A Minor Case of Murder Read online

  "I grew up in this town. And I remember there were always two or three houses in Doah that bore no evidence of Christmas. Jews, my mother explained, decent but misguided citizens who would never pass through the Gates of Heaven into the Kingdom of our Lord. I always felt sorry for the people who lived in those houses, their souls as barren as their homes at Christmastime. I still feel sorry for those in our community who do not believe—the Jews, the Muslims and the Chinese, the homosexuals, the liberals and the atheists. But now, when I think about the MunicipalBuilding at Christmas, dark and unadorned, I have to ask, 'Is the very town of Doah going straight to hell?' "

  The witnesses to the councilwoman's diatribe, elected officials and local residents alike, sat there in stunned silence, embarrassed by Ms. Becht's outburst. Many residents shared her disappointment at the anticipated absence of the Nativity scene which had stood proudly on the front lawn of the Municipal Building for so many years, but even her supporters—especially her supporters—sat there in silence, appalled by her interruption.

  "And in a town that has abandoned its Christian values…" Ms. Becht turned to stare at Cheyenne Harbrough, "…it seems that just about anyone believes they can be mayor."

  But Cheyenne Harbrough would not be shamed into silence. Cheyenne seized the issue with a disarming, self-deprecating humor.

  "Did you hear the one about the traveling salesman and the developer's daughter? A traveling salesman's car broke down, so he walked to the nearest house—it happened to be the home of a developer—and asked if he could stay the night. The developer told the salesman that yes, he could spend the night, but you'll have to sleep with my daughter. "So…" Cheyenne continued, "…the traveling salesman climbs into bed with the developer's well-endowed [here Cheyenne blushed] daughter and cautiously makes a pass at the young woman. She turns to the middle-aged salesman, warning, 'Stop that right now or I'll call my father,' but she gives the gentleman a kiss and rubs up against him and before long they are enjoying intimate relations. An hour later, the salesman finds himself ready to go again. 'Stop that right now,' the young lady again insists, 'or I'll call my father.' But, under the covers, she runs her fingers along the inside of his thigh. The story repeats itself each hour, on the hour, each time the young lady threatening to call her father, but in truth, the young lady instigating, controlling, and reveling in the coupling. Finally, at four in the morning, the young woman's naked body pressed up against the exhausted, middle-aged salesman. 'Stop that right now,' the salesman insists, 'or I'll call your father!' "

  Watching the debate at home on her TV, Cassie poured herself another Jameson.

  Three Web Sites and Two Jamesons Later

  Some men like to conduct their business on the golf course, standing on the first tee or lining up a putt on the back nine. Big Jim was not a golfer and had no use for the business and political opportunities to be found on the links. He was more likely to be found at his regular table at the Eggery, the large round table that had come to be known as the mayor's conference table, sitting at the table with a plate of Jimmy Dean breakfast links and a coffee black, one sugar, finding fact, dispensing wisdom and cutting deals that would benefit Doah Township, and coincidentally, the mayor himself.

  The Eggery was nothing special—that is, of course, unless you like your eggs over easy, thick slabs of homemade bread dripping butter, bacon extra-crispy, home fries extra-spicy, coffee so rich you can smell it from your car. You see what I mean: nothing special unless you like a waitress who knows when to leave you alone but who appears at your side scant moments before you yourself become aware of your desire.

  Big Jim's desires were prodigious, but uncomplicated—mayoral acclaim served with a side of breakfast sausage. At the start of his first term, Big Jim made it a habit to eat breakfast at the Eggery the morning after every political event in DoahTownship. He would meet with his shadow cabinet, official and unofficial advisors, political friends and foes alike, to discuss the wants and needs of the good citizens of Doah. Big Jim was truly bipartisan, welcoming the advice of his political opponents, who were, as well, his fishing buddies, bowling partners, drinking companions and lifelong friends and neighbors.

  Cheyenne was not a regular at the mayor's conference table. She was not even an occasional participant at these breakfast meetings, but she recognized that spending a few minutes with the mayor was the perfect opportunity to gauge the impact of the debate. When Cassie walked into the Eggery, meeting Cheyenne for breakfast, she found Cheyenne sitting with the mayor, her hand under the table, resting lightly on the mayoral thigh and discussing campaign strategy. As Cassie approached the table, Big Jim rose in greeting, until half out of his seat the mayor froze, awkward and embarrassed by his too-obvious arousal. Cheyenne chuckled, giving the mayor a quick peck on the cheek before greeting Cassie with a hug. Cassie and Cheyenne excused themselves and found a private table in the back of the restaurant.

  "So, Cassie, what did you think of the debate?" Cheyenne tried to hide a grin behind her coffee cup.

  "I thought you did pretty well last night. Held your own with the mayor. Made some good points about land use. But really, Cheyenne, was the sex joke really necessary?"

  Cheyenne's grin spilled out from behind the rich French roast. "I wasn't sure about it last night, but I'm feeling pretty good after talking to the mayor this morning."

  "Yeah?"

  "Yeah. Big Jim thinks that Beverly is such a whack job that I come across pretty normal. He wants the sex issue to be this big thing that's never discussed openly, this thing always lurking in the background, making it unseemly for me to be the mayor. But he doesn't want it out in the open where people will be reminded who it is I like to fool around with."

  "Is that why you had your hand on his thigh this morning? To remind everyone?"

  Cheyenne put down her cup of coffee. "To tell you the truth, Cassie, I like teasing the man. Anyway, enough about the debates. Tell me about Andy MacTavish."

  Cassie didn't know where to start. "He bought me a hot chocolate with mini-marshmallows. We talked."

  "And?"

  "And he's kind of dorky. His clothes. His hair. His music. It's like he's stuck in the 'fifties."

  "And?"

  "And he asked if he could call me."

  Cheyenne heard a lilt in Cassie's voice she hadn't heard since Cassie buried her late husband Rob. "And?"

  Cassie's face reddened. "If he calls, I think maybe I'm ready this time."

  Waiting for a man to call was harder than Cassie remembered. She needed to call her editor and discuss a story idea, but suddenly she felt like she was fifteen again, afraid to tie up the phone line and miss a call from Andy. She felt foolish, but on Monday afternoon she placed a call to her editor and pitched a series of stories about New Jersey psychics. Morris jumped at the idea, pleased that his star writer was thinking of multiple stories. He accepted the idea without argument, asking Cassie if she could have the first installment ready by the end of the week. She spent the rest of the day at her computer, trying, without success, to write "The Psychic Bowling Ball of White Sands Beach." Cassie went to bed, Monday night, waiting for a phone call from Andy MacTavish.

  On Tuesday, Cassie searched the Web, intending to look for links to psychic phenomena in New Jersey, but she found herself Googling Andy MacTavish instead. A page of links popped up on her computer screen, but the idea of reading up on Andy made her feel like a Peeping Tom. Without opening any of the links, Cassie exited the screen, reverting to her psychic search. She was directed to hundreds of thousands of hits and sampled a few, reading about levitation, ghosts, astral projection, psychic pets, prophecies, magic, mythology and secret societies. There was no way for Cassie to systematically sample the sites. She scrolled through page after page of search results, bypassing hundreds of links, waiting for…what? Cassie was confident she would recognize the site that she needed amongst the endless scroll. And she did. As she read about military applications of psychic phenomena, her story be
gan to take shape. Three Web sites and two Jamesons later, Cassie logged off the Internet and began to write her newly retitled story.

  The Psychic Spy Network

  Tucked away in a small kiosk on the boardwalk here in White Sands Beach, dressed in her lime green polyester bowling shirt and pink capri pants, chain-smoking Pall Malls, manning the express lane to psychic assistance (twelve questions or less), Madame Alexina remembers the Cold War.

  "I was in graduate school then. Nineteen seventy-one, I think. Yeah, 1971 and I was studying paranormal psychology. You know, ESP, astral projection, dream research, and stuff like that. Anyway, I was sitting in the psych lab one evening running data on an old-fashioned Wang calculator, trying to demonstrate the validity of the trance state and growing frustrated by the analysis of variance. It was getting pretty late—the place was empty, just me and a few lab rats— when I was approached by two suits. You know the kind, crew cuts, and shiny black shoes. I wasn't really into drugs—shit, I was having out-of-body experiences without pot, but it was 1971, so I figured they were narcs."

  But they weren't narcs. According to Madame Alexina, she was approached that night by the CIA and recruited for Project Stargate. At first I was skeptical, but now I've seen the documentation. The Russians were already developing remote spies; the CIA was determined to develop their own psychic spy network.

  "That first night, when they tried to tell me about their research priorities, well, I just threw them out of the lab. Anyway, they gave me an encoded access pass and went on their way. It was months before I decided to give them a call."

  If you believe Madame Alexina (and I do), she spent the next two decades fighting Communism as a remote spy for the CIA. We can only guess about the ways in which her psychic abilities were employed. Madame Alexina was understandably evasive when I asked about specific assignments, but she seems to have spent a good deal of time keeping watch from afar on Communist activity in Cuba and South America. Madame Alexina maintains that she has never left the country; my own research confirms that she has never applied for a passport. Still she has a detailed knowledge of persons and places in Chile and Nicaragua that cannot be found in any book. And she has way too much information regarding Castro's toilet habits.

  According to Madame Alexina, she left the CIA sometime in 1992, worn thin by the strain of two decades of remote spying. The transition to civilian life was not easy for her. Her academic approach to psychic phenomena no longer held her interest and she had great difficulty holding on to a job. She worked briefly in the Atlantic City casinos, spying on card counters and cheats, but she left when she found herself rooting for the cheats to beat the casino. On at least two occasions that she can remember, Madame Alexina was the state's guest at the GreystonePsychiatric Hospital.

  On September 11, 2001, Madame Alexina was in the day room at Greystone watching TV when a plane struck the first tower. On September 12, Madame Alexina was discharged. Today, she offers psychic advice (and sunscreen) to tourists in WhiteSandsBeach. I asked her whether that was all she was doing, but Madame Alexina chose not to respond.

  You be the judge.

  Cassie e-mailed the story to her editor, poured herself a Jameson and water, and turned on the TV. Channel surfing, she sampled a fashion makeover and a reality wedding before stopping to watch Hepburn and Bogart navigating the rapids in The African Queen. Cassie allowed herself to wonder whether Andy MacTavish might be her Humphrey Bogart.

  Inspired by her tale of psychic spying, Cassie found herself wishing she, too, had Madame Alexina's gift, but hard as she tried, Cassie could not look in on Andy MacTavish in his home in WhiteSandsBeach. Tuesday night, Cassie went to bed and, again, Andy MacTavish did not call.

  On Tuesday night, Cassie fell asleep thinking about Andy MacTavish, but her dream that night, as always, was of her late husband Rob. The details might change from night to night, but the dream never changed, nor did the result.

  They were twenty. In her dreams, Cassie and Rob were always twenty. They were at the seacoast. Not the Jersey coast; they were picking their way along huge granite cliffs, ancient, geometric slabs of granite, Ice Age sculpture. The tide was coming in, and they were wet and cold, victims of the collision of tide and cliff. Time was coming in, decades pounding against the granite cliff.

  They were twenty. In her dreams, Cassie and Rob were always twenty. They huddled behind the granite outcropping, hiding from time and tide, seeking shelter from the fierce ocean spray. Soaking wet, Cassie pulled off her sweatshirt and shorts, laying them out on the granite to dry.

  They were twenty. In her dreams, Cassie and Rob were always twenty. Huddled together in a glacial cave, surrounded by ancient slabs of granite, the crash of ocean on rock obliterating the world beyond, Cassie and Rob made love. Secure in the confines of their private granite universe, they made love and fell asleep.

  They were twenty. In her dreams, Cassie and Rob were always twenty. Asleep in the glacial cave, Cassie dreamt of children, of grandchildren, of great-grandchildren. Cassie dreamt of Grandpa Rob and Grandma Cassie. They were seventy. In her dreams, Cassie and Rob were always seventy.

  Suddenly, in her dream-within-a-dream, a seventy-year-old Cassie flew into a rage, screaming at a Grandpa Rob that would never be. In her dream, a twenty-year-old Cassie, still sleeping, was pounding on her husband, her pain echoing in the closeness of the glacial cave. And in a condo in Doah, a thirty-something Cassie sat up suddenly in bed, shivering in a sweltering heat, bug-eyed, exhausted.

  Cassie yearned for the morning that the sun would rise before she did.

  Her First Official Date

  Wednesday passed by in a blur. Cassie remembered just enough of the dream to be discomfited all day. She was teetering on the edge and unable to focus. She made a list of her reasons to be cranky, actually wrote out a list, stopping at reason number 342, finally giving in to the truth, unable to avoid the one reason she had refused to write, had refused even to think. It was Wednesday and, still, Andy MacTavish did not call.

  When Wednesday, mercifully, drew to a close, Cassie prepared for bed, dreading the dream she knew was waiting for her just on the other side of consciousness. But the dream did not come. Cassie enjoyed an undisturbed night's sleep, was still sleeping soundly when her phone introduced her to morning.

  She mumbled into the wrong end of the receiver. "Guh mawnin."

  "Good morning, Cassie. I hope I didn't wake you."

  "Hunnnh?" Cassie looked at the receiver and tried again. "Is that you…Andy?"

  On a beautiful Thursday morning in September, the sun warming her face, the phone call warming her heart, Andy MacTavish phoned Cassie O'Malley and asked her out on a date.

  Cassie had waited for years to care again about a date. She had waited for days wondering if he would call. After an uneventful night's sleep, she lay in bed Friday morning counting the hours until she could drive to WhiteSandsBeach for her first official date with Andy MacTavish. He had offered to pick her up in Doah, but Cassie wanted to drive. She needed to know that, at any point in the evening, she could simply say good night and head home. Certainly, she had no intention of spending the night with Andy MacTavish. After ten years of waiting, she would not have a man think she was easy. According to Andy, they would be going to a minor league ball game. Cassie could not honestly attribute her excitement to baseball.

  Andy MacTavish dated infrequently. He liked to tell himself that his business responsibilities kept him too busy for meaningful dating, but late at night, alone and lonely, he would allow himself to face the truth—his business success was not the cause of his difficulty getting dates, it was the result. Even now, he would gladly cut back on his wide-ranging business activities in exchange for a social life. It had taken Andy most of the week to prepare himself to call Cassie O'Malley. Sharing hot cocoa after a funeral was not the same as dating. She was beautiful. She was sophisticated. She was ever so slightly disreputable. She would not be interested in Andy MacTavish.

 
; By Thursday, Andy had run out of excuses to not call. And when he did call, she said yes. She said yes. And then suddenly, it was Friday evening, and they were meeting at the ballpark.

  Cassie and Andy had agreed to meet at the main gate half an hour before game time. Driving down from Doah, Cassie knew she was going to be late; still, she took the back roads, enjoying the drive through the Barrens, Freddie Hubbard on trumpet, Hubert Laws on flute, enjoying especially the evening's sweet anticipation. When she arrived at the ballpark, Andy was waiting out front, chatting with the ticket takers. It was Cassie's first visit to the cozy brick ballpark; immediately she felt at home. The ticket takers greeted her warmly; as they walked to their seats, Cassie noticed that everyone at the ballpark, the ushers, the vendors, all the personnel, stopped to say hello as Andy hustled them to their seats.

  The Sand Skeeters played ball in a 7,200-seat bandbox. Every seat was a good seat, close to the players, but some seats were better than others. Cassie was startled when Andy directed her to the best seats in the ballpark, the owner's luxury suite.

  "Are you friends with the owner?" Cassie was curious.

  Andy reddened. "I'm sorry. I thought you knew."

  He didn't know what else to say, so he took the opportunity to offer Cassie a brief history of minor league baseball in New Jersey.

  "When the Thunder relocated from London, Canada, to Trenton in 1994, the conventional wisdom was that minor league baseball would not succeed in New Jersey. This, despite a history of minor league teams in New Jersey, which extends back for more than a century. Even the casual fan is familiar with the storied Newark Bears whose 1937 team may have been the greatest minor league team ever. The experts all said that the small town appeal of minor league ball would not take hold again in New Jersey, where south Jersey fans can follow the Phillies and north Jersey fans root for the Yankees or the Mets." Andy gulped for air. "I'm sorry. I hope I'm not boring you with all this."