11 — Busy Work
October 13, 1938
Pauline was humming as she went about her work. Not repetitively, exactly, but now and then a tune would repeat. Dwight watched her through the doorway between her office and his. It was clear she was happy, but...
"Hey, you tryin' to clue me in or somethin'?"
"Excuse me?" Pauline asked, pausing as she sifted through a file drawer.
"The humming. You want a radio in here or something?"
She blushed a bright red, then quickly went back to work.
"Sorry," was all she said.
Shoving up out of his chair, Dwight went and stood in the doorway.
"Who is she?"
"Hmm?"
"Who's the lucky dame that's got you humming away like a power line?"
The blush was gone, and Pauline's face was a mask of calm as she closed the file cabinet and looked at Dwight. The slightest small smile curled, almost illusorily, around her lips.
"Wouldn't you like to know?"
Then she returned to her desk, flipped the 'dex to F, and picked up the phone. When she saw Dwight still standing, smiling at her, she hung up and turned in her chair.
"Look. Her name is Nunzia. She's very sweet, she's very funny, and she's very, very gentle."
Turning away, she penciled something onto the schedule, then picked up the phone again.
"Though she's not too gentle when it counts."
Dwight's smile faded a little, and he walked back into his office. He knew well enough when to pull back from digging for information on Pauline's dates. If he went too far, she'd tell him every blessed detail and...
Well, at his age, he didn't need that.
Stepping to the window, Dwight peered out through the blinds. That car was still parked across the way. Three or four guys in it. It'd been there nearly every day lately. The few times he'd been in a position to see the plates, they were too coated in mud for the view to be useful.
Dwight sat, stared for a while at the notes on his desk, and sighed. He had a pretty good idea of who was in the car, and why they were there.
He'd been rash, perhaps, to prod Dominic Tamburo, but the police sergeant he'd spoken to about the Angellini matter agreed, Tamburo seemed a likely suspect. Well, some Tamburo. Yes, Dom's cigar end matched the one found next to Ari Angellini, but it was possible Dominic was simply present when the guy was dumped on the sidewalk. There were three other sons in Dom's immediate family, plus his father, a plethora of cousins, uncles...
The Tamburos were likely involved, but which ones? The sergeant had advised Dwight to lay off the case, that the cops were looking into it, but then, Dwight knew how the cops tended to "look into" anything that might involve the Tamburos. They'd take a perfunctory glance around, then go pick up a fat wad of cash in an alley and let the matter drop.
Hearing the phone click down in the front office, Dwight sat up a little straighter.
"Hey, Pauline?"
A moment later, his secretary appeared in the doorway, smiling.
"Yes?"
"This person you've been seeing..."
"Nunzia."
"Yeah. She... Well, is she... Ya know, one of those tough sorts?"
"She's very butch," Pauline nodded.
"Right. Well, listen, if she's free... Well, I just feel like it's a good idea if you don't go home alone for a while."
"Oh, that's no trouble. She's been escorting me from the office a lot lately."
"A lot, huh?"
"A lot."
"And her name, Nunzia... Italian?"
"Oh please tell me you're not gonna investigate her," Pauline giggled.
"Nah. Nah, I just... Just wondering if she knows some people of my acquaintance."
Shrugging, Pauline turned to head back to her work.
"It's possible," she called back.
"Nunzia knows a lot of people."
Posted Oct 11, 2019, 4:17 PM UTC · edited