David Handler - The shimmering blond sister

“Certainly.” Maddee sat back down across from her husband and resumed her coupon clipping. She performed the little task same way she gardened-with focused tenacity. Whipping through an ad supplement before she paused, zeroed in, and pounced. Her sharp little scissors going snip-snip-snip in the morning quiet. “Look at this, Dex, the IGA at Four Corners has ten cans of Bumble Bee tuna for ten dollars.” Snip-snip-snip. “You say there’s something you wish to ask me about, Mitch?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Well, don’t be shy. It’s a sign of weakness. I’ve always encouraged Kimberly to speak right up and tell me what’s on her-”

“How long have you known that your husband is the Dorset Flasher?”

Dex Farrell didn’t so much as blink. Just stared straight ahead, his face impassive.

But Maddee paled instantly, her eyes darting wildly about the porch. “Why, whatever do you mean…?”

“I mean that our Flasher isn’t a sexually frustrated kid. Or an overheated man child like Hal Chapman or J. Z. Cliffe. It’s Dex who has been exposing himself to various prominent ladies in the Historic District, and leaving little presents on their doorsteps.” Mitch looked at him. The man still hadn’t moved a muscle. “Actually, this whole crazy business fell right into place once I realized it was you. For one thing, the Flasher never seems to-how shall I put it-rise to the occasion. Makes total sense. You’re, what, sixty-seven years old? That’s not to say you can’t stand and deliver from time to time. I certainly hope you can. Otherwise I don’t have a whole lot to look forward to in the years ahead. But sex has never been what this was about. Has it, sir?”

Dex reached for his coffee and took a small sip, his hand steady as a rock. He didn’t respond. Or look at Mitch. Just gazed out the porch screen at the rosebushes that flanked the Captain Chadwick House’s front path. The Blush Noisettes that Maddee tended to so passionately.

“I’ve been asking myself why the Flasher always strikes on weekends-which just happens to be when Kenny’s in town visiting Kimberly. I kept thinking there had to be some connection. Again, the obvious answer fell right into place: You do your thing on the weekend because Kimberly isn’t here on the weekend. She’s out of the apartment-over at Beth’s place with Kenny. Plus, who knows, maybe you’re a teensy bit conflicted about that. Daddy’s little girl across the hall, lying in bed naked in some geeky young stranger’s arms. But, hey, that’s a little Freudian for me so I don’t think I’ll go there. Armchair psychology is not my thing. I’ve never been a big fan of Spellbound, have you?”

Dex continued to stare out at the rosebushes. He was very still. Scarcely seemed to be breathing.

“Which isn’t to say that it belongs in the pantheon of Hitchcock’s truly awful films,” Mitch went on. “Such as, say, The Paradine Case. Which, interestingly enough, also happens to star Gregory Peck. He and Hitch were clearly not a match made in Selznick heaven. But Spellbound has never appealed to me. So heavy-handed. And, wowser, talk about icebox questions.”

“Talk about… what?” Maddee asked hoarsely.

“You still haven’t answered my question, ma’am. How long have you known? You may as well tell me. I can help you. I certainly don’t wish to hurt you. I’m a friend of the family. And we both know that Mr. Farrell already has a well-documented history of behaving, shall we say, eccentrically in public.”

Maddee lunged for her coffee cup and took a sip, her own hand shaking so badly that Mitch could hear the cup clonk against her front teeth. “I think you’d better leave, Mitch. I think you’d better leave right this minute. I refuse to sit here and allow you to speak such-such vile, awful, despicable…”

“Please stop talking now, dear,” Dex spoke up, his voice quiet but firm. “Kindly shut your mouth and keep it shut. Mr. Berger has shown me the courtesy of paying us a personal call on this matter. In return, I owe him the courtesy of the truth. It’s the only honorable thing to do. Although I’m afraid, young man, that you won’t understand the purpose behind this little undertaking of mine.”

“I’d like to, sir. I really would.”

“Very well. I’ll do my best to explain it to you,” he said to Mitch as Maddee sat there across the table from him in obedient silence, a stricken expression on her face. “Over the years, Mr. Berger, there have been occasions in my life that have called for me to act in an extraordinary fashion.”

“By extraordinary you mean…?”

“Kindly don’t interrupt me. I assure you that I will answer all of your questions at the appropriate time.” Dex folded his hands before him on the table and resumed. “Occasions that have forced me to invent an alter ego so as to do what needed doing. Whether it be escaping the bonds of a rigid, recalcitrant authority or the righting of egregious wrongs. Wrongs that could not be dealt with by traditional means. Maddee and I have endured a great deal of personal humiliation since we’ve returned to Dorset. Perfectly understandable. I put my faith in the wrong men and cost a lot of innocent people a lot of their hard-earned money. I ask for no sympathy. I fully deserve the scorn and derision that is directed at me wherever I go. But not Maddee. It isn’t fair that this good woman has been made to suffer along with me. She had no part in the institutional failures of Farrell and Co. She was an innocent bystander who wished nothing more than to retire in peace to this village that she loved. That’s not so much to ask for, is it? And yet I saw how the old biddies whispered about her behind her back. Shunned her, humiliated her. Made her grovel to regain their precious approval. A fine, caring lady like my Maddee. Someone of breeding and taste. Her folks were very, very fine people. She was quite a stunner in her day, too, my Maddee. You should have seen her in a bathing suit, Mr. Berger. She would have taken your breath away. And yet just look at how these awful women have treated her. They’ve made her sort through other people’s soiled clothing like a ragpicker. Deliver meals around town just like one of those high-school dropouts who drive for Domino’s Pizza. All because she wanted to book the Yacht Club for Kimberly’s wedding. I’ll have you know I paid for that club’s new dock out of my own pocket seven years ago. Yet now my Maddee has to beg her way back into their good graces. They’re intolerably vicious and cruel, these women. Believe me, each and every one of them richly deserved a dose of her own medicine. And that’s exactly what I gave them.”

“What about that poop sample you left on resident trooper Mitry’s welcome mat? Did she ‘deserve’ that?”

Dex’s jaw muscles tightened but he didn’t respond. Didn’t care for inconvenient questions. Just sat there gazing at Mitch.

“The resident trooper referred to Dex as ‘seriously disturbed’ on Channel Eight News,” Maddee explained, her voice quavering slightly. “It was very hurtful. Dex has been under a doctor’s care for these past two years. He knows-we know-that he has a problem with his… moods. He’s coping with his condition bravely. And, believe me, he’s never harmed a soul.”

Dex nodded in agreement. “I’ve done no actual harm to any of the ladies, Mr. Berger. Merely taken it upon myself to mete out an appropriate measure of justice. You can see that, can’t you?”

“Absolutely, sir. You’ve been making a statement.”

“That’s correct. A statement.”

“And no harm has come to anyone. Unless, of course, you count Augie Donatelli getting his brains bashed in. A man is dead, Mr. Farrell. That kind of throws your whole tit-for-tat thing out the window, doesn’t it?”