“Back to Chicago, to report on the plant reorganization to the higher-ups. I’ve been cutting out a lot of deadwood, finding out the weak points in the plant management. That’s what I was brought in to do.”
“Not a popular job.”
“No. I’ve made some people mad,” he said matter-of-factly. “But it’s going to make the plant more efficient in the long run.”
“How long will you be gone?”
“Just Wednesday and Thursday. I’ll fly back in Friday morning. But why don’t we have lunch today? Meet me out at the Athletic Club at twelve-thirty, and we’ll go from there, if that suits your plans.”
“Okay. But please let me take you to lunch this time, my treat.”
The look on his face had to be seen to be believed. I burst into giggles.
“You know, that’s the first time a woman ever offered to take me out,” he said finally. “Other men have told me it’s happened to them. But never to me. A first.” He tried very hard not to glance around at my apartment, so much humbler than any place he’d be used to living in since he’d climbed the business ladder.
“We don’t have to go to McDonald’s,” I said gently.
“Sweetheart, you don’t have a job-”
“Martin, I’m rich.” Gosh, that word still gave me a thrill.
“Maybe not what you would think of as rich, but still I have plenty of money.”
“Inherited?” he asked.
“Uh-huh. From a little old lady who just wanted me to have it.”
“No relation?”
“None.”
“You’re just a lucky woman,” Martin said, and proceeded to demonstrate just how lucky I was.
“You’ll mess up your suit,” I said after a moment.
“Damn the suit.”
“You told me you have an appointment at eight-thirty.”
He released me reluctantly.
“See you later,” he said.
I gave him a light kiss on the cheek. “Twelve-thirty,” I said.
I had an unpleasant task to face that morning. I had decided I should go see Susu. All the people who wrote in to “Ann Landers” and “Dear Abby” complained that they felt neglected when someone in the family had serious legal problems or went to jail, that people tried to act as if it hadn’t happened or stayed away entirely. While Jimmy hadn’t exactly been arrested, I didn’t want to be a fair-weather friend to Susu, though time and circumstance had certainly created a gulf between us. So I pulled on a bright sweater and black pants, and red boots to go with the sweater. Cheerful, casual-as if it were an everyday catastrophe that had befallen the Hunter family.
It took me a second to recognize Susu when she came to the door. Her veneer was stripped away, and so much of Susu depended on that veneer. Her shoulders sagged, her eyes were red-rimmed, her clothes were-it seemed-deliberately shabby and old. She looked as if she’d reached back in her closet for the things she was saving to pull on when she painted the carport. There were dirty dishes piled up in the sink. Susu was not only genuinely a woman in the midst of a crisis, she was also acting out the part.
“Where are the kids?” I asked cautiously.
“I sent them to my sister in Atlanta.” As if she’d put them in a box and taken them down to the post office.
“You’re here all by yourself?”
“Not a soul has come by except our minister.”
“What’s the story on Jimmy?”
“He’s down at our lawyer’s office right now. They kept him all day yesterday. I think they may arrest him today.”
“Susu, you think he did it!”
“What else can I think?”
“Well, I don’t think he did it.”
“You don’t?” She sounded amazed.
“Susu! Of course not!”
“His fingerprints were in the Anderton house.”
“So? Hasn’t it occurred to you there are several ways they could have gotten there without him having been the one to kill Tonia Lee?”
“Like how, Roe? Just tell me how!”
“Maybe some other realtor showed him over the house. Maybe Tonia Lee did show him the house, and then he left and her date showed up and killed her!”
“Jimmy must have been having an affair with her, Roe. Then she threatened to tell me or the kids and he killed her. He must have just lost his temper.”
“I could kick you in the rear, Susu Hunter. You are making up things you can’t possibly know. You get yourself into that shower upstairs and get your nice clothes on and put on your makeup and go down to your lawyer’s office and you ask him yourself.”
I was probably doing exactly the wrong thing. Susu would get down there and Jimmy would say, “Yeah, I did it. And I had been having an affair with her, too.”
Saint Aurora, I told myself sardonically.
But Susu was actually doing it. She went up the stairs at a pace a little brisker than her previous shamble. She was patting her hair absently, doing some damage-control evaluation.
I washed the dishes. I left them in the drainer to irritate Susu into putting them away.
She came down in thirty minutes, looking more like herself.
“When is he supposed to have done her in?” I asked.
“Well, Wednesday night.”
“But he took your son to karate practice, or something, that evening, didn’t he? And he was at work until then, right? After practice, he came right home to supper?”
“Yes.”
So much for it having been Jimmy’s car Donnie had seen.
“So when did he find time to go over to the Anderton house, screw Tonia Lee, and kill her?” I asked.
“That’s true,” she said slowly. “I guess I was just so quick to believe he did it because he’s been acting so funny lately.”
“He may be going through a hard time, Susu. He may even need therapy or something. But I really don’t think Jimmy ever killed anyone.”
“I’d better get down there. Thanks for coming by, Roe. I just kind of gave up.”
“Sure,” I said, not feeling noble at all.
“Of course, if he did do it, I’ll never want to see you again,” she said with a tiny smile.
“I know.”
She’d never been as dumb as she liked to seem.
I was getting back into my car when suddenly I realized that this was the morning of Tonia’s funeral. Another unpleasant task. I looked at my watch. I had thirty minutes. I raced back to the townhouse, dashed up the stairs, tore off my clothes and pulled on my winter black dress, loose and long with a drop waist. No time to bother with a slip; no time to pull on panty hose. I rummaged through the closet and got my black boots. The dress needed a necklace or scarf or something, but there simply wasn’t time, and my earrings would just have to do. I yanked on my coat and ran to the car.
The Flaming Sword of God Bible Church was a rectangular cement-block building painted white, with a parking lot of ruts and dust. A cold wind whistled straight through my clothes as I got out of my car. I pulled my coat tighter around me with one hand and held my hair out of my face with the other. I gusted into the little church along with the chilly wind. The parking area had been crowded, and the church was jammed to capacity. I’d seen a television news truck outside, parked in the rear along with the hearse, and the camera crew was in the church. I was willing to bet Donnie was responsible for that. There was no place to sit; every pew was jam-packed with solid Lawrencetonians in their winter coats. I hovered at the back, trying to spot a dark corner. My mother’s basilisk glare found me anyway. Of course, she’d arrived on time, and was seated decorously in the middle of the church, along with the other members of the staff of Select Realty. They were all there except Debbie Lincoln, who presumably was manning the phone at the office.
For a moment I looked for Idella, before I remembered.