Elaine Orr - Jolie Gentil 05 - Trouble on the Doorstep (14 page)

HOW MANY
HOT dogs was it? George was sitting at the kitchen table looking at the story he’d written for that morning’s paper. Alicia had told him in no uncertain terms that he was wrong about the number of hotdogs the winner had eaten.

“Forty-one for the winner,” I said.
I was breaking up spaghetti and putting it into a boiling pot, something I was not happy to be hovering over again. We’d agreed to meet for lunch at the Cozy Corner, since we hadn’t really had a weekend break, thanks to the contest.

“And he was the only one who didn’t lose his lunch, right?”
He had his laptop out and was writing a correction, trying to be funny about it.

“What were you doing that you missed all this?” I asked.
“If you’d helped roll up the plastic you wouldn’t ask how many got sick.”

“I was getting color commentary from two of the kids who’ve been helping Scoobie do yard clean-up at Silver Times.”

“Help is a loose term there,” Scoobie said. His head was in the refrigerator looking for something to munch on.

“Hey,” I said.
“When did you find out that Nat Markham got the contract?”

George turned to face me.
“I didn’t. What did you hear?”

“He was over there yesterday.
Elmira was mad because he went by her apartment and…nuts. I said I’d call her.”

“You need to learn how to say no,” Scoobie said.
He was now looking for something in the pantry.

“Gee, you think?”

He caught the sarcasm in my tone and grinned.

“At the board meeting I went to Friday they discussed the work that needed to be done, but they said they were going into executive session,” George put air quotes around the last two words, “to discuss the bid. They kicked me out.”

“How come you didn’t tell me that?” I asked.

“I wrote it in my article Saturday.” He said this almost accusingly.

“Not everybody hangs on your every word.”
I gave him a mischievous smile. “And anyway, you’ve seen me a couple times since then.”

“I think I’ll watch TV,” Scoobie said, to no one in particular.

“Yet again the comedian,” George said. He had stayed to guard me, Scoobie’s term, the last two nights.

“I want to know how much they bid,” I said.

“And you want someone to make that information appear?” Scoobie asked.

“I need to make it appear,” I said.

George was about to say something when Scoobie interrupted. “Did you talk to Hank Bauer?” he asked, from his spot on the loveseat.

“Just to say hello,” I said.
“Megan wouldn’t let him bring his walker in the kitchen because there was water on the floor.”

“Who is that?” George asked.

“Mayor of Silver Times,” Scoobie and I said, together.

“That old buzzard?
He calls me every month to give me scoops.” George said the last word in a mocking tone.

“Nothing good?” I asked.
I had forgotten to turn the burner down and was mopping spaghetti water off the top of the stove.

“Since it’s always something negative, and nothing’s ever panned out, I try to duck his calls.”

“So what did Hank say?” I asked, nodding at Scoobie.

“He said that he saw Fred Brennan driving a new Lincoln.”

“See, that’s what I mean,” George said. “He just likes to get digs in at people.”

Sounds to me as if Fred Brennan was getting something off the top of the repair money
.

IT WAS A DULL GRAY afternoon when I pulled into the parking lot at the Silver Times independent living building. Though I didn’t know Fred Brennan well, I knew he was on the Rotary board and they met at four o’clock every Monday. He would have left for the day. I was hoping to pull the proverbial wool over Molly Springer’s eyes.

My plan was to schmooze.
Maybe Molly would have the Markham Construction bid it on her desk and I could see some numbers, or maybe I’d see a label on a file cabinet to get an idea of where she stowed it. How I would come back later to get into said drawer, or whatever, I didn’t know. I had to start somewhere.

I had just entered the small lobby when Molly came out of her office carrying a half-empty coffee pot and walked toward the rest room.
I was just inside the entrance, so she didn’t notice me.

I immediately had a perfect idea.
No one was in the lobby. I walked as fast as I dared into the office and shut the door.
Where to hide?
The open room between the two offices sure wasn’t it. I wasn’t too keen on the cramped spot under the desk in the next room, but better the devil you know.

I squeezed under the desk in the dark room and looked at the time on my mobile phone.
Four-fifteen. Surely Molly left by five o’clock. My knees might hold out that long.

The door to the office opened and I assumed it was Molly, since no one called out to see if anyone was there.
I heard the clink of glass on metal as she put the coffee pot back in its place.

The phone rang, and from the sound of the conversation it was a friend or family member.
“I’ll meet you at four-forty five,” she said, just before she hung up.

Great. She must leave at four-thirty
. I let my legs relax and stretched them a little. It didn’t seem likely that she would come into this office before she left. As before, it didn’t look like anyone used it on a regular basis.

Five minutes later I heard the jingle of car keys and Molly turned out the lights in the outer room and left.
I didn’t hear a key, so I hoped the lock was just one you twist on a door knob.

I waited about ten minutes to be sure she hadn’t thought of a reason to come back, then eased from under the desk and stood.
I was stiff, but that would pass. I stood in the doorway and looked into the outer room. It was twilight, but I would still be able to see for awhile without turning on lights. Not for much longer.

The windows had vertical blinds, the kind you can open or shut with a chain.
They were fully across the window, but the blinds were still cracked open. It wasn’t likely someone would see in if I didn’t turn on a light, but I didn’t want to take a chance. I crawled to the wall that held the blinds and reached toward the window sill, groping for the chain. There were two, so naturally the first one started to slide the blinds open from the middle. I quickly shut that one and tugged on the other one. This time the slats fully closed.

I scanned the darkening office and wished I had the flashlight that I keep in my car, but who knew I was going to sneak around the Silver Times office after hours?

There was an upholstered chair not far from Molly’s desk and a small lamp on the table next to it. That was the extent of a waiting area. I’d have to use the lamp. I decided that if I carried it into the windowless small office I could use it in there. That meant that I had to find any files before it got too dark to read the labels on the file folders.

There were two four-drawer file cabinets near Molly’s desk.
They were wooden and looked expensive, not the kind you’d see in an appraiser’s office. I walked toward them and almost had my hand on the handle when I thought about fingerprints. No one was going to know that I had been there, so who would look for fingerprints? I had a pair of gloves, but they were safe in the car with my flashlight. My eyes fell on a box of tissues on Molly’s desk. They would have to do.

I tugged on a drawer.
“Damn it!” Locked. I turned to her desk and opened the middle drawer. Sitting in the small tray at the front of the drawer was a key ring with several keys. They were not labeled, but two were small, just like those for every file cabinet I’d ever used. The first one didn’t work, but the second one did.

“Yippee,” I said, softly.

The top two drawers in the one on the left looked as if they were files for individual residents. I shut them quickly and went to the third drawer. Financial records, but they looked like accounting files, nothing to do with bids or contracts. The bottom drawer was a junk drawer, complete with paper towels, a hammer, and hand soap.

I got lucky with the next set of drawers.
In the top drawer, where Fred Brennan could easily see it but Molly would have to stand on her toes, were two very thick files labeled “Sandy Estimate 1” and “Sandy Estimate 2.” I touched the edge of the drawer as I pulled out the file folders, so I wiped a tissue over the spot.

I carried the files into the small office and put them on the desk and retrieved the lamp.
I put it on the desk and found an outlet. Before I turned it on I shut the door. I couldn’t imagine that anyone would see the crack of light under the door.

My hands were wet and the tissues were getting shredded.
I decided not to try to use them as I went through the folders.

It looked as if the first folder had details on the individual projects and what Markham Construction expected them to cost.
The second one had a few project drawings and information on the materials to be used. I decided that the first one was most important, and was disappointed that there was not a cover sheet that added up all the costs.

There were about thirty separate projects.
Twenty or so were in individual units and ten were grouped together with a cover sheet called “Common Areas.”

My eyes widened as I kept reading.
I had no basis to judge material or labor costs, so I mostly looked at the many subtotals. How could it cost so much to repair the roof on the independent living building? The project description talked about replacing a lot of the wood under the shingles and the need to replace all of the attic insulation because water had come in through a couple of the seemingly small holes in the roof.

I couldn’t imagine what would have been flying through the air at that height that would hit the roof hard enough to make a hole.
I tried to imagine what a hole would look like, and then realized Nat could probably describe it however he wanted to. It’s not as if someone would ride over the roof in a helicopter and look. And why would they have to replace all the insulation?
Maybe they don’t. Maybe that’s how they’ll get some money for themselves.

Elmira’s estimate was there, but for two thousand dollars more than what I’d already thought seemed inflated.
“What are they doing?” I whispered.

I took a pen and a grocery receipt from my purse and began making notes about each estimate, but I soon filled the receipt.
I opened the desk drawer with the cuff of my sleeve over my fingers, and there were a couple pieces of blank copy paper in the drawer. After about five minutes of detailed note taking I thought longingly of the photocopier, but that seemed like a rash choice, even for me.

After almost twenty minutes more I had a basic list of each project, the estimate, and a couple of notes on labor or materials costs.
That would have to do, and I would total it when I got home. I closed the files and turned out the lamp before I opened the door to the outer office. Too dark. I turned the lamp on to get a sense of how many steps to the file cabinets, then quickly turned it off again.

Though the sun had nearly set, some light from street lamps came into the outer office through the edge of the window blinds, but it wasn’t much.
I walked tentatively toward the file cabinets. There wasn’t much furniture in the room, but it wouldn’t matter if there was only one piece if I ran into it. The last thing I needed was to turn my ankle tripping over something in the dark and have to call 9-1-1. Or George.

Molly’s tissues served me well again, and I was glad that the two files were the first in their drawer.
I could no longer read any labels on the other files. I closed the drawer gently, locked it, and put the keys back in Molly’s drawer. Then I made my way slowly to the office with the lamp. It took a couple of minutes to put the lamp back on the small table. I couldn’t remember if it had been centered on the table and kept moving it around. “Screw it,” I finally said.

The clock on my mobile phone said it was almost six o’clock when I was finally ready to go.
I could feel my heart beating in my temples and realized I was nervous as all get-out.
Gee, I wonder why? Breaking and entering a good way to end the day? Wait, with my notes it’s probably burglary, too
.

I stood at the door that led to the lobby for a couple of minutes.
One person came in the front door and walked slowly past the office. I realized a lot of people were probably eating dinner, and put my cuff over the door handle and opened it just a crack. I couldn’t see anyone. I opened the door really fast, exited, and pulled the door shut as quietly as I could.

I couldn’t see the person coming from far down the hall, but he clearly knew me.
“Jolie, what are you doing?”

HANK BAUER WAS like a dog who had gotten a turkey leg off the table. “I knew I had you figured,” were his words as soon as he got closer. I think my red face gave me away. The only good thing was I convinced him to shut up as we walked down the hall together.

I was sitting in his living room, a mug of cooling decaf coffee on a table on my right.
His furniture was surprisingly shabby. I always figured people who could afford to live at Silver Times had a lot of money.

The sound of a flushing toilet came from the hallway.
As soon as he gave me the mug Hank said he had some “business to attend to.” He moved pretty fast for a guy with a walker.

“So, that Marky got it?
I was right, wasn’t I?” He settled himself into a recliner directly across from me.

“I didn’t see anything like a contract award letter, but that would be my guess.”

“Stupid brat. For how much?”

“I honestly don’t know.
It looked like a huge itemized bid, but there was no summary sheet and I didn’t want to sit in there too long.” Both facts were true. The fact that I could add up those figures later was irrelevant.

“Damn.
I got a bet riding on it. With my buddy Harold, from the hot dog thing.”

I could hardly forget Harold.
He was maybe eighty and kept hitting on Megan. He was only old enough to be her father, or maybe grandfather.

“Maybe it’ll be in the paper,” I volunteered.
I had walked to Hank’s apartment because I didn’t want to stand in the lobby talking to him. I thought if I kept giving him useless responses he would get tired of me. I didn’t have to stay, of course, but I also didn’t want to irritate him.

“I saw that biddy, Elmira, yabbering at you at the hot dog thing,” he said.

“You know Elmira,” I said.

“Hmmph.
Nothing to brag about.” His look was one of disappointment. “You think she’s going to make trouble for the guys on the board?”

I considered this.
She would, of course. Though why she cared when she didn’t have to pay for the repairs I couldn’t figure out. Of course, monthly fees might go up to replenish the repair fund. Or she was just being annoying. My thoughts went with annoying.

“She’s no fan of Andrew Markham, you know,” Hank said.

“I thought everybody liked him,” I said.

“She used to work for him, long time ago.”

“Really?” Elmira was retired before I met her. “What did she do?”

“Sold houses for him.
Well, I don’t know about sold,” Hank said. “She sat in his model houses on Sunday afternoons so people could look at ‘em. He came in one day and she was snoozing on the couch and people were looking around upstairs.”

I laughed before I could stop myself.

“Couldn’t of happened to a nicer person,” he said.

“I should go,” I said, as I bent down to lift my purse off the floor.
My purse with the folded sheets of paper that listed cost data for the repairs.

“I know somethin’ you want to know,” he said.

I looked at him closely. “So, what is it?”

“You want some more decaf?” he asked.

“Hank.”

“Okay, okay.
Those Markhams think they got ol’ Fred Brennan in their pocket, but I think it’s the other way ‘round.” He gave me a self-satisfied smile.

“What do you mean?” I asked.
“They were affiliated with Silver Times long before he came to work here.”

“Yeah, before my time, too.
He’s the one’ll say what they should pay for the repairs and such. Won’t matter what Marky puts in some bid.”

I was able to get away from Hank before long and went to the lobby to see if Lance Wilson’s name was on the list of residents that hung on the wall.
It was, but there were no room numbers. There was an extension for the house phone in Lance’s apartment, so I called.

“Can’t get enough of the place?” he asked as he let me into his apartment.

“It’s all right if I’m not cleaning up hot dog mess,” I said. I looked around. I’d been in his small house a few times, and it looked as if he had a lot his things in the apartment.

“Trying to make it homey,” he said.

“Looks as if you got all your books and movies,” I nodded toward two large sets of shelves. “Your furniture didn’t make it?”

He shook his head.
“I brought anything just wood, like my table and chairs, even my bedroom stuff. I got rid of anything upholstered or leather.”

I wanted to tell him again I was sorry, that as much as he does for people he shouldn’t have to deal with this.
Nobody should have to deal with the results of Hurricane Sandy. Instead, I said, “Can you look at some numbers for me?”

He pointed to the familiar table and chairs.
“Elmira got to you?”

“Eric Morton and Steve Oliver did,” I said.

His smile vanished. “What a waste.” He said it very matter-of-factly.

I figured when you get to be ninety-two you’re more used to people dying.

“And sad,” he added.

I reached in my purse and spread the three pieces of white paper in front of him.

He picked up one and read it without comment. When he picked up the second page he said, “I take it Fred Brennan didn’t give you these numbers.”

“You really want to know?” I asked.
He shook his head.

Lance was an accountant, which is why he makes such a good treasurer for Harvest for All.
I studied him as he read the next two pages. He seems to have so much less energy than even a few months ago. I wanted to ask him if he felt okay, but wasn’t sure he would like that. He seems to keep a lot to himself.

“What is it you want, Jolie?”

“I want to know if the costs look ridiculously high,” I said.

“I don’t really have any basis to judge his estimates.
I see you flagged Elmira’s.” He glanced at me as he kept reading, and frowned. “That does look high, but what do I know?” He shuffled the papers as he looked at them again. “Could you tell the percent he’s charging for overhead and administrative costs?”

I groaned.
“That’s what Andrew Markham meant about varying a percentage.” I clapped my hand over my mouth.

“Listening at the keyhole were you?”
He slid the papers back across the table. “What little I know says the construction material costs look high. If I had the original paperwork, I could look at how they presented the estimates, whether the administrative costs look realistic. Overhead costs for a couple of individual projects would likely be higher if they had to special-order materials, or something like that.” He shrugged. “Or maybe they charge a flat rate for overhead and administrative costs, and I could get a sense of whether it was a realistic rate.”

I frowned.
“I don’t think they had a summary sheet like that. Maybe it was in another file.”

“They’d have to have one.
Kind of hard for the Board of Directors to evaluate if they can’t see the bottom line.”

“Maybe that was the point.
Who’s on that board, anyway?” I asked.

“Mostly residents.
A couple people Fred brought in who work with us old folks a lot. Social worker from the hospital, I think a dietician from somewhere.”

“What would they know about running a complex like this?”
I asked.

“As you say, maybe that was the point.”

I DIDN’T REALLY care about how Silver Times was run or even what they paid for hurricane repairs.
I cared about Steve Oliver and Eric Morton.

The worst thing was I had no one to talk to about anything I learned.
Bill didn’t want George to print Steve’s figures, so George was out. I’d asked Lance not to let George and Scoobie know that I’d gotten the numbers. Lance didn’t look happy at that, not that he probably would have had a reason to talk to them about it.

It was seven-thirty and I was alone in the great room at the Cozy Corner.
Scoobie was going to guard me tonight but he was at class. He was getting a ride home from another student, so I was already out of my daytime attire and wearing a comfy pair of flannel pajamas with cats on them. A Christmas gift from Harry.

My phone chirped.
“Scoobie there yet?” George asked.

I rolled my eyes.
“Not ‘til about eight-fifteen. I have the boogey man locked in an upstairs bathroom.”

“You know, sometimes the comedian stuff isn’t all that funny.
Dogs are with you, right?”

“I sold them.”

“You’re as funny as a sunburn. I’ll call you when I get home.”

George was at some newspaper association meeting in Lakewood.
They were going to swap ideas for how to coordinate news the next time there was a major disaster. George said they were going to talk about how to merge their reporting-the-news role with a help-people-in-danger role. For one night during a storm, anyway. Then all bets were off and it was back to the usual ‘me first’ attitude to get a story.

Mister Rogers barked from the back yard and Miss Piggy joined in, making for a raucous doggy chorus.
Jazz walked to the sliding glass door and hissed, and then began the yowl she uses when another cat wanders into the yard.

“Quiet!”
The dogs wouldn’t hear me until I got to the door. I moved Jazz back with my foot and slid it open. “Come in you two.”

They barked harder.
I couldn’t imagine it was a squirrel at this time of night. I stepped onto the porch. They were on the far side of Aunt Madge’s small back yard. “I’m not telling you again.”
Like that’s a threat.
I walked off the stoop and clapped my hands.

Mister Rogers’ bark turned into a rapid half-growl, half-bark and Miss Piggy moved behind him.
I’d never seen him like that. Dry leaves or a stick crackled behind me. “What the…?”

Someone shoved me from behind and I fell onto the tiny patio, hands in front of me, spread eagle.
I was stunned for about five seconds, and heard footsteps run the short distance to the gate and heard it click shut.

I had the breath knocked out of me and it took several more seconds before I could take a deep breath.
The dogs were all over me. I looked toward the gate, but there was no one there.