“What about children?”
Lorraine Hokinson’s expression changed from serious to stern. “They lost a boy to that awful influenza epidemic during the World War, long before we knew them. They lived a few streets over in those days.”
“A terrible thing. I remember it like it was yesterday,” I said. “Was he an only child?”
Now she was shaking her head and pursing her small, pinched lips. “No, no, there’s a daughter, too, but, well...”
“Yes? Remember, this is confidential.”
She seemed unsure she should continue, but after fiddling with a pearl necklace and drawing in air, she spoke again, her words preceded by more head shaking. “The daughter, Nicolette — Kiki, they used to call her — well, I don’t mean to sound cruel or anything of that sort, but I don’t think that she’s quite right.”
“How so?”
She leaned forward and lowered her voice. “It’s a little hard to explain, Mr. Gilchrist, and I probably shouldn’t be talking this way, but she’s been, well... put away at least once.”
“In an asylum?”
That brought a single nod. “Up at Dunning,” she said. “Wilma, the poor dear, didn’t tell me that — I certainly wouldn’t have expected her to — but, well... others did. It was all I could do to keep from comforting her when I learned about her daughter, but I couldn’t very well, could I? After all, I was told about Nicolette in confidence.”
“I take it you mean the Dunning mental asylum in Chicago?”
“Yes, that’s the place. Now I can’t say that Orville or I knew her very well, Mr. Gilchrist. When the Stovers moved onto the block, Nicolette was already living up in the city — working in some restaurant, I believe. But we’ve met her a few times at Christmas and other holidays when she came to stay with her parents for a day or two, and she always seemed like a nice woman — very quiet, but nice. And truly rather pretty, in a plain sort of way, if you know what I mean.”
“I think so. Do you happen to know if she has ever been married?”
“No, I don’t, although Wilma has never talked very much about her, at least not to me. But I think I’d probably know if she had ever been — married, that is.”
“Do you happen to know if her parents are supporting their daughter financially, Mrs. Hokinson? Or at least helping to support her?” I figured that those were the kind of questions someone doing a credit check ought to be asking, even if I wasn’t much interested myself in the answers.
“I honestly don’t,” she said. “As I mentioned, her mother has never talked much about her — maybe for good reason.”
I asked if she knew anything about the nature of Nicolette Stover’s mental problems, but she couldn’t even speculate. “Her parents are such wonderful people — and so very successful,” she said, the awe again showing. “I can’t imagine what would have gone wrong with the girl. It’s the sort of thing that makes me almost glad that Orville and I couldn’t have any children. They can just break your heart, can’t they?” She sighed and looked toward the doorway through which her husband had exited with his newspaper and stogie, the smell of which lingered in the room like a guest who didn’t know when to leave.
I mouthed my agreement and told her how much I appreciated her time, assuring her that everything she told me would be held in the strictest confidence.
“They can’t be buying a new house, can they?” Lorraine Hokinson asked plaintively as she walked me to the front door. “They’re such nice neighbors. Why would they want to leave that beautiful home of theirs? But then, why else would you be here asking these questions?”
“Credit checks are made for many, many different reasons,” I replied as I stepped out into the spring sunshine and put on my hat. “As I told you earlier, we are not allowed to talk about specifics, but I do think that it’s permissible for me to tell you that the Stovers are indeed happy with their present home.”
For the first time since I had arrived, Lorraine Hokinson broke into a smile. “I appreciate your telling me that, Mr. Gilchrist,” she said, holding out a hand. I took it and returned the smile, inexplicably pleased that something I said had made her happy.
Chapter 14
“So it’s been three goddamn months now since Martindale got himself popped, and what do our illustrious gendarmes have to show for all their investigations? Nothin’, that’s what. Naught, nil, zero.” Dirk O’Farrell scowled and formed an “O” with his forefinger and thumb as he leaned back at his desk in the pressroom on a gray and gusty Monday morning. We all were still on our initial cups of coffee, and for the first time in several weeks, the topic on the floor was the Martindale murder.
“Aw, keep your britches on, Dirk,” Packy Farmer drawled as he rolled a cigarette. “You didn’t really think they were ever gonna get the trigger man, did you? The outfit’s boys ain’t that sloppy, y’know.”
O’Farrell lifted his lean shoulders and let them drop. “Maybe not, but I figured by this time the dicks would find some poor bastard they could hang the rap on. The way both Tom Courtney and the Crime Commission have been hammering on the department, seems like that would’ve been the logical move.”
“Interesting you should say that,” Anson Masters observed. “This very weekend, a tipster I’ve known for years strongly suggested to me that the police are in the process of doing exactly what you suggest.”
“You mean they’ve gone and got themselves a stooge?” O’Farrell demanded.
Masters nodded. “Or close to it.”
“Well, why the hell haven’t you followed up on it?” Farmer accused, waving his newly minted cigarette like a dwarf baton.
“Easy there, Cyril,” Masters tweaked. “As a matter of fact, I was about to bring the subject up. And I was also going to suggest that since our very own Mr. Malek here is a confidante of one Fergus Fahey, he would be an ideal choice to beard the noble chief in his den.”
“Heaven forbid that you should initiate any activity yourself, Anson,” Farmer said, swiveling to face me. “Well, what about it, Snap?”
“Yeah, Malek, what about it? Chop chop,” Eddie Metz put in, as usual the last one to enter the fray.
“Well, hellfire, I’ve been propping you lads up for so long anyway that it’s become a habit. I might as well stay in character. And who knows, I might even let you in on some of Fahey’s pearls of wisdom,” I muttered after stifling a stage yawn. “Anybody want to come along and keep me honest?”
“Nah, we trust ya, Snap old boy,” Farmer said, doing a yawn of his own. “How ’bout some good quotes this time around, though, huh?”
“Even if I have to make them up myself,” I said over my shoulder as I headed out the door in the direction of Fergus Fahey’s office.
“Morning, you vision of ecstasy,” I whispered to Elsie Dugo as I ambled into her anteroom. “The grand poohbah receiving visitors today, or has he taken a sabbatical?”
“Good morning yourself, you silver-tongued knave. Last I knew, he was in there, unless he stepped out his window and flipped onto a passing El,” she sassed. “Let me announce you. Are you Snap today, or Mr. Malek?”
“Let’s try the formal approach. Maybe he’ll develop a new appreciation for my importance.”
“Anything is possible,” she said. She spoke into the intercom and got what must have been a positive squawk, because she gestured toward the closed door. A haggard Fahey was seated behind his desk signing papers. He didn’t look up, so I gently laid two Lucky Strikes on the only open acreage on his blotter.
“Suppose you expect coffee in return,” he grunted, still concentrating on the papers.
“Well, isn’t this the deal we struck yea these many years ago? I scratch your back and you scratch mine?”