The Detective Lane Casebook #1 Page 4

  The woman smiled back. Her name tag said MARJ.

  Nonno leaned closer and said, “She’s too heavy to carry. Just don’t tell her I said so.” He smiled.

  Marj brushed at a stray hair over her ear. She looked over Nonno’s shoulder, then back at him. The furrows in her forehead got deeper.

  “Need to buy her some clothes.” Then Nonno said, hoping the woman would understand if only he could explain. “Told her she don’t need clothes in the summer but we can’t go anyplace without someone making some smart aleck remark.”

  “This is really unusual.” Marj looked to her left and spotted the phone.

  “MY WIFE,” Nonno said the words slowly and at a traffic stopping volume, “NEEDS SOME CLOTHES.”

  Marj looked down at the counter top. Nonno read her indecision. They glanced at a sign on the counter: The Customer is Always Right. Both smiled.

  Nonno looked over his shoulder, “I wasn’t being rude,” he said to the doll.

  Marj almost broke a nail in her hurry to open the gate. “Your wheelchair is right here, sir.”

  Nonno said, “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome, sir.” Marj pushed the chair through the open gate and rolled it beside the doll.

  “I’ll bring it back . . . ” Nonno said.

  “No problem.” Marj held her palms forward while backing away.

  Reading the indecision in her eyes, he said, “I know, you’re thinking a good husband would have bought her a dress sooner.”

  “Thank you, Mister?”

  “Ernesto, just call me Ernesto.”

  “Thank you Mr. Ernesto.”

  “No, it’s Ernesto. No Mister,” Nonno said.

  “Okay, Nomisterernesto.”

  “Okay, I won’t bother the poor woman anymore,” he said to the doll. Then he said to Marj, “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Ernesto lifted Nonna into the chair, bent her knees and rested her feet on the flat metal foot pads.

  “Hey Mom, that woman’s naked!” The voice was at least twice as big as the child. Ernesto caught a glimpse of her before an arm appeared from inside the western wear store to pull her back. “But Mom!”

  Ernesto leaned close to his wife, “I know, I know, she’s just a kid. Just like Ernie.”

  Sunlight knifed through rooftop windows. It formed sharp shadows on the Italian marble floor.

  “Remember that holiday in Italy?” Nonno said.

  They passed into shadow.

  “The sun was strong like today. You had to stay in the shade during the hottest time. Miguel was born nine months later.”

  In silence, they passed through another patch of sunlight. Red and white SALE signs adorned one shop. “Wanna try here?”

  They stopped in front of a mannequin who held her arms out to them. She wore a red one piece bathing suit. “No? You still wanna keep looking?”

  Ernesto pushed her past a sports shop, craft shop and book store. Passing a stack of books, he read a cover: Getting Away with Murder. Nonno looked away, then said, “I don’t think it’s an instruction manual. We don’t need it. Who’s gonna think to dig that deep?”

  Nonno leaned forward, listening to the doll. “The other family’s gotta big reputation around town. Even if the police do start to dig, they’ll have to wait while the lawyers argue. By then, there won’t be much to find. Just worry about Leona. Her name shoulda been Big Mouth.”

  A woman stepped in front of them. She pulled a cell phone from a black leather handbag. Just visible in the V of her white silk blouse was the business end of a gold crucifix.

  “Watch out!” Ernesto said.

  The woman stopped. For over three seconds she studied the doll. She looked Ernesto in the eye and said, “Pervert!”

  Ernesto was caught in the heavy wake of the woman’s perfume. “Donna de la notte!”

  “What did you say?” the woman said.

  Ernesto pushed on to The Sony Store. For an instant he and Nonna were caught on a wide screen TV. The nipple of one of her breasts caught his eye. For a moment he was drowning. Nonno’s feet couldn’t reach bottom. Fatigue reached out with cold hands. He took a long breath. Pushing on, he felt the warmth of equilibrium returning.

  “She called me a pervert. I called her a hooker.” He looked left. The mannequin in a store window had her hands on her hips. She wore a sleeveless cotton dress with blue, red, white and pink petals.

  “You sure?” Nonno turned into the store.

  The woman behind the counter might have been 25. She wore the same dress as the mannequin. Red hair hung down on either side of her face.

  “We want that dress.” The desperation in Ernesto’s voice could have easily been mistaken for command.

  The clerk’s head lifted. Her green eyes focused on the doll. She smiled. “I don’t think we ordered any mannequins.” Ernesto said, “This is my wife and she would like to try that dress on.”

  The clerk stepped back, clutching at the neck of her dress revealing STEPHANIE on a silver name tag.

  “She knows I don’t mean HER dress,” Ernesto said to the doll. “Okay, I’ll tell her we need a dress to fit you!”

  Stephanie looked at the door then appeared to do a mental calculation of her commission. “She looks like a size six or seven. Which would you like to try on first?”

  Lane leaned on Ernesto Rapozo’s doorbell for the third time. Double-checking the house number, he said, “2412, that’s it.”

  He walked to the side of the house and opened the gate. Shade covered the north side of the yard. The weight of the sun lifted from his shoulders.

  At the back of the yard, near the garage, he could see the back of what he assumed was Ernesto’s love doll. An accented male voice said, “Don’t worry about the police. Ernie’ll be fine.”

  Lane stood out of sight near the edge of the house where raspberry bushes bent low with ripe fruit.

  “He doesn’t remember what happened,” Nonno said.

  Lane loosened his tie and felt sweat collecting along his close cut hairline.

  “Don’t worry about Leona. She’s the one who made me promise. She’s got a big mouth but she’s Ernie’s grandmother. Leona always says she’d lie down and die for her kids. She understands.”

  Lane reached into his jacket pocket to retrieve his handkerchief. He lifted it to his forehead. The almost imperceptible crack of cartilage made him freeze. No way the old man would hear that, Lane thought.

  “They’re never gonna . . . ,” the old man said.

  Silence wavered in the heat.

  “What do you mean there’s somebody here?”

  The brim of Ernesto’s ball cap appeared from around the corner of the house closely followed by his nose and beach ball belly.

  “Hello, I’m Detective Lane.” Silently he cursed his inability to stay still.

  “Ernesto,” the old man said and pointed pruning sheers at Lane’s belly.

  “Ernie Rapozo’s grandfather?”

  “Yes. That’s me.”

  “That’s a nasty bruise.” Lane indicated the swelling on the side of Ernesto’s head.

  Ernesto reached up with his free hand. He winced as fingertips brushed the bruise. “Trouble at the mall this morning. No police around then.”

  Lane ignored the implied accusation. “What kind of trouble?” “Doesn’t matter now.”

  “Mind if I ask you a few questions?” Lane moved out of the shade.

  Ernesto looked at the doll. “Okay.” He lifted his shoulders in a shrug.

  Lane wondered if the old man was talking to him or the doll.

  “My wife says you should sit down.” Ernesto pointed with the pruning sheers to an empty lawn chair.

  Lane moved around the other side of the table, pulled out the chair and sat. “Thank you.”

  “Helen says you should take your jacket off.”

  Lane slipped the jacket off and hung it on the back of the chair. What’s the best way to play this? he thought. If th
e Ernesto thought the woman was real, then he’d have to follow the old man’s lead. “Your wife is very considerate.”

  “Iced tea?” Ernesto said.

  “That would be nice.”

  Lane watched the man’s hand as he set the green handled sheers down on the table. The old man’s palm was as wide as a soup bowl with fingers callused and nails black with earth.

  He watched Ernesto move up two steps, open the door and kick off his shoes before stepping inside.

  Lane turned to the doll. Her eyes were blue. Her lips, too red to be real. The shade from a sun hat created a semicircle across the tops of her breasts. The sharp, polished edge of a crease in the dress told him it had been ironed recently. Its floral pattern matched the flowers along the inside of the fence.

  The latch on the screen door rattled. “In Italy a grandmother is called Nonna,” Ernesto said as he backed out the door with a tray, three full tumblers and a pitcher of iced tea. He set a tumbler down in front of the doll, another in front of Lane and sat down between them with his own glass.

  Lane lifted the glass in appreciation. He sipped. “Real tea.”

  “Of course. Nonna likes it that way. Always keep a pitcher in the fridge.”

  Lane looked at Nonna. For an instant he thought a smile creased the corners of her lips. He turned to the brown of the Ernesto’s eyes. “Since your grandson was attacked, we’ve been unable to determine Mr. Swatsky’s whereabouts.”

  Ernesto turned to Nonna and then back to Lane. The old man held onto his silence.

  “It’s been six days since we found his car at the airport. We’ve been unable to contact his wife.”

  “The radio says he stole three million,” Ernesto said.

  “I’m investigating the disappearance.”

  Ernesto put his glass down and rubbed at his shoulder.

  “Hurt the shoulder when you got the bump on the head?”

  Lane’s voice was genuinely sympathetic.

  Ernesto turned to Nonna before answering the question. It was a pattern he followed throughout their conversation.

  “Yes.”

  “Anyway, since you live so close to your grandson, I thought you might be able to shed some light on the disappearance of Mr. Swatsky.”

  “Maybe a little.” Ernesto took a drink.

  “Did you ever meet Mr. Swatsky?”

  “Once.”

  Did his pupils just dilate? Lane felt the sharp shiver of excitement in his belly and fought to keep it out of his voice. Dilating pupils were often the telltale sign of a lying suspect. “When was that?”

  “When Miguel, our son, married Beth,” Ernesto said.

  “Where is Miguel right now?”

  “Tunisia. Works for an oil company.”

  Lane felt himself easing into the flow of the conversation. “Does he see his son very often?”

  “Every two months he’s back for a week or two.”

  “Was Miguel in town when Swatsky disappeared?” Lane said.

  “Nope. He’ll be back soon.”

  Wait. Be patient, Lane told himself. Set it up carefully, try to make him uneasy, then watch for the reaction. “What was your grandson’s condition when you arrived at Leona’s house?”

  Ernesto’s face turned red with anger. He fought to control his voice. “Had a cut on his nose.” He closed his eyes and drew his right forefinger across the bridge of his nose. “He was. . . . How do you say?. . . . Unconscious. Out cold.”

  Almost there. Lane was operating almost entirely on intuition. “What was Leona’s condition?”

  “Not good.” Ernesto put his left hand on Nonna’s. “She was having trouble catching her breath. And she was worried the boy wouldn’t wake up. That Swatsky, what he tried to do to my Ernie!”

  Good, he’s looking at me. Now’s the time, Lane thought. “Do you know where Robert Swatsky is?”

  Ernesto looked at the doll, then turned back to face Lane. A slight dilation of the pupils. To Lane it was as significant as the difference between midnight and noon. “Nope,” Ernesto shook his head.

  CHAPTER 8

  Beth felt the best part of the day settle around her like a prayer. Mom’s having a nap and I’m enjoying a cup of tea, she thought. She took a sip and felt the warm gold of Earl Grey wander its way to her toes. They wiggled at her. She pushed her black hair back with her free hand.

  She looked up. Ernie used his thumb and forefinger to pick up a green tennis ball. He shook off some of Scout’s drool. She jumped at the ball but he held it high. Scout sat, tongue hanging out the side of her mouth. Ernie flicked his wrist. Scout was after the ball before it hit the fence. She jumped. The ball rebounded past her nose and she was frozen; tail pointed here, nose over there.

  After the divorce, after Bob’s attack, Beth feared she would never hear her son laugh again. But she heard it now. It came from way down inside of him. She ignored the guilty reminder that Ernie had no brother or sister and never would. The postpartum depression following her child’s birth had lasted for months. She remembered the fatigue, the hopelessness, forcing herself to eat food that tasted like nothing at all.

  “Beth!” Nanny’s voice cut through the summer heat.

  Beth’s shoulders sagged. Responsibility settled in her belly. An anchor holding her on the bank while the river rushed past.

  “Beth!”

  Beth’s motion was well practiced. She stood. With a flick of the wrist, the hedge was showered with the remains of the tea. Its amber was suspended, like the dog, like the laughter, like her life.

  “What’s up, Mom?”

  “How long did I sleep?” Nanny sat up with sweaty hair flattened on one side.

  Beth looked at the clock on the microwave. “About half an hour.”

  “The detective. You know, the one called Lane. He went to see Ernesto today,” Nanny said.

  “I didn’t know.” Beth sat down in the chair across from her mother. She looked at the coffee table and saw a large brown envelope. “Get some mail today?”

  “Oh, that.”

  “What kind of letter?” Beth was afraid her mother had received more bad news. But what could be worse than emphysema and two heart attacks?

  “Nothing to worry about.” Nanny tried to light a smoke with shaking hands.

  Beth read the fear in her mother’s voice. It was something to worry about. Without thinking, Beth stood, took the envelope and opened it. “This is disgusting,” she said. It was a glossy centerfold of a woman with her legs spread and the fingers of her right hand tangled in pubic hair. FIRST I’M GOING TO KILL THE BOY THEN I’M GOING TO RAPE YOU! was written across the bottom. Beth shivered. The obscenity fell to the floor. She wanted to wash her hands. “What is this?”

  “It’s starting all over again.” Nanny lit a cigarette.

  “Did Bob send this?”

  “No, it was Marv and Lester. They’ve done this before. When Judy ran away I got a letter like this, only it said you were goin’ to be raped.”

  “I’m calling the police.”

  “Go ahead. Waste your time. They’ll tell you there’s no way of tracing something like this. There won’t be any fingerprints but yours and mine.”

  The phone rang. Beth reached for it. “Hello.” She was surprised by her lack of reaction to a familiar voice. “Hello, Miguel. I’ll get Ernie.”

  It took two steps to reach the kitchen window. “Ernie, it’s your Dad. Long distance.” Beth moved back into the family room, picked the picture off the floor and slid it into the envelope.

  “What does that son of a bitch want?” Nanny said.

  The screen door squealed open. Ernie and Scout bounded inside. He reached the phone in three long strides. “Dad?”

  “Take your shoes off!” Nanny said.

  Beth watched Ernie press the receiver to his right ear and clamp his left palm over the other. “Hi Dad.” Ernie listened for at least 30 seconds before saying, “Next week?”

  “Shit!” Nanny said.

  “W
hat time on Saturday?” Ernie said.

  “Don’t forget the oxygen,” Beth nodded at the plastic lines under her mother’s nostrils. She turned to Ernie, saw the colours of the bruise on his cheek and the scar on his nose. Later, when she had the time to think back on this day, she realized this was when she became a different person. When she discovered that anger could make her walk right over top of her fear and grind it into the ground like it was a cigarette butt. How she hated cigarettes!

  “Don’t tell me what to do in my own house!” Nanny said.

  “Seven thirty?” Ernie said.

  “Get me another pack of smokes,” Nanny said.

  Beth was motionless.

  “Where? You wanna go where?” Ernie said.

  Ordinarily Beth would have been hurt with her son’s happiness at hearing from a mostly absent father. And she would have buried that hurt. Not any more, Beth thought.

  “Tell him your mother could use more money for support!” Nanny said.

  Being caught in the crossfire was familiar territory for Beth. She was sure Ernie would be furious when he got off the phone. Still, she thought, Canadians have a tradition for peace keeping. Beth held the joke inside and put a hand to her chest.

  “Sounds great, Dad!”

  “Beth? You gonna let him go?” Nanny said.

  “I’ll see you at the airport,” Ernie said.

  “Who’s gonna tell Miguel what’s happened? It’ll end up being the women ‘cause the men in this family got no balls!” Nanny said.

  “Coglioni,” Beth corrected in Italian. “Ernie, take the dog for a walk. I need to talk with your grandmother.”

  “I just finished throwing the ball,” Ernie said.

  “Take her for a walk, please,” Beth said. “Your grandmother and I have some talking to do.”

  Ernie was about to argue when the phone rang.

  “Who’s calling now?” Nanny picked though the clutter atop the coffee table and found a fresh package of cigarettes. “Damned phone.”

  Scout led and Ernie followed. He grabbed her leash and his shoes.

  Nanny stood and shuffled over to the phone. Beth stood, arms crossed under her breasts.