False Prophet (3 page)

“I’ll check it out.”

“By the way, Detective, there are six stalls and five horses inside the stable.”

Marge patted him on the back. “Good job, Officer.”

Bellingham tried to hold back a smile but didn’t quite make it. The left corner of his mouth spasmed upward. Through crooked lips, he said, “Thank you, Detective.”

It took three cups of tea and a half hour for the maid to calm down. Her name was Mercedes Casagrande, a thirty-five-year-old native of Guatemala who’d worked for Lilah Brecht for seven years. She wasn’t forthcoming with the answers, but guarded as she was, Decker sensed she wanted to help. She just didn’t want to jeopardize her job or the privacy of her
patrona
.

They sat at an oval dining-room table, the room furnished in early-twentieth-century pieces. The interior of the house had been done up in the style of Art Nouveau or Art Deco. Decker never could remember the difference between the two periods. As he made chitchat with the maid, she began to relax and answer his questions in halting English.

Decker slipped out his notepad and asked, “How many days a week do you work here for Missy Lilah?”

“I work all the days except Saturday and Sunday. I don’ work on those days ’cause I go to church.”

“What are your hours?”

“Seven to fife. But sometime I work
diferente
hours. If Missy Lilah need help in the night for the dinner. I work eleven to eight, mebbe nine o’clock. If someone take care of my kids.”

Decker said, “You never sleep in?”

“No.” Mercedes shook her head.
“No duermo en la casa, no.”

Decker said, “So you weren’t here yesterday?”

“I work yesterday, jes.”

“But it was Sunday.”

Mercedes looked confused. “I work only four hours. Missy Lilah call me and say house is a mess. So I come. That is not every week. Mebbe I work Sundays one time a month. But only if someone watch my kids.”

“And what time did you leave?”

“I leave fife, fife-thurdy, mebbe. Everythin’ is okay. Missy Lilah tell me she go out with her brother so I don’ have to make dinner.”

Decker smoothed his mustache. “Missy Lilah was going out to dinner with her brother?”

“Jes.”

“Was she with her brother when you left?”

“No, he don’ come yet, but she say she go to dinner with him. She go to dinner with him mebbe one or two time a week.”

“What’s her brother’s name, Mercedes?”

“El Doctor
Freddy.”

“El Doctor
Freddy?”

“Jes.”

“Does
El Doctor
Freddy have a last name —
nom de familia?
”

“Same as Missy Lilah.”

“Freddy Brecht?”

“I thin’ his name is Señor Frederick.”

“Frederick Brecht?”

“I thin’ so.”

“And he’s a physician?
Un doctor de la medicina?
”

“
Sí
. He work at the spa. But he don’ work there all the time.”

“He has another office?”

“I thin’ so.”

“Do you know where his other office is?
Usted sabe donde está su otra oficina?
”

Mercedes shook her head.

Decker said, “You’re doing great.
Muy bien
. You didn’t see
El Doctor
Freddy come inside the house?”

“No.”

“Does Doctor Freddy have a key to the house?”

Mercedes scrunched up her forehead in concentration. “I thin’… jes.”

Decker wrote down:
No forced entry and Dr. Freddy may have a key
. “And Doctor Freddy wasn’t there when you left to go home.”

“No, he don’ come yet.”

“But Missy Lilah was home.”

“Jes, she come home around four from the spa, all wet. She do very much exercise. She very, very skinny, but es okay ’cause she don’t throw up like
muchas mujeres
at the spa. She tell me all the women throw up to be skinny. I thin’ that’s no good.”

“I don’t think that’s good either.”

“But Missy Lilah no throw up to be skinny. But she do
muchas
exercise.
Mucho tiempo corriendo. En la calle, en la montaña, todo el tiempo, ella corrió
.”

Decker wrote:
Lilah obsessive runner
. “Does she ever run at night?”

“I don’ know.”

If she did, it would put a new slant on the incident. After dinner with her brother, Lilah went out for a midnight run. Then someone familiar with her habits waited for her to return exhausted from her jog, and forced his way in. After she opened the safe, he attacked her, then tossed the room. That play-by-play would also be consistent with no forced entry.

Decker excused himself a moment, stood and walked around the room, wincing as pain pierced his upper body. Even though the gunshot wounds were in the left arm and shoulder, he found that stretching his spine mitigated the throbbing in his extremities. He extracted a couple of extra-strength Tylenols from his shirt pocket and popped them into his mouth, swallowing without water, the movement as reflexive as breathing. Having worked his way off codeine, then Percodan, he’d been alternating with the over-the-counter analgesics — one day Tylenol, the next Advil. Almost eight months to the day, his recovery was good but still incomplete. The OTC tablets helped take the edge off, but he knew there’d come a time when he would have to learn to live without the medicine and with the pain.

He stretched again, then sat and said, “Mercedes, when you came in this morning, did you notice anything different about the house
before
you went into Missy Lilah’s bedroom?”

“No, nothing.”

“Everything was in order.”

“Jes.”

“None of the furniture was moved or the vases put on a different table… anything like that?”

“No. Jus’ the door to Missy Lilah’s bedroom is open. She like it closed.”

“But nothing different in the living room, dining room?”

She shook her head.

“The front door was locked?”

“Jes. I use my key to come in.”

“You have a key?”

“Jes.”

“Anyone else in your family know you have a key to her house?”

Mercedes’s face flushed with fear. “
Ninguna persona!
I keep it in especial place.”

“So you’re positive that no one has the key to Missy Lilah’s house.”

“
Ninguna persona en mi familia
. Jus’ me.”

Decker told her he believed her, but kept the question open in his mind. “When you came in this morning, did you go straight to the bedroom? Or did you do something else first? Hang up your coat and purse, start the washing machine?”

“I hang up my coat and look around. Everythin’ is okay.
Entonces
, I see the door open—”

“The bedroom door?”

“Jes, the bedroom door. I go to close it, I see Missy Lilah—”

Covering her face, she burst into sudden tears, sobbing for a full minute, Decker waiting until the crying subsided. Mercedes reached inside her purse, found wrinkled tissue and wiped her eyes. “She be okay, Missy Lilah?”

“I think so.”

“I pray to
Dios
— to
Jesús
— she be okay. I go to church today to pray for Missy Lilah.”

“It’s good to pray,” Decker said.

“Jes.”

“Makes you feel better?”

Mercedes nodded. “Everyone need
ayuda
— help.”

Ain’t that the truth. Decker patted her hand. “Mercedes, do you clean Missy Lilah’s room every day?”

“Jes.”

“You clean inside her closet?”

“Jes, I vacuum every day there. She don’ like the dust.”

“In the closet, there’s a big safe.”

“Jes.”

“You dust the safe?”

“Jes, every day.”

“Did you dust the safe yesterday?”

“Jes, every day.”

“Do you wear gloves when you dust the safe?”

“I don’ wear gloves, only when I clean the toilet.”

“So it’s possible that your hands touched the safe.
Es posible que su mano ha tacado la puerta de la caja de seguridad?
”

“Sí, es posible.”

Benny had pulled some latents from the safe. The maid was going to have to be inked for print comparison. But there was a good side to her compulsive cleaning; the safe had been wiped clean every day. If some of the latents belonged to Lilah, she had to have opened the safe after Mercedes cleaned it yesterday. Had she been forced to open it? Or maybe she put something valuable inside yesterday and someone had known about it.

Decker scribbled a few notes — questions he’d bring up with Lilah. Hopefully, she’d be completely conscious by late afternoon, in good-enough shape to be interviewed briefly. “We’re just about done, Mercedes. Just a few more questions. I want to talk about the man who works with the horses.”

“Señor Carl?”

“Yes. He says he lives in the stables. Is that true?”

“Jes.”

“How long has he lived there?”

“Four, fife years. He come after me, but he work for Missy Lilah for a long time.”

“You see him a lot?”

“No.”

“If something breaks in the house, who fixes it?”

Mercedes thought. “Missy Lilah send someone — different peoples. Sometimes people from her work.”

“From her work? You mean the spa?”

“Jes.”

“Which people?”

“
Diferentes
. I thin’ sometimes a boy comes to pick the vegetables.”

“A boy? A
muchacho?
”

“No. More old. His name is Mike.”

“Mike,” Decker repeated. “Do you know his last name?”

Mercedes shook her head.

“But he works at Lilah’s spa?”

“Jes, I thin’.”

“Okay,” Decker said. “So Señor Carl doesn’t fix things in the house.”

“No. Jus’ work with the horses, mebbe pick vegetables,
también
. I don’ know.”

“Do you ever make breakfast or lunch for Señor Carl?”

“No.”

“Do you make him snacks? Give him some juice when the weather gets hot?”

“No, he stay out of the house, I stay in the house. We don’ talk, mebbe jus’ one or two time a year. He come to the house and ask for Missy Lilah. But he never come
in
the house.”

“Does he ever use the bathroom in the house?”

“No, I thin’ he have a toilet.”

“You ever wash his clothes?”

Mercedes shook her head.

Decker leaned in close and whispered, “Does he scare you?”

The maid wrinkled her lips and shook her head. “No, he don’ scare me. Missy Lilah say he nice. I thin’ he nice, too. But I thin’, he’s a little…” With her right index finger, she made air circles next to her right temple.

“A little crazy?”

“Mebbe. But I thin’ he love Missy Lilah. One time, Missy Lilah and her brother have a bad fight outside. Missy Lilah don’ let her brother in the house and he get mad. Señor Carl hear it and he get
real
mad.” She demonstrated his anger by wrinkling her nose and balling her fist. “He go in of the stable and get a big shobel. He show it to
El Doctor
and jell at him, and make him go away.”

“It was a
bad
fight?”

“Jes, very bad.”

“Does Missy Lilah fight a lot with Doctor Freddy?”

“Oh, no!” Mercedes was wide-eyed. “Missy Lilah no fight with Doctor Freddy, never. This was
el otro doctor, su otro hermano
.”

Decker digested that. “She has two brothers?”

“Jes.”

“And both are doctors?”

“Jes.
El otro doctor
come here mebbe two or three time since I work here. Missy Lilah don’ like him. He come and dey fight. Señor Carl, he chase him away last time. Jell at him, shake his shobel. Say: ‘Go away. Go away or I kill you.’”

“What’s
el otro doctor’s
name?”

“Missy Lilah don’ tell me. She just call him
su otro hermano
.”

“How do you know he’s a doctor?”

Mercedes was silent. “I don’ remember. I jus’ know he’s a doctor.”

“When Carl chased him away, how long ago was that?”

“I thin’ mebbe two years ago.”

“You haven’t seen
su otro hermano
in two years?”

“No.”

“Okay, let’s go back to Señor Carl. You think he’s a little crazy?
Un poco loco?
”

“More
estupid
.”

“You ever see him be crazy with Missy Lilah?”

Mercedes shook her head.

“Did he ever act crazy with you?”

Again a shake of the head.

Decker checked his watch. It was almost noon and his stomach was growling. But before lunch, he wanted to check out Señor Totes himself. Marge should have picked the stable hand’s brain by now. He’d confer with her, then ask Totes about the fight Lilah had with her other doctor brother. Maybe send Marge down to the spa to check out this Mike character. He pocketed his notepad and thanked the maid for her time.

“Be it ever
so humble….” Marge smiled. “May not be much, but Totes calls it home. Makes my place look pretty high-end.”

Decker smiled, his eyes examining the horseless stall. The wooden floor was clean, most of it covered by a moth-eaten, hand-loomed rug. An army cot lay in the middle of the area, brown standard-issue blankets folded neatly at its foot. Against the back was a two-burner hot plate plugged into an electrical socket. Jammed into the corners were piles of canned goods, a broom, a mop, and a dustpan. Wooden wall knobs, ordinarily used to hang tack, held dirty denim overalls and dust-covered work shirts on the left side, a bath towel, a circular kitchen towel, and a heavy skillet on the right. Not a lot of living space, but then again, the horses never complained.

“A bit of a contrast from the main house,” Marge said. “Notice all the antiques at her place?”

Decker nodded.

“And not just the furniture — all the vases and bowls and rugs and pillows and shit. She put a lot of money into decorating. Spa must do well.”

Decker shrugged. “Is there a john here?”

“He’s got a chemical toilet out back.” Marge wrinkled her nose. “Why he bothered to put it outside, I don’t know. Whole place smells. Lord, how in the world does he eat surrounded by this stink?”