The Scent of Murder (20 page)

I
was so stunned I couldn't think of anything to say.

Gerri Richmond's laughter broke over me like waves. “Here I've spent all this time looking for the money Dennis stole, and my own daughter has it. Perfect. Absolutely perfect.” She went into another laughing fit. “And you don't know where she is.”

“Toon Town thinks he does.” I explained about the list.

“How does he know that?”

It was the obvious question. The one I'd asked. The one Toon Town wouldn't answer. I could have told her that. But I wanted the information instead of a debate, so I lied. “Amy told him she'd hidden the rest of the stuff in one of your places. He figures they'll go there.” Maybe I was even right.

“I'll get the list.” Gerri Richmond levered herself up and staggered out of the room.

I sat and watched the second hand of my watch revolve. After one minute, I got up and walked over to the mantel. It was crammed with family photographs. They'd been arranged chronologically over what I'd guess to be a fifteen-year period. In the beginning, we had the quintessential American family. Two children. Two parents. Everyone smiling. The Richmonds at a picnic. The Richmonds at the beach. The Richmonds at Disney Land. Midway, things had changed. The Richmonds were still smiling, but the smiles looked forced. Everyone was leaning away from, instead of towards, one another. Another couple of photos later, Charlie and Amy were scowling. She'd cut her hair very short. Almost buzzed it. A homemade job, by the look of it. How old was she? I guessed eleven or twelve.

I studied the next snapshot. This one had been taken somewhere in the Bahamas. On the beach. Everyone was wearing bathing suits—except for Amy who was wearing all black. She'd pierced her nose. I ran my eye over the last photographs. Amy wasn't in them. Neither was Charlie. If I were going to do an art show with the pictures on the mantel, I'd title it “Portrait of Family Disintegration.” I was wondering what had happened, when I heard Toon Town beeping. I glanced at my watch. Another minute had gone by. Time to get going. I went to find Gerri. I heard her voice rising and falling, as I walked out of the den. The sound formed a thread and I followed it into the kitchen. The room could have been a magazine ad in
Better Homes and Gardens.
It had all the amenities. Jen-Air grill. Center island. The wall stove built into a brick alcove. Glass refrigerator. The only thing lacking was the family.

Gerri was leaning against the counter. She was curling the phone cord around her hand as she talked. When she saw me, she hung up. “I was talking to Charlie,” she said. “I thought he had a right to know what was going on.”

“I think maybe you should tell him after you give me the list.”

“Are you saying I don't care about my daughter?” she demanded.

“I'm saying I need the list,” I reiterated.

She brushed by me. “It's in my bedroom.”

“I'll go with you.” As I followed her down the hall, I wondered if she were telling me the truth about talking to Charlie. She hadn't shown any need to keep him apprised of things before. Our footsteps echoed on the floor, as we headed for the stairs. Toon Town sounded the horn again. We were running out of time. I followed Gerri Richmond up the stairs and into the master bedroom. The smell of Le Dix lingered in the air. Gerri flicked on the light. I took a look around. The carpet was white. The bed was king-sized and canopied, the dressers and nightstands were painted white with a gold overlay. A large, rectangular mirror in a gilt frame decorated the space over the double dresser. Other than that, the walls were bare. Several cartons stood near a large treadmill.

Gerri followed my gaze. “Dennis's things,” she explained, as she headed for the desk on the far side of the room.

Well, she was more efficient than I'd been, that was for sure. It had taken me six months to tackle Murphy's belongings. Either that, or she was anxious to get all reminders of him out of her life.

I watched her open and close drawers and go through papers. “It's here somewhere,” she muttered. “I know it is.” She took the three drawers out and dumped them on the floor. Then she got down on her knees and started pawing through the mess she'd created.

I got down with her. I saw invitations. Notices from Amy's school. Notices from the superintendent's office talking about disciplinary hearings. Letters from the Richmonds to the only private school in town asking about admission for their daughter.

“Here it is.” Gerri lifted a piece of paper up and waved it in the air.

I snatched it out of her hand and scanned the list. There were five addresses all together. Not as many as I feared. “I'll call the moment I have her,” I told Gerri, as I got up.

She nodded. I waited for her to say something else, but she didn't. Instead, her hands went to her pearls. She fingered the smooth white beads as if they were her rosary. I watched her for a few seconds more, before heading for the door.

Just as I reached it, I heard her whisper, “Tell Amy I'm sorry.”

I wanted to turn back and ask her if she were sorry for anything in particular or for everything in general, but there was no time to listen to her confession. I ran down the stairs and out the hallway. The front door slammed shut behind me, and I walked out into the rain.

Toon Town opened his good eye as I slipped inside my car. The other eye had turned a deeper shade of purple. “Did you get it?” he asked. I could detect a quaver in his voice that hadn't been there earlier. He was getting weaker. I wondered how long he'd been able to hold out, as I handed him the list.

“Here it is.”

“Good.” His hands were shaking as he took it. He held it up to the street lamp. His lips moved as he read. “All right.” He tore up the list, rolled the window down a crack, and threw the pieces out into the rain.

I guess he wasn't taking any chances. Then he told me to get on 690 and get off at West Street.

I did what he said.

I watched him out of the corner of my eye as I drove. He was gripping his knees with his hands. Every once in a while his head would drop down, then he would snap to and bring it up. He was having trouble staying awake, or maybe he was having trouble staying conscious. I couldn't decide which. When we got to West Street, he told me to keep straight. After five blocks, he directed me to make a left.

The houses in this part of town ranged from the small but adequate to the tumbled down. Windows were frequently covered with plastic. The lawns were festooned with “For Sale” signs. Piles of old furniture dotted the curbs. It was like Appalachia. Everyone who could move out already had. The only ones left were the old, the young, the sick, and the unemployable. Recently I'd read an article by a professor of sociology asking whether drug dealers had caused this type of urban exodus or had merely taken advantage of it.

Naturally, though, he hadn't asked the people who were still living there—like the men standing outside. No matter what the weather, they were always there, clustered in convenience store parking lots or lounging on street corners, talking and passing bottles wrapped in brown paper bags back and forth. They followed me with their eyes, as I drove by. Condemned to idleness, I had the feeling they'd still be there if I came back the next day, the next month, or the next year.

When we hit North Street, Toon Town told me to follow it.

“I have a question,” I said to him.

“What?”

“Did you trash my store?”

“No. Why are asking me something like that?” His voice rose a little.

“Then what did you mean when you said you were going to get back at me?”

“I was gonna bug your store and your house.” He gave me a sickly grin. “Shake you up a little. But I never got around to your house. The store is what gave me the kidnap idea.” Toon Town's voice trailed off. He looked spent. Talking seemed to tire him out.

I kept driving. The street was four miles long and twisted and turned through several residential areas. Two miles later, we came to a commerical block, and Toon Town ordered me to slow down.

“This is it,” he said, when he came to the middle of the block.

The building he was pointing to was three stories high. Judging from the number of “For Sale,” “Reduced Price,” and “For Rent” signs tacked on the wall, it had been vacant for awhile. Its pseudo-modern style—glass, metal strips, and colored panels, a style popularized twenty years ago—hadn't worn well. Almost a third of the windows were broken, and the panels, once pink, were greyed-over with dirt. As I tried to read the faded sign hanging over the main entrance, I thought about why the Richmonds didn't just abandon the place and throw it back at the bank. Maybe they were using it as a tax write-off.

“You know what this place was?” Toon Town asked me. Under the streetlight, his face was a technicolor kaleidoscope of purple, black, and red.

“No.”

“The Evan's School for Mortuary Science.”

Somehow, given the players in this little drama, I wasn't surprised.

Death seemed to be the subject, the verb, and the modifier of their universe.

Toon Town brought his hand up and pointed to an empty spot. “You can park here.”

I pulled over to the curb and took my phone out of the glove compartment.

“What are you doing?” he croaked.

“I'm calling the cops.”

“Don't.” He was pleading now.

“How are you going to stop me?”

“You said you cared about Amy.”

“That's why I'm doing it. I'm not compromising her life by going in there and getting everyone upset.” Not to mention getting myself killed.

He coughed. A spasm of pain crossed his face. “Amy is the only one in there.”

“Come again?”

“You heard me. Don't act so surprised. You knew I was conning you back there. I could see it.”

I was surprised, though, surprised he'd been able to read my reactions. If I were in his condition, I wouldn't be doing character readings. Of course if I were in his condition, I'd be unconscious. “But now you're going to tell me the truth?”

“Yes.”

“I'm listening.” I got a cigarette out of my backpack, lit it, and waited.

Toon Town began. His voice was so low I had to move forward to hear. “Amy was in the basement looking for a clean towel when he came in.”

“At the house you said ‘they.' Which is it: he or they?”

“He.”

“Does he have a name?”

“You want to hear this or not?”

I told him yes and shut up. I'd ask my questions when he was through.

“Amy must have heard what was going on upstairs and snuck out the back door.”

“How can you be so sure he didn't grab her?”

“I could hear him as he went through the rooms. He was looking for her. She wasn't there.” He closed his eyes and opened them again. His face was beaded with sweat. “I knew she'd come here. She gabbed about it all the time, about how cool it was that her family owned a building like this. But I couldn't remember the address. I figured once I saw the list, I'd know which one it was. And I was right. I did. All you have to do is get Amy. Just tell her I'm waiting for her. She'll come right out.”

I studied his face. He was leaning against the door. His will was the only thing keeping him going. I didn't think he had the energy to lie. “Then what?”

“Then you drive me to my mother's house and drop me off. I keep the diamonds and you keep Amy.”

“You really have this planned.” I rolled down my window and flicked my half-smoked Camel into the street. “And she's just going to go with me?”

Toon Town coughed. His face looked more swollen than it had earlier. His chin was covered with dried blood. “I'm sure you'll find a way to make her.”

“I don't think so.” I activated the phone.

“Wait,” Toon Town cried. “I think she's got some stuff she was gonna sell to Justin on her. I don't think she ever got rid of it.”

I clicked the off switch. I'd forgotten about that. “How much?”

“Enough that if the cops come, they're going to put her away. Ten hits of acid can get you a five-year minimum.”

“She'll walk. She's only fifteen.”

“They could still put her in juvie. You never know what's going to happen these days,” Toon Town whispered. He was fading fast.

What Toon Town said was true. You never did know. I rubbed my temples. And then there was the fact that if I called the cops and Amy saw them, she'd probably run—something she was very good at—and then things could go bad real fast. She was just stupid enough to keep going when they told her to stop and get herself shot for her pains. If I went in myself, I'd collect Amy, drive Toon Town to a hospital, call my lawyer, then call the police. It was time everything got straightened out—it was past time. I was tired of chasing Amy. Tired of the Richmond family in general. I wanted my life back. Such as it was. Which is why I told Toon Town I'd do what he asked.

“Good. This way everyone's happy.” He closed his good eye again. It seemed to me his breathing had gotten shallower. Or maybe it was my imagination.

I wanted to get as close to the building as possible, so I made a U-turn and parked behind a grey Plymouth. When I told Toon Town I was going, he moved his head slightly to acknowledge he'd heard me.

As I closed the door, I wondered if he'd be conscious when I returned. I was actually hoping he wouldn't be, because it would make things easier if he were out cold. I moved around to the back of the cab, opened the trunk, and got out a flashlight and my baseball bat. Of course I already had my box cutter. If I'd had an Uzi, I'd have taken that too. Then I trotted down the alley to the back of the building. It turned out to be your basic, run-down, rubble-strewn, bad neighborhood, who-gives-a-shit back lot. I tried to avoid the broken beer bottles, fast-food wrappers, crack vials, and used condoms, as I walked to the service entrance. Fast sex. Fast drugs. Fast food. Welcome to the mid-nineties. The triumph of form over content.