The Ghosts of Lovely Women Page 14

  “Was it Kathy Olchen?”

  “That sounds right. She was asking about the number — it was written on something that Jessica had given her. Jessica said it was “insurance,” except that she didn’t say what it was insurance for. This lady knew about the site, and somehow she got my name. She was asking questions, too.”

  “Did she get the answer she wanted?”

  “I don’t know. She asked me if anyone had been sending Jessica cash. Like unsolicited cash.”

  “Had they been?”

  “Not that I know of. I mean, her parents sent her money now and then. They’re pretty loaded.”

  “Why did Kathy think Jessica was getting cash?”

  “I guess it was something weird Jessica said to her before she died. I guess she and this woman had talked, either on the phone or in person. And Jessica said something about money, or money being a burden or something. Later this woman thought it was significant.”

  I sighed. This wasn’t adding up. “So this NR number — this is something the police will be able to look up? And find out who this man was?”

  “Uh— no.” Mitch looked guilty. “Because that particular series of numbers was on the missing sheet. His name, his credit card info, that was all on there. It’s most likely Jessica pulled it for some reason. I mean, the cops can try to trace it through the credit card companies, but that will take a million years, because we don’t know which credit card companies we’re talking about.”

  “You didn’t save a copy of the sheets?”

  “I didn’t need to. I had the computer. Until I didn’t, that is.” He looked regretful. “It’s hard to destroy your own creation.”

  “Sometimes it’s better. Didn’t you read Frankenstein?”

  “You must teach English, huh?”

  I sighed. “Thank you so much for your time, Mitch.”

  “No problem. Sorry I couldn’t help more. But I’ll tell you this. If Jessica pulled that sheet, it was because she wanted to stick it to some guy, right? I mean, why else did she read them all except to look for names she knew?”

  “I don’t know. Why would she want to know that?”

  He picked up his coffee and took his first sip. “She felt like a cop. Like a vice cop. She was glad to hit these guys up for twenty-five bucks, but she wanted to do more. She wanted to find some big-name guy — a politician maybe, and really nail him. She said that men were dishonest about their uh—sexuality.”

  He said the final word as though it were an eccentricity, an odd usage on Jessica’s part.

  When we shook hands again and Mitch sauntered out with his coffee, I realized I hadn’t asked him how he knew her.

  Nineteen

  “I came to see you for one thing only: I did not want you to leave me.”

  —Raskolnikov, Crime and Punishment, Part Five

  The only thing I wanted more than sleep was to resolve things with Derek; in order to do that I had to speak with his sister and find out just how that necklace had gotten into the kitchen junk drawer of the man I just so happened to be falling in love with. I called his home number and a girlish voice answered. “Hello?”

  “Oh — uh— hello. This is Teddy Thurber.”

  “Oh, hi, Teddy! Derek told me you would call. I guess he got in some hot water because of Jessie’s necklace, huh? I’m sorry. I really need to give this back to her!” Her voice was light; it sounded as though she was smiling while she talked.

  “Didn’t Derek tell you — what was going on?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Jessica Halliday was your friend?”

  “Yeah. Still is, although I haven’t talked to her in ages.”

  “Cindy, Jessica was murdered more than a week ago. Didn’t you see it in the papers?”

  “Murdered? Oh my God!” she cried in my ear. “Oh, no, oh no!”

  “I’m sorry. I thought Derek would—”

  “Oh, man. Listen, I need some time to process this. Maybe we can talk later? Do you want to come by? I’m at Derek’s — I’m here with my son, who I think you met. His name is Charlie?”

  “Yes, I met—”

  “Okay. Give me like an hour, and then I’ll expect you, okay?” She sounded as though she was about to cry.

  “Okay, Cindy.”

  An hour later I trudged toward his house with P.G. in tow, allowing P.G. extra sniffing time as repentance for the short shrift I’d given him earlier in my haste to meet Mitch Menteith. I suppose I should have been wary — even suspicious. What if this were just a ruse? What if Derek were waiting there to kill me, and had simply paid someone to act the part of his sister?

  But two things prevented my suspicion — the first was that I was now so tired I could barely keep my eyes open. The second was that, no matter what the evidence, I trusted Derek. I think I had trusted him all along, but I had been distracted, horrified, by the evidence.

  We reached Derek’s place and I pressed the buzzer. A young sounding voice said, “Yes?”

  “Uh— my name is Teddy Thurber. Derek—”

  “Oh, yes Teddy! Come on up!”

  Cindy Jonas looked about as sweet as she sounded. She had strawberry blonde hair, a freckled face dominated by giant green eyes, and the same perceptive look as her brother’s. She was lovely. She wore a pair of jeans and a T-shirt that said “Crank” on it. Her feet were bare. “You’re so young,” I said.

  She laughed. “I’m twenty-six. I’m sure I’ll be glad that I look ten years younger when I’m fifty, right?”

  She led me into the apartment, where I saw Charlie sitting on the floor and playing with blocks. His legs looked tiny and foreshortened when he sat, like the kids in the Charlie Brown cartoons. He’d built an impressive structure, and I was just about to compliment him when he knocked it down with a violent swing of his arm. He smiled at me and said “BANG!”

  “Wow,” I commented.

  Charlie spied P.G. then and said, “Dahgie!”

  “Is it okay for Charlie to pet him?” Cindy asked.

  “Sure.” I led P.G. over to him and Cindy instructed Charlie to pet P.G. very gently, not to hit or squeeze. We watched him for a while and he did quite nicely. P.G. started to close his eyes under Charlie’s ministrations.

  I got up and sat in one of Derek’s dining room chairs. I took Jessica’s necklace out of my purse and gave it wordlessly to Cindy. She sat across from me and held it, nodding.

  “This is Jessie’s,” she said.

  “How did it happen to get here?”

  “Oh, Derek didn’t know it was here, I’m sure,” she said. “I wore it here one day, and then I took it off in the kitchen while I was doing dishes; it was swinging around and getting in the way, and I think I just ended up putting it in there so it didn’t get misplaced or thrown away, and then — I just forgot about it.” She gave me a sincerely regretful look. It was almost impossible not to like Cindy Jonas; she had the proverbial girl-next-door face and a kind demeanor.

  “But how did you GET it?” I asked. “I thought it was very important to Jessica.”

  “Jessie was your student, huh? What a coincidence! I mean, with Derek liking you so much, and me liking Jessie so much. I can’t believe this. I looked up the story online. It sounds so horrifying. So unbelievable when it’s someone you know.”

  “Didn’t Derek say—”

  “Oh, he just called from work and asked if I knew about the necklace and I said sure, and he said would I please explain its existence to Teddy Thurber — you know that sort of stern pedantic tone he gets?” She grinned at me as though we had both appreciated this thing for many years. Our shared joke.

  “That’s all he told you?”

  “He had to run. Some guy from his department went to some conference and they were supposed to meet about the results or whatever.” She grinned again, this time abashedly. “I wasn’t totally listening.”

  “Cindy, how do you know her?”

  She sighed and looked over her shoulder to check on Charlie.
Then she turned back to me. “I went to a booksigning last year for this woman — this psychologist named Dr. Janice Foster.”

  “Janice Foster. Jessica gave me her book. There was one here, in the bathroom.”

  “Is that where it is? Hang on.” She got up and jogged out of the room. In a moment she was back with the Janice Foster book I’d seen in Derek’s drawer. She handed it to me. “Read the inscription.”

  I opened the cover and saw Jessica’s familiar handwriting. “For Cindy — I didn’t know if you had the newest one, but it’s great! Happy Birthday to one of the soulmates on my lifepath. Love, Jessica.”

  “Oh,” I sighed.

  “I sat by Jessie at the booksigning, although I didn’t know her then. We got to talking while we waited for the thing to start, and we found we had a lot in common. Jessie loves acting, and I used to act in high school. We were even in a couple of the same plays. Then we got to talking about our lives, and we found that we were both ambitious — she was going to go off to college in New York and I was going to get my business degree here in Chicago. We just — oh, we just got along instantly.”

  This would be easy, I could see — Jessica’s ebullience and Cindy’s frank friendliness.

  “I told her about Charlie, and she commiserated with the fact that I was a single mom. Somehow we ended up deciding that we’d meet again. So a couple weeks later we met for lunch, and we had a blast. I mean, it was like I’d known her all my life. She was like a sort of little sister, you know?”

  I nodded.

  “After that we met a few more times — that summer. One time I was in a terrible mood. I’d been up all night with Charlie and I’d gotten a bad grade on an exam, and I was just feeling kind of hopeless. She told me she had something for me, and she took out this necklace. She told me that it was from Dover Beach, and that it would lift my spirits and make my dreams come true.” Cindy’s emerald eyes filled with tears.

  “She said we should pass it back and forth whenever one of us was down and needed uplifting. I thought it was pretty, and I loved the sentiment, so I took it. It made a lot of sense to both of us, because in Dr. Foster’s books she spoke a lot about the importance of amulets. You know, like stones used for protection, or for dreams and such. They help us to project our feelings into one object, and therefore make our dreams more concrete. Or something like that.” She shook her head, took a tissue from her pocket, and wiped her eyes. “I really can’t believe this. You have really shocked me here.”

  “Didn’t you see it in the papers?” I asked.

  “Oh, I don’t read the papers at all when I’ve got a big project coming up. I was just swamped last week. God, school is hard, isn’t it?”

  “But you’re almost finished, Derek tells me.”

  “Yeah. Just a little more to go.” She brightened at the thought. “Then I’ll be making plans for Charlie and me. Thank God for my brother.”

  “He’s been supportive?”

  “Oh, yes. Jessie was envious; around the time I was meeting with her Derek had called me and listened and told me he was looking for a change, and he wanted to try teaching. He’d been in a private practice in Michigan for a while, and he liked it okay — I mean, it was lucrative and everything — but he felt like he would be a good teacher. He said he’d find something in the Chicago area and we’d work out a support system. It’s just him and me, so that’s always been important to us. Jessie said she hoped her brothers would be like that, when they were adults.”

  “Just you? No… parents?”

  “No. Dad died when we were kids. Massive heart attack. Derek has always had sort of a father complex toward me, since then. And Mom is in an Alzheimer’s facility. Three years now. She had early onset Alzheimer’s.” Cindy sighed again.

  “Derek never told me.”

  “I’m surprised. He is really into you, you know. Which blows me away.” She smiled to soften the oddness of those words.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Well, it’s just that Derek has always been Mr. Careful, Mr. Circumspect. I swear he waited like a year before he would even use the word “girlfriend” with Anna — she was a few years ago. He’s just always been an ultra slow mover.”

  “Is that so?” I said.

  “But after he met you — it was like his first day at the new job. He called me that night — I guess he had dinner with you?—and said he thought things were going to work out great. I said he sounded mighty cheerful, and he said he’d met the woman of his dreams. That’s you, I guess.” She gave me a close appraisal that was very much like one of Derek’s stares. “So is my brother the man of your dreams?”

  “Your brother is angry at me, I’m afraid.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I found that necklace in the drawer,” I blurted. “And he said he’d never heard of Jessica Halliday, and there was her property in his house. I was… afraid.”

  Cindy stared at me, then burst into a gust of laughter. She covered her mouth, her eyes expressing apology even while she laughed. “Oh, geez, I’m sorry! I always laugh at the stupidest times. It’s usually because I’m nervous or something. Oh shoot. So you thought Derek was like—”

  “Don’t even say it.”

  She was still sputtering slightly. “I’m terrible! This isn’t even funny. Poor Jessie. It’s just — of all people to suspect. I mean, Derek!”

  Charlie sidled up to her; I hadn’t even heard him move from his spot in front of the blocks. “Mommy?”

  “What, Angel?” She scooped him up so that his face was close to hers and kissed him heartily.

  “Mommy can ah have some crackers?” he breathed.

  “Sure. I think you left your box in the kitchen. Look by Uncle Derek’s refrigerator.”

  She set him down and he walked out of the room in his little suspenders. His feet were bare, like his mother’s. While hers were elegant, with pale pink-painted toes, his looked like little potatoes.

  “He’s the cutest little boy I’ve ever seen,” I said.

  “Isn’t he? The one favor his father did me,” she said lightly. “Some pretty good DNA. Good family health history, blah blah. And nice looks.”

  “I think he looks like you.”

  “Well, thanks.”

  “Cindy, I think I’ve ruined things with Derek. But can you blame me for what I did?”

  She shook her head. “No, and he can’t either. If he’s pouting he’ll get over it. He likes you way too much to let something like suspicion of murder bother him.” She was smirking slightly as she said it.

  “Assuming I get to hang around, I’m never going to live this down, am I?” I asked.

  She smiled sympathetically. “Probably not, Teddy.”

  Cindy offered to make me dinner; we had hamburgers and talked a bit more about Jessica. “What do you think I should do with the necklace?” Cindy asked. “Should I go to her mom and dad?”

  “That would be a nice gesture. I mean, Jessica gave it to you as a sort of gift, but her mother gave it to her. Maybe she’d like it as a keepsake.”

  “All right. I feel weird going to their house, though. I mean I’ve never met them.”

  “Maybe you could call. Explain the circumstances.”

  “Yeah,” she said thoughtfully. She lifted the necklace and turned it around in her hands. “But you know them, right? Her parents?”

  “I’ve met them. I don’t really know them.”

  “But it would be less weird if you called than if it was some stranger out of the blue. Could you call them for me, Teddy? I’ll give this back to you. Let me know what they want to do. If they let me keep it, great. If not, then they’ll have it back, and that will be the right thing.”

  “Okay, I guess I could—”

  “Oh, thanks so much.” Her smile, like her brother’s, was infectious and irresistible, but it was also sad.

  “I need to go,” I said. “I have to crash.” I stowed the necklace in my purse, feeling inexplicably burdened.

&
nbsp; Cindy stood up and began clearing the table. “It was really nice meeting you, Teddy. Maybe we can all do something some time. Take Charlie to the zoo or something.”

  “That would be nice.”

  Charlie appeared at my knee. “See song?” he asked.

  “I think your mommy will sing to you tonight,” I told him, enjoying his earnest little face.

  “Oh, so THAT’S what he was talking about!” Cindy said, returning from the kitchen. “He kept telling me about some lady who sang to him. I thought it was something he saw on Barney.”

  “No, it was me. I came here when someone broke into my apartment. Derek took me in until the police came.”

  Cindy put a comforting hand on my shoulder. “This has not been a good week for you, has it?” she asked.

  “No,” I said. “And yes. It’s been very confusing.”

  “Listen. Normally I have Derek keep Charlie on Mondays, but to be honest with you I’m not going to class tonight. I’m skipping it to be with my little boy. And to process this news about Jessica. So if you want to come here and talk things out…”

  “I don’t think so. Not tonight.”

  She nodded. “Get some sleep first. Take it from the perpetual student. Sleep will solve all your problems,” she assured me.

  *

  It didn’t. Either my tall coffee or my unresolved dispute with Derek left me in that worst of states — an exhaustion that defies sleep. I lay on my bed with my eyes open, worrying over endless faces and images: Jessica, Cindy, the necklace, Rosalyn, Mitch Menteith, Danny, the number in Kathy’s wallet, Kathy at the committee meeting, my tears in front of my class, Josh and his interview, Lucia saying “Someone’s been keeping you up at night.”

  “That’s for sure,” I murmured bleakly, staring out my window at a fingernail moon in a dark cloudless sky. I consulted the glowing numbers of my alarm clock: 11:58. I was usually fast asleep by now. Unlike my students, who seemed to subsist on Red Bull and courage, I needed my eight hours of sleep. Now I’d been sleepless for what felt like days.

  “This is ridiculous,” I said. I got up and put on my slippers. P.G. did not wake up, the disloyal creature. I brushed my teeth, combed my hair, and grabbed my jacket. At the first floor door I looked around carefully, half fearing that Richard or some other unwelcome presence would be lurking in wait. The street was almost deserted, except for one couple holding hands on a staircase and a car pulling slowly into a driveway at the end of the block.