He returned to the stool, opened the notebook, and flipped pages. Clinging to his treasure for just a moment before yielding, just as he’d done with the mail.
“Here you go,” he said. “We’re not talking racy, Phil.”
I opened the book. Inside were forty or so double-sided pages- black paper sheathed in transparent plastic. Newspaper clippings bearing Kathleen Moriarty’s byline were inserted on each side. There was a flap on the inside front cover. I slid my hand in. Empty.
The articles were arranged chronologically. The first few, dating back fifteen years, were from The Daily Collegian at Cal State Fresno. A score or so, spanning a seven-year period, were from the Fresno Bee. Next came pieces from the Manchester Union Leader and the Boston Globe. The dates indicated Kathy Moriarty had stayed at each of the New England papers for only about a year.
I turned back to the beginning and checked out contents. For the most part, general interest stuff, and all local: Town meetings and personality pieces. Holiday features of the clever pet variety. An investigative trend didn’t creep in until Moriarty’s year at the Globe: a series on pollution in Boston Harbor and an exposÉ of cruelty to animals at a Worcester pharmacologic firm that didn’t appear to have gone very far.
The last insert was a review in the Hartford Courant of The Bad Earth, her book on pesticides. Small press publisher. Good marks for enthusiasm, points off for poor documentation.
I checked the back flap. Slipped out several folded pieces of newsprint. Skidmore was looking at his toes and hadn’t noticed. I unfolded and began reading.
Five opinion pieces, dated last year, from a paper called The GALA Banner and subtitled “The monthly newsletter of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Discrimination, Cambridge, Mass.”
Byline change to Kate Moriarty. Title of Contributing Editor.
These essays were filled with rage: male domination, the AIDS plague, the penis as a weapon. A piece on identity and misogyny. Stapled to that one was a scrap of newsprint.
Skidmore yawned. “Almost finished?”
“One sec.”
I read the scrap. The Globe, again, three years old. No Moriarty byline. No byline at all. Just a news summary- one of those “roundup” items papers run on page 2 of the final edition.
DOCTOR’S DEATH TIED TO OVERDOSE
(CAMBRIDGE) The death of a Harvard Psychiatric Fellow is believed to have resulted from an accidental or self-administered dose of barbiturates. The body of Eileen Wagner, 37, was found this morning in her office at the Beth Israel Hospital Psychiatry Department on Brookline Avenue. Time of death was estimated at some time during the night. Police would not speculate upon what led them to their conclusion, other than to say that Dr. Wagner had been suffering from “personal problems.” A graduate of Yale and Yale University Medical School, Dr. Wagner completed pediatric training at Western Pediatric Medical Center in Los Angeles and practiced medicine with the World Health Organization overseas before coming to Harvard last year to study Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.
I looked over at Skidmore. His eyes were closed. I pulled off the article, pocketed it, closed the book, and said, “Thanks, Richard. Now how about giving me a look at her apartment.”
His eyes opened.
“Just to make sure,” I said.
“Sure of what?”
“That she’s not there- hurt or worse.”
“No way is she there,” he said, with genuine anxiety that was refreshing. “No way, Marlowe.”
“How can you be sure?”
“I saw her drive away a month ago. White Datsun- you can get the plates, run some kind of trace, right?”
“What if she came back without the car? You might not have noticed- you yourself said the two of you didn’t see each other often.”
“No.” He shook his head. “Too weird.”
“Why don’t we just check, Richard? You can stand there and watch- just like with the scrapbook.”
He rubbed his eyes. Stared at me. Got up.
I followed him into a tiny, dark kitchen where he picked a ring of keys out of a pile of junk and pushed open a rear door. We walked across a backyard too small for hopscotch to a double garage. The garage doors were the old-fashioned hinge-type. Door-sized inserts were centered in each. Garage apartments. Literally.
Skidmore said, “This one,” and led me to the unit on the left. The door-within-a-door was deadbolted.
“Illegal,” he said, “converting the garage. You won’t tell on me, Marlowe, will you?”
“Cross my heart.”
Smiling, he shuffled keys. Then turned serious and stopped.
“What is it, Richard?”
“Wouldn’t it smell- if she was… you know.”
“Depends, Richard. You never can tell.”
Another smile. Shaky. He fumbled with the keys.
“One thing I’m curious about,” I said. “If you thought I was here to dun Kathy for money, why’d you let me in?”
“Simple,” he said. “Material.”
Kathy Moriarty’s home was a twenty-by-twenty room that still reeked of automobile. The floor was wheat-colored linoleum squares; the walls were white plasterboard. The furniture was a twin-size mattress on the floor, sheet crumpled at the foot, revealing sweat-stained blue ticking. Wooden nightstand, round white Formica table, and three metal chairs padded at seat and back with dollops of yellow Hawaiian-print plastic. One of the far corners contained a hot plate on a metal stand; the other, a Fiberglas water closet no bigger than an airplane latrine. Above the hot plate a single bracket shelf held a few dishes and kitchen utensils. On the opposite wall was a makeshift closet frame of white PVC tubing. A few outfits, mostly jeans and shirts, hung from the horizontal tube.
Kathy Moriarty hadn’t spent her sister’s money on interior decorating. I had an idea where the funds had gone.
Skidmore said, “Oh, man.” The skin beneath his stubble was white and one hand was atop his head, snarled in hair.
“What is it?”
“Either someone’s been here or she’s packed out on me.”
“What makes you say that?”
He waved his hands, suddenly agitated. The kid with the poor attention span, struggling to make himself clear.
“This wasn’t the way it looked when she was here. She had luggage- lots of suitcases, a backpack… this big trunk that she used for a coffee table.” He looked around and pointed. “Right there. And there was a pile of books right on it- next to the mattress.”
“What kinds of books?”
“I don’t know- I never checked… but one thing I’m sure of: It didn’t look this way.”
“When’s the last time you saw it look any different?”
The hand in his hair clawed and gathered a clump. “Just before I saw her drive away- when would that be? Maybe five weeks. Or six, I don’t know. It was at night. I brought her some mail, and she was sitting with her feet up on the chest. So the chest was there- that’s for sure. Five or six weeks ago.”
“Any idea what was in the chest?”
“No. For all I know it was empty- but why would anyone take an empty trunk, right? So it probably wasn’t. And if she packed out, why would she leave her clothes and her dishes and stuff?”
“Good thinking, Richard.”
“Very weird.”
We entered the room. He stood back and I began circling. Then I saw something on the floor next to the mattress. Fleck of foam. Couple more. Bending down, I ran my hand along the side of the mattress. More foam fell out. My fingers searched and I found the wound: straight as a seam, surgically neat, barely noticeable even from up close.
“What?” said Skidmore.
“It’s been slit open.”
“Oh, man.” He moved his head from side to side, flapping his hair.
He stayed in place while I got down on my knees, spread the lips of the slit, and peered inside. Nothing. I looked around the rest of the room. Nothing.