The Old Deep and Dark (22 page)

“No.” Reaching out her hands, she said, “I want you. I need you.”

His voice softened. “Good, then, we've got work to do.”

 

23

“What
is
this place?” said Jane, feeling the stairway creak under her weight.

“Like I said on the phone,” said Cordelia, pointing her flashlight ahead of them, “you need to see this for yourself.”

As they descended the steps, Jane saw that the police had set up lights to illuminate the long, narrow room. “When did they get here?”

“About an hour ago.”

Jane had just dropped Tommy back at the summerhouse when the SOS call came in from Cordelia. “I don't want to put too fine a point on this,” said Jane, watching a mouse scurry along the edge of the stairway, “but perhaps the cold case team should do a systematic search of the entire theater.”

“Already on their agenda. They need a warrant to make it official. I can't believe Octavia is out of the country and I have to deal with this on my own.”

Jane wasn't sure what Cordelia thought her sister would bring to the table, unless it was even more melodramatic foreboding.

“We can't go in,” whispered Cordelia, blocking Jane from moving closer than a few yards from the entrance to the room. “The cold case team is doing their official examination. But, I mean, isn't this just too creepy? Not only is the building haunted, it seems to attract skeletons.”

Jane offered a friendly nod to an officer who was stretching yellow crime-scene tape across the top of the door. To Cordelia, she said, “Did you find out anything about skeleton number two?” She figured they might as well start numbering them.

Cordelia pressed a finger to her lips. “Follow me,” she whispered, heading back up the stairs. Once they'd returned to her office, she sat down behind her desk, motioning for Jane to sit across from her. Tapping her head, she said, “This time, I kept my wits about me and, before I called the cops, I did a little bit of digging myself, taking great care not to mess too much with the crime scene.”

Jane wasn't sure that had been a good idea, though since it was a fait accompli, she wanted to know what her friend had learned. “And?”

“I found a billfold, opened it ever so carefully with the tip of a pen.” Looking like she was about to burst with excitement, she blurted out, “I saw the driver's license. I know the name of our latest dead body.”

Jane mentally cringed. This was a real human being they were talking about, someone who'd been shot, assassin style, and then stuffed in a trunk inside a secret room behind the walls of an old building.

“Stanislaw Melcer!”

“Stanislaw Melcer? That was his name?”

“Yes!”

“Other than the fact that he's the second homicide victim you've uncovered, does the name mean anything to you?”

“No!”

“Then why are you so excited?”

“I don't know!” Her elation evaporated as she slumped in her chair.

“The only thing that connects them,” offered Jane, pushing her hands into the pockets of her jacket, “is the men's manner of death and the fact that they were both hidden in the theater.”

“I think they're connected by more than that.”

“Like what?”

“No idea.”

“Just intuition.”

“Nothing is ever ‘just' intuition, Janey. Gut feelings are powerful.”

“Did you learn anything else from his driver's license?”

“The month, date, and year it needed to be renewed.” Closing her eyes to search her memory banks, she repeated, “June 16, 1986.”

“So, since a driver's license is good for four years, that puts the year of his death anywhere from 1982 to 1986. What was happening at the theater here during those years?”

“Exquisite question,” said Cordelia, whipping open one of her lower desk drawers and pawing through the contents. “Thanks to Archibald, I have the answer at my fingertips.” She dropped a file folder on her desk and opened the cover. Placing her finger at the top of a column, she drew it down until she found the information she needed. “Oh, sure, Piccolo. I know the two people who ran it.”

“Call them,” said Jane. She needed to bring Cordelia up to speed about all the revelations she'd learned from JoJi Mura and Tommy Prior, but for the moment, that could wait.

Cordelia pressed a button on her phone and said, with deep solemnity, “Mitford, bring me the bible.”

Jane had seen this immense tome more than once. It looked like something Dickens would have written about—a tattered, patched, and frayed, possibly even decaying, antique address book that Cordelia had likely been given at birth, one in which she'd entered every name, address, and phone number from every human being she'd ever encountered that might have some bearing on her life in the theater.

Mitford, her longtime secretary, a woman she'd poached from her old job at the Allen Grimby Repertory Theater, came through the door holding the book carefully in both hands, as if she were afraid it might disintegrate into a pile of dust before her eyes.

“Thank you, Mitford. That will be all. Now, let me see.” She wet a finger and began flipping through the crumbling pages.

“Why don't you have Mitford transfer the information in that book to a computer file?”

Cordelia gave Jane a half-lidded look. “
Please,
dearheart. One does not trample on tradition.” A few more flipped pages and she had it. “Daria Marsh. Here we go.” She tapped in the number. “People move a lot, so often as not, the phone numbers don't—” She blinked. “Daria? Is that you?” Smiling she said, “Cordelia Thorn here. How are you? Long time, yes.”

Jane scrolled through her cell phone messages while Cordelia made her initial pleasantries. She had a text from her father asking her to call him ASAP. Two voice mails from her restaurant manager. Nothing from Avi.

“Yes, that's the name,” said Cordelia. “Stanislaw Melcer. Ah, you say he was an actor?” She listened, making notes on the front of the file folder. “Missing? Heavens. When? I mean, can you remember the production he was in? The year?” She wrote the answers down, underlining them. “Yes, this is a huge help. I can't tell you what I'm working on, but rest assured, you'll read about it in the newspapers.” She listened a moment more. “Sure, let's get together for lunch one day soon. I'll have my secretary call you and set up a date. You, too, darling. Ta.” Tossing her pen down, she wiggled her eyebrows at Jane.

“So?”

“He went missing during rehearsals for the 1986 production of
Happy Birthday, Wanda June.
He'd been cast in the part of Dr. Norbert Woodley. Great play. I remember seeing it. Actually, I—” Her voice trailed off.

“What?” asked Jane.

Pulling out of her trance, Cordelia cleared her throat and tittered. “I must be remembering this wrong. It's just too … coincidental.”

“What is?”

“I think … no, can't be.”

“Cordelia.”

“I believe Kit starred in that production. I'm not absolutely positive, but it seems to me she played the part of Penelope Ryan. Even if I'm right, it can't mean anything. She worked at this theater a lot back then. It was the heyday of her career in Minnesota, before she started acting nationally.” Locking eyes with Jane, she said, “I'm right, aren't I? It doesn't mean anything?”

“Let's look at the facts,” said Jane, still clicking through her phone. “She knew the first man who died—the one who was buried in the basement.”

“Right.”

“And she might have known the second man who died, the one found today.”

“Possibly.”

“Both were killed with a bullet to the forehead.”

“Well—”

Jane stuffed her phone back in her jacket pocket. “And her husband was murdered on Sunday morning by a shot to the forehead.”

Without moving a muscle, Cordelia said, “There's got to be a flaw in that reasoning.”

“Name it,” said Jane, knowing full well that the logic was sound.

“I feel like I'm going to throw up.”

“I'll find you a wastebasket.”

“That's kind of you.”

 

24

As usual, Booker and his sister stood outside the closed door to the living room and listened as Ray Lawless delivered the news that Tommy had been released from custody because the button the police had found, the one that placed Tommy at the scene of the crime, had been planted. What had begun as Ray's attempt to deliver that news had turned into a heated argument. Before it was over, Booker and Chloe were back in her bedroom. All the lies and family secrets appeared to be coming apart, which was fine by Booker. Chloe, he feared, was also coming apart. He watched her pace and mutter, frustrated that none of his soothing words seemed to penetrate. Since he had no particular belief that the world would be a dandy place after the Jordan and Kit Deere informational apocalypse, he decided to get out while he still could.

He arrived at the Heidelberg Club and sat in his car listening to music, trying to unwind. He kept his gaze firmly fastened to the front door of the main building, willing Erin to come out. She did just that half an hour later. She emerged wearing shades and a nondescript tan raincoat. She looked like she was dressing for the role of the female spy in an espionage movie. Because he didn't know what sort of clothing she normally wore, he assumed it meant nothing more than a poor fashion choice.

He waited in his car, watching her get into a white Ford Focus, undoubtedly a rental, arrange the seat belt, and then drive off. He followed at a judicious distance as she pulled out onto the main road and headed straight for the freeway.

Forty minutes later, as the sun was swallowed by a thick bank of clouds, she pulled into another parking lot, this one at a church on Lyndale Avenue in south Minneapolis. Booker parked across the street and waited to see if she would go inside. It took a few minutes, but she eventually left the car and walked slowly, almost hesitantly, up to a tall chain-link fence. Behind the fence was a playground where several dozen children were playing on slides, swings, jungle gyms, and other assorted equipment. Erin hadn't said anything about having friends in town with young children. Scanning the side of the building, Booker noticed a sign that said,
PLAY-DAY DAY CARE.

Curious.

Erin scanned the playground until she spotted a little girl sitting alone in a sandbox. The girl had curly brown hair and wore oversized clumsy black rain boots and a coat that looked like it was made from a patchwork quilt. As soon as Erin found her, she grasped a section of the chain link, almost as if she wanted to reach out and touch her. Even after the children had gone inside, Erin continued to stand by the fence, a small lonely figure buffeted by a raw autumn wind. Booker found her behavior puzzling. When she turned to walk back to her car, the pinched expression on her face suggested a woman in pain. There was a story behind this visit and he needed to know what it was.

Following Erin back to the Heidelberg Club, they arrived as daylight was beginning to fade. This time, after parking his car, he made no effort to hide himself. As she worked her way against the stiff breeze toward the front door, he called, “Erin, hey. Wait up.”

Maybe he was kidding himself, but when she turned around, he thought he saw the tiniest hint of pleasure in her eyes.

“What are you doing here?” she called.

“Oh, I don't know. I was in the neighborhood.”

“Sure.” She smiled.

“Let me take you to dinner.”

“Not tonight, Booker. I don't think I'd be very good company.”

“But you're leaving soon, right? We won't have that many more chances.” He bet himself that he could make her cave. “Come on. We can either eat here, or we can drive into King's Bay.”

She turned to the door, then back to him. “Let's eat here.”

He offered her his arm. It was a dweeb move, but by the time he'd analyzed it, she'd already taken it and they were sailing through the front door. God help them both if she continued to bring out the dweeb in him.

Dinner that night was nothing short of amazing. He could tell she needed cheering up, so that's what he did. He hadn't realized he possessed any charm at all until he heard the words coming out of his mouth. He got her laughing and kept at it. The wine helped, as did the hokey accordion player, a fat guy wearing lederhosen and kneesocks. The food seemed unusually good. Or maybe it was just the company. Whatever the case, they didn't stop laughing, didn't really move into a more intimate space until their final cup of coffee—until the restaurant had almost cleared of guests and the soft, romantic glow from the candles began to penetrate.

Booker wasn't sure how to approach the questions tumbling around inside him, the ones about her connection to his father, and the newest enigma—the little brown-haired girl at the day care center. He wanted to understand her. He wanted it all at once, fast, easy, like taking a pill. He needed answers, but wanted them without doing any hard work. Mostly, he was afraid that if he pushed, she'd run away. And yet didn't he have to trust that they'd connected tonight? That it meant something. Wires had touched and sparked, bright enough for an entire dining room to see.

“So,” he said, wiping his lips with a napkin, “how much longer do I have you for?”

“You mean, when am I leaving?”

“You know, Erin, Minnesota is beautiful in the fall.”

“The fall's almost over.”

“November can be nice.”

She played with her wineglass. “I wish you'd take that job at Cordelia's new theater.”

“Because?”

“I'll be back in February, when she starts work on my play. Would be nice to think you'd be here.”

“Do you have other friends in town?”