“Right,” Robert returned dryly, “I don’t know why people think we have the magic touch.” He wrote down the oil company’s information and prepared to leave when he saw the kitchen door open and a couple of the boys peek out. Robert glanced at his watch, “Mr. Porter, I have some baseball cards I just bought the other day. I took out the ones I wanted. I had planned on giving them to a friend, but I’m wondering if I might join your game for a hand or so.”
“It would be my pleasure. I’ll have to ask the boys; they might not like playing with a copper. Boys! Come on out.” The five, milk-mustached boys marched out, looking warily at Robert. “What do you think, should we let him play?
A small, thin boy spoke. “Got any good cards?”
Robert told them the names of a few he had just bought.
“Sure, mister you can play,” lisped one of the boys, with curly, brown hair and a cherub face.
Mrs. Porter met him at the door when he returned from getting the cards, “You should have seen the looks on those boys faces when you asked to play. You see, some of their mothers have more kids than they can handle, and these boys were just finding ways to make mischief during the holidays. Mr. Porter made friends with one of the boys, and now they come over almost every day to play, trade baseball cards, and listen to the stories that Mr. Porter makes up,” she chuckled. “They even bet on how big a whopper he’s going to tell them.”
Solemnly, one boy gave Robert a visor as he pulled up a chair.
When Robert returned to the station a couple of hours later, Jake sat waiting in his office.
“What have you been doing? I didn’t think it took five hours to get a statement.” He grumbled as Robert emptied his pocket onto his desk. “What is this? Baseball cards, bubble gum, marbles, and a slingshot?”
“I’ve been promoting a little PR.” He told Jake about the card game at the Porters.
Jake’s shoulders shook with laughter when Robert was done with the story, “I see, a little gambling for the good of the station. That’s the kind of thing we have just spent the past few years trying to clean up in the precinct.” Jake shook his head. “What did you get?”
“Here it is,” he pointed at the desk.
“No. What information did you get from the Porters?”
“A lot. This looks like the real thing.” He handed Jake the information, “We need to get records from the oil company. This gives us a good start on a timeline.”
Robert called Maggie Borman to ask if she knew what gas station charge cards her brother carried.
“I’m not sure. He probably has them listed in his cash books at the house. Why don’t I meet you there and we’ll look?” she offered, and Robert arranged to meet her at the Stevens’ house.
Chapter 3
Robert parked in front of the Stevens’ home and waited for Maggie. The afternoon glow reflected off the windows. His stomach growled. He hadn’t eaten all day except the cookies and milk at the Porters.
When he’d left his house that morning, he hadn’t taken any meat from the freezer. That meant it was either Chinese takeout or he’d have to stop at the store and buy something to make. Maybe chicken. Now that he was thinking along those lines, he did have some potatoes and garlic, add a little butter and some herbs, and he’d have a great dinner. He really wanted to get this over with and head to the store.
He looked around at the houses on the street. Christmas decorations adorned every home. Some more elaborate than others, but there was a theme. He remembered this street entertained visitors. Some walked the block admiring the houses, and others drove by.
A car pulled up. Maggie got out, waiting for Tom to come around and meet her on the sidewalk. Together they met Robert on the porch.
Maggie unlocked the door and turned on the lights.
“Karl kept excellent records. He always knew where his money was and how much he had. He kept Debra on a very tight budget. She never had much money for little extras to spend on her and the girls.” Maggie paused a moment as if to explain her comment. “We never had much when Karl and I were kids. My dad died when we were young, and my stepfather didn’t like kids much. I don’t know why Mom married him except she might have thought we needed a father, or she needed someone to take care of her. Karl had an obsession with saving money. He and Debra were very frugal even for Christmas. I don’t know how much he had, but I’m sure they weren’t poor.”
The police had not yet released the house to the family; the Santa suit lay arranged on the chair with the bag of candy canes next to it. The mail sat in stacks on the dining room table.
Maggie moved to a buffet cabinet in the dining room and opened the doors. “Karl kept his books in here.” She knelt to reach into the opening and removed a handful of cash books. Robert took them and stacked them on the table.
He’d seen the books in the cabinet. “Did he always throw the books in there without stacking them?”
Maggie sat back and shook her head. “That’s odd. Karl would never throw a book in here like this. They probably would be stacked in year order.” She reached in for another stack and looked at the dates. “They aren’t in any order.” She stood, moved away from the buffet, and looked around the room. “Something’s not right.”
Robert sorted through the books. He kept them in the same order that Maggie handed them to him. Made notes of the arrangement in his notebook, then looked through them again for one with the current year. He found one dated 1957, but no book for the current year. He took a quick glance at the balance at the end of 1957, it was not worth kidnapping a family nor would someone like Karl leave that significant amount of money without making arrangements for it if they were moving.
On the shelf below the books, Robert pulled out a brown accordion folder with the months printed on the tabs. The pockets labeled November and December were empty. He wrote in his notebook.
“What time did you come over here on Monday?” Robert asked suddenly.
“About 12:30. When Debra didn’t call or answer the phone, I thought they might be sick,” Maggie answered. Tom remained in silence in the living room.
Robert remembered the neighbors had witnessed someone running from the house at about 7:30 that morning. Whoever it was, got into a cab and took off.
“I am taking these cash books and the folder. I want to see why someone would take all the bills from November and leave the rest.”
“Just out of curiosity, did Karl have any plans for the future that you knew about?” The amount of money in the saving account bothered him.
“Karl always wanted to buy a home out of town on a farm and retire—raise some livestock and grow their vegetables. He’s a farm boy at heart.”
Tom interjected, “I don’t think Debra or the girls were any too excited about moving out to the country.”
Maggie agreed. “Debra, let him talk, but she never agreed or disagreed with him. She told me once that if Karl retired and thought he would sell everything to move on a farm, she’d divorce him. She said it once and never spoke of it again.”
“Had he been planning to retire soon?” Robert quizzed,
“No. He had a plan in place to retire when he turned sixty. He had a few years to go and with his pension from the electric company, he could live comfortably on a farm for years.” Maggie stuffed her fists into her sweater pockets, which stretched the material beyond its reasonable limits.
Tom brought a brown bag in and helped Robert transfer the cash books and the folder. He waited while Maggie locked the door behind them. Across the street, Robert noted the curtains swayed, and the shadow of a figure moved out of sight. The neighbors need to be talked to again. Someone wasn’t telling the whole story.