Sotheby's?”

“Yeah, that sounds like it.”

I could feel the hair on the back of my neck stand up. I was on to something.

“Did you see this lace?”

“Un-unh. But she told me about it. She said it was really old. Hundreds of years even. It was made in Italy, or Spain.”

“Go on.”

He grunted and reached for the last slice of pizza. “That's all I know about it, Mama. Oh, except that if it sold at this place in New York for half of what she thought it would, she was going to retire and take a trip around the world. She wanted to take me with her.” His eyes filled with tears. “We were going to Africa first—on a photo safari. When we were all done, we were going to end up in Alaska walking on one of those glaciers.”

That sounded like Eulonia Wiggins alright.

“You never mentioned this,” I said. I tried not to make it sound like an accusation.

“I wasn't supposed to. Not yet. She wanted me to wait until after the auction. She was afraid talking about it would jinx it. I guess it did.” He turned away to wipe his eyes.

I sat quietly until he had composed himself. “Did anyone else know about this?”

He shrugged, the cold pizza hanging from his mouth.

“Do you know where she got it?”

Unlike Peggy, he swallowed before answering. “Some ancestor of ours, I guess. Her grandmother, or somebody. Does that make us Italian or something?”

“Or something,” I said. Our family had lived long enough in America to claim a pint or two of just about everybody's blood. Scotch, Irish, English, German, Swedish. French, Catawba Indian, even rumors of an African-American way back when, but as of yet no Italians.

He flashed me a smile. It was like the sun peeking through a stormy sky. “I have always liked pizza. And pasta.”

“Me, too.”

“I suppose you have to tell the police.”

“Yes, dear, I'm afraid I do. I'm sorry.”

He nodded. “It's okay. I want whoever did it caught. I want them—Mama, you didn't tell me how she was killed.”

He was going to read it in the papers anyway. Maybe see it on TV. “She was strangled. Someone took a bell pull and strangled her.”

He took it in. “Well then, I hope whoever killed Aunt Eulonia gets hung. No, I want to hang them myself.
After
I beat the shit out of them.”

I did not raise my son to be violent. Football is Buford's influence. Still, if I could catch whoever strangled my aunt, I would call Charlie and have him come over. Together we'd beat the shit out of her murderer.

“The funeral is Thursday at two,” I said after a while. “Down in Rock Hill, at Grandma's church. You want to go?”

He looked puzzled. “Why wouldn't I want to go? I'm not a baby, Mama. You going to come to school to pick me up?”

I nodded. “Charlie, did Aunt Eulonia ever give you a key to her house?”

He wiped his nose on his shirt sleeve. Not a baby, but still a boy. “No. You need to get in?”

“I want her to be buried in one of her favorite dresses. Something different than the one—well, you know.”

“You won't find what you're looking for,” Charlie said. It was uncanny how sometimes that boy could anticipate my next thought.

“Are you sure?”

“Positive. Aunt Eulonia told me she was keeping it somewhere nobody would ever think to look.”

“In that old pie cabinet in the basement of her shop where she hides everything else?”

“I don't think so. It was supposed to be someplace really special. She said I wouldn't guess in a million years.”

If it was in her safety deposit box then I was a day late and out of luck. It had undoubtedly been impounded that morning.

“Could it be at her house?”

“Beats me. She wouldn't give me any hints. But you can search her house yourself, if you want,” he added, ahead of me again.

“What? I can't break in.”

He smiled. “I said I didn't
have
a key. I didn't say I didn't know where one was. Try looking in a little clay flower pot tucked behind the azaleas next to the outside faucet. The one in back, near the garage.”

Charlie squeezed me hard when I hugged him good-bye. “Love ya,” he said.

 

I couldn't reach Investigator Washburn on the phone. He was off duty, I guess. Probably out gallivanting with women half my age. I was invited to leave a message, but I wasn't about to involve Charlie, not without speaking directly with Blue Eyes first. I left a cryptic message, asking him to call me at his earliest convenience. With any luck he would think I was coming on to him and take a hint. With just about any luck, but not with mine.

To me Charlotte is a big city, so by the time I got to Susan's street on the northeast side, my nerves were as tight as an overdeveloped perm. It didn't help matters any when Susan's building came into view. My daughter, perhaps to spite us, certainly to embarrass her father, chose the worst apartment building in all of Charlotte to call home. Don't get me wrong: the neighborhood itself is fine. It's Susan's building that is guaranteed to give you nightmares. I am convinced that in its better days it served as a training school for slumlords.

A small resident rat, or possibly a large visiting cat, ran out into the street when I opened the lobby door. The combined odors of urine, vomit, and boiled cabbage rolled over me like waves, nearly sweeping me back into the street along with the rat. No wonder the poor thing was in such a hurry.

The fifteen-watt lightbulb in the stairwell was a blessing. The obscene phrases scrawled on the wall were hard to read. Unfortunately I could still make out the crudely sketched body parts—most of which exuded fluids—but someone had kindly scrubbed several feet off the top of a giant, erect penis. I hoped it was Susan.

I had to walk up to the third floor. There was an elevator in the building, but as usual, it was occupied. I don't mean that someone was using it as a means of conveyance. I mean someone was living in it.

There wasn't any lightbulb on Susan's landing, the third, so I felt along the wall counting doors. I would have kicked myself for not bringing a flashlight, but I was still wearing my pointed-toe shoes. I knocked on the third door to the right. After five minutes and sore knuckles someone responded.

“Yeah?” The man who opened it was wearing only gray sweatpants, cut off above the knees. His calves were hairy, his
belly was like a sheepskin, and he had very few teeth.

“I'm here to see Susan Timberlake.”

He stared at me as if I had spoken in Mandarin Chinese.

“I'm her mother.”

The door closed. After five more minutes and a sore right foot it opened again. Susan was standing there, clutching a bathrobe. Apparently she couldn't find the belt.

“Mama!”

“The very one. The same one who carried you through nine long months—during the hottest summer the Carolinas have ever had, mind you—endured seventeen hours of excruciatingly painful labor, sat up with you—”

“Do you want to come in, Mama?” Susan was always more deferential over the phone than in person.

It was a difficult choice. I couldn't figure out which was the frying pan and which was the fire. Foolishly I chose to see what I was getting into.

The apartment looked like it had been stripped. The brand-new sectional sofa Buford had bought for her at Sofas on South was missing. All the furniture was missing. The only thing in the living room was a decrepit mattress on the floor, only half covered by a twisted sheet.

“Susan!”

“Now chill, Mama. Don't get all bent out of shape. It was only stuff.”

I took a deep, chilling breath. “Stuff your Daddy paid for. Stuff your roommates—speaking of which, where are they?”

Susan shrugged. It was the first gesture she ever learned.

“I guess Lori's living with her boyfriend. Tanya joined the National Guard, I think.”

“What?” I needed to sit down, but I wasn't about to sit down on that mattress. The lobby carpet had less stains on it.

“Mama, these things happen. It just didn't work out rooming with them, that's all. It's no big deal. Everything's fine, honest.”

“But you can't live here like this. Not by yourself.”

She clutched the robe tighter across her chest. “I'm not alone, Mama. I have Jimmy.”

“Jimmy?” Cerebral lightning hit. I wish it had knocked me
brain dead. “
That
was Jimmy? That pathetic old mange bucket was Jimmy?” Fortunately the man in question had retired to another room. Probably the bathroom.

“Mama! I'm not going to talk with you if you're going to say things like that.”

I took a deep breath. Somewhere in the universe somebody went without air for a minute.

“Okay. I'm sorry. Now, who is this Jimmy?”

She was studying my face to see if I was really sorry. I thought about Aunt Eulonia's death and the pain it was causing Charlie. It must have worked.

“Mama, Jimmy Grady is the sweetest, kindest man alive. I'm in love with him, Mama. And I know he loves me!”

I kicked my left leg with my pointed right shoe. “How old is he?” I asked calmly.

She was able to look me in the eyes, I'll grant her that. “Thirty-eight.”

“Where did you meet him?”

Her gaze wavered slightly. “He's a custodian at school. I mean, he was a custodian there. Last year. It isn't his fault that his wife sued him for child support and he ended up getting fired.”

“His wife?”

She nodded. “But he's going to get a divorce. He never even loved her, you know that? He said he knows he couldn't have loved her, because it didn't feel at all like it feels for me. He says he's waited around his whole life for someone like me.”

“I bet he has,” I muttered. “How many children does your Jimmy have?”

“Five, Mama, but none of them were his fault. His wife kept tricking him into getting her pregnant. She's extremely manipulative.”

“Sounds like Jimmy needs to keep his pecker in his pants.”

“What?”

“Uh, what I—what did happen to the furniture?” It was a useful tactic, learned from Susan herself. When trapped, change the subject.

“Oh that. Jimmy said it would be a good idea to sell it and
put the money into a better car. I need a good car if I'm going to drive to work every day, not a sofa.”

“I see. But what happened to the car your Daddy gave you?”

“Oh that? Well, you see, Jimmy and his friends were driving around one day, obeying the speed limit and everything, and this old geezer runs a stop sign and totals it.”

That certainly accounted for Jimmy. Thank God Susan wasn't along.

“What about insurance? Didn't you tell your daddy?”

She put her hands on her hips, a gesture learned from me no doubt. “Well, you know how Daddy's always yapping about high rates and all. I didn't want him to get upset, so I didn't collect.”

“But Susan, dear, you don't have insurance on this
better
car, do you?”

She sighed patiently. “I will, Mama. Just give me time. It's my life, you know, and my car. Daddy didn't have a thing to do with this one.”

She meant her car. I wish I could say the same thing for her life. I don't know what possessed me to marry Buford Timberlake right out of college. Possessed—maybe that was it. I was possessed by something. After all, there was this Haitian girl, into voodoo, who lived right down the hall.

Mama saw straight through to Buford's core. Knowing her, she probably smelled how rotten it was. I was so in love I couldn't smell or see. Of course, comparing Buford with Jimmy was like comparing girdles with peanuts. There wasn't any relationship there at all.

Buford had a college education and a place guaranteed him in law school. Buford had plans. Buford even had some money. Not much, but enough so that I didn't have to work when Susan was born.

What did Jimmy have? He didn't even have a whole pair of jogging pants. I would have to come back to Susan's apartment building in the daytime, with a high-powered flashlight—maybe connected to a high-powered rifle, and do some sleuthing. It was beginning to look like that Haitian girl, the one into voodoo, might be living under Susan's roof.

I kicked myself into consciousness.

“Susan, are you—I mean, is this something more than a platonic relationship?” I am willing, no eager, to talk myself into believing anything that will make life easier for the ones I love. And for me.

Her eyes widened. She was always good at feigning astonishment.

“Mama, no! Of course not! I would never do such a thing. Not without getting married first. Jimmy sleeps out here on the floor. I sleep back there in the bedroom. Mama, really!”

She had thrown me enough scraps to concoct the meal I desperately needed. I was momentarily grateful. It wasn't as late in the game as it could be.

BOOK: Larceny and Old Lace
3.62Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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