“Just put those files on the floor,” she said.
“This is fine.” I was already tired of the game they played—her put-downs, his collusion, my pro forma reassurances. “Did you want to get your walk in? I didn’t mean to hold you up.”
Her expression shifted. Being brittle herself, she was easily injured. “I can certainly do that if you think I’m in the way.”
“Now, now, now. You stay right where you are,” he said. “I’m sure she’s here to talk to both of us.”
“I suppose we could have some sherry,” she said hesitantly.
He waved her into the chair. “I’ll do that. You just have a seat.”
“Please don’t go to any trouble. I have to be somewhere else shortly.” This was not entirely true, but I wasn’t sure how much more I could endure. I took my notebook out of my handbag and leafed through the pages. “Let me ask a couple of questions and then I can get out of here. I don’t want to take any more of your time than I have to.”
Peter sank into a chair. “Exactly what is it you’re doing?”
Yolanda adjusted one of the rings she wore, making sure the square-cut diamond was properly centered on her finger. “You’ll have to pardon Peter. I only explained it to him twice.”
“This is a follow-up to Morley Shine’s investigation,” I said, ignoring her. “Frankly, we’re hoping to strengthen the plaintiff’s case. Did you have contact with David or Isabelle on the day she died?”
He said, “I don’t remember anything specific, but it seems unlikely.”
“Well, of course it’s unlikely. You were in the hospital, don’t you remember? Your heart attack was December fifteenth that year. You were at St. Terry’s until January second. I was afraid to tell you about Isabelle because I didn’t want you upset.”
His look was blank. “I suppose that’s right. I’d forgotten that it all happened in that same period,” he said to her. And then to me, “They’d pulled out of the firm by then and set up offices of their own.”
“Taking any client they could,” she inserted with acid.
“Was there bad blood about that?”
She fiddled primly with her ring. “Not to hear him tell it, but of course there was.”
“Now, Yolanda, that’s not true. I wished her all the best.”
“Peter hates to make a fuss. He won’t confront anyone, least of all someone like her. After all he’d done.”
“As I understand it, Isabelle came up with the idea for tiny houses while she was working for you.”
“That’s right.”
“What about . . . what’s it called . . . proprietary rights? Wouldn’t the idea actually belong to you?”
Peter started to answer, but Yolanda broke in. “Of course. He never even asked her to sign the form. The woman walked out with everything. He wouldn’t even press the point, though I begged him to. In effect, Isabelle stole millions from him—literally millions. . . .”
I formed my next question with care. I could already tell Peter was much too circumspect to be of any use in my investigation. Yolanda, the spite queen, was going to serve me well if I could set her up right. “You must have been furious.”
“And why wouldn’t I be? She was a self-indulgent, degenerate—” She bit off the sentence.
“Go on,” I said.
“Yolanda,” Peter said with a warning look.
She amended her stance. “I wouldn’t want to speak ill.”
“It won’t hurt her at this point. I understand she was excessive—”
“Excessive doesn’t begin to cover it. She was downright dishonest!”
Peter leaned toward his wife. “I don’t think we should present a totally biased view. You may not have been fond of her, but she was talented.”
“Yes, she was,” Yolanda said, coloring. “And I suppose—to be fair about it—her problems were not all her fault. Sometimes I almost felt sorry for her. She was neurotic and high-strung. The woman had everything but happiness. David latched onto her like a parasite and he sucked her dry.”
I waited for more, but she seemed to have run down. I looked at Peter. “Is that your analysis?”
“It’s not my place to judge.”
“I’m not asking you to judge her. I’d like your point of view. It might help me understand the situation.”
He thought about that one briefly and apparently decided it made sense. “She was unfortunate. I don’t know what else to say.”
“How long did she work for you?”
“A little over four years. An informal apprenticeship.”
“Simone told me she didn’t actually have an architectural degree,” I said.
“That’s correct. Isabelle had no formal design training. She had wonderful ideas. She bubbled over with enthusiasm. It was almost as if the same reservoir fed both her creativity and her destruction.”
“Was she a manic-depressive?”
“She seemed to live with very high levels of anxiety, which is why she drank,” he said.
“She drank because she was an alcoholic,” Yolanda put in.
“We don’t know that,” he said.
She had to laugh at that, patting herself on the chest to curb her merriment. “You’ll never get a man to admit a beautiful woman is flawed.”
I could feel the tension collecting again at the back of my neck. “What sort of man is David Barney? I gather he’s an architect. Is he talented?”
Yolanda said, “He’s a carpenter with pretensions.”
Peter brushed her response aside. “He’s a very good technician,” Peter said.
“Technician?”
“That’s not meant as criticism.”
“He’s the defendant. You can criticize all you like.”
“I’m reluctant to do that. After all, we’re in the same profession even though I’m retired. It’s a small town. I don’t feel it’s my place to comment on his qualifications.”
“What about the man himself?”
“I never cared for him personally.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Peter. Why don’t you tell her the truth? You can’t stand the man. Nobody can abide him. He’s sly and dishonest. He manipulates left and right—”
“Yolanda—”
“Don’t you ‘Yolanda’ me! She’s asked for an opinion and I’m giving her mine. You’re so busy being nice you forget how to tell the truth. David Barney is a spider. Peter thought we should all socialize, and we did, over my protest. I felt it was going too far. When the two of them were in Peter’s firm, I tried to be pleasant. I didn’t care for David, but I did what was expected. Isabelle had brought in a great deal of business and we were appreciative of that. Once she got involved with David . . . he was not a good influence.”
I refocused my attention. She’d be great on the witness stand if she could keep from losing it. “How’d she manage to bring in so much business?”
“She had a lot of money and she traveled in the right circles. People looked up to her because it was clear she had exquisite taste. She was very stylish. Whatever she took up, everyone else followed suit.”
“When she and David left, they took a lot of clients with them?”
“That’s not unusual,” Peter said hastily. “It’s unfortunate, of course, but it happens in every business.”
“It was a disaster,” Yolanda said. “Peter retired shortly afterwards. The last time we saw them was the dinner party they gave Labor Day weekend.”
“When the gun disappeared?”
The two exchanged a look. Peter cleared his throat again. “We heard about that later.”
“We heard about it at the time. There was a frightful quarrel upstairs in the master bedroom. Of course, we didn’t know the subject, but that’s certainly what it was.”
“What’s your theory about who might have taken it?”
“Well, he did, of course,” Yolanda said without the slightest hesitation.
7
I stopped by the office briefly and typ
ed up my notes. The light on my answering machine was blinking merrily. I punched the Replay button and listened to the message. It was Isabelle’s friend Rhe Parsons, sounding harried and dutiful, the kind of person who returns a phone call just to get it over with. I tried her number, letting the phone ring while I leafed through one of the files sitting on my desk. Where was I going to find a witness who could put David Barney at the murder scene? Lonnie’s suggestion was facetious, but what a coup that would be. Four rings . . . five. I was just about to hang up when someone answered abruptly on the other end. “Yes?”
“Oh, hi. This is Kinsey Millhone. May I speak to Rhe Parsons?”
“You’re doing it. Who’s this?”
“Kinsey Millhone. I left a message—”
“Oh, right, right,” she cut in. “About Isabelle. I don’t understand what you want.”
“Look, I know you talked to Morley Shine a couple of months ago.”
“Who?”
“The investigator who was handling this. Unfortunately, he had a heart at—”
“I never talked to anyone about Isabelle.”
“You didn’t talk to Morley? He was working for an attorney in the lawsuit filed by Kenneth Voigt.”
“I don’t know about any of this stuff.”
“Sorry. Maybe I was misinformed. Why don’t I tell you what’s going on,” I said. I went through a brief explanation of the lawsuit and the job I’d been hired to do. “I promise I won’t take any more of your time than I have to, but I would like to have a quick chat.”
“I’m swamped. You couldn’t have called at a worse time,” she said. “I’m a sculptor with a show coming up in two days. Every minute I’ve got is devoted to that.”
“What about coffee or a glass of wine later this afternoon? It doesn’t have to be nine to five. I can come at your convenience.”
“But it has to be today, right? Can’t it wait a week?”
“We have a court date coming up.” We’re all busy, I thought.
“Look, I don’t mean to sound bitchy, but she’s been gone for six years. Whatever happens to David Barney, it won’t bring her back to life. So what’s the point, you know?”
I said, “There’s no point to anything if you get right down to it. We could all blow our brains out, but we don’t. Sure, she’s gone, but her death doesn’t have to be senseless.”
There was a silence. I knew she didn’t want to do it and I hated to press, but this was serious.
She shifted her position, still annoyed, but willing to bend a bit. “Jesus. I teach drawing at Adult Ed from seven to ten o’clock tonight. If you stop by, we can talk while the students work. That’s the best I can do.”
“Great. That’s perfect. I appreciate your help.”
She gave me directions. “Room ten, at the back.”
“I’ll see you there.”
I arrived home at 5:35 and saw that Henry’s kitchen light was on. I walked from my back door to his, peering in through the screen. He was sitting in his rocker with his daily glass of Jack Daniel’s, reading the paper while his supper cooked. Through the screen, I was assailed by the heady scent of frying onions and sausage. Henry set his paper aside. “Come on in.”
I opened the screen door and stepped into the kitchen. A big pot of water was just coming to a boil and I could see tomato sauce simmering on the back burner. “Hi, babe, how are you? Whatever you’re cooking, it smells divine.”
He’d be handsome at any age, but at eighty-three he was elegant—tall, lean, with snowy white hair and blue eyes that seemed to burn in his tanned face. “I’m putting together a lasagna for later. William gets in tonight.” Henry’s older brother William, who was eighty-five to his eighty-three, had suffered a heart attack in August and hadn’t been doing well since. Henry had debated a trip back to Michigan to see him, but had decided to postpone the visit until William’s health improved. Apparently he was better because Henry’d received a call to say he was coming here.
“That’s right. I forgot. Well, that should be an adventure. How long will he stay?”
“I agreed to two weeks, longer if I can stand him. It’ll be a pain in the ass. Physically, he’s recovered, but he’s been depressed for months. Really down in the dumps. Lewis says he’s totally self-obsessed. I’m sure Lewis is sending him out here to get even with me.”
“What did you do to him?”
“Oh, who knows? He won’t say. You know how parental Lewis gets. He likes to have me think about my sins in case there’s one I haven’t told him about. I stole a girl from him once back in 1926. I think this is to retaliate for her, but maybe not. He’s got a long memory and not a shred of beneficence.” Henry’s brother Lewis was eighty-six. His brother Charlie was ninety-one, and his only sister would be ninety-four on the thirty-first of December. “Actually, I’ll bet it wasn’t his idea at all. Nell’s probably throwing William out. She never liked him that much and now she says all he does is talk about death. She doesn’t want to hear it with a birthday coming up. Says it’s bumming her out.”
“What time’s his plane get in?”
“Eight-fifteen, if it doesn’t crash, of course. I thought I’d bring him back here for salad and lasagna, maybe go up to Rosie’s for a beer after that. You want to join us for supper? I made a cherry pie for dessert. Well, actually, I made six. The other five go to Rosie to pay off my bar tab.” Rosie’s is the local tavern, run by a Hungarian woman with an unpronounceable last name. Since Henry’s retirement from commercial baking, he’s begun to barter his wares. He also caters tea parties in the neighborhood, where he’s much in demand.
“Can’t do it,” I said. “I’ve got an appointment at seven and it may run late. I thought I’d grab a quick bite up at Rosie’s before I head out.”
“Maybe you can catch us tomorrow. I don’t know how we’ll spend the day. Depressed people never do much. I’ll probably sit around and watch him take his Elavil.”
The building that houses Rosie’s looks as if it might once have been a grocer’s. The exterior is plain and narrow, the plate-glass windows obscured by peeling beer ads and buzzing neon signs. The tavern is sandwiched between an appliance repair shop and an ill-lighted Laundromat whose patrons wander into Rosie’s to wait out their washing cycles, chugging beer and smoking cigarettes. The floors are wooden. The walls are plywood, stained a dark mahogany. The booths that line the perimeter are crudely built, destined to give you splinters if you slide too fast across the seat. There are eight to ten tables with black Formica tops, usually one leg out of four slightly shorter than the rest. Mealtime at Rosie’s is often spent trying to right the wobble, with the endless intervention of stacked paper matchbooks and folded napkins. The lighting is the sort that makes you look like you’ve been abusing your Tan-in-a-Bottle.
Dinner was uneventful once I knuckled under and ordered what Rosie told me. She’s a formidable presence: in her sixties, Hungarian, short, top-heavy, a merciless enforcer for the food Mafia. The special that night was called gulyashus, which had to translate to “beef stew.”
“I was thinking of a salad. I need to clean up my act after too much junk food.”
“Salad is for after. The gulyashus comes first. I make very authentic. You’re gonna love it,” she said. She was already penciling the order in the little notebook she’d begun to carry. I wondered if she kept a running account of all the meals I’d eaten there. I tried to peek at the page once and she rapped me with her pencil.
“Rosie, I don’t even know what gulyashus is.”
“Just hush and I’m telling you.”
“Tell me then. I can’t wait.”
She had to get herself all settled for the recital, like a concert violinist with her feet placed properly. She makes a point of speaking lumpy English which she apparently thinks contributes to her authority. “In Hungarian, the word gulyás means ‘herdsman.’ Like a shepherd. This dish originate in ninth century. Is very good. The shepherd cook up these cubes of meat with ongion, very litt
le moisture. No paprika then so I don’t use myself. When all the liquid is boil out, the meat is dried in the sun and then stored in this bag made of the sheep’s . . . how you say . . .”
“Balls?”
“Estomach.”
“Previously digested. Very tasty. I’ll take it. I don’t want to hear the rest.”
“Good choice,” she said complacently.
The dish she brought was actually what my aunt used to call “galoshes,” cubes of beef simmered with onion and thickened with sour cream. It really was wonderful and the tart salad afterward was the perfect contrast. Rosie allowed me to have a glass of mediocre red wine, some rolls and butter, and a cheese tray for dessert. The dinner cost only nine dollars so I couldn’t complain. Dimly I wondered if, for total obedience, I’d sold out too cheap.
While I drank my coffee, she stood by my table and complained. Her busboy, Miguel, a sullen lad of forty-five, was threatening to quit if she didn’t give him a raise. “Is ridiculous. Why should he get more? Just because he learned to wash a dish like I teach him? He should pay me.”
“Rosie!” I said. “The man started washing dishes when Ralph quit six months ago. Now he’s doing two jobs and he ought to be paid. Besides, it’s nearly Christmas.”
“Is easy work,” she remarked, undismayed by the notions of fair play, justice, or seasonal generosity.
“It’s been two years since his last raise. He told me that himself.”
“You taking his side, I see.”
“Well, of course I am. He’s been a good employee. Without him, you’d be lost.”
Her look was stubborn. “I don’t like men who pout.”
The Adult Education facility where Rhe Parsons was teaching was located on Bay Street, on the far side of the freeway about two blocks from St. Terry’s Hospital. Once an elementary school, the complex consisted of some offices, a small auditorium, and countless portable classrooms. Room ten was at the rear of the parking lot, an oversize art studio with a door on either end. Light poured out onto the walkway. I have a natural aversion to educational institutions, but drawing seemed benign—unlike math or chemistry. I peered in.