Murder Can Spoil Your Appetite (19 page)

“I was home—sick. I didn’t even go to work on Wednesday.”

“You have your own apartment now?” Lou wanted to know.

“No. I moved in with a friend temporarily. He has plenty of room—his wife took the three kids and split last Christmas. And he very kindly invited me to stay with him until the condo I bought in September is ready for occupancy. Whenever
that
is.”

“What time did your friend get home that day?”

“Around two in the morning, he told me. I didn’t hear him come in.”

“Can anyone vouch for your whereabouts that evening?” Lou asked. “Any visitors? Phone calls?”

“No visitors. And I didn’t take any calls. I was feeling so lousy that around seven-thirty I put on the answering machine and went to sleep.”

“I believe you mentioned that you hadn’t seen Sheila Vincent since the barbecue.”

Whitfield regarded me suspiciously. “That’s right, Detective Shapiro.”

“Well, what would you say if I told you that the two of you were spotted together only a couple of weeks before Vincent’s murder?” The way I figured, it was worth a try, anyhow.

“I would say, Detective, that either you—or your source—is a damn liar.”

The waiter had just taken our orders when I remembered.
Oh, God, Jackie!
Excusing myself, I made a beeline for the pay phones.

She wasn’t at her apartment, for which, to be honest, I was grateful. I left a message, satisfied that the call would mollify her somewhat. But then again, maybe not. Jackie, I reminded myself, was almost as accomplished a worrier as Ellen. And, of course, in the nag department she made my niece look like a mere neophyte. Still, she was a good and loyal friend—to say nothing of being positively the best secretary in New York.

I was about halfway back to the table when I remembered I’d spoken to Jackie on Saturday night. And yesterday was Tuesday. I did a finger-count: three days.
Imagine!
It was enough of a chore having to deal with Ellen’s anxieties. But now, after not hearing from me for only
three days,
here was Jackie acting as if I’d committed a capital crime.

At that moment I could have kicked myself all the way to Philadelphia for even phoning her tonight.

Well, the woman had intimidated me for the last time. Believe it. From here on, I’d call her when it was convenient for me; she’d just have to accept that.

Pleased with this newfound resolve, I felt as if I were growing taller with every step I took. (With any luck, I might shoot all the way up to five-three before I even got to the table.) But only a few seconds later:
Oh, hell. Maybe I’ll give her a ring in the morning.

When I rejoined Lou, a glass of merlot was waiting for me. “You’ll take it easy with that, I hope.” He was indicating the wine. “You’ve still got a drive ahead of you, don’t forget.”

I hadn’t forgotten. Any more than I’d forgotten how that Chianti had affected me on Sunday. So I’d already decided to restrict myself to only half a glass of wine tonight. “Don’t worry. I
am
a responsible adult, Lou,” I retorted sourly.

“Okay, okay. Don’t get mad. So what did you think of Whitfield?”

“I think he’s got possibilities.”

“Possibilities?”

“He could be the widow’s mystery lover. By his own admission he’s been carrying a torch for her all these years. He doesn’t have an alibi, either.” And before Lou could say a word, I threw in, “Which just means he
could have
shot Vincent.”

“Do you really think Mrs. Vincent would consider taking him back after what he pulled?”

“It was a horrendous thing to do, of course, but he
was
young and scared. Maybe she took that into account.”

“I have a boy in high school, Desiree,” Lou responded, an edge to his voice, “and I can’t imagine Jake, even at his age, being so self-involved and irresponsible that he’d leave a girl at the altar—particularly someone he professed to love—
and
run off with her sister.”

“I get the feeling you don’t think too much of the man,” I commented with my customary astuteness.

“His actions were unforgivable. He can’t justify them by pointing to his youth, either. Not with me, anyhow.”

“Oh, I don’t think it was so much that he was attempting to justify his behavior as to explain it. Do you want to hear who
I’d
like to beat up? That Marsha person. After all, this is her
sister
she stabbed in the back.”

“Yeah, but according to Whitfield—and I can’t see any reason he’d lie about that—Marsha was pretty much an emotional wreck.”

I agreed that I hadn’t really been taking this into consideration.

“Which reminds me,” Lou said, “do you think walking out on his wife can also be blamed on his youth?”

Now, while I was as appalled as Lou was by Whitfield’s treatment of his once-upon-a-time fiancée, I had somehow assumed the role of his defender during the past few minutes. And I picked up the sword again. “Don’t be such a smart ass. That was different. It’s not as if Whitfield just skipped out on Marsha or anything. Besides, who knows what the marriage was like. And he did wait until she was in better shape mentally before talking to her about the divorce. That was decent of him, wouldn’t you say?”

“So you’re willing to accept that Marsha’s emotional state was the reason he didn’t break up with her earlier?”

“Okay, you tell me. Why else would he have held off for so long? Unless, of course, he’d begun seeing Sheila again.”

Lou scoffed at the suggestion. “Forget it. But it’s possible, isn’t it, that it was only recently he met someone new—and that this is the
real
reason he didn’t ditch his wife until a couple of months ago? What I’m saying is, maybe he wasn’t as unhappy with her as he wants us to believe.

“ ‘I knew it would be better for both of us if we separated, ’ ”
Lou muttered in a totally unrecognizable imitation of Ron Whitfield. “Bullshit! The guy’s a self-serving bastard. Take it from me.”

Maybe he was right. Maybe Whitfield was just as much of a lowlife as Lou maintained that he was. It didn’t matter, though. What
did
matter was whether he was a killer as well.

 

John and Mary’s was one of Lou’s favorite restaurants. And I soon discovered the reason that—judging from the crowd tonight—so many people shared his enthusiasm for the place. I mean, the food was special enough to make you forget that there wasn’t enough atmosphere here to fill a thimble.

My shrimp cocktail was merely sublime, the huge, fresh-tasting crustaceans served with a cocktail sauce that had exactly the right amount of zip to it. And the prime rib was perfect, done just the way I like it—as rare as you can get without being raw. Lou was equally enamored of his liver and onions, which is something you would have had to force feed me, even if it were to be my last meal before they strapped me into the electric chair. “They really know how to make this here,” he informed me gleefully on sampling the entree. Then he eyed my plate with distaste, embellishing on his silent critique with an involuntary shudder.

As I recall, it was right after Lou had consumed his third revolting forkful that he said, “So what made you decide to become a PI, anyway, Dez?”

He called me Dez!
It was the first time he’d addressed me by my nickname. And for some reason, I was inordinately pleased by this.

At any rate, I was concerned about providing an honest answer to his question. You see, the truth is that when I was young—of such tender years, in fact, that I hadn’t even started lying about my age yet—I got the idea that being a private investigator was a really nifty profession for a woman. You know, glamorous and exciting and all that junk. Back then, I even got a kick out of imagining people’s expressions when I told them what I did for a living. I mean, I was—
am
—absolutely nobody’s conception of what a PI looks like.

If I admitted any of this to Lou, though, he might regard me as just the tiniest bit shallow. So I waffled a little. “I wanted to do something challenging and . . . uh . . . useful.”

“You weren’t worried about personal danger?”

“Not initially. I guess I was too stupid and immature to let myself be bothered by details like that. I did smarten up some later on, of course. Enough to be afraid once in a while, anyway. But I never allowed that to keep me from doing what I set out to do.”

What I didn’t mention was just
how much
later on it was before I even had anything to fear. You see, the way things developed, for the longest time I handled mostly divorce, insurance, and child custody cases, with a few missing pets thrown in. So aside from a very infrequent cat scratch, the only job-related injury I was likely to sustain was a paper cut. Actually, in those days selling shoes would probably have been a more hazardous career choice. This suddenly changed about four years ago, however, when I stumbled into my first murder investigation. But that’s a whole different story.

“Do you like your work?” Lou put to me now.

This time it wasn’t necessary to fiddle with the truth. “Yes, I do. But how about you? Why did you become a cop?”

“My uncle was a cop, and ever since I was a kid I had it in my mind to be just like Uncle Bill. I could hardly wait until I was old enough to join the force. A couple of years after I was married, though, I decided I wanted to be an attorney with the DA’s office. I even went to law school at night for a semester.”

“You didn’t take to it?”

“It wasn’t that. Lois—my wife—got sick, and Jake was already on the way. I always intended to go back eventually, but I kept putting it off.” Lou’s grin was touched with regret. “So here I am.”

For the next few minutes we devoted ourselves entirely to our food. And then Lou asked, “Your husband—what did he do?”

“He was a PI, too. And with the NYPD before that.”

“Were you married long?”

“Only five years. But they were very good years.” The forkful of roast beef that was en route to my mouth came to an abrupt stop for a second or two, and I could feel my eyes misting over. Lou reached over and patted my hand—the one that wasn’t involved with the roast beef. “How long were you and Lois married?” I asked, with only the slightest quiver in my voice.

“Ten years. She finally succumbed to her sickness—leukemia. Next month would have been our twenty-second anniversary.” He cocked his head to one side. “You miss him a lot, huh?” he said gently.

“Yes. It wasn’t recent or anything—his death, that is. Every once in a while, though . . .” I couldn’t quite finish.

Lou patted my uninvolved hand again. “I understand.”

“But I imagine you miss Lois a great deal, too.”

He nodded. “She was a wonderful person—Lois. A very good wife and mother.”

Well, this didn’t sound exactly heartfelt to me. I mean, you really had to hear how casually it was said. And it occurred to me that the Lou-Lois coupling hadn’t exactly been a love match. Now, don’t ask me what made this any of my business. Or where I got the
chutzpah
to attempt to verify my supposition. I like to believe, though, that the
chutzpah
part came out of a merlot bottle. (Okay, it’s true that I hadn’t even reached my limit yet, but that self-imposed half-a-glass quota was hardly based on any scientific formula.) At any rate, I murmured, “You must have loved her very much.”

“I suppose I—” Lou caught himself. “Yes, I did,” he stated firmly. “I don’t remember when I didn’t know Lois. We’d lived across the street from each other since grammar school, and then we started to go out together when we were in our teens. Everyone sort of expected we’d get married one day.” And now he added lightly, “Which we did.”

And all of a sudden, I felt sad.

I must have said those words to myself close to a dozen times as I headed back to Manhattan that night. I couldn’t help it. There he was, married for so many years to a woman he didn’t actually love. (I didn’t care
what
he claimed, it was obvious to me that Lou and Lois were no Mike and Carol—you know,
The Brady Bunch.
)

I doubted if there was anyone special in Lou’s life these days, either. When I’d mentioned our working on Sunday, he complained about having to cancel plans with
his son Jake.
And while this was far,
far
from conclusive, I got the feeling that all he had in his life was Jake, who would soon be taking off for college.
And abandoning poor Lou.

Well, I was not going to permit this thoughtful, decent—and, I decided,
lonely
—man to spend the rest of his years loveless. I’d think of somebody for him. Let’s see . . .

I was still laboring diligently on Lou’s behalf by the time I reached the Upper East Side, having just moments before scratched a third woman as a potential Lou soulmate. She was just too bossy. Plus, she (Jackie, if you must know) was pretty well tied up with that cheapskate Derwin, anyway.

I was so immersed in my crusade to find Lou a suitable companion that I automatically headed for my old garage, remembering only when I’d pulled up in front of it that I’d switched almost three months ago to a new place with more reasonable rates. Rectifying the mistake, I unburdened myself of my Chevy and then, during the one-and-a-half-block walk back to the apartment, managed to come up with—and reject—a fourth candidate for Lou’s consideration. This one biting the dust for being too passive.

It wasn’t until I crawled into bed more than an hour later that I made up my mind to give “Operation Love Match” a little breathing room. If I left it alone for a while, somebody was bound to make herself known to my subconscious. I was convinced of it.

This settled, I soon drifted off to sleep—without it ever registering that there’d been no message from Al on my machine tonight.