Chapter 11: They're Off, You Lose

The office was quickly becoming my second home which wasn’t a bad thing with Miss Iceland in tow. A semi-long ago ex listed among her litany of logic for breaking up with me that in nine months I had never once invited her to my abysmal abode. Of course, how enough recycled beer cans to make you think you missed a party (sadly, you hadn’t), dust bunnies multiplying faster than real ones and furnishings that could make the Kramden’s apartment look palatial was supposed to lengthen our liaison I’m not really sure. So having the office to retire to after our interview of Rick James was convenient and saved me from a bathroom project that, frankly, would take a team and untold amounts of cleaning products to tackle.

We seemed to have the place to ourselves so I liberated a pair of Natty Ices from the gulag of their 30 pack and we took up places across the desk in my office. I sat down gingerly. Making sure to keep my feet on the ground and not roll the desk chair back and smash into the wall like the pre-pubescent I usually am.

“So, you like Rick James for the murders,” she began.

“Do I like him for the murders?” I replied, trying to raise an eyebrow. “Yes, I do and after we prove it you can ‘Book ‘em, Danno.’”

“Shut the fuck up…you know what I mean.”

“OK, settle down Sipowicz,” I answered, sliding a Natty Ice across the desk towards her.

“Hey, thanks,” she said, eyeing up the can. “What were they outta Schlitz?”

She opened the can and took a pull with a deftness that stilled my heart. Meanwhile I fired up my computer and thought about her initial question. I still wasn’t convinced I “liked” Rick James for the murders. Based on what I had seen it was hard to like Rick James in anyway, frankly. He was on the radar no doubt, but I’d actually done some research between naps earlier that day and was itching to show her the results of my efforts since like most house parties I’m invited to I brought little to the table thus far.

I opened two internet pages on my laptop. One was the Miss Iceland’s daily, the Burlington Bee. The other was for a political webzine called Deeper Blue. On both I had called up recent articles by the hipster-geek reporter who had been mysteriously talking with Curly Carson’ ex at that morning’s press conference. “Check this out,” I beckoned and began to turn the monitor towards Miss Iceland. But before I could she’d slid around the desk to look over my shoulder, one hand suggestively (or so, at least, I thought) placed on my back.

“What am I looking at here?”

“Articles by that kid the Bee brought back to replace you on the Sheehan/Carson story,” I explained. “On the right are his stories for your paper. On the left is stuff he’s posting at the same time for the political blog he left the paper for.”

“What the hell kinda name is Deeper Blue?”

“I think it means it leans far left,” I explained as she looked confused. “You know red states are Republican, blue states are Democrat. Right?”

She scrunched up her face even more. “I just figured out which one was the elephant and which one the donkey…I got no freakin’ idea. What should I be looking for?”

“OK, his name is Jeremy Martel and he’s listed as Associate Editor and Contributor for this site. Here’s a list of his articles,” I said and began scrolling through links with synopses of his work. “Global warming, Russian hacking, immigration, Syria…and he’s not playing nice. He rips everyone on the right a new one. Now look at the pieces he did on Sheehan/Carson for the Courier.”

I closed the blog and brought up the newspaper page. Miss Iceland began reading. She leaned in to page down and I leaned back deeper into the palm of her hand and to cop a little “shoulder breast” because I’m still a sexual 7^th grader.

“What do you think?” I questioned, while guessing solid C-cup with my scapula.

“Well, I haven’t seen this many participles dangling since I worked the Patriots locker room during my internship with the Albany Times-Union,” she replied not moving her hand or “can” I noted.

“No, I’m talking ‘bout the content.”

“Not much there. It’s basic boilerplate, Journalism 101 stuff.”

I was so happy she was following my thread that I actually sat up into a less erogenous position. “Exactly, it’s bland as a backup catcher. It’s the tofu on a rice cake of writing. It’s the who, what, where, when and why did he bother writing this crap!”

“You’re right I mean I could shoot this off in my sleep and they wouldn’t have to pay him a stipend plus expenses probably,” she said pale blue eyes brightening.

“Not only that,” I added, “but this kid goes from protest marches in New York City and D.C. to coming back to write this garbage for some dinky daily…uh, no offense intended.”

“None taken…I mean at least I have a paper,” she said, smiling and staring into my eyes.

Without thinking (cause that’s the only way I’m not paralyzed into inaction) I leaned in with my signature first kiss face…lips leading, eyes a quarter open so as to limit the effects of Mace, but still able to catch myself if she pulls away. Miss Iceland, somewhat to my surprise, did neither. In fact, I sensed her also moving in and while it wasn’t as Kevin Costner’s character in Bull Durham described, a “long, slow, deep, soft, wet kiss that lasts three days” that was OK…because, frankly, that sounds disgusting and may be why he chose to make Waterworld…a case of mononucleosis delirium.

What it was was good enough to want more. And when she seemed willing I slipped one hand around the small of her back, buried the other in that silken blond hair, prepped my tongue for a tonsillectomy and…heard a door slam shut.

Gladys’s rubber soled, sensible shoes squeaked a b-line for my office. Miss Iceland and I untangled; she smoothing down her skirt and retreating to her previous seat; me pulling in my chair and sliding my legs under the desk for obvious reasons.

Fortunately, Gladys was back to her no-nonsense self and instead of asking questions about the fumbling noises she heard or even exchanging pleasantries she got down to business. “Did you talk to that guy?”

“Who? Marlo Thomas’s brother?” I cracked, realizing I wasn’t much better than Rick James himself. She arranged her features in a way that said, ‘I know that’s some kind of joke, but I don’t have time to decipher it and you’re an idiot’, all in one look. “Yes, we talked to Rick James of R. James Builders,” I told her. “He was running out, but we got enough to know he’s a character, a bit of a clown. Not a killer clown…like John Wayne Gacy. Just a sad, pathetic clown like…well, all the rest of them really.”

She knew I didn’t share her enthusiasm about his involvement in the killings, but came prepared to change my mind. “Yeah, well, a search of R. James Builders came up with four lawsuits against them in the past year.” I wasn’t sure if this was a lot or little so I pulled on my Natty Ice and returned my usual dim-witted stare. She continued, “And the plaintiff in each case began with a similar phrase…’The Estate of…’”

“You think Rick James killed these people for their property?” Miss Iceland blurted out.

I chuckled to think I was just kissing someone that young and naïve. Then I started second-guessing myself and added, “Wait, that’s not what you’re saying right?”

“Jeezus, maybe I shouldn’t have spoken to you two until the blood rushed back to your heads,” she smiled, indicating she had an idea of exactly what we’d been up to. “These are civil suits. R. James is apparently up to something shady involving the purchase of big tracts of land owned by the recently deceased.”

As a guy who was still trying to figure out whether Razzles was a candy or gum this was too much for me to wrap my head around. Miss Iceland apparently felt the same way and started to head for the exit.

“I’m gonna get going,” she stated a little too nonchalantly for my recently surging libido. “I have to meet with my editor in the morning about setting up a high school graduation coverage schedule…whoop-de-damn-doo. I’ll also see if I can find out more about what’s up with this Jeremy kid. Call you tomorrow.”

With that she was gone and my insecurity went into overdrive, reminding me just how relaxing celibacy could be. Gladys, on the other hand, was completely unfazed barely uttering a goodbye to that tremendous, departing blonde hair and ass combo. I stood at my desk and leaned sideways to follow it across the main office area and out the door until Gladys woke me from my erotic reveries.

“So, now that you’re thinking with the proper head tell me…Do you have another interview set up with R. James?”

“No,” I admitted, sitting back down and finishing off my Natty Ice. “But I have his contact info and he said he’ll be around the site so I’ll catch him.”

“I will say you clean up nice,” she said, finally noticing my uncharacteristic duds. “Though that shirt coulda done with the business end of an iron.”

“The shirt’s fine. It’s the body under it that’s wrinkled.”

She shook her head and I believe I saw the merest whisper of a smile. She then took a minute to recap the results of the other efforts that day. Semi-intrepid reporter Sandy Molesworth and comb-over photog Charlie Grissom had struck out at Artfield High where administration was looking to return to normalcy such as that is in a 21^st century high school. Barton and his fellow English teachers also found little at Sheehan’s place the police having covered their tracks well I thought. He’d be back at work tomorrow trying to keep football players awake through a reading of The Crucible if I wanted to go over what he did find. Finally, she circled back to the penultimate point, “So are you still gonna fight me on this Rick James thing?”

“Listen he’s shady as the ground around Chris Christie’s feet I’m not gonna lie, but I can’t see any connection to him, Sheehan and the Carsons,” I lamented. “Meanwhile, I’m still trying to figure out why Chief Bowden didn’t bring in the State Police to investigate the biggest crime this town has ever seen and then wrapped the thing up so quickly.”

Not a fan of confrontation or deep thinking I reached across the desk and took a long pull from Miss Iceland’s half full Natty Ice. “That’s disgusting,” said Gladys, a longtime germ-a-phobe.

“If you saw what we were doing as you walked in then I think you know the disgusting ship has sailed on that one.”

“Touché.”

“Yes, and I might be poking her with my metaphorical sword right now if you hadn’t shown up like a turd in my punchbowl,” I offered, draining the dregs. “Plus besides money, which he doesn’t seem to need so badly he’d kill three people, what is James’ motive? It seems excessive.”

She wasn’t buying it. “And what’s Chief Bowden’s motive? You don’t know the ends people will go for a big payday and this development is gonna be huge. It will change the whole tenor of this town.”

I thought for a second about James telling Miss Iceland and I about the makeover of downtown that was going to allow him to get the exorbitant prices he was asking for his units. “So what do we do?” I asked, thinking, like with my relations with Miss Iceland, I was getting in over my head.

“I’ll put Sandy Molesworth on it,” said the ever efficient one. “Isn’t her legislator in Montpelier a lawyer? If not they must be knee-deep in the bastards up there. I’m sure he can hook us up and we’ll find out what these lawsuits against R. James Builders amount to.”

As the anti-Harry Truman passing the proverbial buck was just fine by me. I’d still have to talk to James again in order to get Gladys off my back, but that was my goofy-ass cross to bear. Still I couldn’t let Bowden go.

“What about the police coverup? You still haven’t answered that.”

Gladys sighed like someone who felt they had to do everything around there which was pretty spot-on I have to admit. “That’s if it is a cover up. Sometimes it is what is.”

“Profound,” I answered, “but they shoulda still brought in the State Police.”

"They did in a sense,” she said, sniffing a strand of her graying hair before tucking it back behind her ear- the only real quirk she had…publicly at least. “The ballistics report is due tomorrow and for all you know they have the preliminary results already and it confirms everything.”

I had to admit Bowden and Wes Willard did look confident at that morning’s press conference. Then, like women all my life, when I thought I couldn’t get any lower she cut me down even more.

“Remember the robbery spree that happened around here right after you took over the paper,” she began in a slightly preachy tone I knew and loathed so well.

“Yeah, buncha bored kids from Burlington thinking they could outsmart the yokels,” I answered, realizing just how old I’d become when I didn’t give a second thought to using the term “yokels”.

“And remember how it ended?”

I longed for another Natty Ice, some P.G. Wodehouse and Miss Iceland. Sadly, as concerns my laggardly libido, in exactly that order. In lieu of those I replied only part facetiously, “I’ve logged a lotta Little League scores since then, refresh my memory.”

“When the police in the towns around here couldn’t solve the B&Es the State Police offered to help, but no one, least of all Artfield, took up the offer. All these stubborn, old Yankee farts run their towns like fiefdoms and think the rest of the world should keep out,” she concluded, folding her arms across her chest.

“Yes, but if I remember correctly the break-ins weren’t solved till the kids hit a summer house on Kenmore Lake. They don’t have a police department so the troopers came in and cleaned up in two days what Bowden and his buddies couldn’t crack in two months. Yet you expect me to believe they wrapped up a possible triple homicide in under a week,” I shot back a little too smugly.

The first six words of my last rant were ones that were never going to get you anywhere with a woman…in love or war. True to her gender Gladys wasn’t going to let me get off easy. And even truer to her gender she chose to attack me, though Lord knows she could’ve bashed my premise instead, but figured, I assume, let’s cut to the chase.

“Listen, I don’t mind you looking into Bowden,” she began, rising from her chair and making for the door, “but you have to follow up on everything if we’re gonna figure this out and maybe save the paper. You can’t be disappearing all afternoon and you might wanna cut back on the drinking, huh. You’ll need to be at your best especially if you plan on keeping up with Blondie MacBlondenstein.”

“Hey!” I shot out, a little too defensively. Maybe I was feeling something more than lust, as unlikely as that was, for Miss Iceland. “Don’t call her that. I mean she’s not Scottish…uh…or Jewish…not sure where you were going with that. I think she’s Scandinavian so that’s Blondie Blondufsson to you.”

“Can’t believe I’ve put up with you for years,” answered Gladys, shaking her head and walking out.

“Yeah, well, I didn’t exactly draw the long straw with you either,” I said, but I couldn’t keep the smile from my face. I did need to hold up my end for these next weeks. I’d start by eschewing a longed for third Natty Ice, getting something to eat and staying up at least long enough to devise a plan for tomorrow.

I set about this by first creating space between myself and the 30-pack cooling a hole in the office fridge. I locked things up, went to the rear lot and fired up the Falcon to the extent that it could be. Earlier that day Derf had sent a text indicating he conned his employer into approving a motel room due to some imagined sausage emergency that needed tending in southeastern Vermont. Considering they hired Derf in the first place one had to figure they weren’t exactly running a tight ship back at Sausage Central and it would be nice to have the support.

This in mind I tooled out of town onto Highway 5 headed toward the New York border and the only place Derf could possibly be…Green Mountain Racecourse. Of course Green Mountain was a racecourse in name only; hadn’t been such for about seven years. Instead, the rusting hulk and dilapidated property was kept afloat by simulcasting: the video transmission of tracks from across the country for the wagering pleasure of compulsives like Derf and those for whom internet porn just wasn’t getting it done anymore…I’m assuming.

The present bleakness and devastating drear aside Green Mountain was once an animal racing triple threat featuring mid-level thoroughbred, harness and dog racing on a nine month rotating basis. It was a license to print money in the early 60s as a night out with the added bonus of gambling thrown in. It was glamorous, classy- at least at the Clubhouse level and above -and swelled the state budget without even trying until the ubiquity of TV halved the crowd and sent the expensive thoroughbreds packing. The cheaper harness game carried on till 70s cable TV and the proliferation of the lottery halved the half. Dog racing then carried the flickering torch until a 60 Minutes hatchet job exposed the seedy underbelly of that business or as Brian the Dog from The Family Guy angrily summed it up, “Dog racing? That’s our Holocaust, man!”

Outside of glamour tracks like Saratoga or Belmont racing in the Northeast is mostly propped up these days by slot machines or full blown casinos running simultaneously on site. Derf thinks this portends a historical type Renaissance, but it more likely is the calm before the plague. As soon as developers like Rick James can convince politicians the multitude of land taken up by a racetrack could better be used for development around the already existing casinos then it’s just a matter of working out the kickback deal before another American tradition goes South in a fleet of vans full of taped together horseflesh and illegal immigrants.

I paid two bucks to get in and five more for a program as thick and jam-packed as a New Jersey diner menu. It featured the past performances of hundreds of horses at eight different tracks printed in font size-2 and with ink cheap enough to leave you with the hands of a West Virginia coal miner.

I found Derf standing slightly removed from one of the five or six groups that were  huddled around banks of TVs piping in racing from such bastions of equine talent as Sam Houston, Wheeling Downs and Pompano Park. Derf alternated between peering into the program and gazing up at the odds on the screen. He did more of the latter and less of the former, his wagering driven more by what kind of payout he might get than say form, pace or speed figures; or as he was apt to say when a 3-5 shot romped home easily, “I’m glad I didn’t have that.” It was not a recipe for long term success, but Derf was of the school that felt the greatest thrill in life was gambling and winning, the second greatest thrill, gambling and losing. Grinding out a profit, limiting losses or, worse still, breaking even wasn’t going to provide him the fix he needed.

“Funny finding you here,” I cracked, sliding in alongside and beginning the same program to TV screen head-bob the rest of the crowd was doing.

“Yeah, well, everyone has their ‘safe place’,” he responded, mocking modern psychology while juggling odds, post times and potential trifecta combinations in his head. And Derf really was in his element. He loved the desperate gamblers, the challenge, the excitement while all I saw was a place where the windows cleaned the people (metaphorically I mean…in reality the stench of BO was overwhelming).

“Been here long?”

“Since about three. I hit a dollar tri at Aqueduct early and I’ve been working my way through that ever since,” he answered.

Derf wasn’t going to leave till he’d given everything and what he came with back or won enough to pay off his ever metamorphosing debt; an astronomical amount owed to various entities that was known only as “The Bill”.

“Not enough to cover The Bill, huh?” I rhetorically questioned.

“Not even close. I thought I could parlay it into something big, but it’s been all chalk at the West Coast tracks…no prices. That’s why I switched to playing Sam Houston.”

I looked at the monitor. Ten minutes to the 4^th race at Sam Houston. I flipped through the encyclopedic program till I found it. Two year old maidens (never won a race) at four furlongs, 14 horses entered and only one had ever taken to the track in anger, number nine, and he’d given the Winner’s Circle a wide berth never finishing closer than 18 lengths back in seven starts…yet he was the favorite. “Who you like?”

“Everybody, but the nine,” he replied, focusing on a screen crammed with so many flickering numbers and names (odds, exacta prices, pools, scratches, jockey changes…) that it looked like one of John Nash’s conspiracy delusions. However, a ‘beautiful mind’ was not necessary to handicap this race.

“Why toss the nine? He’s the only horse to ever run,” I asked, naively.

“The nine’s already proven he’s a loser. At least with the others you can hope they can run,” he explained. “Plus he’s the favorite, if I needed anymore disincentive.”

“So you take a sorta Schrodinger’s Cat approach to these Maiden races?”

“You gotta a better theory? Now let’s see if Schrodinger can pick the double…,” and with that he lurched off to the betting windows.

I, in turn, shuffled off to the lone concession stand where the assortment of cancer stick-hot dogs and hockey puck-hamburgers did not meet up to the standards of even my far less than discerning palate. Turning back I noticed the crowd consisted of the usual ‘All-Male Revue’. Derf often fantasized of meeting the woman of his semi-twisted dreams at the track, but like a hot cashier at the Dollar Store there must be something seriously wrong beneath the surface for her to wind up in this place.

We made our respective ways back across the sticky linoleum floor, me empty-handed, Derf with one breast pocket bulging with tickets like a transvestite at the beginning of a sex change installment plan, and met up in the exact same spot with three minutes still to post at Sam Houston. “So what did you do all day?” I asked to fill the time while several ‘too big to be jockeys’ backstretch workers tried to load thirteen skittish first-time starters into the gate.

“I was working…,” he started, “uh, you know on the murders,” he concluded just in case I was thinking he’d been running around trying to sell sausage all day (I wasn’t).

“How so?”

He reminded me he’d established the strange link between Chief Bowden and Johnny Java’s which reminded me I never followed up on what that link was which reminded me Gladys was very much right about me needing to change my slothful ways, which reminded me… Fortunately, before I could continue this usual spiral of self-loathing Derf went on. “…and see that degenerate over there.”

“It’s a Wednesday night simulcast you’ll have to be more specific than that,” I replied, looking at the sketchy crowd surrounding the adjacent bank of TVs.

“The one with the curly hair and a little drool coming over his lip. Bouncing from foot-to-foot. That’s The Jester”

The curly hair and drool only narrowed the search down to three, but the bouncing was unmistakable. The so-called, Jester was about 5’7” and 125 pounds with the sunken cheeks and hollow eyes of the star of a late-night Sally Struthers infomercial and a case of ADHD that could fell a prized Canadian heifer. He hopped back and forth like he was standing over a mine fire while delivering a monologue that sprayed saliva liberally down the front of his faded leather jacket.

“Who the hell is that and what does he have to do with our matter?” was all I could respond as I stared half frightened, half amazed.

“The Jester is a New England racing staple. I’ve seen him at every track from Scarborough Harness in Maine to Finger Lakes outside Buffalo,” he began, oblivious to how he was painting himself with the same degenerate brush. “He’s got the best disability scam in the business.”

“What’s his disability?”

“Take your pick. It’s not about collecting disability- Lord knows he deserves that –it’s how he uses his status,” Derf informed. Then with a touch of jealousy in his voice he continued. “Any payoff of $600 or more on a $2 bet is subject to immediate IRS withholding. Though it may not look like it the crowd around The Jester there pushes a lot of money through the windows and cashes a fair share of trifectas, pick 4s and other big winners. They’re also not the kind of people that like to pay 25% in taxes or fill out government forms. The Jester, though, is tax-exempt so he cashes their tickets for a 10% fee. As far as the IRS knows he’s the greatest handicapper alive.”

Derf stared at the drooling dervish wistfully with the rare, especially in the case of The Jester, ‘but for the curse of God go I’ look. Feeling we’d gone astray I tried to reel him back in as several uneager equines continued to refuse the gate at Sam Houston. “So how does he figure into our escapade?”

“The Jester also supplements his income as a runner for bookies; collecting debts, making payments and such. When I told him my story about your Police Chief and the hundred dollar bill he said the guy’s a full-blown compulsive. Owes money everywhere.”

“I thought bookies were passé. That everybody bet with those online offshore places these days.”

“Passe?” Derf said, raising an eyebrow then went on to enlighten me in the ways of his chosen sub-culture. “You have to have money on account to play offshore. Bookies give credit, so there will always be bookies. Anyway, The Jester’s been trying to collect from him for months with no luck. Says it’s gotten to the NWB stage.”  

“What’s the NWB stage?” I asked, tentatively.

Derf did the prerequisite white guy head-swivel then informed me, “Let’s call it ‘Negroes With Bats’ though The Jester doesn’t put it quite so delicately.”

I had more questions, but they were in the gate at Sam Houston and Derf lost interest in all else. If Gladys wanted to play the “Follow the Money” game in solving this Derf’s info just kicked Chief Bowden several notches up the suspect list. Of course, I was already a champion of Bowden’s involvement in the murders so this just cemented that conviction. The question was how it led to Curly Carson, Ted Sheehan and the girl. I thought about approaching The Jester but with the race at Sam Houston off and several other tracks just minutes to post he was hopping and spewing saliva at an increased rate. To try and talk to him now would be like sitting front row at a Gallagher show and not wearing my rain-slicker.

Then suddenly a thunderous “Fuck!!” burst forth from the crowd in front of us as they hit the wire at Sam Houston. A shower of ripped tickets followed from the same general area and Derf, who had taken his own losing with a well-practiced equanimity, cracked, “Another satisfied customer.” With that he slid off to bet the three other tracks that were under five minutes to post and with nearly a dozen other hippodromes in full swing I figured I’d gotten more than I could’ve expected from this rendezvous and surreptitiously slipped out.

As I headed back home I felt I could eat a horse as they say- probably one of those from the just concluded race at Sam Houston that was one more 8^th place finish from fast food filler. My choices were basically go home to the dismal digestive choices therein or venture to Pete’s Pub which my woeful wallet rendered pretty much a non-starter. Then in a misleading moment of motivation that occasionally drifts through the transom of my otherwise purposeless life I considered returning to the office to write up some notes remembering the frozen pizza my well-wishers had stocked for just such an occasion.

To that end I tooled the car through Artfield. A light was still on in the office of the Episcopal Church and a figure I assumed to be Reverend Brooks was moving around inside. He may have been packing in preparation of following through on his promise of ditching this burg and it reminded me that the distasteful duty of trying to interview said nut-job regarding his hatred of Java Joe’s and anything he had on Curly Carson probably had to take place toot-sweet. Tonight was neither toot nor sweet so I continued on to the office and turned on as many lights as possible so as not to let the rare occurrence of my working late go unnoticed on the off-chance Gladys passed by.

As the toaster oven was busy turning two frozen slabs of cardboard into something resembling pizza I was actually writing up a to-do list for tomorrow…

1. Check in w/Barton-Artfield High

2. Talk to Rev. Brooks re: Curly Carson, AA meetings, Johnny Java's 

3. Contact Miriam-Town Hall re: Johnny Java’s ownership

…when I heard a car pull up and someone come in the rear entrance. Though I’d had a beer at the track and was working on my second Natty Ice here I hadn’t gone around the bend enough to be paranoid. They weren’t exactly stealthy in their arrival and shut the back door loudly. My first thought was Gladys so I stood and took up my schedule proudly like some over-eager schoolboy in a Dickens story. Next it crossed my mind Miss Iceland might be back for a little more sugar which made me grimace, not over Miss Iceland, but at the thought of me even thinking of myself as a “little sugar”.

            Unlike characters in a Victorian novel that’s the only thoughts that could pass through my head in the three seconds it took for the person to reach my door. A knife-like shadow crossed the threshold and in the next instant Curly Carson’s ex-wife, Debra Townes was standing across from me.

            “I was hoping it was you here,” she stated, demurely. She was wrapped in a knee-length black raincoat that looked like it was a sturdy tug away from going around her rail-thin figure again and her lank black hair was tied back revealing an expanse of forehead so vast she could’ve been the bastard offspring of a drunken Tom Hanks/Christina Ricci/Martina Hingis three-way.

            “Hey, Ms. Townes, can I help you with something?” I asked, what I thought was innocently enough. And that is when things got WEIRD…

Chapter 10: Of OCD and OMGs

    “Yeah that’s the little piss-ant,” exclaimed Glenn Hubbard when Miss Iceland and I described the hipster geek we saw talking to Curly Carson’s ex at the press conference. I wasn’t sure if ‘piss-ant’ was colloquial New England, but now that I turned 40 it sounded like the perfect way to describe anyone under 30. I made a mental note.

            “I’ll make some calls to the Bee see if anyone knows why they called the kid back for this story,” said the veteran reporter, closing his laptop. He’d nested at one of the desks- he could write his opinion pieces anywhere- which gave my confidence an always needed boost. Meanwhile, Miss Iceland was retrieving her keys indicating she had to go.

            She had the dedication of a new gymnasium wing to attend just across the border in Winchester, New Hampshire then 4 hours to kill before reporting on the scintillating doings of the Rutland Board of Education meeting. I extended my most heartfelt condolences.

            She made for the door. I followed at a respectable distance, but noticing her sweatshirt came down over her hips decided to pick up the pace. She turned to me at the exit and looking into her pale blue eyes I wondered if I was in this thing to save the paper and find the killers or just to get in her jeans. I figured a little from Columns A and B, a lot from Column C. But as a person who will only give blood after confirming they’re giving out a big cookie at the end my standards in such internal moral debates is not high, so I’d get by.

            “If anything comes up call me,” she tossed over her shoulder, her blonde hair bouncing seductively. At the door she turned three-quarters and looked at me. It seemed something on my part was called for, but damned if I knew what. We hadn’t even been out on a formal date yet, but my mind ranged from a peck on the cheek to a pat on that hidden, apple-shaped ass. Considering she hadn’t just converted a third-and-long from deep in our own territory I eschewed the latter and went for the former. It felt awkward, but I perceived a “lean-in” and felt satisfied.

            “Enjoy the Board meeting,” I said smarmily, because I just can’t leave well enough alone. She stuck out her tongue and departed, leaving me a visual that would tide me over till lunch.

            The late Warren Zevon sang, “It’s only in dreams that we are truly free…” and looking back into the still functioning office I could see what he meant. Of course, he also crooned, “He came down to dinner in his Sunday best/And rubbed the pot roast all over his chest…” so he could be hit or miss wisdom-wise.

            Glen Hubbard was on his cell, feet up on the desk, talking to folks at the Bee I assumed. Meanwhile Gladys was center stage, off the sauce, and running the show, as it should be. With a phone cradled on her shoulder she tapped at the keyboard and I knew she was in the process of squaring up accounts with our advertisers. Unfortunately, due to the benevolence and possibly pity of the good business people of Artfield, most folks were paid in advance so this process most likely involved considerably more refunds than collections. We were in the death throes at the paper, but having come to grips with my unambitious cum slothful ways some time prior I’d begun socking away a decent, but hardly substantial sum of money preparatory of the inevitable. I now began to calculate mentally how much of hit this bankroll was about to take.

            With the phone on her left shoulder Gladys motioned with her right hand at piece of paper I was to take. It listed the institutions that would have to be notified we were no longer publishing their event schedules as usual: Library, Little League, Senior Center, Schools, Religious Institutions and so on. Never one brimming with self-importance I simply assumed they’d all just turn to posting on the internet without a second thought. It was faster, free and the future. Still there was something sad about losing the print touch. After all if technology was always better the only place one saw a Segway wouldn’t be when TBS runs Paul Blart: Mall Cop.

            I was saved from this drudgery by the entrance of Derf, in his usual manner, hunched forward over his phone looking for the next wager. “Did you know there are only two Major League games scheduled tonight?” he lamented.

            “Yeah, it’s an early season travel day,” I informed him. “Besides haven’t you, as you so eloquently put it, been ‘getting my ass handed to me’ in baseball so far.”

            “But I’m due…,” he started.

            “Yeah, for 14 years now,” I interjected.

            “Still, if I get hot I can’t dig outta the hole I’m in with just two games.”

            “NHL playoffs start tonight…8 games.”

            Derf twisted up his face as he heaved his bulk into a precarious desk chair. “Hockey? What the Hell do I know about hockey?”

            We seemed to have reached a merciful impasse. I turned for the office, list in hand when Derf’s voice, brightening now, called me back. “I did get my $100 back,” he smiled, brandishing the single bill between middle and index finger.

            “You tracked down Bowden,” I said, incredulously. Not so much for his getting the money as for his putting in any effort at all to get the money. Derf was a rare one, even lazier than I.

            “No, we just kinda ran into each other. I went to get a bagel and tea at that McCarthy’s Bakery…” For the first time I registered the bag and cup Derf had carried in and deposited on the empty desk. “By the way what kinda town has a bagel place named McCarthy’s?”

            “Listen you grew up in Northern New Jersey where there were seven bagels shops in every town and they were turning ‘em back at the door.  We’re behind the times here,” I said, getting agitated. “Now what happened with Chief Bowden?”

            “OK, ok,” Derf began, putting aside the Irish-American-Jewish breakfast treat for the time being. “I was coming out of the bakery when I saw him pull up in front of the sporting goods store.”

            “Larry’s Outdoor. He musta went there straight from the press conference.”

            “Anyway I knew it was him so I waited and when he came out with an armload of fishing crap I confronted him.” Fred took a tentative bite from the bagel, pulled back the top half and peered inside.

            “And he just reached in his wallet and gave you a hundred?”

            “No. First I had to remind him about Boston and the dog track,” Derf continued. “He was acting nervous, like he was in a hurry to get away, get rid of me.”

            That was actually understandable since it’s not every day a semi-rural New England Police Chief gets shaken down for cash by a 6-foot-6, compulsive gambling, Jewish sausage salesman. I needed more though. “So he gave you the money so you’d go away? Did he say anything?” I prodded, thinking I was uncovering something important but knowing not what.

            “Well first he dumped the fishing stuff in his car. Then he took me around the corner to this fruity coffee place.” That was Johnny Java’s, the new coffee place, where I met Miss Iceland the other morning. It was located strategically on the main drag to draw business away from McCarthy’s, particularly among commuters and the ski/resort crowd.

            “What did he do there?”

            Derf took a healthy draw from his tea and smiled. “He just went behind the counter, opened up the register, took out the Benjamin and handed it to me with a look that said, ‘Now get lost’. You know like every girl I've ever dated.”

            Like a tampon on a stick this was one ugly red flag. The police “coverup”, the officers drinking Crap-pucinos, the slowly beginning gentrification of downtown, the terse press conference and now this all suggested Bowden as the point man of some kind of larger scheme. Maybe one that spiraled unfortunately out of control and ended in three people dying. I suddenly wished I had bagged a sample of the stool on my car for DNA testing. Something made me feel the Police Chief was behind (pun always intended) that too.

            With this information I retreated to my office. It had been swept clean of books and back issues and the walls purged of hundreds of coffee stained sticky notes. As I walked, without worrying about tripping, around the desk I felt a draft though there was no window within. My chair felt incredibly high, or maybe the junk removal had simply lowered the room. There was a pad and pens on the frighteningly clean desktop and for a moment I contemplated a Natty Ice while jotting down some notes. Suddenly, however, I was overwhelmed by a “wave of apathy” that rendered me unable to do anything but spend the next minute and a half contemplating what a good garage band name that phrase would make…if I, say, had a garage or was in high school or ever played in a band for that matter.

            That pointless pondering complete I realized I needed to get out of the office. I folded the paper with the numbers I was supposed to call and placed it neatly in the pen/pencil holder slot of the empty desk drawer. By this means I convinced myself I’d actually take care of it later whereas had I stuck it beyond in the full drawer I was preemptively admitting I was never going to do it. It was by such rationalizations that I got through my days. I felt satisfied till I closed the drawer and a corner of the note stuck out thereby launching a full-blown episode of OCD. I proceeded to position the note more carefully then close the drawer gently only to see the paper catch on something causing the corner to slide out again. I repositioned it a second time and slammed quickly, but the air resistance shot the paper straight up in front of me. Catching it with my left hand I folded it twice more, down to postage stamp size, and used my full palm to close the drawer and simultaneously cover the area between the desk and the drawer so it couldn’t escape.

            Now I definitely needed a drink.

            To that end I summoned the strength to formulate an excuse and bolted from my office toward the back door. I needn’t have bothered. One boon of technology is that people were often too pre-occupied with their devices to care about you. Teenagers didn’t yell at you from car windows anymore or kids mimic you singing “You Shook Me All Night Long” out of the back of a school bus and there was virtually no clothing style so unhip that it could tear kids away from their phones or not seem “ironic”.  Of course, I could’ve used this more as an insecure teenager than as a “who-gives-a-fuck” forty year old, but it got me past the currently distracted Gladys/Derf/Hubbard triumvirate, so you take what you can get.

            Once free the Falcon sputtered through town like cars haven’t sputtered since the advent of fuel injection. Bucking and knocking till it felt like it was one loud backfire away from being something Slip and Satch drove on The Bowery Boys. I turned left onto the main commercial drag. Johnny Java’s loomed up on the right and I noticed its plastic and neon juxtaposition to the rest of our so-called Strip. This consisted of the ubiquitous pizzeria and Chinese restaurant in between Morgan’s Hardware, Henry’s Shoe Repair, the Artfield Market and a Feed Store that also offered tattooing Wednesday 4-8 and all day Saturday. Heck, I thought, we were a just a cooper and buggy whip dealer from being a mid-sized 19^th century city so to say the up-to-date coffee shop stood out like a sore thumb would be an understatement.

            The one thing that struck me as I looked upon this anachronistic commercial district and then glanced in my rearview back at Johnny Java’s was the signs. The older stores had their names painted on the doors or in plastic lettering bolted to wood above the display window. A few, like Morgan’s, had taken up the offer of an itinerant, hippie sign painter (Is there any other kind?) who lingered in town a few summers back and sported tasteful black-on-white clapboard signs that hung perpendicular to the stores on simple, black wrought-iron brackets. Conversely, Johnny Java’s featured a giant, blinking coffee cup topped by red and orange flashing light tubes, meant to indicate heat or steam or something, that frankly I found somewhat disconcerting. It also hung over the entire sidewalk and nearly into the road; at least triple the size of any of the hippie’s signs. This seemed like the kind of thing that would twist the stick up the butt of an old zoning stickler like Wes Willard unless there was some incentive, fiscal or otherwise, to let it slide. I made note to consult Miriam at Town Hall about that.

            I also noticed while passing Johnny Java’s that the lights were on in the office of the Episcopal Church. That meant the rancorous Right Reverend Logan Brooks, who’d accosted Miss Iceland and myself the day after the murders, was still in town. His knowledge of Curly Carson’s state of mind and what axe he had to grind with his neighbor Johnny Java’s would have to be probed. Yet with each additional piece of the puzzle I felt more like the one being probed.

            That’s because, once again, this sounded like a lot of work on my part and I hadn’t even taken into account meeting with Barton and the teachers later to see if they got into Sheehan’s place or finding out what info my sister had culled from my brother-in-law. I began wondering how those literary detectives like Sam Spade and Phillip Marlowe did it. Maybe a tougher name, like Mike Hammer, might help, but there was still the whiskey-drinking, bullet-dodging, doll-chasing and wearing of shoes that could crack a walnut. No wonder they were always on the surly side.

            My mind was working overtime as I pulled off the main drag and I next began to stress over the inevitable interviews: Reverend Brooks, the State Police, the County Coroner… I hated interviews. As a reporter that seems counter-intuitive, and it is, but I just couldn’t get past it. People exhausted me. That’s why I quit Boston and took this gig. I craved comfort, people I know, and I wasn’t embarrassed about it anymore. Lord knows, I’d never win a Pulitzer, hell, I may not ever get married, have kids or even own a house, but I figured if those instincts hadn’t kicked in by 40 they weren’t happening. I was tired of chasing things other people wanted. What I wanted was to drink beer, read books, laugh with friends and otherwise be left alone. Not lofty goals, but as the Washington Post horse racing writer and author Andrew Beyer once put it, “Why is it that a man studies the religious symbolism in the poetry of John Milton and he’s a scholar while another studies the symbolism in the numbers of The Daily Racing Form and he’s a bum?” I was beginning to understand more and more, it wasn’t what you enjoyed that mattered, it was your capacity to enjoy it.

            I turned right off the main drag still waxing philosophic about the state of things, but knowing deep down I was really looking for an easy way out that just wasn’t there. If nothing changed in about a month’s time I’d be a man with one somewhat marketable skill, scant drive and a mountain of debt that left very little wiggle room and no desire to wiggle anyway…something that most folks were fine never seeing. This in mind, I searched for some offbeat inspiration-cause the normal kind bounced off me like bullets off Superman- and recalled the words of tennis great Martina Navratilova who ghost-wrote in her autobiography (a library discard), “I wasn’t so much driven by the joy of winning as by the fear of losing.” Of course, I reasoned, that if one had such a great a fear of losing one should just not play in the first place. Problem solved. Then again, that may not have been an option for an athletic pre-teen in Soviet-dominated Czechoslovakia…a place where, I’m pretty sure, my attitude would not have played well.

            All this musing brought me to my apartment where I took a spot directly in front of my door. There was nothing like doing nothing on a weekday morning. Empty parking lots, line-less supermarkets, kid-free parks these are the little things that made life bearable. Through the door, up the stairs and into a comfort zone where a ratty, brown futon never looked so enticing. No sooner had I retired to said sofa/bed with a Natty Ice and George Orwell’s Burmese Days then a text message came through on the flip phone. It was Miss Iceland…

Gym opening total shit show smh   managing overly extravagant & cheesy @ same time lol  like they added rumpus room on the Taj Mahal    good news** Rutland BOE meeting cancelled    meet u in ur office @ 4

I liked all the asterisks and ampersands better when their primary function was to indicate curse words in comics, but time moves on. I was happy Miss Iceland would be there to help sort out what Hubbard, Gladys and Barton had gathered and I immediately made such thoughts known by mashing down on the various number keys of my flip phone 3 to 4 times each in a text that seemed to have an inordinate amount of the letters c/f/i/l/o/r-s/v/y-z. It was really time to upgrade.

I knew I should be back at the office preparing leads for Miss Iceland’s return, but I was nothing if not a pro at procrastination (actually I'm retaining my amateur status in case it ever gets into the Olympics) and after going through the “re-charging my batteries”, “I’d only be in the way”, and “I do my best thinking alone” school of excuses I got back down to what I do best: reading and drinking. But no sooner had I taken a pull and tucked into another sweaty colonial scene (Is there any other kind in Burma?) than the flip phone went off again. This time it was Gladys on the other end in a rare state bordering on animation.

 “Got word the president of the construction company is going to be on site this afternoon,” she began pleadingly. “Get up there and interview him today.”

While I was fixating on Chief Bowden’s involvement in the crime Gladys had always maintained a belief the builders of the new development had at least a hand in the evil doings. That the president of R. James Home Builders, Inc. was a furtive, never seen character only fed her intuition. To date this mystery man had unleashed a phalanx of lawyers on town planning meetings, as well as, teams of architects, foremen, carpenters, plumbers, laborers and such on the job site. But all the while he had stayed back in New York pitching plots to the idly wealthy, early retirees and tele-commuters with stacks of cash and a penchant for Fall foliage and good skiing.

“Goddammit,” I let slip out, closing old Eric Blair. “Uh, I mean, what’s his name? Will he be at that trailer?  Go out there? What should I ask?”

“Did they just find you under a cabbage leaf?” Gladys sneered. “You went to school for journalism. You worked for one of the biggest papers in the country. You don’t know how to conduct an interview?”

“OK, ok…I was coming out of a nap,” I lied. “I’ll go up around 3 and feel the jackass out. I don’t feel as strongly as you about this one, but I’ll do my best to see what he knows.”

“And for God’s sake put on a button-down shirt and a tie…or at least a sports coat. Let him know you’re a professional.”

“You’re asking a lot of a sports coat,” I cracked, but she was already gone.

I shot off another labor intensive text to Miss Iceland asking if she could meet me at the development by 3. She said she could and eschewed my offer of directions reminding me that cars and phones in the present come equipped with GPS and hoping someday I might join her in that world.

Gladys’s advice on presentation seemed sound so I retired to the bedroom and slid open the lone closet door. As a child I could recall my father putting on a suit and tie to take us to Arby’s, but times had changed. While his closet was chockfull of perfectly pressed vests, blazers, button-downs, ties and assorted-necked sweaters (V, crew, turtle), I stared into what appeared to be an Appalachian dental x-ray. Four or five hangers of mismatched attire liberally spaced while shoved into a corner below was a good-sized pile of yellow-collared dress shirts and wrinkled khakis in need of cleaning. Unfortunately I didn’t own-or know how to properly work-an iron and dry cleaning always seemed like an expensive chore what with the dropping off, picking up and I’m no Joan Crawford but enough with the wire hangers already.

Fortunately, one of the garments therein was indeed a sports jacket. Unfortunately it had belonged to my much broader, stouter father so when I tried it on I appeared to be a pair of horn-rimmed glasses and a series of right-handed karate chops down my left forearm short of breaking into a pitchy rendition of “Once in a Lifetime”. Obviously, I’d been “letting the days go by” too often without examining my vestments. When you’re down to acid-wash jeans, an 8-ball jacket and folks are asking “Who the hell is Frankie and why does he want me to relax?” you’ve let things slide. In the end I managed to scrounge up an outfit that even included a never-worn, pastel Jerry Garcia brand tie that Kayla gave me back in the days when she thought she could change me…bless her heart, the sweet kid.

I laid the clothes on my bed which being a mattress on the floor seemed something of a lateral move and retired back to the futon. I drained the remnants of the Natty Ice and lay down hands folded to contemplate my plan of attack on the building president. I mulled, meditated, dozed off, woke, contemplated, rolled over, ruminated and still had nothing. Finally I resolved on saying we were from the Burlington Bee, since technically my paper was no more, and just get a general feel for this guy, good or bad, while hinting that we thought the whole thing was just a tragic misunderstanding, not a crime. Maybe a useful lead would slip out or, more likely, life would once again prove to not be a TV detective series and it would all be a big waste of time. Well, at least Miss Iceland would be there.

A few hours and phone calls later I stubbed out a nervous cigarette as Miss Iceland’s wheels crunched over the gravel of the construction trailer’s parking lot. She exited the Volks in her work clothes: a well-tailored black pantsuit, white blouse, low-heeled black shoes and “K” pendant on a gold chain around her eminently bitable, pale neck. I favored the relaxed jeans and sweatshirt look of the morning, but that was probably only because it was less stunningly intimidating. Watching her tuck a strand of golden hair behind her ear I was reminded of a campus visit to the University of South Carolina; a school I passed on applying to for fear I’d get a rejection letter stamped: “Too Ugly”.

“What’s up?” I said, casually popping a slightly lint-covered Altoids into my mouth.

“Thank God a water pipe burst at the Rutland Town Hall,” she blurted out. “If I had to sit through a BOE meeting after that soul sucking gym opening I woulda friggin’ shot myself.”

Maybe not the kind of girl you necessarily were going to run right home to Mom, but as she shook out her ponytail and arched her back it was not the direction I was leaning anyway…or ever for that matter.

“Well, aren’t you the belle of the ball?” she continued, fingering my tie. Then added, “So how we gonna play this?” and it came back to me that I still hadn’t come up with a game plan.

The idea, as Gladys sketched it out, was for me to find out what I could about the builder and the development without alluding to the murder/suicide in any overt way. Meanwhile, she was gathering info on the finances of the company, their other projects and any litigation they may be involved in. Her theory being the traditional, “follow the money” and you’re liable to find anything. The question was how to best go about it.

My default position was to step back and let Miss Iceland take the lead. Unfortunately, it felt too much like “Good Cop/Testosterone Patch Wearing Cop”, and even I had my pride. Just then what I assumed to be R. James of R. James Builders stepped out the trailer door gesturing for us to give him a second to finish a call.

Sizing him up he was a fairly tall man- 6’2” or so- in his mid-30s, nattily attired in brown shoes and tan dress pants topped by a lavender shirt and matching tie. His jet black hair was molded into one of those faux-hawks by means of enough gel to contaminate the groundwater and his complexion was something Crayola might label “Tanning Bed Orange”. On one arm he wore a watch that was worth more than everything I owned and on the other a veritable rainbow of those stretchy wristbands that seek to inspire by combining multiple words into one: LiveStrong, BelieveAchieve, SuckADick and so on (though that last one I may have misread). Overall, he gave off the impression of the kind of guy who drank every kind of milk but such that came from a cow (almond, soy, cashew…) and could tell you what “Steampunk” was and why it represented the future somehow. In short, he seemed the consummate young, upwardly mobile entrepreneur except for one thing. When seen in profile one noticed a large, disproportionate paunch that gave him the appearance of a lower case “b”; or “d” depending on which way he was facing.

Making his way down the temporary steps from the trailer he continued a rather animated discussion. “Listen, do me a flavor on this one, will ya…Email me approval, attach those docs and everything’ll be copastetic, kapeesh…OK, stay in touch with yourself…”

Miss Iceland and I exchanged glances as if we hadn’t heard right, but before we could synchronize our eye rolls he was coming at us across the lot, hand extended.

“Hi, Richard James, president and head of sales,” he said, pumping our hands and cocking an eyebrow. “But you can call me Rick…” Here he cupped one hand over his ear in a gesture that was last cool if you were MC-ing the Amos and Andy Radio Hour and sang falsetto, “She’s a freak…a Super Freak…that girl is Super Freaky!” Then looking up into our dumbfounded-ness added, “Rick James? Super Freak? Get it?”

We did, yet it didn’t make it any less creepy. I still had no clue how to conduct this interview and tentatively opened my mouth to introduce myself when he came to my rescue with a rapid-fire sales pitch unlike any I’d heard before.

“Listen,” he began while checking his watch. “In a minute I gotta make like a baby and head out…but you look like a happy couple (Miss Iceland, I’m happy to say, didn’t flinch at this) just the kinda folks who’d love it here…young, active, looking for a community to raise a family (obviously he hadn’t been reading my blog)…this is the place for you close to skiing, hiking, good schools…and we’re re-doing the whole downtown…recruiting upscale eateries: steak, Thai, Italian and a seafood joint just for the halibut…plus shopping, an outlet mall with the top names: Polo, J. Screw, Nerdstrom’s, Tommy Middlefinger, all the best…here’s a couple brochures that detail the whole thing…prices start at 450,000 doll hairs…now it’s tooth-hurty I’m late for my dental appointment…only kidding, but I gotta run…smell you later…”

And with that mercifully he was gone.

“That guy’s a piece of work,” said Miss Iceland as we watched him drive off in a tricked-out Cadillac Escalade.

“Oh, he’s a piece of something alright,” I responded, thinking we’d just found a new suspect.

Chapter 9: I'm Touched, But Not In The Good Way

I delivered a heartfelt thank you to all; barely remaining dry-eyed by remembering grown men were only allowed to cry at the end of Brian’s Song (and maybe Bang the Drum Slowly; for Robert DeNiro’s cancer, not his cringe-worthy batting swing). Then everyone got down to mingling amongst the Boxes O’ Joe and doughnuts Gladys had laid out. Max Lipper threw an arm around my neck and pulled me close. His teeth so large and white next to leathery brown skin I felt like I was staring into a row of urinals at Fenway Park.

“You see, bud, folks love you,” he said, gesturing in an arc around the room.

“Who’d a thought,” I began, “or as my father said when I graduated college ‘sometimes even a blind squirrel finds an acorn’…he was tough, but fair.”

“We’re gonna help you figure out what went on with this murder,” Max continued. “Then I figure we’ll have a fundraiser down at Pete’s and collect money to get the paper back on its feet. How’s that sound, bud?”

It sounded pretty good, but as for how it looked, well, that was another story. I knew going in we weren’t exactly going to amass the faculty of Harvard at this get-together, but as I surveyed the room it seemed we might have trouble rustling up even a community college adjunct among the assembled.

To my immediate right I watched as Derf handled an emergency sausage call before going back to looking up offshore point spreads on his phone, all the while muttering, “How can I get anything done with all these interruptions?”  Further along the wall stood our intrepid reporting team. Sandy Molesworth had her iPhone on speaker so she could talk and manicure her nails simultaneously. While next to her photographer Charlie Grissom was performing origami on his comb-over, as our octagenerian social columnist Mrs. Kleinschmidt nodded off on his shoulder over a once-bitten cruller.

Amidst a gaggle of children I spotted my sister Amy chatting with my reporter friend Glen Hubbard, Miss Iceland’s predecessor on the Artfield beat. There were a couple of softball buddies, Bean and Tombs, that weren’t going to crack any cases, but maybe a few heads if that type of thing became necessary.

Just then Max Lipper elbowed me in the side and pointing past Bean and Tombs asked excitedly, “Do you think they’re real?”

I followed his finger to Naomi…er, I mean Winnie, the receptionist who was either planning on pitching in or had forgotten I let her go. Had Derf known her he would most likely have been laying 3 to 5 on the latter.

“Do you think their real?” Max repeated, wide-eyed.

“She’s only eighteen.”

“So what? There are seniors and even a couple juniors at the High School that I would swear had ‘em done.”

“Sounds like you’re not exactly re-making Stand and Deliver over there,” I started. “Besides why should I care if they’re real? Implants are like professional wrestling…I know everything I’m seeing isn’t what it seems, but that doesn’t mean I can’t just sit back and enjoy it.”

Max became transfixed like a deer in her headlights so I continued to peruse the room. Then I grabbed him before he could dive headlong at Winnie and pointed to a huddle in the back corner featuring the English teacher Barton and two bespectacled sweater-clad men. “Who’s that with Mr. Barton?”

“Two guys he recruited from the English Department to help out,” Lipper tossed over his shoulder, trying to keep one eye on my ex-receptionist.

“Kind of a ‘Legion of Whom’,” I deadpanned. “Is it wise for all of you to be out at the same time? Won’t someone at the high school ask questions?”

“Naw…they can’t even if they wanted to. It’s called tenure…and it’s a wonderful thing. Short of showing up drunk they can’t get rid of us. Now where did Miss Knockers go?”

“Sounds like you might be pushing the envelope on that whole tenure thing,” I surmised. “But I think she’s over talking with my staff…uh…my former staff.”

Lipper bolted toward Charlie Grissom and the gang only to be “knocker-blocked” by the mellifluous mu-mu of Miriam the smoky-voiced town clerk who was staring down despondently at an empty donut box. Then eyeing up the dozing Mrs. Kleinschmidt’s uneaten cruller she made a bee-line to my crew with Max drafting behind her.

All things considered, though, I had to hand it to Gladys not simply for the quantity of the attendees, but the eclectic quality as well. Mrs. Kleinschmidt notwithstanding she had culled the best of the Review staff. Charlie Grissom was a professional journalist, Sandy Molesworth merely competent but with connections in high places and Winnie the receptionist possessed attributes that, Lord knows me or, in lieu of me, Max Lipper, would find something to do with. My sister gave us a link to the police through my brother-in-law and Miriam, if adequately supplied with grazing, would be our eyes and ears at Town Hall. Of course the teachers gave us a strong presence at Artfield High not to mention Barton also knowing Ted Sheehan in the…er…biblical sense (Queen James Version, I assume). And thankfully we had Glen Hubbard, a real investigative reporter who just might be able to pull this whole shit show together.

Oh, and there was also Miss Iceland. Surprisingly, I’d almost forgotten her. Now I spied her standing in the back corner near a small closet that had become home to our fax machine, non-digital cameras, answering machine and a small mountain of folding maps. Gladys referred to it as "where technology goes to die”. She was looking so washed-out and willowy I could practically hear Procol Harum’s “Whiter Shade of Pale” playing in my ear. And I was about to "trip the light fandango" over there as soon as I figured out what that meant.

Gladys sidled up beside and caught me eyeing Miss Iceland up. “So, I never knew you were into blondes. I thought you went more for the dusky Latino type.”

“Why? Cause you caught me in here watching Sabado Gigante one night?”

“It wasn’t the ‘watching’ part that made me think that…”

“You’ll never let that die, will you? But if you must know I lean in the other direction. Sex with an albino?…Now that would be something.”

“You’re disgusting,” she stated, rhetorically.

“Tell me something I don’t know. But if you must inquire I think my taste developed the same way it did for most guys of my generation,” I philosophized. “While watching reruns of Petticoat Junction.”

Gladys raised a quizzical eyebrow so I clarified. “They had a blonde, a brunette and a redhead of reasonably equal attractiveness. I always picked Billie Jo…big Meredith MacRae crush, there and on My Three Sons as well.”

“Fascinating,” she spat, obviously unimpressed with more of my oddball ontology. “But are you gonna stand here talking about mediocre sitcoms or go talk to the girl? I tracked her down for a reason you know…”

She gave me a shove in the general direction, but it wasn’t that easy. For starters I wanted to make sure I let Miss Iceland know I was interested, but I have no game, no opening line. Back in the day my routine move was to scour the ATM garbage before hitting a bar or party, find a receipt with an abnormally large balance then write my number on the back and surreptitiously slip it to a single girl who caught my fancy in hopes she would be intrigued enough by the “mysterious rich guy” to call. Obviously that wasn’t going to fly now. And come to think of it didn't fly too well then either.

The other problem was ordinary men, like me, looking to step out of their league need one of two things: money or a willingness to commit. I have neither. With the former an average looking guy could dazzle his way into a hot girl’s pants. With the latter he could grind her into submission. Either way it sounded like a lot of work on my part.

“Just go over and be yourself,” insisted Gladys, noticing my hesitation.

“Yeah, that’s never worked,” I lamented, but lacking any other option I sallied forth to my humiliation.

I kept my eye on her as I tried to circumnavigate Miriam and fend off well-wishes from Bean and Tombs. Not knowing anyone she hadn’t ventured far into the room. Her back was to the rear window with the blind that was perpetually higher on the right side than the left no matter how I manipulated the drawstring. She wore a blue hooded sweatshirt that read “Rice Owls”; great academic school, but all I could think of was the old University of Texas cheer…

UT Cheerleaders: What comes out of a Chinaman’s ass?

UT Fans: Rice!

I decided I wouldn’t open with that.

            The jeans and sweatshirt look was putting me at ease and when, just before I addressed her, I remembered her real name was Karina, thereby allowing me to ditch the catastrophic “Hey girlfriend” opener I was entertaining, I did feel things were looking up.

            “Hey Karina..,” I nonchalantly started, getting the name out the way early. “Did you go to Rice?”

            “No, it’s my ex-boyfriend’s,” she said just as Miriam stepped on the foot of one of my sister’s kids who let out a blood curdling yell.

            “I’m sure she said ex…yeah ex…ex-boyfriend right,” is all I could think as the commotion died down.

            “He moved back to Texas and left me this and his collection of Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys cassettes,” she added, dropping my heart rate back into the normal range.

            “If he’s got They Don’t Make Jews Like Jesus Anymore in there I’ll take it off your hands.” She rolled her eyes and I realized our musical tastes may not exactly mesh and tried a different tack. “So where they have you working?”

            “They have me on the School Culture beat,” she said and I winced visibly knowing that on any decent sized paper this was the lowest a reporter could go. “They’ve got me lined up for more Middle School Spring concerts than should be legally allowed. I attended one last night and I gotta say I had no idea how many Oriental kids attended the  Admiral Dewey Junior High in Rutland till I saw their string ensemble.”

            I needed to towel off the sarcasm it was so dripping and for a second I thought I might be falling in love. "I didn't know Dewy was a Vermonter," I began, wondering if 'Vermonter' was even correct. 'Vermontan'? 'Vermontite'? Then I returned to my senses and asked the burning question, “So what brings you here anyway?”

            “You’re co-worker Gladys tracked me down, told me what was going on and I figured I’d get to work with the great Glen Hubbard so I dropped everything and rushed right over.”

            That seemed like quite the kick in the ass, but as I turned, hopes reeling, toward Hubbard I felt her slap me in the back in the head. “Hey Dumbo, I didn’t come here to work with Hubbard I came here to work with you. Something’s up and you’re not the only one getting jerked around so let’s figure it out together.” I flushed, feeling stupid, but in the end chalked it up as physical contact and a pet name. Or based on my usual interactions with women…impressive progress.

            As I was regaining my composure and half straightening my hair, half feeling if I had a bald spot working yet Gladys approached in her usual efficient mode. “Press conference, town hall, ten minutes,” she said, verbs be damned.

            “Crap,” I blurted out and not just because I’d forgotten the presser in the morning’s activities. I’d also neglected to contact Curly Carson’s ex for whom I had several more questions. Her relation to the other two victims would round out the team Gladys assembled nicely. At this point I didn’t even know where to find her number, but figured she knew where Town Hall and would want to hear the Artfield PD's theory so we would catch up to her there. “Let’s go,” I said to Miss Iceland in 70’s TV detective series style. Then I fumbled for my keys feeling like Jim Rockford, but probably looking more like Cannon or Barnaby Jones in her eyes.

            “Uh, that’s OK,” she said reaching into the pouch pocket of her sweatshirt and producing her own keys. “I’ve seen your car. I got this one.”

            She made for the backdoor, but I lingered next to Gladys momentarily to watch her walk away. “Nice girl…” “Great ass…” we muttered though for the life of me I’m still not sure which one of us said which.

            Miss Iceland artfully negotiated the local streets at limit-busting speed, but as we pulled into a spot near the center of town I noticed we needn’t have worried about ticketing. Two police cars were parked in front, as well as, the Chief’s Chevy Suburban which, I noticed, was loaded with fishing gear. Since the town only owned two cruisers momentarily I debated knocking over the Krauszer’s Convenience Store while things were left unattended, but in the end realized I wouldn’t get far on the meager scratch-off lottery and take-out coffee receipts in the register. So I groaned my way out of the Volks and we jogged across the street and up a wide flight of concrete stairs.

            The Artfield Municipal Building is a square, white-washed, brick building that appears like a giant snowdrift, winter or summer. Entering through one of the huge double doors one is met by a bland lobby with paneling that looks like it was taken off my Dad's old station wagon. From there one is presented with three options as if one was a contestant on the world’s worst episode of Let’s Make A Deal. To the right were the huge oak doors of the Municipal Court where Mayor Wes Willard’s buddy and investment partner Clem Nielsen self-importantly presides once a fortnight over matters stupid and small. Straight ahead behind a simple, plasterboard door was the domain of Miriam the town clerk who made sure nary a dog went unlicensed or a shed went up un-permitted. To the left was our destination, the Council Meeting Room where the press conference was being held.

            The Council Meeting Room was the site of the twice monthly meetings that decided property taxes, building approvals, school budgets and civil service salaries along with more picayune concerns. It was the preponderance of the latter that made attending and reporting on these sessions such a chore. When the housing development near where Ted Sheehan lived was proposed and the outside developers came in to make their pitch I stopped sending Charlie Grissom or Gladys to cover these and began attending myself. Like most folks I enjoy a good ball-busting, as long as it’s not my nuts being roasted on an open fire, but when things went surprisingly smoothly I gave up the ghost and turned to reading through the minutes that Miriam supplied.

            Miss Iceland and I pushed through one of the large double doors and found ourselves in what I assumed for a second was a Yoko Ono poetry reading. Chief Bowden stood at a podium flanked by the two on-duty officers, but he hardly needed the protection. There was one tiny tripod camera manned by what looked like a couple of bored students from UVM, a handful of only slightly older “stringers” from the Boston Globe and the more local papers, and Wes Willard sitting, arms folded, in a chair next to the podium looking like he was pissed at being there or just sucked on a lemon or quite possibly both.

            Looking to the left I noticed Bowden had set up a genius display of distraction along the wall. A long table filled with coffee, juice, bagels, bacon, pastries and assorted other breakfast fare stood beckoning and from the heaped plates in the reporter’s hands it had been liberally visited. Having once been an underpaid novice in the industry I knew finding free food during working hours was a never-ending quest. I could still recall working the overnight sports desk at the Globe and fanning out with my counterpart in obituaries to find leftovers from meetings earlier in the day. Once found we’d page each other in code over the PA: “The eagle has landed in Sector E” equaling turkey sandwiches in the Editorial Department. If pride comes before a fall they’ll probably have to bury me standing up.

            It was obvious in this atmosphere that the Chief would get off easy so it was lucky that Miss Iceland and I had arrived just in time. We took two of the dozen or so chairs set up in two rows in front of the podium just as Bowden stepped forward and began to read a prepared statement. Old habits die hard so I kept peeking to the left to see if they had lox to go with the free bagels as Bowden sped through a statement so bland it could’ve been shredded and sprinkled on the meals served to ulcer patients.

“…and having examined phone records, ballistics and the coroner’s report this office has determined Mr. Carson shot both Mr. Sheehan and Ms. Carson in a fit of alcoholic infused rage before turning the gun on himself. Therefore this matter has been deemed a murder-suicide, case closed. Are there any questions from the press?”

            I raised my hand from the second row, but Bowden pretended not to see. The college kids were already trying to negotiate their camera back into its plastic case as the young reporters, happy to get of town with most of the day ahead of them, dumped their plates in the garbage and went to grab one last cup of coffee and Danish for the road.

            I stumbled through the chairs, pushed past the kids at the buffet (there were no lox I sadly noticed…hey, I can multi-task when need be) and confronted Bowden and Willard as they made their way to a side exit. The two officers, younger guys who I didn’t know, stopped short. They obviously had mistaken me for someone important and had inadvertently blocked Bowden and Willard’s path.

            “I have a question, Chief,” I said as authoritatively as someone of my meager self-esteem could muster. In fact, I had several questions and no idea which to lead with, but Bowden saved my already overloaded brain from having to parse and pick.

            “This conference was for press only,” he stated, condescendingly.

            “I’m press,” I replied, unconvincingly, my voice cracking like Peter singing on The Brady Bunch.

            “Not as of yesterday according to Riley Chase and Green Mountain Bank.” It was Wes Willard chiming in; his face breaking into a smile that seemed painful.

            This was obviously splitting hairs, but I was too sober to argue. Thinking fast I turned and pointed at Miss Iceland. “She’s with the press. Karina, uh…um… (here I coughed out something that sounded like ‘Schmedberg’ then continued) of the Burlington Bee.”

            Chief Bowden chuckled mirthlessly then indicated with his head over his shoulder. “We’ve already spoken to the reporter for the Bee and as far as I can tell he has no questions.”

            I followed his gesture to the right front corner of the room where for the first time I noticed Curly Carson’s ex talking to a hair-gelled, horn rim glasses, bow tie wearing hipster nerd who appeared to be making love to an iPhone with his thumbs.

            When I turned back, mouth agape, I saw Wes Willard’s bony ass slipping through the exit and heard a faint “dumbass” waft in with the slamming door. Man, I thought, and not for the first time, nothing’s ever freakin’ easy…