JM02 - Death's Little Helpers aka No Way Home (42 page)

“But they were close?”

“Close enough, I guess. Joe loved music and he knew a lot about it— I mean theory and history and everything— and I guess Danes does too. I guess they liked the same kinds of things. And Joe felt … bad for him.”

“Why bad?”

“He thought Danes was a sad guy— that he was lonely and his life was … crappy.” Rich shook his head and smiled a little, remembering something. “Joe knew about people.”

“Was he right about Danes’s life?”

“Probably. From the little I’ve seen, I can believe he’s lonely. The guy’s such a prick, nobody with sense would want anything to do with him. But what the hell do I know?”

“I guess Mr. Cortese didn’t mind him.”

Rich laughed some more. “Joe was a special case. He always did good works— more so after Margie passed away— and Danes was one of them. And probably the guy wasn’t such a prick around Joe. Joe had that effect.”

“So was Danes Cortese’s friend or his project?”

“They were friends. Joe felt bad for the guy, but he genuinely liked him too. They had a good time at concerts and such. It was something Joe and Margie used to do, and I think he liked having somebody else to talk to about it.” Rich thought of something and smiled ruefully. “Besides, you don’t leave that kind of property to a casual acquaintance.”

I had another question, but it vanished from my head like breath on a cold day. “What property?” I asked softly.

“The house, up in Lenox.”

“Cortese left Danes property? In his will?”

Rich beetled his brows and looked at me like I was slow, which maybe I was. “Up in Lenox,” he repeated.

“And Danes has taken possession of it?”

“About two months ago.”

Two months ago— eight weeks, more or less. My heart was pounding, and I felt a vein throbbing in my neck.

“What the hell is this about, March?” Rich asked.

“I’ve been trying to locate Danes,” I said slowly, “for his ex-wife. I didn’t know about any property in Lenox, though. It didn’t show up in any of the online searches.”

Rich shrugged. “Transferred too recently, maybe? Or maybe they’re slow in updating their computer records up there, who knows? I never trust those Internet things anyway. Give me a walking, talking county clerk any day.”

“When’s the last time you saw Danes?”

“When we did the filing and made the transfer— about two months ago, up in Lenox.”

“Have you talked to him since?”

“He called me a few days later, asking if I knew who Joe had used for landscaping. I told him I’d check my files and call him back.”

“You have a phone number for him up there?”

“He didn’t have a phone hooked up. He told me to call his home number and leave a message, which I did. Why, you thinking he’s up there still?” I nodded. Rich nodded back. “Could be. He had luggage with him when I saw him. He could’ve been planning to stay for a while. You try calling him, leaving a message?”

“Yes.” Two months ago … eight weeks. “Tell me about the property,” I said, and Rich did.

It was a 110-year-old Victorian farmhouse and an even older barn, on twenty acres that bordered October Mountain State Forest. Cortese had given it a name— Calliope Farms— and for the past ten years he’d spent much of every summer up there. And he had left all of it— furniture and record collection included— to Gregory Danes. Rich gave me the address.

I wrote it down and thought some more. “That’s a pretty hefty bequest to make to a friend,” I said eventually.

Rich shrugged. “It was a small piece of a hefty estate. And other people besides Danes got some nice stuff. Me, I got a Chagall. Anyway, after Margie, what else did Joe have in his life? He had his friends, his charities … and Paulie. Joe left something for everybody.”

I was quiet again. Rich steepled his fingers and watched my face. “You said the estate went through probate quickly. Does that mean no one contested anything?” Rich nodded. “Not even Paul?”

Rich looked at me for a while. “Paulie was taken care of in the will,” he told me finally. “He won’t ever have to worry about keeping body and soul together.”

“Does that mean he didn’t contest anything?”

He sighed. “Not in any … organized way. He had every opportunity— I made sure of that— but Paulie … He complained a little, and he had some … theories, but ultimately he didn’t contest it. And like I said, the will was clean, and he was well taken care of.”

“What kind of theories did he have?”

“Paul gets ideas about things sometimes. For a while he thought that Danes had done him out of the place in Lenox. But it was crazy, and there was nothing to it.”

“Where’s Paul now?”

“I don’t know. The apartment went to him, and so did the house on Sanibel, and I know he’s shown up both places from time to time, but he doesn’t stay at either one. Right now, if I had to guess, I’d say he’s living in his car.”

“What’s the matter with him, Mr. Rich?”

Rich shook his head and looked out the window. “He was diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic, a long time ago,” he said finally.

“Is he on meds?”

“Sometimes. And they work for him— when he takes them. He’s had some real good stretches, where he’s held a job and paid the rent and everything. And then he goes off and has some bad stretches.”

“How bad?”

“He gets fired; he gets evicted; he drops out of sight for months at a time and winds up in a shelter or on the street.” Talking about Paul seemed to make Rich tired. He twisted his hands together on the desk.

“Does he need to be institutionalized?”

Rich made a resigned shrug. “I don’t know. Joe and I talked about it. I think maybe it’s headed that way.” He sighed some more and shook his head. “What does any of this have to do with Danes?”

“Does he ever get violent, Mr. Rich?” Rich looked down at his desk for a moment and then looked up at me. His eyes were worn and old and worried under his white brows. He nodded his head very slowly.

31

I was packing when Jane showed up at my door. She was still dressed for work in a navy suit, and her face was thin and tired-looking. She had an opened bag of barbecue potato chips in her hand. She tipped the bag toward me.

“Want one?” she asked.

“No, thanks,” I said. She followed me back to the bedroom and leaned against the wall. She put a potato chip in her mouth and looked at my overnight bag, open on the floor.

“I got your message,” she said. “I appreciate your letting me know.” I nodded and put a pair of boxers in the bag. “Do you think they’re gone for good?” she asked.

“I think so.”

“You’re not sure?”

I looked up at her. “Pretty sure is the best I can do,” I said. “I can’t guarantee anything for anyone.”

She looked at me for a while and gave a tiny nod. “I appreciate your letting me know,” she said again. She ate a potato chip. “Did you call Ned too?”

“Yep.”

“He must’ve been relieved.”

“I guess. I left a message, and I haven’t heard back.” I laughed a little, but it came out sounding choked. “Lauren said to give him time. I figure a year or so might do it.”

I packed a polo shirt and jeans and tucked my shaving kit next to them. I took a black nylon waist pack from my closet and opened its two pockets. I put a flashlight, a small pry bar, a couple of screwdrivers, a Swiss army knife, a putty knife, and a couple of pairs of vinyl gloves in one. I took the Glock 30 from my bureau and slipped it in the other. I zipped the waist pack and put it in a side compartment of my overnight bag. Jane watched, and her face was very still.

“Where are you going?” she asked.

“Lenox. It’s in western Mass, in the Berkshires.”

Jane crunched loudly on another chip and nodded. “I used to go there in the summers with my parents. It’s a little early for the music, but I guess you’re not going for that.”

“It turns out Danes inherited a house up there, from his late friend and neighbor Joe Cortese. The final transfer took place two months ago, just before Danes split. There’s no phone in Danes’s name in that neck of the woods, and Cortese’s old number is out of service. I’m going to knock on the door.”

Jane looked at the bag again. “And if there’s no answer?”

“I’ll let myself in.”

She glanced at the clock on my nightstand. It was six forty-five. “It’ll be late by the time you get there.”

“I’ll wait until tomorrow to go calling.”

She picked another chip from her bag. “Renting a car?” I nodded. “It’s— what?— a three-hour drive from here?”

“Three and a half,” I said.

“Where are you staying?”

“A place called the Ravenwood Inn, right in town. The woman there said she’d keep a light on for me.”

“Cancel your rental. I’ll give you a lift.”

I zipped up my bag and looked at her. “Don’t you have to work?”

A tiny smile crossed her face. She shook her head. “We’re all but done. We’ve got final versions of the agreements, and all we need now is board approval. Our board said yes today; the buyer’s board is meeting at the end of the week. Until then, I don’t have much to do. Besides, I’ve had my car for three months now, and I’ve used it maybe five times. It’s going to go stale or something if I don’t let it run.”

I took a deep breath. “I don’t know what I’m walking into up there, Jane.”

“It’s not like I’m going with you on your house call. There’s a nice spa up there. I’ll go get myself wrapped in something, or maybe I’ll look at some real estate. Or maybe I’ll just lie in bed all day and eat bonbons.”

I shook my head. “Really, it could be … complicated.”

“I consider myself warned. You want me to sign a release or something?”

“I’m serious.”

She folded down the top of the potato chip bag and tossed it on the bed. She brushed her palms together and dusted off the crumbs. “So am I. I know what you do for a living, John; I’m a big girl.” She crossed her arms on her chest. “Those guys following us took me by surprise— they freaked me out. And those photos …” A shiver rippled through her, and she shook her head.

“I’m sorry that that happened, Jane. I wish—”

She held up a hand. “I know. I know you’re sorry. It was a passing thing, and now it’s past. But you can’t keep that stuff from me, okay? You have to let me know what’s going on.”

We were quiet for a while and I looked into her dark, weary eyes. “Are we taking the chips?” I asked.

It took Jane twenty minutes to shower, change into jeans and a T-shirt, and pack a bag. Twenty minutes after that we were in her gray Audi TT in a fast-moving stream of traffic, northbound on the Henry Hudson Parkway. Jane was behind the wheel; I manned the CD player and doled out the potato chips.

The Hudson River was black below us and empty, but for a tug pushing south toward the harbor. Yellow light spilled from its bridge and vanished on the oily water. The Palisades rose like a stone wave across the river, beneath a mass of purple clouds.

Jane squinted into the oncoming headlights and drove fast and well. And though she was tired, she was full of a nervous energy that could only dissipate itself in talk. It was lurching, lopsided conversation that lingered on no one topic but skittered among several without segue.

“We deferred the issue of my ongoing participation,” she said. “We took it out of the deal agreements and the buyers are making a separate offer.”

“They really think they can convince you?”

“They really think so.”

“And?”

“And they’re really wrong,” she laughed. An SUV swerved into our lane without a signal. Jane punched the horn and the Audi made a sonorous bark. She downshifted, slid left, swore softly, and passed the SUV.

“I don’t know what went on with you two,” she said, “but you should give Lauren a call.” I didn’t answer, and she glanced at me sideways. “Whatever it was, it left her pretty upset.” She glanced at me again. “She really worries about you, and she looks out for you. She spoke to Ned the other day, and he told her he’d hired that woman you liked for the security job— the ex-policeman, Alice something.”

“Ned hired Alice Hoyt?”

Jane nodded. “Lauren thought you’d like that.”

“I do— she’ll do good work for Klein— but I didn’t expect Ned to see it that way. Especially after what happened.”

“Lauren was funny when she told me; she does a great Ned imitation.” Jane puffed out her cheeks and lowered her voice. “I may not like what he’s doing with his life, but there’s no denying he knows his business.” Jane looked sideways again and smiled. “You should call her.”

We took the Henry Hudson into the Bronx, to the Saw Mill River Parkway, and we took that into Westchester. Traffic was heavy all the way. I put on a Steely Dan disc, and when Fagen started singing “Janie Runaway,” Jane talked about vacation plans.

“I was thinking about Europe— maybe Venice or the lake country— but then I thought that’s too much work, and maybe what we could use is some serious vegetable time. To me, that means ocean.” She glanced over. I nodded. “It’s late to find something on the Vineyard or Nantucket, but we could get something on the Maine coast or maybe farther north, like Nova Scotia. Or we could go out West— northern California maybe.” She glanced over and I nodded once more. “Bermuda’s nice too,” she added.

“Uh-huh,” I said. I knew by the silence that followed that that wasn’t enough. Or maybe it was too much.

Traffic thinned when we got on the Taconic Parkway, and it thinned some more as we drove in silence through Briarcliff and Ossining. As we crossed the Croton Reservoir, Jane spoke again, and the sound of her voice startled me.

“I’m getting tired. You better drive.”

We pulled off the Taconic in Jefferson Valley and switched places in the parking lot of a shopping center. Jane tilted her seat back. She kicked off her loafers and tucked her feet beneath her. I adjusted the driver’s seat and checked the mirrors. Jane looked at me and spoke very softly.

“Do you want to go on this vacation with me?” she asked. “Just tell me, yes or no.”

“Yes, I do … sure I do. We just need to see about the timing, that’s all. I’ve still got this case—”

“But you want to go?”

“We just need to work out the timing.”