I shook hands with her, startled how bony and warm her hand felt in mine. Her grip was iron.
She glanced at the woman to her right, introducing me. “This is Nola Fraker.”
“Hi, how are you?” I said as we shook hands.
“And Sufi Daniels.”
Murmured pleasantries were exchanged. Nola was a redhead, with clear, fine-textured skin, and luminous blue eyes, wearing a dark red jumpsuit that left her arms bare and a deep V of naked flesh visible from throat to waist. Already, I didn’t want her to bend down or make any sudden moves. I had the feeling I knew her from somewhere. Possibly I’d seen her picture in the society section or something of that sort. Reminder bells went oft; at any rate, and I wondered what the story was.
The other woman, Sufi, was small and somewhat misshapen, thick through the trunk, her back hunched. She wore a mauve velour sweatsuit that looked like she’d never sweated in it. Her blond hair was thin and fine, worn too long, I thought, to be flattering.
After a decent interval, the three of them resumed their conversation, much to my relief. I hadn’t the faintest idea what to say to them. Nola was talking about a thirty-dollar fabric remnant she was whipping up to wear to a wine-tasting down in Los Angeles. “I checked all the shops in Montebello, but it was ridiculous! I wouldn’t pay four bills for an outfit. I wouldn’t even pay two” she said with energy.
That surprised me. She looked like a woman who enjoyed extravagance. Unless I just make up things like that. My notion of women with money is that they drive to Beverly Hills to have their legs waxed, charge a bauble or two on Rodeo Drive, and then go to charity luncheons at $1,500 a plate. I couldn’t picture Nola Fraker pawing through the bargain bin at our local Stretch N’ Sew. Maybe she’d been poor as a young girl and couldn’t get used to being a doctors wife.
Bobby took my arm and steered me toward the men. He introduced me to his stepfather, Derek Wenner, and then in quick succession to Drs. Fraker, Metcalf, and Kleinert. Before I knew what to think, he was hustling me toward the hallway. “Let’s go upstairs. We’ll find Kitty and then I’ll show you the rest of the house.”
“Bobby, I want to talk to those people!” I said.
“No, you don’t. They’re dull and they don’t know anything. “
As we passed a side table, I started to set my wineglass down, but he shook his head. “Bring it with you.”
He grabbed a full bottle of wine out of a silver cooler and tucked it under his arm. He was really moving at a fair clip, limp and all, and I could hear my high heels clip-clopping along inelegantly as we moved toward the foyer. I paused for a moment to slip my shoes off, and then I caught up with him. Something about Bobby’s attitude made me want to laugh. He was accustomed to doing exactly as he pleased among people I’d been taught to respect. My aunt would have been impressed by the company, but Bobby didn’t seem to be.
We went up the stairs, Bobby pulling himself along by the smooth stone banister.
“Your mother doesn’t use the name Wenner?” I asked, as I followed him.
“Nope. Callahan is her maiden name as a matter offact. I changed mine to Callahan when she and my father divorced.”
“That’s unusual, isn’t it?”
“Doesn’t seem that way to me. He’s a jerk. This way, I don’t have to be connected to him any more than she does.”
The gallery at the top formed a semicircle with wings branching out on either side. We passed through an archway to the right and into a wide corridor with rooms opening off at intervals. Most of the doors were closed. Daylight was beginning to fade and the upstairs was gloomy. I once conducted a homicide investigation at an exclusive girls’ school that had this same air to it. The house felt as if it had been converted to institutional use, someplace impersonal and chill. Bobby knocked at the third door down on the right.
“Kitty?”
“Just a minute,” she called.
He flashed me a smile. “She’ll be stoned.”
Hey, why not? I thought with a shrug. Seventeen.
The door opened and she looked out, gaze shifting from Bobby to me with suspicion. “Who’s this?”
“Come on, Kitty. Would you knock that shit off?”
She moved away from the door indifferently. Bobby and I went in and he closed the door behind us. She was anoretic; tail and painfully thin, with knees and elbow joints standing out like Tinkertoys. Her face was gaunt. She was barefoot, wearing shorts and a white tube top that looked about as big as a man’s crew sock, one size fits all.
“What are you looking at?” she said. She didn’t seem to expect an answer so I didn’t bother with one. She flopped down on an unmade king-sized bed, staring at me as she took up a cigarette and lit it. Her nails were bitten to the quick. The room had been painted black and looked like a parody of an adolescent girl’s room. There were lots of posters and stuffed animals but all of them had a nightmare quality. The posters were of rock groups in tartish makeup, sinister and sneering, depicted in vignettes largely hostile toward women. The stuffed animals ran more to satyrs than Winnie-the-Pooh. The air was scented with eau de dope and my guess was she’d smoked so much grass in there, you could bury your nose in the bedcovers and get high.
Bobby apparently enjoyed her antagonism. He pulled a chair over for me, dumping clothes on the floor unceremoniously. I sat down and he stretched out on the foot of the bed, circling her left ankle with one hand. His fingers overlapped as if he were holding her wrist instead. It reminded me of Hansel and Gretel. Maybe Kitty was worried that if she got fat, they’d put her in the cooking pot. I thought they’d put her in a grave long before that point and it was frightening. She leaned back on both elbows, smiling at me faintly down the length of her long, frail legs. All the veins were visible, like an anatomical diagram with a celluloid overlay. I could see how the bones were strung together in her feet, her toes looking almost prehensile.
“So what’s going on downstairs?” she said to Bobby, her gaze still pinned on me. Her speech was ever so slightly slurred and her eyes seemed to swim in and out of focus. I wondered if she was drunk or had just popped some pills.
“They’re standing around sucking up booze as usual. Speaking of which, I brought us wine,” he said. “Got a glass?”
She leaned over to her bed-table and sorted through the mess, coming up with a tumbler with something sticky and green in the bottom: absinthe or creme de menthe. She held the glass out to him. The wine he poured into it became tainted with the remnants of liqueur.
“So, who’s the chick?”
I loathe being called a chick.
Bobby laughed. “Oh God, I’m sorry. This is Kinsey. She’s the private detective I told you about.”
“I should’ve figured as much,” Her eyes came back to mine, her pupils so dilated I couldn’t tell what color the irises were. “So how do you like our little sideshow? Bobby and I are the family freaks. What a pair, right?”
This child was getting on my nerves. She wasn’t smart enough or quick enough to pull off the tough air she was affecting, and the strain was evident, like watching a stand-up comic with second-rate gags,
Bobby cut in smoothly. “Dr. Kleinert’s downstairs.”
“Ah, Dr. Destructo. What did you think of him?” She took a drag of her cigarette, feigning nonchalance, but I sensed that she was genuinely curious about my response.
“I didn’t talk to him,” I said. “Bobby wanted me to meet you first.”
She stared at me and I stared back. I remembered doing this sort of stuff in sixth grade with my mortal enemy, Tommy Jancko. I forget now why we disliked each other, but stare contests were definitely the weapons of choice.
She looked back at Bobby. “He wants me hospitalized. D’l tell you that?”
“You going?”
“Hey, no twit/! Get all those needles stuck in me? Uh-un, no thanks. I’m not interested.” She swung her long legs over the side of the bed and got up. She crossed the room to a low dressing table with a gilt-edged mirror above it. She studied her face, glancing back at me. “You think I look thin?”
“Very.”
“Really?” She seemed fascinated by the notion, turning slightly so she could see her own flat behind. She studied her face again, watching herself take a drag of her cigarette. She did a quick shrug. Everything looked fine to her.