When the Day of Evil Comes (29 page)

“Oh, he would be so excited,” she said. “He loves talking about his work. It’s one of the few things that gives him pleasure.”

“I don’t know quite how to ask this, but what sort of shape is he in? I mean, will he be able to answer my questions?”

“Well, honey, it depends on the time of day. He’s better in the morning.”

“I was thinking of tonight.”

“That depends on the pudding.”

“Pardon?”

“If they have tapioca pudding, he seems to settle down. He loves his tapioca.”

“So tapioca pudding makes him more lucid?” I’d never heard of the healing qualities of tapioca. Someone should alert the media.

“I think it just gives him a little something to look forward to. Seems to ease him.”

She gave me the name and address of the nursing home.

“Could you send me a copy of the article when you’ve finished it?” she asked.

What a sweet woman. I hate lying to sweet people.

“Sure,” I said, feeling like a heel. “I’d be glad to. But there’s a chance it won’t get published.”

“Well, either way, I’d just like to see it. Charles was very proud of his work at the Vendome.”

“I’ll see to it that you get a copy.”

What sort of person was I, anyway? I should have just told her the truth. She would have helped me. But of course, I couldn’t have known that when she answered the phone. And it
was far too late to do a take back. I’d have to write her a note and confess after I got home.

It took me a while to get my bearings, but I found the neighborhood without too much trouble, about twenty minutes away from Loyola. I stopped at the grocery store and bought four lunch-box servings of tapioca pudding.

The unmistakable smell of urine greeted me as I stepped into the doorway of the Meadowood Elderly Care Facility, which was neither in a meadow nor near a wood. Actually, come to think of it, the nursing home smelled just like Cook County lockup. The inmates were nicer here, and most of them were in wheelchairs or wandering around in bathrobes, but it had basically the same smell. And the same distinct feel of incarceration.

I found Charles McMillan in room seven. Lucky number seven. Wearing a plaid bathrobe and playing a game of gin rummy. Alone.

“Mr. McMillan?”

“He’s not here,” he growled.

I checked the name on the door.

“You’re not Charles McMillan?”

“Who wants to know?”

“I do, sir.”

He looked up. “Who in tarnation are you?”

His wife hadn’t warned me about this part. I’d assumed the man had dementia. Instead, he just seemed pathologically cranky.

“Dylan Foster,” I said. “I’d like to talk to you about the Vendome hotel.”

He hesitated.

“And I brought some tapioca pudding.”

“You talked to Pearl, didn’t you?”

“Yes, sir, I did. May I come in?”

“Only if you bring a spoon.”

I went back to the nurse’s station and rustled up a spoon, popping the top on the tapioca as I sat down opposite Charles McMillan.

He took a bite, which seemed to pacify him considerably.

“What do you want?” he said, without looking up.

“I want to ask you about a day in 1972,” I said. “The day the little boy fell off the balcony.”

He looked up, his denim-blue eyes seeming to focus on me at last.

“Joey Zocci,” he said to me.

“Yes. You remember.”

“Course I remember. Kid went flying off a balcony in my hotel. While I was on duty. I felt responsible. You have no idea.”

I did, actually.

“Who are you?” he snapped.

“I’m a psychologist. His brother was a patient of mine. He jumped off a twelfth-floor balcony at the Vendome three weeks ago.”

He swore and put his pudding down.

“Do you remember the room number?” I asked him.

“1220,” he said, without hesitating.

I felt a chill start at my scalp and race down my spine.

“How do you remember the number so clearly?” I asked. “Just because it was such a traumatic event?”

“Fool family stayed in that room for twenty more years after that. The rest of the time I was at the Vendome. Probably still do.” He gestured with his spoon. “Not all the time. They didn’t live there, mind you. Some people do. After Joe Zocci made his money, they had some big estate in the country. But every time they came to the Vendome they stayed there. Same room.”

“Why do you think they did that?” I asked.

“Joe Zocci, that’s why.” He stabbed at the pudding.

“Meaning?”

“Man’s a tyrant. He did it to punish her. That’s what I think. That’s what I’ve always thought.”

Her? My puzzle was falling apart. I wanted to blame Joe.

“Punish whom?”

“His wife. That Mariann.”

“For what?”

He kept his eyes on his pudding and continued stabbing at it.

“No one has ever asked about this. And I’ve never talked about it. Never said a word to anyone.”

He got up and shuffled around the room in his slippers, an arthritic version of pacing. “You see everything in the hotel business. Every little quirk these people have. They ask for raspberry Jell-O at 4:00 a.m. They need down pillows or feather pillows or those dang hypo allergy ones. They drink too much whiskey and throw up on the floor or leave their dirty underwear behind or watch smut on that dang cable they would never watch in their own homes.”

He sat back down. “People do things when they’re away from home they don’t want anyone to know about. They are their worst selves. Absolutely their worst selves. And you don’t talk about it. You never say a word about any of it to anyone. You just don’t.” He jabbed his spoon in my direction. “No one has ever asked me about this.”

“Asked what? About Mariann? Did she kill the little boy?”

“No one knows what happened to that little boy,” he snapped.

“Punish her for what then? Was she supposed to be watching him? Did he blame her for the accident?”

“Have you met Joe Zocci?” He was almost shouting now.

“Yes,” I said. “He’s a cruel man.”

“Where was he on October 2, 1972? You ever ask him that?”

“I assumed he was there. At the Vendome.”

“Man’s a war hero.”

And then it dawned on me. I’d read it in the newspaper articles in the Zoccis’ library that evening. Zocci had been shot down in Vietnam. In 1971. He’d spent the next two years chained to a wall in a prison in Hanoi.

“He wasn’t at the Vendome that day, was he?”

“No.”

“Was Mariann alone?”

“No.”

“Was she with another man?”

He didn’t say anything.

“Mr. McMillan?”

“I’ve never talked about it.”

So that was it. Mariann Zocci had checked into the Vendome in 1972 with another man. While her husband was in prison in Vietnam. Their son had died that day. And Joseph Zocci had punished her for it for the rest of her life.

“Who was it?”

He didn’t say anything.

“Mr. McMillan?”

“Garret,” he said finally. “Name’s Garret.”

M
ARIANN HAD CHECKED
into the Vendome alone, but had spent that weekend in 1972 with a man named Sheldon Garret, a New York businessman who had made his fortune in men’s clothing. That was all he knew, McMillan told me. He had neither seen nor heard from Garret since the day the little boy died.

Garret’s name had never appeared on the hotel’s register. As far as McMillan knew, the police had not even known of his existence. No mention of him had ever appeared in the media.

Mariann had never been accused of killing the boy. Or of neglect leading to his death. The investigation had wrapped up quickly, the death ruled an accident.

Apparently, neither Mariann nor Garret had noticed Joey Zocci wander out onto the hotel balcony. The toddler had squeezed himself through the bars of the railing to retrieve a toy car that had rolled past the railing, and had then fallen twelve floors to his death.

The Vendome had replaced all its balcony railings after the accident, closing the gap in the wrought iron to four inches from six.

I thanked Mr. McMillan for his time and honesty and said my good-byes.

“Next time bring whiskey,” was all he said to me as I left.

I had no time to look for Sheldon Garret. But I had a hunch that if I tracked down Garret Industries, I would find him. I drove straight for the airport, surrendered my car, and then endured a marathon of security check-in procedures before falling asleep in the waiting area at my gate.

The loudspeaker woke me up as they called my flight. I prayed for a safe return home as I boarded.

The late run to Dallas from Chicago was surprisingly full, populated with hapless travelers like myself who would rather be anywhere but on a plane at 12:15 in the morning.

I found myself in a middle seat—no doubt a consequence of my late ticket purchase—squeezed between a snoring teenager with truly astonishing body odor and a man at least twice my body weight He made no pretense of cramming himself into his own seat. He shoved the armrest up and lapped over onto me, his seatbelt popping off each time he tried to latch it. I got not so much as an “excuse me” out of the jerk for the entire two-and-a-half-hour flight. He just sat there taking up my space, daring me to say something.

How could Jesus stand us, I wondered? We were an obnoxious lot.

I’d fought enough battles for the time being, so I conceded wordlessly to the man, squeezing my elbows to my side and scooting over into about two-thirds of my seat in order to reclaim my thigh from his. I spent the flight reading the research that Cynthia, the reference librarian at SMU, had done on Garret Industries, which I hadn’t looked at until now. I discovered that many pieces of the puzzle had been in my possession the entire time I just hadn’t known what I was looking for.

Garret Industries, Inc., was founded in 1968, the year Joe and Mariann had married, a joint venture between MAZco, Incorporated, and Sheldon Garret. MAZco, I was guessing, was owned by Joseph Zocci and, I suspected, named after Mariann Zocci. Which meant Joe Zocci had named his company after his wife, who had later, while he was in prison in Vietnam, had an affair with his business partner.

The two men seemed to have a knack for sniffing out potential for profit and then going in for the kill. Garret Industries had a number of interests, all seemingly unrelated to one another. It owned a fleet of cattle trucks in New Mexico and Colorado, hotels in Hawaii, and lumber mills in the Pacific Northwest, as well as a chain of clothing stores in the Midwest.

Garret Industries had most recently, it seemed, developed an interest in drilling for oil in the Gulf states and in the Gulf of Mexico. That branch of Garret’s business had begun seven years ago, I gathered around the time Andy Zocci started his company.

I flipped through the file, fascinated with the strange politics of the Zocci marriage. How had Mariann tolerated her husband’s staying in business with Sheldon Garret? It must have been a constant, daily reminder of her sin and of the terrible loss of her boy. The two men had obviously been business partners, perhaps even friends, before Zocci left for Vietnam. Had Mariann and Garret been involved in a prolonged affair? Had it ended the day Joey died? Did Joe Zocci ever find out that Garret was with her at the Vendome that day?

My mind reeled with questions. But the questions would have to wait, because the plane was landing at last. I could not wait to get to my clean little house, throw myself into the tub, and then burrow under my high-thread-count sheets and my quilt. I’d probably be too excited to sleep.

At the gate, the man next to me heaved himself out of the
seat and walked away without a glance in my direction. I grabbed my carry-ons and made my way up the jetway, out of the airport, and back to my truck, which was waiting for me, all rusty and rumbly and familiar. The door opened silently, a welcome little surprise—I’d forgotten about the WD-40—and I drove through the Dallas night to my house, nodding with exhaustion as I went.

My porch light was off. I couldn’t see a thing as I hauled my bags out of the truck and dropped them onto the porch. I stubbed my toe on something heavy and immovable as I unlocked the front door, swinging the door open and gasping, repulsed.

The smell that greeted me was beyond foul. It was deviled eggs times ten thousand. Rotten deviled eggs. And old shoes. And the BO from the kid on the plane.

Something buzzed past me as I flipped on the light. I didn’t need to get a look at it to know what it was.

I covered my mouth and stepped into the house, leaving my bags on the porch and turning lights on as I went. Flies dotted the walls; a strange, pulsing, buzzing wallpaper, an occasional scout taking flight and humming through the nasty air around me. Their corpses were scattered over every surface. My normally spotless floors, table tops, counters were all covered with little pepper-black flecks, their nasty wings to the ground, hairy little insect-legs pointed at the ceiling.

Peter Terry had thrown a temper tantrum.

I walked through my trashed house, doing a quick inventory and determining that nothing was missing, though the glass on every picture of my mother or myself had been broken. I unlocked the buffet in the front room and found my mother’s ring, still in its little velvet pouch. The necklace had been in Chicago with me.