Getting Old Is Criminal by Rita Lakin Read Free Book Online Page A

Life.” She dared him with her eyes to question this, so he moved on.
    He asked Sophie about her marital status. She didn’t want to tell him she’d been married. Twice.
    Now he is tackling Bella.
    “But, Mrs. Fox, you can’t see very well and you cannot hear very well—what can you do?”
    “I can . . . I can . . .” Bella is flustered. She looks to me for help.
    “Mr. Ferguson, Bella is an excellent operative,”
    I pipe up. “You’ll have to take my word on that.
    All my associates make up a great working team.”
    Bella is relieved to be off the hot seat.
    Alvin doesn’t look convinced.
    Shirley smiles at my taking her bossy husband down a peg.
    Alvin tries to save face. “Money is no object, as I’ve said before.”
    Shirley winces. It’s obvious she would like to slap him, but he still holds the purse strings. “It won’t bring your mother back, Alvin.”
    “I need to know the truth!”
    The girls are practically panting—it looks like the job is in the bag.
    I break in. “We’ll get on the case right away.”
    “Done,” he says. “You’ll call when you need more money?”

    5 8 • R i t a L a k i n
    Shirley closes her eyes. Giving away their money is too painful to watch.
    Sophie and Bella pinch each other gleefully.
    “What can you hope to accomplish?” Shirley says to me, after taking a few long, cleansing breaths to calm down. “Romeo certainly isn’t going to confess to you, that’s for sure.”
    “I honestly don’t know. But our first goal is to find out everything we can about Philip Smythe.”
    “How long do you think this is gonna take?”
    She demands a closing date. They can’t support this investigation forever.
    Ida jumps in. “There’s no way of knowing.”
    Evvie says smartly, “We have other clients, you know.”
    I say, “We’re on your side, Mrs. Ferguson. We want answers quickly.”
    Shirley Ferguson stands. She’s had enough.
    “Wait,” I say. “Is there anything else either of you can tell me that might shed some light on what could have happened between the two of them?
    Was Esther’s behavior in any way unusual? Either before or after she met Philip Smythe?”
    “Not that I can think of,” Alvin says quickly.
    “I can think of something,” says Shirley, after a brief pause.
    We all turn to look at her.
    Shirley takes a cigarette out of her purse and slips it between her lips. She knows she can’t smoke in here, but I guess it helps her feel a semblance of calm. “She changed her address.”

    G e t t i n g O l d I s C r i m i n a l • 5 9
    When she has all our attention, she goes on.
    “After she met Philip, she wrote and told us that from that date on we were to write her at a P.O.
    Box number.”
    Alvin gives her one of his what-do -you- know looks. “And that means something to you?”
    “Yes,” she says quietly, which she does to irritate him. “It meant that she no longer received her mail at Grecian Villas. Now, why do you think she would have done that?”
    “Big deal,” says Alvin.
    “I would certainly think so. In Grecian Villas, all she had to do was walk downstairs from her apartment to her box in the lobby and lift out her mail. The new address meant she would have to get someone to drive her to the nearest post office and get her mail there. Why bother?”
    This gives Alvin pause. “I never thought about that.”
    “She didn’t want Philip to see her mail?” Ida asks.
    “I wonder,” I say. “She didn’t want Philip to know she had a family?”
    “My feeling exactly,” says Shirley.
    “But why?” asks Sophie.
    “I don’t really know.” Shirley puts the cigarette back in its pack. Then she smiles wickedly.
    “Maybe she was ashamed of us.”
    “But you mentioned last time that you met him,” I remind her.

    6 0 • R i t a L a k i n
    “Yes, we did. Once. Only two weeks before she died.”
    Alvin adds, “I had business on the East Coast and I thought I’d surprise her.”
    “And let me tell you,” Shirley