Remember Me, Irene

by Jan Burke

  “I’ll pay for it,” I said.

  “Don’t be silly. I wasn’t dropping hints.”

  “You’ve done a lot in two or three days,” I said. “When I was here on Sunday, it looked different.”

  “When the police called and told me what had happened here, I had my kids do some work.”

  “So you knew? You knew when I called you on Monday?”

  “No! They called up my kids—the police called my son—and—Wait. Let me back up a minute.”

  He exhaled, long and slow.

  “The building is owned by my company. It’s a family business in every sense of the word. I’ve got five boys and two girls.”

  “I didn’t know you had so many children.”

  “Yep, seven. One of the girls and one of the boys didn’t give a damn about the business, which is fine, and they’re happy doing other things. But the others—they run the business here in town.”

  “While you stay in Fallbrook?”

  “I’m down there most of the time. So Monday morning, the kids get a call from the police. Later, my youngest son lets me know about it, but I don’t get the details.”

  “What did he tell you?”

  “‘Dad,’” he mimicked, holding his thumb and little finger to his face like a phone, “‘the police called to say a homeless guy climbed up to the upper floors of the Sad Angels Hotel—’”

  “Sad Angels?”

  “That’s what my kids call the hotel. Anyway, he called to say this bum climbed up and had himself a heart attack.” He went back to his imaginary phone. “‘Poor guy was in there dead for days, Dad. Some women were looking for him and found him—one of ’em broke a window so she could call the police.’”

  “And did the police ask any questions?”

  “Yeah, they asked him if we gave permission to a transient to sleep in the Sad Angels. He told them no, which was the truth. Then he called me to ask if I wanted him to start the work on the place, get it cleaned up.”

  He paused, looking out at the fence. “‘Yeah,’ I told him. ‘Start getting that place cleaned up. New fence, new locks. Get a security company to cruise by the place. I don’t want any more people dying in my old angel hotel. Those angels are sad enough.’”

  “And that’s all you knew when I called?”

  He nodded. “That’s all I knew. I didn’t know it was Lucas Monroe. I didn’t even know Lucas was dead. I didn’t know that you and your friend were the women—I found all that out late Monday, when one of the older boys called. He had called the police to find out if it was okay to do some work around the place, and found out more than his brother.”

  “This has all been done in one day?”

  “You teach seven kids to work as a team, they can get anything done! But to be honest, we were already making plans when this happened. The windows were already ordered. Fence wasn’t a problem for a construction company. Same with the general cleanup of the grounds, and the first floor. They probably called in some favors. The kids are fond of the place, believe it or not. Talked me into buying it so Roland wouldn’t level it.”

  “Roland Hill?”

  He nodded. “Why the attachment?”

  He smiled. “See those angels on the corners? Well, we used to live not far from here when the kids were little. I was just starting to make my way. My wife was alive then, of course. We were driving past the place one day—a day when the kids had been giving my wife fits. The youngest looks up and asks his mother why those angels are so sad. ‘Why, those must be your guardian angels,’ she said. ‘And who could blame them for being sad?’

  “Well, my oldest girl pipes up and says, ‘There are seven of us and eight angels.’ Without missing a beat, my wife says, ‘The saddest angel up there is your father’s.’”

  I smiled, but when I looked back at him, his face was full of regret.

  “She was right,” he said. “Back then, I used to drink pretty heavy. Left her with so much work, I sent her to an early grave.” He opened his car door. “Come on, I’m getting tired of sitting in here.”

  I got out, taking my envelopes with me. I watched him take out a separate set of keys and unlock the gate in the fence. He looked back at me, and said, “We won’t go upstairs, if that’s what you’re worried about. I know that’s where he was. But how about the lobby? Have you been in the lobby?”

  “No, I haven’t.”

  “Oh, you’re in for a treat. You’re gonna love it.”

  A security company cruiser stopped by just then.

  Keene talked to the guard for a moment, then motioned me to follow him through the gate. He locked it behind us, and seeing my face said, “You want to hold the keys?”

  “Yes.”

  He handed them to me, but didn’t make a move toward the hotel. He was waiting for an explanation.

  “I had a bad time once,” I said. “Being locked in a place.”

  He nodded, opened his mouth as if to say something, then closed it again. He started walking toward the hotel, across grounds that were now swept clean.

  I followed him to the top of the steps, where he stood looking up at the sad angels, then smiled at me. “One night,” he said, “while my wife and I were out, my second-youngest son was shoved into a broom closet by his older brothers, who thought all his screaming and carrying on was funnier than hell.”

  I think my face went white.

  “They didn’t let him out for over an hour,” he said, not smiling now. “Kid had nightmares for years after that. To this day, he can’t sleep in a tent, won’t go into a phone booth. Has to know where the doors are. Hates being in any closed place. One day, I had an idea. I let him carry my keys. As long as he had the keys in his hand, he was okay. Discovered it made life a little easier for everyone.”

  “I guess there’s not much that raising seven kids won’t let you experience.”

  “Not much. In some ways, we’re all kids, I suppose. So, would you please unlock the front door?”

  I did as he asked. The glass-and-brass doors were almost as shiny now as they must have been in the 1920s. Keene stepped inside.

  “They’ve done good,” he said with pride.

  I followed him into the lobby of what must have been a grand hotel in its day. It wasn’t perfectly restored by any means, and it was empty and devoid of furniture, but it was also clean and smelled of wax and polish.

  We stood on a large mosaic entry depicting Botticelli-like celestial beings. There were angels everywhere. A dry fountain in the entry was graced with carvings of embracing seraphim. Behind it, a grand staircase ascended to a wide balcony on the next level. Except for the angels and the elaborate woodwork, the Angelus seemed an entirely different hotel than the one I had been in on Sunday.

  The room was open and the ceiling a full story above us. Marble columns rose to meet it. It was painted a twilight blue with gold stars, and all around its edges bemused cherubs looked down on us. Several walls were painted with murals; there was wood paneling elsewhere; the windows were tall and their casings ornate. Afternoon sunlight streamed in.

  “Well?” he asked.

  “You’re right, I love it.”

  “Here, sit with me on the staircase,” Keene said.

  We sat there in silence for a moment, then he said, “I’m not sure what you already know about all of this. I’ve spent the last two days trying to figure out what I should and shouldn’t tell you. At first, I was just going to try to point you in the right direction. But things have changed.”

  “Changed how?”

  “Someone is just going crazy now. Honest to God, if I thought I knew who it was, I’d go to the police. You have to believe that.”

  “Tell me what you mean by ‘going crazy.’”

  “Hurting people! Maybe—maybe even worse. Hell, probably worse. When I heard about the woman who runs the shelter getting hurt, I guess I decided I’d tell you just about everything.”

  I waited.

  “I’ve got one or two promis
es to ask you to make. First, promise you won’t drag my kids into this. They’ve never known any of it, and I owe my late wife that much.”

  “If they haven’t had anything to do with it, I won’t be the one to drag them into it, as you say. But I can’t make promises about what other reporters will or won’t do.”

  “I understand. The second promise is more selfish, but I’m not ready to give up my hide yet, and I’m afraid that’s what I’d be doing if whoever is going around hurting people knew I talked to you.”

  “What’s the promise?”

  “You protect me as a source—keep my name and any description of me off the record. I’ll tell you all I can. But nobody knows I’m the one that talked to you. Not the police and not the public.”

  I hesitated.

  “I won’t do it any other way,” he said.

  “Okay, I’ll protect you as a source. But if you’re investigated by the police, they may learn things on their own. I can’t protect you from the law.”

  “Married to a cop, I suppose not.”

  “Does that make you mistrust me?”

  “Hell no. I know how you reporters work. You ever leak this to your husband, pretty soon you’ve got no reputation as someone who can be trusted. No one talks to you. You go nowhere, because no one will tell you anything they wouldn’t want the cops to hear.”

  I nodded. “I guess you do understand how it works. But the cops are working on this, Keene. They aren’t stupid. Reed Collins, Jake Matsuda—the guys who are working these cases—they make connections on their own.”

  “Good. I want the person who’s doing all of this to be caught. I just don’t want to be crucified while they’re looking for the guy.”

  “So talk to me.”

  He stared off toward the fountain, but I don’t think he was looking at it.

  “Jesus, this is gonna be tougher than I thought,” he said.

  “I’ll give you some help. Someone saw an opportunity in Las Piernas. In redevelopment.”

  He cleared his throat and said, “Allan Moffett and Roland Hill. It started with them.”

  “Allan gave inside information to Roland, and Roland gave Allan kickbacks.” It was a guess, but I wasn’t out on any limb.

  “Yes. And I went along with it. I don’t mean they ever cut me in on their deals, but because I was willing to keep my mouth shut, a lot of business came my way.”

  “How much business?”

  “Millions of dollars’ worth. Millions. I wouldn’t be sitting here calling this my hotel if it wasn’t millions.

  Not all with redevelopment. But because Roland used my company, other developers came to me.”

  “And I’m sure Allan helped you to put in competitive bids for city projects.”

  “There was that,” he admitted. “They weren’t stingy with financial advice and inside info—as you know. They handpicked all of us.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “They knew Selman was weak: guy had two separate child-support payments, expensive habits, and was always trying to impress young broads. I had seven kids, and even though the business was growing, I was having trouble keeping ahead of my suppliers’ bills. Corbin Tyler, he just had one kid, but she had some heart problem that kept him in the red. Booter Hodges is just a damned glad-hander. That joker would do anything to rub elbows with money, ’cause unless he brings the bucks into the college foundation, he’s out of a job. He was the one that suggested Selman.”

  “And Ben Watterson?”

  “Watterson came into it a little later, more reluctantly, I guess I’d say. He liked what it did for his business, liked what it did for the city. But it ate at him. I’ll tell you something. It ate at me. Still does. Maybe I’m telling you this because I don’t want to end up like Ben. I don’t want my kids to find me in a shower with my brains blown out. How he could do that to Claire, I’ll never know.”

  “I’ve tried to understand that myself. Maybe he was afraid she’d be ashamed of him if the truth came out. Maybe it was easier to die than to see all those people disappointed in him.”

  “Nuts to that,” Keene said. “People expect too much. Ben was only human. We all are.”

  “Ben was in a position of trust. I can try to understand him, but I also have to be concerned about what he may have done to the city.”

  “The city! Christ, that’s what gripes my ass. The city benefitted like crazy. Jobs, retail sales-tax income—I could go on and on. Sure, a couple of projects didn’t work out, but most of them pulled lousy neighborhoods out of the toilet. The people I hired—they’re part of this city, too.”

  “I see. ‘The poor you have always with you,’ unless you can make them move to some other town.”

  “It’s not so simple!”

  “No. Neither is fixing a deal so that your competitors don’t have a fair chance to provide those jobs.”

  When he finally answered, his voice was much quieter. “No,” he said.

  “And for that matter, neither is murder.”

  “No. But will anyone else see it that way? That’s what scares the shit out of me.”

  “You know something about murder, Keene?”

  The cavernous room was silent, so silent that I heard Keene Dage swallow hard before he said, “I’m not sure. I’m not sure, but I think I do.”

  “Then tell me what you think you know.”

  He looked down at his shoes and said, “Numbers. It all started with numbers.”

  34

  THE NUMBERS ANDRE SELMAN cooked up?” He nodded. “Allan didn’t like the original numbers Selman was coming up with on his study.”

  “Too many people being evicted?”

  “Jesus. You do know. Yeah, Allan didn’t think he could make his projects fly if there was some big protest over the number of people who’d have to move out. Allan and Roland called him in to talk things over. It was the first time they had worked with him, and Selman was smart enough to figure out just what kind of bonanza he had lucked into.

  “So he starts giving his research assistant a hard time. This was Lucas. Lucas was ambitious, you know? Selman thought he could convince him that he had figured the statistics wrong, that Lucas wouldn’t risk pissing off his—what do they call it?”

  “His advisor for his thesis.”

  “Right.”

  “Andre was also his employer,” I said. “Lucas needed the job to stay in school. But he didn’t understand that he was supposed to compromise his principles, did he?”

  “Oh, I think he understood, although no one spelled it out—that would have been too dangerous. He just refused to do it. Selman’s not stupid. Fire this kid, and he’s going to have all kinds of trouble. This kid might turn his ass in, let it be known what the professor is up to.”

  “So he found a replacement,” I said, “and a coconspirator in Nadine Preston.”

  “Replacement, coconspirator, typist, bedmate—you name it. She was a piece of work.”

  “I’ve seen her transcripts,” I said. “She got a D in Andre’s upper-division stat class. She’s got a D, and he hires her as a graduate assistant on a largely statistical study. She retook the class from him, and she got an A. Quite an improvement.”

  “Yeah, well, I can tell you she truly studied under him.”

  “So Andre’s foofing Nadine, and Nadine is retyping Lucas’s thesis.”

  “Shit, you know all of this already.”

  “Some of it. You’re filling in a lot of gaps. I know that Andre managed to discredit Lucas. I’m not so clear on what happened after that.”

  “That should be plenty, right? I’ve just told you enough to get you a headline or two, right? Why not leave it there?”

  “Because I’m not your chump, Keene. You said it yourself. I knew almost all of this. You’ve confirmed a few things for me, filled in some details. But you really haven’t told me much at all. Where’s Nadine Preston now?”

  He looked away from me. “I don’t know.”

  “Kee
ne, this is not the time to get mule-headed. You think this will all stay a secret? Roland Hill’s little gang is coming apart at the seams. You know it is.”

  “I don’t know!”

  Too vehement. He knew something, but he was scared. I decided to take a softer approach. “Something happened. Something that made Nadine decide she would offer Lucas an opportunity to prove that his thesis had been tampered with. What happened?”

  “Selman’s inability to keep his pud in his pants, that’s what. He got bored, found another broad, and Nadine learned about it. They broke up. Selman was such a stupid ass. Here he knows not to out-and-out fire Lucas, but when it comes to women, he’s not so bright. Roland blew a gasket—asks him if he’s been taking drugs like his pal—I forget the kid’s name. OD’ed later on.”

  “Jeff? Jeff McCutchen?”

  “Yeah, that was it. Jeff. I’d forgotten about him. He used drugs all right. You’d never know it just to see the guy out on the street—that’s this myth. People think they know who’s a druggie because they’ve seen a few druggies who are out of control. Figure all druggies are like that. Just like they think they know who’s a drunk because they figure sooner or later a drunk will put a lampshade on his head at a party or live on the streets like your friend Lucas. Hell, I was a millionaire drunk. No one ever saw me drunk in public. Same with this Jeff. Hid it.”

  “He hid it from me. I didn’t learn that about him until recently,” I said.

  “The McCutchen kid was brilliant,” Keene said. “Brilliant in every way but two: drugs and people. He couldn’t keep away from pills and dope, and he was a social zero. Sometimes I think he was just such a smart kid, the only way he could stand to be around anyone else was to get loaded, you know, make himself as dumb as the rest of us. Sad kid. Lonely, I think. Odd.”

  “Let’s go back to Nadine,” I said.

  “Oh, right. Well, Moffett tells Selman he should have at least stayed with her until the final acceptance of the redevelopment proposal. Selman says there’s a problem. Turns out this Jeff is on to everything. He’s caught Nadine going through Selman’s papers.”

  Keene paused, then shook his head. “Now whatever else I could say about Selman—and don’t get me started—he could charm the horns off the devil himself. He gets people to be devoted to him, although I don’t think he’s ever truly cared about another person in his life.”