I found my way to the Bridgeport Business College and parked in a visitor’s spot. It didn’t look all that much like a college. It was a long, flat, industrial-looking building without an ounce of academic charm. But it reportedly had good courses, and that was what had led Sheila to come here for her night classes.
I didn’t know whether Allan Butterfield was part of the regular faculty, or merely taught an evening course here on the side. I went through the entrance doors and approached a man sitting at the information desk in the drab foyer.
“I’m looking for a teacher, his name’s Butterfield.”
He didn’t need to consult anything. He pointed. “Take that hall to the end, go right, office is on the left. Just look for the signs.”
I was standing outside Allan Butterfield’s door a minute later, and rapped on it.
“Hello?” said a muffled voice from inside.
I turned the knob and opened the door on a small, cluttered office space. There was just enough room for a desk and a couple of chairs. Papers and books were stacked helter-skelter.
Butterfield wasn’t alone. A redheaded woman in her early twenties sat on the other side of the desk from Butterfield. An open laptop was balanced on her knees.
“Excuse me,” I said.
“Oh, hi,” Butterfield said. “Glen, Glen Garber.” He remembered me from our meeting after Sheila’s death, when I’d been attempting to trace Sheila’s final hours.
“I need to talk to you,” I said.
“I’m just finishing up here with-”
“Now.”
The woman closed her laptop and said, “That’s okay, I can come back later, Mr. Butterfield.”
“Sorry, Jenny,” he told her. “Why don’t you pop in tomorrow?”
She nodded, grabbed a jacket she had draped over the back of her chair, and squeezed past me to get out the door. I took her chair without being invited.
“So, Glen,” he said. First time I met him, I put him in his early forties. Five-five, pudgy. Mostly bald, a pair of reading glasses perched on the end of his nose. “Last time we spoke, you were trying to track down Sheila’s movements the day of the… well, I know you were extremely concerned. Have you gotten some answers to your questions? Achieved some sort of closure?”
“Closure,” I repeated. The word tasted like sour milk in my mouth. “No, no closure.”
“I’m so sorry to hear that.”
No sense beating around the bush. “Why are there so many calls from you to my wife’s cell phone before she died?”
He opened his mouth but nothing came out. Not for a good second or two. I could see he was trying to think of something, but the best he could come up with on short notice was “I’m sorry-I-what?”
“There’s a slew of calls from you to my wife. Missed calls. It looks to me like she was receiving them, but didn’t want to take them.”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t know what you’re talking about. I mean, I’m sure, occasionally, I may have had reason to call your wife about the course she was taking, she had questions related to the assignments, but-”
“I think that’s bullshit, Allan.”
“Honestly, Glen, I-”
“You need to know that I’m having a very, very bad day, which happens to be part of a very, very bad month. So when I tell you I’m not in the mood for bullshit, you need to believe me. Why all the calls?”
Butterfield appeared to be assessing his chances at escape. The office was so crowded, he’d never get out from behind that desk and through the door without stumbling over something before I could block his path.
“It was totally my fault,” he said. There was a slight tremor in his voice.
“What was your fault?”
“I behaved, I behaved inappropriately. Sheila-Ms. Garber-she was a very nice person. Just a naturally nice person.”
“Yes,” I said. “I know.”
“She was just… she was very special. Considerate. She was someone… someone I could talk to.”
I didn’t say anything.
“I don’t really have anyone in my life, you see. I’ve never been married. I was engaged once, in my twenties, but it didn’t work out.” He nodded sadly. “I don’t think I was… she said I tried a little too hard. Anyway, I rent a room upstairs in a nice old house on Park. I have this job, and I like it, and the people here, they’re good to work with, but I don’t have a lot of friends.”
“Allan, just tell me-”
“Please. The thing is, I’m not accustomed to kindnesses. Your wife was very nice to me.”
“Nice how?”
