A Pain in the Tuchis: A Mrs. Kaplan Mystery (8 page)

Mrs. K and I looked at each other, both of us wondering what the man had in mind. So Mrs. K asked him.

“Well,” he said, “it’s obvious this being a…a gay establishment, that is, one catering especially to gay couples, doesn’t matter to you.”

“Matter?” Mrs. K said. “Why should it matter? Oh, you mean we might be mistaken for being…for having a ‘relationship,’ as you put it? Well, yes, but that is more amusing than anything else. I mean, at our age…”

“Yes, that’s my point,” Andrews said. “My mistake illustrates a couple of things, such as how we tend to take things for granted that we shouldn’t, and how we don’t have to think of ourselves as belonging to one group or another just to eat in a good restaurant.”

“Listen,” Mrs. K said, “I’m sure the bran muffins here are as good as anywhere else. Maybe better, although so far I have not had a chance to find out. If the other people here don’t mind that Ida and I are not hugging and
potching
each other on the
tuchis,
I’m sure we don’t care if they are.” I nodded in agreement.

Mr. Andrews laughed at this and said, “So I take it you don’t mind my telling this little story?”

“Of course we don’t, do we, Ida?”

I shook my head. “It is not every day we get into the newspaper.”

Mr. Andrews shook our hands and thanked us and again walked away. And this time he did not return, so we could finish our tea before it became cold.

“Isn’t it interesting, Ida,” Mrs. K said as she put down her teacup. “For all I know, we are the only Jewish people in here. And I can see we are the only people our age. In some people’s minds, with their prejudices, that makes us somehow different. In this restaurant, apparently it is only our not having a ‘relationship’ that makes us different. And yet really we are all the same, all just people, are we not?”

I nodded. I had not thought of it that way, but of course she was right. It is a funny world.

The waiter came over and brought more hot water for our tea, and when he had gone Mrs. K said, “So, Ida, finally perhaps we can get down to the business we came here for. Let us make that list we promised to Inspector Corcoran.”

I again took out my notebook.

“So far we have on the list Rena Shapiro, Hannah Bissela, and this William Johnson, or whatever his name is,” I said. “Who else should we put down?”

We both were silent while we thought about this. Mrs. K spoke up first.

“What about Angela Reiskof?” she said. “Do you remember the arguments she and Vera used to have?”

How could I forget? Angela is a very political person. She takes extremely seriously what she believes in, such as the environment—she is always telling us about how we should be worrying about “global warming,” for example, not that we do not have enough to worry about already—and other what you would call “liberal” positions. Many of us share Angela’s views; we just do not express them with so much force. We listen to Angela and nod our heads, or shake them if we disagree, maybe offer our own two cents’ worth, and let it go at that.

Vera, on the other hand, generally disagreed with Angela, and she was just as loud in saying so. Actually, I don’t think Vera really believed or even cared about half the things she said; she seemed to treat Angela’s little outbursts as some kind of game, in which whatever Angela said, Vera would take the opposite position and try to beat her down with it. The rest of us would usually just go as far away as we could when the two of them got into it, because it could be most unpleasant. It was like a mean person teasing a dog with a bone, the way Vera got Angela more and more angry. It seemed to amuse her. I am not sure which one of them won most of those arguments—like I say, the rest of us usually did not stay around to watch or listen—but I know that just mentioning Vera’s name around Angela would send her temperature several degrees up. Yes, Angela definitely belongs on the list.

We both paused to think and when I heard nothing from Mrs. K, and myself had no other ideas, I assumed we were ready to leave. But just as I was picking up the last crumbs of my muffin—it was actually quite good, if a
bissel
sweet for my taste—Mrs. K said, “What about Margaret Freid?”

“Who?”

“Margaret Freid. You remember the kerfuffle. It was just after Vera moved to the Home.”

“Now that you mention it, didn’t Margaret accuse Vera of some kind of hanky-panky with her husband, Ben?”

“That’s right. Vera and Ben both denied it, of course, but
oy,
what a stink it caused between Margaret and Ben. And then when Ben passed last year, Margaret said it was because of all the aggravation Vera caused. I remember when her son was here for the funeral, he had some pretty harsh words for Vera. Something like it should have been her that died instead of Ben, right?”

“Yes, and I suppose that gives both of them a motive,” I said, “but Margaret moved away right after Ben’s death, to be closer to her children. I doubt she or her son came back here just to get even with Vera.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Mrs. K said. “But let’s put her on the list just to be complete.”

And so I did.

When we had finished making the list, I put away the notebook and we asked for the check. After we paid, our waiter gave us a nice smile and said, “You girls have a nice day, now.”

At our age, anyone who calls us “girls” must be either blind or kind. Lawrence the waiter seemed to have perfectly good eyesight, so I prefer to think he was just being nice.

Next time I shall give him a bigger tip.

The next afternoon Mrs. K and I took a nice walk in the neighborhood after breakfast. We like to walk at least once every day, if the weather allows. Back at the Home, we found that the two policemen were waiting for us. Marilyn, the receptionist at the front desk, told us as soon as we had entered the lobby.

“They said to take your time,” Marilyn said. “They’ll be waiting in the lounge.”

Mrs. K and I went to our rooms and freshened up—to tell the truth, I got there just in time, if you know what I mean: a brisk walk at my age gets the juices flowing in more ways than one—and then I passed by her room and we went together to the lounge. Corcoran and Jenkins were sitting, reading magazines. I suppose even policemen like to take a break now and then. The only surprising thing was that while Jenkins was reading
Sports Illustrated,
Corcoran was holding a copy of
Hadassah Magazine
and seemed quite interested in the article he was reading. Both of them put the magazines down when we approached. Corcoran gave us a nice smile. Jenkins nodded.

“So, did you ladies come up with any names for us?” Corcoran asked as soon as we had sat down opposite them.

“We did,” Mrs. K said. “Now, these are just people who seem to us to have had a stronger dislike for Vera Gold than most other residents. No one really liked her, except of course her family.”

Corcoran glanced at the page I had handed to him. “Hmm. Not a lot to go on, but that’s okay. We’re just beginning our investigation.” He asked Jenkins for his notes and looked them over.

“I don’t see anyone on your list who has turned up in our interviews, except perhaps this Rena Shapiro, the lady with the cat? Seems like everyone remembers that incident.”

He looked again over the notes, then looked up. “There are a few others who at least were or could have been in the room at some time that day. I’m told that at lunchtime, someone on the nursing staff always brought Mrs. Gold a pill to take with her lunch. We haven’t been able to establish whether that actually happened on the day in question. Apparently they weren’t serving meals that day, at least not on their regular schedule. I understand it was a religious holiday, wasn’t it?”

“Yes,
Yom Kippur,
the Day of Atonement,” Mrs. K said.

“Right. Of course. I actually knew that. So there possibly was that person. Also, in the afternoon somewhere between three and four, a member of the cleaning staff looked in to see if everything was all right, and apparently it was.” He checked his notes again. “The nursing staff checked up on her several times during the day, but they didn’t necessarily enter the room. I’m told Mrs. Gold did not need assistance to use the toilet and she could adjust her bed automatically.” Another glance at the notes. “One curious thing was that one of the nurses said that, when she looked in on Mrs. Gold, she noticed a little pill cup on the table next to the bed, and she thought she saw one pill in it. She didn’t think anything of it, as she was not assigned to help with Mrs. Gold’s medicines, and since Mrs. Gold was asleep, she just closed the door and went on her way.”

“And was that pill found by the bed when Mrs. Gold was later…later found deceased?” Mrs. K asked.

“Well, no. But we don’t know whether that has any significance, as we don’t know what kind of pill it was—if indeed there was such a pill—or whether Mrs. Gold woke up and took it. We did ask her son about it, but he said he didn’t notice any pills by her bed.”

More consulting the notes.

“Oh, yes. One of the serving staff whom we interviewed said she saw someone—one of the residents, she assumed, a woman—going into Mrs. Gold’s room with what looked like a glass of water sometime late in the afternoon, sometime after four o’clock.”

“And she knows who this woman is?” Mrs. K asked.

“Unfortunately, no. She had just started work here the day before and didn’t know any of the residents by sight. Of course, we asked if she might be able to identify the person if we showed her pictures of all the women residents, but she said she only saw the back of the woman as she entered Mrs. Gold’s room and wouldn’t know what her face looked like. The best she could say was that she was an older woman, slender, wearing a gray dress.”

“Hmm. Too bad she couldn’t see the face.”

“Yes, and I was hoping you ladies might be able to help. Perhaps you can somehow find out who this person was. I’m sure people here will tell you things they might hesitate to tell us. Anyway, please keep your ears open for any information about that.”

This was, of course, most interesting news. What would a resident have been doing in Vera’s room at that time, especially when everyone was supposedly at
Yom Kippur
services? We would just have to wait and find out.

Corcoran continued reading from his list. “Another person who has been mentioned to us is a man of about, well, let’s say older than fifty, described as heavyset, even overweight, who was seen lurking in the area of Mrs. Gold’s room about five
P.M
. We don’t know who he is or whether he tried to enter the room, just that he was nearby.”

Neither Mrs. K nor I could shed any light on who this might have been. But whoever he was, he was now a suspect on Corcoran’s list, and therefore had to be added to our list.

As Corcoran was about to say something else, a server came by with a tray of cookies, followed by another pushing a tea cart. This was the regular afternoon snack, always a different baked goodie with tea. It is something we look forward to, not just because it is usually quite delicious, but also as a break in the afternoon routine. Sometimes it is even hard to stay awake in the late afternoon, and a little
nosh
helps to keep us from dozing off.

We all took a cookie or two from the tray and a cup of tea. And a napkin for our laps, of course, we shouldn’t make crumbs on the carpet. As we were beginning to munch on the crispy cookies, Inspector Corcoran’s eyes seemed to light up as if he were having a revelation of some kind. He looked at Mrs. K and said, “Do you know what kind of cookies these are, Mrs. Kaplan?”

“I believe they are just ordinary
mandelbrot,
” Mrs. K said. “It just means almond bread. Every Jewish mother bakes them. And we have a very fine baker here at the Home.”

“Well, they’re delicious,” Corcoran said, “but more than that, they remind me of cookies I haven’t had since I was a kid. You know, my grandmother on my dad’s side was Jewish, and she used to bake cookies just like this for us kids. It’s like being back in her kitchen.”

Okay, so Inspector Corcoran making a fuss over cookies he remembers was a
bissel
surprising, especially finding out his grandmother was Jewish. (If it had been his grandmother on his mother’s side, it would have made him Jewish also, because being Jewish passes from the mother to her children, but not from the father. It has never seemed fair to me, but who am I to argue with tradition?) But what was really a shock was the reaction of Corcoran’s partner, Jenkins.

I am quite certain that in all the time Mrs. K and I have been in the presence of the policeman Jenkins, he has not once smiled or even looked like he was thinking of smiling. A real sourpuss, that Jenkins.

But as soon as he tasted the
mandelbrot,
his eyes too seemed to light up, and you would have thought he was listening to a choir of angels. In fact, he too was remembering something. Like a regular human being, he looked up and was actually smiling! And he talked like a
mensch
also.

“My grandmother wasn’t Jewish,” he said. “She was Italian. But these cookies taste exactly like the biscotti she used to bake. Haven’t had them in years!”

“
Es gezunterhayt,
eat in good health,” exclaimed Mrs. K. Anything that can put a smile on the
ponem
of sourpuss Jenkins is to be encouraged.

We all sat there
fressing
the
mandelbrot
and sipping our tea for a few more minutes, until Corcoran finally put down his cup, neatly folded up his napkin, and said, “Thanks very much for the tea and—what did you call them,
mandel
…”

“Mandelbrot,”
Mrs. K said.

“Yes, thank you. Maybe you can get me the recipe and my wife can make them. But I suppose we’d better get back on track here. I wanted to ask you whether the name Julio Melendez rings a bell.”

Mrs. K looked at me and I at her, but we both shook our heads.

“Is it maybe that singer who plays the guitar?” I asked. I’m sure his name is something like that.

Corcoran laughed. “No, nothing like that. Mr. Melendez is, or at least was, one of the cleaning staff here.”

“And why do you ask if we know this Mr. Mendez?” Mrs. K asked.

“It’s Melendez. Well, I trust I can tell you two and it won’t go any further.” He glanced around us, perhaps looking for whether Mrs. Bissela was hiding under one of the cushions. The way she seems to know everything that happens here, I would not be surprised. “Anyway, maybe you can find out something more about it than we have so far.”

We nodded.

“Mr. Melendez, as I said, was a member of the cleaning staff. Just came on a few weeks ago. The day after he was hired, he was assigned to vacuum the hallways. He apparently was cleaning just outside Mrs. Gold’s room when she came out and almost ran into him. According to someone who witnessed the incident, Mrs. Gold said something sharply to Mr. Melendez. He responded, after which she shouted a racial epithet, which I won’t repeat here, loud enough for the witness and anyone else in the area to hear.”

Oy,
again Vera is making herself popular with the staff.

“This is something I had not heard about. So what happened then?” Mrs. K asked.

“Apparently at this point, Melendez threw down the vacuum cleaner hose he was holding and walked away, he says to avoid saying something he would later regret, because he was so upset. Insists all he said was she should watch out. Anyway, he told his superior what had happened, and they told your Mr. Pupik.”

“And Vera?”

“When Pupik asked Mrs. Gold about it, she claimed he had insulted her first. Made quite a stink about it, according to Pupik.”

I can imagine. And also I can imagine Pupik’s reaction. He would do anything to shut Vera up once she starts on him.

“So what did Pupik do?” Mrs. K asked.

“Had the man removed from the vacuum detail, apparently, and docked him a week’s pay. Poor guy quit the next week.”

Mrs. K thought for a moment about this. Then she said, “You apparently have interviewed this Mendez…Melendez, whatever. Tell me, is he what you would call a heavy gentleman?”

“As a matter of fact, he is,” Corcoran said, smiling. “And we are taking that into account.”

Had we known all of this, Mr. Melendez would surely have been on our list. I added him now.

After the policemen had left, Mrs. K and I sat for a while going over what they had said (well, what Corcoran had said, as Jenkins is mostly the silent type).

As we were about to leave, Mrs. Bissela approached us, smiling and clearly with something on her mind.

“Rose, Ida. I saw you were busy talking with those two policemen. The ones who are investigating Vera’s death. What did they say?”

It is not like Mrs. Bissela to come right out and ask for information; usually she is getting it more indirectly. She must have been extremely anxious to find out what the policemen told us.

“Now, Hannah,” Mrs. K said gently, “you know anything they told us would be confidential and not to be passed along to others.” She didn’t add, “At least anything you would find interesting,” but I’m sure that was understood.

“Yes, but certainly there is something you can tell me.”

“Well,” Mrs. K said, “Inspector Corcoran did say there were some people seen in the area of Vera’s room during the day she died, but they don’t know who they were. A woman resident, and a heavyset man. Do you have any idea who they might be, or who might have gone into Vera’s room that afternoon?”

Mrs. Bissela thought about it, then shook her head. “No, I was at the services most of the day, as you were.”

Mrs. K nodded. “Well, Ida and I are making a list of whoever might have had a reason to harm Vera. We have the most obvious people….”

“Like Rena?” Mrs. Bissela said. “And Angela?”

“Yes, they certainly are the obvious ones. To be honest, I even have you on the list, because it is well known you did not like Vera.”

“An understatement, I’m sure. By all means, include me on your list. It is quite appropriate. But of course I did not do it. Whatever it was that was done.”

“I’m sure you didn’t, Hannah. And maybe you can help us with who else we should put down. You usually know more about these things than we do….”

Mrs. Bissela brightened. This was her specialty. “You have heard about the cousin, I assume? Erik Weiss?”

“The one in Singapore?” I asked.

Mrs. Bissela laughed at this. “No, no. Not Singapore. Sing Sing. It is a prison in New York.”

“Prison?” Mrs. K said. “For what is he in prison?”

“I think it is for embezzlement, or something like that. He was taking money from a business he worked for, somewhere in this state I think. Just a
ganif,
a thief. Not a nice person. I once saw a picture of him—it is a while ago, Vera showed me a photograph of the family for some reason—and he is indeed
zaftig,
quite a large man, like the person you mentioned. If not that he was in jail, I certainly would be adding him to your list, near the top.”

“Why is that?” I asked. “Did he also commit a murder or…what?”

“It is not why he is in jail, but how he got there. What I heard is that Vera, as they say in those old gangster movies, blew the whistle on him. Sold him down the river. You know, turned him in to the authorities. And testified against him.”

“What do you mean? Was Vera really such a
shtunk
as to turn against her own family?”

“Well, it apparently was not as bad as that, although the cousin might not agree.” Mrs. Bissela lowered her voice a bit. “What I heard is that Vera was working for the company that Erik was stealing from. He was their accountant or something. She had actually gotten him the job, had vouched for him. When she found out what he was doing—I don’t know how—she told him he should turn himself in, return the money, and take his punishment. At that time I guess he had not taken much money and probably would not have been treated harshly. But he refused, and in fact he continued to steal the money, probably assuming Vera would never turn him in, a close relative. If that is so, then Vera was in a real pickle, whether to look the other way and let Erik continue to embezzle from her company, or to tell them what he was doing.”