High Spirits [Spirits 03] (22 page)

      
While I was fairly sure by this time of Flossie’s overall, or perhaps that should be underlying, character, I still didn’t think it would be a good idea to entrust her with the nature of my—or rather, the police’s—interest in Maggiori. Not, as I said before, because I thought she was a bad person, but because she clearly wasn’t tops in the decision-making department. She remained a weak vessel and, while I had great hopes for her if she stuck with Johnny Buckingham and Co., I wasn’t ready to trust her with my life. So to speak.

      
That being the case, I still might be able to get some information from her. And, as Johnny Buckingham was perhaps the only person in the world whom I’d trust with a secret—well, besides Harold Kincaid—I figured I might be able to do it as we dined.

      
“Say, Johnny, did you know that I was doing a séance in a speakeasy when the joint was raided a couple of weeks ago?”

      
Johnny almost choked to death on his noodles. Then he laughed so hard, he had to wipe his eyes. I tried not to resent this reaction from an old friend.

      
“Oh, my Lord, Daisy, does Billy know about this?”

      
I sighed. Johnny knew me too well. “No, not really. He only knows that—” Sweet heaven, I was about to say
he only knows I’m working with the police
. Sometimes I think I need to be locked away in a safe place and only let out on a short leash. Like Spike. “He only knows that I conducted a séance for Mrs. Kincaid. He doesn’t know where I did it or what happened there.”

      
Johnny shook his head, although he looked more amused than censorious. I guess when you’ve been down as low as Johnny was after the war, you become tolerant of your fellow human beings’ foibles. “You’re really something, Daisy.”

      
Flossie broke in. “She’s swell.”

      
I appreciated this accolade and decided to take the plunge. “Say, Flossie, I overheard Mr. Maggiori talking on the telephone to someone last night. It sounded as if it was somebody who gives him tips about police raids. No wonder the police have trouble shutting his operation down completely.”

      
“Oh, sure,” she said happily. “That’s Pete Frye. He’s one of Mr. Maggiori’s tame coppers.”

      
I almost dropped my teeth.

      
Flossie misunderstood my reaction. “I know. It’s a shame that some coppers are dirty, but they are.”

      
“Um ... I see.” I drank some tea, thinking I could have saved myself a whole lot of heartache and worry if I’d only asked Flossie the name of the rat earlier in the game.

Chapter Twelve
 

“
What?”

      
I hadn’t expected Sam Rotondo to be overjoyed at my request, but he didn’t have to bellow into my eardrum.

      
“I said get over here right now.”

      
“Why?”

      
“You know why.” Curse it! Why was the man so darned dense?

      
“Cripes,” he said.

      
“It’s one of your very own.”

      
“I don’t believe you.”

      
“It’s not
me
you don’t believe, curse you, Sam Rotondo. I’m only relaying information.” I think I really hated him at that moment in time. “It’s one of your very own people,” I repeated stiffly into the receiver. I didn’t dare be more specific, since the telephone wire wasn’t a secure way to relay information.

      
Silence.

      
Well, to heck with that. “His name—”

      
“Stop!” bellowed Sam.

      
If I went deaf after this telephone conversation, I was going to sue the Pasadena Police Department. I said nothing.

      
“We’ve got to meet somewhere. I don’t want this to go over the telephone wires.”

      
“You can jolly come here, then,” I told him.

      
“Well ...”

      
“I’m not stepping foot out of this house one more time today, Sam Rotondo.”

      
More silence.

      
“Well?” I said crisply.

      
“I don’t want to do it there, either.”

      
I assumed “there” in this instance was my home. He probably didn’t want to be seen entering our nice little bungalow in the middle of the day instead of merely in the evening, as he did all the time for card games. And a fine time it was for him to begin thinking about the safety of my family, thought I.

      
“Well?” I said again.

      
“You going to church tomorrow.”

      
“I always go to church.” My voice was as cold as Sam’s temper was hot.

      
“I’ll see you there and talk to you after the ceremony.”

      
“Service,” I corrected.

      
“Whatever it is, I’ll talk to you then.”

      
“Not if you go to the First Methodist Church, you won’t.” He’d surprised me there one Sunday morning about a year earlier. I’d been singing a duet with Lucille Spinks and nearly fainted when I’d seen him looming in the congregation.

      
“Huh? What do you mean?”

      
“I mean I’m going to the Salvation Army church tomorrow. A friend of ours is a captain in the Salvation Army, and he invited us to the dedication of a new chapel. So we’re going there.” In that instance, I guess I was using the so-called “Royal Us,” as I still hadn’t confirmed with the rest of my family that they’d join me.

      
“Yeah, well, I’ll talk to you there. We’ll probably be able to get a minute alone.”

      
“Probably.” I was none to happy about it, either.

      
“What was that all about?” Billy asked when I hung up the receiver.

      
Sighing heavily, I turned to him and slumped into a chair at the table. Our telephone was in the kitchen, so I didn’t have far to go in order to accomplish my slump. “I found out the name of the person who’s tipping Mr. Maggiori about police raids. He’s a policeman.”

      
Billy whistled softly. “Whoo boy, Sam’s not going to like that.”

      
“He already doesn’t like it. I don’t like it, either.” After briefly burying my head in my hands, I said piteously, “I’ll be
so
glad when this whole thing is over.”

      
“I bet.” Billy sipped from a fresh cup of tea I’d brewed for us right before I telephoned the police station.

      
I added milk and sugar to my own tea and took an appreciative swig. For some reason, and I don’t know why, I find tea with milk and sugar very comforting.

      
“I wish I’d never agreed to do this in the first place. I knew Maggiori and his gang were criminals, but I didn’t realize how scared I’d be whenever I was with them.”

      
“Well, you’re doing your duty as a citizen, I guess,” Billy said doubtfully.

      
Equally doubtfully, I said, “I guess.”

      
Billy squinted at me across the table. “So you’re going to the Salvation Army tomorrow?”

      
“Yeah. I introduced Flossie Mosser to Johnny, just as you suggested, and there seems to be a spark of interest there.” I heaved another largish sigh. “I guess that’s encouraging, anyway. Maybe Johnny can get her to leave that beast who beats her up.”

      
To my great relief, Billy grinned at me. “I’ll go with you. I want to see this Flossie character.”

      
My heart leapt up as I beheld my husband, not in the sky, but in a supportive position across from me at the kitchen table. How often did
that
happen? I can tell you: not often. I reached for his hand and squeezed it. “Thank you, Billy.” A tear dripped from my eye, and I swiped at it with my other hand. “You don’t know how happy that makes me. I really didn’t want to go alone.”

      
“You won’t be alone,” said my marvelous husband stoutly. “We’ll get the whole family to go. Then, when you have to talk to Sam, you can kind of sneak off to a corner.” He grinned again.

      
“Thanks, Billy. You’re the tops.”

      
His grin soured. “Yeah?”

      
I didn’t want him to sink into one of his despondent moods, so I chirped, “Yes, you are. And I’m afraid you won’t be able to understand the full glory of Flossie’s transformation. She’s toned down her overall appearance, except that she still has that brassy bottle-blond hair. She’s really quite pretty.” When I spoke the words, I realized they were not merely true, but that they surprised me.

      
When I’d got my first glimpse of Flossie Mosser amongst that crowd of criminals and flaming youth types in the speakeasy, she’d seemed sort of like a gaudy ornament. It had been difficult to think of her as an actual person. But now that she’d adopted tasteful garb and softened her makeup, and I’d become slightly better acquainted with her, I realized she was not merely an actual person, but a good-looking one with feelings, dreams, and ambitions, if only to lift herself out of her present life.

      
Billy was as good as his word. He talked the entire family, including Aunt Vi, who didn’t hold with any church but the Methodist variety, into attending the Salvation Army the next morning. I called Mr. Hostetter to tell him I’d be absent from the choir. As luck would have it, he wasn’t home, so I spoke to his wife, who was a very nice lady. She didn’t even shriek or anything when I told her why my family planned to defect for the day.

      
“The Army does valuable work in the community,” she said, which amazed me, since Mr. Hostetter had almost fainted at the suggestion the choir sing “Onward Christian Soldiers.”

      
Aunt Vi fixed us a delicious dinner, as usual, and when I finally got to bed that night, I actually slept well, and without a headache for the first time in days.

* * * * *

      
As soon as my family piled out of the Chevrolet—it was always a struggle to get Billy anywhere, since we couldn’t very well stash his wheelchair in the motor, and he couldn’t walk far—a woman rushed up to us. I thought perhaps she’d been assigned by the Army to greet strangers, although she was clad in a nice blue suit instead of a uniform, and I smiled at her.

      
It wasn’t until she cried, “Oh, Daisy, I’m so glad to see youse guys!” that I realized the woman was none other than Flossie Mosser! Looking absolutely
normal!
She must have gone to a hair salon and had her hair dyed, because it was a nice light brown color, and all the marcelled waves were gone. She now wore it in a short, but tasteful, bob. I was flabbergasted.

      
“Flossie! Your hair!”

      
That was a stupid thing to say since it only made her uncomfortable. She stopped short and began madly patting away at her hair. I grabbed her other hand.

      
“You look wonderful, Flossie. I honestly didn’t recognize you at first.”

      
“You didn’t?”

      
“No. I hadn’t expected your hair to be so ... lovely.” I didn’t want to tell her she’d looked like a gaudy doll before and prayed that she’d take my words as praise. “You look truly beautiful.” Only a tiny fib, and I expected God would forgive me for it.

      
“You think so?” she asked in a small voice, clearly unsure of herself.

      
“Absolutely!”

      
When I introduced her to the rest of the family, they all seemed pleased to meet her, although Billy appeared slightly disappointed. I know he was hoping to see the traces of her dissipated former life. Or present life, if Jinx was still in the picture. I wasn’t able to ask her about that, but figured I’d learn soon enough, when I performed my séance on Tuesday. The notion made me shudder. Not of seeing Flossie, but of being with that gang of thugs again.

      
However, I must say that the Salvation Army puts on a rousing service. Not only was there a lot of music and singing, but people from the congregation stood and told their stories before the sermon. Some of them were even more dismal than Johnny Buckingham’s. One man evidently had begun a life of crime as a child and continued along the same path until he’d been saved by a Salvation Army chaplain who’d visited the jail in which he resided at the time. It was really an interesting—dare I say entertaining? I don’t know if that’s allowed in church—service.

      
Well, except that Sam was there, glowering at everything from a back pew. His arms were crossed over his chest, and he couldn’t have looked much more sour if he’d sucked on a lemon immediately prior to entering the sanctuary—which, by the by, was quite nice. The Army didn’t go in for frills. I reckon they spent their money on other things, but the place had nice white walls and a serviceable, if plain, platform up front where the general (or whoever he was) delivered a most inspirational sermon. He reminded all of us in the congregation that Jesus hadn’t limited His works to the gentry but had included everyone in his message of salvation. His sermon was full of joy and God’s forgiveness of sins, which was a heck of a lot better than the hellfire and damnation some churches preached (or so I’ve been told. I’m a Methodist, and we’re fairly tame as far as the brimstone stuff is concerned). All in all, the entire service was quite uplifting.

      
It was during the sermon that I realized Flossie had started crying. Poor thing. She was sitting in between Billy and me, and I took her hand and squeezed it. She squeezed back but kept sniffling. Poor Flossie. I sensed that her life was about to make a huge turn in a different direction, and I hoped it would be a better one for her. It was while I was trying to offer Flossie comfort that I spied someone in the congregation that, I swear, looked exactly like Stacy Kincaid. After blinking several times, I squinted again at the apparition I thought I’d seen, but whoever it was—it couldn’t possibly have been Stacy—was hidden behind some lady’s big hat. Well, it didn’t matter.