Kale avenue was a narrow street that ran off of Main two blocks down from the Key Lime Pie. Katia’s address turned out to be a huge gray Victorian home that had been converted to apartments. The darkly shadowed face of the three-story house was almost invisible behind banana and oleander trees.
Carver limped up onto the wide front porch. Two old women were perched on a long bench that was probably an ancient church pew, but neither of them looked at Carver. On the porch ceiling a paddle fan with a schoolhouse light slung below it slowly rotated, creating a slight breeze and enough illumination for Carver to study the bank of brass mailboxes and find Katia’s apartment number. Dozens of moths circled the light beneath the fan, their frantic arcing and darting causing faint shadows to flit over the porch. He opened a screen door and climbed a narrow flight of stairs to the second floor, found a door marked 2-C, and turned a brass crank that made a rasping noise inside the apartment. He stood waiting. Someone was cooking Italian somewhere in the house. The garlicky aroma prodded Carver’s appetite.
Floorboards creaked, and light in the door’s fish-eye peephole rolled like a wild pupil, then was steady. He knew Katia was studying his distorted image in the hall.
Then the door opened and she smiled out at him. She was wearing a faded pink robe and was barefoot. He saw that her toenails were painted bright red. Her features seemed puffy and her hair was mussed, as if she’d been sleeping, but her blue eyes were alert. “Mr. Carver!” she said in a surprised voice, as if he were an unexpected gift.
“Evening, Katia.” He returned her smile. “I know it’s past business hours, but I drove by the research center and you weren’t there, and I need to talk to you again about Dr. Sam’s death.”
She appeared doubtful for a moment, then she said, “Well, I don’t see why not.” She opened the door wider and stepped back to let him in.
Her apartment had high ceilings but was small. The living room was crowded with Victorian furniture suited to the house. Some of it was threadbare, but other pieces had been refinished or reupholstered. Oval mahogany frames hung on the walls from gold-braided cord hooked over crown molding. Each of them held antique photographs of the sort that made their subjects appear either hopelessly stern or zanily cross-eyed. Either way, people you’d just as soon not meet. On a coffee table with Queen Anne legs that were no compliment to Queen Anne, half a dozen glossy Smithsonian magazines were scattered about, but not for show; they were dog-eared and well read. In a tall window, a round-cornered air conditioner that might date back to Victorian times was spitting out cold air along with flecks of ice that caught the light from an ornately shaded marble and brass floor lamp. The room smelled musty but was cool, almost cold.
Katia motioned with her arm, inviting Carver to sit on a plush maroon sofa with a lot of carved wood on it. He sat down, finding it comfortable, and leaned his cane against the wood and velveteen arm. From where he sat he could see into a tiny kitchen with yellowed stove and refrigerator. The refrigerator had round corners like the air conditioner.
Katia lowered herself into a dainty chair across from him. Her robe rode up on her bare legs, better than Queen Anne’s. She asked Carver if he cared for anything to drink, but he declined. That took care of the amenities.
He said, “I had a look around inside the Bings’ house this evening.”
She arched a surprised eyebrow. “Millicent was there?”
“No.”
“Oh.” She nodded, understanding. “Is that legal?”
“I found the door unlocked.”
Katia smiled, knowing he was lying and an unlocked door wouldn’t make trespassing legal anyway, but she didn’t press him on it. She looked like a teenager in the soft lamplight. “I imagine Millicent cleaned out most everything but the furniture.”
“She did a good job of that,” Carver said.
“But you found something, or you wouldn’t be here.”
“I didn’t exactly find anything, but I saw evidence of something. Why do you suppose Millicent left so abruptly, and in such a way that she wouldn’t have to return?”
“Well, she had to go north to her husband’s funeral, so why shouldn’t she try avoiding another trip down here to settle her affairs? Makes sense to me.”
Carver watched the light play over the flecks of ice shooting from the air conditioner, wondering if a rainbow might be possible. He said, “You touched on another reason last time we talked.”
Katia didn’t have to search her memory. “You mean when I said she seemed scared?”
“Uh-huh.” Carver waited.
“That was just a feeling I had. Nothing definite.”
Time to broach the subject. “Katia, would you have any idea if Dr. Sam and Millicent engaged in what might be called kinky sex?”
She looked surprised but not shocked. Then she laughed nervously. “Well, they sure wouldn’t tell me about it, would they?”
“Not intentionally. What I mean is, do you remember anything slipping out about the subject during conversation?”
“No, I don’t think so. Anyway, this is a conservative part of Florida, so what exactly do you mean by kinky sex? Anything other than the missionary position?”
“Sadomasochism. Chains, whips, leashes, that sort of thing. Happens even in Florida.”
An incredulous expression passed over her young face. “Dr. Sam? Millicent? You’ve got to be kidding!”
Carver gave her a minute to let the idea settle in. “People tend secret flames, Katia, and sometimes the heat consumes them. They lead private lives that are often unlike the ones they present to the world. Sort of existing on two levels. You get a little older you’ll realize that, if you don’t know it already.”
“Sure. And whatever two consenting adults do, especially if they’re married, is their own business.”
“Couldn’t agree more. I’m a little kinky myself.”
She squinted at him, unable to quite figure him.
“We’re not talking about a crime here,” he told her.
“We might be, in Florida,” she said. “But that doesn’t matter a fig to me. It’s just that with Dr. Sam and Millicent I think the idea’s way, way off the mark. He was obsessed with his work and there wasn’t room for much else. And Millicent never struck me as . . . well, the carnally adventuresome type. I don’t recall Dr. Sam ever saying anything even remotely sexual. God, this was a middle-aged couple, Mr. Carver.”
Ah, the young, he thought. He said, “Maybe their sex life had gone stale and they were experimenting.”
“Oh, sure, maybe. But how would I know, even if it was any of my business? And how would you know?”
“I don’t know,” Carver said. “Not for sure. I found some eye hooks, and some holes drilled in the wall that were spaced as if they were used to constrain somebody. There were marks on the paint that might have come from chains or manacles being scraped over the plaster. Discoloration from perspiration. I found a leather leash in the closet.”
Katia pressed her knees together tight enough to whiten the flesh. She looked thoughtful. Said, “The Bings didn’t have a dog.”
“You wouldn’t guess it by looking at the carpet where I found most of the drilled holes,” Carver told her.
She seemed confused, and passed a hand down her cheek vaguely, as if feeling for an injury, and shook her head. “Listen, even if what you found does mean anything, so what? I mean, Dr. Sam and Millicent’s sex life couldn’t be relevant to what you’re investigating: Henry Tiller’s death, whatever you think’s going on over at the Rainer place.”
“Don’t forget Dr. Sam’s suicide,” Carver said.
She frowned. “I don’t see the connection.”
“Could be there isn’t any. That’s one of the things I’m trying to determine.”
Katia stared at the dark window as if she could see out of it. Then she stood up and clutched her robe around her. “I keep getting images of Dr. Sam and Millicent,” she said, making a face as if she’d found a roach in her stew. “I don’t like what I see. If you don’t mind, I think I’ve had about enough of this conversation.”
Carver set his cane in the flowered Victorian carpet and gained his feet. “I don’t blame you,” he said. “I don’t like asking you about it, but you were the one who might know.”
“Well, I don’t know. I mean, neither Dr. Sam nor Millicent ever said or did anything that gave me any insight into their sex life. They simply didn’t talk about that kind of thing. Not that I was curious. I didn’t consider it any of my affair when Dr. Sam was alive, and I consider it even less my business now that he’s dead.”
“I wouldn’t argue,” Carver said. “Whatever they did in the privacy of their home, it’s most likely irrelevant.” He limped across the faded flower pattern to the door and opened it.
“You don’t really believe that, do you?” she said behind him.
He braced with the cane and twisted around to face her, one foot out in the hall. The pungent scent of spicy Italian cooking wasn’t so appetizing now. “I don’t know what to believe,” he said. “I honestly don’t know.”
“I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t dirty Dr. Sam’s memory by speculating with the wrong people about his sex life.”
“You have Chief Wicke in mind?”
“Yes, among others. Talking to him might make any nasty rumor sort of semiofficial and lend it credibility. I mean, the idea’s nauseating. It isn’t dignified, and Dr. Sam was a dignified scientist. Let’s leave him with that.”
“And Millicent’s still alive,” Carver said. “We wouldn’t want to drag her private life out for everyone to see.”
“Of course not.” Katia looked angry for a moment. “I wasn’t forgetting Millicent.”
“I trusted you to tell me the truth,” Carver said. “You can trust me to do what I can. But I can’t promise, because I don’t know where this’ll lead.”
“What you suspect about Dr. Sam and Millicent,” she said confidently, “won’t lead anywhere at all. It’s simply not them.”
“I expect you’re right.”
She gave him her young, naive smile, the girl who knew more about sea life than life on land.