The Four Last Things

by Timothy Hallinan

  “Attention to detail is essential to success,” I said as we shouldered our way into the foot traffic on the sidewalk.

  “Say again?” he said.

  “One of my mother's maxims,” I said. “She's a fool for detail.”

  “Isn't she going to be sorry to hear about you?” he said.

  I supposed she probably would be. Anyway, it wasn't the kind of remark that invites a rejoinder.

  “My friend's in the hospital,” Barry said from behind me. “He's got bad burns. I wonder how you're going to like bad burns.”

  “I don't think it's something one looks forward to,” I said. “What slum of the spirit did they find you in?”

  “I found them,” he said. “Just like I found you.”

  We crossed the square. Most of the homeless were still asleep beneath their washing-machine boxes. I hadn't known so many washing machines were sold in Los Angeles. The people on the sidewalks all looked normal and safe, on their way to enviably boring jobs. No one caught my eye. I guessed I didn't look like someone who was on his way to die.

  The Borzoi lobby yawned dingy and empty. We went straight to the elevator and up to the floor marked executive offices. Barry stood very close behind me, using the privacy to indulge himself in the luxury of poking a gun, probably my gun, into my back. That was the second gun I'd had taken from me.

  “God, I'd love to puncture your kidneys,” he said as the doors opened. “Second door on the right.”

  The door said DR. MERRYMAN. I pushed it open.

  “Simeon,” Merryman said, “nice of you to come. I know it's early.” He was wearing a turquoise shirt this time, and pale yellow slacks. “And look,” he said, smiling. “Here's a friend of yours.”

  I turned, looking for Eleanor, and saw Meredith Brooks.

  Chapter 27

  Brooks looked like he hadn't slept in days. He had on the same clothes he'd worn the night before, and his hair was rumpled and his mouth drawn into a line of disgust as though he suspected his tongue was contagious. For what was probably the first time in forty years, he hadn't shaved. He seemed to regard Merryman with almost superstitious dread.

  “Where is she?” I said.

  “Where she'll keep,” Merryman said. “Don't worry, Simeon, you'll see her soon enough.” He glanced at Needle-nose and said, “Shut the door, Barry,” in the tone of a man who had given a lot of orders in his life. Barry shut the door. “You've met, I believe,” he said to me.

  “Only recently,” I said. “But I've admired his work for some time.”

  “Barry has his uses,” Merryman said as though he and I were alone in the room. “He's a genuine textbook sadist, rarer than you'd think. It's always a pleasure to work with someone who enjoys what he does.”

  “There's nothing like cheap labor.”

  Merryman flashed his teeth at me. “Won't you sit down?”

  “I thought you'd never ask.”

  I sat down in a heavy metal chair. Merryman seated himself behind his desk, every inch the professional man despite the vivid color of his shirt. Brooks and Barry remained standing. On Merryman's desk were the congealed remains of a dinner and two breakfasts. The meeting had clearly been going on for some time, but Merryman looked like he'd had twelve hours' sleep, followed by two sets of tennis and a sauna. He gave me an anticipatory smile and then glanced over my shoulder.

  “For Christ's sake, Meredith, stop hovering like that,” he said sharply. “Sit down and don't fidget. Brooks has been having pangs of conscience,” he said to me.

  “That must be a new experience,” I said.

  “Yes. He's quite unprepared for it. It's sweeping through him as measles did with the Indians. After a life of more or less perpetual professional betrayal during which he never developed so much as a night sweat, his immune system has suddenly sprung to life, and the result is the shivering, shambling wreck you see sitting there. Of course,” he added confidingly, “he'd never really made plans to betray me before.”

  I didn't say anything.

  “Although we must remember that we haven't firmly established that he did. This isn't a court of law, and if it were, Meredith would be more at home in it than any of us, wouldn't he?” He smiled again.

  “Do you want an answer?” I said.

  “I have a number of grievances with you, Simeon,” Merryman said, letting the smile slip a notch or two, “not the least of which is that you tried to divide Meredith and me. We've had our little problems, I won't deny that. We're not naturally congenial with one another, any more than you and I are, although heaven knows I've been pleasant enough to you. But Meredith and I, in spite of the occasional friction between us, complement each other. We built this operation together. He's a brilliant man of business. I'm a brilliant stage manager. Together we give the people what they want and persuade the people to give us what we want. And we take what they've given us and together we build with it. What's wrong with that?”

  “I wouldn't know where to start.”

  “Don't bother.” He winked brightly at Barry. “You'll be talking soon enough.”

  “He offered me a million dollars,” I said.

  Merryman's eyes flicked to Brooks. “He did? That's not quite the way he tells it.”

  “This man came to my house—” Brooks began.

  “He called me,” I interrupted. “Told me he didn't want to see me at the office. Said he knew I'd been working on Sally's death and he wanted to know if I'd found out what she had on you.”

  Brooks sputtered. “Dick,” he said, “this is—”

  Merryman held up a hand. “Go on, Simeon,” he said.

  “Well, I had been working on it. I kept working on it even after you phoned to warn me off. I knew there was money in it but I didn't know how to use what I'd learned. I was going to come to you to see what it was worth, but then Brooks called and offered me a million on a platter. He invited me over, introduced me to Adelaide—nice lady, by the way . . .”

  “Is she,” Merryman said equably, resting his chin on his hand. “I haven't had the pleasure.”

  “And he asked me what I had. I asked him what it was worth, and he said it was worth a million, cash, if it was something that would allow him to control you absolutely, keep you working for him, but deprive you of whatever power you had in the Church. I said that what I had would do all of that and more, and told him what it was, and we arranged to meet at five this evening for the payoff.”

  “Isn't that interesting?” Merryman said conversationally. “We hadn't learned that it had gone quite that far.”

  “It hadn't,” Brooks said. His face was filmed with sweat. “He barged in with some cock-and-bull story about dentists and Utica—”

  Merryman's gaze flattened and grew opaque. He looked straight at Brooks. “That's enough, Meredith,” he said. “It's certainly provocative, isn't it, that you didn't call us after your visit with Simeon last night. If we hadn't had the courtesy to call you to tell you our news about Miss Chan, we probably still wouldn't know all that Simeon knows about dentists and Utica, would we?” He arched his eyebrows and smiled inquiringly. “And it's such fascinating information.”

  “The Fox sisters,” I said. “When you first fell into the Church it must have felt like old home week.”

  “Meredith doesn't know anything about the Fox sisters,” Merryman said. “I'm amazed you do.”

  Brooks slumped further down in his chair, studying one of his cuff buttons.

  “Of course, Simeon,” Merryman continued in the same chatty tone, “I realize, and I'm sure that Meredith here does too, that you're just continuing in your effort to divide us. I certainly have no intention of taking seriously anything you've just said. For one thing, I'm positive that Brooks doesn't have a million dollars anywhere that he could have given to you without my knowing it. Do you, Meredith? That isn't the way our bookkeeping works, is it?”

  “Of course not,” Brooks said faintly.

  “You see, Simeon?” Merryman said, shrugg
ing his shoulders. “With a discrepancy like that, how could I take you seriously? The idea that Meredith keeps two sets of books is too absurd to contemplate. Good Lord. I've known the man for eight years.”

  “Would you miss a hundred thousand?” I said. Brooks shifted nervously in his chair. Merryman put one hand on top of the other, very much the listening doctor.

  “You have my attention,” he said.

  “I'm sure it's all there, of course, right out on the books where it should be. One hundred thousand dollars for delivery of Sally Oldfield.”

  Merryman looked at Brooks but directed the question to me. “Paid to whom?”

  “Hubert Wilburforce.” I tried to sound surprised. “You mean you didn't know how Brooks got hold of Sally?”

  “No,” Merryman said. “I'm embarrassed to say that I didn't. A hundred thousand dollars, Meredith. How much is that per pound? She didn't look like a very big girl. And paid to good old Hubert, too. I must call Hubert one of these days.”

  He regarded Brooks for a long moment and then sighed. “Well,” he said, “it seems my partner hasn't been completely candid this morning. Especially where the books are concerned. We'll have to look into that. Not for a moment, of course, do I believe that Brooks is really a threat to me,” he went on almost dreamily. “He's got ink in his veins, foolscap for skin. He's a paper man. Aren't you, Meredith?”

  Brooks made a little dry noise that might have been assent.

  “But since he hasn't been completely candid, and since I need to know everything you know, Simeon, I'm going to have to ask you a few questions. Then you can go join Miss Chan while we debate the matter of your reward. Stand up.”

  I looked around me. Barry was standing directly behind my chair. Brooks was still seated, staring fixedly at the floor. He looked old.

  “Have you searched him, Barry?”

  “I found a gun,” Barry said, displaying it.

  “Listen to my question, Barry,” Merryman said, as though he were speaking to a child. “Have you searched him? Pocket by pocket?”

  Barry hesitated.

  “No, he didn't,” I said.

  Merryman smiled up at me, all white teeth and dark skin. “I appreciate the impulse to get Barry into trouble, Simeon, but you'll learn it's counterproductive in the long run. What you want is for Barry to like you, to have a teeny smattering of regret that he has to practice his craft on you.”

  “I think it's a little late for that,” I said.

  “You're probably right.” Merryman suddenly sounded impatient. “Search him.”

  Barry patted me down again, then went through one pocket after another. He pulled out everything I'd stashed away the night before: my money, my car keys, my address book, my wallet, a comb, a little travel bottle of after-shave, and two handkerchiefs. I'm not in the habit of carrying a comb, but I thought it would make the after-shave look a little less odd, just in case someone should get a chance to look in my pockets. Barry lined the items up on Merryman's desk. Merryman examined them in turn, pausing to flip through the address book, then picked up the handkerchiefs.

  “Is our nose running?” he asked in the first-person plural of medical people all over the world.

  “I don't know about yours,” I said, “but mine is.” I picked up the handkerchiefs and put them back in my pocket.

  “We'll keep these for the moment,” he said, pocketing the keys, “and I'll want a closer look at this.” The address book followed the keys. He opened the after-shave, sniffed it, and handed it back to me. “A bit heavy for my taste,” he said. “I prefer real lime.”

  “So do I,” I said, “but who can afford it?”

  “Now, Simeon,” Merryman said as though I hadn't spoken. “I need to know absolutely everything you've found out, figured out, intuited, guessed, whatever. The complete dossier, anything that might help us to evaluate how much your silence is worth to us. You can think of it as a Listening session if you like, except that we haven't got the time to do it absolutely properly, so we're going to have to accelerate the process. Sit down again.”

  I sat. Barry passed a belt around my lap, threaded it through the rungs of the chair, and pulled it tight. Then he took my left hand, pulled one of the handkerchiefs from my pocket, and twisted it around my wrist. He knotted the handkerchief through the belt.

  “Didn't bring your tools?” I asked. My voice wasn't very steady.

  “He doesn't need tools,” Merryman said comfortably. “He's very ingenious.”

  Barry took hold of my right hand and turned it palm down. He held it in a surprisingly strong grasp while he reached over to the nearer of the two breakfast plates and picked up a fork. Then he slipped one of the tines of the fork under the nail on my index finger and shoved it in.

  I screamed for what seemed like a very long time. I kicked the chair backward and scuttled like a crab until I cracked its back against the wall. Then I kept scuttling, going nowhere but away from Barry, screaming until my throat felt like rags. Barry leaned against Merryman's desk and watched me with total absorption, turning the fork over and over in his hand. His mouth was open.

  When I'd finished screaming and was leaning forward in the chair, fighting down an urge to retch, Merryman held up both of his beautifully shaped hands, fingers spread wide. “Ten,” he said. He curled his right index finger. “You've got nine to go. Then, if you want to experience really exquisite pain, Barry can go back to the one he just did. You have absolutely no idea what it feels like a second time.” He turned to Barry with an indulgent expression.

  “ Would you like to do another one?” he asked.

  Barry nodded and got up. I was screaming before he took a step, twisting against the bonds of the chair. Merryman leaned forward and placed a restraining hand on Barry's arm.

  “Later,” he said. “I think Simeon's ready to talk to me now. Is that right, Simeon?”

  I managed a nod.

  “Nothing to be ashamed of,” he said. “All those stories about people resisting torture are nonsense. No one can stand up to the prospect of real pain once they've felt it. That's why we started the conversation with a little attention-getter. So I wouldn't have to waste time asking you the same question twice.

  “Wait outside,” he said to Barry. “I'll call you if I need you.” He turned to Brooks, who was looking ashen. “I think I'd like you outside too, Meredith. Just to create an atmosphere of perfect candor. Do you mind?” He might have been offering him a ride home. Brooks waved off the question with one heavy hand and stood up, with some difficulty, to follow Barry out of the room.

  “I should be afraid of him?” Merryman said to me as the door closed. It had been loud enough for Brooks to hear. “Hardly. He has the narrowest comfort zone of any human being I've ever met, including other lawyers. The slightest change in the status quo turns him to milk. That's one reason he's good in business. Very conservative, very steady. With all the cash we have to deal with, an impulsive man would be disaster. Still, I'll have to look into those books.” He crossed his arms across his chest and regarded me in a friendly fashion from across the room. “All right, Simeon, tell me. If anything strikes me as false or incomplete, or if you fail to answer any of my questions in a forthright manner, I'll call Barry back in. Once he's in the room, I won't stop him no matter what you say, so don't make me call him. Have I made myself clear?”

  “Yes.”

  He reached up and smoothed his hair. “Start at the beginning, if you don't mind.”

  I did. I told him about Harker, about the assignment to tail Sally, about Sally's murder and the fact that I'd seen Barry on the scene. I explained about the real Ambrose Harker and about Skippy Miller being my only link to the man who'd hired me.

  “Why didn't you just wash your hands of it and go to the police?” he asked. He hadn't taken his eyes off me since I'd started talking. “A girl is murdered virtually under your nose and you don't go to the police?”

  “What for? What were the cops going to give me? I di
dn't even have a client. All I wanted at first was to get a little money out of it. Then, as I learned more and more, I realized that there was more than a little money floating around and that I could probably catch as much of it as I could hold in two hands.”

  He gave me a long, absolutely level gaze. Most people look you first in one eye and then in the other. Merryman had the knack of looking directly into both eyes at once. After perhaps a full minute he said, “So you went to Big Sur to see Mr. Miller. Driven by the profit motive.”

  I ran through all of it. I told him about my first interviews with Brooks and Wilburforce, explaining that I'd used Eleanor only for her connection with the Times and emphasizing that she knew only what had been said on those occasions. I didn't mention Hammond or the Red Dog.

  “We know what Eleanor knows,” he said. “She was very cooperative last night. She was more cooperative, in fact, than you're being. She told us, for example, that you asked her to look into the death of poor little Anna, which she didn't, and to locate Caleb Ellspeth, which she did. I'd say Eleanor knows quite a bit more than you're telling me. I wonder whether we shouldn't call Barry in here?”

  “No,” I said, very quickly.

  “You've just gotten your only break,” he said. “If Barry comes back in, I'm going to let him do a double. He'll enjoy that much more than you will. Was your talk with Mr. Ellspeth productive?”

  “He told me more about Meredith than he did about you.”

  “Of course. He barely knows me. The man was away from home practically all the time. Do you think he's a danger to me?”

  “No. He's frightened. I had the impression that you had something on him.”

  Merryman was watching me very intently. “He didn't tell you what it was?”

  Praying that Eleanor hadn't told them, I said, “No.” If I didn't get out of there, I didn't want them going after Ellspeth and Ansel.

  After a moment, he dropped his eyes and studied the nails of his left hand. “Good,” he said. “Then that's under control, isn't it? Still, I think we'll have Barry drop by and remind him that we'd really rather he didn't talk to strangers.”