Sammy Keyes and the Kiss Goodbye (11 page)

Which (with one skunk reporter, four odd ducks, and six testy teens) was (as Sarah Rothhammer was just sharing) already quite a zoo.

Hudson and Rita weren’t part of the waiting-room hubbub, being instead sidetracked by the suspicious activities taking place inside the Highrise laundry room.

“Why in the world would we call Gil Borsch?” Hudson whispered after Rita suggested it.

“Because
that
,” Rita said, “is the Nightie-Napper.”

“Vince Garnucci is the Nightie-Napper?”

Now, ordinarily a man with a … let’s just call it an
affinity
for old-ladies’ nightgowns (or muumuus, or bedsheets of floral design) would not seem like a threatening figure.

It was clear from his quick, furtive actions as he rummaged through the dryer and held up articles of clothing before tossing them back in that the Highrise manager was doing more than checking the moisture content of processed laundry. Still, to Hudson, a call to a psychiatrist seemed more appropriate than a call to the police.

But there
was
the unsettling issue of Holly’s mention of Sammy’s mention of the Nightie-Napper shortly before the attack.

And, slight as the man rummaging through the dryer was, maybe secrets of this sort brought out the beast inside.

Maybe there
was
danger in confronting him.

Especially since Rita no longer lived in the building and nobody knew they were there.

Now, please don’t jump to the conclusion that Hudson Graham was wimping out.

He most certainly was not.

But Hudson Graham, being an intelligent man, was considering the options before springing into action. It was not in his DNA (or his CIA training) to call the police (or, for that matter, ask for help). It
was
in his nature (as well as his training) to handle things himself.

But he had just decided that a call to Sergeant Borsch would be wise when Rita suddenly stepped out from behind cover and into the laundry room.

“Vince!” Rita snapped as she moved quickly across the room. “All this time it’s been
you
.”

The dryers in the basement of the Senior Highrise are (like everything else in the building) old. They are giant tumblers with large, porthole-style doors that swing open for easy access (and are still only fifty cents for forty minutes).

“Rita!” Vince Garnucci gasped as he ditched a shortsleeved, 100 percent cotton, primrose-patterned nightgown into the dryer. “What brings you back to the Highrise?”

But Rita cut straight to the point. “All this time we residents suspected each other—but it was
you
.”

“Me?” Vince Garnucci let out a forced laugh. “Rita, what are you talking about?”

“You know darned well what I’m talking about! You’re the Nightie-Napper!”

“Me?” The manager produced another laugh. “I was just trying to figure out whose clothes these were so I could call and say they’re done so the Nightie-Napper
won’t
get them!”

It was true that some residents had taken to marking their names inside their garments to discourage their disappearance (which is never a bad practice in institutions where memories are slipping anyway), but Rita wasn’t buying. “Nice try, Vince.”

Rita had always been a lady around the building manager. A (comparatively) calm, level-headed lady. But she had a look in her eye now. A serious, you-are
-mine
look in her eye. And instead of ladylike shoes, she was wearing red, kick-tush shoes, and the combination was clearly throwing Vince Garnucci for a loop.

“Now, Rita,” he said, backing away from her as she approached.

“Don’t you now-Rita me! I know what I saw!”

“Why would I steal nightgowns?” the manager choked out, backpedaling as Rita chased him.

“For your grandmother!” Rita cried (because two plus two was definitely equaling four).

“Hudson!” the manager cried. “Stop her! This is all a misunderstanding!”

But Hudson knew a guilty man when he saw one and instead said, “Give it up, m’man.”

Panic flashed across Vince Garnucci’s face. But rather
than just give it up (as well he should have), he continued moving backward, praying for a way out.

Instead, he found a way
in
.

Into an open dryer, that is.

The minute he crashed into it and stumbled backward, Rita pounced forward, shoved him in the rest of the way (swinging his legs around with a mighty heave-ho), and closed the door. “Call Gil!” she commanded Hudson, and leaned her weight against the big portal window while the Highrise manager slammed his palms against the glass and cried (muffled though it was), “Let me out! Let me out!”

Having both a cell phone and the presence of mind not to argue with a woman whom he’d just discovered possessed not only the vim but also the vigor to lock a grown man inside a clothes dryer, Hudson dialed the number. And when the call was answered with a hopeful “Is there news?” instead of the stoic “Gil Borsch here,” Hudson felt almost guilty about the news he did have. “No,” he replied, then quickly added, “Any chance you could get to the Senior Highrise? Rita’s trapped Vince Garnucci in a dryer. Looks like he’s the Nightie-Napper.”

“She’s … wait … 
what
?”

“You heard me, Gil.”

After a short hesitation, the lawman said, “That sounds like something
Sammy
would do.”

Hudson frowned as he eyed his wife, wedged up against the dryer. “Must be the shoes.”

“What’s that?”

“Can you just get here? We’re in the basement. I don’t know how long a man can breathe inside a closed dryer.”

“On my way,” Gil said, and clicked off.

Inside the dryer, Vince Garnucci had collapsed into a wretched puddle of pleas. And although the pleas themselves were not quite discernible through the glass (or the tears), it was clear that the man was losing it.

“Let him out, Rita. He’s harmless.”

“He’s a thief!” Rita countered.

Hudson nodded. “Let him out.”

Rita turned and studied the manager through the glass, then opened the door ever so slightly. “Confess,” she said through the crack. “Or get tumbled!”

What came through the opening was a long, gaspriddled barrage of incoherent (and very weepy) verbiage. And when the manager collapsed back into a balled-up position at the bottom of the dryer, Hudson asked, “What did he say?”

Rita shook her head. “Something about his grandmother being demanding and unreasonable.”

Hudson Graham had an exquisite opportunity to make a joke at Rita’s expense, but instead simply said, “Rita, the man’s in obvious pain. I don’t know how long he can breathe in there, and we’re not going to tumble a confession out of him. Let him out.”

So Rita relented.

Which Hudson immediately regretted.

With the eyes of a madman (or maybe just those of a man trapped in a dryer by a madwoman in high-tops), Vince Garnucci darted out of the laundry room, neatly
avoiding Hudson with a quick zig and a long zag around a row of washers.

And while Hudson was calling, “Mr. Garnucci! It does no good to run away!” Rita was zigging around him in hot pursuit. “Rita!” the septuagenarian called after her, but that, too, was to no avail. Rita simply shouted, “He’s the
Nightie-Napper
!” like it was a crime of unparalleled proportions (while also clearly conveying that Hudson had better get his boots in gear to help her undo the damage he’d caused).

Unfortunately for Hudson, he was not familiar with the labyrinth of basement hallways, doorways, and shortcuts.

Also unfortunate for Hudson was that he couldn’t track his bride by the
ticky-tap-tapp
ing of her shoes as he normally might.

There was also the dilemma of having told Gil Borsch that they were in the Highrise basement—something he felt he should update the lawman about as soon as possible.

This collective of unfortunates was, however, nothing in relation to the huge unfortunate of having given his new wife advice that had backfired.

Still. It was with great relief that Hudson wound up on the first floor and immediately heard his wife’s voice (shouting as it was) from down a hallway near the manager’s desk. This was followed almost immediately by the additional relief of Sergeant Borsch whooshing in through the front door.

“Gil!” Hudson called. “This way!”

So the two men raced toward the sound of Rita’s voice and skidded to a halt when they saw Rita with her foot
jammed in a doorway, preventing an apartment door with a dull brass
MANAGER
plaque on it from closing. “This is not a joke, Vince!” she was shouting. “And I’m not dropping it!”

“
How
old is she?” Gil asked, forgetting his manners (which were notoriously MIA anyway) as he took in the scene.

Hudson shook his head and neatly avoided the question. “I tell you, it’s the shoes.”

“Rita,” Sergeant Borsch said, approaching the impasse. “Let me handle it.”

“Hrmph!” Rita said. “If by ‘handle it’ you mean you’re going to let him get away again, no thank you! This building has been terrorized by the Nightie-Napper for … for years!”

“Terrorized?” Gil said with a bit of a smirk. “By someone who steals nightgowns?”

“It’s not just nightgowns! And don’t you mock me, Gilbert Borsch! Ask anyone who lives here—the situation has been very unsettling!”

Now, there is clearly a huge gap between being unsettled and being terrorized, but Gil Borsch (wisely) didn’t make an issue of it. Instead, he calmly reached over Rita’s shoulder and knocked on the door. “Police!” he barked. “Give yourself up, Garnucci.”

And just like that, the pressure Vince Garnucci had been exerting on the inside of the apartment door ceased, causing the outside pressure Rita had been exerting to fling the door open.

Hudson had been to the Highrise enough to have had many friendly exchanges with Vince Garnucci. Usually the topic was the weather, but one time the manager had told him a long story about his grandmother’s foray into a seedier side of town, where she’d been on her bicycle in search of some organic agave for her afternoon tea. “I guess I was too slow finding some for her, so she set out to do it herself,” the manager had said with a laugh. “I will never hear the end of it!”

Hudson had mentioned the exchange to Rita, who had advised him to avoid conversations concerning the grandmother at all costs. “Once he starts,” she’d warned him, “he goes on and on and on and on!”

And that had been the extent of the thought Hudson had given to Vince Garnucci’s bicycle-riding grandmother. Only now as the man disappeared down a hallway inside the apartment (leaving his front door wide open) did Hudson realize there was something peculiar about the situation. (Well, beyond a grown man stealing old ladies’ nightgowns, that is.) “Does his grandmother live here?” he whispered to Rita.

“I’ve never seen her,” Rita whispered back. “I was under the impression that she lived across town.”

But the question was understandable because the apartment was furnished in florals. From the slipcovers on the couch, to the window treatments, to the kitchen-chair cushions, to the lampshades, the place was like a three-dimensional quilt of unmatched flowery fabrics.

And then to the left, partly tucked away behind the
door, Hudson noticed a bicycle. An old-fashioned, onespeed, yellow, slant-framed bicycle with a white basket (adorned with synthetic flowers), faded blue-and-yellow handle ribbons, and a classic
ching-ching
handlebar bell.

“Something’s not right here,” Hudson said, to which Gil Borsch muttered, “You can say that again.”

Then Rita (referring to the abundance of overlapping pillows propped neatly along the back of the couch) whispered, “I believe those used to be Rose Wedgewood’s muumuu.”

“I mean, beyond theft,” Hudson said, pointing out the bicycle. “Something’s not right here.”

“Oh!” Rita gasped. “She
does
live here?”

Wanting to get a better look, Rita stepped over the threshold, but both Hudson and Sergeant Borsch pulled her back. “We don’t want to compromise the investigation with an unlawful entry,” Hudson said.

“Exactly!” Sergeant Borsch agreed, eyeing Hudson with appreciation. Then he cupped his mouth and bellowed, “Garnucci! Get out here!”

From inside the apartment, a gray-haired woman appeared. She was wearing glasses, a collared floral dress, and Velcro-close shoes, and was relying heavily on a cane. “Go away,” came her high, warbly voice. “I’ll pay for the damages. Vinnie has been through enough.”

The trio stared at the woman a moment, not wanting to argue with her. She was, after all,
old
. Far older than Hudson or Rita.

But Sergeant Borsch eventually managed to clear his throat and say, “I’m sorry, ma’am, but—”

“I said I’d pay!” she warbled, taking another step forward.

And that was when Hudson noticed something peculiar. “Uh, Gil,” he whispered as he leaned over to speak to the lawman. “Look at the arms.”

“Huh?” Gil asked.

“The
hair
on the arms? It’s brown. And rather thick?”

With a jolt of horror Sergeant Borsch and Rita simultaneously realized what Hudson had already concluded: This woman was neither old nor (actually) a woman.

“I’m feeling very
Psycho
,” Gil Borsch said under his breath. “Rita, you might want to back up.”

“Vince,” Hudson said calmly to the (wigged-out) man, “we know that’s you.”

“I am
Carlotta
,” came the high (not-quite-so-warbly) voice. “And I demand that you leave us alone!”

“Sorry,” Sergeant Borsch informed him. “Not gonna happen.”

From the bits and pieces Vince Garnucci had relayed about his grandmother, it should have been pretty clear to the others that she was a woman who didn’t take no for an answer, and this version of Carlotta Garnucci was certainly living up to that reputation. Rather than surrender or retreat, she attacked.

Fortunately, she was not a knife-wielding psycho, but simply a bike-bashing one. In a flash, the fake, flowered female was behind the fake-flowered basket, ramming the bicycle (wheel first) out the door and into Sergeant Borsch.