Chapter 5
Henry pushed the button on the Mercury’s built in garage door opener and pulled into the large garage at his home on Mel Avenue. He pushed the button again and the door closed behind him. He got out of the car and headed for the door that led directly into his kitchen when he smelled the unmistakable odor of onions and garlic.
“Heeeey, you were gone early this morning!” Henry’s housemate Charles greeted him while cooking an omelet at the kitchen stove.
“Yeah, I met Wayne for breakfast and then ran over to the Coachella Real Estate office.” Henry replied looking at Charles’ creation in the large skillet and realizing that it was nearly two o’clock and he had not eaten since his bagel breakfast with Wayne early that morning.
“There’s plenty here for you if you want some.” Charles said.
“Sure, that sounds good. I’ll grab a couple of plates.” Henry said, making his way to the kitchen cabinet.
Henry bought the house on Mel Avenue, a small street of older homes between Indian Canyon and Via Miraleste two blocks north of the hospital, shortly after moving to Palm Springs. The house was a single story on a large lot and was more or less a large U shape with a pool in the middle. There were two master bedroom suites, one in each wing, in addition to two other bedrooms, each with their own bathroom.
The layout of the place suited Henry perfectly; all of the bedrooms had French doors that opened up to the backyard pool, lawn area, the barbecue and a small pool cabana. Henry knew that the house was much larger than what he needed when he first saw it, but he liked it, so he used the money that he had from the sale of the home that he and Irma had shared for so many years in Eagle River and some of her life insurance to pay cash for it.
Henry set one of the bedrooms up as his office. There was a comfortable chair and a good lamp for reading, a large desk with Henry’s computer which he used to pay his bills and do his research on the Internet, and a bookcase that reached to the ceiling with a locked drawer where he kept his weapons and their ammunition. Even though there were no children in the house, he kept his guns unloaded and locked up. There was no need to expose them to potential accidents. There were also some things that he wanted to keep private from his housekeeper Juanita. Not that she would have a problem with the weapons, Henry thought, but he didn’t want her to think that he was a violent person, which he wasn’t. In Henry’s way of thinking, once a cop always a cop and he thought of his Colt and the Glock the same way a carpenter would think of a favorite hammer and a nail puller.
Right after Henry moved into the house, he met Charles at the Senior Center where Henry had been going to meet people and socialize since he arrived in Palm Springs. He ran into Charles while playing pool at one of the center’s tables on afternoon. Charles Knightly III was a fairly good pool player and they hit if off right away. Henry discovered that Charles’ longtime partner Jonathan passed away of AIDS a few months before and Charles moved to Palm Springs from Northern California after his death.
Charles was a retired High School teacher from San Francisco and had spent a year caring for Jonathan full-time before he died. After moving down to Palm Springs with his dog he couldn’t find a place to rent that allowed pets. Henry had this huge house and empty rooms so he offered Charles the other master suite. The layout of the house was perfect for their arrangement; Henry had a master suite and a separate office on one side of the house with direct access to the pool. Charles and Pierre, his dog, had moved into the master bedroom on the other side of the house. The fourth bedroom was set up for guests and had only been used once when Henry’s daughter Claire came out for a brief visit a year ago.
Two months after he moved in, Charles sort of stopped looking for another place to live and he had been Henry’s housemate for the past two and a half years. He paid Henry a few hundred dollars a month in rent, and they split most of the utilities. Henry liked having someone around to talk with, didn’t mind the dog and it had suited them both well.
Henry pulled the plates out of the kitchen cabinet and set them on the dining room table. He walked back into the kitchen to grab some silverware for the two of them, and set them down next to the plates.
“What would you like to drink?” Henry asked Charles, reaching for the refrigerator.
“I’ll just have a glass of milk.” Charles replied, “Make sure it is my lactose free kind.”
“Of course, Henry said, “I wouldn’t try to poison you!”
“Speaking of poison, since you went out to have breakfast with Wayne, and it is not Thursday, he must need your help again, has someone been offed?” Charles asked deftly flipping over the omelet in the pan on the stove. “Offed?” Henry asked, “Well, someone has been killed and Wayne requested my help.” Henry continued, pouring Charles’ milk into a glass on the counter.
“I know that cops say “offed”, I saw it in a movie! So is it anyone famous or that I should know?” Charles asked, watching the omelet carefully to make sure the cheese didn’t run out into the skillet.
“Yes, you’ve seen him around.” Henry said carrying Charles’ milk to the table and reaching for a bottle of water for himself.
“Ok, ok, stop making me guess, who is it?” Charles asked now sliding the omelet onto a platter.
“Rex Thornbird.” Henry said, “Do you know who that is?”
“Rex Thornbird? Sure, he’s the mid-century specialist; his face is on every block here in this part of town – that’s terrible, he’s a nice man – what happened?” Charles asked turning the stove off.
“Well, I can’t tell you too much of course, but he was found dead inside the kitchen of one of the houses he was trying to sell not too far from here actually.”
“Hmmmm, so Rex Thornbird is dead, eh? - bacon?” Charles asked.
“Sounds good.” Henry said, “I smell it, is it in the microwave?”
“Yes,” Charles replied, “Do you mind getting it out?”
“I got it,” Henry replied reaching for the oven mitt to take the hot tray with the bacon slices out of the microwave and he put it on the table.
“How do you know Thornbird?” Henry asked Charles who was grabbing some napkins from the cabinet and making his way to the table with the platter with the omelet.
“First of all, his picture is everywhere; it seems as though he has the For Sale market cornered in Palm Springs, you’ve seen the signs around here haven’t you?” Charles set the platter with the omelet down on the table and cut the omelet deftly in half with his knife. He slid half on Henry’s plate and the other half on his own.
“Secondly he was here at the house about a month or so ago, wanting to know if we wanted to sell the house. I told him I wasn’t the owner, but that you probably weren’t interested in selling anyway. Then from the car he was driving and the way he was dressed, I thought he was interested in me, and I asked him if he wanted to meet for coffee later, but he turned me down.” Charles related, taking a sip of his special milk.
“Oh for goodness sake Charles, Thornbird was married up until a few years ago, how could you be hitting on him?” Henry asked putting his fork down and looking with wonderment at his roommate.
“Heeeey, my gaydar isn’t that far off.” Charles said defensively, “He’s one of the family.”
“Well, I don’t think so, it doesn’t matter though does it, he’s dead, and we don’t know who did it, nor do we have a motive.” Henry said picking up a slice of bacon.
“Well I think you should look into his customers.” Charles said. “When he was here, he told me about all these movie star owned homes that he sold in this area, and there’s no way that there are that many places in this neighborhood that were owned by celebrities – if you ask me.” Charles said in between bites.
“Hmm, maybe.” Henry said, “Or maybe you’re just jealous of him since he didn’t want to join you for coffee.” Henry said with a smile as he put the last of his omelet in his mouth. “You’ve outdone yourself on this omelet as usual. How do you know that there are a
lot of celebrity owned homes in Palm Springs?”
Charles took a deep breath and started his story. “Well, Jonathan – rest his soul – and I have been coming to Palm Springs on vacation for many years. We started in the late seventies when we heard then President Ford was coming here to relax. We figured if presidents came here, why shouldn’t we” Charles recounted. “It’s not a bad drive from San Francisco, we would spend weekends at the Ballantines Hotel, that was before the gay resorts were all over the place like they are today.
Anyway, Palm Springs became popular with the Hollywood crowd during the Great Depression.” Charles continued. “This place was the perfect hideaway, far enough away from the gossip columnists like Louella Parsons and Hedda Hopper in Hollywood, and they came here to play tennis just down the street at the Palm Springs Racquet Club, or attend a party or two, and unless things got too wild, they were pretty safe here.”
“You know, I knew there was a celebrity connection,” Henry said, “But I had no idea that it was this extensive.”
“Oh yeah,” Charles continued, “The El Mirador Hotel used to be the place where they all hung out, Gable, Lombard – a lot of them stayed there, but some of them had homes here as well. Anyway, the Army came in at the start of World War II and took over the El Mirador and turned it into Torney General Hospital.”
Charles finished the last of his omelet and put his fork down on the plate while he grabbed the last piece of bacon with a questioning look at Henry who nodded his approval.
“Torney General Hospital?” Henry said, “That must be long gone, I don’t recognize that name.”
“No, this is the desert, nothing ever disappears it just gets reinvented.” Charles said. “We now call it Desert Regional Medical Center, it’s the hospital right behind us here on Indian Canyon.”
“Wow!” Henry said, “I didn’t know that, our very own hospital? You’re right; this place has really undergone some transformations. So I know about Liberace, Dinah Shore, Elvis and Lawrence Welk, who else used to visit here?” Charles picked up his and Henry’s now empty plates and carried them to the sink. He started rinsing them off and said. “Well, I mentioned Gerald Ford, who still lives here and you probably already know about Bob Hope who was actually appointed Honorary Mayor.”
Charles walked back over to the table to get the microwave plate that held the bacon. “And everyone tends to forget Sonny Bono, who was the mayor here before he was elected to the U.S. Congress where he represented the district before his unfortunate skiing accident. But I’ll bet you didn’t know the Gabor sisters had homes here and Frank Sinatra had a house built close by on Alejo Road, Kirk Douglas had a place in Las Palmas. Oh yeah, Harpo Marx lived over next to the Tamarisk Country Club near what is now Rancho Mirage. And somebody mentioned to me that Marilyn Monroe had a rendezvous in a small hotel on Racquet Club Road while Kennedy was in town in 1962.”
“Yeah, I’ve already heard the story about Monroe’s affairs at a hotel, but I didn’t know about the Kennedy part.” Henry answered. “So all these celebrity homes that Thornbird was selling, it could be that they are all genuine.” Henry said as Charles put the last of the dishes into the dishwasher.
“Well, as I said, I just don’t think so.” Charles said as he poured the dishwashing liquid into the machine. “You know, Palm Springs had already lost its luster while Jonathan and I were vacationing here in the late seventies, and a lot of celebrities had moved to more upscale places like Palm Desert, Rancho Mirage and Indian Wells. Plus, it seems like a lot of the houses that Thornbird was selling in this area were small and probably originally intended for winter homes for the Los Angeles middle class. You probably ought to read up on Alexander homes on the Internet.”
“I remember hearing about Alexander homes when I was looking for this place.” Henry said, “I’ll do a search to see what I can find. But thanks, you’ve been a big help in getting me into the right direction on my research.”
“Heeeey, no problem, always glad to help. Now I’m going to take Pierre out to the park for a walk” Charles said, grabbing Pierre’s leash and going into the backyard to get the dog from under one of the large bougainvillea bushes where it usually took an afternoon nap.
“Ok, see you in a bit.” Henry said heading for his office, “I’m going to log onto the Internet to see what I can find out about Mr. Thornbird and Alexander homes.”
Henry walked into his office and pulled the chair out as he sat down at his desk. He moved the mouse on its pad and the flat panel screen flickered to life. Henry was proud of his computer station, there were a lot of people his age that either didn’t know, or refused to use the machines. When he was still working, Henry had insisted that the Eagle River police department take advantage of the new technology and his force was one of the first in Wisconsin to have terminals in their police cruisers.
He had continued this professional philosophy to his personal use and started using a computer at home to pay his bills, write letters and surf the Internet quite a few years ago. Shortly after moving into this house, he bought the machine and had the high speed Internet connection installed so that he could be as well informed as possible. When he started working for the FBI as a profiler, he realized that he couldn’t do it without the machine and the fast connection.
Now, he brought up his browser and surfed over to realtor.com. He used the website when shopping for his own house and knew that he could use it to see all the homes that Rex Thornbird had been trying to sell before his unfortunate demise in the house on Granvia Valmonte.
By typing in the zip code for Palm Springs and doing a search of the properties for sale, Henry quickly had a full list of every home that was offered by numerous realtors and agencies in the neighborhood. Sure enough, of all the listings within this zip code, it looked as though Thornbird and Coachella Real Estate had over eighty percent of them. He looked up the house on Granvia Valmonte where he had been that morning with Wayne and found in the description that it was owned by Rudy Vallee as Rosie had mentioned.
Many of the homes that were listed by Thornbird contained references to ownership or occupancy by celebrities. Some of them seemed a little far-fetched, like a home on Tacheva that had been owned my Patsy Cline. Henry wasn’t sure that Patsy Cline had ever been to California, much less Palm Springs, but the décor in the house was described in the listing as very western, so he supposed it could be possible.
After looking through the various descriptions, he thought he heard Charles and Pierre return from their walk, but he wasn’t through reading everything about the various homes. By the time he got up, he realized that it was getting dark outside and Charles had left a note on the refrigerator that he had gone out and wouldn’t be back until later.
It had cooled off considerably outdoors, where the temperature was a very comfortable 74 degrees and Henry opened up the doors from the dining room to the pool. While he had already swum his laps in the morning, he decided to relax in the pool before dinner and headed to his bedroom to get his towel. He turned the stereo on and flipped the switch so that he could listen to the speakers outside. He loved the pool, it was one of the nicest things about the desert climate, and he certainly would not have bothered with one in Wisconsin.
It was about eight o’clock that evening when Henry finally ate dinner. He had been to Jensen’s supermarket on Sunrise Way the day before and bought salad makings at their extensive salad bar. He had quite a bit left over and it was in a container at the bottom of the refrigerator. He took it out, arranged it on a plate, poured on some dressing and grabbed a bottle of California white wine from the refrigerator. He sat at the dining room table, ate his salad and drank his glass of wine thinking that Charles was right about looking into Thornbird’s past customers. Even Rosie had said that not all of them were satisfied.
He finished his salad, drank the last of his wine and brought his plate and glass to the sink. He rinsed them and put them in the dishwasher with the dishes from the omelet lunch that he
and Charles shared earlier in the day. He dried off his hands and remembered that he left the flyer that he picked up on the way home from Coachella Real Estate in the car. He went out to the garage and picked the paper up from the big Mercury’s passenger seat. He headed for his bedroom and closed the door and switched on his television. He sat down on the bed and looked at the flyer. He’d picked it up from in front of a home on Via Miraleste, just around the corner. It was from Coachella Real Estate and had a small copy of Rex Thornbird’s picture on it. It featured a three bedroom, two bathroom house and had a description on the flyer:
Rex Thornbird, the mid-century specialist and Coachella Real Estate are proud to feature this newly renovated home in the desirable Ruth Hardy Park neighborhood. Enjoy this exquisite home with practical layout and charm from a bygone era when gas was cheap and homes were constructed with quality. The kitchen is renovated and features modern appliances and new countertops. The backyard is professionally landscaped; the pool was recently re-plastered and is ready for your use. This home is in move in condition and will not last long at this amazing price. Call Rex Thornbird today to arrange a personal tour of this beautiful executive home.
Geez, they really pour on the hyperbole, Henry thought, and counting his picture, Thornbird was featured three times on the 8 ½ by 11 flyer. It almost seemed as though he was selling himself as opposed to the house. The flyer had indeed been in a plastic box that was attached to the For Sale sign as Rosie had mentioned.
Thinking of Rosie Murphy, he wondered exactly what the relationship was between her and Thornbird. He hoped it wasn’t anything improper and that Mr. Murphy wasn’t the jealous type. The petite woman with her bright hair and green eyes had impressed him; he didn’t want her to be involved in what Charles thought was Thornbird’s exaggeration and liberties in describing the properties he was selling. Although, the flyer he had in his hand didn’t seem improper at all, no mention of any celebrity connection with this house.
The more he thought about it, the more he realized that the connection between celebrities and these homes was shaky. Certainly there wasn’t a plaque on the wall announcing “Bing Crosby slept here” and no mark left behind if a celebrity had indeed owned the home. Of course, some famous people’s properties were very obvious. Bob Hope’s flying saucer estate was known by everyone in the valley, and most folks also knew about Liberace’s compound near downtown Palm Springs.
Charles had certainly opened his eyes to the celebrity connection that Palm Springs had earlier. Charles was very knowledgeable about Palm Springs’ past, but then what else could you expect from a retired High School history teacher? Henry doubted that the average home buyer or Palm Springs visitor knew which movie stars had lived here or even stopped at the El Mirador for a drink. If someone who seemed knowledgeable told them that a home was owned by a celebrity, how would they find out otherwise?
Had Thornbird embellished the lineage of these properties in order to get a premium sales price? A higher sales price meant a higher commission for Thornbird. Henry didn’t doubt there was some fiction writing at this point; he remembered the picture of the Bob Hope estate that was on the wall of the conference room at Coachella Real Estate. It hung amongst the other pictures of estates and homes that the office claimed they had handled. If they played fast and loose with the facts in the office, what did Thornbird do when trying to convince people to buy a house from him?
Was this a big conspiracy to defraud buyers? How many people were in on it? How many buyers had been taken by this embellishment? Was one of them so angry at being duped that they decided to make Rex Thornbird pay the ultimate price? He decided that the report of Thornbird’s past deals that Rosie was working on was becoming very important.
Maybe he’d probe her little to see what she knew of the conspiracy, if it was indeed a conspiracy. He doubted she was in on it, but she may have been aware of what was going on. Maybe he could get her to relax enough tomorrow to open up a little bit on Thornbird’s way of doing business. Perhaps a few more details on her relationship with Thornbird would be forthcoming as well. But he really needed the report that she was working on for him. He’d take that list and make arrangements to talk to everyone beginning with those that had purchased these so-called celebrity owned homes from Thornbird.