Stalking Horse (The Lt. Hastings Mysteries)

by Collin Wilcox

  “But if someone should take a shot at him,” I said quietly, “that would be the end. Even if the bullet misses, the shock would probably kill him.”

  The five men nodded in unison while Richter said, “That’s your department, Lieutenant. You’ve got to make sure that shot is never fired. And you’ve got to do it secretly, without the senator ever knowing.”

  “But, Christ—” I waved an angry hand. “But that’s impossible. That’s absolutely impossible. You’re asking me to put out a dragnet for someone I can’t even identify. And besides, you’re asking me to keep some significant facts from my own men.”

  “It’s possible,” Richter said, “that we’ll have to tell Chief Dwyer the details, to get you the men you need. If so, then we’ll do it. But don’t forget, all we need from you is a name. We’ll handle the rest. In fact, that’s the only way we want it.”

  Looking Richter hard in the eye, I said, “I can’t do it. Not alone, I can’t do it. Not without at least one person who knows the whole story to work with me at the command level. I don’t mean Chief Dwyer, either. I mean a field commander like me.”

  Richter’s eyes narrowed. “One person? Who?”

  “Lieutenant Friedman,” I answered. “We work together. There’s no way—no way at all—that I can work on anything without Friedman knowing.”

  “Friedman is a troublemaker,” Richter snapped. “He’s good. I’ll admit he’s good. He’s smart, and he knows the streets, there’s no question about it. And, frankly, I thought about him first. But he’s too—too—” Peevishly, he let it go unfinished.

  “Too what?” Blake asked quietly, turning in his chair to face Richter fully.

  “Too abrasive,” Richter replied. But as he spoke he dropped his eyes before Blake’s hard, flat stare. I saw the Secret Service man draw a long, measured breath. He waited for Richter to raise his eyes. Then, speaking very quietly, he said, “We’ve just been saying, Mr. Richter, that we’ve got what amounts to a national crisis here. It doesn’t seem to be the time or the place for intramural bickering.”

  “But—”

  “It’s not the time,” Blake repeated. He waited while Richter’s indignation slowly faded, leaving the FBI man sitting slack in his chair, mouth loose, eyes impotent, hands making futile gestures on the gleaming walnut conference table.

  “Of course,” Blake continued softly, “strictly speaking, I’m only here as an observer. However—” He let it go unfinished, at the same time glancing meaningfully at his watch. Around the table, everyone looked discreetly away from Richter—everyone but me.

  “All right,” Richter said, suddenly pushing his chair back from the table as his hot, baleful eyes met mine. “All right. Get Friedman, then. But just keep him away from me, that’s all.”

  Not replying, I reached across the table for the thick manila folder.

  Three

  DISGUSTEDLY, FRIEDMAN CLOSED THE file folder and slid it across my desk. “Richter strikes again,” he muttered.

  I decided not to answer.

  “You know how it’ll go, don’t you?” Friedman grated.

  “How’ll it go?”

  “How it’ll go,” he said, “is that, with luck, we’ll find this guy and turn him over to Richter. Whereupon, surprise, it’ll turn out that suddenly there’s no further need for secrecy. So Richter calls in the reporters and carves another notch in his gold cufflinks.”

  “You make the whole thing sound like a publicity stunt.”

  “No,” Friedman said slowly, staring thoughtfully at the folder. “No, I don’t think it’s a stunt. Whoever wrote those letters means business, I’d say. I think he really intends to try and kill Ryan.”

  “You think so?” As I spoke, I opened the folder and looked at the first letter, only a few typewritten lines:

  Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord. For what you have done to us, you must pay. Can you guess who we are? Can you guess who I am? When you know, then you must die. But first, you must suffer, as you made us suffer. You must pay, as we paid. Then you must die.

  “You don’t think so?” Friedman asked. “You don’t think he’s got murder on his mind?”

  I shrugged. “Talk is cheap. As I understand it, Ryan gets dozens of crank letters a year. Most of them don’t mean a thing.”

  Friedman pointed to the folder. “The FBI’s psychologists seem to agree with me.”

  “I know. Still—” I turned to the second letter, reading:

  This is your second notice. Your second chance to make the winning guess, and save yourself. Whenever you’re in a crowd, look around. At your dedication, look around. One of the faces will be mine. You know it very well. You will recognize me. Then you will die.

  “To me,” I said, “he sounds like a talker. And I learned, back in the schoolyard, that there’re the talkers and the doers.”

  “To me,” Friedman said, “he—or she—sounds like someone with a plan.” He reached across the desk and flipped to the third letter.

  You have only one chance to save yourself. You will be told only once. Prepare yourself.

  He tapped the letter with a stubby forefinger. “He—or she—wants something. He’s used the first two letters to soften Ryan up, or so he thought. Now he’s getting down to business.”

  “Extortion, you mean.”

  He shrugged. “If I had to guess, I’d say, yes, extortion. Money. I’ve learned a few things too. Like, premeditated murder is mostly a matter of money.”

  I tapped the letters thoughtfully. “What d’you make of this guessing game? ‘Can you guess who I am?’ he says. That implies that he’s known to Ryan.”

  “I agree. So, obviously, we’ve got to find out what the senator knows. Except that according to the ground rules, we can’t find out. At least, not from the senator.” He settled back in his chair and produced a cigar. After the cigar was lit to Friedman’s satisfaction and the smoking match had sailed unerringly into my wastebasket, he said, “What’s our situation in all this, anyhow? How much authority do we have?”

  “I talked to Dwyer as soon as I got back from the FBI, about noon. By that time, apparently, he’d gotten a call from Washington. And the answer to the question is, we’ve got everything we need, as long as we ask quietly.”

  “How much does Dwyer know? Does he know about the death threats?”

  “No. All he knows is that the FBI needs local help for security at the dedication. We’re on detached duty. Secret detached duty.”

  Friedman grinned. “I’ll bet Dwyer’s stewing.”

  “You’re right, he’s stewing. But he’s behaving. Whoever called from Washington knew which buttons to push and how hard.”

  “I hate to admit it,” Friedman said, “but Richter, for once, is being smart. With Dwyer’s big mouth and his tiny brain, plus his thirst for publicity, the secret would be out in twenty minutes. It’s happened before.”

  “I know.”

  “Well,” Friedman said, “where do we start?”

  I spread my hands, then pointed to the file folder. “So far, that’s all we’ve—”

  My phone rang.

  “Lieutenant Hastings.”

  “This is Duane Hickman, Lieutenant. Can you talk?”

  “Yes, I can talk. Except that this isn’t a secure line. You understand that.” As I spoke, I gestured for Friedman to pick up an extension phone.

  “Yes, I understand.”

  “What can I do for you?”

  “I wanted to update you on a few recent developments. I’ve just been on the phone to Washington.”

  “All right.” I reached for a notepad. “Go ahead.”

  “First,” Hickman said, “Jack Ferguson, the senator’s chief of staff, is scheduled to arrive in San Francisco two days from now. On Friday, in other words. He’ll probably want to see you, so you should hold yourself in readiness. He expects to arrive about one P.M. He’ll come directly here to the senator’s office.” He paused, obviously expecting a reply. Deciding that I didn’t
like his tone, I didn’t oblige. Across the desk, Friedman cast his eyes up to the ceiling, sighing deeply.

  “Do you understand?” Hickman prompted impatiently.

  “Yes,” I answered wearily, “I understand.”

  “Good,” he said fussily. “Then the following day, Saturday, the senator and his wife will arrive.”

  “Does Jack Ferguson know about the letters?” I asked.

  “Yes, he does. My understanding is that in Washington only Jack and one other staffer know about them.”

  “Do you have an itinerary for the senator when he arrives in San Francisco?”

  “Not yet. The senator’s doctors are hoping to convince him that he should stay in the family home until the dedication, but I’m not sure whether they’ll be successful.”

  “Where’s the family home?”

  “In San Francisco.”

  “Where in San Francisco?”

  “In Pacific Heights,” he answered. “On Broadway.”

  “Today or tomorrow,” I said, “I’d like to get together with you. I need background. A lot of background. This material you’ve given me doesn’t amount to much. All I’ve got, really, are the letters and the FBI lab reports saying that there aren’t any fingerprints, and the paper came from the dime store, and a different typewriter was used each time. Except for a few interoffice memos and psychologists’ evaluations, there really isn’t much for us to go on.”

  “Lieutenant—” His tone was both harassed and faintly patronizing. “Today and tomorrow I’m going to be working sixteen hours a day on this dedication.” He paused a moment, then irritatedly asked, “What kind of background is it you need, anyhow?”

  “To begin with, I want a rundown on the senator’s family.”

  “The family?” His voice betrayed sudden anxiety. “You’re going to talk to the family?”

  “I’ve got to start somewhere. I’ve got to have information. The family is the obvious place to start.”

  “But if you ask the family about this, it’ll get back to the senator. Which is just what we’re trying to avoid.”

  “You’re also trying to avoid getting him killed.” As I said it, Friedman nodded emphatic approval, circling his thumb and forefinger.

  “Lieutenant—” Hickman paused, drawing a deep breath. “I appreciate the fact that you’re trying to do your job. But you should understand that there are two separate threats here. The first threat, real or imagined, is the one that this—this letter-writer poses to the senator. That threat’s hard to handicap. After all, this has happened before, many times. But the second threat, the threat that stress poses to his life, that’s real. And, in my judgment, it’s the more serious threat of the two.”

  “This letter-writer doesn’t worry you, then.”

  “I didn’t say that. Look—” He drew another breath. “You’ve got to understand the senator’s importance. You’ve probably heard all the stories—that he dominates the party, that he handpicked the President and controls him. Well, Lieutenant, I can tell you that it’s all true. And the effect of all this is that staff people handle a lot of the senator’s low-level decisions, leaving him free to take on the big problems. That’s my job. And it’s a tough job. There’re a lot of decisions that’re hard to call. Like this one.”

  “The problem is, I’ve got a job too. And to do my job, I need information.”

  I heard an exasperated sigh. “Listen, Lieutenant, I’m not trying to stop you from doing your job.”

  “Then give me the information I need, Mr. Hickman. Or else give me a memo saying you refuse.”

  Still listening on the extension, Friedman was nodding vigorously, smiling as he saluted me with clenched fist.

  “Oh, Jesus,” Hickman groaned. Then, deeply reluctant, he said heavily, “All right, if you’re going to play the memo game, then I don’t have a choice. What is it that you want, anyhow?”

  Careful not to let my voice reveal the satisfaction I felt, I said, “For starters, I want a rundown on his family. Then I want the names of anyone who has a grudge against Senator Ryan. Anyone at all.”

  “As to the last part,” he said, “I really can’t help you. There are, of course, hundreds of political enemies—and business enemies too. Lots of people think the Ryans ruined them, I suppose, going back to the senator’s grandfather. As you know, the Ryan fortune is enormous—as big as the Rockefeller fortune, at least. That kind of money and power makes enemies. Lots of enemies.”

  “But aren’t there any special enemies? Anyone that stands out?”

  A moment of silence followed before he said, “I honestly can’t think of any, Lieutenant. If I do, I’ll call you.”

  “All right. Now, what about the family? Give me the family tree, why don’t you? Briefly.”

  “Well,” he said, “I guess you’d have to start with Patrick Ryan, the senator’s father. Or maybe with James Ryan, his grandfather. James was born in 1850, and died in 1910. He was on the fringes of the great San Francisco fortunes—the Comstock Lode and the railroad czars. He was a stock speculator. He made and lost several fortunes, as the saying goes. But the crash of 1907 finished him for good, and he died broke, unfortunately. He still had the mansion and the diamond stickpins. But that was all.

  “Patrick was James’s only son. He was born in 1890, and died in 1960. Patrick had three sons, two of them older than Donald. His wife died in 1946. Her two older sons were killed in the war, and that certainly contributed to Mrs. Ryan’s death.” He paused for breath. Clearly, this was a ritualistic recitation, learned by heart and delivered in a slightly bored monotone. Listening to him, I wondered whether an intimate knowledge of the Ryan genealogy was a prerequisite for his job, in the same way that priests must learn the details of Christ’s life. Opposite me, Friedman was projecting a similar reaction.

  “From the first,” Hickman was saying, “Patrick Ryan demonstrated incredible skill in business. He was only twenty years old when his father died, but within five years, by 1915, he was already a millionaire.”

  “How’d he make his money?” I asked.

  “He started out in banking, as a clerk. But he was able to realize something from the sale of the family home, and he took the money and started speculating in stock, just like he’d seen his father do. But, as I’m sure you know, Patrick Ryan had an absolute genius for timing. Whatever he touched turned to gold. During the ‘panics,’ as recessions were called in those days, he was always out of the stock market and in a cash position. He’d take the opportunity to buy distressed businesses for a few cents on the dollar, so he had the resources to wait out the hard times, when he’d sell the businesses for enormous profits after he’d built them up.

  “In 1929 it was the same story all over again, and the rest is history. He picked up bankrupt shipyards at bargain prices and merged them into huge conglomerates. By that time, in the early thirties, Donald was in the business. He was given his first ‘command,’ as his father called it, in 1935, when he was twenty-one.”

  He paused again. Across the desk, I saw Friedman’s gaze wander thoughtfully off across the office. Like me, he was interested in the Ryan story.

  “In the middle thirties,” Hickman continued, “aviation was just coming into its own. As you probably know, Patrick Ryan had acquired Jessup Aviation down in Los Angeles. Jessup was Donald’s first command. He saw the war coming and he developed the P-50, one of the best fighters the war produced. He was ready for peace, too, and for the jet age. By 1950, Jessup Aviation was already what it is now—the biggest, most successful aerospace combine in the world. Of course, the term ‘aerospace’ hadn’t even been coined then. But that’s what it was. By the mid-fifties, Donald Ryan was married and had two children. He was already in politics. He was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1956, the first time he ran.”

  “He went into politics because his father wanted him to do it,” I said. “Isn’t that right?”

  “Yes,” Hickman answered, “that’s right. It’s no secret that P
atrick Ryan was an ambitious man. Some, of course—” He coughed self-consciously, departing from his prepared speech. “Some call him other things, less complimentary. He was determined, absolutely determined, that his son should run the country. He was thinking of the presidency. What he got, of course, was almost as good. Some say better.” He paused again, longer this time. Then, on a note of unmistakable finality, he asked, “Is there anything else, Lieutenant?”

  To myself, I smiled. “Nothing except my original request.”

  “Which was?” It was a frosty question. Hickman obviously didn’t appreciate liberties taken at his expense.

  “Which was a rundown on his immediate family. Names, ages, occupations, places of residence.” As I said it, I drew the notepad closer, pencil poised.

  “The senator’s wife,” Hickman intoned, “is the former Belle Cardwell, daughter of Wilson Cardwell, the financier. She’s, ah, in her fifties. James Ryan, the senator’s son, is thirty years old and lives in Washington. He’s the senator’s legislative assistant. He’s married and has two children. Susan is the senator’s daughter. She, ah, lives in San Francisco.”

  “Is she married?”

  A pause. Then: “She’s recently divorced, Lieutenant. She’s, ah, living in seclusion, I guess you’d say.”

  “What was her married name?”

  He sighed, answering reluctantly, “Robinson. But I don’t think—”

  “Does Mrs. Ryan live here in San Francisco?”

  “Part of the time she lives here, part of the time in Washington with the senator. Naturally.” He spoke curtly, defensively. I wondered why.