Brother Bones-Tapestry of Blood by Ron Fortier

Author:Ron Fortier [Fortier, Ron]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Airship 27 Productions
Published: 2014-05-23T00:00:00+00:00

From what I recall of his personal file, his father deserted them when he was only a child and he was brought up by his mother who doted on him endlessly. I mean, here was a grown man still living with his mother.”

“Nothing wrong with being a loving son,” the Irish cop countered, thinking of his own saintly mother living in the Heights.

“Oh, it was more than that, I assure you. Every time Smalley finished a new display arrangement in one our windows the old lady would come down on the bus to check it out. Honestly, she would come into the store and examine each piece of the diorama like some army inspector. The poor boy was a nervous wreck until she gave him her approval.”

“You said former employee,” Rains took over. “So he no longer works here?”

“No, we had to let him go…hmmm, let me think. Yes, about six months ago. Just at the start of the year.”

“Why did you fire him?” Gardner took another big drink of water. “Frankly, because he started acting peculiar.” He saw Duffy tilt his fedora up and rushed to finish.

“More so than usual. You see his mother died last year. It devastated the poor fellow. Naturally we gave him time off to handle the arrangements etc. Many of the girls who worked in his department went to the funeral.

He was Jewish, I think.

“Anyways a few weeks after her passing, one of the girl’s reported to the Floor Manager that Smalley had started acting…ah…strange around one of the new dummies we’d just gotten in.”

“How so?” Duffy looked up from his notepad.

“It was a female model and according to what I’m told, he began to… well, act inappropriate with it. He was caught fondling her.” Gardner’s face took on a sick expression. “One morning, one of the girl’s came in early and found him embracing the thing. She was only dressed in underwear and Smalley was kissing her…it…you now what I mean!”

“So you canned him,” Duffy concluded aloud.

“Well, not at first,” Gardner said in his own defense. “He was given several warnings. One of our personnel people even suggested he see a psychiatrist. It was obvious his mother’s death had unhinged him. But he refused. It was as if he didn’t care. When the next complaint was filed we had no choice but to fire him.

“Believe me, we hated to do it.”

“Alright,” Dan Rains rose out of his chair and Duffy did the same.

“We’re going to need this Smalley’s home address.”

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