The Cinco de Mayo Murder (13 page)

“Then what's all the secrecy about? Mrs. Gruner practically threw me out of her room over this person. She won't talk about him. She doesn't even want to think about him.”

“You've got yourself a problem, Chris. I've given you three wonderful scenarios. I don't think I have the energy to come up with a fourth.”

I smiled and Mel laughed. It was late afternoon, and she had taught all day. She was doing pretty well in the energy department from what I could see.

“I'll have to keep at this,” I said. “But I'm afraid my friendship with Mrs. Gruner has ended. I don't know how to handle this.”

“Give her a few days and call her up, just to see how she is. Offer her a drive. Take her to lunch. You're certainly a gracious person. She'll thaw. Maybe she'd like to visit your house. Can you imagine what it's like to live in Hillside Village for years and never see the inside of a house?”

I had already done that. “I just hope she agrees to talkto me.”

I walked home slowly, admiring the flowering trees on both sides of the street that made spring so beautiful in the Northeast. Shiny new leaves were appearing daily on shrubs and deciduous trees. Spring is really my season.

I still had half an hour before Eddie would be dropped off, and dinner required only warming up. I fished out the phone number for Martin McHugh and dialed it, preparing to disconnect before the voice mail picked up.

“Yeah, McHugh,” a harried voice said.

“Mr. McHugh, my name is Chris Bennett and I was a friend of a Rimson classmate of yours.”

“Rimson. That's awhile.” The voice a little less harried.

“Heinz Gruner. Do you remember him?”

“Lived on my corridor one year. I'm sorry to tell you he died, if you don't already know.”

“I do know. It's why I'm calling you.”

“Where are you, Miss—”

“Chris Bennett. I'm calling from Oakwood, New York.”

“Oakwood, yeah. I have friends up that way. I'm in the middle of something right now. Would it be possible for me to call you later on?”

“Sure.” I gave him my number.

“Better than that. Could I take you to lunch tomorrow? I'd like to get away from the office for a while anyway and I have a club nearby. How's twelve fifteen?”

Considering that McHugh had been on my “lost” list, this was quite a turn of events. “That would be lovely. Just tell me where.”

He gave me directions, told me where to park, and we had a lunch date. I hung up grinning, with twenty minutes before Eddie came home. I dialed Herb Fallon's number.

He was there and curious about my conversation with Martin McHugh. “Lunch at a club,” he said. “I knew I was in the wrong profession.”

“There's more, Herb. I found something in one of Heinz's letters that I think ties in with your seeing him with a mysterious stranger.” I recited the two lines from memory.

“Letters?” he said. “You found his letters?”

I explained.

“You're really going great guns, Chris. I'll bet that's the guy I saw him with. It was winter, as I remember. I don't know anyone at Rimson with a K.”

“I've been calling him Mr. Kafka.”

“From the sound of it, you'll have as much trouble finding out who he was as the poor guy in Kafka's book.”

I told him about Mrs. Gruner's reaction.

“Very interesting. She knows about him and wants to keep him a secret. Looks like you've stumbled on something important.”

“But I don't know where to go with it. Could this man have been a professor emeritus?”

“I'll look at the records but I'm not optimistic.”

“Were there any organizations at Rimson that might have invited an outside speaker?” It had just occurred to me that speakers popped up on college campuses all the time.

“Yes, there are. You may have hit on something. What's today? Wednesday,” he said, answering his own question. “I have some free time tomorrow morning. Let me see if I can scrape up some old information. We have frequent speakers, as well as musical performers, sometimes a dance troupe. Your Mr. K could have been any of those. Good thinking. I'll call you when I've finished my digging.”

I reminded him I was going into the city to have lunch with Martin McHugh, so I might not be back before three. He asked me to save him a menu.

“That's a pretty fancy place to have lunch,” Jack said when I told him.

“Which makes me nervous, as I'm sure you can understand. I suppose I should wear my black suit and look like a New York woman taking time from her busy day at the office to entertain a client.”

Jack thought that was pretty funny. “Good thing you have a black suit. They might not let you in.”

“Stop scaring me. Want to hear Mel's scenarios for who this Mr. K might be?”

“I'm listening.”

I went through them, making him laugh louder at each suggestion. I had actually taken them quite seriously. Mrs. Gruner's reaction to my discovery of those two lines in Heinz's letter had been so unexpected and irrational that I was willing to believe almost anything about Mr. K.

“Well, she's got a good imagination. Maybe this McHugh guy will clue you in on something more substantial.
I like your idea, by the way, that K was a speaker or a musician. It fits with the school.”

“And it's not a stretch to imagine that K knew the Gruners.”

“Well, the way you're going, you'll probably have it all worked out by the weekend.”

Martin McHugh had given me two parking garage options: one right near the club, the other about two blocks away. Needless to say, the farther one was less expensive, and that's the one I headed toward. I had allotted my time well and arrived inside the club building six minutes before our meeting time. I smoothed my hair, which is most of what I do to make myself look presentable, then glanced at the handful of people standing around the lobby, obviously waiting, as I was, to meet someone.

From where I stood, I could see down the inside halfdozen stairs to the outer doors. A man pushed a door, clambered up the stairs, and pushed open an inner door near where I stood. He stopped and surveyed the lobby area, turning slowly, finally fixing his eyes on me. “Miss Bennett?”

“Mr. McHugh?”

He held out his hand. “Glad to meet you. Let's go upstairs.”

The club was on the top floor. We took an express elevator, paused at the receptionist's desk only long enough for Mr. McHugh to wave and smile, then walked inside the dining area. We were shown to a table near a window with a view of the Empire State Building. I had never before had the sensation of sitting on top of the world.

“I always get the buffet,” he said as the menus were handed to us. “But you're welcome to order off the menu. I like variety. What about you?”

“I like it, too. I'll join you.”

“Let's go.”

We walked to a smaller, viewless room and filled our plates with delicous-looking salads. The hot dishes, which we would come back for, sounded wonderful. I was sorry the invitation hadn't included Jack, who has the better palate and the greater capacity.

Back at our table, Martin McHugh said, “So what's the story you're looking for?”

I gave him a briefing.

“That was a nice year,” he said nostalgically. “A good crowd on the corridor. No obvious crackpots or shirkers. I can't tell you I was Heinz's best friend because I wasn't, but he was a good guy: quiet, studious, a nice person to have around. When I heard about the accident, it threw me for a loop.”

“Before we talk about that, I wonder if you'd mind telling me why you've never had anything to do with Rimson since you graduated. Most of the other men who lived on that corridor have kept in touch with the college, gone back for reunions, updated their addresses. You didn't.”

“There was a reason. Your question brings back the other part of the Rimson experience, the negative. Happened my senior year. I was all set to graduate, had a good record, one or two misses but nothing terrible, when an English teacher called me in and accused me of plagiarizing a paper I had written. I assume you know how serious a charge that is.”

“I do.”

“He said another student's paper had almost identical language in some parts, had the same factual error that I made somewhere, and it was clear I had copied from him.”

“Or he from you.”

“He didn't put it that way, but yes, you're right. That was the other alternative. I was told I wouldn't graduate.”

“How terrible,” I said spontaneously. “What did you do?”

“I worked hard not to go to pieces. The professor wouldn't even entertain the possibility that the other guy stole from me, which is what I was sure had happened. Either that or the most unlikely coincidence in the history of the college had occurred. Bottom line, I didn't graduate. We were a less litigious society at that time and my parents, who believed me, didn't hire a lawyer and make threats. We just talked to a dean, who resolved the problem by allowing me to take another English course elsewhere. When I finished it—with an A, by the way—they sent me my diploma.”

“What an ordeal,” I said. “And to have such a weight hanging over you all these years.”

“Well, there's a silver lining, if you can call it that. Several years ago at a conference, I ran into the guy I was supposed to have cribbed from. I cornered him and got him to confess that he'd read the draft of my paper while I was out of my room. I had a tape recorder in my pocket to tape some of the speakers, and I was smart enough to record the conversation, although the quality was pretty awful. I sent it to the English professor, who agreed to reinstate my grade for that semester. Nothing was ever done to the son of a bitch who actually plagiarized.”

“Or to the professor, I bet.”

“He still thinks he's God.” McHugh buttered a roll and took a bite. A waiter came and dropped off our wine. “Well, here's to solving mysteries.” McHugh touched his glass to mine. “So now you know why I don't write checks to my alma mater. I'll tell you, if anyone ever did that to my son, I'd put the college out of business.”

I could believe it from the passion in his voice. “I'm glad you were tough enough to survive.”

“But you didn't come here to talk about my problems. What's up with Heinz Gruner?”

I told him.

“So you're looking for information on that trip he took to Arizona.”

“And anyone who might have gone with him or met him there.”

“Well, it wasn't me. I've never been to Arizona. Took a vacation in Florida last year and I go to California frequently, but never Arizona.”

“Do you remember any discussion about his trip?”

“I couldn't have dredged it up without your background stuff, but now that I think about it, I remember hearing him say he was going. I think his parents were sending him as a birthday present or something. It isn't the kind of place that appeals to me, all that dry heat and boring blue sky, carrying water everywhere you go so you don't dehydrate. I'd rather have the changes of season here in New York.”

“Wasn't there someone on that corridor from Arizona?”

“Steven Millman. Right. I don't remember which city—”

“Phoenix. That's where Heinz flew to.”

“I assume you've spoken to him.”

“Steven Millman practically doesn't exist, Mr. McHugh.”

“Call me Marty, OK? In my business, the only people who call me mister work for people who work for me.”

“I'm Chris, and no one works for me.”

“Sounds like a good life. Why doesn't he exist?”

“I wish I knew. The last address on record is his parents’ when he was at Rimson. He dropped out of the college the summer that Heinz died.”

Marty McHugh looked at me as though I had said something intriguing. “Do tell. And no one answers his phone?”

“His mother, but she says she isn't sure if she can find him.”

“Son of a bitch.” He drank some more wine and looked out the window. We had a lovely day, a blue, almost cloudless sky, the sun hitting the Hudson River in a blinding splash of light. “I'll find him for you. I'll need a couple of days.”

His statement stunned me. “How will you do that?”

He gave me a smile. “I have my ways. Ever hear of six degrees of separation? I have a Rolodex that connects me to the whole world. I'll get you Steve Millman.”

“He may have changed his name,” I said.

“Just adds to the fun.”

“You seem to be an amazing man,” I said.

“Seem to be? When I hand you Steve Millman on a silver platter, you'll know how amazing I am.”

I laughed. I hadn't known what to expect from this man, but being entertained was not high on the list.

“So your theory is that Millman met Heinz in Arizona, they went hiking and Heinz fell, or—” He stopped. “Or what?”

“That's what I'd like to know. It may have been a simple accident, but whoever was with him—and I'm convinced someone was with him—didn't report the fall, stole some of his possessions, and sent one of the two suitcases back to the Gruners.”

“I never liked Millman,” Marty McHugh said.

“Why?”

“Snotty bastard. Know-it-all. You wouldn't have liked him, either.” Marty pulled a leather agenda out of an inside jacket pocket and made a note with one of those big fat fancy black fountain pens.

“What did you think of Herb Fallon?” I asked. I wasn't looking for negative comments. I just wanted to know where his opinion fell regarding the person on the corridor with whom I'd had the most dealings.