Little Death by the Sea (22 page)

“I can’t, either. I’m just here for a quick
visit. Laurent and I’ll be over tomorrow for dinner.”

“I like the man,” her father said. “He’s got
some very interesting stories to tell.”

“Oh, really?” Laurent’s story-telling
abilities hadn’t really come up much in their relationship. Maggie
found herself intrigued.

“Ahh, well, probably not the sort of stories
a young man tells his lady love. Quite the scamp in his day, was
your Laurent. Reformed by love.” Her father straightened out his
newspaper, folding it to a smaller size to make his reading
tidier...less conspicuous?

Although not surprised that Laurent had a
mysterious past, Maggie was astonished that he might have shared
any of it with the father of his lover. Or that her father hadn’t
been alarmed by whatever Laurent had divulged. Couldn’t have been
anything too dangerous, Maggie decided, as she watched John
Newberry’s pleasant face relax into a concentration of reading. It
was true her father seemed fascinated by Laurent. And, for some
reason, she found she wasn’t entirely comfortable with the
idea.

“Mind if I use the phone, Dad, in the ante
room?” Maggie stood up and held her notepad in front of her.

“Of course, darling, help yourself,” he
murmured into his newspaper.

Maggie stepped into the small room used as
the business part of her Dad’s study. Here, away from the den with
its books and side tables and Steiffel lamps, were the desk and fax
machine. There was even a copier machine that her father seemed
never to use but had insisted on having. Maggie closed the door
separating the two rooms.

Picking up the phone, she quickly gave the
operator her overseas calling card code and the number in Paris.
After several lengthy clicks, the line rang.

“
Allo? Chez Zouk
.” A woman’s voice
came clear and distinct over the line.

“
Oui, est-ce que Madame Zouk
?” Is this
Madame Zouk? Maggie asked.

“
Comment
?” Excuse me?

God, she was afraid of this. Her French was
crap. Why didn’t she just have Laurent make the call for her?

“
Madame Zouk. Je cherche Madame Zouk. Elle
est la
?” I’m looking for Madame Zouk. Is she there?

“
Ahhhh! Madame Zouk, elle n’est pas ici .
Elle a vacance en Provence. Comprenez
?”

On vacation in the South of France? Maggie
let out a long, breath. Her expectations and hopes draining out
with the breath.

“
Oui, merci, Madame. Merci beaucoup. Au
revoir, madame
.” Maggie hung up quickly just as the door opened
and Becka entered with a small silver tray. On it was a lone
Waterford goblet sparkling with her gin and tonic. A fat green
wedge of lime bobbed to the top.

“Oh, thanks, Becka. Could you tell my Mother
I’ll be out in a minute? I’ve just got one more phone call to make.
Thanks.” The maid nodded and left.

On vacation. That figures. It’s August. All
of France is on vacation and probably in Provence too. She took a
long sip of her drink and felt immediately revitalized.

Well, that puts off visiting Paris until
September, she thought. Just as well. She was still not asking the
right questions and she needed to at least have that part down
before she put a six hundred-dollar-flight-plus-hotel on her
American Express card.

She picked up the phone again and dialed.

“Brownie? Hey, this is Maggie. Sorry I’ve
been out of touch.”

“Maggie? Maggie who?”

“Very funny. I’m really sorry. I’ve been
busy, you know, trying to figure out this thing with Elise.”

“Figure out what thing with Elise?”

Maggie took a sip of her drink. He wasn’t
going to make this easy.

“Look, Brownie, I’m sorry I’ve been out of
touch, so there you are. Now I’ve got a couple of questions I’m
hoping you can help me with or you can continue to be a jerk and I
won’t even blame you, okay?”

Brownie paused on the other line.

“Shoot,” he said.

“Thanks. First, do you remember seeing
anything weird the night you came to my apartment for dinner when
Elise was killed?”

“You mean other than all the cops and the
people hanging about in the hallway?”

“Please, Brownie.”

“Well, I remember the cops were really kind
and sweet to me.”

“Seriously?”

“I could have been the killer as far as they
knew, right? But they never checked my pockets or anything. I
could’ve had a knife on me, you know. In fact, I did have one.”

“What? A knife?”

“You know the one I always carry? The Swiss
Army knife?”

“Well, you don’t need a coroner to tell you
Elise wasn’t killed with a little ol’ Swiss Army pen knife.”

“Excuse me, Maggie, but they didn’t even
check to see if I had a big, bloody butcher knife. Plus, I even
picked up some crap coming into your apartment and they could care
less, you know?”

“You picked something up in the hall?”

“Yeah, at first I thought it was garbage, but
it was sort of shiny and then I thought it looked valuable so I
picked it up.”

“What was it?”

“Who knows? I still don’t know. A kid’s toy,
maybe? I thought I’d give it to Nicole.”

“You’ve still got it?”

“You can’t seriously think this is
important?”

“It’s one more thing than I had fifteen
minutes ago.”

“It’s a piece of junk, a kid’s toy—”

“We don’t have kids in the apartment. It’s a
singles complex. When can I see this thing? What’s it look
like?”

“It’s gold, looks kinda cheap...I don’t know,
like a ring of some kind but not for your finger.”

“Can you drop it by my folks’ house?”

“Your flat off-limits now that your frog
boyfriend’s taken up residence?”

“I just thought it’d be more convenient for
you. Drop it off at my place if you want.”

“Forget it. Yeah, I’ll drop the thing off at
your folks’ place. If you’re not there, I’ll give it to your
Mom.”

“Thanks, Brownie.”

Maggie hung up and took a large swig of her
drink, nearly draining it. She rattled the ice cubes against the
crystal and stared, unseeing, at the large hunt print her dad had
mounted over the desk. Very slowly, something seemed to be forming,
gelling in her mind. Was it a picture of Elise’s killer?

Maggie finished the rest of her drink and
stood up. Whatever it was, she had to trust that it would develop
in time. Her eye fell on a small gilt-framed photograph nearly
hidden on her father’s desk. It was a black and white snapshot of
twelve-year old Maggie and ten-year old Elise and their dog
“Little”, from another summer many years ago. Both girls were tan
and smiling, their lithe arms intertwined around each other’s
shoulders. Elise wore a jaunty sailor’s cap and behind them both
was the boathouse and dock at the family’s lake house. Maggie
carefully picked up the little picture taken so long ago. She had
never seen it before. Her father’s happy girls. His two first
mates. Her father had sold the lake house during Maggie’s senior
year of high school. By then, she and Elise had long since tired of
baiting hooks and playing first mate or reading in the boathouse
during an afternoon rain.

Maggie replaced the picture and turned to
leave the room, wondering how many times one can continue to lose
the same person.

Chapter Thirteen

1

Laurent led the way down the darkened
corridor of the basement of the Parthenon. Cobwebs hung in large
wattles in the corners, dripping into his face as he and Maggie
made their way down the hall. It was hard to believe that someone
actually worked down here, actually packed a lunch and hummed
himself off to work only to arrive at the creepy bowels of a
hundred-year old building.

Maggie slipped her hand into Laurent’s and
squeezed it.

“
Allo
?” Laurent called as they neared
a doorway at the end of the hall, light spilling out onto the
cement floor. “
Allo? Monsieur
?” They stopped in front of the
door and peered inside.

“Mr. Danford?” Maggie called softly.

“With you folks in just a minute,” a voice
said.

Laurent and Maggie looked at each other and
then entered the small broom closet of an office. A metal desk was
shoved up against one of the cement walls. A half-sized window
hovered over it. From the outside of the building, the window would
be eye level with one’s Reeboks, Maggie noted. Little had been done
to make the office comfortable or attractive. No plants or pictures
on the walls, no rugs across the cold and uneven concrete floor,
not even a lamp with a shade to make the night watchman’s station
less wretched.

“You’re the girl whose sister was killed last
month?” The man finally extricated himself from behind his six-foot
filing cabinet and maneuvered around two metal folding chairs to
stand in front of Maggie and Laurent. He held out his hand.

Laurent shook it. The man withdrew his hand
before Maggie could shake it too.

“Yes, that’s me,” Maggie said. “I was hoping
you could—“

“Told the police everything. Didn’t see
nothing. I’m on duty at night, you see. Didn’t happen at night, did
it?”

He settled himself into a large swivel chair
situated in front of the desk. He sort of resembled Barnie Fife
with a touch of mange, Maggie thought. His balding head supported
long wisps of hair, witnesses to a losing battle. His eyes were
bloodshot and watery and Maggie found herself scanning the office
for liquor bottles.

“No,” Maggie said, turning her eyes back on
the skinny little man. “But maybe you’ve seen strange people around
at night. You know, shady characters that might be involved?”

Mr. Danford scratched the back of his head
with a long, crooked finger.

“Thought the cops said this was a spur of the
moment kinda killing.”

“
Monsieur
, do you know if any peoples
come here at night? Bad people?”

Maggie wondered what the old guy would think
of this big bruiser with the French accent.

Danford finished scratching himself and
looked up at Laurent.

“Sometimes I seen some weird characters
around here. In the winter, mostly. Trying to get in to sleep it
off for the night, you know? Someplace warm.”

“And in the summer?” Maggie asked
impatiently.

“Well, summertime’s different. People want in
for different reasons in the summertime. This here drug dealer the
cops was asking me about? He comes by from time to time. I reckon
he’s got a customer in the building somewheres, don’t you? Else why
would he keep coming by?”

“What’s he look like?”

“Looks like crap, you want to know. Got this
long nasty yellow hair, you know how they wear it these days?”
Maggie hadn’t a clue, but she nodded encouragingly. “And clothes
all ripped to hell. Big holes in the knees of his trousers and his
seat too, sometimes. Can’t be making much money as a drug dealer,
that’s what I told Cissy. Cissy’s my wife.”

“I met her the other day,” Maggie said.

“That’s right. She said you come by. Ol’
Cissy makes sure I get my sleep. She won’t wake me if my own mother
was to call, the last breaths of life a-squeezing outta her. My
Cissy looks out for me.”

“That’s great. So, this drug dealer—“

“I done told the police all of this.”

“I know, Mr. Danford, but if you could just
run over it one more time for me. Please.”

The old man shrugged and stretched back in
his chair.

“Can’t take too long. Gotta make my rounds
pretty soon.”

“Thank you for your time,
Monsieur
Danford.” Laurent nodded at the man but made no moved to leave.

“This drug dealer,” Maggie said. “Have you
ever talked with him?”

“Told him to get his sorry ass outta the
building once. That’s talking to him, ain’t it?”

“And he was okay about that? I mean, he left
all right?”

“He left.”

“But he came back.”

“I told you, he’s got hisself a customer
here. Must have.”

“But you don’t know who.”

“I got my suspicions. And no, it’s nobody I’m
gonna tell you about.”

“Do you remember if he was around the night
before my sister was killed?” That would have been the night I
first brought her home, Maggie thought.

“He was. Shuffling up the goddamn hallway on
the third floor. I knowed he was there ‘cause of the way he drags
his feet, like he’s drunk or something.”

“And you just threw him out?”

“That’s right. About three a.m. No
problem.”

“Okay.” Maggie looked at the man and then,
helplessly, at Laurent. Again, she’d run out of questions and
didn’t know how to process the answers she was getting to the
questions she had asked.

Laurent indicated the doorway with his head
and Maggie sighed. Might as well.

“Thank you for your help, Mr. Danford,”
Maggie said stiffly. She touched Laurent’s arm and they trudged
silently back upstairs to Maggie’s apartment. Laurent unlocked the
door and Maggie threw herself down onto the living room couch.

She raised herself up on one arm and watched
Laurent who had seated himself in the large tub chair opposite the
couch, his long legs stretching out and filling up nearly the
entire floor space of the little room.

“Well, I’d say we’re nowhere on this. I can’t
buy the theory that this drug pusher is the killer. It’s too pat. I
mean, what did he do? go around rapping on doors: ‘I say, is the
lady of the house at home and would she be interested in some
crack?’ I mean, isn’t it too much of a coincidence that he is a
drug dealer and she was a drug addict?”

“You think the police have made up this
theory?”

“I think they thought: dead junkie,
on-premises drug dealer, let’s put them together and wrap this case
up.”

“
C’est possible
. And your friend?
Monsieur
Alfie?”