'Were they lovers in the technical sense?'
'I think they were. Young Mrs. Chantry thought so. In fact, she was considering divorce.'
'How do you know?'
'After Paul moved in with them, she came to me. She wanted me to break up their relationship, at least that was the way she put it to me. I think now she was trying to use me as a witness against her husband, in case it came to divorce. I told her nothing.'
'Where did the conversation take place, Mrs. Grimes?'
'Right here in the shop.'
She tapped the floor with her toe, and her whole body moved. She was one of those women whose sex had aged into artiness but might still flare up if given provocation. I kept my own feet still.
'What year did you have that talk with Mrs. Chantry?'
'It must have been 1943, the early summer of '43. We'd only just opened this shop. Paul had borrowed quite a lot of money from Richard to fix the place up and stock it. The money was supposed to be an advance on further art lessons. But Richard never got his money's worth. He and his wife moved to California before the summer was out.' She let out a snort of laughter so explosive that it jangled her beads. 'That was a desperation move if I ever saw one.'
'Why do you say so?'
'I'm absolutely certain it was her idea. She pushed it through in a hurry, practically overnight-anything to get Richard out of the state and away from my husband's influence. I was glad to see the twosome broken up myself.' She raised her spread hands and lifted her shoulders in a large gesture of relief, then let them slump.
'But they both ended up in Santa Teresa, after all,' I said. 'I wonder why. And why did your ex-husband and Paola go to Santa Teresa this year?'
She repeated the gesture with her arms and shoulders, but this time it seemed to mean that she didn't have any answers. 'I didn't know they were going there. They didn't tell _me._ They just went.'
'Do you think Richard Chantry had anything to do with it?'
'Anything is possible, I guess. But it's my opinion-it has been for a long time-that Richard Chantry is dead.'
'Murdered?'
'It could be. It happens to homosexuals-bisexuals-whatever he is or was. I see a lot of them in this business. Some of them go in for the rough trade almost as if they wanted to be killed. Or they wander away by themselves and commit suicide. That may be what Richard Chantry did. On the other hand, he may have found a soul mate and is living happily ever after in Algiers or Tahiti.'
She smiled without warmth but so broadly that I could see that one of her molars was missing. Both physically and emotionally, I thought, she was a bit dilapidated.
'Did your ex-husband go for the rough trade?'
'He may have. He spent three years in federal prison-did you know that? He was a heroin addict on top of everything else.'
'So I was told. But I heard he'd kicked the habit.'
She didn't answer my implied question, and I didn't put it to her more directly. Grimes hadn't died of heroin or any other drug. He had been beaten to death, like William Mead.
I said, 'Did you know Richard Chantry's half brother William?'
'Yes. I knew him through his mother, Mildred Mead. She was a famous model in these parts.' She narrowed her eyes as if she had remembered something puzzling. 'You know, she's gone to California, too.'
'Where in California?'
'Santa Teresa. She sent me a card from there.'
'Did she mention Jack Biemeyer? He lives in Santa Teresa.'
She knitted her black brows. 'I don't think so. I don't think she mentioned anybody by name.'
'Are she and Biemeyer still friends?'
'I doubt it. As you probably know, he inherited Mildred from old Felix Chantry. He stashed her in a house in the mountains and lived with her for years. But I think he broke off with her long before he retired. Mildred was quite a lot older than Jack Biemeyer. For a long time she didn't show her age, but she's feeling it now. She made that clear in the card she sent me.'
'Did she give you her address?'
'She was staying in a motel in Santa Teresa. She said she was looking for a more permanent place.'
'Which motel?'
Her face went vague in thought. 'I'm afraid I don't remember. But it's on the front of the card. I'll see if I can find it.'
XXIV
She went to her office in the back of the store and returned brandishing a postcard. On the front was a colored picture of Siesta Village, which was one of the newer waterfront motels in Santa Teresa. A shaky hand had written on the back, beside Juanita Grimes's name and address in Copper City:
Dear Nita:
Am staying here temporarily till I find a better place. The foggy whether does not agree with me, in fact am not feeling too well. The Calif. climate is not what its cracked up to be. Don't quote me but am looking for a nursing home where I can stay temporarily and get back on my feet. Not to worry-I have friends here.
Mildred
I handed the card back to Mrs. Grimes. 'It sounds as if Mildred's in some trouble.'
She shook her head, perhaps not so much in denial as in resistance to the thought. 'She may be. It isn't like Mildred to complain about her health. She's always been a hardy soul. She must be over seventy by now.'
'When did you get this card from her?'
'A couple of months ago. I wrote her an answer and sent it to the motel, but I haven't heard from her since.'
'Do you know who her friends in Santa Teresa are?'
'I'm afraid I don't. Mildred was pretty close-mouthed about her friends. She lived a very full life, to put it mildly. But old age finally caught up with her.' She looked down along the slopes of her own body. 'Mildred had a lot of trouble in her time. She didn't go out of her way to avoid it, either. She's always had more guts than she could use.'
'Were you close to Mildred?'
'As close as any other woman in town. She wasn't-she isn't a woman's woman. She's a man's woman who never married.'
'So I gather. Wasn't William an illegitimate son?'
Mrs. Grimes nodded. 'She had a long love affair with Felix Chantry, the man who developed the copper mine. William was his son.'
'How well did you know William, Mrs. Grimes?'
'Paul and I saw quite a lot of him. He was a budding painter, too, before the army took him. Paul thought he had more potential talent than his brother Richard. He didn't live to develop it. He was murdered by an unknown hand in the summer of '43.'
'The same summer that Richard and his wife went to California.'
'The same summer,' she repeated solemnly. 'I'll never forget that summer. Mildred drove over from Tucson-she was living with a painter in Tucson then-and she drove over from there to view poor William's body in the morgue. Afterwards she came to my adobe, and as it turned out she spent the night. She was strong and healthy in those days, no more than forty, but the death of her son came as a terrible shock to her. She walked into my house like an old woman. We sat in the kitchen and killed a quart of bourbon between us. Mildred was a lively conversationalist most of the time, but that night she hardly said a word. She was completely used up. William was her only child, you know, and she really loved him.'
'Did she have any idea who had killed him?'
'If she had, she didn't tell me. I don't think she had. It was an unsolved killing. It stayed that way.'
'Do you have any thoughts on the subject, Mrs. Grimes?'
'I thought at the time it was one of those senseless killings. I still do. Poor William hitched a ride with the wrong party, and he was probably killed for the money in his pockets.' She was looking intently into my face as if it were a clouded window. 'I can see you don't believe that.'
'It may be true. But it seems too easy. William may have hitched a ride with the wrong people, but I doubt that they were unknown to him.'
'Really?' She leaned closer. The part in her hair was white and straight as a desert road. 'You think William was deliberately murdered by someone he knew. What do you base that on?'
'Two things, mainly. Talking to the authorities about it, I got a feeling that they knew more than they were saying, that there may have been a deliberate or half-deliberate cover-up. I know that's vague. The other thing on my mind is even vaguer. However, I think I give it more weight. I've worked on several dozen murder cases, many of them involving multiple murders. And in nearly every case the murders were connected in some way. In fact, the deeper you go into a series of crimes, or any set of circumstances involving people who know each other, the more connectedness you find.'
Her eyes were still intent on my face; I felt as if she were trying to look directly into my mind. 'You believe that Paul's death the other night was connected with William Mead's death in 1943?'
'Yes. I'm working on that theory.'
'Connected in what way?'
'I'm not sure.'
'You think the same person killed both of them?' In spite of her age, she sounded like a young girl frightening herself with a story whose ending might frighten her more. 'Who do you think it was?'
'I don't want to lead you. You seem to have known all the suspects.'
'You mean you have more than one suspect?'
'Two or three.'
'Who are they?'
