He looked at me, and back at Steven, “And has she been helpful?”
“Very much so. You have a good employee here.”
“I’m sure of that.” I wondered if he would remember my name next time he saw me. “Now I’m taking you to my club for lunch. “
Richmond gathered up his papers. “I’ll hear from you then?” he said to me. “With more information? And I’d really like to have some of those photos. Here’s my card with all my contacts. And you will hear from me too. Do you have a card?” I shook my head and quickly jotted down my phone and e-mail. “I’ll get a proper consulting agreement sent to you.” He turned to the director, “That’s all right, isn’t it? For her to work for me off hours?’
“Of course, of course. Give Steve any help he wants and consider it cleared with me. He is an old Deerfield roommate and if you make him happy enough, maybe we can even lure him onto the museum board.” He winked.
Steven laughed. “I’m in your sights, is that it?”
“You know it.” As they left, he was saying, “Now, tell me, have you heard from Buzzy? Or Dex? We’re planning a reunion….”
And they were gone.
I was about to have a consulting contract. I wasn’t sure what that would entail, except that it was one more responsibility. What had I done? And what did he really do on his job? The business card was on thick creamy stock, with real engraving, like a wedding invitation, discreet and elegant. The company name was discreet too and told me precisely nothing. His title was director. I tried unsuccessfully to call Darcy and get her to tell me what to expect, and to explain why she deceived me about who he was. Her dad’s golf buddy? I still felt indignant about that.
But Deerfield was a fancy boarding school and he was a friend of our museum director. Just as Darcy had predicted.
And I had accomplished precisely zero for the museum today, but there was one useful thing I could still do. I called the precinct again.
“Mrs. Donato, we were about to call you. Good news, bad news. We ran the plates, but the owner reported those plates stolen awhile ago and the car doesn’t match…”
I groaned.
“Yeah, well, it was long shot. Here’s the good news. Since a couple of other people reported it, we’re keeping our eyes open—we’d like to know what he’s up to—but it doesn’t look like it was directed at you. He was seen parked in other places too. We’ve got a few pictures we’d like you to take a look at, known neighborhood nuisances and such.”
Relief flooded through me. He’s a neighborhood nuisance, that’s all. This was not about us. I was not going to send my daughter away. I was not going to cash Rick’s check, no matter what he said. What I was going to do was get on with my life.
Right now, getting on with my life meant getting some actual work done. I headed to the museum archives where material was waiting for me.
My job is really an internship with a tiny stipend. I need the money and experience, they need the labor and it fits perfectly with my academic work. The museum is dedicated to local Brooklyn history, everything from the Dutch settlements to the building of the Brooklyn Bridge to the most recent immigrants from Afghanistan, Ghana, Russia, Yemen, Jamaica. Part of our mission is to educate the public that history is happening all the time. Eventually I will write a paper for credit about my work here.
My assignment was to research background for an upcoming exhibit about neighborhoods changing through the decades, and all the turmoil that created. No doubt that’s why Darcy had hooked me up with this Steven Richmond.
Scrolling through the newspaper film, I found everyday lives laid out for me in words and pictures. There were graduations from public, private, and parochial schools. The hairstyles changed from backcombed beehives to the long, straight Joan Baez look to the curly shag and the cute Hamill wedge. Hmm. That one looked like my own graduation picture. And of course there were the mothers with beehives and the daughters with shags, too. And fathers with military-trim barbering and sons with flowing curls and drooping mustaches.
The clothing styles went from prim dresses for women and stiff suits for men to flowing bell-bottoms and daisy prints for everyone. Only the parochial school uniforms were the same from one decade to the next.
And the smiles for Halloween, graduation, First Communion, prom were the same, year after year.
New businesses opened, with proud owners holding the first lucky dollar in a photo. Most of those stores have come and gone. I miss the friendly butchers at 3 Vets Meats, but here was Park Diner, seemingly immortal, in a picture from the 1950s, and here was a corner bar that had changed names from Eagle to Flynn’s to Shamrock to Oak, but never disappeared.
I looked at the street scenes with teenagers and wondered if the girl in our house was in any of them, part of the everyday crowd, living her everyday life. Until…
I mentally slapped myself and ordered my mind to focus on work.
Politicians were criticized, defended themselves, faded or were promoted out of local public life. There were letters from the early seventies, railing about the hippies who were moving in, and from the eighties, railing about the investment bankers moving in.
One of the summer interns popped in to chat and pass on the gossip that the boss was really pushing on deadlines. Great. Just what I needed to hear.
Actually, I did tend to get sidetracked, so fascinated by these tiny windows into life in the recent past that I almost forgot researching. By the end of the day, though, I had learned about some major actions way back when. Landlords were sued, and by the city, no less! There was even a small-scale riot. I made copies and notes
.
A tenants organization and its lawyer. A judge. A reporter who kept showing up as the author of the news reports.
That reporter, Brendan Leary, intrigued me.
He would be such a terrific source for our exhibit. He seemed to know everyone and be everywhere, and he wrote with passion. Then he seemed to disappear. I ran a Nexis search, hoping his byline would turn up at another paper.
No luck. I found a few other Brendan Learys and tracked them down. There was a fireman in the Bronx, an Aer Lingus pilot with a beautiful Irish accent who tried to get a date, a potter in Boston named Brenda Leary who was annoyed to find out she was showing up as Brendan. No reporters or ex-reporters.
I refused to believe he could not be found.
The major paper where he had worked might have some records for him but in a large organization, which department might be the most helpful with information? Dope, I said to myself. If you want information, start with the library. A couple of phone extensions later, I was talking so someone at the newspaper library’s reference desk.
I explained what I wanted and the voice at the other end exclaimed, “Brendan Leary? Why, I haven’t thought about that old reprobate in a decade or so! Good thing you got me today. I’m the only old-timer still here. Sure, I knew him. He retired a long time ago. No party or anything, just left, just like that. Not a clue as to what’s become of him. Well, you’ve given me a very interesting problem.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…”
“We live for interesting problems. I have a few ideas. Give me your number and I’ll see what I can do. I’ll get back to you Monday or Tuesday.”
I had accomplished a lot today and as I started to wind up, I suppose it was inevitable that I started thinking about our skeleton again, much as I had hoped to push it away with work. My work on this project was too close to my home.
I wondered again if that living girl was in any of these pictures? Had she walked these streets or spoken to these people? What was she doing in my house that caused her death? Of course that’s what I really wanted to know.
I forced myself to stop thinking and to stop working, too. I closed up all my folders, stacked up my notes, and left. I stopped in at the precinct and examined an array of photos but none of them were the ugly guy in front of my house. So much for my fantasies of seeing him hauled off in cuffs. And I did have to ask myself what exactly could be the charge? Annoying me—no, scaring me—probably was not cause for an arrest.
When I got home, Joe was washing the dust from his arms in my kitchen sink, but Chrissie was nowhere in sight.
“She asked for the day off,” he told me. “She said she had to do something important and it would be fine with you.”
“Well, it’s not fine. It would be nice if she would clear these changes with me. Or if you would. What were you thinking?”
“That she’s smart and responsible? You worry too much. See you tomorrow.”
Chris came home a few minutes later.
“Mom, I had the most interesting day!”
“I’m sure you did, not being at work and all.”
“I asked Joe and he said it was OK.” The excitement was replaced with uncertainty. “I mean, wasn’t that the right thing to do?”
“It depends on what you were doing, which you did not tell him. How about telling me?”
“I—I don’t want to.” She saw my expression and added quickly, “I mean, not yet. It’s—it’s a secret. You won’t mind, honest. I just—I just—I needed to do something myself.” I’m sure my face was grim; hers was a mixture of uncertainty and defiance.
“This isn’t all right, Chris. You can’t take off for a day with nobody knowing where you are. What if…?”
“Mom!” It was the three-syllable mom, as only a teenager can say it. “I’m not going to get into any trouble. I’m smart and I’m careful. Or is that you don’t trust me?”
I was staring at defeat and I knew it. Did I trust her intentions? Probably. Did I trust her good sense? Not completely. Does any parent of a teen? Nope, not really.
Was it a good idea to tell her that? I didn’t know. I gave up. For now.
“OK, miss,” I said. “You get a pass this time. Don’t make me sorry I believe you and next time you take off for the day, I want to know. Got it?”
She heaved a great, martyred sigh, muttered yes, and stalked from the room. Wise choice. One of us had to. The old stairs shook under the angry pounding of her platform sandals and almost immediately music poured from her room at top volume. The volume was normal but the choice was odd. From way before her time, and even before mine, it was The Doors who were rocking the house, singing about lighting their fire.
I sighed and resigned myself to being unable to work as long as Chris was home. I could go up, though, and switch on my bedroom air conditioner, change into cooler clothes, check my e-mail.
My computer screen was covered with a piece of paper. A note from Chris?
It said: REMEMBER WHAT HAPPENED TO THE CURIOUS CAT. CATS AND THEIR KITTENS SHOULD NOT ASK QUESTIONS.
My blood turned cold. I used to think that was a poetic figure of speech. It is not. The blood froze first, then my breathing seemed to freeze, too. Then my knees buckled and I had to sit down.
Was this a threat? It
was
a threat. My brain must have chilled too, because it took a minute to sink in, that someone had been in my house. He let himself in. Walked around here in my room. Touched my things.
Was he still there? No, I thought, no, not very likely, with Chris and me having been in almost every room of our small house. Still there was the basement and the empty downstairs apartment. There were closets and the roof, accessed by a trap door in the ceiling, at the top of a shaky internal ladder. In a closed vertical passageway. By then my heart was beating louder than Chris’ music.
I tiptoed to her room and opened the door without knocking. Her indignation stopped when she saw my face, and the finger held to my lips. I motioned to her to keep quiet and come downstairs with me. I managed to snag my phone from the kitchen counter on the way out.
Out on the front stoop, with my daughter next to me trying to ask questions, I called my friendly contact at my neighborhood precinct. Again.
“This is Erica Donato.” I was stammering. I couldn’t help it. “We’ve spoken about an incident…really, a few incidents….”
“I haven’t exactly forgotten you. Must’ve been two whole hours since we talked. I feel like we’re going steady here.”
Was he being sarcastic? Or trying to lighten up?
“I have something else to report.”
“Tell me.” He was all business now.
When I was done he said, “Stay outside until I can send someone over to check the house, Did you touch anything in that room? No? Good, keep it that way. I’m going to come take a look myself. Oh, yeah, and is your daughter there? I’m on my way over.”
Then I turned to my white-faced daughter and used as tough a voice as I could muster. “Tell me now what exactly is going on? And no more nonsense. You heard what I told him about the note on my computer. What could it possibly mean?”
“Well, I don’t…I mean…it’s a prank, isn’t it? It must be.” She couldn’t look at me.
“I don’t think so. Not for minute. Someone was here. In our house. And call me crazy, but this looks like a threat. There’s going to be a detective here in a few minutes and I don’t plan to be stupid with him, so before he gets here, I’d better know whatever you know!”
“I thought I was doing a good thing,” she whispered. “That girl…I wanted to know more about her…I thought you would be proud of me…” Tears started rolling down her cheeks.