Shakespeare’s Landlord

Chapter Three

He was exactly on time.

As I stepped back to let him in, I was again impressed by his size and presence.

The big thing about fear, I reminded myself, is not to show it. Having braced myself with that piece of personal junk philosophy, I found myself unable to show the policeman much of anything, besides a still face that could be construed as simply sullen.

I watched him scanning my sparse furniture, pieces that were on sale at the most expensive local stores, pieces I’d carefully selected and placed exactly where I wanted. It is a small living room, and I’d chosen with its size in mind: a reclining love seat with a footrest, rather than a sofa; a wing chair; small occasional tables; small pictures. I have a television set, but it, too, is not large. There are no photographs. There are library books, a large stack, on the bottom level of the table by my chair.

The prevailing colors in both upholstery and pictures are dark blue and tan.

“How long have you lived in this house?” Friedrich asked when he’d finished looking.

“I bought it four years ago.”

“From Pardon Albee.”

“Yes.”

“And you bought it when you came to Shakespeare?”

“I rented it at first, with an option to buy.”

“What exactly do you do for your living, Miss-is it Miss?-Bard?”

Titles are not important to me, nor is political correctness. I didn’t tell him to call me Ms. But I saw that he had expected me to correct him.

“I clean houses.”

“But a few things more than that?”

He’d done his research. Or maybe he’d always known about me, every detail of my life here in Shakespeare. After all, how much could the chief of police in this town have to occupy his mind?

“A few things.” He required elaboration, his lifted eyebrows implying I was being churlish with my short answers. I suppose I was. I sighed. “I run errands for a few older people. I help families when they go out of town, if a neighbor can’t. I get groceries in before the family comes home, feed the dog, mow the yard, and water the plants.”

“How well did you know Pardon Albee?”

“I bought this house from him. I clean some apartments in the building he owned, but that is by arrangement with the individual tenants. I worked for him a couple of times. I saw him in passing.”

“Did you have a social relationship with him, maybe?”

I flared up to speak before I realized I was being goaded. I shut my mouth again. I breathed deeply. “I did not have a social relationship with Mr. Albee.” As a matter of fact, I’d always had a physical aversion to Pardon; he was white and soft and lumpy-looking, without any splendors of character to counterbalance this lack of fitness.

Friedrich studied his hands; he’d folded them together, fingers interlaced. He was leaning forward, his elbows resting on his thighs.

“About last night,” he rumbled, shooting a sudden look over at me. I’d seated him on the love seat, while I was in the wing chair. I didn’t nod; I didn’t speak. I just waited.

“Did you see anything unusual?” He leaned back suddenly, looking straight at me.

“Unusual.” I tried to look thoughtful, but felt I was probably just succeeding in looking stubborn.

“I went to bed about eleven,” I said hastily. I had-the first time, when I’d found I couldn’t sleep. “Marie-Mrs. Hofstettler-told me this morning there was a lot of activity outside, but I’m afraid I didn’t hear it.”

“Someone called me about two-thirty in the morning,” Friedrich said gently. “A woman. This woman said there was a body in the park, across the street from me.”

“Oh?”

“Oh yes, Miss Bard. Now I think this woman saw something, something about how that body got into that park, and I think that woman got scared, or knew who did it and was scared of that person, or maybe had a hand in Pardon Albee’s turning up out there and just didn’t want the poor man to lie in the park all night and get covered in dew this morning. So I think whoever it was, for whatever reason, had some concern about what happened to Pardon’s remains. I sure would like to talk to that woman.”

He waited.

I did my best to look blank.

He sighed, heavily and wearily.

“Okay, Miss Bard. You didn’t see anything and you don’t know anything. But if you think of something,” he said with heavy irony in his voice, “call me day or night.”

There was something so solid about Police Chief Claude Friedrich that I was actually tempted to confide in him. But I thought of my past, and of its emerging, ruining the sane and steady existence I’d created in this little town.

And at this moment, I knew the man was dangerous. I came out of my reverie, to find he was waiting for me to speak, that he knew I was contemplating telling him something.

“Good-bye,” I said, and rose to show him to the door.

Friedrich looked disappointed as he left. But he said nothing, and those gray eyes, resting on me, did not look hostile.

After I’d locked the door behind him, I realized, apropos of nothing, that he was maybe the fifth person who’d entered my house in four years.

On Tuesday evenings at 5:30, I clean a dentist’s office. When I first moved to Shakespeare and was living off my savings (what was left after I’d finished paying what the insurance didn’t cover on my medical bills), while I built up my clientele, Dr. Sizemore had stayed until I got there, watched me clean, and locked the door behind me when I left. Now I have a key. I bring my own cleaning supplies to Dr. Sizemore’s; he prefers it that way, so I charge him a little more. It is a matter of indifference to me whether I use my own supplies or the client’s; I have my favorites, but they have theirs, too. I want to be Lily Bard who cleans; I don’t want to be Busy Hands or Maids to Go or anything business-sounding.

Strictly privately, I call myself Shakespeare’s Sanitary Service.

I’d thought of housecleaning as the ultimate in detachment when I’d decided how I would try to support myself, but cleaning has turned out to be an intimate occupation. Not only have I found out physical details about the people who employ me (for example, Dr. Sizemore is losing his hair and has problems with constipation) but I’ve learned more about their lives, involuntarily, than I feel comfortable with.

Sometimes I amuse myself by writing a fictional column for the biweekly Shakespeare Journal while I work. “Dr. John Sizemore recently received a bill from a skin magazine-and I don’t mean the kind for dermatologists-so he’s hiding the copies somewhere… His receptionist, Mary Helen Hargreaves [when the locals said it, it sounded like Mare Heln] does her nails at work and reads English mystery novels on her lunch hour… His nurse, Linda Gentry, finished a package of birth control pills today, so next cleaning night, there’ll be Tampax in the bathroom.”

But who would be interested in a column like that? The things I’ve learned are not things of real interest to anyone, though I was among the first to know that Jerri Sizemore wanted a divorce (the summons from the lawyer had been open on John Sizemore’s desk), and I learned last week that Bobo Winthrop was practicing safe sex with someone while his parents were at the country club dance.

There are lots of things I know, and I’ve never told anyone or even thought of it. But this thing I know, about the death of Pardon Albee… this, I thought, I might have to tell.

It would lead to exposure, I felt in my bones.

My life might not be much, but it’s all I have and it’s livable. I’ve tried other lives; this one suits me best.

I was through at Dr. Sizemore’s at 7:30, and I locked the door carefully, then went home to eat a chicken breast, a roll, and some broccoli sprinkled with Parmesan cheese. After I’d cleaned up the kitchen, I fidgeted around the house, tried a library book, slammed it shut, and at last resorted to turning on the television.

I’d forgotten to check the time. I’d turned the TV on during the news. The pictures were among the worst: women holding screaming children, bombs exploding, bodies in the street in the limp grip of death. I saw the face of one desperate woman whose family was buried in rubble, and before my finger could punch the channel changer, tears were running down my face.

I haven’t been able to watch the news in years.