Dead In Red (3 page)

“Who found the dead man?” I asked.

Cyn turned hard eyes on me, her mouth
tightening. “Our miller, Ted Hanson.”

“Is he in today? Can I talk to him?”

“No.” Her rebuke was adamant.

“Excuse me?” I pushed.

“No, Ted isn’t here today. In fact, he’s out
of town on a buying trip.”

“When will he be back?”

“In a few days. Why are you so
interested?”

“Morbid curiosity,” I said, echoing
Richard’s words. “Last night I was hired to take Walt Kaplan’s job
at a bar down the street.”

She gaped at me, unprepared for honesty;
sudden fear shadowed her eyes.

A sharp knock preceded the door opening.
Gene held a loaded tray in one hand and bustled inside. He set
cardboard cups before Richard and me, placing frosted rectangles of
strudel on baker’s tissue next to them. His smile was genuine.
“Enjoy.” He eased the door closed behind him.

The awkward silence lengthened.

Richard cleared his throat. “Ever see any of
the old crowd, Cyn?”

Cyn seemed grateful for a change of subject.
“Since I came back to the area nine months ago, I’ve only caught up
with Cathy Makarchuk. She married Barry Garner. They have five
children—can you believe it?”

Nothing on Earth is more boring than
listening to old school chums reminisce. I reached for my coffee,
eager to rid my mouth of the lingering sour taste of vomit, and my
hand brushed the edge of the desk. The image of a smiling man burst
upon my mind. Heart pounding, I snatched up my cup with a shaking
hand and took a sloppy gulp.

At some time before his death, Walt Kaplan
had sat on the edge of that desk.

# # #

CHAPTER 2

“Fill the beer cooler, and later we’ll talk,”
Tom said, and slapped me on the back, nearly knocking me off my
feet.

“Sure thing,” I said and faked a smile.

He left me standing by the bar’s back door,
where a Molson truck had just made its weekly delivery. Thirty
cases of beer sat stacked against the wall. I found a dolly behind
the door, so at least I wouldn’t have to kill myself dragging the
beer into the cooler. Then again, I wondered how much stress my
recently broken arm could take. I’d only been out of the brace
about seven weeks.

The first five cases proved easy to lift. By
the time I’d hauled the rest of them in I’d worked up a sweat and
had rethought my ambition to work as a bartender. I much preferred
cutting up fruit garnishes and washing glasses to actual physical
labor.

Four construction workers sat at the bar
nursing beers, picking at bowls of pretzels while they watched ESPN
on the TV bolted to the wall. Since Tom didn't serve food, I
wondered if liquid bread—aka beer—constituted their midday meal.
Tom had already given me the cut-off lecture. Nobody left drunk
from his establishment unless they had a designated driver. In the
twenty years he’d owned the tavern, he’d never been sued and wanted
to keep it that way.

I hadn’t worked behind a bar in at least
twelve years, but it all came back within minutes as I waited on my
first few customers, rang up the sales, and collected my first
paltry tips. No doubt about it, I wasn’t going to get rich working
here. Still, it felt good to be among the employed once again. For
as long as it would last. Tom hadn’t mentioned this being a
permanent arrangement.

Luckily I wasn’t picking up too many
disquieting vibes, either. One of the guys was behind in his truck
payments, sweating the repo man. Another hadn’t been laid in three
weeks and wondered if his old lady was boffing someone else. Just
the usual errant signals I picked up on shopping carts, door
handles and money. Inconvenient at times, but I’d learned to ignore
most of it. I knew when to pay attention, too.

The lunchtime crowd had emptied out when
Richard ambled through the side entrance. He’d never been to The
Whole Nine Yards before, and I guess he wanted to see for himself
what I’d gotten myself into.

He paused at the end of the bar, taking in
the dark bead board that went halfway up the walls, the chair rail,
and stucco above it decorated with sports posters and memorabilia.
He took the first stool, rested his forearms on the bar. Dressed in
a golf shirt and freshly ironed Dockers, he looked out of place in
this working-class establishment.

I strolled down and halted before him. “What
can I get you, sir?”

He looked up at me with no show of
recognition. “Got any Canadian on tap?”

“Labatts.”

He nodded.

I drew him a beer and set a fresh bowl of
pretzels down in front of him. “What about those Bisons,” he said,
setting a ten spot on the bar.

I didn’t follow minor-league baseball, but I
guessed I’d have to while working in a sports bar. Bummer. “Uh,
yeah. What about ’em?”

Richard’s mustache quirked as he reached for
his glass.

I rang up the sale and gave him his change.
Tom was stooped over the other end of the bar, watching TV. I
wandered over to him. “I’ve got some questions I wanted to ask
about Walt.”

Tom tore his gaze away from the tube. “Sure
thing.”

“You said he was a loner. No best
friends?”

Tom shook his head, then looked thoughtful.
“Well, maybe me. But we didn’t talk all that much. I gave him the
job because he’d been hurt working construction and couldn’t go
back to it. He got some kind of disability payments, which is why
he only had to work here part-time.”

“What kind of disability?”

“Bad hip. Had a limp. Sometimes he used a
cane.”

“What did he do with his free time?”

Tom shrugged. “He never really spoke about
it.”

I glanced over my shoulder. Richard was
looking down the bar beyond us, gazing intently at the TV. He’d
never shown a burning desire to watch waterskiing before and was no
doubt eavesdropping.

I turned back to Tom. “Did Walt ever mention
women or describe his ideal girl?”

“Not that I recall.”

“He wasn’t gay, was he?”

Tom straightened, his eyes widening.
“No!”

“Just asking.” Where did the red stiletto
heel fit in? “He go to strip joints?”

“Not that I know of.”

“Did he buy his sex?”

Tom squirmed. “I don’t know. I don’t think
so. Walt was private. He didn’t talk about stuff like that. But he
listened when the other guys would talk. Why’d you ask such a
personal question?”

“I didn’t know Walt. Maybe nobody—even his
family—really did.”

Tom’s brow wrinkled. Maybe he hadn’t wanted
to know.

“It would help if I could see where
Walt lived. See
how
he
lived.”

“I got his keys from the cops. I’ll give
them to you later.” Tom cleared his throat and glanced over his
shoulder at the back room. “I’ve got some paperwork to take care
of. Will you be okay out here alone for a while?”

I gazed at our only customer, Richard, and
nodded.

Tom took off and I grabbed the damp rag by
the sink. The bar didn’t need wiping down, but I did it anyway,
ending up back in front of Richard.

“How’s the job going?” he asked.

“So far so good.”

He nodded, but seemed to expect more of an
answer. I didn’t have one.

“I’m gonna check out Walt’s apartment later.
Wanna come?”

Richard drained the last of his beer. “Why
not?” The words sounded bland, but the crinkle in his eyes and the
set of his mouth betrayed his interest. Brenda was right. He’d been
bored silly during his convalescence, but looking into Walt’s
murder wasn’t a lark. Odds were we wouldn’t be in danger this early
in the game. I had no desire to put myself or anyone else in harm’s
way. But the last time I’d gotten caught up in the web of emotion
surrounding a murder, it was Richard who’d nearly paid the ultimate
price. Truth was, I wanted him to accompany me, and yet anxiety
gnawed at my nerves. For all the insight I’d experienced while
pursuing a murderer three months earlier, I’d never had a clue that
Richard might be in danger. That he’d be so grievously injured.

I didn’t like to revisit that guilt.

Pawing through Walt’s possessions was
another matter. We might not find anything that would give me
answers. And if I did, well, I didn’t have to share it with
Richard.

“Want another?” I asked Richard, indicating
his glass.

He stood. “I’m all set. Give me a call later
and I’ll meet you.”

“Sure.”

He headed for the door. Under his empty
glass was a five-dollar tip.

* * *

The south
side
of Main Street near Eggert Road was already in shadow as Richard
and I stood on the sidewalk looking up at the apartment windows
over a dress boutique. The drapes were drawn. Good. I wasn’t
interested in attracting the attention of the neighbors. Not that
it mattered. I had permission to be there. Still, poking around a
dead man’s possessions cranked up the creepiness factor a
notch.

Steep, narrow stairs led up to the second
floor.

“Did I hear your boss say the guy was
disabled? Why didn’t he find first-floor digs?”

I shrugged and pulled out the keys Tom had
given me. Richard stooped to pick up newspapers that had
accumulated. The shelf under a two-receptacle apartment mailbox
overflowed with Walt’s junk mail. He grabbed that, too, and we
trooped up the stairs.

I picked out the key Tom said would open the
door. It did. I stepped into the apartment’s dark interior, groping
for the light switch just inside the door. I flicked it and wan
yellow light illuminated the entryway. Walt had been dead only five
days, but already the place smelled of disuse. Still, the air felt
heavy with Walt’s presence. Not that I could take in the essence of
his soul, but I could feel some residual part of what and who he
was, and also the first tendrils of migraine stirring behind my
eyes.

Richard thrust the mail at me and shoved his
hands into his pants pockets, gazing around the cramped place. The
cops hadn’t made too big a mess, leading me to believe Walt kept
his home meticulously clean. I sorted through the circulars,
dumping them into the empty kitchen waste basket, then backtracked
to open the entry’s closet door and found winter coats and boots.
Nothing very interesting.

Back in the tidy galley kitchen, the
cabinets housed plain white Corelle dishes and Coke glasses from
fast-food restaurant giveaways. In the closet pantry, cans were
stacked in descending sizes, heavy on store-brand tomato soup and
mac and cheese. I’m no gourmet, but when it came to dinner prep
even I could do better than Walt.

I wasn’t eager to touch everything, but already I
understood a lot about Walt Kaplan, a man who listened and rarely
gave much of himself to others. There was no sense of joy in his
home. Nothing that mirrored the smile he had given someone in Cyn
Lennox’s office.

The spotless bathroom brandished
much-washed, frayed brown towels on the racks by the sink and
bathtub. I poked through the medicine cabinet and found mint
mouthwash, toothpaste, dental floss and a prescription bottle of
anisindione. “Rich?” He poked his head around the door and I handed
it to him.

He read the label, frowned. “It’s an
anticoagulant. You might be more familiar with the commercial name,
Coumadin.”

“What do you think was wrong with Walt?”

Richard shrugged. “Blood thinners treat deep
vein thrombosis, pulmonary embolus, arterial fibrillation—any
number of things.”

“So what’s that mean?”

“Prevents strokes.”

He might’ve said so. Richard scrutinized the
label again. “Being stabbed while on this dose would’ve greatly
speeded up his death.”

The thought made me shudder.

Richard went back to the living room.

The bedroom door was ajar; the place most
people stored their secrets. Not a wrinkle marred the fiberfill
burgundy quilt that lay across the full-sized bed. Like the living
room, no reading material littered the flat surfaces of the dresser
or nightstand. No dust, either.

A dresser stowed underwear, socks, and golf
shirts folded with expert precision, although the contents had been
disturbed—probably by the cops. Suits, shirts and slacks hung in
color-coordinated order stuffed the pokey little closet. A plastic
shoe rack attached to the back of the door contained six pairs of
Walt’s shoes, polished to a glow. A stack of nine identical,
nondescript shoeboxes sat huddled on the closet floor. No
manufacturer’s name graced the generic boxes. A couple of year’s
worth of Victoria’s Secret catalogs sat beside them in a tidy pile.
Pretty tame stuff. My gaze kept wandering to the stack of
shoeboxes. I knelt and ran my right palm over the front of the
boxes. It gravitated toward one in particular on the top left of
the pile. I pulled it out to examine it.

The wide box was standard gray cardboard,
nothing out of the ordinary, and no different than the others. I
held it in my hands and the red sequined shoe flashed before my
mind’s eye once again, bringing a stab of pain with it. I ground my
teeth and concentrated. This time, the view was from the back; pear
shaped, cupped to accept a soft-skinned foot upon its tapered heel,
the ankle strap looping to look like an overgrown, sparkling halo.
No saint wore shoes like those. And why associate Walt’s death with
the shoe? It was gaudy, flashy—not at all Walt’s style. I hadn’t
come across any sex toys—not even a box of condoms. I doubted he’d
ever brought any of his playmates home.

And come to think of it, in my vision I only
ever saw one shoe.

I lifted the lid. Empty, except for a couple
of papers: A brochure of Holiday Valley, the ski resort south of
Buffalo, and a scrap with four hand-written numbers: 4537. Pin
number? Combination lock? Last four digits of a phone number? And I
got the feeling that the collection was incomplete. Walt had hoped
to add more things to it. His time had simply run out.