Antiques Flee Market (14 page)

Junior exclaimed, “My God, that means Joe Lange killed Yeager!”

I took a sip of my neglected, now not-so-hot hot toddy. “Not necessarily,” I replied. “Joe denies killing Walter…and I happen to
believe
him.”

Henry, who’d remained silent throughout my oratory, hiccuped, then slurred, “’S’got a se…crut.”

Junior and I exchanged puzzled glances at this seeming non sequitur.

I said, “Yes, Henry, I’m sure Joe Lange has many a secret locked inside his poor troubled mind.”

“Not Joe,” Henry said. “Walt…Walter.”

I swiveled to face him. “What kind of secret?”

Henry shook his head vigorously, as if trying to clear bats from his belfry. “Don’…don’ know.”

Sighing in disappointment, I swiveled back to my cooled-off drink. I was about to ask Junior to reheat the concoction, when Henry again spoke.

“One time? Started to tell me, but…didn’t.”

“When was this?” I asked.

“Winter ’85.” Henry seemed to be sobering up, or perhaps just remembering how to form complete words and semblances of sentences. “I was working ER, Walter comes in. Serious case of pneumonia. Thought he was gonna die…and, tell ya the truth, so did I.” Henry paused, took a gulp of his whiskey, then continued: “While I was tending to him, he kept tryin’ to tell me something…but I couldn’t be swayed from my duty.” Frankly, “duty” sounded a little more like “doody.”

“You mean,” I asked, pressing, “Walter wanted to talk to you
confidentially?
He wasn’t just telling you where it hurt?”

“Maybe he was, in a way.”

“What were his words
exactly
?” I pressed.

“I don’t know!” So much thinking and talking had made Henry suddenly irritable. “I was busy! Tryin’ to save the man’s life.”

“Think back, please,” I said, adding sympathetically. “I know it’s been a few years, but it’s important…
try
.”

Henry frowned in thought. “He said, ‘Somebody else needs to know. Can’t take it to my grave.’ More or less.”

Junior had been quiet until now. “You ever ask Walter what he meant, later on, after he recovered?”

Henry nodded. “I did. A few months after.”

“And?” I prodded.

Henry shrugged grandly and almost fell off the stool. “Denied ever sayin’ such things. But claimed not to remember, either. Said he musta been delusional, ’cause of the high fever. And that was possible. So, naturally, I jus’ dropped it.” Henry finished his whiskey, set the glass down with a clink. “Guess we’ll
never
know.”

But I knew some people who might.

I turned back to Junior. “Where are the Romeos having lunch?”

He shrugged, not so grandly. “What’s today?”

“Tuesday.”

“They go for the meat loaf at Riverside, Tuesdays.”

Why Junior could keep track of the Romeos’ daily lunch schedule, and not his own anniversary, was a mystery even Vivian Borne did not care to try unraveling.

“Thanks,” I said, tossing a fin on the counter. (All true detectives call five-dollar bills “fins.”)

The Romeos—Retired Old Men Eating Out—were friends of long standing who generally didn’t like any women coming around when they got together.

Except for one certain female: little old me. Seems these old Casanovas didn’t mind
my
company, as long as I delivered some juicy tidbit of news, which I always did (even if I had to make it up), to keep my good standing with them.

While women have long worn, unfairly I would insist, the mantle of Gossip Monger, the truth is that men are often far worse, although they do have an offhand subtlety about it that females largely lack.

Entering the restaurant, which carried its riverboat theme to extremes, I quickly spotted the Romeos sequestered at a round table for six in back, and made my way toward them, skirting a fountain with a miniature paddle wheel (that on occasion had sunk).

The lunch hour was winding down, the men enjoying coffee after their fattening meal. I was glad I didn’t have to watch them eat, which is never pretty, often more food going
on
their faces than making the journey inside their mouths, and the noisy clacking of plates at their table had more to do with dentures than dishes…but again I digress.

The Romeos were a small group today, partially due to the flu that had been going around, but mostly because the Grim Reaper had dwindled their numbers in recent years. Only present today were Vern, a retired chiropractor, who looked like the older Clark Gable if I took off my glasses; Harold, a former army captain, with Bob Hope’s eyes and ski-nosed good looks when I squinted; and ex-mayor Ivan, a dead ringer for Jimmy Stewart, from a distance.

Ivan was the first to see me, and waved; Harold and Vern similarly beckoned me over. I draped my raccoon coat over the back of an empty chair, giving them my best Mae West “Hello,
boys
!”

This always got a big laugh out of them, and today was no exception.

Harold, patting the seat of the vacant chair between himself and Vern, said, “Nice to see you, Vivian. Set ’er right down. You know, we were just talking about you and Brandy….”

Frankly, I would have been shocked if we
hadn’t
been the topic of conversation.

After Harold’s wife died, I’d dated the former captain for a while, with an eye on matrimony, but I broke it off after a few weeks because he barked too much (you can take the man out of the army, but not the army out of the man), and Vivian Borne doesn’t take orders from
anybody
.

Vern said, “We heard Brandy’ll be out of the hospital tomorrow.”

Vern, too, had wanted to marry me, but I threw cold water on the chiropractor’s amour, which coincidentally was what the fire department also had to do, at his place of business, when the building spontaneously combusted; poor dear was a terrible pack rat. (There’s only room for one pack rat in my life—as the vocalist said warming up: me, me, me.)

I claimed an empty coffee cup and filled it from the pot on the table.

Ivan asked, “How is your little girl doing?”

Him, I would have considered marrying…but so far, the widower had shown only middling interest in my potential, which I found strange (his lack of interest, not my potential).

Not wanting to spend too much time talking myself—otherwise I’d never hear what these old goats knew—I put on a truncated bus-and-truck performance of the show I had given Junior and Henry earlier, leaving out the improvisational improvements.

When I’d finished, Vern remarked, “Poor Joe…kid’s never been right since coming home with battle fatigue.”

Harold barked, “‘Poor,’ my foot. Sees a little action overseas, then gets discharged on a Section 8. That softie doesn’t know what
real
shell shock is.”

And, neither did Harold. During the War to End All Wars, he’d never left an army base in Georgia. Of course, in his defense, the Nazis and Japanese never did make it past Atlanta.

Ivan, however, who had seen plenty of action at Guadalcanal, came to Joe’s defense. “Let’s not forget that that boy
voluntarily
enlisted—which is more than can be said about most young men these days—
and
he served honorably in the Gulf War.” He paused, adding quietly, “No one knows a soldier’s breaking point…not even the soldier himself.”

That drew silence, and we all sipped our coffee. I admired Ivan’s touching defense of Joe, but silently cursed him for throwing a wet blanket over the conversation. I had dirt I needed to mine!

So, directing my question to the group, I asked, “Why wasn’t Walter Yeager ever a member of the Romeos?”

The men exchanged uncomfortable glances.

I waited, excited, sensing I’d hit a nerve.

Ivan cleared his throat, then said simply, “Walt was all right. He just didn’t really fit in.”

His answer, however, didn’t ring true to me. I knew that several of the Romeos had been in the same graduating class in high school, sharing many interests, such as sports, music, and photography. And Walter had been a pal of theirs. Nothing wrong with my memory.

“In what way didn’t he fit in?” I asked casually. “Surely you hadn’t grown
that
far apart in the intervening years….”

Ivan shifted in his chair. “Viv, frankly? I’d just rather not say.”

“Why not?” I pressed.

Ivan shrugged. “Don’t want to libel the dead.”

“You can’t libel the dead,” I pointed out. “They’re
dead.
”

“Well, then,” Ivan remarked, “I don’t care to speak
ill
of the dead.”

We had arrived at an impasse. But there was no impasse that yours truly couldn’t squeeze through, jump over, or go around.

Leaning in conspiratorially, I said, “Henry just told me about the time he treated Walter in the ER, and Walter had something he wanted to get off his chest. It seemed
terribly
important—sort of a dying declaration. Any idea what that might have been?”

Ivan half-smiled. “Doesn’t sound very likely. Consider the source. I mean, did Henry say what it was?”

“Walter never got around to spilling the beans.” I paused, then pulled out my ace and played it. “If any of you know something, you’d better tell me, before Henry makes up something
preposterous
while in his cups.”

Harold muttered, “She has a point.”

Vern nodded, “I agree.” He looked at Ivan. “It’s your story, Ivan…so you should tell it.”

Ivan sighed. “I guess it won’t do any harm at this late stage…. Hell, pretty much everybody involved is dead by now.”

I reached across and patted Ivan’s hand where it rested on the table. “Another good reason to set the record straight. As we grow older, such things do matter.”

“All right,” Ivan said, and shrugged a little. “It happened during the summer of ’42….”

“That was a
wonderful
movie!” I said. “
The Summer of ’42?
Did any of you see that film? So romantic….”

“Viv,” Ivan said, frowning. “Are you interested or not?”

“Sorry. Yes. Vitally. Go on.”

Ivan continued, “This all happened a month after graduation, and a few weeks before Walter and I enlisted in the army—”

“And me, too,” inserted Harold. “I’ll never forget the day when—”

I kicked the captain under the table for interrupting, and he growled, “Hey!” What was wrong with these old fools with their short attention spans?

For a moment, Ivan seemed to lose his train of thought, or else was fortifying himself to continue on with his tale. Then he picked up the thread. “One night before we were to ship out, Walter and I went on a double date with two girls who’d graduated with us from high school. Opal—she was my date—and Ella Jane….”

Opal I’d barely known back then, but Ella Jane I did, of course. Her mother and I had just spoken at the nursing home.

“Walter drove,” Ivan was saying, “and we went to a movie, I think…not sure because, well, it
was
a long time ago…and I guess we’d all been drinking a little. Hitting the ol’ hip flasks?” Ivan smiled briefly, then cast his eyes downward. “The next morning, Ella Jane came around to my parents’ house looking for me. She was upset. She said that after Walter dropped Opal and me off, he…well, there’s no nice way of saying this…
forced
himself on her.”

Well, my dears, this news came as a shock to me, especially since I’d had my own intimate encounter with Walter, and only a few months before this alleged assault, and he had been so considerate and tender, his first time and all. But, then, alcohol hadn’t been a factor.

Ivan was saying, “I…I didn’t know what to do…. I guess I should have confronted Walter….” He hung his head again. “And I was overseas by the time word got to me that Ella Jane had killed herself. So, you see, Vivian, why I—
we
—didn’t care to have him in our group.”

I said, “You
could
have done something when you got back, Ivan.”

Ivan laughed dryly. “What? Accuse a returning war hero of an assault that may or may not have happened three years earlier, with a girl who was no longer living? Remember, I only got Ella Jane’s side of the story. She killed herself, and that shows a certain instability. Who’s to say her story was even true?” Ivan shook his head sadly. “But bottom line? I didn’t really
want
to know.”

Harold and Vern nodded, understanding. Once a boys’ club, always a boys’ club.

Suddenly, I wondered if Grace Crawford knew that her daughter might have been sexually assaulted—and by whom. Or had the girl kept her terrible secret to the very end?

What
was
it Grace had said?
Do unto others as they do unto you?
Had the elderly woman orchestrated Walter’s death from her nursing home bed? If so, why had she waited so long?

And was she strictly confined to that bed, or was she mobile? Some old women, even lacking a driver’s license, have been known to jump into a car and go off on one kooky quest or another.

Then something preposterous jumped into my mind: that the intended victim might have been
Chaz
! Thus doing to Walter what he had done to her: Take away what he had prized most, his newly found granddaughter.

I said out loud, “Then, Walter could have been murdered for a different reason.”

Vern frowned. “Didn’t he get killed for some valuable book? Anyway, that’s what I heard.”

“Me, too,” Harold said. “That punk of a granddaughter of his did it, they say.”

Defending the girl, Ivan said, “She
did
get released from custody….”

“On a technicality!” Harold barked. “Ekhardt woke up long enough to get her off on a technicality, the old rascal.”

Vern said, “Well, one thing’s for sure…whoever has that book has to be the killer. It’s worth thousands and thousands.”

All of this was old news, and getting me nowhere, so I decided now was the time to reinforce my reputation as the all-knowing one around here.

I said quietly, “Joe had the book.”

Which shook things up at the table.

When the Romeos’ utterances had quieted, I told them about visiting Joe at the jail, and how the boy had denied poisoning Walter, but admitted to taking the book.