Opera, the neighborhood tuned out.
On one sprint, the man threw down the towel. Wilma tripped on it. She flung her hands out too late. Her nose hit the street, broken for sure. She squirmed up before he could drop on top of her. She ran with blood and snot racing down her chin and soaking into the wet collar of her white bathrobe. When she hit the drive this time, she decided to try her bungalow again. Maybe the lock would hold. Maybe the man would give up and leave. Maybe she could telephone somebody. Maybe Gertie.
Her feet ripped across the gravel driveway. She launched into the bungalow and swung to slam the door shut behind her. The man’s brogue wedged in the frame. Wilma pushed. The man pushed harder. He forced his way in and shut the door behind him. The screams stopped right about then.
Jack had read this story enough times to get through it without crying. Enough times to have it memorized and almost enough times to believe it. He folded it once again and stuffed it back in his jacket.
He climbed the concrete steps of 243 Newland Street and paused on the porch. A poinsettia plant in a glazed black pot bloomed its flaming red flowers. Two rockers sat next to the front door. One was painted yellow, the other blue. The sun had paled them both. The yellow rocker’s seat had been worn down to the original wood. Jack knelt to inspect the knitting bag between the rockers. He found a handful of cream-colored doilies. The name on the mailbox read “Van Meter.” He had to start somewhere, so he started here, by knocking on the door.
It took some shuffling and mumbling, but eventually a woman opened the door. She was too young to be called old, but too old to stick with that platinum dye job. Jack said, “I’m sorry to bother you. I’m looking for either a Mr. or Mrs. Philip Van Meter. Would I be right in assuming you’re Mrs. Van Meter?”
The woman jutted her hip to the left and planted a hand on it. “What are you selling, honey?”
Jack pulled his father’s badge and license from his back hip pocket. He showed it to her. “Mrs. Van Meter, I’m an investigator.” He flipped his wallet closed and replaced it. “I’d like to ask you a few questions about an incident that occurred in your backyard about two years ago.”
“You’re either talking about the orange tree I planted there or the whore who took a face plant in my bathtub.”
A wave of heat raced through Jack’s veins. The nerve endings on his face tingled. He tucked it away under a polite tone of voice. “I’m speaking of Mrs. Chesley. Wilma.”
“Her name was Wilma all right, but you got the wrong last name. She was no Missus.”
“She was widowed. Maybe she used her maiden name with you. Greene.”
“Sounds right.” Mrs. Van Meter blew a wayward bang off her eyebrow. The bang fell right back where it had strayed to begin with. “Anyway, there’s not much to tell. She got drunk, fell in the tub. What’s to investigate?”
Jack pointed at the rockers. “Perhaps we could sit and chat for just a couple of minutes.”
Mrs. Van Meter nodded. She walked around Jack and took up residence in the yellow rocker. Jack settled into the blue one. Mrs. Van Meter said, “Tell me your story before I tell you mine. What are you after?”
“Mrs. Van Meter, I do freelance work for an insurance company. I’ve been asked to determine just how accidental Miss Greene’s death was.”
“What for?”
“They don’t tell me, exactly. My guess is someone took out a life insurance policy on her and now he wants to get paid.”
“Who would insure that tramp?”
Jack dug out a bag of tobacco and set to rolling a cigarette. “Like I said, they don’t tell me.”
Mrs. Van Meter snapped her fingers. “I bet it was her husband. I bet she wasn’t a widow like she said. I bet she was a grass widow. Now that husband wants to collect. But, hell, maybe he did it.”
Jack offered Mrs. Van Meter the cigarette. She accepted. He lit it for her, amazed at how steady his hand was. He hoped his voice and face were staying as steady and his anger was still well below the surface. He started rolling another smoke for himself. “Perhaps you should be the investigator.”
“I could find more than the police did, that’s for sure.”
Jack stopped rolling. “They didn’t find much?”
“They didn’t care. They picked up the body and left. Didn’t ask no questions or nothing. All they did was tell me to stay clear of the bungalow. Said they’d clean it themselves.”
“Did they?”
“They had a woman do it. A little fat Mex. Left the place spotless. I was showing it to renters that afternoon.”
Jack twisted the ends of his cigarette, lit it. He inhaled and glanced at the rooming house across the street. “Why do you think her husband may have done it?”
Mrs. Van Meter leaned on the arm of the rocker and tilted her head toward Jack. Passersby could’ve immediately recognized the gossip pose, had there been any passersby. The block was empty of all living things except a mackerel tabby and the house finch he had his eyes on. Mrs. Van Meter said, “Well, Miss Greene came home that evening drunk as a skunk. The sun had barely set. It was maybe eight thirty, nine o’clock. About twenty minutes later, a car comes rolling down the drive. A Packard so old it looked taped together. The fellow must have known her pretty well because he didn’t knock on her door or anything. Just walked right in like he was the one paying me rent. Next thing you know, they’re screaming at each other just like a married couple. She comes running out wearing nothing but a bathrobe. It was indecent, I tell you. I looked out the window right over there and saw one of her breasts flopping like mad outside the robe. Bouncing like it wanted to play in the breeze.”
“How embarrassing,” Jack said.
“Well, she tucked it away soon enough.” Mrs. Van Meter tapped her ash onto the porch. She rubbed her house slipper over it until it ground into the concrete. “Anyway, she runs into the street here, and the fellow comes out chasing her. She’s screaming bloody murder. He’s diving for her left and right. It was a mess.”
“Sounds bad.”
“Well, she was a drunk. We’d hear her all the time, blasting her phonograph, having little parties, laughing like she wanted the whole world to know something was funny.”
“And she screamed a lot?”
Mrs. Van Meter placed a thumb and forefinger on opposite sides of her mouth and rubbed them just below her bottom lip until they met in the middle. If any lipstick had drifted down, this move would’ve put it back in place. Her makeup hadn’t drifted or moved. It was immaculate. She’d put on her face before putting on shoes this morning. “No,” she said. “Except for that night I never heard her scream.”
“And you said ‘we.’ You said, ‘We’d hear her all the time.’ Do you mean you and Mr. Van Meter?”
“Of course. Who else?”
“And Mr. Van Meter was with you on the night in question?”
“I don’t like what you’re insinuating. Where else would my husband be after the sun sets other than right here with me?”
Jack smiled a gentle grin he’d learned during his early days on the force, when he’d partnered with a cagey veteran named Dave Hammond. Hammond had the best poker face Jack had ever seen. He taught Jack a trick or two. Jack said, “I apologize, Mrs. Van Meter. My assumption was that he was home. I’m just double-checking everything.”
Mrs. Van Meter leaned back in the rocker and crossed her arms. “And what else do you assume?”
“These are just guesses on my part, Mrs. Van Meter. Please understand that. But I guess that Mr. Van Meter is either elderly or was in some way incapacitated on the night of July 14, 1944.”
Mrs.