and it was still half full when Shakes Dooley, the owner of record, replaced it with a fresh one.
“It’s a crime,” Shakes said as he drained the old beer into the sink, “to see a fine, healthy man such as yourself wasting a perfectly honest lager.”
I said, “Mmm-hmm,” and went back to my notes.
Sometimes I find it easier to concentrate in a small crowd. Alone, in my apartment or office, I can feel the night ticking past me, another day gone down for the count. In a bar, though, on a late Sunday afternoon, when I can hear the hollow, distant crack of bats from a Red Sox game on the TV, the solid drop of pool balls falling into pockets from the back room, the idle chatter of men and women playing keno and scratch cards as they do their best to ward off Monday and its horn honks and barking bosses and drudging responsibilities-I find the noises mingle together into a soft, constant buzzing, and my mind clears of all else but the notes laid before me between a coaster and a bowl of peanuts.
From the morass of things I’d learned about Karen Nichols, I had compiled a bare chronological outline on a fresh sheet of yellow legal paper. Once that was done, I doodled in random notes beside hard facts. Sometime during all this, the Red Sox had lost, and the crowd had thinned slightly, though it had never been much of a crowd in the first place. Tom Waits played on the jukebox, and two voices were getting heated and raw back in the poolroom.
K. Nichols
(b. 11/16/70; d. 8/4/99)
· a. Father dies, 1976.
· b. Mother marries Dr. Christopher Dawe, ’79, moves to Weston.
· c. Graduates Mount Alvernia HS, ’88.
· d. Graduates Johnson & Wales, Hospitality Mgmt., ’92.
· e. Hired, Four Seasons Hotel, Boston, Catering Dept, ’92.
· f. Promoted Asst. Mgr., Catering Dept., ’96.
· g. Engaged to D. Wetterau, ’98.
· h. Stalked by C. Falk. Car vandalized. First contact w/ me: February ’99.
· i. D. Wetterau accident, March 15, ’99. (Call Devin or Oscar again, try to see BPD report.)
· j. Car insurance cxld due to lack of payment.
· k. May, receives photos of D. Wetterau and other woman.
· l. Fired from job, May 18, ’99, due to tardiness, multiple absences.
· m. Leaves apartment, May 30, ’99.
· n. Moves into Holly Martens Inn, June 15, ’99. (Two weeks missing. Where’d she stay?)
· o. Seen w/ Red-Haired Geek and Blond Rich Guy @ HM Inn, June-August ’99.
· p. C. Falk receives nine letters signed K. Nichols, March-July, ’99.
· q. Karen receives private psychiatrist’s notes, date uncertain.
· r. Raped by C. Falk, July ’99.
· s. Arrested for solicitation, July ’99, Springfield Bus Depot.
· t. Suicide, August 4, ’99.
Overview: Falsified letters sent to C. Falk suggest third-party involvement in K. Nichols’s “bad luck.” C. Falk not being vandalizer of car suggests same. Third Party could be Red-Haired Geek, Blond Rich Guy, or both. (Or neither.) Possession of psychiatrist’s notes suggests possibility of Third Party being employee of psychiatrist. Further, ability by psychiatric employees to garner personal info of private citizens supplies opportunity to Third Party to infiltrate K. Nichols’s life. Motive, however, seems nonexistent. Further, assumptions-
“Motive for what?” Angie said.
I put my hand over the page, looked back over my shoulder at her. “Didn’t your mama ever teach you-?”
“It’s rude to read over someone’s shoulder, yes.” She dropped her bag on the empty seat to her left and sat down beside me. “How’s it coming?”
I sighed. “If only the dead could talk.”
“Then they wouldn’t be dead.”
“Staggering,” I said, “that intellect of yours.”
She backhanded my shoulder and tossed her cigarettes and lighter on the bar in front of her.
“Angela!” Shakes Dooley came bounding down the bar, took her hand, and leaned over to kiss her cheek. “Well, if it ain’t been too many days.”
“Hey, Shakes. Don’t say a word about the hair, okay?”
“What hair?” Shakes said.
“That’s what I keep saying.”
Angie hit me again. “Can I get a vodka straight, Shakes?”
Shakes pumped her hand vigorously before letting it go. “Finally, a real drinker!”
“Going broke on my buddy here?” Angie lit a cigarette.
“He drinks like a nun these days. People are starting to talk.” Shakes poured a generous helping of chilled Finlandia into a glass and placed it before Angie.
“So,” I said when Shakes left us alone, “come crawling back, eh?”
She gave me a smoky chuckle and took a sip of Finlandia. “Keep it up. It’ll make torturing you later that much more pleasurable.”
“Okay, I’ll bite. What brings you here, Sicilian Spice?”
She rolled her eyes as she took another drink. “I got some oddities regarding David Wetterau.” She held up her index finger. “Two, actually. The first was easy. That letter he wrote to the insurance company? My guy says it’s a definite forgery.”
I turned on my stool. “You already looked into this?”
She reached for her cigarettes, extracted one.
“On a Sunday,” I said.
She lit the cigarette, her eyebrows raised.
“And turned something up,” I said.
She curled her fingers and blew on them, polished an imaginary medal on her chest. “Two things.”
“Okay,” I said. “You’re the coolest.”
She placed a hand behind her ear and leaned in.
“You’re aces. You’re the bomb. You put the ‘B’ in bad-ass. You’re the coolest.”
“Already said that.” She leaned in a little closer, hand still behind her ear.
I cleared my throat. “You are, without question or reservation, the smartest, most resourceful, perceptive private detective in the entire city of Boston.”
Her mouth broke into that wide, slightly lopsided grin that can blow holes in my chest.
“Was that so difficult?” she said.
“Shoulda rolled right off my tongue. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“Just out of practice kissing ass, I guess.”
I leaned back, took a lingering look at the curve of her hip, the press of flesh on her stool.
“Speaking of asses,” I said, “allow me to note that yours still looks tremendous.”
She waved her cigarette in my face. “Wood back in the pants, perv.”
I placed my hands on the bar. “Yes’m.”
“Oddity number two.” Angie put a steno notepad on the bar and flipped it open. She swiveled her stool so that our knees almost touched. “Just before five on the day he was hurt, David Wetterau calls Greg Dunne, the Steadicam guy, and begs off. Says his mother is ill.”
“Was she?”
She nodded. “Of cancer. Five years ago. She died in ’94.”
“So he lies about-”
She held up a hand. “Not done yet.” She stubbed her cigarette in the ashtray, left several chunks of coal still burning red. She hunched forward and our knees touched. “At four-forty, Wetterau received a call on his cell phone. It lasted four minutes and originated from a pay phone on High Street.”
