Chapter 13

The next morning was Chicago cool, a slippery slope in late fall that could quickly deteriorate to cold, freezing cold, arctic cold, and why-the-fuck-would-anyone-live-here cold.

I made myself a cup of coffee and listened as the weather banged against my windows. Then I did what most runners do. Ignored the elements, got my running stuff on, and headed to the lakefront. A mile later, I felt loose and warm. The wind was steady and in my face. I kept my head down and plowed through. At four miles, I turned away from the lake, felt the breezes shift at my back, and let them chase me home. When I was done, I sat on my stoop as the sweat dried and the endorphins flowed. I’d be a little sore later on, but it was worth it. And would be worth it again. Tomorrow.

After the run, I showered, dressed, and found my car on the street. I headed west, through a light dusting of local traffic and into a dowager of a Chicago neighborhood near Humboldt Park. I parked in front of a Ukrainian church with a Madonna icon that used to cry but now just looks at you. Still, the people come. Still, the people leave money.

I got out of my car and stretched my eyes down the street. To my left a row of graystones marched into the distance. To my right a car parked at an angle to the curb. Two figures sat in the front seat. One drummed his fingers along the dashboard. A bass line growled from a pair of speakers in the back. I stepped close to a two-flat to read its number and stepped back. A stone gargoyle, face rubbed and smooth with age, smiled from its rooftop perch.

Halfway down the block I found the address I was looking for. In the last months of his life, John Gibbons had taken a room here. At least that’s what he’d told me. Like the rest of the street, it wasn’t much. For a man in the supposed prime of life, it was even less. For me, it was a place to start.

I walked across a shabby lawn to an even shabbier porch. As I walked, I felt, then heard something. A scattering of Kibbles ‘n Bits crunched underfoot. I should have taken it as an omen. I didn’t.

The door cracked open a couple of inches, then maybe four more. The pointed face of a woman peeked across the threshold.

“Hello there,” I said.

The woman shifted and pale light washed over us both. Her face carried a bit more oval that I’d first thought, with high cheekbones and deep shadows underneath. The hair was thin, diluted by time and a lack of sun. Thick glasses sealed up small brown eyes pinpricked with black. They crawled over me and then beyond.

I thought maybe she hadn’t heard me and was about to speak again when the woman gave forth with a noise, somewhere between a squeak, a grunt, and a snicker. Then I heard the shifting of feet inside.

“I’m a friend of John’s,” I said. “John Gibbons, that is.”

I moved one foot onto the threshold, just inside the doorjamb. The heavy maple door crushed my big toe.

“Keep your foot back there,” she said through the now-closed portal.

I hopped lightly and pretended it didn’t hurt.

“You caught my foot there, Ms….”

I looked at the mailbox name above GIBBONS.

“Ms. Mulberry.”

I swore I heard a cackle although I’d be hard pressed to say I knew exactly what a cackle sounded like.

“Serves you right there, Mr. John Gibbons’ friend. What do you want?”

“Nothing, Ms. Mulberry. Just some back rent I know John was owing. I wanted to make up the difference….”

The big door suddenly swung open, and an interior light clicked on. Through the screen I could see a woman, ageless in the worst way possible. Maybe sixty, maybe eighty, she was too dusty and out of focus to get a handle on. Perched on each shoulder was a calico cat, entwined around her legs four or five others. Kittens and cats lounged on the stairs behind her. Some of them wore miniature ice bags strapped to their little cat heads. Mulberry must have caught me staring.

“They have migraines. From the heat, you know.”

“But it’s October.”

She flashed me a look, magnified by the Harry Caray glasses.

“Never mind,” I said.

I was inside the house now, inside a sitting room stuffed with felines and their respective droppings. I managed to get a handkerchief close to my face and found a spot on the sofa. To my left was a small alcove. Inside it, a desk littered with cuttings from newspapers, plates of half-eaten food, and an ashtray filled to overflowing. On the wall was a bulletin board with Post-it notes and index cards skewered with thumbtacks. Mulberry pulled a ledger out of a gray filing cabinet she kept next to the desk and laid it flat between us. The entries were handwritten in ballpoint, and immaculate. The landlady admired her handiwork for a moment, then looked up.

“Bring a check?” she said.

Her eyes fastened on my hand as I reached inside a coat pocket.

“Actually, Ms. Mulberry, I have something better than that.” I flashed my investigator’s license.

“I’m here because John Gibbons is dead.”

The ledger flew shut. She glanced at the name on the license, then threw the look back my way.

“The police have already been here. Been and gone, Mr. Kelly. I wish you’d go, too.”

Little cat faces gleamed at me from various corners of the room. Something drifted by my ankles, but I didn’t jump.

“I need your help, Ms. Mulberry.”

“He was murdered, wasn’t he?” Her smile revealed a set of teeth that were better left undisturbed.

“Yes, he was, ma’am.”

“The police didn’t tell me that. But I knew all the same. Just like Law & Order. Was it brutal?”

“Shot in the stomach and left to die down at Navy Pier. That’s no picnic.”

Now the landlady leaned forward and touched my arm.

“Was he in the lake? They’re supposed to be blue when they’re pulled from the lake.”

I shook my head.

“No, his body was found just past the pier.”

Her eyes had widened and glowed a warm copper. An angora moved to the couch and settled close by her cheek. The other cats drifted away.

“This is Oskar. Spelled with a k. He’s my alter ego.”

I nodded and looked from purring angora to fruitcake landlady.

“I put Sun-In in Oskar’s hair. Now it matches mine.”

I had to admit the resemblance was uncanny.

“You want to go upstairs and see John’s room?”

I nodded again, and she pointed to a set of darkened stairs.