Standard poodles need daily exercise and quality time with their masters. Fifteen minutes of our game leaves Jake winded and ready for a nap. It doesn’t tire me out at all. Jake does all the work. It proceeds like this. I dribble the ball behind the three-point line and try to shoot. Jake tries to steal the ball and occasionally does. When I try to shoot Jake defends. It is not easy trying to score from three-point range with a standard poodle in your face. Especially one that appears to have pogo sticks for legs. I shoot and occasionally score. Jake tracks down the ball and maneuvers it around the court with his nose until he has finally rolled it back to me and the process starts over. We went through our routine and when I thought Jake was sufficiently winded we went back inside.
The answering machine was still beeping. I punched the button and was greeted by a familiar sexy voice. “Hey, Donnie, what’s happening? Call me when you and Jake are finished horsing around.”
Cassandra Alexandria Smith, a.k.a. Sandy, was my current love interest although the “L” word had never been used and wasn’t likely to be. I teased her about her name suggesting that her parents must have been looking for something complicated to go with Smith. An exercise they chose not to go through again. Sandy was an only child. She stood about five foot four inches tall with a very muscular, athletic and well-proportioned body. In a word, Sandy was built. She worked out three times a week. We liked each other a lot, enjoyed spending time together, had great sex, and for the most part led separate lives. Sandy was an investment broker. We met on the telephone when she tried to sell me on her services. I was intrigued by her voice and therefore granted an appointment hoping the rest of the package looked as good as the voice sounded. It did. She was single and “taking a sabbatical from men.” I asked her out anyway. She said yes. That was a year ago.
We never demanded each other’s time. If getting together wasn’t convenient for both parties, neither got offended. “Not tonight” was okay. We rarely planned far ahead. I liked her a lot but I wasn’t in love. I was still carrying a twenty-year-old torch that seemed to burn brighter as time passed, no doubt fueled by adolescent hormones left unsatiated. I think something in Sandy’s past haunted her also, but so far it had been left undiscussed.
I called her back. “Do you need to be investigated?”
She laughed, “Absolutely!” Sandy had a great laugh.
“Tonight?”
“No, not tonight.” she said. “I’m beat. I couldn’t give you my best tonight and I have an early appointment tomorrow.”
“No problem,” I replied, although I did feel a pang of disappointment in my lower extremities. I asked about her day and she told me in a language of fine detail that only Wall Street junkies would have understood. She had had a good day, a very good and stressful day that had left her limp. A day I understood very well. Once upon a time I had been on that roller coaster. I listened intently and interjected at the right moments. She had to tell it to someone who understood. She had to share the excitement, get it all out, unwind.
Finally, Sandy ran out of steam. “God, I’m talking a lot tonight,” she said.
“It’s okay. You had a big day. Besides, we private investigators need to hone our listening skills.”
She laughed again. “Tell me about your day.”
I told her and she was fascinated. “What are you going to do? How do you start?”
“Ma’am,” I mimicked in my best Bogie, “I haven’t a clue.”
Early the next morning I was in the office playing PC solitaire and pondering a plan of attack. I always played solitaire when I wanted to think something out, usually something like a big stock purchase. I had done some police work for “Big Bob” Wilson, my high school buddy who now happened to be the chief of police, and some investigative work for a few lawyers in town and for an insurance company on an insurance scam. None of it would have taxed anyone with half a brain. I had never tried to find a missing person, so the solitaire had its work to do.
Meanwhile, I had a ten thousand dollar check that I wouldn’t cash until the job was done, and a half-finished second cup of coffee was cooling on my right-hand mouse pad—I had long ago trained myself to use the mouse with either hand, so I had mouse pads on both sides of my keyboard. I was playing solitaire using Vegas rules, one look at the card. Use it or lose it. I had four aces up early, caught a few breaks, and ran the deck for the entire $208. I was up $174 when I paged Roy Husky. He called minutes later.
“Cherokee Investigations,” I answered most officially.
“I have a Cherokee I need investigated,” came the reply. I didn’t know Roy had a sense of humor. I might like this guy.
“Jeep or person?” I replied.
“Funny!” he deadpanned.
“You too.”
“You paged me,” Roy said.
“Pictures?” I questioned.
“On my way with them now,” came the reply.
“Cell phone?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m in the office,” I said.
“Ten minutes,” Roy said and hung up.
I went back to solitaire and promptly ran the table and won another $208. Back-to-back wins are not uncommon even though winning once sometimes takes twenty or thirty hands. I was up $382 when Roy walked in.
“Where’s security?” Roy cracked.
“He’s over there in the corner asleep,” I said pointing at Jake, but I knew Roy was asking about Billy. “What have you got?”
“Nice dog. Take a look at these,” Roy said, handing me a stack of photos.
What Roy had was a lot of pictures of Sarah Ann Fairchild and not that many of Ronnie. Sarah Ann obviously liked the camera and Ronnie did not. The best pictures of Ronnie were the wedding pictures, but even in those he was not looking into the camera. There were only a few good candid shots of Ronnie, when he wasn’t aware of the photographer.
“Ronnie disliked cameras,” I commented.
“Evidently.”
“Thanks, I’ll get these back to you later.”
Roy nodded and left, a man of few words.
I studied the pictures and thought. If I were Joseph Fleet and had a daughter who was heir to his fortune, I would want to know everything I could about the man she was marrying. I pulled out Roy’s card and dialed his cell phone number.
“Yes sir,” Roy answered.
Either Roy had developed tremendous respect for me in a very short time or he assumed Joseph Fleet was calling. I assumed the latter.
“Relax. It’s your friendly gumshoe. Did Fleet have his son-in-law checked out when he started dating Sarah Ann?”
“Of course.”
“By who?”
“I think you mean by whom,” he said. “Some guy in Knoxville.”
“That helps a lot,” I bantered. “Find out.”
“I thought you were the private investigator.”
“Yeah, right,” I replied in my most sarcastic voice and hung up.
I went back to my game of solitaire and almost got shut out on the next deal, losing $47. By the time the phone rang