Bubbles Ablaze (26 page)

“Makes sense. Hugh told me he didn't care about coal,” I said.

“He didn't care about much besides himself.” Louise unwrapped the towel from her head and ran her fingers through her wet hair. “However, he did care about impressing his father. Even though his father was weak and partially paralyzed, he still called up Hugh every day and reamed him out. Until last year. That's when he hit bottom.”

“Hugh or his father?” I asked.

“Both. Senior McMullen suffered another stroke and Hugh had to put his father in a nursing home. Since his father was out of the house in Glen Ellen, Hugh sold it and moved full-time to Pittsburgh.” She folded the towel and laid it in her lap. “He'd only communicate with the office by phone. That's why I don't know about him and Price. Hugh McMullen rarely came to Slagville so I never took his calls or overheard his phone conversations.”

“What did you do with your day?”

Louise laughed. “Not much. Checked the want ads because I was certain the company was going down the toilet.”

“You ever hear of Carl Koolball?” I asked.

“Are you kidding? I must have typed his name two-hundred times on letters to other coal companies.”

“Why?”

“Mr. McMullen said we had a legal obligation to warn them once we found out that Koolball was threatening our employees. He was worried that Koolball might get hired someplace else and become violent there and we'd be liable. You read so many newspaper stories about employees taking Uzis into work and such.”

I'd heard from Roxanne that Stinky was threatening
management if it didn't fess up to the state. But I'd never heard that he was threatening employees.

“Threatening employees, how?” I asked.

Louise glanced at her bare toes. “You know, now that you mention it, I'm not really sure. Mr. McMullen just told me that Stinky was a threat and that I needed to get those letters out fast. I guess I kinda took his word for it. I mean, he was my boss.”

Smear campaign, I thought. “Before that incident did you know Stinky, I mean, Carl?”

“I never heard his name before, although I gather he was a cartographer in special projects.”

I couldn't think of anything else to ask until Jane said, “Didn't Hugh ever come by the office, even on a lark?”

“Once a month he'd make a visit.” She paused, weighing whether or not to go on.

I let her weigh. When I was starting out in reporting I used to jump in and offer suggestions to my interviewees, simply because I couldn't stand the awkward silences. Since then I've learned that awkward is good. Human nature can't abide silence.

“This is probably pretty tasteless of me to say, since he's dead now,” Louise said eventually, “but I threw a fit last month when he called me into work on Labor Day.”

“Labor Day?” I said encouragingly.

“Labor Day!” she said firmly, apparently hot at the thought of McMullen's inconsideration. “I mean, here this guy is never in the office. Then he decides to come to Slagville during Labor Day weekend, one of my few long weekends in the year, and he calls me in, too.”

“What for?” Jane asked.

“I don't know. To type up those Koolball letters and order flowers for his girlfriend. He was so self-centered, he didn't care that I had a family and maybe wanted to spend a day with them.”

“Girlfriend?” Jane said. “Hear that, Mom? Hugh McMullen had a girlfriend.”

“Must have been ‘none of your business,' ” I said.

Louise leaned forward. “I think it was. I was supposed to go to a family reunion that weekend.”

It took me a second to catch the misunderstanding. “No, that's not what I meant. When I ran into Hugh McMullen in Limbo, he said he didn't kill Price, that he had an alibi. Supposedly it was a friend he was with. When I asked him the friend's name, Hugh said, ‘None of your business.' ”

Louise sat back, a quizzical look on her face. “That was probably her, then. Twelve Tremont Road, Slagville. I know the address by heart. I sent flowers there all summer.”

“And the name?” Jane asked.

Louise shook her head. “Have no idea. Sorry.”

A lid dropped on the kitchen floor. Gary getting a second helping. It reminded Louise that she needed to get a move on. “I better go,” she said, standing.

I thanked her and turned to leave, stopping myself as though a terribly insightful thought had just occurred to me. “Too bad you don't have the phone records of Hugh's calls when he was in the office. My editor swears by records. He likes to say more men have been saved by paper than by guns.”

“He's probably right.” Louise turned the knob on her front door. “Good night, then.”

“Good night.”

Jane lit into me as soon as we were safe in the Camaro. “More men have been saved by paper than by guns? Where did you get that one, Mom?”

“From a toilet paper ad.” I was fixated on the list of Slagville streets on the Columbia County street map I had picked up at the Texaco. I may not read the articles in the newspaper, but I never miss a good TP ad.

Jane leaned over to inspect what I was doing. “Oh, goody. We're off to Twelve Tremont Road.”

“Tremont. D-Five.” I ran my finger down the D line and
intersected it with the Five line. “What about that party you're so anxious to get to?”

“I can drink and smoke and dance anytime, but tracking down a murderer's girlfriend? How often does that happen?”

I kept my finger on Tremont Road and regarded my precious daughter. “You can drink and smoke anytime?”

She punched me in the arm. “Took you long enough to pick up on that. You're getting rusty.”

T
he sun had almost set by the time we found Tremont Road. It was at the edge of town and only three blocks long. Small Cape-style houses were set back from the street, their homey lights twinkling amidst the whish of falling leaves in the breeze. Unlike most neighborhoods in Slagville, this one was suburban, but the homes were as surgically immaculate as all the other homes in the anthracite region. People here had spent the Saturday raking up and pruning hedges.

Except for Twelve Tremont Road.

There were no lights on in the house and brown leaves littered the overgrown grass lawn. It was neglected.

“It's almost spooky,” Jane said. “Slap a gargoyle on the roof and it'd be haunted.”

“It's all the Halloween decorations around here,” I said, getting out of the car. “You coming?”

“No thanks.” Jane clutched her sweatshirt and slid deeper into the seat.

I rang the doorbell five times until a neighbor's light clicked on. I was being watched. Good. I strolled next door to Fourteen Tremont Road where the light had gone on and tried there. The welcome mat read
THE FESTER
'
S
.

A male Fester in a T-shirt, dirty jeans and work boots answered, smelling of mowed grass and barbecued ribs. In the background a mother Fester and two boy Festers were gathered around the table.

“I apologize for interrupting your dinner,” I said. “I'm not soliciting.”

“That's too bad. You look like you might have something that I'd want to solicit.” He chuckled.

Mrs. Fester got up and joined her husband at the door. “What's wrong? You got a flat? Andy has a jack. He won't mind fixing it for you.”

By now both boys were out of their seats. “I'll go get your jack, Dad!” announced one.

“No, it's not like that.” I pointed to Twelve Tremont Road. “I'm trying to contact the woman who lives there. Do you know if she's at church and I should wait? Or out of town?”

All four Festers gaped at me as though I had asked if they could loan me the spare keys so I could break in and clean out their neighbor's silver. I reached in my purse and gave him the same House of Beauty business card I'd given to the McMullen Coal security guard. “I'm a hairdresser.”

The mother frowned at the card over her husband's shoulder. “I don't think Mrs. Sullivan needs her hair done. What do you want her for?”

“It's kind of personal,” I said, “and I'm leaving town later tonight, so if you know where she is, that would help.”

Mr. Fester handed me my card. “I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but Mrs. Sullivan's dead. She passed on at St. Vincent's two weeks ago.”

“Dead?”

“Oh, dear. You're not like a long lost baby Mrs. Sullivan gave up for adoption, are you?” mother Fester asked. “That would be so sad.”

“That would be impossible,” her husband scoffed. “This woman's barely forty.”

Forty! Why didn't he say thirty? I had to start taking Vitamin E.

“No,” I said, “it's that I . . . I thought she was alive. I just sent her flowers.” Liar, liar pants on fire.

Mr. and Mrs. Fester exchanged uncomfortable looks. “So, you're the one,” Mr. Fester said. “We've been trying to figure out
who's been sending a ninety-year-old woman flowers all summer.”

Ninety-years-old? Hugh McMullen was making it with a ninety-year-old woman?

“Would have been nice to think she had an admirer,” Mrs. Fester said. “She was so alone.”

“Except for that man who visited her occasionally,” Mr. Fester said. “We assumed he was the one who was sending her flowers. Thought maybe he was her grandson.”

“Grandson?” I said.

“I suppose he would be your long lost nephew,” Mrs. Fester said. “That is, if you are Mrs. Sullivan's long lost baby daughter.”

“I gotta get you off
Oprah
.” Mr. Fester returned to the dinner table, his services as a tire changer obviously not required.

“Do you know how I can reach Mrs. Sullivan's grandson?”

“I don't. This other woman asked me that just the other day.” Mrs. Fester folded her arms and leaned against the door. “Said she was a reporter from New York, though she grew up in Slagville. Had a real snazzy blue sports car.”

“Snazzy blue sports car, eh?” I recalled my daredevil ride along Slagville's winding roads, missing trees by a millimeter in one mighty spiffy Mazda Miata.

“Is this woman tall?” I said. “Red-headed? Drives erratically?”

“I'll say. She nearly creamed my boys while they were playing field hockey in the street.”

Roxanne's face fell, literally, as she peeled off my homemade gelatin mask. “You think Esmeralda Greene is investigating the same story?”

“I assumed I was the only one checking Hugh McMullen's alibi on the night of Bud Price's murder, but I was wrong.” I fiddled with a tube of mascara on Roxanne's vanity. “I've been wrong about a lot of things.”

“Not about this face mask.” Roxanne pasted her face against
the mirror. “I can hardly see my pores.” Roxanne was getting ready for her reunion with Stinky and she wasn't sparing a drop of makeup, nail polish or glitter.

“And it's a lot less expensive than those nose strips you buy in the drugstore for fifteen bucks,” I said. “Maybe I should stick with beauty and drop this news business. Wouldn't have to work before dawn on Sunday mornings and I wouldn't have to compete.”

“Or read the boring stuff in the newspaper,” Roxanne added. She sipped from her Diet Pepsi and applied glue to a false eyelash. “Anyway, seems to me like you've been batting a thousand in this news business. You broke the story about the violations against McMullen Coal, right?”

“Thanks to you and that box of documents.” I winced as Roxanne pulled off the sticky false eyelashes and tried for a more exact fit. “What are you going to say if Stinky asks if you still have the documents?”

“I'm going to hope he doesn't ask.” She displayed a can of silver glitter. “Do you think all over body shimmer would be too much?”

“Go for it. Oh, shoot.”

“What's wrong, baby?” Roxanne blinked. The eye with the false lashes looked abnormally enlarged.

“Those Catasauqua Republicans. I didn't make advance calls and now it's almost eight.”

Roxanne deployed one last spritz of body shimmer into her cleavage. “Stop it. Saturday night and all you're talking about is work, work, work. It's the Hoagie Ho! Aunt LuLu's coming and I tried to talk Jane and G into going, but I couldn't convince them. They were eager to get home, I guess. Tired of this old coal town.”

“Jane's got a party in Lehigh she's dying to go to.”

“Yes, but . . .” Roxanne held up a finger. The nail was painted black and had a tiny rhinestone pasted in the center. “I reminded G that the Hoagie Ho is a great place to pick up clients.”

“You think G is that talented, say?”

“I don't think. I know.” She pinched a second lash from its container. “Mr. Salvo called, by the way.”

“I'm not calling him back. He'll only tell me I'm fired again.”

“Actually, it wasn't about work.” She pressed the lash onto her lid and held it there until it set. “He was asking if you'd seen Steve Stiletto. The AP bureau's been trying to reach him and they can't find him anywhere.”

All of a sudden my stomach felt very, very hollow. I could sense blood slipping out of my face. Visions of Wednesday night, Stiletto in the coal car, bloodied and unconscious, flashed in my mind.

Roxanne noticed right off. “Oh, I shouldn't have put it that way. I'm sure Steve's fine. When was the last time you ate, Bubbles?”

I thought about breakfast with Stiletto. “Not since around eight.”

“Shame on you. You'll go all kinetic. Run downstairs and fix yourself something to eat.” She let go of the lash and blinked.

“Maybe a sandwich,” I said, heading downstairs.

“And don't forget to change,” she yelled after me. “I don't want to be the only woman done up tonight.”

I picked up the portable and dialed Mr. Salvo at the
News-Times
. Tucking the phone under my chin, I explored Roxanne's refrigerator for easy food. I was famished, I realized, but almost incapable of making myself a meal. Too darn nervous.

Where was Stiletto? Why hadn't he called? He'd promised that I could call him and he'd come. But now he was missing. He wouldn't go missing. Darn. I didn't know if he even had a new cell phone.

“Salvo. Speak.” He was always grumpiest on Saturday nights, the end of his work week.

“It's me, Bubbles.”

“You still in Slagville?”

I found some lettuce, a half a tomato and turkey. “Yup.”

“You call the Catasauqua Republicans?”

“Nope.”

“Christ. I wanted an advance story on that. Three to four inches saying they were meeting. Who? What? Where? and When? I'll have to take Eddy off obits to do it. Is Stiletto with you?”

“No.” I cut the tomato with Roxanne's dull knife, sending seeds everywhere.

“Where the hell is he? The AP can't reach him in New York or the number he gave them in your area. There's no answer at his house in Saucon Valley and he doesn't have a new cell phone yet. They need him to cover the President tomorrow. He's doing a last-minute stumper in Jersey for statewide Republicans.”

This isn't good, Bubbles, my mind was scolding. Stiletto would call. He would leave a message to see how you are. He wouldn't just drop off the face of the earth.

“You're not interrupting,” Mr. Salvo said. “That means you know something. You always talk when you don't have anything to say and, ipso facto, the opposite is true. Tell me what's going on.”

“Someone's been pretending to be Stiletto. The imposter has been making phone calls from Stiletto's house in Saucon Valley to a private detective in Slagville.”

“Holy crow. What for?” Mr. Salvo was concerned. Almost like a real live human being. I unwrapped a loaf of rye bread.

“Whoever hired the detective wanted to keep tabs on me. It's a lot like Wednesday night when I got the fake fax from you and Stiletto got the e-mail message. Steve and I are pretty convinced it's the same person.”

Mr. Salvo was silent. There was a pencil tapping in the background and then he said gruffly, “I'm gonna take this in Notch's office. Hold on.” And he put me on hold.

I spread mayonnaise and lay down some lettuce and tomato to the digital music version of “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head.” Salvo got on right after the turkey.

“Why didn't you tell me about this before?” he demanded. “After what happened Wednesday night, Dix Notch wanted to be updated on any new developments with you. This would definitely count as a new development, Bubbles.”

“I didn't know much until Stiletto told me this morning that the calls from the imposter had been made from his house. He knows the detective, Zeke Allen. He's a nice guy, religious. The fake Stiletto sent Zeke on a charter flight to Colorado yesterday, though he should be back by now.”

“What's Stiletto doing about this?”

“He said he was going to meet Zeke at the Lehigh Airport. Then they were going to the state police and then back here. Zeke's flight was supposed to get in at four this afternoon.”

I bit into the sandwich. It filled the void in my stomach, but not the pit. I was getting increasingly worried. My sixth sense was vibrating faster than a Dr. Scholl's battery-powered foot massager.

“I'm going to make some phone calls on this,” Salvo said. “Spell that sham detective's name for me.”

“He's not a sham. He's really nice.”

“Don't get hoodwinked, Bubbles. You're a reporter. Keep an open mind. Now spell it.”

I spelled it and took another bite.

“Allen. Like the Green Mountain Boys. You coming home now?” he asked.

“No, I, uh.” I remembered that I hadn't confided in Mr. Salvo about Stinky's request that I meet him at the Hoagie Ho. I was afraid that if I had, I would have to reveal that Stinky stopped by my house Friday morning. Then Mr. Salvo would mumble all that legal mumbo jumbo about harboring a fugitive or obstructing justice and how modern reporters don't pull those tricks anymore. But I was one of those reporters who introduced herself as a mortuary stylist to get a secretary's name, so he and I shared a difference of opinion on what was technically ethical and what was technically not.

“I have to escort my mother to a dance. Her friend Genevieve has a date and she doesn't.” That was a lie. Mama and Genevieve were at Pete Zidukis's house for a pre-Hoagie Ho get together.