The Dead Key

Suza

“Damn it.” Iris lit a cigarette and slumped back. A key doesn’t just disappear. She crossed her arms angrily and felt something poking at her chest. Darned underwire, she thought, and unhooked her slept-in bra. Something fell out and hit the floor. It was the key.

“There you are.” Iris picked it up and looked hard at the number 547 etched into its face. “Who do you belong to?”

The key didn’t answer, but she wished it could. She lay back down.

When Iris had managed to keep an entire cup of coffee in her hungover stomach, she picked up the phone and dialed Suza

“Hello,” a raspy voice answered.

“Suza

“Yes.”

“This is Iris. You called me last night.”

“Of course. Iris. You should come and see me this morning. My niece is at church until noon.”

“Can you tell me what this is about?”

“If you want to talk, come to 13321 Juniper Drive in Lakewood. I’ll be waiting.” The woman coughed, then hung up.

“Okay, crazy lady. I’ll be right there,” Iris said into the dead line, and set the phone down. It was nuts, she told herself, but she had taken the key to find its rightful owner. Regardless of whatever drunken theories she’d conjured up the night before, it was her responsibility now. Iris rehooked her bra and slipped the key into her back pocket.

Juniper Drive was a long, crowded street in Lakewood one hundred blocks west of Tremont. Iris navigated her way through the tight grid of bungalows until she found the right one. It was a small brick box with aluminum awnings and a screened-in front porch. An old woman was sitting in a rocker behind the rusted screen.

Iris squinted into the porch. “Are you Suza

“You must be Iris. Come in. Come in. We don’t have much time before my niece gets back from Mass.” Suza

“Hi.” Iris eased herself down onto the creaky couch. “Um, thanks for inviting me over.”

Suza

“Well, after you called I started thinking . . .” She pulled an extralong menthol out of a red leather cigarette purse and lit it with a shiny, gold fashion lighter. “About the bank. I didn’t mention it before on the phone, but you know there were investigations. Police investigations before the bank closed.”

“Really? Why?”

“I’m not sure. The police questioned all of us. They asked me all sorts of strange questions about the files. I didn’t know a damn thing of course. But I talked to one of my friends, Jean—you know, in private—to find out what the heck was going on. She said that strange things had been happening.”

“What sorts of things?”

“Files were disappearing from the Deposits Office. And keys . . .”

“Keys for what?”

“The safe deposit boxes, among others,” Suza

“Did your friend tell that to the police?” Iris leaned forward on the couch and stared into Suza

“Well, no. She didn’t.”

“Why not?”

“There were threats.” Suza

Iris waited for more information, but Suza

Finally Iris had to ask, “What sort of threats?”

“I got a call in the middle of the night the week before the bank closed.” Suza

“Or what would happen?”

“Didn’t say really, but I had a good idea. A few people disappeared around that time.”

“Disappeared? Who?”

“That girl, Beatrice, for one thing. I got that phone call from her late one night about some safe deposit box. I didn’t think much of it at the time. But you know it kinda got to me. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. So I went to see her. I went all the way up to the ninth floor to find her a few days later. She wasn’t there. No one knew where she was, and the way I heard it, she never came back.”

“What do you think happened to her?”

“I couldn’t say.” Suza

“Why did you say she was a liar?”

“Some girl I never met called me up thinking I had some deposit box at the bank. That was a lie! Lord knows who else she blabbed that nonsense to. You can’t be too careful. At least, I can’t.”

Suza

“Is this yours?”

Suza

“Do you know who it might belong to?” Iris pressed, not wanting to admit she’d taken it directly from Suza

“I really couldn’t say.”

Damn it. Iris shoved the key back in her pocket. “So . . . whatever happened with the police investigation?”

“Nothin’. That was the thing. One day they were calling everybody, and the next day nothin’.”

“So, then, what did you mean when you said the other day that some people got what was coming?” Iris asked.

“A couple rich families went bankrupt. It was all over the news. The Hallorans. The Wackerlys. Old Man Mercer died. They said it was a car crash.” Suza

The name Halloran was familiar for some reason. Iris puzzled over it until she remembered Linda up on the third floor. Her last name was Halloran. Iris shook her head, trying to knock loose the co

“You better be careful who you go asking about the First Bank of Cleveland,” Suza

“Is that why you called me? To tell me to be careful?”

“Well, I wasn’t going to say nothin’, but you seemed like a nice enough girl on the phone. I didn’t want to have you on my conscience.” She lit another cigarette.

“Thanks, I guess, but what do you think is going to happen exactly? I mean, who really cares about the old bank at this point?” Iris eyed the smoke and debated lighting one herself.

“You’d be surprised how many of those fat-cat bankers is still around.” Suza

Something on Suza