“That's what I thought,” he said. “Won't be home for a while yet.”
“Nice fire escape.”
“Could use some repair, what with the bolts being all rusted out. Don't know if I'd trust it. Course if there was a fire a body might not care about rust.”
I sent him a tight smile and crawled the rest of the way through the window. I wasted little time getting down the stairs and out of the building. I hopped into my Jeep, locked the doors, and took off.
Half an hour later I was back in my apartment, deciding what to wear for an evening of sleuthing. I settled on boots, a long denim skirt, and a white knit shirt. I spiffed up my makeup and put a few hot rollers in my hair. When the rollers came out I was several inches taller. I still wasn't tall enough to make it in pro ball, but I bet I could intimidate the hell out of the average Pakistani.
I was debating Burger King versus Pizza Hut when the phone rang. “Stephanie,” my mother said, “I have a big potful of stuffed cabbages. And spice cake for dessert.”
“Sounds good,” I said, “but I've made plans for this evening.”
“What plans?”
“Dinner plans.”
“Do you have a date?”
“No.”
“Then you don't have any plans.”
“There's more to life than dates.”
“Like what?”
“Like work.”
“Stephanie, Stephanie, Stephanie, you work for your no-good cousin Vinnie catching hoodlums. This is no kind of work.”
I mentally bashed my head against the wall.
“I've got vanilla ice cream, too, for the spice cake,” she said.
“Is it low-fat ice cream?”
“No, it's the expensive kind that comes in the little cardboard tub.”
“Okay,” I said. “I'll be there.”
Rex popped out of his soup can and stretched, front feet out, hindquarters raised. He yawned and I could see down his throat all the way to the insides of his toes. He sniffed at his food cup, found it lacking, and moved on to his wheel.
I gave him a rundown on my night, so he wouldn't worry if I came home late. I left the light burning in the kitchen, turned my answering machine on, grabbed my pocketbook and brown leather bomber jacket, and locked up after myself. I'd be a little early, but that was okay. It'd give me time to read through the obits and decide where to go after supper.
Streetlights were blinking on when I pulled up to the house. A harvest moon hung low and swollen in the dusky evening sky. The temperature had dropped since the afternoon.
Grandma Mazur met me in the foyer. Her steel gray hair was tightly curled in little sausage rolls all over her head. Pink scalp gleamed between the rolls.
“Went to the beauty parlor today,” she said. “Thought I might pick up some information for you on the Mancuso case.”
“How'd it go?”
"Pretty good. I got a nice set. Norma Szajack, Betty's second cousin, was there getting her hair dyed, and everyone said that's what I should do. I would have tried it out, but I saw on a show that some of them hair dyes give you cancer. I think it might have been Kathy Lee. Had on this woman with a tumor the size of a basketball, and she said it came from hair dye.
“Anyway, Norma and me got to talking. You know Norma's boy Billie went to school with Kenny Mancuso and now Billie works at one of them casinos in Atlantic City. Norma said when Kenny got out of the army he started going down to Atlantic City. She said Billie told her Kenny was one of them high rollers.”
“Did she say if Kenny had been to Atlantic City lately?”