outside my office when I arrived that morning. She was short and quite plump, wearing jeans in a size I’ve never seen on the rack. Her blouse was tunic-length, ostensibly to disguise her considerable rear end. Someone must have told her never to wear horizontal stripes, so the bold red-and-blue bands ran diagonally across her torso with a dizzying effect. Big red canvas tote, matching canvas wedgies. Her face was round, seamless, and smooth, her hair a uniformly dark shade that suggested a rinse. She might have been any age between forty and sixty. “You’re not Kinsey Millhone,” she said as I approached.
“Actually, I am. Would you like to come in?” I unlocked the door and stepped back so she could pass in front of me. She was giving me the once-over, as if my appearance was as remarkable to her as hers was to me.
She took a seat, keeping her tote squarely on her lap. I went around to my side of the desk, pausing to open the French doors before I sat down. “What can I help you with?”
She stared at me openly. “Well, I don’t know. I thought you’d be a man. What kind of name is Kinsey? I never heard such a thing.”
“My mother’s maiden name. I take it you’re in the market for a private investigator.”
“I guess you could say that. I’m Shirese Dunaway, but everybody calls me Sis. Exactly how long have you been doing this?” Her tone was a perfect mating of skepticism and distrust.
“Six years in May. I was with the police department for two years before that. If my being a woman bothers you, I can recommend another agency. It won’t offend me in the least.”
“Well, I might as well talk to you as long as I’m here. I drove all the way up from Orange County. You don’t charge for a consultation, I hope.”
“Not at all. My regular fee is thirty dollars an hour plus expenses, but only if I believe I can be of help. What sort of problem are you dealing with?”
“Thirty dollars an hour! My stars. I had no idea it would cost so much.”
“Lawyers charge a hundred and twenty,” I said with a shrug.
“I know, but that’s in case of a lawsuit. Contingency, or whatever they call that. Thirty dollars an hour…”
I closed my mouth and let her work it out for herself. I didn’t want to get into an argument with the woman in the first five minutes of our relationship. I tuned her out, watching her lips move while she decided what to do.
“The problem is my sister,” she said at long last. “Here, look at this.” She handed me a little clipping from the Santa Teresa newspaper. The death notice read: “Crispin, Margery, beloved mother of Justine, passed away on December 10. Private arrangements. Wynington-Blake Mortuary.”
“Nearly two months ago,” I remarked.
“Nobody even told me she was sick! That’s the point,” Sis Dunaway snapped. “I wouldn’t know to this day if a former neighbor hadn’t spotted this and cut it out.” She tended to speak in an indignant tone regardless of the subject.
“You just received this?”
“Well, no. It come back in January, but of course I couldn’t drop everything and rush right up. This is the first chance I’ve had. You can probably appreciate that, upset as I was.”
“Absolutely,” I said. “When did you last talk to Margery?”
“I don’t remember the exact date. It had to be eight or ten years back. You can imagine my shock! To get something like this out of a clear blue sky.”
I shook my head. “Terrible,” I murmured. “Have you talked to your niece?”
She gestured dismissively. “That Justine’s a mess. Marge had her hands full with that one,” she said. “I stopped over to her place and you should have seen the look I got. I said, ‘Justine, whatever in the world did Margery die of?’ And you know what she said? Said, ‘Aunt Sis, her heart give out.’ Well, I knew that was bull the minute she said it. We have never had heart trouble in our family….”
She went on for a while about what everybody’d died of; Mom, Dad, Uncle Buster, Rita Sue. We’re talking cancer, lung disorders, an aneurysm or two. Sure enough, no heart trouble. I was making sympathetic noises, just to keep the tale afloat until she got to the point. I jotted down a few notes, though I never did quite understand how Rita Sue was related. Finally, I said, “Is it your feeling there was something unusual in your sister’s death?”
She pursed her lips and lowered her gaze. “Let’s put it this way. I can smell a rat. I’d be willing to bet Justine had a hand in it.”
“Why would she do that?”
“Well, Marge had that big insurance policy. The one Harley took out in 1966. If that’s not a motive for murder, I don’t know what is.” She sat back in her chair, content that she’d made her case.
“Harley?”
“Her husband…until he passed on, of course. They took out policies on each other and after he went, she kept up the premiums on hers. Justine was made the beneficiary. Marge never remarried and with Justine on the policy, I guess she’ll get all the money and do I don’t know what. It just doesn’t seem right. She’s been a sneak all her natural life. A regular con artist. She’s been in jail four times! My sister talked till she was blue in the face, but she never could get Justine to straighten up her act.”
“How much money are we talking about?”
“A hundred thousand dollars,” she said. “Furthermore, them two never did get along. Fought like cats and dogs since the day Justine was born. Competitive? My God. Always trying to get the better of each other. Justine as good as told me they had a falling-out not two months before her mother died! The two had not exchanged a word since the day Marge got mad and stomped off.”
“They lived together?”
“Well, yes, until this big fight. Next thing you know, Marge is dead. You tell me there’s not something funny going on.”
“Have you talked to the police?”
“How can I do that? I don’t have any proof.”
“What about the insurance company? Surely, if there were something irregular about Marge’s death, the claims investigator would have picked up on it.”
“Oh, honey, you’d think so, but you know how it is. Once a claim’s been paid, the insurance company doesn’t want to hear. Admit they made a mistake? Uh-uh, no thanks. Too much trouble going back through all the paperwork. Besides, Justine would probably turn around and sue ’em within an inch of their life. They’d rather turn a deaf ear and write the money off.”
“When was the claim paid?”
“A week ago, they said.”
I stared at her for a moment, considering. “I don’t know what to tell you, Ms. Dunaway….”
“Call me Sis. I don’t go for that Ms. bull.”
“All right, Sis. If you’re really convinced Justine’s implicated in her mother’s death, of course I’ll try to help. I just don’t want to waste your time.”
“I can appreciate that,” she said.
I stirred in my seat. “Look, I’ll tell you what let’s do. Why don’t you pay me for two hours of my time. If I don’t come up with anything concrete in that period, we can have another conversation and you can decide then if you want me to proceed.”
“Sixty dollars,” she said.
“That’s right. Two hours.”
“Well, all right. I guess I can do that.” She opened her tote and peeled six tens off a roll of bills she’d secured with a rubber band. I wrote out an abbreviated version of a standard contract. She said she’d be staying in town overnight and gave me the telephone number at the motel where she’d checked in. She handed me the death notice. I made sure I had her sister’s full name and the exact date of her death and told her I’d be in touch.
My first stop was the Hall of Records at the Santa Teresa County Courthouse two and a half blocks away. I filled out a copy order, supplying the necessary information, and paid seven bucks in cash. An hour later, I returned to pick up the certified copy of Margery Crispin’s death certificate. Cause of death was listed as a “myocardial infarction.” The certificate was signed by Dr. Yee, one of the contract pathologists out at the county morgue. If Marge Crispin had been the victim of foul play, it was hard to believe Dr. Yee wouldn’t have spotted it.
I swung back by the office and picked up my car, driving over to Wynington-Blake, the mortuary listed in the newspaper clipping. I asked for Mr. Sharonson, whom I’d met when I was working on another case. He was wearing a somber charcoal-gray suit, his tone of voice carefully modulated to reflect the solemnity of his work. When I mentioned Marge Crispin, a shadow crossed his face.
“You remember the woman?”
“Oh, yes,” he said. He closed his mouth then, but the look he gave me was eloquent.
I wondered if funeral home employees took a loyalty oath, vowing never to divulge a single fact about the dead. I thought I’d prime the pump a bit. Men are worse gossips than women once you get ’em going. “Mrs. Crispin’s sister was in my office a little while ago and she seems to think there was something…uh, irregular about the woman’s death.”
I could see Mr. Sharonson formulate his response. “I wouldn’t say there was anything irregular about the woman’s death, but there was certainly something sordid about the circumstances.”
“Oh?” said I.
He lowered his voice, glancing around to make certain we couldn’t be overheard. “The two were estranged. Hadn’t spoken for months as I understand it. The woman died alone in a seedy hotel on lower State Street. She drank.”
“Nooo,” I said, conveying disapproval and disbelief.
“Oh, yes,” he said. “The police picked up the body, but she wasn’t identified for weeks. If it hadn’t been for the article in the paper, her daughter might not have ever known.”
“What article?”
“Oh, you know the one. There’s that columnist for the local paper who does all those articles about the homeless. He did a write-up about the poor woman. ‘Alone in Death’ I think it was called. He talked about how pathetic this woman was. Apparently, when Ms. Crispin read the article, she began to suspect it might be her mother. That’s when she went out there to take a look.”
“Must have been a shock,” I said. “The woman did die of natural causes?”
“Oh, yes.”
“No evidence of trauma, foul play, anything like that?”
“No, no, no. I tended her myself and I know they ran toxicology tests. I guess at first they thought it might be acute alcohol poisoning, but it turned out to be her heart.”
I quizzed him on a number of possibilities, but I couldn’t come up with anything out of the ordinary. I thanked him for his time, got back in my car, and drove over to the trailer park where Justine Crispin lived.
The trailer itself had seen better days. It was moored in a dirt patch with a wooden crate for an outside step. I knocked on the door, which opened about an inch to show a short strip of round face peering out at me. “Yes?”
“Are you Justine Crispin?”
“Yes.”
“I hope I’m not bothering you. My name is Kinsey Millhone. I’m an old friend of your mother’s and I just heard she passed away.”
The silence was cautious. “Who’d you hear that from?”
I showed her the clipping. “Someone sent me this. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I didn’t even know she was sick.”
Justine’s eyes darkened with suspicion. “When did you see her last?”
I did my best to imitate Sis Dunaway’s folksy tone. “Oh, gee. Must have been last summer. I moved away in June and it was probably some time around then because I remember giving her my address. It was awfully sudden, wasn’t it?”
“Her heart give out.”
“Well, the poor thing, and she was such a love.” I wondered if I’d laid it on too thick. Justine was staring at me like I’d come to the wrong place. “Would you happen to know if she got my last note?” I asked.
“I wouldn’t know anything about that.”
“Because I wasn’t sure what to do about the money.”
“She owed you money?”
“No, no. I owed her…which is why I wrote.”
Justine hesitated. “How much?”
“Well, it wasn’t much,” I said, with embarrassment. “Six hundred dollars, but she was such a doll to lend it to me and then I felt so bad when I couldn’t pay her back right away. I asked her if I could wait and pay her this month, but then I never heard. Now I don’t know what to do.”
I could sense the shift in her attitude. Greed seems to do that in record time. “You could pay it to me and I could see it went into her estate,” she said helpfully.
“Oh, I don’t want to put you to any trouble.”
“I don’t mind,” she said. “You want to come in?”
“I shouldn’t. You’re probably busy and you’ve already been so nice….”
“I can take a few minutes.”
“Well. If you’re sure,” I said.
Justine held the door open and I stepped into the trailer, where I got my first clear look at her. This girl was probably thirty pounds overweight with listless brown hair pulled into an oily ponytail. Like Sis, she was decked out in a pair of jeans, with an oversize T-shirt hanging almost to her knees. It was clear big butts ran in the family. She shoved some junk aside so I could sit down on the banquette, a fancy word for the ripped plastic seat that extended along one wall in the kitchenette.
“Did she suffer much?” I asked.
“Doctor said not. He said it was quick, as far as he could tell. Her heart probably seized up and she fell down dead before she could draw a breath.”
“It must have been just terrible for you.”
Her cheeks flushed with guilt. “You know, her and me had a falling-out.”
“Really? Well, I’m sorry to hear that. Of course, she always said you two had your differences. I hope it wasn’t anything serious.”
“She drank. I begged her and begged her to give it up, but she wouldn’t pay me no mind,” Justine said.
“Did she ‘go’ here at home?”
She shook her head. “In a welfare hotel. Down on her luck. Drink had done her in. If only I’d known…if only she’d reached out.”
I thought she was going to weep, but she couldn’t quite manage it. I clutched her hand. “She was too proud,” I said.
“I guess that’s what it was. I’ve been thinking to make some kind of contribution to AA, or something like that. You know, in her name.”
“A Marge Crispin Memorial Fund,” I suggested.
“Like that, yes. I was thinking this money you’re talking about might be a start.”
“That’s a beautiful thought. I’m going right out to the car for my checkbook so I can write you a check.”
It was a relief to get out into the fresh air again. I’d never heard so much horsepuckey in all my life. Still, it hardly constituted proof she was a murderess.
I hopped in my car and headed for a pay phone, spotting one in a gas station half a block away. I pulled change out of the bottom of my handbag and dialed Sis Dunaway’s motel room. She was not very happy to hear my report.
“You didn’t find anything?” she said. “Are you positive?”
“Well, of course I’m not positive. All I’m saying is that so far, there’s no evidence that anything’s amiss. If Justine contributed to her mother’s death, she was damned clever about it. I gather the autopsy didn’t show a thing.”
“Maybe it was some kind of poison that leaves no trace.”
“Uh, Sis? I hate to tell you this, but there really isn’t such a poison that I ever heard of. I know it’s a common fantasy, but there’s just no such thing.”
Her tone turned stubborn. “But it’s possible. You have to admit that. There could be such a thing. It might be from South America…darkest Africa, someplace like that.”
Oh, boy. We were really tripping out on this one. I squinted at the receiver. “How would Justine acquire the stuff?”
“How do I know? I’m not going to set here and solve the whole case for you! You’re the one gets paid thirty dollars an hour, not me.”
“Do you want me to pursue it?”
“Not if you mean to charge me an arm and a leg!” she said. “Listen here, I’ll pay sixty dollars more, but you better come up with something or I want my money back.”
She hung up before I could protest. How could she get her money back when she hadn’t paid this portion? I stood in the phone booth and thought about things. In spite of myself, I’ll admit I was hooked. Sis Dunaway might harbor a lot of foolish ideas, but her conviction was unshakable. Add to that the fact that Justine was lying about something and you have the kind of situation I can’t walk away from.
I drove back to the trailer park and eased my car into a shady spot just across the street. Within moments, Justine appeared in a banged-up white Pinto, trailing smoke out of the tail pipe. Following her wasn’t hard. I just hung my nose out the window and kept an eye on the haze. She drove over to Milagro Street to the branch office of a savings and loan. I pulled into a parking spot a few doors down and followed her in, keeping well out of sight. She was dealing with the branch manager, who eventually walked her over to a teller and authorized the cashing of a quite large check, judging from the number of bills the teller counted out.
Justine departed moments later, clutching her handbag protectively. I would have been willing to bet she’d been cashing that insurance check. She drove back to the trailer where she made a brief stop, probably to drop the money off.
She got back in her car and drove out of the trailer park. I followed discreetly as she headed into town. She pulled into a public parking lot and I eased in after her, finding an empty slot far enough away to disguise my purposes. So far, she didn’t seem to have any idea she was being tailed. I kept my distance as she cut through to State Street and walked up a block to Santa Teresa Travel. I pretended to peruse the posters in the window while I watched her chat with the travel agent sitting at a desk just inside the front door. The two transacted business, the agent handing over what apparently were prearranged tickets. Justine wrote out a check. I busied myself at a newspaper rack, extracting a paper as she came out again. She walked down State Street half a block to a hobby shop where she purchased one of life’s ugliest plastic floral wreaths. Busy little lady, this one, I thought.
She emerged from the hobby shop and headed down a side street, moving into the front entrance of a beauty salon. A surreptitious glance through the window showed her, moments later, in a green plastic cape, having a long conversation with the stylist about a cut. I checked my watch. It was almost twelve-thirty. I scooted back to the travel agency and waited until I saw Justine’s travel agent leave the premises for lunch. As soon as she was out of sight, I went in, glancing at the nameplate on the edge of her desk.
The blond agent across the aisle caught my eye and smiled.
“What happened to Kathleen?” I asked.
“She went out to lunch. You just missed her. Is there something I can help you with?”
“Gee, I hope so. I picked up some tickets a little while ago and now I can’t find the itinerary she tucked in the envelope. Is there any way you could run me a copy real quick? I’m in a hurry and I really can’t afford to wait until she gets back.”
“Sure, no problem. What’s the name?”
“Justine Crispin,” I said.
I found the nearest public phone and dialed Sis’s motel room again. “Catch this,” I said. “At four o’clock, Justine takes off for Los Angeles. From there, she flies to Mexico City.”
“Well, that little shit.”
“It gets worse. It’s one-way.”
“I knew it! I just knew she was up to no good. Where is she now?”
“Getting her hair done. She went to the bank first and cashed a big check—”
“I bet it was the insurance.”
“That’d be my guess.”
“She’s got all that money on her?”
“Well, no. She stopped by the trailer first and then went and picked up her plane ticket. I think she intends to stop by the cemetery and put a wreath on Marge’s grave….”
“I can’t stand this. I just can’t stand it. She’s going to take all that money and make a mockery of Marge’s death.”
“Hey, Sis, come on. If Justine’s listed as the beneficiary, there’s nothing you can do.”
“That’s what you think. I’ll make her pay for this, I swear to God I will!” Sis slammed the phone down.
I could feel my heart sink. Uh-oh. I tried to think whether I’d mentioned the name of the beauty salon. I had visions of Sis descending on Justine with a tommy gun. I loitered uneasily outside the shop, watching traffic in both directions. There was no sign of Sis. Maybe she was going to wait until Justine went out to the gravesite before she mowed her down.
At two-fifteen, Justine came out of the beauty shop and passed me on the street. She was nearly unrecognizable. Her hair had been cut and permed and it fell in soft curls around her freshly made-up face. The beautician had found ways to bring out her eyes, subtly heightening her coloring with a touch of blusher on her cheeks. She looked like a million bucks—or a hundred thousand, at any rate. She was in a jaunty mood, paying more attention to her own reflection in the passing store windows than she was to me, hovering half a block behind.
She returned to the parking lot and retrieved her Pinto, easing into the flow of traffic as it moved up State. I tucked in a few cars back, all the while scanning for some sign of Sis. I couldn’t imagine what she’d try to do, but as mad as she was, I had to guess she had some scheme in the works.
Fifteen minutes later, we were turning into the trailer park, Justine leading while I lollygagged along behind. I had already used up the money Sis had authorized, but by this time I had my own stake in the outcome. For all I knew, I was going to end up protecting Justine from an assassination attempt. She stopped by the trailer just long enough to load her bags in the car and then she drove out to the Santa Teresa Memorial Park, which was out by the airport.
The cemetery was deserted, a sunny field of gravestones among flowering shrubs. When the road forked, I watched Justine wind up the lane to the right while I headed left, keeping an eye on her car, which I could see across a wide patch of grass. She parked and got out, carrying the wreath to an oblong depression in the ground where a temporary marker had been set, awaiting the permanent monument. She rested the wreath against the marker and stood there looking down. She seemed awfully exposed and I couldn’t help but wish she’d duck down some to grieve. Sis was probably crouched somewhere with a knife between her teeth, ready to leap out and stab Justine in the neck.
Respects paid, Justine got back into her car and drove to the airport where she checked in for her flight. By now, I was feeling baffled. She had less than an hour before her plane was scheduled to depart and there was still no sign of Sis. If there was going to be a showdown, it was bound to happen soon. I ambled into the gift shop and inserted myself between the wall and a book rack, watching Justine through windows nearly obscured by a display of Santa Teresa T-shirts. She sat on a bench and calmly read a paperback.
What was going on here?
Sis Dunaway had seemed hell-bent on avenging Marge’s death, but where was she? Had she gone to the cops? I kept one eye on the clock and one eye on Justine. Whatever Sis was up to, she had better do it quick. Finally, mere minutes before the flight was due to be called, I left the newsstand, crossed the gate area, and took a seat beside Justine. “Hi,” I said, “Nice permanent. Looks good.”
She glanced at me and then did a classic double take. “What are you doing here?”
“Keeping an eye on you.”
“What for?”
“I thought someone should see you off. I suspect your Aunt Sis is en route, so I decided to keep you company until she gets here.”
“Aunt Sis?” she said, incredulously.
“I gotta warn you, she’s not convinced your mother had a heart attack.”
“What are you talking about? Aunt Sis is dead.”
I could feel myself smirk. “Yeah, sure. Since when?”
“Five years ago.”
“Bullshit.”
“It’s not bullshit. An aneurysm burst and she dropped in her tracks.”
“Come on,” I scoffed.
“It’s the truth,” she said emphatically. By that time, she’d recovered her composure and she went on the offensive. “Where’s my money? You said you’d write a check for six hundred bucks.”
“Completely dead?” I asked.
The loudspeaker came on. “May I have your attention, please. United Flight 3440 for Los Angeles is now ready for boarding at Gate Five. Please have your boarding pass available and prepare for security check.”
Justine began to gather up her belongings. I’d been wondering how she was going to get all that cash through the security checkpoint, but one look at her lumpy waistline and it was obvious she’d strapped on a money belt. She picked up her carry-on, her shoulder bag, her jacket, and her paperback and clopped, in spike heels, over to the line of waiting passengers.
I followed, befuddled, reviewing the entire sequence of events. It had all happened today. Within hours. It wasn’t like I was suffering brain damage or memory loss. And I hadn’t seen a ghost. Sis had come to my office and laid out the whole tale about Marge and Justine. She’d told me all about their relationship, Justine’s history as a con, the way the two women tried to outdo each other, the insurance, Marge’s death. How could a murder have gotten past Dr. Yee? Unless the woman wasn’t murdered, I thought suddenly.
Oh.
Once I saw it in that light, it was obvious.
Justine got in line between a young man with a duffel bag and a woman toting a cranky baby. There was some delay up ahead while the ticket agent got set. The line started to move and Justine advanced a step with me right beside her.
“I understand you and your mother had quite a competitive relationship.”
“What’s it to you,” she said. She kept her eyes averted, facing dead ahead, willing the line to move so she could get away from me.
“I understand you were always trying to get the better of each other.”
“What’s your point?” she said, annoyed.
I shrugged. “I figure you read the article about the unidentified dead woman in the welfare hotel. You went out to the morgue and claimed the body as your mom’s. The two of you agreed to split the insurance money, but your mother got worried about a double cross, which is exactly what this is.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The line moved up again and I stayed right next to her. “She hired me to keep an eye on you, so when I realized you were leaving town, I called her and told her what was going on. She really hit the roof and I thought she’d charge right out, but so far there’s been no sign of her….”
Justine showed her ticket to the agent and he motioned her on. She moved through the metal detector without setting it off.
I gave the agent a smile. “Saying good-bye to a friend,” I said, and passed through the wooden arch right after she did. She was picking up the pace, anxious to reach the plane.
I was still talking, nearly jogging to keep up with her. “I couldn’t figure out why she wasn’t trying to stop you and then I realized what she must have done—”
“Get away from me. I don’t want to talk to you.”
“She took the money, Justine. There’s probably nothing in the belt but old papers. She had plenty of time to make the switch while you were getting your hair done.”
“Ha, ha,” she said sarcastically. “Tell me another one.”
I stopped in my tracks. “All right. That’s all I’m gonna say. I just didn’t want you to reach Mexico City and find yourself flat broke.”
“Blow it out your buns,” she hissed. She showed her boarding pass to the woman at the gate and passed on through. I could hear her spike heels tip-tapping out of ear range.
I reversed myself, walked back through the gate area and out to the walled exterior courtyard, where I could see the planes through a windbreak of protective glass. Justine crossed the tarmac to the waiting plane, her shoulders set. I didn’t think she’d heard me, but then I saw her hand stray to her waist. She walked a few more steps and then halted, dumping her belongings in a pile at her feet. She pulled her shirt up and checked the money belt. At that distance, I saw her mouth open, but it took a second for the shrieks of outrage to reach me.
Ah, well, I thought. Sometimes a mother’s love is like a poison that leaves no trace. You bop along through life, thinking you’ve got it made, and next thing you know, you’re dead.