Fifteen

I’ve had a life. I mean, I’m married and divorced, I’ve travelled, I’ve solved a murder, I’ve been the target of a mafia vendetta. I’ve lived. But that Saturday afternoon was the first time I’d sat at the bedside of a probable murderer, patting his sister’s hand and pretending I wasn’t pumping her for information.

“Was John overworking?” I said. “Between his sound engineering and his part-time business?”

Becky shook her head, barely listening. She was studying her brother, as if she could will him back into consciousness by the sheer intensity of her gaze. She was mistaken. He was deeply out of it. His breath fogged the plastic mask over his nose and mouth and then cleared it. Fogged it and cleared it. And his eyes were still, glinting in a slit in his eyelids. His feet flopped outwards under the thin blanket and his hands were resting on their backs on top of it, his fingers curled, not a twitch anywhere, even when the little clothes peg pinched him every half minute to measure his blood oxygen.

“Or was it the reunion?” I said. “Did he overdo it?”

“He was a little pink around the eyes on Sunday morning,” said Becky, “but it was his fiftieth reunion.” She reached forward and brushed the shock of sweaty sandy hair back from his brow. “I think his color’s starting to look a little better, don’t you?”

“Perhaps,” I said. In truth between the overhead lights, the greying cotton gown slipping below the tidemark of his golfer’s tan, and the tubes and wires snaking all over him, John Worth couldn’t have looked worse unless someone had given him a black eye.

“It was a different time,” Becky said. “Fifty years ago. We didn’t know any better.” I held my breath. Was she changing her story? About to acknowledge her brother’s shortcomings after all? “Cheerleaders baked cookies for the team, decorated their lockers. We even laundered their uniforms in Domestic Science. Can you believe that?”

“It’s all pretty outlandish to me,” I said. “Or maybe glamorous is a better word. Homecomings and proms and reunions. It’s like something from the movies.”

“Really?” Becky said. “Nothing glamorous about it, if you ask me. Bunch of seniors drinking too much and sleeping in the wrong beds.”

“And when you say seniors … ” I said. “Do you mean the high school seniors at the graduation or senior citizens at the reunion?”

She did a little nose laugh. “You’re right,” she said. “Nothing’s changed. They were just the same this year as fifty years ago. Booze, tears, and drama.” She sighed. “It was sweet, in a weird way. All of them together again.”

“All of them?” I said.

“Most of them. There’s one they never get to come back and celebrate. Joan Something. They always hope, but she’s missed forty-nine parties since graduation.” She reached out and took hold of John’s hand, squeezing it. “Crazy not to see people while everyone’s still here. We’ll all be gone soon enough.”

“There’s always one, though, isn’t there?” I said. “It’s a shame, when the committee goes to so much trouble. And … is it just the one night or is it like a festival?”

“Our exotic, glamorous high school reunions?” Becky said. “It’s just one night.”

“Well, that’s nice then, isn’t it?” I said. “That your brother’s still here days later. It must be you he wants to spend time with, mustn’t it? I mean, there’s no other reason for him to stay on in Cuento?”

I wondered if I was treading too close to the heart of the matter. But I’d been staring at the bark of the trees and missed the wasp’s nest dangling from the wood.

“Nice?” said Becky. “You think this might be nice?”

“Not this exactly,” I said. “But before … ”

“… the massive heart attack.”

“Yeah, before the massive heart attack. He spent some time with you instead of working. I do always think you Americans work soooo hard. Two jobs isn’t even unusual, is it? It’s very admirable.”

But I’d lost her and there was no getting her back, even with flattery. Even with true flattery, like this right now. Because I meant every word: they did work hard, with their four-day vacations crammed into a long weekend and one day off for Christmas. Right now Becky Worth was working hard at piecing together everything I’d said to her.

“What side business?” she said. “His job at the studio, you said. And a side business?”

“The pet grooming,” I said.

“What?”

“Cat grooming service?” I said.

“I’m the one who works in the veterinarian’s office over in Cuento,” Becky said. “Not Johnny.”

“Have you swapped cars?” I said.

“We did, last weekend,” she said. “But only for a day. Why? Why are you so interested in the reunion? You’re not cops, you’re not reporters. He already said that dead guy left the party alive. Or wasn’t there at all.” She was still gazing at John, but she was frowning. Any second now, she’d turn and look at me and I wasn’t sure I’d be able to get my expression innocent if she did.

“It’s for these two kittens,” I said. “I saw the advert on the Cala … ?”

“The sacred El Camino!” Becky said, actually rolling her eyes. “I couldn’t believe he let me drive it! But, what ‘advert’?”

I opened my mouth to answer but before I could utter a word there was a massive movement from the bed. John had lifted a hand and was plucking at his mouth. “Maaaarrrh,” he said; a bone-chilling sound, coming from deep in his barrel chest and amplified by the dome of the mask.

“Johnny!” Becky said and stood to bend over him.

He reached up with the other hand and grabbed her by the neck. “Maaaarrrhhh,” he said.

“Johnny?”

“Hey!” I said.

He swivelled his head as far as the mask would let him and let his gaze settle on me. “Nooooo!” he said, which was pretty clear.

“Let go of my neck, Johnny honey,” his sister said. “You’re confused.”

“I’ll get someone,” I said, sliding out of my seat as he took a swipe in my direction. I edged out of the room and headed back to the nurses’ station. But one of his machines must have alerted them already because two of them were bearing towards me at the fastest clip possible without a walk turning into a run.

“He’s awake,” I said. “A bit distressed, but definitely awake!”

The nurses brushed past me and on into John Worth’s little side room. I shifted from foot to foot, swithering on which way to go. Back to see what was bothering John or home to the Last Ditch to find out what Todd had grubbed out of his bin?

Then a red light went on above the door to his room and one of the nurses came flying out, tugging an alarm hanging from a cord around her neck. I pressed myself back against the wall to let her pass and then scurried away.

Todd was sitting in my living room when I finally, finally, finally got back, after the Uber ride from the seventh circle of hell. I sneaked in round the back of the Skweek, battling an extra twenty feet of oleanders so I didn’t have to pass Della’s room, to find him sitting in my armchair staring at a black plastic bin bag resting on a white plastic sheet in the middle of the floor. He had an aerosol container in each hand, caps off, trigger fingers on nozzles, ready to go.

“Where have you been?” he said. “I thought the sister was only coming from Reno.”

“Uberland,” I told him. “I’d have been better on the bus. Have you just been sitting here the whole time?

“Sorry. Kathi wouldn’t let me take it into one of the rooms and I didn’t want to do it in the parking lot.”

“That’s not what I meant,” I told him. “I’m just amazed you’ve managed not to open it.”

“Open a garbage sack?” said Todd. “Are you crazy? I have no idea what’s in there. You open it, you skanky ho, and I’ll zap the critters before they escape.”

“What critters?” I said. “Did you feel it moving when you brought it over?” Todd shuddered and I saw a rash of goose pimples pop up on his forearms. He had pushed his sleeves back in case they interfered with his quick-draw aerosol action. I took a closer look at the cans. “Todd, is that the stuff from Costa Rica? You can’t spray that in here. Or at least let me open the window.”

I opened the window then, pulling on a pair of latex gloves—there were always latex gloves lying around anywhere Kathi spent time—I undid the orange ties on the sack and folded it back.

“Well!” I said.

Todd was pressed back in his chair with both arms held straight out in front of him. “What is it?” he said, sounding strained.

“There’s nothing in here for you to worry about,” I said. “Lay down your weapons and have a look-see.”

Todd narrowed his eyes at me, but he knows I would never ambush him with fruit flies or maggots. He set the canisters down, rose warily up onto his tiptoes, and peeked over the rim of the bag. Then he whistled, stood back down on his heels, and came closer.

“That is very interesting,” he said, whipping out his camera. “You take it out and I’ll photograph it.”

“Or,” I said, “we call Mike to come and take it away.”

“Right, right,” Todd said. “You unpack, I’ll snap, then we put it back and call Mike.”

“Deal,” I said. “Okay.” I snapped the blue gloves to make sure they were snug on my wrists and plunged my hands in. “Item one,” I said, pulling them out again. “Jimmy wig.” I turned it inside out. “No visible staples.”

“Check,” said Todd.

“Item two: kilt. Not a real one. Cheap costume quality.”

“Kilt,” said Todd. “Check.”

“Item three: leather-effect waistcoat. Aka vest. Not a real one. Cheap costume quality.”

“Village People biker vest,” said Todd. “Check.”

“Draught excluder,” I said, pulling out a long sausage of fabric stuffed with straw. “Home-made. And another draught excluder. And a huge draught excluder. And a—why are you not saying check?”

“Because I’m speechless at how dumb you are,” Todd said, watching me pull another one out of the sack. “Draught excluders?”

I was rootling in the bottom of the bag for the last item. “And a severed head,” I concluded. “Oh! They’re not draught excluders, are they? They’re arms and legs.”

“And a torso,” Todd. “To put the kilt on.”

“Ew,” I said, pulling a tiny little draught excluder with two round supports out of the bin bag’s last corner.

“So … that’s true?” Todd said. “Scottish men don’t wear anything underneath?”

“It’s true,” I said.

“But they do those dances with all the swinging around.”

“They do,” I said. “But on a real kilt—not this thing, but on a real one—the pleats are stitched down to hip height and the sporran chain adds a bit of battening too. And remember it weighs nine pounds.”

“What does?” said Todd, round-eyed.

“The kilt, you pig!” I said. “It’s really hard to get it to fly up from Scottish dancing. Now, a Scottish-Jewish wedding, on the other hand? When they lift the groom up on a chair?”

Todd was quiet for a minute, imagining. And I was quiet for a minute revisiting some happy memories. Then we shook ourselves back to attention.

“So this fake Mel Gibson dude was dressed up and sitting on John Worth’s porch over Halloween?” Todd said. “And then all of a sudden, when the Voyager publishes Tam’s identity, Worth dismantles the display, like it’s some big emergency.”

“With his sister’s help. But even with his sister’s help it’s so stressful he has a heart attack. Oh, he came round by the way. He heard me talking to his sister about the reunion and he pretty much willed himself awake. It was like Moby Dick breaking through the waves, Todd. You should have seen it!”

“But how does draft-stopper-fake-guy relate to real dead Tam?” Todd said.

“A decoy? Only, that just raises the question … ?”

“Where was Tam?” said Todd. “The non-fake dude, in the fake-nude suit.”

“Presumably with a kilt of his own on top,” I agreed. “Isn’t there a big spread in the Voyager the day after Halloween? Porch-decorating finalists?”

“There is,” said Todd. “And I bet the photographer has five thousands shots of porches all over town that didn’t make the grade.”

“Do you know him?” I said. “Any chance you could bat your eyelids?”

“Her,” said Todd. “And no. I tried to get her to delete a pic of me in a fun run one year where I looked as fat as a blimp and she got really weird about it. Photographers, you know.”

“We should hand this over to Mike,” I said.

“Not yet,” said Todd. “Not before we put this back in John Worth’s garbage can for Mike to find.”

“You’re right about that,” I said. “But I didn’t just mean the stuff, I mean the lead. Mike could get a search warrant for the photos. We really need to hand over what we know.”

“We do,” Todd agreed. Technically. But his voice was as dead as a dude who’d been ripped up into five draught excluders. “Or, even if we can’t get the photographer to cough up, we can check out all the photos that made it onto the website.”

“There’s something I’d like to do too,” I said. “After dark, I’d like to go through the Moes’ wheeliebins.”

“Wheeliebin!” said Todd.

“Garbage carts, whatever,” I said. “See if they’ve just shoved everything in there for the dustmen on Monday.”

“Dustmen!” Todd said.

“Sanitation engineers, whatever.”

“But why?” said Todd.

“Because I think John Worth killed Tam and stashed him on someone’s porch and that someone found him and chucked him in the slough. But if they didn’t unstaple his hat, they might have skimped on all the other clean-up too.”

“But unless it’s one of the Moes,” Tam said, “it could be anyone. It wouldn’t even need to be someone from the class of sixty-eight, would it?”

“No,” I admitted. “But we could try cross-referencing porches with the yearbook. We might get lucky. Mind you, the library shuts in twenty minutes so we’re going to have to hustle up there and speed read.”

“Or,” said Todd, “wear that coat with the kangaroo pouch. Twenty minutes isn’t enough.”

“Téodor Mendez Kroger, MD,” I said. “Are you suggesting I steal a library book?”

“For a good cause? For the weekend? Absolutely.”