The minute I saw the outrageously bright and naughty see-through undergarments, I knew Abby would love them. (And get a lot of use out of them, too.) “How much for the whole trio?” I asked.
“You’re in luck,” she said. “The set just went on sale this morning. It was originally priced at nine dollars and ninety-four cents, but now it’s just seven eighty-five.”
I gulped. That was a whole lot more than I paid for underwear from the Sears Roebuck catalog. And I felt a little funny even considering buying Abby such an expensive and intimate gift. Still, I knew she would go wild for the lacy red stuff, and I wanted to give her something really nice and uplifting. (That’s not a dumb bra joke, I swear! I meant as nice and uplifting as the free cocktails Abby was always giving me.)
“Can I pay by check?” I asked. I knew without looking I didn’t have that much cash in my wallet. I never had that much cash in my wallet. I did have that much money in my checking account, though-plus a whole four dollars and fifteen cents more.
“Do you have any identification?”
“Yes… a Social Security card and a driver’s license.” (When Bob and I ran away to New York and got married, we both took the New York State driver’s test even though we didn’t have a car. We wanted to prepare ourselves for our undoubtedly glorious future, when Bob would return from Korea, and get a good job, and we’d buy a little house in Levittown on the GI bill, and then get ourselves a brand spanking new two-toned Ford convertible. So much for planning ahead. Instead of a car without a top, I got a life without a husband.)
“That’ll be fine,” the salesgirl said, taking a box from the shelf behind the counter and lining it with tissue paper. “Now, what size brassiere does your friend wear?”
“ 34C,” I said, with certainty. I knew the size because Abby bragged about it at every opportunity. She also boasted about her waist and hip measurements (23 inches and 35 inches respectively), which I gave to the salesgirl to help her choose the right size panties and garter belt. Then, as she was selecting the flimsy undergarments, arranging them in the box, and writing up the sales slip, I sneakily launched my investigation.
“A good friend of mine used to work in this department,” I said. “Her name was Judy Catcher. Did you know her?”
The girl gasped and stopped what she was doing. She raised her head and gave me a look that teetered between shock and sorrow. “Judy? You were a friend of Judy’s?”
“Yes, that’s right,” I said. “We used to live in the same neighborhood.” I felt bad about lying to this perfectly nice and innocent-looking person, but I was, after all, working on a murder story, and I knew from past experience that the fewer people who knew my true identity and occupation, the better off (i.e., safer) I would be.
“But you do know she’s dead, don’t you?” the girl inquired. Her hoarse voice crackled with deep concern. “It was in the papers and everything.”
“Yes, don’t worry. I know all about it… I’m not going to start crying and cause a scene or anything.”
The girl relaxed somewhat, and as she did, her own eyes-her incredibly large and luminous green eyes-welled up with tears. One drop fell out and landed on the tissue paper with a crinkly splat.
There were lots of customers at the lingerie counter now-impatient, irritable shoppers scrambling to make their last-minute purchases before closing time. A surprising number of them were men. They looked embarrassed and uncomfortable, but utterly determined to get what they came for. I hadn’t realized that sexy underwear was such a must-have Christmas item. That seemed a little bizarre to me. (Unless, of course, the customers were all acquaintances of Abby’s.)
“Are you okay?” I said to the grieving salesgirl. “I’m so sorry I upset you. Do you think we could go someplace private for a minute or two?”
“I can’t leave my station. My supervisor would kill me.” She took a handkerchief out of her skirt pocket and dabbed her eyes dry. “Come,” she said, picking up her sales book and Abby’s present and glancing nervously in all directions, “let’s go around the corner to the other side of the counter. It won’t be so crowded back there.”
She was right. The area around the corner-the girdle section-was practically deserted. I guess girdles haven’t yet made the stretch from secret stomach-cinchers to public stocking-stuffers.
“We can talk here,” the girl said, “but I’ll have to pretend that I’m showing you some merchandise in case my supervisor comes around.”
“Fine,” I said. “Show me anything you want.” To enhance my image as a serious shopper, I put my purse down on the counter and took out my checkbook. Then, when the girl bent over to get a stack of girdles out of the stock drawer, I unzipped the side pocket of my purse and took out the picture of Judy-the one that was taken in front of Walgreen’s, with the bearded weirdo and the weenie dog. I slipped the photo under my checkbook just as the salesgirl’s fluffy red head and despondent freckled face popped up above the counter again.
After she put her armful of girdles down on top of the display case, I reached over and touched her hand. “My name’s Phoebe Starr,” I told her, resurrecting the trusty pseudonym I’d used throughout the Comstock case. “What’s yours?”
“Vicki,” she said. “Vicki Lee Bumstead.” I smiled but I didn’t say a word. Far be it from me to point out the whimsy of other people’s funny names. Besides, Vicki’s name wasn’t funny in and of itself like mine. Only her surname was comical, and only because Dagwood (or, more precisely, the cartoonist Chic Young) had made it that way.
“I’m really sorry I made you cry, Vicki,” I said. “Were you a friend of Judy’s, too?”
“Yes,” she said, leaning against the counter and nodding so vigorously I thought she might shake something loose. “Judy was my best friend. The best friend I ever had. We worked here together, five days and two nights a week, for over a year. I miss her so much I can’t stand it.” She hugged her arms in close to her chest as though protecting herself from the cold. I felt so sorry for the girl I wanted to hug her myself.
“I know exactly how you feel,” I exclaimed. (You probably think I was lying, but I wasn’t.) “She was gone so suddenly, and so violently, it’s… well, it’s just so hard to accept… and impossible to understand.” I fought to keep myself from falling into my own deep well of loss and misery.
Vicki pulled herself together, too. “Phoebe Starr… Phoebe Starr… Phoebe Starr,” she suddenly repeated, cocking her head and narrowing her eyes, looking at me as if seeing me for the very first time. “Were you and Judy very close?” A visible seed of suspicion had taken root in the loamy depths of her mind. ”I’m only asking because Judy never mentioned your name to me-not even once. And it’s kind of funny that she never told me about you, because she always told me everything.”
“Well, to tell you the truth, Judy and I weren’t that close,” I blurted, trying to sidestep Vicki’s abrupt scrutiny. “It was my Aunt Elsie she was really close with. They lived right across the hall from each other.” For a person who truly hates to lie, I sure am good at it.
“Elsie Londergan is your aunt?” Vicki’s eyes were softening now, returning to their normally bulbous and luminous state. “Judy talked about her all the time. She loved her so much! She said Elsie was the mother she had always wished for.”
“My aunt feels the same way-as though she’s lost her only daughter.”
“Uh-oh!” Vicki said, suddenly shifting her gaze from my face to a point in the distance behind me. “My crabby supervisor’s headed this way. Act like you’re looking at the girdles.” She slid the stack of foundation garments under my nose and held the top one up for my inspection. “This is one of our bestselling models,” she said, raising her throaty voice to a loud, conspicuous frequency. “It features cotton elastic gores, a perforated rubber waist cinch, coiled wire boning, front clasps, back laces, and six adjustable garters.”