Trace (Trace 1) (8 page)

Shaken emotionally by his bedside meeting with Mitchell Carey and the old man’s strange words, Trace stopped at a small roadside bar a half-mile from Meadow Vista Sanatorium and ordered a vodka on the rocks.

The tavern was empty and the bartender was busy watching a televised game show and seemed uninterested in intruding in Trace’s drinking. He tossed down his drink rapidly, called for a refill, and went into the men’s room, where he untaped the recorder from under his shirt and unhooked the wire leading to the golden frog microphone.

He took the recorder back into the bar. The bartender had refilled his glass and, having decided that Trace was going to be more than a one-drink customer, apparently figured he would help enrich his customer’s life with joy and camaraderie. And talk.

“What’s that, a tape recorder?”

“Yeah. You’re missing your show.”

“I hope you’re not with
Candid Camera
,” the bartender said. “I didn’t wear my best shirt.” He smiled at Trace.

“Go watch your show.”

“Ahhh, I hate this show. It’s stupid. They get these two families on, see, and then they try to get them to—”

Trace coughed in the direction of the man’s face, then said with agitation, “Oh, Jesus, I’m sorry. You’d better go wash your face off right away.”

“Whatsa matter?” The bartender put a tentative hand to his cheek.

“Honolulu herpes,” Trace said. “I’ve got it and you can get it just by breathing the same air as me. Christ, I’m sorry. Quick, wash. I’ll leave you my card. If you get it and your wife wants to know why, I’ll tell her it was innocent.”

“You’ve got a hell of a nerve coming in here.”

“If you want to waste time talking, that’s your business. But I’m telling you. Wash. Right away.”

The bartender glared at Trace for a moment, then walked to the other end of the bar, ducked under the counter, and walked quickly to the men’s room.

“Gargle too,” Trace called.

Alone in the bar, now quiet except for the insipid yelping of a television emcee who thought, quite mistakenly, that he was charming, Trace rewound the tape recorder and turned up the volume.

It started playing in the middle of his interview with Nurse Simons and he fast forwarded it to the end of that section. Then he heard Carey’s voice.

“Hundred…two hundred…dying…dying…hundred hundred…no more…take it away…more dying…dying…dying.”

Then there was a pause and then the old man’s voice started again. Softly, in the background of the tape, Trace could hear the voice of the nurse who entered the room. “What’s going on here?”

But the microphone was close to Carey’s face and his words came out clear, even though faint.

“They’re killing me,” the old man said. “Help me. Help me.”

Trace played the strip of tape back again, just to be sure.

“They’re killing me. Help me. Help me.”

Trace finished his drink, then popped the tape out of the recorder, slid it into his jacket pocket, and inserted a fresh tape. A few minutes later, the bartender came out of the bathroom and Trace walked toward it.

“I don’t want you touching nothing in there,” the bartender snapped.

“Nothing that belongs to you.”

Inside the men’s room, he restrapped the tape recorder to his waist and hooked up the microphone again.

He washed his hands carefully. Who knew what strange diseases the bartender might have?

When he went back outside, he drained the last drop of his drink and put a ten-dollar bill on the bar.

The bartender was sitting at the far end, warily, near the cash register.

“I don’t want your money,” he said.

“This money’s okay. I’ve had it treated.”

“I don’t want it. I might get something. Idea of some guy comes in here with something and doesn’t—”

“I’ll leave the money. Use it to pay somebody you don’t like.”

Outside the bar, he looked through the glass window and saw the bartender use a napkin to pick up his glass and drop it into a garbage pail. Then he used the same napkin to pick up the ten-dollar bill, and he put it into his cash register, at the bottom of his pile of tens.

From the roadway, there was nothing to distinguish the Mitchell Carey home from all its affluent neighbors, but when Trace came up the driveway and parked in the open area in front of the large garage, he could see that the house stretched back from the visible front section in a long-legged el. The addition was easily twice as big as the section of house visible from the roadway, and inside the el there was room for a swimming pool and tennis court and elaborately manicured gardens. Trace saw a dog kennel in one far corner of the property with two beautiful black and copper Gordon setters lounging inside.

There was no street behind the Carey house and the property rolled away to a large clump of trees. Far in the back, he saw what looked like a large pond.

The doorbell was answered by a woman wearing a housedress of red-striped cotton and a kerchief around her head.

“My name is Tracy. I’d like to see Mrs. Carey.”

“Oh, yes?” the woman said, and then waited.

Trace hesitated, then said, “I’m a friend of a friend’s. Bob Swenson. From Garrison Fidelity Insurance?”

“Oh, Mr. Tracy,” the woman said. “How is Bob? It’s been so long since I’ve seen him.”

“You’re Mrs. Carey?”

“Yes, of course.” The woman took the kerchief from her head and shook loose her naturally graying blond hair. Her face was smooth, and although she had to be in her sixties, her skin was soft and unlined.

“I’m sorry,” Trace said. “Bob’s well. He’s at a convention in Europe.”

“He always did like to travel, that one. Don’t just stand out there. Where are my manners? Come on in.”

She led Trace to a sitting room in the far corner of the house, large enough to seat a small orchestra and its audience. Through the large front windows, Trace could see the road that passed in front of the house.

“Would you like tea?” Mrs. Carey asked.

“Do you have coffee?”

“Yes. It’ll just be a minute.”

She left the sitting room and Trace stood up from the sofa and looked around. It was a warm, personal room with good oil paintings hanging side by side with inexpensive prints. The shelves held expensive carved jade and little cloth stuffed mice. It was a room that said real people lived there, not manikins from a magazine insert on how to decorate your home like the stars.

On one of the shelves was a large ball of crystal, four inches thick, and Trace held it up to the light to look at it. He loved the look and feel of crystal and he was disappointed when he saw air bubbles and little imperfect dark spots inside the glass. When he replaced it, he saw on the shelf two small black wax candles and a saucer with half-burned incense cones in it.

When Mrs. Carey came back with a tray, Trace said, “Servants’ day off?”

“Servants? Oh, we wouldn’t have servants. What would I do in this big house if I didn’t clean it myself? And Mitchell wouldn’t think of hiring somebody to fix something that he could fix himself.”

The woman was altogether too nice, Trace thought. She reminded him a little of one of the aunts in
Arsenic and Old Lace
who went tippy-toeing happily around while the bodies of the poison victims piled up inside the cellar.

The thought brought him up short because he again remembered Carey’s words: “They’re killing me. Help me.” Did that have anything to do with this pretty little woman who was bustling about with teapots and coffeecups?

“So tell me, how is Bob?” she asked again with a smile.

“He’s fine. He’s on a convention,” Trace said again. “In Europe.”

“He always did like traveling,” she said.

Nuts, Trace thought. The woman was either nuts or the dullest conversationalist in the history of the world.

“Bob asked me to stop by and see how you and your husband were getting on,” he said.

“Oh, we’re fine,” she said.

“Of course, Bob was sorry to hear your husband was ill.”

For a moment, she paused. “Oh, yes. It’s an awful thing. He’s been so sick.”

She sat in silence for a few moments, and finally Trace asked, “Did Bob and Mr. Carey grow up together?” The long pauses in the conversation made him uneasy. It was a trick he often used with other people, letting the air hang dead and silent; it made people uncomfortable and they started jabbering just to fill the dead air. But with Amanda Carey, he felt that unless he said something, they might just sit in silence until they decayed.

“Oh, no,” she said. “Bob and I were friends. We went to school together from childhood. Bob didn’t meet Mitchell until I married him. Bob and I were from another town, near here, but he didn’t know Mitchell. My, my, how Bob always liked to travel.”

“How long’s your husband been ill?”

“April sixth. Three months ago. He had a stroke. Right after we learned it happened.”

“Learned what happened?” Trace said.

The woman sipped her tea silently and then began to rock gently back and forth in her chair. She was humming softly to herself, still smiling at Trace, but smiling as one might when looking at a favorite painting, not expecting a smile back.

She began to sing softly to herself and Trace could make out some of the words. “‘…prettiest tree you ever did see, and a tree in the woods and a limb on the tree, and a branch on the limb and a twig on the branch and the green grass grew all around, all around, the green grass grew all around.’”

He was about to interrupt when Mrs. Carey said, “That was her favorite song when she was little.”

“Whose favorite song?”

“Belinda. Our daughter,” Mrs. Carey said. “She’s dead now,” she added with a finality that hinted that it had answered all questions and solved all puzzles.

“I’m sorry,” Trace said, silently cursing Walter Marks for not giving him any information on the Carey family.

“Yes. April sixth. It was an automobile accident. In Europe.”

“And that’s when Mr. Carey became ill?”

“He had a stroke right after it happened.” She was talking to Trace but staring past him at the large windows in the front of the room through which the high-noon sunlight poured. Softly she said, “‘And the green grass grew all around, all around, and the green grass grew all around.’ Do you like that song?”

“It was one of my favorites when I was growing up,” Trace said.

“So young,” she said, and then she seemed to snap out of it and asked Trace, “So how is Bob Swenson?”

“He’s fine. He’s at a convention in Europe.”

“Oh, my, how that boy likes to travel. When we were growing up, he always said that he wanted to see the whole world. It wasn’t really any surprise when he joined the navy right after high school.”

“How is your husband now?”

“He’s not well. I don’t think he really wants to get better anymore. You don’t know how he loved Buffy.”

“Buffy?”

“Belinda. Everybody called her Buffy.” The old woman’s face brightened. “That’s her picture over there.” She pointed to one of the cabinets in the room, but Trace could see no picture.

“Where’d that picture go?” Mrs. Carey said. “It was there.” She shrugged, as if putting the picture out of her mind forever. “Buffy’s picture was there. She’s dead now,” she said, almost as an afterthought, and suddenly Trace felt very sick about the way he made his living. When he had first gone to Las Vegas, he had gambled for a living, and while a lot of people thought that was degenerate, at least it was just him against a vast impersonal casino. Now he had to traipse his way with muddy feet through the tragic lives of other people and it made him sick sometimes. He wanted a drink.

“Do you mind if I pour myself a drink?” he said, nodding toward the liquor cabinet.

“No, you go right ahead. Mitchell always liked a drink when he came home from the office. That was before he became ill.”

There were no ice cubes, so Trace just splashed vodka into a large tumbler. “Bob Swenson said you were concerned about the treatment your husband might be getting at Meadow Vista,” he said.

Mrs. Carey looked at him, her large brown eyes wide open in surprise. She had lovely eyes, Trace thought. When younger, she must have been something to dream about.

“‘Who is Hecuba that all the Swains adore her?’” he said softly.

And Mrs. Carey said, “No, no, it was Sylvia, not Hecuba. ‘Who is Sylvia? What is she that all our swains commend her?’
Two Gentlemen of Verona
.”

“Yes, you’re right. I was thinking of something else,” Trace said. “We were talking about the treatment your husband is getting at Meadow Vista.”

“Oh, it’s fine. I’m sure they’re doing all they can for him—Well, it’s all right. His business is being sold and Mitchell won’t be going back there. I guess he won’t have to worry about that anymore.” Her voice trailed off at the end of the sentence and she sipped her tea and began to hum again.

Trace found looking at her painful, and turned away. He sipped his vodka and with his free hand picked up the crystal ball.

The door to the room flew open and Trace looked up as a young woman snapped, “Put that down. Who are you? What do you want here?”

“Before you go barking at me, champ, count the spoons. They’re all still there,” Trace snapped back.

The woman was in her early twenties. She wore jeans rolled halfway up her calf and a tight-fitting man-style shirt. Her hair was blond and frizzed out wildly around her face in a hairstyle that Trace found revolting. But the girl was beautiful. Even without makeup, she looked fresh and appealing.

“Oh, Muffy, don’t be cross,” Mrs. Carey said. “This is Mr. Tracy. He’s a friend of Bob Swenson’s. You remember Bob. From the insurance company?”

“Oh,” the woman said, and paused, then she walked into the room and extended her hand toward Trace. “I’m Melinda Belknap,” she said. Her handshake was surprisingly strong.

Mrs. Carey was on her feet and said, “Muffy, I’ll make you some tea.”

“Yes, Nana, please,” the young woman said.

Mrs. Carey left the room and Trace said, “I’m Devlin Tracy, I’m with Garrison Fidelity Insurance.”

“I’m sorry for barking at you just now. I just didn’t know who you were and I don’t want people bothering her. She’s not strong.”

Trace had placed the crystal ball back on the shelf and Muffy moved it slightly, as if to its correct position, then sat in the chair Mrs. Carey had just left.

“Now you know who I am,” Trace said. “Who are you?”

The woman smiled at him. She had large white even teeth and it was a good smile. “I was a friend of Belinda’s,” she said. “The Careys’ daughter.” She licked her lips as she spoke. Her lips were full and shiny and Trace wondered if lips like that came naturally or if she slept with her mouth pressed into a saucer of salad oil.

“We were in Europe on Easter vacation when she died,” the woman said. “We were friends, always together, all through college. Belinda and Melinda. They called her Buffy and me Muffy. Buffy and Muffy.”

“I had two friends when I was growing up,” Trace said. “They used to call us Huey, Louie, and Dewey. How come you don’t sound like a Muffy?”

“What’s a Muffy supposed to sound like?” the young woman asked.

“Like you’ve got lockjaw. From biting down hard so the silver spoon doesn’t slip out of your mouth.”

“Like this?” She curled her lips back so they showed her tightly clenched teeth, and she spoke with a voice that came from deep in her throat, like a series of glottal stops. “So, I said, Lyle, I said, Lyle, I told you I was a
sailor
, and this shabby scow has a motor, for Gawd’s sakes, a motor.” It was a devastatingly accurate impression of moneyed, female preppie speech, and despite his instant dislike of the young woman, Trace laughed aloud.

“That’s too good to be an act,” he said.

“All act. I only got to be Muffy after I met Buffy. Belinda and Melinda, I guess it seemed logical to make me Muffy. But the only silver spoon I ever saw was when Buffy’d take us out to a good restaurant for dinner. I grew up on pitted stainless steel.”

“How’d she die?” Trace asked.

“A car hit her. I was sleeping late. I usually do, but Buffy got up early and she was out shopping. She liked to go out early and buy apples and fruit and stuff. So she had her arms filled with bags and she was crossing the street, that was in Rome, and one of those lunatic kamikaze drivers ran her down. She died right away.”

“What happened to the driver?”

“Who knows?” she said. “He was arrested, but what happened, I don’t know. I came back here with Buffy’s body and Mr. Carey had gotten sick and I could see Mrs. Carey needed me, so I thought I’d stay to help her.”

“Do you know anything about Meadow Vista? Where Mr. Carey is?”

“What did Amanda say?”

Trace shrugged. “She didn’t seem to mind it.”

“Well, I don’t like it at all,” Muffy said.

“Why not?”

“Mr. Carey was getting better in the other hospital after his stroke, then they took him to Meadow Vista for some special kind of therapy.”

“Oxygen enrichment,” Trace said.

“Yeah. But he’s not getting any better and then I find out about that guy who changed his insurance to the doctor who runs the place. I thought, suppose it’s all a dodge and that’s what they do with these poor unfortunates. What would happen to Nana if Mr. Carey dies and she finds out that this doctor inherits his estate. Not just his insurance, but everything.”

“You think they do that? As a regular practice?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “Maybe they do. And maybe they make sure that people who sign things over to them don’t get well. I don’t know if they do that and I’m not saying that they do, but maybe they do.”

“That’s called murder for money,” Trace said.

Muffy shrugged.

“What does Mrs. Carey think about this whole thing? She’s the one who mentioned it to my boss.”

“You’ve talked to her. She can’t concentrate real well on things anymore. I’m not going to let anything—”

She stopped as Mrs. Carey reentered the room holding a tray with two cups.

“For you, dear,” she said as she put a cup of coffee in front of the young woman. “And I made you more coffee, Mr. Insurance, I forgot your name. That must be cold.” She cast a disapproving eye at the black coffee that Trace had not touched, and put it on the tray.