Hundred-Dollar Baby

by Robert B. Parker

  There was a doorman at the entrance. He was a bulky guy wearing a maroon uniform with some braid. He had one of those New York Irish faces that implied he’d be perfectly happy to knock you down and kick you if you gave him any trouble.

  “Lionel Farnsworth,” I said.

  The doorman took the phone from its brass box on the wall.

  “Who shall I say?”

  “Clint Hartung,” I said.

  “Spell the last name?”

  “H-A-R-T-U-N-G,” I said. “Hartung.”

  The doorman turned away and called. He spoke into the phone for a minute and turned back to me.

  “Mr. Farnsworth doesn’t recognize the name,” he said. “He’d like to know what it’s in regard to.”

  “Tell him it’s in regard to matters we discussed in White Deer, Pennsylvania, a while back, when we were both visiting there.”

  The doorman relayed that into the phone and then listened silently for a moment, nodding. Then he hung up the phone and closed the little brass door.

  “Mr. Farnsworth says he’ll be down. You can wait in the lobby.”

  I went in. It was a small lobby done in black marble and polished brass. There was a bench on either side of the elevator door. They were upholstered in black leather. I sat on one. In maybe two minutes I heard the elevator coming down. And in another minute the doors opened and there he came. I stood.

  “Mr. Farnsworth?” I said.

  He turned toward me and smiled. He had his hand in his coat pocket, with the thumb showing. The thumbnail gleamed.

  “Yes,” he said. “What’s this about White Deer?”

  He was a really good-looking guy. About my height but slimmer. His dark hair had just enough gray highlights. It was longish and wavy and brushed straight back. He had a nice tan, and even features, and very fine teeth. He was wearing light gray slacks and a dark double-breasted blazer, and, God help us, a white silk scarf.

  “I knew you were down there at Allenwood for a couple of years,” I said. “Just a ploy to get you to see me.”

  Farnsworth’s smile remained warm and welcoming. He glanced casually through the glass front door where the doorman was watching us. Then he took his hand from his coat pocket and stuck it out.

  “Well, it worked, didn’t it,” he said. “And so delicately done. White Deer, Pennsylvania.”

  We shook hands, he gestured gracefully toward the bench where I’d been sitting, and both of us sat down on it. He shifted slightly so he could look me square in the eye.

  “So,” he said. “What can I help you with?”

  Pretty good. No attempt to explain why he’d been at Allenwood. No outrage at being tricked. Just frank and friendly. No wonder people gave him their money. Frank and Friendly Farnsworth. Ready to deal with what is. And of course the doorman was handy, if things didn’t go well.

  “I’ve been employed by a big law firm, Gordon, Kerr, Rigney and Mize,” I said. “They brought and won a class-action suit against a big national corporation, the name of which I’m not at liberty to divulge.”

  “Well, by God, good for them,” Farnsworth said.

  “Yeah,” I said. “For once the good guys won. The settlement is, well, just let me tell you it is substantial, and a number of individuals are entitled to a considerable piece of change. If we can find them.”

  “You’re not going to tell me I’m one of them?” Farnsworth said.

  “Wish I could,” I said. “But no, I’m looking for someone named April Kyle, and I have reason to believe you might know her.”

  “April,” he said. “April, what was the last name?”

  “Kyle,” I said. “Like Kyle Rote.”

  “Kyle Rote?”

  “Never mind,” I said. “Do you know where I could find her?”

  “April Kyle,” he said. “I don’t really think I know anybody named April Kyle.”

  Okay, so Lionel lies.

  “Are you married, Mr. Farnsworth?”

  “No,” he said. “Not at the moment.”

  He smiled a big, open, engaging smile at me.

  “Between gigs,” he said. “Sort of.”

  I knew people often didn’t brag about hiring prostitutes, but if he were single, he had less reason to lie, and there was serious money kicking around in this deal, and he might get some of it if he helped April to get hers. I almost smiled. My story was so good I was starting to believe it. A guy like Farnsworth would have sniffed around this situation. He didn’t. And that was odd.

  “Between gigs can be good or bad,” I said.

  He gave me a warm between-us-guys smile.

  “At the moment, it’s pretty damn good,” he said.

  “Congratulations,” I said.

  After we had shared our male moment, I stood.

  “Thanks for your help, Mr. Farnsworth.”

  “Sorry I wasn’t more useful,” he said. “How’d you happen to come across that Allenwood thing?”

  “Routine investigation,” I said. “It won’t even be in my report.”

  “Good,” he said. “I could explain it but it’s a bother.”

  “Don’t give it a second thought,” I said.

  He smiled and nodded. We shook hands. As I left, I brushed against his right side. There was a gun in his right-hand jacket pocket.

  “Oh,” I said. “I’m sorry.”

  “No harm,” he said.

  “God,” I said, “I’m clumsy.”

  “No problem,” he said.

  I went out of the lobby and passed the doorman. He watched me closely. I crossed with the light. The doorman was still watching me, and continued to watch me until I crossed into the park.

  In Farnsworth’s defense, it hadn’t felt like a very big gun.

  23

  Frank Belson and I had breakfast at the counter of a joint on Southampton Street, not far from the new police headquarters.

  “Nice call,” Belson said. “Ollie DeMars done time, for assault at MCI Concord 1990 to ’92, and in the federal pen at Allenwood in 1998. So he was there the same time as your guy.”

  “Lionel Farnsworth,” I said. “What was the federal charge?”

  “Him and another guy were stealing pension checks from mailboxes. Ollie rolled on the other guy and got off with a year, easy time.”

  “That’s our Ollie,” I said. “Stand-up guy.”

  “Standing up for Ollie,” Belson said. “I called the prison. Both of them were in the minimum-security part. Guy I talked with said it would be surprising if they didn’t know each other.”

  I had a bite of corned beef hash. Belson drank coffee.

  “What do you know about Ollie?” I said.

  “I don’t know him myself,” Belson said. “But I asked around. Talked to OC squad, couple detectives in his precinct.”

  “Ollie qualify for organized-crime attention?”

  “Not really. He’s not that organized. But a lot of the organized outfits use him. He’s got a sort of loose confederation of street-soldier wannabes that he’ll rent out for strong arm work.”

  “He needs to hire better help,” I said.

  “To deal with you? Hawk? Sure he does. But his people are fine for slapping around some no-credit guy from Millis, borrowed money to open a restaurant and is behind on the vig.”

  “Ollie do any of his own work?”

  “Mostly he runs things. But he’s tough enough to run them. He can keep the wannabes in line,” Belson said.

  I ate some more hash. Belson’s breakfast was an English muffin and coffee. No wonder he was lean.

  “He’s not necessarily a loyal person,” I said.

  “Guy in the mailbox deal is probably still in Allenwood, doing Ollie’s time,” Belson said.

  I finished my hash. Frank took a bite out of his English muffin. I looked at his plate. He was still on the first half of the muffin.

  “Is that all you eat for breakfast?” I said.

  “I drink a lot of coffee,” Belson said.

  “
That’s nourishing,” I said.

  “I’m never hungry much,” Belson said. “I eat enough to stay alive.”

  “Me too,” I said.

  The counter man cleared my plate. I ordered more coffee and a piece of pineapple pie. Belson put some grape jelly on his remaining half a muffin.

  “Fruit,” Belson said.

  “You healthy bastard,” I said.

  “Ollie ain’t a major leaguer,” Belson said. “Because he ain’t the brightest bulb on the tree. But people who know say he’s got a big ego, and he’s pretty crazy, and most people don’t take him on if they don’t have to.”

  “I may have to,” I said.

  Belson nodded.

  “Speaking of ego,” Belson said.

  “I like to think of it as self-confidence,” I said.

  “I’m sure you do,” Belson said.

  “He’s annoyed Tony Marcus,” I said. “It is an article of religious faith with Tony that whore business is black business.”

  “Tony believes that about any business he’s in,” Belson said.

  “His faith is flexible,” I said.

  “Tony would win that one,” Belson said. “Why don’t you let him.”

  “Tony wants to give me a chance to neutralize Ollie. Probably doesn’t want you guys on his ass.”

  “Yeah, and we’d be all over him, working night and day and day and night to find out who aced a creep like Ollie DeMars.”

  “I’m just reporting the news,” I said. “I’m not making it.”

  “You gonna talk with him?”

  “Ollie?” I said. “Yeah.”

  “Why don’t I go along, flash the badge. That way you probably won’t have to shoot anybody.”

  “Thanks for caring,” I said. “How crazy is Ollie?”

  “Not crazy enough to shoot a cop,” Belson said.

  24

  Belson was on the radio during the short drive to Andrews Square, and we parked outside Ollie’s place for a few minutes.

  “I may have to talk about stuff that might not be legal,” I said. “I hope you won’t overhear it.”

  “Huh?” Belson said.

  I nodded.

  “Okay,” I said.

  Some uniforms pulled up in a couple of cruisers. We got out. Belson went and talked to the uniforms, and came back to me. He took out his badge, clipped it onto the lapel of his topcoat, and he and I went into the storefront.

  There were three people I didn’t know out in the front. One of them, a husky guy with a blond ponytail, got up when he saw us and walked down the hall. In a moment he came back with Ollie beside him. Ollie looked at me as if he had never seen me before. He looked at the badge on Belson’s lapel and smiled.

  “Yessir, officer,” Ollie said. “How can I help you?”

  “Let’s talk in your office,” Belson said.

  “Sure,” Ollie said and walked back down the hall.

  We followed. When he was behind his desk, he leaned back and put his feet up and spread his hands.

  “Do I need a lawyer here?” he said.

  “Naw,” Belson said. “We’re all friends here. You know Spenser?”

  Ollie’s eyes widened and he looked at me carefully.

  “Oh,” Ollie said. “Sure. I didn’t recognize you. How ya doing?”

  Ollie was wearing a tattersall shirt today, and a black knit tie, and a sand-colored corduroy jacket.

  “Swell,” I said. “Tell me about your friendship with Lionel Farnsworth.”

  Ollie stared at me unblinking for a minute, then looked at Belson.

  “He’s no cop,” Ollie said.

  “Tell me about your friendship with Lionel Farnsworth,” Belson said.

  Ollie looked at Belson and back at me.

  “Who?” he said to Belson.

  Belson grinned without warmth.

  “It can go quick,” Belson said, “you talk with Spenser. It’ll take a lot longer he asks, you look at me, I ask again.”

  Ollie shrugged. The suburban Rotarian veneer was getting thin.

  “I guess so,” he said.

  “So,” I said, “tell me about your friendship with Lionel Farnsworth.”

  “I don’t know him,” Ollie said.

  “You do,” I said. “You were in Allenwood federal prison with him in 1998.”

  “I was there, yeah, on a bad rap, by the way, but I didn’t know anybody named Farnswhatever.”

  “And when he needed some arm-twisting done for him up here,” I said, “seven years later, he called you.”

  “I ain’t doing no strong-arm work for Farnsworth.”

  Belson was tilted back slightly in his chair, one foot cocked on the edge of Ollie’s desk.

  “Ollie,” he said. “You are making a liar out of me. I said you didn’t need a lawyer, and now you are shoveling so much shit at us that, maybe you keep doing it, you are going to need one.”

  “For what?” Ollie said.

  Without the glad-handed good-guy disguise, Ollie’s natural stupidity began to dominate. He even sounded different. Bullshit is only skin deep.

  “Just listen to me for a minute,” I said. “You sent some guys over to the mansion, and Hawk and I kicked their ass. Then you sent four guys to chase me off the case, and Tedy Sapp and I kicked their ass. Now I know who hired you to do it, and when I confront him with these facts, he’ll claim it was all your doing and he just wanted you to talk with April.”

  “At which time,” Belson said, “we in the Boston Police Department will feel obligated to protect and serve your ass right into the fucking hoosegow.”

  “Or,” I said, “you can flip on old Lionel now, while the flipping is good, and tell us your side of the story before we even talk with Lionel.”

  “What about the assault stuff,” Ollie said.

  “I don’t need to press charges on those,” I said. “Hell, I won both fights anyway.”

  “Okay,” he said.

  He stood suddenly and walked to his office door and closed it.

  “Okay,” he said again.

  He walked back to his desk and sat down. The jolliness was back. He wasn’t confused now. He knew what to do.

  “I’ll tell you about Farnsworth,” he said.

  25

  My last serious talk with April had ended badly, so this time I talked with her in the front parlor of the mansion, with Hawk and Tedy Sapp present in case she attempted to seduce me again. She had been sulky since I’d rejected her, and she was sulky now.

  “I’ve located Lionel Farnsworth,” I said.

  She had no reaction.

  “You know him, don’t you?” I said.

  “No.”

  “He was with you twenty-three times in the year before you came up here,” I said.

  She shrugged.

  “They’re all johns,” she said.

  I nodded.

  “I’ve had a talk with Ollie DeMars,” I said.

  “Who?”

  “The gentleman who’s been managing the harassment,” I said. “He tells me that he was hired to do that by a gentleman he once knew in Allenwood prison, a man from New York named Lionel Farnsworth.”

  “I thought it was someone with an offshore bank account,” April said.

  “Ollie made that up,” I said. “It was his old prison pal Lionel.”

  April didn’t say anything.

  “What we have here,” I said, “is a remarkable coincidence. The guy who is extorting you is a guy you have known professionally at least twenty-three times.”

  She shrugged again.

  “I have prevailed upon Ollie to leave you alone,” I said.

  “You think he will?” April said.

  “Yes.”

  “Then I don’t need you anymore,” April said.

  “That depends on how earnest Lionel is,” I said.

  “I told you I don’t know Lionel.”

  “April,” I said. “What the hell is going on?”

  “Nothing,” April said. “This O
llie person has been stopped. Thank you. That’s all I need.”

  Hawk stood up.

  “Our work here is done,” he said to Tedy Sapp.

  Sapp grinned.

  “Ollie was no match for us,” Sapp said.

  He turned to April.

  “I’ll pack and be gone in an hour,” he said. “Nice doing business with you.”

  “Say good-bye to the ladies,” Hawk said.

  April nodded. She didn’t say anything. Hawk and Sapp left. April and I sat. The silence continued. She cannot have lived the life she’s led, Susan had said, without suffering a lot of damage. Under stress, she had said, the damage usually surfaces.

  “There’s nothing so bad I can’t hear it,” I said.

  She nodded.

  “There’s nothing so bad I won’t help you with it,” I said.

  She kept nodding. I stood.

  “Okay, Toots,” I said. “No lectures. If you find that you need me again, you know where I am.”

  “Yes,” she said.

  I went to where she sat and bent over and kissed her. She stiffened slightly. I stepped back and pretended to shoot her with my forefinger, and turned and left.

  26

  Hawk drove Tedy Sapp to the airport. I went, too. Now that I was off the case, I had nothing else to do. And it gave me a chance to see if the tunnel was leaking today.

  “April didn’t like you,” Hawk said to Tedy Sapp.

  “No,” Sapp said. “She didn’t.”

  “I’m not sure she liked any of us.”

  “Worse with Tedy,” Hawk said. “He being gay and all.”

  “Lot of women like gay men,” Sapp said. “They can talk about things comfortably….”

  “Like pottery,” Hawk said. “Hair tint.”

  Sapp ignored him.

  “Without any sexual tension, so to speak. And, as we all know, gay men are urbane, witty, sophisticated, and unusually charming.”

  “Some of Ollie’s people,” I said, “can testify to that.”

  “But…” Hawk said.