Black Orchid Blues (10 page)

Meeting Sheila and Junior had cleared up one mystery. In the months prior, I’d often heard music when walking past the Bernards’ residence. Someone in that house was an accomplished pianist. He or she loved to play Chopin and Brahms. Someone sang opera too. Sometimes I heard Enrico Caruso playing on the Victrola, most often his recording of sacred music by Rossini. I would also hear the pure, thrilling live voice of a young, male tenor singing along. It must’ve been Junior and Sheila: he singing and she at the piano in accompaniment.

It all made for a pretty picture: fine, upstanding parents. A plain but obedient daughter, properly married, and a respectful, dutiful son-in-law. Queenie wouldn’t have fit in. Queenie must have been the secret son, the prodigal they never saw, never spoke of.

Hmm.

I recalled the night before, seeing the lights burning in the Bernards’ window. I had wondered why they were awake when all others on the block were asleep. To think I’d envied them. They’d probably already heard from the kidnappers. They were probably terrified.

And now I’d have to deliver this box to them. Once more, I’d have to act on the kidnappers’ behalf.

I narrowed my eyes. The kidnappers. Who were they? How would they have known to contact the Bernards? Surely, not many of the family’s friends knew about Queenie. So were the kidnappers from Queenie’s past, privy to his secret? Or were they simply desperate strangers who’d lucked out? Had they terrified Queenie so badly that he’d told them his true identity?

One thing was sure: the kidnappers had been busy. While everyone had been waiting for them to contact Fawkes, they’d brutalized Queenie and gone after his family.

And then, by accident or intent, they told a reporter about it.

I used the spoon handle to flap the handkerchief back over the finger, replaced the paper separator, and slid the letter back into the envelope. Then I went back upstairs, taking the obscene package with me. I left it on the parlor room coffee table and went to the phone. I reached for the receiver and glanced at the clock.

It was 3 a.m. Would Sam be home?

I dialed his number and let it ring five times. It occurred to me that maybe Sam shouldn’t be involved. He would insist that I take the box to the cops. I wasn’t sure I wanted to do that, not yet. I was about to hang up.

Too late. His voice stopped me.

C
HAPTER
14

F
orty minutes later, Sam and I were sitting over coffee in my parlor. The cigar box sat closed on the table before us. I wasn’t sleepy and neither was he, so we didn’t need the java, but it provided familiar and comforting qualities to help us in light of this unusual and disquieting delivery.

I told him about my talks with Fawkes and Morgana and Jack-a-Lee. I mentioned that I’d stopped at the station to talk to Blackie.

“Did you tell him about Olmo?”

“No, I wanted to check with you first.”

“Good.” His gaze dwelled on the box. “Do we agree that it wasn’t an accident, or mistake, it landing on your doorstep?”

“You think it’s a trap?”

“I don’t know.”

“But what kind?”

“Again, I don’t know. But the best way to avoid falling into it is to take a step back—and get help.” He sipped his coffee. “We need to decide what to tell the police.”

“Don’t you mean
whether?
The letter states that the police are not to be involved.”

“Kidnappers always demand that.”

“Normally, I’d say, ‘So what?’ But this time we’re dealing with someone’s life.”

“You’re always dealing with someone’s life in a kidnapping.”

That was true. I hesitated. “You’re saying we have to take this to the cops?”

“Are you actually suggesting we shouldn’t?”

“I’m saying … that maybe we should let the family decide. Or, at least, not do anything until they’ve been informed.” I paused. “I’m asking for time.”

“Do you actually want to be the one to give them this?”

He had a point.

“No,” I said, “but …”

He sighed, set his cup aside. “I don’t know. We’d be taking an awful gamble.” He got up, moved to the window, and peered out. Worry puckered his forehead. “We should take that damn box to the cops. Let them handle it.”

I went to him, put my arms around his waist, and rested my head on his back. He hugged my arms to his sides and lightly drew his fingertips over my clasped hands. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. He radiated such a sense of comforting warmth. He smelled faintly of herbs and tobacco. Lately, he’d taken to smoking a pipe.

“Looks can be so deceiving,” he said.

I could feel his voice rumble through his chest. I raised my head. He nodded toward the Bernard house.

“You can read the address that clearly from this distance?” I asked.

“No, I took a walk past the house before coming here.” He sighed. “Looks so peaceful. God only knows what they’re going through.”

The house was dark and still. It was a stately redbrick building, three doors down from the equally elegant McKay house, which had been the scene of two very inelegant murders.

“You’re sure you don’t want to go to Blackie with this?” Sam asked.

“Not until I’ve talked to the Bernards. Telling the cops, that’s their decision to make.”

He hugged me close. “But you know what they’re going to say.”

I rested my face against his chest and nodded. “No cops.”

“We’ll be sitting on a ticking bomb.”

“I know.”

The room was so quiet we could hear the sound of our own breathing. His heart beat steadily beneath my ear.

“All right,” he whispered into my hair, “we’ll try it your way. No cops. For now.”

C
HAPTER
15

W
hile I lived in a limestone town house on the south side of 139th Street, the Bernards lived in one of the Roman redbrick houses on the north side. Many people loved the sunny yellow limestones, designed by Bruce Price and Clarence S. Luce, but the stately redbrick homes caught most of the accolades. They were designed by Stanford White, one of New York’s leading architects, and they were eye-catching.

Like its neighbors, the Bernard home was beautiful and manicured, but unlike the others it was also shrouded in shadow that Friday morning. I told myself it was merely an accident of foliage: a large tree stood just east of the front door. It filtered most of the early-morning sunlight, and, with its wide expanse of branches, blocked most of the afternoon’s too.

It was around nine when I rang their bell and waited expectantly, the cigar box tucked under one arm. I’d rewrapped it in the brown paper and found some fresh twine for a simple knot. From the corner of my eye, I caught a flash of movement: that of a curtain being drawn back, then quickly let go. That didn’t bother me. It made sense to check who was at the door. But as the seconds ticked by, it did begin to frustrate me that someone was home, knew that I was out there, and still wouldn’t answer the door.

A moment later, the Bernards’ neighbor Gladys Cardigan stepped out from next door, dressed in slippers and a flowery pink housedress. She was about seventy years old and small. She appeared to fit the textbook definition of a cute, little old lady, but she was tough and sinewy. Her eyes were bright and shrewd. She’d buried two husbands, along with two sons who died on the battlegrounds of France.

Mrs. Cardigan was a retired teacher and now volunteered at the New York Public Library. She assisted librarian Ernestine Rose in setting up the monthly poetry readings and book discussions at the Harlem branch on West 135th Street, just off Lenox Avenue. To me, Mrs. Cardigan was an inspiration. To most everyone else, she was simply an inveterate snoop.

She stood on her threshold, half in, half out, and gestured toward the Bernards’ front door.

“You’ll be waiting there for ages. They’re home, I’m sure of it. But if they didn’t invite you to come over, they’re not going to answer the door.”

“Oh, really?”

True, the couple of times I had visited the Bernards’ house it had been by invitation. I had never before just stopped by. In a brutal sort of way, it made sense to apply that attitude to certain types of strangers. It was clearly an effective way to avoid panhandlers, religious zealots, salesmen, and a motley crew of drifters who would happily waste your time if you let them. I didn’t think it right, however, to extend that attitude toward neighbors.

Mrs. Cardigan glanced at the package under my arm, her eyes curious, then smiled at me. “Why don’t you come over here for a minute or two? Have a cup of tea?”

Hmm. A chat. So she could pick my brains
.

I could turn the invite down, make enough of a nuisance out here to convince the Bernards to let me in, or … maybe it would be wiser to hear what Mrs. Cardigan had to say about our neighbors.

She had a lovely, frilly house, overstuffed with decor. There were lace doilies and china dolls, brocaded furniture and fringed lamps. The overall effect was slightly suffocating, but I enjoyed it. It reminded me of my maternal grandmother, Great Nanny Belle. There were pictures of Mrs. Cardigan’s lost family everywhere.

Like Nanny Belle, Mrs. Cardigan provided her company with butter cookies and tea. She kept glancing at the box but bided her time. I’d decided to let her take the lead. Once we were settled in the parlor, she did. She sat across from me, sipping her tea. She darted her eyes at the parcel, which I’d placed next to me on the parlor sofa.

“A present for the Bernards?” she asked.

“A mistaken delivery.”

“Oh,” she smiled. “That does happen, doesn’t it?”

“Sometimes.”

“I don’t see an address on it,” she said. “How do you know it’s theirs?”

My, she had good eyes.

“Did you open it?” she asked.

“Well, I had to.”

“And?” She waited.

“And,” I shrugged, “it’s theirs.”

“You’re sure?”

“Very.”

She pursed her lips, evidently disappointed, then reluctantly dragged her gaze away from the box. She took another sip and looked at me. “You used to go over there a lot, didn’t you?”

“Sometimes, when my husband was alive.”

“How did they seem?”

“Normal,” I said, intentionally downplaying my interest.

She gave a snort. “I guess normal is as normal does.”

“Why? You don’t think they’re—”

“They almost never go out. Never have company.”

“True, but—”

“I’ve been trying to get that woman to join my poetry readings for years. At first, she’d open the door and speak politely, but she always stood firmly in the entrance. Now she won’t even do that. Never once invited me in for coffee or tea. Nothing.”

“You don’t say.”

Warming to her story, she leaned forward and lowered her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “I used to know them before they moved to Strivers.”

“Where from?”

“Brooklyn. My baby sister Lucile went to school with Phyllis. It was just coincidence that we ended up on the same block. Strange how that can happen.”

“Fate,” I said.

Mrs. Cardigan nodded, lost to her memories. “I remember how, when Sheila was a little girl, they used to dress her up. Fine outfits. Everything fine. Always had to be the best. Only they didn’t call her Sheila then. Her name was …” She frowned in thought, then snapped her fingers. “Janie. That’s right. They used to call her Janie. She was a pretty little thing. Too bad she didn’t stay that way.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, she was rather light-skinned back then. And pretty, real pretty. They’d get her all dolled up in ruffled lace dresses and Mary Janes. The whole nine yards. They’d parade her up and down DeKalb Avenue like she was the finest thing since hot cocoa.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that, is there?”

“Oh, I’m not saying there was something wrong with it. But it was a bit odd, I think, how they just up and sent her away.”

I cocked my head. “What? Did something happen?”

“I don’t know. I remember seeing Phyllis on the street and asking about her. She got this funny look on her face. Then she said something about sending the child down South to stay with her sister. I was so surprised. They doted on that child. She must’ve been around eleven or twelve at the time. I couldn’t imagine them sending her away.”

“Did you ask them why?”

“They wouldn’t say.” Concern wrinkled Mrs. Cardigan’s brow. “You know, you couldn’t ask for nicer-looking people. But they’re strange, Lanie. Strange. And nice-looking people aren’t always nice.”

“’Tis true.”

“Why, I was just reading the other day about that doctor in Chicago. He killed five women. Married them for their money, then killed them all dead. They had his picture in the paper. You couldn’t wish for a better-looking man. But he’s evil.”

“No, you can’t judge a book by its cover.” I took another sip.

“I think it’s been ten years now since they sent that child away. One day, she was here; the next, she was gone. Just like that. You didn’t see hide nor hair of her.”

“Is that right?”

“Of course, the child was so moody.”

“You mean sad, or temper tantrums?”

“Kind of hard to say. Sometimes, she’d be so quiet, you’d think she was scared to talk. But then she’d get right smart and sassy. She’d say things that would make you blink.”

“How so?” Recalling the Sheila I’d met, I found that hard to imagine.

“Knowing, like a little adult. She had a keen intuition, and when she got like that, it was almost—almost, mind you—as if
she
was the one in charge. She’d say something and Phyllis would get this expression, like she was …” Mrs. Cardigan frowned, searching for the word.

“Angry?”

“No, scared.”

“Of her own child?”

“That’s right. And that’s why I used to think they’d gone and made that child disappear.”

“Disappear?”

“Mm-hmm. I was so glad to see her when she moved back. I don’t want to tell you what I thought they’d really done.” She gave a delicious shudder. “Anyway, years went by. I’d see them and ask about her and they’d give me some vague answer. Never said nothing about her coming back, and when I mentioned that they must miss her, they’d just glance at each other and then give me the same old smile. I’m ashamed to admit it, but I used to wonder if Janie was even theirs, if they’d perhaps kidnapped her.”