Hire a Hangman

by Collin Wilcox

  “I know what you’re thinking.”

  “Alan Bernhardt,” Friedman intoned. “It so happens he owes me back-to-back favors.”

  Alan Bernhardt, Friedman’s favorite PI, the actor who also wrote plays and directed little theater. To support his habit, as he wryly called his addiction to the theater, Bernhardt hired out as a free-lance investigator.

  “What we’ll do,” Friedman said, “is put tails on Pfiefer and Vance—and maybe John Hanchett, too. When they’re out of the house—safely out of the house, under surveillance—Bernhardt can get inside, hopefully, and lift some fingerprints, or maybe swipe a glass, whatever. If we get a match with the Llama’s cartridges, we’ll go for a search warrant.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Kidding?”

  “What if the judge asks us how we got the prints? Christ, Bernhardt could be jailed for breaking and entering.”

  “We get a broad-minded judge.”

  “Bullshit.”

  “Okay.” Airily, Friedman waved. “We’ll go to plan B.” His expression turned crafty. “As I understand it, even as we speak, Canelli and Dolores are down at juvie, where her kid is being held. Right?”

  Warily, Hastings nodded. “Right.”

  “Well, then, our game plan is obvious. We contact Canelli. He gets it across to Dolores that, in exchange for springing her kid, she’s got to make at least a tentative identification of whoever we say.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Actually, I’m not serious,” Friedman answered blandly. “Not totally. But, what the hell, it’s worth a shot. She gives us enough to get a search warrant. We pick up a glass, or whatever, and we’re in business. Maybe we’ll even find a Colt forty-five, who knows?”

  “What if Dolores refuses to go along?”

  “Then we let Canelli play the white knight who virtuously defies his superiors to save Dolores’s child—who, obviously, we plan to get released no matter what. But Dolores, of course, won’t know that. So maybe she’ll be so grateful that Canelli’ll get himself laid.”

  Hastings shook his head incredulously. “You’re really something, you know that?”

  Modestly, Friedman cast his eyes downward. “I try.”

  “Of the two, I’d rather go with Bernhardt. Forget about Dolores. Christ, we’d really be in trouble if she told the judge we conned her. Think about it.”

  “Fine. We go with Bernhardt. I’ll set it up. Meanwhile, though, let’s tell Canelli to put some pressure on Dolores. What can it hurt? He tells her he’ll spring her kid and we’ll drop the receiving-stolen-goods charge. All she has to do is go along. If she does, then we’ve got two ways to go. We’ve got Bernhardt and Dolores. That’s called insurance.”

  “Hmmm.”

  2:15 PM

  “Wait a minute,” Dolores demanded. “Let me get this straight.” She stood truculently before Canelli, hands propped on her hips, dark eyes snapping furiously. Giving way a half step, Canelli was conscious of her breasts, so close to his chest. They stood in the large reception room of the youth guidance center. The windows were screened with heavy steel mesh, the linoleum floor was cracked, the chairs and tables and walls were covered with graffiti. Most of the bedraggled chrome-and-orange-plastic chairs were occupied by grieving adults, almost all of them minorities. For a terrified child and his despairing parents, Canelli knew, this was the anteroom of hell, the first way station on a long, sad journey to nowhere.

  “Wait a minute,” she said again, each word sharply bitten, “are you telling me this is a setup—a deal? A ransom, for God’s sake, my kid for your murder case, is that what you’re telling me?”

  “Aw, jeez, Dolores, that’s not it. You’re—jeez—you’re exaggerating. All I’m saying is—”

  “You want me to lie. You want me to—”

  “Not lie. It’s just—just—” Lowering his voice, he glanced at the couple closest to them: two blacks, both of them gray-haired, both of them crying, tears streaking their worn, seamed faces as they touched each other awkwardly, seeking comfort. “It’s just that the lieutenant needs a little room to maneuver, that’s all. See, he wants to—”

  “Yeah, he gets room to maneuver, and I get the shaft, same old story. I’ve got a choice: fall for fencing, or fall for perjury. And I’ll tell you right now, Canelli, I’ll take the fencing fall. My record’s clean. There’s no way I’ll do time for fencing. Probation, sure. But there’s no way—”

  “Dolores. Wait. You’re—jeez, you got it all wrong. All you gotta do is go along, do like you’re told, just this once. Your kid gets sprung, and we drop the fencing thing. So you’ll be clean, nothing on your record. All you gotta do is have a little, you know, a little flexibility. A little faith. All you gotta do is—”

  “Faith? Christ, faith in what? In who? You? The cops? You’re all—all crooks. You—” Suddenly her knees buckled, and she sank into a nearby chair. She opened her purse, began furiously looking for a handkerchief.

  “Aw, jeez …” Canelli drew another chair close to her, produced a handkerchief, handed it over. As she snatched it out of his hand and began blowing her nose, he ventured a smile. “That’s two that you owe me. Handkerchiefs, I mean.”

  The handkerchief muffled her monosyllabic response. Tentatively he touched her knee. She moved sharply away, blew her nose with a note of finality, dropped the handkerchief in her purse, and turned to face him.

  “I trusted you,” she said. “I—” As if it were painful to say, she winced, shook her head, finally confessed: “I liked you. And now you—you’re doing a number on me. You’re—”

  “Dolores. Please. Jeez, I—”

  “What you’re doing—really doing—is holding him hostage.”

  “Holding—?”

  “Oscar. He’s your—your goddamn captive, that’s what he is.”

  “Wait.” Firmly, he raised his hand. “Wait. Back up, here. I didn’t fence those two guns. You did that, Dolores. Don’t forget that. And I didn’t give Oscar a sack of dope to deliver. Your ex-husband, or whoever he is—he did that, not me. So don’t start doing a number on me, Dolores. Don’t try to run over me, because it won’t work. I—I’m glad you like me. I like you, too. You probably know that. Girls know those things, I finally figured that one out. But let’s keep the record straight here. Nobody ever said cops don’t cut corners. But—”

  “Half the people I know, the cops’ve got them by the throats. They want something hot, maybe girls, dope, TVs, whatever it is, the cops always get a deal. They don’t pay full fare for anything. They snap their fingers, and—” She sniffled, blinked, pressed the handkerchief to her nose.

  “Listen—” Uneasily, Canelli pointed. “Your, uh, mascara, or whatever it is, it’s—”

  “Ah!” Furiously she turned her back on him, dug into her purse for a mirror and compact. “You always get me crying. I don’t cry, except when you make me. You know that?”

  “No fooling?” Speculatively, Canelli frowned. Then, puzzled: “Really?”

  “Oh—fuck off, will you?” With her back still turned, she squared her shoulders, lifted her chin, crossed her legs. “Just fuck off.”

  “Ah, jeez …” He put his hand on her shoulder. “Don’t be like that, Dolores.”

  She drew away from his touch.

  “Listen,” he said, “don’t sweat it, okay? Just cool it, hold on to that goddamn temper. And I’ll—” He rose, touched her shoulder again. “I’ll give the lieutenant a call, set him straight.”

  “Oh, yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  2:30 PM

  He stared at the telephone as if it were an icon. It sat on its own stand beside the window. It was as if the table were a pedestal, and the window a celestial backdrop: shape and shadow and substance, one fateful composition.

  He’d once read that the telephone was the ultimate twentieth-century power symbol. In medieval times it had been the lance and the sword. Whoever commanded the most swords wielded the most power.


  Now it was the telephone: life or death at the sound of the dial tone. The red phone sat on the President’s desk. Lift the receiver, say a few words, and millions would die, vaporized.

  Lift this phone—his phone—and two had died. Hanchett, sated with sex, blinded by his own ego, had died in the gutter. Teresa Bell, haunted by her demons, had gotten his call, opened her door, smiled her madwoman’s smile—and died.

  He got to his feet, walked a dozen steps to the far side of the room, turned, fixed his gaze on the telephone.

  Two calls made …

  One call remaining.

  Before the police came again, there was one call yet to make.

  But not here. Not yet. Not from this phone.

  Even though it was a local call, it would doubtless be logged. Somewhere, on some phone company tape, the record would exist.

  And yet, if they went back over the phone company records, the police would discover that, until Hanchett had died, they’d talked almost daily. So now it would be suspicious that they didn’t call each other, didn’t talk almost every day.

  He realized that he was still standing staring at the phone, his back braced against the wall.

  Back against the wall …

  Was his back against the wall?

  A prisoner, awaiting death by firing squad, that was the meaning of the phrase. All pleas exhausted, all hope gone, the prisoner stood with his back to the wall, blindfolded.

  As he stared at the phone, his eyes lost focus; the image of the phone blurred.

  To call, or not to call …

  Hamlet’s lament. Laurence Olivier with bleached blond hair, weighing his options, life or death.

  Just as now—here—he was weighing his own options, calculating his chances, life or death.

  No, not death. In California, only the indigent went to the gas chamber. Thank you, Governor Jerry Brown. Thank you, Justice Rose Bird.

  Moving slowly, conscious that an effort of the will was required, he pushed himself away from the wall, returned to the chair beside the telephone, lowered himself into the chair.

  Before he called her, he must first bring it all into focus. Sometimes it was essential that the chronology be complete.

  He could vividly remember the words that had first touched fire to the fuse: “There’s the money,” she’d said, sugaring her espresso. That had been the beginning.

  But where would it end?

  In death?

  Yes, surely in death.

  After the first words spoken in the coffee shop, those words that seemed so innocuous now, it was then necessary that they speak of death. They’d been in bed. In the afterglow, he’d been lying on his back, fingers laced behind his head, staring up at the ceiling. She’d been lying on her side, turned away from him, aloof. Yet, making love, she’d been fierce, demanding everything, taking everything for herself.

  Was that what had him hooked—that fierce, rapacious, headlong sexual greed? Or was it her utter ruthlessness, contemptuously undisguised?

  Earlier in the evening, dressed in jeans and sweaters and running shoes, the uniform of the yuppie, they’d had pizza and gone to a movie on Union Street. Eating the pizza and drinking red wine, she’d been moody, preoccupied. After the movie, driving to her place, they’d hardly spoken. He’d debated the wisdom of questioning her. Would she flare up? The answer was inherent in the question: yes, she would flare up.

  But perversely, he’d decided to test her. Speaking quietly, self-consciously casual, he’d said that he’d decided to go to Cancun for the skin diving. He’d be gone for a week or ten days. Could she come down for a weekend, at least?

  Still turned away from him, she hadn’t responded for a long, distancing moment. Then, her voice low and impersonal, she’d said, “What good would that do?”

  He’d said that he didn’t understand. What good did anything do?

  Her response had been a low, vicious grunt, hardly a ladylike response.

  Ladylike?

  It was the last word he’d ever think of to describe her. Beautiful, yes. Irresistible, certainly. Fascinating, always.

  But ladylike, never.

  “That isn’t in the rules,” she’d finally said. “Going away isn’t in the rules.”

  Then she should change the rules, he’d said. Immediately adding, “We should change the rules.”

  “How?” she’d retorted bitterly. “Kill him?”

  One word—two words—and reality shifted. The past and the present and the future had tilted, fused, then separated, finally re-formed. All in seconds. Milliseconds, really.

  If he’d chosen not to reply, it would have ended there. In the silence between them, the seconds would have elapsed: longer, more fateful seconds. Followed by minutes. Then hours. Finally days. Eventually—sooner, not later—she would have found someone to take his place. The same scenario would begin: the seduction, the exploration.

  Kill him …

  The words had lingered in the darkness, a palpable third presence. He’d never been able to remember the response he’d made. It could have been mere mumbling, inarticulate assent—wishful thinking.

  But it had been enough.

  Once the words were spoken, once the sounds of approval had been uttered, illusion changed shape and substance. Wishful thinking became commitment.

  From the first, those first few seconds and minutes, the pattern remained unchanged. Always she took the initiative. Driven by a hatred that had consumed her and a greed that never let her go, she began to make plans. Once more, a pattern emerged. Always, it began with the “what if” game, shades of earliest memory: children, fantasizing. The word murder was never spoken. Instead, it came as a “what if” question, at first so deliciously tantalizing: what if they could “arrange for him to die”?

  Expertly, she’d begun by sketching in the images: the sunny beaches, villas in Spain or southern France. Exotic nights of love, love in the afternoon. Freedom. Complete, utter freedom. And, yes, money. Kill the king, snatch the key to the counting house.

  And, yes, justice.

  For what Hanchett had done, death was the due.

  And all without risk.

  Find Teresa Bell. Tip the fragile balance. Make the madwoman their executioner. The perfect plan, flawlessly executed.

  Die, Brice Hanchett. Pay. Finally, pay.

  And then the lieutenant had called.

  Was it the title of a play—a movie? The Inspector Calls. Yes, certainly, the title of a movie.

  From the first, he’d known that Hastings suspected them. Just as, from the first, he’d suspected that Teresa Bell might confess. It had always been a calculated risk, that she would confess: the madwoman in search of absolution.

  Die, Teresa Bell, the lost soul, the madwoman wandering wild-eyed through the empty, echoing corridors of her mind.

  Leaving the two of them, now. Once more, the two of them, planning, scheming. But now the visions of villas and sun-soaked beaches had faded, along with the imagined nights of magical love. So suddenly, gone.

  Fear had done that: obliterated the fantasies, leaving only reality.

  Followed, he knew, by the first nibbling of terror. Already he could feel it beginning, deep down in the center of himself.

  With an effort, he extended his left arm, lifted the telephone, used his right hand to touch-tone her number.

  “Hello?” She’d answered on the second ring.

  “Hi.”

  “Ah—” He could hear her catch her breath. She’d been expecting him to call.

  “Let’s get together tonight.”

  “Yes—I guess we should.”

  “Nine o’clock?”

  “Yes …” It was an uncharacteristically wan, indecisive monosyllable. She was feeling it too, then. The first nibbling of terror, like a rat chewing the border of a shroud.

  “Okay—nine o’clock, then. I’ll—”

  “Are you all right?” Her voice was hushed.

  “No, I don’t think I’m all r
ight. Not really all right.”

  “Are you—?” She broke off, cleared her throat. “Do you want to—to get out? Is that it?”

  “We have to talk. See you at nine.” He broke the connection, heard the dial tone begin.

  2:40 PM

  She replaced the telephone in its cradle, rose, went to the kitchen, selected a stem glass from the rack over the counter, took last night’s half-finished bottle of Chardonnay from the refrigerator, and filled the glass. Appreciatively, she sipped the wine, just a little too cold.

  Nine o’clock …

  More than six hours …

  Why had he said nine o’clock?

  Like all conspirators, they’d fixed a secret meeting place: the yacht harbor, the slip that led to one row of berths. The slip was perhaps two hundred feet from the yacht club’s main parking lot. He’d selected the place, a good choice, not too isolated, not too public. This would be their fourth meeting here. Twice, dressed in windbreakers and jeans and deck shoes, as if they were going sailing, they’d met during the day. Once—the first time—they’d met at night, a cold, foggy night. They’d planned that first meeting down to the minutest detail. It had been a Friday night, which meant there would be a crowd at the yacht club. So they’d dressed as if they were going to dinner, ostensibly part of the crowd.

  Two days after they’d met at the yacht club that foggy Friday night, he’d given Teresa Bell the gun.

  And the following Monday night, Brice Hanchett had died.

  That’s how she thought of it: died. Not murdered. Died.

  She took the glass of Chardonnay from the table, raised the glass, sipped. Yes, the flavor was rising as the wine warmed.

  How often in the past five days had she tried to recall the precise moment she first realized he must die? Sometimes it seemed that the decision had come in a dream. She’d been an executioner in the dream—a hangman’s apprentice, the one charged with tying the black hood over the victim’s head to spare the onlookers the sight of his dead face, contorted by death’s final agony. But then she’d been instructed to kiss him good-bye before she pulled the hood down over his face. And then, violently protesting, she’d awakened, horrified. Because somehow he was already dead, before the hangman’s trap had been sprung. His skin was cold and clammy, his eyes empty, his purple lips slack, his mouth idiotically gaping.