Murder Can Rain on Your Shower (5 page)

as he was in a navy blazer, white shirt, and red-and

navy polka-dot tie, Nick was not on his way to a poker

game with the boys. ‘‘Hi, Desiree,’’ he said, holding the elevator door for me. ‘‘Haven’t seen you in a

while.’’

And
whose
fault
is
that?
I challenged. But only to myself. Aloud, I was a tad less combative. ‘‘Uh, yes, I suppose it has been some time.’’

He smiled warmly. ‘‘Well, it’s always nice to run

into you.’’

It’s
always
nice
to
run
into
you,
I mouthed as soon as the elevator door clanked shut. I couldn’t stop my

self from giving that door a little kick. And naturally, I hurt my toe.

Practically the first thing I saw when I walked into my apartment was the flashing light on the answering

machine. I had one message.

26

Selma
Eichler

‘‘Hi, Dez, it’s Mike. Please give me a call at Ellen’s

when you come in.’’

I got back to him immediately.

‘‘I spoke to my mother this afternoon,’’ Mike said

softly. ‘‘She phoned about . . . about my aunt.’’

‘‘Yes, she wanted to be the one to break the news

to you. I’m so sorry, Mike.’’

‘‘Thank you.’’

‘‘How is your dad taking it?’’

‘‘I’ll soon find out for myself. Ellen and I are driving

up to Greenwich a little later on this evening. I don’t expect him to be in very good shape, though. Bobbie Jean was his only sibling. Also, her death has to be an awful shock to him. She was a very healthy

woman—at least, we all assumed she was. Besides, she

was considerably younger than my dad is. And for this

to— Well, it must have knocked him for a loop.’’

‘‘I’m sure your presence there will help.’’

‘‘Luckily, I’m working nights all of next week’’—

Mike’s an MD, a resident at St. Gregory’s—‘‘so I’ll

be able to spend most of tomorrow with my folks,

too. But tell me something. I understand Bobbie Jean

became fatally ill at the table while she was eating her salad.’’

‘‘That’s right.’’

‘‘Did she appear to be okay earlier?’’

‘‘As far as I could see, she appeared to be fine.’’

Now, as the conversation progressed, Mike’s tone

had more or less returned to its normal level. At this point, however, he lowered his voice again. ‘‘Do you suspect that . . . and I hate to even think this might be the case . . . but do you suspect she may have been

poisoned? Ellen says you told
her
it was most likely a heart attack, but I figured that might have been just

to reassure her.’’

‘‘You figured right. Which doesn’t mean that
I’m

right. We may learn that Bobbie Jean died of a heart attack after all.’’

‘‘Maybe. Uh, listen, Dez, my aunt had her share of

faults, probably more than her share. She did some

MURDER
CAN
RAIN
ON
YOUR
SHOWER

27

things to people that were . . . that I consider . . . that I imagine
most
people would consider just about unforgivable. But while I didn’t always approve of her

actions, I
was
fond of her. Even if I hadn’t been, though, I wouldn’t want anyone to get away with mur

dering her—if that’s what happened. So—and please

don’t take this wrong—what I’m trying to say is, I’d like to hire you.’’

‘‘To
hire
me? You want to
pay
me to check into your aunt’s death?’’

‘‘Yes, I want to pay you. That’s how you earn your living, isn’t it?’’

‘‘Not by taking money from my family, I don’t.’’

(And
not
these
past
few
weeks,
either,
for
that
matter—

when
I’d
handled
a
grand
total
of
one
lousy
insurance
investigation.)

‘‘You’re jumping the gun a little, Dez,’’ I was re

minded. ‘‘I’m not family yet.’’

‘‘And
you’re
splitting hairs, Mike Lynton. Look, I have every intention of learning what happened to

Bobbie Jean. The only thing is, if you insist on bugging

me about taking money, I won’t keep you posted on

my progress.’’

‘‘Okay, okay, you win,’’ Mike conceded with an ane

mic little chuckle.

I grinned at the receiver. ‘‘Of course I do. But you said that your aunt had done some terrible things to people. What people? And what things?’’

‘‘I’m not sure exactly what transpired with every

one. My mother could undoubtedly fill you in on the

details. But there was something with Carla Fremont.

And I seem to remember that prior to this, Bobbie

Jean had some sort of altercation with Robin, Carla’s mother. There was also some nasty business with Lor

raine Corwin. And a Grace somebody-or-other. And

I don’t know who else.’’

‘‘Those women you mentioned—are you aware that

they were all at the shower?’’

‘‘Yes,’’ Mike said gravely. ‘‘That’s what’s so

troubling.’’

28

Selma
Eichler

At this precise moment I realized that the surprising

thing wasn’t that Mike’s aunt had died today.

It was that Bobbie Jean Morton, formerly Connell

fomerly Polansky formerly Lynton, had lived as long

as she did.

Chapter
5

When I walked through the office door on Monday

morning, I was all but accosted by Jackie, my one-third secretary. (I share her services with the two principals of—are you ready?—Gilbert and Sullivan, the law firm

that rents me my space here.) ‘‘Well? How did every

thing go yesterday?’’ she demanded. Unfortunately—or

fortunately for Jackie, as it turned out—a cousin’s

wedding had prevented her from attending Ellen’s

shower.

‘‘It wound up being a
real
surprise.’’

‘‘I don’t like the way you said that. What hap

pened?’’

‘‘Mike’s aunt—the one who arranged for the affair

to be held at her country club? She became ill—

deathly
ill—while eating her salad. The paramedics were called, and they rushed her to the hospital. But she was gone by the time they got her there.’’

‘‘Oh, no, how terrible! Heart?’’

‘‘My guess would be poison. Although right now

that’s all it is: a guess.’’

‘‘But you
believe
that somebody slipped something into her salad.’’ (Jackie is nothing if not persistent.) I hunched my shoulders. ‘‘Or possibly her drink.

Who knows? I doubt if the cause of death has been

established yet, though. So it could turn out to be her

heart or her liver—or whatever—after all. But I’ll tell you this: That lady would never have won a popularity

contest—even if no one was competing against her.’’

‘‘Do you suspect anybody in particular?’’

30

Selma
Eichler

‘‘Christ, Jackie! Give me a break, will you? The

body’s hardly cold yet.’’

‘‘But you do have a tendency to jump to conclu

sions,’’ Jackie very thoughtfully pointed out. Suddenly

her eyes narrowed. ‘‘Say, did you telephone your den

tist on Friday? That was the third reminder you’ve

gotten from him.’’

‘‘I intended to, honestly. But it slipped my mind.’’

From the expression on her face I could tell that

Jackie wasn’t buying into this little falsehood. The fact

is, I was really in no mad rush to schedule an appoint

ment to have someone poke away at my gums until

they bled. ‘‘I’ll get to it later, I promise.’’

‘‘You are so lax, Desiree. Right this minute I’m pic

turing you without a tooth in your head, and take my word for it, you could give someone nightmares. If

you don’t call—and today—I’ll call for you. I’m not

kidding.’’

Is it any wonder that I frequently have trouble re

membering who works for whom?

Nevertheless, while Jackie can be so overbearing

that at times I’ve daydreamed about stapling her lips together, at other times I realize how important she is to me. And not only in her capacity as my onethird secretary, either. She’s also a valued friend. I had already started to head for my little cubicle, but Jackie wasn’t through with me. ‘‘Why don’t you

phone the dentist as soon as you get to your office?

That way you won’t forget.’’

I pretended I didn’t hear her.

As soon as I sat down at my desk I proceeded to set up a folder on Bobbie Jean. It was a pathetically thin folder, of course. I started by typing up a brief descrip

tion of her sudden illness. And then I added what I could remember of the remarks made about her at

the shower by the four women who so obviously—and

passionately—despised her.

Following this, I went through my overdue bills and

wrote out checks to those companies that seemed

MURDER
CAN
RAIN
ON
YOUR
SHOWER

31

most likely to either cut off an essential service or send somebody over to break my kneecaps.

These things having been dealt with, I went to

lunch. Now, in view of yesterday’s trauma, I felt enti

tled to a little treat. So I made a beeline for Little Angie’s, where you can gorge yourself on
the
most delectable toppings on the world’s thinnest, crispiest pizza crust. Exactly how good are those pies? All I can tell you is that if I should ever get the death penalty (for murdering my sister-in-law, Margot,

maybe?), my last meal will be a slice or four of Little Angie’s pizza. Probably with anchovies.

As soon as I got back from lunch I stopped off at the water cooler. (Anchovies will do it to you every time.) Elliot Gilbert—one of the partners in the afore

mentioned Gilbert and Sullivan—was just tossing

away his paper cup. I noticed instantly that this sweet

heart of a man didn’t look like himself today. The

usual smile was absent from his cherubic face, and his

eyelids were almost at half-mast.

‘‘Are you okay?’’ I asked.

Elliot managed to spread his lips in a smile. ‘‘It’s that obvious, huh? The truth is, my daughter and sonin-law dropped off their three kids at our house on Friday—they had some kind of function in Maine this

weekend. And much as I love them, those grandchildren

of mine are a handful. On Saturday morning Mitchell, one of the twins—they’re two—drank some dishwashing

detergent and we rushed him to emergency.’’

‘‘Dishwashing
detergent?’’

‘‘I know. What can I say? The boy has lousy taste.’’

He grinned, then followed this up with a yawn.

‘‘Thank God he’s all right, though.’’

‘‘Still, that must have taken a lot out of you.’’

‘‘Oh, that wasn’t even the half of it. Bradley, the eleven-year-old, is suddenly into music—drums, with

our luck. And he brought his set along so he could practice. And practice he did, day and night and night

and day.’’ Elliot grimaced as he said this. ‘‘You may

32

Selma
Eichler

not believe it, Desiree, but those sounds are still rever

berating in my head.’’ I was about to offer a few words

of commiseration at that point, but Elliot hadn’t

wound down yet. ‘‘And then poor Florence, our

cocker spaniel, began acting strangely—she went

around whimpering all the time. We still wouldn’t

have any idea what the problem was if my wife hadn’t

caught Mitchell shooing Florence away from her dish

this morning and then polishing off the rest of her Alpo himself. And’’—suddenly Elliot brightened—‘‘I

almost forgot,’’ he said. ‘‘Jackie told me the other day

that you were giving your niece a shower on Sunday.’’

‘‘Uh, that’s right.’’

He forced another smile. ‘‘Well, I’m glad
somebody

had a pleasant weekend, anyway.’’

Chapter
6

Call it self-defense.

I didn’t have a smidgen of a doubt that Jackie would

make good on her threat to get in touch with my

dentist herself if I let things slide any longer. So before

leaving work on Monday, I contacted Dr. Lutz’s office

to arrange for an appointment. At least this way I’d have some input about the scheduling. Anyhow, I was