Sara Paretsky - V.I. Warshawski 07 (7 page)

“Mrs.
Frizell! Mrs. Frizell! Are you home?”

Her
neighbor, who’d hovered on the front walk while I worked on the lock, came in
with Carol, clucking her tongue and making worried sounds in her throat. The
dogs rushed past us, spattering our legs with urine.

“Mrs.
Frizell? It’s me, Mrs. Hellstrom. We just want to see if you’re all right.”

Mrs.
Hellstrom found a lamp inside the living room door. In its feeble glow I
finally saw a wall switch for the hall. It had been a long time since Mrs.
Frizell had felt the impulse to clean anything. Dust had disintegrated into a
thick coat of dirt; our damp shoes turned it to mud. Even through the stench
and the chaos, though, it was clear that the only place the dogs had been
relieving themselves was by the door. She looked after them even if she didn’t
care about herself.

I
followed the Lab up the stairs, playing the flashlight on the threadbare
carpet, choking and sneezing on the dust I kicked up. The dog led me to the
bathroom. Mrs. Frizell was lying on the floor, naked except for a towel
clutched to her side.

I
turned on the switch but the light was burned out. I called the news down to
Carol and knelt down to find Mrs. FrizeU’s pulse. The Lab, energetically
licking her face, growled at me but didn’t try to bite me. Just as Carol and
Mrs. Hellstrom joined me I felt a faint flutter.

“Bruce,”
I heard Mrs. Frizell say faintly as I backed away. “Bruce, don’t leave me.”

“No,
honey,” Mrs. Hellstrom said. “He won’t leave you. You’re gonna be okay now—you
just took a bad fall.”

“Can
you get me a better light, Vic?” Carol said sharply. “And call 911. She’s going
to need a hospital.”

I
shoved my way past the other dogs crowding into the doorway and found the old
woman’s bedroom. As I went in I tripped and fell over the piles of bedding on
the floor. I supposed they were for the dogs, although I had assumed they would
sleep in bed with her. I unscrewed the twenty-watt bulb from the naked
gooseneck lamp by the bed and took it back to the bathroom.

“Blankets,
Vic, and get that ambulance,” Carol said sharply, not looking up.

“Mrs.
Hellstrom? Can you bring some blankets while I hunt for a telephone?”

Mrs.
Hellstrom was glad to be useful, but clucked again in dismay when she saw the
blankets. “These are so dirty, maybe I ought to go home and get something
clean.”

“I
think it’s just important to get her warm. She can’t get much dirtier than she
already is, lying on that floor all day.”

Downstairs
I found Mr. Contreras trying to clean up the worst of the mess by the front
door. “You found her, doll? She alive?”

I
gave him a brief report while I hunted around for a phone. I finally found an
old-fashioned black model buried under a stack of newspapers in the living
room. The dial was stiff but the phone was still connected. So she was at least
in touch with reality enough to pay her bills.

I
called the emergency number and explained the problem, then went to the kitchen
to find something to use as a cleanser. It seemed important that Todd Pichea
and Vinnie not know the dogs had been defecating in the house. Although anyone
who thought about it would know they’d have to. Even the best-trained dogs
can’t hold on to themselves for twenty-four hours.

I
took the dogs’ water dish and a bottle of Joy so old the detergent had hardened
in it. I dug a spoonful of soap out, mixed it with water, and started scrubbing
with some kitchen towels I found in the back of a cupboard. The kitchen was as
bad as the front hallway, so I emptied the dogs’ food dish and dug some soap
into it for Mr. Contreras. By the time the paramedics arrived, escorted by a
couple of blue-and-whites, we’d cleaned up the worst of the mess. The stretcher
bearers wrinkled their noses against the clouds of dust as they climbed the
stairs, but at least they wouldn’t be able to report a heap of dog shit to the
city.

“You
her daughter?” one of the cops asked as the medics brought Mrs. Frizell down.

“No.
We’re all neighbors,” I said. “We just got concerned because we hadn’t seen her
for a few days.”

“She
got any kids?”

“Just
one son. He lives in San Francisco, but he comes to see her every now and then.
He grew up here but I don’t really know him; I never can remember his first
name.” That was Mrs. Hellstrom.

One
of the medics leaned over the stretcher. “Can you tell us your son’s name,
honey? Or his phone number?”

Mrs.
Frizell’s eyes were open, but they were unfocused. “Bruce. Don’t let them take
Bruce away from me.”

Mrs.
Hellstrom knelt clumsily next to her. “I’ll look after Bruce for you, honey,
but what’s your son’s phone number?”

“Bruce,”
the old woman called hoarsely. “Bruce.” The paramedics picked her up and took her
out the front door. I could see Vinnie and the Picheas still waiting by the
gate.

“Bruce
isn’t her son?” I asked.

“No,
honey,” Mrs. Hellstrom said. “That’s the big dog, the black one.”

“Can
you take care of the dogs while she’s in the hospital? Or at least until we can
get her son out here?”

Mrs.
Hellstrom looked unhappy. “I don’t want to. But I guess I can feed them and let
them out as long as they stay over here.”

The
police stayed a bit longer, asking how we discovered Mrs. Frizell, what our
relationship to her was, and so on. They didn’t pay attention to Todd’s annoyed
squawks about my breaking and entering. “At least she found the old lady, son.
You think she should have been left to die?” an officer who looked close to
retirement said.

When
they realized Carol was a nurse, they took her to one side for a more detailed
set of questions.

“Do
you know what’s wrong with her?” I asked Carol when the cops finally left.

“I
think she broke something, probably her hip, getting out of the tub. She’s
badly dehydrated, so her mind’s wandering a bit. I couldn’t get a clear picture
of when she might have fallen. She might have been lying there a couple of
days. We’re lucky we came down, Vic; I don’t think she’d‘ve made it through the
night.”

“So
it’s a good thing I decided to get involved,” Todd put in.

“Involved?”
Mr. Contreras huffed. “Involved? Who found her? Who got the medics? You just
stood out there keeping your wing tips clean.”

That
wasn’t a fair comment: Pichea was wearing topsiders.

“Look,
here, old man,” he began, leaning toward Mr. Contreras.

“Don’t
try to argue with them, Todd. They’re not the kind who can understand you.”
Mrs. Pichea linked her arm through her husband’s and looked around the dirty
hall, her nose wrinkling in contempt.

Mrs.
Hellstrom touched my arm. “You gonna try.to find her son, honey? Because I
should be going home. I want to change these clothes, anyway.”

“Oh,
there’s a son?” Pichea said. “Maybe it’s time he came home and took charge of
his mother.”

“And
maybe she wants to live her own life,” I snapped. “Why don’t you go to bed now,
Pichea? You’ve done your good deed for the day.”

“Nope.
I want to talk to the son, get him to understand that his mother’s gotten way
out of hand.”

The
dogs, who’d been barking at the ambulance, came roaring back into the house and
started jumping up on us. Pichea stuck out one of his topsiders to kick the
earmuff. As the little dog went yelping down the hall I cupped Pichea on the
shin.

“It’s
not your house, big guy. If you’re scared of dogs, stay at home.”

His
tight, square face looked ugly. “I could have you brought in for assault,
Warshawski.”

“You
could, but you won’t. You’re too chicken to take on someone your own size.” I
muscled my way past him and started a dispiriting search for a piece of paper
with Mrs. Frizell’s son’s name on it. It took me only half an hour to realize I
could call directory assistance in San Francisco—how many Frizells could there
be? Six, as it turned out, with a couple of different spellings. The fourth one
I reached, Byron, was her son. Tepid would be a strong description for his
response to the news about his mother.

“You’ve
got her to a hospital? Good, good. Thanks for taking the time to call.”

“You
want to know what hospital?”

“What?
Oh, might as well. Look, I’m in the middle of something right now—Sharansky,
did you say your name was? Why don’t I call you in the morning.”

“Warshawski.”
I started to spell it but he’d broken the connection.

Todd
waited around until Byron cut me off. “So what’s he going to do?”

“He’s
not catching the first plane out. Mrs. Hellstrom will look after the dogs. Why
don’t the rest of us just go home and give it a rest.”

Like
Mrs. Hellstrom, I was anxious to change my clothes. Carol had already gone
while I was trying the second Frizell. Mr. Contreras had wandered out to the
kitchen to put out fresh food and water for the dogs. He was anxious to get
back to Peppy, but was too chivalrous to leave me alone here.

“You
think they’ll be okay, doll?”

“I
think they’ll be fine,” I said firmly. I was damned if he’d saddle me with five
more dogs to look after.

As I
shut up the house we could hear them whining and scratching at the front door.

The
next morning, before leaving for work, I put two hours into cleaning and
polishing my apartment. Pichea’s remark last night had flicked me on the raw.
Not about finding myself alone at eighty-five—I could envision worse fates—but
finding myself like Mrs. Frizell: my stacks of newspaper and dustballs
crumbling into lung-choking dirt; so cantankerous that the neighbors didn’t
want to call even when they thought I might be ill.

I
baled a month’s worth of newspapers in twine and set them by the front door to
drop at the recycling center. I polished the piano and the coffee table until
they would have met even Gabriella’s high standard, washed the dishes piled on
the sink and kitchen table, threw out all the moldy food in the refrigerator.
That left me with a choice of peanut butter or canned minestrone for supper,
but maybe I could squeeze in an hour at the grocery on my way home.

I
skipped my run and took the el downtown. The work I’d planned for the day would
take me to a variety of government offices scattered around the Loop; the car
would only get in my way. By four I was able to call Daraugh Graham to report
on Clint Moss. He really was anxious for information: his secretary had word to
interrupt the meeting he was in to receive my report.

When
Daraugh learned Moss had invented his class standing in the University of
Chicago’s MBA program, he demanded that I go to Pittsburgh to make sure he
hadn’t manufactured his previous work history. I didn’t want to do it, but my
payments on the Trans Am meant keeping my good customers happy. I agreed to
catch an early flight the next day—not at seven, as Daraugh ordered, but eight,
which meant getting out of bed at six. That seemed like enough of a sacrifice
to me.

I
stopped at Mrs. Hellstrom’s on the way home to see how she was making out with
Mrs. Frizell’s dogs. She seemed a little flustered; she was trying to get
dinner for her grandchildren and didn’t see how she could manage to look after
the dogs at the same time.

“I’m
going out of town in the morning, but when I get back on Friday I’ll give you a
hand,” I heard myself saying. “If you take care of them in the morning I’ll
feed them and walk them in the afternoon.”

“Oh,
would you? That would be such a relief. Mrs. Frizell is so peculiar, you
wouldn’t think she’d care, but we could steal everything she has in the
house—not that there’s anything in there I want, mind you—and she wouldn’t
notice. But if we didn’t feed her precious poochies she’d probably sue us. It
just seems like so much work.”

She
gave me the keys we’d found buried in the living room the night before,
confident I planned to start my evening shift at once. “Just put the keys
through my mail slot when you’re done. I’ll get duplicates made while you’re
away and put them in your mailbox. No, maybe I should give them to that nice
man that lives downstairs from you. He seems reliable, and I hate to leave
someone’s house keys lying around.”

I
asked if she knew which hospital Mrs. Frizell was in.

“They
took her to Cook County, dear, on account of her not having any insurance—she’d
never even signed up for Medicare—it really makes you think, doesn’t it? I
don’t know what we’ll do when my man retires. He was thinking of doing it next
year. He’ll be fifty-eight, and enough’s enough after a while, but when you see
what happens to old people—but anyway, maybe I’ll try to get over to see her
tomorrow. You’d think that son of hers—but of course, he didn’t have too easy a
time, growing up in that house. Couldn’t wait to leave, and small wonder, when
you see how she is. His daddy couldn’t take it, either: scooted a month before
he was born.”

I
took the keys from her before she could elaborate on the eccentricities that
drove both Mr. Frizell and his son from Harriet Frizell’s side. Maybe she
wouldn’t have been so suspicious and inward-turned if her husband had stayed
around. And maybe not.