Elaine Orr - Jolie Gentil 07 - Vague Images (3 page)

CHAPTER THREE

ON TUESDAY, the air had a clean smell, thanks to rain the night before. I sniffed from a window, as I had no plans to leave my house today.

My foot hurt somewhat less, but enough that it was on my mind anytime I moved
. My bungalow is small. From my position lying on the couch, I could see the arched doorway that led into the kitchen, which is at the end of the very short entry hallway.

If you turned right just before entering the kitchen, you’d be facing the bathroom. On either side of it were the bedrooms. I had done some roof patching and replaced a lot of drywall before I moved in, but there was much left to do before the house would be the way I wanted it. I’m not picky, I’m just not fond of scuffed hardwood floors and chipped bathroom tile. But, no complaints
. I’m happy to have a place of my own.

The murder had taken up nearly all of the news space in the
Ocean Alley Press
that morning. There was a brief article on the robbery at Mr. Markle’s store—short and ski-masked person in grey sweats, no suspect, little money taken. The robber had kept one hand in a pocket, and Mr. Markle assumed the person had a gun.

George had stayed at the robbery scene for half an hour, then he got a call from his editor about the murder
. He was royally irritated that neither Scoobie nor I had called him, but calling a reporter is not the first thought in your head when you find a body. He had talked to me on the phone last night for ten minutes, and finally gave up trying to learn more than what was in the police statement. There just wasn’t much to tell. I kept my word to Sergeant Morehouse and did not say he thought she died from being hit on the head.

Anyway, thanks to the murder and the need to meet the paper’s evening deadline, there was no mention of me avoiding the deer or a photo of any skid marks I made in not hitting the animal
. I gave myself a mental head slap for thinking about this when a woman had lost her life.

George now has a daily column called “Around Town.”  He usually only has one or two items in it
. Some are mildly humorous, some announce a Lions Pancake Breakfast, or something like that. When the paper’s editor created the column a few months ago, he said it was to consolidate all the non-essential stuff in one place. I doubt George was supposed to repeat that term. Some days I think George spends more time on that column than he does writing news stories. Today, the column was absent.

I read the article on the murder for the third time
. It mentioned that Ms. Weiss had recently moved to Ocean Alley from Perth Amboy, and that she was known as an efficiency expert in health care. The Ocean Alley Hospital’s CEO and Board of Directors issued a joint statement that spent more time stressing the hospital was a safe place for patients and staff than on the death of a woman who reported directly to its Board of Directors.

Because there was little time to write the article before the paper went to press last night, there was only one quote from someone she had worked with previously
. A man at Trenton General Hospital had said that Weiss was, “Renowned for putting hospitals in the black, no matter what it took.”

It sounds like he’s saying she didn’t give a tinker’s damn who she hurt.

The statement from Ocean Alley Police said only that they had no suspects and were exploring all leads. They could have been talking about a fight at the Sand Piper, a local bar.

It was almost five o’clock
. Scoobie was observing x-rays on the evening shift at the hospital. He likes that shift, which goes at slow speed except when there are car wrecks. Not that Scoobie is lazy. He just is not fond of hordes of people. That’s why he’s studying radiology instead of nursing or something.

I had a turkey sandwich on a table near my couch, courtesy of Aunt Madge who had stopped in last night and this afternoon to check on me
. She had also put a casserole in the fridge, and I was trying not to drool in anticipation. There was a clink of plates from the kitchen. “Don’t do the dishes, Aunt Madge, I can stand in front of the sink for a minute with no problem.”

“You can practice that when Scoobie’s home
. I don’t want you falling on my watch.”

I rolled my eyes.

The paper and my little cat, Jazz, were on my stomach. As was her custom when anyone was in the house besides me or Scoobie, my recently acquired pet skunk, Pebbles, was under my bed. Jazz raised her head and sniffed in the direction of the turkey sandwich. She looked at me and I shook my head no. She curled into a tighter ball.

Aunt Madge called from the kitchen
. “You said yesterday you wanted to ask me something, and then you fell asleep. What was it you wanted to know?”

“Probably about Nelson Hornsby from First Prez.”

I heard the water shut off and she walked into my living room as she wiped her hands on a dish towel. “What about him?”

“You first.”

“Don’t be a twit.”  This is one of Aunt Madge’s regular names for me. I consider it a term of endearment. She sat in the rocker, which faced the couch on which my foot and I were propped.

“I heard him talking to Tanya Weiss just before, before she was…killed.”  I still saw her eyes every time I thought of her. Green eyes wearing false eyelashes, and broken eyeglasses on the tile floor next to her
. It was unnerving.

“Nelson works in purchasing, doesn’t he?  I know Tanya was fairly new.”

I nodded. “Sergeant Morehouse said she was brought in to cut the budget, and I heard her tell Nelson she was going to try to get rid of some people without actually laying them off. He figured she meant some sort of trumped-up stuff so she could fire them. He was mad. It sounded like she didn’t want to talk to him, and she walked away.”

Aunt Madge pursed her lips, something she rarely does
. “Ever since the hospital merged with that for-profit health care group from New York it seems all you hear are words like efficiency, cost effectiveness, and maximizing resources. Never anything about a new MRI machine or reduced waiting time in the Emergency Room.”

“I remember the merger, guess I didn’t pay a lot of attention.”

“The hospital is the biggest employer in town, after the schools. And even if it weren’t, at my age you pay attention to health care. Of course, if you get yourself in trouble a lot you should probably pay attention when you’re younger.” 

“Hey, I don’t ask for…”

She waved a hand. “No matter right this minute. Are you asking me if I talked to Nelson about the new owners, or whatever they are?”

“Um, more like if you think he’s a violent person.”

Aunt Madge laughed. “That’s like asking if your friend Lester Argrow is quiet. Nelson Hornsby and violence are impossible.”

Lester Argrow, my friend Ramona’s uncle and a local real estate agent, is loud and nosy
. I felt relieved to hear Aunt Madge’s comparison. It was no big deal that I hadn’t repeated Nelson’s muttered statement.

“What?” she asked, apparently seeing something in my expression
. Then she shook a finger at me for a couple of seconds. “Don’t bother him. His wife just finished a round of radiation for breast cancer. Successful, from what I hear, but still stressful.”

“That’s too bad
. I don’t think I know her.”

We spent a minute talking about Nelson’s forty-something wife asking for aggressive treatment because she wanted to be sure she lived to see their kids graduate from high school
. Then Aunt Madge got back to my business. “Why are you asking about him?”

“After that woman talked to him, she walked back toward the main part of the administrative office area and he walked into a men’s room
. Just as he walked in he said something in a low voice. He said he could kill that bitch.”

She frowned, nodding her
head of light brown hair. Aunt Madge changes hair color every month or so. I have no idea why, and it seems to be her only frivolous habit. “Not something I would expect him to say, but it sounds more like an expression, like ‘if you don’t quit butting into other peoples’ business I’ll cut you out of my will.’”

I gave her a look that showed I got her point
. “I thought so, too. That it was an expression. So I didn’t tell Sergeant Morehouse about…”

“Oh, you need to do that.”

Aunt Madge rarely tells people what they should do. She says things like ‘you might want to consider’ something.

“You think?”

She nodded, very firmly. “And I’d love to be a fly on the wall when Sergeant Morehouse finds out you kept something from him.”

WHEN I TOLD HIM ON WEDNESDAY, Sergeant Morehouse definitely wasn’t happy, and he didn’t seem to believe the pain medicine excuse.

“I guess it was kind of sub-conscious
. Nelson’s a mild-mannered person, so it didn’t occur to me to think he meant it.”  I was trying to maintain an expression of innocence, and apparently failing.

It was two days after my near-collision with the deer and my first day driving
. We were sitting in Morehouse’s very tiny office in the police station. His desk is wedged between two four-drawer file cabinets, giving the impression that I shouldn’t bother him because there really isn’t room for me in his office.

“That’s a crock. If you remembered that he was annoyed with the deceased about getting rid of some staff, you remembered that he said he could kill her.”  He drummed the eraser end of his pencil on his desk
. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

The real reason is that I have a hard time being a tattle tale in general, but in the few moments I had listened to her, I thought the woman was a bitch, and anyone around her would want to kill her
. I saw no point in saying this.

“I really did forget
. Like I said, it was probably sub-conscious. He volunteered to help Harvest for All at the fundraiser we did at the carnival. Food pantry volunteers don’t murder people.”

Morehouse snorted
. “Get someone mad enough, anyone can kill. Anything else you
forgot
?”

“No.”  I reached for my crutches, and hesitated
. I settled back into my chair. “I know you weren’t here twelve years ago, but did Lieutenant Tortino ever mention some people I used to babysit for?”

He flipped a page in the notebook where he writes down what people like me say
. “Oh yeah, we always talk about how you made money in high school.” 

“Okay, it was more than that
. Could you ask him if he’s seen any of the people from, um, my babysitting job?”

Morehouse had an odd expression
. “You didn’t hit your head when you got out of that wheelchair, did you?”

“No.”

“Leave him a note.”

“I can’t.”

Morehouse picked up a folder on his desk and opened it, not looking at me. “Your fingers work, you can write a note.”

“It’s not something I can put on paper
. Could you just ask him?  That secretary who sits by the captain and Tortino will give me the fifth degree. I can’t say it to anyone but Lieutenant Tortino.”

Morehouse looked at me for at least five seconds, which is a long time when you’re the one being eyeballed
. He stood. “C’mon.”  He walked out of his office and started down the narrow hallway.

I followed, concentrating on keeping up with him without crutching too fast
. I didn’t want to land on my derriere. Going by the so-called bullpen where the junior officers sit made me feel as if I was on display.

“Jolie and me need to see Tortino.”  Morehouse was a few feet in front of me, talking to the secretary.

“Do you have an appointment?”

“Gladys, you know I don’t
. He’ll see us.”

While Gladys, who is in her mid-fifties and dresses like she buys her clothes in the thrift store, made a big deal of looking at the lieutenant’s appointment calendar, I heard the squeak of a chair and Tortino walked to the door of his office and gestured to us
. I thunked in behind Morehouse.”

Tortino has a long face and usually wears an impassive expression
. Just now he looked half amused. “To what do I owe the honor, Jolie?”

I hadn’t sat down yet, so I pushed the office door shut with my crutch
. That wiped the smile off Tortino’s face.

“You remember that night, when I was babysitting at the Finch house?”

Tortino’s tone was sharp. “That night we are not to discuss?  Ever.”

I was seating myself as he spoke, and looked at him as I put my injured foot on top of the other one
. “I know we aren’t…”

“Then don’t.”  Tortino was not impassive now.

Morehouse was moving his head slightly to look at Tortino and me in turn as we spoke.

“I think I saw…the boy.”

“What boy?” Morehouse asked. He was ten or twelve years younger than Lieutenant Tortino. He probably hadn’t even heard scuttlebutt.

Tortino was silent for several seconds, then he asked, “Where?  Where did you see him?”