by Tom Fowler
He shook his head. “Whatever,” he said. “Just try not to interrogate our guests.”
“I’ll do my best,” I said.
He walked away, no doubt satisfied he headed off The Baltimore County Inquisition. I shrugged and made my way around the room. A few people shook my hand, asked me how I knew Stanley, and shared their own tales of his life. Everyone who talked to me had been a client of Stanley’s at some point. No one identified themselves as his friends. I decided not to mention this depressing fact to Pauline.
After a circuit of the room, I found Pauline alone. She offered a tired smile. Her makeup, well applied though it had been, couldn’t hide the lines under her eyes. I empathized.
“Thanks for coming,” she said, giving me a quick hug.
“Of course,” I said.
“Honestly, I don’t know why I asked you to come. It’s not like Stanley’s killer is in the room.” Her voice cracked toward the end. I offered her a tissue from the travel pack in my pocket.
“You need support. I understand.”
Pauline nodded as she wiped at her eyes. “I’m trying to be strong for the kids, but it’s hard,” she said. “Zachary is even more quiet than normal. Katherine has been doing enough crying for all of us. She just went into the ladies’ room again, the poor thing.”
“It’s a hard time for all of you.” I looked around the hall again.
“Do you dislike funeral homes, C.T.?”
“Doesn’t everyone?” I said. “Except funeral directors, I suppose.”
“You’ve stayed on the outside most of the time you’ve been here,” said Pauline. “Even now, you’re looking around.”
“Part of my constant vigilance as a private investigator.”
“Or some discomfort at being here. It’s OK. I understand. I’m just glad to have someone else in my support network right now.”
“And I’ll be a part of it again from seven to nine,” I said.
We had three hours between viewings. Pauline invited me to dinner with her and the kids, but I declined. They needed some time to themselves. She persisted, though, and then Katherine asked me, too, and got weepy when I hesitated, so I caved. Zachary didn’t seem too pleased, but little cheered him where I was concerned.
There are many good restaurants within a quick drive of Ruck’s Funeral Home in Towson. We didn’t go to any of them. Instead, we were the best dressed people at the Towson Diner on this day—and maybe in its history. Katherine said it became her favorite place since she transferred to Goucher, and she simply wanted comfort food. I couldn’t argue with her logic.
The Towson Diner is shoehorned onto York Road in such a way to make getting in easy unless anyone else happens to be leaving when you’re trying to pull in. Getting out is even worse. Making a left onto York Road at rush hour when we would be leaving is something best left to the Impossible Missions Force. The alternative would be to make a right out of the parking lot and use the York Road traffic circle to turn around. At the moment, I was glad I didn’t drive to the diner.
After we ordered our food—a club sandwich and sweet potato fries for me—the Rodgers talked about Stanley. I felt like an outsider eavesdropping on a private conversation, only without the sense of titillation normally accompanying eavesdropping. I sat and nursed my iced tea; they needed the time to have a meaningful conversation, even if it took place in the middle of a diner. Finally, Pauline decided to include me. I would have preferred she hadn’t. “What did you like to do with your dad, C.T.?” she said.
I was in a pickle here. My father and I got along very well, but we didn’t do a lot of father-son things together now and never really did. My father encouraged me to continue martial arts (after my mother insisted I enroll), but he never stood there punching and kicking alongside me. I needed to come up with something. “Going to baseball games,” I said. Which is true. My father likes to sit among the people in the bleachers. My mother, on the rare occasions she graced Camden Yards with her presence, sat in club level. “We still go a couple times a year.”
“Lame,” Zack said.
“Zachary!” Pauline glared at her son.
“We can’t all go fishing,” I said.
Pauline looked at me. “You’re not helping,” she said.
I shrugged. Why did they have to involve me?
We made it back to the funeral home with only a minor adventure getting onto York Road. I returned to the viewing room while Pauline talked to the funeral director. Katherine and Zack followed me in. I paused at the collage, glanced at the boat picture again, and moved on. They stayed behind, looking at it for a while. My parents decided against having such a collage at my sister’s viewings. Seeing this one made me more thankful for their restraint.
The evening crowd was a lot different than the afternoon visitors. They wore nicer suits, made more eye contact, and gave firmer handshakes. I didn’t go out of my way to talk to anyone, but like in the afternoon viewing, a few people found me. This time, they introduced themselves as Stanley’s friends, or friends of the family, not mere clients. I said I was a friend of Pauline’s. She didn’t have a lot of people there. Might as well even the scales.
About a half-hour into the second session, I saw a mousy man lurking near the photo collage. He wore a gray suit with a gray shirt and gray tie. If his hair were gray, it would have been the perfect camouflage. Instead it was brown. The suit looked at least a size too big for him. He pushed his glasses up on his nose often enough to make me think they needed to be re-fitted, too. He lingered at the collage, occasionally looking around the room like a wallflower uncomfortable leaving the corner at his first high school dance.
Being the gregarious fellow I am, I walked to him. He saw me approach and looked away quickly, though he didn’t leave the photo collection. Normally, I would have offered him a handshake, but I suspected he didn’t take part in social amenities. “How are you?” I said.
He swallowed hard before answering. “Not sure I should be here, really,” he said. His tone sounded nervous, but his voice carried a surprising authority with it.
“Did you know Stanley?”
“Here’s the thing.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “I didn’t know him at all.”
“Then I’m not sure why you’re here.” I dropped my tone, too, figuring it would minimize his nervous looking around. It didn’t. He scanned the room again before he answered.
“I stayed in the suite next to his,” he said.
Now I understood his nervousness. I showed him my ID. “Wait here,” I said. “I’m investigating this case, and I’m going to find a place we can talk in private.”
I led the nervous man to an empty office down the hall and shut the door. The desk was way too crowded and messy for the funeral director to meet with the public in here. Papers, pamphlets, and books were scattered about in a system which must have made sense to someone. Gaudy decorations like plastic skulls filled the spaces not encroached upon by aggressive piles of paper. “OK, we can talk in here,” I said.
He let out a long sigh. “Good,” he said. “I didn’t want to in there. Too many people . . . you never know who’s around.”
“I suppose. What’s your name?”
“Marvin. Marvin Bernard.” He didn’t offer a handshake. I was neither offended nor surprised.
“C.T. Ferguson.”
“You’re investigating the case?”
I nodded. “I’m working for the widow,” I said.
“Are the police calling it a suicide?” Marvin said.
“So far. They don’t seem willing to come off it.”
“It was no suicide.” Marvin looked around the office, I guess out of habit. None of the tacky desk decorations threatened him.
“Did you see anything?” I said.
“No, no. I heard it happen, though. Our beds were on the same wall.” He paused and reddened. “Please don’t ask how I know.”
I could guess, so I didn’t. “What did you hear?”
“A couple of guys went in there. I heard two voices beside his. They talked for a while. From what I heard, it was about money. Then I heard someone get punched, then two muffled shots.”
“Muffled?”
“Yes,” said Marvin. “Maybe by a pillow or a silencer.”
“Silencers don’t really exist outside of Hollywood,” I said. There had been a suppressor screwed onto the end of the gun, but only the county’s ballistics tests could determine if it got added after the fact.
“Anyhow, whatever they used, the shots weren’t very loud.”
“But you definitely heard two.”
Marvin nodded. “Absolutely.”
Now I knew Stanley Rodgers hadn’t killed himself. I needed a lot more to get Gonzalez and the BCPD to classify it as a homicide, though. “I’ll keep you out of this as much as I can,” I said. “But in case I need to reach you, do you have a card?”
He gave me a business card, and I handed him one of mine. Then he left the funeral home without going back into the viewing room. I looked at the business card. Marvin V. Bernard. Certified Public Accountant.
Of course he was.
Chapter 5
I needed to go back and see Rodgers’ hotel room at the Sheraton. If Marvin told me the truth—and I had no reason to think otherwise—a second bullet hid somewhere. I couldn’t get Gonzalez to take action on the case with a bunch of conjecture and a story about talking to a mousy accountant. If I could point to a second bullet hole in the suite, however, I’d be golden. I like being golden.
After locking the office, I walked back into the viewing room. Pauline talked to a few people and smiled as much as she could. Katherine and Zachary frowned and scowled rather than put on friendlier faces, but they still talked to some well-wishers. When no one stood near Pauline, I approached her. “I need to go,” I said. “There might be something important about the case, and I need to check it out.”
She looked wide-eyed at me for a second before nodding. “Sure, OK,” she said. “Let me know if you discover anything.”
“I will.”
The Sheraton made for a very short drive from Ruck’s. I parked along the side of the hotel and walked around to the front entrance. Being in a suit for the funeral would help me here, but I hoped my attire didn’t look too nice. It should look like a cop’s garb. I would settle for the outfit of a detective who cared how he dressed.
I walked through the front doors, over the giant, garish Sheraton rug, and into the lobby. Only one person stood in line at the front desk. Two people manned it, and the second one dressed in a pressed shirt and tie did paperwork while the other tended to the customer. I approached the well-dressed man.
“Detective Ferguson,” I said, flashing my ID quickly enough he couldn’t read it (I hoped). “Can we talk somewhere in private for a moment?”
“Do we need to?” His name tag identified him as Darren, assistant manager. His head was smoothly shaved, and a goatee circled his mouth. An unbuttoned shirt almost hid the very top of a tattoo on his chest. He glanced back at his paperwork. I could see Darren’s priorities.
“Depends,” I said.
He went back to the paperwork. “On what?”
“On whether you want your potential guest to know someone got murdered in this hotel recently.” Darren and the other man behind the desk both looked up. The fellow in line stared at me and blanched. “Oops,” I said. “I guess he knows now.”
Darren stood and gestured for me to follow him behind the front desk, which I did. As we passed through a door into a series of offices, I heard the other associate try to talk the guest into staying at the Sheraton, saying he was sure I was mistaken. We went into a cubicle where four monitors on the wall displayed the outputs of eight security cameras. I wondered if Stanley’s killers would be on camera. Gonzalez could request the video; it would sound a lot more official coming from him, anyway.
“Did you have to scare away my customer?” Darren said, slumping into a task chair. It was the only place to sit in the room. I leaned on the edge of the wraparound desk.
“I needed to break the hypnotic hold of your paperwork,” I said.
“We all got shit to do, man.”
“True, man. Right now, what I got to do is take another look at the penthouse where a guest got shot.”
“I think we have someone staying there.”
The BCPD must have said they were finished with the scene. “I’ll be quiet,” I said.
He frowned. “Shouldn’t you have some dudes with you or something?” he said. “A CIS team?”
“CSI? No, not today. I’m only following up a lead. The CSI guys might come later.”
“Oh,” Darren said. “Do you think I could look around with them?”
“No,” I said.
“Oh. So what do you need from me?”
A real police detective would offer a measured, even response, free of contempt. I kept this in mind as I answered. “I need to get into the penthouse.”
Darren nodded. “Right. Let me call up there and see if anyone is inside.” He consulted a guide sheet beside the phone and dialed 8902. Darren bobbed his foot up and down over his knee as he held the receiver to his ear. After about half a minute, he put it down. “No one’s there,” he said.
“Can you make me a key?” I said.
“Yeah, sure.”
We went out to the front desk area again. Darren took a blank keycard, entered some numbers on the pad, and swiped the card through a reader. He handed it to me. “Good luck, Detective . . . what was your name?”
“Ferguson. And thank you.” I left the front desk for the elevators before Darren used the rest of his brain and puzzled out I might not be who I implied I was. Once inside the elevator, I put my pass card into the slot to go to the penthouse level. A minute later, I got off the elevator and walked to the suite where Stanley Rodgers died. To make sure no one returned in the last few minutes, I knocked on the door. No answer. I swiped Sheraton-approved plastic and went into the room.
Someone was staying here. Whoever it was left an open suitcase on the bed. I saw men’s clothes inside. Considering this fellow rented a suite, his knockoff Polo shirts looked cheap. I pictured where Stanley’s body lay on the floor. He could have fallen from pretty much anywhere. Or maybe the guys who shot him moved him. Marvin said it sounded like someone had been hit before the gunshots. I didn’t see any blood trails on the floor, though, so he was probably killed where he lay. Did the second shot come before or after?
If the bullet lodged anywhere normally visible in the room, the BCPD would have seen it. They would have unmade the bed and other basic things. The other bullet couldn’t have left the area without damaging a door or window, which also would have been obvious. Wherever this bullet was, obviously was somewhere hard to see, somewhere the police wouldn’t have looked when they processed the scene.
I poked around in the closet. The current guest hadn’t hung up any of his clothes—none of them merited hangers—so the open space made my job easier. I used an LED flashlight to help me as I looked high and low, but I didn’t see a bullet hole anywhere. Next, I looked under the king-size bed, but its frame was solid wood and flush against the floor all around, which cut down on the real estate I could search. What was left would be easily visible in a sweep of the area.
The two nightstands yielded the same results. The police could have shifted them easily. I needed something they were unlikely to move, something they would presume was there all along. This left the armoire against the wall. It contained several drawers, a shelf, and held the TV. I shined the flashlight along the floor near the upright wardrobe. Scuff marks—probably unremarkable in hotel rooms—were faint, but they were there. Those may have come from housekeeping two years ago, but right now, they were all I could go on.
I decided against moving the armoire with the TV and drawers intact. Even if it were light enough for me to budge, the process would make new scuff marks along the floor. I didn’t know if it woul
d count as ruining the crime scene, but doing so would certainly change it and make obvious the fact I came looking for something. While Gonzalez seemed like a decent fellow, he and his bosses wouldn’t be as forgiving of my peccadilloes as the BPD. I took the drawers out of the cabinet, disconnected the TV, and put it onto the bed.
Now the armoire was light enough so I could lift a corner and swivel it out from the wall. I hefted one side of it, then went around and did the other side, then did the whole process again. When I finished, I could stand or crouch behind it. I looked at the wall, but only noticed a few spots of dirt the large dresser hid. When I crouched and used my flashlight, I found the bullet hole. It was maybe eighteen inches off the floor and the same distance inside the border of the furniture. Easy to miss without rearranging things. I snapped a picture of it with my phone. Once I had the photo, I moved the armoire back, reconnected the TV, and put the drawers back in.
As soon as I finished, I heard the lock whirr to life. I looked around. The bathroom was too far away, and I couldn’t hide anywhere near where I was. I shook my head as the door opened into the room. A man in his mid-fifties escorted a much younger lady inside. They giggled and talked quietly among themselves, both of which they stopped when they saw me.
“Hotel security,” I said, giving them a quick flash of my ID. “I think someone sent me to the wrong suite, though.”
“They must have,” the man said. “Can you leave now?”
Why keep a middle-aged man and his call girl of choice waiting? “Of course,” I said. I left and headed for the elevator. When I heard the suite door close, I walked to the stairs. I didn’t need them calling real hotel security. I went down to the second floor, then hurried to the steps running along the rear of the hotel. I exited via the back door, went to my car, and left.
I called Rich on my way from the hotel and said I would bring carry-out if he’d be home. He said he would. I stopped at a convenience store for paper towels, then went to the best place for to-go food near Rich’s house: Gil’s Pizza. The shop looks like any other residence on Belair Road, save for the sign identifying it as a restaurant. They don’t do eat-in or delivery: if you want one of their pies, you go there and pick it up. Gil’s makes pizzas in only one size, and regardless of toppings, they always turned out perfectly greasy. It must have been the cheese. I used paper towels to cover the passenger’s seat, so I could put the boxes there without worrying about the grease bleeding through. I loved Gil’s pies, but I loved my leather more.