Putting on the Dog (24 page)

“Leverage for what?”

“The negotiations. I told you we’d been separated for almost four years, but I didn’t mention that during most of that time, we’ve been involved in ugly divorce proceedings. Somehow, they never seemed to go anywhere. For reasons I could never understand, Dev was in no hurry to get divorced—even though I was anxious as hell to get it over with.”

“So you were holding on to this information about who Dev’s lover was?”

“Yes. But there’s no reason for me to keep it a secret anymore. I could make a few phone calls, and the whole world would know.” She shook her head. “But there’s nothing for me to gain from it. Not now, not with Dev gone.

“I admit that I’ve never forgiven Dev, not for what he put me through,” she continued. “But somehow, I’ve never really been able to blame Hugo.”

My ears pricked up like Max’s do whenever he hears the crinkle of cellophane. “ ‘Hugo’?” I repeated. “Hugo...
Fontana
?”

Sydney shrugged. Smiling sardonically, she said, “So now you know. The first major love of Dev Barnett’s life as a gay man was the Pulverizer himself.”

As I drove along a winding country road back to the South Fork, my head was spinning. Hugo Fontana...
gay
?

I marveled over Sydney’s claim, wondering if it could possibly be true. I pictured America’s number one action hero at the dog show, trekking across East Brompton Green with his tough-looking Chesapeake Bay retriever beside him. Then I thought back further, to the first time I’d seen him. It had been the night of the party under the tent, the night that Devon had been murdered....

“Oh, my God!” I cried as a lightbulb flashed on in my head. “Sydney was
there
!”

My heart was suddenly pounding. Of
course.
That was why I hadn’t been able to take my eyes off her when I’d first seen her standing in the doorway of the barn. She’d been at the opening night party, dressed in an orange leather pantsuit that clashed horribly with her bright red hair and glitter eye shadow.

Devon Barnett’s wife had lied to me about having been in the Bromptons—on the very night her estranged husband had been murdered.

My head positively buzzed as I wondered what other lies she had told me.

First the revelation about Hugo Fontana, now the realization that Sydney was hiding something.... My observation that there had been more layers to Devon Barnett than I’d ever imagined, was simply the tip of the iceberg. I was discovering that the people he’d surrounded himself with were just as complex.

As I stared out the window at the passing scenery without really seeing anything, I replayed the demise of Sydney and Devon Barnett’s marriage in my head. I pictured her spending long evenings at home alone, trying to convince herself that her husband was working, but little by little putting the pieces together—and realizing that what he was really doing was sleeping with half the gay men in New York. And then the humiliation and heartache of learning that he had fallen in love with one of them.

As I turned off the quiet back road onto Sunset Highway, Sydney’s words reverberated through my head: “I admit that I’ve never forgiven Dev, not for what he put me through.”

I’d just added another name to my list of suspects.

I still felt dazed as I trudged across the lawn of Shawn Elliot’s estate toward the guesthouse.

As far as I could see, there were no signs of life. Nick and the dogs were probably still at the beach—which would give me some time to unwind. I was thinking about how much I was looking forward to a glass of something wet and frosty when I noticed the square of white, stuck in the middle of the front door where I couldn’t possibly miss it. My first thought was that it was a note from Nick, trying to smooth things over. Or maybe it was from Shawn, an apology for his outrageous behavior the night before.

As I unfolded the single sheet of paper, I thought about the desperate call I’d made to Betty, just the day before. If I remembered correctly, I was all in a tizzy over being pursued by two fabulous men. In an impressively short time, I realized, I’d gotten myself down to none.

I saw immediately that neither of my estranged love interests had left me the note. In fact, my stomach lurched as I read the three short sentences that were neatly typed on the page.

Chess isn’t who you think he is. Check into his past.
Start with his hometown—and Mr. Sylvester.

It wasn’t signed.

My instinctive response was to check behind me and peer into the bushes that surrounded the guesthouse, just to make sure whoever had left me the note wasn’t lurking in the shadows, watching for my reaction. Then I held the single 8
¹
⁄2’’ x 11’’ white sheet closer, scrutinizing it and trying to find something—anything—that would give me a clue as to who had tucked it into my front door. As far as I could tell, it was an ordinary piece of paper, the kind used in just about every computer printer in the world. In fact, the only thing remotely distinctive about it was a barely noticeable streak running along the left side—a sign that the printer’s owner would soon be in need of a new ink cartridge. Either that, or shaking the cartridge side to side in a high-tech version of the Macarena.

As I stepped inside the guesthouse, I discovered I’d been right about Nick and the dogs still being absent. I was glad to have the opportunity to follow up on the note’s suggestion. An idea of what ruse to use was already forming in my mind as I dialed Information again.

“What city and state?” the voice at the other end of the line asked.

“Crabapple, Iowa. The public library.”

I waited, gripping my pen as I heard the clicking of computer keys at the other end of the line.

Finally, the operator said, “I’m sorry. I don’t have a town by that name.”

I frowned, wondering if I’d remembered the name of Chess’s hometown incorrectly. “Is there anything that sounds like it?” I asked. “Or maybe some other spelling—like maybe ‘Crab’ starts with a ‘K’?”

“I need an exact name,” the operator told me impatiently.

Thank goodness for the Web, I thought, after I gave up on that approach. Instead, I set up Nick’s laptop on the kitchen table and logged on. One good thing about the Internet is that it never gets snippy, no matter how many questions you ask.

I typed in the key words “Crab” and “Iowa.” What came up wasn’t very helpful.

Next, I tried “Tree” and “Iowa.” Maybe I hadn’t heard everything Chess had said correctly, but I was pretty sure I got at least that part right. Nothing. I started trying other combinations with “Iowa,” like “Pine,” “Maple,” and “Elm.”

“Bingo!” I cried as “Sweet Elm, Iowa” appeared in half a dozen listings.

“So there’s no such place as Crabapple, Iowa, but there is a Sweet Elm,” I mumbled, thinking aloud. “Could be a play on words, the result of Chess LaMont’s off-beat sense of humor.”

But I wondered if that was all it was. Another possibility was that Chess was deliberately trying to mislead people. It was certainly a good way of making it harder for someone to find out anything about his past.

Still puzzling over whether I’d managed to stumble upon Chess’s actual hometown, I forged ahead, punching in more words to see what I could learn. The Sweet Elm Chamber of Commerce treated me to a pretty comprehensive overview of the town I suspected Chess had fled a decade earlier. In addition to a park with a baseball field, picnic grounds, and public rest rooms near the bandstand, it had six restaurants including two that weren’t chains, two hardware stores, and five churches. And there was plenty to do. This summer, in addition to the Fourth of July parade, the town was sponsoring “I’m Sweet on Sweet Elm” Day, an annual event that featured a blueberry pie eating contest, music by the Sweet Elm Sweeties, and of course, the ever-popular Miss Sweet Elm pageant.

From what I could see, it was a wholesome Midwestern town out of a Norman Rockwell painting. Not necessarily the most comfortable place for a young man who was anticipating coming out of the closet.

Fortunately, in addition to a war memorial, an historical society, and a senior center, the town also boasted a public library. Its phone number was right there on the Website, and I copied it into my address book. Then I dialed it, glancing at my watch and hoping that the fact that it was an hour earlier in Iowa would work in my favor.

“Sweet Elm Public Library,” answered a voice so sugary that its owner clearly belonged in a town with that name. “How may I help you?”

“Could you please connect me with Reference?”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” the young woman said sincerely. “I’m afraid our Reference librarian, Ms. Pruitt, has left for the day.”

So much for the benefit of the time difference. “Maybe you can help me. I live in New York, and I’m planning a surprise party for a friend of mine who grew up in Sweet Elm. I thought it might be fun to get hold of some pieces of his past, like the picture from his high school yearbook. He graduated ten years ago.”

“We keep all the Sweet Elm High School yearbooks on file, all the way back to 1928,” the young woman informed me, “but you’ll still have to talk to Ms. Pruitt. That kind of research is really her area.”

And so much for immediate gratification. “When will she be in?”

“You can probably reach her tomorrow. She comes in at ten.”

“Thanks for your time. I’ll try her then.”

Next to the phone number of the Sweet Elm Public Library, I jotted down, “Call Ms. Pruitt, Reference. Thursday, 10:00 A.M., Central Time.”

Given what I’d learned about Hugo Fontana earlier that day, the handsome action hero with the bulging muscles held new interest for me. I made a beeline for Poxabogue.

“Dr. Fox is in surgery,” Shelley informed me when I appeared, unannounced, in Suzanne’s office. “She’s removing a mass....”

“It’s okay,” Suzanne called from the back of the office. “Jessie’s always welcome.”

I found her suturing a black shih tzu whose tiny body lay limp on the stainless-steel table. The dog’s tongue hung motionless from her slackened jaw, and her fur was matted against the side of her skull as if she’d been in that position for some time. Her intravenous catheter was hooked up to a clear plastic IV bag with a narrow tube.

Even though I’d performed surgery hundreds or even thousands of times myself, I was struck by how vulnerable the helpless pup looked. Out of habit, I glanced at the digital reading on the purple pulse oximeter nearby on the counter to make sure the animal was stable. Even though she looked like a rag rug, she seemed to be doing fine.

Suzanne glanced up. “This is a hard one,” she told me grimly. “Charley here was one of my first patients. Sweetest little dog you ever saw. And now, we’ve got this mass to deal with. I was hoping it was just a cyst, but we weren’t that lucky. I’m really going to sweat it out, waiting for the pathologist’s report to come back.”

“That’s tough,” I commented, knowing how difficult it always was to deal with the probability of cancer.

“I’m just about done here.... I’ll be right out, Jess.”

Two minutes later, Suzanne and I were sitting in her office. “A long day,” she said with a sigh, leaning back in her chair.

“Most of them are,” I observed.

“At least this one’s almost over. So what brings you to beautiful downtown Poxabogue?”

“I’m here to ask you a favor,” I replied with a grin. “What else?”

“Shoot.”

“When I looked through your files the last time I was here, I noticed that Hugo Fontana is a client of yours.”

For the first time since I’d walked in the door, she smiled. “I’m one of the few people who knows the Pulverizer can’t stand the sight of blood. He can barely watch me cut Brutus’s toenails.”

I decided not to mention that there were a few other facts about the Pulverizer that most people didn’t know.

“I’d like the opportunity to talk to him,” I told her. “Is there any way we could set up a house call?”

“Sure. I could call him and remind him that Brutus is due for a rabies shot. I remember that his last one was a year ago, just after I bought the practice. He was one of my first clients. I still remember how impressed I was when he walked in! Anyway, I could tell him it’s time for a booster and that I’ll be sending an associate with a mobile unit to his house to take care of it.”

“Perfect. Thanks a million, Suzanne,” I said sincerely.

She pulled a file from the metal cabinet, plopped back into her desk chair, and dialed the number handwritten on front.

“Mr. Fontana?” I heard her say in the same professional tone I used with clients. “This is Dr. Fox, Brutus’s veterinarian.... I’m fine, thank you. The reason I’m calling is that I happened to check Brutus’s chart and I see that he’s due for a rabies shot. I’m working with a mobile services unit this summer, to see if it’s an addition that might benefit my practice. Rather than having you bring him into the office, I can have a veterinarian come right to your home, whenever it’s convenient.... Tonight? If you hold a moment, I’ll check my schedule....”

She glanced at me, her eyebrows raised questioningly. I nodded.

“Tonight looks fine. How does six-thirty sound?”

I gave her the thumbs-up. I guess Hugo did, too.

“I’ll be sending an associate, Dr. Jessica Popper... Yes, as a matter of fact, she is involved with the dog show.... Yes, the SPCA
is
a worthy cause.... You’re right; the way some animals are treated is horrendous. Okay, then, Dr. Popper will see you and Brutus this evening at six-thirty.”

“Thanks, Suzanne,” I told her sincerely once she’d hung up the phone. “I owe you.”

“I’m glad you feel that way,” she replied, “because now I’ve got a favor to ask
you.
”

“Anything.”

“I’d like you and Nick to have dinner with me Friday night.”

“That’s the kind of favor it’s easy to say ‘Yes’ to.”

“There’s a catch.”

I raised my eyebrows expectantly.

“Remember that guy you mentioned the other day... the single one?”