Robert Francis, CPA
I was sitting at my desk looking over one of my clients’ old returns. It was July. I didn’t have much to do. A few extensions, but even most of those were taken care of. I mean, I had things I could be doing, but nothing that couldn’t wait.
I stared up at the ceiling fan. How many offices even had ceiling fans anymore? That’s why I liked my building. It was old, maybe even a little decrepit, but at least it wasn’t a sterile box. And a hell of a lot more comfortable after I put the air conditioner in the window.
God, the summer dragged on. I passed the time staring at ceiling fans and going over old tax returns. Sometimes I even checked my e-mail. I thought about ordering pizza so I wouldn’t have to leave my office for lunch, so I could keep up the hard work. What the hell was I doing here?
Then there was a knock on the door. At first I was confused. I didn’t have any appointments that afternoon, and no one ever just dropped in on me, not at this time of year. But there was another knock, and I could see the shadow of a little fist through the frosted glass, right below the “Robert Francis, CPA” that was stenciled on the door. After the third knock, I finally found my voice.
“Come in,” I said.
The door opened and Margo Fletcher stepped into my office. She was an old college friend of mine, but I probably hadn’t seen her in 7 or 8 years. We had been close once, but then she married a man named Stevens or something, and you know how that goes.
The years hadn’t treated her well. She was getting dumpy and the crow’s feet had started showing. Then again, you could say the same thing about me. At least I wasn’t wearing a plum-colored beret.
“Hello, Margo,” I said.
“Hi, Rob,” she said.
“Please sit down,” I said as I stood up, gesturing to the chair across from my desk. I sat down again as soon as she took a seat. “It’s been awhile.”
“Probably just after the wedding.”
“Right. I heard you have a kid now. Congratulations.”
“Yes, Billy’s wonderful. How’s Linda?”
“She’s great. She left me for an archaeology professor, and now they’re combing some ancient Mayan ruins. Or maybe it was Incan. I wasn’t really paying attention when she told me.”
“Oh,” Margo said, adjusting her beret and flipping a few strands of hair behind her ear. She was obviously uncomfortable, but if it was because of me or it had to do with why she had come to see me in the first place, I didn’t know. It was silent for a moment.
“So what brings you down here?” I asked finally.
“Well,” she said, pursing her lips, “You always told me that if I ever needed anything, I could always come to you.”
I nodded. I had said that. It’s the sort of thing you say to your friends. Especially when you don’t really mean it.
“It’s just that, well, I don’t have anyone else I can turn to,” she said. “Since I’ve gotten married, I don’t really have any friends that are just my friends. They’re all my friends and Harold’s friends. And I don’t want Harold to find out about this. I guess I have some friends from work, but I don’t know if I trust them this much. And -”
“Okay, Okay,” I said, waving a hand to try to get her to stop. I had no idea what she was getting at. “I get the picture. So what is it?”
“Do you remember the ring Eddie gave me in college?” she asked.
“Yeah,” I said. Eddie had been Margo’s boyfriend in college. Just before graduation, he proposed to her. A week later he just disappeared. We never found out what happened to him. I’d always assumed the worst, but it took Margo a long time to accept that he wasn’t coming back. “Yeah,” I said again, “I remember. The old ring with the dolphin on it that he got from his grandmother.” How could I forget? It was the ugliest ring I had ever seen.
She nodded. “It’s missing,” she said.
“Okay,” I said.
“I just know it’s been stolen.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. It’s always in my jewelry box. I never take it out. But I heard the Antiques Roadshow was coming to town, and... It wasn’t there.” She was about to cry.
“Did you tell the police?” I asked.
“No, I couldn’t.”
“Why not?”
“They would want to ask Harold about it.”
“So?”
“I don’t want him to know.”
“Why not?”
“I never told him about Eddie.”
“You could tell him the ring is from your grandmother.”
She managed to look shocked. “You want me to lie to my husband?”
I shook my head. I didn’t know what to say. None of what she said made any sense. There was no way she had been married for as long as she had been without lying to her husband. It just wasn’t possible. And there really wasn’t any reason she couldn’t tell the truth. I had only met Harold a few times, but he didn’t seem like the sort of guy who would get too bent out of shape over his wife holding onto the ring of her lost lover. Especially given the circumstances.
“I need to find that ring,” Margo said. “It’s the only thing of his I still have. I . . .” She started crying, and then I understood. She didn’t want to tell Harold, not because of how he’d react, but because she felt guilty. She loved her husband, but not as much as she loved the man who had left her.
“So what can I do?” I asked.
“I was hoping you could talk to Linda’s brother about it. I know he’s a cop and I was hoping he could look into it without having to talk to Harold. And maybe you could help him. You went to the police academy, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, until I found out how boringly repetitive police work is.”
“But you’re an accountant.”
“Touche,” I said after a moment. She was right, of course, but accounting wasn’t my first choice. But then I got married with a possible family on the way, and suddenly money didn’t seem like such a bad thing anymore.
“Anyway,” Margo said, “do you think you could ask him for me? Though if you and Linda… I mean I would have called her, but I didn’t have her number so I just looked you up in the phone book and-”
“Don’t worry about it. I’ll call him and then I’ll see what I can do. OK?”
She nodded.
“All right. He’s probably going to want to know the details so do you mind if I ask you a few things?” I paused. She nodded. Then I started asking her questions. Her answers were all disjointed, and generally unhelpful, but what she told me amounted to this: Margo found the ring missing from her jewelry box the day before, yet strangely, nothing else was taken. The last time she saw the ring was two weeks ago. Harold had taken her jewelry collection to be appraised for an insurance policy, but Margo made sure the ring was there when Harold brought everything back. In those two weeks, she and Harold had not entertained any guests except for her parents, and they had gone nowhere near her bedroom. Billy, her son, couldn’t even walk yet. And as far as she could tell there was no sign of breaking and entering.
When Margo finished telling me everything she could, I told her I would see what I could do, which wouldn’t be much. I saw her the seven feet from her chair to my door, watched her go, breathed a sigh of relief, and sat back down at my desk.
I sighed and pulled out my cell phone. I scrolled down the list of contacts until I got to Michael. Michael was my brother-in-law, my ex-brother-in-law. We had never gotten along. But he was a cop. I pressed send.
He picked up on the third ring. “Detective Frasier here.”
“Hello, Michael, it’s Rob.”
“What can I do for you?” His tone was condescendingly professional.
“I have a little favor to ask you,” I said.
“That’s pretty funny,” he said.
“Yeah, well, it’s not for me. It’s for a friend.”
“That’s even funnier.”
“All right, look, my friend is Linda’s friend, too. Just pretend you’re doing it for her.”
“OK, so what is it I’m supposed to be doing?”
“My friend thinks her ring was stolen. She doesn’t want to call the cops officially because she doesn’t want her husband to find out.”
“Why not?”
“It’s from another man.”
“You?”
“No. An old lover who’s no longer in the picture. He just disappeared one day.”
He paused for a second. “You know, I might know what you’re talking about. Linda told me a story once. Is this that ring with the ugly dolphin on it?”
“Yes.”
“I met that chick once. That was the ugliest fucking ring I have ever seen.”
“I know. So you’ll look for it?”
“Why not? I’ll make some calls. You know there’s not really any chance it will turn up though, right?”
“Yeah, I know. I just want to be able to say I tried. Thanks.”
“Save it. I’m not doing it for you, anyway.”
“Fine. Just call me if it turns up.”
“Sure,” Michael said, then he hung up.
There wasn’t really anything else for me to do until he called me back. The rest of the afternoon managed to pass by without me noticing, even though I didn’t do anything. I’d never spaced out that completely before, not a thought in my head, but in retrospect, it’s not a bad way to get through life.
I decided to call it a day. I put on my Red Sox hat, turned off the light, and locked the door behind me. My apartment was only a ten minute walk away, but by the time I got there, I was drenched in sweat. Once I opened the door, my cat Scratchy walked up to me and rubbed himself against my leg. I bent down and scratched him behind his ears, then got up and kicked him out of the way. The cat was the only thing I still had from my marriage. I threw the mail down on the kitchen table. Three bills and reminder from Tufts that my ten-year class reunion was coming up. A chance to get together and tell people I barely remember how none of my dreams ever came true.
I got a Red Baron French Bread Pizza out of the freezer and tossed it in the toaster oven. I sat down on the sofa in front of the TV and watched the news and ate my pizza until the Sox game came on. I fell asleep in the seventh inning.
I woke up just in time to find out they had blown it in the ninth, and then my phone rang. It was Michael. Nothing had turned up. It was no surprise. Just before he hung up, he said, “Why are you doing all of this, anyway? Haven’t you not seen this chick in like ten years?”
“She asked me to,” I said.
I could practically hear him shrug on the other end, and then the line went dead. It was late so I decided to go to bed and call Margo in the morning.
*
I got to my office in the morning and puttered around for a few hours before I finally called Margo and told her the bad news.
“Oh,” she said. One syllable, but it carried a lot of meaning. Her disappointment was nearly palpable. I could practically see the tear running down her cheek.
“I’m sorry,” I said. Then I did something really stupid. “Hey, you know, there might be something else I can do. I can’t promise you anything, but I’ll poke around a little more. I don’t really have that much to do around here anyway.”
“Really? That would be great. Thanks a lot, Rob. Call me if you find anything.”
Fantastic. Why not giving her a little false hope before breaking her heart? “No problem,” I said. We said goodbye and hung up. Then I had to figure out what the hell I was going to do.
How do you find a ring that has vanished into thin air? The only thing I could think of doing was to look up pawn shops online. There were 18 in the greater Boston area, at least there were 18 listed online, which we all know is a highly reliable source. Still, it was a start, Margo was a friend, I could get lucky, and, most importantly, I had nothing better to do so I started calling. The first on the list was the Malden Center Thrift Store. No, they didn’t have a ring with a dolphin on it. Neither did the next 17. Then I looked up jewelry stores in the Boston area. There were only 6,044 of them on the Google local business search. Obviously all of them weren’t actually used jewelry stores, but I wasn’t going to sort through all those links for the ones that were. Which brought me back to square one. I didn’t have any more ideas. I’d just have to wait a few days and call Margo back and tell her I did everything I could, but I didn’t have any luck.
*
That night found me in front of the television once more. I had just finished my spring roll and had moved onto my pork chow ho fun from Dragon Garden when my phone rang. The only thing I seemed to be doing lately was making and taking phone calls. I was surprised to see that it was Linda, my ex-wife.
“Hello,” I said.
“Hello,” she said.
“So how’s Peru?” I asked.
“I’m not in Peru,” she said.
“Mexico?”
“Guatemala.”
“Same thing.”
She sighed. “Not really.”
“So you having fun in those Mayan ruins?”
“They’re not Mayan, they’re Toltec. I already told you all this before, but as usual you weren’t listening to me.”
“That’s why you divorced me.”
“Rob-”
“So is there a reason you called, or did you just want to fight?”
“I wanted to know how Scratchy was doing.”
I looked over. He was licking his paws. “He’s shiny. So what do you really want?”
“I just told you.”
“Oh, please, you don’t give a fuck about the cat.”
“I talked to Michael. He told me Margo lost her ring.”
“Yeah, she thinks it was stolen.”
“So why are you helping her look for it? You haven’t talked to her in years.”
“She asked me to. Jesus Christ, why does everyone think I’m such a douche that I wouldn’t help out a friend who asked me to? Am I really that big of a dick?”
Thankfully, Linda didn’t answer that question.
“Look,” I said, “It doesn’t matter anyway, because I’m not finding it. I called your brother, who I know hates my guts. I called a bunch of pawn shops. I’m thinking about calling old Mr. Martinelli tomorrow and-”
“That old Mafia guy, that you do taxes for?”
“Yeah.”
“You were going to ask a gangster for a favor just to find that ugly ring?”
“Yup.”
“Why the hell would you do that? You know he’s going to want something in return. It’s not going to be something nice.”
“Well, I’ve got to do something.”
“Why?”
“Because I said I would.”
Linda sighed and hung up on me. I went to bed.
*
The next morning in my office I was trying to come up with alternatives to calling Mr. Martinelli so I got out the yellow pages and started calling jewelry stores. It wasn’t like I had anything else better to do. After a dozen or so, the closest I came to finding it was a ring with a Jesus fish on it in Randolph. So I gave up again and actually tried to do some accounting. That didn’t last long either. Lunchtime rolled around and Margo called. I had nothing to tell her, and she tried to sound upbeat, but I could hear the disappointment in her voice. It made me feel guilty, even though I had actually tried to do something, so I told her I would do everything I could. I was such a sap. Finally, I managed to get her to hang up. When the hell did I start caring about this so much? Just two days ago I was thinking of ways to get Margo out of my office. I don’t know, I guess I wasn’t as tough a guy as I liked to think. I picked up the phone and dialed a number very slowly. I hoped no one would pick up. Someone did.
“Hello,” a female voice said.
“Hello,” I said, “Is Mr. Martinelli home?”
“May I ask who is calling?”
“Robert Francis. I’m his accountant.”
“Just one moment please.”
Please tell me he’s not home, please tell me he’s not home, please tell me he’s not home.
“Robert,” Mr. Martinelli’s voice boomed a moment later, “What can I do for you.”
“Well, uh, Mr. Martinelli, sir, you always say that if I ever need anything, that I should just ask, um, so...” Oh, this was not going to go well.
“So what can I do for you?” Mr. Martinelli asked.
“Well, you see, I have this friend, and she thinks one of her rings was stolen, and, it’s very important to her, and I was just wondering, if, um, you knew anyone who was in the ‘used jewelry’ business.” I did the quote marks thing with my fingers, winced because it probably not the right thing to do, and breathed a sigh of relief when I realized he couldn’t see me anyway.
“I might know someone,” Mr. Martinelli said.
“Could you talk to him and see if maybe he’s seen it?” I asked.
“I would be happy to,” Mr. Martinelli said, “But, Robert...”
“Yes, sir?”
“How will he know which ring it is?”
“Oh,” I said, “That’s actually easy. It’s in the shape of a dolphin. Trust me, you’ve never seen anything like it. It’s just about -”
“My Edna, God bless her soul,” the old man interrupted, “loved the ocean and dolphins in particular. She would have loved a ring like that, I think.”
“- the most beautiful ring you’ve ever seen,” I finished.
“I will ask my friend if he has seen this ring,” Mr. Martinelli said.
“Thank you,” I said.
“It’s my pleasure,” Mr. Martinelli said, “I do this out of friendship. I know that if some day I need something from you, you will be only happy to help me out.” Well, there it was.
“Of course,” I said.
“I will call you back in a little while after I talk to my friend.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Goodbye, Robert.”
“Goodbye, Mr. Martinelli.”
I took a deep breath and slowly lowered the phone down. I could only imagine what he would ask me to do in return: fix his books, launder money, smuggle drugs in uncomfortable places from Mexico, dispose of bodies in the Jersey woods, run for U.S. Senate...
After far too much speculation, he finally called me back.
“Hello, Robert,” Mr. Martinelli said.
“Hello, sir,” I said.
“Unfortunately, my friend has not seen the ring. I’m sorry I couldn’t help you more.”
“That’s all right, sir. I’m sure you did all you could. Thank you for trying.”
“See, that’s what I like to hear, son, proper gratitude. So many people your age have forgotten how to show it, but you haven’t have you?”
“No, sir.”
“That’s why I know you won’t mind if I ask you now for a little favor.”
Oh, God, this was it. “No, not at all,” I said.
“I know this time of year is slow in your line of work. Next week, on Thursday afternoon, my granddaughter has a dentist appointment and her parents are away on vacation. I’m looking after the little angel, but I have an important business meeting and my assistants really have better things they could be doing. Do you think you could take her for me?”
“Of course,” I said, not knowing it was possible to feel so much relief.
“I know you will take good care of her for me, won’t you?” Mr. Martinelli said. It sounded so innocent, but it so wasn’t.
I swallowed. “Of course,” I said again.
“I’ll call you next week with the details. Thank you, Robert.”
“No problem.”
“Goodbye, Robert.”
“Goodbye, Sir.”
We hung up.
I was actually feeling pretty good until I realized I still had no idea where the ring was. And I really didn’t have anything else I could do. And I actually meant it this time. The next time I talked to Margo, I would have to tell her that. But I figured it could wait until she called me tomorrow. I could give her at least one more night of hope.
*
Another night on my couch. Another phone call from my ex-wife. We skipped the niceties.
“You again?” I said.
“Yeah, so did you end up talking to Mr. Martinelli?” she asked
“Yes.”
“Find anything?”
“Nope.”
“So what criminal act do you have to perform to pay him back?”
“Actually, I just have to take his granddaughter to the dentist next week.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. I’m starting to think that maybe we have him all wrong. Maybe he’s just a nice old man who really is an olive oil importer.” I could imagine Linda rolling her eyes at me. “You just rolled your eyes at me, didn’t you?” I said.
“How’d you know?”
“Why do you mean, ‘How did I know?’ I just knew.”
“All right, well look. The reason I’m calling is that Margo was my friend, too, and I know how much that ring meant to her, and I thought I could help.”
“You’re in Honduras, how are you going to help?”
“Guatemala. Anyway, I know you. I know you missed something really obvious, you always do. Just tell me everything she told you.”
“But-”
“Just tell me, all right?”
I told her. I told her everything Margo told me, and every detail of everything I had done since then. When I finished, Linda was silent for a moment.
“Why don’t you just ask Harold what happened to the ring?” she said.
“Margo asked me not to. Besides, why would Harold know what happened to the ring? You think he stole his own wife’s ring?”
“You said it yourself. If Margo’s telling the truth, no one else was in the house, or at least there’s no evidence of it. Harold’s really the only one who could have done it.”
“Yeah, but,” I said, even though I realized she was right. I had to disagree out of habit. “Why would he do it?”
“I don’t know. Why does anyone do anything? You’ll just have to ask him.”
“I guess,” I said.
“So you really never thought it might be him?” Linda asked.
“No,” I said.
She sighed. “That’s just like you. You never see what’s right there in front of you. It’s really a good thing you dropped out of the academy. You’d have made a lousy cop.”
“Thanks,” I said. She was right again, but I wasn’t going to let her know that. We said goodbye, and I went to bed.
*
The next morning I thought about what I should do. I was fairly convinced that Harold had to be somehow responsible, but I couldn’t really tell Margo that without something resembling proof. If he had nothing to do with it, then I’d just end up looking like an asshole. Really, the only person who knew if Harold had done it was Harold. I knew Margo didn’t want me to talk to him, but I didn’t see how I could find the ring if I didn’t talk to the number one suspect. It wasn’t the greatest idea in the world, but it was all I had.
When I got into my office I looked Harold up online. I knew he was a lawyer for a firm in the Back Bay. He wasn’t hard to find. I took the T to the Prudential. The security guard at the front desk gave me a hassle, but eventually she called upstairs, and Harold remembered who I was, and I got a guest pass so I could go upstairs. When I got to his floor, the receptionist directed me to his office, and he got up to greet me.
“What’s going on?” Harold asked, “They told me it was some kind of an emergency.”
“I might have exaggerated a bit,” I said.
He started to look suspicious. “So then why are you here? I thought something might have happened to Margo.”
“Something did happen, just not what you think. And no, not that either. I’m just doing a little favor for her. She lost a ring. She thinks it was stolen. I’m looking for it for her.”
“Why didn’t she tell me about it then?” he asked.
“She didn’t want you to know,” I said.
“Then why are you telling me?” he asked.
“Because I think you know what happened to the ring.”
“Are you saying I took it? Why would I take my wife’s ring?”
“That’s what I came to ask you. Harold, why did you take your wife’s ring?”
“This is ridiculous. She probably just misplaced it.”
“She’s pretty sure it was stolen. And I’m pretty sure it was you.”
“Even if what you’re saying wasn’t so ridiculous, there’s no way you could know it was me.” He was trying to sound indignant, but his words were straw in the breeze.
“Maybe not. But if anyone else had taken it, why would they take just one ring, and nothing else? You’re the only other person who could easily get to it. You had the opportunity, now we just need to determine your motive. So, Harold, why did you take your wife’s ring?”
He sat down, and the fight seemed to drain out of him. “Can I tell you a story first?”
“Does it have anything to do with your wife’s ring?” I asked.
“Maybe. You tell me.” He gestured for me to take the chair across from his desk. I sat down.
“Go on,” I said.
“Well, you see, there was this guy, and he really loved this woman, and they got married. They got married even though the man knew his wife loved some other guy more, that’s how much he loved her. Oh, the wife tried to hid her true feelings, but the man was able to put it together from an overheard conversation here, a slip of the tongue there. The reason he could live with it was that he knew this other guy had just disappeared one day, was either dead or missing, maybe he just ran away. So the man knew he was the only one. Then one day, the man gets his wife’s jewelry appraised for an insurance policy, and he finds out that the ring he sees his wife wearing when she thinks he isn’t looking, the ring her old lover obviously gave her, hell, he’s heard her friends talking about it for Christ’s sake, well, that ring isn’t worth a dime. It’s not antique, it’s a cheap piece of costume jewelry. But the man doesn’t tell his wife that. He knows it would break her heart. And the very next week, when the goddamn Antiques Roadshow is coming to town, the wife says she wants to find out what they think of some of her pieces, but the husband knows exactly which piece she’s really talking about. So the next day the ring disappears. So she never finds out that the man she loved so much had only given her a worthless trinket.” Harold paused. “That have anything to do with why you’re here?”
I sat there for a moment then stood up. “Sorry to bother you,” I said, “I don’t know what got into me.” I turned and walked out the door.
I took the T back to Davis. I walked to my office and sat down behind my desk. I picked up the phone. I dialed Margo.
“Hello?” she said.
“Hey,” I said, “It’s Rob.”
“What is it?”
“I just wanted to let you know that I tried everything I could think of, but I don’t think I can find your ring.”
“Oh,” she said, “That’s OK. I’m sure you did your best. I’ll be all right.”
I could tell she wasn’t, but it was a hell of a lot better than she would have been if she knew the truth. Someday she’d get over losing the ring. She didn’t need it to remember Eddie. If she did, he wouldn’t really be worth remembering anyway.
I said goodbye and Margo mumbled something back, probably nothing important, but I wish I knew what it was because I never spoke to her again. I don’t think I could have, knowing what I knew.
I sat at my desk looking up at the ceiling fan moving the air-conditioned air around. I knew it didn’t accomplish anything, but the thought of turning it off depressed me. Then it would just sit there without a purpose. Like me. I wondered if I was the only person in history who lived vicariously through a ceiling fan.
I looked away from the ceiling and sighed. I picked up the phone and dialed a number, I couldn’t even tell you what it was, I had dialed it so many times before my fingers just knew it, and Linda picked up.
“Hello,” she said, “I didn’t think I’d hear from you again so soon. What’s up?”
“I have a stupid question for you,” I said. “What did you ever do with your engagement ring?”
Even over the phone I could tell she was surprised. There was just a hint of hesitation before she spoke, though there wasn’t any sign of it in her voice. “I wear it on a chain.”
And that surprised me. “Does the archaeologist know what it is?”
“Yes.”
“And he’s OK with that?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never asked him, and he knows to keep his mouth shut because he knows how much it means to me.”
“If it means so much to you, why did you leave me?”
“Well, that was a pretty good example right there.”
“Sorry.”
“No you’re not. But that’s all right. That’s also why I love you.”
“Who wouldn’t?”
“You.”
“Right,” I said. There was silence for a moment. “Hey, do you think I’m too old to go back to the police academy?”
“Yes,” she said, “I’m pretty sure you can’t be over 24.”
“Well, since I’ve already been in before maybe I’m grandfathered in?”
“I doubt it.”
“Well, can you ask your brother if there’s anything he can do?”
“I can ask him, but you know he doesn’t like you. He’d probably just fuck you over, especially if I asked him to.”
“Thanks,” I said.
“But no, I’ll talk to him. I’ll ask him nice.”
“Thanks,” I said.
“Besides, if it doesn’t work out, you can always become a P.I.”
“We’ve already demonstrated I’d be the worst one ever.”
“Well, sure, but you just have to do the leg work. Then you can call me and I can figure it all out for you again.”
“Maybe.”
“Yeah, maybe. I gotta run. I’ll talk to you later.”
“All right. Later.”
I hung up. I got up and turned off the air-conditioner. I wondered how long it would take the room to warm up.