Husbands And Lap Dogs Breathe Their Last (6 page)

Like Ernestine Cutter, Deuteronomy was born and raised in Horeb, the only child of an imperious English teacher who was widowed young. She insisted on unaccented American speech. Whatever tendencies Deuteronomy had toward a Downeast accent were drilled out of him.

He was now a widower and had a daughter who lived half a continent away. He rarely saw her. He didn’t see much of Elektra either, who had been his housekeeper for many years and lived in the house. In fact he saw little of anyone. Since his wife Edwina’s death about a decade earlier, he had gone out less and less. It was more a matter of disinterest than depression.

In the last few years he emerged only at night, usually in the summer, to take midnight boat rides. Otherwise, unless it was essential, he saw no one and spoke to no one. He relied on Elektra to manage all the practical elements of the household and his life. When communication was necessary, he often used postcards. There was no particular rationale for this idiosyncrasy. It was just what he did.

Deuteronomy had inherited the house, a large Victorian, from his mother. Her grandfather, a sea captain, had built the house in 1848. The sea captain had been wealthy, and the house reflected this. It had many large rooms on three floors plus a full attic, with a grand staircase in the middle ornately carved from Maine maple. Unfortunately, the sea captain’s descendants were not wealthy, and they had struggled to provide the maintenance that such a house required. The home was still grand but had long since become shabby.

Deuteronomy spent much of his time in his bedroom, which was large and resembled a nineteenth-century English men’s club. The walls were covered in late Victorian wallpaper in morose shades of blue and green, with navy blue, floor-to-ceiling velvet drapes. These were original to the house and in dire need of replacement. Deuteronomy wouldn’t hear of redecorating, even during those periods when he could have afforded it. Somehow the deteriorating elegance suited him.

His bedroom was furnished with a massive oak bed, several leather lounge chairs, a wall of books and a large writing desk. On this sat a computer and a printer; both of these were distrusted but accepted as a part of the general cultural decline in which thoughtful men now found themselves. There was also an old hi-fi console, which Deuteronomy used to play classical records.

Most of his days passed uneventfully: He read, he thought, he wrote letters to his daughter or his few remaining friends, or he made notes for novels he would likely never write. At night he listened to music.

Deuteronomy—”Deuty” to his friends—had recently arisen. He was about to go to the dining room for his breakfast when Elektra, irate, burst into his bedroom without knocking. Fortunately, he was already dressed in black slacks, a grey herringbone jacket and a crisp white shirt with a striped bow tie.

“In boat dead body, is in plastic wrap like the leftover chicken!”

“What are you talking about?” Deuteronomy asked calmly. He was used to Elektra’s theatrics and never allowed himself to succumb.

“Through whole winter maybe this body been in boat. Look to me it freeze and thaw, freeze and thaw, freeze and thaw. And the animals, they eat this body. Ugly!” Elektra continued with sweeping dramatic gestures evoking the probable rise and fall of the temperature. “But him I know. I see the big blue ring on finger. This is the ring it belong to Chess Biederman. I say this to the police.”

“Do you mean that you’ve just discovered Chess Biederman’s body on my boat?”

“Yes. Chess Biederman! Nekra! Nekra! Nekra! What is the word in the English?”

“Dead?”

“Yes! Him dead!”

“How was he killed? Suffocated? Stabbed? Shot? What?”

“I not knows this.”

The door buzzer interrupted the conversation, an unusual occurrence in a household that had few visitors. That the front door had a buzzer, and was even used regularly, was somewhat unusual in rural New England. Because of the climate and perhaps for other reasons lost to history, the back door is the usual means of coming and going. This had to be an important call.

Elektra went to answer the door. After she did, Deuteronomy heard a male voice.

“The police here,” Elektra announced anxiously as she returned to Deuteronomy’s bedroom. “These police they come see you. In the parlor I put police.”

“I don’t feel like seeing anyone,” he replied.

“Is the police!” Elektra exclaimed vehemently.

“Yes, I suppose you’re right,” Deuteronomy said, rising dutifully to face the inevitable. He straightened his bow tie and walked down the hall.

A uniformed policeman sat on Deuteronomy’s sofa. The officer was perhaps forty, short, taut and muscular. He carried with him a canvas bag, which he’d set on the floor. From it he removed a half-finished doily and went to work on it with a crochet hook.

“What are you doing there?” Deuteronomy asked as he entered the room.

“Tatting. It reduces stress,” the officer replied gruffly, setting down his handiwork and rising. “I’m Officer Bernier from the Sagadahoc County Sheriff’s office. I transferred down here from Bangor a few years ago. I don’t think we’ve met.”

“No. I don’t go out much. I’m Deuteronomy Smelt, but presumably you know that. You may refer to me as Mister Smelt or Deuty, as you wish.”

They shook hands. Officer Bernier sat and resumed tatting.

“I understand Chess Biederman’s body has been found on my boat,” Deuteronomy said.

“That’s correct.”

“Are you absolutely sure that’s who it is? I ask only because my housekeeper informs me that the body was both desiccated and disturbed by animals.”

“He was wearing a ring known to belong to Chess Biederman, and we have dental records. Also, as you likely know, Chess disappeared in the fall, and no one has seen him since.”

“I assume you’re here because you think Chess was murdered?”

“We’re awaiting autopsy results.”

“But what’s your gut instinct?”

“My gut instinct is to wait for the autopsy results.”

“Of course, of course. Still, it could be the result of natural causes, couldn’t it? I recall that Chess was prone to a number of allergies as a child, though I can’t remember any longer to what he was allergic. I do remember my late wife commiserating with Chess’s mother about his health, the way women do.”

“If Chess died from an allergic reaction, why was his body hidden in your boat?”

“That’s true. I can’t argue with that,” Deuteronomy conceded.

“Were you and Chess well acquainted?”

“It’s a small village. I’ve lived here all my life.”

“Would you say you were friends?”

“No. We were of different generations and temperaments.”

“Your housekeeper told us he visited you recently.”

“Last fall. He wanted to talk about a writing project he proposed to undertake.”

“And what was that?”

“A true crime book about the Cold War. He wanted to know what cases I thought he might include.”

“Why would Chess Biederman want to write about the Cold War?”

“Who can say? Based on what little I know of him, he appeared to be a man of eclectic interests—for example, those sex machines or whatever they are that he’s been making. Also, he was quite the devotee of popular music and Eastern mysticism, I believe, or at least he once was. It seems he was also interested in the Cold War.”

“Why would he consult you?”

“Apparently, you’ve forgotten that I used to write spy novels,” Deuteronomy said, piqued. “My nom de plume was Nash Hammer.”

“That’s right. I think I knew that.”

“I would imagine so,” Deuteronomy said in an imperious tone. “How many popular authors live in this village?”

“Did someone tell me one of your books was made into a movie?”

“Several were. There was also a television series. That was more than a few years ago, of course.”

“I don’t suppose you know of a reason why someone would want to murder Chess?”

“No.”

“Just a few more questions. Who had access to the boat?”

“No one that I’m aware of, but it’s hard to say precisely. The boat is stored at the back of Ernestine Cutter’s land. I suppose almost anyone could have snuck back there without being observed. However, it was shrink-wrapped in the fall—just after Thanksgiving, I believe—and unless you know something I do not, no one’s touched it since.”

“You haven’t visited the boat since last fall?”

“Why would I? You know what Maine winters are like.”

“That’s all for now. I’ll be back in touch if there’s anything else. Thank you for your time.”

Deuteronomy sat in the parlor for a few minutes after Officer Bernier departed and reflected on Chess’s death. Deuteronomy was not a man much given to emotion. He felt a certain sadness at Chess’s passing, but it was an acknowledgment of the transient nature of life, not of a sense of personal loss. Yet, curiously, there was something else: a physical response, a pulse, even a sense of elation. Deuteronomy was intrigued by the manner of Chess’s passing and, if he were honest with himself, excited by it. He pondered this unexpected and titillating occurrence and what he might do to untangle the mystery. Eventually he rose and went looking for Elektra. He found her reading by the kitchen table.

“What are you reading?”

“The Zane Grey. Is western.”

“Why are you reading that?” Deuty asked, baffled, as he often was by Elektra’s wide and, in his opinion, undiscerning taste in literature.

“Why not read this? Reading help to improve the English.”

“I was reflecting on some costumes my wife and I once kept for costume parties and Halloween,” Deuty said. “Have these been discarded, or are they stored away?”

“Why you want the dress-up things? Is not Halloween, and people not invite you to party anymore anyway. You not even go out!”

“That is an exaggeration. I do go out. I am fond of going outside at night in the summer, particularly for rides in my boat.”

“What of this? I am the one that steering.”

“Who steers is not relevant to how often I go out or where the costumes are,” Deuteronomy replied testily.

“You know the dress-up things in attic!” Elektra exclaimed, equally exasperated.

Climbing the stairs, he reflected on how irritating Elektra had become. Surely she hadn’t been like this years ago when he hired her, or he never would have. Arriving at the third floor landing, he opened the door to the attic and climbed a shorter series of steps to his final destination.

The attic was rarely visited. It was unfinished. The trusses had been filled with insulation but were exposed, and plywood had been nailed over the floor to create a rudimentary walkway. Although it was large, running half the length of the house, the pitch of the roof greatly reduced the space in which it was possible to stand fully erect.

In spite of these limitations the space had been well used as a dumping ground for that which was no longer immediately useful but was too precious, inconvenient or imbued with sentiment to part with. Taped boxes were stacked four feet high and even higher in the center.

Although the boxes were covered with dust, they were not as dirty as they might have been, given their length of stay. The reason for this was that a year earlier, over Elektra’s objections, Deuteronomy had demanded that several neighborhood lads be employed to arrange the boxes sequentially in chronological order from most ancient to most recent and affix labels, neatly printed in permanent ink, describing the contents of each. He also demanded a thorough vacuuming.

He congratulated himself on his foresight in pushing through this important organizational initiative, which would now prove so useful in locating the critical item he sought. He estimated what the approximate antiquity of the costumes might be and calculated a rough location. He was correct within four boxes. There they were, Costumes and Accessories c. 1975.

Deuteronomy deftly ripped off the tape and opened the flaps. Digging through the contents, he remembered that his fourth and most recent wife had convinced him for more than a decade to appear at Halloween parties as Abraham Lincoln to her Mary Todd and, after that, as Samson to her Delilah.

He continued to dig through the box and found New Year’s Eve hats and noisemakers. Beneath them, at the bottom of the box, he found what he was looking for—a long bushy beard and mustache that were part of his Samson costume, as well as a tube of theatrical adhesive. This, he quickly realized, had long since dried up. He resealed the box and returned downstairs with the facial hair. The adhesive went into the trash. The disguise went into his bedroom.

As she always did, Elektra served Deuteronomy dinner in his room promptly at 5:00 p.m.

“For boat ride we go tonight?” she asked him after setting the tray down.

“No. I’m tired. I’ll be turning in early.”

Shortly before dusk he checked to see that Elektra was in her room, watching television. He dressed in dark, casual clothing and attached the facial hair with the only substance he had at hand, rubber cement from his desk drawer. It immediately fell off. After several attempts he concluded he was so rarely seen around the village that he wasn’t likely to be recognized with or without biblical facial hair.

It had been quite a while since he had driven his car, but after a hunt he located his keys and a small flashlight. As dusk turned to night he placed these in his pocket, opened a window and slowly climbed out. It wasn’t the easiest maneuver. He wasn’t as young as he once was, and he wasn’t in the most vigorous condition, due to his insufficiency of exercise. Still, he managed it and scurried toward the garage, unnoticed. He started the car and pulled out as slowly as possible, hoping not to attract Elektra’s attention.

He headed out of Horeb toward Zion, the county seat. The exact route was somewhat unclear to him. The narrow two-lane road that had always wound through the towns between Horeb and Zion was now wide and four lanes, and it included a new bypass to larger roads that Deuteronomy had never encountered before. He had to stop and ask for directions at a gas station that had mysteriously arisen in a former wild blueberry barren, but he finally drove into Zion and headed for his destination: the county morgue.