Big Foot Stole My Wife Page 11

  To her surprise, he squatted down behind her car for a long moment. When he arose and came to her window, his expression was stony.

  “You think that’s funny, lady?” he said. “Well, you’re the sickest damn practical joker I’ve had the displeasure to deal with. Driver’s license and registration.”

  “I don’t understand,” Eloise said with as much civility as she could muster. “I was not exceeding the speed limit, and I am always careful about coming to a full stop at stop signs. I’ve never had a traffic ticket in my life, except for the odd parking ticket.”

  “Yeah, right. I’m gonna have to radio in and find out what the violation is. License and registration—now.”

  Eloise handed over the pertinent documentation, adding her proof of insurance to emphasize her willingness to cooperate, then sank back as the officer returned to his car. Why was she being treated with this unmistakable contempt?

  She was startled out of her reverie when a woman pushing a stroller glared at her and said, “You make me want to puke.”

  Eloise got out of the car and blinked at the woman, who mutely pointed at the back of the car. There on the asphalt, attached by a rope tied under the bumper, lay a bedraggled stuffed toy sprinkled with red paint. At a distance, Eloise realized, as her stomach knotted with disgust, it looked very much like a dead cat.

  “Oh, my God,” she said, fighting for breath and oblivious to the tears streaming down her cheeks. “I didn’t know it was there. What must everyone have thought of me? I would never harm a cat! You must believe me! I’m not—not like that.”

  She sat down in the car and dully waited for the officer to return. When he finally did, she explained rather inarticulately that this was a cruel joke played upon her by her estranged husband and then, regaining control of herself, made sure the officer wrote down Justin’s name and that of the Lincoln-Mercury dealership.

  The officer nodded solemnly. “We get some pretty strange calls when people are divorcing, but this is the nastiest trick I’ve heard of. You want me to untie the rope?”

  She did, of course, and when the evidence had been put in her trunk, she turned around and drove home. After a glass of gin took the knots out of her stomach, she donned gloves and wrote anonymous letters to the homeowners in Justin’s new neighborhood, warning them that he was a convicted child molester. Then, feeling steadier, she called all the cemeteries in town and made evening appointments for Kelli so that she and Justin could explore the possibility of spending eternity in adjoining slots. Inspiration struck, and she called all the funeral homes and arranged for representatives to drop by and assist the lovebirds in preplanning their funerals.

  Although the activity was satisfying, it did little to erase the dreadful image of the stained toy cat with the rope around its neck. It was obviously a threat against Puddy, held captive and no doubt being abused and neglected. Would she find him at the end of the next rope?

  Again she found it impossible to sleep, and by the next morning she was so exhausted that she could barely focus on her surroundings. The furniture seemed unfamiliar, the walls bulging, the windows presenting a surreal picture of her yard. The telephone rang several times during the day, but Eloise could only stare at it.

  By nine o’clock that night the gin bottle was empty, as were the sherry, scotch, and vermouth bottles. Eloise was trying to coax the last olive out of the jar when the doorbell chimed. She sat where she was, paralyzed at the possibility that she might find herself confronting Milt or even one of her treacherous friends. Then she remembered the posters she had put up offering a reward for Puddy’s return and stumbled to her feet.

  No one was waiting on the porch, nor was there a second envelope on the doormat. What she did see was a box, six inches square, with printing on its side. She gingerly picked it up and read the swirling words: Memorial Funeral Home and Crematorium.

  She looked wildly at the empty sidewalk, then stepped back inside and locked the door. Her hands trembled violently as she forced open the box. Inside was a small brass urn with decorative etching and inlaid mother-of-pearl flowers. Biting her lip, she opened the lid and gazed at the soft gray ashes.

  At that point, automatic pilot took over. She placed the urn on the coffee table, picked up her purse, and went out to the garage to find the three-gallon gas can left by the yardmen. She drove to the gas station and managed to fill the can at the pump, then continued to Justin’s house in the posh neighborhood on the top of the hill.

  There were no lights shining from the downstairs floor, but a glow came through drawn drapes in a second-floor room and she could hear what she thought was a television show.

  She soaked the porch with gasoline, then went around to the deck at the back of the house and did the same. She dropped a lit match, returned to the front of the house and did the same, and watched until flames began to leap like devilish ballerinas.

  Her task completed, Eloise drove home. She had no delusions that she would not be apprehended and charged with arson. She could only hope that first-degree murder would be added once the ruins had been sifted.

  She was seated in the living room, cradling the urn and reminiscing about Puddy’s days as a mischievous kitten, when the doorbell chimed. So soon, she thought as she set the urn on the mantel and prepared herself to face the consequences of her actions.

  A nervous woman, vaguely familiar, stood on the porch. “Mrs. Bainbury, I live down at the corner across from the park, and I want you to know how sorry I am.”

  “Sorry?” echoed Eloise.

  “Four nights ago we got a call that my father had had a heart attack. I bundled everybody into the car and drove all night to get to the hospital. It turned out not to be all that serious, but we stayed to help my mother get through the ordeal. When we arrived home less than an hour ago, I opened the garage door and saw a large yellow cat shoot out and disappear into the shrubbery. My son recognized it as yours, and the poster on the telephone pole confirmed it. I suppose he must have been locked in the garage all this time. I’m really, really sorry.”

  “These things do happen, don’t they?” murmured Eloise. She was going to offer a word or two of sympathy for the woman’s father when she saw a police car coming down the street. “If you’ll excuse me,” she said, “I need to make sure Puddy finds fresh kibble and water on his return. Thank you so much for coming by.”

  When the police car pulled into her driveway, Eloise was in the yard, sprinkling ashes on the rose bed. Ashes added important nutrients to the soil, she thought with a smile. The roses would be glorious by the end of the summer.

  Dead on Arrival

  The girl’s body lay in the middle of my living room floor. Long, black hair partially veiled her face and wound around her neck like a silky scarf. Her hands were contorted, her eyes flat and unfocused. The hilt of a knife protruded from her chest, an unadorned wooden marker in an irregular blotch of blood.

  For a long, paralytic minute, all I did was stare, trying to convince myself that I was in the throes of some obscure jet lag syndrome that involved a particularly insidious form of hallucination. I finally dropped my suitcase, purse, nylon carry-on bag, and sack of groceries I’d bought on the way from the airport, stuck my knuckles in my mouth, and edged around the sofa for a closer look.

  It was not a good idea. I stumbled back, doing my best not to scream or swoon or something equally unproductive, and made it to the telephone in the kitchen. I thought I’d managed to avoid hysterics, but by the time Peter came on the line, my voice was an octave too high and I was slumped on the floor with my back against a cabinet door.

  “There’s a body in the living room,” I said.

  “Claire? Are you all right?”

  “No, I am not all right, but I’m a damn sight better than that poor girl in the living room, because she’s dead and I’m going to scream any minute and you’d—”

  “I thought you were in Atlanta at that booksellers’ convention until Thursday?”

  “W
ell, I’m not,” I said unsteadily and perhaps a shade acerbically. “I got home about three minutes ago, and there’s this body in the living room and I’d appreciate it if you’ll stop behaving like a nosy travel agent and do something because I really, truly am going to lose control—”

  “Get out of there,” Peter cut in harshly. “No! Go downstairs and wait until we get there.”

  I dropped the receiver and gazed down the hall at my bedroom door, Caron’s bedroom, and the bathroom door. All three were closed. I looked up at the back door, which was bolted from the inside. I listened intently for a sound, a faint intake of breath or the merest scuffle of a nervous foot. Or a bellow from a maniacal monster with a bad attitude and another knife.

  It took several seconds of mental lecturing to get myself up, out of the kitchen and back through the living room, where I kept my eyes on the front door with the determination of a dieter passing a bakery or a mild-mannered bookseller passing a corpse. I then ran down the steps to the ground floor apartment and pounded on the door in a most undignified fashion. I was prepared to beat it down with my fists if need be when the lock clicked and the door opened a few inches, saving me countless splinters and an unpleasant conversation with the miserly landlord.

  “Mrs. Malloy?” said a startled voice. “I thought you were in Atlanta for another couple of days.”

  The apartment had been rented a few weeks earlier to two college boys with the unremarkable names of Jonathon and Sean. I hadn’t bothered to figure out which was which, and at the moment I still wasn’t interested.

  “I am not in Atlanta. Let me in, please. There’s been an—an accident upstairs. There may be someone hiding up there. The police are coming. I need to stay here.”

  “The police?” he said as he opened the door and gestured for me to come in. Jonathon (I thought) was a tall boy with blue eyes and stylish blond hair. At the moment his hair was dripping on the floor like melting icicles and he was clutching a towel around his waist. “I was taking a shower,” he explained in case I was unable to make the leap unassisted. “Police, huh? I guess I’d better put some clothes on.”

  “Good idea.” I sank down on a nubby Salvation Army sofa and rubbed my face, fighting not to visualize the body ten feet above my head. In my living room. Partly on the area rug.

  “I’ll tell Sean to get you something to drink,” Jonathon continued, still attempting to play the gracious host in his towel.

  He went into one of the bedrooms, and after a minute the other boy appeared. Sean moved slowly, his dark hair ruffled and his expression groggy. “Hi, Mrs. Malloy,” he said through a yawn. “I was taking a nap. I stayed up all night because of a damn calculus exam this morning. Jon said the police are coming. That’s weird, real weird. You want a glass of wine? I think we got some left from a party last weekend.”

  Before I could decline, sirens whined in the distance, becoming louder as they neared the usually quiet street across from the campus lawn. Blue light flashed, doors slammed, feet thudded on the porch, and voices barked like angry mastiffs. The Farberville cavalry, it seemed, had arrived.

  Several hours later I was allowed to sit on my own sofa. The chalk outline on the other side of the coffee table looked like a crude paper-doll, and I tried to keep my eyes away from it. Peter Rosen of the Farberville CID, a man of great charm upon occasion, alternated between scribbling in his notebook and rubbing my neck.

  “You’re sure you didn’t recognize her?” he said for not the first time.

  “I’m very, very sure. Who was she? How did she get into my apartment, Peter?”

  “We checked, and the deadbolt hasn’t been tampered with. You’ve said several times now that you’ve got the only key and the door was locked when you came upstairs.”

  I leaned back and stared at the network of cracks in the ceiling. “When I got to the porch, I had to put everything down to unlock that door. I then put the key between my lips, picked everything up and trudged upstairs to my landing, where I had to put everything down again to unlock this door. It was locked; I’m sure of it.”

  “Caron doesn’t have a key?”

  “No one else has a key—not even the landlord. He had someone put on the deadbolts about five years ago and told me that I’d have to pay for a replacement if I lost my key. I considered having a copy made for Caron, but never got around to it. The only key is right there on the coffee table.”

  We both glared at the slightly discolored offender. When it failed to offer any hints, Peter opted to nuzzle my ear and murmur about the stupidity of citizens dallying in their scene-of-the-crime apartments when crazed murderers might be lurking in closets or behind closed doors.

  The telephone rang, ending that nonsense. To someone’s consternation, Peter took the call in the kitchen. Luckily, someone could overhear his side despite his efforts to mutter, and I was frowning when he rejoined me.

  “Her name was Wendy, right?” I said. “I can’t think of anyone I’ve ever known named Wendy. Well, one, but I doubt she and a boy in green tights flew through an upstairs window.”

  “Wendy Billingsberg, a business major at the college. She was twenty-two and lived alone on the top floor of that cheap brick apartment house beside the copy shop. She was from some little town about forty miles from here called Hasty. Her family’s being notified now, and I suppose I’ll question them tomorrow when they’ve had a chance to assimilate this. It’s even harder when the victim is young.” He looked away for a moment. “Wendy Billingsberg. Perhaps she came into the Book Depot. Try to remember if you’ve seen the name on a check or a credit card.”

  I did as directed, then shook my head. “I make the students produce a battery of identification, and I think I’d remember the name. I did look at her face when they—took her out. She was a pretty girl and that long black hair was striking. I can’t swear she’s never been in the bookstore or walked past me on the sidewalk, but I’m almost certain I never spoke to her, Peter. Why was she in my apartment and how did she get inside?”

  Peter flipped through his notebook and sighed. “The medical examiner said the angle of the weapon was such that the wound could not have been self-inflicted, so she wasn’t the only one here.”

  “What about the two boys downstairs? Have they ever seen her before, or noticed her hanging around the neighborhood?”

  “Jorgeson had them look at the victim and then interviewed them briefly. Neither one recognized her or offered any theory concerning what she was doing in your apartment. Could she have been a friend of Caron’s?”

  “I don’t think so,” I said, then went to the telephone, dialed Inez’s number, and asked to speak to Caron.

  She responded with the customary grace of a fifteen-year-old controlled solely by hormonal tides. “What, Mother? Inez and I were just about to go over to Rhonda’s house to watch a movie. Aren’t you supposed to be in Atlanta?”

  “Yes, I am supposed to be in Atlanta,” I said evenly, “but I am not. I am home and this is important. Do you know a twenty-two-year-old girl named Wendy Billingsberg?”

  “No. Is that all? Inez and I really, really need to go now. Rhonda’s such a bitch that she won’t bother to wait for us. Some people have no consideration.” Her tone made it clear there was more than one inconsiderate person in her life.

  I reported the gist to Peter, who sighed again and said he’d better return to the police station to see if Jorgeson had dug up anything further. He promised to send by a uniformed officer to install a chain until I could have the lock rekeyed, and then spent several minutes asking my earlobes if I would be all right.

  We all assured him I would, but after he’d gone, I caught myself tiptoeing around the apartment as I unpacked groceries and put away my suitcase. The front door had been locked; the back door had been bolted from the inside. The locks on the windows were unsullied except for a patina of black dust from being examined for fingerprints. They were not the only things to have been dusted, of course. Most of the surfaces in the apart
ment had been treated in a similar fashion, and had produced Caron’s prints all over everything (including the bottle of perfume Peter’d given me for my birthday), mine, and one on a glass on the bedside table that had resulted in a moment of great excitement, until Peter suggested they compare it to his. The success of this resulted in a silence and several smirky glances.

  Wendy and her companion had not searched the apartment. There was no indication they’d gone further than the living room. Why had they chosen my apartment—and how had they gotten inside?

  An idea struck, and I hurried into the kitchen and hunted through junky drawers until I found the telephone number of my landlord. I crossed my fingers as I dialed the number, and was rewarded with a grouchy hello. “Mr. Fleechum,” I said excitedly, “this is Claire Malloy. I need to ask you something.”

  “Look, I told you when you moved in that I didn’t want any damn excuses about the rent. I ain’t your father, and I don’t care about your financial problems. I got to pay the bank every month, so there’s no point in—”

  “That’s not why I called,” I interrupted before he worked himself into an impressive fettle. “I was hoping you might remember the name of the locksmith who installed the deadbolts several years ago …”

  “Yeah, I know his name. You lose the key, Mizz Malloy? I told you then that I wasn’t going to waste money on a spare.”

  I wasn’t inclined to explain the situation at the moment. “No, I didn’t lose the key. I was thinking about having a deadbolt installed on the back door—at my expense, naturally. My daughter and I would feel more secure.”

  Fleechum grumbled under his breath, then said, “That’s all right with me, as long as I don’t have to pay for it. But you’ll have to find your own locksmith. My deadbeat brother-in-law put in the deadbolts, due in part to owing me money. He cleared out three, four years ago, taking his tools. My sister had everything else hauled off to the dump. I’m just sorry that sorry husband of hers couldn’t have been in the bottom of the load.”