Dying to Retire (12 page)

“The apartments are lovely,” I said. “We’re not cooking, so we haven’t taken advantage of your kitchen.”

“Lots of people like to cook, though. Saves a lot of money, especially if you’re here for a long spell.”

“That’s what I’d like to talk to you about.”

“You know the units you and your friends are in just came on the market. I have a few brochures you can take with you.” He reached into the top drawer of his desk.

“Well, actually, we weren’t interested—”

“Here you go. This one talks about the financing available. And this one details all the services we have here. You won’t find a better buy in all of south Florida.” He made a little pile of pamphlets in front of me.

“I’m sure that’s true, but—”

“They won’t last, these units. Inventory is tight. Usually sell out in a couple of days when they come on the market. I sold one last week to a couple from Michigan.”

“Thank you, but I’m really not interested in moving to Florida.”

“It’s an opportunity to get in on the ground floor. The prices will only go up, you know. Good-sized rooms, lots of services included—no extra charge—beautiful views.”

“You’ll probably lose those views when the proposed development goes up, won’t you?” I said, thinking maybe that would halt his sales pitch long enough for me to get a few words in.

“Where did you hear that?”

“There’s a sign advertising luxury towers down at the beach.”

He made a face. “Shouldn’t be there.”

“Even if it weren’t,” I said, “many people have mentioned it to me since I arrived. It sounds as if your residents are very upset about the proposal.”

“There are great views right now,” he said. “Those buildings aren’t there yet. You never know about those things. What if they never go up? You might miss out on a great buy. Foreverglades is still a bargain. You know the old saying, ‘Gotta strike while the iron’s hot.’ Don’t worry about what’s not here.”

I envisioned the disappointment of the couple from Michigan when they found out their view would be obliterated by three high-rise buildings. Apparently truth in salesmanship was not Mr. Rosner’s strong point.

“Do you think our rental units will still be available next week?” I asked. “Dr. Hazlitt and I plan to go down to Key West tomorrow, but I’m hoping to stay here again when we return. I’d like to make the arrangements now.”

He tapped his fingers on the desk. “I don’t know. We might sell the apartments by then.”

“If you think that’s the case, perhaps you can recommend a hotel or motel nearby,” I said, gathering the brochures he’d piled in front of me and handing them back to him.

“Keep those. I’m sure we can work something out. Since it’s you, I’ll make the sale contingent on accommodating guests for a week or so. How does that sound?”

“Oh, I wouldn’t want to inconvenience your buyers.”

“No problem. I’ll deal with it.” He studied my expression. “Sure you don’t want to buy a unit?”

“I’m sure.”

“Yeah, well, no hard feelings. Can’t blame a guy for trying. Gotta earn my commission somehow.” He hesitated, then said, “These are prime units, you know. They’ll go fast.”

I nodded but said nothing, fearing any words would launch him into a new sales pitch. I had a feeling there were many more empty apartments in his inventory than the three Seth, I, and the Metzgers had occupied, but didn’t voice that opinion. I gave him my credit card number for the deposit and left.

As I walked back down the hall, Minnie Lewis came around the corner.

“Hello, Jessica. You’re just the person I want to see. Are you exploring our facilities?” she asked.

I explained my reason for being there.

“I’m giving a cooking class in a half hour,” she said, “but thought I’d e-mail my grandchildren first. Have you seen our computer room?”

“I saw it in passing,” I said, “but didn’t go in.”

“Do you have a minute? I’ll show you around.”

“I do,” I said.

“I’ve also been meaning to ask you something.”

“Yes?” I said.

“Let’s wait till we can close the door,” she said in a low voice.

The computer center, unlike most of the other rooms, was empty. It consisted of a long lopsided counter, held up on one end by a chair that had been wedged underneath. Perched on the slanting top were two large desktop computers of the same vintage as Mark Rosner’s. Attached to each was a combination printer, scanner, and fax machine. Lying next to each monitor and keyboard was a thick instruction book, set in large type, and a credit card device to pay for using the Internet. A bookshelf at the far end of the room held an assortment of board games—chess, Scrabble, checkers, Monopoly—as well as decks of playing cards, and a caddy holding poker chips. Four square tables and a stack of chairs were pushed against the wall.

Minnie closed the door behind us and pulled two chairs over to the counter.

“These are pretty old,” she said, gesturing toward the computers. “Then again, so am I. I’d better not complain.”

I laughed. “It’s still a nice convenience for the residents.”

“It is for me,” she said. “A lot of people have their own computers. Portia did. That’s why the management didn’t bother to put too many in here, and doesn’t update them. But Sam did business for fifty years with an adding machine, paper, and pen, so we didn’t see the point in buying a computer at our age.”

“That makes sense.”

She fussed with her handbag, pulling out a handkerchief. “Speaking of technology,” she said, her voice shaky, “I understand the results from the laboratory tests on Portia came back.” She looked at me, waiting to see my reaction. “Do you know anything about that?”

I nodded.

She cleared her throat. “Tell me it didn’t say that she died from a heart attack brought on by diet pills.”

“Where did you learn that?” I asked.

“Foreverglades is very small, and there’s no such thing as a secret. Helen called me. I don’t know where she heard it—her beauty parlor, probably. Is it true? Do you know?” She dabbed her mouth with her handkerchief.

I wondered how Helen had come to that conclusion. I hadn’t mentioned the autopsy report when I’d visited her, but she might have guessed, based on my questions. Or perhaps Clarence had confided the results to someone, and the Foreverglades grapevine had taken care of the rest.

“Yes. It’s true,” I said.

“They make mistakes sometimes, don’t they? They could have mixed up two people, maybe.”

“Everyone makes mistakes,” I said, “but in this case it’s highly unlikely the results are from someone else and not Portia.”

“I was afraid you’d say that.” She shivered. “That’s not good, not good at all.”

There was a knock on the door, and Minnie and I turned to see the Simmons twins march in one behind the other. They wore matching canvas carpenter’s aprons around the waists of their overalls. Hammers and screwdrivers hung from loops at their hips. They pushed up the peaks of their orange baseball caps and nodded at us in unison.

“Here to fix the counter,” said Earl. I’d noticed he was slightly heavier than his brother, a clue to his identity.

“Fix the counter,” Burl echoed.

The pair busied themselves with their project. It was interesting to see that they needed little or no verbal communication to coordinate their efforts. Together they wrestled out the chair that had been propping up the counter, and while Burl held up the end, Earl crawled underneath and started hammering, the racket especially loud in the small room.

Minnie covered her ears with both hands and stood. “I guess I’ll have to use the computer later,” she shouted over the noise. She waved for me to follow her.

Out in the hall she walked quickly, pulling me along to a broom closet, where she flipped on a light and closed the door behind us. “I don’t want us to be heard,” she said in a low voice. “No one will interrupt us here.”

“I understand,” I said, thinking Sam was not the only eccentric in the family.

“Listen, Jessica, Portia was my best friend. I would have known if she was taking diet pills.”

“People sometimes keep secrets, Minnie, even from their best friends.”

“You’ll never convince me,” she said, pacing in the small space. “If Portia died from taking diet pills, then someone poisoned her.”

“Do you know what you’re suggesting?” I asked.

Tears filled her eyes, and she wiped them away angrily. “Yes, and I didn’t sleep half the night thinking about it.”

“Let’s look at this logically,” I said. “How could someone put a tablet in Portia’s pillbox without her noticing?”

“Clarence filled her pillboxes every day,” she replied. “I’d hate to think he would do that, but he certainly could have smuggled an extra pill into her regimen without her realizing. She trusted him. She would just pour out a handful of pills and swallow them down. She never even looked at them, much less counted them.”

“How many pillboxes did she have?” I asked.

“One for each mealtime, I guess,” she replied. “I don’t know if she had more than that. I do know she carried one with her in her bag in case she wasn’t home when it was time to take the next dose.”

The closet door was flung open to reveal matching expressions of shock on the faces of the Simmons twins.

“Pardon us,” I said, squeezing by them, Minnie close on my heels. “Where now?” I asked her.

We hurried down the staircase and Minnie guided me into the kitchen, where her class would soon be held. She closed the door and leaned against it. “They won’t come in here.”

“Let’s say it wasn’t Clarence,” I said, trying to gather my thoughts. It was hard to carry on an interview on the move. “How could someone else sneak another pill into her supply?”

“Oh, it would have been so easy.” Minnie said, dabbing at her eyes. “She was very careless about her handbag. She never remembered where she’d left it. When the Residents’ Committee would meet, she’d just drop it on some table and go off buttonholing people, urging them to vote on whatever issue she was working on. Plus, her vision was terrible. I can’t tell you how many times I had to help her hunt for her bag after a meeting. Sometimes it was just sitting on a table in the hallway, or on the floor by her seat. Once I found it here, in the kitchen. She’d brought in some snacks, stopped to put them on a plate, got distracted, and forgot all about her bag.”

“And people knew this about her?” I asked, thinking that if someone had evil intent, there would have been ample opportunities to get into Portia’s bag and pillbox.

“I warned her she was going to get her wallet stolen one day. I always thought someone would be taking something out, not putting something in. I should never have let her be so cavalier. Why didn’t I think of it?” She was crying in earnest now, the tears falling faster than her wadded handkerchief could contain them.

“Minnie, you can’t possibly think you’re to blame for Portia’s death.” I pulled a packet of tissues from my purse and gave it to her. “No one could have prevented this except the person who gave Portia the pills.”

“I’m sorry to fall apart like this,” she said, taking a deep breath to calm herself. “The idea that Portia might have been killed—on purpose—is overwhelming. I just can’t believe that anyone hated her so much. She was so nice.” She looked at me hopefully. “Do you think it could have been an accident? Maybe someone thought they were doing her a favor, helping her to lose weight.”

I shook my head sadly. “Everyone knew she had a heart condition. She made no secret of it. If someone gave Portia diet pills, that person intended to kill her. That’s no accident,” I said. “That’s murder.”

I pulled open the heavy glass door to DeWitt Wainscott Enterprises, and walked inside. In the center of the reception area was a large table on which was a model of Foreverglades, its pink buildings rendered in miniature, down to the white-painted grilles on the terraces and the concrete walkways in the courtyards. I paused, fascinated by the detail of the model, and walked around the plastic box that covered the display. Next to the blue paint that represented the bay were three tall white structures, dwarfing their pink neighbors. Due to the angle of the spotlight shining down from the ceiling, long shadows were cast over them. In addition to the three high-rises, several smaller blocks occupied space on the property, as well as a swath of beach made from what looked like real sand. On the model, the gazebo and boardwalk I’d trodden a few days ago were missing, but the dock was considerably enlarged, with tiny yachts anchored to the new pier. A ribbon draped around the top of the model buildings said WAINSCOTT TOWERS AT FOREVERGLADES.

It occurred to me that the model made an authoritative statement. It presented the proposed construction as a fait accompli, something already established, not merely the vision of the developer. It said, “This is what will be,” not, “This is something to consider.” I thought of Portia tilting at windmills, fighting people who had more power, influence, and money than she could ever hope to secure. But could her persistence as a gadfly, constantly circling the ears of the developer, have irritated someone enough to call for her extermination?

“Good afternoon,” a voice said from behind me. “May I help you?”

I turned to see Amelia’s sister-in-law, Marina. She was a broad woman in her late forties, her long red hair braided and twisted into a chignon. She was dressed in a navy pinstriped suit, white blouse with a floppy bow at the neck, and high-heeled sandals, the shoes making her pitch slightly forward as she walked, spoiling the corporate image she was trying to project.

“I saw the sign at the beach,” I said, hesitating.

“And came to find out more,” she finished my sentence for me. “How wonderful. Let me show you around. Where are you from?”

“Cabot Cove, Maine.”

“That’s pretty far north,” she said, smiling at me as if I were a student who’d just given the right answer. “It must be frigid up there this time of year.”