Sauce for the Goose, page 9
part #9 of Jimmy Flannery Series
"Flannery. Jimmy Flannery," I say, and she writes it down. "I'm going over to the hospital to see Frank," I say, "and see if maybe there's something I can do. But you can tell him that I stopped by if you want to."
"You're not going to..." she starts to say, but lets it lay there.
"Mention this conversation? No, I ain't."
That seems to settle her mind a little bit, but I can see she's still got a lot of doubts about a stranger who walks in with so many questions.
"So what time did he ask for the messenger?" I say, like it's something that just popped into my head.
"How do you know he called for a messenger?" she asks, her suspicions spilling over again.
"Because the paper the messenger delivered was the favor he did for my friend."
"The messenger picked up about three o'clock," she says.
"So, even though his wife had been rushed to the hospital, Frank took the time to finish a little thing like that and hand it over to a messenger. Ain't that just like Frank? Always thinking about others before hisself."
She looks at me like she thinks I'm trying to feed her some Irish honeycake but there's no way she can get mad on her boss's behalf about a compliment.
"I'll be going then," I say. "Thank you very much."
I can tell she's glad to see me go.
I stop in the doorway and I ask, "Your switchboard keep a log on outgoing calls?"
She's finally had enough of me. "That's none of your business, Mr. Flannery."
"Please, just call me Jimmy. Everybody does."
EIGHTEEN
I meet Willy Dink over at the diner where he takes his messages. He hands me a plastic baggie with a couple of ounces of dried lion dung in it plus a pair of rubber surgical gloves.
"What's them for?" I'd asked him.
"Well, it ain't exactly winter, is it?" he says. "I think it'd look a little funny, you going around wearing a pair of regular gloves."
"Don't you think it's going to look just as funny, me going around wearing rubber gloves?"
"Make like they caught you doing the dishes."
"That ain't the right kind of rubber gloves."
"By the time they get to thinking about why you're wearing a pair of rubber gloves, you'll've already shook their hands and the lion smell'll already be all over them. Now, you just make sure you don't get any on yourself or Alfie won't have anything to do with you for a week."
I drive over to O'Meara's and take Alfie in the house first, telling him to lay down in Billy's basket, Billy not being there.
"Where's Billy?" I ask Cora and Jake.
"He's with my mother, keeping her company," Cora says.
Jake looks at his watch. "You got about five minutes to do whatever you got to do. These people are right on time. You sure Alfie ain't going to trot over to them looking for a pet?"
"I got a feeling Alfie ain't going to like them any better than you do but just to be sure I'll go get ready. Now you be sure to give me a big introduction because I got to shake each and every hand."
I go put on the rubber gloves and then finger the dry dung in the baggie. It don't smell as bad as I thought it was going to smell. In fact it don't hardly smell at all, but then I ain't got a dog's nose who's probably got a better ancient memory for the smell of lion than humans do.
I ain't one to make my mind up about another person on first impressions. I mean some of the most innocent-looking people I ever met, like Chips Delvin, are the craftiest, some of the meanest-looking the sweetest, and the other way around.
But when I get a look at the late Mrs. Papadopolous's nieces and nephews I don't got—have—to have an affidavit to know that what we've got here is some very piggish people, the kind what applaud like mad when some crook gets up and says, "Greed is good," or some woman in a ten-thousand-dollar dress covering her bones says, "You can't be too thin or have too much money."
O'Meara's quick to meet them at the door so they can't all come piling in and maybe have one or two of them get around me, into the parlor and over to Alfie—playing like he's Billy—before I get to shake their hand.
"Hello, Mr. Papadopolous," he says to the first one what walks through the door, a big pushy type, with thinning hair and the blankest eyes I think I ever see on a person. I'd like you to meet my teacher, Miss Cora Esper, and my friend, Committeeman James Flannery. Miss Esper, Mr. Flannery, I'd like to introduce George Papadopolous, Mrs. Papadopolous's nephew, her brother's son."
I don't know if he thinks practically giving Cora and me titles is going to impress them, but George's expression don't even flicker except he glances down briefly when he feels the texture of my hand, which in a rubber glove ain't quite natural.
O'Meara does the same for Martin Kalogeras, who is the late Mrs. Papadopolous's late sister's son, and Mrs. Theresa Bacos and Mrs. Thelma Argente, one of which is the daughter of her late husband's late brother and the other of which is her own late brother's daughter. All these details give me a chance to hold onto their hands for a minute to make sure the lion doo-doo really gets rubbed in.
The last one I shake hands with is Stanley Duskind, the lawyer. If George Papadopolous's eyes is blank, this one's eyes is like looking into a calculating machine. He's adding me up while we're holding hands, wondering if I'm another lawyer disguised as O'Meara's friend.
"Committeeman, did Mr. O'Meara say?" he asks.
"The Twenty-seventh."
"Old Delvin's ward?"
"That's right. Do you know Mr. Delvin?"
"I heard about him. Who hasn't heard about Chips Delvin? Passing of an era. A piece of Chicago history."
He's got this smile what flashes on and off like the strobe light on a camera. He gives me the old click click which I think he thinks makes him a very charming person.
"You know Mr. O'Meara long?"
"I know him long enough to call him Pothole when I want to get his goat."
O'Meara looks at me funny, like he's surprised I'd know such a thing or even that I'd even know he had a nickname.
Duskind's smile goes click-click. "Do you know how he got that nickname?"
"I know, but I ain't telling."
"A man of discretion," he says, and turns away from me. "Well, shall we make our inspection?"
"I'm curious about something," I say. "What's this inspection all about?"
"As the beneficiaries of the estate, my clients have a fiduciary interest in the maintenance of this property and the items held in trust and under guardianship."
"You're talking about Billy?"
"The dog. Yes, the dog."
"Thanks for helping me clear that up. For a minute there I didn't know what you was talking about. You see we don't call Billy the item."
"Well the orders of the court so designates the animal in question," Duskind says.
"Well, that's good to know," I say. "It tells me a lot about the temper of the court. But it still don't tell me if it spells out you got the right to come here inspecting the property or whatever anytime you decide you want to."
"You know a little about the law, do you, Mr. Flannery?"
"I pick up a little doing what I do."
"I could go through the trouble and expense of getting a court order," he says.
"I wouldn't ask you to do that. You put my friend through the trouble and expense of getting an order to keep you from torturing Billy—"
"Please," he says, raising a hand, asking me not to be so harsh in my description.
"—but O'Meara ain't the kind to get even if it means acting small. Besides, there's nothing to hide around here. You want to go in, take Billy's pulse, see how long the poor old man's got to live, nobody's going to mind. As long as you don't hurt him. As long as you don't stick a needle in him."
I figure I got everybody feeling nervous and maybe even a little bit guilty for doing what they're doing. Well, at least the nieces and Martin Kalogeras look a little uncomfortable. My trying to play a tune on their heartstrings ain't bothered George Papadopolous or Duskind one little bit.
Click-click goes Duskind. "Let's go in and have a look around, shall we?"
When we get to the kitchen one of the nieces, Theresa Bacos, makes a little mew of concern when she sees Alfie laying there in Billy's bed, his head on his paws, bored brainless with it all, just hanging in until I give him the word that we can get the hell out of there.
Theresa hunkers down—I notice she ain't got a bad set of stilts—and reaches out the back of her hand to give Alfie a sniff, the way they tell you to do with dogs you don't know really well.
Alfie sits up like a bee stung him and backs off like she's threatening him with a gun.
"Billy, Billy, Billy," she coos.
Alfie gives her a little growl. It's bad enough she smells bad, but her calling him by another name is the final insult.
Martin Kalogeras gives this phony hearty laugh and says, "The dog doesn't like you, Tess."
"He may be getting old but he shows good sense," Thelma says, sticking in her two cents and demonstrating to anybody what's paying attention that these ladies don't get along too well.
Kalogeras tries to give Alfie a pat on the head, being a little bolder about it, sticking his hand right down there like the dog he thinks is Billy wouldn't dare growl at him.
Alfie's ears go back and he snaps at the offending hand which Kalogeras snatches back just in time, otherwise he could've lost a finger.
"That old dog's acting awfully spry," he says.
"You scare an animal and he'll find a way to fight back even if he's dying," Cora says very sweetly.
She looks so fresh and pretty Papadopolous and Kalogeras ain't about to take exception to anything she says, and since Thelma and Theresa didn't like her at first sight, she ain't lost any ground there.
"Get out of the way, Martin. Let me have a look at that dog," George Papadopolous says in this voice.
Martin steps aside but you can see he don't like being ordered around by his cousin.
Papadopolous reaches out his left hand. Alfie gets ready to take a nip but then Papadopolous grabs him by the scruff of the neck with his right hand and starts to hunch closer for a better look.
"Hey," O'Meara says. "Get your hands off that dog before I bust your fingers."
Papadopolous lets go fast and backs away, Alfie sitting there trembling and glaring at him very indignantly.
"Are you threatening me, O'Meara?" Papadopolous says.
"That's right. You were inflicting an injury on a ward of the court which has been put in my care. You ask your lawyer; I ask you to cease and desist and you don't, then I got a legal right to use all appropriate force to protect and defend the creature what is my responsibility."
"Oooof," Papadopolous says, like O'Meara's punched him in the belly. He looks at Duskind, who's got this little smile on his face which tells me that he don't much like George Papadopolous either. He gives a little shrug like he's not about to argue the legalities right here in somebody's kitchen.
What we got here is a lot of people what don't like one another and are joined together only because of financial considerations. Sometimes that can be a powerful glue and sometimes that can be otherwise.
"Would you like to look at the rest of the house?" Cora asks like there ain't a bit of tension in the air. "Watch your clothes. We've been painting, improving the property, and some places are still wet."
NINETEEN
I take a drive over to Illinois Masonic to pay my respects to Frank Vollmer and see if there's anything I can do in his time of trouble. Also to have another look at the pearlescent white Jaguar. I walk up and down the lines of cars until I find it. I take down the plate number and then I go into the hospital and ask at reception for Mrs. Vollmer's room.
The receptionist asks me if I'm family and when I tell her I ain't—I'm not—she tells me that only family is allowed.
"Is her husband with her?" I ask.
"I wouldn't know that, sir."
"Maybe I could at least talk to somebody at the nurses' station," I say. "I'd like to have a word with Mr. Vollmer."
"Is it very important?"
"Well, compared to a wife what's in a coma, I'd say no. But, on the other hand, it might give Frank—Mr.Vollmer—a little comfort," I say, smiling this wistful smile I trot out for such occasions.
"Well, if you walk along this corridor and turn left you'll come to the nurses' station," she says. "But, if anybody asks, don't tell them I let you through."
I take the route she points out which takes me past a couple of public telephones on the wall with privacy booths around them. Vollmer's on the phone in one of them with his back to me.
I see the number of Mrs. Vollmer's room on one of the doors and I walk over and go inside. They got the shades drawn with just the night-light on.
Mrs. Vollmer is a very pretty woman lying there with her hair fanned out on the pillow and one of them plastic harnesses to deliver oxygen around her head and in her nose. And her eyes is closed as she breathes very gently.
I'm standing there looking down at her, wondering why a woman like her would want to take her life—if that's what she done—did—when she stirs a little and her eyes flutter open.
I know enough from talking to Mary to know that don't necessarily mean she's coming out of it but I grab the moment just in case and take her hand, so she'll have something—somebody—outside herself to connect with.
"Dolce?" she mumbles at me. At least that's what I think she says. I think maybe she said "Dolly" or "Dollin," but then she says it again. I'm pretty sure it's "Dolce." And then her eyes flutter closed again and she's back in a deep sleep again.
I let go her hand and walk back out into the corridor.
Vollmer's still on the phone. I stop about six feet back and stand there waiting for him to finish.
One minute he's laughing and the next minute he's hunched over the handset talking into it like he's trying hard to make a case for something to the person on the other end of the line.
Maybe he feels me looking at him like people do, because he tosses a glance my way over his shoulder and when he sees me suddenly gets red in the face and more than a little flustered. Which I think is something to think about since him being an attorney and standing up there teaching and all, you'd expect better control over hisself when confronted with minor surprises.
He says a quick good-bye, hangs up and turns to me with a smile and eyebrows that're asking me what I'm doing there.
"You visiting somebody?" he asks.
"Well, actually, I come to inquire about your wife and maybe see was you around."
"What for?"
"Well, to thank you for taking care of that little thing for that friend of mine, but mostly to see if there's anything I can do."
"That's very kind of you, Jimmy," he says.
"That's all right, Frank. This is a very tough world we live in and we got to help one another all we can. Is your wife doing better?"
"She's holding her own but I wouldn't say she was doing better."
"You know what happened?"
He stares into my eyes for a minute like he's wondering why he should discuss private family matters with a comparative stranger, no matter how well meaning, and I guess he sees something there that gives him confidence or maybe he just needs somebody to talk to, so he says, "I came home from school and found her unconscious."
"So you had to rush her to Emergency," I say.
"I called her doctor." He stands there for a minute just looking at me again. "I didn't realize how serious it was."
"Her being unconscious?"
"That's right. I thought she was just passed out."
"Uh," I say, which is a remark he can take any way he wants to take it; that I understand what he's getting at, that I don't understand and need more information or that I'm just sympathizing.
"Over the last year or so, I've often come home to find Joan passed out."
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to—"
"That's all right."
"—intrude."
"That's all right. It's a wonder everybody in town doesn't know about it by now. She's had a few near accidents in public places, a couple of sly mentions in the gossip columns."
"I don't read that stuff."
"I don't suppose you would, Jimmy. I can see that you're not the sort of man who'd have much interest in such things. Well, we—myself and her friends—were doing our best to keep it quiet."
"So you thought she was just drunk again?"
"Until she failed to respond in spite of everything I tried to do."
I almost asked him what he tried to do, but that would've shut him up, a stranger questioning him that way, so I just stood there letting him talk it out the way he wanted to.
"I called the doctor," he says.
All of a sudden his face squeezes up like he's in pain and he turns away like he's going to cry and he don't want me to see. I put out my hand and pat him on the shoulder, telling him it's okay he wants to let go and relieve himself. He shudders and when he turns back to face me, he's composed hisself.
"If my delay causes some permanent damage or..." he don't say anything about her death but I know that's what he means "...I don't know if I'll ever be able to forgive myself."
"You done what you thought was best. A person can't do better than that."
"Thank you for saying that, Jimmy. Right this minute I'm not sure I really believe it, but it's a comfort to hear."
"There anything I can do?" I ask. "Anything at all?"
"You stopping by to see how Joan and I were doing means more than I can say," he tells me. "You're a good friend, Jimmy."
"Speaking of which, I'd like to tell you thanks again for what you did for O'Meara. I was over to his place and he told me how you sent that cease and desist petition over by messenger. I mean that was an awful nice thing to do seeing as how you had these heavy worries on your mind."
