by Bill Bernico
“If you’re asking was I mad,” Sylvia said, “the answer is no. Sammy’s leaving didn’t put me in any financial straits. I have my own money and I’ve invested it wisely. I get checks every month and I live quite comfortably. I didn’t even charge Sammy any rent to stay with me. He bought his share of the groceries and chipped in for the utilities, but that was it.”
“You see, Sylvia,” I said. “This is the kind of information that helps us put the whole picture together.”
“What do you mean?” she said.
“What Elliott’s getting at,” Gloria said, “is that when an investigation first gets under way, everyone who knew the victim automatically becomes a suspect. That’s why we ask as many questions as we do. The questions may not seem important to the people we’re asking them of, but they help us eliminate people as suspects, and I think we can safely say that you’ve been eliminated.”
“Well, I should hope so,” Sylvia said, somewhat indignant. “I was the one who asked the police to pursue this matter, if you recall.”
I held up one hand. “No offense,” I said. “We ask everyone the same kinds of questions. Everyone doesn’t always answer as straight-forward and honestly as you have, and those are the people we look more closely at during our investigation.”
“I don’t think we need to trouble you any further today,” Gloria said. “Thank you for your time and hospitality, Mrs. Nash.”
Gloria and I got up to leave and Sylvia walked us to the door. “Would you let me know if you find out anything?” she said.
“We certainly will,” I said. “Goodbye, Mrs. Nash.”
Back in the car Gloria turned to me and said, “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
“Later,” I said. “We have work to do.” I tried to keep a straight face.
Gloria slapped my arm. “Apparently not,” she said. “I was thinking that we should check downtown and see if there’s a will on file for Sammy Shapiro.”
“I’m way ahead of you,” I said as I pulled away from the curb and headed for the records department at City Hall. “If we see Delbert today, try not to get him too excited.”
“I can’t help it if Del likes to show his premature appreciation to my touch,” Gloria said. “I think it’s kind of cute, actually. Let me talk to him first. I promise I won’t get him all worked up.”
I found an empty space nearly in front of City Hall and stuck a quarter in the meter. We found Delbert Smithers standing behind the counter in the records department. His face flushed a bit when he saw Gloria and me approaching. He nodded politely when we stepped up to the counter.
“Well, hello again, Del,” Gloria said. “How are you today?”
“Okay,” Del said. “How can I help you?”
“Do you remember us?” I said. “We were here a couple of months ago and you helped us with some land transfer information.”
Del nodded. “I remember,” he said. “What are you looking for today?”
Gloria took over again. “Del,” she said, “we’d like to know if you have any record of a will for a man named Samuel Shapiro. Could you take a look on your computer and see what you can find?”
Without answering, Del turned to his computer, hit a button or two and brought up his search screen. “Spell that last name, please,” he said.
Gloria spelled the name for him and he typed it in. “First name?” Del said. “Gloria provided it and Del entered it, hitting the Submit key when he had finished. A second or two later he announced, “Samuel Shapiro, age sixty-seven, his address is…”
Gloria held up one hand. “You can skip all that, Del,” she said. “Mr. Shapiro has passed away. We’re only interested in whether or not he left a will. Would that information be in there?”
“Let me have a look,” Del said, hitting another series of keys. “Here we are, Samuel A. Shapiro. He filed a will with the county on the twelfth of last month. Looks like he left anything of value to a woman named Gail Grimes, his daughter.”
“Does it tell you exactly what it was that he left her?” I said.
Del scrolled the screen up and checked for me. “Looks like he left a hundred shares of some unnamed stock and the deed to a two point seven acre parcel. That’s all it shows on this screen.”
“Are there any other details?” Gloria said, smiling at Del.
Del quickly looked away, somewhat embarrassed. “That’s all it shows in this database. You’ll probably have to ask the attorney who drew up the will for the details.”
“Is the attorney’s name listed on the will?” Gloria said.
“Of course,” Del said, as if Gloria should know that.
“Could I have that name?” Gloria said.
“John P. Marshall,” Del said, writing the information on a small slip of paper and passing it to Gloria.
“Del,” Gloria said, “you’re a life-saver. Thank you so much.” She laid her hand on top of his and then quickly withdrew it, apparently just in time from the look on Del’s face.
“Thanks, Del,” I said and quickly shuffled Gloria out of the office.
On our way back down the City Hall steps, I grabbed Gloria’s arm and stopped. “That was a close one,” I said. “Any bets on whether Del has looked you up in one of his databases and has maybe printed out your picture? Another five bucks says it’s hanging on the wall in his private office, or on his bathroom wall at home.”
Gloria pulled her arm out of my grip and said, “Are all men this shallow, or is it just you?”
“It’s all of us,” I said. “It’s a prerequisite to get into the club. Wanna see my membership card?” I reached for my wallet, but Gloria was already on her way down the steps and heading for the car.
“Lighten up,” I said when I was behind the wheel again. “Read me the attorney’s address, would you?”
Gloria paused long enough to give me a look I didn’t like and then said, “Marshall, Marshall and Liebowitz. Sixteen fifty-five Vine Street, ninth floor.”
“How handy is that?” I said. “That’s just three blocks from our office.”
I parked behind our office building and got out, preferring to walk the three blocks rather than have to deal with parking. Gloria and I walked into the lobby and checked the information board. Marshall, Marshall and Liebowitz occupied rooms 910 and 912. The elevator ride gave me a chance to grab Gloria’s neck with my fingers and massage her scalp.
“Feeling guilty about something?” Gloria said.
“Like what?” I said innocently.
“All right,” I admitted. “So my sense of humor borders on the offbeat at times. That doesn’t make me a bad guy, does it?”
“You know, Elliott,” Gloria said. “You could keep the sense of humor, if only you could learn when not to use it. That spontaneous manner of yours is gonna get you in trouble one of these days.”
“Duly noted,” I said, and removed my hand from her neck.
The elevator door opened and we found ourselves in a hallway that was plusher than a lot of offices I’d been in. Room 910 was two doors from the elevator and we let ourselves in. A classy-looking gray-haired receptionist peered over her bifocals and greeted us. Her name plaque identified her as Helen Moore.
“May I help you?” she said.
I was impressed right off the bat. Most receptionists I’d encountered had always said, ‘can I help you’ instead of ‘may I help you.’ It showed a bit of class in my book. Even I didn’t always use that word correctly.
“We’d like to speak with Mr. Marshall,” I said.
“Do you have an appointment?” Helen said.
I shook my head. “I’m afraid not. We just stopped in on a hunch. Can we still see him?”
“Which Mr. Marshall did you wish to see?” Helen said. “We have two.”
“You have to what?” I said, and then caught myself. “Oh, there are two of them, I see. I’m not sure which one we need to talk to. Maybe you could tell us. We’re here looking into the details of Samuel Shapiro’s will.”
&n
bsp; “And are you related to Mr. Shapiro?” Helen said suspiciously.
“Is that important?” Gloria said.
“I should say so,” Helen said. “You can’t just walk in off the street and ask to see private records without permission.”
I reached into my suit pocket and pulled out one of my business cards and handed it to Helen. “Elliott Cooper,” I said. “And this is Gloria Campbell. We’ve been hired by the late Samuel Shapiro’s sister, Sylvia Nash, to help put Mr. Shapiro’s affairs in order.” I showed Helen a copy of the contract Sylvia Nash had signed when she’d hired us.”
Helen looked at my card and studied the contract and then looked up at me. “That would be John Marshall,” she said. “Let me see if he’s available.” She picked up her desk phone and pressed one of the dozen buttons that ran up the side of her phone console. “Mr. Marshall,” she said into the phone, “I have a Mr. Cooper and a Miss Campbell here to see you. Are you free?” She listened for a second and then hung up, keeping my card, but handing the contract back to me. She said, “Have a seat. Mr. Marshall will be with you shortly.”
“Thank you,” I said. “By the way, are you by any chance related to Clayton?”
“Clayton?” she said.
I pointed to her wooden name plaque. “Clayton Moore,” I said.
Helen’s face didn’t register any recognition.
“Clayton Moore,” I repeated. “The Lone Ranger. Television, back in the fifties? Never mind.” I could see she was not a movie or television buff.
Three or four minutes later I heard a door open and looked up to see a man dressed in a suit that looked like it cost more than my car. Gloria and I stood up to greet him. I extended my hand. “Elliott Cooper,” I said. “And this is Gloria Campbell. We’d like to talk to you about Samuel Shapiro if we may.”
“Follow me,” Marshall said, and led us into an office that put the plush hallway to shame. A large mahogany desk sat in front of a large corner window that afforded a view down Hollywood Boulevard all the way to the horizon. On the wall were several awards and diplomas from prestigious schools. There was also a framed photo of this same man shaking hands with Bill Clinton. Next to that was a framed photo of John Marshall standing next to a huge marlin that was hanging by its tail. He caught me looking at it.
“That was one huge fish,” he said, proudly. “Took me an hour and a half to reel him in.”
“Very nice,” I said.
Marshall gestured toward two wood and leather chairs across from his desk and invited us to sit. “Now,” he said, “what was it you wanted to know about Mr. Shapiro?”
“Were you aware that Samuel Shapiro was dead?” I said.
“No, I wasn’t” Marshall said. “When did this happen?”
“Just a couple of days ago,” I said.
“I’m sorry to hear it,” Marshall said. “What exactly is your interest in this matter?”
Gloria sat up straight and said, “We’ve been hired by Mr. Shapiro’s sister to look into the circumstances surrounding his death and to check on the contents of his will.”
I passed a business card and the contract over to him and he inspected them briefly before handing the contract back to me.
Marshall pressed his intercom button and asked his receptionist to bring in Shapiro’s file. A minute later she appeared in the doorway holding a manila file. She gave it to Marshall and excused herself again before leaving the room. Marshall opened the file and paged through the forms before stopping on Sammy’s will. He looked up from the papers and said, “What was it you wanted to know about the will?”
“I checked,” I said, “and found out that Mr. Shapiro’s daughter is the sole beneficiary. I understand that he left her a hundred shares of some unnamed stock and a two point seven acre parcel. I’d like to know which stocks they were and where the parcel is located.”
“That will become public record as soon as I receive notice of Mr. Shapiro’s death,” Marshall said.
“I’m sure it will,” Gloria said. “But perhaps you could aid our investigation into Mr. Shapiro’s death by giving us that information today. If you need confirmation, you could call Lieutenant Dean Hollister of the L.A.P.D. or perhaps you’d like to speak to the county medical examiner. His name is Andy Reynolds. They’ll both verify Mr. Shapiro’s death if you need proof.”
Marshall studied us for a moment before pressing his intercom button again. “Helen,” he said, “would you ring Andy Reynolds in the medical examiner’s office for me, please?” He hung up the phone and thirty seconds later it rang. “Thanks, Helen,” he said. “Mr. Reynolds,” Marshall started to say and then amended it to, “Is it Mr. or Dr. Reynolds? Very well, Dr. Reynolds, this is John Marshall at the offices of Marshall, Marshall and Liebowitz. I have a Mr. Cooper sitting across from me and all I need to do is verify the status of one Samuel Shapiro. Uh huh. Two days ago? Thank you, Doctor.” Marshall hung up the phone and turned back to me.
“Well?” I said. “Is that enough proof for you?”
“That will do,” Marshall said. “I’d still have to get the official notice before releasing any copies to you, but for now, I could at least give you the information you’re looking for.”
“That’s all I need for now,” I said, and waited.
Marshall picked up the will and skipped down to the part about disbursements. He read aloud from the page. “I, Samuel Shapiro, being of sound mind and body, leave one hundred shares of MSFT stock to my sister, Gail Grimes. I hereby donate my two point seven acre parcel to the City of Los Angeles.” Marshall read off the coordinates of the land parcel, giving me the longitude and latitude along with the legal description.
I wrote all this down in my notepad, closed it and tucked it into my coat pocket. Gloria and I stood. I extended my hand and said,” Thank you, Mr. Marshall. That’s all we’re looking for at this time.” We left the office and had to walk past the receptionist to get back out to the hall. I thanked her before we left and said, “What about Roger?”
“Roger?” Helen said.
“Roger Moore,” I said. “You know, James Bond, 007? Live and Let Die? Any relation to him?”
I could tell by the look on her face that she was in no mood to play the game and I didn’t press the issue. We caught the elevator back to the lobby and began walking west on Hollywood Boulevard back toward our office.
“Aren’t you curious to know where that tract of land is?” Gloria said. “What if it’s sitting on top of an oil field or right where some clever businessman wants to build a mall?”
“We’ll find out soon enough,” I said. “I know someone in the land office who can put an address to these coordinates. What I’m more curious about is the hundred shares of stock. That could be worth a small fortune. He gave the land away to the city. There’d be nothing in that for the daughter.”
“How would you know that the stock could be worth a small fortune?” Gloria said. “We don’t even know what that stock symbol means.”
“I do,” I said. “MSFT is the stock symbol for Microsoft and depending on when he bought it, well, that would determine how much it’s worth.”
“Now how do you know this?” Gloria said.
“I’ve been following Microsoft’s stock for a few years now,” I said. “If only I’d have liquidated everything I had back then and bought all I could, hell, I’d be retired right now.”
“How do you figure that?” Gloria said.
I thought about it for a moment and remembered something I’d read about it recently. “When they first offered Microsoft stock to the public, I believe it was sometime in March or April of 1986, it was selling for right around twenty-one dollars a share.”
“And today?” Gloria said. “What’s it worth today?”
“Give or take,” I said, “it’s right around twenty-eight dollars a share.”
“A whole seven dollars?” Gloria said. “Is that your idea of growth?”
“But you have to remember,” I said. “The stoc
k has gone up a lot higher during those past twenty-six years and has split several times. So, for example, if you’d bought a thousand shares back in ‘86, you’d have two thousand shares the first time it split and went down again. Okay, so now it’s going up again and it splits again. Your two thousand shares are now four thousand shares, and so on.”
“Just how many times has Microsoft stock split since 1986?” Gloria said.
“The last time I checked,” I said, “Microsoft stock has already split nine times. Do you know how many shares you’d have now if you started with a thousand shares?”
“I may have a lot of talents,” Gloria said, “but math on the fly was never one of them. Suppose you tell me.”
“For starters, a thousand doubled is two thousand. Two thousand doubled is four thousand. Just think of it like computer memory,” I said. “That went in similar increments. My first computer had four thousand bits of memory. That doubled to sixteen and then doubled to thirty-two. Double that and you get sixty-four. That’s how much memory I had in one of my first computers. And that was about all the memory they had on the Apollo rocket that went to the moon—just 64K of memory. Anyway, double that to get a hundred twenty-eight thousand. Double it again and you have two hundred fifty-six thousand. Once more and you now have five hundred twelve thousand bits of memory, or half a meg.”
Gloria sighed. “And you say women are long-winded,” she said. “So what’s the answer to my original question? How many shares would you have today if you had bought a thousand shares back in 1986?”
“Well,” I said, “in that example I just gave you, I doubled the computer’s memory nine times. Think of those as stock splits and you get the same answer. Your one thousand shares would now be five hundred twelve thousand shares. So your initial investment in those thousand shares would have been twenty-one thousand dollars. Today, your half million plus shares would be worth a little more than fourteen million dollars, give or take.”
“So Sammy Shapiro’s hundred shares could be worth as much as a million four,” Gloria said.
“That’s if he bought them in early ‘86,” I said. “Hell, even if he only got in on five of those splits, he’d still have stock worth somewhere around ninety thousand dollars. And even that’s enough to tempt someone into murdering him.”