To the Manor Dead (10 page)

I waited until I
heard the cars drive away before I crawled out from under the table. There was a bright little rectangle on the dingy wall, marking the spot where the Church watercolor had hung. Claire certainly wasn’t waiting to cash in on her inheritance. Interesting.

I hurried back through the garden, past the summerhouse, into the woods, and made my way down to the riverbank. Moose and Zack were waiting, sitting in the boat looking snookered.

“Hey, babealicious, how’d it go?” Zack asked.

From their bloodshot eyes and goofdaakus grins, I could tell they’d added reefer to their repertoire.

“Fine,” I said, as Moose steered us out into the river. “You guys catch anything?”

They both looked at me with stupid smirks and I could tell their lines hadn’t gotten wet. “We had a blast just tooling around,” Zack said.

“Boat goooood,” Moose said.

“Boat goody-good,” Zack answered.

“Boat groovy good.”

Zack stood up and bellowed to the heavens, “
Groooooovy boat!
”

They seemed to think this was the funniest line ever uttered—they hooted so hard that we almost capsized. When they finally wound down, they were both winded.

“Fucking fuck-fuck,” Moose said in exhaustion.

“Fucking fuck-fuck
fuck
,” Zack said, and they exchanged bleary smiles.

We were approaching Sawyerville. I thought of the Parliament butt in my pocket, of the packed tote in Daphne’s bedroom, what I’d learned from Becky about Daphne and Esmerelda’s rendezvous in the summerhouse, Claire’s surreptitious sale. There were a lot of new pieces—now I just had to figure out where they all fit.

“Fuck
for
real
, dude,” Zack said in a whole new tone of voice, pointing to something in the water ahead of us.

There were two large pale orbs floating side-by-side.

“Looks like a couple of balloons,” Moose said.

We got closer.

“Those aren’t balloons,” I said.

“
Holy shit
,” Zack said, his eyes growing wide with shock.

I’d recognize Esmerelda Pillow’s boobs anywhere—even with her head missing.

BOATERS FIND HEADLESS BODY
IN HUDSON

It was late Monday morning and I was sitting at my desk in the shop reading the
Kingston Daily Freeman
. I hated to see my name in the paper, but it was impossible to keep it out—it’s not every day a headless torso is found in the Hudson, especially this far north of the Bronx. After spotting Esmerelda’s breasts, I’d used Zack’s cell to call the police. The Coast Guard appeared about ten minutes later—plenty of time for Moose to toss his stash—and hauled in the body. On shore we were put through perfunctory questioning and sent on our way.

As for Esmerelda’s head, it bobbed ashore at Kingston Point beach on Sunday afternoon. Put a damper on more than one family picnic.

I put down the paper, fed Bub a piece of cantaloupe, and considered what my next move might be. Then the bell jangled and a butch black woman in her mid-thirties walked into the shop.

“Janet Petrocelli?”

“That’s me.”

“Chevrona Williams, New York State Police. I’d like to ask you a few questions.”

“You a detective?”

“Yes.”

“I’d like to ask you a few questions, too.”

She shrugged, took out a small notepad. She moved like a man and was pretty inscrutable.

“Esmerelda Pillow,” she said casually, and then she studied my face.

“What about her?”

“You found her body.”

“Yup.”

“Had you ever met her before that time?”

“I wouldn’t call that a meeting. More like a near collision.”

“I’d appreciate an answer.”

“Don’t tell me you think I chopped her head off? By the way, was chopping the head off the cause of death?”

“It’s rare to survive decapitation,” she said.

I smiled at her but she didn’t smile back.

“Once again: had you ever met her before that time?” she asked.

I felt sweat break out under my arms. I fed Bub a piece of a cantaloupe. I petted Sputnik. I wondered if I should lie. I fed Bub another piece of cantaloupe. Then I fed Sputnik one. Lois hated cantaloupe.

“Let me rephrase the question,” Detective Williams said. “Your car was seen in the lighthouse parking lot before dawn last Wednesday. Esmerelda Pillow was known to be involved in the heroin trade and to use the lighthouse as a pick-up and drop-off point, often in the pre-dawn hours.”

“I’m not involved in the heroin trade. I don’t even smoke pot. I like wine, a little tequila now and then. Vodka once in awhile, at parties, that kind of thing. Champagne when I’m not buying. That’s it for me.”

Chevrona Williams took a step toward me. She was tall and lean and God did she have gorgeous skin and amber-brown eyes. Maybe I should just become a lesbian, a nice neurotic fem. We could vacation in P’town and join a softball league. It would make life so much simpler.

She scrutinized me, narrowing her eyes—I had the feeling she was a Clint Eastwood fan. But it worked.

“Okay,
yes
, I had met Esmerelda Pillow before, once, that morning, at the lighthouse. I was walking Sputnik, this is Sputnik, but you probably figured that out.” She just kept giving me that Clint look. “Oh, okay, I went there to meet her.”

“Why?”

“
Why?
”

“Why?”

“Um …” I took a deep breath and exhaled. “Because I’m looking into Daphne Livingston’s death and Esmerelda called and told me she might have some helpful information.”

Williams jotted something in her notebook. “And did she?”

“No. Yes. Yes and no.”

“Let’s start with the yes.”

“She indicated that Daphne was addicted to heroin and that someone may have given her bad heroin.”

“And the no?”

“She was so oblique that I couldn’t get any hard information out of her. Like the name of who might have done it. Or why.”

Detective Williams made a few more notes. “So you didn’t get any names at all?”

“None.”

“And Esmerelda didn’t seem frightened?”

“Just the opposite. She was totally cool, in a freaky ancient hipster way.”

I saw a slight lessening in the detective’s sangfroid. “She was a contemptible woman.”

“Oh?”

“She’d hook a newborn if she could. I see junkies in the system every week who we can trace back to Pillow. She once let a shipment of tainted heroin go out on the street. Six people died in Kingston alone.”

“So I guess her death is no big loss.”

“Off the record I’d call it a gain.”

“Did you know she was supplying heroin to Daphne Livingston?” I asked.

“Interesting.”

“And did you know that the police chief over in Rhinebeck let the Livingston family cremate Daphne’s body before there was an autopsy?”

“I’d heard that, yes.”

“What do you make of it?”

“I’d call it shoddy police work, but things work in mysterious ways over there, especially when it comes to the old families.”

“You mean they’re above the law?”

“It’s my understanding that Chief Dunn is going to receive a reprimand. He violated procedure, but he claims that there was no evidence of a crime and he was just following the family’s wishes.”

“Have you met the Livingston family?”

She shook her head.

“They’re a …
strange
bunch, and just about every one of them seems happy that Daphne is out of the picture.”

“That doesn’t make them murderers,” she said.

“True. But I don’t trust Chief Dunn and, not to cast any aspersions, but you never know who knows who, or who
owes
who, even in law enforcement, if you get my drift.”

“You’re drifting all over the place.”

“It’s a tendency of mine.”

She leaned in toward me again. “You think it was murder?”

“There are a couple of people with very strong motives.”

“Be careful. I’ve seen people get badly hurt when they start playing detective.”

“I found a cigarette butt near Daphne’s body.” I took the Parliament stub out of my desk drawer and handed it to the detective. She unwrapped the tissue and looked at it.

“I didn’t know anybody still smoked these,” she said. “We’ll have it analyzed. But my words stand:
be careful.
And let me know if you hear anything else.” She handed me her card.

“I like your name—Chevrona—it’s cool.”

She finally smiled. “My mom lived next to a gas station. She wasn’t the brightest donut in the dozen. Hey, at least I’m not Exxona.”

“You grow up locally?”

“Newburgh.”

“There much crime around here?”

“Enough.”

I was heading over
to Zack’s for dinner—he and Moose had gone out on the boat again and this time they’d actually fished. Zack was going to grill up a striped bass he’d caught. I was wary about eating anything that came out of the Hudson, no matter how safe the state claimed it was. But I was looking forward to dessert—a thick slice of Zack.

It was just dusk and as I drove down a side street I saw Josie Alvarez sitting on a stoop, looking like the loneliest kid in the world. Must be where she lived. I zipped down my window to say hi. Just then her debonair stepfather drove up and got out of his truck, carrying a bag of take-out food. Her shoulders went up, her mouth down.

“There she is—little miss popularity,” he sneered at her.

Josie looked at the bag of food.

“I’m so fucking sick of feeding you. Can’t you get on welfare?”

Josie said nothing.

“Answer me, you dumb bitch.”

Then he slapped her across the face with the back of his hand.

I got out of my car.

“Hey, Phil,” I said, walking over.

He turned on me. “What do
you
want?”

I karate kicked him in the stomach. Hard.

His mouth flew open and he collapsed to the ground with a loud, “Uh!” The sack of food went flying.

I knelt beside him. His eyes were rolled up. I gripped his jaw and turned his face toward me.

“You ever lay a finger on Josie again and I’ll rip your balls off and shove them so far up your ass you’ll think you had them for breakfast. You got that?” When he didn’t respond, I gave his Adam’s apple a sharp rap. “I said—you got that?”

He moaned and nodded.

I turned to Josie. “Come on.” I started back toward my car.

She hesitated.

“
Come on,
” I said.