Day Shift

14

On Monday morning, Manfred was at his window as the Rev and Diederik went from the Rev’s cottage to the chapel. He had his phone in his hand as he watched them make their way down the newly restored sidewalk. A couple of old people, one with a walker, were taking their constitutionals around the hotel. Both of the senior citizens stopped in their tracks as the oddly assorted duo went by.

The new citizens of Midnight were probably gaping because the Rev was wearing the same rusty black suit, black hat, and string tie he always wore, along with his ancient cowboy boots and his threadbare white shirt. (His face did not look as old as his clothes, but it was deeply grooved.) But the boy was at least two inches taller than he had been mere days before; consequently, his clothes were straining at the seams.

“Well, damn,” Manfred said to himself. “We’ve got to get that boy more clothes. The Rev’s been wearing the same thing for years. He’ll never notice the kid needs something new.” He called Fiji. “I don’t know how much you know about kids’ sizes,” he began, “but the Rev’s visitor has to have something that fits.”

“I just got him some shorts and T-shirts,” she said, surprised.

“They’re too small now,” Manfred said.

She hung up, and Manfred watched as she burst out her front door and walked over to the chapel. The Rev and Diederik were just crossing the chapel yard to the steps, the boy looking anything but enthusiastic. Fiji stopped dead at the sight of Diederik, and then she marched toward them. The wind had picked up, and Manfred smiled to see her hair and her skirt frisk in the air like banners. She planted herself in front of the Rev. Manfred watched her mouth moving. The Rev was standing stock-still, stiff with unhappiness at being intercepted on his appointed round. But then her words caused the old man to look behind him at the boy, and he appeared a bit surprised at what he was seeing.

Fiji’s arms waved a little, and the Rev nodded, and then he entered the chapel and the boy followed Fiji over to her house. As they walked through Fiji’s front yard, the boy looked around him at all the flowers, blooming gloriously, and the bushes, lush and green despite the Texas heat. Finally he spotted the cat, Mr. Snuggly, and Manfred watched Diederik’s face light up. He scooped up the cat and carried him in the house, Mr. Snuggly’s face visible over the boy’s shoulder like a fuzzy golden thundercloud.

Manfred laughed. It was the best he’d felt in days.

Then Manfred pondered the meaning of the boy’s accelerated growth. He didn’t have a clue. He wondered when Diederik’s father would return. He hoped it would happen before Diederik was six feet tall.

Manfred got a personal phone call about an hour later, just when he’d gotten into his stride on his professional phone site. “Hi, Mr. Bernardo, Phil Van Zandt here,” said a man’s voice. “From Magdalena Orta Powell’s office,” it added helpfully.

“Oh, sure! Sorry, I was deep in the work zone,” Manfred said. “What’s up?”

“I’m sorry to say the police department in Bonnet Park wants to question you,” Phil Van Zandt said sympathetically. “They called Ms. Powell. She’s made an appointment there for two this afternoon, which will give you enough time to drive there, stopping for a quick lunch.” Because only barbarians skip lunch, his voice implied.

“Okay, I’ll try to be there,” Manfred said, trying to rearrange his day mentally.

“Ohhhhhh… there mustn’t be any ‘try’ about it, Mr. Bernardo. You can be there at two, right? Or Ms. Powell will have to call them to reschedule. And that’ll mean she has to rejigger her whole afternoon.”

“Or you do.”

“Well, yes, but that’s my job. So you can make it?”

Manfred glanced at the clock he kept on the desk. “Yes, I can make it,” he said. “Headquarters of the Bonnet Park police?”

“Yes, right, need the address?”

“Thanks.” Manfred scribbled it down. “I’d better get started.”

“No problem,” said the obliging Phil. “Hope all goes well.”

Cryptic, but pleasant.

Manfred logged out and checked his pockets to make sure he had everything. Unfortunately, he had no good-luck charm to include. Fiji was walking up to his front door as he went out.

“I was going to ask if you’d go with me to Marthasville to buy Diederik some more clothes,” she said.

“Sorry, I have to go in to the police station in Bonnet Park with my lawyer,” he said. “The police want to question me.”

Fiji said, “Here, then.” She put her hands on either side of Manfred’s head, and her lips moved. The pressure of her small hands was intense and felt somehow hot, as though she’d rubbed her hands together briskly before applying them.

“What was that for?” he asked, when her hands were back by her sides.

“That was to make your words believable,” she said, grinning. “I tried it out last week on a policeman who stopped me because my tags had expired.”

“It worked?”

“You betcha. I didn’t get a ticket. And I did go right to Davy and get new tags the next day.”

“So, does my believability expire?”

“No spell lasts forever without reinforcement,” she said. “Not that I know of, anyway.”

He got into his car feeling a bit… jaunty, which was an adjective he’d never thought of applying to himself. He had a good lawyer and a good witch and a kick-ass adventuress on his side. He listened to NPR on his drive to Bonnet Park, convinced it would make him feel smarter. The Dallas traffic almost popped the balloon of his confidence, but he negotiated it with some finesse and pulled into the visitor’s lot ten minutes early.

As if she’d planned it to the second, a Lexus pulled in beside him, and out of it stepped Magdalena Orta Powell. It must be her; she looked like a distinguished lawyer. He decided she was in her midforties. Her hair was short and styled perfectly, her makeup was good but understated, her skirt was a beige cotton blend and fitted her curves unapologetically, and the short-sleeved brown and white patterned blouse with its big brown buttons was attractive but definitely on the ladylike side. Her brown heels were attention-grabbers. Manfred felt certain he could not have taken a single step wearing them.

“Mr. Bernardo?” She shook his hand. Her grip was firm, but she didn’t squeeze. She stood back and gave him a head-to-toe scan. Manfred had wisely eschewed his public “all black” look for his police visit, instead wearing a pair of khakis and a white linen shirt with subdued palm trees all over it. “No jewelry aside from the piercings, good,” she said. “The piercings are bad enough.”

“But they’ll believe me,” Manfred said confidently. He didn’t know what Fiji had done to him, but he wished he could pay her to come over and do it every morning.

“Are you on drugs?” his lawyer asked sharply.

“I never use drugs,” he said. “And what do I call you? I can’t say ‘Magdalena Orta Powell!’ every time I want to get your attention.”

“Ms. Powell will do just fine,” she said. “Shall we dance?” She pointed up the walkway to the glass doors into the public safety building. “This is less intimidating than going into the Dallas police headquarters,” she added, “but don’t be fooled. This is professional law enforcement, and they hate having a messy case on their hands.”

“I haven’t done anything wrong,” he said, with great certainty.

“I wish I could guarantee that meant you wouldn’t end up in jail.”

He did feel a twinge of concern for a moment, but then it floated away on the tide of his conviction that he would convince the police that he was the most upright citizen they’d ever met.

“Detective,” he was saying a few minutes later when they’d been ushered back to an interrogation room. He stood and shook the detective’s hand.

“You know each other?” Ms. Powell didn’t get up, but she nodded to the detective as if she’d met him before.

“We met at the hotel, Vespers, right, Mr. Bernardo?” Detective Sterling sat down opposite them.

Manfred gave him a much closer look than he’d given when he’d first met the detective. Sterling was dark and stocky, and his close-cut hair was graying. He’d put on a pair of glasses with metal rims, which glinted in the overhead light, giving him a strangely old-fashioned look. Another man entered at that moment and took the seat by Sterling. They were wearing what amounted to a uniform: white short-sleeved shirts, blue patterned ties, and khakis. But the other detective was very tall, at least five inches over six feet, and older, too, with snowy hair. He did not wear glasses, and his blue eyes were sharp and intent in a weathered, red, lined face.

Yet Manfred was not afraid. He could feel Ms. Powell tense, though, and she said, “Well, a detective who does not seem to have met my client yet. Hi, Tom.”

Tom smiled at Ms. Powell. “Maggie. Hey, buddy, I’m Tom Freemont.”

Manfred smiled back at him as they shook hands. “Good to meet you, Detective. What can I do for you all today?”

“You’ve gotten all kind of snarled up in something, Mr. Bernardo,” said Detective Sterling. Just us good and simple folks, trying to understand. “We need to straighten that out, make sure we understand exactly what’s happening.”

Manfred tried to look intelligently interested.

Ms. Powell said, “Are you charging my client with anything?”

“No, not at the present time.”

“Then what do you need to know about? What crime are you thinking he may have committed? Because I sure haven’t heard of anything. Did not Rachel Goldthorpe die of natural causes?”

“We’re still waiting for the test results to come back. Maybe a combination of age, weight, high blood pressure, and a bad case of pneumonia all wound up together and killed her.” Detective Freemont flipped open a folder and glanced at the contents. “We have to say there was no immediately obvious cause of death.”

“So you don’t think my client had anything to do with the death of Mrs. Goldthorpe.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“So you believe she was murdered?”

“We don’t know at the present. But, all right, at this time we don’t suspect Mr. Bernardo of murder,” Freemont said baldly.

“Then what?” Magdalena Orta Powell looked puzzled and vexed. She pulled it off beautifully.

“There are the charges leveled by Lewis.”

“You charging Mr. Bernardo with theft? Do you seriously think Ms. Goldthorpe brought a purse full of jewelry to a séance with her late husband?”

“She might have.” Freemont tilted his chair, waving his hand in an “anything’s possible” gesture.

“Right. And when she slumps over dead, my client’s first impulse would be to go through her purse? No, I don’t think so! He calls downstairs, like anyone would do. His first concern was Mrs. Goldthorpe.”

“That’s what he says,” Detective Sterling said, stopping just short of insulting sarcasm.

“Do you have any evidence at all that suggests any different?” Ms. Powell’s eyes were practically shooting fire. Manfred was proud of her. He was positive that she was defending him brilliantly.

“No, we don’t,” Detective Sterling said. “But we find it strange that his friend”—and here he poked his finger in the air in Manfred’s direction—“was sitting with two people who later that evening died in an apparent murder/suicide, while Mr. Bernardo’s guest, the very next day, died in his room.”

“There’s no connection whatever,” Manfred said calmly. He knew they would believe him. “I didn’t know someone I knew from Midnight was going to be there. I don’t think Olivia knew the couple very well. And the next day, while I was having clients in my room, she went shopping, at least as far as I know. I’ve scarcely seen her since then. You haven’t been by to ask her any questions about their deaths, or she’d have told me. And you know I didn’t kill poor Rachel. I didn’t know she had jewelry to hide until she told me that day during our session.” And here his voice sharpened. “Why was my name even leaked to the press? There’s no evidence at all that I’ve ever done anything wrong!”

Only Ms. Powell’s hand on his arm stopped Manfred from rolling forward. He stopped talking then. But he didn’t lower his gaze, and he waited to hear what they would have to say.

“All right,” Sterling said finally. He pulled off his glasses and polished them with a pocket handkerchief he conjured out of nowhere. “Well, I’ve got to say you put forth a convincing argument, Mr. Bernardo.”

Yes! You go, Fiji! Manfred thought.

“Where were you last night, Mr. Bernardo?”

“At home,” he said promptly.

“Did you go out at all?”

“Nope. The night before, I had some friends in,” he said.

“Who?”

“Actually, Olivia Charity. And Joe Strong and Chuy Villegas, who also live in Midnight.”

“And the night before that?”

Manfred knew this was the question they really wanted to ask, because of the body at the Goldthorpe house. “I went out to eat,” he said. “Then I went home.”

“Where did you eat? It any good?”

Oh, come on! Manfred thought. He got out his wallet and pulled out the receipt from Moo and Oink. “I don’t usually keep receipts,” he said, “but I haven’t cleaned out my wallet lately.”

Freemont leaned over to take the receipt from Manfred, and the detectives gave it a very serious look. They wouldn’t be able to get past the time and date stamp. Sterling sighed.

Freemont said, “So you contend that you were at Vespers for your…” He looked down at a paper. “Client weekend, the same weekend your friend from this tiny, tiny town is there, completely by coincidence. Also by coincidence, the people you both meet happen to die.”

It did sound fishy, put that way.

“He doesn’t contend that, he states it,” Ms. Powell said calmly. “Because that is exactly what happened. He never met the couple who died so tragically. His acquaintance, Olivia Charity, never met Rachel Goldthorpe, at least not to my client’s knowledge. This is all nothing more than coincidence, the kind the world is always throwing at us. Mr. Bernardo has never seen Mrs. Goldthorpe’s allegedly missing jewelry. You can hardly charge my client with her death when you don’t know what killed her. So that’s the end of this conversation.” Ms. Powell got smoothly to her feet. Following her lead, so did Manfred. “This was a long way for my client to drive to answer a few questions he’s answered before.” Nobly, she did not mention her own inconvenience, because she would get paid for it. “I trust you won’t demand his presence again.”

“Only if the tox screen shows something,” Freemont said, suddenly sounding bored. He stood, too, towering over them. “And you ought to know, that little shit Lewis Goldthorpe plans on dragging your client through as much mud as he can.”

Ms. Powell and Manfred left the Bonnet Park police/fire station within an hour of entering it. Manfred realized he was now much poorer, but since he was walking out a free man, the price was fair. Ms. Powell was silent until they reached her car. Then she said, “I think we should bring action against Lewis Goldthorpe.”

“Won’t that just draw more attention to a bad situation?”

“Depends on what he accuses you of. If he tells the world you’re a thief, you may be sorry you didn’t get a preemptive strike in.”

“It would be best for me if this just went away. Any more time in the news, and my reputation’s going to be terrible, anyway. If there’s any big exposé on me because of this publicity, I’m not going to come out looking good. And frankly, I’m as nice a guy as they come in the psychic business.”

“Interesting way to put it.” The lawyer looked at him.

He shrugged. “But so true.”

“Why do you think Lewis Goldthorpe is gunning for you?”

“Because Mom always liked me best.”

When Ms. Powell looked blank, Manfred said, “Because his mother never got along with Lewis, and she did with me. She didn’t know me very well, so that made it easy. If she’d really spent a lot of time with me, it might have been a different story. But I didn’t want her possessions, I got along fine with her husband because he was dead, I listened to all her stories because she was a nice lady, and I believe in an afterlife, like she did.”

“Whereas Lewis…?”

“Fought with her husband when he was alive, badgered her about anything she planned to leave her children, didn’t believe in any psychic help I could offer her, and wasn’t at all interested in his nieces and nephews. Plus, he doesn’t really believe in life after death.”

“So you think that’s all it takes to keep a woman’s attention and loyalty? Not coveting her possessions? Listening to her stories?”

“Whoa! I think we just veered off the course. I wasn’t saying that at all. I was saying that was why Rachel was glad to talk to me rather than her own son. I was less demanding and more accepting.”

Ms. Powell took a deep breath and visibly calmed herself. “Sorry,” she said.

“You’re going through a rough patch in your own life,” Manfred observed.

“Not hard to tell,” she said, and smiled ruefully. “Sorry for being unprofessional. I’m back in lawyer mode now.”

“Has Lewis actually accused me with the police?”

“Yes, he has.”

“So why haven’t I been arrested?”

“Because there’s no evidence to prove you took her jewelry.”

“Then why can’t his allegations be ignored?”

“Because her jewelry still isn’t around, and though they don’t really believe him, it’s possible he’s right.”

“So I’m over a barrel until the jewelry is found. My situation is completely the same. Why did they call me in here?”

She was looking off into the distance. Her eyes went to his face. “Fishing expedition,” she said. “A waste of my time and your money.”

Manfred looked at her doubtfully. “My time is money, too,” he pointed out. He couldn’t help but feel a little offended.

“I’ll bet it’s not as valuable as mine,” she said.

And he was sure that when he got his bill, he would agree.

As he drove back to Midnight, Manfred thought about the bottom line on this little “fishing expedition.” The detectives didn’t know anything new, he hadn’t completely dispelled their suspicions — though he was convinced he’d weakened them — and he’d lost hours of work time.

On the plus side, he’d gotten to know his lawyer, and he found himself much more confident he’d stay out of jail.

Magdalena Orta Powell was not exactly what he’d expected, and he was pretty sure she felt the same about him.