B is for Burglar (30 page)

I slouched down in my seat abruptly, banging one knee on the dashboard. Oh jeez, that hurt! I eased up slightly, peering over the edge of the steering wheel. They apparently hadn't paid any attention to me because they were both getting out of the car, moving toward Lily's front door with nary a backward glance. They knocked and she opened the door for them without any exclamation of surprise, horror, shock, or dismay. I wondered how long she'd known that Marty was alive. Had she been in league with them from the beginning? I watched the house uneasily. As long as Leonard was there, I was reasonably certain that Lily was safe, but I didn't think Marty would be at all inclined to leave Lily Howe alive when they went off. I was going to have to do a little hovering over Lily Howe, playing guardian angel to her whether she knew it or not.

 

 

 

 

I sat there while an incredibly painful, probably permanent bruise formed on my knee, trying to figure out what I should do next. I didn't want to leave the scene now that I had the enemy in range. There wasn't a public phone within miles, and who was I going to call anyway? I thought about getting out of the car and creeping up to the house, but I've never had very good results with that sort of thing. There are never windows open where you want them to be. On the few occasions when I've managed to eavesdrop, the subject matter has always been irrelevant. People just don't sit around verbalizing the pertinent details of recent crimes. Peer over a windowsill and chances are you're going to watch the villains play Crazy Eights. I've never seen anyone dismember the body or divvy up the bank heist. I decided to stay in my car and wait.

There's nothing as conspicuous as someone sitting alone in a parked car in a residential neighborhood. With any luck, some worried homeowner would spot me and call the cops and then I could have a nice chat
with someone in uniform. Mentally, I organized a condensed version of the murder plot so I could tell it succinctly when the time came. The house was quiet. An hour and forty-five minutes passed and the gathering darkness gradually reduced visibility to mush. Lights in houses all up and down the street came on, including Lily Howe's. Somebody sprayed the neighborhood with barbecue cologne. I was hungry and I wanted to take a leak and I couldn't decide if I should risk squatting down behind someone's bush. I don't feel I suffer from penis envy, but in moments like this, I do yearn for the anatomical advantages.

At 9:23, Lily's front door opened and Leonard and Marty came out. I leaned forward, squinting. There weren't any lingering farewells. The two of them got in the car, slammed the doors, and backed out of the drive. I waited until their car had disappeared and then approached the house. The porch light had gone off. I knocked. There was as moment of silence and then I heard the chain slide into place. Lily had read all the manuals on rape prevention. Good for her.

“Who is it?” came the muffled voice from inside.

I reduced my voice to a whisper. “It's me. I forgot my handbag.”

The burglar chain slid back and Lily opened the door a crack. I pushed forward so fast, the door almost broke her nose. There was a clunk and she cried out, but by then I'd closed the door behind me again.

“We have to talk,” I said.

She had a hand to her face and tears had risen in her eyes, not because of any damage I'd done, but because
she was upset to begin with. “She said she'd kill me if I said anything.”

“She's going to kill you anyway, you twit. What do you think—she's going to walk off and leave you around to spill the beans? Did she tell you what she did to Wim Hoover? She put a bullet right behind his ear. You're dog meat. You don't stand a chance.”

Lily paled. A sob broke the surface like a bubble of air from the bottom of a pond, and then she seemed to collect herself. She closed her eyes and shook her head, like a prisoner faced with the rack. She didn't care what I did to her, she was not going to talk.

“God damn it! Tell me what's going on!”

Her expression hardened and I got a sudden glimpse of what she must have been like as a kid. Leonard's sister knew how to deal with bullies like me. She became stubborn, passive, a defensive stance she'd apparently perfected over the years as a way of warding off attack. She simply withdrew, pulling in on herself like a mollusk. She must have been threatened routinely as a child with everything from tetanus shots if she didn't wash her hands every time she peed, to police arrest if she didn't look both ways before she crossed the street. Instead of learning the rules, she'd learned to disappear.

To my amazement, she crossed to one of the turquoise chairs and sat down without another word. She picked up the remote control and flicked the television on, moving through six channels until she found a sitcom she liked. She was going to tune me out. I went over to the chair and hunkered beside her, talking earnestly while she kept her face to the screen. She
watched intently as a buxom platinum blonde in a tank top proceeded to put together a birthday cake.

“Mrs. Howe, I'm not sure you understand what's going on here. Your sister-in-law has killed two people and no one seems to be aware of it but us.”

Flour puffed up in a big cloud, obscuring the blonde's baby face. Befuddled, she'd apparently used baking powder
and
yeast, causing the dry flour to explode. The laugh track was cranked up to “hilarious.” Oh that gal! Wasn't she a screech! Lily smiled faintly, reminded perhaps of baking disasters of her own.

I touched her arm. “We're running out of time, Lil, because know what? I think Marty Grice is going to double back and kill us too. She'll have to.”

No response. Maybe what I said had no more reality for her than this bimbo with the birthday cake. She was cracking eggs now, getting splatted in the face with yolks. Simple laws of nature were being violated here and she was the butt of the joke. In walked the husband. His mouth fell open at the mess she'd made. New paroxysms of laughter erupted. I wondered if anything in the real world had ever struck me with such force.

I said, “Where did they go just now? Are they leaving town?”

Lily laughed aloud. The blonde had turned the mixing bowl upside down on her husband's head. She showed
him
. A few bars of the show's dizzy theme song played and the station cut away to the commercial. I reached over and pressed the volume button, extinguishing the sound. In silence, a dog skidded across the linoleum with a can of chopped liver in pursuit.

“Hey,” I said, “Leonard's in trouble. Are you going to help him or not?”

She glanced over at me, and I saw her lips move. I leaned closer.

“Excuse me. What?”

The strain was showing in her face and her eyes seemed unfocused. She watched me with all the concentration of a drunk, dependent and out of control. “Leonard never hurt anyone,” she said. “He had no idea what she was doing 'til it was too late.”

I thought about Mike's report of Leonard's passion for his wife. I didn't see him as an innocent victim in all of this, but I kept my big mouth shut. “As long as he knows anything, he's in danger. If you'll tell me where they're going, I can get him out of it.”

She spoke in a whisper. “Just to Los Angeles 'til the new passport for Marty comes through, and then they're flying to South America.” Her eyes filled with tears. “I might never see him again,” she said. “And we were always so close. I can't turn him in. I can't betray him, don't you see?”

“You're trying to do what's best for him, Lily. He'll understand.”

“It's been awful. It's been a nightmare. When you showed up, I thought he'd die of fright. He nearly had a heart attack and that's when she came back. She thinks you took Elaine's passport and she's furious at the delay. He's afraid of her. He's always been frightened by the fits she throws. . . .”

“Of course he has. I'm afraid of her myself. She's nuts. Do they have the bags in the car with them?”

She was breaking down now, caving in. The notion of Leonard's desertion caused too much pain and the image of packed suitcases cracked her heart. It was all too much. What difference did any of it make now that he was leaving her?

“They've gone off to pack,” she said. Her voice came out in a gasp and her nose had started to run. “That's were they went. The motel out by the pass and then the house. They fought about it, but she wouldn't leave it behind, because it was evidence.”

“Leave what?”

“The . . . uh . . . you know . . .”

“The murder weapon?”

Lily nodded and nodded gain. I didn't think she could stop. It was as if the cords in her neck had come loose and her head was destined to wag indefinitely. She looked like one of those bobble-head dogs people have perched up in the back windows of their cars.

“Lily, listen to me. I want you to call the police. Go to a neighbor's house and stay there until somebody comes. Do you understand? Come on. Do you need anything? A sweater, a handbag?” I wanted to scream at her to hurry, but I didn't dare.

She was looking at me with washed-out, worried blue eyes, her gaze as trusting as a dog's. I got her to her feet and flipped the TV off, and then bundled her out the front. I scanned the street, but there was no one in sight. I couldn't believe Leonard would let Marty hurt her, but we all knew who was in charge. In some ways I felt as if I was wasting time, but I had to make sure Lily Howe
was safe. We went up to the first house that showed a light, a cedar-shingle place two doors down.

I rang the bell. Some man opened the door and I pushed her forward, explaining that there was trouble and she needed some help. I urged Lily to call the cops and then I left. I wasn't sure if she'd do it or not.

I got in my car and squealed out, burning rubber as I skidded around the corner two blocks down. I drove tensely, sliding through stop signs, bypassing traffic any way I could. I had to get to the house before they did. I got stuck at a light and used the time to paw through my glove compartment, looking for the flashlight. I pulled it out and checked the batteries. They seemed fine. The signal changed to green and I took off again.

Belatedly, I realized my gun was still locked in the file cabinet at the office. I nearly slammed the brakes on and went back for it, but I didn't have time. If they went to the motel first, packed, checked out, and loaded the car up, I might have time to get to the murder weapon before they did. If they beat me to the punch, I was going to head straight for Tillie's and call the police. I had no intention of taking on Marty Grice all by myself.

I could feel a big rush of adrenaline and my neurons fired up, completing a circuit with a joyous leap. An answer to an old question popped into my head and I suddenly knew how they'd maneuvered the stomach contents. Marty had stolen Elaine's kitchen trash. It wasn't any more complicated than that. The brown grocery bag Mike had seen in the hall was Elaine Boldt's
garbage, containing the empty tuna can and the soup can that comprised her supper that night. Marty had had hours to set it up and I could visualize the scenario as though I had powers of clairvoyance. Leonard went out to dinner with Lily and Marty gave Elaine a call, inviting her over on some casual pretext. Elaine stopped by and at some point was bashed in the face until dead. Marty took the keys and went over to Elaine's as soon as it was dark. She retrieved the kitchen garbage and took it back to her house, leaving it in the hall for a minute while she went down to the basement for the kerosene. That's when Mike had appeared, opening the front door and closing it again when he realized that something was desperately wrong. Marty finished dousing the place with kerosene and sat back to wait for Leonard's prearranged call at nine, reporting by phone what Elaine had eaten so he could later mention it to the police. A tuna sandwich and tomato soup. Maybe Marty stuck the leftovers on her own refrigerator shelf so it would all tally up and look legitimate. Marty set the fire and then slipped over to Elaine's where she holed up in comfort until her flight to Florida the following Monday night. My guess was that she'd dyed her hair before she left and I suspected that the fine clump of gray-brown hair I'd seen in Elaine's bathroom wastebasket during my initial search was, in fact, additional evidence that Marty Grice had been there.

I reached the Grices' house and pulled up across the street, taking a moment to study the house and yard. In the darkness, the fire damage was hidden, but the place still exuded that aura of ruin and abandonment. There
was no sign of the car out front. No lights anywhere in the house. No pedestrians on the street.

I left the keys in the ignition and got out of the car, leaving the door ajar. I wanted to be able to ease back in and take off without a lot of fumbling around, if it came to that. I opened the trunk and took out the tools I thought I'd need. As soon as I determined that nobody was coming, I crossed the street and cut through the Grices' side yard.

I moved quietly along the walk, surveying windows as I passed. Most of the windows at the front of the house had been broken out by the fire and boarded back up again, but there were two near the back of the house that were still intact. I chose one and jimmied it open. It was pitch-black, and the neighborhood was quiet except for crickets chirring in the grass. I knew I should give myself an escape route, but I couldn't take the chance. If the two of them showed up, they'd spot any open windows or doors. I'd just have to work fast and hope my guess about the murder weapon was correct. I didn't have time for mistakes.

I climbed into the kitchen and pulled the window shut. The floor crackled with broken glass as I passed through. My flashlight streaked across blackened doorframes, smoke-tinged walls, into a hallway dense with shadow. I held my breath, listening. The silence was flat, one-dimensional. The electricity was turned off and I missed the soft hum of machinery. No refrigerator, no furnace, no wall clock, no water heater ticking from the other room. Some vague phrase about the silence of the tomb came to mind, but I pushed it away.