Our scenario had plenty of holes, which we weren’t going to fill without more information. First, though, I needed a phone, if Kip was going to share mine with his chief. We left his motorcycle at my house and climbed into the Subaru. I wasn’t in the mood for more chewed windowsills, so Diva clamored in behind us.
At the Verizon store, the manager assured me that I could have my number temporarily rolled over to a burner. He did add that unless I designated a name to my burner, the number would not be recognizable to those I called.
Because my biggest worry was clients calling me, I didn’t bother with any of that. Kip stayed in the car, keeping Diva busy.
Burner now in hand, we left Verizon and a few minutes later pulled into the driveway of the Victorian house on East Ridge, home of the Ridgefield PD. At various times the house had been a private residence, a boarding school, a multi-family, and the state police barracks. I wondered what would become of the beautiful building once the new fire/police facility was built on Old Quarry Road. It anchored a row of majestic homes overlooking the Veterans Park School Field, but returning it to a single-family didn’t seem logical, because it had an unappealing cell tower on the property. Condos, maybe?
I was contemplating these things as I sat with Diva in the driveway, waiting for Kip’s return. Diva listened, ears alert, as I chatted away while familiarizing myself with the new burner. I began to have second thoughts. There was always a learning curve with new electronics, and I wanted to race inside and retrieve my phone, fingerprints be damned.
“How long?” I asked when Kip climbed into the Subaru.
“Not sure,” he said.
“Did you play my messages for your police chief?”
“I did. And I showed him the GPS locations where your phone had been. He said it didn’t prove anything. You could have left and then come back to kill Goodwin.”
“Did he say why I would want to kill Mark?” I asked. “And doesn’t the locked room prove that I was telling the truth?”
“He found ways to refute everything I put forward. I’m guessing Tom got to him first, but he didn’t seem like he was about to send someone to arrest you. I suspect he believes you and wants to dot the i’s and cross the t’s. I think you should leave it in a lawyer’s hands.”
“I was hoping it wouldn’t come to that,” I said.
Kip gave me a sideways glance. “Maybe you should err on the side of caution.”
I didn’t want to spend my precious New York City fund on a lawyer if I didn’t have to, but I wasn’t about to tell that to Kip.
“Where to next?” asked Kip, looking hopeful that there was more for us to accomplish.
I explained that I had an obituary to write and had to get back to work. Kip exited onto East Ridge and took Governor to Main.
Downtown Ridgefield was typically Saturday morning busy. There didn’t seem to be a day that the town was void of walkers, with and without pets. Books on the Common had attracted a fair number of window shoppers, and Tazza, as usual, its handful of outdoor tables was filled. The Lantern was packed with people spilling out onto the sidewalk as they waited for one of the outdoor tables. I would have enjoyed sitting there watching the world go by, and I suspected, from the way Kip looked longingly at the restaurant, that he would too.
“I love this building,” said Kip, nodding toward a replica of the charming Victorian that had burned to the ground in 2005. Owners recognized the landmark structure as key to the eclectic architecture of the downtown area and rebuilt so it looked exactly like its predecessor. Along with the restaurant, it also housed Ursula’s, a cute little boutique. “I have a bead on one of the apartments on the upper floors.”
I looked up at the inviting covered porches overlooking Main Street. “It would be a great place to watch the Memorial Day parade,” I said.
Ten minutes later, as we pulled into the driveway of the lake house, that same black truck drove by. It disappeared too quickly for me to catch any more of the plate—just the AV.
“That’s three times in two days,” I told Kip, indicating the truck’s taillights as it rounded the corner and disappeared from sight.
“Keep the doors and windows locked when you’re here alone,” said Kip. “Just in case it’s not a neighbor.”
Burton Hemlocker, 79, an antique car collector who could be seen around town driving his bright-red snub-nosed vintage Ford pickup, died peacefully at his home on Wednesday (date). He is survived by his wife of ten years, Marietta Hemlocker, who says his greatest moment in Ridgefield was his cameo performance on the ACT stage, which he was awarded for his continued support.
Unlike some subjects of my obituaries, Burton Hemlocker had a lot of good local color, and I was going to enjoy doing this one. Apparently he’d had a great sense of humor. He’d taken advantage of the town senior center, Founders Hall; the library; the Men’s Club—you name it, Burton Hemlocker was involved. He was a world traveler and a voracious reader. He came from a lineage that really did go back to the Mayflower, had gone to impressive colleges, and had made a fortune in hedge funds. As I made my list of things to include in Burton’s obituary, I found myself wishing I had known the man, an emotion I try to evoke whenever I write an obit.
I was probably going to have a little pushback on this one, because Marietta had already insisted I include “died peacefully of natural causes.” I didn’t plan to include the natural cause bit without official determination, but peacefully was probably open to interpretation.
According to his wife, Burton had still been alive when she’d found him, and between tears, she’d explained how she’d run to the house to get the defibrillator they had purchased when Burton’s heart problems got more serious. She also called 911 and then returned to the garden, where she found him dead. I wasn’t sure how peaceful that kind of exit was, and I hated misleading obituaries where solace for the family overrode accuracy. Not knowing all the facts and because he’d died in the garden, a place he loved, I could swallow the compromise.
“Sorry, Burton,” I said aloud. “You aren’t paying my bill, at least not directly.”
Burton. The name triggered something rolling around in my brain. I chased it for a few moments before I caught it. It reminded me of the name on the Great Dames Book Club list. Balkan—that was it. Balkan, like the sea. First name Barbara.
I put the obit aside and went to work searching for Barbara Balkan. I hoped that I was in lottery-winning mode when I searched Legacy.com for her; however, no one fitting the profile of a woman old enough to have been in Lottie’s book club popped up. I then checked obituaries going back a few years, hoping to find a male relative in the New York area. And suddenly there he was. Andrew J. Balkan III had died three years ago in Chappaqua. Lots of info about his life, predeceased by his parents … blah … blah.
Survived by … that stopped me short. He was survived by his sister Barbara Wysocki (David) of Stamford, Connecticut.
Bitsy was none other than one of Lottie Arlington’s fellow book club members. Why hadn’t David told us that? His claim that he and Lottie weren’t close wasn’t completely truthful, was it?
It took several tries to reach Kip.
“Sorry, I didn’t recognize the number. I forgot to add you to my address book,” he said when he finally answered.
“You aren’t going to believe this,” I said, too excited to worry about the implications of him forgetting to add my number to his contacts. “I finally remembered one of the names on the Great Dames Book Club list.”
I told him about Barbara “Bitsy” Balkan Wysocki.
“I think another visit to the Wysocki house is in order,” said Kip. “And this time we’ll make sure Bitsy is there.”
“While you arrange that, I’m going to finish my work and take our four-legged Houdini for a walk,” I said. “Call me as soon as you know something.”
As I worked through Burton’s obituary, I made a list of questions to ask Marietta and opted to text in case she too didn’t recognize my number.
She texted back that it would be easier to meet with me later this afternoon. I agreed.
Then I texted my uncle that he should put my new number in his contacts. My thumbs were getting tired.
Uncle Richard called immediately. “Where is your phone?” he asked.
I gave him the rundown. He agreed to watch Diva so I could meet with Marietta.
“Okay if I cook at the cottage tonight?” he asked. “The power is back on, and Horace and I want to enjoy some of these late-August evenings on the porch before it gets too chilly. If you’re busy, I’ll just carry it over to Horace’s deck.”
“Actually, can you cook extra? I’m feeling a little badly about neglecting Scoop these days.”
“I owe him a huge dinner for alerting the firefighters that you were trapped inside that house. I could make a butterfly lamb on the grill with roasted potatoes and some mint jelly,” said Uncle Richard, warming to his menu.
“Scoop is a vegetarian,” I reminded him.
“Oh, right, let’s keep it simple. We’ll have portobella mushroom burgers,” he said, and then listed off a number of other things he planned to cook. So much for keeping it simple.
Before we hung up, he also gave me the name of a lawyer to call, just in case. I texted Scoop and explained about the burner phone. It rang almost immediately.
“What happened to your regular phone?” he asked.
I was getting tired of explaining, but I did owe it to him.
“You can still call my regular number because the calls are getting forwarded. I wanted you to be able to recognize me in case I called or texted you from the burner.”
“Hey, did you check out the info I sent you on Roth Arlington and Henry Harmless?” he asked. “I left it on your email.”
“Not yet, but I will.”
“It’s interesting, though probably not anything for your obituary.”
“Well, that’s done and gone, so even if it was something, I couldn’t use it,” I said, and told him about Sondra Milton.
“Sorry I haven’t been any help. These pets take a lot of time.”
“Tell me about it,” I said, and looked at Diva, who was doing her big-eye thing at my feet. “By the way, tonight will be a good time to talk to Horace next door. He says he’s interested in the kittens.”
“Not to be insensitive,” said Scoop, “but does Horace know how long a cat can live? Horace is how old?”
I hadn’t thought of that. And then I wondered again about Mrs. Arlington adopting Diva. From my nosing around on the internet, I’d learned that a Great Pyrenees had an average life span of ten to twelve years. I couldn’t see Mrs. Arlington adopting this adorable little pup if she thought she had only a short time to live. I was now more certain than ever that whatever had made her want an obituary had happened between the time she’d adopted Diva and the time she’d called me.
Before hanging up, I made Scoop swear that he wouldn’t write anything for the paper until he had permission from Kip. I’d leave the kitten-adopting process to him.