The Thanksgiving Day Murder (12 page)

He turned up the driveway and we said good-bye. I had no idea my luck was about to change.

Over the next day there was a kind of explosion of information, just about all of it unexpected. It started as I put my things down in the house and went to check the answering machine. I have to say I feel uncomfortable having an answering machine in my home, but it came with my husband and I think of it as his, although messages are often left on it for me, as was the case today. I saw the blinking light and pressed the
PLAY
button.

“This message is for Miss Christine Bennett,” a slow, careful elderly female voice said. “My name is Mabel Bernstein, B-E-R-N-S-T-E-I-N, and I spoke with Miss Bennett this morning. I have some information for her, but she'll have to call me back today because I won't be available tomorrow.” She recited her number, added, “Please give her the message,” and hung up.

The confusion was caused by Jack's security-conscious temperament. He refuses to identify us by name and has a rather grim-sounding order to leave a message at the tone. I dialed Mrs. Bernstein's number as fast as I could.

“Oh, Miss Bennett,” she said happily, “I wasn't sure I'd reached the right number.”

“That was my husband's voice. Tell me what your information is.”

“I just remembered the name of the moving company Natalie used. They're Annie's Angels and they move people all over the Village.”

“Annie? A woman's name?”

“We're a pretty independent lot down here. Anyone can do anything. And does.”

“That's really terrific, Mrs. Bernstein.”

“Well, I hope it gives you something to work on. You said I was the end of the line. At least now someone else is.”

“I'm sure this is going to help. Thank you very much and have a wonderful vacation.”

Before I got off the phone, she had given me Annie's Angels' phone number. I called immediately and got an answering machine. I supposed Annie was out doing her thing.

“He let us out early,” Jack said, walking in half an hour before I expected him.

“Does he take a cut in pay for that?”

“He gets a round of applause.”

“Coffee?”

“You bet.” He followed me into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator, eventually taking out an apple. “How was your trip to the Village?”

“Profitable, but not until late this afternoon. And I got to see Sandy Gordon's house in New Jersey.”

“Sounds like a busy day.”

I told him.

“I'm hearing a few interesting inconsistencies,” Jack said as I finished. He had taken a sheet of plain white paper and folded it in quarters as he does to take notes. Along the shorter fold he noted a few things as I spoke. “The landlady, or landlord as she prefers to be called, said Natalie was new in town, but Mrs. B. on the fourth floor, who knew Natalie a hell of a lot better than the landlord, says she used a local mover to move her stuff. Doesn't sound like it came from Indiana.”

“Right. So she'd been living in New York before she
moved to Greenwich Avenue. And Wormy said she had references, one of which she checked. So Natalie had held at least two jobs in New York before coming to H and J.”

“So we've got a lady who tailors her story to suit her purposes.”

“But why?”

“Maybe she stiffed a landlord in New York, you know, moved out without paying the last month's rent or left the apartment in such a mess, she would have owed a lot of money.”

“She didn't do that on Greenwich Avenue.”

“She had a husband by then and she wanted him to think she was the greatest.”

“That's possible.” I looked over my own notes to see if I'd left anything out. “Oh yes. They were planning a vacation and Natalie had bought a lot of clothes for it, which she never wore. They all still had price tags hanging from them. Sandy has a passport. It's a few years old and I didn't look inside to see where he'd gone with it. But Natalie doesn't have one. They were going to St. John, which is an American possession, so she didn't need one.”

“Her idea or his?”

“I asked him. He said they'd made the decision together. Sounds reasonable.” I poured the coffee and put out some cookies.

“Can I say something?”

“When did you ever have to ask?”

He gave me the little smile that hinted something was coming. “Suppose you're talking to somebody and you mention you were married last summer and the person asks where. You say St. Stephen's Convent upstate and this woman says, ‘What an interesting place to get married. Whose idea was that?' And you say, ‘My husband and I picked it because I spent fifteen years there as a nun.' ”

“Is that wrong?” I said, getting an odd feeling.

“Not wrong at all, just slanted. If I'd married any other
woman in the United States, would I have gotten married at St. Stephen's?”

“Well no, but—”

“But I married you, so I did. Do you remember when we first talked about it?”

I did. “You said your mother wouldn't be very happy about it.”

“But we made the decision together and we did it. And I'm glad we did,” he added, reaching across the table and touching my face. “You get my point? I would never say to anyone that we got married at St. Stephen's because my wife insisted. And if Natalie said to Sandy, ‘Wouldn't it be nice to go to St. John?' the chances are he'd think it's a pretty nice idea and he'd tell you they made the decision together.”

I did get the point. And Jack was right. Sandy always put the best face on everything that had to do with Natalie. It meant he wasn't the best source of information, although for many things he was my only source. “So it's possible she didn't want to get a passport. The reason is probably that she's older than Sandy thinks.”

“Not unusual. Many women lie about their age.”

“Her hairdresser said she had quite a bit of gray.”

“Her hairdresser. That's good. You're a good investigator, Chris. Not that I didn't think so before.”

“Her friend Susan is thirty-six and said Natalie claimed to be a few years younger, but Susan thought Natalie was Susan's age from things she had said.”

“Sounds like she's a perceptive witness.”

“I think she is. I may get back to her and ask her a few more questions. I wonder if Natalie was married, maybe even had children, and left them to start a new life.”

“Sounds like a possibility.”

“Maybe her former husband came to New York with the kids for the Thanksgiving Day parade and saw her there. That could really explain her disappearance.” I could feel
excitement building as the image took shape. “She couldn't run away from them because of the crowd, and he might follow her and see Sandy. So she goes along with him, knowing she's been found out and the new good life is over.”

“I think that's an idea to work on,” Jack said. “That the end of the cookies?”

“I'll get more tomorrow.” That seemed to satisfy him and we went up to bed.

It wasn't even eight-fifteen when the phone rang the next morning. At the other end was Arnold Gold, already in his office preparing for a nine A.M. date in court.

“Got something for you,” he said. “You awake enough for a hot piece of news?”

“Up and running.”

“I was listening to my favorite music station as usual when I got into the office this morning. They have a report on the advertising world just after the eight-o'clock news, not anything that gets my blood going, but I heard a familiar name mentioned. Hopkins and Jewell. Isn't that where you said your missing woman worked?”

“Yes. What's the news?”

“They're breaking up.”

“They're what?” I couldn't believe I'd heard right.

“Going their separate ways. Even the guy who broke the news on the radio seemed surprised. There hadn't been any rumors, the company'd been doing very well, only got together five years ago, et cetera, et cetera.”

“I'm shocked. I don't know what to say.”

“You ask them anything embarrassing?”

“Not that embarrassing. Some stuff is missing from Natalie's file. I asked if Hopkins could have taken it, but I don't really have a motive for her to have done so. Or at least not a strong one.”

“Well, the advertising man said they would divvy up
their assets, work out some deal on the jobs they're working on, and split up.”

“Thanks for keeping your ears open.”

“I'd guess this'll be in today's
Times.
Back in the financial section if you read that far.”

“Not usually. My quote assets unquote are in the same safe bonds my aunt bought.”

“Probably just as well. Gotta tend to my law practice, Chrissie. Let me know what happens.”

“I will.” I hung up and reported to Jack, who was finishing up breakfast.

“I can't see what this has to do with your asking questions about a woman who worked for them a few years ago, even one who was in at the beginning.”

“I can't either, but Arlene Hopkins really came across as trying to limit my access.”

“Could be for ten other reasons.”

“Could be. Maybe I'll give Wormy a call later on.”

“Don't forget your Greenwich Village mover. I think that's your best bet at this point.”

“Right.” I looked at my watch. When the dishes were done, that would be my first call.

“Annie's Angels,” a very sweet female voice answered.

“Good morning. My name is Christine Bennett and I have a question about someone you moved about five years ago. Her name was Natalie Miller and she moved to Greenwich Avenue.”

“What do you need to know?”

“The address she moved from.”

“I'm not sure I have the right to give that out. I'll really have to ask Annie. Can you tell me what this is all about?”

“She disappeared over a year ago and we're trying to trace her.”

“What do you mean ‘disappeared'?”

“She may have been kidnapped.”

“This sounds a little crazy.”

I couldn't dispute her judgment. “When can I reach Annie?”

“She usually comes in around nine. You want to call us back?”

“Yes.”

“I'll tell her what it's all about when she comes in.”

Since looking at Sandy's stamp collection, a few new ideas had started forming in my mind. When Jack and I were married, Jack asked his local post office in Brooklyn to forward his mail to his new address, our house in Oakwood. It was a natural thing to do. Old bills had to be paid, magazines had to be sent on, friends who had only your last address would want their mail to find its way to your new address. And there was something else that was a very long shot, but when you've got very little, you try anything. I dialed Sandy's number at work a little before nine—Jack had just set out for Brooklyn—and sure enough, he was there.

“Two things, Sandy,” I said. “When you married, did Natalie have mail forwarded from the Greenwich Avenue address?”

“She didn't. She said she was tired of all the junk mail she got and this was a perfect time to cut it off. Her friends knew where she was going and she didn't care about anyone else. She paid the Con Ed bill, settled everything with her landlord, and didn't leave a forwarding address. I did, of course, and all my junk mail followed me. I don't think I ever saw a piece of mail with her maiden name on it.”

“Second question. I noticed while you were upstairs yesterday that you had a lot of stamps still stuck to envelopes.”

“That's right. Sometimes I save the whole envelope, sometimes just the stamp. I soak the stamps off, dry them, and put them in special albums.”

“So you look over all the mail that comes into the house.”

“Always. All collectors do. Nowadays a lot of mail is marked by a machine. It's mostly personal letters that have stamps.”

“Did Natalie give you stamps off her envelopes?”

“All the time. She loved my collection. I don't think she'd ever seen a stamp collection before, and mine is pretty extensive. I showed her how to tear off the right part of the envelope, and every so often she'd give me a bunch. In fact, I remember when we were first married, she—Chris, you're a genius.”

“What is it?”

“She gave me an old stamp from an envelope that had been mailed a long time before. She started to tear it wrong and I stopped her and showed her what I wanted, including the postmark.”

“Sandy, did you see how it was addressed? I know it was a couple of years ago, but do you remember anything at all about that envelope?”

“It was handwritten. That's all I caught. She tore off the stamp, with the postmark, and gave it to me. It'll take me some time, but I can find it for you. I'm sure that's in a box that I haven't worked on yet.”

“OK. That's your assignment. Maybe we'll find somebody somewhere who knows Natalie Miller.”

“You'll hear from me.”

That gave me a lift. If it came from someplace in Indiana, we could take out ads in local newspapers. I wondered whether Miller was her maiden name or the name of someone she had married. Sandy's explanation of how she had not left a forwarding address certainly pointed to a woman trying to lose her past.

At a few minutes after nine I called Annie's Angels again, and this time Annie herself was there. She asked why I wanted the information on Natalie and I told her the truth.

“I remember her,” Annie said, not giving anything away. “I went to her old apartment to give her an estimate.”

“Do you have that address?” I crossed the fingers of my free hand.

“I do, but I don't know who you are and I'm kind of reluctant to give it out.”

“I'll be glad to come down to your office. I can be there before noon.”

“What the hell, it's five years.” She gave me an address on the east side over near Gramercy Park.