He turned onto his back. “Could you get me some Aleve – it’s in the cabinet by the stove.”
I found the bottle, shook out a pill, filled a water glass from the tap.
Mancusi said, “I need two.” When I returned, he snatched both tablets from my hand, waved away the water. “I swallow dry.” He demonstrated. “My big talent… I need to rest.”
He rolled away from us.
Milo said, “So sorry for your loss. If you think of anything, call.”
No answer.
As we made it to the door, Mancusi said, “Mom always hated those caps.”
Outside the building, Milo said, “Think that was a performance?”
“Moskow described him as theatrical, but who knows?”
“Theatrical how?”
I recounted the hand-on-hip hair toss.
He frowned. “Did a bit of that just now. But he did barf righteously.”
“People get sick for all sorts of reasons,” I said. “Including guilt.”
“Symbolic catharsis? Or whatever you guys call it.”
“I call it throwing up. He’s an only child with no close relatives. I’d really like to know if there was a will.”
“Agreed,” he said. “The question is how to find it.”
“Maybe those relatives she wasn’t close to can tell you.”
“Tony minimizing the relationships because he didn’t want me talking to them?”
“Family values,” I said. “It’s where it all starts.”
He drove three blocks, popped the unmarked’s trunk, gloved up, and rifled through the box of personal effects he’d taken from Ella Mancusi’s bedroom.
No mention of any relatives other than Tony, but an attorney’s card in a rubber-bound stack elicited a hand- pump.
Jean Barone, Esq. Wilshire Boulevard, Santa Monica.
The other cards were for plumbers, electricians, A.C. and heating repair, a grocery delivery service.
Men coming in and out of the house, maybe getting to know Ella Mancusi’s routine. If no other leads surfaced soon, they’d all need to be checked out.
Milo phoned Jean Barone and after she got over the shock, she said yes, she’d drawn up Mrs. Mancusi’s will, preferred not to discuss client matters over the phone.
As we headed for Santa Monica, Milo said, “Maybe it’s me, but she sounded eager.”
Jean Barone met us in the cramped, empty lobby of her building, a two-story structure just west of Yale. The space needed freshening. She looked as if she’d just renewed her makeup.
She was a middle-aged, wavy-haired brunette packed tightly into a peacock-blue knockoff Chanel suit. After checking Milo’s I.D., she took us up in the elevator to her two-room suite. No name on the plain white door but hers. Below her degree, supplementary credentials as a Notary Public and Certified Tax Preparer.
Her office smelled of Shalimar. She took a seat behind a dark, wood-like desk. “So horrible about Mrs. Mancusi. Any idea who did this?”
“Not yet. Is there anything you can tell us about her, ma’am?”
“Not really. The only thing I did for her was draw up the will, and that was five years ago.”
“Who referred her to you?”
“The yellow pages. I’d just graduated, had no referral base yet. She was one of my only clients in six months. It was easy, basically boilerplate.”
She opened a drawer and drew out a single sheet of paper. “Here’s your copy. No confidentiality for deceased individuals.”
“There was no copy in Mrs. Mancusi’s house.”
“She didn’t want one,” said Barone. “Said I should keep it.”
“How come?”
Barone shrugged. “Maybe she didn’t want anyone finding it.”
Milo scanned the will. “This is all of it?”
“Given her situation, there was no need to get fancy. The estate was her house, plus a pension, a little cash in the bank. No liens, no encumbrances, no attachments.”
“Only one heir listed.”
“Her son,” said Barone. “I did suggest there were steps she could take to reduce the estate tax burden on him. Like putting the house into a joint trust with a lifetime usage clause for her. She wasn’t interested.”
“Why not?”
“She wouldn’t tell me and I didn’t pry. She was more interested in my hourly rate, clearly didn’t want to spend an extra dime.”
Milo handed me the will. In the event of Anthony Mancusi Jr.’s pre-deceasing his mother, everything was willed to the Salvation Army.
Milo said, “She talk at all about the son?”
“Is he a suspect?”
“We’re looking into everyone close to her.”
“Bet that’s not a huge crowd.”
“Why do you say that?”
“She was polite,” said Jean Barone, “but a little… I got the feeling she wasn’t too sociable. No interest in small talk, cut to the chase. Or maybe she was just minimizing the billable hours. You know that generation. Careful with a buck.”
“Unlike today’s generation,” said Milo.
“My two kids have great jobs but they’re overdrawn on their credit cards.”
“Maybe Mrs. Mancusi thought her son was irresponsible and that’s why she didn’t want to give him the house.”
“She wouldn’t have actually been giving it to him, just – ” Barone smiled. “Functionally, it’s the same thing, so maybe you’ve got a point. But if she didn’t trust him, she didn’t tell me. I can’t overemphasize how reserved she was. But polite. Ladylike. It’s so strange to think of her being murdered. Was it a robbery?”
“Doesn’t seem to be.”
“You’re thinking the son wanted to push things along?”
“We’re not thinking anything yet.”
“Whatever you say.” Barone batted her lashes.
Milo got up. “Thanks for the copy. And for the nonbillable time.”
“Sure,” she said, touching his hand. “You’re the most interesting thing that’s happened all week.”
During the ride down I said, “Must be the uniform – oops, you’re not wearing one.”
He said, “Nah, my cologne. Eau de schmo.”
It was four p.m. by the time we headed for the Prestige Rent-A-Car lot in Beverly Hills. During the drive, Milo called the motor lab. A couple of errant hairs and various wool, cotton, and linen fibers had showed up in the Mercedes, but no blood or body fluids. The car had been vacuumed recently by someone who’d taken care not to leave prints. The lab would be removing the door panels tomorrow but the tech cautioned Milo not to expect too much.
He said, “Story of my life,” and drove faster. “Ella’s estate was mostly her house. What do you think it’s worth?”
I said, “That part of Westwood? Million three, minimum.”
“That’s what I was thinking. Nice windfall for a loser like Tony.”
I said, “Ella wasn’t interested in reducing his tax burden and she stood by as he lost the apartment on Olympic and ended up in that dive.”
“Mommy thinks he’s a loser and he knows it.”
