Clutching at Straws

by J. L. Abramo

  “I’m on it, Al,” I said.

  I left Lefty for my date with Hank Strode.

  I had called Hank earlier and invited him to join me for lunch. I took a peek at my watch and saw that I had forty-five minutes to kill before we met. I decided to check in on Lieutenant Lopez while I was at the station.

  Then I looked at my watch again and remembered the Rolex.

  Lefty said that he was going for the Rolex when he tripped over the judge’s body. As Joey had suggested, if Wright had been surprised by Chancellor, killed the judge, and removed his watch, the Rolex would have been found in Al’s pocket with the gun and the cash, not on the floor. I was sure that Kay Turner could do something with that and made a mental note to give her a call after lunch.

  I went up to the desk sergeant and asked to see the lieutenant. Before he could respond, a voice beside me caused me to gulp.

  “The lieutenant is out on a call, Diamond, maybe I can help you.”

  I slowly turned to the familiar voice and braced myself for the familiar visage. Detective Sergeant Johnson had a face that only a mother could love. I won’t try to describe the back of his head.

  “I wanted to chat with the lieutenant about the Chancellor case,” I said.

  Johnson’s face looked badly out of focus. The sad thing was that it had nothing to do with my eyesight.

  “What about it?” he asked.

  What the hell.

  “I was wondering what she thought about the Rolex.”

  “Which Rolex would that be?”

  I had some time before meeting Hank, I figured I might as well squander it.

  “The judge’s Rolex. It was sitting on the floor in his bedroom when your boys stormed the place.”

  “I don’t remember anything about a Rolex,” Johnson said.

  “I don’t mean to question your powers of recollection, Sergeant, but do you think you could check?”

  “It’s not exactly my job to indulge your whims, Diamond.”

  “Forgive me Sergeant, I haven’t had time to study your job description. I only asked because you volunteered assistance. It can wait until I catch up with Lieutenant Lopez.”

  “You just love getting the hair on the back of my neck up, don’t you Diamond?”

  “Absolutely not, Sergeant,” I said, trying not to envision it.

  Johnson let me wait it out for almost a full minute.

  “Sullivan,” he said to the desk sergeant, “put down the doughnut and get on your PC. See if there’s any mention of a Rolex in the Chancellor crime scene report.”

  Johnson and I stood fidgeting and avoiding eye contact while Sullivan did his research. I hummed “California Dreamin’” silently in my mind to pass the time.

  “Nothing,” said Sullivan finally.

  “That satisfy your curiosity, Diamond?” asked Johnson. “Actually it makes me wonder which of your colleagues decided that it wouldn’t be missed.”

  “Are you suggesting that one of the attending officers stole a watch?”

  “Don’t tell me it doesn’t happen.”

  “What proof do you have that there was a Rolex there to begin with?”

  “Just the word of a murder suspect. But if it was there, whoever grabbed it was adding evidence tampering to grand theft wristwatch.”

  “That’s a serious charge, Diamond.”

  “That it is, Sergeant Johnson, and tough luck for Lefty that I have no way to follow it up. Right?”

  “I don’t know,” he mumbled.

  I could feel the nibble. I quickly took in some line.

  “Then again, the lieutenant did express her willingness to dig around if I could hand her a shovel. Tell her I’ll call later. Maybe she’ll think it’s worth looking into.”

  “I’ll look into it, Diamond,” he said. “Just do me a favor and keep your theory between us until you hear from me.”

  “Fair enough, Sergeant. Thanks.”

  “Don’t thank me, Diamond. And wipe that big-game fisherman grin off your face. Don’t think you’re smart enough to play me without the sheet music.”

  So much for the brilliant strategist attitude.

  “My mistake, Sergeant. I forget humility from time to time.”

  “Well, then, it’s a good thing you have my handsome face to remind you.”

  “Yes it is, Sergeant,” I said.

  Suddenly he was much easier to look at.

  “I’ll be in touch,” he said, and turned to walk away. I continued on to the courthouse.

  I told Hank that lunch was on me. Cuisine and venue his choice. At ten past noon we sat on a park bench across from the Hall of Justice, each holding a hot dog from the nearby stand, napkins tucked under our legs against the wind.

  I took a gulp of my Orange Crush and got to it.

  “Hank, tell me about Chancellor and Ryder.”

  “They didn’t get along.”

  “So I’ve heard. Can you be more specific?”

  “I don’t know, Jake. There was something between them, but I really don’t know what it was.”

  “Fine,” I said, “disclaimer noted.”

  “Okay, for what it’s worth. Last week, just before Judge Chancellor took the long weekend at his cabin, I asked him what he thought of the prospect of Lowell Ryder as the next DA. I’d seen the two go at each other, in the courtroom and in the hallways, so I pretty much knew where Chancellor stood. We were on the elevator alone, it was too quiet for me, I guess that I just asked the obvious to make conversation. His answer surprised me.”

  “Which was what?”

  “The judge said that Lowell Ryder would never be San Francisco DA. Those were his exact words, with an emphasis on the never.”

  “Do you think it would have worried Ryder any?”

  “I doubt it. Ryder is so favored I can’t see how Chancellor could have touched him, even with the help of the Judge’s buddy, Governor Krupp.”

  “What do you think motivated Chancellor’s vehemence?”

  “I really couldn’t guess, Jake.”

  “Couldn’t or wouldn’t, Hank?”

  “Can’t say, Jake. Not enough information.”

  I popped the last of the hot dog into my mouth, wiped the glob of mustard from my lip, drained the orange soda, and thanked Hank for his time.

  The bad taste in my mouth had nothing to do with the meal.

  Eleven

  “Darlene,” I said, walking into the office, “I need you to get together with Buzz Stanley again.”

  “Please, Jake, have mercy.”

  “We need to know if there was anything in the wind about trouble between Lowell Ryder and Judge Chancellor. It’s a shot in the dark. Run it by your cousin Edie, as well. Did you reach Vinnie?”

  “No.”

  “Keep trying. How about Joey Russo?”

  “He said you can call him whenever you’re ready to go to San Quentin,” Darlene said. “Joey said that Johnny Boy Carlucci isn’t going anywhere.”

  “I’ll be in my office,” I said, moving toward the back.

  I walked through the connecting door and shut it behind me. I opened the two large windows to let out the stale air and let in the noise from the avenue below. I flipped the switch on the pole fan and pointed it toward my desk chair and the window behind it. I hoped it would clear the atmosphere. I sat and lit a Camel to test the theory.

  I called Joey Russo.

  “How does this afternoon sound?” I asked.

  “Works for me. I’ll pick you up at four,” he said.

  I grabbed a flyer off a pile on the desk, advertising a new sandwich joint up the street, and turned it to the blank side. I drew two vertical lines down the sheet, dividing it into three approximately equal parts.

  I wrote a heading at the top of each column.

  It was inventory time.

  Things I think I know:

  Lefty Wright didn’t kill Judge Chancellor.

  Someone paid Vic Vigoda to lure Lefty to the scene.

  Vi
c Vigoda played poker.

  Vic Vigoda was expendable.

  Someone lifted the Rolex at Chancellor’s place.

  Freddie Cash played poker.

  Freddie Cash had nine toes.

  I walked back out to Darlene’s desk.

  “Darlene,” I asked, “how could we find information about Freddie Cash’s medical history?”

  “That’s not always easy,” she said. “Medical records are for the most part treated as confidential. If we knew his PCP, maybe I could convince a gullible receptionist that I’m with an insurance company doing some background and ask a few questions. Do we know his PCP?”

  “I don’t even know what that is, Darlene,” I complained. “It sounds like an automobile valve.”

  “Right. I forgot that you stopped going to the doctor when the idiot kept insisting that you quit smoking. Primary care physician. Didn’t you mention that Freddie was in law school?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then he would have taken some kind of physical examination,” Darlene said. “I’ll see what I can find out.”

  “Good.”

  “What are we looking for?” she asked.

  “A toe count,” I said.

  I went back to my list.

  Things I’d like to know:

  What happened to the Rolex?

  Did Freddie know Vic Vigoda?

  Why was Chancellor so against Ryder’s candidacy?

  Where did Vigoda get the two grand found in his wallet?

  Who got the one hundred thousand in ransom?

  I walked back out front, poured a cup of coffee, and walked back to my desk. As I sat down I could hear the new tenant in the office above doing what could only be jumping jacks. A piece of paint from the ceiling dropped onto the middle of the desk.

  I designated the third column “Things I’ll never know.” Instead of getting started on what could have easily been the longest slate, I reviewed the progress on column two.

  Sergeant Johnson was looking into the missing watch. Darlene would be looking into Freddie’s toe count and Chancellor’s problem with Ryder. I could put Vinnie on the poker question, try to confirm if Freddie and Vic had ever sat at the same table.

  Just before four, Joey picked me up.

  “When we see Carlucci, let me do all the talking,” Joey said as we pulled into the parking area at San Quentin.

  Twenty minutes later Joey and I sat in metal folding chairs in the corridor outside John Carlucci’s prison cell. On the other side of the bars, Carlucci paced, ranting about the 49ers’ offensive line in a high-pitched goodfellas’ voice.

  Joey patiently waited for Carlucci to shut up.

  The guard who had set us outside the cell had admonished us to refrain from reaching between the bars for any reason.

  I felt as if we were in a movie scene, a cross between The Silence of the Lambs and My Cousin Vinnie.

  When we finally got down to business, John Carlucci made it clear that there was no grass growing between his toes.

  “Judge Chancellor was never what you would call San Francisco’s most beloved citizen,” said Carlucci.

  “I can’t argue that, John. We were hoping for something a bit more concrete.”

  “Joey, look at me. I’m sitting here in a cage. How would I know any more about what’s going on out in the street than you guys do?”

  It was a trick question, and Joey treated it as such. With a cherry on top.

  “You could be in Siberia, John, and know more than we do.” Carlucci ate it up.

  “Chancellor was in to visit me less than a week ago. They gave the judge a much nicer chair, by the way. The judge said he had obtained a lead on information that he wanted explored. Chancellor said he wanted to ask my brother Tony to do the looking, and he came to get my blessing.”

  “Did he give any particulars,” Joey asked, “about what he wanted explored?”

  “Chancellor said he was trying to locate someone,” Carlucci said, “that he had some kind of document that might help in the search. I stopped the judge before he went any further. I wasn’t really interested in the details; I have other things on my mind, like when the prison cafeteria will serve creamed spinach again.”

  “That was it?” I blurted.

  Joey cleared his throat.

  “I told Chancellor he could go ahead and see my brother about it, and I quoted him a price for services,” said Carlucci. “I guess he never got to talk with Tony.”

  “A document?” Joey said.

  “That’s all I can tell you, Russo. It must have been something pretty important to the judge, because he was willing to pay ten thousand for the research. If it were that valuable an item, I would have expected the police would have found it in his safe. Did the kid they have in jail empty the safe?”

  “According to what Lefty Wright told Diamond,” Joey said, “Wright took cash, a gun and a gold chain, and left some other jewelry and coins.”

  “What about papers?”

  “Papers?” asked Joey.

  “A will, insurance policies, birth certificate, passport, personal papers, whatever?” said Carlucci.

  “Lefty never said anything about any papers in the safe,” I said. Joey gave me another look to remind me that we had agreed he would be doing the talking.

  “Look, I’m not the detective here,” said Carlucci, “but let’s assume that the judge wasn’t killed because he surprised your boy Lefty in the act. Let’s assume that the kid is alert enough to hear Chancellor coming and coolheaded enough to get out of the place without having to knife the poor bastard. I mean that’s what all this is about, am I right?”

  “Yes,” said Joey.

  “If Chancellor was killed to keep him quiet about something in this document he alluded to, then whoever killed him wouldn’t leave the thing behind. If there was nothing in the safe that fits the description, then someone grabbed it or it’s still in Chancellor’s house, at his office, or at his place in the woods.”

  Joey looked as if he had another question or two, but when Johnny Boy raised his hand in front of his face, Joey remained mute.

  “Now, if you’ll excuse me,” Carlucci said, “I think it’s time for the poison they call dinner around here.”

  “Thanks, John,” Joey said, and almost dragged me out of the cell block.

  “Do you think Carlucci has any idea what he’s talking about?” I asked Joey as we walked to the car.

  “It’s not out of the question,” Joey suggested. “Where to?”

  “How about Vallejo Street Station? I’d like to ask Lefty about Judge Chancellor’s personal papers.”

  Twelve

  Joey dropped me in front of the Vallejo Street Station a few minutes before six. I knew his wife would be waiting for him for dinner, so I thanked him and told him that I would walk back to my office from there. I asked the desk sergeant if I could speak with Lefty Wright and was told to take a seat. Five minutes later Lieutenant Laura Lopez came up behind me.

  “Got a minute, Diamond?” she asked.

  “For you, Lieutenant. Anytime.”

  I followed her to her office on the second floor.

  “I need your help, Jake,” she said, when we were seated across her desk.

  The use of my first name was suspect.

  “Oh,” I said.

  “I have a lab report here,” Lopez said, tapping a folder on the desktop, “which suggests that the money found on Lefty Wright at the Chancellor house didn’t come out of the safe.”

  “I don’t follow,” I said. Since I didn’t.

  “The bundles of money had traces of soil and grass stains and were slightly damp. The crime scene investigators are positive that the cash was sitting outside the house under a fieldstone below the entry window. Your boy had the money before he went in.”

  I wasn’t a lawyer and I wasn’t in court, but I knew enough not to ask a question that I didn’t know the answer to.

  “Why would Lefty have gone in, if it wasn’t for the
cash that wasn’t in the safe?” Lopez said, asking for me.

  “I don’t know,” I confessed.

  “I’ve got a couple of ideas. One, Wright went in to wait for Chancellor with intent to kill. Two, he went in for something else in addition to the five grand outside. Since nothing was found on him to support the latter, you can see where this hurts his murder defense. In any case, he knows more than he’s telling us, and more than he’s telling you by the look on your face.”

  I’m sure it was really something. I wanted to ask her why she was being so candid, but I felt pretty certain she was about to tell me.

  “So, as I said, Jake, I could use your help,” she continued. “I tried reasoning with Wright earlier, and he’s not being smart. Talk to him.”

  “With all due respect, Lieutenant,” I said, “I’m not in the business of grilling my clients for the police.”

  “I understand that, Diamond. But I’m assuming that you are in the business of trying to help your clients, and you have one downstairs that needs a lot of help. Give it some thought.”

  “Can I see him?” I asked.

  “Sure.”

  “In private?”

  “I’m being cordial, Diamond. Don’t insult me.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Get out of here. If you hurry Lefty might share his dinner with you,” she said, and put her face into the crime scene report until I was out of the office.

  A uniformed officer locked me into the cell with Lefty and told me to yell when I needed out.

  “Would you like half of this burrito, Jake,” Lefty asked when the cop left.

  “I was hoping for the whole enchilada, Lefty,” I answered.

  “You’ve been talking with Lieutenant Lopez.”

  “Actually, Lopez did most of the talking. I more or less sat there looking like an idiot. I don’t particularly care for being played by my own client,” I said, “it sort of defeats the purpose.” Wright began to say something but I stopped him.

  “Look, Lefty, here’s the deal. If you really need my help, tell me everything and give me a fair chance to decide. If you don’t need my help, take it easy and good luck.”