Sudden Mischief (7 page)

"Don't get giddy here," I said, "but have you heard from Brad Sterling?"

"No."

"I went to see him and he wasn't there and his office was closed. Do you know his home address?"

"No."

"You have any thoughts on his absence?"

"Perhaps he's gone away for a few days."

"Perhaps," I said.

The ice was out of the river and the boat crews were on the cold water pulling hard while their coaches followed in small motor boats, yelling instructions through bull horns. Susan and I ran with the river on our left, the sparse Saturday-morning traffic moving on Fresh Pond Parkway to our right. Across the parkway some kids were out early throwing a baseball on the prep school field. It was still cold enough so that a ball off the handle would make your hands ring up to your shoulder.

Susan ran beside me, on my left, so that my sword arm would be free. She wore a lavender headband and gray-lensed Oakley sunglasses and a gray sweat jacket that said Ventana Canyon on the left breast, and came low enough to cover most of her fanny, which, she contended, was ladylike when wearing shiny black tights. Her running shoes were white with lavender highlights, which explained the headband. She was in shape and she ran easily. Me too.

"You work out before you met me?" I said.

"No, I don't think I did," Susan said.

"You play any sports as a kid?"

Susan laughed.

"Cute little Jewish girls, when I was a kid, did not play sports."

"What did you do," I said.

"We looked beautiful and our daddies took us to libraries and theater matinees and movies and museums and shopping and lunch."

"No mommies?"

"Mommy thought spending money was a bad thing. She always disapproved of the things my father bought me.

"Did you have money?"

"We had enough. The drug store did well, I think. I always thought we were… upper class, I guess."

"I bet you were," I said.

We chugged up over the Eliot Bridge and onto the Boston side of the river. Actually, I chugged. Susan glided.

"It's funny to think of you," I said, "little Suzy Hirsch sitting at dinner every night with these two people that I don't know."

"Thing is," she said, "I didn't know them either."

"Not even your father?"

"Especially my father. He was simply a playmate. He was never really a father. He never reprimanded or instructed, or even explained. If I was doing something he didn't like, he'd speak to my mother about it. She'd do the parenting."

"Which she probably liked," I said.

"Yes, I suppose she did. It gave her status, so to speak, in the family. And it gave her a chance to berate me in a socially acceptable way."

"Probably a lot of parental discipline is disguised anger," I said, just to be saying something. I had no idea what I would accomplish by getting her to tell me about her childhood, but I liked hearing it. And it couldn't hurt.

"Yes, she was quite careful about that. She would denigrate me, whenever she could. If I said something at dinner she would smother a snicker. But every time she did anything direct, she would give it the maternal spin. She had to protect me from my failures of character: `Oh Susan, you know how you are."'

"And your father never intervened."

"No. Parenting me was my mother's job. Besides, we had to protect her."

"You and your father."

"Yes."

"From what?"

"From breaking down. She was very nervous. That was the phrase, nervous. I suppose now we would say she was phobic."

"Oh, Ma," I said. "You know how you are."

Susan smiled.

"Perhaps if you decide to give up professional thuggery," she said, "you could hang out your shingle."

"Then could I say things like, she was projecting her own inadequacies onto you?"

"Yes, only I think you need to deepen your voice a little more and say it more slowly."

There was sweat on Susan's face and sweat had soaked through the back of her gray jacket. But her voice was still even and conversational.

"You and your father ever talk about that?"

"Protecting my mother? No. It was an unspoken agreement. We'd pretend she wasn't phobic. We'd agree that she was `nervous' and that we didn't want to `upset her.' But the agreement was silent. We never spoke of it. We never, in my memory, spoke of anything."

"Nothing?"

"Nothing of substance. He'd ask me how I liked school, or tell me what a pretty dress I had on. That sort of thing. But an actual conversation-I can't remember one."

"So the only parent you had was your mother and she was jealous of you. Did she love you too?"

"I think so. I know that I was ashamed of her. She was older than other kids' mothers, and she was really square. And I know I hated her for being so"-Susan smiled sadly-"nervous. But however bitchy she was, I knew she loved me. And she was always there. I trusted her, as much as I despised her. She was the one who took care of me."

"And she had her problems," I said.

"Yes," Susan said, "she had many and they were probably deep seated and my father was probably one of them."

"He fool around?" I said.

"I have no idea," Susan said. "I spent a lot of time with him, but I can't express to you how much I didn't know my father."

From the Harvard Boat House to the Larz Anderson Bridge is uphill. You never notice it driving along Soldier's Field Road. It's not very dramatic, but if it marks the last stretch of a four-mile run, it becomes more apparent.

"Well, dysfunctional or not," I said, "they produced a hell of a daughter."

"A bit dysfunctional herself."

"You think?"

"Not easy to live with," Susan said.

"Impossible to live with," I said. "But what we do works out pretty good."

"Just pretty good?"

"Masculine understatement," I said.

"Oh that," she said.

We went up the little hill and turned left across the Anderson Bridge, where I had almost died last year.

"I am being a bitch," Susan said, "about Brad Sterling."

"Yes."

"I'm sorry."

"I know."

"I don't know if I can promise not to be again."

"I know."

"Nothing breaks you, does it," Susan said. "Nothing makes you swerve."

"For crissake, Suze, I love you," I said. "I plan to continue."

"If I weren't so ladylike," she said, "I might cry."

"Isn't it sort of unladylike, anyway, to sweat like you do?" I said.

"Hey," Susan said. "Unlady-like this!"

"Of course," I said. "How could I have been so wrong."

"Been yachting?" I said.

"Ah is in disguise," Hawk said. `"The Marblehead look. Blend right in."

"Boy, you certainly fooled me," I said. "How'd it work?"

Hawk shrugged.

"Been outside the Ronan place maybe an hour when two hard cases come along."

"Cops?"

"Naw. Tough guys. A tall fat one, and a short one with muscles, no neck that I could see."

"Well, well," I said.

"Sound familiar?"

I nodded. "What did they say?"

"They want to know what I'm doing there. And I say, `Who wants to know?' And they say, `We do,' and it go sort of like that for a while. And they say if I know what's good for me that I'll haul my black ass out of there."

"That wasn't very sensitive," I said.

"I told them that."

"And?"

"Apparently they hadn't intended it to be sensitive. So, I figured since they looked a lot like two guys braced you a while ago that maybe I might have run into a whatchamacallit…"

"A clue," I said.

"That's it," Hawk said, "a clue, and you being a great detective might know what to do with it. So I let them chase me away, and here I am."

"It's the same two guys," I said.

"I figure," Hawk said. "So whoever owns them not only don't want you nosing around, he don't want me."

"He or she," I said.

"That's right," Hawk said. "I was being insensitive."

"I got threatened again yesterday myself," I said.

"Astonishing," Hawk said. "And we so charming too."

"The thing is it was on a matter that Ronan shouldn't have anything to do with."

"You assuming the two stiffs I talked to work for Ronan."

"Yes," I said.

"Sonovagun," he said. "I thought so too, and I not even a great detective. Who threaten you yesterday?"

"Tall guy, sort of thin, strong looking, sharp dresser, drives a dark green Range Rover…"

"You got threatened by a guy who drives a Range Rover?"

"Embarrassing, isn't it? Said his name was Richard Gavin."

Hawk shrugged.

"So many assholes," he said. "So little time."

"So I try to find out a little about the alleged sexual harassment and get threatened," I said. "And I ask you to keep an eye on Ronan and you get threatened. And while I'm trying to look into the harassment charges, I find out that Sterling's big charity thing was a bust and nobody got any money. Except that I couldn't get in touch with anyone at a beneficiary group called Civil Streets. So I try to find out a little about Civil Streets because I just stumbled across it while I'm looking into the Sterling thing, and I'm a neat guy, and I like to be thorough, and because I don't know what else to look into, and I get threatened."

Hawk was sitting in one of my office chairs with his feet up on my desk. He was wearing blue suede loafers that matched the blazer.

"I a great detective I might think there was some connection."

"If you were a great detective you might explain to me why Brad Sterling isn't around."

"Gone?"

"I went by there and his office is closed. Nobody knew where he was."

"Secretary."

"Nope. Door was shut and locked."

"It appears," Hawk said, "that the plot be thickening."

"Christ," I said, "maybe you are a great detective."

"Want me to drift by his house, see if he there?"

"Haven't got his address," I said.

"You ask Susan?"

"Yeah."

Hawk nodded.

"Here's a trick," Hawk said.

He picked up the white pages from the top of a file cabinet and riffled through it, and paused and ran his finger down a page and stopped. He shook his head.

"No Bradford Sterling."

"What a shame!" I said. "Watch this."

I punched the speaker phone button and dialed a number and a voice said, "Reilly Research."

"Sean," I said. "Spenser. I need an address."

"Full name," the voice said, "last name first."

"Sterling, formerly Silverman, Brad, I assume Bradford."

"Location?"

"Greater Boston."

"Home or business."

"Home."

"Please hold."

Some Klezmer Muzak came on. "Klezmer Muzak?" Hawk said.

"Sean thinks it's funny," I said.

"He sounds like a funny guy," Hawk said.

The Klezmer stopped and the voice came back and read out the phone number and an address in Brighton.

"Brighton?" I said.

"Brighton."

I said thank you and the line went dead. I killed the speaker phone.

"Chatty bastard," Hawk said.

"He's a computer geek," I said. "He thinks it makes him seem businesslike."

I turned the speaker phone back on and called the number in Brighton. After four rings a machine answered.

"Hi, Brad Sterling. Sorry I'm not here right now, but your call is important to me, so please leave a message and I'll call you back as soon as I can."

I hung up.

"Why would he have an unlisted number?" I said.

"Everybody got unlisted numbers," Hawk said. "It's one of the ways you know you a Yuppie."

"I suppose you're in the promotion business you don't want people calling you at home," I said. "You in on this deal?"

"Uh huh."

"There's nothing in it for either one of us."

"Susan might like it," Hawk said.

"Not so far," I said.

"But she might," Hawk said. "Later on."

"Maybe," I said.

"Besides," Hawk said, "I made two hundred thousand last week in Miami, so I can afford to take a few days, and I don't much like people threatening me."

I did not ask him what he had done in Miami to earn the money.

"Okay," I said. "Let's go over and burgle Sterling's apartment."

"What you looking for?"

"I have no idea," I said.

"It's a start," Hawk said.

"Maybe Brad ain't as rich as he say."

We'd come properly equipped, which is a definite advantage for B&E, the pry bar and other things in a red Nike gym bag. It took us about ninety seconds to jimmy the door quietly enough so that nobody stuck their head out into the hall and said "hey"; and neatly enough so that when we closed it behind us the break-in wasn't obvious.

It was one room and sparsely furnished. Narrow bed, clean sheets, neatly made, table and chair, bureau, bath off one side, no kitchen. A long hook swung out from the back of the door for suits and sport coats to hang on, and a single window looked out on the air shaft. Hawk was even less impressed.

"Maybe Brad a lot less rich than he say."

"Maybe he simply prefers Thoreauvian simplicity," I said.

"Sure," Hawk said. "That probably it."

"Lucky Susan's not still married to him," I said.

"She don't prefer Thoreauvian simplicity," Hawk said.

"No."

Searching the place wasn't a challenge. Our only problem was that it was so small we got in each other's way. Brad was a neat guy. His socks were carefully rolled. His freshly laundered shirts were organized by color. His spare keys were in a small lacquer box, each key neatly labeled with little plastic tags. There was nothing very interesting about the labels. I put the keys in my coat pocket and put the box back in the drawer. Neckties lay on top of the bureau as neatly as in a haberdashery case. Three pairs of shoes were lined up under the foot of the bed. Under the head of the bed was a working flashlight, and a box which had once contained a pair of Rockport walking shoes. Now it contained a thick bundle of letters, still in their envelopes. Hawk dumped the box out on the bed and we each took a letter. The letters were handwritten in bright purple ink on lavender stationery in what I took to be a female hand. They were all addressed to Brad Sterling at this address. We each read our letter. The salutation was "My darling."

"If I wasn't such a dangerous and self-contained African American person," Hawk said, "I'd blush."

"Like me," I said.

"Just like you, 'cept the flush be darker. You know who writing these letters?"

"Mine is signed `J,' " I said.

"Mine too," Hawk said.

"Could be Jeanette," I said.

"Like Jeanette Ronan?"

"Like that," I said. "Or it could be Jane, or Janet, or Jean, or Jenny, or some private lover's nickname that we couldn't even guess."

"Life be easier if it's Jeanette," Hawk said.

We read some more letters. All starting "My darling." All of them signed "J."

"She not too inventive," Hawk said. "But she very concrete."

"This is less fun than you'd think it would be," I said.

The room had a stuffy, closed-up feel as we stood reading the mail.

"You the expert here," Hawk said. "You call these love letters?"

"She says she loves him," I said.

"That ain't what she spends her time talking about," Hawk said.

"It's a white thing," I said.

In the fifth envelope I picked up, tucked neatly inside the folded stationery, was a Polaroid picture.

"Jeanette Ronan," I said and held the picture up for Hawk to see. Jeanette was naked, standing smiling in front of a canopied bed.

"All of Jeanette Ronan," he said. "Guess life going to be easier for once."

"I wonder who took the picture?" I said.

"Say in the letter?" Hawk asked.

I read the letter. It alluded to the picture and was very detailed in what the naked woman pictured had in mind for the recipient. But it didn't tell me who took it.

"No," I said and handed the letter to Hawk.

He read it carefully. "You know, I never thought of doing that," he said.

"Hang around," I said. "You learn."

"Maybe `My darling' took the picture," Hawk said.

"It's a Polaroid. If he took it, then why did she mail it to him?"

"So you think somebody else taking nudies of her?" Hawk said. "And she mailing them to `My darling'?"

"That may be the definition of depravity," I said.

"Or thrift," Hawk said. "Two for one."

"Sometimes your cynicism achieves Shakespearean resonance," I said.

"Coming from you," Hawk said, "that a real compliment."

We continued through the letters. We found three more photographs of Jeanette Ronan nude. No useful explanation in the letters, though the pictures were mentioned. When we got through, we put everything back the way it was and closed up the shoebox. I put the shoebox in the gym bag.

"Look like sexual harassment to you?" Hawk said.

"Maybe she's harassing him," I said.

"How many straight single guys you know feel harassed by getting nude pictures of good-looking women in the mail?" Hawk said.

"Just a thought," I said.

There was a phone on the top of the bureau with an answering machine beside it. I went over and pushed the all-message play button. The first message began without preamble.

"Brad you sonovabitch," a woman's voice said. "You either send the goddamned support payment or I swear to Christ I'll have you back in court."

"Reach out and touch somebody," Hawk said.

"Hi Brad," another woman's voice. "It's Lisa. I'm feeling neglected. Call me."

We listened to all thirteen calls, the mechanical machine voice announcing time and day of call after each one. The calls spanned at least a week. Two were from the Brighton branch of DePaul Federal Savings asking him to please call. One was from an outfit called Import Credit Company in regard to his car lease payment, please call. There was a call from the Cask and Carafe Wine Shop saying that his check had been returned and asking when he could come in and settle his account. Another angry call about money. Another call from Lisa, this one more urgently wondering why he hadn't called. "I don't want to think I'm just another notch on your gun," she said. Five other calls from women following up on a recent evening, or looking forward to one in the offing.

I wrote down all the names.

"Brad seems to have mixed success with women," I said.

"But not from lack of trying," Hawk said.

"And he's living in one room in Brighton," I said, "and not paying his bills."

"So, unless he very thrifty," Hawk said, "the story he told Susan is right."

"Sounds near dissolution to me," I said.

"You find an address book anywhere?" Hawk said.

"No."

"Checkbook?"

"Nope."

"Maybe his office," Hawk said.

I reached in my coat pocket and took out the keys and found the one marked office.

"Maybe," I said.