“You look like you’re about ten years old,” Fiji said, smiling. Then she looked at him again. “Or maybe older,” she added.
“Oh! I’m not.” Diederik laughed, but he also looked a little anxious.
Joe noticed that the boy had dodged saying whether he was older or younger, and he had to respect the boy’s privacy, though he was just as curious as Fiji. They glanced at each other; Joe understood that she would not question the boy further.
After Joe had finished Fiji’s manicure, he asked Diederik to sweep up around the station after wiping it down, and Diederik jumped at the chance to be useful. This was a boy who really wanted to be busy, a boy who wasn’t used to sitting idle, much less kneeling in the bleak chapel with the Rev in meditation. Joe made a mental note to suggest to the Rev it was probably time to weed the pet cemetery and do the lawn mowing and bush trimming behind the chapel in the confines of the high fence. The pet cemetery was the prettiest place in Midnight, aside from Fiji’s yard, which always had flowers in bloom except in the dead of winter.
“Maybe tomorrow,” Fiji was saying, as if she’d read Joe’s thoughts, “you can come to help me in my garden in the morning. Have you ever done yard work?”
“No, ma’am,” he said.
“If I show you what weeds to pull, I’m sure you can do that. It would be a big help to me. I won’t be torn between the shop and the yard.” Fiji looked happy. “I’ll stop by the chapel to see if I can clear that with the Rev.”
Diederik looked pleased. “Thanks, and have a nice day,” he said, just like a flight attendant when the passengers were exiting the plane. “Maybe I will see you tomorrow. Thank you for the muffins and orange juice.” Fiji left with an empty basket.
“Whoever brought him up did it right,” Chuy murmured. Diederik did a good job of cleaning the manicure station. Next he helped Joe dust all the antiques. Joe showed him a secret drawer in an old desk, which Diederik found appropriately cool. Chuy remembered he had a set of jacks left by a client’s child, and after he taught Diederik how to play, the boy enjoyed it very much.
And he was unbelievably fast.
By and by, it was time for lunch. Joe and Chuy took Diederik across the street to Home Cookin and introduced him to Madonna and little Grady.
Oddly, Diederik didn’t seem to know what to make of Grady, especially when he found out Grady was over a year old. Grady was going from stool to stool in front of the counter, but he didn’t seem to mind being lifted into his playpen when Madonna was too busy cooking and serving to keep an eye on him. She always acknowledged offers to watch him with dignified thanks, but clearly she was sure it was her job to keep the baby from harm. Madonna was not one to share her thoughts or emotions, so it surprised everyone (but Diederik) when she said, “I am sure ready for someone to come in to manage the Gas N Go, someone permanent, so Teacher can be here to help me more.”
After they’d absorbed this, Joe said, “He hasn’t heard from the owners?”
“Oh, he has,” she said, pouring more iced tea from the jug. “But they keep saying no one wants the job permanently, even though it’ll come with the house, which the owners rented to . . . the previous family.”
None of them wanted to talk about the previous manager of the filling station/store. Or his kids.
When their food came, Diederik ate every scrap on his plate. There was no conversation once the food was in front of him; he consumed it with single-minded concentration. He only paused to raise a hand to greet Fiji, who’d come in to pick up her lunch to take back to her shop. After he’d wiped his mouth with his napkin, as he saw the others doing, he seemed to be thinking hard about something.
“This is a good place,” Diederik said suddenly. “Why is it hard to find someone who would live here?”
“We like it here just fine,” Joe said. “But I guess, for a lot of people, there’s just not enough going on, and they don’t like to drive to Davy or even farther to do their serious shopping.”
“But there are wide-open spaces, and you can see people coming. And there aren’t many peoples,” Diederik said, sweeping his arm to indicate the vastness of the country around them. His accent became more pronounced, and Joe tried to figure it out. But he hadn’t traveled much. He glanced at Chuy, who gave a tiny shrug. Chuy didn’t know, either. “That’s wonderful. It’s safer.”
Fiji looked worried at the inference that Diederik was used to living in danger, but she didn’t speak. Joe gave her an approving smile. He liked Fiji for her warm heart, but at the same time, it was what occasionally made her indiscreet.
It was a good moment for Bobo to come in, the sun lighting up his hair like a halo, an irony that made Joe smile. Diederik smiled when Bobo entered, too; everyone did, especially Fiji. It was the charm of the man, and Joe was sure that charm would last until Bobo was old, if he was fortunate enough to live that long.
“The reporters are getting bored hanging around Manfred’s, and some of them are heading this way,” Bobo said.
Diederik looked from one adult to the other, trying to figure out if he should be scared. Joe said, “Diederik, we’re going to leave out the back door and drive to Davy. Have you ever had ice cream?”
The boy shook his head. “What is it?”
“Something really good,” Fiji said. “You’re going to have a great time.”
“Explain to the Rev,” Joe told Chuy. “Okay, buddy, here we go!” He extended a hand to the boy, and Diederik took it without hesitation. They made their way through the kitchen, with a wave to Madonna, and then they were outside. Joe and the boy walked back to the street, peering around the corner of Home Cookin until the little gaggle of reporters went inside. Then they crossed Witch Light Road and walked to the parking area behind the store to climb into Joe’s truck. Diederik buckled his seat belt without Joe saying a word, and in short order they were headed north on the Davy highway.
Joe smiled at the boy. “I think you’re really going to like ice cream,” he said, and he was right.
10
The next day, Olivia turned onto Old Pioneer Street, which lay in the heart of Bonnet Park. Most of the houses on Old Pioneer had been built in the sixties and seventies, or earlier. They were positioned strategically on narrow, deep lots, and all had well-established lawns and plantings. Though many had been renovated, refurbished, and repaired, they had one thing in common: They were sizable, and they made a statement.
Eyeing the numbers on the brick pillar mailboxes, Olivia turned into the gravel drive of the third house on the right. Visitors were clearly supposed to take the right turn onto the circle around a large rosebed full of mature plants, all in bloom. Only the family or tradesmen would continue to the back of the house. Or a gardener, like the young man at work on the roses. He appeared to be Hispanic and maybe nineteen. He was snipping the deadheads and tossing them into a bucket. He was very curious about Olivia’s arrival. He turned to watch as she parked in front of the house.
Olivia’s feet crunched on the gravel as she went up the shallow steps to the double front doors and knocked. She was a blonde at the moment, and she wore blue contacts and bright red lipstick to complement her dramatic eye makeup. Her sleeveless blouse was a bright print, and her trousers were navy blue.
“Yes?” said the maid who answered the door. She was Hispanic, and short. Her hair was thick and long and still solid black, though the wrinkles around her mouth and eyes put her in her forties. “Can I help you?” She craned a little to the side to see the young man working in the rosebed.
“I’m Rebecca Mansfield from Home Health,” Olivia said, her voice solid with confidence. She waited.
“I’m Bertha,” said the woman, reluctantly. “I’m the housekeeper. What can I do for you?”
“Nice to meet you, Bertha. We got a signed application from Mrs. Goldthorpe about receiving our services.” She had a messenger bag slung across her chest, and a
clipboard. The combined force of these authority symbols was just too much for the maid, who stepped back to let Olivia enter. The moment Olivia was inside, she moved swiftly to the center of the foyer, and her eyes got busy taking in everything. It was the scale she needed. To her pleasure, she found that Manfred’s floor plan had been more detailed than she’d ever expected.
Bertha, who was clad in scrubs in lieu of a maid’s uniform, said, “Miss Mansfield, Mrs. Goldthorpe passed away.”
“She what?” Olivia looked at the woman, apparently shocked.
“She died of pneumonia, or something,” Bertha said. “So we don’t need any home health care. You want to talk to her daughter, Annelle? She’s upstairs.”
“Of course,” said Olivia-as-Rebecca. “I’m so sorry. Ah, she did agree to our terms. . . .” Olivia felt she might not make it past Bertha if she didn’t hint that money might be involved.
“Yes, ma’am. I’ll get her.” The maid turned to go up the stairs.
“I’ll just come with you,” Rebecca said. “I don’t want to drag her away from whatever she’s doing.”
Bertha looked at her doubtfully but led Rebecca up the stairs and into the large room that was the second left after the landing. Yes, Manfred had been right. This was clearly the master bedroom. A woman who must be Annelle was standing in the doorway of a walk-in closet, looking tired and sad. She was short and plump, though not nearly as plump as her mother had been, and her hair was dark brown and graying just a bit.
Annelle was surprised to see someone she didn’t know, and not pleased. “Who is this, Bertha?” she said, making a visible effort to pull herself together.
“This is Miss Mansfield from Home Health,” Bertha said carefully. “Your mom must have filled out some forms?”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” Annelle said incredulously. “What else is going to happen? Why’d she do that?”
Bertha remained, looking curious, too. “I didn’t know anything about it, Miss Annelle,” she said rather smugly.
“Miss Mansfield?” Annelle was looking at her doubtfully. “I’m Annelle Kling, Mrs. Goldthorpe’s daughter. I’m afraid you didn’t get the news that my mom passed away very suddenly.”
“Bertha just told me. I’m so sorry for intruding on your grief,” Olivia lied. “We had an appointment set up with Mrs. Goldthorpe a few days ago, but when we rang the bell, no one answered, and when we left a phone message, we didn’t hear back. So my office sent me by to do a wellness check. We get worried when we don’t get a response from an elderly client.”
“Even when they haven’t signed up for your service? That’s real customer devotion,” Annelle said, an edge to her voice. “Or are you trying to tell me that my mom’s estate owes your company money? Because I’ve got to tell you, my dad’s will wasn’t even out of probate, and now my mom’s passed away, and there’s just no telling when this will all be settled.”
“Not at all,” Olivia said, emphatically. “She had signed a preliminary contract, but of course under the circumstances we wouldn’t dream of trying to enforce . . . That’s not how we do business. Her insurance policy was going to pay for it in full, anyway.”
Annelle looked relieved, though Olivia got the impression it wasn’t over the money situation, but all about not facing any more paperwork. “Oh, okay, good,” she said. She took a deep breath, preparatory to telling Olivia good-bye, so Olivia babbled on.
“It’s just that almost all of our clients are elderly—your mother was relatively young!—and so often at that age memory is not quite what it was. We worry when people that age don’t respond, to put it simply.”
Annelle seemed to be taken aback. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to imply you were being . . . overzealous. We’ve just had people coming out of the woodwork to try to claim my mother owed them money, and all those claims have been spurious. I apologize if I seem too suspicious.”
Not suspicious enough, Olivia thought. “No problem,” she said. “Your mother seemed to be such a sweet lady. I’m very sorry to hear of your loss. I don’t want to cause you any further trouble, but might I visit a ladies’ room before I go to my next appointment?”
Annelle did her best to hide her exasperation. She was clearly anxious to get back to the painful but necessary task of cleaning out her mother’s closet. “Sure,” she said. “Since you’re in here, you might as well use Mother’s, behind that door.” She pointed to a door in the north wall of the room.
“Thanks so much,” Olivia said, pushing open the indicated door. She closed it firmly behind her, dumped her bag and clipboard on the vanity, and looked around. Since there was no way she would get to search the bedroom, she would look around the bathroom as long as she dared. She actually sat on the toilet while she searched the area, and after as thorough an examination as she could assay in a believable length of time, she flushed the toilet and started the water in the sink, while giving the inside of the medicine cabinet and the storage cabinet quick but intensive scans.
Nothing. Not a crack or crevice that wasn’t normal building practice. No false back or revolving shelves or little holes in the floor. Though she didn’t have time to go through the lower cabinet, below the sink, she had a super-quick look to verify there was nothing suspicious.
Dammit.
When she came out of the bathroom, wiser only in a negative way—she was fairly sure nothing was hidden there, and she hadn’t learned anything more interesting besides the fact that Rachel Goldthorpe had had a great Mary Kay saleswoman in her neighborhood—Olivia made her good-byes and renewed her condolences to Annelle Goldthorpe Kling before going down the carpeted stairs and out to the front courtyard. She was not a hell of a lot wiser than she had been when she drove up. At least she felt more familiar with the layout. She’d confirmed that Manfred was a good observer, and she felt more comfortable with the plans he’d made of the house.
Now she had to decide what to do next.
The young gardener was still at work, though in a leisurely way, when she reemerged onto the gravel. Olivia was conscious of his stare as she opened the car door to let some of the trapped heat escape from the interior before she got in. She tossed in the messenger bag and clipboard, when her wandering thoughts were recalled by the sudden appearance of an unprepossessing and angry man. He didn’t come from the front of the house, but came around the house on the gravel driveway from the backyard . . . perhaps the guesthouse? Her inner alarm system told her there was something to watch out for in this man, and she always listened to that system with great attention.
This must be Lewis Goldthorpe; he looked enough like his sister to make her guess almost a certainty, even if the first words out of his mouth hadn’t been, “I’m Lewis Goldthorpe. This is my house. What are you doing here?”
Her hands clenched. It was almost impossible to resist the urge to kill him. She could do it so quickly, so cleanly, he wouldn’t even know what had hit him. And that would be a better end than an asshole like this deserved, Olivia thought. Just a hard thrust of her fingers to his throat would silence him and bring him down, and then a quick twist and it would all be over. Manfred’s problems, and hence the Rev’s problem, would vanish. With no one to bring charges against him, Olivia was sure the missing jewelry would be found and all would be well for Manfred . . . if only this man were dead. It was a happy daydream. But there was the young gardener, who was staring for all he was worth. And then Annelle Kling was standing in the open door.
“Lewis!” Annelle called sharply. “Come here.” She appeared to be biting back a long litany of things she wanted to say to her brother, and none of them were friendly.
“What’s this woman doing here?” Lewis demanded. “I want to know!” He was about five foot eight, bespectacled like his sister, and blessed with a thick head of blond hair. From its careful styling, Olivia could tell it was his crowning glory. He also wore a long-sleeved dress shirt and bow tie. O
livia could see a white T-shirt underneath, through the little gaps between buttons. He was a plump man. How did he bear the layers in this heat?
“She’s from a home health care agency,” Annelle said, enunciating every word with care. “Evidently Mother had called them while she was ill.”
“Preposterous. She would have told me. I took care of her.” He turned his challenging glare to Olivia, trying and failing to look her directly in the eyes. He turned on his sister. “Have you gotten Mother’s suite cleaned out yet?”
“You’re not moving into the house,” Annelle said, exasperation in every word. “We’ve gone over this and over this. We’re going to sell it. God knows, Rosie and I don’t want to live in it, and you can’t afford to buy us out. You can stay in the pool house until we sell this place.”
The gardener was as rapt as though he were watching his favorite reality show.
“You may go,” Lewis told Olivia, in a patronizing way. “None of this is your concern.”
The gardener was shaking his head silently, trying not to laugh.
It wasn’t Olivia’s concern, true, but it was interesting. Olivia smiled, making sure she looked completely benevolent. “Yes, I have to get to my next appointment.” She glanced at her wrist to check the time. “I’ll be late if I don’t get moving.” She maintained the smile as she got into the car and buckled up, relieved to feel the blast of the air-conditioning after she turned on the ignition. She managed a cheerful little finger wave at the three people staring after her as she circled the round rosebed and left the property.
When she’d reached a more mundane street, she drove through a Wendy’s to get some iced tea with lemon. It tasted absolutely wonderful. She sipped it on her way to her motel, which was a far cry from Vespers. She parked around the corner from the stairs to her room and looked the lot over carefully before going to the second floor. No one had been in her room; the maid had come before she’d left that morning.