Death In Duplicate

TWENTY-SIX

“IT LOOKS LIKE IT COULD USE A BIT OF CARETAKING,” KATHLEEN said.

“It looks like it could star in an old Alfred Hitchcock movie,” Susan replied, getting out of the car without taking her eyes off the house standing before them.

“This family invests in some incredible real estate, doesn’t it?”

“I’ll say.”

“Windswept. Woodwinds. Maybe they’re just collecting mansions with similar names.” Kathleen was walking up the pebble drive toward the house.

Susan followed her, still trying to absorb the sight in front of them. Built in the shingle style so popular on the Connecticut and Long Island coasts in the early twentieth century, the house was immense and gloomy, rising out of the land without benefit of landscaping. A four-car garage sat off to one side and, as Kathleen made her way up onto the deep porch that encircled the house’s first floor, Susan wandered over to take a closer look. Windows on the floor above the car ells were curtained and she suspected this was the caretaker’s apartment that Donald had mentioned. Piles of plastic flowerpots leaned against the side of the building and she went over to rummage around for the house key.

Spiders fled and a mouse scared her almost as much as she scared it, but she didn’t find the key and was giving up her search when she heard Kathleen calling her name.

“It’s open! Susan, it’s open!” she was saying. Susan stood up and realized that her friend was standing in the doorway of the mansion. She ran over to join her. “How did you get the door open?”

“Turned the knob. Did you try the door out there?”

“It never even occurred to me.” Susan walked into the house. “It’s got to be ten degrees colder in here than it is outside.”

“Probably feels wonderful in the middle of summer,” Kathleen said, pulling her jacket closed.

“Yeah, I guess. Let’s look around.”

“Do you think Mike could have stayed here?”

“I suppose anyone could have.” Despite the bedraggled grandeur of the outside of the house, the interior had been decorated in the fashion of many vacation homes with hand-me-downs and cheap upholstered pieces. Dust bunnies hugged the corners and mouse droppings dotted the worn area rugs. Susan and Kathleen had a wonderful time looking around. The kitchen pantry was bare except for a few cans of tomato soup and a musty box of Triscuits, but there were sheets on beds in two of the nine bedrooms upstairs and one had obviously been slept in. The electricity worked although space heaters seemed to be the only source of warmth.

“He might have stayed here for a bit,” Susan said as she and Kathleen wandered into the last bedroom on the floor.

“Yeah, I guess.” Kathleen walked over to the window. “You know, we may be on the highest spot on the island. The view is incredible from here.”

Susan joined her. “You’re right. Look, there’s the Perry Island Care Center.”

“Where?”

Susan pointed.

“Wow! That is some location. Right on that thin peninsula out on the Sound. Amazing!”

Susan stared out the window. “You’re right. I didn’t realize it when I was inside the building.” She stood a while longer considering the scene before her and then turned to her friend. “I don’t think there’s anything else to be seen here. Obviously Mike Armstrong could have stayed here, but I don’t see what that proves. Let’s go out to Perry Island Care Center. Maybe we’ll come up with something there.”

Susan glanced down at her watch. “We still have about half an hour before we’re expected there.”

“Do you have another idea?”

“Yes. I’d like to see the real estate office where Blaine Baines got her start. It must be downtown.”

“Are you just curious or are you thinking of buying a second home?” Kathleen asked as they made their way downstairs.

“I’m just curious, but that’s not the story I’m going to tell anyone who asks.” She looked around as Kathleen closed the door behind them. “I wonder just how much a place like this costs.”

“Well, we’re going to the right place to find out.”

“You know, we’ve been in a lot of real estate offices in the past week, but this is the first one without the Baines name on the door,” Kathleen said, as they paused outside Perry Island Realty.

“It’s also the first one that didn’t promise exclusive or executive homes,” Susan pointed out.

“No, in fact, some of these homes seem to be anything but executive,” Kathleen said, squinting at one of the photographs displayed on a wooden board outside of the office. “This one’s not much more than a shack!”

“It’s a rental property. Most seem to be.”

“Maybe the sale listings are inside,” Kathleen said.

“If you women are looking for something to buy on the island, you’re not gonna have an easy time of it. Not much for sale this time of year.”

Kathleen and Susan realized they had been joined by a short, elderly man with a florid complexion and brilliant blue eyes. He was beaming at them. “We’re getting ready for a big summer rental season though, so if you’re in the market for a nice quiet house on the beach, you’ve come to the right place.”

“That’s exactly what we’re looking for,” Kathleen lied.

“Although we were thinking of buying sometime in the future,” Susan added, trying to cover all bases.

“Why don’t you both come right in and I’ll see if I can help you find everything you’re looking for.” He pulled a key chain from his pocket and unlocked the front door. “My name is Walter Heckman. Most people call me Walt,” he added, as though this was an unusual idea. “We’re pretty casual here on the island.”

“Is this your agency?” Susan asked. She and Kathleen followed him into his modest office.

“I don’t own it, but I run it and I’m the only agent here during the off-season. We don’t get enough business to make it worthwhile employing anyone else most of the year. Of course, we’re the only agency on the island and, in the summer, I’m swamped and I hire extra help.

“Just sit yourselves down on that couch right there and I’ll bring our listing books over.” He picked up two large loose-leaf folders from a cluttered desk in the back of the room. “Let’s see. You said rental and sales, right?”

“Yes,” Susan answered.

“Houses for sale or undeveloped property or both?”

“Uh… both. I’m interested in buying and my friend is thinking of renting for the summer,” Susan said.

“Someplace suitable for young children,” Kathleen added, getting into the spirit of the charade.

“I’m sure I have what you’re looking for right here then.” Walter put a stuffed loose-leaf folder down on the coffee table before Kathleen. “And these are for you,” he said, giving Susan two loose leafs with barely a dozen listings in each.

“That’s quite a difference,” Susan commented, opening the top folder.

“There was a time that we had a lot of properties for sale on the island, but things have changed a lot in the past few years.”

“Really.” Susan flipped through the sheets, remembering that Donald was supposed to have bought many properties on the island.

“Yes, I suspect it will be easier to help you find something to rent,” Walter Heckman said to Kathleen, pulling a chair across the room and placing it across from the two women. Susan noticed that he had placed himself slightly closer to Kathleen and he immediately reached out and began to flip through the notebook, describing some of the properties and when they would be available. Susan silently studied the material he had given her.

There were twelve houses for sale. They seemed to be arranged in descending order according to price. Susan perused each one, from the large turn-of-the-century stone mansion built on a seawall overlooking the Atlantic to a tiny fifties ranch huddled in the woods, looking for anything that might be significant but finding nothing. She then turned to the undeveloped properties, but, with only black-and-white photographs and having little idea of what acres of land actually meant, she found herself listening in on Kathleen’s conversation and wondering if her friend might actually be planning a summer vacation on Perry Island.

“I like these two, but they’re not on the ocean side of the island, are they? My daughter is not a very strong swimmer and I’m a bit concerned that she won’t be comfortable in large waves.”

Walter Heckman’s assurances that both of the properties in which Kathleen was professing an interest were on the Sound rang a bell. Susan examined the notebooks again and then gathered them up and wandered to the back of the room where a framed map of Perry Island hung on the wall.

“Can I get anything for you?”

“No, I was just wondering where… uh, where one of these houses is located.”

“The rental properties are marked with red pins, those for sale with green.”

Susan studied the map for about five seconds, idly listening to Kathleen and the real estate agent’s conversation, before she recognized the pattern before her: the red pins were scattered all over Perry Island although most were within a short walk of the water; all the green pins were stuck into the map on the Atlantic side of the island. Susan squinted and walked a few steps closer.

Friends and families of residents of the Perry Island Care Center could find many places to rent close by, but if they wanted to buy a home, they would be forced to travel all the way across the island to visit their loved ones.

Susan was continuing to examine the map, considering what this might mean when Kathleen joined her.

“Walt is going to get some application forms for me. I hope we won’t be late for lunch at P.I.C.C.”

“Dinner,” Susan corrected automatically.

Kathleen leaned closer to Susan. “You won’t believe what I’ve learned,” she said.

“Me, too.” Susan stopped speaking and smiled as Walter hurried over to the women, his hands full of contracts.

“I understand you’re in a hurry, but if you have any problems figuring these out, you will give me a call, won’t you?”

Kathleen turned back to him with a wide smile on her face. “Of course. I just need to speak with my husband and then I’ll get back to you.”

“Excellent. Perhaps I should give you my home phone number and my cell phone.”

“I can just leave a message on your phone here, can’t I?” Kathleen asked.

“Yes. Of course. If that is what you would prefer to do.”

“I would.”

“And thank you for your time. This has been very interesting,” Susan added as the women made for the door.

“Some of those homes are bargains, you know.” He rushed to get to the door before them. “There are very few ocean side estates available in the Northeast.”

“I’m afraid the places I’d like to own are slightly out of my price range,” Susan explained, trying to sound disappointed.

“I could put you on our list of prospective buyers. To let you know if anything new comes on the market.”

“That would be nice. I’m afraid we’re in rather a hurry right now though. Perhaps I could also call and let you know.”

The smile that had been fixed on Walter Heckman’s face since meeting Kathleen and Susan outside of his office vanished. “That would be fine. Of course. Whatever works for you.”

“You’ve really been very helpful,” Kathleen assured him warmly. “And I really will call.”

The smile returned to Walter’s face as he swept the door open for the women and they thanked him politely, waiting until they were alone in Susan’s car before saying any more.

“You won’t believe this,” Susan began. “There’s not one property for sale anywhere near Perry Island Care Center! Only rentals. The sale properties are all on the ocean side of the island.”

“And you won’t believe this. The majority of the rentals on the island-on the Sound side-are owned by Donald Baines Executive Homes, and the others are owned by Blaine Baines Executive Homes and Estates!”