A Catered Thanksgiving (23 page)

T
he stairs were so dark that Bernie had to feel her way up them. She counted seven steps, then a landing, then five more steps after that. She could hear Libby crying, “Come back,” behind her, but she ignored her and kept on going. She was determined to get this squared away one way or another.

She tightened her grip on her knife, just in case Geoff was up there waiting for her, but she didn't think he was. The space felt empty, devoid of life. She wouldn't be able to explain to anyone why she felt that way, but she did, and by this time she'd learned to trust her instincts. It was when she didn't that things usually went wrong.

She heard Libby say, “God, I hate you,” as she scrambled up behind her. By that time Bernie had reached the attic. It was lighter up there, the illumination coming from the moon shining through the window. It had finally stopped snowing. She moved over so Libby would have somewhere to stand.

“Welcome aboard,” she told her when she made it.

“I'd rather be on a cruise ship.”

“You get seasick.”

“I'd still rather be on a cruise ship.”

Bernie didn't reply. She was too busy looking around. The room looked like the storage area their dad had built in their attic for their winter clothes, only this area was intended for human habitation. The room had been framed out with two-by-fours and sheetrocked with three-quarter-inch brads, which held the Sheetrock in place.

The Sheetrock went only two-thirds of the way up the two-by-fours. The rest of the space was open, leaving a view of the underside of the rafters supporting the roof. Bernie noted that the Sheetrock hadn't been finished off here, either. It was down and dirty construction at its finest. Probably an amateur job, she decided. Certainly a professional would never want his name attached to something like this.

There were two pieces of furniture in the room. A twin bed and a small dresser with a lamp sitting on it.

“Home, sweet home,” Bernie murmured as she walked toward the bed.

She touched the coverlet. It was a thin cotton chenille. She lifted up the coverlet and felt the sheets. They were thin from too many washings. The single pillow on the bed was lumpy.

“It's cold in here,” Libby noted. There was no sign of a heater.

“And boiling hot in the summer,” Bernie added as she went over to the dresser.

“You know how we said that Alma probably lived somewhere else and came in every day?” Libby said, taking in the surroundings. “I think we were wrong. Who else would be living up here?”

“The mad sister,” Bernie said.

“What?”

“Obviously you're not up on your gothics,” Bernie said.

“Not since I was thirteen,” Libby answered.

She watched as Bernie pulled the top dresser drawer open. It was filled with neatly folded socks, cheap underpants, two old bras, and a couple of pairs of folded pajamas. There was a manila envelope sitting on the bottom. Bernie pulled it out and opened it up. The envelope contained three birthday cards signed
Love, your son Roberto,
a photograph, and a letter.

Bernie opened the letter and read, “‘Alma, if you continue harassing me, I will have no choice but to turn the matter over to the authorities. Your accusations re your son are baseless, and I will not be blackmailed by you.' It's signed ‘Monty.'” Bernie passed the letter over to Libby. “The letter is dated a little less than three weeks ago.”

“I bet that's when he called the immigration on her.”

“It's not too much of a stretch to make that assumption.”

“I wonder what she was accusing him of.”

Bernie studied Alma's son's photograph for a minute. “I think I know.” She tapped the picture with her fingernail. “Look at the kid's chin. Does it remind you of anyone?”

“No.”

“Look again.”

“I still don't see it.”

Bernie took the photo back. “The kid has Monty's chin.”

“I think you're stretching it.”

“He does,” Bernie insisted.

“I think you're seeing that because of the letter. I can think of lots of other explanations.”

“But what if it is true?” Bernie insisted. “What if Alma had a son with Monty?”

“Well, it would open up a load of possibilities,” Libby conceded. “I wonder what Alma wanted Monty to do.”

“Obviously give her some money for the kid. That would explain why she agreed to live like this.” Bernie gestured toward the room. “He probably promised her he'd take care of the kid….”

“Like send him to college…,” Libby hypothesized, going along with Bernie's scenario.

“And she kept asking him….”

“And he kept putting her off.”

“So finally she makes a threat—like she's going to tell everyone.”

“And he calls immigration on her and has her taken away. Problem solved.”

“Which, if true, makes Monty even more of a turd than I thought he was.”

“Which is saying a lot.”

“Well, it's certainly one way to get cheap labor.”

“Slave labor, really. With the attic door positioned the way it is, she couldn't come or go without his knowledge.”

“And approval. I don't think the door opens from the inside.”

“Lovely.” Libby sighed. “Good reason to kill someone. I wonder what the rest of the family will say when we ask about Roberto.”

“Something snotty and unhelpful, no doubt.” Bernie cocked her head toward the opening leading to the next room. “I bet that's where Roberto slept,” she said, walking toward it.

“At least he had a room of his own,” Libby said.

“I suppose that's something.”

“But not a lot.”

“Well, as Mom used to say, it's better than a sharp poke in the eye,” Bernie replied as she and her sister stepped inside the second room.

It was very much like the first one. There was a narrow bed and a small dresser with a similar-looking lamp, but there was a thicker coverlet on the bed, a small area rug on the floor, and a small mammal cage shoved over into the far corner of the room.

Bernie went over and took a look. “I guess the kid had a ferret as a pet.”

“How do you know that?”

Bernie made fanning motions in the air with her hands. “The vibes are strong with me.”

“Seriously.”

“Seriously.” Bernie pointed to the box, half hidden by the cage, that said
FERRET FOOD
. “That's how.”

“You don't have to gloat.”

“I'm not gloating. I'm rejoicing.”

“Let's just drop the subject, shall we?”

“Fine with me.” Bernie couldn't help smiling as she turned and studied the walls.

Alma's son had nailed pictures of football and basketball players cut from newspapers and magazines up on three of the walls, while the fourth wall was covered with photos of Mexican beach resorts and ruins.

“I guess he's getting to see them now,” Bernie commented as her gaze swept over them and onto the empty bags of food that were strewn by the bed.

“One can only hope,” Libby said. She looked at the food on the floor. There were half-empty potato chip bags, empty soda cans, empty bags of dehydrated Hawaiian chicken and noodles, and a plate from downstairs with the remains of turkey, cranberry sauce, corn-bread stuffing, and green beans. “I guess Geoff was camping out here,” she said as she spied a rolled-up sleeping bag in the corner.

Bernie went over and unrolled it and shook it out. It smelled of unwashed bodies, but there was nothing in it.

“What were you looking for?” Libby asked.

Bernie shrugged. “I don't really know. Anything.”

Libby went through the drawers. Tees, shirts, pants, briefs, hoodies, and socks were all crammed in together in no particular order.

“Nothing.” Libby straightened up. Her hands were cold, and she flexed her fingers, then rubbed her palms together to get the circulation going while studying the square cut in the Sheetrock that served as an entrance to what Libby presumed to be the rest of the attic. “I wonder what's in there.”

“Only one way to find out,” Bernie said. And she walked through the opening.

Libby followed a moment later. “It looks like our attic,” she said, assessing the boxes of old clothes, the mattresses, bed frames, and rolled-up rugs. A persistent odor of mildew and decay hung over the room, probably, Libby reasoned, because there was a leak somewhere in the roof.

Bernie walked over to a large armoire. “I wonder what's in here,” she said.

“Probably more junk.”

“Let's find out, shall we?” And Bernie opened the door.

B
ernie blinked. She couldn't believe what she was seeing. It looked like one of those Halloween tableaus her neighbor down the street liked to set up on his lawn. Only this was real. Geoff was pinned to the back of the armoire with his samurai sword.

“I guess we don't have to look for Geoff anymore,” Bernie said when she got her voice back a moment later.

Libby didn't answer. She was still in shock. She just stared at Geoff, and he stared back at her.

Bernie frowned. “I'll say one thing. This has certainly been a morning of surprises. First Alma's son and now Geoff.”

“I just hope this is the last of the lot,” Libby said.

“God, me too.”

“So when Geoff ran away…”

“He came up here. Which is why we couldn't find him.”

“And someone was waiting for him.”

“Or he discovered someone up here who didn't want to be discovered, or someone came up and found him here.”

“So all the time we were looking for him, he was”—Libby pointed to the armoire—“in there.”

Bernie chewed on the inside of her cheek. “Maybe. Maybe not. I don't think it's possible for us to tell when he was killed. But one thing is clear.”

“What's that?” Libby asked.

“I don't think this happened here. It would take a lot of strength to pin someone to the wall like this.”

“Okay.” Libby crossed her arms over her chest. “I can see that.”

“And he wouldn't have died instantly. He would have struggled.”

Libby forced herself to regard Geoff's body. “It doesn't look as if he struggled, does it?”

Bernie shook her head. “Not at all. I think whoever did this killed him first and then pinioned him to the back of the armoire. Either that or he was so close to being dead that he didn't have any strength left to fight. Otherwise, he would have pulled the sword out of himself. Or tried to.”

“Why do it that way? Who was going to see it?”

“That is the question, isn't it?” Bernie said.

“I wonder if he was shot first.”

“If he was, it certainly isn't anyplace we can see it.” And Bernie picked up a T-shirt that was lying on the floor and stepped into the armoire.

“What are you doing?” Libby asked.

“Checking to make sure Geoff wasn't shot in the back of the head.” And with that Bernie inserted the shirt between Geoff's head and her hand, and gently moved Geoff's head forward. “No bullet wound,” she announced after she'd had a look. She withdrew the T-shirt. “And no blood on the shirt.”

She regarded Geoff some more, while Libby regarded her sister with an expression composed of equal parts of awe and horror.

Bernie pointed to a bruise on the side of Geoff's throat. “I think maybe someone pressed on his carotid artery and cut off his blood flow. Then, when he was unconscious, they skewered him to the back of the armoire, closed the cabinet door, and left him to die. Want to take a look?”

“Thanks, but I'll pass.”

“Thought you would,” Bernie told her.

“I don't do windows and I don't do bodies. I don't think that's unreasonable,” Libby said.

“So you've told me.”

And Bernie began emptying Geoff's pants pockets and handing the contents to her sister. Bernie found a half-eaten pack of peanut M&M's, a wallet with Geoff's driver's license, two credit cards, a business card with the name of a lawyer on it, which Bernie palmed, and twenty dollars in cash in his right-hand pants pocket; and a nasal spray, two three-week-old ticket stubs to a movie house down in New York City, and a pack of cigarettes and a Zippo lighter in his left-hand pocket.

“I guess Geoff was telling the truth when he told us he smoked,” Bernie commented as she started in on Geoff's jacket pockets.

The left-hand one contained three quarters and a couple of pennies, while the right-hand one contained a neatly folded piece of paper. Bernie unfolded it, noting as she did that the paper was the kind used in printers. Someone had cut out letters from a magazine and pasted them on the center of the page to form four words.

“Interesting,” she said, passing the paper on to Libby, who read the words,
payback is a bitch,
out loud.

“It certainly was in this case,” Libby commented as she studied the paper. “I didn't think people did this kind of thing anymore,” she said as she handed the paper back to Bernie.

“Did what?” Bernie asked.

“Cut out letters and pasted them on paper. It's not necessary now that people use computers instead of typewriters.”

“Guess our murderer is an old-fashioned kinda guy. Or gal.” Bernie folded up the paper and slipped it into her pocket along with Alma's letter and the photo of Alma's son. “Then he should be right up your alley, you not liking technology and all.”

“Speaking of which,” Libby said, looking down at Geoff's belongings. “Where's Geoff's cell phone? Because it's not here.”

“It isn't, is it?” Bernie said, peeved at herself for having missed something so obvious.

Libby grinned. Now they were even.

“He must have dropped it somewhere around here.”

“It would be good to find.”

“Yes, it would,” Bernie agreed as she took the contents of Geoff's pockets from Libby and put everything back the way she'd found it. She started to close the armoire door.

“I take it we're leaving him for the police?” Libby asked.

“That's the general plan. Unless you have another idea.”

“Not me.” Libby was glad not to have Geoff staring at her anymore. It made her feel guilty.

Bernie and Libby spent the next fifteen minutes trying to find Geoff's cell phone and failing. Finally, they both decided to call it a day. The phone could be anywhere. But the effort hadn't been wasted, because during that time Bernie began to form a hypothesis about who the murderer could be. It was slightly far-fetched, but she reasoned that far-fetched was better than nothing.

“And now I think it's time to wake everyone up, don't you?” Libby said as they went down the stairs to Monty's room. She slid the door shut behind her and closed the closet door.

Bernie nodded. She was curious to see how everyone would respond to the news. So was Libby. They discussed what they were going to do and how they were going to do it as they walked down the hall. Then they began knocking on doors.