Chapter Fourteen
“Damn, we should’ve gotten the address.” Judy drove back and forth on the same two-lane road, trying to find the mission, but they kept getting lost. “Then I could have plugged it into the GPS.”
“Father Keegan said it was next to the firehouse,” Aunt Barb said, her face to the window. “There’s the firehouse straight ahead, and the only thing next to it is that strip mall.”
Judy stopped at a traffic light, eyeing the run-down strip mall of three crappy storefronts, one of which had a handmade going-out-of-business sign. “Can you have a mission in a storefront?”
“Pull in. Let’s see.” Aunt Barb clucked. “You know, I’ve been down this road a bunch of times, but I’ve never seen a mission. It’s as if all of this existed around me, but I never noticed it before.”
“I know what you mean.” Judy was thinking about how much her Aunt Barb hadn’t noticed about Iris. The hidden cash made her feel uneasy, and it seemed to mirror what her aunt was saying about the neighborhood; there were things in plain sight that they should have seen, but they’d missed.
“The light’s green,” her aunt said, pulling Judy out of her reverie. She cruised forward, crossed the intersection, and turned into the crappy strip mall, which held a tiny parking lot in front of the stores. She spotted a battered Hyundai leaving the strip mall from the back.
“Maybe it’s behind the stores. Again, no sign.”
“Evidently, everybody who needs it knows where it is.”
“Right.” Judy steered around the back, entered a littered back lot, and hit the brakes quickly, surprised to find small children running around, playing on old upholstered couches, used card tables, scattered mattresses. “Yikes, good thing I was going slow.”
“I’ll say.”
“I guess this is it.” Judy eyed a rusty white Dumpster that read SOCIETY OF ST. VINCENT DE PAUL. The back of the building was a dingy gray stucco cluttered with electric meters and heating units next to an unmarked glass door, which stood open, propped up by a cinderblock.
“Hey, that’s my ottoman!” Aunt Barb exclaimed, opening the door.
“What do you mean?” Judy cut the ignition, took her purse, and got out of the car.
“That flowery ottoman, next to the maroon couch.” Aunt Barb pointed, climbing out of the passenger seat.
“I don’t remember that ottoman.”
“You wouldn’t. It’s from the old house, and I kept it in the garage because it didn’t go with the new furniture. I always thought I’d get it reupholstered but I never got around to it. I gave it to Iris when we cleaned out the garage. She said it was pretty, and I thought she could use it.”
“When did you clean out the garage?” Judy’s ears pricked up, wondering when Iris had put the money in her storage chest.
“About a week ago. I was feeling better and I wanted to clear the decks before my mastectomy.”
“Was it your idea to clean the garage?”
“Yes, and I totally forgot about the ottoman when we went to Iris’s apartment. She didn’t have the room for it, so she must’ve brought it here.” Aunt Barb shook her head when they reached the ottoman. “An ottoman is a rich-people thing, when you think about it. It requires room. Space. I’m not rich by any means, but I have room for an ottoman. I assumed she did, too.” Aunt Barb sighed. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I’ve been so insensitive, living in my own little world.”
“That’s not true. You didn’t know.”
“Maybe I didn’t want to know, or maybe I should have known. Isn’t that the height of insensitivity? That you just didn’t know, because you couldn’t imagine that people lived a different life from the one you do?” Aunt Barb kept shaking her head. “Isn’t that the very definition of insensitivity? Of selfishness?”
“Not at all. You were being generous, and you can’t find a negative in that.” Judy guided her aunt toward the open door. “Aunt Barb, when I was in the garage last night, I noticed that there were two plastic chests, the same type but different colors. Was one of those Iris’s?”
“Yes, I gave it to her. The purple one, for Iris. Get it?”
Judy had missed that. “What’s it for?”
“I got her my favorite gardening tools, a trowel, a spade, and the best fork for weeding. There’s only one that works really well.” Her aunt’s face fell. “Poor Iris. I don’t think I could bring myself to see that chest now.”
“You ever go in the chest?”
“No, why would I? I have my own tools.”
Judy felt reassured. “Do you want me to take it away?”
“No, not at all. I want it to stay just the way it is. I still have your uncle’s jackets in the closet.”
“That’s okay, whatever you want.” Judy squeezed her arm, and they entered the building, their eyes adjusting to the cramped, dimly lighted room. Women speaking Spanish looked over briefly, then returned to going through cardboard boxes of used toys, books, and children’s shoes. Kids played underneath metal rolling racks stuffed with clothes, and Judy recognized one of the little girls from church.
“Judy, look over there.” Aunt Barb gestured at one of the racks. “I see two of the dresses I gave her, hanging up, and some of the shoes, too. So this must be where she brought it. She gave it to the mission, like Maria Elena said. How nice is she? I mean, was.”
Judy saw grief cross her aunt’s face. “She was nice, but I wonder why she didn’t tell you.”
“I bet she thought it would hurt my feelings.”
“That’s probably why,” Judy said, wondering what other reasons Iris could have had for keeping secrets, as well as how she got the money and why she stowed it in her aunt’s garage.
“There’s the counter.” Aunt Barb led the way toward an ancient cash register on a plywood counter. Behind it, shoes, rain boots, and work boots sat stacked on old wooden shelves, next to a random array that included an old bicycle, floor lamps without shades, and a push lawnmower that was missing a blade. They lingered at the counter, then one of the women came over from the far side of the room, with a smile. She was in her thirties, but heavily pregnant, and her belly strained both her sweatshirt and jeans.
“Hello, ladies,” she said in English, with only the hint of an accent. “Is there something I can do for you?”
“Yes,” Aunt Barb answered. “My name is Barb Moyer, and this is my niece Judy. We were friends of Iris Juarez’s.”
“Oh no.” The woman’s face creased with sadness, and she extended a small hand. “I’m Maria. I’m so sorry about Iris. We all loved her.”
“Thank you, and I’m sorry for your loss.” Aunt Barb released her hand. “We’re looking for Daniella. Father Keegan sent us.”
Maria blinked. “Daniella isn’t here.”
“Oh, I got the impression she worked here on Sundays.”
“She does, usually. Sometimes with Iris.”
“But Daniella didn’t come in today?”
“No, they called me this morning to come in for her, so I came in. Sunday is a busy day for us, after Mass. We have to open.”
“Why didn’t she come in? Is she sick?”
“No.”
“Do you know where Daniella is, where she lives? We’d like to go talk with her.”
Maria hesitated, and Judy became aware that the women had stopped talking in the background, evidently eavesdropping as they looked through the clothes and shoes. “She went home.”
“Where? Kennett Square?”
“No, home to Mexico.”
“Really?” Aunt Barb frowned, puzzled.
Judy hid her surprise that Daniella would leave the country, on the same weekend her friend turned up dead. “When did she leave?”
“I don’t know.”
“When was the last time she worked here?”
“Friday, I think.” Maria scratched her cheek, her manner suddenly hesitant.
Aunt Barb rested a hand on the counter, seemingly tired again, so Judy took over.
“Maria, who told you to come in today? Who called you?”
“Lupe.”
“Who’s she?”
“She’s, like, the boss.”
“What did she say?”
Maria pursed her lips. “She said I had to come to work because Daniella went home.”
“Did she say when Daniella went home?”
“No.”
“Did she say why?”
“No.”
“How did she know?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know anything more than she told me.” Maria averted her dark eyes.
“What’s Lupe’s phone number?”
“I don’t know.”
“What’s Lupe’s last name?”
“Why?” Maria edged backwards, resting a hand on her pregnant belly.
“Maria, we’re just friends of Iris’s, and there’s no hidden agenda here. It would really help us if we could talk to Lupe. If she called you on your cell phone, you could just look at the phone to get her number.”
Maria shook her head. “I … don’t feel good telling you her number.”
“I understand.” Judy didn’t want to give up. “Maria, how about you tell us Lupe’s last name then? We’re just trying to talk to her about Iris’s death. They were friends, and somebody should tell Daniella that Iris died, don’t you think?”
“I don’t know.”
“Please?” Judy smiled in a way that she hoped looked reassuring. Suddenly her phone began ringing in her back pocket. “We’ll keep the information to ourselves, I promise. How about you tell me her last name and I’ll get the number myself?”
“No, no.” Maria backed away from the counter. “I don’t feel … comfortable.”
“But we could get that information anywhere. Father Keegan would tell us her last name. You would just be saving us the trouble of asking him.”
“Then ask him. Please, ask him.”
“Really?” Judy’s phone kept ringing, and Aunt Barb took her arm, looking at her with pained eyes.
“Judy, let’s go. I don’t want to upset anybody. That’s not the point.”
“You want to leave?”
“Yes, please.” Aunt Barb gestured at the ringing phone. “And you should answer that. I bet it’s your mom, and we don’t need to make her angrier than she already is.”
“She can wait.”
“It could be an emergency.”
“All right, I hear you.” Judy checked her phone on the fly.
As it turned out, it wasn’t her mother.
But it was an emergency, of sorts.