Chapter Seven
On the way back to the car from the Park Blocks, I called Angela to say that Melvin Turner might be calling to warn her about my unseemly behavior and try to talk her out of using me. “I’ll tell him to go to hell,” she shot back. “He’s such a dick.”
“No, don’t get into it with him. Just say you’re an adult with the right to choose your own lawyer. Leave it at that, okay?”
She agreed, albeit a bit reluctantly.
At the car, Semyon Lebedev called to say he had some information for me. I told him I was in town, and we agreed to meet. He pressed me for a spot, and I suggested the basement bar at Ringlers Annex, across from Powell’s Books. He laughed. “This is a good spot, Cal. No Russians go to yuppie bars downtown.”
I was sure Archie had had enough of the backseat, so I swung by Caffeine Central and dropped him off, offloaded my backpack, and filled his water dish. At least he could have the run of the inside of the building.
“Guard the castle, Big Boy,” I said, and he gave me that look, the one that means “you always say that.”
I got to the Annex before Semyon and watched as he came down the stairs to the bar. He looked fit, his hair cut high and tight, military style, and the tattoos on his muscled arms a swirl of ink in the low light. He glanced around first, nodded to me, and came back from the bar with the same thing I was drinking—a pint of the house amber. We clinked glasses and exchanged greetings. He said, “My contact in the automotive business was not anxious to talk to me.” A grim smile split the dark, three-day growth on his cheeks. “I had to…ah, remind him of the favor he owed me.”
“I appreciate that, Semyon.”
His eyes flashed a warning. “The organization you’re messing with is dangerous. Car theft is where it started, but they have diversified. The big boss is Ilya Boyarchenko, a scumbag who gives the Russians in this town a bad name. He is slippery, has good lawyers, and denies any criminal connections.” He laughed derisively. “In Russian, we call him ubiytsa. He rules without mercy. People with loose lips are dealt with harshly.”
I nodded as my gut tightened a little. “Understood.”
Semyon took two long swallows of his beer. “So, my friend took a look at the shops where the car you are interested in could have been taken, shops where records of ownership are not an issue. There are several such shops in the area, but one shop received cars during the time you are interested in. This one has the highest volume.” He removed a folded piece of paper from his shirt pocket, opened it, and squinted in the low light. “Four cars were brought in: a 2016 Lexus GS on March sixteenth, a 2015 Prius C on March nineteenth, and a 2017 Honda Civic and a 2016 Lincoln Navigator on the twenty-first.” He waved the paper. “I’ll give you these notes. They include the timing of each drop.”
I nodded. “Did your friend notice the condition of the front ends of these cars?”
“Nyet.”
“Registration? Colors?”
Semyon shook his head. “I’m sorry, Cal. My friend swore he did not have this information.”
My heart sank. “That’s it, then?”
“There was one other thing. He told me the Lexus was a stolen car driven up to Portland by a man called Lenny the Fox, a well-known car thief and friend of my friend. The reason he mentioned it, I think, was that this man, Lenny, killed himself the same night he dropped the car off. This bothers my friend. He said he thought it was strange.”
“What’s Lenny’s full name?”
Semyon glanced down at his notes. “Bateman. Leonard Bateman.”
I nodded. “So, these cars are stripped and sent to a crusher. What happens next?”
“They’re stored until they’re shipped off to a scrap recovery operation.”
“How long does that take?”
Semyon shrugged. “Hard to say. Weeks or the next day, depending on when they have a full load to ship.”
“Are the cubes stored inside or outside?”
He shot me a so-what look. “Some of both, mostly outside.”
“Got it.” At this point, I ran out of questions, and Semyon seemed anxious to leave. He finished his beer, handed me his notes, and sauntered out, but not before warning me again to be careful. I sat there nursing the last of my beer and turning things over. I was disappointed he didn’t have more for me, but I reminded myself this had been a long shot to begin with.
If whoever killed Margaret Wingate did use the Boyarchenko ring to get rid of the car, my decision tree split into two branches—accident or murder. If an accident, then it could have been any one of the four cars. I knew the makes, models, and years, but nothing else. If not an accident, then at least I could eliminate the Prius and the Honda. No way a small, light car like either of those would have been selected for such a job, I figured. That left the Lexus and the Lincoln, both of which were stoutly built and could be relied upon to keep going after colliding with a human body.
Another thought occurred to me. If it was a paid hit designed to look like an accident, then using a car from out of town, like the Lexus, would make sense. A car stolen in Portland for the job would have presented a much higher risk of being noticed by the cops.
That was okay, as far as it went, but I finished my beer and left the Annex feeling deflated. Accident or murder, my Hail Mary pass felt like a dud. There was the question of the suicide. I didn’t have a clue what it meant, if anything, but I did call Nando Mendoza and asked him to run Leonard—Lenny the Fox—Bateman through his databases.
After a hard run along the river with a happy dog, a whirlwind shopping tour through Whole Foods for provisions, and a plant-watering stopover at Winona’s, I was starved. I’d scored some fresh Alaskan rockfish at the market, which I sautéed in a little butter and lemon juice and topped it with toasted sliced almonds, broiled asparagus drizzled with olive oil, and a nuked sweet potato. The first glass of chilled Sancerre I had with the meal tasted so good I had a second.
I was cleaning up when Nando called back. “This Lenny the Fox…” he began as if we hadn’t terminated our previous conversation, “has only the one conviction—grand theft auto when he was twenty-two. He was from L.A. and had a reputation as the Houdini of car thieves. Apparently, he learned well from his one mistake.”
I chuckled. “Any family in L.A.?”
“A brother in Highland Park named Kenneth Bateman.”
“What about the details of his death? Anything?”
“He was found on the morning of March seventeenth by the maid at Swanson’s Motel just off Southeast Foster on 111th. She discovered him hanging from the bathroom door using a noose fashioned from bedsheet strips.”
“The bathroom door? Was he a midget?”
Laughter. “No. He apparently put the noose around his neck and simply folded his legs.”
“This happens?”
“If the will is there…. I investigated a case once where a man hung himself with his belt from a doorknob.”
“Was Lenny’s death ruled a suicide?”
“Yes. The case is closed.”
“Anything else?”
“Nothing of note except many of the rooms at Swanson’s Motel are rented by the hour.”
I thanked Nando and told him to put the search on my tab. That alone would eat up the retainer I’d received from Angela. You’ve got to be more realistic about your rates, I told myself, echoing the recurring theme of my accountant, Gertrude Johnson.
I was curious what, if anything, Kenneth Bateman might be willing to tell me about his car-thief brother. I found a phone number for him in the White Pages and had him on the line a couple of minutes later. “I’m sorry for the loss of your brother,” I said after introducing myself and emphasizing I wasn’t a cop.
“What exactly do you want, Mr. Claxton?” he asked, his tone wary.
“I just have a couple of questions. I’m tryi
ng to determine if your brother’s death has any bearing on a case I’m involved with.”
He puffed a sarcastic breath. “I can tell you Lenny didn’t kill himself. That’s bullshit.”
I popped to attention. “Why do you say that?”
“Lenny was no angel, and he drank a lot, but he’d never kill himself. We received his belongings when they shipped his body down. A switchblade knife was included. The Portland cops said he used it to cut the sheet strips that he tied together to make a noose. My brother was not the type to carry a switchblade, you know?” He laughed. “And Lenny wasn’t handy at all. No way he makes a rope out of a bedsheet. No fucking way.”
“Did you tell the police this?”
“Yeah, I did, but it was clear they had their minds made up.”
When I asked about when and why Lenny went to Portland and who he might have been in contact with, Kenneth cut me off in a hurry. “Lenny never discussed his business dealings with me,” his brother said. That ended the conversation.
Afterwards, I sat there in the study, a little stunned. Lenny the Fox stole a Lexus in L.A., drove it to Portland, and then, after dropping the car off at the chop shop, went to a motel and was either murdered or hung himself. That same day, Margaret Wingate was struck and killed by a hit-and-run driver. I got up and retrieved the notes Semyon had given me. I knew from the newspaper report that she was struck around five-thirty p.m. I checked the time that the Lexus was dropped off—six-forty p.m. “That could work,” I said out loud, “if the Lexus was driven directly from the crime scene to the chop shop.”
I turned to Arch as a small swirl of excitement stirred in my gut. “Damn, Big Boy, the timing fits.”
Chapter Eight
That Friday morning I watched as a stream of viscous, aromatic coffee collected in the upper chamber of a small, steam-driven espresso maker, the one I took on fishing and backpacking trips. A little added milk heated on the stove and a sugar cube, and voilà—not a cup for a purist but a passable way to start the day. I’d been meaning to get a decent espresso machine for my galley kitchen at Caffeine Central, but like replacing the sign out front, I hadn’t gotten around to it.
By the time Archie and I came down to open up, a sizable line had gathered out on Couch Street, promising a busy day. In addition to the usual problems of abrupt lease terminations, evictions without cause, and various complaints about landlord neglect, I was experiencing a sharp uptick in undocumented immigrants looking for advice and reassurance. I was no expert in immigration law, which is highly specialized, but I had a stack of cards on my desk of lawyers who were. If the clients were Hispanic and challenged by English, I sent them off with a reminder that Portland was una ciudad sanctuaria.
Around midday, Angela called to say Melvin Turner had contacted her, as I predicted. “He was pissed, Cal,” she said. Then, in an exaggerated imitation of his voice, she went on, ‘“I don’t understand why you saw the need to hire some hick lawyer from Dundee. He’ll take advantage of you, Angela.”’
I chuckled. “How did you respond?”
“Just the way you told me.”
“Good. Listen, I asked him to send you a copy of your mom’s will. Keep an eye out for it.”
“Will do. Uh, there’s something else—I also got a call from a newspaper reporter today. She said she was doing a story on Portland gentrification. I don’t know how she got my cell number, but it was pretty cool. She asked me some questions about Mom and the North Waterfront Project.”
“What was her name?”
“Cynthia Duncan. She seemed really sharp, Cal.”
Uh oh, I said to myself. I knew Cynthia well—an aggressive, thorough investigative journalist. “She is sharp. What did she ask you?”
“She asked about Mom, what her role in Wingate Properties was, and how she felt about North Waterfront.”
“And how did you respond?”
“I told her about the will and her unexpected death, and that I’d hired an attorney—you—to represent me with all the legal stuff. I told her about Mom’s epiphany after the Women’s March, and how she wanted to change the direction of Wingate Properties. She started boring in on North Waterfront and Turner and Avery, and that’s when I realized I was talking too much, so I shut up. God, I hope I didn’t say too much.”
I shrugged. “Well, what’s done is done. If she calls again, tell her you don’t have anything more to add. The problem with reporters is that they have their own agenda and timing, and it might not square with ours.”
That’s how I left it with Angela. Great, I said to myself. I’d worked with Cynthia on an earlier case and knew how relentless she was. I thought about calling her but decided against it. Better to keep a low profile at this point. Maybe this won’t go anywhere.
The day flew by, and when I finally closed up shop, I walked with Archie over to Deschutes Brewery for a beer and sandwich and to let the afternoon traffic abate somewhat. I leashed my dog to one of several unoccupied outside tables and took a seat at the window, where we could see each other. Packing seventy muscular pounds with a broad back, a deep chest, and a one-master attitude, Arch was no mark for dog-napping, but we were both more comfortable when connected visually.
I glanced at my watch when I finished eating. I was tired and anxious to get back to the Aerie, but I had one stop to make on the way out of town—Swanson’s Motel. The timing’s ideal, I thought. By the time I walk back to the car and fight my way over to Southeast Foster, the night shift at the motel should be on, the people who might’ve seen something the night Lenny the Fox died.
The Ross Island Bridge was still snarled to a standstill, and I didn’t get to the motel until half past seven. The night manager had a poker face marked by a set of vertical lines on either side of his mouth that became deep crevasses when he smiled, which was too often. “Sorry,” he told me, “but I don’t know spit about that suicide.”
“I’m just wondering if Mr. Bateman checked in alone or had any visitors that night.”
The crevasses opened up. “I got nothin’ to tell you, buddy. Even if I knew something, I don’t talk about our clientele. Company policy. Got our reputation to protect.”
I swung my eyes around the dingy office. “Of course. If your policy changes, give me a call. I could make it worth your while.” I watched his beady eyes as I said the last sentence, but he didn’t react in the least.
The motel consisted of two rows of two-story units. I was parked in front, and, when I left, I drove between the two units instead of pulling out on the street. Too early for any John and hooker traffic, the back unit was quiet except for a white panel truck parked in front of a first-floor unit with its door open. I parked next to the truck, as a small, squat man with sloped shoulders came out of the room carrying a toolbox. I got out and smiled at him. “Keeping the place running, huh?”
He smiled back and shook his head. “Plenty of work around here. You know, doesn’t matter what the signs say in the bathroom, the idiots keep trying to flush rubbers down the toilet.”
I barked a laugh. “Job security.”
He smiled even broader. “You got that right.”
I introduced myself, telling him I represented an insurance company. “I’m wondering if you remember anything about the suicide that happened last month, on the sixteenth?”
His face stiffened, and he measured me through rheumy eyes. “Hey, got strict orders not to talk about what goes on at this place. Job security.”
I laughed again. “Understand. Just wondering if you were around that night. Whatever you tell me’s strictly confidential. I’m not a cop.”
He took a furtive look around before answering. “I was around. So what?”
“Did you see the man come in?”
He crossed his arms, and his look turned calculating. “I’m not sure if I remember that exactly.”
Shit, I said to myself
. Should have brought more cash. I took out my wallet, emptied it of two twenties, and extended them. “Would this improve your memory?”
He took the bills and tucked them in a shirt pocket without thanking me. “Had a toilet backup four doors down that night. I was in my truck, seen ’em drive by.”
“Them? Someone was with him?”
“Yeah, another guy was drivin’.”
“How do you know the victim was the passenger?”
“I seen ’im get out. Little, skinny guy. He was wobbly-legged drunk. The maid who found ’im told me what he looked like.”
“What about the other man? What did he look like?”
The handyman scratched his head and wrinkled his brow. “Didn’t get a good look.”
“You didn’t see anything?”
“Nope. Sorry.”
“Did you see the other man leave?”
“Nope.”
I knew I’d lose him on the next question, but I had to ask it. “Would you be willing to tell the police what you saw?”
His eyes grew wary. “If you send the cops to talk to me, I’ll get amnesia in a hurry. Job security.”
“No worries,” I said. “What about other people who might’ve—?”
His phone buzzed, he took the call, and after listening for a moment said, “Gotta run, bub.” I handed him a card and told him to call if he thought of anything else, but doubted that the request registered with him. I watched him hurry off, suspecting he might know more than he told me. But at least I saw the vague outlines of something now, and my instincts were to keep pushing.
When I got back in the car, I turned to Archie. “I know you’re anxious to get home, Big Boy, but how about one more night in Portland? I’ll throw in a river run tomorrow morning.” He wagged his stump of a tail and whimpered a couple of times, which I took for a yes. The promised run must’ve clinched the deal.
Moving Targets Page 5