MURDER IN RETROSPECT (Allie Griffin Mysteries Book 5) (8 page)

              And there he was, in the exact same spot. He was a creature of habit, as Allie suspected him to be, as writers tend to be.

              She approached him with a degree of caution, more for his sake than for her own.

              "You'll have to pardon me, but do you mind if I sit down here and talk to you for just a moment?"

              She must have sounded like a salesperson or a Jehovah's Witness, for the writer had the look one has when one is socially trapped and is too polite to run.

              "Sure," he said.

              He was in his twenties, which up until recently would have been Allie Griffin's key dating demographic. Her self-consciousness at being recognized as the town cougar, plus a passing reference to the label in one of the recent articles about her, had tempered her habit for dating younger men. She did admire him though, with his sensitive eyes that were wide and dark brown, and his long, straight hair that was the color of Hershey's dark chocolate, pulled back behind his ears, which spilled over in front of his face when he bent over his journal.

              "I can't help but notice that you're a writer. I could tell the other day when I was here, the way you looked around and wrote, looked around and wrote. You're probably quite observant."

              "I like to think so," he said softly.

              "How observant are you?" she asked with a smile.

              He returned her smile. "What do you mean?"

              "Well," she looked off to the side coyly, "what color are my pumps?"

              "You're not wearing pumps. You’re wearing pink Nikes."

              She looked back at him. "I think I like you. What's your name?"

              "Call me Zak."

              "Zachary."

              "Short for Isaac."

              "Isaac is nice. Why shorten it?"

              "You on the hunt for something, Ms. Griffin?"

              Allie laughed. "You
are
observant! Ok, no more beating around the bush. I'm looking into the death of Robert Hawkes and I need to know what you've seen and heard." She leaned in. "I don’t reveal sources."

              "It's ok even if you do. I'm a writer and I take sides. Use my name if you have to. I'll tell you what I know, but it's not pretty."

              "I have a feeling that 'not pretty' is the kind of info I'm looking for."

              "They came in to talk about divorce. Two times when I was here. Hawkes and his wife. She signed a pre-nup and would have gotten nothing if the divorce went through. When I heard about Hawkes's death, I immediately thought it was her. But then the police said they no longer considered her a suspect. I figured killing him in order to prevent divorce was a pretty good reason for murder. Well, not a good reas— you know what I'm saying."

              "I know. And this is very interesting. You say they met a couple of times to discuss this?"

              "Yeah, the first time they were alone. Just the two of them. The second time there was a third guy. I'm pretty sure he was Hawkes's lawyer."

              "Can you describe him?"

              "Tall, very dark hair that was slicked back, mustache. Looked very old school. Like someone you'd see in an old forties movie, a typical hardened businessman. Wore great clothes—"

              They were interrupted by a buzz from the young man's pager.

              "Something's up. I gotta get back to work."

              She tried to thank him, but he'd run off too quickly.

#

              The hospital was bustling this Saturday evening, as is normally the case with hospitals everywhere on Saturday evenings. A lot of teenagers come in with alcohol poisoning. There are injuries ranging from broken limbs to strange things lodged in strange places, and each and every one of the cases resulting from the release of energy pent-up during the week. In all her years living with a man who worked in a hospital, she'd never heard of a Saturday night emergency room case that wasn't the direct result of a man or woman going a little too crazy on the weekend just because it was the weekend.

              Something was a little different tonight; it was still a bit early for the crazy Saturday night rush. And it happened all of a sudden. The place became brighter, more bustling. And a bunch of people holding boom microphones and cameras entered, walking backwards. Following them was a team of EMTs wheeling in a gurney. And on that gurney was none other than Eli Campbell.

              Behind everyone, with a sole camera in his face, and looking as sullen and ruffled as an abandoned puppy, was Dougie the bartender.

              "Douglas?" said Allie, walking over to him.

              She took him by the arm and turned him away from the camera. The camera followed, and Allie dug into her purse for a sheet of paper and a black magic marker. These she found, and wrote in big block letters the word that she had tried desperately to stop using, unladylike as it was to use it now.

              She tucked this note into the back of her collar and faced the camera with it.

              The camera went down and the operator said, "Now why'd you have to go and do that?"

              He was a young kid, fresh out of high school. And Allie shot him a look that made his face drain of every ounce of color.

              "Dougie," she said. "What's going on?"

              "Parmesan cheese," he said quietly.

              "What? What about parmesan cheese?"

              "Our fry cook put it on the meatballs."

              "Uh, ok?"

              "Yeah, well they were Swedish meatballs."

              "Ah. That probably didn’t go over well."

              "Well it was no worse than anything else going on. The chef there didn’t even see them."

              "Ok. So what happened?"

              The gray man took a breath. "When we were married, we didn’t really have any money, right? We used up everything we had on the wedding, cuz in those days you had to have a band and that cost you a pretty penny. Today you hire some kid to come and plug in his computer and hit play. Even I can do that."

              "Douglas—"

              "I'm getting to it. So we didn’t have any money left to go on a honeymoon. So we said we'd wait. Anyway, on our wedding night, we went back to my apartment. I had this stinky little place in Colchester. You walk into that place, the roaches start spraying you, you know what I'm saying? Anyway, that was my place, and she was happy to be moving in. We didn’t eat nothing the whole day cuz your wedding is your wedding and I can't eat under those circumstances. So we were both starving. So I made us some spaghetti with marinara sauce from a jar and we sat on my couch—I didn’t have a table—and we ate it together. Now she didn’t finish hers. And I think, ain't it cute that she eats like a baby bird and all that. Goes to show you how dumb I am thinking this woman eats like a baby bird, cuz, well you saw her, she ain't exactly a whaddaya call it…nobody's gonna be putting her in any Victoria Secret catalogue."

              "Douglas, I still don't—"

              "I'm getting to it. So we got married on a Saturday night, see? And every Saturday night since, that's our spaghetti night. And we eat it on the couch. Even after we got our dining room set. You know, it's a whaddaya call it—commemorative gesture—to be eating the same thing every Saturday like that on the couch. It’s our thing, reminds us of that wonderful night. So every Saturday I cook up a batch of spaghetti with marinara sauce from a jar. With parmesan cheese on top. Now today, Chef Campbell is off in the kitchen calling our fry cook a 'two-fingered toad', and it's this rare moment where there aren’t any cameras on us. And she tells me, 'I hope he doesn’t say anything about the parmesan cheese on the Swedish meatballs.' And I say, 'I didn’t know he was putting parmesan cheese on the Swedish meatballs.' She says he's been doing it ever since she hired him. And I say, 'Well maybe, who knows, maybe they taste good.' Then she says, 'I don’t know. I never tried them.' And I say, 'Now why on earth wouldn’t you try them?' And she says, 'Cuz I never liked parmesan cheese.' Then it hits me. Every Saturday night since we were married, I'd been serving her spaghetti with the stuff on it and never really noticing why she don’t want to finish it. And I then I say it to her. I say, 'Why didn’t you ever tell me?' And she says, 'You enjoyed it so much. I didn't want to say nothing.' And then she says, 'It was enough for me just to look over and see you there.' Well, Allie, listen, if this gets around, so help me I'll never forgive you. I mean, I got a reputation to uphold, you know what I'm saying?"

              "Ok," said Allie.

              "Well, when she said that, I'm telling you, I start to cry. Right there in the restaurant, I'm looking at this woman who I've loved all my life. She drives me crazy and she's like a swarm of black flies, but I couldn’t be without her even for a day. And we could've been eating spaghetti on my couch every night for all I care, because she's right, it was enough to look over and see her there too."

              Dougie turned for a moment and wiped at his eyes with his sleeve.

              "Anyway," he said with the ghost of a tear in his eye, "all that hit me when she said that. And then Captain Tangerine over there comes over and barks an order at her—something about cleaning up her filthy kitchen or something—well listen, I had no choice but to pop him one right in the jaw. He went down like a bowling pin. Hit his head on my floor. So that's what happened."

              "Oh my... Douglas..."

              "Don’t say anything. I know it was wrong. Anyway, the producer, that's him over there, he explained it to me in the car on the way here, and had me sign some papers they wrote up saying they won’t press charges, but I'm not allowed to talk about this to anyone. They're not gonna use the footage of me popping the guy, and they’ll edit it to make me look like the villain. I say who cares? I want my quarry rats back in the place. They understand me. And they know I'm not a villain."

              Allie fought back tears as she grabbed Dougie the bartender and pulled him in close and gave him the hug to end all hugs.

              "Stop that, will you?" He pulled away and turned and wiped his eyes on his sleeve again. "Now why you gotta go and do that?" His voice was rattled.

              "You're the sweetest man I've ever known, Douglas. It takes a real man to be able to cry."

              "Well then that chef over there must look like Robert Mitchum, cuz he was crying like a two-year-old with diaper rash when he hit the floor."

              A laugh burst out of Allie's throat. And Dougie laughed too.

              A figure caught the corner of her eye. She turned and saw the imposing figure of Cassandra Hawkes staring at her. She turned back to Dougie.

              "What's she doing here on a Saturday night? Awfully strange time for a Board of Directors' meeting."

              "Who's that?" said Dougie.

              "Woman at three o'clock. Don’t let her see you staring."

              He looked over in a manner that no one on earth would describe as the least bit subtle.

              "She looks familiar," he said. "I think she's been in my place."

              "Get out. Her? Do you know who that is?"

              "I don’t know the name. But I think that's her. Came in on the regular with some guy. Never talked to no one."

              "Anyway you can find out who she was with?"

              "Yeah, some guy who looked like Clark Gable."             

              Allie drew a breath.

              "Actually," said the bartender, "now that I think of it, they were the ones who sent back the fried pickles. We never had anyone send back the fried pickles. It's really the only thing our guy can cook right. I remember it. We comped the bill for them. I think I could probably dig out the receipt for you. Can I get back to you?"

              Allie shook her head. "Douglas, if you weren't already married..."

              And that's about when Frank Beauchenne arrived, nearly doubled over in pain.

              "Are you sure?"

              "
What else could it be from?
" said Frank Beauchenne from his hospital bed. "
You said it yourself that Del Collins ate those meatballs too.
"

              "But I ate them and I'm fine!"

              And then it struck her that she hadn’t actually eaten them. The first time with Del, she'd passed up the soup in favor of a salad. And dinner with Beauchenne had been a somewhat nervous affair, and she found that the grilled veggie sandwich had filled her up enough and she could only take a couple of slurps of the soup and that was it. And then it struck her that she'd nearly killed two people with nothing but turkey meatballs.

              "Oh Frank," she said, "I don’t know what to say. I'm sorry."

              "
Don’t worry about it.
"

              "No, I owe you."

              "
Really, don't worry about it.
"

              "I'll come visit you, right now, ok? I'm in the car; I can be there in a half a minute."

              "
Even though there's no one else I'd rather see, I'm not even sure they’re going to keep me here.
"

              "Well you hang tight, Sergeant. I have a quick errand to run and as soon as I'm done I'll be there."

              She hung up the call and entered the lobby of the Tree Top Inn.

#

              Behind the front desk was the matronly woman with the cemented bun in her hair.

              "Hello again," the woman said cautiously.

              Allie was ready. She'd had a fifty-dollar bill in her hand and now she slapped it on the desk in front of the woman.

              "It was silly of me to think you were protecting Eddie Ganz. He had no reason to be hiding his whereabouts. His guest, on the other hand, did. That's why you shut the book on me. It was to protect Sarah Sandeswack. She'd been here before, and not with him."

              She slid the fifty over the desktop of the counter and watched the woman's eyes follow its course.

              "All I need to know is who else she's stayed here with."

              The woman stopped the motion of the bill with her fingertips, released it from Allie's grip, and then looked up at her. "His name is DuBarry. He's a lawyer. Anything else you need to know is going to cost you a lot more money than you have in that last season handbag of yours."

              Allie smiled at the woman. "You would need it too, for your defense. Harboring information about a murderer; good luck with that. Oh, and I got this bag on clearance and it looks fabulous. Good day."

              "Wait," said the woman.

              Allie turned.

              "Is he really a murderer?"

              "Actually I don’t know."

              "Well, I don’t want to be an accessory. I'm just in the habit of doing whatever I can to make my guests welcome."

              "That includes taking bribes to keep their affairs a secret?"

              "It's called survival."

              "No," said Allie, "it's called greed. Good day."

#

              On the way to her car, her pace slowed a bit. The air was chilly and sweet with burning leaves, and she inhaled it and savored it like a sip of wine. She realized she'd not allowed herself the luxury of slowing down like this in a very long time. Her phone rang. It was Dougie the bartender.

              "Hello?"

              "
Yeah, Allie?
"

              "Hello Douglas."

              "
Yeah, Dougie the bartender.
"

              "How have you been since last night?"

              "
Well I slept better than I have in years. A lot of stress went away last night.
"

              "That's good to hear."

              "
Anyway, I got some information on that person we saw last night. That woman.
"

              "Yes, that's wonderful. What have you got?"

              "
That woman last night? She was in my bar.
"

              "Yes, I know. You'd said that."

              "
And she was with some guy.
"

              "Who looked like Clark Gable."

              "
Did I tell you that?
"

              "Yes, yes you did."

              "
Well, they were in this one time. Let me tell you, my guy, my fry guy, he's fresh outta prison, you know that?
"

              "You don’t say."

              "
They got him on a petty theft. He stole eighty-three dollars from a liquor store. You know why? To pay his mother's rent. His mother was short on the rent and he went and robbed a liquor store with nothing but a screwdriver.
"

              "Get out."

              "
Yeah, and they picked him up and it turned out he had a suspended license because his insurance lapsed on account of he gave his mother all his cash to pay the rent, except for eighty-three dollars. He was short that. So anyway they got him on that too. Sad story because he's really a nice kid. Just made a couple of mistakes. Bad decisions. Happens to the best of us.
"

              "I guess it does."

              "
So the kid's in prison for eight months and they put him in the kitchen. And he learns how to make fried pickles using prison wine. You know what that is?
"

              "I'm not sure I want to know, Douglas."

              "
They take fruit juice and they add sugar and yeast to it and shake it up and they hide it like under their mattress or wherever. And it stays there for weeks and turns into alcohol. They say it's the worst tasting stuff on the planet. But listen, have you ever tasted vinegar straight? Not exactly champagne. So this kid gets an idea to put the prison wine into his fry batter. And the stuff just pops. And he's a hit with all the jailbirds. So fast-forward a bit. He gets out and comes in to my place looking for a job. And what do you think he brings with him?
"

              "Fried pickles?"

              "
That's right, Mrs. Detective. Let me tell you, you should never knock anything until you try it, because these are the best fried pickles you ever had.
"

              "Douglas, I bet this story is going somewhere."

              "
Yeah, well, you guess correctly, because this is exactly the dish that your friend there sent back. Her and her boyfriend Clark Gable. They were the first and only folks who ever sent the things back. You remember people like that. I remembered it was about three weeks ago, because that night I came home and found that the toilet had overflowed and flooded the upstairs. So we had to get a plumber.
"

              "Douglas, it's getting a little late here."

              "
I'm getting to it. So what I'm saying is I was able to track down the date that way. And I went into the files, because the missus, she keeps the files like what's the word? Anal intensive? She's OPD. Whatever it is, she keeps good files. I found the comped bill from that night. I got it in front of me here. The name is Sandeswack.
"

              "I love you, Douglas."

              "
Yeah, listen I been meaning to talk about that. You know I'm married, right?
"

              Allie sighed. "Yes, Douglas, and that's fine with me."

              "
Yeah, because my wife, you know she gets a little whatddyacallit.
"

              "Jealous."

              "
Enraged. She gets enraged. What can I say? She thinks I'm a catch.
"

              "Douglas, as always, it's been a distinct pleasure talking to you."

              "
Keep your head about you, kid.
"

              "I will."