professionalism. She was going to have a hell of a time carrying letter boxes up and down the steps quickly in those shoes.
They introduced themselves, and Tammy handed them each a box. Plummer joined them, taking a third box. Josie and Gretchen followed him up the steps as he talked. “I’ve had that house on Hempstead for years,” he said. “A damn shame. Is Mrs. Bassett okay?”
“Yes,” Josie said. “A small bump on the head but otherwise fine. Happy to be alive.”
“She lost everything though,” Calvin muttered. At the top of the steps, they followed him left and down a long hall. On the second floor, the insistent drum of the rain was nearly a roar. “Do you know where I can reach her? I can at least return her security deposit. I definitely don’t need it now. She was always a great tenant. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find good tenants?”
Gretchen started with his first question. “We’re not sure where she’ll be placed but as soon as we know, we can pass that along.”
“Speaking of tenants,” Josie said as they came to a doorway. “We were wondering if you could tell us about the tenants who lived in the house before Mrs. Bassett.”
Calvin walked into a large room which was empty, save for a stack of file boxes along one wall. He motioned for them to place their boxes on top of the pile. “This is to do with that thing you jumped into the water for, isn’t it? On the news, reporters are speculating that it was a body. Is that the case?”
“Yes,” Josie answered, setting her box down. “It is a body. It’s with the medical examiner now.”
Calvin hung his head. “You’re telling me there was a body buried under one of my houses?”
Gretchen put her box on top of Josie’s. “Yes. Do you have any idea how it might have gotten there?”
Calvin laughed as he headed back down to the file room. “If I knew anything about a dead body underneath one of my properties, you’d be having this conversation with my attorney. Of course I don’t know anything about it. Listen, that property has always been a rental. Like I said, I’ve had it for decades. Before Mrs. Bassett, there were a bunch of tenants; not the most savory types, if you take my meaning. Any one of them could have been doing illegal things there. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if they had been. I was lucky to find Mrs. Bassett. I’m sad to see her go. Sad to see the house go. Insurance will cover it, I imagine.”
“About those former tenants,” Josie said, trying to keep him on track as they took more boxes from Tammy and followed Calvin upstairs again. “Do you have records? A list? Something we can use to track them down?”
Over his shoulder, he said, “I’m only required to keep records for seven years, but I suppose I can check and see what I’ve got. Actually, Tammy probably knows where those records are better than me.”
Back in the file room, he addressed his young secretary.
“Tammy,” he said. “I need you to find all the records we have on the Hempstead property, if you can find them quickly.” He looked out of the file room toward the front door. Beyond, the murky brown water began to cover the grass.
With a sigh, Tammy turned away from them, walking sideways through a narrow passage between two piles of letter boxes and then navigating her way to a file cabinet in the corner of the room, blocked by a rolling cart with computer equipment on it. “I think those are in this one,” she said, pushing the cart aside. They watched as she bent at the waist to open the bottom drawer. As she riffled through it, Josie looked over to see Plummer’s gaze glued to his secretary’s rear, eyes hungry. Gretchen’s elbow jabbed at Josie’s side, an indication for Josie not to stare. Josie tore her eyes from the attorney and stepped forward, searching for an empty file box. A moment later, she and Tammy were loading file folders marked “Hempstead” into it.
Plummer said, “I trust you’ll return them to me when you’re finished? We don’t really have time to make copies right now.”
Outside, the mournful wail of the emergency fire siren went on. Gretchen said, “We don’t need copies. We can bring them back as soon as we’ve finished with them.”
“Perfect,” Plummer said.