them. They looked up and waved back, the pair of them seemingly as happy as could be. Less than eight hours ago Phillip had been screaming in blind terror. And yet now he seemed fine. Bright eyed and carefree as he strolled in the morning sunshine with his younger brother, totally absorbed in their game, smiling and laughing and…
Mitch hit the brakes right there in the middle of Dorset Street, the hairs on the back of his neck standing up. Of course! Why hadn’t he seen it before? Why hadn’t any of them? He sat there watching the boys in his rearview mirror, his eyes bulging, head spinning. Then he pulled over and grabbed his cell phone. Des answered on the second ring.
“Listen, how close are you to Boston right now?”
“I had to make a pit stop in Glastonbury. I’m not even in Hartford yet. Why are you asking?”
“How long will it take you to get back here?”
“A half hour. Twenty minutes if I put my cherry on.”
“Put it on, girlfriend.”
“Why, Mitch?”
“Because I need your help. And you’ll want to call Yolie. She needs to be there, okay?”
“Needs to be where? Mitch, what in the hell is going on?”
“I’m about to tell you. But first answer me this: Can you get your hands on a good, sturdy pair of bolt cutters?”
He’d never been inside of their place before.
It was exceedingly formal. A stately grandfather clock ticktocked discreetly just inside of the front door. Oil portraits of dead ancestors hung from the living room walls. The gleaming antique furniture smelled faintly of lemon oil polish.
“What a wonderful surprise, Mitch,” Maddee exclaimed as she led him inside. She wore a floral print summer dress today. And her pearls. And a fresh coating of her alarming magenta lipstick. “Dex will be so pleased to see you.”
“I was out running errands. Hope it’s not too early to pay a social call.”
“Not at all. Dex still keeps Wall Street hours. Once an early riser always an early riser. He’s already done his calisthenics and eaten his breakfast. And Kimberly’s left for her eight o’clock Vinyasa class.” Maddee eyed him critically. “Nonetheless, I’m terribly cross with you.”
“You are? Why is that?”
“You’re empty-handed. Are you honestly telling me you couldn’t find one item of old clothing to pass along to the Nearly New shop?”
“I’m still searching, ma’am.”
“Please keep at it, Mitch. There are people out there who are hurting. They depend on us.”
Dex Farrell was parked at a teak table on the screened-in porch with a cup of coffee and the Wall Street Journal. He wore a crisp white shirt, blue-and-gold bow tie, pressed khaki slacks and white bucks. Maddee had been seated across from him clipping supermarket coupons from the local shoreline weekly newspaper, Mitch gathered. Her coffee cup sat next to a tidy stack of coupons and a small, pointy pair of scissors.
“Why, good morning, Mr. Berger,” Dex said, gazing at him over his rimless eyeglasses.
“Good morning, sir. You suggested I drop by some time for a chat.”
“And here you are. I’m glad. Pull up a chair.”
“Can I get you anything?” Maddee offered as Mitch sat at the table. “Coffee, lemonade?”
“No, thanks. I’m fine.”
“Then I’ll leave you two boys to talk. I have my Meals on Wheels duty this morning.”
“I wish you wouldn’t go just yet, Mrs. Farrell. Can you stay a few minutes? There’s something I wanted to ask you about.”
“Certainly.” Maddee sat back down across from her husband and resumed her coupon clipping. She performed the little task same way she gardened-with focused tenacity. Whipping through an ad supplement before she paused, zeroed in, and pounced. Her sharp little scissors going snip-snip-snip in the morning quiet. “Look at this, Dex, the IGA at Four Corners has ten cans of Bumble Bee tuna for ten dollars.” Snip-snip-snip. “You say there’s something you wish to ask me about, Mitch?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Well, don’t be shy. It’s a sign of weakness. I’ve always encouraged Kimberly to speak right up and tell me what’s on her-”
“How long have you known that your husband is the Dorset Flasher?”
Dex Farrell didn’t so much as blink. Just stared straight ahead, his face impassive.
But Maddee paled instantly, her eyes darting wildly about the porch. “Why, whatever do you mean…?”
“I mean that our Flasher isn’t a sexually frustrated kid. Or an overheated man child like Hal Chapman or J. Z. Cliffe. It’s Dex who has been exposing himself to various prominent ladies in the Historic District, and leaving little presents on their doorsteps.” Mitch looked at him. The man still hadn’t moved a muscle. “Actually, this whole crazy business fell right into place once I realized it was you. For one thing, the Flasher never seems to-how shall I put it-rise to the occasion. Makes total sense. You’re, what, sixty-seven years old? That’s not to say you can’t stand and deliver from time to time. I certainly hope you can. Otherwise I don’t have a whole lot to look forward to in the years ahead. But sex has never been what this was about. Has it, sir?”
Dex reached for his coffee and took a small sip, his hand steady as a rock. He didn’t respond. Or look at Mitch. Just gazed out the porch screen at the rosebushes that flanked the Captain Chadwick House’s front path. The Blush Noisettes that Maddee tended to so passionately.
“I’ve been asking myself why the Flasher always strikes on weekends-which just happens to be when Kenny’s in town visiting Kimberly. I kept thinking there had to be some connection. Again, the obvious answer fell right into place: You do your thing on the weekend because Kimberly isn’t here on the weekend. She’s out of the apartment- over at Beth’s place with Kenny. Plus, who knows, maybe you’re a teensy bit conflicted about that. Daddy’s little girl across the hall, lying in bed naked in some geeky young stranger’s arms. But, hey, that’s a little Freudian for me so I don’t think I’ll go there. Armchair psychology is not my thing. I’ve never been a big fan of Spellbound, have you?”
Dex continued to stare out at the rosebushes. He was very still. Scarcely seemed to be breathing.
“Which isn’t to say that it belongs in the pantheon of Hitchcock’s truly awful films,” Mitch went on. “Such as, say, The Paradine Case. Which, interestingly enough, also happens to star Gregory Peck. He and Hitch were clearly not a match made in Selznick heaven. But Spellbound has never appealed to me. So heavy-handed. And, wowser, talk about icebox questions.”
“Talk about… what?” Maddee asked hoarsely.
“You still haven’t answered my question, ma’am. How long have you known? You may as well tell me. I can help you. I certainly don’t wish to hurt you. I’m a friend of the family. And we both know that Mr. Farrell already has a well-documented history of behaving, shall we say, eccentrically in public.”
Maddee lunged for her coffee cup and took a sip, her own hand shaking so badly that Mitch could hear the cup clonk against her front teeth. “I think you’d better leave, Mitch. I think you’d better leave right this minute. I refuse to sit here and allow you to speak such-such vile, awful, despicable…”
“Please stop talking now, dear,” Dex spoke up, his voice quiet but firm. “Kindly shut your mouth and keep it shut. Mr. Berger has shown me the courtesy of paying us a personal call on this matter. In return, I owe him the courtesy of the truth. It’s the only honorable thing to do. Although I’m afraid, young man, that you won’t understand the purpose behind this little undertaking of mine.”
“I’d like to, sir. I really would.”
“Very well. I’ll do my best to explain it to you,” he said to Mitch as Maddee sat there across the table from him in obedient silence, a stricken expression on her face. “Over the years, Mr. Berger, there have been occasions in my life that have called for me to act in an extraordinary fashion.”
“By extraordinary you mean…?”
“Kindly don’t interrupt me. I assure you that I will answer all of your questions at the appropriate time.” Dex folded his hands before him on the table and resumed. “Occasions that have forced me to invent an alter ego so as to do what needed doing. Whether it be escaping the bonds of a rigid, recalcitrant authority or the righting of egregious wrongs. Wrongs that could not be dealt with by traditional means. Maddee and I have endured a great deal of personal humiliation since we’ve returned to Dorset. Perfectly understandable. I put my faith in the wrong
