The Undertaker

Well, I'll be damned, I thought. Whoever the guy was, he had been using my name long enough to be listed in the phone book. That meant this wasn't some spur-of-the-moment thing. They had stashed their Peter Talbott here, him and his wife, and bought him a house and a business to settle into. An accident? Both of them? Not that the world would really miss one CPA more or less, but unless the coffins they buried this afternoon in Oak Hill weren't empty, someone went to a lot of time and trouble to put the guy and his wife here, and a lot more to make him go away.

I picked up the phone and dialed. After three rings, I heard what I expected to hear, “This number is no longer in service in Area Code 614. If you need assistance, please dial...” I hung up and flipped to the yellow pages, to the A's, where the Accountants dwelled, all five pages of them. I saw a simple two-line listing for “Center Financial Advisors, Accounting and Financial Services, 1811 N. Sickles, 758-9119.” No color graphics or snappy, modern logo like the big accounting firms, not even a boxed ad or bold type, only the two lines of plain black-and-white print. That meant the guy was either very, very successful and didn't need any additional business — and I had never known a bean counter who fell in that category — or his accounting business was so far down in the crapper that a small ad was all he could afford.

The clock radio on the end table said it was almost 6:00 PM. I would have at least an hour or an hour and a half more daylight, so I decided to check out my alter ego for myself. After all, my busy social schedule was clear for the rest of the night, so why not?

With my Marathon gas station road map spread out on the car seat next to me, the house on Sedgwick and the office on Sickles proved easy to find. They were a couple of miles apart further in toward town. The house was in a quiet, middle-class neighborhood on the northwest side, about three miles from the motel. It was an older Dutch Colonial with white clapboard siding, dark green shutters and door, flower boxes below the front windows, and two big oaks in front. I could imagine Beaver Cleaver skipping down the front walk on his way to school as Ward mowed the grass in his white shirt, tie, and cardigan sweater, smoking his pipe. Unfortunately, Ward wasn't taking care of this one. The grass was thin and mostly overtaken with weeds, the wood siding on the house had faded, the flowers in the window boxes hung limp and ratty, and the hedges were in desperate need of trimming.

I circled the block past the Neighborhood Watch sign with the big eyeball and parked in front of 625. After all, I was Peter Talbott, wasn't I? If this was my house, I had nothing to hide. I strolled up the sidewalk to the front door, rang the bell, and waited. Nothing. The drapes were drawn across the front picture window. There were no lights on, but leaning out as far as I could, I peeked around the edge and caught a glimpse inside. The house was empty. No furniture. No carpets. Nothing but bare walls and bare wooden floors. Interesting. The two bodies were barely in the ground, yet someone had already cleaned the place out.

Following a line of concrete stepping-stones, I walked around to the side of the house, whistling softly and acting as casual as I could in case anyone was watching. The path brought me to a gate in a wooden fence that ran around the back yard. I opened it and stepped inside. Again, empty. Not even a lawn chair, a rake, or a garden hose. They had picked the place clean.

“Can I help you, young man?” I heard a sharp-edged, woman's voice call to me.

I turned and smiled, knowing it wasn't a question. It was an accusation. On the other side of the fence stood a tall, craggy, gray-haired woman leaning on a long-handled garden rake, watching me like a sentry with a pike. She wore a man's oversized denim work shirt and she drew a steady bead on me with a pair of small, hawk-like eyes.

“You know, you just might,” I answered her with a big smile. “I've been trying to reach the Talbotts for a couple of days now.” I motioned toward the house. “I rang the bell, but nobody answered. Guess they aren't home.”

“Nope. Won't be coming back, neither. They're dead, both of ‘em, in a car wreck, three days ago.”

“That's awful. A car wreck, huh?”

“When you get to be my age, you don't want to speak ill of the dead, ‘cause you might be next. But the way Pete drove, didn't come as no surprise.”

“You knew them pretty well?”

“'Bout as well as I know you. They moved in maybe six months ago and kept to themselves. Didn't talk much to me or anyone else around here, far as know.”

I had to laugh. “Warm and friendly?”

“New Jersey. Same difference. She had a mouth on her could curdle milk. And him? All I ever heard from that fat slob was a loud belch. No, sir, they never fit in, not in this neighborhood, and that's the way they wanted it.”