Loose Screw, page 5
“I heard on the news that he’d been killed by a hit and run driver in some parking lot. Seemed strange. I could understand someone brought down when they were crossing a street, but in a parking lot? I suppose it’s possible. Just seemed unlikely.”
“That’s very perceptive of you, Miss, uh …?”
“Missus. Mrs. Hattie Lorenzen.”
“Did you know Mr. Fonseca well?” Herc asked.
“Please, come in, if you don’t mind a little mess.”
I had visions of a hoarder but dutifully followed Herc into her living room. No stacks of newspapers and magazines greeted us, as I’d feared. Instead, on one side of the room, a sewing machine sat on a small table. Nearby, an iron rested on an ironing board. Across the room, a partially clothed dress form wore what appeared to be the bodice of a dress or blouse. Hard to tell at this point. And several patterns with fabric pinned to the back were strewn across a coffee table.
“I’m a dressmaker,” she said by way of explanation. “Tailor when I want to charge more. You caught me just as I was about to start on the sleeves. I appreciate the interruption. Sleeves are always the hardest part for me, all that fitting them perfectly to the holes for the arms, you know?”
“Yes, I do,” I replied. “I’m a bit of a seamstress myself, although my latest projects have been decorative pillows. Is this your full-time occupation or just a hobby?”
“Full-time, as much as I can get work. Not everyone wants hand-tailoring these days. Much too easy to buy from the internet.”
“So you’re here most of the time?” I asked.
“More than I’d like. My children think that means they can drop their kids by whenever they’re out of school or the sitters are on vacation. Sewing and childcare do not mix, but since I’m not always busy, I can’t really say no.”
I continued to pursue my line of questioning. “Being here so much, you must see most of the comings and goings in the rest of the building.”
She cocked her head, as if wondering how much to say. “I guess, unless I’m stumped on some sleeves that refuse to go in. Why?”
I attempted to spell it out for her, even though I was pretty sure she was playing coy. “We’re trying to put together a picture of who Mortimer Fonseca was. Was he here most nights when he wasn’t at work?”
“He lived above my neighbor, Lucy Cavanaugh. She’d be better able to answer that question, although she’s at work now until around six thirty. A while back, I attempted to put together a party for the building residents. The guy above me wasn’t interested. When I knocked on Morty’s door, he told me he didn’t socialize. As it turned out, it was just Lucy and me sitting around drinking wine for a couple hours.”
“But you refer to him as Morty,” Herc said. “That suggests you knew him well enough to call him that.”
She laughed it off. “Don’t mind me. I do that with everyone. When I asked him to my party, he told me his first name, and I just took it from there with the nickname.”
I supposed that made a certain amount of sense, but I wasn’t buying it. She knew him better than she was letting on. Why was she holding back? The only way to dislodge whatever she wasn’t telling us was to keep asking questions. “Did he have any visitors?”
“Not to speak of, but like I said, I don’t live under him, so I wouldn’t’ve heard others’ footsteps. We all park in back, and as you may have already noted, there are outside stairs on the side of the building that go up to the walkway in front of the two second-floor apartments.”
Herc added his own questions. “How about trash? Don’t you all use the same container behind the building?” He was guessing because we hadn’t gone there yet.
“Uh, well, sure. Why?”
“What did you note about his trash?” Herc asked.
She blinked. “What a strange question. Nothing in particular. Wait, now that I think about it, we all do our trash differently. Lucy uses the large white wastebasket bags that you pull and tie. The guy upstairs, Cal, uses heavier duty black garbage bags. Probably to hold all the beer bottles. I frequently see empty beer boxes and pizza boxes that didn’t make it into the bags just thrown into the trash. And Morty, just small white garbage bags, tied and stacked neatly, never more than three at a time.”
Hattie Lorenzen was much more observant than she’d been letting on. Even though it was just Val and me in our duplex, I doubted I could describe her trash quite as well.
“Anything else you can tell us about the man?” I asked, preparing to leave.
Hattie didn’t dismiss the question, like some neighbors would, not wanting to get involved. “He was very observant. I was coming in one night after a quick run to the fabric store for more interfacing when I heard him talking to Cal. Not exactly talking but not shouting either. He sounded more like a drill instructor.”
“What did you hear?” Herc asked.
“Not much. They were already exchanging words when I arrived. Something about the height of something. I took it to mean the planters we’re allowed to have next to our doors. Apparently Cal’s was too high. ‘Yours exceeds the forty-inch limit,’ Morty said. ‘How do you know that?’ Cal returned. ‘It just is. I can see it’s at least forty-four inches,’ Morty said. ‘What’s four inches?’ Cal replied. He sounded dumbfounded that Morty would pay so much attention to his planter. At that point, Morty offered to get a tape measure. Then Cal said something about it not being a big deal and Morty got all huffy, saying something about it not being allowed in our tenant agreement. Tenant agreement? I’d never heard of such a thing, and I’ve lived here longer than both of them. So I went and checked my records and sure enough, there it was.”
“In other words,” Herc said, “Fonseca was within his rights to complain.”
“Well, yes,” she replied, “although it’s never been a problem with anyone here before. At least not that I know. Like I said, I wasn’t even aware there was such a rule.”
I wished Herc hadn’t interrupted her. I wanted to hear the rest of the story. “What happened next?” I asked her.
She shrugged. “All I know is that Cal said something unrepeatable to Morty, but you get the drift, and two seconds later I heard a door slam. I assume that was Cal’s because I’ve never known Morty to be so demonstrative with his own door.”
I couldn’t recall if there’d been a planter outside “Cal’s” door or not. Obviously, even as a temporary homicide detective, I hadn’t been as observant as Hattie claimed Morty was. I exchanged looks with Herc, signaling I was ready to leave. He asked for her alibi for the time period around Fonseca’s murder. She said she was home alone with no one to vouch for her. Then Herc did his usual song and dance about calling him if she remembered anything more that might help the case, handed her his card, and we let ourselves out of her door.
We were on our way back to the car when I stopped in my tracks. “What’s up?” he asked.
“I’ve got to know, Herc.” I pivoted and headed for the exterior stairway going up to the second floor. I didn’t take time to explain. He followed in my wake.
“You gonna ask that guy about that encounter with the victim?” he asked.
“No. Just want to see—” I held up in front of Cal’s door. Nothing was there.
We swiveled in sync and returned to the car.
“Satisfied?” Herc asked once he’d buckled his seatbelt.
CHAPTER 7
“I could’ve told you there was no longer a planter or anything in front of that guy’s door,” Herc said once we were underway. “I stood right to the side of the door when I knocked.”
“I should’ve remembered.” The fact that Herc had and I hadn’t unsettled me.
“You’re just out of the habit. You’ve been using your eyes to see designs in your head instead of looking for evidence.”
“You’re being kind.”
“Okay, you’re getting old. Like that better?”
I bristled. “No! Besides, you’re the same age. It hasn’t affected you.”
“Then we’re back to my first explanation,” he said, chuckling. “C’mon, don’t concern yourself about the planter, and let’s get lunch. We still have a little time before Gordon is supposed to have our info for us.”
Mention of food usually took my mind off my current problems. Herc was well aware of this, although it was also his usual feeding time as well. I reluctantly tucked the issue of the planter away in my brain for later consideration when I was less upset. “Okay. Burgers or salad?” We were both trying to lose a few pounds, but when our minds were digesting the early details of a case, it was easier to nibble on a burger while we ruminated than pick away at lettuce and tomatoes.
We wound up at a nearby fast-food drive-through—two cheeseburgers for Herc and a veggie burger for me. To offset the burger, I had water instead of my usual diet cola.
“Where are we?” Herc asked as we sat in the parking lot unwrapping our goodies.
“I assume you’re asking where we are in the case,” I replied. “We know that Mortimer Fonseca was so caught up in the details of the buildings he inspected, he managed to alienate most of his clients and fellow inspectors, which is where we were when we first started to find his killer. We’ve interviewed his boss, one of his peers and two of his neighbors. We still need to hit the other inspectors and one other neighbor. Until we receive his personnel records, we won’t know if he had any relatives. As for friends, that list is still a big zero, which if it remained that way throughout this investigation, I wouldn’t be surprised, given what we’ve learned about his being a loner. We’ve done an initial sweep of his apartment and learned only that he lived by himself and was very neat. His computer files thus far have revealed little; they’ll need further review.”
Herc had finished off the first cheeseburger by the time I finished. He swallowed. “Good summary. Don’t think I could’ve said it better myself.”
And it was so much easier for him to rely on me to do the recap than do it himself.
“You’ve pretty well laid out our afternoon for us,” he said, continuing. “We scour whatever info Gordon deigns to give us, attempt to track down the rest of the inspectors and swing back to Fonseca’s apartment building to interview the neighbor we missed.”
“Lucy Cavanaugh.”
“Hey, you did that without consulting your notes. At least your memory’s not fading.” He winked. Well, he did something with one eye. Herc had never quite managed the art of the wink.
Ten minutes later, we headed back to the building inspection office. Gordon had completed the assignment we’d given him and then taken off for the afternoon. For a legitimate purpose or so we couldn’t track him down and ask for more, we didn’t know. We’d soon find out as we went through the package.
As it turned out, Gordon had outdone himself. The packet started with Fonseca’s personnel file, all his personal information as well as all the supervisory comments he’d received ever since he was hired. The staff breakdown included names, phone numbers, education, prior experience and time with the department. There was also a list of all Fonseca’s clients for the last year, including type of project and current status. Finally, we received the list of client complaints.
“We need somewhere to lay out all this and digest it,” I said after we’d finished flipping through the stack of documents.
“We could ask the receptionist for a spare office here.”
“That would save time, but I’d prefer not to feel like I’m in a fishbowl, which would be the case here. Let’s go to my office.”
“I thought you’d never ask.”
Later, after we laid out the various documents on my desk, I took the personnel files and Herc went through the list of Fonseca’s clients. I drew the short straw and finished my part within a few minutes. My review revealed only one next of kin, a Jessica Connors, who lived over in Somerset Manor. No surprises in his education and work records; we’d learned the same from Gordon.
The supervisory remarks were more interesting. Gordon spoke with him several times during his six-month probationary period. The first and second interviews were basically complimentary of Fonseca’s quick grasp of procedures and policies, although each contained oblique references to his overenthusiastic interpretation of the rules. For the next few months, the reviews were done monthly. They became progressively more detailed about his going overboard in the enforcement area of his job; however, these concerns apparently weren’t enough for Gordon to terminate him before he became permanent. “I suspect Gordon decided it would be more trouble finding and training a new inspector than keeping Fonseca on, despite the man’s job performance.”
“Not so different from a few of the hiring decisions we’ve come across in our own department,” Herc said. “It’s not easy being a supervisor in this day and age. So many ways employees can challenge your decisions. Sometimes it may not seem worth the effort.”
“Why, Herc, I’ve never heard you sound so defeated.”
“Employee relations have changed a lot since you left. Supervisors back away from being candid with their people for fear of being sued. And I can’t blame them. People have become so litigious.”
“Litigious? You’ve really taken that word-a-day calendar I got you to heart.”
He snorted. “You’d be surprised to know, Rowena Summerfield, that my vocabulary was quite adequate before you took it upon yourself to reeducate me.”
“Gotcha. I’ve been adequately chastised. Anyway, getting back to Fonseca’s employment record, his evaluations are not particularly glowing, but he doesn’t appear to have been written up.”
“Amazing, considering the vitriol expressed in some of these complaints.”
Vitriol? What was with him today? Had he not been able to sleep last night and sat up reading his calendar instead? “Give me the headline version,” I said.
“Okay. ‘Self-important martinet.’ ‘Intractable.’ ‘Refused to see reason.’ ‘Picky to the nth degree.’ Well, you get the idea.”
“Did anyone respond to the complaints?”
“Oh, yeah. Usually Fonseca himself, although I’d bet money his responses were dictated by Gordon. The wording is much too cordial, although it’s all customer-service speak.”
“Could any of the complainants be considered possible killers?” I asked. That was the purpose for requesting the complaints.
He read through them again. “As a matter of fact, there’s two here we should follow up with. The first is Sterling Kuhl, a wannabe restauranteur who says he’s going broke because he can’t afford to make all the ridiculous changes Fonseca required before approving his application. Apparently he’d already sunk all his money in the renovation of his restaurant before Fonseca came into the picture. He demands that Fonseca be fired and his application approved forthwith or he’ll be forced to take measures on his own.”
“Which, of course, he doesn’t describe. Just suggests, right?”
“Right. This other guy, Perry Ludwig, owns a construction company. Claims his business suffered irreparably due to Fonseca’s comments about his slovenly work to numerous clients.”
“That’s weird.”
He wrinkled his nose. “Weird? How?”
“If you were in Ludwig’s place, would you charge someone with calling your work slovenly? No, because if there was any truth in Fonseca’s judgment, you wouldn’t want anyone investigating your work products and talking to your customers. And if there wasn’t, why would you want to bring any attention to your affairs at the risk of giving Fonseca’s opinions credence?”
Herc tilted his head to the side. “Since you’ve explained away the situation either way, why did Ludwig go on record with a complaint?”
“At the moment, I don’t know. But I’d say that’s reason enough for us to talk to him.”
“Agreed,” Herc said. “We should talk to Kuhl also.”
“Our list of interviews grows.”
“That’s a good thing, isn’t it?” Herc asked. “Because it gives us a wider circle of suspects and shows anyone who wants to know that we’re digging in and doing our jobs.”
“On the other hand, it means more time spent on this investigation before I can get back to my reno.”
His brow furrowed. “This getting to be too much? I’d hate to lose your assistance, Ro, but I don’t want your business to go under. Since we’re in your office anyhow, you want to take some time to see how things are getting along here?”
It meant a lot that he’d suggest I take a break, because he seemed to have gotten back into his old groove having me along. “It’s only been a day. Val would’ve called if anything really serious had popped up. But thanks.”
He placed his beefy hand over mine, just for a nanosecond, because only recently I’d made myself pretty clear about not wanting anything romantic from our relationship. Not that he wouldn’t try again, especially if things cooled between Chuck and me. But for now, this had just been a gesture of friendship.
Time to get back to the documents we were perusing. “Any other complaints of note?”
“Just a couple who got turned down on their first applications. Let’s see what we can glean from the list we have so far before we add any more of these names.”
We turned our attention to the other documents Gordon had provided, Herc checking over the list of Fonseca’s clients for the last several months and I going over the info on the other staff.
“I had no idea so many building permits were taken out here in Shasta,” Herc said after a bit.
“I’m not surprised. Shasta is not only growing, it’s also becoming more prosperous. People have money to spend on upgrading their properties.”
“Our victim had quite a list of permit applications to review.”
“And if he was turning down eighty percent the first time through, that must’ve kept him quite busy.”
Herc turned to me. “Do you suppose he did that on purpose, as his way of manufacturing more work?”
