Chapter 4

Jaw-dropping. That’s the best way to describe the Conroy mansion. The home—if one could call it that—looked like a small version of Versailles. Built to impress. White stone and red brick with tall arching windows and a gray slate roof. Under California’s cloudless blue skies, the manse looked as out of place as the gilded statue of Aphrodite, the Greek Goddess of beauty, that graced the twenty-foot marble fountain in front of the home’s center motor court.

Lupe, or the woman who I assumed to be Dr. Conroy’s housekeeper, stood beneath the mansion’s huge columned portico and waved for us to pull the car around to the side of the motor court.

“We’ve been getting floral deliveries all morning,” she said. “I’m not sure if they’re for the wedding or the memorial, but I’d prefer you not to block the entrance.”

Wilson pulled the Rolls to the side of the house, and I got out. Quick as I could, lest Lupe got curious about the Rolls and came too close and realized the seat of the English drive was set too far back for a short, plump senior like myself.

“You must be Lupe.” I shuffled across the gravel drive toward the front door. The woman looked to be about my age, late sixties, early seventies. Hispanic with dark, graying hair, and a pleasant round face. “The doctor told me to talk to you. My name is Annie Johnston. I’m from the mortuary.”

My fictitious name for the day rolled off my tongue as easily as I extended my hand to shake hers. I wasn’t about to use my own name. My plan to infiltrate the Conroy Estate was dependent upon Lupe not knowing my real identity.

“I apologize for my intrusion,” I said. “But my boss insisted I come by and pick up a suit for Jared’s memorial.”

The second she heard Jared’s name, Lupe dropped my hand, squeezed her eyes shut and covered her mouth with a clenched fist. I had hit a nerve.

“I apologize. I didn’t mean to appear insensitive. This must be a very difficult time for you.”

Lupe brushed her eyes with the back of her hand. “Jared was a good man. And it’s all been so sudden. One moment we were planning a wedding. Everyone here was so happy, there was so much to do and look forward to, and now—ugh! It’s awful, Jared’s dead, and we’re planning a funeral.” Lupe swallowed hard. “I’ve been fielding flower deliveries all morning. If you give me a moment, I’ll go find a suit.”

I glanced back at Wilson. He stood with his arms and legs crossed and leaned casually against the front of the Rolls, and smiled knowingly. My plan to get inside the Conroy house had hit a snag, and he knew it.

“Now what are you going to do, Old Gal?”

“Excuse me.” I trailed after Lupe. “Would it be too much for me to ask for a glass of water? I’ve been running from place to place all morning. I forgot my water bottle. It’s a little warm, and I need to take a pill.” I patted my chest. “I’m afraid my heart likes to bounce around like a tennis ball if I don’t take my pills regularly.”

If I had eyes in the back of my head, I would have seen Wilson smile. Score two for the Old Gal. He knew full well my medical remedies amounted to nothing more than what I could grow in my garden, and my erratic heartbeat was a thinly veiled guise designed to gain access to the mansion.

“Follow me.” Lupe led the way back beneath the portico and through a set of glass and wrought-iron front doors with gold-leaf filigree insets that must have been ten feet high. They opened onto a marble hallway, and soon as she shut them behind us, Wilson left my side. Like a bee to honey, he disappeared down the long hallway ahead of us.

I worried the echo of our footsteps across the marble flooring might alert the doctor to my presence, but Lupe assured me we were alone, or as alone as one might be in a house where the servants outnumbered the occupants. The doctor couldn’t hear us. He was in the east wing, in his study, napping.

“Wasn’t always so quiet around here,” Lupe said. “But since I’ve been here, the doctor’s wild party days with celebrities and lots of beautiful people...they’re long gone.”

I followed Lupe into an expansive kitchen with a twelve-foot center island that opened onto a sunroom with hanging ferns and potted palms. Lupe stopped in front of a double-wide sub-zero refrigerator and took out a bottle of water and handed it to me.

“I’ve coffee if you’d like,” she said.

I accepted the bottle and glanced casually at my watch. “That’d be nice. I do have some time, and I have to admit, I am curious. One hears such stories.”

“Hard not to. The house had quite a reputation. In its day, it was right up there with Hugh Hefner’s Playboy Mansion. But that was well before I started working for the doctor.”

I took a seat at the kitchen’s island, and with my water bottle in hand, feigned taking a pill.

“These days it’s only the doctor here in the house and a few staff. Jared lived out back in the guest house.”

“Must get lonely, a big place like this with just the doctor around.” I scanned the kitchen and the adjoining sunroom. The light showed brightly through the windows and danced silently through leaves of several potted palm trees and onto an empty settee. “If only the walls could talk, right?”

“I take it you’ve heard the rumors.” Lupe took a cup from one of the kitchen cabinets and poured me some coffee. “Cream? Sugar? Or maybe something a little stronger?”

From a drawer beneath the island, Lupe pulled out a silver flask and splashed a swig of what looked like rum into her cup. I covered my own. I suspected this wasn’t her first morning brew, and I planned to use it to my advantage. The poor woman had no one to share her grief with, and I sensed she would welcome a gentle ear.

“Can’t avoid hearing a thing or two now and then,” I said. “In the eighties, this house had quite the reputation. Sex, drugs, and rock and roll, right?”

“I wouldn’t know. I don’t trade in gossip. The doctor wouldn’t like it if I did. But between you and me, there’s still plenty of evidence around here things were wild back in the day.”

I glanced back into the sunroom. Wilson had taken a seat on a small couch beneath a palm tree. And he wasn’t alone. Seated next to him on the settee were two gray-haired ladies, women my age, dripping in jewels. Made up to the max, and dressed in long, jewel-colored silk robes, like goddesses. I had seen their kind before—restless spirits. A less experienced psychic might have mistaken them for ghosts, but I knew better. These were luminaries: pests identifiable by a slightly greenish tinge about their silvery-shadowed selves, and in my opinion, much less respectable than ghosts.

“Do you think the house is haunted?” I asked.

Lupe laughed. “I don’t believe in ghosts. The doctor, however, he’d tell you differently. I hear him sometimes. He still talks to his dead wife. As for me, I think the doctor’s only haunted by her memories and mourns her loss. Poor soul’s a broken man.”

“You don’t believe in ghosts?”

“Do you?”

“I work in a mortuary,” I lied. “Sometimes I wonder.”

My eyes shifted back to Wilson and the luminaries. The three of them finger-waved and mouthed hello. I glanced back at Lupe. Did she not see the two women sitting on the settee, or had she merely chosen to ignore them?

“Besides, the doctor keeps me too busy for such nonsense.” Lupe poured herself a second cup of coffee, topped it off with another jig from the flask, took a sip, then offered me a swig.

I shook my head.

“Don’t mind telling you it’s nice to have someone to talk to. Doctor’s not much for chitchat.” Lupe pushed the flask to the center of the counter and raised her cup to mine. “If you change your mind.”

I raised my cup and took a sip of my coffee. Between her inebriated state and need for company, I planned to get as much information from her about Jared and the house as I could.

“How long have you worked here?” I asked.

“A couple of years. The last housekeeper didn’t last. Actually, the last several housekeepers were in and out of here pretty fast. The one before me went running out of here like a madwoman. She said the doctor frightened her.”

“I’ve heard he can be difficult.” I looked down at my cup, best not let her think I was too curious.

“I’ve known a lot worse. But if it’s stories about the doctor you’re looking for, you won’t hear any from my lips. Far as I’m concerned the man’s a saint. It’s just a matter of accepting his moods.”

“You like it here then?”

Lupe took another sip of her coffee. “It’s a job.”

I sensed not much upset Lupe. Job security obviously trumped the doctor’s mood or the fact the house was haunted. It was clear Lupe had chosen to either ignore the luminaries or was totally unaware of their presence. Which can happen. Luminaries are very specific about with whom they make contact, and how much of themselves they will allow to be seen or heard. Either way, I felt certain Lupe was hiding something about herself that might explain her loyalty to the doctor. And I felt I knew what it was.

“And a green card?” I asked.

Lupe put her cup down. The color drained from her face.

“How did you know?”

“A good guess. You wouldn’t be the first housekeeper in Beverly Hills guaranteed a green card in exchange for loyalty.”

Lupe sat back from the counter, her hands outstretched to her cup. “I needed a place to go to. Somewhere safe.”

“You’re not legal?”

“I am now. I was a schoolteacher, educated in the US. I came here on one of those student exchange programs years ago, then I went home like you’re supposed to. I taught English in Guadalajara.”

“Which explains why you speak so well.” Lupe’s English was pitch-perfect, without a trace of an accent. “But not how you ended up here, working for the doctor.”

“Things happened. I needed to get out of Mexico. One of my students got himself mixed up with a cartel. I made the mistake of trying to interfere. The boy’s father smuggled me across the border. If he hadn’t, I’d be dead.” Lupe reached for the flask and added another jig of whatever was inside to her coffee. The third or maybe fourth since we’d sat down. “Dr. Conroy employs a lot of people. One of them happened to hear of me and knew the doctor was looking for a housekeeper and put me in touch. Dr. Conroy took care of the paperwork, and here I am. And grateful to be so. I suppose you could say he made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.”

Or walk away from, I thought. I wanted to keep her talking. I told her I’d accepted a few offers like that myself.

Lupe grabbed her cup and held it tight between her hands. “A girl’s got to do what a girl’s got to do, right? Sometimes the choices aren’t so easy.”

“And now you can’t leave. You’re stuck,” I said.

“Hey, I’m safe, and so far, I haven’t wanted to leave. So things worked out.” Lupe swallowed the last of her coffee and stood. “But enough about me. You wanted to see the place, and the doctor won’t nap forever. I’d prefer he not find me chatting in the kitchen. Come with me. I’ll show you around. I’ll text the guard at the gate to call my cell if we get deliveries.”

  

Parked behind the kitchen’s back door was a small, red, canopied golf cart, big enough for two. Lupe told me to jump in, and with my hand on my head to keep my hat from flying off, and the other holding onto the grab rail, and Wilson balancing like a bag of clubs on the back, we took off like we were late for tee time.

With one hand on the wheel, Lupe pointed to the estate’s sculpture garden—a large, peaceful-looking green expanse with a marble fountain in the center—surrounded by tall hedges and accented with Greek sculpture. Or what I thought was Greek sculpture. On closer look, as we whizzed by, I realized those marble-looking figures I thought resembled Greek goddesses, weren’t Greek at all, but chiseled, life-sized copies of former Hollywood stars. Nude statues. Copies of their namesakes posed to look like the gods.

“Whoa!” I yelled at Lupe to stop the cart. “Is that—”

“Marilyn Monroe?” Lupe laughed. Directly in front of us, the star was posed as she had been for the famous shot of her above the subway grate with her skirt flying in the wind. Only here she stood naked, like a nymph, with her hands on her legs and a perpetual smile frozen on her face.

“There are twelve in all. It’s the doctor’s own Hall of Fame. Next to Marilyn there’s Mansfield, Bardot, and Taylor. I’d stop and walk you through, but there’s not time. However, you might notice the statue in the fountain.” Lupe pointed toward the water feature in the center of the yard.

“Is that?”

“Steve McQueen,” Lupe said. “The doctor has a rather odd sense of humor.”

“Or is an equal opportunist.” Wilson poked me on the shoulder. I grimaced. A reminder shades were to be neither seen nor heard by either me or anyone else while I was investigating. “Just sayin’,” he said.

“Is the doctor bi-sexual?” I asked.

“Not that I’d know. But he’s definitely bipolar, never know what his mood’s going to be.” Then directing my attention to an arched opening in the hedge, Lupe added, “There’s a pathway leading from the garden through to the tennis court, pool area, and the doctor’s private gardens. I won’t bother showing it to you now, time being what it is, but I will show you the guest house before the doctor wakes up. I wouldn’t want to risk him knowing I invited company in for the nickel tour. We’ll take a shortcut past the garage. There’s not much to see there.”

As we zipped past the garage, I did a double take. Was it my imagination, or were my eyes playing tricks on me?

“Stop.” I pointed at the trellised garden area, just beyond the garage. “What’s that?”

“That?” Lupe laughed, and with her foot to the accelerator kept going. With the wind in our faces, I held tight to the grab bar and steadied myself. “Did you think you saw a spaceman?”

“I’m not sure. Did I?” I strained to look over my shoulder.

“No. That’s Billy, the beekeeper. He’s got his beekeeping suit on today. Must be working with his hives.”

“A beekeeper?” I stared over my shoulder as Lupe pressed on toward the guest house. “Are the bees part of the doctor’s new Bee-Natural product line?”

“Hardly. These here are more of a hobby. The doctor’s business, the bee part of it anyway, is done in Europe. Something about European bees being better for what he needs. But bees, in general, are endangered, and the doctor, priding himself on his garden as he does, felt he needed his own hives. And Billy, well, he needed a safe place for his bees. Kind of like me, I guess. Everybody’s got their secrets. But I don’t ask.”

While Lupe may not have wanted to ask, I sure did. My questions about the beekeeper and the doctor were just beginning to form as Lupe pulled up in front of the guest house. I was momentarily stunned by the elegance of the cottage. Similar in design to the main house, but covered in ivy and much more serene. A mood I felt more reflective of its former occupant.

“Wasn’t Dr. Conroy at all concerned about Jared getting stung? I mean, with all his allergies, I’d think that might be a problem.”

“For you and me, maybe. But it was never much of a concern to Jared. In fact, it was Jared who suggested Billy to the doctor. Billy’s a friend.”

Lupe got out of the cart and headed to the front door of the guest house.

“For how long?” I asked.

“Jared and Billy?” Lupe paused with the key in the door. “Oh, I don’t know. Billy started hanging around here about the time Jared and Amy met.”

“Before or after?”

“After, I think.”

“Why?”

“Just curious,” I said.

“Well, there’s nothing to it. In fact, I remember being in the kitchen when Jared and the doctor agreed the bees were no riskier than it might be if Jared was to go to the beach. Supposedly, the bees aren’t the aggressive kind, and behind the garage, where Billy keeps them, neither the doctor nor Jared thought it’d be much of a problem. As you can see, it’s a fair distance from the guest house. Must be about half a mile. Plus, Jared always carried an EpiPen with him. The doctor insisted on it.”