Seven Up - By Janet Evanovich Page 0,84

but I didn't want to miss anything, either.

We all stopped about ten feet from the wreck. The train engine was still but Bell was right, the engine was radiating a lot of heat. The sheer mass of the engine was intimidating even at rest.

Mary Maggie stared at what was left of the Cadillac and swayed in place. "It's my car," she said. "I think."

"How can you tell?" Bell asked.

"I can see some of the upholstery fabric. My uncle had the car seats reupholstered in blue. It wasn't the normal upholstery fabric."

"Anything else?"

Mary Maggie shook her head. "I don't think so. There's not much left to see."

We all walked back and huddled again. Some trucks pulled up with heavy rescue equipment and started to work on the Cadillac. They had a jaws of life standing by, but they were using acetylene torches to cut the car away from the train. It was getting dark, and portable spots had been brought to light the scene, giving it an eerie, movie-lot feel.

I felt a tug on my sleeve and turned to find Grandma Mazur standing on tiptoe trying to get a better view of the accident. Mabel Pritchet was with her.

"Have you ever seen such a thing?" Grandma said. "I heard on the radio that a train hit a white Cadillac, and I got Mabel to drive me over. Is it Chooch's car?"

"We don't know for sure, but we think it might be."

I introduced Grandma to Mary Maggie.

"It's a real pleasure," Grandma said. "I'm a big admirer of wrestling." She looked back at the Cadillac. "Be a shame if DeChooch is in there. He's such a cutie." Grandma leaned across me to Mary Maggie. "Did you know I was kidnapped? I had a bag over my head and everything."

"It must have been scary," Mary Maggie said.

"Well, in the beginning I thought Choochy was just trying something kinky. He has this problem with his penis, you know. It don't do nothing. Just lays there like it was dead. But then it turned out I was kidnapped. Isn't that something? First off we drove around some. And then I could hear us going into a garage that had an automatic door. And the garage was attached to one of those finished-off basements with a couple bedrooms and a television room. And the television room had chairs that were done in leopard print."

"I know that house," Mary Maggie said. "I went to a party there once. There's a little kitchen downstairs, too, right? And the downstairs bathroom has wallpaper that's tropical birds."

"That's right," Grandma said. "It was all jungle motif. Chooch said Elvis used to have a jungle room, too."

I couldn't believe I was hearing this. Mary Maggie knew DeChooch's secret hideout. And now I probably didn't need it.

"Who owns the house?" I asked.

"Pinwheel Soba."

"I thought he moved to Florida."

"He did, but he kept the house. They have relatives here, so they spend part of the year in Florida and part of the year in Trenton."

There was the sound of tearing metal, and the Cadillac was separated from the train. We watched in silence for several tense minutes while the top was peeled back. Tom Bell stood close to the car. After a moment he turned and looked at me and mouthed the word empty.

"He's not in there," I said. And we all choked on tears of relief. I'm not sure why. Eddie DeChooch wasn't such a great person. But then maybe no one is bad enough to deserve getting made into a pizza by a train.

I CALLED MORELLI when I got home. "Did you hear about DeChooch?"

"Yeah, Tom Bell called."

"This was really strange. I think DeChooch just left the car there to get run over."

"Tom thought that, too."

"Why would DeChooch do that?"

"Because he's crazy?"

I didn't think DeChooch was crazy. You want to see crazy? Take a look at Sophia. DeChooch had problems, physical and emotional. And his life was snowballing out of control. A few things went wrong and he tried to fix them and it just kept getting worse instead of better. I could see how everything was related now with the exception of Loretta Ricci and the Cadillac on the train tracks.

"One good thing happened tonight," I said. "Grandma showed up and started talking to Mary Maggie, telling her about the kidnapping. Grandma described the house DeChooch took her to. And Mary Maggie said it sounded like Pinwheel Soba's house."

"Soba lived in Ewing, off Olden Avenue. We have a file on him."

"That makes